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Qualcomm Sticks With Windows RT
Tim McDonough, Vice President, Marketing at Qualcomm, was Qualcomm´s commitment to Windows RT. Ever since Microsoft announced Windows RT, ARM supporters had high hopes and Windows RT has yet to live up to some.
Tim confirmed Qualcomm´s commitment to Windows RT and future releases, saying “we are here for the long run”. He describes the partnership as the beginning of a long journey and of course Qualcomm is going to continue rolling out chips that will run great with Windows RT.
Qualcomm mentioned that Samsung ATIV and Dell XPS 10, both of which use Qualcomm’s S4 dual-core APQ8060A chips, run really nice. Tim told us that he is a real fan of both devices and that he is currently using one of them.
We also learned that Snapdragon 600, the one used in the HTC One and some versions of Samsung’s Galaxy S4, is 40 per cent faster than the S4 Pro, adding that Adreno 320 graphics core is significantly faster than the Adreno 225 used in the S4 APQ8060A chip. Another number we got is that the Adreno 330 is up to four times faster than the 225, which is a huge leap forward. Let’s not forget that Snapdragon 800, which is up to 75 per cent faster than Snapdragon S4 Pro, is also coming in mid-year, second half of 2013. The 800 will be Qualcomm’s first chip with Adreno 330 graphics.
One can easily conclude that there should be some Snapdragon 600 and 800 Windows RT convertible tablets at some point in the future. To stay on the safe side, Qualcomm just confirmed that new and exciting things are coming in the next months and quarter and they are Windows based.
We have to notice that most people in the tablet world get really excited talking about convertible tablets in all shapes and sizes, as the physical keyboard is definitely an accessory you want to have.
AMC Goes To The Clouds
Applied Micro Circuits has released its cloud chip which takes networking and computing and crams it all onto one SoC.
The X-Gene server on a chip, is being billed as the first 64-bit-capable ARM-based server in existence. According to the company it is the first chip to contain a software-defined network (SDN) controller on the die that will offer network services such as load balancing and ensuring service-level agreements on the chip.
Paramesh Gopi, president and CEO of Applied Micro, said that these new chips have now made it past the prototype stage and are being used by Dell and Red Hat. Gopi expects physical servers containing the X-Gene to hit the market by the end of this year.
The chip is manufactured at 40 nanometers and has eight 2.4 GHz ARM cores, four smaller ARM Cortex A5 cores running the SDN controller software, four 10-gigabit ethernet ports, and various ports that can support more Ethernet, SSDs, accelerator cards such as those from Fusion-io or SATA drives.
The cost of ownership, which includes power requirements are about half of that of a comparable x86 product, but wouldn’t discuss actual power consumption, the company claims.
Windows RT Devices To Drop In Price
Prices of Windows RT devices have started to decline, signaling an attempt by PC makers to quickly clear out stock after poor adoption of tablets and convertibles with the operating system.
Microsoft released Windows RT for ARM-based devices and Windows 8 for Intel-based devices in October last year. The price drop is an acknowledgement that Windows RT has failed, analysts said.
Prices of popular products usually don’t fall, but Windows RT devices were not in demand, and prices fell, analysts said.
The starting price for Dell’s XPS 10 is now US$449 for a 32GB model, scalping $50 off the original launch price. The 64GB model is $499, which is a drop from the original $599 price. By comparison, the price of the Latitude 10 tablet with Intel processors and Microsoft’s Windows 8 OS remained stable at $499.
Asus’ VivoTab RT, which is largely sold through retailers, is being offered by Amazon.com for $382 with 32GB of storage, which is a heavy discount from the $599 launch price. Retailers like Best Buy, Staples and Office Depot have also dropped the price of the tablet by $50, now selling it for $549.
Newegg is listing VivoTab RT as having been discontinued. Asus did not respond to a request to comment on whether the company was still offering the tablet.
Lenovo is offering the IdeaPad Yoga 11 for $599 as part of a seven-day deal, which is a drop from the original $799 price. However, TigerDirect is offering an IdeaPad Yoga 11 model for $599 on its website, while Amazon is selling a model for $499.99.
Samsung did not ship its Windows RT tablet, Ativ Tab, to the U.S. market.
However, the starting price of Microsoft’s Surface RT remained consistent at $499 on its online store. Microsoft also offers Lenovo’s IdeaPad Yoga 11 through its store, but has stopped offering tablets like the VivoTab RT on its website. The company last month said it stocks its store with RT devices based on availability and demand.
Shark Bay 1 Chipset Goes Pentium
In the universe where Haswell comes as two-chip platform, formally referred to as Shark Bay 2-chip platform by Intel, there will be three mobile chipsets. The HM86 is targeting at mainstream consumers, HM87 targets Premium consumers and SMBs, while the top one QM87 targets the hard working corporate market.
Things get a bit simpler with the Shark Bay 1-chip platform. The value consumer chipset is simply called Baseline, while the next one is simply called Premium. It can’t get any simpler than that. The Shark Bay 1-chip Platform has same I/O, or what we call a chipset, integrated on either Haswell U or Haswell Y processors line.
The Premium chipset supports Windows 8 connected stand by, Intel Active Management Technology 9.0, Intel Small Business Advantage, ACHI and Raid Rapid storage technology, Intel Insider, Intel Anti-Theft Technology, wireless display and three independent displays.
The list goes on with 8 USB ports where two to four can be USB 3.0 ports, up to 6 devices with PCI express 2.0 5GT/s, four SATA ports capable of 6Gbps. The chipset doesn’t have VGA or LVDS as the CPU has the graphics on it, but the Premium chipset has two sensors interface with I2C and UART, 1.5 to 5MB firmware support, Anchor Cover, Platform trust technology and Platform Flash Armoring technology.
Getting away from numbers and naming the chipset simply Premium means that U and Y line of CPUs are meant for tablet and Ultrabook markets, where manufacturers want you to love the product as a whole, not specifics. Premium and Baseline chpisets for Y and U line Haswell processors capable of TDPs as low as 13W are coming in Q3 2013.
Is Ubuntu Linux Spyware?
Richard Stallman has asked a South American free software association not to promote Ubuntu Linux at its events because it “spies on its users” by collecting its users’ desktop search activity and selling the data to Amazon.
Canonical released Ubuntu 12.10 last October with Amazon search integrated into its Dash desktop search function.
Although Ubuntu users can opt out and Canonical claims it anonymises users’ search information before sending it to Amazon, the change resulted in Ubuntu users being shown Amazon ads in response to desktop search queries.
The ‘feature’ has attracted a lot of criticism and might have led some users to defect to other Linux distributions.
When Stallman’s request was denied by the FLISOL event organiser with the excuse that it would limit user freedom of choice, Stallman fired off a response to the organisation’s entire mailing list on Sunday. Parts of his email are quoted below, as translated by Groklaw.
“The issue I raise is about what should happen at FLISOL events. Give away copies of Ubuntu or not? Promote Ubuntu or no? I asked the organisers of the event that they, as a policy, not distribute or promote Ubuntu.
“Freedom of users is something else, and there isn’t a conflict between a user’s freedom and my request. If someone decides to install Ubuntu, I would consider it a mistake, but it’s his own choice to do it. What I ask is that you don’t participate, help or suggest that he do it. I didn’t request that you block him from doing so.
“As a matter of principle, I don’t believe anyone has a right, morally, to distribute proprietary software, that is, software that deprives the users of freedom. When the user controls his own software, he can install what he wants and no one can stop him. But today’s issue isn’t about him, what he does, but rather what you do with him.”
As Stallman sent his email only yesterday, it’s not yet known whether FLISOL has reconsidered promoting Ubuntu at its free software events.
These points might seem like splitting hairs, but apparently Richard Stallman – the author of the GNU General Public Licence (GPL), as well as the founder and president of the Free Software Foundation – is serious about them.
TSMC And Imagination Team Up
TSMC and Imagination Technologies announced the next step in their tech collaboration in an effort to develop Imagination’s next generation PowerVR 6-series GPUs.
The new GPUs are still not ready for prime time, but they should be used in future SoC designs, including those stamped out using TSMC’s 16nm FinFET process. The two companies will work to create new reference system designs, utilizing high bandwidth memory standards and TSMC’s 3D IC technology.
As GPU muscle becomes more important for next generation SoCs, designers need more advanced and more complex processes, such as TSMC’s 16FinFET.
“Through advanced projects initiated under this partnership, Imagination and TSMC are working together to showcase how SoCs will transform the future of mobile and embedded products,” said Hossein Yassaie, CEO of Imagination.
TSMC VP Cliff Hou argued that the need for high performance mobile GPUs will drive silicon processes in the future, much in the same way CPU development pushed new processes in the nineties.
Dual Core 35w Haswell Coming In Q3
We found out peculiar fact that some members of Intel’s M Processor line, 35W dual-core products, won’t get the Haswell upgrade until Q4 2013. Haswell starts in very late Q2 2013 and is still scheduled to launch in late May or early June, but most of the parts are aimed at the very expensive quad core MX line and MQ line edition parts.
When it comes to dual-core 35W Core i7 and Core i5 Haswell parts they won’t come at least until Q4 2013, at least this is the current part. Core i7 3540 launched in this quarter, Q1 2013, and it is a 3GHz dual-core with four threads and a top turbo frequency set at 3.7 GHz. It is a 35W, 22nm Ivy Bridge part with 4MB of cache memory. A replacement part might be on the way with a slightly higher clock in Q3 2013, but the Haswell based replacement is set for Q4 2013. With an official price of $348 it is not really the cheapest kid on the block.
Core i5 3380 remains the fastest dual-core 35W Pentium part until Q4 2013 Haswell reinforcement. The 2.7GHz / 3.4GHz turbo clocked dual-core will remain the fastest in this league at least until Q3 2013, when it might get slightly faster version of the Ivy Bridge based core, but it won’t be replaced by Haswell 35W dual-cores before Q4 2013.
Intel definitely wants to prioritize the quad-core 55W i7-3940XM $1096.00 replacement called Core i7 4930MX and Core i7-3840QM replacement in $568 market segment, branded as Core i7 4800 MQ, as it can simply make more money on these pricey these parts. These quad-core Haswell parts start selling in Q2 2013, followed by 17W Ultra low voltage dual-cores in Q3 2013 and only after these two lines rolls out, Intel will introduce the rest of the Haswell line-up.
Intel’s Pentium Getting Updated
Intel is going to update its desktop Pentium family with several slightly faster Ivy Bridge-based processors.
According to CPU World the chips should hit the shops in the second quarter of 2013 which is a quarter after January’s refresh of budget desktop families, and one quarter before the launch of Haswell. The new chips have the original titles of Pentium G2030, G2030T, G2120T and G2140. They will have two cores, but lack Hyper-Threading technology, and can run two threads before getting all confused.
Both the G2000 and G2100 series CPUs support only basic features, like Intel 64 and Virtualization. They do integrate HD graphics which are clocked at 650 MHz and dual-channel memory controller, that supports DDR3-1333 on the G2030 and the G2030T, and up to DDR3-1600 on the G2120T and the G2140.
Pentium G2030T and G2120T are low-power models, replacing G2020T and G2100T but are clocked 100 MHz higher, that is at 2.6GHz and 2.7GHz respectively. However they still fit into 35 Watt thermal envelope. Pentium G2030 and G2140 mainstream microprocessors will be faster than “T” SKUs, and they will have 57 per cent higher TDP. Intel expects these to replace the G2020 and G2130 SKUs. The G2030 will run at 3 GHz. The G2140 will operate at 3.3 GHz. No word on prices yet.
Ivy Bridge E Delayed Until Fall
y Bridge E, Intel’s ultra-high end chip that is set to replace the Core i7 3970X, has been delayed. It doesn’t look like it was anything major. Our sources tell us that the decision was made by Intel server guys who did not want to launch this chip in Q3 as originally indented.
Since Q3 starts in July, a relatively slow month for IT, the normal time to launch products is late August or September, but at this time there is no confirmation that this will happen at this time.
Sandy Bridge E, or Core i7 3960X, was launched in Q4 2011, November 14th to be precise. This can give you a clue on when to expect the successor.
Originally Ivy Bridge E was supposed to launch in Q3, one quarter after the launch of quad-core Desktop Haswell processors. Ivy Bridge E works in X79 motherboards but we do expect that a few key motherboard vendors will have their newer versions ready for the launch of the new $999 flagship processor.
If Intel continues at this pace, it will take quite a while before we see Haswell E in action.
Will Intel’s Haswell Debut With Bugs?
According to a report over at Hardware.info that managed to get their hands on an internal Intel document, it appears that Intel’s Haswell platform might have a problem with its USB 3.0 host controller.
Although it is not as serious as the Cougar Point SATA 3Gbps bug, the USB 3.0 controller on Haswell platform will have issues with the S3 sleep mode and devices that are connected via USB 3.0 port. Apparently, when waking from S3 sleep, applications that are accessing the data from, for example, USB 3.0 storage device might freeze and force the user to reopen them manually.
Thankfully, the bug will be more of a nuisance rather than a problem as any loss of data is excluded. Intel does not plan to delay the launch and it is still scheduled for mid-2013, according to an Intel representative comment for Hardware.info. Intel is apparently still researching what other consequences this issue could possibly have and plans to resolve the problem in a future CPU stepping.