Intel's 2nd Generation Core processor family announced, includes 29 new CPUs and enhanced graphics

 

They're here! That is, Intel's Sandy Bridge mobile and desktop processors herein known as the 2nd Generation Core processor family or more simply as Intel Core 2011 processors to us. After months of teasing and on-stage demos, Chipzilla is finally unleashing the details of its new Core i3, i5, and i7 processors, and considering there are 29 new CPUs in total as well as new integrated graphics options (now known as processor graphics) there's quite a bit to digest. Hit the break for our rundown of the new platform and a look at some of Intel's newest performance and graphics-focused features.

Intel Core 2011 processor details

It was just a year ago that Intel released its first generation Core processors, so what exactly makes this platform different? Well, a few things. For those that haven't followed the Sandy Bridge saga, the new family of processors are all based on Intel's 32nm microarchitecture and are the first to put both the processor, memory controller, and graphics on the same die. What's that mean for you? In short, it means the package is smaller and all the parts get to take advantage of each other better -- for instance, by dynamically clocking both the CPU cores and graphics to match whatever workload you throw at it, and giving them up to 1MB of shared cache. Speaking of those graphics, while they may still not be on par with a discrete video card, they're more powerful than ever before. According to Intel, the new HD 2000 and 3000 processor graphics provide 2x the performance of Capella-based systems, and that actually holds up with what we've seen in early benchmarks (so long, GMA 4500). What's more, Intel's improved its Turbo Boost and Hyper-threading technologies such that the new chips enable higher levels of CPU performance as well -- up to a 60 percent improvement with quad-core mobile CPUs. Additionally, the new integrated chips reduce power consumption and can actually completely turn off an idle optical drive, enabling what Intel's calling "incredible battery life."

The processor details

That new architecture means new CPUs, and Intel's introducing a total of 29 new processors, which include different varieties of mobile and desktop Core i3, Core i5, and Core i7 models. The chart above gives you a pretty good breakdown of the versions and Intel's provided a more detailed breakdown of each of these, including clock speeds and TDP here. You will note that there's a slightly different naming convention now -- there's the processor name followed by four numbers, rather than the previous three. As we had heard, the quad-core i7 CPUs will be the first to ship in systems -- they should be hitting this week -- while the dual-core versions won't be shipping until February. Not to worry, the ultra-low voltage (ULV) versions for ultraportable laptops are coming and will be introduced in the second half of the year. There's even a set of specially-marked overclockable 'K' series processors for the tweakers in your family, which lets them individually set the clockspeed ratios for each individual core -- though they'll also need a premium P67 Express motherboard.

New features

That's the brunt of the technical stuff (if you are looking for more on that, hit some of the links in more coverage), but Intel's trying harder than ever to explain the speeds and feeds with new consumer friendly features. Most of them have to do with the enhanced graphics -- here's a short rundown of the main ones we expect to hear quite a bit about at CES and at Intel's CES presser.

• Intel Quick Sync Video - The title of this one isn't exactly the most self explanatory, but Intel's promising way faster video transcoding with it's new integrated Quick Sync feature, which does encoding in hardware -- it says it will be 17x faster than older generations of integrated graphics. Intel's partnered with media software companies like CyberLink, Corel, and ArcSoft to enable this hardware-accelerated H.264 and MPEG-2 video conversion.

• Intel InTru 3D / Clear Video HD - 3D Blu-ray playback over HDMI 1.4? Not a problem for Intel's Core 2011 platform. This doesn't mean Intel's providing the 3D technology for laptops or desktops, but it's promising that you can play stereoscopic 3D and HD content on your TV using HDMI.

• WiDi 2.0 - Our biggest complaints about the original WiDi was the lack of support for 1080p. Well, Intel's finally enabled streaming of full HD with its latest processors. There's still lag and you will need to pick up a new TV receiver, most likely a new one from Netgear, to take advantage of the new full HD abilities. We've got more details on this and Intel's new Insider video content service here.

Article source : http://www.engadget.com/

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Posted in: Computers

June 2, 2011, Macintosh product updates

Macintosh product updates and announcements for June 2, 2011:
Software
Zoo Entertainment, Inc has announced plans for its indiePub label to release Kona’s Crate, a physics-based title, this summer for the PC, Mac, Android and iOS devices. Kona’s Crate is a physics-based game in which players need to help deliver a crate of celestial supplies to Kona, a star hungry mystic waiting on his island. The crate rests on a jet-powered platform, which players must cleverly maneuver to complete their delivery on time.
Praised on PC for its lush visuals, sharp writing and quirky story, adventure game The Next BIG Thing, the spiritual successor to the million-selling Runaway series created by Pendulo Studios, releases today for Mac through digital download on the official online store, MacApp Store, Steam as well as on all the other major Mac distribution platforms. The game takes you on a wild adventure set in an alternate version of classic Hollywood, where monsters and humans live side by side. To solve the unbelievable case, you take the helm as unlikely journalist duo Dan Murray and Liz Allaire, searching the environment for clues and chatting up witnesses. The visuals shine with HD graphics up to 1920x1080 resolution in a gorgeous hand-drawn style. With funny dialogue, an incredible cast of monsters and imaginative puzzles, adventure fans will want to play The Next BIG Thing straight away.
G5 Entertainment has released the new time management title for Mac, Stand o’ Food 3. The sequel to the most popular burger-serving game comes with all new graphics, music, customers, products, devices and special levels. Riding the wave of success in his hometown, Ronnie the Chef extends the operations of Stand o’ Food chain to Tinseltown, where he meets Nikki and Mr. Clarence, and disrupts revenge plans of evil Mr. Torg.
Tagtraum Industries has announced beaTunes 3, an update to the popular music library management and music analysis tool for Mac OS X and Windows. beaTunes lets music lovers take control of their library. It helps to enforce spelling rules, finding miscategorized songs, duplicates, fix faulty sort names, etc. The new release features superior musical key detection, improved library inspection, a complete UI overhaul and support for non-iTunes music collections.
Chris Mayer has announced Brain App 1.5 for iPhone, iPad, and Mac. Using tried and tested techniques, Brain App presents a variety of rapid-fire math problems in quick succession to exercise the brain. There are now 15 brain exercise modes in five exercise types. The result of more than a year research and development, version 1.5 brings cross-platform synchronisation between iOS and Mac, along with exciting new social features powered by the Brain App website.
Bundleecious has announced today its new bundle, including 10 premium apps for Mac at 90% off. This new bundle of amazing Mac applications include Disk Drill Pro, Cashculator, Elasty, Minco, Folx Pro, Radio Gaga, iPliz, ePic, iMagePhone Pro and WhatSize. Bundleecious is an indie bundle which aims to present innovative offers for all Mac-users. This incredible offer will expire on 12th of June. Don’t miss it!
iDevGames is set to kick off the largest Mac game programming contest on the planet. The sixth running of the uDevGames Mac game development contest is set to begin on July 1st, giving the developers three months to design, create, and polish their games, including all coding, graphics, and sound. The entire Mac gaming community is invited to follow the progress of these games as they are being created, play them when they are finished, and vote for the “Best Overall Game.”
The Pixelmator Team has unveiled Pixelmator 2.0, a major upgrade of the groundbreaking image editing tool that provides everything needed to create, edit, and enhance still images. Pixelmator 2.0, codenamed Chameleon, features drawing tools, Content-Aware technology-based Fill, a Healing Tool, new retouching tools, a Smudge Tool, and more. The new, full-featured and precise drawing tools in Pixelmator allow users to easily add, create and edit vector shapes.
Freeway 5.5 Express, is now available in Apple MacApp Store. This is a unique opportunity to take advantage of a fantastic discount on The Mac website authoring tool. Design, build and maintain great sites and never have to write code. Freeway, famous for its visual design model, ease-of-use and clean efficient standards-compliant code generation, is the tool of choice for Mac users who prefer to focus on their design, not the code.
Nulana has announced Flexiglass 1.2, an update to their popular application for extraordinary convenient window management on a Mac. Flexiglass enables some of the OS X missing features, like Linux style Alt-Dragging and Windows 7 Snap feature. Flexiglass was selected by Apple in their New & Noteworthy category and has been in What’s Hot for over a month. Version 1.2 brings new features to Flexiglass such as new screen layouts and ability to restore window to its original position.
SweetP Productions has announced Cookie 1.7, an update to their popular cookie and browser history management utility for Mac OS X. Cookie helps you to manage exactly who can access information about your online activities. It scans your computer for all types of Cookies, from all the top browsers, and is easily configured to remove all unwanted/tracking-advertising cookies. Cookie is super easy to use, just configure it once, and take control of your sensitive personal information.
Elite Mac Care is a unique service for those switching from Windows to Mac or simply needing help. Instruction can range from basic operations, all the way up to trouble shooting common issues. Elite Mac Care also offers purchasing help when buying a new Mac, guiding you through the maze of models, services, and warranties. This service comes with a free one-hour Getting Started lesson for your new Mac. The company offers fast, prompt, and extremely reasonable pricing for our services.
MacFriendly has announced their new Bundle just for Mac users. The bundle includes the latest version of 10 downloadable applications, including HDRtist Pro, Data Recovery for Mac, CrossOver Mac Professional, WebDesign, Logo Design Studio Pro 2, Video Studio Express for Mac, Captain FTP 6.2, RoboPostman, Diagrammix, Client Folder Maker 3.5. Great software at an amazing price. Available for a limited time, the Bundle represents a savings of over 85% off the list prices.
Graphic Node has announced an update to its Stills pack of images for Apple’s iWork. With the addition of 50 brand new 3D objects, the Stills collection now contains an impressive selection of 700 images. Stills subjects range from office stationery and medical appliances to food, with a sizable selection of fruits and appliances. With Stills, users can decorate presentations, invitations, Web pages, posters, newsletters, and a variety of other documents.
MacXDVD Software has announced a buy-one-get-one-free offer on all their products. Consumers can get MacX iPhone Mounter for free after buying any of their products. With the assistance of the free gift, MacX iPhone Mounter, it is easy to backup movie, TV show, video, music, podcast, playlist, ebook, etc on iPhone, iPod, iPad to Mac and mount iPhone as hard disk drive to transfer files as well. This offer is only valid for Mac users for a limited time.
TidBITS Publishing Inc. has announced the latest title in the Take Control series: Take Control of TextExpander, by Mac expert Michael E. Cohen. In the ebook, Cohen helps readers take full advantage of the power of TextExpander 3, an award-winning text expansion utility from Smile with a 5-star rating in the Mac App Store.

Article source : http://www.appletell.com/

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Posted in: Quick News

Previewing ‘Windows 8’

Today, at the D9 Conference, we demonstrated the next generation of Windows, internally code-named “Windows 8,” for the first time. Windows 8 is a reimagining of Windows, from the chip to the interface. A Windows 8-based PC is really a new kind of device, one that scales from touch-only small screens through to large screens, with or without a keyboard and mouse.

The demo showed some of the ways we’ve reimagined the interface for a new generation of touch-centric hardware. Fast, fluid and dynamic, the experience has been transformed while keeping the power, flexibility and connectivity of Windows intact.

Here are a few aspects of the new interface we showed today:

•	Fast launching of apps from a tile-based Start screen, which replaces the Windows Start menu with a customizable, scalable full-screen view of apps.
•	Live tiles with notifications, showing always up-to-date information from your apps.
•	Fluid, natural switching between running apps.
•	Convenient ability to snap and resize an app to the side of the screen, so you can really multitask using the capabilities of Windows.
•	Web-connected and Web-powered apps built using HTML5 and JavaScript that have access to the full power of the PC.
•	Fully touch-optimized browsing, with all the power of hardware-accelerated Internet Explorer 10.

We also showed effortless movement between existing Windows programs and new Windows 8 apps. The full capabilities of Windows continue to be available to you, including the Windows Explorer and Desktop, as does compatibility with all Windows 7 logo PCs, software and peripherals.

Although the new user interface is designed and optimized for touch, it works equally well with a mouse and keyboard. Our approach means no compromises — you get to use whatever kind of device you prefer, with peripherals you choose, to run the apps you love. This is sure to inspire a new generation of hardware and software development, improving the experience for PC users around the world.

Today, we also talked a bit about how developers will build apps for the new system. Windows 8 apps use the power of HTML5, tapping into the native capabilities of Windows using standard JavaScript and HTML to deliver new kinds of experiences. These new Windows 8 apps are full-screen and touch-optimized, and they easily integrate with the capabilities of the new Windows user interface. There’s much more to the platform, capabilities and tools than we showed today.

We are excited to bring an innovative new platform and tools to developers and see how their creativity jumpstarts a new generation of apps. Windows 8 apps can use a broad set of new libraries and controls, designed for fluid interaction and seamless connectivity. Apps can add new capabilities to Windows and to other apps, connecting with one another through the new interface. For example, we showed today how a developer can extend the file picker control to enable picking from their own app content or from within another Windows 8 app, in addition to the local file system and the network. We’re just getting started.

And this isn’t just about touch PCs. The new Windows experience will ultimately be powered by application and device developers around the world — one experience across a tremendous variety of PCs. The user interface and new apps will work with or without a keyboard and mouse on a broad range of screen sizes and pixel densities, from small slates to laptops, desktops, all-in-ones, and even classroom-sized displays. Hundreds of millions of PCs will run the new Windows 8 user interface. This breadth of hardware choice is unique to Windows and central to how we see Windows evolving.

The video below introduces a few of the basic elements of the new user interface. Although we have much more to reveal at our developer event, BUILD (Sept. 13 - 16 in Anaheim, Calif.), we’re excited to share our progress with you.

Today’s demonstration followed our announcements earlier this year about Windows 8 running on System on a Chip (SoC) processors, and our browser engine innovations and significantly increased standards support in Internet Explorer 10. Windows 8 extends these innovations and reimagines every level of the Windows architecture — the kernel, networking, storage, devices, user interface — all building on the broadest and richest ecosystem of software, peripherals and devices.

We have so much more on the way! We’re working very hard to get the product ready for early testing, and we plan to kick off our engineering dialogue through our team blog, just as we did for Windows 7.

So please stay tuned — we have a lot of cool innovation coming in the months ahead.

Article source : http://www.microsoft.com

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Posted in: Quick News