VizWorld.com

ExPreview has the information on a new PCB from NVidia with some interesting improvement at the very-technical level, as well as some “consumer” information like the addition of HDMI out.

According to the P897 design plan that NVIDIA sends its partners, it uses 4/6 phase NVVDD power solution ADP4100. It changes FBVDDQ power solution from 2-phase to single phase. And the MOSFET package has been changed from LFPAK to DPAK to save cost. Another noticeable change is the PCB layer decreases from 10 to 8. The length of PCB keeps unchanged, while the height of it is reduced by 1.5cm. In order to cut cost further, they will change DVI connector, crystal and probably change BIOS Rom from 1M to 512K.

But for the GT200 and NVIO2 chip, you might mistake GeForce GTX260 of P897 PCB design for GeForce 9800GTX+ (as they look so similar). Compared with P654 design, P897 GeForce GTX260 is expected to save cost of $10 to $15, which will undoubtedly improve its competitiveness. According to our source, this product will be available in the third week of this month.

via GeForce GTX260 Coming With New PCB Design to Cut Cost – Expreview.com.

Hardware nvidia

Over at OSNews they’ve got an article about the decline of SGI.  The last quarter (the economic downturn) has been especially bad for SGI, and there’s even talk of SGI requesting a Government bailout.  SGI has long been a favorite of government supercomputing agencies for it’s NUMALink technology (large shared memory spaces), and I’m sure they still make some money in that space.

In any case, SGI is a legendary company, and it would be a sad day for the computing world if they went under. Sure, companies come and go, but I’m sure SGI has a special place in the hearts of many computer fans out there.

Also over at insideHPC, John West has a good breakdown of what’s happened to SGI recently.  Of particular note is the news that the recent poor financials are partly due to the writedown of their recent restructuring (read, layoff).

via SGI in Trouble Again.

Hardware sgi

On Monday, Amazon is holding a press converence (10am Eastern), that’s expected to be the announcement of the new Kindle.  There’s alot of rumors, and a few pics floating around, but the details are still a mystery until Monday.

I want one of these so bad..

Reminder: Monday is Kindle 2 Day!.

Hardware

Over at Engadget they’ve got information on a pair of 24-inch e-paper displays being shown at a Taiwanese book show.  One is black-and-white (left), but the other is actually a Color e-paper display.

Giant e-paper display spotted, ogled at Taiwanese book show – Engadget.

Hardware epaper

Another win for GPU’s as Computers, OpenMM is giving researchers 100x faster results on Molecular simulations:

The key to the accelerated simulations OpenMM makes possible is the advantage it takes of current graphics processors (GPUs), which cost just a few hundred dollars. At its core, OpenMM makes use of GPU acceleration, a set of advanced hardware and software technologies that enable GPUs, working in concert with the system’s central processor (CPU), to accelerate applications beyond just creating or manipulating graphics.

Platform agnostic, it works on both NVidia & ATI cards, and work with GROMACS.

via New open-source software permits faster desktop computer simulations of molecular motion.

Hardware gpgpu

NVidia has shipped out Ion Demo units to various lucky reviewers for benchmarking and evaluation.

The Atom’s antiquated chipset is clearly limiting the processor’s appeal for some devices, but help has arrived from Nvidia in the form of the Ion reference design. More a new application than fresh silicon, the Ion platform pairs the Atom with the very same GeForce 9400 integrated graphics chipset you’ll find on motherboards designed for Core 2 processors—except instead of arriving on a Micro ATX or Mini-ITX form factor, the Ion reference platform is about the size of a deck of cards.

So what does The Tech Report think?

One thing is abundantly clear about Nvidia’s Ion reference design: it’s much, much better than the 945G-series chipset and GMA 950 graphics that Intel typically pairs with the Atom processor. But that’s sort of like saying Jessica Alba is hotter than Susan Sarandon. The real question is whether the Ion platform actually makes for a more capable system without spoiling the Atom processor’s existing appeal. And the answer is yes.

They admit that the performance isn’t really up to gaming standards, but it’s more than adequate for Multimedia applications, capable of HD decoding easily.

via Nvidia’s Ion platform – The Tech Report – Page 1.

Hardware

Jon Peddie Research has published some numbers on Graphics Chip shipment data for the Q3/Q4 of 2008.  Unsurprisingly, there was a drop in Q4 shipments compared to Q3.  The first drop since 2008, but like they mention:

“While the quarterly results for Q4 08 are obviously unusual it is perhaps slightly less surprising considering that Q3 was also a surprise in the other direction ” Jon Peddie commented. “Shipments for Q3 08 were unusually high even for the traditionally high third quarter. In talking to vendors in related industries we have seen the same scenario playing out – a robust third quarter and a much slower fourth quarter.”

So what does this mean for us?  Well, NVidia gained some ground on AMD/ATI in this quarter.  Desktops are still the majority of sales due to things like CrossFire & SLI, but with the new mobile processors coming out that may shift in 2009.

via Computer Graphics Chip Shipments Dive in Q4 ’08.

Hardware

The guys at fxguide have gotten theri hands on one of the new Autodesk HP xw8600 systems, with dual Quad Core Xeon processors, a Quadro FX5600 and a Lucid 88192 D/A converter.

We’ve got one of the new Autodesk HP xw8600 systems fired up at the fxphd loft in Chicago. The new systems started shipping last month and we got it quickly up and running and paying the bills. But before we shut down our old IBM6217 system, we took the time to run our fxguide suite of benchmarks so we had something to which we could compare the new system. In our results, we’ve also included results from our old school original Onyx 2 system, which was running Inferno version 5.3. The new xw8600 was from 1.1 to over 2 times faster than the 6217 on our benchmark test.

They’ve got their entire test suite & a benchmarking report available on their site.

via fxguide quick takes » Flame 2009 Benchmarks on the new HP xw8600 System.

Hardware

John West over at InsideHPC.com has the info on an upcoming Webinar hosted by NVidia about Tesla Computing with Matlab.

NVIDIA is hosting a Tesla GPU Computing Webinar on Thursday, February 5 at 2:00pm EST. Melissa sent me an email with the details, which I paste in below for your convenience

Attendees will learn about GPU computing, NVIDIA CUDA parallel computing architecture, the Jacket engine for MATLAB from AccelerEyes, and how to get 10x to 50x speed-up for several MATLAB functions.

Topics covered will include GPU computing in general, CUDA, and the Jacket engine for MATLAB from AccelerEyes.

via Webinar on using Jacket and GPUs to speed up Matlab | insideHPC.com.

Hardware matlab, tesla

BOXX Technologies has just announced a new workstation named the 4850 that (they claim) is the most powerful single-processor workstation ever designed, and several reviewers are showin it several thousand dollars below all the competition.

Now, in addition to those stellar performance numbers, BOXX detailed cost analysis reveals that, in terms of price, the 4850 Extreme also bests these same Apple, Dell, and HP systems. Extreme is priced nearly $2000 below Dell’s model, nearly $3000 below Apple, and $3400 below HP.

The benchmarks they’re showing are pretty impressive as well:

More information about the Boxx 4850 can be found on BOXX’s website.

via PR-CANADA.net – BOXX Technologies “Extreme” Workstation Priced Thousands Below Competition.

Hardware boxx