Daisuke Papipupipu's Technology Guide » computers

ATI XGP

papipupipu — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 00:53:22 +0000

As the COMPUTEX festival in Taipei progresses, new and exciting products are released. It appears to the public that one of the most anticipated ones was the external graphics processor, ATI XGP. As it is clearly said, this can be used in any type of computer, but was especially made for laptops since they lack powerful graphics cards. By having this external graphics processor, now laptop owners are able to view their favorite movies without problems or play games such as BioShock and Oblivion. People could now opt for small light weight laptops that own elegant designs. This is a great advance to the usability of computers and laptops.

It is now officially released by the Canadian company that the processor will boast multi GPU capabilities that will enable the device to run high end Crossfire X technologies. In order to improve performance, the GPU will possess the new ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3800 series processor. The Mobility Radeon 3800 series processor is one of the most powerful in ATI’s whole lineup of GPU’s, as it has a 2.25 GHz memory clock speed, 55nm building process, ATI’s reputable Powerplay, and at least one PCI 2.0 support. In 3DMark test scores, the ATI 3800 easily beat the older counterparts from ATI and the GPU’s from Nvidia. This graphics processor is also praised for its low energy consumption, reduced temperature levels, and its low noise level. Since these small areas in the processor are turning into an important factor for customers and gamers, it is important to note the excellence of this processor. By utilizing this, the external GPU hub will certainly succeed in its release. The easiness and the importance of this device was commented by ATI vice president of marketing Mark Skynner, “With ATI XGP Technology, notebooks can switch between everyday computing and hard-core gaming with a simple plug-in that’s also portable enough to bring powerful 3D performance on-the-go.”

The ATI XGP is planned to be connected to the main system through a PCle 2.0 graphics form with a specially designed cable from Japan Aviation Electronics Industry Ltd. It is officially released that the transfer of speeds between the graphics unit and the computer will be of an incredible 4.0 GB per second, enabling a smooth graphics performance. It is clear that suppliers for this device are excited as shown through Mark Saubert, the marketing manager of Japan Electronics Aviation Industry that commented “ATI XGP Technology is cutting edge and we’re excited to participate in this revolutionary solution for notebooks. ATI XGP Technology redefines what mobile graphics is all about.”

Interestingly, this external GPU processor possesses its own set of USB 2.0 connections. Just imagine having a couple of few extra ports for your computer. People with ultraportable or small laptops that have only a few ports could opt for this system as a multimedia power source or simply as a USB hub. For this reason, it is clear that the ATI XGP could bring a new era for the user’s computer environment.

In the past few years, ATI was losing grounds on the laptop graphics card sector to Nvidia. As a result, this response from ATI was an excellent booster product. Currently, demands over powerful GPU’s are growing and laptop graphics card sales had boomed. It’s as if ATI was the perfect timer of products by releasing this device in this strategic time.

Information from:

http://www.i4u.com/article17809.html

http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/080604/20080603006591.html?.v=1

http://www.engadget.com/2008/06/04/amds-ati-xgp-external-laptop-graphics-platform-goes-legit/

http://www.xataka.com/2008/06/04-ati-xgp-grafica-externa-para-portatiles

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/591/1/

Panasonic GPS Strada CN-HX1000D and CN-HW1000D

papipupipu — Fri, 23 May 2008 00:31:15 +0000

Matsushita Electric’s most famous brand, Panasonic, recently announced the public of its planned launch of the world’s first HDD car navigation system with linkage between the car and the home. Two of these kinds of GPS would be introduced under the F Class Strada navigation category with the serial numbers of CN-HX1000D and CN-HW1000D. What left many people’s mouth open about this navigation system is the first unique use of the Bluetooth technology to control all the features of the home through the car. By using this, people may leave their doors unlocked, or the electrical appliances on and control everything via the automobile. This system even allows the person to adjust the temperature of the air conditioner, turn the alarm on and off, and surprisingly, it allows the person to view the home on the screen through the use of an IP camera. The interesting part is that this is done through a navigation system which is normally used as a device to understand the roads. But this, in contrast from traditional GPS systems, may serve as an inside-car multimedia center since it even includes a DVD player, a 7 inch Viera LCD screen, a mobile TV tuner, an I-Pod link, and the Bluetooth. In order to improve the image quality of the screen, Panasonic developed a high quality circuit with the high definition technology of plasma televisions. This GPS system is also unique with its excellent sound quality achieved through the supervision from a group of recording engineers from MIXE’s Lab. The engineers of Panasonic are incredible by finding an efficient and hard way of connecting to the home through Bluetooth technology. According to the Japanese site of Panasonic, the car navigation first transfers the information to a Bluetooth enhanced mobile phone, and then the phone transfers it to the domotic system of the house. This was all done through collaboration with all of the major Japanese phone operators such as AU, Softbank, and NTT Docomo. Since Japan was the first country to utilize the third generation technology of mobile phones, most of its mobile phone bands are wide range and this is the reason why the transfer of data was possible. However, there is a low chance for this GPS to go to foreign countries since there is almost no other country in the world with a mobile phone system like Japan’s, so don’t expect this to appear in any of your countries.

In Japan, the company is planning to sell 8000 sets per month, but Panasonic official Naohisha Morimoto said, “The catch is you need a special Internet-linking home with its own server that hooks up gadgets and lighting to work with mobile phones and products like Strada F-Class. Only about 2,000 homes in Japan have such Net-linking systems so far.” This basically means that Panasonic is planning to increase these kinds of homes in the country and therefore, the plan was 8000 sets.

Panasonic is planning to introduce an in-dash type navigation system which is the CN-HX1000D (planned to be introduced at June 13) and a 2DIN type which is the CN-HW1000D(planned to be introduced at June20). The features included in these two navigation systems would be the same but will have different price tags. By having two different models, Panasonic is planning to accommodate many different kinds of car models since the models differ in the way of placement.

Information about Panasonic

Panasonic started its operations in 1955 and soon grew itself into a multinational brand with a revenue exceeding 8000 billion yen. This company is a major employer with over 340,000 workers worldwide and has a product range from TV sets to vacuum cleaners.

Information about Matsushita Electric Industrial

Matsushita Electric Industrial is a global multinational company founded by Matsushita Konosuke in 1918. The company is mainly known through the Panasonic brand, but they also own other companies such as National and Technics. With its huge industry, Matsushita was able to gain net sales exceeding 9 trillion yen and increase its research and development. BY having all of this, the company manages to have corporate offices in almost all of the major countries and stock market listings in Tokyo, Osaka, Nagoya, and New York. The company is based on Osaka with headquarters at 1006 Kadoma, Kadoma-shi, Osaka 571-8501, Japan.

Information from:

http://www.japancorp.net/article.asp?Art_ID=18154

http://panasonic.jp/car/navi/products/HX1000/contents_a/design.html

http://www.zonagps.com/

http://www.techradar.com/news/portable-devices/satnav/panasonic-car-navigation-knows-way-round-home-368106

http://in.news.yahoo.com/associatedpress/20080514/r_t_ap_tc/ttc-worried-about-your-pet-forget-to-loc-02c743b.html

Macbook Air

papipupipu — Thu, 01 May 2008 19:21:39 +0000

With its tiny form factor, it is not surprising to hear that the Macbook Air is currently the thinnest laptop in the market and the lightest 13 inch laptop in the industry. But to achieve this, Apple needed to sacrifice many of the essential equipments that people consider to be a basic requirement for everyday use. The computer itself lacks an Ethernet port and a security slot, which are only available through an external USB to Ethernet adapter. Apart from this, the Macbook Air only has one USB port, but with a smaller size than traditional ones. This means that some peripheral devices won’t work on this system, unless the user decides to buy and use an external USB hub. Without these ports, the user will need to carry more items and this adds weight to the overall carriage. By considering this, it is easy to think that there is no meaning to buy a computer like this if the overall weight increases. In this case, the Macbook Air is easily defeated by other small and light 13 inch laptops in the industry because of the lack of basic ports. However, like other Apple laptops, the computer maintains a minimalistic design that visually appeals to most of the consumers and by being lighter and smaller, it attracts huge amounts of people. This is an important factor to Apple because this is the only key of success of the laptop since it lacks many ports. Apart from this, the computer is in danger for its outdated and low-end features. This happened since the designers needed to sacrifice everything to create a small and light computer. The Macbook Air has a slow, but small Core 2 Duo processor that uses the old Merom technology of Intel, one of the first processor technologies of the mobile Core 2 technology. Since the Macbook Air was released near the beginnings of 2008, it has been criticized for not including the newer Penryn microchips, which improves overall performance of the computer because of the use of a 45 nanometer dual core. Also, Macbook Air’s processor reduces overall performance and increases heat by having a specially designed body that reduces the size. The heat problem is even worsened from the small size that reduces overall temperature management. Some people have already complained about the extreme heat of the computer that sometimes causes the processor to shut down. This problem is extremely serious because every time the chip shuts down the user would need to remake the work that was stopped. After this, Apple introduced a software update, but this couldn’t fulfill the people’s needs; therefore, reviewers gave the update unsatisfactory responses. The chip problem is not the only performance based conflict the Air has. This thin computer has an extremely slow hard drive with a reading speed of a mere 4200 rpm and a size of 80 gigabytes. Considering that the computer has a webcam like other line of Apple notebooks, 80 gigabytes is not a sufficient size to store videos and pictures. For example, if a person records 10 videos with 1 minute each, the user would lose 10 gigabytes of the hard drive. This is a huge amount since the preinstalled software would take about 10 gigabytes of the hard drive and the OS would take more memory from the computer. Because of these performance problems, the sacrifice of major components of a computer doesn’t satisfy the needs of a consumer regardless of the appearance. There is a higher chance that the buyer would choose to purchase other slim 13 inch notebook systems such as the Dell XPS m1330 and the CR series of Vaio that doesn’t throw away the essentials of a computer. Like the Dell XPS One (stated in the last post of “Competition to the iMac”), the Macbook Air is broken down into a small consumer range that are willing to give up performance over appearance. However, the buyer would need to sacrifice one other thing: price. The Macbook Air has a base price that starts around the 2000 dollars mark, which is over priced for a 13 inch laptop. Many other 13 inch laptops with higher configurations start under the 1000 dollar mark, meaning that these are better choices for most people. Nevertheless, the computer is still one of a kind and no other competitor offers a system like the Macbook Air. Even with this, the Macbook Air remains a hard choice for many, apparently showing the weaknesses of such laptop systems.

Information from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacBook_Air http://reviews.cnet.com/laptops/apple-macbook-air-80gb/4505-3121_7-32818756.html

Competition to the iMac

papipupipu — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 00:26:32 +0000

It may seem surprising to many people, but the all-in-one Apple computer is starting to be imitated from major PC manufacturers such as Dell and Gateway to compete with this loved company. To me, it seems quite late for these makers to realize the likes of the iMac and the extreme versatility of such desktop computers. By simply thinking this, I went to the wrong direction and thought that these were doing a not-so-good job. But recently, after browsing a bit, I was astonished from the grand results from these PC makers. Even with this, you may think that the usual PC makers are creating the traditional PC’s with nothing special. However, these usual PC makers contradicted the thoughts of many consumers by introducing stylish and eye catching computers with excellent performance. For example, Dell, with its recent successful launch of the well designed XPS M1330, surprised many when they revealed their impeccable one piece desktop named the Dell XPS One. It is the most common thought that nothing could surpass the family based, friendly looking iMac. However, this one is something that can get near to the standards of iMac. At first glance, the computer is unique in almost all aspects. It even has a Blue Ray player and burner in the computer, a keyboard with a touch pad, a discrete graphics card, and a glossy 20 inch screen. It creates more competition to the iMac by including the Adobe Elements Studio, which competes decently with Apple’s user-friendly iLife. Currently, the XPS One is the only computer in the market with such unique specifications. However, even with its splendid specifications, most people wouldn’t consider having a blue ray disc drive and the touch pad. This would lower the consumer range for buyers who want a one piece computer that includes a blue ray disc drive. This number is extremely low, creating less competition with Apple. However, the computer is still stealing away a portion of the iMac customers and also, by considering the growing popularity of the High Definition discs, the XPS One could become the next generation of these types of computers. This could be further supported if the Dell all-in-one bumps their screen size to 22 inch or above with the movie suited 1080p definition. Currently, the Dell only has a 1680 x 1050 definition, which is not sufficient enough to achieve the entering of the home theater media center desktop category. After looking at this, it is possible that the Apple faculty decides to introduce blue rays or other HD players in their computers, but it will be too late for them since Dell would have already dominated the sector. It is simply a matter of who develops and introduces the product first; that is why the iMac is currently babbling about their huge popularity. By introducing it before, the company would have all their time they desire to improve the product. But it is possible that their popularity will decline as the time goes on because if the XPS One reaches the reliability of Mac systems and gains excellent software, the Dell would acquire a huge number of customers.

On the other hand, America’s cow icon computer manufacturer doesn’t seem to have a bright future as Dell’s. But Gateway still introduced the computer early enough to attract customers and get advantage from the growing popularity of the one piece computers. Their computers have less unique features, resembling the iMac in many aspects. Apart from the features, the computer has an obvious name like Dell’s called Gateway One. By having this, the system is able to emphasize the fact that the computer is an all-in-one. However, as stated before, the Gateway One highly resembles the Mac, and therefore, it is often referred to as the clone of Mac. Apart from this, the Gateway includes as standard equipment a 19 inch screen with a 1.3 megapixel camera and by having this camera, the Gateway can compete with iMac even with the excellent software the Apple possesses.

With a price starting around the 1300 dollars, the Gateay One easily beats the high end price of Dell XPS One. However, the iMac has a price around the 1200 dollars, making it a better buy for people who are low in budget. This will create serious problems for Gateway since the iMac has better specifications. The base model of the Gateway One has a 1.5 ghz Core 2 Duo processor and the low end Intel Media Accelerator X1300, while the iMac has a 2.0 ghz processor and an ATI graphics card. The Apple even has a 20 inch monitor which is larger than Gateway’s. However, the Gateway has the ability of being customized, easily overpowering other all-in-ones in which parts cannot be changed. This is an excellent feature since the customer can improve the computer’s performance preventing the extreme stress buyers face when parts are not exchangeable. As shown, most of Gateway’s features are easily eaten away with the unbelievable equipments of the iMac. In order to compete with the iMac in a direct way, Gateway will need to pass through an intense stage of improvement.

If for some reason, people don’t find the value of the all-in-one computers, they could still buy traditional desktop computers. Buying the computers from this sector is an indirect way of competing in which manufacturers benefit. These types of computers are others that are being considered by many customers, regardless of the appearance. However, some of these have nice touches that allow the machine to have a miniature casing with all of the necessary features. The world’s largest PC maker is doing an excellent job on the creation of small desktops with convincible prices. HP’s Pavilion Slimline s3200 is the one of them that is making the benefitting job for the company. Rated “Excellent” in the renowned computer reviewer CNet, this is one of the best buys in the computer industry. With a starting price below the 1000 dollar line, it is splendid that the computer has gaming computer rivals like Alienware and the Dell XPS line of computers. These gaming computers have prices that range from the 1000 dollars to the 10000 dollar line. Why is it possible for a cheap computer to compete in this way? The answer to this is the intense price reducing techniques used by HP that allows the price to be lower than the competition. Also, apart from the value, the computer catches the attention of the people with its attractive design. The computer has a black glossy looking cover and a miniature size measuring 27.6 inches high and 10.7 inches wide. This is something to put an eye into it since it attracts customers that are in love with Macs but are laid off from the high prices of them. This is one of the best value computers in the industry, making it an excellent choice for performance lovers and budget-low customers.

The Apple iMac is still the king of the compact desktop systems with its excellent configurations versus price. However, Dell and Gateway recently released their own all-in-one systems. Dell, especially, is trying hard to compete with the iMac to steal the customers away, but the XPS One is still inferior to the Apple. On the other hand, HP is doing an impeccable job, showing formidable signs of competition with the Apple. If time goes on, there is a possibility of seeing an intense competition industry with the compact computers and all-in-one systems.

Information from:

http://h10010.www1.hp.com/wwpc/ca/en/ho/WF05a/12132708-12133156-12133158-12133158-12133158-80626073.html http://www1.la.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/xpsdt_one http://www.xataka.com/2007/10/24-dell-xps-one-desvelado http://reviews.cnet.com/desktops/dell-xps-one-with/4505-3118_7-32743745.html http://reviews.cnet.com/desktops/hp-pavilion-slimline-s3200n/4505-3118_7-32609456.html http://www.gateway.com/programs/one/index.php

Dell XPS m1330

papipupipu — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 01:42:38 +0000

Known as a large manufacturer of highly customizable computers, Dell was not recognized as a leading gaming computer manufacturer. In this time, Dell decided to start a flagship line of computers called the Xtreme Performance Computers, abbreviated as XPS. At the beginning, the computers found in this line of computers were simply Dell’s high end computers in the Inspiron line rebadged with a label of XPS on the computer. These computers were soon flowing away from the designs of the Inspiron line, gaining a new image. After many years of working in this sector, Dell has been able to gain a lot of market share. This was further intensified from the acquisition of renowned gaming computer maker Alienware. However, designs of the computers were starting to become outdated and Dell was starting to lose market share in the computer sector to computer giant HP. For this reason Dell put a huge design faculty on the designing of the new 13 inch laptop named XPS m1330. This computer was a success since the beginning because of its slim design. This new design was able to surprise many computer manufacturers such as Sony and Apple. When released, the computer was named the slimmest 13 inch laptop in the industry. This was true until recent when the new Macbook Air was released. Nevertheless, this computer has many eye catching features such as a touch sensitive media control, a slim LED display, and brushed aluminum parts. In my opinion, the LED display was the most catching feature of the computer since it made the computer less than an inch thick and allowed the system to have a weight less than 4 pounds. The weight is especially incredible since a weight lower than 4 pounds is the requirement for an ultraportable computer. The thing about this is that ultraportables have displays that range from 10 to 12 inches and there is rarely a computer with 13 inches to have a weight less than 4 pounds.

Since the release of the XPS m1330, many good looking computers were starting to be produced from Dell. Computers such as a 15 inch version of the 1330 and a stylish onepiece desktop computers were starting to be introduced by this renown computer manufacturer. Dell also started to compete directly to stylish computer makers like Apple and Sony. The new competition created may help the computer industry to boost its research of the computers to get more stylish machines. Overall, I think this was an important decision Dell took to regain its market share in the computer industry and to gain a reputation of a computer maker of inspiring and cool computers.

Information from: www.wikpedia.org www.cnet.com

Pictures of Dell XPS m1330