News for Thursday, 9 March 2006

While the FireWire format has not evolved for a long time, the USB format is on track for a new major step in its development: the wireless USB is around the corner. It will allow you to connect wirelessly peripheral at the speed of the USB2.
The first compatible devices should arrive for Q3 2006. It will first be printer, digital camera and external HD, but many other peripherals might adopt this new wireless format. As for the standard USB2, the theoretical number of simultaneously connected peripherals to one computer will be 127.
Knowing that the main driving force of the WUSB is Intel, implementation should come quickly, first via USB dongles or extension cards, then directly integrated into the motherboard controllers.

Hereafter are the first benchmarks of a MacBook Pro 2.16GHz with Cinebench 9.5

Rendering (Single CPU): 324 CB-CPU
Rendering (Multiple CPU): 607 CB-CPU
Multiprocessor Speedup: 1.87
Shading (CINEMA 4D) : 371 CB-GFX
Shading (OpenGL Software Lighting) : 805 CB-GFX
Shading (OpenGL Hardware Lighting) : 1232 CB-GFX
OpenGL Speedup: 3.32

The CPU performances are very similar to those obtained with a PMG5 Dual 2.5GHz.
In order to test Rosetta, I have launched the benchmark application : Altivec Fractal Carbon, which is essentially measuring the Velocity Engine performance.
The result obtained was 3100, so similar to the one of a PMG4 866MHz.
So it gives us an idea of what will be the performance obtained with Rosetta on a MacIntel for an Altivec-dependent application.

Toshiba will of course be the first manufacturer to release a HD-DVD enable notebook.
The Qosmio G30 will feature a 17''HD display with a resolution of 1920x1200 (1080p compatible) and will be powered by an Intel Core Duo T2500 (2 GHz). The current HD-DVD format being not fully finalized, the optical drive will come with region-free settings.
The final price is not known yet, but should be between 2500 and 3500 euros.

I sometimes wonder if Apple really deserves the passion of its users' community.
Yesterday, Andrew Escobar got one of these infamous mails from Cuppertino - the kind we used to get quite often - demanding that he stops distributing Front Row Enabler.
Clap clap... Once again, a brilliant exemple of how Apple despises its customers, denying them the right to install Front Row on a computer purchased... maybe a couple of days before the soft's coming out.
To tell the truth, I was kind of hoping that the shift to Intel would put a halt on this dreadful obsession: "I, Apple, stand by and drive my customers bananas forcing them to get new machines". Very nice wishfull thinking indeed...
That was a piece of my mind. I'm sorry, but that kind of behaviour from a company we give so much support and energy is a bit hard to swallow.

Following the Intel transition, we have strengthen our monitoring of Intel-related news; and during the current Intel Developers forum, Santa Clara's Giant has made many announcements.
Following the impressive first benchmarks of the future Conroe, additional information has been released.
First, during this exhibition, Intel was presenting 2 servers; one based on AMD Opteron 64 and the other on an Intel Xeon Woodcrest. Of course, Intel-based server was the fastest one, while being the lowest power-consuming solution. Just to remind you Apple might have to use such processor to keep offering dual dual-core-based computers.
In another place, Intel was unveiling a new technology named Robson, using a NAND enabled system on could boost some OS task performances. In addition, this technology could also improve battery lifespan in notebook while improving the ratio "performance per watts".
To keep improving performance over power consumption, Intel has announced that the Conroe, that will be officially named Intel Core, will include many new features. One of them, entitled, Advanced Media Digital Media Boost, should double the performance of SSE instruction sets which are involved in multimedia-oriented applications.
Intel should also propose in a near future, the first Wimax card dedicated to notebooks.
It is becoming every day clearer why Apple has decided to move to Intel.
Intel's on-going evolution regarding both processors and platforms is solid and performance-wise very promising.