Tech Olive

While we at least know that new MacBook Pros will be arriving sometime soon (rumored for March 11th), word has gotten around that Apple will also update the MacBook Air this summer, and it’s none other than a Sandy Bridge update. While this may not seem like a huge piece of news, keep in mind that the current MacBook Air line uses last-gen Core 2 Duo chips with less-than-stellar graphics. Despite this, there not all that bad, but with Sandy Bridge, the MacBook Air could possibly be an amazing piece of work, since the graphics are built directly onto the CPU chip.

via [CNET]

Intel made the announcement today that they have discovered quite a major design flaw in their new Sandy Bridge 6 Series chipsets. This affects all P67 and H67 motherboards that were sold since release and ones that are currently stocked. Intel says that the issue is related to the SATA degradation of the motherboard and that throughout the lifespan of the board, there is potential of a big decrease in performance and even non-recognition of attached devices. For now, Intel has stopped its chip manufacturing to find a way to fix the issue and is working with OEMs and motherboard manufacturers on customer support procedures and it’s very possible that recalls will be implemented.

Intel estimates the cost of repair and replacing the chipsets will be over $700 million, but they do think that new and updated chipsets should begin shipping by late February.

Thanks, Daz

[Hardware Canucks]

Maybe hell froze over or something, but it’s straight out of Chipzilla’s mouth that the frontman of the Black Eyed Peas, Will.i.am, is now the “director of creative innovations” at Intel. As far as his duties are concerned, it’s all pretty foggy at this point. Intel only had this to say about what he’ll be doing:

“In his unique role, will.i.am will collaborate with Intel on many creative and technology endeavors across the “compute continuum” that may include such devices as laptops, smart phones and tablets. Complementing his visionary role as the front man for The Black Eyed Peas, will.i.am is also already working on music expressly for Intel.”

Intel, what have you done?

[Intel via LA Times]

Hot on the heels of Intel‘s release of newer-gen Core processors, Asus says that they’re set to raise quotes on their motherboards. Chewei Lin, general manager of the motherboard division at Asus, said the increase isn’t due to greed or taking advantage of the new Sandy Bridge CPUs, but rather to cope with the labor shortage in China, the NT dollar’s appreciation and higher material costs (copper mostly). However, Lin continued on saying that this will hardly affect everyday consumers and DIY system builders since prices have already been on the rise recently. It mostly affect OEMs and their contracts with motherboard makers like Asus.

via [DigiTimes]

Image Credit: jepuy

At CES 2011, we saw an influx of Sandy Bridge laptops and desktops, but the CPUs themselves weren’t for sale yet. However, online vendors such as Newegg are now selling a few models of Sandy Bridge processors. Models available and pricing are as follows:

• Core i5 2300 (2.8GHz) – $185
• Core i5 2400 (3.1GHz) – $195
• Core i5 2400S (2.5GHz) – $205
• Core i5 2500 (3.3GHz) – $210
• Core i5 2500K (3.3GHz) – $225
• Core i7 2600 (3.4GHz) – $300
• Core i7 2600K (3.4GHz) – $330

You’ll notice there’s a letter after some of the models. “K” represents an unlocked processor, while “S” represents a CPU with a 65W TDP. Unfortunately, these new procs use a new socket type (1155), so you won’t be able to nail them down into your current motherboards.

[Newegg]

CES 2011 has now come and gone and what a week it was! While the show officially started on Thursday, companies were already announcing and unveiling new products as early as Monday, and since I didn’t cover everything that happened under the Las Vegas Convention Center roof, I decided to sit down and reflect back on the week, as well as catch up on stuff that I missed.

After the break, I’ll be recapping some of the best in PC products that were shown at CES and give you my prediction on what this year will have in store for us based on what we saw at CES 2011.

Continue Reading »

I got some good news and I got some bad news. Which do you want to hear first? The good news, eh? Alright.

The good news is that Intel’s Light Peak technology is all ready to go!

The bad news is that it will use copper instead of fiber optics. That’s right, folks. The same technology that was used by the two-hundred-year-old telegraph is being used in Light Peak. So what gives? David Perlmutter, executive vice president and general manager of Intel’s Architecture Group, says that fiber optics is too new of a technology, so it’s still relatively expensive. Plus, he found that copper “came out very good, surprisingly better than what we thought.” He continued by saying that a majority of users today will be fine with just copper, but fiber optics is still the faster transfer protocol (duh).

Seriously? Intel is settling for mediocrity? So I guess it can’t really be called “Light Peak” anymore since, you know, copper doesn’t use light…

via [Computerworld]

That’s right, ladies and gents. Angry Birds has hit PC. For those that don’t know, Angry Birds was previously only available as a mobile app and quickly became the addiction of over 6.5 million people according to the sales numbers as of August 2010. The gameplay itself is a mix of strategy, physics, and reverse-tower defense that has the player launching birds at evil pigs to get stolen eggs back. PC gamers wanting in on the action or any mobile gamers wanting to play in glorious full HD graphics, head over to Intel’s “AppUp” digital distribution platform and download yourself a copy for $4.99.

UPDATE: We almost forgot. Angry Birds is also available in the Mac App Store for the same price of $4.99. Apparently it’s already the top selling game on there. Who woulda thunk it?

via [Big Download]

We’ve seen a lot of leaks about Intel’s upcoming 2nd generation Core processors (codenamed Sandy Bridge), making it seem like it has already been announced, but Intel is just now officially officializing their next gen family of CPUs. So what new details do they have for us? Well, the entire family will consist of 29 total processors that will consist of desktop and mobile versions of new Core i3, i5 and i7 chips. All of the new CPUs will be built on Intel’s 32nm architecture and will be the first to have the processor, memory controller and graphics all on the same die, which means we’ll be see some mean laptops in even smaller packages.

So what can we expect? Intel says that around 500 machines will use the new CPUs. There’s already been a few systems that have leaked out and we should see a boat load of machines be unveiled at CES later this week.

via [Engadget]

This isn’t the first machine spotted running Intel’s new Sandy Bridge chip by any means, but it’s the first with benchmarks included, and boy are they impressive! This leaked 17-inch Alienware M17x gaming laptop scored a 15,940 in 3DMark06 sporting a 2GHz Core i7-2630QM with integrated graphics. Yes, integrated graphics. Furthermore, a higher-end version of the M17x scored a 20,155 running a 2.2GHz Core i7-2720QM with AMD Radeon HD 6900M graphics. Not too shabby.

[Notebook Review Forums via Engadget]

Image Credit: Chip Hell