AMD's ATI Radeon HD 4770 Released!

AMD's first 40nm GPU core, the RV470 has been released on the new mid range ATI Radeon HD 4770 with a starting price point of just USD99 or RM360.

The Radeon HD 4770 boast GDDR5 memory, DirectX 10.1 support, a 750 MHz clock speed, a memory clock of 800 MHz using a 128-bit memory bus and a frame buffer size of 512MB which produces 960 GLOPs of processing power. ATI CrossFireX is also supported.

If the current benchmarks is to be believed, not only is the Radeon HD 4770 faster than Nvidia's 9800GT, it would also be much cheaper.

Read on to get more info.

History of AMD

Over the course of AMD's four decades in business, silicon and software have become the steel and plastic of the worldwide digital economy. Technology companies have become global pacesetters, making technical advances at a prodigious rate — always driving the industry to deliver more and more, faster and faster.

However, “technology for technology's sake” is not the way we do business at AMD. Our history is marked by a commitment to innovation that's truly useful for customers — putting the real needs of people ahead of technical one-upmanship. AMD founder Jerry Sanders has always maintained that “customers should come first, at every stage of a company's activities.”

We believe our company history bears that out.

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1960

1969 AMD incorporates with $100,000; establishes headquarters in Sunnyvale,Ca
lifornia

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1970

1970
AMD introduces its first proprietary device: the Am2501 logic counter

1972

AMD goes public

1979
Production begins in new AMD Austin manufacturing facility

1979
AMD debuts on the New York Stock Exchange

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1980

1982
At IBM's request, AMD signs an agreement to serve as a second source to Intel for IBM PC microprocessors

1984
AMD is listed in "The 100 Best Companies to Work for in America

1985
AMD is listed in Fortune 500 for the first time ATI incorporates ATI develops its first graphics controller and first graphics board product

1986
ATI secures major contract with Commodore Business Machines to supply 7000 chips per week

1987
AMD acquires Monolithic Memories, Inc. and enters programmable logic business ATI debuts EGA Wonder™ and VGA Wonder™

1988
Work begins on AMD Submicron Development Center

1989
ATI assists in establishment of VESA standard for graphics industry

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1990

1991

AMD's Am386® microprocessor family debuts ATI introduces Mach8™ chip and board products: first ATI products to process graphics independently of the CPU

1992

ATI introduces Mach32™: first ATI integrated graphics controller and accelerator in one chip ATI releases VESA Local Bus (VLB) products, followed by peripheral component interconnect(PCI)products ATI establishes ATI GmbH in Munich, Germany

1993

AMD Am486® microprocessor family debuts AMD establishes joint venture with Fujitsu to produce Flash memory products ATI goes public; stocks are listed on NASDAQ and Toronto Stock Exchange

1994


AMD and Compaq Computer Corp. form long-term alliance to power Compaq computers with Am486 microprocessors ATI introduces Mach64™: first ATI graphics boards to accelerate motion video

1995
AMD introduces AMD-K5® microprocessor: first independently-designed, socket-compatible x86 microprocessor ATI is first graphics company to ship Mac-compatible graphics boards

1996

AMD acquires NexGen, a microprocessor companyATI releases industry's first 3D graphics chip, first combination graphics and TV tuner card, and first chip to display computer graphics on a television
ATI enters the notebook market with the industry's first notebook 3D graphics acceleratorATI establishes ATI Ireland
1997
AMD introduces the AMD-K6® microprocessor: helps drive PC prices below $1,000 for the first time, making PCs affordable to average consumers ATI is first graphics company to provide hardware support for DVD acceleration and displayATI is first graphics company to release products supporting Accelerated Graphics Port, the new industry standard

1998
ATI is first company to introduce a complete set-top box design
ATI ships its ten millionth AGP chip

1999
AMD Athlon™ processor becomes first seventh-generation processor for Microsoft® Windows® computing Vantis, AMD's programmable logic business, sold to Lattice Semiconductor

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2000

AMD is first to break the historic 1GHz (one billion clock cycles per second) with the AMD Athlon™ processor
AMD introduces AMD PowerNow!™ technology with Mobile AMD-K6®-2+ processors
ATI Radeon™ graphics technology debuts: leading product for high-end gaming and 3D workstations
ATI acquires ArtX, Inc., a graphics chipset company

2001

AMD Athlon™ MP processor debuts: the company's first multiprocessing platform
AMD HyperTransport™ technology is adopted by Agilent, Apple Computer, Broadcom, Cisco Systems, IBM, nVidia, Sun, and Texas Instruments

2002

AMD acquires Alchemy Semiconductor for low-power, embedded processor technology
AMD Cool'n'Quiet™ technology debuts with Athlon™ XP family: helps lower power consumption, enables quieter-running system, and delivers performance on-demand to maximize users' computing experience
ATI launches ATI Radeon™ 9700 Pro: world's first DirectX 9 graphics processor

2003

AMD and IBM sign joint manufacturing technology development agreement to develop future generation manufacturing technologies
AMD Opteron™ processor and AMD Athlon™ 64 processor debut
With Fujitsu, AMD forms FASL, LLC, and a new company: Spansion™
AMD forms strategic alliance with Sun Microsystems and acquires National Semiconductor's x86 business
ATI introduces ATI Radeon™ 9600 XT: world's first high volume 0.13um low-k chips

2004

AMD demonstrates world's first x86 dual-core processor
AMD announces the 50x15 Initiative with the goal of accelerating affordable Internet access and basic computing to 50 percent of the world's population by 2015
Advanced Micro Devices (China) Co., Ltd. is established, headquartered in Beijing
ATI is listed in the NASDAQ 100
ATI introduces first 110nm GPUs (ATI Radeon™ X800 XL)

2005

AMD introduces AMD Turion™ 64 mobile technology for notebook PCs and AMD Athlon™ 64 X 2 dual-core processor for desktop
AMD introduces the world's highest performing processors for 1-8P x86 servers and workstations
AMD files landmark antitrust litigation against Intel for illegally abusing its monopoly to exclude and limit competition
Spansion™ goes public
AMD announces grand opening of Fab 36 in Dresden, Germany
ATI GPU is featured in Microsoft Xbox 360, revolutionizing high-definition gaming

2006

AMD acquires ATI to create a new, innovative processing powerhouse CrossFire™ multi-GPU gaming platform debuts
AMD LIVE!™ media center PCs debut
Dell Inc. announces it will offer AMD processor-based systems
AMD begins revenue shipments of processors from Fab 36
AMD's Shanghai Research and Development Center (SRDC) launches to focus on the development of AMD's next-generation mobile platforms
AMD demonstrates the industry's first native quad-core x86 server processor
AMD is a founding member of The Green Grid, an open, global organization designed to decrease IT facility energy usage patterns

2007

AMD demonstrates Accelerated Computing platform that breaks teraflop performance barrier
AMD introduces ATI Radeon™ HD 2000 series graphics processors to deliver The Ultimate Visual Experience™ graphics for desktop and mobile platforms

2008

TACC, based on AMD Opteron processor-based Sun servers, becomes world's largest computer devoted to general research.
AMD LIVE!™ Explorer launches, enabling immersive HD entertainment for the home PC.
Launch of AMD Changing the Game, a non-profit program intended to improve kids' technical and life skills by teaching them to develop digital games with social content.
AMD demonstrates the Cinema 2.0 Experience, punching holes in the 'sensory barrier' separating cinema and games.
Dirk Meyer succeeds Hector Ruiz as CEO of AMD.

2009

GLOBALFOUNDRIES, a new leading-edge semiconductor manufacturing company, is formed by a joint venture between AMD and the Advanced Technology Investment Company (ATIC).
AMD introduces the ultrathin notebook platform codenamed "Yukon," enabling exceedingly thin and light OEM designs with rich entertainment capabilities at an affordable price. The platform is based on the new AMD Athlon™ Neo processor, ATI Radeon™ X1250 integrated graphics and optional ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3410 discrete graphics and enables true HD entertainment in a new category of stylish notebook PCs.
AMD introduces the AMD platform technology codenamed "Dragon" for desktop PCs, which provides the power to do it all by combining AMD's highest-performing CPU, the AMD Phenom™ II X4 processor, with award winning ATI Radeon™ HD 4800 Series graphics and AMD 7-Series chipsets.
AMD introduces its most energy efficient AMD Opteron™ processor to date: the Quad-Core AMD Opteron EE processor. The new technology not only delivers more choices for IT customers who require an extremely energy efficient solution, but also targets the unique needs of cloud computing platforms.
AMD ships the 50 millionth ATI 'Hollywood' graphics processor for the Wii game console from Nintendo, making 'Hollywood' the most successful AMD technology-based game console chip to date in terms of unit sales.
AMD unveils a plan to revolutionize the deployment, development and delivery of HD content through the 'AMD Fusion Render Cloud,' a massively-parallel supercomputer.
AMD's Lone Star campus in Austin, TX achieves a gold certification under the U.S. Green Building Council Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green Building Rating System. Based on current certified projects, this is the largest gold certified LEED® commercial building in Texas.

HP now selling super-safe laptop battery with three-year guarantee

It is a great time now to who ever using laptop and want to stay it without power socket when using it outside of house.HP now produce super-save laptop battery with three years warranty.



Below is description of it.

Considering that we're still getting reports every month or so about laptop batteries catching on fire and exploding, it's not really paranoid to be a little worried about the chemical cells that keep your notebook up and running.

When the crisis broke a few years ago, much research went into battery safety, but nothing ever came of it commercially, and today's batteries are more or less designed the same as they've ever been, just with a little stricter production processes.

Now, finally, one of these "safer" batteries has come to market via HP, which is selling batteries based on technology from Boston Power. The company claims its Sonata cells are "designed to meet and beat any safety standard" available. The HP version of these battery packs, known as the HP Enviro Series, are the first end-user products to use the Sonata technology, a technology which was first demonstrated over two years ago.

Priced at $150 (about a $20 premium over a standard battery), the six-cell battery packs are compatible with 16 existing HP and Compaq notebook models. Right now you can only get them as an add-on cell, but HP says it will begin selling the batteries with new laptops later this month.

There's more to this battery than just safety, though. First off, they charge lightning-fast, reaching up to 80 percent of total capacity in just 30 minutes. Arguably even better than that, the batteries can be recharged many more times than standard cells: Up to 1,000 times before performance and capacity begin to degrade, and HP backs that up with a three-year warranty on the batteries.

For comparison: Typical batteries take hours to hit 80 percent capacity and can only be recharged a few hundred times before capacity degrades to the point of uselessness (a problem called "battery fade").

Very cool technology, and I'd love to get a Sonata cell for my rig. I just wish they weren't so expensive!

Windows Vista Ready Boost

ReadyBoost is a component of Microsoft's Windows Vista operating system. It works by using flash memory, USB 2.0 drive, SD card, CompactFlash or any kind of portable flash mass storage system as a drive for disk cache.

ReadyBoost is present, with fewer restrictions than in Vista, in the beta version of Windows 7.ReadyBoost is also used to facilitate SuperFetch, an updated version of Windows XP's prefetcher which performs analysis of boot-time disk usage patterns and creates a cache which is used in subsequent system boots.

Using ReadyBoost-capable flash memory (NAND memory devices) for caching allows Windows Vista to service random disk reads with performance that is typically 80-100 times faster than random reads from traditional hard drives. This caching is applied to all disk content, not just the page file or system DLLs.

Flash devices are typically slower than the hard drive for sequential I/O, so to maximize performance, ReadyBoost includes logic to recognize large, sequential read requests and then allows these requests to be serviced by the hard drive.
When a compatible device is plugged in, the Windows AutoPlay dialog offers an additional option to use the flash drive to speed up the system; an additional "ReadyBoost" tab is added to the drive's properties dialog where the amount of space to be used can be configured.

250 MB to 4 GB of flash memory can be assigned. ReadyBoost encrypts, with AES-128, and compresses all data that is placed on the flash device; Microsoft has stated that a 2:1 compression ratio is typical, so that a 4 GB cache could contain upwards of 8 GB of data.

According to Jim Allchin, for future releases of Windows, ReadyBoost will be able to use spare RAM on other networked Windows Vista PCs.For a device to be compatible and useful it must conform to the following requirements:
• The capacity of the removable media must be at least 256 MB (250 after formatting)
• Devices larger than 4 GB will have only 4 GB used for ReadyBoost
• The device should have an access time of 1 ms or less
• The device must be capable of 2.5 MB/s read speeds for 4 KB random reads spread uniformly across the entire device and 1.75 MB/s write speeds for 512 KB random writes spread uniformly across the device
• NTFS, FAT16 and FAT32 are supported (Windows 7 and Vista SP2 will support also the new exFAT filesystem)
• The initial release of ReadyBoost for Windows Vista supports one device. Windows 7 supports the simultaneous use of ReadyBoost on multiple flash drives.
• The recommended amount of flash memory to use for Windows ReadyBoost acceleration is one to three times the amount of random access memory (RAM) installed in your computer depending on the brand, wear and tear due to read-write cycles, and size of the flash memory, the ability to format as NTFS may not be available. Enabling write caching on the flash drive by selecting Optimize for performance in Device Manager will allow formatting as NTFS.

source:wikipedia

Why is your graphics solution important?

Much of what you do on a computer today, including using the Vista operating system, browsing the Internet, editing photos, making presentations, watching movies, and gaming, is becoming increasingly visually intensive. Selecting the right graphics solution can make these visually intensive tasks come alive, and enable a rich, lifelike and pleasing experience.

Which Graphic Solution Should I Select?

Basic (Integrated) solutions: In a basic solution, the graphics “engine” is part of the system chipset, and the memory that is used for graphics is typically part of the main memory (RAM) that is also used for other system functions. A basic solution may be adequate for you if you use your notebook for basic tasks. For example:

* Word processing or e-mail
* Run the Microsoft Vista Basic operating system
* Browse the internet and visit text-heavy sites


Advanced (Discrete) solutions: Advanced solutions are physically separate (“discrete”) from the chipset, and include a high performance graphics engine that is dedicated to executing graphics functions, as well as high-speed graphics memory that is also separate from main system memory. Typically, discrete solutions are more powerful than integrated solutions, and are the preferred type of solution if you use your notebook for visually demanding tasks. For example:

* Run the Vista Premium, Vista Business or Vista Ultimate Operating systems
* Browse graphics intensive web sites
* Play video games
* View, create and edit videos

Help you to choose battery cell

When choosing a laptop battery, it’s important to consider how your laptop is used:

* Is your laptop plugged in on your desktop most of the time?
* Do you spend more time unplugged than plugged in?
* Do size and weight matter when you travel?

In most cases, the number of cells inside a battery determines its size, weight and life between charges. A cell is essentially a smaller battery that is packaged with and connected to other cells to form one large battery. Generally, the more cells, the more power, weight and size a battery has.

Finally, it’s important to note that battery life is always subject to demands and usage. For extended periods of use away from an outlet, you might want to consider purchasing a second battery for your laptop from Dell.com.

Computer virus attacks 'to peak next Monday'

Internet users are being warned to stay vigilant by researchers who believe that next Monday could be the worst day the year for computer attacks.

After analysing information on viruses and internet worms taken from more than 500,000 machines around the world, security experts at PC Tools have pinpointed November 24 as the potential peak of malicious software activity for 2008.

Data from 2007 showed that the high point of action from viruses, worms and other internet-based attacks came three days before America's Thanksgiving holiday, leading them to suggest that the same day could prove the bleakest 24 hours of this year.

The company says the increase in virus activity could be the result of internet shopping in the run-up to Christmas, as millions of users begin going online to purchase gifts for their friends and family.

With the chance for criminals to access financial details, online shoppers make an attractive target for the writers of malware.

The number of people shopping online this Christmas is expected to grow again this year, with internet sales in the UK alone predicted to hit £13.16bn – an increase of 15% over 2007.

More people are expected to use the web for their shopping as a way of finding lower prices to help them beat the credit crunch.

But while security experts are expecting the traditional increase of malware over November and December, they have also warned of another source of potential attacks. Spammers and criminals have attempted to use the popularity of American president-elect Barack Obama as a way to trick users into downloading malware.

A flood of emails purporting to link to a video of Obama's acceptance speech were actually connected to a trojan horse program which would compromise the target's PC. Meanwhile, a separate burst of spam messages contained a file called BarackObama.exe, which, when activated, places a rootkit on the victim's machine and opens it up to hackers around the world.