Hardware 23 - Socket to 'em

Hardware 23 - Socket to 'em

Posted on 9th May 2011 at 11:49 by Podcast with 3 comments

This week, Clive, Harry, Paul and Antony discuss Folding@home, going through what it's all about and what hardware you should be using to generate the most points per day.

Also on the agenda are some of our thoughts about factory-overclocked graphics cards. We discuss where in the market these provide real value, and when you?d be better of trading up to a better GPU altogether.

Harry also treats us all to a very long comprehensive run down of the current state of the SSD market, and what developments we can expect to see there over the next few months.

Finally, we take a look at AMD?s soon to be retired Phenom brand, and discuss what AMD got right and wrong with this chip-generation. We also take a look back at the conclusions we drew from our first experiences with Phenom-branded processors, and how our thoughts back then compare to our thoughts now.


As always, we've also set up our weekly competition, the lucky winner of which will walk away with a Speedlink Strike FX wireless gamepad. This gamepad is compatible with both the PC and PlayStation 3, and functions at distances of up to 10m.

As ever, the bit-tech hardware podcast features music by Brad Sucks, and was recorded on Shure microphones. You can download the podcast direct, listen in-browser or subscribe through iTunes using the links below. Also, be sure to let us know your thoughts about the discussion in the forums.

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Gingrich Set to Run, With Wife in Central Role

Still in her 20s when they met, Ms. Bisek had been raised in a town of 1,500, the only child of a meat packer and a secretary. A churchgoing Roman Catholic, she had attended a Lutheran college where she practiced piano five hours a day. ?Is this the wisest course for you to be taking?? Karen Olson, her best friend, recalled asking.

Today, Ms. Bisek is Mrs. Gingrich, married for 11 years, but perhaps best remembered for the six-year affair that contributed to her husband?s political downfall. His critics cast Mr. Gingrich, the former House speaker, as a hypocrite who sought to impeach a president over infidelity while engaging in it himself with Ms. Bisek, who was a Congressional aide.

Yet in a curious tale of Washington reinvention, the onetime congressman from Georgia is counting on the third Mrs. Gingrich for his political redemption.

As he prepares for a Republican presidential primary run ? he said Monday that he would formally declare his intentions on Wednesday ? Mr. Gingrich is presenting himself as a family man who has embraced Catholicism and found God, with his wife as a kind of character witness. Depending on one?s point of view, she is a reminder of his complicated past, or his secret political weapon.

Barely a sentence goes by without Mr. Gingrich uttering the words ?Callista and I.? They are constantly together ? at the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast in Washington, at conservative political conferences, at book signings and screenings of their documentary films. She is the voice on his audio books; her face is all over his 2012 Web site, where visitors can read ?A Note from Newt & Callista.?

At Villanova University on a recent Thursday night, Mrs. Gingrich warmed up the audience for a showing of the couple?s movie about Pope John Paul II by signing books and DVDs in her left-handed curlicue. But when asked whether she is ready for the scrutiny a campaign would bring, she smiled tightly and grew silent.

Mr. Gingrich answered for her. ?Seems to be,? he said, with uncharacteristic tentativeness. ?We?ve talked about it for a year. It?s difficult.?

Mr. Gingrich is well aware that social conservatives are skeptical of him because he did not emphasize their issues in Congress, but also because of his two divorces and admission of infidelity. He has been meeting with religious leaders around the country to address their concerns.

Deal Hudson, president of Catholic Advocate, a conservative group, said that if Mrs. Gingrich ?wants to be first lady,? she would probably have to discuss their relationship as well.

So far she has not. Both Gingriches declined to be interviewed for this article.

?They would say they wished they had met in a different time in their lives under different circumstances,? said Jackie Cottrell, a friend who worked with Mrs. Gingrich as a staff member on Capitol Hill. ?But it?s important to note that they brought their family together in a loving way.?

Mr. Gingrich took up golf because his wife plays; she has adopted his political agenda. In 2009, after years of attending Mass to hear her sing in her church choir, he converted to Catholicism. And when Mrs. Gingrich, who plays French horn with the city band in Fairfax, Va., appears in concerts, her husband totes her black instrument case. ?I?m a band groupie and a choir groupie,? Mr. Gingrich likes to say.

How eager she is for him to run after he has been out of office since 1999 is a matter of discussion among their friends. Vin Weber, the former Republican congressman from Minnesota, said he is ?quite convinced? Mrs. Gingrich is happily on board. ?They?ve been out of public life,? Mr. Weber said, ?and I think she misses the excitement of that.?

Others say she wants her husband to run because he wants to. She has hired Ms. Olson as her chief of staff; she is also writing a children?s book, due out in September ? just in time for her to go on a book tour and reintroduce herself to the public as the primary race heats up.

?I think she has stepped out of her comfort zone more to promote the movies and the books and has found that she enjoyed that,? said Ms. Cottrell. ?That?s been a little bit of a toe in the water.?

At 45, 22 years her husband?s junior, Mrs. Gingrich always looks perfectly composed. She favors an almost retro look ? platinum hair teased and sprayed, bold-colored suits accessorized by a triple strand of pearls or eye-popping diamond jewelry. In college, friends say, she once signed up for an 8 a.m. bowling class and rolled a 200 wearing a pencil skirt.

Barclay Walsh contributed research.

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Preventing Customers from Getting Stressed Out

The restaurant chain Boston Market had a problem: it couldn't figure out why people weren't returning even though they said they liked the food. When customers were surveyed, they themselves couldn't articulate why they didn't come back.

Then Boston Market hired Shopper Sciences, a consulting company that tried to answer the question a different way. In addition to asking dozens of customers for their opinions, it also asked them to wear a portable stress sensor while they ate. The wrist sensors, which are made by a startup called Affectiva, detect galvanic skin response?how conductive, or "clammy," the skin is. This measurement usually correlates with levels of physiological arousal, either positive excitement or negative stress.

Shopper Sciences found that diners were stressed out by eating at Boston Market. "The old Boston Market served food out of metal trays, and you were expected to eat chicken with a plastic fork," says John Ross, CEO of Shopper Sciences. "The collective gestalt was terrible." Ross says the findings helped inspire a redesign at the chain, which now offers food on real plates, with metal knives, forks, and spoons. "It's the same food quality and price point," he says, "but now it's being delivered in a new way."

With the availability of smaller, cheaper, and more powerful sensors, businesses are finding new opportunities to collect data on how their customers feel about them. Researchers have long used galvanic skin response to glean insight into people's emotions, but gathering this data required volunteers to sit still with wires strapped to their fingers or palms. Affectiva's device, called the Q Sensor, measures galvanic skin response many times per second while a subject goes about normal activities. The sensor also measures the wearer's movements and temperature. Later the device can be plugged into a computer so the information can be analyzed.

"At the highest level, emotions drive decisions," says Dave Berman, the CEO of Affectiva. "A lot of times people think they know what they feel but can't articulate it, or aren't even aware of it. We provide tools that help people better understand how their customers are feeling."

Disney is evaluating the Q Sensor and other companies' products as tools for measuring viewers' reactions to TV shows, particularly on ABC and ESPN, says Duane Varan, the chief research officer at Disney's media and advertising lab. "It's a very powerful set of measures," Varan says. However, he cautions that data from these physiological sensors could easily be misread: a high degree of arousal could mean someone liked a scene rather than having been annoyed by it.

To address such potential misreadings, Affectiva has released a facial recognition program to accompany the Q Sensor; the software can make use of video observations to help determine whether a person is reacting positively or negatively.

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Microsoft Looks Set To Acquire Some Stunning Skype Office Space

The Internet is abuzz with reports that Microsoft is set to close a deal to acquire Skype, the popular VoIP company, for as much as $7 billion dollars, with a possible announcement coming early Tuesday morning despite suggestions thede deal is in late-stage negotiations and has not yet been finalised.

Buying Skype, Microsoft would acquire its 650+ million users, its operating losses and thousands of staff across the world. The Redmond-based company would also inherit Skype?s office spaces, which are amongst some of the most beautiful and vibrant offices in the world.

We have embedded some below for your viewing pleasure, we are sure there are some Microsoft employees eying-up these spaces as we speak.

Stockholm, Sweden

Skype?s operations in Sweden run out of a completely restored massive historical building, Münchenbryggeriet, a landmark of the city?s skyline. Built in 1846 as a clothing factory, the building became Sweden?s largest brewery in 1857 and operated as a brewery until 1971. The office can hold up to 100 employees and plays host to colourful furnishings from all over Europe (via The Cool Hunter):

London, England

Skype?s offices in London aren?t well known ? in fact you wouldn?t even know where they were unless you had been given exact instructions. That said, the interior of Skype?s London offices are were designed by office design firm Morgan Lovell, pushing the boundaries to design them something really different.

Tallinn, Estonia

We got the opportunity to visit Skype?s offices in Tallinn, Estonia a year ago, the largest Skype facility of them all. Home to a core development team of engineers and designers, the offices in Tallinn stay true to the design ethos of the company.

Palo Alto, United States

Dtail writes:

Skype recently hired architecture and interior design firm Blitz to renovate their current 54,000 sq ft space in Palo Alto. Their primary goal was to create a world-class office that would differentiate themselves from their Bay Area competitors. Ultimately, they want to recruit the best talent in the field.

The new space reflects Skype?s spirit of innovation in a highly functional yet creative workplace designed to encourage interaction and spontaneity. Specific acoustic requirements were made in order to support the audio and video capabilities of their 250 employees. The project is seeking LEED Silver certification.

Clausen, Luxembourg

Skype?s Corporate HQ is based in Clausen, Luxembourg and features some incredible industrial designs with vibrant colour throughout.

Skype has offices all over the world. As discussed above, most of its development team is based in Tallinn, Estonia. Product management, business development, marketing and communications work from London, with finance and legal teams enjoying the quiet life in Luxembourg.

Skype?s audio and video researchers work out of Stockholm, with the rest of its offices placed in Prague, San José, São Paulo, Hong Kong, Tokyo and Tartu.

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Source: http://thenextweb.com/microsoft/2011/05/10/microsoft-looks-set-to-acquire-some-stunning-skype-office-space/

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AMD releases Catalyst 11.5 drivers, 11.5a hotfix

It's only been two weeks since the last official Catalyst update, but AMD has slipped out a fresh driver suite and hotfix today. Considering the brief window since Catalyst 11.4's release, it should come as no surprise that version 11.5 doesn't contain anything too spectacular, but AMD has ironed out a few kinks alongside a couple of adjustments to Hydravision.

According to 11.5's release notes, the HydraGrid feature found in HydraVision is now aware of user-created bezels. HydraGrid now also includes an "Automatic Grid" option that aligns to the user-defined display layout. AMD also solved one bug in Windows XP and seven in Windows 7. The XP flaw appears to be limited to Civilization V, causing the game to crash upon launch when Crossfire is enabled.

Download Catalyst 11.5 Drivers

Desktop: Windows XP 32-bit | Windows XP 64-bit | Windows Vista/7 32-bit | Windows Vista/7 64-bit
Mobile: Windows Vista/7 32-bit | Windows Vista/7 64-bit

The Windows 7 flaws included two that crashed PowerDVD, one that caused VC1 videos to hang in WMP, an issue with Avivo settings in the AMD Vision Engine Control Center, one that caused visual corruption in BioShock, and two transcoding bugs (MPEG-2 to H.264 and H.264 to AVCHD). As we said, there's not much going on in Catalyst 11.5, at least when it comes to performance optimizations.

Download Catalyst 11.5a Hotfix

Meanwhile, the Catalyst 11.5a hotfix offers speed enhancements for Splash Damage's Brink, which launches tomorrow. It also delivers another transcoding fix along with resolving an issue with mouse cursor lag. Another bug caused flickering problems with the Radeon HD 6600 series cards when playing various games in DirectX 9, including Civ V, Dead Rising 2, Fallout 3, Mafia 2, StarCraft 2 and WoW.

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Source: http://www.techspot.com/news/43708-amd-releases-catalyst-115-drivers-115a-hotfix.html

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A Touch Screen That Plays Sticky

An experimental touch screen that uses variable friction to make different areas feel sticky or rough could point the way to a new paradigm in interfaces.

The touch screen uses high-frequency vibrations to create a thin layer of air between the glass and the user's finger. The finger slips easily over the layer of air but catches slightly on the glass when the vibrations are turned off. Varying the vibrations as the user's finger moves can cause different parts of the screen to feel slick or sticky.

"It adds a feeling of realism," says Vincent Lévesque, a computer scientist at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. "It's more physical. It feels like there are real buttons that actually exist." Lévesque and colleagues demonstrated a prototype of the device at the ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems in Vancouver this week.

The screen is one of a number of new devices that offer complex tactile feedback. Some mobile phones on the market, for example, use vibrations to generate a click or some other tactile signal. But the new device, called a tactile pattern display (T-PaD), is meant to do more than just buzz or click, says Ed Colgate, a mechanical engineer at Northwestern University whose team developed the touch screen.

"We're not just about giving signals," he says. "We're about giving physical sensations like the experience you have when you interact with the real world."

The T-PaD uses piezoelectric discs positioned against a glass plate. When a current is run through the discs, they vibrate at 26 kilohertz and transmit the vibrations to the glass. Lasers track the motion of a user's finger and vary the vibrations accordingly.

For instance, when a finger runs across a button, the vibrations will slow or stop, giving the impression that that part of the screen is sticky. If you drag a file into a folder, you'll feel the screen get sticky as your finger hits the target. Turning a wheel or moving a scroll bar on the screen, you'll feel your finger move over tactile "tick marks." Turning the vibrations on and off very quickly?for instance, every time a finger moves a millimeter across the screen?can make part of the screen feel rough, as if it is covered with a grating.

In a paper presented at the ACM conference, Lévesque and colleagues showed that the tactile feedback allowed people to complete tasks slightly more quickly. The users also generally liked the touch screen, although some complained that their fingers became tired after using it for a while.

"It's actually quite magic when you touch it. It's really neat," says Vincent Hayward, a mechanical engineer at Université Pierre et Marie Curie in Paris, who is familiar with the device. However, he warns that the approach has problems?the prototype is bulky and uses a lot of power. It also provides feedback only while a finger is moving. Tapping on the screen doesn't produce any special sensation. He says that he expects the tactile displays to eventually make their way into consumer electronics. "There's a lot of engineering to be done," admits Colgate. "But it is by no means theoretically impossible."

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Baidu Ranks 29th in The World?s Top 100 Brands

Global brand agency Millward Brown Group claims that Baidu now ranks 29th in the world?s top 100 brands. In the report, 12 of the top 100 companies came from China, many of them State-owned, making the Chinese Internet search engine the most valuable brand for a non-State-owned Chinese company.

According to the study, Baidu climbed 46 positions this year with an estimated market value of $22.56 billion, an huge 141 percent increase compared to last year in the BrandZ list of the world?s top 100 brands.

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Source: http://thenextweb.com/asia/2011/05/10/baidu-ranks-29th-in-the-worlds-top-100-brands/

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New technology could power electronics with sound

South Korean electrical engineers are developing a technology that could recharge your phone battery with the sound of your voice, according to the Telegraph. Dr. Sang-Woo Kim said that various approaches for gathering energy from the environment have been explored, but sound has been overlooked as a source. As such, Kim and his associates at Sungkyunkwan University's Institute of Nanotechnology in Seoul are determined to convert energy from speech, music and other background noises into electrical power.

Beside the concept of charging your handset while chatting, Kim noted that there would be many practical applications for such a technology. For instance, sound-insulating walls near roads could generate electricity from the sound of passing vehicles. For homes or businesses near a busy highway, this would also present the additional benefit of reducing unwanted noise from the traffic. Thinking about other mobile platforms, imagine being able to extend your laptop's battery life by listening to your favorite song.

 

 

The technology works by placing a sound-absorbing pad on strands of zinc oxide that are sandwiched between two electrodes. Sound transferred through the pad causes the zinc oxide wires to compress and release, creating an electrical current. While the technology isn't too refined yet, Kim said an existing prototype can generate about 50 millivolts of electricity from 100 decibels of sound. It remains to be seen whether the technology can be polished enough to charge consumer electronics, but Kim is hopeful.

He believes that using a different material for the wires could produce more energy with less noise. "Our current output performance can be applied to various electronic devices with low-power consumption such as self-powered sensors and body-implantable tiny devices. We believe that we can realize more efficient sound-driven nanogenerators," Dr. Kim said. The Telegraph noted similar energy-scavenging technologies such as a heartbeat-powered MP3 players and a Nokia device that harvests energy from movement.

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Source: http://www.techspot.com/news/43707-new-technology-could-power-electronics-with-sound.html

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Microsoft to close $7b Skype acquisition deal

Microsoft is set to close a deal to acquire Skype, the popular VoIP company, for as much as $7 billion dollars, according to the Wall Street Journal.

We could expect an announcement as soon as next Tuesday, although the deal is in late-stage negotiations and is not yet finalized.

After much speculation about a possible Google or Facebook purchase of Skype last week, it may come as a surprise to some that Microsoft is winning the bid, although the software megacorporation has long been included in such rumors.

eBay first acquired Skype in 2005 from the company?s founders at $2.6 billion in cash and stock. Since then, eBay have successfully monetized the service, making it an attractive, established brand for Microsoft to add to their struggling web stable.

A quick informal polling, though, indicates that this is not something consumers are looking forward to.

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Source: http://thenextweb.com/microsoft/2011/05/10/microsoft-to-close-7b-skype-acquisition-deal/

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Boehner Outlines Demands on Debt Limit Fight

In his most specific statement to date on what Republicans will demand in the debt ceiling fight, Mr. Boehner told the Economic Club of New York that the level of spending reductions should exceed the amount of the increase in borrowing power.

?Without significant spending cuts and changes to the way we spend the American people?s money, there will be no debt limit increase,? Mr. Boehner told members of New York?s business and finance community. ?And cuts should be greater than the accompanying increase in debt authority the president is given.? Mr. Boehner said those cuts should be in the trillions of dollars, not billions. 

In the speech, delivered ahead of a second round of debt limit negotiations with the White House and Senate Democrats on Tuesday, Mr. Boehner did not provide a timeframe for when the spending reductions would have to be imposed.

His address came after a leading Senate Democrat, Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York, accused Mr. Boehner of ?playing with fire? by holding the debt limit increase hostage to a push for spending cuts and budget restrictions.

?The idea of refusing to raise the debt ceiling should be taken off the table,? Mr. Schumer said in a conference call with reporters before the speech. Mr. Schumer also said he believed that the debt limit increase should be approved by mid-July to reassure nervous credit markets, though the administration has said it can push the deadline into early August.

In his remarks, the speaker expressed strong resistance to the effort by some Senate Democrats and President Obama for an alternative to enacting specific spending cuts as the price for increasing the debt limit: ?triggers? that prompt automatic spending reductions and perhaps tax increases if Congress and the White House do not meet targets for lowering the deficit in coming years. That idea has emerged as providing the potential for compromise over the debt increase.

Mr. Boehner said the reductions should be ?actual cuts and program reforms, not broad deficit or debt targets that punt the tough questions to the future. And with the exception of tax hikes ? which will destroy jobs ? everything is on the table.?

Acknowledging that many in the financial world are uneasy about the prospect that the government might not be able to make good on its financial obligations, Mr. Boehner said it would be more damaging to the nation if Congress granted the administration?s request without taking steps to curb deficit spending and bring down the federal debt.

?It would send a signal to investors and entrepreneurs everywhere that America still is not serious about dealing with our spending addiction,? Mr. Boehner said. ?It would erode confidence in our economy and reduce the certainty for small businesses. And frankly I think it would kill even more American jobs.?

The administration has not specified the amount of the increase it is seeking in the $14.3 trillion debt limit, but the previous increase in 2010 was just under $2 trillion, and estimates are that a similar amount would be required to avoid a second politically charged vote on the debt limit before the 2012 elections.

Mr. Boehner also said the debt talks should include ?honest conversations? about how to rein in the costs of the Medicare program, and he advocated fundamental changes. Other senior Republicans acknowledged last week that any changes to the health insurance program for older Americans are unlikely to incorporate the party?s proposal to begin providing private insurance subsidies for future retirees.

The speaker managed his party?s negotiations with the White House and Senate Democrats this year over current spending and pushed his demands for cuts to the final hours, when a last-minute deal for about $38 billion in cuts avoided a federal government shutdown shortly before midnight on April 8. Asked by an audience member whether he would entertain a short-term increase in the debt limit if no deal was reached, Mr. Boehner was noncommittal.

Mr. Schumer and Roger C. Altman, an investment banker and former Clinton administration Treasury official, said the consequences for the nation?s economy could be dire if the government defaulted for the first time in its history or if the debt-ceiling talks were pushed to the brink.

?If America were to default, even for 24 hours, that would have an unprecedented and a catastrophic impact on global financial markets and on American markets,? Mr. Altman said.

But Mr. Boehner said the debt limit fight provided a unique opportunity. ?I don?t want to allow this moment that we have in our history to pass without real action to solve our long-term economic problems,? he said.

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