AMD is promoting its new holographic label as a way to ensure authenticity os its Processor-in-a-Box products. Last week, AMD aknowledged that a number of discarded K7 and K8 processors was found in ilegal possession of taiwanese companies. According to at least one report, police seized 60,000 remarked chips in a single company. Some remarked processors could have reached European and Asian markets. AMD´s new holographic label is based on Dupont Izon technology.
AMD publicly aknowledged on Tuesday that a number of discarded K7 and K8 processors was found in illegal possession of at least four taiwanese companies. According to some news sites, police seized 60,000 remarked chips in a raid on one of such companies. Some doctored processors are said to have been shipped to other asian countries and Europe, but AMD denies this allegation. The company advises consumers to buy chips only from authorized resellers.
AMD today introduced the AMD Alchemy Au1200 processor, a low-power system-on-chip solution designed to provide living-room quality video in portable devices. The chip has been optimized for personal media players (PMP) and enables DVD-quality displays, video transfers from digital recorders and longer battery life (400 mW consumption at 400MHz). It supports DDR1 and DDR2 memory and sports AES-128 data encryption. The Au1200 processor will be available in the second quarter in 333MHz, 400MHz and 500MHz speed options.
The Inquirer reports that the new Pentium 4 6XX family will be introduced in the end of February 2005. The chips will be initially available at 3 GHz to 3.6 GHz and feature 2 MB of L2 cache. Other capabilities will include Execute Disable security technology and Enhanced Speedstep, which manages performance and power consumption. According to the site, Intel will also introduce the i945 (Lakeport) and i955 (Glenwood), supporting not only the 6XX processors but also future dual-core parts.
AMD announced that the Opteron processor family will include PowerNow! technology with Optimized Power Management (OPM) beginning in the first half of 2005. According to the company, the PowerNow! feature will allow enterprise IT and workstation customers to decrease overall power consumption by enabling them to optimize performance-on-demand. The integration of PowerNow! technology with OPM can reduce power consumption in the datacenter by dynamically changing power states based on workload utilization.
IBM, Sony and Toshiba unveiled the first details of the Cell microprocessor that is to equip the PlayStation 3. According to the companies, it is a multicore chip comprising a 64-bit Power processor core and multiple synergistic processor cores capable of massive floating point processing, all optimized for compute-intensive workloads and broadband rich media applications. More info on the Cell processor will be relead during the International Solid State Circuits Conference (ISSCC) on 6 February 2005. Other characteristics include:
Multi-thread, multicore architecture.
Supports multiple operating systems.
Substantial bus bandwidth to/from main memory, as well as companion chips.
Flexible on-chip I/O (input/output) interface.
Real-time resource management system for real-time applications.
On-chip hardware in support of security system for intellectual property protection.
Implemented in 90 nanometer silicon-on-insulator (SOI) technology.
AMD extended its Mobile Sempron family with the release of a 3000+ model. It is clocked at 1.8 GHz and contains only 128 KB of L2 cache. The 90-nanometer 754-pin part supports 3D Now!, SSE2 and No Execute technologies. The Mobile Sempron 3000+ is priced at USD 134 in 1,000-unit quantities.
Nvidia may be closer to finally offering Intel chipsets. The companies announced the signing of a broad multi-year patent cross-license agreement and a chipset agreement for Intel's front-side bus technology. According to a press release, this will enable Nvidia to deliver the Nforce platform on Intel-based systems, but neither company elaborated on specific products.
Intel has finally launched the Pentium 4 570J, clocked at 3.8 GHz, which will be the highest clock available for some time, since the company recently dropped plans of a 4 GHz P4. The 90 nm chip uses an 800 MHz FSB and sports 1 MB of L2 cache. The J means that the processor supports the no-execute security bit.
Intel launched this week new versions of multi, dual and low voltage Itanium 2 processors. The multi-way products include the highly anticipated 1.6 GHz chip with 9 MB of L3 cache. The company also unveiled a MP version with the same clock and 6 MB of L3 and a 1.5 GHz model with 4 MB of L3. Other new products are two DP chips clocked at 1.6 GHz with 3 MB of L3 – available with 400 MHz or 533 MHz FSB – and a low voltage (62 W) chip clocked at 1.3 GHz with 3 MB of L3.
