EVGA uploaded a YouTube clip that shows off the ACX (Active Cooling Xtreme) graphics card cooler. Not a lot of details are available, but we can expect this cooler to make an entry on May 23rd, meaning it will most likely be used by one or more of EVGA's upcoming GeForce GTX 700 series cards.



EVGA teases the ACX GPU cooler - More news at DV Hardware

ThinkComputers came across what is said to be the specifications of NVIDIA's soon-to-be-released GeForce GTX 780 graphics card. If the rumor mill is right, you can expect the 780's launch in about three days.

The GeForce GTX 780 would be based on a cut down version of the GK110 core codenamed “GK110-300-A2?. Unlike the GeForce GTX Titan that has 14 streaming multiprocessors and 2688 cores the GTX 780 will have 12 streaming multiprocessors and 2304 cores. The core clock is set at 863 MHz with a turbo boost of 900 MHz. The included 3 GB of GDDR5 memory operates at 1502 MHz (6GHz effective) and will operate along a 384 bit memory bus. Power is given to the GPU by an 8+6 pin PCI Express connector and the card has a TDP of 250W. Display connectors include dual link DVI, HDMI and DisplayPort.

GeForce GTX 780 specifications leaked? - More news at DV Hardware

Bright Side of News receive d exclusive word that Sean Pelletier has left his position as Senior Technical Marketing Manager for Windows, Windows RT, and Apple notebooks at NVIDIA to take up a position at AMD. It's unknown what Pelletier's focus will be at his new job.

Today we got word of yet another one of AMD's acquisitions of top-notch talent. We earlier reported on the acquisitions of people like Jim Keller, Raja Koduri and Roy Taylor among many others. Today, we got word from both internal an external sources that Sean Pelletier (Pelly), Nvidia's Senior Technical Marketing Manager for Windows, Windows RT, and Apple Notebooks. He has worked at Nvidia for almost 6 years and has primarily held a role in notebook marketing for quite a while.

While we don't quite know his role within the company, it is known that he would likely help the company to head up their initiatives in trying to position themselves in the new middle of the notebook market. Sean has traditionally worked with us here at BSN* with notebook graphics, generally tending to be on the high-end. Since AMD has recently launched their Radeon HD 8970 for notebooks, it remains to be seen what new products he will be responsible for handling.

AMD snatches away NVIDIA's Sean Pelletier - More news at DV Hardware

The Register reports Intel is dabbling in the customization of its x86 processors for specific large-scale customers in the server market. The effort is a strategy to expand its dominance and increase competition vs ARM. Intel will not only select parts based on unusual temperature, power supply or overclocking tolerances, but will now even implement different features or instructions onto chips for specific customers.

Everyone expects any processor package maker to do deep sorts through their chip bins, finding components that can handle slightly higher temperatures or that have their voltages and clock speeds altered to fit in a specific thermal envelope, or that can deliver higher performance as clocks are cranked above the thermal limits of standard processors.

(Over in the ARM world, this has been going on for years and far more comprehensively: the British processor core designer flogs its technology blueprints to Samsung, Qualcomm, Broadcom et al, who package the CPUs with all manner of electronics to build heavily customised chips for specific applications.)

As it turns out, Intel has been doing more than just picking out devices with unusual temperature, power supply and over-clocking tolerances, and is in some cases actually etching different features or instructions onto its silicon for specific customers. This is a step outside the chip giant's comfort zone.

Intel offers custom x86 silicon in effort to beat ARM - More news at DV Hardware

ASRock send out a press release to announce that its upcoming A-Style motherboards for Intel's Haswell processor will feature 2T2R Dual Band 802.11ac WiFi + Bluetooth v4.0.

Take a good minute to reminisce all the joy and fun you had on the internet. Good times, I tell you. Then take another solid minute to recollect those dark depressing moments when the connection was either slow or unstable. Images turning into rectangles with red crosses, laggy videos that took forever to load, downloads that tragically failed at the last few seconds, and it all seemed like the world was coming to an end. Rest assured that ASRock is bringing better Internet connections to the upcoming Intel® 8 Series motherboards with A-Style: 2T2R Dual Band 802.11ac WiFi + Bluetooth v4.0!

802.11ac WiFi is a new wireless computer networking standard that provides high-throughput wireless local area networks on the 5GHz band with data transferring speeds up to 867Mbps, a whopping 289% speed boost compared to the former models with 2T2R 802.11n WiFi. Besides the new WiFi, some models will also come with a new ASRock Wi-SD front tray which includes 4 USB 3.0 ports and an SD 3.0 card slot.

ASRock A-Style motherboards to offer 802.11ac WiFi and Bluetooth 4.0 - More news at DV Hardware

Futuremark announced they're close to finalizing PCMark 8, you can find details about what's new in this benchmark over here. PCMark is a benchmark that measures application performance, it focuses on tests based on home and office use. One of the new elements in PCMark 8 is a battery life test. PCMark 8 will be made publicly available towards the end of Q2 2013.

Battery life testing
For the first time in the series, PCMark 8 will combine performance testing with battery life measurement. You can estimate battery use from each benchmark test or use Battery Life mode to loop a test until the battery is almost empty for more accurate results.

New Adobe and Microsoft application tests
PCMark benchmark tests are based on common use scenarios such as browsing the web, photo editing, video chat, writing and gaming. PCMark 8 takes this one step further by including additional benchmark tests based on popular productivity and creativity applications from Adobe and Microsoft.

Developed with industry expertise
PCMark 8 has been developed in partnership with the members of our Benchmark Development Program. PCMark BDP members include Acer, AMD, Condusiv Technologies, Dell, HGST, HP, Intel, Microsoft, NVIDIA, Samsung, SanDisk, Seagate and Western Digital.

We believe that this open process of close cooperation with industry experts is the only way to create accurate and impartial benchmarks that measure performance fairly. Having high-level access to the industry's leaders also ensures that our benchmarks are relevant not only for today's hardware, but remain relevant year after year.

The complete benchmark for Windows
Whether you are looking for long battery life, maximum power, for the home or at the office, PCMark 8 will help you find the devices that offer the perfect combination of efficiency and performance for your needs.

PCMark 8 will be available in several editions ranging from a free to download Basic Edition to a fully-featured Professional Edition designed for device manufacturers, businesses and the press. PCMark 8 is compatible with Windows 8 and Windows 7.

PCMark 8 to have a battery life test - More news at DV Hardware

Jon Peddie Research published its Q1 2013 GPU market report. The research firm notes AMD and NVIDIA saw their share of the GPU market increase, while Intel saw its share drop from 63.1 percent to 61.8 percent quarter-over-quarter.

Jon Peddie Research (JPR), the industry's research and consulting firm for graphics and multimedia, announced estimated graphics chip shipments and suppliers’ market share for 2013 Q1.

The news was disappointing for Intel, but encouraging for Nvidia and for AMD on the desktop.

AMD lost 0.3%, quarter-to-quarter, Intel slipped 5.3%, and Nvidia increased by 3.6%.

The overall PC market declined 13.7% quarter-to-quarter while the graphics market only declined 3.2% reflecting an interest on the part of consumers for double-attach—the adding of a discrete GPU to a system with integrated processor graphics.

On a year-to-year basis we found that total graphics shipments during Q1’13 dropped 12.9% similar to PCs shipments declined by 12.6% overall. GPUs are traditionally a leading indicator of the market, since a GPU goes into every system before it is shipped and most of the PC vendors are guiding down to flat for Q2’13.

The popularity of tablets and the persistent economic malaise are the most often mentioned reasons for the altered nature of the PC market. Nonetheless, the CAGR for PC graphics from 2012 to 2016 is 2.6%, and we expect the total shipments of graphics chips in 2016 to be 394 million units.

The ten-year average change for graphics shipments for quarter-to-quarter is a growth of -2.2%. This quarter is below the average with a 3.2% decrease.

Our findings include discrete and integrated graphics (CPU and chipset) for Desktops, Notebooks (and Netbooks), and PC-based commercial (i.e., POS) and industrial/scientific and embedded. This report does not include handhelds (i.e., mobile phones), x86 Servers or ARM-based Tablets (i.e. iPad and Android-based Tablets), Smartbooks, or ARM-based Servers. It does include x86-based tablets.

The quarter in general

AMD’s quarter-to-quarter total shipments of desktop heterogeneous GPU/CPUs, i.e., APUs jumped 30% from Q4 and declined 7.3% in notebooks. The company’s overall PC graphics shipments slipped 0.3%.

Intel’s quarter-to-quarter desktop processor-graphics EPG shipments decreased from last quarter by 3%, and Notebooks fell by 6.3%. The company’s overall PC graphics shipments dropped 5.3%.

Nvidia’s quarter-to-quarter desktop discrete shipments were flat from last quarter; and, the company’s mobile discrete shipments increased 7.6%. The company’s overall PC graphics shipments increase 3.6%.

Year to year this quarter AMD shipments declined 29.4%, Intel dropped 8.8%, Nvidia increased 3.6%, and VIA fell 8.4% from last year.

Total discrete GPUs (desktop and notebook) were up 1.1% from the last quarter and were down 11% from last year for the same quarter due to the same problems plaguing the overall PC industry. Overall the trend for discrete GPUs is up with a CAGR to 2016 of 2.6%.

Ninety nine percent of Intel’s non-server processors have graphics, and over 67% of AMD’s non-server processors contain integrated graphics; AMD still ships IGPs.

Year to year for the quarter the graphics market decreased. Shipments were down 15.8 million units from this quarter last year.

Graphics chips (GPUs) and chips with graphics (IGPs, APUs, and EPGs) are a leading indicator for the PC market. At least one and often two GPUs are present in every PC shipped. It can take the form of a discrete chip, a GPU integrated in the chipset or embedded in the CPU. The average has grown from 1.2 GPUs per PC in 2001 to almost 1.4 GPUs per PC.

AMD and NVIDIA gaining marketshare in GPU market - More news at DV Hardware

Gelid introduces the Rev.2 GX-7, a CPU cooler with a copper base, seven 6mm heatpipes, a large aluminium fin array and a Slim 12 PL Blue LED PWM fan that spins at 750 - 1800RPM, it produces an airflow of 57.9 to 98.5CFM with a noise level ranging from 12 to 28dBA. The cooler measures 130mm x 65mm x 159mm and weighs 720g (incl. fan). Gelid's Rev.2 GX-7 has a MSRP of $65 (45EUR)

allows for better RAMsink clearance and even easier installation. The Slim 12 PL Blue has a Hydro Dynamic bearing and a dimension of 120x120x15.8 mm. In addition the fan features blue LED’s. The fan also includes a premium PWM control, so the temperature can be controlled precisely by the BIOS. Further high-end GCExtreme thermal compound is included in the package.

Design Concept:
Traditional heat pipe arrangement of high-end heatsink heatpipes are usually soldered on one row. Therefore the heat absorption capacity of the outer heatpipe will be negatively affected when there are more than 5 heatpipes.

To solve this problem a special array of heatpipes was used on Rev. 2 GX-7 to take full advantage of all 7 6mm heatpipe heat transfer capacity. On Rev. 2 GX-7 two heatpipes were soldered on top of three middle heatpipes.

Air Flow Concept:
The fins in the middle part of the heatsink of Rev. 2 GX-7 were designed in a V-shape. This allows the cooling air to reach the heatsink module more evenly. Thanks to some openings inside of the heatsink and near the heatpipes let fresh-air flows in from the top and the bottom to zones normally poorly ventilated and eliminates the creation of hotspots from building. The unique heatsink shape supports dual fans.

Besides the multi-award winning high performance GC-Extreme thermal compound additionally mounting clips for AMD AM2/ AM2+/AM3/AM3+/FM1/ FM2 and Intel 775, 1366, 1155, 1156 sockets and back plates for Intel LGA 775, Core i5 and Core i7 boards are all included. The LGA 2011 mounting clip needs to be purchased separately.

Gelid Rev.2 GX-7 CPU cooler is out - More news at DV Hardware

FUD Zilla delivers word that NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 780 is scheduled to be launched on May 23rd. The cards will be available in retail stores at launch day, but overclocked models won't arrive until a few weeks later.

Anticipated to sell for between 500-600EUR ($500), the GTX 780 is reportedly based on a GK110 GPU with 2304 CUDA cores, 863MHz base clock, 900MHz boost and 3GB GDDR5 memory clocked at 6000MHz.

As noted earlier the GTX 780 reference graphics card will use the same cooler previously seen on the GTX Titan that should hold it at somewhere between 40 and 45 dBA making it much less noisy than the GTX 680.

According to an Nvidia-made performance slide that we had a chance to see, which pits the new card to AMD's Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition, the GTX 780 should end up anywhere between 25 and 50 percent faster than the HD 7970 GHz Edition, with exception of the Tomb Raider where it is faster by around 20 percent.

ThinkComputers came across some benchmarks that show that the GeForce GTX 780 is about 20 percent faster than the GeForce GTX 680 in 3DMark, 3D Mark 11 and Valley Benchmark.



The GeForce GTX 770 on the other hand is anticipated to follow on May 30th. This card is based on the GK104 GPU, it's basically a rebrand of the GeForce GTX 680 but with faster clockspeeds. FUD Zilla says the card will aim at a price point similar to the Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition, or in the 400-450EUR / $450 range.

As noted and rumored earlier, the GTX 770 will be a simple rebrand of the GTX 680, but with slightly higher clocks. It features 1536 CUDA cores and runs at 1046MHz base GPU clock. It also feature Nvidia GPU Boost 2.0 that will take the GPU up to 1085MHz when possible. It will be available with both 2GB and 4GB of memory, clocked at a pretty impressive 7000MHz and paired up with a 256-bit memory interface.

As it is based on a version of the GK104 chip it is no wonder that it needs 6+8-pin PCI-Express power connectors and has a 230W TDP. It will also feature two DL-DVI, HDMI and DisplayPort outputs. Judging by earlier leaks, pictures and some information that we saw, it will also use a reference cooler similar or same as the one on the GTX Titan. This means that the card will be significantly quiter.

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 ships on May 23 and GTX 770 on May 30 - More news at DV Hardware

Engadget came across a report from Strategy Analytics that claims that Samsung made 94.7 percent of Android device profit in Q1 2013 with a profit of $5.1 billion. LG is next with a distant $119 million, representing 2.5 percent of the market, while all other Android device makers combined account for just 2.7 percent.

With $5.1 billion of Samsung's $7.9 billion operating profit last quarter believed to have come from Android, the Korean firm reportedly accounted for 94.7 percent of Android's hardware profit engine. The only other company that made enough money to stand out was LG, whose $119 million in mobile profits got it to a much smaller 2.5 percent. HTC, Sony, ZTE and the rest were lumped into the ignominious "other" category, at 2.7 percent. The figures don't mean that all other Android manufacturers are floundering, but they do suggest that Samsung is in a much better position to survive any market turbulence.

Samsung rakes in 94.7 percent of Android device profits - More news at DV Hardware

Xigmatek introduces Janus, a low-profile HSF with a nickel-plated copper base, six 6mm diameter nickel-plated copper heatpipes, and a large auminium fin array. There are two fans but they're arranged in a somewhat unusual top-flow push-pull configuration. The top fan is a 120mm PWM model, it spins at 800 - 1200RPM with a max airflow of 38.42CFM at a noise level of 22.4dBA, while the bottom fan is a 2000RPM 80mm model with max airflow of 13.53CFM at a noise level of 19.2dBA.

The cooler measures 120mm x 110mm x 45mm (without fan) and weighs 317g (430g with fual fans). The kit includes Xigmatek's Universal Mounting Kit for Intel LGA Socket 755, 1155, 1150, 1156, 1366, 2011 and AMD Socket AM2 / AM2+/ AM3 / AM3+ / FM1 / FM2

Janus is the god of beginnings and transitions, gates, doors, endings and time. Janus is a two-faced god which has the ability to look into the future and past. Xigmatek continues to innovate once again, this time adopting Janus to be the name that will be heard for many years to come in the CPU cooling industry. Janus is one of the world’s thinnest low-profile coolers. Standing at a height of 60mm Janus can virtually fit in any case.

Xigmatek Janus low-profile HSF revealed - More news at DV Hardware

Google officially announced All Access, a new music streaming service that lets you discover, play and share music on Android and web-based devices. The service promises millions of songs to be available from the get-go, it's currently only available for the US but more countries will follow at a later date.

They’ve also used their knowledge about searching to help you discover new music by allowing you to explore songs and albums based on your tastes, or even create a radio station that is tailored specifically to your preferences in music.

As for availability and pricing, if you live in the U.S. you’ll be able to sign on for a 30-day free trial. The monthly subscription cost is $9.99 but if you sign up for a 30-day trial by June 30th, that cost will lower to $7.99 a month. Whether you’re interested in it right now or not, the smart thing would be to do the trial anyway so if somewhere down the line you decide you want the service, you’ll have the lower price available to you.

Source: VR Zone

Google All Access music streaming service arrives - More news at DV Hardware

ASUS presented details about its upcoming Z87 motherboard lineup, this includes the mainline Z87 boards, the Z87 ROG and the Z87 TUF series, and form factors ranging from Mini-ITX to ATX. You can read about each of these motherboards' new features at The Tech Report.

As one might expect, Asus will roll out a full range of boards spanning Mini-ITX, microATX, and ATX form factors. The Deluxe pictured above is the top ATX model that doesn't belong to Asus' separate TUF or ROG product families. It boasts plenty of toys, including wicked-fast 802.11ac Wi-Fi and more 6Gbps SATA and USB 3.0 ports than any sane person should need.

Asus hasn't made dramatic changes to the firmware found on the Deluxe and its other Z87 boards, but there are a few enhancements worth noting. The UEFI now summarizes any changes that have been made before you exit. There's also a favorites tab that can be populated with frequently used functions. Users can save text notes within the firmware, too, and the interface looks a little bit sharper thanks to scaling and font changes.

ASUS shows off its Z87-based Haswell motherboards - More news at DV Hardware

X-bit Labs wrote NVIDIA decided to delay the introduction of its Tegra 4 SoC to speed up the arrival of Tegra 4i. The latter part features an integrated LTE baseband modem, a feature the firm desperately lacks in its regular Tegra chips. NVIDIA says Tegra 4 will arrive three months later than previously anticipated, while Tegra 4i should arrive six months sooner than expected.

“Because we decided to pull in Tegra 4i by six months, as a result, we slipped out Tegra 4 by about three months, we are going to have a trough in Q2 this year,” said Jen-Hsun Huang, chief executive officer of Nvidia, during a recent conference call with financial analysts.

Nvidia second quarter of fiscal year 2014 ends on July 29, 2013. As a result, even if one of the company’s partners starts to ship a Tegra 4-based device in the final days of quarters, that will be more-or-less in line with Nvidia’s original promises in February and several weeks behind usual trajectory for a new system-on-chip ramp up. In any case, the firm will have rather powerful chip to ship for gadgets due in the holiday season, which is a positive news.

Nvidia did not really announce any timeframes for Tegra 4i-based products and even did not claim a single design win with partners. Market rumours suggested that the Tegra 4i is a product to ship early in calendar 2014, so pulling it in by several months into 2013 makes a lot of sense since the company will be able to address inexpensive smartphones with it.

NVIDIA Tegra 4 delayed in favor of Tegra 4i - More news at DV Hardware

Razer announced it has finalized Atrox, an arcade stick for the Xbox 360 designed in cooperation with the fighting game community. The device is now available for pre-order on Razer's website and will ship worldwide in June for $199.99 (199.99EUR).

Razer™, the world leader in high-performance gaming hardware, software and systems, today announced the Razer Atrox Arcade Stick for Xbox 360®, the final product following an extensive beta testing program.

Tested by some of the world’s best pro-gamers and Fighting Game Community members all over the world, the Razer Atrox Arcade Stick is constructed with modders and tournament gamers in mind. Featuring premium quality Sanwa™ components, the 10 highly responsive buttons and a precision eight-way joystick allow gamers to strike instantly and surely, game after game, while maintaining peak performance and reliability.

An extremely moddable controller, the inside of the arcade stick platform opens up at the touch of a button, making the Razer Atrox a breeze to customize for all tastes and play styles. Users can swap in their own personal designs for a unique look, while also getting access to the internal compartments and honeycomb structure for easy screw mounting.

The easily accessible internal compartment of the Razer Atrox reveals dedicated slots to store an included alternate bat top joystick, the detachable cable, and a screwdriver for modding, giving gamers plenty of room for storage as they travel around dominating FGC events.

“Following a huge beta testing program, we’re confident that we’ve built an arcade stick enthusiasts will love,” says Min-Liang Tan, Razer co-founder, CEO and creative director. “We know that the Fighting Game Community is huge on modding their arcade sticks, and that is why we made the Razer Atrox extremely mod friendly. We are excited to see what extreme mods the Razer Atrox will be the base for.”

About the Razer Atrox Arcade Stick for Xbox 360®
Arcade gaming has come a long way since its glory days– an era woven into the fabric of gaming history as one that paved the way for innovation, and also one that brought us bittersweet nostalgia. Hours spent at the arcade honed the gamer in you; for every coin you inserted, every combo you executed, every hit you took, and every ultra you unleashed in return – you became a better player. And this is the approach we took when designing the Razer Atrox Arcade Stick.

Years upon years of collective gaming experience from pro-gamers and you, the Razer community, have culminated in the ultimate Arcade Stick for the Xbox 360. Engineered and refined to perfection through countless prototypes and an extensive beta testing phase, the Razer Atrox Arcade Stick is crafted to allow advanced modification – With internals and storage easily accessible at the touch of a button, the joystick, all 10 buttons and the top panel are fully interchangeable for full customizability. And that’s just the beginning.

Featuring genuine Sanwa hardware and an ergonomically authentic arcade layout, the Razer Atrox represents the pinnacle of precision and reliability and is the definitive Arcade Stick for tournament-grade gaming.

Forged from the fires of an arcade gaming legacy, the Razer Atrox is, in the most primeval sense, Bred to Fight.

Product features:

10 tournament-grade Sanwa buttons

Authentic Sanwa joystick with ball top and additional bat top

Interchangeable top plate allows for custom artwork finishes

Fully accessible internals and storage compartments for easy modding

Honeycomb structure on the inside for easy screw mounting

Storage room for alternative bat top joystick and more

13 ft / 4 m detachable USB cable

Screwdriver included for modding

2.5mm audio jack for headset use on Xbox LIVE

Razer Atrox Arcade Stick to ship for $199.99 - More news at DV Hardware

In an interview with The Atlantic, outgoing Intel CEO Paul Otellini revealed that one of his regrets is that he passed up the opportunity to have Intel silicon inside the original iPhone. Otelini says Intel grossly underestimated the volume that the iPhone would sell and claims he should have followed his gut rather than rely on the forecasted data:

A squabble over pricing apparently led Otellini to back off, steering Apple right toward the ARM-powered competition.

Here's what happened, in Otellini's words:

We ended up not winning it or passing on it, depending on how you want to view it. And the world would have been a lot different if we'd done it . . . The thing you have to remember is that this was before the iPhone was introduced and no one knew what the iPhone would do... At the end of the day, there was a chip that they were interested in that they wanted to pay a certain price for and not a nickel more and that price was below our forecasted cost. I couldn't see it. It wasn't one of these things you can make up on volume. And in hindsight, the forecasted cost was wrong and the volume was 100x what anyone thought.

The Atlantic says Otellini expressed visible regret when telling the story. The retiring Intel chief lamented that he should have followed his gut and not the data alone. "My gut told me to say yes," he told the paper.

Source: The Tech Report

Intel CEO regrets turning down iPhone - More news at DV Hardware

Currently the electronics industry is pushing to adopt 4K ultra-HD but Japan Broadcasting Corp (NHK) already foresees the need for much bigger resolutions. NHK claims 8K (7320 x 4320) resolution is the maximum needed for 2D images, as well as 22.2-chanel audio, because this is the highest resolution that the human eye can process. Any further developments will be in 3D, NHK says Super Hi-Vision will require about 33 million pixels, while true stereo-3D will take 10 to 100 times as many as that.

“One of the main reasons we carried out research into 8K TV is due to the characteristics of human perception. Our conclusion is that 8K will be the final two-dimensional television format. The resolution involved is the highest that the human eye can process. Any further developments will be in 3D,” said Kimio Hamasaki, a senior research engineer at NHK science & technology research laboratories in Japan, in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter.

NHK began developing 8K technology also known as Super Hi-Vision (SHV) in 1995. The 8K format has resolution of 7680*4320 pixels – four times the resolution of 4K and 16 times that of current HD – as well as 22.2-channel audio. The equipment for 8K was designed in partnership with Japanese leading manufacturers of electronics, including Fujitsu, JVC, Panasonic and Sharp. The annual R&D; budget of NHK is around $77 million, yet it is unclear how much the company has spent on 8K/SHV development. Having spent well-over a billion of dollars on R&D; since 1995, NHK has developed plethora of technologies not only for 8K/SHV, but also for other applications.

Full details at X-bit Labs.

True Stereo 3D to require 330MP to 3.3GP resolutions - More news at DV Hardware

DigiTimes spoke to several Taiwanese laptop makers and got to hear that they have a pessimistic outlook for Q3 2013. Intel's Haswell platform may help spur sales, but notebook vendors are disappointed that Windows Blue will arrive only in late 2013 and not in September as previously anticipated.

Notebook vendors originally thought that Microsoft would launch Windows Blue in September 2013 and the new operating system could pair with Intel's Haswell platform, to be unveiled in early June, to boost global demand in the third quarter. But because Microsoft will launch Windows Blue in late 2013, the vendors are pessimistic about the global notebook market in the third quarter, according to sources from notebook players.

The sources pointed out that the PC industry can only rely on Intel's Haswell platform to boost demand in the second half. Although new Haswell-based ultrabooks have adopted several unique features, hoping to attract demand, since consumers are no longer interested in hardware improvements, the sources are concerned that the new platform may not help boost demand much.

Laptop makers pessimistic about Q3 2013 demand - More news at DV Hardware

Samsung announced the creation of the first 45nm embedded flash logic process:

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., a world leader in advanced semiconductor solutions, today announced the industry's first 45 nanometer (nm) embedded flash ("eFlash") logic process development. Samsung successfully implemented the new process into the smart card test chip, which means that this process technology fulfills the stringent quality requirements of the security solution market and can be successfully deployed on a commercial scale.

"Samsung's 45nm eFlash logic process has the potential to be broadly adopted into various components for security solutions and mobile devices, including smart card IC, NFC IC, eSE (embedded secure element) and TPM (Trusted platform module)," said Taehoon Kim, vice president of marketing, System LSI Business, Samsung Electronics. "The excellent performance from this smart card test chip will help solidify our leadership in the security IC market."

The smart card IC based on Samsung's 45nm eFlash logic process guarantees high reliability and endurance of 1 million cycles per flash memory cell. The performance results are the industry's best class and superior to any other solutions currently on the market, generally rated for 500,000 cycles.

Through the improvement in both flash cell structure and operating scheme, the test chip features random access time to read memory that is 50 percent faster and the power efficiency is enhanced by 25 percent over previous products built on the 80nm eFlash logic process.

Samsung's advanced 45nm eFlash logic technology, built on the technological synergies created through decades of know-how and experience in both embedded flash and logic processes, will enable Samsung to provide competitive performance levels and greater value to its foundry and ASIC customers in the field of consumer microcontrollers and automotive chips that require higher speed, larger memory capacity and higher power efficiency.

Initial smart card IC samples for commercialization using this 45nm eFlash logic technology are expected to be available in the second half of 2014.

Samsung reveals first 45nm embedded flash logic process - More news at DV Hardware

SilverStone is about to ship two new sealed watercooling units; the Tundra TD02 and the Tundra TD03. Based on a design by Asetek, these coolers feature a SilverStone fan and some other customizations. Availability is slated for later this week.

The TD02 features a radiator assembly that measures 278 x 124 x 33.5 mm (LxWxH, excluding fans), and can latch on to four 120 mm fans, a pair of FM121 fans come included. The TD03, on the other hand, uses a radiator assembly close to half the size of its sibling, measuring 124 x 159 x 45 mm. The base+pump assembly is the same for both, measuring 55 x 60 x 33.5 mm, which features a polished copper base.

Source: TPU

SilverStone Tundra TD02 and TD03 liquid coolers revealed - More news at DV Hardware