IT-Code-News: IT News Head Lines (AnandTech) 1/14/2015

Diamond Multimedia Updates Networking and DisplayLink Products Portfolio

We made the annual customary visit to Diamond Multimedia's suite at CES. Last year, they had products on display marking their first foray into the networking market. Primarily known in the channel for their graphics cards based on AMD GPUs, their DisplayLink products (USB 3.0-based video adapters and docking stations) are also selling quite well.

At CES 2015, Diamond Multimedia demonstrated a Microsoft Surface Pro driving a 4K display using a DisplayLink-based USB 3.0 to 4K Display Port adapter. This adapter allows any PC / tablet with a USB 3.0 port to drive a 4K monitor (even if the internal GPU is not capable of 4K video output). The DisplayLink docking solution also got an upgrade with the DS3900 Ultra Dock with Dual Video Display.

On the networking side, Diamond Multimedia is testing the 802.11ac market with a 2x2 AC1200 router and a AC750 range extender. There is also a USB 2.0 AC600 USB adapter as well as a USB 3.0 AC1200 USB adapter. 500 Mbps powerline kits as well as an IP camera with in-built PLC (power line communication capabilities) - HP500CK - round up the wireless / networking product stack.

On the TV / game capture side, the WPCTV3000 connects to a HDTV / display and allows screen mirroring from PCs or Macs from multiple users. The GC2000 1080p HD capture box is for console gamers wanting to record their gameplay and either stream it over the network / Internet or store it in a SD card in the box.

Gallery: Diamond Multimedia - CES 2015 Suite Tour

The BVU5500 4K display adapter (USB 3.0 to Display Port) was the most interesting product on display. The advent of USB 3.1 should make for some interesting DisplayLink products, not only due to the increased available bandwidth, but also the power delivery aspect. It will take a couple of more generations for DisplayLink to get there, but, in the meanwhile, manufacturers such as Diamond Multimedia continue to bring out business-focused products using their current chipsets.

Quantenna

At CES 2015, we had the opportunity to meet up with Quantenna at their suite and look at the demonstration of their 8x8 160 MHz MU-MIMO 10G Wi-Fi platform announced last year. Unfortunately, photography wasn't permitted, but the demo was very similar to the first generation 802.11ac demonstration by Buffalo Technologies. One of the most important advantages of the new 10G platform is the integration of the 2.4 GHz radios (for 802.11n support) in the same package. This ensures that vendors don't need to hunt elsewhere for the 2.4 GHz support. For example, Asus went with a Broadcom SoC / 2.4 GHz radios while Netgear went with a Qualcomm SoC / 2.4 GHz radios for their QSR1000 solutions. On the WLAN PHY rates side, we have upwards of 6.9 Gbps for the 5 GHz band (since this is a true 8x8 solution). The PHY rates of the 2.4 GHz band along with the proprietary extensions (additional QAM-rates support for both bands that is outside the official specifications) take the peak WLAN PHY rates upwards of 9 Gbps. Quantenna is marketing the system as a 10G solution. It is on track for shipping later this year, but Quantenna wouldn't commit on a more specific time-frame.

The other interesting announcements included a reference design with Lantiq for mid-range 4x4 routers. Using the QSR1000 platform along with a Lantiq GRX300 processor, this enables vendors to have a quick turnaround for their router platforms. The QSR1000 provides 4x4 MU-MIMO 802.11ac (5 GHz) support, while a Lantiq GRX300 SoC provides the 802.11n / 2.4 GHz support. Also on display was the MAUI platform aimed at providing enterprise vendors and service providers a way to optimize the Wi-Fi performance and troubleshoot issues at the customers' end using cloud-based analytics.

Broadcom

Broadcom launched a number of products in their 802.11ac lineup in order to update their portfolio with Wave 2 features. The BCM4366 is the 4x4 MU-MIMO capable radio for high-end systems. For gateways and routers, this can work in tandem with a BCM47094 network processor SoC (which has two Cortex-A9 cores running at 1.4 GHz). It has support for 160 MHz channels (contiguous 80 MHz + 80 MHz, as well as two discontiguous 80 MHz channels). The BCM4366 also includes a NitroQAM feature (QAM-1024). This is outside the 802.11ac specifications (Broadcom-proprietary), and is expected to provide significant performance benefits for clients with Broadcom chipsets. The network processor SoC also integrates USB 3.0 support.

Broadcoms PR doesn't talk about peak WLAN PHY rates, but it looks from D-Link's DIR-895L product page that we don't get the expected 3.4 Gbps+ from a 4x4 MU-MIMO solution capable of connecting to other 4x4 MU-MIMO clients. The cap seems to be at 2.165 Gbps.

Other updates to the lineup include the BCM53573 and the BCM47189 which are 2x2 802.11ac SoCs integrating the CPU, Ethernet switch as well as the radios in a single chip.

Marvell

Marvell also announced a Wave 2 802.11ac solution in the Avastar 88W8964. The target market is access points, service provider gateways and STBs. Similar to the other solutions described above, we have 160 MHz channel support. The main advantage is the integration of a dual core Cortex-A9 with offloading for many WLAN functions. This frees up the host CPU for other functions.

Even though a true 4x4 160 MHz solution can support upwards of 3.6 Gbps, the Avastar 88W8964 has MU-MIMO support for three 1x1 or a mix of 2x2 and 1x1 client devices. The cap on the WLAN PHY rate is at 2.6 Gbps.

Summary

Despite Qualcomm Atheros announcing their MU-MIMO chipsets early last year, solutions such as the TP-LINK AC2600 got announced only at CES 2015. Shipment is also slated for Spring 2015. The solution doesn't have 160 MHz support either. On the other hand, Broadcom has just announced their 160 MHz Wave 2 solution, but customers such as D-Link are expecting to bring routers based on it to the market in the same time-frame as the QCA 9980 solutions. In any case, all the solutions other than Quantenna's seem to missing one key feature or the other. As a end-user, if one wants to upgrade their Wi-Fi router / access point by the end of the year, a Quantenna 10G-based solution is probably the best bet. That said, solutions such as the D-Link DIR-895L that adopt the XStream platform (two sets of 5 GHz radios) along with the latest MU-MIMO solution from Broadcom are also very attractive for use-cases where channel interference is not much of a concern (rules out dense apartment complexes) and the presence of non-MU-MIMO clients prevent the MU-MIMO solutions from providing full benefit.

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AMD Enters NAS Market with QNAP's 10G-Ready TVS-x63

QNAP's CES suite was quite busy when we visited them last week. Considering the number of product and feature announcements that were made, it wasn't a surprise at all. There were three new major product announcements, and we will cover them in the course of two articles.

The NAS market has been dominated by Intel's x86 platform at the mid- to high-end, and ARM-based SoCs at the lower end of the market. Things are shaking up this year, with the launch of a 2x 10GbE equipped ARM-based model from Synology, the DS2015xs. On the x86 front, I had often wondered why AMD never had a product in the market. Considering the fact that the HP ProLiant microservers based on the AMD Turion platform were quite popular in the DIY market, it was surprising to find the COTS NAS vendors ignoring it completely. With the launch of the TVS-x63 lineup, QNAP has become the first vendor to bring an AMD-based x86 NAS to the market.

The TVS-x63 lineup has 4-, 6- and 8-bay models. Each of them come with either 4 or 8 GB of RAM. Higher amounts of RAM are necessary for applications where the Virtualization Station package will find use. In addition, the 8-bay model also comes with a '+' SKU. This version has a 10GBASE-T NIC pre-installed in the spare PCIe slot. The '+' version comes with either 8 or 16 GB of RAM. We will summarize the specifications of the various models in the TVS-x63 towards the end of the article. Prior to that, we will take a look at the AMD embedded G-series SoC that powers these NAS units.

QNAP specifies the CPU in the TVS-x63 models as 'AMD quad-core 2.4 GHz with Radeon Graphics' in their marketing material. At the suite, we pulled up the System Information tab, which revealed the AMD SoC to be GX-424CC.

The GX-424CC is a 4C/4T Steppe Eagle configuration (based on the Puma / Jaguar+ microarchitecture). It has a TDP of 25 W. The L2 cache is 2 MB in size and the cores run at 2.4 GHz. The integrated Radeon GPU runs at 497 MHz. The unit can support DDR3 memory at 1866 MHz. Puma is the successor to Jaguar. It supports out-of-order execution. Performance-wise, it is expected to be similar to that of the Silvermont cores in the Bay Trail SoCs.

The block diagram of a typical AMD G-Series embedded SoC based on the Puma cores is produced below. It is a first-generation APU SoC design. The I/O ports mentioned at the bottom of the block diagram are important in determining how the QNAP TVS-x63 NAS units balance the I/O amongst the various necessary ports.

Considering the 8-bay TVS-863 for further analysis, we find the various I/Os distributed as shown below. It must be noted that the first two bays are directly connected to the SATA ports of the SoC. QNAP strongly suggests that those two ports be used for SSD caching. Typically, SoCs targeting the NAS market have native Ethernet ports, but the AMD SoC needs a PCIe bridge chip. We will have to see what effect this has in the performance department.

On the multimedia side of things, the TVS-x63 has two HDMI outputs. It supports true 4K output for the UI as well as QvPC side of things. However, video playback will be restricted to 1080p. The VCE engine is supported by the firmware, enabling hardware-accelerated transcoding similar to what we saw with the TS-x51 and TS-x53 Pro units that used Quick Sync.

The extract below summarizes the specifications of the various models in the TVS-x63 lineup.

QNAP has sprung a surprise by going the AMD-route for a high performance NAS. We can probably expect the Intel-based NAS units to go down in price over the next few months. I am assuming it also provides some leverage for NAS vendors to negotiate with Intel on the pricing. On the whole, this development is a good one for consumers. In terms of pricing, the TVS-863+-8G is expected to retail for $1400. This is cheap considering the 10G port is pre-installed. The vanilla models come in at $1200 for the TVS-863-4G, $1000 for the TVS-663-4G and $800 for the TVS-463-4G.

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OCZ Suite Tour: Vector 180, JetExpress PCIe NVMe Controller & Z-Drive 6000

While the Barefoot 3 platform is already a couple of years old, it is still going strong. OCZ has been in the process of adopting Toshiba's latest A19nm to its whole product lineup and with all other drives having made the change, the Vector is the last (but definitely not the least) to make the switch to the latest NAND process.

Aside from the new NAND, OCZ is also adding a new 960GB capacity. We have seen many OEMs upping their capacities to 960GB/1TB in the past six months or so and the Vector 180 marks as OCZ's first client-level SATA SSD with 1TB-class capacity. The Vector 180 also features partial power-loss protection (or Power Failure Management Plus as OCZ calls it), which is not a full implementation like in enterprise drives, but there are capacitors to ensure that data at rest is safe. In other words, all user data in the DRAM buffer will still be lost in the case of sudden power loss, but the capacitors ensure that all metadata is safe and that the drive will continue to operate normally after a power loss (i.e. the NAND mapping table won't be lost, which can brick the drive or at least slow down the next boot up as the drive has to go through recovery process).

The rest of the specs remain pretty much unchanged from the Vector 150. The drive is rated at 50GB of writes per day and carries a 5-year ShieldPlus warranty (no purchase receipt required and all defective drives will be replaced with brand new units). Given that the controller and the underlying firmware remain unchaged I would expect the performance to be very similar to the Vector 150.

Unfortunately, the Barefoot 3 platform still doesn't support low-power states, so the main market for the Vector 180 will be in desktop systems. This is a problem in the silicon itself (it is two years old, after all) and to fix that the silicon would require a redesign, so instead of spending resources on that OCZ has decided to focus on the next generation JetExpress controller.

Originally OCZ's plan was to release the Vector 180 here at CES, but the company decided to spend a bit more time validating the drive to ensure that everything is okay (which, as some of you may remember, is quite different from what OCZ used to do a few years ago). Availability should be in the coming weeks, though, and I would expect pricing to be close to the Vector 150 or perhaps a bit lower given the new, more cost efficient NAND.

The big and obviously interesting news is OCZ's JetExpress controller. It's a native PCIe 3.0 x4 controller with NVMe support and SATA/AHCI are also included for legacy support (SATA isn't going anywhere anytime soon anyway). In terms of features the JetExpress has pretty much all the bells and whistles. DevSleep, TCG Opal 2.0, eDrive, LDPC error correction and TLC NAND are all supported. The controller itself is small enough to fit in M.2 as seen above, unlike the FPGA designs that we have seen in drives like the Samsung XS1715.

Architecturally the JetExpress sports the same Aragon cores as the Barefoot 3, but the core count is much higher (I'm hearing seven cores) with each core having its own specific purpose. The chip consists of several power islands, which can be shut down individually for increased power efficiency. The DRAM controller is massive and supports up to 32GB of DDR3, which enables very high capacities (I was told that even 10TB is achievable, although in most cases the problem is the form factor and its physical limitations, not the controller itself).

OCZ will start by shipping the JetExpress to enterprise customers in the first half of 2015 and a client release will follow in H2'15 -- most likely right around the time Intel releases its Skylake platform with proper PCIe and NVMe support.

OCZ's ECC engine is also quite interesting. The controller supports both BCH and LDPC error correction and there are three different modes (high performance, high endurance and hybrid) available. Basically, high performance mode means that only BCH ECC is used, which has less overhead than LDPC but isn't as powerful and thus results in lower endurance. The high endurance mode, on the other hand, has LDPC enabled, which increases the endurance by about 3x from what I've heard. The hybrid mode basically has BCH enabled at first, but as the NAND is cycled and starts to require more ECC, LDPC will kick in to boost the endurance. The reason why OCZ is offering all three modes is that LDPC adds some latency, so once it kicks in there is some performance loss and typically enterprise customers want a device that has predictable performance throughout its life (or at least an option to choose a mode like that). Similarly, some customers value performance more than endurance (online transaction processing is a good example since the more transactions you can do the more money you will make), so OCZ is offering the customer the opportunity to select what mode is the best for their usage.

In addition to the upcoming JetExpress drive OCZ was showing off their upcoming Z-Drive 6000 for enterprises with NVMe support. The drive comes in 2.5" 15mm form factor with the SFF-8639 connector (basically the enterprise version of SATA Express) and utilizes PCIe 3.0 x4 interface. The Z-Drive features the same PMC controller as Samsung's XS1715 but obviously the firmware is à la OCZ. Performance comes in at up to 3GB/s for sequential reads and 2GB/s for writes and random performance is up to 700K IOPS for reads and 175K for writes. Capacities go all the way up to 3.2TB, although OCZ was very confident that the company can build a 6.4TB version as well. OCZ is currently sampling a handful of key OEMs and volume availability should be in the coming months.

I spent a good hour talking with OCZ's CEO, Ralph Schmitt, about how OCZ is doing under Toshiba and what is the direction of the company, so watch out for a deeper dive after CES.

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A Quick Look at Keyssa: Contactless USB 3.0

While we often don’t discuss startups, at CES we found a company called Keyssa that claims to have the technology to do away with wired connectors entirely. Normally, these claims are rather misleading, but in the case of Keyssa it seems that this is quite possible as the company was formed as a spin-off from research at UCLA labs. Similar to 802.11ad, Keyssa uses the 60 GHz spectrum to deliver immense amounts of bandwidth (6 Gbps), but at much lower power levels. This lower power level does constrain the range of this technology to a few centimeters or so, similar to NFC.

In addition to the immense bandwidth, Keyssa’s connectors are relatively small and are around a millimeter thick, with a length and width similar to a microUSB 3.0 connector. It seems that this technology takes advantage of USB-IF’s media-agnostic USB standard, as in a demonstration of a prototype SSD with Keyssa’s connector the SSD appeared to be a USB drive on to a laptop with a pad for the SSD. Company representatives stated that there will be products shipping with this connector this year, and it should be interesting to see how this affects mobile devices if this technology gains traction.

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LG G Flex 2: Hands-on Impressions

With the announcement of the LG G Flex 2 at the LG Press Conference, we finally saw the launch of a device with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 810 SoC. While the SoC is one notable improvement from the previous G Flex, we see a great deal of improvement in almost all areas. One of the most immediate improvements is the new OLED display when compared against the previous G Flex. There are a great deal of other improvements, which can be seen in the spec sheet below.

	LG G Flex 2
SoC	MSM8994 2.0/1.5 GHz 4x A57/ 4x A53 Snapdragon 810
RAM/NAND	2/3 GB LPDDR4, 16/32GB NAND + microSD
Display	5.5” 1080p LG P-OLED
Network	2G / 3G / 4G LTE (Qualcomm MDM9x45 UE Category 9 LTE)
Dimensions	149.1 x 75.3 x 7.1-9.4mm, 152 grams
Camera	13MP rear camera, 1.12 µm pixels, 1/3.06" CMOS size, F/2.4. 2.1MP F/2.0 FFC
Battery	3000 mAh (11.4 Whr)
OS	Android 5.0 with LG UI
Connectivity	802.11a/b/g/n/ac + BT 4.1, USB2.0, GPS/GNSS, Slimport, NFC
SIM Size	MicroSIM

As one can see, while there are a lot of elements shared with the LG G3, there are a number of areas where we see notable improvements that differentiate the G Flex 2 from the G3. The size of the phone has also decreased, as LG claims that people didn’t like the sheer size of the previous LG G Flex.

LG has also changed the design of the G Flex 2 to be more similar to the LG G3 with its brushed metal finish, although the self-healing polymer dictated a glossy finish with a brushed design beneath the finish. The self-healing polymer itself has been notably improved, healing over seconds instead of minutes like the original LG G Flex. LG has also introduced Dura-Guard glass, which is said to improve drop resistance when compared to Corning Gorilla Glass.

In practice, this combines to make the LG G Flex 2 into a rather interesting phone. Unfortunately, it seems that all of the phones available for demonstration were running non-final software. This meant that it wasn’t possible for us to properly benchmark the device, and there seemed to be more lag in the UI than the LG G3 or Nexus 5. In addition, these demo phones were running in poor conditions for benchmarks, as maximum brightness was constantly reduced due to thermal throttling.

Despite these issues, the G Flex 2 was still an interesting device to try. While I haven’t used the original LG G Flex extensively, I noticed that the 1080p display on the G Flex 2 behaved differently from the 1080p display on the Galaxy S5. Although the G Flex 2 doesn’t have the odd ghosting effects present on the Galaxy S5, the G Flex 2 does have noticeable mura or some sort of texture to the display. Given the demo conditions, it’s difficult to discern whether or not the display is RGB stripe or some form of PenTile.

Outside of the display, the UI brought our first experiences with LG’s UI when layered on top of Android 5.0. Unfortunately, the UI seems to be quite similar to the G3’s UI on Android 4.4, even though there are noticeable changes in areas like the notification drawer and multitasking menu. It may be that we will be left waiting until the LG G4 to see a redesign of the UI to fit with the new design guidelines. At any rate, the camera remains identical to the LG G3, with the same Sony IMX135 sensor, optics, laser AF, and OIS+. The UI remains largely similar here as well, and it seems that there remains a noticeable amount of shutter lag similar to the LG G3. On the bright side, the G Flex 2’s camera remains quick to focus and the OIS is incredibly stable when compared to most solutions I’ve tried. Overall, despite some issues the LG G Flex 2 seems to be a promising device.

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Microsoft Demonstrates Updated Lumia Camera App At CES

Last night I got a chance to meet with Juha Alakarhu, head of the Lumia Imaging technologies, to get a demonstration of the updated Lumia Camera app that will be coming soon. The new app will be enabled by the Denim firmware update, but due to the ISP requirements it will only be available on the Nokia devices that shipped with the Snapdragon 800 series of SoC, which is the Lumia 1520, and the Lumia Icon/930 at the moment. Some of the changes are pretty dramatic, so hopefully some parts of the new app will be available to the Snapdragon S4 and 400 devices as well.

The first major change is the camera startup time. When Windows Phone was first launched, one of the features touted was “pocket to picture” with the dedicated camera button. As time has gone on, the camera button is no longer a requirement, so this has fallen off a bit to the detriment of the platform. But an even larger issue on the Nokia Camera app was how long it would take to be ready to take a picture. For example, with the Lumia 735, launching the Lumia Camera app takes about 4 seconds or so to load and be ready to take a photograph. Juha discussed how Microsoft has worked to create a camera app that can load almost instantly. On the updated Lumia 930 with Denim, launching the camera app now takes around a second. I don’t have my equipment in Vegas to do a time lapse and get the exact amount of time, but pressing the camera button on the phone has the camera app ready to do almost instantly. I cannot imagine that these changes will not be made available to all of the Lumia phones, as any more efficient code is going to be even more pronounced on the slower processors of those devices.

Microsoft also reworked the algorithms on the image quality side, as they tend to do. Although I do not have an older 930 to test with anymore, they did have some side by side comparisons with the old algorithms and the new ones, and the image quality is even better than before.

Another area where Microsoft has and Nokia have both been missing a major feature compared to their rivals is in the area of High Dynamic Range (HDR). HDR has been an option on Android and iOS for a long time, and with the relatively limited dynamic range of smartphone camera sensors, many people really like the extra pop that HDR can bring to an image. The HDR on the Lumia is not just a standard HDR though. Microsoft is calling their implementation “Rich Capture” and it covers a couple of features in addition to HDR. But the basic implementation is that like any other HDR setting, it takes several bracketing photos at different exposures and then merges them together to create a single image. The Lumia Camera implementation will allow you to customize the exposure after the fact by keeping all of the photos together, and you can adjust how much HDR you want to add to the image when you are done. It is a slick implementation, and the added customization is always welcome.

Gallery: Lumia Rich Capture

Likely the most impressive addition to Rich Capture though is a new feature that I believe is unique to Lumia called Dynamic Flash. With smartphones, the flash is almost necessary due to the small sensor size for any sort of low light imaging. With OIS and larger sensors and pixels on some of the phones, you can get away sometimes without using the flash except in the most extreme circumstances. Apple’s solution was to implement a dual flash, which adjust based on the scene. This requires a specific flash in the device though. The Lumia solution is that the camera takes two photos – one with the flash and one without the flash. It then blends them together to keep the shot from being blown out by the harsh LED flash. And the Dynamic name comes in because you can adjust the amount of flash in the image after the fact. Juha discussed how he likes to keep the flash on even for daytime shots now, just so that he can add a bit of sparkle to the eyes in his images. This is a fantastic addition and is really amazing to see for the first time.

Gallery: Dynamic Flash

Another area where the Lumia camera fell short was in shot to shot time. Once again, I do not have all of my test equipment here so I will see how much of a difference they have made, but now they have changed the app to allow you to take a new photo while the last image is still being processed. Shot to shot is still not up there with an iPhone, but it does seem better overall. When I get back home I will test the new camera against the numbers from our 930 review and see what the increase is.

However, there is another solution to shot to shot time that has been added as well. The new Lumia Camera app now supports 4K video at 30 frames per second. 4K is about an eight megapixel image, so the app is now set up so that if you hold the shutter button, it will start recording at 4K. When you release the button, the recording stops. You can then open the video, and you have the option to choose the best frame from the video to use as a standalone image. The demonstration we were given was a skateboarder jumping over a person on a bench, and you could freeze the moment when the jumper was right at the peak of his jump. It is useful, although you are limited to the eight megapixel image even though it is a twenty megapixel sensor. Hopefully a future update supports full burst mode.

And although I have already given this away, the final update to Lumia Camera is the 4K video support. Initially, Microsoft had stated that this would be limited to 24 FPS but that appears to have changed and now it is offered in 24, 25, or 30 FPS. You can also choose 720p, 1080p, or 1440p in any of those framerates. In addition, the Lumia Camera app still supports 5.1 Dolby Digital surround sound recording for video with the 4 HAAC microphones.

This is a fantastic update to the Lumia Camera, and one that was much needed. Some of the features will not be possible on the lower tier phones due to the ISP included, but hopefully the new processing algorithms and especially the startup time can be added. And just because people want to know, no, there was no discussion yet of a Lumia 1020 update.

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Crucial Announces MX200, BX100 SSDs & SSD Toolbox

Crucial's MX100 has been one the most successful SSDs on the market. Its very aggressive pricing along with decent performance and great feature set has made it an excellent buy for mainstream users. Here at CES Crucial just introduced the MX200, the successor of MX100, and a new budget-oriented model called the BX100.

The MX200 is essentially the branded version of Micron's M600 that we reviewed earlier. The notable change compared to the MX100 is that the MX200 features Dynamic Write Acceleration (DWA), which is Micron's/Crucial's SLC cache implementation. I covered the feature in detail in our M600 review, but in short the SLC cache size is adaptive and changes depending on how much data the user is storing in the drive (unlike e.g. Samsung's and SanDisk's implementations where the SLC cache size is fixed). I wasn't very impressed by the performance of the M600 and DWA, but what DWA does provide is higher endurance since SLC is significantly more durable. Crucial is rating the 250GB version at 80TB, 500GB at 160TB and 1TB at 320TB, which is a notable increase over the 72TB that the MX100 had.

Otherwise the MX200 is very similar to the MX100. It's a Marvell 88SS9189 based design with Micron's 16nm 128Gbit NAND and as usual the MX200 features DevSleep, TCG Opal 2.0 and eDrive encryption. MSRPs are $140 for 250GB, $250 for 500GB and $470 for 1TB, which is certainly a bit more compared to the MX100. M.2 and mSATA models are also available, though the capacities only go to up to 500GB. Availability will be later in this quarter and we are expected to get samples in the next couple of weeks.

The other SSD that Crucial is launching is more interesting. The BX100 will be Crucial's entry-level drive (the B stands for budget) and the intriguing part is that Crucial is using Silicon Motion's 2246EN controller with 16nm 128Gbit NAND, which is change from Crucial's usual Marvell designs. Actually, the BX100 is the first drive from a NAND OEM to ship with a Silicon Motion controller, so that is certainly a big design win for the company. I've been pretty pleased with the 2246EN and it has done well in our tests, so I can see why Crucial chose to go with that one.

Feature wise the BX100 drops all the M-class features, so there is no hardware-accelerated encryption or SLC caching. Pricing is $70 for 120GB, $110 for 250GB, $200 for 500GB and $400 for 1TB, so it's very competitively priced like the MX100, although given the lack of features I would have like to see a bit lower pricing since the MX100 currently retails for about the same prices. Availability is also Q1'15 and we will be getting samples soon.

Finally, after a long period of waiting, Crucial is launching its own toolbox for SSDs, called the Crucial Storage Executive. The 1.0 version is a fairly basic toolbox with support for firmware updates, drive monitoring, secure erase and PSID revert, although Crucial has plans to add more features in the future. Supported drives are currently the M500, M550, MX100, MX200 and BX100 and the software is already available for download from Crucial's website.

Crucial MX200 Product Page

Crucial BX100 Product Page

Crucial Storage Executive

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NVIDIA Launches GeForce GTX 965M

In a rather unusual turn of events, the first I officially knew of the GeForce GTX 965M was when I saw it in some of MSI’s new gaming notebooks on Sunday. NVIDIA usually briefs us on new product launches, but for whatever reason they didn’t feel the need to send us anything in advance. (Maybe it might have something to do with Tegra X1 and all the car stuff being shown at CES?) Officially, NVIDIA unveiled the new GPU two days ago on January 6, but we’ve been busy running around Las Vegas so this is the first chance I’ve had to say a bit more about the new GPU. Let’s get into the details.

Given the quiet nature of the launch, you can already guess that this isn’t a new GPU core. Basically we’re getting another GPU for laptops based on GM204, and it’s one step down from GTX 970M placing it somewhere around the level of the GTX 870M but with updated features courtesy of GM204. In terms of specifications, the GTX 965M is has 1024 CUDA cores clocked at 944MHz, plus boost clocks, and the GDDR5 memory uses a 128-bit bus and is clocked at 5GHz. By way of comparison, GTX 970M has 1280 cores clocked at 924MHz (plus boost) with a 192-bit GDDR5 5GHz interface. This effectively puts performance at roughly half the speed of the desktop GTX 980, or around 2/3 the performance of the GTX 980M (depending on memory bandwidth use).

NVIDIA unfortunately doesn’t disclose any information on TDP or pricing with their notebook GPUs, and it’s not clear if the GTX 965M will come with 2GB or 4GB of VRAM (or perhaps both configurations will be available). That said, it’s a safe bet that GTX 965M will use less power than GTX 970M, which in turn uses less power than the GTX 980M (around 100W). We will hopefully see some notebooks with GTX 965M in the near future for testing, and considering the number of notebooks we saw sporting the new GPUs we expect that to occur sooner rather than later.

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Samsung Announces Galaxy A7, Promises "Competitive Price"
New device falls on the high-end of mid-range, packs Snapdragon 615

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LG G Flex 2 Packs Snapdragon 810, Hits Preorder for ~$699 in Europe
Second-gen model is cheaper, more durable, and packs a much better spec

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Microsoft Accuses Google of Irresponsible Disclosure of Windows Bugs
Google published exploitable security hole two days before it would have been patched despite Microsoft asking not to

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iPhone 6 Drives Apple Market Share to New Highs in U.S., Europe
Android remains strong, though, in the lead in nearly all markets and decisively in control in China

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Belfie Stick Fills Gaping Hole in Selfie Market by Snapping Selfies of Your Butt
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Available Tags:SSD , AMD , AMD , MSI , USB , MSI , Intel , Cooler Master , Samsung , Galaxy , Cooler Master , OCZ , USB 3.0 , LG , Microsoft , NVIDIA , GeForce , GTX , Google , Windows , iPhone 6 , Market Share , iPhone , Apple ,

Samsung Galaxy A7
SoC	Exynos 5430 or Qualcomm Snapdragon 615
Memory and Storage	16GB NAND + MicroSDXC, 2GB LPDDR3
Display	5.5” HD SAMOLED
Cellular Connectivity	2G / 3G / 4G LTE (Ericsson M7450 or MDM9x25)
Dimensions	151 x 76.2 x 6.3 mm, 141g
Camera	13 MP Rear Facing, 5MP Front Facing
Battery	2600 mAh (9.88 Whr)
Other Connectivity	802.11 a/b/g/n + BT 4.0, USB2.0, GPS/GNSS, NFC
SIM Size	Nano SIM (Dual SIM SKU available)
Operating System	Android 4.4 KitKat

Keyboards (Small Form) at Cooler Master
Users	Model	MSRP
PERFORMANCE	NovaTouch TKL	$150-$200
MAINSTREAM	QuickFire TK QuickFire Rapid-i	$100-$150
ESSENTIAL	QuickFire Rapid	$30-$90

Keyboards (Full Size) at Cooler Master
Users	Model	MSRP
PERFORMANCE	Trigger-Z	$150-$200
MAINSTREAM	QuickFire Ultimate	$100-$150
ESSENTIAL	QuickFire XT	$30-$90

Mice at Cooler Master
Users	Model	MSRP
PERFORMANCE	Reaper	$70-$90
MAINSTREAM	Mizar	$50-$70
ESSENTIAL	Xornet v2	$30-$50

Power Supplies at Cooler Master
Users	Model	Connector	Warranty	Efficiency	MSRP
PERFORMANCE	V-Series	Fully Modular	7 Years	1200W @ Plat 1000W @ Gold 850W @ Gold	$190-$300
MAINSTREAM	VSM	Modular	5 Years	750W @ Gold 650W @ Gold 550W @ Gold	$100-$120
ESSENTIAL	GM	Modular	5 Years	750W @ Bronze 650W @ Bronze 550W @ Bronze	$80-$100

Headsets at Cooler Master
Users	Model	MSRP
PERFORMANCE	Sirus C	$90-$130
MAINSTREAM	Ceres 500	$50-$90
ESSENTIAL	Ceres 300	$30-$50

Cases at Cooler Master
Users	Model	Size	MSRP
ULTRA	Cosmos II	Ultra	$300+
PERFORMANCE	Stryker	Full	$160-$200
MAINSTREAM	Silencio 652S	Mid	$80-$130
ESSENTIAL	HAF 912	Mid	$50-$70

Tuesday, January 13, 2015

IT News Head Lines (AnandTech) 1/14/2015

Quantenna

Broadcom

Marvell

Summary

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Air Cooling (Top Down) at Cooler Master
Users	Model	Fan Size	MSRP
PERFORMANCE	Gemini S524 V2	120 mm, fits 140 mm	$45+
MAINSTREAM	Gemini M4	120 mm Slim	$30-$40
ESSENTIAL	Vortex Plus	92 mm	$20-$30

Air Cooling (Tower) at Cooler Master
Users	Model	Fan Size	MSRP
PERFORMANCE	V8 GTS	140 mm x2	$80-$100
MAINSTREAM	Hyper 612 v2 Hyper D92 Hyper 212 EVO	140 mm 92 mm x2 120 mm	$35-$50
ESSENTIAL	Hyper T4 Hyper TX3 Hyper T2	120 mm 92 mm 92 mm	$18-$30

AIO Liquid Cooling at Cooler Master
Users	Model	Size	MSRP
PERFORMANCE	Nepton	280/140 mm	$100-$130
MAINSTREAM	Nepton	240/120 mm	$100-$130
ESSENTIAL	Seidon	120 mm	$50-$70