What the heck ? was what I was thinking the first time I noticed this one. Creative launched a teaser site for an upcoming "Stemcell Computing" product named Zii. Anyone have an idea what this is all about?
Sparkle released low-profile GeForce 9600 GT and GeForce 9800 GT graphics cards for SFF and obviously .. HTPC systems:
|
Specification | |
|
Model Number |
SX96GT512D3L-NM SX98GT512D3L-NM |
|
Graphics Processing Unit |
GeForce 9600 GT / GeForce 9800 GT |
|
Core Clock |
650 MHz / 600 MHz |
|
Memory Clock |
1800 MHz |
|
Memory Type |
512MB GDDR3 |
|
Memory Interface |
256-bit |
|
Stream Processors |
96 / 112 |
| Stream Processors Clock | 1625 MHz /1500 MHz |
|
Bus Type |
PCI-Express 2.0 |
|
RAMDAC |
400 MHz |
|
Outputs |
HDMI+DVI+HDCP |
They both feature low profile PCB and native HDMI output support, designed for the users who want build HTPC home theatre. They have adopted 512MB GDDR3 and 256bit memory interface. According to the specification Sparkle releases, GeForce 9600GT features 96 stream processors ?! , which sounds a bit implausible.
Valve issued a press release announcing that there is a huge sale on every title going on right now at the Steam game store. Yes, everything is on sale. Savings range from 10% off of the regular price, up to 75% on some titles.
Through January 2, 2009, every game on Steam is available at 10% to 75% off the regular price. Select publisher catalogs such as Ubisoft, THQ, and 2K Games are 25% off. Award-winning titles such as Bioshock and Portal are available for 75% off the regular price.
Here's just a small sample of the sale prices: Portal : $4.99, Bioshock : $4.99 (Reg.: $19.99), Fallout 3 : $39.99 (Reg.: $49.99), Left 4 Dead : $37.49 (Reg.: $49.99), Dawn of War - Everything Pack : $29.99. Remember, this sale is only from now until January 2, 2009.
The new Realtek HD Audio 2.12 driver is available for download. The binaries support Windows 2000, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2003 x64, Windows Vista, Windows Vista x64, Windows XP, Windows XP x64.
Due to the UBER slow servers from Realtek we made a package containg both the XP and Vista drivers.
1.Vista WHQL Supporting: ALC882, ALC883, ALC885, ALC888, ALC889, ALC861VD, ALC660, ALC662, ALC663, ALC665, ALC260, ALC262,ALC267, ALC268, ALC269, ALC272, ALC273, ALC887
2.Windows 2000/XP WHQL Supporting: ALC880, ALC882, ALC883, ALC885, ALC888, ALC889, ALC861VC, ALC861VD, ALC660, ALC662, ALC663, ALC665, ALC260, ALC262, ALC267,ALC268, ALC269, ALC272, ALC273, ALC887
3.HDMI Device WHQL Support: ATI HDMI Devices
4.OS Supporting: Microsoft WindowsXP, Widnows2000, Vista x86/x64
5.Pack with Microsoft High Definition Audio UAAV1.0a(5013)
6.Add/Fix
1.) Driver :
1.Customizations.
2.Support encryption feature for ALC670.
Download from Guru3D (XP/Vista package @ 24MB), click here.
On behalf of all the Guru3D.com staff-members, let us wish you a Merry Christmas and in advance a Happy New Year 2009! Thanks for being with us and thanks your support! Please, accept our sincere wishes of sound health, prosperity and a lot of gaming and hardware fun !
Every Christmas we have a little contest here at Guru3D.com
This year we teamed up with the good people and Gigabyte Technology Netherlands and will give away a really nice combo. This year we have one big price, a reasonably sized upgrade as the winner of this years contest will receive not one but two prizes .. and they are:
Go to this page and find out more about the contest.
In this festive moment, it is time to recollect all the good we've had this year and look in anticipation of that upcoming holiday joy.
On behalf of all the Guru3D.com staff-members, let us wish you a Merry Christmas and in advance a Happy New Year 2009! Thanks for being with us and thanks your support! Please, accept our sincere wishes of sound health, prosperity and a lot of gaming and hardware fun !
If you have a chance to do so, check back Christmas morning, when we'll startup a Christmas competition in which some nice prizes are to be won :)
Ay, a bit of a mud-fight just started. Last week NVIDIA announced their ION platform. The formula WAS simple: Combine the highly rated GeForce 9400 GPU found in new desktop and notebook PCs with the Intel Atom CPU. Nvidia's push for the Ion platform, which combines its GeForce 9400 mGPU with the Intel Atom CPU, is heavily reliant on Intel being willing to abandon its current Atom pricing system. Under the existing scheme, Intel will only sell Atom CPUs and corresponding chipsets in a bundle, but if hardware vendors are unable to buy just the Atom CPU, the Ion platform becomes too expensive for most applications.
Nvidia executives recently visited local PC makers, in an attempt to drum up support for allowing its MCP7A and MCP79 chipsets into the Atom ecosystem. However according to digitimes, Intel is refusing to acknowledge it's gonna happen. In an internal statement distributed to hardware makers recently, Intel reiterated that Atom CPUs for netbooks and nettops are only available bundled with its 945GSE and 945GC chipsets, the makers said.
When asked to comment, Intel indicated that it has no plans to validate the Nvidia MCP79 chipset on Atom-based nettop or netbook platforms. Intel also has no plans to form a partnership with Nvidia to support nettop or netbook platforms based on the Intel Atom CPU, the company added.
To be continued, for sure. Oh and to NVIDIA here's a hint, VIA's Nano. Politics politics ...
Update: Intel now denies this completely and states that anyone can buy the Atom 330 Chip and or Chipset.
ASUS releases it's triton 88 cooler. The exterior of the fierce-looking Asus Triton 88 CPU cooler comprises of an exclusive twin-pillared heatsink design, a 120mm inner-fan with a Diamond blue LED, and 6 copper heat pipes. With this ensemble of thermal features, Asus Triton 88 CPU Cooler is able to deliver ultimate cooling performances for up to 180W and can support multiple applications
PC Games Hardware reports German overclockers got their hands on three Phenom II samples and managed to overclock one of the chips to 5925MHz with LN2 cooling and the chip running at a voltage of 1.9V.
Thanks to extreme cooling they could even run benchmarks like the 3DMark 06 with more than 5 GHz. By their own account they achieved a "respectable result
We get closer to the actual release of the GeForce GTX 285, early january. A GeForce GTX 285 marketing slide claims the refresh product of the upcoming 55nm GeForce GTX 285 graphics card will be about 10 percent faster than the GeForce GTX 280 purely based on a smaller 55nm fabrication node.
The new GeForce GTX 285 will feature 240 shader processors and 1GB GDDR3 memory. The TDP is 183W - which is 53W less than the 65nm GeForce GTX 280.
Aaah, we'll be hearing so much more in the first week of January one the product actually gets released (read our preview btw). One GTX 295 already is a beast of course. But some GTX 295 SLI tests already have leaked onto the web.
XFastest was able to test two GTX 295 cards on a nice Core i7 965 EE-based system. So that's a Quad SLI setup (each GTX 295 has two GPUs), and what would that return in 3DMark Vantage ? Well, overclocked the two GTX 295 cards at 705 core 1400 shaders 2500 MHz memory and the Core i7 quad-core at 4190 MHz their performance score for Vantage was a whopping 32573 points.
Here at Guru3D we're so trying that as well very soon :)
ECS today releases their A790GXM-AD3 motherboard, which is Socket AM3 ready, and thus 45nm Phenom II + DDR3 memory ready.
ECS today releases the A790GXM-AD3 Black Series motherboard disclosing the extraordinary gaming performance of AMD
This program allows you to fine tune your GeForce graphics card for the maximum performance possible, with Core/Shader/Memory clock tuning, real time monitoring support including in-game, Logitech Keyboard LCD Display support, and compatibility with almost all EVGA (and other) graphics cards.
The new 1.4.0 version includes:
Download - click here.
Welcome to the holiday season ! Christmas or not we'll still have a couple of things to show you this week. 1st Christmas day a competition with some very nice prizes. This week as well a new Rig of the month but we'll start off with a review:
G.Skill SSD Solid State Disk 64 GB review
This new SSD is MLC-based and measures in at just 2.5-inches, easily placed in a desktop PC, and obviously a perfect fit for your laptop. With a SATA II interface type and a built-in EDC/ECC protection, this G.SKILL drive is ready to handle your data for sure. The drive deliver an incredible 155 MB/s read and 90 MB/s write speeds.
The G.SKILL FM-25S2S will be in two sizes, the 64GB model and the 128GB model. So in this review we'll look at the G.Skill 64GB SSD which you can find under part number FM-25S2S-64GB at a sales price of roughly $159 (USD).
The SSD is small, compact, but knows how to deliver a punch. Let's check her out.
You can read the review at this URL:
You can read the review right here.
OK says
Game publisher Electronic Arts announced it will lay off 10 percent of its workforce, or 1,000 people, which is double the amount of lay offs the firm announced in October.
Electronic Arts Inc. announced it will lay off 10% of its work force in a restructuring plan that includes a consolidation of facilities operated by EA. The majority of the restructuring will be completed by March 31, 2009. This announcement is a four percent increase from the six percent work force reduction EA announced on October 30, 2008.
EA expects the restructuring plan will result in annual cost savings of approximately $120 million and will bear a restructuring charge of $55-65 million over the next several quarters.
The restructuring will result in the closure of at least nine studio and publishing locations. The Black Box Studio in Vancouver, British Columbia will be shut down and The Black Box development teams and associated game franchises will be moved to the nearby EA studio location in Burnaby, British Columbia [via dailytech].
If you were unaware, a recent update to the Valve Store allowed users to display pricing in a localized currency. However, something was lost in translation as 1 euro equaled $1 (USD). Due to the differences in exchange rates and the value of the USD compared to the value of the Euro, it means that Europeans are now paying exceptionally inflated prices for their Steam purchases. There's a rather large Steampowered thread detailing the issue far better than I ever could.
Valve stated that they are aware of the pricing issue with the new Euro currencies in use in the Valve Store: "Yes, we agree that some of the prices for third party products are higher then what you can find locally but we are working to fix that."
As noted though, Valve is aware of the issue and is working on a fix for it.
In Asia some 55nm GeForce GTX 260 versions have been spotted in the stores already. And it seems that this product refresh will happen silently. eVGA on the other hand is making a little fuzz about it. They are launching three 55nm parts based on that GTX 260 and core 216 version, namely the reference clocked, Super Clocked and Super Super Clocked cards.
What everybody would like to know is of course, will the smaller fabbed products show any performance gains ? Well, it doesn't look like there's much change whatsoever other then the die-shrink from 65nm towards 55nm. In Austria the product already popped up in some stores, : e-GeForce GTX 260 Core216 55nm Superclocked, Retail, 896MB lists at ditech.at for
Posting a little late as it slipped through the mazes here. But NVIDIA is poised to energize the PC market by transforming Atom PCs into a premium experience found today in higher priced laptops and desktops. NVIDIA will supercharge the fastest-growing segments of the PC market
