Brain Farm shoots first-ever Ultra HD Phantom Flex4k drone footage

Intel SSD 750 Series 1.2TB PCIe NVMe Review

The push for greater performance from storage devices is seeing enthusiast drives transition towards PCIe-linked connections for increased bandwidth. While faster hardware is great, on paper, it is of limited use if the surrounding ecosystem is unable to put the performance increases to effective use.

That’s where the SSD-optimised Non-Volatile Memory Express (NVMe) specification comes into the picture. Today we will be looking at one of the first storage devices to make NVMe accessible for enthusiast consumers – Intel’s SSD 750 Series PCIe drive.

 

In the SSD 750 Series drive, Intel is aiming to give enthusiast consumers an SSD that is built for raw performance. There’s no compromising when it comes to form factor, size, or power consumption – drive performance is the ultimate objective, with special emphasis on random operations. The big benefit that NVMe brings to the 750 Series SSD is lower latency, thanks to a combination of CPU-attached PCIe lanes and the specification’s different CPU overhead.

Shipping in capacities of 400GB ($389) and 1.2TB ($1029), Intel is using a standard PCIe 3.0 x4 connector to feed the half-height, half-length (HHHL) add-in card version, while the 2.5″ (15mm-thick) alternative receives its four PCIe 3.0 lanes via the SFF-8639 connector. We actually saw an implication of more widespread consumer support for the SFF-8639 connector when we reviewed Asus’ NVMe-supporting TUF Sabertooth X99 motherboard.

With head-turning performance numbers being thrown around, such as 2,400/1,200 MBps sequential read/write and 440,000/290,000 4K random read/write IOPS, let’s take a closer look at Intel’s SSD 750 Series drive and head on into testing.

Specification:

• Capacities: 400GB, 1.2TB.
• Interface: PCIe 3.0 x4 (NVMe).
• Form Factors: 2.5-inch with SFF-8639 connector, HHHL PCIe x4 Add-In Card (AIC).
• Memory Components: Intel 20nm MLC NAND.
• Sequential Read/Write Speeds (up to): 2,200/900 MBps (400GB), 2,400/1,200 MBps (1.2TB).
• 4K Random Read/Write (up to): 430,000/230,000 IOPS (400GB), 440,000/290,000 IOPS (1.2TB).
• Latency Read/Write (typical): 20/20 μs (400GB), 120/30 μs (1.2TB).
• MTBF: 1.2 million hours.
• Endurance Rating: 70GB Writes Per Day, Up To 219TBW (Terabytes Written).
• Warranty: 5 Years
• Power Consumption (Idle): 4W (400GB), 4W (1.2TB).
• Power Consumption (Active) Read/Write: 9/12 W (400GB), 10/25 W (1.2TB).
• Weight (up to): 195g (AIC), 125g (2.5″).
• Operating Temperature: 0-55°C (AIC), 0-70°C (2.5″).

Intel releases four new Braswell CPUs

The new Braswell architecture CPUs bring greater CPU and Graphics performance over the previous generation entry-level CPUs from Intel while offering lower consumption and lower TDP. The four new CPUs unveiled by Intel include the Celeron N3000, N3050, N3150, and the Pentium N3700. All four are 14nm chips and feature Airmont processing cores.

The Celeron N3000 is a dual-core processor with a base frequency of 1.04GHz and Turbo Boost speed of 2.08GHz. It comes with 1MB L2 cache, Gen 8-LP graphics, DDR3-1600 memory support and a 4W TDP. Next up is the Celeron N3050. It too is a dual-core chip but features a higher clock speed of 1.6GHz and Turbo Boost up to 2.16GHz. The rest of the specs are similar, except for a slightly higher 6W TDP rating.

The Celeron N3150 and the Pentium N3700 are quad-core chips with 2MB L2 cache and 6W TDP rating. Both feature the same base frequency of 1.6GHz but offer different Turbo Boost speeds. The Celeron N3150 has a Turbo Boost frequency of 2.08GHz while the Pentium N3700 offers a higher 2.4GHz Turbo Boost clock.
Source: CPUWorld

Brace yourselves, Tegra X1 Chromebooks could be imminent

A logical continuation of a so far fruitful Google – Nvidia alliance.

Attack and counterattack. It’s probably the best way to describe what’s going down in the PC landscape between market veteran Microsoft and a certain up-and-coming player in this niche that enjoys a comfortable dominance over the web search décor.
While Chromebooks are likely light-years away from actually contending with mainstream Windows laptop sales, their recent education strides haven’t left Redmond feeling too secure of its supremacy. Ergo, both combatants reportedly have $149 portable computers for emerging countries in the pipeline.
Looking to take the fight to the next level, Chrome OS machines are starting to slowly but steadily improve their upper mid-range and high-end relevance. In the past month alone, a second-gen Google Chromebook Pixel and 15-inch Acer with full-on Intel Broadwell horsepower have gone official. And now rumor is the Tegra X1 chip will soon find its way inside above-average web-centric notebooks.

It goes without saying Nvidia’s Tegra K1 sequel doesn’t exactly play in the same league as fourth-gen Intel Cores. But neither do Celerons compared to the X1. Built on Maxwell microarchitecture, the platform we saw acing AnTuTu tests not long ago rocks four muscular Cortex-A57 cores and a quartet of more frugal A53s. Not to mention the outstanding 256-core (!) GPU accompanying the speedy CPU.
Remember, the much laggier K1 was almost unanimously praised for the work it did under the hoods of 13-inch Acer and 14-inch HP Chromebooks, currently available at sensible $220 and $270 starting prices. So, in addition to Celeron-eclipsing potency, X1s could help deliver decent quality-cost ratios.
Before you begin jubilating at Microsoft’s expense, Chrome OS enthusiasts tuning in should keep in mind all the above is speculation at the moment. Essentially, it appears development work is underway to ensure support on the platform, which may mean Tegra X1 Chromebooks will materialize at some point… or not.
Sources: Liliputing, CNX-Software

MediaTek’s Helio SoCs aim for the high-end smartphone market

MediaTek today announced its new Helio family of high-end SoCs that aim to deliver leading performance with frugal power consumption. While MediaTek enjoys a relatively decent market share in the low and mid-range smartphone SoC segment, the company has so far struggled to match up to Qualcomm and Samsung’s best in the high-end segment. The company is hoping to change this with the new Helio SoCs. The new range comprises of the Helio X and the Helio P chipsets. The Helio X10 will be a 64-bit chipset with a total of eight processing cores clocked at 2.2GHz. This chipset will be capable of handling display refresh rates up to 120Hz and can encode 480p slow-motion videos. MediaTek did not reveal any details on the Helio P series chipset though. The Helio P is said to be the company’s premium performance chip and is aimed at flagship Android smartphones. The company did mention though that it expects first products powered by Helio chips to be available by the second quarter of the year. Helio P powered devices will arrive later in the year. Source: DigiTimes