Sharp Shows off World's Smallest WLAN Module
Smaller, lighter and more efficient
Sharp has unveiled the tiny DC2J1DZ115 802.11b/g wireless module. It measures just 10x10x1.6mm and has the industry's lowest electric power consumption (0.9mW/waiting).
HIS has an Iceq 3 cooler for X1900 cards
Samples will begin shipping later this month at a cost of 20,000 yen. According to the release, Sharp has the ability to produce 100,000 units per month.
Samsung Moves to 80nm DDR2
Samsung may see production efficiency increase by up to 50%
Samsung is moving its DDR2 production over to a smaller 80 nanometer manufacturing process. The company's current product lines are build on 90nm technology and the switch will allow them to keep up with rising demand for DDR2 modules.
The move to 80nm will allow the company to increase production efficiency by 50%. By utilizing a "half-node" process, Samsung was able to use its existing 90nm infrastructure to ease the transition to 80nm.
"With the demand for DDR2 at its highest level since it made its market debut in 2004, our 80-nm technology provides us with the ability to more efficiently support the sustained demand growth that is expected in the DDR2 marketplace this year," stated Samsung's DRAM Marketing Director, Tom Trill.
Socket AM2 CPUs three to five per cent faster
Than its DDR one brothers
Than its DDR one brothers
We have seen many AM2 socket CPUs. Most of them are running at 2.4GHZ and are showcased with DDR 2 800 memory. That is the only way to show any kind of performance difference from the DDR 400 based existing 939 CPUs.
The guys that ran some benchmarks on those machines confirmed that you can expect three to five per cent performance increase and that is about it. AMD claims that those engineering samples are the final revision so you should not expect more of the performance incensement. The existing engineering samples are running at 2.4 GHz but they might end up even faster at the launch date.
However, the price of the DDR 2 will drop and will make it more accessible for the general consumers but DDR 800 wont be anywhere close to mainstream. AMD is playing an interesting game but at least it could support DDR 3 when it comes out, so that is something.
Crossfire runs on Intel 975X chipset
ATI claimes it could run on SLI boards as well
ATI claimes it could run on SLI boards as well
MSI is showcasing a 975 motherboard that runs two Crossfire cards. As of this show MSI even gives technical support for 975 boards running the two ATI cards.
All you need to do is to plug the two cards and install them. Otherwise it should run. An ATI marchitecture chap told us that you could run two Crossfire cards on an SLI motherboard. It is all to do with software. Some Nvidia elements confirmed the claim that Crossfire could run at SLI and vice versa.
There is a famous ULI chipset patch that can let you drive SLI on pretty much anything but we haven't tried it so far. An MSI chap told us that you can unofficially run two SLI even on Intel's 975 chipset.
So, dual cards are pretty much possible each way if they want it.
ATI RV 560 is the RV 570
First is a TSMC kid, second UMC
First is a TSMC kid, second UMC
We have already reported about RV 570 and already noted that this chip will have the bridge inside and that it comes with a 256 bit memory interface. We have some more juice to offer, as the chip will be manufactured at TSMC. It is an advanced version of RV530, Radeon X1600 and this is the chip that is supposed to inherit the mantle of the recently announced X1800 GTO.
RV570 should be just as fast and the production cost will be much lower. Secret of the RV570 is that the chip is built on 80 nanometres and it looks like ATI might move to 80 nanometres faster than we all expected.
We've heard about the RV560 before and we also heard that it is a 256 bit chip that should inherit the RV530 mantle. We should be talking about the same twelve pixel pipelines but that's not clear at this point. This chip is architecturally the same as RV570 and the only difference is that it will be produced at UMC.
This happened before as Radeon 9600, RV360 was the TSMC kid while the later coming Radeon 9550 was based on a new old RV370 UMC chip.
Socket AM2 officially supports up to DDR800
DDR 1000, 1200 and faster possible, but it's overclocking
DDR 1000, 1200 and faster possible, but it's overclocking
We learned that socket AM2 officially supports all the memory standards up to DDR 2 800. An earlier article by our Theo Valich indicated that faster memory might just work and he was right. The memory manufacturers are introducing DDR 2 at 1066MHz or faster speeds already, so there is your answer.
This memory will work but you will need to overclock your board to make your memory works at desired speed. The memory speeds will just go faster - even faster than DDR 2 1200MHz and that will happen relatively soon. Those modules are in the labs as we speak
Socket AM2 and Intel 975 chipset will support those faster memory speeds but it will still be considered as overclocking.
7800 GS is Nvidia's top AGP performer
EVGA 7800 GS AGP
NVIDIA didn't forget its AGP supporters. It decided to offer its top range card for the upper market. The card is well known as the Geforce 7800 GS and it is indeed state of the art of AGP performance.
The last Nvidia high end AGP card was based on NV40 core and comes with a Geforce 6800 Ultra name. Those cards are still top performance but the market wanted something faster. That’s how Nvidia decided to make its 7800 GS AGP.
We managed to get one of the EVGA cards. Those guys are getting the reputation of the high overclocker and they again managed to make quite a fast card. Its card is clocked to 460 MHz core and 1350 MHz memory and we know it can go even more than that.
EVGA did a good job, It made a very fast AGP based cards, probably the fastest AGP based cards around. It is definitely the fastest one that we tested so far and it will bring some new light to AGP supporters.
This probably won't be Nvidia's last and fastest AGP as there is still some space for improvement and there can always bridge all of the chips they have.
Abit showed off more than mobos
Speakers and USB
There were two unique things at the Abit stand during CeBIT - speakers and USB devices. We told you about the motherboards earlier, now it is time for the other things to shine.
The speakers are called the iDome series, and come in 2.1 format, or you can buy the speakers or sub separately. What makes them stand out is that they are digital right up to the final step. Abit says that other 'all digital' models tend to do unnecessary D -> A -> D conversions, but I have not taken them apart, so I can't say for sure.
The specs are pretty solid. They will take 24 bit 192KHz inputs, optical of course, and put out 100W of power across all three speakers. This goes through a fully digital amp and has 6 DSP modes, digital of course. If it isn't obvious, everything they could make digital, they did.
The other interesting bit was the Abit AN8 32X motherboard, or one specific part of it. The board itself is nothing special, but it has one really neat feature that Abit calls wake on USB. It is something of a misnomer, unlike Wake on LAN, it doesn't wake the machine up, but the USB wakes up when you plug something in.
This allows you to take a device that charges off USB, an iPod for example, and charge it without powering the whole computer up. As obvious of a thing as this is, I can't find anyone else that is doing it.
Albatron preps a great high-end product
CeBIT 2006 Can PX975X make Conroe fly?
Albatron wants to break free from the reputation of being a manufacturer of low-end and mainstream products. After the positive PR and sales success that K8SLI brought to the company, engineers decided to go one step further.
Since AMD keeps its CPUs on very tight allocation, Albatron decided to make its first high-end motherboard for the Intel Socket 775 platform. Conroe is supported, of course.
What makes this board extremely interesting is the presence of not one, but two 24-pin EPS12V connectors, which enable delivery of up to 450 Watts on motherboard alone, just for your overclocking pleasure. If CrossFire or SLI - via that leaked ULi patch - are used, the consumption of the power grows to unbelievable levels, we were told. Therefore, user has the option of connecting two power supplies at the same time, and core-logic will redistribute the power. This sounds like a wet-dream to owners of arguably the best case in the world, Stacker from Cooler Master.
In order to be able to support two PSU's, company waved goodbye to old way of regulation power, so the PLL circuitry is gone for good. Digital clock regulates every rail pf power, while the fat heat-pipe coolers three elements on the motherboard: NorthBridge (i975X), SouthBridge (ICH7) and RAID5 controller which gives you an option to connect six SATA-II devices.
Price is the best thing. The board will cost a mere $249, which isn't that much for a 10 SATA-II, 10 USB 2.0, double-PSU capable product. I only wonder what Kinc, Shamino or other members of the hardcore overclocking crew will be able to do with this baby.
Asetek to water-cool Alienware PC's
Asetek marchitecture
There is a big chance that Alienware will go for Asetek water cooling. It is a very nice small and practical water cooler that has the water pump on the water block. It just has two tubes that goes to a 12 inch radiator and that is about it.
It cools this machine perfectly and the machines original cooler is inefficient on the heavily load. Alienware still uses the Intel stock cooler that can not cool the machine at the highest load.
We don’t know when such a machine could be introduced but we do know that things might get complicated if Dell actually buys Alienware.
It is a great way to cool a great machine.
HIS has an Iceq 3 cooler for X1900 cards
Much more efficient than ATI's
HIS is one of ATI's partners that wants and knows how to make a difference. Those guys finally made the ICQ 3 cooler that can cool Radeon X1900 XTX much better than ATI's stock cooler.
These cards should be available in a few weeks and they can guarantee you that it will run at least 10 degrees Celsius lower than the ATI reference X1900 XTX cooler.
This is something that can actually boost its sales as we think that X1900 XTX will actually bea lot quieter. SO it is either icq3 or we are talking about water cooling. The choice is of course yours.
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Final Update :
Dual GeForce 7600GT Card Spotted at CeBIT
Galaxy comes on board with a single SLI card with dual GeForce 7600GTs
Reports from CeBIT 2006 (english translation) revealed that multi-GPU video cards are gaining momentum. While most SLI configurations use two physical cards, there have been some cards have dual-GPUs integrated onto a single PCB. Gigabyte was first to release its 3D1, which integrated two GeForce 6600GT GPUs but ended up selling poorly. ASUS followed with its Extreme 7800GT, integrating two GeForce 7800GTs and even including an external power adapter.
Galaxy, a relatively unknown Asian manufacturer of PC add-in cards, demonstrated what it calls its Galaxy video accelerator. Based on dual GeForce 7600GT GPUs, the Galaxy brings forth SLI performance in a package that's easy to manage. Like the ASUS board, and Gigabyte board before it, the Galaxy packs twice the amount of memory as a regular 7600GT card. So far, however, official specifications have not been announced.
The company is no stranger to SLI and previously manufactured multi-GPU cards based on 3DFX processors prior to being absorbed by NVIDIA. The GeForce 7600GT is pin compatible with the GeForce 6600GT, so it may very well be possible that Xianka used an earlier design but anticipates capitalizing on the dual GPU craze earlier in the product cycle this time around.
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That concludes TechEnclaves CeBIT coverage for 2006. Thank You for Staying Tuned.