iSoftNews
Technology News, Paradise

Archive for the 'Hardware' Category

22.06.10 » A New 30″ Contender: HP ZR30w Review

Recently, HP’s performance ZR series of LCD displays have attracted quite a bit of attention. We’ve heard your comments and pleas for reviews of the 22” and 24” ZR series of HP displays, and those are still very much forthcoming. But for today, we’re breaking some news with a review and launch announcement of HP’s […]

22.06.10 » Pandora Radio on iOS 4.0 Results in Audio Skipping

Today Apple announced the gold master release of iOS 4 to the general public. While the rollout has gone relatively smoothly thus far, with both Anand and I moving from the latest release candidate to the gold master build without issue, we noticed something unnerving while doing performance and battery life testing involving one of […]

22.06.10 » Welcome to Valhalla: Inside the New 250GB Xbox 360 Slim

Five years ago we dissected the original Xbox 360. Today we're back with the new, slim Xbox 360 and have put together a similar guide to disassembling the console. In addition we've gone in and looked at the power savings and noise reduction made possible by further integrating the CPU and GPU onto a single […]

22.06.10 » Apple’s 13-inch MacBook Pro (Early 2010) Reviewed: Shaking the CPU/GPU Balance

Earlier this year Apple updated its entire MacBook Pro lineup. The update wasn't cosmetic, the 2nd generation unibody design carried over from 2009. Instead the 15-inch and 17-inch notebooks got Core i5/i7 CPUs paired with NVIDIA GeForce GT 330M GPUs. The 13-inch model was left with a Core 2 Duo and only saw a big […]

22.06.10 » Apple’s iOS 4 Explored

Just two days before the official iPhone 4 release Apple delivered its promised iOS 4 update to all iPhone 3G and 3GS owners. The new OS release enables Apple's own variant of multitasking, organizational folders and lays the foundation for much of what we should expect to see from Apple over the coming years.

The smartphone […]

22.06.10 » MSI GX640: $1100 for a Speedy DX11 Laptop

Finding a reasonable gaming laptop without spending a ton of money can be difficult; finding one with DX11 support and high quality components for $1100? That's just being greedy, isn't it? And yet that's exactly what MSI's GX640 brings to the table. Sporting AMD's Mobility Radeon HD 5850, it's a slight step down in performance […]

22.06.10 » AVADirect’s Clevo W860CU: Mobility 5870 vs. GTX 285M

Who makes the fastest mobile GPUs right now? That question can be a bit tricky to answer, since getting identical laptops other than the GPU is difficult at best. Thankfully, AVADirect was good enough to send us a couple Clevo W860CU notebooks that are indeed identical, outside of the GPU. One sports AMD's top-of-the-line Mobility […]

22.06.10 » 2010 Value SSD (~$100) Roundup: Kingston and OCZ take on Intel

Two years ago the best SSD you could buy was made by Intel and it cost $7.44 per GB of MLC NAND. Today Intel is actually the value leader. The 80GB X25-M G2 will set you back $205 at Newegg, or $2.56 per GB. The performance crown now belongs to companies like Micron and SandForce. […]

22.06.10 » AMD and Intel Mobile Rematch: Gateway NV5933u vs. Acer 5542

Our previous comparison between AMD and Intel laptops is now a year old, and plenty has changed since then. With a couple of the more recent releases on hand, it's a good time for another head-to-head comparison. Unfortunately, getting the latest AMD-based laptops can be tricky, so we don't have their recently announced "Vision 2" […]

22.06.10 » ASRock X58 Extreme3: An Enthusiast X58 Motherboard at a Budget Price?

Today, we take a look at an X58 motherboard from ASRock, the Extreme3.  The Extreme3 is the next iteration up from the ASRock X58 Extreme, with the notable additions being USB3 and SATA 6Gb/s functionality. The good news is that ASRock have managed to provide the extra features whilst retaining a sub $200 price point, […]

22.06.10 » Computex 2010: Motherboards

Another year, another Computex.  Every time it comes around, vendors attempt to tease and tantalise both journalists and Joe Public alike with concept models, previews, machines running really fast, and the ubiquitous booth attendants holding motherboards upside down.  As part of our motherboard coverage here at AnandTech, rather than post separate news articles for each […]

22.06.10 » SeaMicro Announces SM10000 Server with 512 Atom CPUs and Low Power Consumption

The past couple of years have shown us a lot can be done with very modest CPU power thanks to Moore's Law. Everything from netbooks to smartphones rely on a new category of "fast enough" silicon that is more power than performance optimized. A number of companies are working on a similar approach to server […]

22.06.10 » Media Streamer Platforms Roundup

A few months back, Anandtech carried the review of the Patriot Box Office media streamer. Pursuant to a very good reception from readers, we have decided to start a dedicated home theater section where we will be covering products in this space. Of primary interest will be media streaming boxes, but we will also cover […]

22.06.10 » Two OMAP 3430 Phones: Nokia N900 and Motorola Droid

We've been playing around with two OMAP 3430 based phones for a while now - the Nokia N900 and Motorola Droid. Though they aren't the newest smartphones to come across our bench, both are important baselines and still very relevant devices, each for totally different reasons: The Motorola Droid is the phone that launched Android […]

22.06.10 » Intel’s X25-M and X25-V Now Available in Best Buy Stores

Consider this one big step for SSD-kind: Intel just sent along a note letting us know that its X25-M and X25-V SSDs are now available at Best Buy. The drives appear to be priced competitively if you look at Best Buy's online listings. An 80GB X25-M G2 will set you back $230 + tax while […]

22.06.10 » New Xbox 360 Slim Does Have an IR Receiver

I've gotten this question a few times already so I thought I'd just answer it once publicly. The new Xbox 360 Slim we tore down yesterday does in fact have an IR receiver, it works perfectly with the Xbox 360 IR remote that shipped with the first 360s five years ago.

In other news, I haven't […]

22.06.10 » AnandTech 13-year Anniversary Giveaways Continue: G.Skill 4GB Memory Kit

Thirteen years ago I wrote my first articles on a Geocities hosted website called Anand's Hardware Tech Page. In celebration of our 13th year of operation a number of our gracious sponsors have provided us with hardware to give away to you. This site has and always will be yours, and as a way of […]

22.06.10 » Computex 2010: New ASUS Notebooks

Tagging along with the launch of the Eee Pad and Eee Tablet at Computex 2010, ASUS has also unveiled a range of new notebooks. Amongst the new releases are fourth generation Eee PC netbooks, G series gaming monsters, eco-friendly U series notebooks, and the latest from the co-branded Lamborghini performance line. With these new notebooks, […]

22.06.10 » Gigabyte H55N-USB3 : Mini-ITX done the Gigabyte way…

We’ve been waiting for one of the major players to get their mitts into mini-ITX for Intel’s chipsets and finally Gigabyte has delivered with the Intel H55 chipset based H55N-USB3.

mini-ITX goes USB 3

ECS did us all a favour by introducing their H55H-I at an incredible $79, forcing Intel and to lower the price of the […]

22.06.10 » New Driver Enables Smooth 1080p Flash Playback on NVIDIA NG-ION

When we reviewed Zotac's ZBOX HD-ID11 we noted that the upgrade to the Next-Generation ION didn't feel like much of an upgrade. Performance improved in some cases, but power consumption got worse and in 3D games and Flash playback performance actually dropped. The latter was a particular problem because many want to buy these NG-ION […]

22.06.10 » Acer Ferrari One: An AMD Ultraportable

Acer's latest Ferrari-branded laptop looks to compete in the crowded CULV ultraportable market. Packing an X2 L310 processor and HD 3200 graphics, on paper at least the Ferrari One should compete relatively well. Does AMD have a viable answer to the long battery life CULV laptops? Do the HD 3200 graphics offer any real benefit? […]

22.06.10 » Sprint HTC EVO 4G – Vivek’s First Impressions

While we're still waiting on our EVO 4G review sample, AnandTech Mobile Editor Vivek Gowri got his hands on the HTC EVO 4G. Android 2.1 running on a Qualcomm Snapdragon SoC with a giant screen and 4G network support makes for one beast of a phone.

Read on for Vivek's thoughts.
More: continued here

22.06.10 » HP Launches New Consumer LCDs

Following the launch of their budget range of LCDs, HP has now launched some more premium models for those in need of better specifications. There are four new models ranging from 20” to 27” featuring integrated speakers and HP’s BrightView displays, and three of the models include HDMI connectivity. The 27” model in particular boasts […]

22.06.10 » More ASUS Eee Pad Details, No MKV Support on 10″ Model

At the start of Computex ASUS unveiled its two tiered approach to an iPad competitor: the 12" Eee Pad running Windows 7 Home Premium on an Intel CULV Core 2 Duo, and the 10" model running Windows Embedded Compact 7 on NVIDIA's Tegra 2. Yesterday ASUS answered some additional questions we had about the models:

- […]

22.06.10 » Mac OS X Steam Performance: Half Life 2 Episode 2, Still Slower than Windows

Last month Ryan Smith published his findings on OS X Portal performance. While we're all glad that Valve ported the Steam engine to OS X, we weren't very happy with the performance of the initial release. Since then Valve has updated its Steam client and games as well as released Half Life 2 Episode 2 […]

22.06.10 » The Xbox 360 Slim (Valhalla): Dissection Galleries Up

Today UPS dropped off my Xbox 360 Slim (codename Valhalla) and I did exactly what you'd expect me to: run power numbers on it and take the whole thing apart. I've posted pics of the system compared to the old Jasper Xbox 360 here and a gallery of my dissection of the system here. Expect […]

22.06.10 » AnandTech 13-year Anniversary Giveaways Continue: G.Skill 4GB Memory Kit #2

Yesterday we kicked off the first of 28 days of giveaways celebrating our 13 years of operation here at AnandTech. G.Skill was the first to send in product and they sent in a lot: 58GB of desktop and notebook memory for us to give away. Congrats to yesterday's winner: Wieland, your 4GB kit will be […]

22.06.10 » Lenovo Announces IdeaPad Y560d 3D Laptop

Lenovo is launching their IdeaPad Y560d today, better known as the company's first 3D laptop. The new laptop is marketed as "TriDef" due to the triad of a 3D display, software applications to make the most of it, and the glasses to view it. Other interesting additions are Lenovo's "Enhanced RapidDrive" technology that combines HDD […]

22.06.10 » ASUS U30Jc Revisited: Adding an SSD

Last week we looked at the ASUS U30Jc and found a lot to like… so much that we awarded it a Bronze Editors' Choice. The stock configuration comes with a conventional hard drive, but SSDs are all the rage these days. What happens to performance when you install a decent SSD, like a 120GB OCZ […]

22.06.10 » Son of Intel Employee Missing, AT Reader Help Requested

A friend of mine who works at Intel emailed me asking for my help in this. Kyron Horman, the son of an Intel employee, has gone missing. The report is vague but seems to imply that the child went missing somewhere in Multnomah County, Oregon. He is 3'8" tall, weighs 50 lbs and has brown […]

7.12.09 » The Cable Chronicles: Win7 Digital Cable Advisor Released

As we mentioned in our previous edition of The Cable Chronicles, Microsoft and CableLabs have come to an agreement to allow the installation and use of CableCARDs on unapproved and non-OEM systems, allowing for the wider proliferation of CableCARD equipped HTPCs beyond the handful of OEM systems that CableLabs had previously approved. With […]

7.12.09 » vApus for Open Source: Creating a virtualized stress test

If you’ve been keeping up with our articles for a while, you might have picked up on vApus Mark I: the virtualized stress test we created for internal use at the Sizing Servers testlab.
As detailed in Johan’s article, this bench consists of 3 separate applications, all of which we are very familiar with […]

7.12.09 » AMD Unveils Bulldozer & Bobcat: 2011 Microachitectures

Could this be AMD’s comeback? It sure looks bold at a high level……
More: continued here

7.12.09 » DirectX11 Released For Windows Vista

For those of you sticking with Vista, Microsoft has finally officially released DirectX 11 for Vista, after having spent the last couple of months in beta. This final release looks to be the same as the last beta released earlier this month.
The update is KB971512, which is being released as part of a […]

7.12.09 » Core i7 Giveaway Winner, AT on Kindle, Site Redesign Preview and More

We have a winner! We’ve also got AnandTech offered on Amazon’s Kindle and a preview of the new AnandTech site redesign. I hint about a call to writers and a potential reader meetup in India. …
More: continued here

7.12.09 » Windows 7 Performance Guide

After nearly a year of serious waiting, the next Windows is here. Its arrival puts a stake in Vista, and may finally be what Microsoft needs to put XP to bed….
More: continued here

7.12.09 » The Radeon HD 5970: Completing AMD’s Takeover of the High End GPU Market

With 2 Cypress chips on 1 card, today marks the day where AMD completes their takeover of the high-end video card market. It’s the fastest single card on the planet for $599, and quite overclockable out of the box. Goodbye GTX 295….
More: continued here

7.12.09 » HP Mini 311: Netbooks get ION

The HP Mini 311 is one of the first netbooks to ship with NVIDIA’s ION platform. The question everyone’s asking is: does ION improve the netbook experience? The answer is yes, but there are other questions we still need to address….
More: continued here

7.12.09 » Anand’s Thoughts on the Kindle 2 and Marvell Making Affordable eBook Readers

A couple of weeks ago Marvell announced its ARMADA line of custom ARM based SoCs. We have a little more detail on one of its members: the 166E. Marvell hopes that the 166E will pave the way for affordable ebook readers in 2010….
More: continued here

7.12.09 » Mobile Buyers’ Guide, December 2009

Looking for a laptop, netbook, or even a notebook this holiday season? We’ve put together our thoughts on the various price segments and have selected a few laptops worthy of mention for this buyers’ guide….
More: continued here

September 2010
M T W T F S S
« Jun    
 12345
6789101112
13141516171819
20212223242526
27282930  

Warning: include() [function.include]: URL file-access is disabled in the server configuration in /home/isoft/public_html/wp-content/themes/isla-10/footer.php on line 15

Warning: include(http://www.isoftnews.com/wp_smartrss.php) [function.include]: failed to open stream: no suitable wrapper could be found in /home/isoft/public_html/wp-content/themes/isla-10/footer.php on line 15

Warning: include() [function.include]: Failed opening 'http://www.isoftnews.com/wp_smartrss.php' for inclusion (include_path='.:/usr/lib/php:/usr/local/lib/php') in /home/isoft/public_html/wp-content/themes/isla-10/footer.php on line 15