AMD Next-Gen FX-Series CPUs to Arrive in Q3 2012 Says Report

For the third quarter of the following year, AMD seems to prepare the introduction of its next-generation FX-Series processor, code named Vishera, which is expected to make the transition to the Piledriver cores. When compared with the first-generation Bulldozer cores, that are used for the current FX-Series processors, Piledriver is expected to bring a 10-15 percent increase in performance/Watt, as AMD revealed right after the launch of the FX-8150 & Co. The added performance will come from IPC improvements like structure size increases (about one third of the total performance), and power optimizations that reduce the overall consumption of the CPU. The latter will also enable AMD's Piledriver core to reach higher frequencies at a...

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IMEC Demonstrates 10nm RRAM Cell

At this year’s IEEE International Electron Devices Meeting (IEDM), IMEC has showcased a fully functional Resistive RAM (RRAM) cell measuring 10-nm by 10-nm, which the organization claims is the smallest such cell to be developed yet. RRAM is one of the emerging technologies for nonvolatile memory to be researched by scientists and is believed to be a candidate for replacing NAND Flash technology in the scaling race to sub-10nm memories. Current charge storage based Flash memory technologies are believed to face scaling limitations beyond 18nm. RRAM is based on the electronic switching of a resistor element material between two stable (low/high) resistive states. The major strengths of RRAM technology are its potential density and speed. The...

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AMD Radeon HD 7800 Pitcairn Set for February, 2012

With the end of the year drawing nigh, and as CES 2012 approaches, the web somehow gets a hold of more and more info on what NVIDIA, Intel and, in this case, AMD has planned.  This isn't more information about what exactly AMD's decision to no longer compete with Intel implies. Instead, some details on one of the Radeon HD graphics products have emerged. We already wrote about a Tahiti HD 7900 and how it was caught on photo working in a dual-card crossfire setup. Now, a report offers something on the card, or cards, that will reach the market soon after the Tahiti does. Codenamed Pitcairn, the Radeon HD 7800 series board, or boards since there are two of them, will show up in February next year (2012). More precisely, Pitcairn will...

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Intel to Retire More LGA 1156 CPUs in 2012

Intel continues to make room in its product lineup for new processors based on the Sandy Bridge architecture and recently announced that 2012 will mark the retirement of several LGA 1156 CPUs, including the Core i7-870. The chip maker has announced its decision through a series of Product Change Notification (PCN) documents and this covers no less than seven Core i7, i5 and i3 chips as well as two Pentium processors. These are the Core i3-540, the Core i5-650, i5-660, i5-670, and i5-680 as well as the Core i7- 860 and i7-870, while the Pentium processors in question are the Pentium G6950, and G6960. Customers can place orders for these chips until June 29 of 2012. The last shipments of tray CPUs will be sent towards customers on December...

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AMD Radeon HD 6000 First to Get DisplayPort 1.2 Certification

It wasn't enough that the AMD Radeon HD 6990 graphics card was the fastest in the world, the item appears to have gained AMD some more recognition, this time from VESA. The Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA) just named the dual-GPU card the first to achieve DisplayPort Version 1.2 certification. In other words, it has complete support for the 5.4 Gbps HBR2 (High Bit Rate 2) data link rate, which doubles the maximum data transfer rate to 21.6 Gbps. This allows for a higher maximum video and audio performance (better resolution, color depth, refresh rate, etc.). “As we continue to expand the capabilities of the DisplayPort standard and add benefits for the end user, we are simultaneously increasing the value of device certification...

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Kingston HyperX Reaches DDR3-3600MHz, Sets New Memory World Record

Only a few days after Corsair announced that it achieved a new DDR3 world record with their Dominator GTX6 memory series, Kingston with the help of the guys from Lab 501 took this WR to a whole new level surpassing the previous result with a cool 133MHz data rate. We was there during this world record attempt and we had some great time seeing how Matose from Lab 501 obliterated the previous result achieved by Corsair. Even more impressive was that Matose surpassed the previous WR while keeping the HyperX memory at tighter timings than those used by Jake "Planet" Crimmins. The difference isn’t huge as we are talking about CL10 vs. CL11, but as most of you probably know lowering timings while also managing to achieve high memory clocks is...

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Zalman Enters Graphics Card Business, Starts Building AMD Radeon Solutions

Korean cooling specialist Zalman known primarily for its cooling solutions and cases has now decided to enter into the graphics card business as an AMD add-in board (AIB) partner and already announced a few mainstream solutions based on Radeon HD designs. While definitely surprising, Zalman’s move actually makes a lot of sense as the company’s coolers were already used by many AIBs for their graphics cards. This greatly simplified Zalman’s entrance into the market as it can outsource its printed circuit boards (PCBs) from other companies such as PC Partner, Hightech Information Systems, or TUL and then add its cooling solutions on top of these. As Overclockers.ua has managed to find out, Zalman’s initial graphics card lineup will be comprised...

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Symbian Belle for Nokia N8 Comes “Early Next Year” (UPDATED)

Nokia N8 is one of the smartphones that were supposed to be the Finnish company’s flagship smartphone for quite a while. However, the smartphone was replaced after a year by Nokia N9, on a limited base, and more recently by the Lumia 800. Initially launched with Symbian^3 on board, the N8 received a major software update back in October, so most owners should now have Symbian Anna installed on their devices. Unfortunately, this is not enough for an ex-flagship device that has the hardware, but not the software to compete with other smartphones in its price range. Even though the phone’s beastly 12-megapixel camera is one of the best in the market, the 680 MHz processor can barely keep up with today’s modern handsets. Although Nokia is determined...

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iPad 3 Specs Leaked in Japan - Device Is Thicker (Rumor)

A Japanese source with a mixed track record of predicting Apple’s upcoming products claims to have talked to an Asian supplier who is privy of the tech specs pertaining to the Apple iPad 3. Specifically, Makotacara’s source says the next iPad has the same screen size as the current devices, but that it’s thicker. While the original Apple Smart Cover accessories will fit, the source said, many third party cases - which also cover the back of the current-generation iPad - won’t. The image produced by their connects seems to show an iPad 3 protective case, though the report fails to confirm what the object is exactly. Had it borne an Apple logo, one could be fooled it was the actual tablet computer. We shouldn’t be particularly interested in...

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BlackBerry Milan First Photo Emerges – Elegant Slider with BlackBerry 10 OS

Shortly after BlackBerry London’s first photo made headlines last month, a new BBX (BlackBerry 10) smartphone emerged, which clearly shows that RIM is not yet ready to get rid of the thing that made it so popular among mobile phone users, the traditional QWERTY keyboard. The folks over at CrackBerry published the first image of BlackBerry Milan, one of the BlackBerry 10 smartphones that appeared in RIM’s roadmap for the 2012. Although details on the phone’s specs sheet are slim to say the least, from what we can see in the picture there’s no doubt that Research In Motion will keep the QWERTY keyboard, but it will add its phones some of the functionality offered by large touchscreen display. Sources close to the matter told CrackBerry that...

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