Windows 7 ATI Catalyst 9.3 Unified Driver

AMD is ready for the RTM release of Windows 7. Or at least this is what the chip-maker claims as it has released ATI Catalyst 9.3 Unified Driver introducing support for Windows 7 Beta Build 7000. The processor manufacturer, which acquired ATI, indicated that the advent of ATI Catalyst 9.3 drivers for Windows 7 represented a guarantee that support would be available with all planned future releases of ATI Catalyst, for the remaining milestones of the next iteration of the Windows client, but especially for the gold (final) version Windows 7.

“AMD’s expertise in visual computing shines through in the combined experience of Windows 7 and ATI Radeon graphics,” revealed Anantha Kancherla, group program manager responsible for Windows graphics, Microsoft. Read more

Fit For Purpose?

What’s all this then? At first glance it looks like it might be some sort of wireless gadget but believe it or not it is a complete PC, and no, that’s not a giant key. It’s called Fit-PC Slim and the whole thing measures just 10 x 11 x 3cm, which isn’t much larger than a pack of 20 cigarettes. Inside the box they have managed to squeeze an AMD Geode CPU running at 500MHz, there’s 512Mb RAM, a 60GB hard drive, Wi-FI and audio adaptors plus all the usual inputs and outputs. It comes pre-loaded with Linux or XP; there’s no fan, so it’s completely silent and all it needs to run is a simple 12-volt power supply. Amazing stuff, though you might now be asking why, and I have to say that I have no easy answers, but for someone out there it’s just what they’ve been waiting for!

USB 3.0 in the Pipeline

Now contain yourself! News that Intel has released the final draft specification for USB 3.0 has been sending ripples of excitement throughout the PC industry. You too will have to come to terms with a whole load of new jargon if you want to stay ahead of the game. Provisionally dubbed ‘SuperSpeed USB’ the big selling point is that data transfer speeds are up to 10 times faster than USB 2.0, which means a whopping 5 Gigabits per second. That’s really fast, quick enough to whizz a DVD from one place to another in just a few seconds and it’s going to make things like data transfer from things like MP3 players, cameras and storage devices virtually instantaneous. Plugs and sockets look superficially similar, and it should be backwards compatible but USB 3.0 sockets have an extra 5 contacts, set behind the front five contacts and these are the ones that carry the SuperSpeed data. Read more

NVIDIA’s Secret Weapon: 40nm GPUs

According to the most recent details regarding NVIDIA’s upcoming graphics products, the Santa Clara-based chip maker is planning to release its very first 40nm GPUs, even before competitor AMD has a chance of delivering its own 40nm-based solutions. Apparently, NVIDIA will step up to the next-generation TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company) 40G process technology with the introduction of new mobile chips, codenamed N10x.

At this point in time, there are no details regarding availability and official release date but, according to VR-Zone, NVIDIA will try to be the first to offer a 40nm graphics card, thus increasing its chances of gaining the number one spot in the graphics card market. Read more

Cool Sculpture

From a distance it looks like a piece of cool modern art, which maybe it is, but you’re unlikely to see one of these in a gallery or on public display, in fact it’ll probably never see the light of day as it’s designed to live out its life inside a PC case, keeping CPU chips cool. The Thermaltake V1 is designed to replace the boring old fan on many popular CPUs, including Intel Core 2, Pentium and Celeron processors, AMD Athlon 64 FX and X2 series processors. Heat from the chip is removed by four heatpipes and dissipated by the cooling fins, a super quiet fan set between the fins keeps the air moving. There’s more information that you need on the Thermaltake website, which may also be able to tell you where you can get your hands on one, if you want to be cool, and seen to be cool…

Top Ten Notebooks You Couldn’t Do Without

Mobile computing has conquered both the high-end and the mainstream markets and analysts claim that the number of sold notebooks will outpace desktop systems by 2010. Mobile gaming is still a niche market, dominated by bulky notebooks with significant price tags, but most of the general-purpose laptops deliver optimal performance at a reasonable price tag.

The first entry in the mainstream notebook line-up is the Acer Aspire 5920 model, that comes rigged with an Intel Core 2 Duo T5450 chip running at 1.6 GHz. The system also packs 2 GB of DDR2 memory and runs Windows Vista Home Premium. The 15.4-inch LCD display sports anti-glare technology that boosts the video output and offers a comfortable computer experience. The system sells for about $910 via the company’s retail outlets. Read more

Gateway ships retail PCs with 64-bit Windows Vista

You knew it was coming. Gateway, to our knowledge, has become the first large PC vendor to ship most of its retail PCs with the 64-bit version of Windows Vista Home Premium. The refreshed product line also brings back an Intel quad-core processor, which had been dumped by the company in the previous product cycle.

When we wrote about Gateway’s spring retail PCs back in January of this year, it was quite obvious that, at least for that product cycle, Gateway had thrown out Intel’s Core 2 Quad Q6600 quad-core processor in favor of an AMD Phenom X4 chip. Back then, company representatives assured us that an Intel quad-core would return soon. It took some time (four months), but an Intel chip is back, but only for the pricey “FX” version. Read more

Nvidia Due to Implement on-the-fly GPU Switching

Nvidia have announced that the MCP78S chipset will give the user the possibility to switch between GPU cores. The new chipset incorporates a GeForce 8-class DirectX 10, Shader Model 4.0 graphics engine, but also has the capability of controlling a PCI Express 2.0 graphics card connected via the chipset’s 16 PCIe 2.0 lanes.

This is not a title of novelty, since this feature is widely supported by most of the integrated chipsets, but the chipset also supports HybridSLI, giving the user complete control over the two GPUs. Should the system need hardcore graphic performance, the user may enable the graphics card, while on average computing the system graphics is hosted on the lower-power integrated GPU. This feature really comes in handy since, unlike the previous versions, GPU switching does not need a computer reboot. Read more