CES 2013 Podcast Day 1 - Everything Lenovo, NVIDIA Tegra 4 and Shield
Subject: General Tech | January 7, 2013 - 04:33 AM | Ryan Shrout
Tagged: video, Thinkpad, tegra 4, shield, podcast, nvidia, Lenovo, ideacentre, ces 2013, CES
CES 2013 Podcast Day 1 - 01/06/2013
It's time for podcast fun at CES! Join us as we talk about the first day of the show including a lot of announcements from Lenovo, the NVIDIA Tegra 4 and Shield products and more!
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Hosts: Ryan Shrout, Josh Walrath, Allyn Malventano and Ken Addison
Program length: 45:50
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PC Perspective's CES 2013 coverage is sponsored by AMD.
Follow all of our coverage of the show at http://pcper.com/ces!
CES 2013: NVIDIA Officially Releases Tegra 4 SoC
Subject: General Tech | January 7, 2013 - 03:01 AM | Tim Verry
Tagged: tegra 4, SoC, nvidia, cortex a15, ces 2013, CES, arm
Details about NVIDIA’s latest system on a chip (SoC) for mobile devices leaked last month. On Sunday, NVIDIA officially released its Tegra 4 chip, and talked up more details on the new silicon.
Interestingly, the leaked information from the slide held true over the weekend when NVIDIA officially unveiled it during a press conference. The new chip is manufactured on a 28nm, low power, high-k metal gate process. It features four ARM Cortex-A15 CPU cores running at up to 1.9GHz, one (additional) low power Cortex-A15 companion core, a NVIDIA GeForce GPU with 72 cores (not unified shader design unfortunately). In addition, the Tegra 4 SoC includes the company’s i500 programmable soft modem, and a number of fixed function hardware used for audio and image processing.
According to Anandtech, the majority of GPU cores in the Tegra 4 are 20-bit pixel shaders though exact specifications on the GPU are still unknown. Further, the i500 modem currectly supports LTE UE Category 3 on the WCDMA band with an LTE 4 modem expected in the future.
Image Credit: ArsTechnica attended the NVIDIA press conference.
Tegra 4 will support dual channel LP-DDR3 memory, USB 3.0, and a technology that NVIDIA is calling its Computational Photography Architecture that allegedly will allow real-time HDR imagery with still and video shoots.
According to NVIDIA, Tegra 4 will be noticeably faster than its predecessors and the competing SoCs from Apple and Qualcomm et al. When compared to the Nexus 10 (Samsung Exynos 5 SoC) and the stock Android web browser, the Tegra 4 device (Chrome browser) opened pages in 27 seconds versus the Nexus 10’s 50 second benchmark time. Users will have to wait for retail devices with Tegra 4 hardware for independent benchmarks, however. Thanks to the higher top-end clockspeed and beefier GPU, you can expect Tegra 4 to be faster than Tegra 3, but until reviewers get their hands on Tegra 4-powered devices it is difficult to say just how much faster it is.
Speaking of hardware, the Tegra 4 chip will most likely be used in tablets (and not smartphones). Here’s hoping we see some prototype Tegra 4 devices or product announcements later this week at CES.
PC Perspective's CES 2013 coverage is sponsored by AMD.
Follow all of our coverage of the show at http://pcper.com/ces!
CES 2013: NVIDIA Grid to Fight Gaikai and OnLive?
Subject: Editorial, General Tech, Graphics Cards, Systems, Mobile, Shows and Expos | January 7, 2013 - 01:07 AM | Scott Michaud
Tagged: CES, ces 2013, nvidia
The second act of the NVIDIA keynote speech re-announced their Grid cloud-based gaming product first mentioned back in May during GTC. You have probably heard of its competitors, Gaikai and OnLive. The mission of these services is to have all of the gaming computation done in a server somewhere and allow the gamer to log in and just play.
The NVIDIA Grid is their product top-to-bottom. Even the interface was created by NVIDIA and, as they laud, rendered server-side using the Grid. It was demonstrated to stream to an LG smart TV directly or Android tablets. A rack will contain 20 servers with 240 GPUs with a total of 200 Teraflops of computational power. Each server will initially be able to support 24 players, which is interesting, given the last year of NVIDIA announcements.
Last year, during the GK110 announcement, Kepler was announced to support hundreds of clients to access a single server for professional applications. It seems only natural that Grid would benefit from that advancement: but it apparently does not. With a limit of 24 players per box, equating to a maximum of two players per GPU, it seems odd that a limit would be in place. The benefit of stacking multiple players per GPU is that you can achieve better-than-linear scaling in the long-tail of games.
Then again, all they need to do is solve the scaling problem before they have a problem with scaling their service.
PC Perspective's CES 2013 coverage is sponsored by AMD.
Follow all of our coverage of the show at http://pcper.com/ces!
CES 2013: Seagate Wireless Plus - All the Mobiles!
Subject: General Tech, Storage, Mobile, Shows and Expos | January 6, 2013 - 10:11 PM | Scott Michaud
Tagged: Seagate, ces 2013, CES
Certain mobile device manufacturers do not include a standard powered USB type A port for your removable storage? There’s an app for a peripheral for that!
The Seagate Wireless Plus basically amounts to a 1TB external drive duct taped to a battery with a wireless dongle overly attached to it. The manufacturer claims that there is enough charge to power your storage for 10 hours to remain powered for as long as your mobile device. Seagate programmed compatibility with iOS, Android, and Kindle Fire HD as well as extra functionality for Airplay, SLNA, and a Samsung app for Smart TVs and BluRay players. In other words, at the very least this drive was designed for compatibility with a lot of devices.
The device is currently available online at Amazon and BestBuy. It is expected to cost $199.99 MSRP. Press blast after the break.
PC Perspective's CES 2013 coverage is sponsored by AMD.
Follow all of our coverage of the show at http://pcper.com/ces!
Storage Visions - The Panasonic DataArchiver - 108TB of Blu-Ray Archival Storage in a 6U Chassis
Subject: Storage, Shows and Expos | January 6, 2013 - 09:59 PM | Allyn Malventano
Tagged: Panasonic, ces 2013, CES, bluray
At Storage Visions I came across a clever device from Panasonic. The DataArchiver:
This is a 6U rack-mount chasses, capable of being filled with 108TB of Blu-Ray discs. Several stacks of 12-disc cartridges load into two drawers. A handler rides between the two drawers, fetching cartridges as needed, and loading the discs into the 12 installed Blu-Ray drives:
This system provides excellent long-term archival storage of Blu-Ray discs (when handled properly - as it does), and for the extra cautious, the system can even mount and access the discs as RAID-5 or 6 volumes, allowing for single or double protection from faulty discs / disc sectors. The DataArchiver also implements AES256 across all discs in the array. Certainly an interesting piece of archival technology.
PC Perspective's CES 2013 coverage is sponsored by AMD.
Follow all of our coverage of the show at http://pcper.com/ces!
Storage Visions - FusionIO shows off ioDrive II and ioFX
Subject: Storage, Shows and Expos | January 6, 2013 - 09:31 PM | Allyn Malventano
Tagged: storage visions, fusionio, ces 2013, CES
At Storage Visions, we checked out new products from FusionIO, namely the ioDrive II and ioFX:
There was a demo running with a pair of ioFX units paired together:
The pair were driving a demo which was streaming 12 uncompressed HD streams, playing back simultaneously, and drawing a continuous 3GB/sec from the storage:
More important was the conversation I had which hinted at bootability coming to these drives soon (albeit only with UEFI due to the demands the FusionIO device driver places on the host system). Also of interest was that ioSphere, the front end manager for FusionIO products, now has a HTTP / web-based interface, meaning administrators can now manage and push firmware updates to dozens or hundreds of ioDrive's simultaneously.
PC Perspective's CES 2013 coverage is sponsored by AMD.
Follow all of our coverage of the show at http://pcper.com/ces!
CES 2013: Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga 11S Brings Intel Core i5 to 11-in Form Factor
Subject: Mobile | January 6, 2013 - 07:31 PM | Ryan Shrout
Tagged: yoga 11s, yoga 11, yoga, Lenovo, ideapad yoga, Ideapad, ces 2013, CES
The Lenovo Yoga laptops were actually announced at last year's CES and we have had one in house for a couple of months as well, doing a quick look type video of it back in October. The Yoga notebooks are convertible Ultrabooks with a 360 degree hinge allowing you to wrap the display behind the keyboard and put the machine into a tablet form factor. The first one we saw was powered by the Intel Core i5 processor but was in a 13-in design.
There has been an 11-in version of the Yoga, but it was powered by NVIDIA's Tegra 3 processor and runs Windows RT. The Yoga 11S being announced today runs the full version of Windows 8 and includes Intel ULV Ivy Bridge Core i5 series processors, integrated Intel HD 4000 graphics and can be configured with up to 8GB of DDR3 memory and a 256GB SSD.
An 11.6-in 1366x768 IPS display with 10 point touch capability is at the heart of the convertible notebook that is rated at 6 hours of battery life with a 3.08 lbs fighting weight.
The Yoga's biggest feature is the ability to convert into four different "modes" of usage: laptop, tablet, stand and tent. You can see all of them demonstrated on our Yoga 13 preview video above and the same forms exist on the new Yoga 11S.
The Yoga 11S will also be available in "Clementine"
The Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga 11S will be available in mid-February and will start at $799.
Check out the full press release after the break!
PC Perspective's CES 2013 coverage is sponsored by AMD.
Follow all of our coverage of the show at http://pcper.com/ces!
CES 2013: Lenovo ThinkPad Helix Convertible Ultrabook With "Rip and Flip" Design
Subject: Mobile | January 6, 2013 - 07:21 PM | Ryan Shrout
Tagged: ultrabook, Thinkpad, tablet, Lenovo, helix, convertible tablet, ces 2013, CES
The ThinkPad line from Lenovo just got a bit more interesting with the announcement of the Helix, a new touch-enabled convertible tablet form factor that includes a new design labeled as "rip and flip."
Hardware specifications on the Helix are pretty impressive given the small form factor and include Ivy Bridge-based Core i7 processors, up to 8GB of memory and a 256GB SSD, two USB 3.0 ports, RJ45 port, mini-DisplayPort and even mini-HDMI. The machine will also have optional LTE radios to go along with the 802.11n WiFi and even NFC support.
The display panel is an IPS 11.6-in 1080p rated at 400 nits - that is very high brightness for a Lenovo machine in my experience. The screen is rated for 10 point touch capability as well in case you need BOTH HANDS for your project.
Also new is the Lenovo glass ClickPad which I am very eager to get my hands and try. That is the one area where MacBooks have continued to dominate in terms of notebook design and if Lenovo's ThinkPads can match or improve then we might have a winner on our hands.
The machine will weigh in at 3.68 lbs for the tablet and dock, 1.84 lbs for the tablet on its own, for great portability. Battery life claims are at 5 hours on the tablet alone and 10 hours with the tablet and base combination, but as with all battery life specifications plan on cutting that to 50-60% for real-world usage scenarios.
The new form factor of the ThinkPad Helix is being branded as "rip and flip" due to the tablets ability to be pulled off the keyboard / trackpad dock easily with a single release point. Folding it down into a standard clamshell design results in your standrad laptop configuration, but with only a 20mm z-height.
Lenovo will start shipping the ThinkPad Helix in mid-February with a starting price of $1,499.
Keep checking our CES 2013 coverage at http://pcper.com/ces and continue on after the break for the full press release!
PC Perspective's CES 2013 coverage is sponsored by AMD.
Follow all of our coverage of the show at http://pcper.com/ces!
Lenovo Makes a Play for the All-In-One Crowd with the IdeaCentre A730
Subject: Systems | January 6, 2013 - 06:00 PM | Chris Barbere
Tagged: system, Lenovo, ideacenter, ces 2013, CES, A730
Lenovo has announced their new IdeaCentre A730, "the world's slimming 27-inch multi-touch all-in-one". Mesuring less than an inch thick, the A730 can support up to 10 touch points and is optimized for Windows 8.
Key Features include:
- 27-inch multi-touch frameless display measuring just 24.5 mm (0.9 inches) thick
- 10 finger multi-touch technology, optimized for Windows 8
- Widely adjustable screen angle for comfortable use
- Large 27” Quad or Full HD display
- Up to 3rd Gen Intel® Core™ i7 processor
- Up to NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 745M 2GB graphics
- Up to 1TB HDD storage or 1TB SSHD storage with 8GB SSD cache
A widely adjustable, frameless display allows the screen to be set into almost any position and folded back for added comfort.
PC Perspective's CES 2013 coverage is sponsored by AMD.
Follow all of our coverage of the show at http://pcper.com/ces!
Lenovo IdeaCentre Horizon 27-in Table PC for Computing and Gaming
Subject: Systems | January 6, 2013 - 06:00 PM | Ryan Shrout
Tagged: video, table pc, Lenovo, ideacentre, horizon, ces 2013, CES
Lenovo claims to be ushering in "an entirely new PC category" at CES this year with the IdeaCentre Horizon table PC. That's right a table; though not a very large one with a 27-in display. The hardware specifications aren't particularly interesting and include a 1080p display, Core i7 Ivy Bridge processor, discrete graphics options topping out at the GeForce GT 620M, optional SSD, Bluetooth, 802.11n, etc.
We stopped by the Lenovo suite earlier in the week and got some hands-on time with the unit as well as a walk through of its features. Check out the video here:
The 27-in display is actually capable of 10 point multi-touch capability and allows for "interpersonal" computing which simply means it is intended for more than one user at a time. Lenovo claims that this makes it a family PC and for some unique cases including game nights and various kids-based applications. Of course, you can tilt up to 90 degrees and use the machine for standard computing circumstances.
The Horizon is pretty thin at just over 1-in when looking at the profile. It weighs almost 18 pounds and that wouldn't normally matter except that Lenovo has put a battery in this machine capable of keeping it running for up to 2 hours without a power connection. The idea of a portable 27-in monitor with a 2 hour battery life is humorous to say the least but would still be useful for taking to the couch to use as a dinner table while watching TV and reading on your incredibly close 1080p screen. Seriously though, the intention is to allow consumers to take the Horizon to the coffee table and play a game with the family without having to run a cable to the wall.
Lenovo is even going to have some gaming accessories included with the IdeaCentre Horizon including a striker, joystick and the coolest thing I've ever seen, an e-dice. It will come preloaded with games from EA, Ubisoft and more importantly, Monopoly. SOLD!
Pricing will start at $1699 and availability is schedule for early summer. Check out the full press release after the break!
PC Perspective's CES 2013 coverage is sponsored by AMD.
Follow all of our coverage of the show at http://pcper.com/ces!
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