Computer Systems - Page 32

Apple hasn't upgraded the Mac Pro in a significant way since 2010. The case is still the original aluminum design that the Intel Mac Pro launched with back in 2006. Many professional users have felt a bit left out since Apple normally updates their systems yearly. These lack of updates have even sparked rumors that Apple is planning to discontinue the Mac Pro line of systems.

However, Tim Cook has continued to say that a new Mac Pro will be coming later this year. Apple is unable to continue selling the current version of the Mac Pro in Europe as it doesn't meet new regulatory standards for safety. One French retailer has said that Apple pointed them towards a spring launch of a new Mac Pro design.

Spring will officially end on June 20, meaning Apple's Worldwide Developer Conference, which runs June 11-15, is within that time frame. If a new Mac Pro is to be launched this spring, the Worldwide Developers Conference is the most likely suspect for when and where it will be launched.

CES 2013 - I visited Digital Storm's suite and the focus of the room really was this massive system known as the Aventum. A fully customizable system, the Aventum starts at just shy of $5,000 and can run all the way up to $8,000 or more. It sits in a case custom designed by Digital Storm and fabbed locally in the San Francisco Bay Area.

The case is simple and elegant, and the model they were showing off in the suite, and subsequently at the Intel party tonight, featured hard-plumbed watercooling, an Intel 3970K, dual EVGA GTX 690s, and a plethora of other high performance components.

It features the Digital Storm A.R.E.S. cooling system, which allows lights, fans, and monitoring to be controlled from within Windows. If you're in the market for a new system, you should definitely check the Aventum out.

The tiny Raspberry Pi has been a popular system among hackers and educators alike. For $35, you get a fully functional PC to mess around with, program, and do what you like. If you own one and don't know where to start, you're in luck, as the system has gotten a free educational manual courtesy of a team of UK teachers from Computing at School.

The manual is licensed with a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 unported licence, which in non-legal speak means you can use, redistribute, change and copy. There's only one limitation: you can't sell it. There's lots of information in the manual, such as information of Scratch, Python, and the command line.

You can grab it from the Pi Store, or from this link if you don't have a Pi yet. Raspberry Pi would also like to issue a thanks to those who helped in the creation:

LG is teasing us with some information about their 2013 lineup of PCs and notebooks ahead of their CES 2013 debut. All of the machines are Windows 8-powered and use LG's IPS display technology, which should make them ideal for users who need accurate color reproduction, such as photographers.

The first is LG's hybrid notebook, the H160 Tab-Book, which features an 11.6-inch display and QWERTY keyboard that is hidden beneath. It weighs in at 2.3 pounds and is only 0.6 inches thick. It reportedly has 12.5 hours of battery life, though the processor isn't detailed. I would venture to guess an Atom will power the machine. A second model, the Z160, comes with all of the same specifications, but comes with an i5 processor and higher specifications.

LG's Ultrabook, the Z360, comes in at 2.5 pounds and 0.5 inches thick and will be powered by a core i5 processor. It features a full HD IPS display. Finally, LG is showing off the AIO V325, which will have a 23-inch display. The screen will feature 10-point multitouch support and will be powered by an i5 coupled with a GT 640M. Interestingly, it will feature a TV tuner and picture-in-picture so that you can watch both TV and your desktop at the same time.

ORIGIN PC, a boutique manufacturer of laptops and desktops, has announced today that they are bringing back ready-to-ship models for the holidays so that you can get that new system on time to game on Christmas Day. The systems are like most pre-configured system in that they have already been built and can be shipped out next-day.

According to the press release, "These high-performance systems are available while supplies last and offer the same unmatched quality and performance as every custom ORIGIN PC without the wait and without any compromise. Every RTS system is put through the same rigorous benchmarking and testing and built and supported in the United States. With included popular PC games, features such as professional overclocking and award winning Lifetime 24/7 Support, the ORIGIN PC RTS system makes the perfect holiday gift."

You can choose ready-to-ship models from the MILLENNIUM, EON15-S and EON17-S lines of computers. The EONs are both laptops, while the MILLENNIUM is a desktop gaming rig.

If you thought that the Raspberry Pi models found in the cheap Model A and Model B offerings were great - well, things are about to get a whole lot Moore's Law-sy with Hardkernel's latest offering.

The product in question is the ODROID-U, which costs just $69 but sports a 1.4GHz quad-core Exynos 4412 CPU, you know - the same thing that powers Samsung's Galaxy S III and Note II smartphones. On top of its quad-core processor, it has 1GB of RAM, a quad-core Mali 400 graphics chip, micro-HDMI out, USB ports, a headphone jack and Ethernet connectivity.

One thing the ODROID-U doesn't have is on-board flash memory, Hardkernel have left this out and provided a microSD card slot instead. For an additional $20, you can get yourself double the ram at 2GB, and get the chip clocked up to a nice (and hopefully not toasty) 1.7GHz on the ODROID-U2 model.

Apple just can't catch a break lately - iPhone 5s are experiencing issues, their stock is dropping like its not hot, and now there's rumors circling that Apple's previous warnings of the new iMac model would see "significant shortages", may actually push the release of the new Retina-sporting iMacs into 2013.

Apple currently states on their US site that the new 21.5-inch iMac will be released later this month, with the 27-inch model coming next month. But, if the rumors are actually true, we could see a delay of the new iMac in relation to Apple's new production method which has been dubbed "friction-stir welding".

This method utilizes intense heat and pressure, which is used to create an even more seamless join than previous techniques used. We've heard about delays, with Apple CEO Tim Cook stating in a conference call with analysts that the new iMac would see "significant shortages" but didn't state why, but continued to expect that the new Retina iMacs would make their original November and December delivery dates.

Being based in Australia is great for some things, the culture, the laid-back lifestyle, health care, and the weather - but there are huge downsides in that we don't see a lot of great IT brands getting any recognition in this company which excites me that little bit more when I get to be involved with companies like Digital Storm and their latest creation, Bolt.

Digital Storm's new Bolt is the company's slimmest, custom-designed gaming PC yet. Digital Storm's engineers went on a search for a slim chassis, but didn't find any on the market that suited their needs, so they did the next best thing - created their own chassis from the ground up, as you do.

This means that every aspect of Bolt's design from cooling, performance and upgradeability were designed not only specific to the bolt, but to the highest possible standards. Digital Storm's Bolt measures in at just 3.6-inch wide, and 14-inch tall. The thin chassis that makes up the Bolt is also designed to effectivity vent out heat allowing it to sport the best components on the market, without worrying about it breaking a sweat.

"The Mac mini is packed with great features. But the action on this product and the update is on the inside." Four USB 3.0, SD card reader, HDMI, i5 or i7 Ivy Bridge, 16GB of RAM, and 1TB or 256GB of flash. Server model comes with a 2.3GHz i7, 4GB of RAM, and dual 1TB drives for $999. Both ship today.

Phil really rushed through that to get to the iMac refresh. The iMac has gone through 7 generations, with "each one better than the last." The new one is incredibly thin. "It's stunning from every side. Edge-to-edge glass... Would you like to see one in person?" "The most beautiful Mac we've ever made."

And here comes the specifications. At the edge, its only 5mm thick. It features no optical drive, an IPS screen, and all of the internal components have been "re-engineered."

If you thought the Raspberry Pi was impressive, you ain't seen nothing yet. Intel have asked their engineers to build the absolute smallest fully-featured compute unit possible, which is something they like to call the Next Unit of Computing.

On a board measuring just 4 inches by 4 inches, you'll find an integrated Core i3 processor on a 7-series chipset, mini-PCIe slot, mSATA slot, two SO-DIMM slots and three USB ports. Power is supposed through an external AC/DC adapter, but there's also a header for an optional internal power supply. Filling out the external ports we have an ethernet port, and two HDMI outputs.

Intel's Next Unit of Computing isn't a standard form factor just yet, which means the chipmaker had to work with a chassis vendor in order to put together the reference platform. Intel are hoping to sell you a chassis, PSU and Core i3-powered motherboard for the $399 or so mark. This would also include an mSATA SSD of some description, but would be OS-less. $399 is impressive, at that size.

HP unveiled four new all-in-one PCs on Monday, starting with the SpectreOne. The SpectreOne is jut 11.5mm thin, making it HP's thinnest all-in-one PC yet. Sporting a 23.6-inch flush-glass Full HD display with a curved back, the SpectreOne looks swish.

Together with its wireless trackpad with multi-touch technology, with the ability of easily scrolling, swiping and tapping through Windows 8's tile-based OS, it is very, very Apple iMac-like. The SpectreOne is filled with an NVIDIA GPU, optional SSD and optional ExpressCache, two USB 2.0 ports and two USB 3.0 ports.

It also, surprisingly, sports NFC technology, where you can transfer pictures, videos and other goodies to the PC just by tapping a smartphone or NFC tag to its base. HP has also said that the SpectreOne sports "the latest Intel processors", but has left out any specifics. HP's SpectreOne desktop will be made available across the US in November, with a starting price of $1,299.

Fox News are reporting that "multiple sources" have teased that Apple will unveil new desktop iMacs next week at their September 12 event. I think we're going to see them, too.

The new iMacs would most likely sport third-generation Intel Core CPUs, as well as Retina displays. Right now there's no confirmation, but I think we're going to see more products unveiled at the event. Maybe a new iPhone, new iMac, new iPad mini, new iPod touch and iOS 6. Count those, that's 5 things. The shadowing on the last teaser posted showed the number 12, with the shadow reading '5'. Everyone thinks it's going to be the iPhone 5, but what if it's actually 5 separate, refreshed and brand spankin' new Apple devices? That would be quite the epic event, especially after what we've seen from Motorola and Amazon in the past week.

Think about it, there have been 6 iPhones, meaning that the new iPhone being called 'iPhone 5', would make it feel out of whack with Apple's numbering scheme. The new iPad dropped its number, and was just called the 'new iPad'. I really think we're going to see Apple do the same thing with the iPhone, and just call it the 'new iPhone'.

Windows 8 is nearly here, and partner to Microsoft, Samsung, have unveiled three new all-in-one PCs. They're known as Samsung's Series 5 and Series 7 PCs, and all of them are of course powered by Microsoft's nearly-here OS, Windows 8.

The Series 7 is the higher-end of the lot, sporting a 27- and 23.6-inch model coming in at $1,699 and $1,099, respectively. Both models include a 1920x1080 multi-touchscreen, meaning you can take full advantage of Windows 8 touch abilities. Just like smart devices, the new all-in-one PCs have the ability to zoom in on photos and web sites using the pinch-to-zoom gesture, as well as scrolling through pages by swiping the screen.

Samsung has also added five hand-gesture-recognition features that allow a user to perform functions without tapping the touchscreen. If you were to hold your hand in front of the screen and rotate it clockwise, it would turn the volume on a movie up, turn it counterclockwise, and the volume gets turned down. Swiping left or right would turn the pages of an e-book, with these functions working as long as you're no further than three feet from the PC.

CyberpowerPC has announced a new desktop PC called the Pro Gamer FTW. This new line of systems is "tailored for the seamless integration of gaming and live HD broadcasting." The new line features six different base models, the cheapest of which starts at a mere $1085. The systems also feature the option of NVIDIA or AMD graphics.

"They are powered by a choice of Intel's X79 Sandy Bridge-E platform, Z77 Ivy Bridge or AMD's FX Bulldozer processors; equipped with NVIDIA's overwhelming Kepler-powered GTX or AMD's astounding Tahiti series, and feature AVerMedia's innovative Live Gamer HD." This way, if you're in the Red, Green, or Blue camp, Cyberpower has you covered.

Cyberpower brags that "every system is meticulously built with precise cable routing to ensure optimal airflow and a clean aesthetic appearance" and this one should be no different. Housed in the massive Azza Genesis 9000, there's plenty of rooming for cooling and high-end components. The machines are also highly configurable:

A new report from KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo outlines his estimates to Apple's product launch schedule for the second half of 2012, where he notes we should see an all-new iPod touch and iPod nano models, as well as a new iPhone and iPad mini models, and tweaked internals for the full-sized iPad.

Kuo's report also mentions Apple's Mac range, where he believes Apple will launch their 13-inch Retina MacBook Pro in the Sept-Oct time frame. He notes that the launch of this 13-inch Retina MBP would be a little on the quiet side, because it would launch close to the new iPhone and iPad mini models:

Computex 2012 - Walking around the show floor at ECS we bumped into our good friends at ECS who were showing off the latest All in One PC or AIO named the G24 Aura. The new Mini-ITX based AIO PC sports support for Intel 2nd and 3rd Generation Core CPU along with Celeron Processors. We've got support for two SO-DIMM DDR3 modules, one 3.5" HDD or two 2.5" ones along with support for a Slim optical drive or another hard drive.

Moving away from the main specifications we've got a 23.6" screen that offers us a Full HD 1920 x 1080 resolution with 10-finger multi-touch being an option. At the front we have a 1.3M Pixel webcam and microphone built into the screen. Across the bottom of the display we can also see two speakers.

Turning around to the back side we've got a place for a slim optical driver or another hard drive, we've got I/O connectivity on both sides along with our main buttons on the rear. Also present is a Kensington Lock along with a VESA stand support.

Computex 2012 - ASUS took the stage earlier today unveiling a bunch of new Republic of Gamer-branded devices, first up we have their new desktop gaming rig, ROG Tytan. ASUS have crammed quite a few unique abilities into Tytan, so we'll start with the specs, shall we? Tytan sports Intel's Core i7-3960X 6-core processor with three O.C. modes, but we'll get into that a little later.

Backing up the 3960X we have Intel's X79 chipset, NVIDIA's dual-Kepler GEFORCE GTX 690 GPU, 16GB of DDR3 2133MHz RAM, two 128GB SSDs in RAID0 with a 2TB 7200RPM drive for storage, ASUS' Xonar DX sound card and a Blu-ray writer. Whilst the specs are impressive, its the housing that is the real feature here. I mentioned the three O.C. modes before, which to me is one of the stand-out features of the Tytan.

Overclocking can be quite difficult, and the results vary so much between hardware that it's hard to have a baseline of what to expect. ASUS have removed this effort for the user, with three O.C. modes all at the touch of a button. On the top of the case is a 'speed' button, sans Keanu Reeves and a bus rigged with explosives. The speed button can be pressed three times for 3 pre-defined O.C. speeds. The default stage is stock, then we have 3.8GHz, followed by 4.0GHz and finishing with 4.2GHz. It may not be the break-neck, needs-liquid-nitrogen-to-push-it-speeds, but hey, out of the box overclocking without the need to reboot is impressive.

ASUS have introduced a new all-in-one PC featuring Intel's third-generation Core processors. The new ASUS ET2411 is a 23.6-inch Full HD multi-touch LED-backlit beast, sporting Windows 7, HDMI, and much more.

The touch-screen alone is something that makes the ET2411 standout. The ET2411 also comes with ASUS' SonicMaster Technology which boasts louder volumes, and improved clarity. The all-in-one PC can also be used as a secondary display on another PC by connecting other PCs, laptops or tablets through its HDMI input.

ASUS' ET2411 is also wall-mountable for those with a smaller apartment or house, or those wanting to have it look stylish. It can be specced with a Core i5 or i7, comes with 2GB of RAM (expandable to 8GB), 500GB HDD, 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi, DVD/Blu-ray drive, two USB 3.0 ports on the side, 3 USB 3.0 ports on the rear, HDMI-in and out, VGA, card reader, GbE connectivity, and a Kensington lock.

If you're Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft, there isn't much you can't afford. It appears like Microsoft has created a device that is meant for CEOs only, at least for now: "Steve Ballmer has an 80-inch Windows 8 tablet in his office. He's got rid of his phone, he's got rid of his note paper. It's touch-enabled and it's hung on his wall."

The description above was given by Microsoft VP Frank Shaw to Wired. This isn't just a Microsoft play-thing like Microsoft Surface is as they actually plan to offer this to the public. While it's probably not going to end up in many households at launch, Microsoft believes that in 2 years it very well could. As far as calling it a tablet, well, I have to disagree. 80 inches is not a tablet.

"It's not a consumer thing now, but we know historically that that's how all things start," he said. "The idea that there should be a screen that's not a computer, we'll laugh at that in two years." The device is powered by Windows 8 and does appear to be slightly stunt-ish, but I can see the benefits of having a device like that in my office. "It's his whiteboard, his email machine," Shaw said, "and it's a device we're going to sell."

The power of Facebook has allowed a disgruntled Apple fan to start a petition for the company to pay more focus to its Mac Pro line of systems. The maker of the page, Lou Borella, wants Apple to refresh its professional-level desktops, or at least be vocal with Mac Pro fans to let them know something is at least coming soon.

The maker of the page is said to be a professional editor and graphic animator in the New York City area, and initially posted a lengthy plea to Apple to update everyone on their Mac Pro plans, claiming that he didn't want to go to "the Dark side" by buying a Windows-based machine, and that hacked models combining more modern equipment with Apple's OS X operating system were insufficient to meet professional needs.

The page has more than 4,200 likes, and over 2,270 people talking about it. You know what, I love this idea. I have to hand it to Lou, this is one of the best ways to get attention from a usually secretive company. Apple has been concentrating more on slightly updating their iOS-based devices, than they have on their Mac Pro line. But, we can see the changes within OS X, and the upcoming Mountain Lion, where it's going more toward iOS. Maybe this is why Apple are being hush-hush when it comes to refreshing their Mac Pro.