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It’s friday the 13th!  Now that I have your attention and sure you will be interested in what news I have for you today!

As we all know Nehalem motherboards and chips were show cased at Computex 2008. The show casing of the up-coming processors was an indication that the processors at set to launch within the 4th quarter of this year. Now with that information is out what news has Intel got for the general public?

Intel will be releasing information on their Larrabee Graphics device. You can read some of my older graphics related posts here …. Larrabee will be unveiling the technology at Siggraph 2008 or international conference and exhibition on computer graphics and interactive techniques.

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I was un-aware of Nvidia and ATI’s interest in laptop graphics solutions. Nvidia have announced that they are to release 13 mobile based GPU’s, quite a few then!

ATI have hit back already and released their product at the Computex show. The graphics device will supply an external PCI-E 2.0 platform for graphics performance enthusiasts alike, ie Gamers.

You can see the product imaged to the right. The slim lined box features an ATI Radeon 3800 GPU. It can be connected via a 4.0 Gbps PCIe 2.0 connection.

The XGP support CrossFireX functionality and will work along side your existing internal graphics device. The external graphics will accelerate 1080p high definition videos. The XGP has HDMI and DVi based ports, it can support up to four displays and even has USB 2.0 ports.

Now as you guessed it, How is the external graphics device going to communicate with the laptop device. Well unfortunately the XGP uses a special PCIe 2.0 cable. That means for compatibility issues the laptop aka Puma must use this PCIe interface connection. This to me seems like a problem because Nvidia will also be doing the same. The result being another competition between vendors! Which one will we choose? Will all laptops come with these customised PCIe 2.0 connections? Its a shame that the designers couldn’t use existing technology but I cant see USB 2.0 being a viable option.

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Its Friday again, i’m sure I always start my Friday posts like this :/. Right anyway, As you area all aware Computex is here will load of goodies on the horizon. I wanted to take time out of my busy working day to create a few diagrams on the Nehalem architecture but un-fortunately I wasn’t able to. Over the next week I will be updating the public on hardware specially Processor, motherboards and graphics cards.

I know there will be some goodies very shortly around those types of hardware. Any way, keep posted and for now here’s a short video to show what the latest (Soon to be old) Graphics hardware can do in case of emergency’s!

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I recenty created a mainstream/ enthusiast computer based on the Dual Core AMD processor, AM2+ board and the 8800 GS graphics interface. In theory the computer should perform brilliantly in all circumstances of computation. I then realised this was not the case.

Relating Issues:

• Half Life 2 based gaming crashes - Freezing once connection has been made to server (Multi-player)
• Other gaming - Crashes when entering Graphics mode, Resolutions not being found

Nvidia based

• GeForce Release 175WHGL Ver:175.16
• GeForce Release 169WHGL Ver:169.32

both drivers resulted in low 8bit color windows interface rendering. Lowest resolution could only be used in windows environment

**Solution: I will be updating the Abit AX78 drivers and using EVGA Nvidia 8800 GS driver. Also un-blocking half life 2 based Internet Protocol ports.

I will be posted BIOS, Window driver updates with version and target links.

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Funnily enough I dont have any news on the new ATI graphics products but I do have information on Nvidia’s new Graphics card. Nvidia have already spat out the 9000 series so why bother bringing out another graphics card so early?

Well my theory is that Nvidia basically used a 8800 series architecture for the Nvidia GX2 and didn’t really bother creating a new graphics architecture where as ATI have. Ok ATI’s graphics is long awaited but why not wait for GDDR5 memory?

Right lets get to it then, The upcoming GeForce GTX 260/280 models based on the GT200 chip NV60 use a 65nm manufacturing process with 100 mm2 larger die size than the previous 90nm. The GPU has 16 processing block double compared to the 8800 GTX, 240 shader processors not to mention the new 5112 bit memory controller! which uses to be 384bits wide.

The GT200 die process is pretty pricey but isnt this the case for all graphics hardware? The result in buying the core would be increased logic processing, more than any other semiconductor made within the IT industry. This is why using a 576 mm2 die size equates to nearly 1 billion transistors!

Lets see what the outcome will be! I will hopefully have news on the latest ATI release for all you ATI fans out there. Its literally a waiting game for the enthusiast!

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Its yet another Friday afternoon, the only thing keeping me going now is the bank holiday weekend! Over the last week I built a AM2 + based system using ATI’s chipset along with Nvidias Graphics. I’ve had many issues regarding this specification. I will be posting an article regarding the issues so users can help find fixes to similar problems! So Keep Visiting!

Over the past week I’ve seen some changes in hardware technology, I havn’t come across any news regarding Intels Larrabee and Nehalem architecture. But were I’m currently seeing movement is within the Graphics market of the main players ATI and Nvidia.

As we are all aware Nvidia have released their 9000 series cards including the GX2 back in the first quarter of 08. ATI are releasing their new graphics series soon and Nvidia had to counter act this move. You can read my last article ATI Radeon vs Nvidia GT200 for more information on the two manufacturers.

If any viewers would like an article mentioned or have any ideas for future posts then please leave a comment.

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Nvidia are in the process of changing their current product naming conventions. Over the past years Nvidia used a straight forward model naming structure such as the 6200 and 6600 obviously the latter having the highest specification. Nvidia can also mislead consumers because some versions of their 8800 series cards are faster than their 9600 series cards. To the majority of consumers this could be confusing.

Nvidia started to complicate model names when they created sub-model cards such as the 8800 GT, GS and GTS? What do all these mean? To the enthusiast this isn’t quite a problem because enthusiast will be familiar with their naming conventions from previous generation cards. The problem is obviously new consumers to the Graphics market. Nvidia may feel that because of the complicated model naming, new customers could easily buy products from alternative vendors.

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I previously written a blog on ATI’s possible graphics card products. You can view the post here amd ati 4800 series graphics cards.

Right lets get to it! ATI are releasing a new series of graphics card to their Radeon based products. The series will be called 4800 and is set to be released between the 15th and 22nd of June.

Coincidentally Nvidia release their new more advanced graphics cards the GT200. I dont think the Nvidia card will be a total re-vamp but a pumped up version of their GX2 additions.

ATI havn’t brought out a graphics card since Nvidias 8800 series of cards . This may be a slow process considering Nvidia are now brining out yet another graphics card, I think ATI have considered the market and timing well. If Nvidia had such a perfect product thats future proof for directx 10 why bring out GT200 based board? I think Nvidia mad e abad judgement by creating a GX2 card thats basically two 8800 glued together, its not exactly new technology.

Back to ATI, the 4850/ will use 512mb of GDDR3 not 4? and will be able to run four of the cards under a cross fire platform. The 4870 will use 512 GDDR5 and the 4870×2 will carry GDDR5 @ 1gig now thats impressive!

The pricing and performance of the cards are yet to be discovered but my bet is Nvidia will be running around like headless chicken thinking of a plan to fight back!

Keep posted for more information on these new graphics cards!

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Has Nvidia really bought out VIA the eastern based hardware company? Well No! The CEO of Nvidia Jen-Hsun Huang today told Cnet that they have no interest what so ever in buying VIA. I can imagine why the hype was created within the hardware community, with Intel and AMD looking to offer integrated chipset graphics Nvidia need to strategically move into the C.P.U markets.

As we are aware VIA have pushed newer technology to all sectors of the computer market by moving ISA into PCI based bus systems. They have also created memory, motherboard based architecture and even processors.

Now I can imagine why speculation was created between the two companies. Huang had to disagree with the comment. He stated that his motive was to be totally devoted to the graphics market and that Nvidia is a visual computing technology company to which they are completely focused on.

With this said, what will happen to Nvidia’s future? Did Jen-Hsun feel interrogated and pressured by the community? Is the CEO under a lot of pressure because of competition?

Well, with Intels larrabee graphics on the horizon, could Intel take Nvidia’s share of the graphics market? With raytracing being implemented by multiple vendors could this affect nvidia markets further?

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ATI are about to fight back with their latest editions of their graphics cards the 4800 series. The products are based on the RV770 Chip process. The 4870, 4850HD and 4850PRO all use GDDR3. The graphics cards are built on a 55nmand have 480 stream processors.

The 4870 is built with high-end GDDR5 memory something that Nvidia Lacks. The processing clock will run at 850 GPU and 1050 Mhz Memory clock. The slower card will spec at 650/850 Mhz.

They may be released in May, but don’t count on it!

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