MSI Z77A-GD45 Motherboard Poses for the Camera

If the Z77A-GD65 Intel Ivy Bridge motherboard that we took a look at earlier today is too rich for your blood, you will be glad to know that MSI also prepares a less expensive version of this board, dubbed the Z77A-GD45. Despite being cheaper, the board will also include the features that made MSI motherboards famous among computer users such as Military Class III components, OC Genie II and ClickBIOS II, but its specs list was reduced a bit. Gone are the extra SATA 6Gbps connectors or the additional USB 3.0 ports, the GD45 coming instead with just the default connectivity options provided by the Z77 chipset it is based upon. That being said, we still get most of the features that one would expect from a present day motherboard, while the...

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ASRock Z77 Fatal1ty Professional-M Micro-ATX Ivy Bridge Board Makes Appearance

Besides the Z77 Fatal1ty Professional we presented earlier today, ASRock’s Ivy Bridge Fatal1ty motherboard series includes the micro-ATX Z77 Professional-M LGA 1155 solution that will also be showcased at this year’s CeBIT fair. Despite the smaller form factor used, the Z77 Professional-M includes many of the features of its older sibling such as a high capacity DIGIPower VRM with 11 phases dedicated to the CPU and 3 to the memory.  A pair of x16 PCI Express Gen 3.0 slots is also available together with a third PCIe x16 slot, this time Gen 2.0, that has four PCI Express lanes routed to it. Just like the Z77 Fatal1ty Professional, ASRock’s micro-ATX creation is also compatible with Nvidia SLI and AMD CrossFireX dual-GPU setups, but when...

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Samsung Will Ship Flexible AMOLED Displays in 2012

Samsung may not be making LCDs anymore, but its OLED business is something it is placing great hopes in, as evident from both direct and, in this case, indirect announcements.  Word just came out that Samsung has decided on a sort of estimated time of arrival for its flexible AMOLED display panels.  We've known about them for months, but they are still in prototype form, so demos of bendable devices have been sparse.  Nevertheless, they happened at electronic shows in the past and, if Samsung has its way, devices with flexible AMOLED panels will go on sale this year (2012), according to a report.  The first ones will possess a resolution of 480 x 800 pixels, plus a brightness of 300 cd/m2, a color depth of 16.7 million...

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Samsung Galaxy S III Planned for an April Release

South Korean mobile phone maker Samsung Electronics is expected to bring to the market in the not too far future a successor for its high-end Samsung Galaxy S II smartphone, none other than the long rumored Galaxy S III. The company has already confirmed that the device will be unveiled before the middle of the year, but did not offer specific info on when that might happen. The latest rumors on the matter, however, suggest that Galaxy S III might be launched in April, and that it will benefit from a worldwide simultaneous release.  Packing a 4.8-inch 1080p high-definition display and a 1.5GHz quad-core Samsung Exynos processor, it will be the next flagship device from Samsung.  The smartphone is also expected to sport an 8-megapixel...

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MSI Z77A-GD65 Intel Ivy Bridge Motherboard Stars in Picture Preview

With CeBIT 2012 rapidly approaching, more and more motherboard makers rush out to present their solutions based on Intel’s next-generation 7-series chipsets, including MSI, whose upcoming Z77A-GD65 board recently starred in a picture preview. Not much has changed since our initial encounter with the MSI Z77A-GD65, so this uses the same PCB layout and low profile blue heatspreaders. If we were to take a look under the PWN heatsinks installed by MSI, we would notice that its creation uses a 9-phase VRM design in order to feed power to the CPU, which should be more than enough for even the fastest Ivy Bridge processors. The board’s expansion features include three PCI Express x16 slots (two of these are Gen 3.0 compliant), four PCIe x1 slots,...

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Weird Power Connectors on NVIDIA Kepler GK104 Card

Just when we thought we had nothing to worry about as far as NVIDIA Kepler was concerned, except the potential TDP, the world has stumbled upon something, simply put, strange.  There appear to be some very strange power connectors on the reference design of the first Kepler-based graphics adapter.  When we learned about the possibility of the first GK104 GPU-based product to have a 300W TDP, we could guess there would be two power inputs on the card.  The pictures that TechPowerUp, Expreview, ChipHell and other people online spotted, though, raise some serious questions.  There appears to be a new type of plug in play, one that stacks a couple of 6-pin (or possibly an 8-pin and a 6-pin) on top of one another.  This...

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Microsoft to Release Windows 8 Professional Plus, Ultimate Versions

Microsoft has just made available for download the Consumer Preview flavor of its Windows 8 operating system, yet people are already interested in learning what the future might have in store for them. Apparently, there might be nine different versions of Windows 8 set to arrive on shelves, at least this is what some enthusiasts found in the Consumer Preview’s registry.  Among them, we can count the Ultimate SKU that was rumored only a few days ago to have been scrapped from books.  Microsoft hasn’t made official info on its plans on the matter, but it appears that there will indeed be more Windows flavors, including some unheard of before.  The full list of Windows 8 SKUs reportedly includes: Windows 8 Starter edition Windows...

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ASRock to Unveil Z77 Fatal1ty Professional Ivy Bridge Motherboard at CeBIT 2012

At this year’s CeBIT fair, ASRock plans to expand its series of “Fatal1ty” branded gaming motherboards with a new model based on Intel’s upcoming Z77 chipset for Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge LGA 1155 processors. This new motherboard will be called the Z77 Fatal1ty Professional and will most probably become ASRock’s most advanced gaming board based on a 7-series Intel PCH. To underline its premium position in the company’s lineup, ASRock fitted the Z77 Fatal1ty Professional with a 20+ phase digital-PWM power circuitry, as well as with two x16 PCI Express 3.0 slots that are compatible with CrossFireX and SLI setups. An additional PCI Express x16 Gen 2.0 slot is also available (x4 electrical), which is seconded by a PCIe 2.0 x1 and a legacy...

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AMD Won't Compete Against Microprocessor Customers in Servers

When AMD announced the acquisition of SeaMicro, some may have grown concerned that the Sunnyvale, California-based company was aiming for a change in tactics on the server front.  In other words, server makers have a cause to believe that AMD will start making its own such machines.  According to X-bit Labs, AMD made a point of assuring everyone that it is not its intention to compete with its customers.  Instead, the corporation will combine the intellectual property and other resources gained from the buyout with its own portfolio.  In other words, while it will keep supporting SeaMicro's current customers, its future activities will be more in the way of combining IP and Seamicro fabric with its new processors and...

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On March 23, NVIDIA Will Launch GK104 Kepler GTX 600 Cards

After months and months of 28nm video cards being sold only by AMD, we finally know when NVIDIA will launch its next-generation video adapters.  According to Expreview, the first products based on the GK104 GPU will be made available on March 23 (2012).  Since the company just a short time ago boldly said nothing will be able to beat Kepler, many people are eagerly anticipating the release.  It is unclear what the first card will be called. Some think GeForce GTX 680, other mention the GeForce GT 670 Ti name.  Whichever it is, we hope it will live up to its hype, even if 28nm chip shortages do affect supply.  At this point, the fabled GK100 has either been scrapped (unlikely) or will be postponed for the second half...

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Canon Intros EOS 5D Mark III DSLR with 22.3 MP Full-Frame Sensor

More than three years after the release of EOS 5D Mark II, Canon has announced a new incarnation of its enthusiast full-frame 5D series in the form of the 5D Mark III, which improves upon many of the features of its predecessor. The biggest change that Canon brought to the Mark III is the inclusion of a new 22.3MP CMOS full frame sensor which is paired together with the company’s own Digic 5+ image processor. This configuration allows the EOS 5D Mark III to come with an ISO range of 50 to 102,400 (100 to 25,600, natively), while also being able to reach speeds of up to 6fps in its continuous shooting mode or record high-definition videos. Both 1080 and 720 recording is supported (1080 at 24/25/30p and 720 at 50/60p), together with stereo...

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Asus P8Z77-V Deluxe Intel Ivy Bridge Motherboard Starts Selling in China

With one month to go until the official release of the Intel 7-series chipset family, a Chinese online store has listed Asus’ upcoming P8Z77-V Deluxe motherboard for Ivy Bridge processors with pricing being set at 2,499 RMB ($396 US). The motherboard is based on Intel’s Z77 chipset, which is the most advanced controller available in the 7-series PCH family. Designed to be compatible with both Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge processors the Asus board comes fitted with a Digi+ VRM, DDR3-2800MHz overclocking support, EPU, and a TurboV Processing Unit (TPU).  The board’s expansion features include two PCI Express x16 slots Gen 3.0, one PCIe x16 Gen 2.0 slot (x4 electrical), four PCIe x1 slots, as well as eight SATA ports, TechPowerUp reveals. Four...

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Overclocker Breaks DDR3 Clock Record, G.Skill Kit Reaches 3736MHz

Looks like the world records for overclocking have suffered another severe case of breakage, and it's all Christian Ney's fault.  The Swiss overclocker boldly fashioned himself a home-made test bench and forced a 4 GB G.Skill extreme RipjawsZ memory kit to run so fast that it shattered the limits previously set.  By the end of the experiment, the clock speed was of 3,736 MHz.  “It was a lot of fun while tweaking G.SKILL memory. You can feel the unlimited potential and always want to go higher and higher” said by Christian Ney.  HWBOT has already validated the results, so go here to learn more about the feat. We will just sit back and take in that huge number.  If this is what DDR3 can do, we can only wonder what...

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Nokia Belle Feature Pack 1 Coming Soon to Nokia 603, 700 and 701 Smartphones

One month after Nokia deployed the long-awaited Belle upgrade for the Symbian Anna smartphones, the Finnish company promises that the first major update of the operating system will be rolled out in the coming months. It appears that the first smartphones to receive the Feature Pack 1 update will be Nokia 603, Nokia 700 and Nokia 701.  Currently, the latest iteration of Symbian operating system comes on the newly announced Nokia 808 PureView smartphone, which is expected to arrive on the market in May for around 600 US dollars (450 Euro) before taxes and subsidies. One of the most important changes added by Nokia Belle Feature Pack 1 is the processor speed improvement. According to the Finnish company, those who own a Nokia 700 or 701...

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