Intel Ivy Bridge CPU Die Estimated

Intel's Ivy Bridge series of central processing units has been the topic of many rumors and leaks recently, but its die layout has not been disclosed yet.  That did not stop Hiroshige Goto, contributor for PC Watch, from estimating it and the configurations it would allow for.  According to him, the layout is the same as the one exhibited by the Sandy Bridge collection.  The central portion has four x86-64 cores, each with 256 KB of dedicated L2 cache memory. All are connected by 8 MB of shared L3 cache.  On the sides of the central portion lie the system agent and the graphics core, the HD 4000 which behaves up to 122.1% better in benchmarks compared to SB's HD 3000.  The system agent includes a PCI Express controller,...

Read more »

Altec Lansing Launches inAir 5000 Wireless AirPlay Speaker

If you own an iPhone, iPad or iPod touch and have some money to spare, you might want to look at the Altec Lansing inAir 5000 Wireless AirPlay Speaker. With the product name of MA5000. It uses Wi-Fi to stream music from any room in the house. It supports any device running iTunes, which includes the above mentioned mobile devices and, naturally, computers. "Altec Lansing is thrilled to add the first AirPlay speaker to our long line of products that support Apple devices and their customers," said Brendon Stead, co-president, Altec Lansing.  "Apple customers have come to expect the best in design and usability, and the inAir 5000 addresses those needs while promising the amazing audio performance for which Altec Lansing is known." Just...

Read more »

Noctua NH-L12 CPU Cooler Formally Revealed

There is a new CPU cooler in town, one that has a somewhat peculiar heatsink and fan layout.  Not only are there two fans in total, but they are of different sizes: one measures 120mm in diameter and the other 92mm.  They are set up in dual PWM mode, one above and one below the horizontal fin stack. Heat is taken out of the CPU by four nickel-plated copper heatpipes.  Due to its shape and compact size, the Noctua NH-L12 CPU Cooler will be most appealing to people who want to make an HTPC or other small systems.  Small motherboard like the upcoming H77-based Media series from Intel may end up bearing an Ivy Bridge chip and this cooler on top of it.  The product's price is $59.90 / 45.27 Euro and the product page is...

Read more »

iPad 3 Retina Display Leaked in Photos by Chinese Site

A generally accurate source of hardware leaks, Apple.pro greets us with a shiny new iPad 3 display believed to be Retina-grade. The size of the panel is identical to that of the one found in the iPad 2. There is some debate as to how dense the pixels really need to be in order for Apple to lawfully market a Retina-grade display for the iPad 3. This Mac-centric blog saves everyone the trouble of doing the math by confirming that a 9.7-inch display with a 2048-by-1536 resolution at 264ppi (pixels per inch) held 15-to 18-inches away from your face is, indeed, Retina-quality. Apple never said there was a requirement on the number of pixels per inch. Instead, the company mentioned the viewing distance at which the human eye is no longer able...

Read more »

Intel's Media Motherboard Line Includes Z75 and Z77 Models Too

We've covered the H77 Media motherboards that Intel will release for the Ivy Bridge CPUs and, now, it’s time for the DZ75SL and DZ77BH to be detailed.  The DZ77BH, Blue Hills, will have two PCI Express 3.0 x16 slots working in dual x8 mode, plus three PCI Express 2.0 x1 slots.  Additionally, there are two legacy PCI slots and either two or four RAM slots (probably the latter).  Furthermore, Intel implemented seven SATA ports, four of which are SATA III (SATA 6.0 Gbps) and the rest are SATA II (SATA 3.0 Gbps).  Meanwhile, the back panel includes an eSATA connector, FireWire, a PS/2 port, Gigabit Ethernet, 7.1-channel audio with optical S/PDIF and one HDMI output.  Four USB 2.0 ports are present as well, as are four...

Read more »

Silicon Power Launches New Flash Drive with COB Technology

With the multitude of USB 3.0 devices launched nowadays, flash drives that don't support it are a rare breed, but this is precisely the sort of product Silicon Power has created. Silicon Power's newest Universal Serial Bus storage device is a flash drive called Year of the Dragon Souvenir Edition Touch 836. As one can tell from the name, this is not just any USB stick, certainly not generic enough to be lost in the wide and deep river of such things. Though not as fast as USB 3.0 units, it boasts the COB (Chip On Board) packaging technology, making it smaller and lighter than rivals. Specifically, it measures 35.5 mm x 12.3 mm x 4.5 mm (1.39 x 0.48 x 0.17 inches) and weighs 4.5 grams. The size is not its only asset: SP also chose a sandblasted...

Read more »

LG Optimus 4X HD (the Quad-Core X3) En-Route to MWC 2012

Following the unveiling of a new 3D smartphone, as well as of its L-Style handsets, South Korean mobile phone maker LG Electronics is also gearing up for the release of its first quad-core smartphone.  Previously spotted online as the LG X3, the device is now said to be en-route to shelves as Optimus 4X HD.  In fact, this is the name under which LG will announce the smartphone officially at the upcoming Mobile World Congress 2012 in Barcelona.  The phone will run under the Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich operating system, and should boast a 4.7-inch 720p display, along with an 8-megapixel photo snapper, and support for HSPA 21Mbps. It will also feature Nvidia’s Tegra 3 quad-core application processor.  The handset is expected...

Read more »

Nokia Carla (ex-Symbian) Update Coming to Belle Smartphones in Q4 2012

Nokia has just released the Belle update for most of its Symbian Anna smartphones and the company is readying for a new challenge, Nokia Carla for all compatible devices. The folks at NokiaPoweruser have been tipped by a source close to the matter on Nokia’s update roadmap for 2012. It looks like the Finnish company will start shipping the first Nokia Carla smartphones in Q3 2012. For the time being, the following models have been confirmed to ship with Nokia Carla, beginning Q3 2012: Nokia 603, Nokia 700 and Nokia 701. The rest of Nokia smartphones that have just received the Belle update will be upgraded in Q4 2012. The following first-generation Belle smartphones will get the update in the fourth quarter of the year: Nokia N8, Nokia C7,...

Read more »

The iPhone 5 LTE Chip Possibly Unveiled

Semiconductor mammoth Qualcomm has just rolled out its fifth-generation Gobi chip that supports a wide array of wireless standards, including LTE. Apple has been a faithful customer of Qualcomm’s, using their chips in several iPhone and iPad iterations. With the iPhone 5 expected to launch later this year boasting 4G / LTE wireless, there’s no reason not to predict the inclusion of Qualcomm’s new chip in the device. If anything, Apple will still push forward with plans to make the iPhone 5 LTE capable, and use another chip (from another firm) to achieve its goals. Most pundits agree that the new Gobi chip, which offers support for TD-SCDMA, TD-LTE, LTE on FDD and TDD networks worldwide (as well as embedded GPS capabilities), will also make...

Read more »

Samsung Galaxy Nexus+ Concept Phone Runs Android 5.0

After launching Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich last year, Google is reportedly gearing up for the release of the next version of its mobile operating system, namely Android 5.0 Jelly Bean.  Nothing has been officially confirmed on this for the time being, but that does not prevent enthusiasts from imagining what the OS would look like.  All of the latest major Android flavors were launched on new, unique devices, and we could expect Jelly Bean to suffer a similar fate.  The handset that would carry it might be similar to the Samsung Galaxy Nexus+ smartphone that can be seen in the photo to the left.  In all fairness, this is merely a concept device, created by Hasan Kaymak, but that does not mean that it couldn’t become...

Read more »

Fujifilm Launches X-Pro1 Camera with X-Trans CMOS Sensor

Fujifilm has been working on the X-Pro1 X-Trans CMOS camera for three years, but the time has finally come for its official introduction. The X-Trans CMOS sensor is supposedly capable of shooting photos and recording videos in resolutions that only full frame sensors usually achieve. It is this sensor that the X-Pro1 has been designed with, as evident from the specifications section on the official product page. The effective number of pixels is 16.3 million. “The huge response we received from users of X-100 leads us to develop X-Pro 1 with some added features,” said Mr. Kenichi Tanka, managing director, FUJIFILM India. “With X-Pro 1 we are entering into the digital mirror-less camera market which has shown a rapid growth due to their...

Read more »

Raspberry Pi Gets Fedora Remix ARM Linux

Remember the Raspberry Pi? The small, credit-card sized PC that is supposed to start shipping this month? It seems to have actually gotten a steam of developers to make a special version of Linux just for it.  People from the Seneca College have created a special version of the Linux-based operating system Fedora Remix ARM.  Loaded on a 2GB SD card, it only needs to be inserted into the Raspberry Pi in order for everything to kick off.  Without needing any special installation or hardware configuration, it boots straight into the user information screen and recognizes a mouse and keyboard easily via the two USB ports.  Likewise, the display only needs to be plugged into the HDMI port for everything, including 1080; streaming, to work properly.  The first batch of...

Read more »

LG Optimus 3D Max Officially Introduced Ahead of MWC 2012

Shortly after LG officially introduced the Optimus 3D Cube in South Korea, the handset maker revealed another version of its Optimus 3D sequel, the LG Optimus 3D Max. The latter will be showcased at this year’s Mobile World Congress trade fair. For unknown reasons, LG decided to go underground at the MWC 2012. There aren’t any big launch events or conferences announced for the exhibition.  Official word is that the company decided to keep its meetings small, which is one of the reasons some of the European media wasn’t invited. LG Optimus 3D Max is a very small step forward compared to the previous Optimus 3D model, which still stands out when it comes to hardware configuration. Unfortunately, the lack of software support, such as new...

Read more »

Intel Ivy Bridge CPU Graphics Work Up to 122.1% Better in Benchmarks

We've seen the latest news on the Cedar Trail processing platform and, now, we get to see some early benchmarking results for the much more hyped up Ivy Bridge CPU line.  As has been said repeatedly before, the Ivy Bridge series will have better graphics than the Sandy Bridge CPUs.  Just how much better was hard to say, regardless of what clock speeds and other numbers managed to leak to the net.  Now, however, we have some actual benchmarks to feast our eyes upon, courtesy of Expreview.  Having managed to get a hold of an engineering sample of the unlocked Core i5-3570K, they pitted it against the Core i5-2500K.  The former has the HD 4000 graphics, while the latter uses the existing HD 3000. Needless to say, the...

Read more »

Ubuntu for Android Video Presentation

Canonical announced last evening, February 21st, the Ubuntu for Android product, allowing users to connect a multi-core Android phone to an Ubuntu desktop.  Once docked, the Android phone's data, apps and connectivity can be easily accessed within the Ubuntu desktop PC. For example, you can go to Unity Dash, go to the Video Lens and you'll see all the videos stored and captured with the phone. In the same way, the photos stored in the Android phone can be easily viewed and accessed. The apps available on the mobile device can also be viewed in the Application Lens, and they can also be launched on your Ubuntu desktop. Another amazing feature is the People Lens, allowing you to view all of your phone's contacts, favorites, recent calls. The Android's network settings and connectivity...

Read more »