Tuesday, August 3, 2010

CORE Or Boost? AMD And Intel Turbo Features Dissected

CORE Or Boost? AMD And Intel Turbo Features Dissected
Intel arms its Core i5 and Core i7 CPUs with Turbo Boost. AMD's hexa-core Phenom II X6 chips sport Turbo CORE. Both technologies dynamically increase performance based on perceived workloads and available thermal headroom. Which one does the better job?
Automotive turbochargers increase torque and power output, which is why they're used to increase the air-fuel mixture rate per combustion cycle. AMD’s and Intel’s performance-improving technologies don't actually a require an additional piece of hardware bolted on like a turbo would be, but they both invoke the gas compressor namesake anyway.

Motorola Droid X Reviewed

 Motorola Droid X Reviewed
You have to hand it to Motorola; as little as a year ago their future looked bleak. Android was still in its infancy and lacking polish, mainstream devices running it were few,
and there weren’t public or visible signs of any forthcoming devices which would challenge the dominance of BlackBerry or iOS, especially from Motorola. A few months later, they launched the Motorola Droid, and a few months after the floodgates opened up - out has poured a steady stream of relatively polished devices running Android 2.x. It’s been breakneck almost, with new flagships every 3 months on average - the latest is Motorola’s Droid X on Verizon - henceforth just 'X.'

HP Confirms Plans for Both Windows and webOS Tablets

HP Confirms Plans for Both Windows and webOS Tablets
Hewlett-Packard will offer a tablet computer with Windows 7 for business and a second tablet with Palm's webOS for a consumer tablet. HP gave no pricing or release dates beyond "fall" for the Windows slate. Despite the dismal showing for webOS in the smartphone market, an analyst said HP will need to figure out how to use it in a tablet.
Hewlett-Packard has confirmed it plans separate tablet computers running Microsoft's Windows and Palm's webOS. HP says it will use Windows for a business device and webOS for a consumer-oriented machine.

Two GeForce GTX 460s Beat One GTX 480?

Two GeForce GTX 460s Beat One GTX 480?

The GeForce GTX 460 has already proven itself an excellent value as a single card, but can two of them offer superior performance at similar cost to Nvidia’s flagship GTX 480? Let's just say that there's a good reason to buy an SLI-compatible motherboard.
Graphics giants Nvidia and AMD continuously run up against the limits of manufacturing technology in their effort to release revolutionary products every eighteen months.

U.S. Orders for Dell Streak Overflow Even Without a Price

U.S. Orders for Dell Streak Overflow Even Without a Price

U.S. pre-orders for the hybrid Dell Streak tablet-smartphone are piling up even without a price or a release date. Already launched in the U.K., Dell said the Dell Streak is its most successful pre-order device. The smaller Android-powered Dell Streak with Adobe Flash support is expected to offer some competition to Apple's popular iPad.

ASRock Core 100HT-BD : Bringing HTPCs to the Mainstream Market

ASRock Core 100HT-BD : Bringing HTPCs to the Mainstream Market
 
Home Theater PCs (HTPCs) have remained a niche market, catering mainly to enthusiasts who love the challenge of setting up and maintaining them.
The demand for dumb devices with HTPC capabilities has seen tremendous increase over the past few years, with the success of devices such as the WDTV and other media streamers. Blu-Ray players also end up integrating features such as media streaming and wireless networking. Often, though, users end up demanding things which are difficult for these units to implement. A case in point is Netflix streaming on the WDTV Live, which ended up being implemented in WDTV Live Plus. Torrenting (and other similar PC capabilities) end up making an appearance in the homebrew firmware versions of these products. One of the easiest ways to avoid such disappointments is to invest in a HTPC. These are more future proof than the small media streaming boxes and Blu Ray players for which one has to depend on core firmware updates from the manufacturer.