Legit Reviews News History
ASUS Posts Eee Source Code to Comply with GPL, Promises SDK
After catching a significant amount of ire for possibly violating the GNU General Public License, ASUS admitted its fault, apologized, and offered the complete sources for download, including the much-demanded asus_acpi module and kernel sources.
ASUS also announced the upcoming release of a software development kit specifically designed for the Eee. While the Eee can run standard Linux (or Windows XP, if you've installed it yourself) applications, the Eee's small 800x480 resolution and unique hardware means that the user experience is often subpar. ASUS has not offered a release date for the SDK, only requesting that interested users "Please check back soon at eeepc.asus.com for more information in the upcoming weeks."
Posted by | Fri, Nov 30, 2007 - 11:57 AM
AMD Abandons Plans for Dual-Processor Enthusiast Platforms
Advanced Micro Devices said on Thursday it currently has no plans to develop its dual-processor (DP) platforms for enthusiast. The decision essentially cancels any efforts in regards of the well-advertised FASN8 platform and forces the world’s second largest supplier of x86 microprocessors to leave the market of the so-called extreme enthusiasts.
“[…] AMD has discontinued future planning and development of its eight-core enthusiast platform at this time. […] We will continue to support customers that have an existing Quad FX with DSDC and are also working on an upgrade path for those customers. [The upgrade path] likely won’t be a Phenom-branded product,” Ms. Suzy Pruitt, a spokeswoman for AMD, said in an interview with TechReport web-site.
Posted by | Fri, Nov 30, 2007 - 11:53 AM
Look out Lenovo: Dell plans expansion in China
Dell plans to expand its presence in China from 45 cities to more than 1,000 over the next year or so in a bid to match the broader market reach of Lenovo.
Over the next year or so, Dell will expand beyond the 45 Chinese cities where it now has a presence into smaller cities, using both its direct sales model and partnerships, Felice said. These smaller cities are now dominated by domestic PC vendors like Lenovo, but fast-growing demand for computers makes them an attractive target for Dell.
Posted by | Fri, Nov 30, 2007 - 10:54 AM
Dell Fails to Delight Investors
Dell grew its bottom line 27% in the third quarter, but the PC makers' first public discussion of its comeback plan left investors feeling cold. Rising operating expenses and weakness in its U.S. consumer business belied Dell's talk of restructuring and refocusing the company for growth.
In the three months ended Nov. 2, Dell grew its revenue 9% year-over-year to $15.6 billion, ahead of the $15.3 billion expected by analysts. Dell reported net income of $766 million, or 34 cents a share, vs. $601 million, or 27 cents a share, at this time last year.
Posted by | Fri, Nov 30, 2007 - 10:53 AM
New Net neutrality laws could backfire
Comcast's recent efforts to throttle file transfers that use the BitTorrent protocol have led to a renewed call for Congress to enact stiff Net neutrality laws.
According to Comcast, reasonable network management is all it's doing. "Comcast does not, has not, and will not block any Web sites or online applications, including peer-to-peer services, and no one has demonstrated otherwise," spokeswoman Sena Fitzmaurice told CNET News.com. "We engage in reasonable network management to provide all of our customers with a good Internet experience, and we do so consistently with FCC policy."
Posted by | Fri, Nov 30, 2007 - 10:51 AM
Google to bid for U.S. mobile airwaves
Google Inc said on Friday that the Internet leader would bid on coveted airwaves to launch a U.S. wireless network, putting it in competition with traditional telecommunications players AT&T and Verizon.
Google said in a statement that it was ready to go it alone rather than rely on partners in bidding in the Federal Communications Commission-run auction of 700-megahertz wireless spectrum due to begin on January 24. The company said it would make its official filing ahead of the FCC deadline on Monday for companies to declare their interest in joining the airwaves bidding.
Posted by | Fri, Nov 30, 2007 - 10:50 AM
AMD to lower Radeon HD 3800 series GPU pricing
AMD has recently notified its partners of plans to drop the price of its Radeon HD 3850 and 3870 GPUs by around US$20, according to sources at graphics card makers. The original official Radeon HD 3850 (RV670 Pro) and 3870 (RV670 XT) prices were US$179 and US$219. After the reduction, the new prices will be set between US$159-179 and US$199-219, respectively.
In response to AMD's plans, Nvidia also notified its partners that it will consider following up with price reductions of its own, causing several makers to delay mass orders to prevent themselves from absorbing the price damage, according to the sources.
Posted by | Fri, Nov 30, 2007 - 10:49 AM
Nvidia to launch GeForce 9 series in February
Nvidia is ready for its next-generation GPU launch. According to sources at graphics card makers, the company plans to launch its GeForce 9 series GPU after the Lunar New Year in February.
The first chip to rollout of in GeForce 9 family will be the D9E, a high-end product that adopts 65nm manufacturing. The new product will also support DirectX 10.1 and Shader Model 4.1, revealed the sources. In addition to the D9E, Nvidia will roll out a mid-range GeForce 9 family product named D9P in June 2008. The new GPU will adopt 55nm processing, the sources pointed out.
Posted by | Fri, Nov 30, 2007 - 10:48 AM
AMD triple-core CPUs to launch in February 2008
AMD recently notified its partners that it plans to launch two triple-core CPUs (Toliman) in February next year while two dual-core CPUs (Kuma) will appear by the end of the second quarter, according to sources at motherboard makers.
The triple-core 7700 and 7600 will have core frequencies of 2.5GHz and 2.3GHz, respectively, and a TDP of 89W. frequencies for the dual-core 6250 and 6050 have not yet been set, but the CPUs will have a TDP of 65W, the sources revealed.
Posted by | Thu, Nov 29, 2007 - 04:55 PM
Intel Upgrades Software to Support Mac OS X Leopard
Intel Corporation today announced an upgrade of its popular software tools suite for Mac OS X Leopard, the sixth major version of Apple's advanced operating system. The latest 10.1 version of the Intel C++ Compiler and Intel Fortran Compiler, as well as the Intel Threading Building Blocks, Intel Math Kernel Libraries and Intel Performance Primitives, have been optimized for Apple's Leopard and Xcode 3.0 development environment launched last month.
Several Mac developers, including Apple's own Leopard development team, Adobe and Autodesk, have used Intel's compilers since the Mac OS X tools suite was introduced in January 2006. "Leopard, Xcode and Intel's compilers give developers powerful new tools to squeeze even more performance out of the latest Intel processors," said Bertrand Serlet, Apple's senior vice president of software engineering. "Intel's software works well in our Xcode environment, and the Intel engineering team does a great job supporting our Apple engineers and Mac OS X developers."
Posted by | Thu, Nov 29, 2007 - 11:07 AM
AMD Expands R&D Presence in India
AMD today announced the opening of a new silicon design and platform research and development (R&D) facility in Bangalore. As India's role and importance in AMD's global R&D network increases, the number of employees in Bangalore continues to grow, requiring a new facility that will accommodate the current team while also providing room for future growth. Employees will move into the new 52,000 square-foot center upon its completion and continue to focus on development of AMD's most advanced, next-generation processing solutions.
Engineering staffs in Bangalore are playing the lead role on "Shanghai," AMD's first 45nm quad-core microprocessor, and are currently involved in design testing and optimization of the new chip. Prior to their efforts on "Shanghai," teams were responsible for delivering key intellectual property (IP) for the first Quad-Core AMD Opteron microprocessor, previously codenamed "Barcelona."
Posted by | Thu, Nov 29, 2007 - 08:00 AM
Intel still top chipmaker in '07, AMD Could Drop Off Top 10
Intel will increase its market share by the end of 2007 to 12.5 percent, keeping its place as the world's top chipmaker, while rival AMD will drop out of the top 10, research firm iSuppli predicted. That is pretty shocking! Total semiconductor revenues are expected to reach $271 billion, up 4.1 percent from 2006. In September, iSuppli had said it expected the market to grow by 3.5 percent.
"Intel successfully defended much of the market share that it won from AMD in the first quarter in the PC microprocessor segment due to the success of its lines of dual- and quad-core chips," said iSuppli's head of market intelligence, Dale Ford.
Posted by | Wed, Nov 28, 2007 - 02:43 PM
HD DVD Surpasses 750,000 Dedicated Players
Following landmark Black Friday promotions through major retail chains, the North American HD DVD Promotional Group today announced that sales of dedicated HD DVD players exceeded the 750,000 mark. The data is based on retailer reports and other point of sale data, and includes standalone set-top players as well as the Xbox 360 HD DVD player.
"HD DVD continues to gain momentum and market share with consumers," said Ken Graffeo, executive vice president of HD strategic marketing for Universal Studios Home Entertainment, and co-president of the HD DVD Promotional Group. "With more than four weeks left for holiday shopping, HD DVD is turning out to be a perfect consumer electronics gift."
Posted by | Wed, Nov 28, 2007 - 12:40 PM
'Cyber Monday' sets sales records - $733 Million In Purchases
Online shoppers in the U.S. set a record for one-day sales on Cyber Monday, racking up $733 million in purchases, comScore Networks said Tuesday. The figure represents a 21 percent increase over the same day last year and the most money that U.S. shoppers have ever spent in a single day online.
Cyber Monday is the first Monday after the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday, when people return to work and begin making online purchases, as opposed to brick-and-mortar store purchases they may have made on "Black Friday"-- the day after Thanksgiving. The total number of online shoppers was up 38 percent this year, comScore said, although it noted an average decrease in spending of 12 percent.
Posted by | Wed, Nov 28, 2007 - 09:45 AM
Verizon Wireless opens to other phones
Verizon Wireless plans to open its network to devices other than the ones hand-picked by the company, a move that could expand the features available on mobile phones and give the second-largest U.S. wireless carrier a response to a phone software project led by Google Inc.
The decision, announced Tuesday, means that customers would be able to buy devices of their own choosing and run them on Verizon's network. Traditionally, wireless providers like Verizon let customers pick only carrier-approved devices, with carrier-approved software features. The model has some benefits for consumers, because many of the available phones are subsidized by the wireless provider. That means devices that would otherwise cost hundreds of dollars are available for under $100 or even for free.
Posted by | Wed, Nov 28, 2007 - 09:43 AM
Spansion Hopes Charge-Trapping Technology Will Improve Flash Memory
Spansion, created from a flash memory joint venture started by Advanced Micro Devices and Fujitsu, says that the "charge-trapping" technology that underlies its MirrorBit and Ornand flash chips provides a path for the industry to continue to shrink the size--and hence increase the performance--of flash chips.
Charge trapping, moreover, can be used in NOR flash chips, a smaller market historically dominated by Intel and Spansion, and NAND flash chips, found inside phones and MP3 players. Although AMD started making charge-trapping chips back in 2002, a lot of the basic technology comes from Israel's Saifun Semiconductors, which Spansion bought in October for $328 million. If Spansion can pull this off, it could turn into a financial boost for the company, which chronically suffers financial losses.
Posted by | Wed, Nov 28, 2007 - 09:00 AM
New Samsung bribe allegations
Samsung Group created a $215 million slush fund to bribe influential figures, a former company attorney said Monday, adding details to previous allegations of corruption at South Korea's biggest conglomerate. Samsung immediately denied claims by Kim Yong-chul, who held the company's top legal affairs position from 1997-2004
A former prosecutor himself, Kim told reporters Monday that Samsung used Samsung Corp. - its trading arm - to create the pool of money through intricate contracts with other group affiliates. He said family members of Samsung Group Chairman Lee Kun-hee used $65 million from the fund to buy expensive art work. Kim also disclosed the names of Samsung executives he says managed the slush fund with their bank accounts.
Posted by | Tue, Nov 27, 2007 - 10:30 AM
Nvidia delays Updated GeForce 8800GTS Video Cards
Nvidia has postponed its upcoming GeForce 8800GTS GPU from the original launch date of November 19 to December 11, according to sources at graphics card makers. Since the G92 graphics chip, on which the GeForce 8800GTS is based, has shown good performance after overclocking in the recently launch 8800GT series cards, several graphics card makers is planning to launch overclocked versions of the 8800GTS to boost demand. GeForce 8800GTS 512MB cards are expected to be priced around US$299-349.
The new GeForce 8800GTS 512MB cards will replace the previous generation GeForce 8800GTS 640MB cards with a 65nm process GPU, supporting PCI Express 2.0, HDMI and PureVideo Gen2. The GPU will have 128 streaming processors, 970MHz GDDR3 memory frequency, 650MHz core frequency and a maximum TDP of 140W, according to the sources.
Posted by | Tue, Nov 27, 2007 - 10:27 AM
Blu-ray outsells HD-DVD format in Europe
High definition movie DVDs in the Blu-ray format have outsold the rival HD DVD standard in Europe this year, breaking the 1 million barrier and constituting 73 percent of all HD movie discs sold.
Citing industry sales data, the Blu-ray disc association said in a statement on Tuesday Blu-ray movie disc sales had topped 1 million units and when counting Blu-ray gaming discs the total number produced for sale in Europe exceeded 21 million units. Of the high definition movie discs bought by consumers so far this year in Europe, 73 percent were in the Blu-ray Disc format and 27 percent were HD DVD, according to sales data provided by Media Control Gfk International.
Posted by | Tue, Nov 27, 2007 - 10:25 AM
Toshiba, NEC Electronics to team up on 32-nm chips
Japanese chipmakers Toshiba and NEC Electronics said Tuesday they would jointly develop 32-nanometer chips to better keep up with rivals. The companies will decide in 2008 how and if they will jointly produce the chips, they said.
Samsung Electronics, IBM, Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing, Infineon Technologies, STMicroelectronics and Freescale Semiconductor have said they would work through 2010 to develop and produce 32-nanometer chips. A nanometer is a billionth of a meter. Actual production would require new equipment such as immersion steppers, which are multimillion-dollar machines that use purified water between the lens and the silicon wafer to draw thin circuit lines onto microchips.
Posted by | Tue, Nov 27, 2007 - 10:24 AM