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In combination with the new NVidia GeForce GTS450 cards swarming the newswaves today, NVidia has released a new driver. Normally this wouldn’t be huge news, except this one boasts some pretty significant performance improvements and new features across the board. While they, obviously, focus on the new 400-series cards, they claim that even older hardware will benefit.
Shown above is the GTX460 boosts for a variety of games, showing anywhere from 7% to 30% improved performance, but they also have vastly improved the SLI scaling functions, enabling SLI scaling of up to 90-95%! That means those of you still using older hardware can buy another identical card, and nearly double your performance across the board via SLI.
Tech ARP – NVIDIA Release 260 GeForce Drivers.
Hardware driver, nvidia
A few months ago we spilled the beans about the damage PowerPoint has caused in the Afghanistan operations abroad, but now the Pentagon has let loose the true dogs of war: The Government Acquisitions Process.
But that slide was child’s play compared to the three-foot wall chart the military uses to explain its gajillion-step process for developing, buying, and maintaining gear. The “Integrated Acquisitions Technology and Logistics Life Cycle Management” diagram is kind of a precis to the whole interminable progression, from “decompose concept functional definition into component concepts & assessment objective” to “execute support program that meets materiel readiness and operational support performance requirements and sustains system in most cost-effective manner.” Stare long enough, and you’ll start to see why it takes a decade for the Defense Department to buy a tanker plane, or why marines are still reading web pages with Internet Explorer 6.
Even printed 3 feet wide that would be tough to read. Having dealt with this process myself, however, I can attest to it shedding absolutely no light on the mysteries within.
I think this may be a 2-kitten slide.
via Revealed! Pentagon’s Craziest PowerPoint Slide EVER | Danger Room | Wired.com.
Graphics bad, flowchart, military
News of NVidia’s GTS450 is all over the net. While not a powerhouse of computational horsepower (only 192 CUDA Cores), it’s got a faster clock speed and lower power consumption, making it a perfect candidate for overclocking.
The company’s third Fermi desktop iteration is described as “a little more than half of the GF104 implementation,” which in real terms means 192 CUDA cores versus the GTX 460′s 336, reduced memory bandwidth with a 128-bit-wide bus and a lower number of ROPs at 16. These disadvantages are ameliorated by 783MHz graphics and 1566MHz processor clock speeds as well as a much more forgiving power profile — the new GTS 450 cards will require just the one 6-pin power connector for auxiliary juice.
Reviews abound, so check em out:
via NVIDIA makes GeForce GTS 450 official, promises beastly overclocking — Engadget.
Hardware nvidia, review
What’s that you say, that 65″ TV you’ve got isn’t big enough? How about the new 100″ Diamond Vision OLED display from Mitsubishi? They claim they’ll begin selling it in 100″ and higher sizes next week (September 21st) for those of you with deep pockets.
The Diamond Vision is bright (1,200cd/m²) and has a good contrast (twice as better as LED, says Mitsubishi) – so it can be used in brightly-lit areas such as airports or stations. The OLEDs were jointly developed by Mitsubishi and Pioneer.
They do this my manufacturing small modules that are 234mm-square, and 128-pixels square. Unfortunately, each pixel is approximately 3mm in size, so you have to stand a ways back.
No idea what the price on this will be yet, but no doubt it will be reserved for the various Jumbotron-stadiums of the world.
via Mitsubishi to start selling the 100″ Diamond Vision OLED displays on September 21st.
Hardware display, mitsubishi, oled
The Boxee Box is almost ready to come to market, and pre-orders are opening today at $229, just slightly over the “under $200″ mark they were originally shooting for. Surprisingly, however, they’ve made a last-minute hardware change and ditched the NVidia Tegra 2 and replaced it with the Intel Atom CE4100, the same chip powering the Google TV. That seems an odd decision, but Avner Ronen has a good explanation for it:
“The major problem we had with the Tegra 2 was support for high-profile HD playback,” he said. “You can do high-profile VC-1 with Tegra 2, but not H.264.” It was a problem of bitrate, he told us, and while NVIDIA’s dual-core Tegra T20 was apparently not up to the task, the team had internally tested Intel’s CE4100 decoding streams at up to 90 megabits per second. The newly revamped Boxee Box is now capable of 1080p H.264 playback at 60fps, and… well, that’s actually about it.
That’s a bit damning for NVidia and the Tegra system, being incapable of H.264 HD playback at high bitrates, and surely one NVidia is addressing as we speak.
via Boxee Box ditches NVIDIA’s Tegra 2 for Intel CE4100, pre-orders start today at $229 MSRP — Engadget.
Hardware boxee, nvidia, tegra, television
Douglas Greene has just announced a new Machinima Series that he plans to shoot inside Second Life, a Sci-Fi drama named ‘Awakening’.
The project is titled ‘Awakening,’ and is the brain child of none other than Yours Truly. Currently in pre-production, ‘Awakening’ is a Sci-Fi series that chronicles the worst, and the best, that humans can become, if left to their own devices. The story is rich, the characters are deep and complex, with one twist and turn after another that is sure to keep the viewer on the edge of their seat.
Still in early stages of pre-production, he’s looking for scriptors, animators, and various production people to aid in creation of clothing, avatars, and sets.
This has the potential to be the biggest Machinima ever undertaken in Second Life, and could set the bar for future work.
via Awakening – a major Machinima series coming to SL – Harrisburg Second Life | Examiner.com.
Graphics second life
Those of you in the UK can check out an interesting iPhone App that visualizes Stephen Fry’s “The Fry Chronicles“ (Released Today). Built by Stefanie Posavec and Dare Digital, it’s an interesting interactive visualization tool.
The entirety of the book is represented by a circular wheel of ‘spines’, each of which represents a section of text. The arcs around the outside of the wheel connect sections that are tagged with the same theme. By spinning the 112 self-contained sections around, viewing their opening words and following their tags, one can explore the book in a personalized, non-linear structure. Categories are distinguished by color: People, Subjects, Feelings and Fryisms.
You can get the app, myFry , for 7.99 £ on iTunes UK.
via myFry: a Visual Exploration of the Fry Chronicles Book (on the iPhone) – information aesthetics.
Science book, interactive, iphone
Finally, BP released their report on the Deepwater Horizon accident, and The Guardian summarized it in a timeline. The original report has a lot of additional information, and it can be found here. From Credit Loan comes the infographic about the rise of China, and GOOD made a nice overview on America’s Public Education System. Closing the first roundup of the week, a couple of designs about Fast Food: first, a brief history of Fast Food, made by Medical Insurance, and a chapter of the Burger Wars, this time with In-N-Out vs. Five Guys, from Travel Insurance.
Read more…
Graphics, Science design, economy, environment, infographic, infoviz, Visual Loop, visualizations
In combination with the new NVidia GeForce GTS450 cards swarming the newswaves today, NVidia has released a new driver. Normally this wouldn’t be huge news, except this one boasts some pretty significant performance improvements and new features across the board. While they, obviously, focus on the new 400-series cards, they claim that even older hardware will benefit.
VizWorld.com 
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