Nvidia Kal-El+ Is Just a 28nm Die Shrink of the Original Kal-El - Report

The Kal-El+ name popped up here and there for a couple of times in these past few months, but until recently nobody outside of Nvidia knew what this SoC is all about.

The mystery however seems to be unraveled now thanks to the VR-Zone website, which recently published a report regarding the state of Nvidia’s Project Denver architecture where it also reveals that Kal-El+ is nothing more than a die shrink of the current Kal-El, aka Tegra 3.

Sadly, we don’t know if the move to 28nm will also be accompanied by an increase in operating clocks, but this is highly possible if you ask me.

When this 28nm SoC will arrive is anybody’s guess at this time, but I think that mid-2012 is the only timeframe that actually makes any sense as by the end of 2012 Nvidia is also expected to launch its next-gen Tegra SoC dubbed Wayne.

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Intel Launches Celeron G460 and 807UE Sandy Bridge CPUs

A few days ago, we reported that Intel plans to update its processor lineup with a series of new low-cost Celeron chips, namely the G460 and 807UE, which were just made official by the Santa Clara-based company.

The CPUs were spotted by the CPU-World publication and both of these pack at least one unique feature that makes them stand out from the rest of Intel’s Celeron parts.

In the case of the G460 this special feature is the chip’ support for the Hyper-Threading technology, thus becoming the first Celeron CPU to include this option, while the 807UE comes with an ultra-low power design that enables it to fit into a 10W TDP.

As far as the rest of the specs are concerned, the Celeron 807UE packs a single processing core clocked at 1GHz which is seconded by 1MB of Level 3 cache.

The integrated graphics has a base frequency of 350MHz, but thanks to the Turbo Boost technology can go up to 800MHz when the need arises.

Moving to the Celeron G460, this also includes a single processing core, but this time this is backed by 1.5MB of cache memory and works at 1.8GHz.

The rest of the CPU’s features are identical with those of the Celeron G440 it’s meant to replace, coming with an integrated dual-channel DDR3-1066 memory controller and 650/1000MHz graphics clock, outside of its newly found Hyper-Threading support.

Thermal Design Power (TDP) for the Celeron G460 is set at 35W, while the recommended price was established at $37 US (roughly 27.5 EUR), which makes it just a tad less expensive than the dual-core 2.4GHz Celeron G530.

Pricing for the 807UE was not disclosed as the CPU will only be available in the OEM space, but this should come as a great alternative to Intel’s Atom D2000-series processors.

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Intel Core i7-3960X and i7-3930K CPUs to Reach C2 Stepping in January 2012

Intel is preparing a new revision of its current desktop Sandy Bridge-E processors launched in mid-November that will arrive in January of 2012 and will fix the VT-d errata present in the C1 stepping of these CPUs.

As our review of the Core i7-3960X has shown, when used for running highly multi-threaded apps the performance that Sandy Bridge-E is capable of is downright impressive, but despite all this power Intel wasn’t able to resolve all the issues present in Sandy Bridge-E in time for its launch.

The most important of these for workstation and server users is the lack of VT-d hardware virtualization.

This can be a real show stopper where hardware acceleration of a virtual machine is a must, so Intel has now prepared the C2 revision of the Core i7-3960X and i7-3930K which TechPowerUp reports that is set to start rolling out to customers on January 20th, 2012.

Intel has reportedly already begun delivering samples of these CPUs to its partners.

Besides the fixed VT-d errata, the C2 revision of the Core i7-3960X and i7-3930K will also feature new S-spec and MM numbers, so a BIOS update for current motherboards will most likely be required.

Intel’s new C2 stepping is also what the company plans to use for its Sandy Bridge-E Xeon E5 CPUs which will include up to eight computing cores, 20MB of Level 3 cache, 2 QPI links, 40 PCIe Gen3 lanes, and four DMI 2.0 lanes. The TDP for these chips will be set at 150W.

A firm release date for these processors hasn't been mentioned, but Intel said recently that it has already starting sampling Xeon E5 chips to select number of cloud and HPC computer vendors, with mass availability expected in Q1 of 2012.

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Intel Prepares Core i5-2550K Unlocked Processor

After the release of the Core i7-2700K, Intel is now working on another multiplier-unlocked Sandy Bridge part, this time from the Core i5 series, namely the i5-2550K, which is expected to arrive at about the same time as AMD’s next wave of FX-Series processors.

This launch strategy would help Intel to better its position in its fight against AMD’s Bulldozer CPUs which all feature an unlocked design.

The new chip was uncovered by CPU-World in Intel’s Material Declaration Data Sheets database that was updated at the end of last week in order to include this new part, identified as the BX80623I52550K.

No specifications for the Core i5-2550K were provided together with the chip’s listing.

However, this CPU is expected to resemble a great deal its predecessor meaning that it will sport four computing cores, 6MB of shared Level 3 cache memory, Intel HD 3000 integrated graphics, a dual-channel DDR3-1333 memory controller and an unlocked multiplier.

As far as its operating clock is concerned, CPU-World expects this new chip to get 100MHz higher base and Turbo frequencies than the current i5-2500K, which means that this will run at 3.4/3.8GHz.

Thermal Design Power (TDP) will be set at 95W and the chip will lack Hyper-Threading support.

Pricing is still unknown at this point in time, but it should come somewhere in between the $216 (161.7 EUR) Core i5-2500K and the $317 (237.4 EUR) Core i7-2600K.

In April of the next year, the four K-series unlocked Intel processors will be joined by two other chips based on the 22nm Ivy Bridge core that will be known as the Core i5-3570K and Core i7-3770K.

Both of these processors will greatly resemble the Sandy Bridge parts they are meant to replace but will feature more powerful integrated graphics and a lower 77W TDP.

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Intel’s Ivy Bridge Core i7-3770K CPU Benchmarked

Everybody nowadays seems to have access to engineering samples of Intel Ivy Bridge processors and one of these users was kind enough to post online a series of benchmarks describing the performance of the upcoming Core i7-3770K in various benchmarks.

The tests run on the quad-core Intel processor included 3DMark 06, Fritz Chess, and Cinebench 11.5, both in their single and multi-threaded versions, if available.

You can check out the results in the gallery bellow this post and compare it with your own processor as all the benchmarks run are available for free on the Web.

For those of you who aren’t up to speed with Intel’s upcoming Ivy Bridge chips, you should know that the Core i7-3770K tested by bigpao007 has a 3.5GHz base speed, 3.9Ghz maximum Turbo, 8MB of Level 3 cache and an integrated HD 4000 graphics controller.

The CPU uses the LGA 1155 socket and packs all the technologies featured in its Core i7 Sandy Bridge counterparts.

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Nokia Lumia 900 Specs ‘Confirmed’, Still Under Development

Nokia has yet to make an official announcement on when its next Windows Phone will become available for purchase, but it seems that lucky users have already managed to play a bit with the device. 

We’re referring here to the Lumia 900 smartphone that made it to the headlines a few times before, and which has fallen into the hands of a guy over at GeekTechBlog.

No photos with it were made available, but we’re assured that the smartphone is real, and that it looks and feels great, although still under development at the moment.

Specs such as the 4.3-inch WVGA Clear Black screen or the 1.4GHz application processor and 8-megapixel photo snapper on the back were “confirmed” as well, along with the next version of Windows Phone.

The phone is also said to come with a microSIM mechanism similar to the one on the iPhone, and with no USB port cover. It is also expected to feature a matte finish as on the Lumia 800, though the inclusion of a matte one is not out of the question either.

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