IT-Code-News: IT News Head Lines (TweakTown) 03/04/2014

Wednesday, April 2, 2014

IT News Head Lines (TweakTown) 03/04/2014

TweakTown

RumorTT: Apple moving iPhone 6 into mass production in May
With spring fresh in the air in the northern hemisphere, its that time for things to begin blooming once again. However, I am not talking about flowers and trees, I am talking about rumors of Apple's next-generation iPhone. A new report from RedmomdPie is suggesting that Apple will be pushing the 4.7-inch version of the iPhone 6 into mass production beginning sometime in May, but the 5.5-inch iPhone 6S will not be headed to production until later in the summer due to delays.

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RedmondPie cites Reuters as the source of the info, which says that its contacts within the Asian manufacturing industry have said that Apple has began pushing out orders to its supply chain for the components that make up the iPhone 6. While I am inclined to take this news as mostly speculation, it is about time for the Cuppertino-based company to begin building up stock if it plans on launching a new phone this year, but with the iPhone 5C being such a major flop, will apple actually bring a second device to market for its sixth iteration of the iPhone? What do you think? Will we see 4.7-inch and 5.5-inch iPhone's hit the market later this year?

LSI announces availability of new Nytro MegaRAID 8140-8e8i
Today, at the WORLD HOSTING DAYS in RUST, Germany, LSI Corporation launched the Nytro MegaRAID 8140-8e8i. The new card is double the flash capacity compared to previous shipping Nytro cards and has four times the number of ports. The new design is geared towards scale-out servers and high capacity storage environments.

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The launch of this card coincides with the announcement from LSI that it has surpassed the 100,000 units of Nytro cards shipped worldwide. Demand for Nytro continues to be driven by the ever growing requirements for high-performing, massively scalable datacenters. According to Tom Swinford, senior vice president and general manager, Datacenter Solutions Group, at LSI, "The Nytro MegaRAID 8140 card provides cloud and hosting companies with a single, integrated solution to simply and cost-effectively scale caching and connectivity to support their customers' growing performance and storage requirements."
The latest 8140-8e8i integrates an expander onto the card that enables scale-out server environments with connectivity for up to 236 SAS and SATA devices. In addition to this expandability, the card also contains 1.6TB of onboard flash for intelligent data caching to maximize application. Also included is the Nytro Flexible Flash feature which allows users to partition the flash as primary storage for data volumes or partition the onboard flash as a boot drive.

Google Chrome plugin lets you view LinkedIn profile email addresses
A free Google Chrome plugin that lets users view the email address of other LinkedIn profiles, even if they aren't connected, is in the legal cross hairs of LinkedIn.

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The free Sell Hack extension provides a "hack in" button, and while it is being defended by its creators, LinkedIn and security experts aren't overly impressed with the feature.
"LinkedIn members who downloaded Sell Hack should uninstall it immediately and contact Sell Hack requesting that their data be deleted," said Krista Canfield, LinkedIn Senior Manager of Corporate Communications, in a statement to TNW. "We advise LinkedIn members to protect themselves and to use caution before downloading any third-party extension or app. Often times, as with the Sell Hack case, extensions can upload your private LinkedIn information without your explicit consent."
Meanwhile, LinkedIn plans to send Sell Hack an immediate cease and desist notification, due to at least "several violations."

RSA provided the NSA with more information than originally thought
The National Security Agency (NSA) had two encryption tools that were adopted by EMC-owned security firm RSA, allowing the federal government easier access to snoop on Web communications, academic researchers recently noted.

TweakTown image rsa_provided_the_nsa_with_more_information_than_originally_thought

The researchers are largely made up from professors at the University of Wisconsin, University of Illinois and Johns Hopkins, as they found the "Extended Random" extension which is able to nullify the RSA Dual Elliptic Curve software faster.
"If using Dual Elliptic Curve is like playing with matches, then adding Extended Random is like dousing yourself with gasoline," a researcher told Reuters.
The researchers also noted:
"The C version of BSAFE makes a drastic speedup in the attack possible by broadcasting long contiguous strings of random bytes and by caching the output from each generator call. The Java version of BSAFE includes fingerprints in connections, making it relatively easy to identify them in a stream of network traffic."
This is a discussion that RSA would likely hoped to remain quiet, as RSA executive chairman Art Coviello defend the company's actions during the RSA Conference earlier in the year.

HTC's One M8 gets pulled from 3DMark results for cheating the system
phLast summer it was Samsung that got caught cheating the system when it came to 3DMark benchmark scores, and it appears that HTC has now decided to follow a similar path with its new HTC One M8. 3DMark has delisted the new phone from its ranking system after research and testing was conducted by AnandTech that proved the M8 was falsely bumping performance when publicly available benchmarks were ran.

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HTC was caught by a version of 3DMark that is not available to the public but otherwise identical to the public version showed results that were 15-percent lower than those ran on the detectable public version of the benchmark. This means that HTC is boosting performance when it detects 3DMark is running. This is a direct violation of Futuremark's rules and as such, it pulled all results from its 3DMark website.
HTC says that it does optimize performance when running benchmarks and that the deception is a feature as it shows the phones maximum performance. "Our engineers optimize in certain scenarios to produce the best possible performance. If someone would like to get around this benchmarking optimization there are ways to do so, but we think most often this will not be the case," said HTC. The issue is that 3DMark does not seek to discover a phones maximum performance, but rather its real-world performance. This means that the benchmark must be ran under normal everyday conditions.

Apple could plan to release DSLR-like lenses for future iPhone models
A new patent filed by Apple is lending some insight into the companies future plans for its iPhone and iPad mobile devices. The patent shows that Apple has came up with a concept that would see DSLR-like interchangeable lenses attaching to a bayonet-style mount surrounding the camera. Add-on lenses for the iPad and iPhone have been around since the first iPhone launched, and now it looks like Apple wants to cash in on those accessories.

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The bayonet mounting method has several advantages over some of the magnetic, and clip-on designs that are already on the market as it gives Apple a way to ensure that the lens is perfectly aligned with the iPhone's camera sensor every time. This will improve image quality, and allow Apple a licensing avenue that would force lens makers to pay Apple for the rights to create lenses to mount onto the new iPhones. In the end, I feel that this is exactly what Apple was going for, and I actually think that they will release this mount in the form of a case rather than built into the camera.

LaCie Fuel grows to 2TB capacity to hold more content
In Late January, we got our hands-on the new LaCie Fuel 1TB storage device for review. We liked the Fuel a lot and gave it a 90% rating when all the tests were done. One of the things that might have bothered some about the Fuel was that 1TB of storage isn't that much space.

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LaCie has announced a new version of that drive that has the same feature, but has twice the capacity. The storage capacity is now up to 2TB. The 1TB version is still available. LaCie talks about the device as if it's for the iPad only. It should work with just about any mobile device that has a version of the Seagate media app available. Devices that support that app include iOS devices, Android, and the Amazon Kindle.
The 2TB Fuel is able to stream content to up to five devices without needing an internet connection. When a Wi-Fi connection is available, the Fuel can be used as a hotspot. AirPlay is supported making it easy to shoot content to the big screen in the living room. Battery life for the device is 10-hours. The 2TB Fuel can be pre-ordered now for $249.99 in the US with shipping globally happening this month.

MinnowBoard Max developer board starts at $99 with Intel Atom power
If you are the sort of geek that is into projects that require a CPU and board among other things, check this out. A new developer board has landed called the MinnowBoard Max and it is an update to the original MinnowBoard. That original product used an Intel Atom E640 CPU and sold for $199.

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The new product offers better hardware and a cheaper price tag. The MinnowBoard Max comes in two versions with the base model selling for $99. For the money, you get a small developer board with a 1.46GHz Intel Atom E3815 CPU and 1GB of RAM.
If you need more performance, you can get an upgraded version with a 1.33GHz dual-core Atom E3825 with 2GB of RAM. That hopped up version sells for $129. The MinnowBoard max supports Android 4.4, Debian Linux, and other operating systems.
Both boards have HDMI, USB 3.0, USB 2.0, and Ethernet ports. They also both have 8MB of system memory for firmware and a microSD card slot for bulk storage. Developers looking to add their own peripherals also get GPIO pins.

HTC One M8 will be available in most of Asia next month
Asian fans of the HTC one M8 that launched in the US last week who are waiting to get their hands-on the device will be able to get it soon. The M8 will roll out to most of Asia by early May according to reports.

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The report comes from a company spokesperson who said the rollout for most of Asia would begin in early May. That would seem to indicate the device would be available in the first week or so of the month. HTC has launched the One M8 in Singapore.
The smartphone launched in Singapore this week at a price of 998 Singapore dollars with availability on April 5. That equates to about $792 here in the US. Presumably, that is the unlocked and no contract price for the phone, but that is unclear. The global launch for the smartphone is April 11.

Google+ updated to show number of views on profile page
If you have spent much time on Google+, you like many others, have probably noticed that here isn't as much going on there as there is on other social networks. Google is apparently trying to show people that there are visitors to its social network.

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It has enabled a view counter on the profile page of the Google+ service. The number of views shows up beside the number of subscribers you have on the profile page, below your picture. The views number is an aggregate amount of views for posts, photos, and the profile page.
The number should prove or disprove the theory of many that they are wasting their time on Google+. I can see some brands or people not wanting the number of times their content has been viewed showing up. Those people can opt to turn off the views counter.
To do that you need to go in under settings and uncheck the box for "show how many times your profile and content have been viewed." You should also know that the number is now active by default so if you don't go there and turn it off, the number of views you have had will show.

Check out MetaWear, an awesome DIY Wearables dev board on Kickstarter
Wearable electronics are the hottest thing in tech right now and with things like fitness trackers, smartwatches, and head mounted displays being released every week, it was only a matter of time before the DIY community joined the party. Today, MbientLab has launched a crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter for its new MetaWear development and production platform that is designed to make DIY wearables easy, cheap, and fun!

TweakTown image check_out_metawear_an_awesome_diy_wearables_dev_board_on_kickstarter

MetaWear is designed around a small ARM processor and Bluetooth LE platform that is small enough to fit in arm bands, watches, headbands and more. MbientLab has optimized Metawear for cost and shrunken the Bill of Materials, so that use can take its design and move straight into production with your finished product. The entire development board is about the same size of a US quarter and is CE and FCC certified by TCB lab in California, meaning that no additional paperwork needs to be filled out.

TweakTown image check_out_metawear_an_awesome_diy_wearables_dev_board_on_kickstarter

Additionally, MetaWear has been designed with smartphone and mobile device integration in mind. This allows the end-user, product designer, or every day maker to quickly and easily integrate custom built apps that interface with the board. MbientLab has created a custom developer friendly API that easily allows integration into iOS and Android platforms, and use smartphones and tablets to control sensors, peripheral or feed back data to the device.

TweakTown image check_out_metawear_an_awesome_diy_wearables_dev_board_on_kickstarter

Finally, MetaWear has had its firmware pre-written by a professional engineer, saving the user both time and money, and allowing them to focus more on integration than making the hardware work at basic levels. MbientLab has also provided downloadable cad files that make creating custom enclosures using 3D printing, something we all know I am quite fond of. As far as Kickstarter campaigns go, MetaWear is seeking a relatively small goal of just $8,000, and as of this writing, it was already 1/5th the way there at $1400.

Obtaining your own MetaWear board is as simple as backing the campaign for at least $20, which lands you a MetaWear Board plus basic accessories. For those wanting the full kit which includes the board, sensors, LEDs, a battery and a bonus surprise, $35 is the magic number. I have been in touch with the MetaWear's creators and their commitment to DIY electronics, the Maker Movement, and and empowering others to make awesome stuff is second to none. I have jumped in and backed the project at $35 and challenge you to do the same. I will have a full review of the MetaWear development kit shortly after the campaign is over, so stay tuned to TweakTown for more on that.

TweakTown image check_out_metawear_an_awesome_diy_wearables_dev_board_on_kickstarter

Samsung Galaxy Tab4 comes in 7, 8, and 10.1-inch sizes
A few days ago, we mentioned that some images had leaked that were supposed to be a new line of tablets from Samsung. Samsung has now made those Galaxy Tab4 tablets official. There are three different tablet models in the series, and they are all very similar.

TweakTown image samsung_galaxy_tab4_comes_in_7_8_and_10_1_inch_sizes

The only real differences between the tablets are the screen size and the battery capacity. All three tablets can be had in Wi-Fi or Wi-Fi and mobile broadband equipped versions. They all use a 1.2GHz quad-core processor and have screens with 1280 x 800 resolution. All three offerings also use Android 4.4 for the operating system. Rear cameras have 3MP resolution with the front camera having 1.3MP resolution.
Rounding out the feature list for the trio is Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi Direct, Bluetooth 4.0, GPS, and Glonass. The quad-core processors are paired with 16GB of internal storage and 1.5GB of RAM on all units. They also all have microSD card slot for expansion.
The differences include screen size with the Galaxy Tab4 10.1 having a 10.1-inch screen, the Tab4 7.0 having a 7-inch screen, and the Tab4 8.0 offering an 8-inch screen. The other difference is battery capacity. The 10.1-inch tablet has a 6,800 mAh battery with the 8-inch unit offering a 4450 mAh battery. The battery capacity of the 7-inch unit is unknown. Pricing and availability are unannounced.

HP to pay $54 million in proposed class action settlement
HP has taken a beating on its purchase of WebOS from Palm. The sell off of WebOS left many investors in the computer maker upset. They were angry enough that they filed a class action suit against HP. That suit now has a settlement offer on the table.

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HP has agreed to a $57 million settlement that will be placed into an interest-earning escrow account. The money will sit there until the judge presiding over the case decides whether he feels that the deal is good enough. The suit was filed by some major investors of HP after the company talked up its major WebOS plans only to back out and sell the asset off later.
The plaintiffs are a number of institutional investors that are angry about what HP said publicly and planned privately to do. The suit that was filed lists information given from unnamed HP employees that claims while HP was saying it would flood the market with WebOS devices; it didn't plan to launch the first devices using the OS until 2013.
A settlement of $57 million will certainly help the investors feel better. WebOS hasn't exactly had a successful life so far. It failed in the smartphone market with Palm, it failed with HP, and now LG has purchased it for use in Smart TVs. History tells us that LG has a tough road ahead. Without a clear leader in the smart TV OS market, maybe this is where WebOS needs to be.

OkCupid urges users to boycott Mozilla's Firefox over anti-gay CEO
Mozilla's new CEO has come under a lot of fire lately because of his negative stance on gay marriage. In fact three of Mozilla's board members resigned over his appointment to the CEO position. Today the entire company is catching more flack due to Brendan Eich's anti-gay politics, with OkCupid notifying every Firefox user of his stance on gay rights and urging them to use another browser that is headed up by a more equal rights friendly CEO.

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OkCupid is not outright banning Firefox users from accessing its site though, and has a small link at the bottom of the letter that lets users pass through to the full site. Mozilla takes issue with the new CEO over a $1000 donation he made to support proposition 8, the bill that would have banned gay marriage in California. OkCupid says that if gay marriage were banned world-wide more than 8-percent of the relationships it has created would be illegal.
Eich has released a statement on the matter saying, "I know there are concerns about my commitment to fostering equality and welcome for LGBT individuals at Mozilla...I am committed to ensuring that Mozilla is, and will remain, a place that includes and supports everyone, regardless of sexual orientation, gender identity, age, race, ethnicity, economic status, or religion." and so has Mitchell Baker, chairwoman of Mozilla. "Acting for or on behalf of Mozilla, it is unacceptable to limit opportunity for *anyone* based on the nature of sexual orientation and/or gender identity. This is not only a commitment, it is our identity"... "Speaking as the Chairwoman, I want to speak clearly on behalf of both the Mozilla Corporation and the Mozilla Foundation: Mozilla supports equality for all, explicitly including LGBT equality and marriage equality."
OkCupid's full statement can be found below.

" "Hello there, Mozilla Firefox user. Pardon this interruption of your OkCupid experience. Mozilla's new CEO, Brendan Eich, is an opponent of equal rights for gay couples. We would therefore prefer that our users not use Mozilla software to access OkCupid.
Politics is normally not the business of a website, and we all know there's a lot more wrong with the world than misguided CEOs. So you might wonder why we're asserting ourselves today. This is why: we've devoted the last ten years to bringing people-all people-together. If individuals like Mr. Eich had their way, then roughly 8% of the relationships we've worked so hard to bring about would be illegal. Equality for gay relationships is personally important to many of us here at OkCupid. But it's professionally important to the entire company. OkCupid is for creating love. Those who seek to deny love and instead enforce misery, shame, and frustration are our enemies, and we wish them nothing but failure.
If you want to keep using Firefox, the link at the bottom will take you through to the site. However, we urge you to consider different software for accessing OkCupid.
However, we urge you to consider different software for accessing OkCupid: [such as]
Google Chrome, Internet Explorer, Opera
Thank you,
OkCupid
Background on Mr. Eich and Mozilla
In 2008, Mr. Eich supported the passage of California's Prop 8, a statewide initiative to ban gay marriage, with a $1000 donation. Granted, his contribution is now six years in the past, and people can change. But Mr. Eich's boilerplate statements in the time since make it seem like he has the same views now as he did then. Mozilla recently promoted him to CEO, hence the issue only now coming to our attention. His donation was known to Mozilla at the time of his promotion, and, furthermore, CEOs are rewarded based on their company's performance. The CEO is the visionary for a company and its products. We are sad to think that any OkCupid page loads would even indirectly contribute towards the success of an individual who supported Prop 8-and who for all we know would support it again. We wish Mozilla's institutional commitment to freedom and openness were better reflected by their choice of leadership. "

Weekly Giveaway: Win 1 of 5 SanDisk Extreme II 240GB SSDs! (Global)
We have teamed up with SanDisk who is giving away five of its Extreme II 240GB solid state drives!
Instead of making you wait over a five week period as usual, we're giving them all away this week to five lucky winners. This is no April Fool's joke!

TweakTown image weekly_giveaway_win_1_of_5_sandisk_extreme_ii_240gb_ssds_global

Even More Speed for Your Most Intense Applications
Blaze through your day and stay ahead of deadlines while extending the life of your PC with the SanDisk Extreme II Solid State Drive (SSD). With a simple upgrade to your laptop or desktop, this SSD will increase the speed and responsiveness of your computer, providing a significant improvement to your user experience.

Exceptional read/write speeds for enhanced multimedia performance

Available in capacities up to 480GB**

Solid state architecture resists wear and data corruption

Quiet operation

Low power consumption**

Rules and Conditions
Step 1 - Like TweakTown's Facebook Fan Page at http://www.Facebook.com/TweakTown. Your like will be confirmed.
Step 2 - Like SanDisk's Facebook Fan Page at http://www.Facebook.com/sandisk. Your like will be confirmed.
Step 3 - Like this News Post!
Step 4 - Like and Share this post!
Step 5 - Make any comment on the same post!
Step 6 - Sit back and hope you are a winner - good luck!
Disclaimer
This promotion is in no way sponsored, endorsed or administered by, or associated with Facebook. You understand that you are providing your information to TweakTown and not to Facebook. The information you provide will only be used for selecting and contacting a winner.
- Giveaway runs from April 1, 2014 until April 8, 2014 at 11:00am GMT +8:00 - no entries will be taken into consideration after that time.
- If you are a winner, you will be asked to provide your full name, address and telephone number for shipping via Facebook message. These details will only be provided to the company participating in this giveaway. If you do not claim your prize within two weeks, it is forfeited.
- For this weekly prize, anyone in the world can enter. You don't pay the shipping charges, but you are responsible for any taxes.

Apple and Tesla Motors team up to release iPhone-colored Model S cars
This morning Tesla Motors announced it is teaming up with Apple to design and release a special edition of Tesla's Model S electric vehicle that matches perfectly, the colored anodized finish of Apple's iPhone 5S smartphone models. This news puts an end to months of speculation surrounding a secret, behind-the-scenes meeting between Elon Musk, Tim Cook and Apple & Tesla executives.

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"This partnership signifies both Apple and Tesla Motor's commitment to releasing products that its users demand as well as continuing the cutting edge design that both companies are known for," Tesla said in a statement. "Apple's expertise and assistance with anodizing has been paramount to getting this project off the ground. In late 2014, the first iPhone Gold, Silver, and Space Gray Model S vehicles will roll off the line, thanks to Apple's amazing commitment."

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Tesla says that Apple has been hands-on throughout the entire design process, and has helped the team tackle the enormous task of anodizing an entire car with a uniform, blemish-free color coating, just like that on the iPhone 5S models. The surface finish is said to be of the same hardness as an iPhone 5S, leading it to be very resistant to scratches from keys, road debris, and bumps in parking lots. Apple says that it only makes sense to merge qualities from the best iPhone ever made, with the best electric vehicle ever produced, and with both the car and iPhone carrying the model designation of "S," it was destined to be.

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Additionally, Tesla announced it worked with Apple on its Touch ID system, and will be implementing it into both the doors and ignition system. Owners will have two options to enter and start their Model S, using their own biometrics as the key. iPhone 5S owners can utilize their iPhone's fingerprint scanner to remotely unlock and start their vehicle, or they can scan their finger on a Home Button-like scanner located in the doors of the vehicle. To start the vehicle, a similar button with built-in fingerprint scanner will be located on the dash.
This news comes hot on the heels of Tesla's recent announcement about the new titanium plate that has been fitted to its undercarriage to block road debris from penetrating the floorboard and damaging any battery packs. Tesla did not mention any anodizing options for this plate at the time of writing.
What do you think about Tesla and Apple teaming up to deliver Model S vehicles that match owner's iPhone smartphones? Is this the beginning of a new trend, or is it just another clever marketing stunt from Apple?

Microsoft scam leader given four-month suspended sentence
The man behind a successful Microsoft computer scam was handed a four-month suspended sentence, in what was a rather clever scam. Mohammed Khalid Jamil, based in Luton, England, created a fake company and outsourced calling efforts to an Indian firm, which led to British citizens cold called from people posing as Microsoft reps.

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Victims were targeted for around $60 up to $250, and scammers would be given remote access from victims - leading to poor PC security - and a "software fix," a Microsoft-provided software patch available for free, which would solve the problem.
Jamil needs to pay $8,300 in fines, along with $9,440 in compensation, then pay almost $24,000 in court restitution penalties.
"We believe it may be the first ever successful prosecution of someone involved in the Microsoft scam in the UK," said Lord Harris, National Trading Standards Board chairman, in a statement. "It's an important turning point for UK consumers who have been plagued by this scam, or variants of it, for several years. Many have succumbed to it, parting with significant sums of money, their computers have been compromised and their personal details have been put at risk."

ADATA Premier Pro SP920 1TB SSD Review

Introduction

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With the SF-2281 era grinding down and the SF3700 series late to market, companies have turned to competitor Marvell to breathe new life in the consumer SSD market. We first tested the new Marvell 88SS9189 in the Crucial M550 just weeks ago, now it's ADATA's turn to show the world what they can do with the new controller.
Unlike LSI SandForce, Marvell leaves final firmware development to the companies selling the final product. That fact, paired with the different types of flash on the market, means we see larger differences between Marvell based SSDs than we do from LSI SandForce based drives.

Specifications, Pricing and Availability

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The ADATA Premier Pro SP920 pairs the Marvell 88SS9189 controller with Micron 20nm 128Gb die size flash in all four capacity sizes. This works out well for the two largest capacity sizes, 1TB and 512GB, but the smaller two models, 128GB and 256GB, are slower due to the loss in parallelism when reading and writing to the flash. We'll talk about this more in the SP920 128GB review that will follow this review.
ADATA sent pricing over via MSRPs for the Premier Pro SP920 series. The 128GB should launch at $89.99, 256GB at $159.99, 512GB at $334.88, and the massive 1TB model at $529.99.
The SP920 1TB is the same price as the Crucial M550 1TB at Newegg at the time of writing. These two drives are very similar in construction, warranty (3-years), and performance. In the years before the Samsung 840, ADATA was always a value leader with products that ran with the best in both performance and price. Now that the market has shifted and the fab companies are getting aggressive, it will be interesting to see how ADATA competes as a flash customer SSD manufacturer.
With a drive that is nearly identical to the M550, ADATA needed to deliver in other areas, and that is what they did. The SP920 includes a nice accessory package, an area where Crucial's M550 falls short. The SP920 includes a desktop adapter bracket, Acronis data migration software to clone your existing drive, and ADATA even developed a SSD toolkit.
... Read the rest in your browser!

SanDisk Extreme II 240GB 6-Drive SSD RAID Report
Till April 8th, 2014, you can win one of these drives!

Introduction

TweakTown image sandisk_extreme_ii_240gb_6_drive_ssd_raid_report

SanDisk's Extreme II is no stranger to TweakTown. We've reviewed the Extreme II more extensively than just about any drive I can think of. Well, we're back with more. This time, we're going to see what kind of performance we can extract from two- to six-drive arrays. More importantly, though, we're going to see how well the Extreme II 240GB does in a head-to-head competition with our two current performance leaders.
SanDisk's Extreme II is the successor to their highly successful Extreme series of SSDs. The Extreme II supplanted the Extreme series and brought with it some newer hardware as well as new technology. The original Extreme series leveraged SandForce second generation controller technology combined with SanDisk's own 25nm Toggle NAND technology. This was a very potent combination when it was launched, and like the Extreme II, the Extreme was a TweakTown favorite and one of the fastest drives ever made when it launched.
The Extreme II carries forward the Extreme's enthusiast pedigree. Geared toward power users and enthusiasts, SanDisk designed the Extreme II to deliver bleeding-edge performance in any user environment. Unlike the original Extreme, the Extreme II does not rely on compression technology to generate peak performance. The Extreme II performs equally well whether or not data can be compressed. This is important in today's world where nearly every piece of data comes in a compressed form.
As NAND technology progresses, lithography necessarily shrinks. Shrinking lithography as it relates to components like CPUs generally brings with it a performance increase. Lithography shrinkage as it relates to NAND Flash Memory is quite the opposite. As NAND lithography shrinks, performance as well as endurance shrinks along with it. Technologies are being developed to mitigate the performance and endurance issues that are inherent to NAND lithography shrinkage. One of the leading technologies is programming an emulated single bit per cell (SLC) caching layer into multi bit per cell (MLC) flash memory.
SanDisk was first to introduce the world to emulated SLC technology. SanDisk calls their emulated SLC technology "nCache". SanDisk utilizes this technology on the Extreme II to increase endurance as well as performance by caching small random writes on an emulated SLC layer and flushing them sequentially to the drive's MLC NAND array.
The Extreme II is born of the latest technologies and, as we've documented many times, is one of today's elite performance oriented SSDs. We've seen the Extreme II set many a lab record, but we have a new test that we consider the ultimate in determining whether or not an SSD can deliver consistent high performance over time or if it's just a benchmark babe.
The purpose of today's review is threefold. First, we're going to see how well we can get two- to six-drive Extreme II arrays to scale on the limited bandwidth available from Intel's Lynx Point chipset. Second, we are going to see if the Extreme II performs well when blasted by our new consistency test. The Extreme II is going to face off against our current performance champions in a head-to-head competition. Third, SanDisk and TweakTown are teaming up to give away five Extreme II 240GB SSDs to five of our lucky readers.
This is going to be good, so let's get started!
... Read the rest in your browser!

Available Tags:iPhone 6 , Apple , iPhone , Google , Chrome , Intel , HTC , Google+ , Galaxy Tab , Samsung , Galaxy , HP , Firefox , CEO , Microsoft , SSD ,

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