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SuzukiSavage.com
/cgi-bin/YaBB.pl General Category >> The Cafe >> The Chrome Wars /cgi-bin/YaBB.pl?num=1408930382 Message started by Oldfeller on 08/24/14 at 18:33:02 |
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Title: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/24/14 at 18:33:02 This thread is actually about the very rapid change in our computing world that is currently going on. It is about 22% of school districts in the USA in year 2013 dumping Windows and Apple and going over to Chromebooks to teach our kids computing. This number went well past 50% in the first half of 2014. We are training all of our children to use this new operating system from kindergarten right up through High School right now. This is about Chromebooks taking over 40% of new laptop sales away from Windows and iOS in the first three quarters of 2014. This is about Intel and AMD and Samsung and Nvidia Tegra K1 fighting hardware wars over being the very best Chromebook in a rapidly exploding Chrome market. This is about Microsoft trying to strike back with the Streambook, BingBox and Windows 9. This is about Intel busting itself to control Chromebooks, because they have so lost totally lost out already in mobile and to continue to dominate in anything at all Intel MUST win in the Chrome Wars. Intel MUST control the new dark and light purple wedges inside this area chart to become better than the #7 chipmaker that they currently are volume-wise right now. http://wikibon.org/w/images/thumb/9/9d/ARMInetelProjections2022byDeviceV2.png/500px-ARMInetelProjections2022byDeviceV2.png No other class of product (other than wearables) is "the current battleground" for so many diverse software and hardware functions or has so many determined competitors contesting inside it. No other market is currently growing as rapidly and has as much potential to completely redefine the desktop/keyboard computing world in the next 3 years. As ARM goes 64 bit and rolls down to 20nm the potential for ARM processors to run inside desktops and laptops is very rapidly becoming real -- and where that rubber is hitting the road is inside the Chrome Wars. Welcome to the Chrome Wars ..... ============ Why ignore wearables, it is much bigger market than Chromepace after all ..... Wearables are a subset of super small microprocessor products that right now totally belongs to ARM and the cell phone companies. They are the ones equipped to deal with this pico sized stuff and they are bashing each other over them smart watches right smartly as we speak. Smart watches come across as an accessory to your smart phone, as are your various smart "fitness" devices right now. Us old motorcycle dudes don't wear them fitness trackers for much ..... :D |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/24/14 at 18:48:30 http://au.ibtimes.com/articles/563515/20140822/nvidia-chromebook-acer-13-google-hp-stream.htm#.U_qUknVdX3A Google Works on Powering Up Chromebook Line to Kill Competitors, Nvidia Joins with Acer for New Killer Laptop "Chromebooks have been gaining traction for the past periods with Seeking Alpha noting its sales growing at an exponential rate. The main reason behind the sales surge is the increasing capabilities of Chromebooks matching Mac and Windows notebooks. Google's computer line is reaching the 40% level. Analysts predict that the share may double in the next few years similar to the success of the Android smartphone." Computing companies are rapidly jumping into the Chrome Wars from all sides, as they KNOW that if they are slow they will simply get left out again, similar to what happened to them during the cell phone Android explosion. People, especially women, like Chromebooks because Google Chrome products are a no-brainer no-maintenance fast "no complex trash to deal with ever" operating system. You just open the lid and go. Shut it when you are done. People like Chrome for all the same reasons they have learned to hate Microsoft. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/25/14 at 05:11:58 "Is Word really worth it?" Folks are beginning to articulate why they are such convert fans of Chromebooks and why Chromebooks are taking over laptop sales to such a huge degree based on word of mouth referral. Here is the article that best articulates why folks like these little laptops and desktop boxes and why they don't miss their Microsoft. http://blogs.computerworld.com/laptops/23614/chromebooks-are-revolution-easy This article explains the "one common Windows PC located in the den and a crowd of Chromebooks with one sitting on everybody's nightstand" which is what is really seems to be what is happening in the USA today. Remember them last words in that last sentence --- "Is Word really worth it?" Microsoft, the answer people keep coming up with time after time is ..... based on the high cost of MS ownership and the large maintenance/upkeep and aggravation factors is ..... "Hell no". |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/25/14 at 08:37:56 http://computers.woot.com/offers/hp-14-dual-core-16gb-ssd-chromebook-13 Woot strikes again !!! dual core for $179.99 http://static.bhphoto.com/images/images345x345/hp_f0g99ua_aba_pavilion_chromebook_2955u_2gb_16ssd_windows_8_14_white_1004169.jpg HP 14-Q010nr 14" Chromebook, HD BrightView LED-backlit, Intel Celeron 2955U, 16GB SSD, 2GB DDR3L, 802.11n, Chrome OS $179.99 In Stock. Ships in 3-5 business days Screen Size 14" Condition Factory Reconditioned Now, if any of that stuff in the previous article rings true to you and you happen to need some casual computing right now, well here is a good price on a dual core HP 14" Chromebook, in the same white case that is coming out soon configured as the infamous AMD Mullins SOC powered fanless totally silent MS Windows Streambook for only 20 bucks more when it comes out price supported by MS at $199.99 ..... We know you are going to want to pop for one of those Streambooks when they come out and you'll need one of these dual core Chromebooks to compare it against so the Streambook has a chance of winning at something ...... ;D ...... and yes this one does make some noise, it does have a fan in it ...... ..... remember, you will need a new cloud style printer and you will need to get used to Google Docs and the other Chrome apps. And no, no MS Skype or MS Explorer nor any other MS program for this one (unless an on-line version exists). |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/25/14 at 09:54:50 http://liliputing.com/2014/08/hp-chromebook-14-nvidia-tegra-k1-coming-soon.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/nvidia-tegra-k1.jpg HP Chromebook 14 with NVIDA Tegra K1 coming soon Poor Intel, they just can't win for losing. AMD comes out to flatten their tires with the Mullins SOC and now here comes Tegra K1 to put sugar in their gas tank. (a fanless 13 hour battery life is a lot of sugar to go be stickin' in that gas tank ...) Poor poor, Intel, what could possibly happen next to take their little private Chrome exclusive world away from them? Samsung and a custom-built 20nm Exynos Octacore? Allwinner and another 28nm Octacore? Rockchip and a 28nm A-17 quad core? Yep, all of the above are headed your way, Intel. Soon, too. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/26/14 at 02:47:42 http://www.pocket-lint.com/news/129880-microsoft-to-give-chromebooks-some-stiff-competition-this-christmas-says-cheap-pcs-are-coming http://cdn.pocket-lint.com/r/s/727x/assets/images/php6ju0xm.png Now, this is interesting stuff for the CEO of Windows to say in public ---- "And finally, Turner announced HP is planning to release 7-inch and 8-inch versions of its new Stream PCs for $99 this winter: "We are going to participate at the low-end," he explained. "We’ve got a great value proposition against Chromebooks, we are not ceding the market to anyone." First, he's now making product announcements FOR HP -- HP isn't saying this at all. Next, he's acting all oblivious to the fact his MS Office won't fit right on 8" screens (although he just scrapped 20,000 of MS's 8" wonderful mini-tablets just recently and cancelled their big launch party only two days before it was to take place). Microsoft, you are acting pretty neurotic right now -- you are also stacking up even more potential flops right before you come out with Win 9. Is this a smart thing to be doing? And you are making your faithful MS fans all nervous when you put wonderful announcement stuff like that out there, then cancel it, yank it, scrap it at the last minute. Lastly, your largest Chrome competitor now is ...... HP (your good buddy HP is playing both sides of the street, he's interested in selling some hardware and he would sell you down the river in an instant so he could do that) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/26/14 at 03:38:00 http://www.zdnet.com/chromebooks-long-term-threat-to-intel-7000032710/ Chromebooks: Long term threat to Intel http://cdn-static.zdnet.com/i/r/story/70/00/032710/no-intel-200x185.jpg?hash=BGp4MTR1ZT&upscale=1 "It doesn't help matters that Chromebooks with ARM processors run extremely well and have done OK in the market. The lightweight OS is designed to run well on lesser hardware, and that means no Intel technology is needed. It's going to get worse with Nvidia entering the Chromebook market, as its Tegra processor is a good fit for the laptops with Google inside. That must worry Intel more than a little. This is a direct assault to the Intel image, as Chromebook owners discover they don't need Intel inside. As these Chromebooks without Intel hardware spread through schools, students are going to get used to them. It won't take long until the next generation of computer buyers forget about Intel. That should be a concern to the giant processor maker." (actually, Intel is currently the #7 ranked chip foundry world-wide) What is really hurtful is that the other chip manufacturers are coming in from their other relative fields and they are just taking huge chunks of Chromespace market share away from Intel --- effortlessly. How is this ???? Intel's current small processor crop simply isn't very efficient, it isn't integrated well at all and it runs HOT HOT HOT with relatively poor battery life (even more so than a Mullins) when you ask it for top end performance speeds. Intel requires a 50 watt/hour battery and a big CPU fan in a silly HP Chromebook 14, for crying out loud. And that's for normal, average 6 hour type battery life. (Hey, Intel really liked it when they were competing against them ancient, 32nm designed 4 year old dual core Exynos chipsets. Intel could win some in that particular foot race.) This "Intel winning" ends though, immediately. The 28nm and 20nm lithography 64 bit ARM chipsets are coming, and they will beat up Intel on all fronts very easily. So will the 28nm Tegra K1. Plus, these integrated ARM systems on a chip can be sold at a profit, which Intel still hasn't figured out how to do yet .... ::) Isn't losing money getting old to your stockholders yet, Intel? ::) And so, Intel has no response to the new 20nm ARM fully integrated chipsets at all until Intel's 14nm replacement generation can get up into volume production some times late next year (maybe, if that actually happens). And here is the last, most deadly effect of the Chrome Wars on Intel -- their Core i3 group is already getting lapped by ARM in Chromespace and their low end of Core i5 is getting threatened as well. This ARM competition threatens to flow over into main PC space when Win 9 comes out next spring. Apple has already flat-assed told Intel that unless they can make a green processor (green according to Apple standards) the Apple A8 and A9 chipsets will start to go into Apple laptops starting in 2015. Things look tough for Intel .... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 08/26/14 at 12:00:33 A 16GB SSD would not even hold one of my games....I have 32gb usb's. Chrome books are "E" books with a tad more power...but if they keep miniaturizing or perhaps just use blocks of mem chips for storage instead of drives, who knows how it will go. I realize drives and chips store information differently, but lets hope the trend in price drops keeps up with the technology rising, and THAT will be a good thing. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/26/14 at 12:22:00 In all of these new Stream devices the fast SSD is intended to hold the operating system and a bare sprinkling of applications. 16 gigs isn't a lot in Windows, but in Linux it could hold your whole hard drive, OS, all the apps and all your stored data. Ditto for Chrome. Windows is just that thick and porky compared to other OS's. ================== SIMM cards up to 128 gig and USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 one to two terabyte portable hard drives make up the rest of what the Streambooks are missing. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/26/14 at 12:28:07 http://www.mercurynews.com/60-second-business-break/ci_24935442/biz-break-intel-cut-more-than-5-000 http://extras.mnginteractive.com/live/media/site568/2014/0116/20140116__0117intel~2.JPG Biz Break: Intel to cut more than 5,000 jobs as revenues stagnate (that's a 5% job reduction on this one cut) Do you remember a prediction that Intel and Microsoft stocks were going to get hit by the speculators fairly soon? And shortly after that stockholders would be screaming for the loss leader money dumping to STOP ASAP !!! "Today: Intel (INTC) expands on statement that it will reduce workforce, stock declines after chipmaker discloses profit and revenue declines in 2013 and forecasts little change in remainder of fiscal 2014. The Lead: Intel stock falls after chipmaker confirms layoffs, stagnant 2014 forecast Intel said Friday that it would cut about 5 percent of its workforce in 2014, an announcement that arrived one day after the Santa Clara chipmaker detailed a financial decline in 2013 that is not expected to improve this year. During a conference call Thursday evening to discuss the company's financial results, Chief Financial Officer Stacy Smith disclosed that Intel would be "bringing down employment" in 2014; the company went into greater detail Friday, confirming with Mercury News reporter Steve Johnson that it would be shedding about 5 percent of its global workforce of 107,000 employees, or about 5,350 workers. While confirming the cuts, Intel spokesman Chris Kraeuter would not disclose more information about them Friday, such as where they would occur, saying only that Intel is "realigning and refocusing our resources" in response to the evolving chip market." Oh Rockchip .... has your nebulous Intel deal just been "realigning and refocusing our resources" right out the window and into the trash can? Intel has just now effectively sold all its first year 14nm capacity to the Japanese and Intel is also trying to sell that same capacity to Apple and Altera and Panasonic figuring that when the vague price portion finally jells they will lose 2 out of 3 of them back to 20nm and more reasonable ARM fab pricing. Intel is showing the signs of finally reaching the bottom of the old deep PC funded rear wallet pocket .... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/27/14 at 01:32:55 http://www.eeherald.com/section/news/onws201408001.html Let's talk briefly about where the chips are coming from, the general rankings and who is growing and who is not growing right now .... http://www.eeherald.com/images/bulletin051414Fig01.png This is from the first quarter of this year, showing the traditional order of ranking that has been sitting around for the last 4-5 years basically unchanged. What is changing is the volumes this ranking order is based upon (note: instead of being twice as big or bigger, Intel is only slightly bigger than Samsung right now). So, let's look at who is growing (or not as the case may be) http://www.eeherald.com/images/bulletin051414Fig02.png Intel has not ever been considered as a fab for hire before this year, so their fab ranking history is very very sketchy right now. Most all of their dollar based ranking data is skewed, because they would only report their production at full retail value. Intel chips are never sold at retail value, ever. A fab has to report the real sales price for the chips it produced x number of chips produced, and Intel refuses to do this. Complicating this issue is the fact Intel has been selling all of its low end chips at a strong loss (sometimes at over a 100% loss) while trying to break into mobile. (as in sell it at a strong loss, but report it at retail price as a + number ???) Also complicating Intel's reporting is that their fabs are currently only partially utilized right now but Intel chooses not to tell anyone just how low this partial utilization level has gone. The last factual reporting done by anyone based upon real known raw output numbers ranked Intel in the #7 position of all fabs based upon the output of finished chips. TSMC was the largest chipmaker in that "real output" list by a considerable margin. And yet Intel claims to be 3 times bigger than TSMC by using full retail pricing for all products and reporting their "overall size" off of maximum theoretical capacity (while actually running at less than half of that right now due to low demand). Intel is fixing this by shutting down some offshore fab plants, just not quickly enough to keep up with the drop in demand for their products. So, Intel is now trying to peddle new 14nm lithography technologies that they are claiming are "production ready". So far they have sold this production capacity once already this year to Altera then defaulted on this deal earlier this year by not being able to meet either the production start date nor to get close to the predicted cost to produce the Altera 14nm chipsets. Altera went back to Samsung and their 20nm process for what they needed. As a fab for hire, Intel is racking up a very spotty history in their new fab for hire endeavor. What is clear to all parties is that Intel's interior pricing structure is way way way out of line with the rest of the fab industry -- as are every volume or costing based or structure based number that they have been using to create their internal "Intel Success" numbers that they have been using for years and years with their stockholders. It would be very hard to buy any large scale 14nm production commitment out of Intel right now because it is clear the people negotiating with you have no choice but to actually use these sorts of funny Intel internal numbers to base their offers to you .... and once harsh reality peels the layers of vapor and fudge off that actual real production run of chipsets they will cost you more and it will come to you slower than initially offered. It would be hard to buy Intel stock right now, knowing that the numbers reported to shareholders are "unique" to Intel in both structure and source. "Vapor" and "fudge" is not how a fab for hire (or any other business) operates -- brutal, total honesty is how a fab for hire operates. Intel doesn't get this yet. Look to see Intel's final 2014 rankings decline still further as the vapor fog bank is replaced by some slightly more honest fab-style reporting. Also look for the next Intel management change to come about sometimes fairly soon as the stockholders are pissed off at being lied to. This sea change in management will likely be part of a major restructuring of the company similar to what MS just went through. There will be some large restucturing charge offs to cover some past sins that need to be properly buried at last. Intel's current predicted growth of 1% is also a made up number -- actually Intel is still shrinking at the same rate as classic PC is shrinking (around -6 % year on year so far). Intel has been hiding this in their utilization numbers up until this point but running any plant way below maximum capacity is VERY inefficient and costs the company yet more money that has to out somewhere at some point in time. Intel cannot continue to claim "1% growth" off of their current attempts at loss leader mobile chip production as they have LOST MONEY (billions and billions) to produce these chipsets. Losing money is not "growth" -- just ask your accountant, he will tell you. Report your stuff monthly at full retail value and producing it inefficiently due to poor plant utilization and selling it at a strong loss because you just plain have to must be reported eventually as an additional "adjustments to revenue" or a massive "restructuring" loss. Rolling it and hiding it from one quarter to the next is illegal and will cost the upper level dudes their jobs. One wonders what Intel really really looks like right now, once you peel off the onion layers of vapor this and fudged that ..... :) Dorothy, don't pull back that curtain, honey -- you won't like what you see. And put your emerald glasses back on, sweetie -- let's try to be good little Intel stockholders, OK ?? Aw, gee wiz -- I warned you ...... The Great and Powerful OZ is really just a flim-flam sham of a man, a old short fat bald headed little man sitting on a tall tall stool just so he can reach the levers that control the big flames and smoke generators actively wreathing the puppet head out there on the stage. http://cdn.static-economist.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/full-width/images/2013/05/blogs/schumpeter/20130504_wbp504.jpg Hey !!! Can you please stop it with all the hollering, explosions, shooting flames and billowing smoke for just a minute -- this isn't fun sitting out here getting roasted ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/27/14 at 08:05:03 http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/zbox-pico_05.jpg http://liliputing.com/2014/08/zotac-zbox-pi320-pocket-sized-bay-trail-desktop-pc.html Zotac ZBOX PI320 is a chubby cell phone pocket-sized BingOS Bay Trail desktop PC We expect some reviews on this very first BingOS box shortly -- pricing isn't available yet and MS hasn't been waving a prototype of it on a stage yelling about how wonderful it will be when it finally gets built. Zotac simply built this one on their own, simply because that is the size they see all computers becoming in the next few years. Well, Mark Shuttleworth, your Ubuntu Edge is finally here now, just missing the cell phone portion of your idea ..... ;) StreamOS or Windows 9 or whatever they call it, if it is desirable, will bring forth a crowd of such like devices. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/28/14 at 07:30:35 http://www.tomshardware.com/news/nvidia-denver-tegr-kepler-mobile,27429.html Is Tegra K1 with dual Denver Cores as good or better than low end Intel Core i3 ??? Well, it equals or betters the Haswell Celeron 2955U in very early reports from Tom's Hardware, and as Tom's puts it "The claim it is a 2x improvement in ARM power and battery life isn't too far off the mark." Can this K1 chip's next 4 Denver cores in a 20nm generation go head to head with the rest of Intel Core i3 -- in a mainstream laptop or PC? Looks like mebbe it could, and offer 2x battery life and better graphics as well. http://media.bestofmicro.com/6/Y/448666/gallery/denver-vs-a15r3_w_600.png http://media.bestofmicro.com/6/Z/448667/original/nvidia-denver-benchmarks.jpg "Nvidia’s benchmarks show that Denver is roughly twice as fast as Cortex A15 R3, Krait 400 and Silvermont/Bay Trail. It even beats Intel’s mainstream Haswell Celeron CPU in the majority of tests. Of course we have to leave any final judgements until we have hardware in our own hands for testing, but these numbers do suggest that Nvidia’s use of the phrase “doubles the performance” might not be far from the mark." Please note that all of these future Tegra K1 versions will actually occur before Intel can get any volume production out of their new 14nm designs, designs which according to Intel only supposedly offer a meager 5% speed increase over Intel's current Haswell offerings. Google always picks the best of the best each year to go inside the Google Nexus for that particular year -- this year's Nexus product will have a Tegra K1 inside it. Apple's dual core 20nm A8 is going to look a little pale besides the Tegra K1 Denver and the Samsung Exynos 5433, 5480 and 5483 all of which will all launch this fall at the same time the Apple A8 debuts. Intel has nothing really new or different in the pipeline until fall of next year, nothing that isn't just another rename of the same exact chipsets that they have been selling as loss leaders for two years now. Intel is treading water pending its next big reorganization, in other words. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/28/14 at 09:10:15 http://www.pcper.com/category/tags/arm "The custom 64-bit Denver CPU cores use a 7-way superscalar design and run a custom instruction set. Denver is a wide but in-order architecture that allows up to seven operations per clock cycle. NVIDIA is using a custom ISA and on-the-fly binary translation to convert ARMv8 instructions to microcode before execution. A software layer and 128MB cache enhance the Dynamic Code Optimization technology by allowing the processor to examine and optimize the ARM code, convert it to the custom instruction set, and further cache the converted microcode of frequently used applications in a cache (which can be bypassed for infrequently processed code)." This is a very detailed techno-review of 64 bit Tegra K1 Denver as a PC chip -- and yes they are treating and will be testing it against PC standards like a PC chip. Tegra K1, like Qualcomm, greatly modify and improve upon the stock ARM A-57 designs. Tegra K1 with four (4) Denver cores would be a PC class chipset -- make no mistake about it. Way way more than a phone or a tablet would ever need, more than a Chromebook would require. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/28/14 at 09:40:16 Samsung’s first 64-bit 20nm Octa-core chip could launch on September 3rd inside the Galaxy Note 4 smartphone http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/antutu-galaxy-note-4.jpg Big question (not yet confirmed) is that this chip will be the first 64bit 20nm chipset that will actually throw some L functions even with Android L not being officially available yet (the full 64 bit completely optimized Android version of L that is). Reports are that this chipset will still get right on up there with the current Tegra K1 in both benchmarks and performance AS SHIPPED and once the Android L (64 bit version) is out and has been optimized for each of the 8 each 64 bit ARM cores and the Mali 704 graphics set is properly configured for compute sharing in L then this phone will EXCEED the Tegra K1 Denver's performance level and force NVIDA go ahead and release the next 4 core 64 bit Denver version early. http://www.antutu.com/static/attachment/articles/201406/20063109-content.jpg see.... it's me -- unlock yourself Some of the L new stuff is coming with this phone, even in advance of the release of Android L. All of this is intended to crowd Apple and their release of the A8 20nm chipset in the new larger iPhone. ;) Samsung and Apple, gotta feel all the love there ..... them hocky sticks are jest a flyin' up against them helmets. <CRACK !!!> <WACK !!!> <THUD !!!> Speaking of all that S-A love (and rushing some advanced stuff off to market just to be the first and so as to stick your middle bird finger way up in Apple's eyeball socket at the same time) -- didn't Samsung foul up their first Octa-Core release 3 years ago by sending it out in a phone before the ARM software and drivers and hardware interfaces were completely cooked? Just reminding you that you swore you'd never do that again ..... ::) Tegra K1 is NOT going to create any bobble at the 64 bit change over point -- they will wait until their Denver cores are ready and the software to support it is out there in Android and Chrome and everything is known to be working at optimum. Samsung, however, is rushing things again, lifting entire portions of pre-release L code and putting into next week's phone release -- is this a potential for a big big woopsie yet again? Companies and their corporate egos -- what can you say? Samsung, being their own foundry, can correct any shortcoming very quickly on the fly or if needed release a new improved version very quickly. They have done this with Exynos 5 Octa-Core A-15 family four times during the 3 years it lasted. A flagship chipset at Samsung never sticks around more than 1 year before being superseded with something better. But still, I wouldn't buy this first phone unless the full L Android 64 bit software is completely released -- no way in hell. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/29/14 at 10:24:32 http://liliputing.com/2014/08/chromebooks-intel-broadwell-chips-way.html Announcements of 64 bit Quad and Octa-core chipsets from Allwinner, Mediatek, NVIDA and Samsung are ringing up Intel's chimes a bit. Intel's best Chrome chipset, a Haswell based Celeron 2955U is getting punched around some by the Tegra K1 in a very public fashion .... and now here comes the rest of the ARM Octa-core crew to get their turns at hitting on that dangly Intel 2955U speed bag. AMD is also here now, getting their licks in on the speed bag using their fanless integrated Mullins chipset. Mullins is both integrated and fanless, just like the ARM boys. Intel's PR department responds to this dangly sack abuse with a big brown vapor gas blast from way out sometimes in 2015 -- and I quote the smelly brown vapor as follows: "Google’s François Beaufort notes that code for a Broadwell-based device code-named Auron has been posted to the Chromium code repository." http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/broadwell1.jpg "Auron is just the code-name for a board that someone is testing. It’s not clear if this will turn into a real product anytime soon. But it does seem likely that some PC maker will attempt to offer a Chromebook with a Broadwell chip eventually… so why not start preparing the code now? Broadwell chips should offer better performance-per-watt and lower power consumption than today’s Haswell chips (which are found in a number of Chromebooks from Acer, HP, and Dell). We’ll have to wait until 2015 to see Broadwell chips for desktops and premium notebooks. But the first Broadwell chip is coming this year. The Intel Core M processor is a low-power chip aimed at [very high end] portable devices including fanless tablets, notebooks, and 2-in-1 systems So don’t be surprised if some of the first Broadwell-based Chromebooks are thin, light, and fanless.". And, supposedly 5% faster and at a 20% energy improvement -- all of these future 14nm numbers relative to the existing 22nm Haswell of course, not the actual competitive ARM based 28nm and 20nm chipsets which already do better than the new Haswell supposedly will be able to do. :D BUT HEY .... it will finally be fanless but it will still likely need them BIG Intel loss leader price supports to be made into any real shippable products. :D |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/29/14 at 20:05:35 Chrome Wars are heating up now with all of the various players putting their units into play for their slice of this Christmas's sales pie. AMD, Tegra K1, Samsung, Mediatek, Allwinner are all throwing real new chips and real new Chromebooks into the pot. Intel has their same old 3 year old Haswell Celeron 2955u and a potential wiff of 2015 undefined brown vapor that may be a "Auron" Broadwell Chromebook board should the wiff of vapor actually linger that long. Next month Microsoft's and HP's Mullins-based Streambook should hit in Sept/Oct, and we shall see from all the competitive reviews exactly what Microsoft can actually do to lighten up and speed up their Pre-Win 9 released OS product to try to play more effectively in the Chrome Wars. We should also see if/whatever China actually gets for all its ball busting efforts on 'ol Microsoft -- a crude looking XP replacement supposedly will be able to be downloaded for free. ;) Make no mistake, people who are noting prices of laptops and desktops go abruptly down just recently have the wave of Chrome based products to thank for it. You may not use Chrome yourself, but you will still benefit from it. Intel is being forced to get better. Microsoft is being forced to get better. Google is unifying and consolidating. The entire ARM world is responding by getting better quicker ..... My daughter and her husband are buying a couple of Win 7 pro laptops this weekend on sell out at Costco for their niece & nephew --- enough machine to carry them all the way through college .... pretty decent 1 terabyte hard drive, 4 gigs systems memory, pretty powerful upper range Core i5 CPU equipped machines loaded with the full Win 7 Pro package (retro'd Win 8.1 machines in other words) that are being sold out for cheap because of the impending Win 9 wave. ====================================== Along the same vein, check out these Staples coupons for $100 off any PC over $499 -- that is a sizeable discount that is going to get better as we approach Black Friday. http://www.staples.com/coupons/?storeId=10001&AID=10428703&CID=AFF%3A3640101%3A3640101%3A10428703&CJPIXEL=CJPIXEL&cm_mmc=CJ-_-3640101-_-3640101-_-10428703&SID=skim32X105X0cd0dd8df6da2665a62818dbaae64cfe&PID=5152777 $100 off all laptops, desktops, all-in-one PCs and tablets regularly priced $499 or more. PC suppliers are building Chromebooks and dumping their existing warehouse stocks of Win 8.1 PC based products. All they are sure of is that RAPID CHANGE is going to make those warehouse PC/laptop Win 8.1 stocks less and less valuable and if they don't move them before Christmas they might get Streambooked. Chromed, or Thresholded to death. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/31/14 at 13:10:27 http://liliputing.com/2014/08/lilbits-8-29-2014-hello-haswell-e.html Intel now needs some revenue. One place they are accustomed to getting it is from the small faithful crew of full bore case modding water jacketing PC enthusiasts who are willing to go drop $4,000 every time a new Intel upper end Core i7 chipset comes out .... not that they really need it for anything, mind you, but it might make their bit coin mining go a little better. Do you happen to remember how harshly and scornfully Intel derided the AMD Bulldozer 8 core chipset as "totally unnecessary" after it came out? Truth was that Microsoft's OSs would not even really use the core count after 4 for much of anything at all ..... and cores 6 through 8 just sat there mostly. ::) ..... yeah, we all remember what you said, Intel. You ain't fooling anybody. However, Intel now needs some revenue .... badly .... so here comes the brand new "never been faster ever before" Haswell E series to pick the hip pockets of them water jacket overclock'n boys. And yeah, the Intel corporate image & ego really does need a bit of a boost right now, and something positive to distract them pesky stockholders would be right helpful too ...... http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/haswell-e-157x200.jpg "The most powerful is a Core i7-5960X 8-core processor with 16 processor threads, 20MB of cache, and a base clock speed of 3 GHz. (more if overclocked or turbo'd) The new chips also feature Intel’s new X99 Chipset, with support for DDR4 memory." ;D http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--lCTGRkm6--/c_fit,fl_progressive,q_80,w_636/fkmmjltl5gchet2q0qo8.jpg So what can you do with this "can't be fully utilized by any earthly OS" 8 core Intel x86 processor system? Alienware, of course. Any decent alien OS system can use dozens and hundreds and thousands of them up to 8 core Intel x86 CPUs for doing those uber complex real time alien multi-dimensional totally alien hyperspace navigation calculations .... ::) <grin> ..... ET skype home ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/31/14 at 16:37:01 http://www.extremetech.com/computing/186332-microsoft-slashes-prices-to-compete-with-chromebooks-the-second-coming-of-the-netbook http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/microsoft-used-car-sales-man-windows-discount1-640x372.jpg "The behemoth flails wildly". At its Worldwide Partner Conference, Microsoft has finally decided to compete with Chromebooks at the very lowest end of the PC market. Come fall, you’ll be able to get your hands on an HP Stream laptop running Windows 8.1 for just $200 — a Windows price point that we haven’t seen since the last time the PC market scraped the barrel (netbooks). With Chromebooks quickly gobbling up market share, and Windows 8.1 and Windows Phone 8.1 failing to gain a significant foothold, Microsoft has clearly decided it’s time to resort to desperate measures. On the Chromebook side of the fence, market research company NPD recently announced that Chromebooks are up to 35% <now 41%> of commercial laptop shipments in the US so far in 2014, and between 5 and 6% <now 9 to 12%> of total laptop sales. “Commercial shipments” refers to enterprise (business) and institutional (education, government) customers. 35% of commercial shipments is a jump of more than 250% compared to the same period last year, says NPD. Around 6% of overall consumer laptop sales is pretty good (the entire market is tens of millions in the US per year). http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/microsoft-windows-chromebooks.jpg Clearly, from the aggressive pricing and the amusing <and intentionally quite incorrect and misleading> Windows vs. Chromebook slide, Microsoft is a bit concerned. I don’t think anyone — especially Microsoft — ever considered Google’s rather oddball OS a threat. But, with ever decreasing component costs, almost ubiquitous WiFi internet access, and an increasingly rich suite of web apps, it seems Chromebooks are becoming rather popular." Here is the difference between the old Windows netbook and the Chromebook -- the casual user people, especially the ladies, REALLY REALLY LIKE the Chromebook a lot. Unlike Windows netbooks, the Chromebook is zero (0) hassles to keep up with and does not require you to be an expert at the inner workings of your OS. What Microsoft has done is to signal to the laptop makers that they will have to diversify on the low end of things especially since low end Windows machines will HAVE to be cut to sub-profitable levels in the future. And this is being required by Microsoft just so Microsoft can survive -- forcing the laptop makers to sell their competitively featured & functioning Windows units at next to no profit just so Microsoft can remain present in the low end of things at all. The laptop makers cannot survive without making some profit. They are currently making a profit selling Chromebooks at the $200-$250 price point. HP for one is putting out at least one model of every sort of OS that is out there, making sure to represent at least the current hardware norms of that OS. No matter who the winners wind up being, HP intends to be there, busily selling something that they can make a profit at while all these low end things oh so slowly start to sift out the losers from the winners. Unless Microsoft can get a whole lot lighter on those hardware requirements, it looks like Windows itself might be what sifts out into the low end loser pile. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/01/14 at 05:05:35 http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/05/03/us-microsoft-gates-idUSBREA410YS20140503 Bill Gates on track to own no Microsoft stock in four years http://s1.reutersmedia.net/resources/r/?m=02&d=20140503&t=2&i=893771593&w=580&fh=&fw=&ll=&pl=&r=CBREA411SKF00 Speaking of which, Microsoft stock is getting sold off by certain heavy MS holders. Billy boy here is getting monitored by the SEC for any potential insider trading since he is the Technology Advisor to MS's CEO and here Billy is selling off all of his MS stock on a SEC approved 4 year scheduled plan. Note that Balmer the stupid hasn't begun selling off any of his mass of stock yet, because Billy gets to go first as you can only liquidate so much stock at a time without throwing the whole thing into the toilet. The SEC is not going to let that happen. When Ballmer breaks traces and suddenly dumps chunks of his stock, then you know it is all over but the shouting. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/02/14 at 22:26:05 http://www.moderndefrag.com/2014/07/college-student-chromebook-review.html This is the best written of the college student reviews, with the best thought out recommendations. It is long though, so here is just the conclusion. Conclusion: "In my experience, my Acer C720 was perfect for what I needed. and for less than $200, I was more than happy. I could boot up in an instant to take notes in class, write papers and create PowerPoint presentations without an issue, listen to music, video chat with friends, and watch movies. For most students, a $200 Chromebook is all you will ever need." And yup, he said Powerpoint -- he bookmarked Word, Excel and Powerpoint on line and used them instead of the Google docs equivalents because his college had that as an absolute requirement (so he met the requirement). http://blog.chegg.com/2014/03/18/acer-chromebook-a-college-student-review/ This is a terse synopsis of a detailed multi page review in depth of "college on a Chromebook". "Having messed with the Acer Chromebook C720 for the past couple of weeks, I’ve come to love it a lot and will honestly recommend this to anyone looking for a cheap and portable laptop for simple tasks. Some might have issues with the fact that Chrome OS relies heavily on the web, or the flaws with the track pad, and lack of app compatibility, but if you’re looking for a computer to browse the internet, write papers and stream music, you can’t go wrong with the affordable $199 Acer C720 Chromebook." Simple and light plays well at a wifi based college (and most are now days) and the absolute requirement to be able to run all day on battery power comes across as a real benefit to an on the go college student. Another review by a student is found here: http://dailytrojan.com/2014/01/24/google-chromebooks-a-worthwhile-option-for-students/ "Chromebooks, available from a number of PC manufacturers like Samsung and Acer for as little as $199, run Google’s Chrome operating system, which is essentially the Chrome web browser with a few built-in web apps. It utilizes Google Cloud, so you don’t have to worry about losing your files or backing things up. You’ll have to forget your grand plans of simultaneously writing ten papers while directing US military satellites from your dorm, but in this case, less is more. All of the needs of the typical students are accommodated by Google’s range of productivity tools. Need to write a paper or take notes? Google Docs allows you to not only create word documents, but to easily collaborate with others — an excellent tool for creating group study guides. In addition to Docs, Google’s office suites includes tools for creating spreadsheets and slideshows, comparable to Excel and PowerPoint." And now here is a college IT department person's read on chromebooks (and the fall downs there of, which he laments but knows are out there --- OLD SOFTWARE still in use by various departments with aging heads of same) https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/chromebook-central/k2fzC03mWQY "That depends entirely on the particular university you're enrolled with, and the instructors. Many people absolutely love using their Chromebook for their college studies. But there are a few things to watch out for. The university using a critical application that requires Java is probably the biggest. Java is a big mess of security vulnerabilities that the Department of Homeland Security has urged everyone to get rid of, but some companies and universities still have old applications that require it. There is a similar situation with Microsoft Silverlight. Some have badly written web sites that check specifically for Microsoft Internet Explorer and the refuse to work with another browser. This has nothing to do with whether Chrome can handle the site; it has to do with lazy or less-than-knowledgeable web developers. There are some user agent string switchers in the Chrome Web Store that can usually get you past this problem. Their function is to lie to the web site and tell it that you're using MSIE when you're not. The other big thing is that some universities have videos that are in a proprietary format like Windows Media. Chrome OS cannot play these directly, but if you can download, rather than stream, the videos you can run the files through an online converter like zamzar.com to make copies that the Chromebook can play. The last thing is that if the university password protects and encrypts pdf files, Chrome OS can't handle that. Hopefully that's enough information for you to investigate whether a Chromebook is right for your university. Good luck, and if you have more questions, you know where to find us. " What do you sense from reading about Chromebooks from educators both in grade school and in college? To them it comes across as a good thing. The fall downs are correctly identified as out of date this and that (things which should be replaced ASAP). Students see low cost and LIGHT and all day battery life as critical benefits. "Easy" is a fringe benefit, as is absolute ease of collaboration on those "approved" group projects. One female student said it best "My friends have to spend time and energy dealing with their machines fouling up on them all the time -- I don't. I have never had to make an emergency trip to the Computer Support office yet and one of my friends has made half a dozen, easy." Same "mileage may vary" wording is used by all students when you get up into the 500 level and up courses -- the specialized softwares used by your major likely are quite old and may not be Chrome compatible. But by then you generally have gotten a new laptop anyway since college is severely hard on laptops, physically. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/03/14 at 08:06:12 First StreamBook is out, not from HP but from Asus, the guys who made netbooks popular. Asus is even using the Eeebook moniker, which denotes netbook (and is something they own instead of StreamBook which they do not) http://liliputing.com/2014/09/asus-eeebook-x205-netbook-reborn-199-euro-notebook.html Asus EeeBook X205: the 2.2 pound all day life "netbook" reborn as a $199 notebook http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/eeebook_03.jpg "The EeeBook X205 features an Intel Atom Z3735 Bay Trail processor, a 1366 x 768 pixel display, 2GB of RAM, 32GB to 64GB of solid state storage, and up to 12 hours of battery life. It’s basically what you’d get if you took the guts of a cheap Google Chromebook and threw Windows on it instead of Chrome OS… or possibly what you would have seen by now if netbooks had evolved into laptops instead of sort of fading away for a few years." Asus has swung pretty much low end on the unit, making up a netbookish take on the StreamBook. However, Asus can make a very slim profit on this unit, which may or may not play true with the 14" HP StreamBook when it comes out with its better specs, keyboard and screen size. Reviews are pending awaiting arrival of the units. Unless Microsoft has done something to BingOS to make it run a lot better on smaller resources folks are anticipating Chromebooks to run a lot better/quicker than the similar priced BingOS units. Also note that with everyone going to MS Office On-Line and bookmarking the pages for Word, Excel and Powerpoint on their Chromebooks, so having Microsoft out there saying that you can't do Office on a Chromebook is pretty much not true any more. Microsoft will likely now try to somehow exclude Chromebooks from using their free Office On-Line web pages and that will get them a lawsuit or two pretty quick like. Plus, there are Chrome store apps already in the Chrome Store that allow your Chromebook to identify itself as an old version of Windows IE to those sites that try to say "we only support MS products" or "this site can be best viewed by Internet Explorer". The Chrome wars are up and going now, with two vendors now placing matching cased Chrome and Windows warriors out there on the very low end of the fighting field. Their swords are still sheathed though as they haven't reached the reviewers yet. ;) Once again, very good direct comparisons will be able to be made as Asus makes the exact same unit in a Chromebook. Microsoft has now joined Intel in "staying in existence" by loss leader spending. In both cases, the companies MUST come out with a competitive product soon before their loss leader spending runs their bank accounts dry. Neither company is making any real profit from their mobile forays, and now their low end laptop businesses have gone under water too. Both are resorting to bribes, free products and loss leader spending. Bribes and free products can only keep you going for so long, eventually you will have to make a customer acceptable OS version (or some inexpensive integrated chipsets) with a low enough cost posture that allows you to make a real profit doing it. Both companies have had to cannibalize their low end (profitable) product lines as the march of ARM and Open Source has begun eating them up from below the knees like piranha in a shallow stream crossing. What is scary is that consumers are realizing that phones, tablets and Chromebooks/netbooks can indeed do 95%+ of what the family needs done on a regular basis. One (1) old style full Windows desktop/laptop unit (the family antique) sitting in the den hooked up to a scanner and a wifi E-printer can supply the remaining elephant power for what the family only occasionally needs. And as the net based stuff keeps getting better and better and better, that required "occasional elephant use" will decline until the old den unit can be thrown out as unneeded. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/03/14 at 09:26:32 [mediahttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MceLc7-w1lQ][/media] video at YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MceLc7-w1lQ Takes only a minute and vola -- you see PC and phone and tablet suddenly start to act connected. They aren't really -- but they all do support Blue Tooth and that is what this Logitech Blue Tooth Keyboard is all about. The idea is sound -- as are the wifi and Miracast and Chromecast video exchange formats and somebody is going to do the Shuttleworth trick sooner or later as the processors and media exchange are already out there, readily available. Why do you have to have 3-4 separate devices? Your phone (or your tablet) is already plenty good enough to power that big screen for you ..... :) .......... real answer is, selling you 3-4 separate devices makes more money for Samsung & company. And Microsoft would just roll over and die if they didn't have desktops / laptops any more .......... ============================================= I can't believe we actually let them put this ugly clunky heavy piece of crap around our slim wrists -- we have singlehandedly set gay pride back for a decade at least. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/intel-mica_02.jpg NEWS FLASH -- Intel enters into the Smart Watch fray with the following $1,000 "low end capability" slightly porky and oversized full wrist band device. It is a full sized 1/4" thick solid metal bracelet in size, but it can't do all that the current Samsung Fit and Samsung S etc. etc. etc. can do. All them Intel stockholders must be jest a cheering to see how "advanced" our Intel Leadership looks right now in the second half of 2014 ..... ::) http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/intel-mica.jpg =============================================== Now you can have the Intel wrist unit that doesn't do very much for $1,000 ..... Or You can have the Samsung Gear S (shipping now) for a quarter of that price ..... http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/samsung-gear-s.jpg http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/fleksy-s.jpg http://liliputing.com/2014/09/samsung-gear-s-smartwatch-kinda-first-tizen-smartphone.html "Samsung unveiled the Gear S smartwatch last week and began showing off the watch with a 2 inch screen and support for cellular networks at the IFA shows in Berlin this week. Like most of the company’s other smart wearable devices, the Gear S runs an operating system based on Tizen Linux. Samsung also plans to use Tizen on smart TVs and smartphones eventually… but so far every attempt the company has made to launch a Tizen phone has been either scrapped or delayed. So in some ways, the Gear S will actually be the first smartphone to ship with Tizen." Now, you can go on line, text and make a phone call with this one (no cell phone required). 'Ol Dickie Tracy would be proud to own this slim thin fully featured wrist radio. ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D --------- just wait until you see what Google uncorks to counter the Apple wrist unit that is coming out in a month or there-abouts ---------- |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 09/03/14 at 12:17:30 Like I have said so many times in the past when talking to friends...there is coming the day that your television will be an all encompassing "communication" station. And so will your portable... I am talking about kindle/ipad type devices turning into a Bluetooth cell/notepad device. If a company comes out with a pad that is say 10" and has cell phone capabilities/w Bluetooth, I am so going to buy it, even though I would have to wear a "manbag" or "murse" to put it in. I am so tired of squinting to see print on my cell phone and even though I "pinch" it larger, I still have to minimize the "pinch" to navigate to the next phrase. When I go on vacation, I carry my kindle fire, a small laptop and my cell phone... too many devices! Its simple now really, I want a 10" screen, 10megapixel camera/w light, cell phone with Bluetooth, all in one! Give me what I want.... i'm getting to old to wait for it.....!!!! ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/03/14 at 21:25:36 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/toshiba-satellite-cl10-b-is-a-windows-notebook-with-chromebook-like-specs.html Toshiba Satellite CL10-B is a Windows notebook with Chromebook-like specs http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/toshiba-cl10-b_01.jpg "Asus isn’t the only company launching a portable Windows notebook with the kind of specs you’d expect from a Chromebook. The Toshiba Satellite CL10-B is an 11.6 inch notebook with an 11.6 inch display, 2GB of RAM, and 32GB of eMMC solid state storage. The notebook weighs 2.4 pounds, measures about 0.8 inches thick." Come on HP, where is that 14" Stream Machine you promised ???? -- now you are getting lapped by Toshiba of all people. HP pulled all the specs for their new device once already and have had the time necessary to rethink the thing. The German computer show is over in two days, should HP fail to announce their Streambook one would be tempted to consider that they have RE-considered the effort in light of comparing the prototype Streambook's results VS their own same case Chromebooks. Unlike Microsoft and Intel, HP is a commercial firm that does not pursue a flop past the point of identifying it ..... People are already asking if the Asus and Toshiba units have upgradeable memory slots, or if the memory is hard soldered in place as per the original HP Streambook design. They correctly point out the Asus Chromebox and Chromebook were memory and SSD upgradeable from the get go. I think people know pretty much the failure points of a Windows machine by now ...... and 2 gigs of systems memory is NOT ENOUGH MEMORY for a quick general use Windows machine. Not unless MS has retooled the OS some to make it quicker and less hungry ..... :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/04/14 at 06:30:11 And this is just for Old_Rider to take a drool at since he believes in super TVs ...... :) Watch full size on YouTube for best effect: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EXtihYufl8Y ..... and here are the interface gestures explained https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3b5UcfJ24aM |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/04/14 at 18:57:18 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/hp-launches-new-chromebook-11-chromebook-14-intel-nvidia-chips.html http://liliputing.com/2014/09/dell-launches-999-chromebox-for-meetings.html Busy busy day in the Chrome Wars .... HP dropped their Tegra K1 Chromebook, 14 inches, 12+ hours of run time, sounds very very nice. They also dropped two other chrome devices that are step ups to what they sell now. There is NO HP STREAMBOOK YET ..... and may never be one, since the 14" HP Tegra K1 outperforms the current Intel Chromebook chipsets so strongly graphically that it raises the Chromebook performance bar quite a bit, and this plays specifically for Microsoft's lame and late StreamBook. HP already sees 2 "netbook style" low / slow grade MS BingOS devices already sitting out there already already doing nothing saleswise, so where the heck is their 14" BingOS Mullins based Streambook unit going to land if they go ahead and push it out there anyway? It can't go low because it costs too much and it can't go high because it simply isn't good enough to compete against the HP 14" Tegra K1 Chromebook that just did get pushed out there by HP. Heck, it is conjectured that the AMD Mullins cannot compete all that well against the Intel Celeron 2955U that is commonly used in the Chromebooks and Chromeboxes currently being shipped by everybody, much less against the Tegra K1 which is kicking so much Celeron 2955U graphics and 6 vs 12 hour battery life butt lately. Has entry of HP Tegra K1 killed the Mullins StreamBook ???? ::) Dell has now dropped in their first Chrome Box and Business Meeting Class Chromebox for Meetings. Chromebook sales to education and to business are absolutely booming right now and Dell is the major supplier to education and business here in the USA ..... so Dell is multiplying their Chrome stuff as just quick as they can, but only with step up units. Dell units are noted as being very very well built so as to justify their premium price tags. So far we have a round dozen new Chromebooks/boxes being announced at this German show, with some of them being quite upscale and nice. Only two (2) low end Windows BingOS devices have been announced so far, and neither one is the HP " spec yanked" AMD Mullins StreamBook that we have been a' waiting for. HP is instead announcing several even more "upgraded" Chromebooks of various grades and types instead. ?????????????? ::) ????????????? Is there a message in there somewhere for you, Microsoft? hint: streamline and slim down your Windows 9 or else start losing even more market share next year |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/05/14 at 00:32:25 Chrome wars are still showing a software divide between x86 and ARM. Intel runs best if you plan to run Chrome and Linux distros. ARM runs best if you plan to run Chrome and Android apps. >:( There are two price points developing. Absolute bottom end and next jump up for slightly better stuff. Absolute bottom end is $179 to $200 and Chrome still owns that span. The devices down here are adding memory and drive space and better screen/keyboard to make up the $250 to $300 "next jump up" which is now populated by both Chrome and Windows devices. Windows still has no OS variant that can play with these $200 low levels of resources, so although Windows is there now (2 instances) nobody seems to be taking them seriously. Windows is simply so fat and porky and slow that it simply won't play well at all at the current $200 low end hardware base level. Windows needs to go on a diet and hit the gym and sweat off some fat ..... Microsoft needs to get busy and really create a light enough variant that can perform this job or accept the fact that they simply can't go there and quit trying. Given the fact that some 70-80% of new laptop sales right now is happening at this $179-$200 lowest level seems to indicate Microsoft needs to hit the gym (or agree to fade away). |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/05/14 at 09:05:45 Faced with a big big day yesterday in the Chrome Wars, a notable day that saw Tegra K1 showing very very well and taking producer's market share away from Intel and with Dell showing its future Chrome based hand in business and education ..... Intel PR suddenly feels it is necessary to "blast back" at Tegra K1 with some really really undefined stuff from the far far future, to get back up on the stage and steal the mike from them like Ballmer used to do, jumping up there on the stage stealing somebody else's keynote presentation time. http://liliputing.com/2014/09/intel-launches-4-5w-core-m-broadwell-chips-for-fanless-tablets-and-convertibles.html Intel launches 4.5W Core M “Broadwell” chips for fanless tablets and convertibles http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/intel-core-m_08.jpg Read it carefully, it never says "when" this will happen and it only shows pictures of a fully integrated SOC chipset that Intel simply cannot currently make at all right now. The motherboard pics however obviously show NO SOC INTEGRATION AT ALL while the chip pic shows an integrated SOC. This "product launch" is a collage of miscellaneous pictures from current stuff that do not reflect any cohesive whole at all. (did you think nobody would notice?) It also carefully says "Second Generation Broadwell" when the first generation of Broadwell is currently under development and is only slated to become real sometime next year. Nice BS vapor PR opportunity taken, Intel, but this is basically just another Intel vapor distraction that will get reformatted and name changed at least 3 times before it actually happens, over two years from now. It also shows that Intel knows very well what they aren't and wishes that they could be. Now, if Intel works at it hard and gets some serious help from Rockchip on the mobile chip design, maybe in one to two years they CAN have a chipset like this. Maybe. ;) In any case, Intel is fulfilling their role as "catalyst to make ARM get better quicker" just as surely as ARM is making Intel get better much much quicker than ever before. ================================== Extra news on this topic. Well, not on the next generation of Broadwell M, but on new items over $999 each that will be built with the current Broadwell generation. Four convertable tablets will be built that will be Surface Pro level ranging from $1,699 at first down to $999.99 once volume shipping begins ....... What is it with Intel that every new item always costs a thousand dollars? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/05/14 at 09:43:17 Intel has always kept a tick tock cadence to rolling out a new lithography tick this year and downsizing their current stuff, then on the next year's tock cycle rolling out new technology to advance their product line technologically. Tick-Tock has been disrupted this year, with 14nm lithography lagging back a bit more than one full clock cycle due to issues getting it working well. Intel is getting all confused internally now, being so very large and vertically silo'd they keep getting surprised internally when items needed for a new technology tock cycle simply aren't there yet. Right now half of Intel is still ticking from last year when the rest seems to be tocking on the original schedule (with some pieces that aren't nearly ready to be built on a tick that simply isn't finished yet). It is making a right mess of things right now ..... =================================== ARM isn't as strongly affected by the lithograph screw up as Intel has been because they always planned finer smaller lithography steps (and are now stepping down those smaller steps very gracefully). 20nm is progressing nicely as the new upcoming main-stream lithography level, with 16-14nm to follow next year equally gracefully. ARM did react to the 14nm lithography mess by putting out the A-17 as a new A-9 replacement and by upgrading the A-7 and A-15 generations slightly twice while keeping the lithography at 28nm. 28nm is the "old mainstream" in ARM now, but because of the steady ARM updates all the various players are doing very well still as they step down to 20nm. They are all lined up and ready to go now to step down to 20nm and go to 64 bit, which is the next big ARM wave of stuff that is coming out now as we speak. Everyone will step quietly past 22nm Intel while they are still piled up at the foot of the 14nm step that Intel simply can't take yet. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/06/14 at 05:00:26 Intel is on the verge of starting to getting it right next year. No sources, just me. They will still do loss leader next year and into the next, but the amount lost per processor will be less and less. I have had quite a bit of enjoyment bashing Intel because they started out soooooo far behind and were just so full of themselves they couldn't see it. It made for some good Three Stooges comedy. Microsoft too, although Microsoft seems to be understanding where they are now but are seemingly wanting mobile to want to "catch up" to their huge memory and processor requirements instead of downsizing their OS requirements to get in line with reality. This is a key deadly mistake for Microsoft that they are making right now as we speak. Chrome is becoming popular now, and folks are getting past having to have MS Word just to function at work. Back to Intel -- the fight is coming to Intel now as all the various ARM vendors are beginning encroaching on laptop land. Intel is seeing their middle chips, the Core i3's, being directly attacked right now in the Chrome Wars. By standard ARM upper end cell phone chipsets --- not even special built ARM chipsets --- yet. This directly threatens the installed base for both Intel and Microsoft. They cannot ignore it and they cannot play "fumble around try try trying again" as they have been doing for the last 3 years. Each fumble and try try again at this stage will lose them a piece of home ground that they can never likely get back again. The Chrome Wars will quickly tell us which way this trend will go. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/07/14 at 05:53:39 Chromebook and Chromebox removing MS laptop/desktop marketshare So, we see that MS is worried about Chromebooks and Chromeboxes since they are strongly accepted by education, are generally accepted by the consumer and now are starting their roll into the business sector with Dell/VMware/Citrix as their empowering sell through partners. What does this mean for MS? MS was already suffering from flat 0% growth in laptops and a 6% year on year decline in desktops, so how much more will Chromebooks/boxes hurt them? The figures so far this year indicate potentially over a 30% decline in new unit notebook sales and up to a 10% potential decline in non-obsolete installed base, speaking in very general terms (including consumer and business together). But, you say, but ..... consumer doesn't matter to MS this year since they don't derive any income stream from consumer as they are mostly giving their OS away of late trying to stop the tablet and Chrome bleeding. Hey, exactly what does that last statement really say about MS's future if they don't change the bulk/slowness of their base OS? And how the heck can they stick with a pay-me business plan in a world where all other OS products (including Apple's) are given away for free ???? Let's just agree that education is a done deal at this point and all the kiddies are getting educated using Chromebooks and they will all grow up understanding and accepting Chome devices as "real devices" (right up through college anyway). Yes, so let's focus on Business since that is what hurts MS the most as far as their revenue goes. http://cdn-static.zdnet.com/i/r/story/70/00/032494/2014-08-11-10-39-54-am-620x397.png?hash=ATL0LwNjLJ&upscale=1 This is Gartner's generic predicted growth in Chromebooks, split by business and consumer. It is conservative as it is based off the 2013 numbers which have already been exceeded by 2014's first half reality, so the expansion curve will likely be steeper than shown in the graph. So you could take this chart and make a predicted MS decline chart out of it by flipping it over and showing MS market share shrinkage at the same levels. One Chrome device sold = one Windows device that didn't sell. Why would this trick very likely be a valid future prediction? Because MS has their thumb up their butt for 3 years now and will not/cannot bring themselves to cut down on the gross flatulence in their Windows OS's construction. We are talking about them building ever more complex OS programs that makes sure Windows requires TWICE AS MUCH systems memory for even a basic minimal install on a low end device. And the corpulent Windows OS always takes twice as long to execute any given task, comparatively, given the same resources. Bloatware A Chrome unit that is configured off the EXACT SAME SPECS as the most minimal Windows machine screams along with copious useful speed, while the Windows unit chugs along doing the same old long boot delays and slow page building delays we have all seen for years and years now. Pure MS bloatware ..... The Chrome device still wins if you give the Windows unit the double up memory and the stronger processor it "requires" -- Chrome OS is simply that much quicker to execute compared to MS. How can I say this? Win RT and its apps, running on standard ARM mobile grade processors, routinely outpaces Win 8.1 on all app execution stages by 20-50% because the ARM based Win version is simply that much quicker to execute. And surprise, Chrome OS and Chrome apps are even quicker than Win RT and RT apps ..... Dell will release figures at years end on their Chromebook and Chromebox sales -- simply assume Chrome took out one Windows business revenue unit per each Dell Chromeunit sold and you have your rough Microsoft "business income hit" answer. It will be brutally huge as it rolls out over the years ..... unless MS can actually do something smart with Windows 9 to make it a lot faster and lighter. And yet so far we see no signs of anything drastically better are coming out of Threshold as far as better memory use or any functional increase in app execution quickness ..... "Same old same old" functionally will kill MS within 2 years at the rate at which they are going -- even if they completely fix the ugly Win 8.1 interface issues. MS has competition now on all sides that clearly outperform the basic Windows OS on pure function, speed and core hardware requirements. ::) Apple, ChromeOS, Android, Tizen and the Linux Distros PREDICTION TIME AGAIN: When Win 9 comes out a porky loser yet again, expect to see MS's market share to continue to decline along with their stock prices. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/07/14 at 08:42:10 Ruh Rho, Microsoft ...... Sams Club has them a new webpage a building for a 14" AMD processor equipped fan-free silent thin HP Streambook ---- and the Sams Club wholesale price is $299 ..... Whut happened to your AMD powered HP 14" $199 Chromebook Killer Streambook???? Your MS/HP BS has apparently tricked two of your other faithful partners into putting out two (2) 11" $199 loss leader Win 8.1 BingOS laptops to go out there and flounder around a bit in out there in Chromeland .... (until your support payment $$$ run out, then the two of them will be abruptly price raised up a bit or else completely dropped out of their product line up, depending on what each vendor wants to go do with it) But hey, really, has your good buddy HP apparently decided not to even start to go play a lose lose lose lose low end laptop game with you down there in Chromeland ??? Or did you forget to pay HP the $100 per unit to get them to go down to the $199 price point? Or could you only afford to pay them $50 per unit in the first place ??? Wassup, doc ??? What'cha gonna do now, MS ?? ::) Win 8.1 BingOS ....... ugly malformed b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-bloatware ...... http://doubtfulnewscom.c.presscdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/underside1.png Auuugh !!! I even tried shaving off all my fur, but I'm way too "upgraded" to ever get back down into my $199 price point hole no matter how hard I try !!! |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/07/14 at 11:43:00 Yes, I know, BingOS is not a full sized mainstream real Microsoft OS product --- I was not being fair to them Microsoft lovers everywhere. OK, only the Windows 8.1 mainstream full retail releases then, Pro Server Edition, the full 64 bit fully tweeked for many-many-core processors version. Now that is a significant heavy weight OS, to be sure ..... needs a significant Intel processor full rack set and a huge power supply and a ton of memory to handle it properly. http://natgeoeducationblog.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/corkwhale.jpg ...... Hey, jest stick yer pocket knife straight in to full depth with the holes separated about six inches apart and create you a weakened zipper type seam right along that there belly line, then kick on her a few times with yer boot until she starts to let go jest a wee little bit ...... Now let's give it a single hard cold boot speed test ..... wow --- that's really fast !!! Opened up completely and displayed itself completely within one (1) second !!! ;D I don't think the 15-20 guys show in the first picture standing off to the right with the cameras and the mics in them black and orange slickers even managed to get a shot of it as it happened so durn fast. Jest a taste or a bit of a feel for it, maybe, but nary a single recorded image from all them cameras .... BTW, we do think some of that "special" Intel brownish future vapor stuff may have indeed been involved with this particular performance test. (you have to scroll over at the bottom of this whole post to see them camera guys) http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2013/11/27/article-2514317-19AD404300000578-157_634x355.jpg Window 8.1 Pro 64 bit (weighing in at 60 tons) can open up and display itself inside of one second as per this Microsoft/Intel verified single cold boot speed test. ;D ....... but not using my boot, nosireee Bob, .... not ever. I like my boots and my feet jest the way they are ....... <gag> <barf> If you look real sharp at the pic you can see the kicker guy's hand flung up and the top part of his head as he gets violently bowled over by the speedy MS OS's booted output ..... Yup, he got MS Win 8.1 Multiprocessor Pro OS right on up his nose, in his ears and some way down deep into his open hollering mouth he did .... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/07/14 at 12:52:38 Now, if you have the courage to click on the link below, here is a real time boot off between 2 versions of mac machines, a Windows 8.1 machine and a Chromebook ..... and no, it isn't pretty for the Windows and the Mac machines. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqx-I_rVLBs [media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqx-I_rVLBs[/media] Now, on a nine year old Core 2 duo (a Dell lease return machine) running Linux Mint when I cut mine off at the monitor, it can resume in a measured two (2) seconds from a cold screen. And it resumes automatically to the last screen displayed when it was turned off too -- no fumbling and clicking or touching to get where you need to be like on a Windows 8.1 machine. But they say Linux is way way too geeky for normal mortals to use .... why that is I do not know as my Linux Mint is stone easy to set up and use compared to Microsoft 8.1 and it is VERY QUICK too. And secure. And completely free, let's not forget that. ======================================== Why Windows feels it doesn't need to change. We define computing, we are the standard by which all others are compared. No other system can do it ALL, only we can. No one else has the real computing experience and we have that all knowledge sewn up tight with this big huge nasty patent club we can use to defend it all. We can do absolutely nothing and continue to rake in the money from all those locked-in business chumps out there. ======================================== Reality is that, as always ...... change, she comes. If you don't keep up with the change waves, you get left behind. This is starting to become very obvious when you have to lay off functionally 45% of your people and functionally cease supporting your older softwares with 5 or more years left in their original support plans. Your average computer reviewer person now-a-days is knowledgeable and current on 3-4 operating systems now. Quite a few of these guys freely admit to preferring other brands of OS over yours, brands that they personally chose to use out of simple preference. Macs and Chrome are preferred over your OS by quite a few now ...... and their now vocal criticism of your unchanging rather bloated OS is mounting weekly. Hey Win 9 -- got any real improvements in that 60 ton pile of stuff other than a re-tweeked start page? ::) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/08/14 at 08:54:26 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/hp-announces-the-14-inch-300-hp-stream-laptop.html HP announces the 14 inch, $300 HP Stream laptop http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/hp-stream_004.jpg Yup, it was all a big April Fools Joke from HP and Microsoft, that they ever could really do a $199 notebook to compete against ChromeBooks -- reality doesn't bend that far. The fact that Toshiba and Asus actually went and supposedly did it indicates just how far the herd mentality can go among computer producers. Now if those two guys actually expected to be paid the $50-$100 per unit in offset dollars from Microsoft, well, that will indeed be an item of some interest to their respective lawyers. (ie show me the contract) You see, HP points out that they NEVER ever said anything, but it was the head dude from Microsoft that was waving around an unlabeled HP 14" PC at HIS event making all sorts of unfounded statements about what "somebody" was going to do -- HP NEVER SAID THEY WERE GOING TO DO ANYTHING. Which, as we all know from the re-posting and reading of the yanked HP internal web pages that this current HP story is a bunch of total bullshite. Yep, we watched the battery grow bigger and bigger, we watched the heat sink expand and grow and turn into copper. We watched the BOM cost slowly keep creeping on up as the testing went on until HP finally had to come clean THAT THEY SIMPLY COULDN'T DO IT at a price that Microsoft could afford to pay the rest of getting it down to the $199 price point. Yep, HP couldn't even get close enough to a functional Windows unit at the $199 price swinging that 14" screen so they pulled the web page and upped the price to something that could really be done. ARE YOU DISAPPOINTED THAT MICROSOFT AND HP WOULD ACTUALLY LIE TO YOU? Aren't you used to it yet? HEY, DID YOU REALLY EXPECT WINDOWS 9 WAS GOING TO BE ANY FORM OF REAL OR SIGNIFICANT IMPROVEMENT OVER WINDOWS 8.0, OR 8.1? :) well ??? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/08/14 at 09:57:37 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/microsoft-overhauls-msn-will-rename-bing-mobile-apps-msn-apps.html Microsoft overhauls MSN, will rename Bing mobile apps MSN apps BingOS, the love child of Ballmer and some unnamed male MS counterpart has begun to stink in the eyes of current MS management. http://doubtfulnewscom.c.presscdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/underside1.png It cannot be used to make up a cut down OS that has any real systems memory reductions or hard drive storage advantages to it and it has gotten a very bad reputation associated with it due to several recent failed initiatives. The word Bing will henceforth only be associated with the search engine, and some other "new and improved" naming for that same search engine is to be forthcoming around the same time as the Windows 9 pre-release. It will become "new and improved" at that time. The Windows 9 pre-release is VERY VERY IMPORTANT to us at Microsoft because it will allow us to claim that the users themselves didn't want us to change this or that, so we can say we are "listening to our users" as we once again do basically NOTHING to significantly improve the Windows 8/8.1/9 OS beyond a few start up tweeks. We will now start to rename every major feature of our system every six months or so in hopes of confusing the reviewers. Each time a little minor appearance tweek or two will allow us to claim "new and improved" or "revolutionary" or "ground breaking". This is a trick Intel has used for years and years now (along with some far future magic Intel brownish smelly vapor) and the trick seems to work out pretty well for them. Intel's real actual stuff never really changes once they come out with it either. ..... so, not even their own stock holders will likely understand anything but "New stuff is coming --- Hooray !!! Buy more stock !!!" |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/09/14 at 15:24:48 Today Apple has come out with their A8 chip, 5 inch cell phone, and their iOS 8 operating system. It was a big big Apple day today. Google is about ready to fire back, as is Samsung. But suddenly Intel jumps up on the stage and grabs the microphone. In a classic Intel meaningless vapor blast - Intel suddenly announces the chip that comes after the chip that comes after the one that isn't quite ready yet. And the media press corps jumps to cover it like it is real news. Skylake And now the idiots in the general press are running around guessing at what lithogaphy it will be built with ..... Etched with phaser beams, you gullible idiots. Trimmed with light sabers. (Intel doesn't know, they just made it up this morning) ==================== There is an Intel vapor answer given out now ==== 14nm, wireless 14nm that is. :-? don't ask Now for the rest of the story ........ Apple was planning yesterday to tell the whole world about moving to A9 with all their Mac products starting in 2015 and completing the move away from Intel processors in that time frame. In a total panic, Intel has committed to making an inexpensive Apple Green energy efficient ecologically approved chipset GUARANTEED by 2015, or their name isn't Pinocchio. And it will be called Skylake. ::) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/09/14 at 18:40:59 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/intel-introduces-reference-design-android-tablets.html Intel is also thinking about getting into the operating system business to a small degree. Specifically, Intel is talking about creating a fork of tablet Android tweeked specifically for their own processors. They will also supply listings of approved bits and pieces that work well with their processor and their Android fork. This is to make things "easier" for their pet vendors. Intel is also working on a custom tweeked Android/Tizen for the future Sophia phones. Same reasons. Fun, huh? I wonder what Google thinks about this ..... In the Chrome world Google can accommodate some stuff like this since all the drivers are customized to the device during the device set up and remain part of its support tree. The hardware in the device must stay stable and must totally adhere to the approved board design or Google support stops for the changed boards until a new board design and product name is approved. But Android is a much larger universe where everyone adheres to the Android (ARM based, Linaro controlled) standards with no customization but what the vendors provide for at the device level. Intel's far eastern build partners are saying they aren't willing to chase all of Intel's constantly changing stuff ..... you go do it, Intel. This constantly changing processor stuff is for the birds. =================== Real root issue is that the marketplace end users are pushing back at Intel because their processors simply don't work at all with 5-8% of the android apps out there. And this issue is much larger with the far eastern language apps. And Intel doesn't work fast or really well with 25-30% of what is out there (all languages) because Intel devices have to use a compatibility layer (software) to get their stuff to work instead of being really compatible. This compatibility layer software imposes a slow down effect and doesn't work perfectly in all cases. Intel doesn't work well because their Intel cored processors are not really ARM compatible and never have been. Intel's solution -- everybody else change everything else to get in line with us. Intel is paying these vendors money to build these products and eating a third to three quarters of the cost of the processor on top of the "technology assistance" Intel is currently paying, so right now if the tablet makers want the bribe money they have do what Intel wants. This still doesn't make the tablets work very well ---- and oriental customers are learning not to buy them. Soon though (next year or the year after) Intel's technology assistance and processor price supports are planned to stop -- then what motivates the far eastern tablet maker to keep on using Intel's not working very well processors after the big bribes stop? Intel's solution -- everybody else change everything else to get in line with us. Intel has NEVER had to adhere to somebody else's standards, so why should they start now? Intel sez, "What we need here is a custom Android for Intel ...." So, reality is Intel is still trying to run in their own "kinda" x86 processor world. So, reality is that Microsoft REALLY IS still trying to run a x86 software world. Neither has really changed yet, neither thinks they should have to. Both are sitting around 10-14% market share and are expecting everybody else to cater to them. Both are due for another hard hard set of lessons I am afraid. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/10/14 at 06:40:29 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/qualcomm-unveils-snapdragon-210-chip-entry-level-phones-tablets.html Qualcomm takes aim into the future and fires their .22 caliber single shot rifle in the present just once, killing Intel's future vapor Sophia chipset in its tracks with a head shot. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/qualcomm-snapdragon-210.jpg "The Qualcomm Snapdragon 210 is an ARM Cortex-A7 processor with Adreno 304 graphics and support for 3G and 4G LTE networks. Other features include Bluetooth 4.1, 802.11n WiFI, and support for 108p HD video playback with hardware acceleration for H.264 and H.265 videos. It also supports Qualcomm’s Quick Charge 2.0 technology to let you charge a tablet or phone’s battery up to 75 percent fater. The Snapdragon 210 is the kind of entry-level chip that’s probably faster and more energy efficient than a top-of-the-line model from a few years ago." :-/ Poor Intel. Intel just hates Qualcomm for doing things like that, just a quick off the cuff with minimal effort Qualcomm can drop a commandingly good low cost chipset right into Intel's planned market slot and completely de-rail Intel's grandiose vapor plans for Sophia in 2015-2016. By the time Intel can actually really physically make anything, the market will be full up with Qualcomm's far better, less expensive, fully integrated "everything right there on the chip" SOC product. And by putting it all on the chip, Qualcomm guarantees Intel WILL have to pay support dollars for all the other stuff they will require on their motherboard AND Intel will now have to bribe the phone vendors to even use their incomplete not really Android compatible Intel stuff. But hey, even if they do bribe the phone guys to put a phone out there Intel still can't make the savvy oriental phone buyers actually buy their incompletely compatible large and cumbersome phones. They could however give them away for free, or very nearly so. By the millions, no less. Intel stockholders might not care for that particular idea though ..... >:( nor would the Chinese government By the time Intel gets there, Mediatek and Allwinner will each have a new generation of low end chipsets fighting over that same slot with Qualcomm. All will be full SOC ARM products, all will be much better than Sophia is planned to be now. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/10/14 at 08:25:32 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/intels-low-power-edison-pc-module-now-shipping-developers-hobbyists.html Wow, the Evil Empire Strikes Back .... twice no less http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/intel-edison-boards.jpg Meet the Edison boards. $50 buys you an Intel "development board" for the internet of things class product development. Or you can pay a lot more for the bigger board that doesn't actually do a lot more than the little board (but you can plug in Arduino modules that you may already own if you are a hobby board type person). "Neither Edison board supports video output though, so if you’re looking for a low-power mini PC with an HDMI port, you might want to look elsewhere. Edison is a development platform for embedded devices, not a consumer product that you can turn into a home media PC." For those uses, you can buy one of these a whole lot cheaper, it works a lot better and has a bootable SD card slot, USB, HDMI and VGA outputs and memory and audio and lots & lots of good working free software already on the SD card ....... :) or you can have Intel and pay a lot more and get nothing, no video system, no sound, etc. etc. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/raspberry-pi-vga-adapter.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/10/14 at 10:25:18 There are discussions going on about the ASUS Eee 205 Bingbook (you gotta call them something boys and according to HP Streambook ain't a gonna be it) about not having enough memory to do anything, and what you can do goes very very slowly. Here is one guy's fairly good statement about what Microsoft has done to itself in going after Chromebooks. "Theoretically being able to do more and actually being able to do more are two different things. 1GB of RAM on an Android tablet is pretty useful, even for some photo-editing apps and video conferencing. The same is not true for Windows; I have an Acer tablet with Win8.1 and 2GB of RAM, and it's often far more sluggish than my Android tablets with lower-spec hardware. Windows really needs to escape its Win32 and COM-based roots and become a lightweight OS. As a professional developer, it pains me that Windows still uses a large, monolithic kernel designed for full desktops. Linux, Mac, and by extension, ChromeOS, Android, and iOS devices abandoned the monolithic idea many years ago and now use a modular architecture. This allows them to only load exactly what they need to work. I thought WinRT was a step in the right direction, but it seems the RT team at Microsoft has been mostly disbanded. I think WinRT is now officially dead, so our only hope is for the core Win OS guys to start working on making the underlying Windows architecture more friendly to small low-powered devices. Ironically, AMD is pushing ARM for servers because of their relatively low power consumption. Linux supports ARM quite well, and had Microsoft continued to pursue Windows on ARM they could have release Windows Server RT to compete. Oh well." Good concise recommendation there -- pay attention MS. If you are only going to support one type of Windows, it has to get slimmer to the point it can actually run well on a tablet or on a low resource notebook. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/10/14 at 11:08:31 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/report-microsoft-drop-nokia-windows-phone-brand-names.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/nokia-lumia-730.jpg Wow, the "re-branding of Microsoft" goes apace, don't it ....... ??? Along with killing Bing+anything else, Microsoft is now killing off the "Nokia" and "Windows Phone" brand names. This is a good thing, IF MS has something real and improved to replace them with. Otherwise it is just re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic as it oh so slowly goes down ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/11/14 at 07:43:44 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/windows-9-previewed-series-leaked-photos.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/w9-start-menu.jpg Having told us about everything that is being dumped now (to try to get the company downsized to fit the remaining people) MS is starting to show some screen shots of the still porky and corpulent Win9. Nothing is being said about it working faster or requiring any fewer resources or reducing the required hardware/memory. So, it isn't "new and improved" yet, just reskinned a little bit. Same old slow performance, same old blocky ugly so far ..... and I just love the "cracked window pane" background they are using --- broken old windows is about right for this new release Win9. The trash can is back though. weeee ! :( |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/11/14 at 08:48:11 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/intel-prepares-for-even-smaller-and-cheaper-mini-pcs.html Intel prepares for even smaller (and cheaper) mini PCs http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/idf-mini-pc_01-680x377.jpg So, while MS shows teaser screen shots of a still porky fat and corpulent Win9 Intel is busy having a developers conference showing hardware makers where they need to be aiming if they want to stay in business in two years. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/idf-mini-pc_08-680x385.jpg Intel is calling them "mini-pcs" and they look about like chromebooks do now form factor wise. Passive heat sinks for cooling, HDMI and USB 3.2 (reversible) all the way. Biggest connectors on them is a VGA and a LAN jack. New wireless connectivity to everything will start to make the wired connections kinda passe though ..... Intel is telling all their hardware users to pay attention to the Chrome Wars as that is what computing is going to be going forward. Intel also freely acknowledges all the various OS camps out there -- Intel is quietly telling their hardware builders to PAY ATTENTION TO SUPPORTING MULTIPLE OS's as that will be the way it is going out into the future. If Windows can't manage to get slim and quick, then MS is showing that you will have to be able and willing to abandon Windows. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by verslagen1 on 09/11/14 at 09:36:14 From what I see... 2 USB ports are not enough. 4 is an absolute minimum for recreational use. business needs 6 to 8. I currently have 3 dongles for the programs I use. I'd like to see nesting sata drives, hot swappable please. that would allow taking a drive home to continue a project w/out interruption. Or taking your collection of videos over to your friends. flash drives would be convenient but not always large enough. and ports for sd cards are a must as is a sound port, and HDMI/video port. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/11/14 at 09:57:16 Versy, USB 3.2 (reversible) allows the USB cable to carry full current for powering/charging purposes and it allows for powered hub configurations (with the hub power supply carrying the milliamps needed to do that). Plug up USB hard drives now top out at 2 terabytes, so if you need your world to be portable, it can happen fairly easily. USB 3.2 is hugely fast, encroaching in the SATA speed ranges. Plus, remember, they intend for wireless everything to be commonly out by then, so you won't require all those USB connections. Plus I think those boards have pin outs for some extra USB ports (case mounted) already on them, the pics just don't show the little pins very well. Me, I think folks like us with older stuff to connect will just invest in a good powered hub of the 2.0 3.0 variety, and have just one hub cable going over to the machine, hub to the keyboard, hub to the mouse, etc. etc.. This will cut down on the cable clutter effect. You can buy hubs now with 4 and some with up to 8 USB connections. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/11/14 at 11:26:07 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/now-can-run-android-apps-chromebook.html http://liliputing.com/2014/09/intel-atom-cherry-trail-14nm-chips-coming-2015.html One of the big differences in ARM/Google and Intel/Microsoft is the extreme amount of dubious future brown vapor put out by Intel/Microsoft and the extremely slow rate of improvement Intel/Microsoft can barely manage to do. Let's use Cherry Trail & Sophia as an example. First, Cherry Trail was due in late 2013 or early 2014 as 14nm and Sophia was due to be 10nm by 2015. Then earlier this year Sophia was supposed to be built first of the two, hitting late in this current year at 28nm made at TSMC with Sophia being designed and built by Rockchip (in a cooperative integrated design effort which is apparently somewhat aborted at this point in time). Sophia was originally a phone chip, then a tablet chip then a lowball integrated cell phone chip by Rockchip / TSMC and now it is all Intel designed and built again (but only at 14nm) as is true for the whole 6 deep lot of these processors (and some of them do smell sorta chromebookish around the edges now too). None of the 6 deep lot of them STILL have been built yet in any real form at all .... but the little brown vapor poots jest keep on 'a coming, one right after another as the months and now the years have rolled on by. 2015 is the earliest arrival for any of the chipsets now. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/atom-roadmap-680x265.jpg Let's contrast this protracted confusing 2 year long dotted brown vapor trail from Intel/MS against what ARM/Google does, time after time. Give you a feel for just how fast and good ARM/Google/Android/Chrome can be when developing something nifty neat. There are lots of projects cooking at Google all the time, we hear about them percolating along but whenever one gets about ready to pop out of the toaster, Google announces and passes it out with real running examples at a Google I/O programmers conference so as to let the programmers get a look at it first and get their feedback. The news isn't for the general public, it is for the programmers and the news is treated that way by dispersing it "hands on" at the I/O conference. Yup, just like they did two months ago with them Android apps running both on-line and offline inside of bone stock standard Chromebooks and Chromeboxes. "In case you were wondering how you can run apps designed for one operating system on an entirely different OS, it’s because ARC (Android Running in Chrome) is basically an app that now runs on Chrome and allows Android apps to run as if your Chromebook were an Android device. Developers don’t need to make any changes to their Android apps — although Google is still working with developers to bring select apps to the Chrome Web Store for now. That’ll probably help ensure that you don’t end up trying to load apps that don’t work well on devices that may not have a touchscreen." http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/android-on-chrome-os.jpg So, Google builds the ARC tool (Android Running in Chrome) announces it at the programmers conference, then asks for a dozen "first picks" to be volunteered from the developers themselves, works on it with the developers for two months to get it all perfected and then RELEASES the tool in a normal nightly build with no announcement at all. It is now going to be part of the ChromeOS itself, just like all the other daily changes. The whole thing took only 3 months publically to do with only two "announcements" involved -- instead of taking well over two years for the Cherry Trail/Sophia confused muddled mess which isn't nearly done yet. Now the announcement to the programmers at the I/O conference was simple, if you use both touch and mouse/trackpad in your Android app then you can run ARC on it to determine if it is fully ARC compatible and once it shows clean on ARC you can go post it in the Chrome depository. ChromeOS will run it just like the ARC tool did. Think on this for just a second -- a developer can take an old grody Android app, slide it across the ARC tool to fix it up then post it as a Chrome app and as an updated Android app. He gets an entire new extra market for his product for free with no more effort than he does to upgrade the app to a new Android version. It is the same App now -- he only maintains the one app from now on for both worlds. As a matter of fact, the next number version Android Supplier Development Kit will churn out Chrome ready Android apps automatically since ARC will be built right into the Android L version 4.5 SDK. I think Intel had better spend their some of their efforts getting more closely in line with the Chrome/Android world rather than trying to create their own little Android world off by themselves -- especially since their chips might then be able to do tablets and Chromebooks without that nagging software compatibility layer execution delay issue they have now nor the 5-8% "it won't run at all" incompatibility issues that they have now. AND HEY MS, yup your old buddy Microsoft is just plain in a world of hurt right now -- native language Android is SUPER HUGE in the orient and ChromeOS is getting large here in the USA. Both are very light very fast OS products that now complement each other and add value to each other while both running on the lighter faster hardware that Windows simply can't touch right now. :-/ By their own bloated x86 only choices MS has cut themselves off from participating in this new future wave of small light and fast. Hey Intel, you gotta pick which horse you plan to ride boy, you can't keep straddling them both forever. Eventually a foot will slip and dump you on your kister. If MS would get with the Chrome/Android program, then Microsoft Word running in a Chrome window, Excel running in a Chrome Window, etc. with both being sold for both Android tablets and Chromebooks/Boxes through the Google Play Store would give MS a nice steady future income stream that wouldn't evaporate on them nearly as fast as otherwise. But MS has way way too big of an ego to do that, not for a few years yet. Plus, to do this trick Windows itself has to slim down considerably ..... and MS has only gotten fatter, never slimmer in its entire company history. =============================== :D So, Android and ChromeOS are coming together at last, complementing each other in complete harmony. :D We are now looking out for the first Chinese ChromeOS (FOSS non-Google version) machines to crank up in the Far East running Android L version 4.5 SDK developed FOSS Android softwares off-line on FOSS ChromeOS hardware level laptops and desktop boxes. Light, efficient, fast XP PC replacement type boxes, cheap. The Chinese yin yang symbol can be the Chinese ChromeOS's trademark symbol .... http://kthread.com/kthread/images/logos_post/yin_yang.png |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/12/14 at 10:37:46 http://news.yahoo.com/android-fans-mock-iphone-6-2012-era-specs-163546329.html Android fans mock the iPhone 6’s 2012-era specs Hey, it isn't Samsung saying it this time -- it's phone reviewers and fans this time around. And they are NOT being nice to good 'ol Apple right now ..... http://l.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/YZvkc48V0UKsAfGZM3ltJQ--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTY1NDtweW9mZj0wO3E9NzU7dz05NjA-/http://media.zenfs.com/en_US/News/BGR_News/iphone-6-nexus-4.jpg Here is the gist of the story -- Apple isn't the only 64 bit ARM chipset out there, and they are not the fastest right now either. However the new Apple A8 chipset is an unknown at this time. Folks are trying to get their hands on the new iPhone 6 right now for benchmark testing on the A8 so it can be ranked properly ..... .... and also so they can let Tegra know if the new dual core Denver cored K1 needs to be pulled in early and also tell Samsung if the new magnified Exynos Octa with the second generation A57 cores needs to be pulled forward early as well. ;) ..... we think Samsung knows the answer to this already since they are helping TSMC build the volume production runs of the A8 chipsets iOS 8 as an OS is just now playing catch up to Android (2 years back) for features the Android fans have had for a while and the Apple fans have been jest a panting for over fer 2-3 years now. There are very few primo iOS apps that are the really really good best of class apps that have not already been ported over to Android by now -- and with the Android apps being able to run inside ChromeOS off-line or on-line the ChromeOS users will be able to be run these really good best of class apps on-line or off-line using the INEXPENSIVE light and fast Chromebook/Chromebox hardware that is jest a multiplying out there so fast right now. :D :D :D If the Apple person says "it's the apps" well then they are already sitting there already in Android land. If they say "it's the light, quick well-built hardware" then they know they can find equivalent hardware in the Chrome world (yup, right on up to the Chrome Pixel) that costs a whole lot less than equivalent Apple hardware does right now. No one is EVER going to convert a die hard Apple fan, but even Apple fans have to admit that Android/Chrome is coming up on them and challenging them now on all fronts. ================================== Both Apple and Android'/Chrome are lining up to beat up on Windows right now. Windows is offering nothing but "huge bulky and expensive" to justify themselves at this stage of the game. Fast, it ain't .... Giving the Win8.1 Bing'd version away isn't really a positive right now because your Bing'd offerings aren't running any better at all (and your various intentional systems lock-in tricks are really really being somewhat irritating). Win9 will arrive soon and it might create a watershed erosion effect for MS IF MS does not slim Win9 down and get it so it can run fast, light and well on the same class of equipment that its competitors can run so very well upon. ::) MS, we are a' waiting on you to take your turn at bat now --- you went and tweeked 'ol Google's nose with that BS waving of that BS fictitious HP Streambook of yours up there on that stage -- and you immediately got ARC thrown right back in your face by Google for doing that right stupid bravado wavin' & braggin' trick of yours. So now it is your turn to belly up to the plate and show us how you can still go hit one out of the park. Or at least show us you know what a bat is and which side of the plate you are supposed to stand on when batting. Even Forest Gump could do that ..... Heck, Forest could even hit the ball occasionally by golly. http://https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSZMAzKbWuOEiVFQkYFLxV_a2ELZtRAwQ74AYArgDzrEn6aVc1zbA "ROAR !!!" <crunch> "Droid SMASH puny broken MS !!!!" AND Please, MS, purty purty PLEASE DO go piss 'ol Google off again a couple of more times, we like Google when they get mad -- Google does a whole lot more a whole lot quicker when their skin turns all green and they bulk up & bust all out of their shirt & britches like that. Fergets all about playing Switzerland, they do .... Right now Droid wants to go smash him some Windows instead. ;D http://www.nairaland.com/attachments/1697133_win9a-780x584_jpeg1f6c40427a11ff3de9cc1616d5f0fa50 |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/13/14 at 05:58:12 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/google-is-bringing-chromebook-lending-library-to-college-campuses.html Google is bringing the Chromebook Lending Library Kiosk to college campuses all over America http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/chromebook-lending-library.jpg Oh my goodness .... Chrome is coming soon to campus kiosks all over America. Free Chromebooks (to borrow for free for 4 days that is). Watch out young college kids -- there is a trap here for you (you might jest like it and Momma and Daddy might jest have to pay for it if you don't give it back). Female college students will be particularly attracted to the Chromebook's lightness speed and ease of use (no deep systems knowledge or any form of maintenance is required by a Chromebook) and the female buddy factor will tend to apply here as well. (yeah, they all do go to the bathroom at the same time and they do discuss their dates while they are in there. If one girl likes it, they all like it.) Women, btw, tend to hate MS Windows for losing their stuff for them and for getting all mucked up all the time. They will love Chrome because they can go crush the machine under a steam roller and all their work will still be safe up in the cloud. Just type in your Gmail name and password into a replacement Chrome machine and vola, you are instantly back in business again with all your data still sitting there just where you left it. College computer systems support people will get a wake up call from the kiosks as well. They will have to modernize their "approved computer listings" somewhat due to the fact the students will see the Chrome stuff actually WORKS FINE off-line and that it can handle the required MS formats just dandy. Computer Programming schools and Electronics Engineering schools will also have to pull their thumb from their butt a little bit now -- computing in the cloud is worth more coverage now than one occasional chapter in your old year 2011 edition text books. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/14/14 at 07:17:39 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/spice-dream-uno-one-first-android-one-smartphones.html http://www.cnet.com/news/mozilla-launches-low-cost-firefox-os-phone-in-india/ This is just humorous -- just a little funny to give you a Sunday chuckle. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/intex-cloud-fx.jpg Firefox leads the way thank you Firefox, for making such rapid progress possible Firefox gives away a Firefox Phone OS that allows third world countries to have a "get you on line" rather slow very cheap smart phone that cost less than $50 retail at this point in time. Some are saying $35 or $25 is actually possible right now. This is down from $80-$100 just a year ago. This cost/speed evolution also is putting a bit of a monkey onto Google's back as they have got to go do something similar now. ======================== http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/spice-android-one-e1410698889999.jpg So, the "monkey on their back" equipped Google now gives away KitKat version 4.4.4 to run on the newly spec'd Android 1 a phone and software combo that now allows these same emerging markets to have a reduced memory and speed Android phone that can retail for right at $100-$115 at this point in time. KitKat version 4.4.4 does have all the same functions as a USA phone (but is scaled down to run on a much weaker 3rd world processor) and it still uses all the standard Android apps from the Play Store. In short, it is a real KitKat 4.4.4 that runs really really really fast on all the common more powerful USA phone processors. BTW, Google IS putting Android in general on a performance enhancing diet that is two full number revisions old now and that is one of the reasons phone prices keep going down here in the USA of late. Lower cost for memory and use of cheaper processors are another reason phone prices are going down this year. Performance speed is going up and up though because the code is tighter and quicker .... This is also why cell phone processors aren't really getting a lot more powerful this year -- they don't need to. Indeed, Qualcomm has come out with twice as many LOWER power "cell phones on a chip" than the more powerful ones. Same thing for Samsung, Mediatek and Allwinner, as the next billion or so phones sold will be in India, Africa and China, not here in the USA. This also is saying that your older two year old phone is still going to be quick enough and current acting enough for another year or so as the new slimmer quicker Android software versions roll out through the various carrier's update programs ..... (I likes that, I do) ======================== So, here is the joke. MICROSOFT now announces its new so far nameless program to take over the third world with cheap Windows phones that can cost less than $200 (using the yet to be made Intel Sophia processors of course). Huh? What the heck are you talking about? $200 ??? Those are mainstream USA build prices for your current cheapest Windows stuff, right? What the heck ARE you talking about? ;D So, Intel is now 'a teach'n MS how to poot them little confusing clouds of brown future vapor whenever they get stressed -- so's MS can "respond" to somebody else's announcing something that is neat & nifty & real & something that could be damaging to MS's image unless MS immediately pooted a little far future "news flash" brown vapor cloud down upon it (to murk & smell things up a bit, to get all them irritating news hounds off the real scent). MS just isn't very good at BS'ing the mobile press corps yet without actually putting their foot down into it though. ================= Realizing they had screwed up yet again, in the next PR release MS begins talking about a $25 phone instead of the $200 phone they were talking about earlier. :-? :-? :-? :-? :-? :-? :-? Huh ??? Jest practicing them Intel PR release "I obviously misspoke myself" confusion techniques, ain't ya? More (but not better) information comes to light as the mobile pundit corps begin to react to and to analyze the MS disjointed statements. http://www.bidnessetc.com/23992-can-microsofts-nokia-130-penetrate-developing-markets/ http://images.bidnessetc.com/img/0b8aff0438617c055eb55f0ba5d226fa-can-microsofts-nokia-130-penetrate-developing-markets.jpg Microsoft's new $25 phone is a NOKIA 130, a "dumb" feature phone not a smart phone. But Microsoft had been saying it is going to discontinue the NOKIA brand name and will only sell Windows smart phones out into the future -- and we believe this too, just like we believe everything else Microsoft has said lately. SO THE PUNDITS NOW SAY MS INTENDS FOR THE NOKIA 130 TO IMMEDIATELY GO TO AFRICA AND INDIA AND CHINA AND GET THE MS BRAND NAME PRESENCE OUT INTO THOSE NEW EMERGING MARKETS so MS can follow up later on with their $200 Windows smart phones ???? (this still makes no sense to me) Or something like that ..... but who knows for sure ??? It's MS, pooting some little "solids laden" brown vapor news poots. Hey MS, do you make any money (real $$$ in profit) selling any of those Nokia phones ??? We thought that was why you planned to junk them all ASAP. Have you even got anybody left who still knows how to make those phones since you fired all those Nokia people last month ??? You do realize that China, India, Africa etc are all crowded up right now with cheap 2G locally produced dumb phones and nobody is going to buy your expensive Nokia 130 unless you literally give them away for free like you tried to do two years ago? How did that free phone give away program 2 years ago work out for you, anyway ???? Ain't your name over there inside those new emerging markets yet ???? Next, why the heck would you plan to use an Intel Sophia chipset? You do realize that the Rockchip 28nm TSMC "Sophia" chipset deal is lilkely toast now right along with the Rockchip tablet processor deal ??? And that the Intel designed and built 14nm Sophia chipset isn't even designed yet and that it isn't gong to land until late next year at the soonest. Also if / when it does gets here that new 14nm Sophia phone chip might jest be a wee bit expensive since Intel has all of them 3 new 14nm lithography lines at 5 BILLION DOLLARS per line to pay for ???? ;) .... plus it will be Intel's very first attempt at doing a fully integrated cell phone chipset? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/16/14 at 08:31:57 Raw Positive Spin Prediction Time ..... put your rose colored glasses on before reading ..... OK, I stroke the rose tinted crystal ball for after Christmas and into the first of 2015 and I see ..... With a low introductory price Win 9 begins selling better than Win 8.x ever did. MS begins to make a real profit again as the upgrade churn they create by killing off all the old windows versions begins to take hold. Microsoft retains their market share .... Lower Resource Win 9 becomes available. Chromebooks and Chromeboxes take a dip in growth rate accordingly. Android L comes in and begins to unify the Android world at 64 bit, but the exceptions still equal or outnumber the Android L camp as the Far East still lags behind in acceptance of ANY standards at all. Google continues to tweek Android L so it freely runs its Android apps on Chromebooks inside a Chrome window. Crouton is tweeked by the FOSS people so Ubuntu/Mint runs inside a Chromebook window as well. With these moves "all of Linux on the same machine" becomes Windows 9's second level competitor (Apple is still its primary competitor). Chromebooks continue to grow in market share (just more slowly). Microsoft will tune Win 9 repeatedly to run lighter and faster to remain competitive. Intel does another round of plant/people/cost cutting and their new plants make much less costly chipsets that come out and work well on all OS types. Intel begins to make a real $$$ profit again on all their product lines. Intel can finally stop giving away money ..... ::) ..... I done told you, wear your rose colored glasses when reading the above paragraphs ..... ======================================= If you want my real world predictions, then half of these things may indeed "half happen" and the other half will not happen -- life is like that. For every strong winner there is a loser or two off in the ditches. But these are the pivot points .... the hinges on which change will happen or not happen. There will be other pivot points that come up unexpectedly, but as always "Change, she comes". ======================================= If you want my pessimistic predictions, put a bold text red "NOT !!" after every paragraph's ending period. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/18/14 at 00:36:46 Microsoft's Harsh Reality I spent some time searching out where MS is headed past Threshold/Win9 and I got a surprise -- they have just totally restructured, tossed out all of the Ballmer era's roadmaps and plans, CHANGED their internal working structures with new younger bosses over each new departmental structure and they have just recently fired anyone solely associated with maintaining a "non-current" legacy program of any sort. MS is killing off all legacy stuff, root and branch. Now MS is planning out what business they are going to be starting in 2015. They are just now starting to figure something concrete for their far future road map as the New Microsoft. Win9 is the last of the Ballmer era plans, and it runs out fairly soon (inside 2015). MS is very familiar with where they came from and they know that a discrete PC wearing a separate non-changing OS and folks buying lots of separate programs for big bucks each is a total dead end going out into the future. Actually, their past has become a costly albatross around MS's neck and they desperately need to get the rotting bird carcass off of them and get it thrown over the side of the boat just as soon as they can. Threshold/Win9 will come, it will follow the existing Windows Version #9 format and it will be used to offload all the old Windows version albatrosses over the side of the boat. Win9 will be your required upgrade path for all previous versions. Then MS will introduce "Windows" or "Windows Core" as the generic name for an evolving system that will be based on a moderate yearly charge. Think of the "MS 360" services offered so far, but extend them way past Office and into the entire computing structure from hardware to OS to apps. Google's threat with web-based Chromebooks and Android has forced MS to open up their eyes a bit, realizing that the next wave of computing is indeed upon them. "Windows Core" is the brand new MS far future terminology for offering productivity software and OS as a net-provided service on any level of hardware, anybody's processor etc. etc. This is MS's current far future dream .... you just keep the Windows Core loaded on your local machine and touch a server for whatever else you happen to need for this session. To pursue this thinking, MS is trying to use companies like BarrelFish (staying within the terms of their FOSS license) and several other net-progressive thinkers. http://www.barrelfish.org/ http://www.barrelfish.org/barrelfish.png However, MS is over a year late now to this "buying into the new net technology" game. Google has already winnowed the field for all the really good innovator companies and Google has already bought them all last year. Apple bought a few as well. MS is trying to use BarrelFish just to learn how to run their proposed Windows Core on any and all platforms while Google actually IS all those other platforms (except Apple of course). This presents some problems to MS going forward as they grope for a viable long term future. Google is out there right now, clumsily rolling out MS's dream. Question becomes, can MS close ties with Business give them enough preference over Google's current roll out lead as MS just now begins to get re-started on a Google type plan? Word isn't going to be enough to base the new Microsoft on -- nor is Excel nor is Powerpoint. The entire package has to be attractive. :-/ A light tight and small very fast multi-processor multi-core Barrelfish style "Windows Core" throwing the entire range of MS products on a MS specified set of inexpensive hardware -- all based upon a very moderate systems rental cost. This might very well be a viable future for MS. Think of it as renting an Xbox for Business .... But, Microsoft has still has got to charge yearly money for their stuff just to survive. ::) It is going to be tough to go up against an entire world of "free" while doing that "charging yearly money to just be surviving" thing. If ChromeOS picks up all of Android in a Chrome Window and FOSS moves Ubuntu/Mint softwares into a Chrome Window then indeed MS will be competing directly against all of Linux. This is tough, since some of the bits and pieces of "all of Linux" are actually better than any given bit or piece of MS. (Excel and the CAD programs and Photoshop are perhaps exceptions to this statement) But even these most excellent of the old style single use programs are themselves are beginning to attempt to move on-line even as we speak. MS is not alone in realizing their past isn't going to be their future. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/18/14 at 08:02:27 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/polaroid-socialmatic-camera-features-wifi-bluetooth-android-built-printer.html Polaroid Socialmatic camera features WiFi, Bluetooth, Android, and a built-in printer http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/socialmatic_01.jpg I never owned a Polaroid except once, professionally (taking pictures of warehouse damage was part of my job). Never the less, it makes me happy to see an old American name brand make the transition across the digital dIvide so intact and so gracefully. I suspect the "digital paper" is quite expensive, similar to the self-developing film packs used to be ..... :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/18/14 at 09:05:00 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/now-can-run-android-apps-chromebook-unofficially.html Now you can run most Android apps on a Chromebook (unofficially) http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/android-on-chrome-os.jpg Well now, this is not really unexpected --- some Android developers are "out of pocket" at the moment and these missing guys are not immediately moving their Android apps over to the Chrome Store in a timely fashion. ;) .... but some of the faithful Chromebook users are also uber-geeks and they are capable of taking direct action if needed .... Indeed, some of the developers put the stuff in there for free so long ago they can't even remember their own developer passwords. Or they are dead now or not working as programmers any more or whatever .... you name it. They are GONE. Relax, help is at hand. Since all of Android is open source and it is covered by the Apache Software License, Version 2.0 you can do something locally on your own machine to help the situation. "Developer vladikoff has posted code and instruction on github. In a nutshell what you need to do is: 1) Install Android app from the Chrome Web Store so your Chromebook will install the Android app runtime. 2) Install Node.js and vladikoff’s chromeos-apk tool on a Linux system (it’ll work on a Chromebook running Ubuntu in Crouton, so you don’t necessarily need a separate computer). 3) Download an Android APK and then use the chromeos-apk tool to prepare the app to run on Chrome OS. 4) Copy the converted app to your Chromebook, type “chrome://extensions” (without quotes” in the URL bar, enable Developer mode, and then use the “Load unpacked extension” option to locate and install the app. That’s it. Not every Android app will work… and some apps that expect touchscreen displays or other hardware that may not be available on a Chromebook might not function." Literally you are "the transferring contributor" to a forked project that only exists on your local machine from now on. I suspect that the Chrome store is going to eventually post an approved protocol for moving an abandoned free work over to Chrome in the absence of the original owner. This protocol will assure that: 1) It gives the original guy all his development credit. 2) Makes sure the transferring contributor makes no money off the original free app and it stays a free app. 3) Provides a way to fork the original free app for further development. FOSS is FOSS is FOSS -- even MS uses it now. Just follow the rules, it is all very sensible. ;D |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/18/14 at 10:08:26 Now that all of Android can freely move over to Chrome, let's see how the Linux Distro world full of bigger, juicer softwares is doing on being able to jump into a Chrome window. Well now, Libre Office is ready to be hosted on-line. http://blog.rollapp.com/2013/11/libreoffice-cloud.html Ditto for Gimp, but it is already hosted by spoon.net https://spoon.net/apps/gimp Plus, Crouton is still able to run the whole Ubuntu world locally off-line on your Chromebook as a control-alt keystroke sort of thing. This path also includes Steam and gaming. Microsoft has some competition now from "all of Linux" as well as Apple's Mac and iOS products. What is scarier is that all of Microsoft's own mainstay programs all are going on-line as well, so a Chromebook can get to ALL of Microsoft's old stalwart key programs -- including MS Office itself. ::) There is no reason a Chromebook isn't fully useable right now as a full service general purpose OS. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/19/14 at 07:55:46 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/run-android-apps-windows-os-x-linux-chrome-modified-runtime.html Run Android apps in Windows, OS X, Linux with Chrome (and a modified runtime) Well now, what are them busy busy busy FOSS guys up to today ??? Android apps, running in well, everything everywhere using a slightly tweeked version of Google's ARC runtime tool that is called ARChon. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/archon.jpg "The ARChon custom runtime is a modified version of Google’s Android Runtime for Chrome. It allows you to run multiple side-loaded Android apps at once… and in addition to working on Chrome OS devices it works on Windows, OS X, and Linux computers running the Google Chrome 37 or later web browser." Remember when the Google Chrome browser started to act like its own OS once you lit it using the base system? When it started taking voice commands and doing all those things that the base OS simply never was able to do? That functionality is still there and the ARC idea means yup, you can run almost all of Android there now as well --- if you are a bit of a programmer/geek that is. What could this mean ?? (if the base OS people wanted to cooperate with it that is) Hardware and base OS instantly become somewhat more flexible and if you write your neat new software idea to run in Android using the new L Supplier Development Kit it could go run in a lot of other different places for no extra effort. So, Android comes a visiting ..... boy, you can jest hear them little gears a whirrlin' inside all those open source people's heads. A unified Linux world with easy access to all of the Linux/Android/Chrome softwares on the same device. Anybody's device. Microsoft had better go make Win9 a really really good release (and speed up that poky porky puppy while they do it, too). They can't just kick out the same old slow bulky crap with a slightly tweeked start screen with no performance enhancements. This year Apple had to go incorporate a baker's dozen of Chrome tricks and Android tricks into their new iOS 8 because their users flat assed demanded it. Google is doing more and more neat things ongoing, so to get access to them you may still need to run the Google Chrome browser on that other system. And, unless MS and Apple take direct actions to try to block it, Google Chrome browser may soon give you access to Android apps inside a Chrome window -- anywhere -- everywhere -- Chrome Browser running on whatever is still lighter and faster though, which makes that same old point about bloatware all over again. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/19/14 at 08:49:40 http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/09/18/will-google-android-apps-on-chromebooks-devastate.aspx Will Google Android Apps On Chromebooks Devastate Windows Laptops? http://g.foolcdn.com/editorial/images/145281/image1_large.jpg So, what does Wall Street have to say about Droid getting all big and green and busting out of its clothes? "On both laptops and PCs, Microsoft is depending on two factors -- familiarity and a dependence on old software -- to keep users tethered to Windows. Unfortunately for Microsoft, the world favors mobile operating systems over desktop-based ones. According to Gartner, approximately 1.17 billion Android devices will be shipped this year, compared to 333 million Windows devices. Within the PC market, global shipments of desktops and notebooks are expected to fall 5% next year, which makes the sudden rise of Chromebooks an alarming anomaly for Microsoft and its partners. Once Google fully lifts the barrier between its mobile and PC platforms, Microsoft will inevitably lose market share in laptops and convertibles as Android users start mixing with Chromebook ones. Microsoft's best strategy to counter Google is to fulfill its promise to merge its mobile, tablet, and desktop operating systems into "One Windows," which will finally allow it to retaliate against Google with a unified platform. But until that happens, Google will keep enhancing Chrome OS with Android apps -- turning Chromebooks into the proper Android laptops that HP failed to build -- and continue chipping away at Microsoft's dominant position in traditional laptops" |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/19/14 at 09:21:39 Microsoft needs to keep users locked in to Windows, and right now that is getting harder and harder to do. Once users get a taste for FOSS they realize there are alternatives out there that actually can work better and faster and easier than MS. Expect to see Win9 come out just as soon as MS can swing it. Expect to see some really novel pricing at first (so hit it while the good deals last). Win9 is likely one of the very last discrete Windows versions -- from now on out you rent a constantly changing OS service that will work largely through the internet more like what Chromebooks/boxes do. Also don't expect much real change inside Win9 -- MS hasn't improved much but the start screens at this point in time. Read the entire Win9 roll out as a concentrated attempt to get rid of all of the legacy Windows versions and all of their supporting softwares and all their very high maintenance costs (which MS MUST do right now since they have already fired all the people and actually aren't really keeping up with the old stuff any more). |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/20/14 at 01:25:02 The title of this thread was Chrome Wars as Microsoft had declared war on Chromebooks by standing on a stage and waving a $199 14" HP Streambook unit around in the air and declaring ALL OUT WAR ON CHROMEBOOKS !!! Well, as we all know the 14" HP Steambook never made it through boot camp, coming in finally at a porky $299 once HP finally figured out how to make it at all. And that is the current best price of any MS OS warring unit that has really actually made it into the real retail channels. Meanwhile, the Asus EeeBook X205 was declared, but so far has only shown up at the German IT show as one very cheap looking display copy of an old style netbook like 11" device. Toshiba did a "me too" declared unit but it never has materialized in any form either. That's it for the Chrome Wars .... Meanwhile, over a dozen new Chromebooks have come out and joined the $199-$300 Chromebook/box ranks that are marching forward in formation towards Christmas. Win9 preview has waddled its porky puppy self out further out into the light now, and we see that it isn't going to be a better lighter faster OS at all -- indeed at this point it seems to be the last gasp in the Windows 8 series with some improved start screens. Microsoft has totally laid itself off now, shrunk and restructured and re-bossed all its internal bits and pieces now, and the new MS still needs to figure out what it is going to be going into the future and then it has to show us something to prove it is really functional any more. BingOS turned out to be a joke, and MS has now pulled the plug on Bing+anything as a very bad marketing idea. Windows is actively killing off some of their old brand names and has now leaked out a plan to replace all their previous OS versions support-wise by thrusting Win9 down everybody's throat as the REQUIRED update path. MS can only afford to keep up with their one (1) current OS and the supporting softwares any more. Until MS gets itself straightened out and puts out a real viable product again, MS isn't going to war with anybody. The Chromebooks and Chromeboxes will just keep on coming, rolling out over the landscape .... MS standing up on a stage this summer pulling a HUGE brown vapor Ballmer act (in three full scenes no less) is just sorta sad. And it begs the question if Win9 is just more of the same. =================================================== What really IS coming out for this Christmas at Costco and other low end volume stores are all their warehouse stocks of Win 8 and Win 8.1 machines that have been rolled back to Win 7 by re-writing their hard drives with a Win7 image. (as is permitted by MS's licensing terms). These "used" refurbished retrofitted machines will then be sold at reduced prices, while the Win 8.x machines will not move new at any price. Look to see Win 8.0 and 8.1 to be major major players in this Thanksgiving Black Friday sales. Look for more Win 7 roll back "refurb" machines to come out as the warehouses get emptied in preparation for the Win 9 roll out. Look for the first wave of Win 9 machines to contain remastered Win 8 and Win 8.1 machines that are OEM factory re-burned, re-labeled and re-boxed. Also look to see MS begin claiming "free Win 9 upgrade rights" for all Win 8.x machines sold this Christmas season in an attempt to keep the Windows brand name viable. Look to see the user push back on Win 9 preview's ugly and bulk and slowness to get fairly extreme once the public learns just how little has really been changed from Win 8 / Win 8.1. :( The Windows brand name will begin to get questioned going into next year as MS rolls out their forced upgrade scheme (and as all their old software partners scramble to get on-line so as to participate in the up and coming Chrome wave). Change, she comes ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/20/14 at 15:51:56 And that leads to the question "How bad is the erosion of the Windows brand name right now?" Checking into this has led to some interesting info dating back from 2008 and then again in 2012 when it was recommended to MS that they dump the Windows brand name completely because they had turned it into a net negative value with Windows 95 and Windows ME and had done the name yet further damage floundering around with the first version of Windows XP (which if you remember wasn't very good at all until Service pack 1.2 rolled around). Ditto again in 21012 for Win 8 and Win 8.1 -- more brand name erosion has taken place in 2012 - 2014 to the point the brand name Windows means "screwed up" all over again. Vista was the first "renaming" of Windows ---- and wow, what a bath that was. "Threshold" per se isn't a fix in other words, making some really really much better software is the only fix that you can do that will get you where you want to be. Right now MS is being told by some pundits not to call it Threshold or Windows 9 at all -- firstly it is really going to be Win 8.2 structurally AND if MS screws it all up up again they may kill off their Windows brand name entirely beyond any real hope of recovery. Instead the pundits are saying "have a Preliminary Release with no name, give it away for testing for free (or whatever) and leave it out there for a year and show some really dedicated and rapid activity fixing whatever the people tell you is wrong with it. Then, after the fixes slow down and people are actually happy with it, then call it Windows 9 BUT NOT BEFORE THEN. In other words, prove to us that you are REALLY different from Ballmer's MS in some real, meaningful ways. Show us that your OS is SIMPLY BETTER than Chromebooks and Linux and Mac and iOS 8. Don't bullshite us .... make some truly great software and let it do the talking for you. ::) Four years ago, Windows was the #2 strongest brand name. Last year it was ranked #34. This year it may fall even lower ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/21/14 at 18:52:13 Intel ..... and Apple Intel makes a lot of noise about how it is going to 14nm and how they will have no competition from anybody from then on. Lots of brown vapor, lots and lots of smoke and noise. Apple/TSMC/Samsung simply produced the 20nm A8 chipset in volume and on time and shipped it this month. No claims beyond 25% processor improvement and a 2x improvement in graphics are being made, but folks are noticing something about that 20nm chipset that was un-claimed, un-announced and not screamed about or touted at all. Intel's much vaunted 14nm chipsets have 1.4 to 1.8 billion transistors on their 14nm dies. The 20nm Apple A8 has 2 billion transistors on its 20nm die -- and that die is SMALLER than any of the proposed 14nm Intel stuff. ????? :-? WTF ????? I think that some pundit folks need to go back and calmly re-visit the design level advantages that RISC offers ARM designs vs Intel's porky x386 CISC design overhead again. I have mentioned before that 32nm ARM equalled the performance of 22nm Intel and that 28nm ARM kicked 22nm Intel's butt all over the place ---- and apparently 20nm ARM RISC is going to kick 14nm Intel's CISC butt around some as well. What do you think 16nm and 14nm RISC ARM is going to do to 14nm CISC Intel? Me, I think most of ARM will stay at 20nm until Intel finally gets down to 10nm and finally starts to put some real pressure on 20nm ARM performance-wise. And remember ARM has several steps they can take with 16-14 nm being the first FinFET step. Remember, at 20nm ARM is still using simple flat planar lithography that is SO SO SO much faster and cheaper to produce. By the time ARM is forced to go to FinFET it will be all worked out to the point that the costs and production speeds will be there to support the ARM move. The ARM RISC mobile products do not really require the extra processor power right now, a 28nm chipset is MORE than powerful enough and energy efficient enough to meet all of battery powered mobile and tablet needs --- especially since Android is getting both faster and lighter lately. What MAY drive smaller 14nm ARM RISC lithography is IoT (internet of things) with all that tiny tiny tiny wearable stuff. But, please understand -- Intel has 3 planned (one actually running right now) 14nm lines. Between them, Samsung, Global Foundry and TSMC have 6 planned 14nm lines between them (with two up and running right now). Intel's cost to product a chipset is still 2x what the ARM fab boys have for their cost. The ARM fab boys post a profit every quarter and to date Intel has posted a net loss every quarter on its mobile business ever since they got into it. With Tegra K1 and the newest Exynos Chromebook chipsets ARM has entered into the 2014 laptop arena with some more powerful and somewhat specialized laptop chipsets. Apple's 2015 debut of their 14nm A-9 is going to also enter into the laptop realm as Apple is building A-9s right now and Intel's loudly promised 14nm Skylake is still an undefined & undesigned little brown vapor poot as far as real production goes. Intel is running a year plus behind on everything lately, so why should the just announced Intel Skylake be any different? Intel has been warned and told by Apple publically now, and when Intel fails to deliver Skylake on time and on cost Apple will change over a lower end laptop or two to their own domestic production of their own 2014-2015 produced 14nm quad core A-9 chipsets. In 2016-17 Apple's A10 next generation is going to be fully laptop and desktop capable and they will never have to pay Intel's bulky profit margins ever again. We will see a struggling Intel trying to make Apple A9 and A10 chipsets on a defined cost foundry contract for Apple before this is all over. However, Intel at 14nm is supposedly able to make a real phone chipset (if their hiring of several design folks away from Rockchip and from Qualcomm bear the proper fruit that is). ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/22/14 at 06:16:15 http://img.ibtimes.com/www/data/images/middle/2014/08/04/450075-google-logo.jpg So, it's been a whole week now since Chrome and Android got married up, so what is Google up to now? Let's see, Android L is going to come out in late October or early November along with the Christmas offerings of new, more powerful Nexus devices. At the same time, Samsung will drop their newest 64 bit chipsets and phones and tablets and begin shipping them for Christmas as well. We are talking announce and ship on the same day. Android L will be full 64 bit from the get go and it will carry all the Chromebook/Android mate up tricks from the get go as well as being fully encrypted by default from the get go. What does this all mean? China and the NSA can't get into your phone or your tablet ...... (yup, not unless they can steal the encryption key when the phone is being built and first loaded that is) Samsung and Google have been staying mute lately and holding off on putting out the new products and that silence has made some go theorizing that there were a few late burbles in Android L that took some extra time and effort to smooth out. If so, then this was smart -- last major generation change Samsung pushed out the first OctaCore Exynos 5410 product that simply didn't work quite right because the software/hardware core swapping part of the A15-A7 generation simply wasn't fully cooked yet. That was an embarrassing enough mess to be sure. It is very important that there be no burbles at the 64 bit Android release. However, words will be pushed out on October 30-31 saying when all the stuff will actually fly for real for Christmas. Lastly, Android L may be called Lemon Meringue Pie or Lollipop and it will likely carry the Android 5.0 numerical designation as it is the very first 64 bit Android. :D |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/22/14 at 07:41:47 Now, a few words on the digital divide between the USA/Europe and the Developing Countries. Americans want to upgrade their stuff every 2 years when the contract comes up -- we don't HAVE TO but we certainly do WANT TO upgrade our stuff every two years. It is a habit we have. What we stick inside our electronics "dead stuff" drawer this year is beter than what some developing countries will ever be able to buy on their top end during the next two years, most likely. Kit Kat 4.4.4 will remain active in the developing countries for several more years now as their cell services and phones are early 3G at best and they simply won't go past a 32 bit dual core processor for a few years yet. Indeed, Kit Kat may even roll out a few more dot revs as the third world processors get a little bit better and better. But Kit Kat will remain current for them to use. As will Firefox OS. Android L is coming out of the gate at 64 bit and the only chipsets out there that ARE 64 bit are pretty much powerhouses that can run a small laptop very nicely (and, BTW they are actually being used for Chromebooks as we speak). Intel is focusing on keeping ARM out of their laptop business and they are attempting to go after phones again this year. Ain't got a chipset yet, but that isn't stopping the Intel vapor machine from puffing away. Microsoft may or may not pull off a compelling Win 9 software this year that could help Intel do that. Irregardless, Intel is running OK on Android right now and they are trying to get into all sorts of low end Android devices right now. Why? Why low end devices? Intel is hurting VERY BADLY for some volume to fill up their big wafer fab lines and absorb some of the cost of their manufacturing operations. Irony right now is that if Intel had that larger volume right now while they are losing so much money on each chip produced that they could 'big success" themselves right into chapter 11 by having to pay out a great deal more of that loss leader contra revenue stuff. So, Intel is gambling on letting TSMC build their low end for them at 28nm at a low cost position until they can get their 14nm lines running efficiently and at a much much much lower cost profile than they have running anywhere right now. Plus, signs are now showing that the deep pockets of Intel aren't really bottomless ..... they are being very selective now where they go spray their bright red arterial blood spray. Price supports on their Intel Chromebook chipsets have backed off by $25 just lately and the price of those Intel chipped items abruptly went up by that same amount. The Arm chipped Chromebook products remained unchanged ..... ;) Hey Intel, Joseph Heller wrote a book about you called "Catch 22", you ought to go read it sometime. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/23/14 at 04:51:45 http://www.extremetech.com/computing/189329-nvidia-sues-qualcomm-samsung-for-infringing-on-its-invention-of-the-gpu http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/darth-vader-face2-640x480.jpg Nvidia sues Qualcomm, Samsung for infringing on its ‘invention of the GPU’ Wow, I thought Nvidia had learned something from watching Linus's middle finger pop up in public -- don't be an arsehole. Boy was I wrong. Nvidia is being a bigger arsehole right now than it EVER was before. This lawsuit is unfounded, Nvidia did not "invent" the GPU (the very first IBM mainframe had a graphics co-processor and all that software/hardware design IP for that has been donated to FOSS for over a decade now) and what is only amusing to lawyers is the fact that Samsung doesn't make (and never has made) its own GPUs. Samsung is going to request legal support from ARM and VR Graphics (the folks they do buy their GPUs from) and let Nvidia's lawyers explain to them how those guys (who predate Nvidia in mobile industry GPUS) are infringing on Nvidia's patents. ARM will be very very negatively impressed that their licensee Nvidia is going around suing people who are using ARM Mali graphics. Nvidia is a relative newbie in the RISC world after all, coming from an x86 CISC background. What's behind the story? Nvidia isn't doing as well financially as they have been doing in years past (with the PC industry tanking and all) and they want to do them a Microsoft and suck a little profit from those who are doing well. Issue is that they are being ridiculous in what they are attempting. And only a ridiculous West Coast judge would even consider granting them a "stop all shipments" court order against a South Korean company who isn't even the maker of the GPUs in question. Linus's middle finger is going to be popping up again, I can just hear what he's gong to comment about Nvidia doing this. Also, do you think this will affect your sell through of your current Nvidia products somewhat, by any chance, with you being such an incredible arsehole just lately? And do you think it is funny that Nvidia goes sues Qualcomm who owns Adreno graphics that they bought from AMD who bought it with ATI who merged with Bitboys who INVENTED 3D graphics back in 1990, three years before Nvidia was formed? Can you say "big arsed countersuit"? http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/medfield-krait-smartphone-mobile-soc,3117-7.html So, go sue some people who are going to sue you right back, you idiot, and very likely they will win when they do it. Erode your shrinking bottom line a little more, you idiot. And go get yourself a fresh phosphorescent green coating of "stinking arsehole" while you are going about it, too. Nvidia ..... you'd snatch defeat from the jaws of victory doing some really stupid stunts like this. Your Tegra K1 was doing very well, and your follow on Denver cored version looked good too -- but not if you are going around suing people for stupid shite and pissing everybody off. Samsung cross licenses with Google and Samsung is the largest (or counting Apple, the second largest) customer of ARM, who is the one you are really suing with your nonsense BS suit. Even Apple doesn't win suing Samsung and the tit for tat they have been doing for the last 5 years is a drain on both of them. Apple and Google have agreed to drop all lawsuits between them since their tit for tat was foolish and draining on both parties. And nobody successfully sues ARM, aka Acorn which was formed by IBM, Sun, Apple and DEC way way back in the day to develop and further RISC technologies and was granted all the founding companies various RISC patents to go do so. And you are really stupid, because Apple and Google are teaming up now to go after patent reform in the electronics industry as they see exactly what you are doing is a slow poison effect on all technical innovation as the successful innovators are being sued by the out-competed failures fairly consistently now-a-days. Nvidia, you may be the poster boy example for this patent reform effort, BTW. http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/wp-content/uploads//2012/06/Screen-shot-2012-06-18-at-10.32.45-AM.png "Fwck you, Nvidia" ...... mmmm, are the Nvidia Denver drivers in the Linux kernel yet? Remember what Linus said would happen if folks like you didn't cooperate and behave decently? "Folks like that should be ignored ....." ;) I wonder just how long that Denver kernel work is going to take now. And when the Linux kernel work finally gets done, just how long with the Chromebook board approvals & the software driver tuning take over at Google? Stupid Nvidia, just plain stupid. Drop the BS lawsuits And it really doesn't matter what MS has promised you, they can't deliver on it because they are in the same boat you are now .... a loser in the Chrome Wars. And they are really ARE asking you to cut your own throat with this one. Remember, you were a WINNER last week, now you are a stone loser now, big time. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/23/14 at 13:51:51 Samsung stops shipping laptops of all kinds to Europe Samsung states that they do not see enough demand for their laptop products in Europe right now. They may return after the upcoming market glut has sold itself down and the OS wars have settled a bit. Right now Europe isn't a predictable, viable enough market for laptops so Samsung will sell out NOW under controlled circumstances and get out ASAP. Samsung intends to be sold out and gone by New Years. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/24/14 at 06:15:36 This Christmas is the dump all the old stuff, sell it all off Christmas. This Black Friday is going to have some MOST EXCELLENT DEALS on the few surviving Windows desktop PCs and for all notebooks and laptops. Lots of uncertainty in the marketplace combined with wholesale and retail channels sitting kinda stagnant & just slam full of goods that are getting ready to age out technologically. No matter which way the Chrome Wars turn, there is going to be massive change at the start of 2015 and most of these warehouse stocks of existing units are going to be stuck on the wrong side of that change no matter what it winds up doing. The new 20nm and 14nm lithographies are both going to say about the same thing for the equipment next year -- the new stuff will be FANLESS and it will all be very small form factor compared to the stuff getting sold off this year. You got a few canny vendors who are leaving the worst of the PC/laptop markets right now, intending not to take a year's end bath in those areas. Those like Samsung will get out early by stopping production and shipments NOW and letting any existing inventory sell down naturally (and admittedly they don't have a lot to sell down, Samsung isn't a big player in PC/laptops in Europe relatively speaking). The bigger players are a lot more exposed and they find themselves not having a lot of margin to play with for making up great sale prices as current prices have been pushed down pretty consistently over the course of the last two quarters. Dumping this inventory is going to hurt them a lot. Windows 9 is coming. Microsoft is going to change from a "buy it once and keep it for 10 years" business plan to a "rent your software yearly and trust us to keep it current" model. Chromebook has risen as a viable alternative to Windows. Chrome has picked up Android and is integrating all of Linux to become a full function alternative to Windows that is always kept current and that is always free. This is attracting a lot of people (especially in Europe/Russia) who are repurposing existing devices rather than buying anything new. There isn't a lot of money to be made in computers any more -- the selling price has come down to only a couple of three-four hundred dollars on the low end, no matter which kind you are chasing. Sub $350 is most common with some coming in at sub $200 now --- this huge price drop has got to winnow out some of the lower volume producers fairly soon. Change, she comes ..... http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/samsung-gear-s-white-270x193.jpg Remember, this is a cell phone, and next year if you give its grandson a wireless keyboard and monitor then you could type a post on it. Or do a spreadsheet. This is the sort of AMAZING change that will happen inside the world of the Internet of Things next year ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 09/24/14 at 06:41:44 Seen a young gentleman with one of the "watches" this Monday, we were compairing my google glass and the watch. His was bluetoothed to his phone much as my glass is to my phone. We both have issues with battery power and his did not shoot video. Wearable tech is going to improve, lets hope the graphene batteries come about quickly. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/24/14 at 06:50:40 Both Samsung and Lenovo are coming out with their own relatively sleeker more normal looking Glasses -- yep, Google will have piloted yet another venue for their ads to take place (and invented yet another new technology). Shopping with Glasses, with an app that instantly reads the bar code on the shelf label and instantly gives you the 2 day shipped Amazon price for the same item ..... plus gives you three alternative Amazon items for you to consider. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/24/14 at 07:59:35 ROCKCHIP FINALLY SPEAKS AFTER GETTING CO-OPTED BY THE INTEL TECHNOLOGY SHARING ARRANGEMENT http://liliputing.com/2014/09/new-rockchip-processors-coming-to-low-cost-tablets-this-year.htmlk http://www.cnet.com/news/meet-intels-sofia-the-new-low-cost-smartphone-processor-created-in-singapore/\ http://www.pcworld.com/article/2604843/how-intel-plans-to-find-its-way-in-smartphones.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/t-chip-roadmap.jpg Don't see any Intel Inside over there at Rockchip at all ..... I do see another pretty much stock 64 bit ARM A53 octacore coming out though as Rockchip's heavy hitter for next year. Do you think this poses any lesson for the Chinese supplier base in their future dealings with Intel Technology Sharing? ========================== New stinky brown vaporous information has floated up about Intel's Sofia's brand new low cost dual core design team -- to make this happen sooner (first half of 2015) Intel Singapore and Intel Malaysia have now been teamed up to attempt to create a 28nm 3G low cost low performance cell phone chip for Intel which will land within the required 6 month time frame. The new Singapore/Malaysia dual core Sophia will still be built at 28nm at TSMC, but it will not be fully integrated. Instead, it will apparently be built from at least three separate chipsets, with mating hardware on the motherboard. Contra revenue will likely be required to fund the additional hardware cost and there will be large amounts of Technology Funds spent to get somebody to actually use the awkward little abortion in a real cell phone or two. In the same set of news releases, the CEO of Intel Bryan Krantz says he really does not want to pay contra-revenue on cell phones. Read this to say he hates what he hears, but sees it will be needed again -- or read it he's a gonna step on this little poot right quick-like before some of his over-eager crew goes and spends his company to death yet again over doing something just plain stupid all over again. Neither Rockchip nor Rockchip's Chinese vendor base seems to be involved with the current Intel Singapore/Malaysia dual core design effort at all at this time. They may possibly might be involved in a later on 2016 time frame follow on chipset, a 28nm quad core designed phone Sophia chip that IS supposed to be both 4G and fully integrated. Right. Since these later 4 core 2016 plans are lapping over into the same time frame that Intel says it will have its own pair of domestic 14nm Sophia chipsets available, then it all becomes somewhat vaporous, brown and very problematical. We know that 28nm chipsets from the orient are relatively inexpensive stuff and the Intel domestic production off a brand new 5 billion dollar lithography line has got to cost Intel a lot more money .... Key take away from all of this is that Intel still doesn't know how to build an integrated cell phone chipset and still has no single concrete plan to fix this lack. Got lots & lots of brown vapor trails going out through year 2016 though .... all named Sophia. ::) <poot> <poot> <poot> <poot> <poot> <poot> Hey, Brian -- when you go and name all your poots "Sophia" it gets kinda hard for us to keep them all straight, you know |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/25/14 at 03:23:01 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/installing-android-apps-chromebooks-made-easier-chrome-apk-packager-tool.html Installing Android apps on Chromebooks made easier by Chrome APK Packager tool http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/chrome-apk-packager.jpg "Developer bpear96 has released an Android app called Chrome APK Packager. Install it on your Android phone and it will come up with a list of apps installed on your Android device. Check the box next to an app you want to install on a Chromebook or PC running the Chrome browser, hit the “Generate Chrome APK” button, and it’ll create an Android app that’s compatible with Chrome (assuming you have the ARChon runtime for Chrome installed)." My goodness, in just two weeks it goes from "you can do it" to "this is how you do it" to "here is a one click Android App that does it automatically for you from your phone". Somehow I jest don't think Microsoft (or Apple) can match the reaction speed and general skills levels of the crowd of Googlites that are marching in formation towards Christmas. CHROME STUFF IS GETTING BETTER at an incredible rate while MS still hasn't even got their base OS's operational 8.x brokenness fixed yet, much less tried to get it tuned to run any lighter, faster or better. Young people who are up on all this techno stuff likely will buy into the free stuff that is rapidly getting better rather than the pay me stuff that is going to cost yearly subscription money just to stay the same 'ol porky slow stuff. Plus, folks who know Android and the Chrome browser know all about how all this new works already ...... Since the Chrome browser is going to get all this goody built into it along with voice search and all the other good just invented tricks, then good 'ol Apple is still struggling to play catch up despite just having dropped iOS 8 out on the market. MS is so far behind now that their confused stinky brown vapor isn't even keeping up any more. ::) (feeling Scroggled yet, MS ???) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/25/14 at 04:43:30 http://www.extremetech.com/computing/161666-the-demise-of-microsofts-monopoly-the-pc-market-by-the-numbers http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/global-computer-640x435.png I found this year old article that turned out to be VERY accurate in what it had predicted. Having proven itself accurate over the last year, listen to what it predicts for next year. You will watch all of this happen in the next 6-8 months unless MS pulls thumb from butt and starts working on improving its OS product in VERY MEANINGFUL fashions. "If we cast our gaze to the future and extend the lines on the graphs by a few years, it’s clear that this trend will continue until the PC is merely a specialized device for productivity and gaming. As tablets and smartphones close the performance gap, and input devices improve, the PC market will shrink even further." Productivity and Gaming .... huh? ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) Prediction time again --- inside of year 2015 Ubuntu/Mint will get integrated into current chromebooks in a more seamless and easy to use fashion (no more awkward Crouton four finger keystrokes to switch over). Ubuntu/Mint Steam games will come along for the ride, completing the general purpose FOSS OS system. Chromebooks will be able to run MS Office On-Line, run all the rest of the major Windows style programs that are so quickly getting themselves on-line, run all of the old Linux softwares, run all of Android that is worthwhile and play them Steam games. Chromebooks will be fanless and more powerful than they are now, yet with better battery life and be both physically thinner and lighter to carry around all day. Cost will float in the $200 - $300 neighborhood. Look to see FOSS making up Ubuntu/Mint like flavors to do all these same combination/integration tricks if Google fails to do so. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/25/14 at 13:23:46 Toshiba and Acer each dropped in a new Chromebook today, each of which offers over 8 hours of run time on a charge. The Toshiba has a full size laptop battery that gets over 11 hours actually, which is very very good. By my count there have been six new Chromebooks dropped to only one "way way out of price position" Stream Book machine so far. I doubt there will be any more BingOS machines since the entire Stream Book class seems to have failed to meet the needed price and performance guidelines. Plus, so far MS isn't "contra revenuing" the Chrome Killers enough price-wise to even get them down into the real Chromebook striking range. Seems like $50 is all the price support MS will allow, which ain't nearly enough to get the job done. So far the Chrome OS has been improved twice since the war was started while the current version of BingOS has been technically discontinued (the name, anyway) during this same very short period of time. ::) not much of a war really so far, kinda more of a dumb biatch slappin' actually. ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D :D Oh my goodness, another metaphor for this ongoing struggle comes to mind ..... A skinny quick '60s hippy chick having a slap fight with a fat sloppy spandex street ho. (yeah, MS sells it -- charges a lot for it even though it ain't all that good. MS's ho keeps giving you the clap repeatedly too). Well, if MS actually can improve Win9 in several significant fashions, then that fat sloppy spandex clad ho might just slap that skinny hippy chick back some next week. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/29/14 at 18:59:00 http://liliputing.com/2014/09/hp-unveils-new-stream-laptops-199.html Hp has announced two more Stream machines, bringing the total number announced (but still fully vaporous) up to three for HP with zero being real at this point in time. Ya gots a 14", a 13", an 11" announced now, using similar chipsets to the Chromebook crew. These puppers will supposedly cost $199, $250 and $300 when their vapor evaporates. Christmas season starts tomorrow, so it is time to start with the Christmas Carols !!! So, you all know the songs, so let's all sing along !!! :D On the first day of Christmas my low end market gave to me, 7 actual real BRAND NEW FANLESS chromebooks, a dozen in stock older chromebooks and boxes, and on the Intel side 3 still vaporous HP StreamBooks, Two discontinued Surface tablets, and a not real Asus Eee netbook in a pear tree. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/02/14 at 05:24:31 MS swung a meaty spandex clad arm and hit back today -- but the meaty arm was all vapor so it did NOTHING AT ALL to the little skinny hippy chick. No audible Christmas season SMACK sounds all so far. Looking for the Win 8.x machine discounting to become sorta severe come Black Friday -- them MS fan boys can now see Win 10 coming and it might be good, so expect all the current stocks of Win 8.x to just sit unless the STEEP discount deals and some avowed "upgrade rights" to Win 10 are announced ASAP and are promoted strongly. Time to clear the retail channels, boys ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 10/02/14 at 08:29:58 What happened to windows 9? Just seen this in yahoo news this morning... https://www.yahoo.com/tech/windows-10-undoes-the-disaster-of-windows-8-mostly-98835840904.html Treading water with a broken arm..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/02/14 at 09:19:32 Microsoft lost count on their own chain of little stinky Sophias. ::) <poot> <poot> <poot> <poot> .............. <poot> |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/03/14 at 02:14:16 Now, MS claims that "this same software" is going to run on tablets and phones. One suspects some "exaggeration for effect" here, or else Win 10 is going to have to go on a diet. To pull this off for tablets and phones, Win 10 is going to have to make a lean and quick software -- finally. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/04/14 at 07:03:49 http://liliputing.com/2014/10/acer-chromebox-is-now-available-for-180-and-up.html http://liliputing.com/2014/10/hp-chromebook-14-nvidia-tegra-k1-now-available-299.html Acer drops a new Chromebox and HP drops a new Chromebook (Tegra K1). It seems to me this makes about a 10:1 ratio of low end things going to Chrome rather than Windows. This is not good for MS since NONE of their new HP Streambook stuff is becoming real very fast and may not make it in time for Christmas. This also may be a function of the laptop manufacturers realizing that they have whole warehouses full of Windows stuff to get rid of before Win 10 comes out next spring. They may feel that they don't need to add to the pile of losses they are going to take before summer of next year. MS needs to come out with the "free upgrade to Win 10 promise" real soon so some stuff will start selling .... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/05/14 at 16:25:12 http://liliputing.com/2014/10/wsj-hp-split-two-companies-pc-enterprise.html HP to split into two companies (PC and enterprise) http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/hp-slate-7-beats_02.jpg MS's buddy HP has got some serious profit problems and does not think this year's end big sell off on all those Win 8.x laptops and tablets and stuff is going to help their bottom line at all. As a matter of fact, to avoid a doom doom doom scenario HP is going to split itself into two parts ASAP, with all the good parts (printers, etc) going to the Enterprise Side and all the "suck us down into the dirt" and "bound to make us fail" stuff going to the Consumer Side. Then HP as Enterprise can still survive even if HP as consumer cannot. So, Microsoft, don't be looking for those likely to fail StreamBooks to be coming out any time soon, Microsoft. ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) Microsoft, guess what HP Enterprise thinks is your very best selling, very most successful MS software? :) Yup, Windows 7 ..... http://liliputing.com/2014/10/hp-plans-split-2-companies-2-better-one.html "It’s too early to say whether the split will result in better products for either consumer or enterprise markets. But HP is certainly hoping that two companies will be more profitable than one… or at least that if one fails, the other can still succeed. Profit margins for consumer devices have been shrinking in recent years thanks to falling prices of laptops, tablets, and other computers." |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/07/14 at 06:13:42 SALES FIGURES ARE IN FINALLY FOR FIRST HALF OF 2014 So, how is the Chrome Wars doing, based off of first half 2014 sales figures? Two different guys are reporting on two different markets, so let's try to keep them straight and then combine them into some sort of meatball "general percentage". First chunk of data is "business to business sales" or COMMERCIAL SALES. This includes schools, colleges, commercial businesses, ie NOT YOU. "Chromebooks accounted for 35% of all US commercial laptop sales during the first six months of 2014, according to the research firm NPD"." 35% of all business sales is a very respectable number. But what about Consumer sales, that much much harder to track sort of number? "Gartner says that more than half of Chromebook sales in 2014 will be to consumers." Sooooooo ...... meatball time. I predict Chromebook sales this year to be at least a solid 20-30% of all laptop sales. Maybe more, if Christmas does real good like it did last year. At this number, I would say ChromeOS has become a viable minor alternative to MS Windows overall and it is the leading or commanding alternative in the lower end of the laptop market. The Core i5 chromebooks have come out now and reviewers all say the same thing, a Chromebook doesn't need the bigger badder battery power sucking Core i5 Intel processor. To get the same relatively small bump in speed, simply put 4 gigs (or more) of systems memory into a much cheaper Haswell chipped Chromebook and have at it. 8 gigs of systems memory is shameful wasteful total overkill, 6 gigs is moderate overkill and 4 gigs is jest about right. The stock 2 gigs isn't enough .... so buy it with more memory on sale in a few months. Be careful to buy a unit with memory expansion room, HP for example swings cheap and only has ONE memory card slot in some of its Chromebooks and Chromeboxes. This sucks. Graphics speed counts somewhat more than processor speed in Chromebooks, which is why Tegra K1 seems to be doing so well. Default Intel graphics in the early Haswell isn't the best, so pick your Chromebook accordingly. Performance wise, Chrome is kicking MS Window's butt on every item tested. Early Win 10 testing says the same thing, Windows is still fat and porky and slow. Windows is jest plain "giving it all up" to the Chromebooks performance-wise. The handwriting is up on the wall now ..... software makers are rushing to get their product on-line with a license key that you purchase which allows you full access to the on-line and off-line product. Server based processing "power" support comes with the rented on-line package, so a chromebook doesn't need all that huge CPU muscle to make a CAD software recalculate. Prediction: Major Software will move to the web in 2015-2016. Computing is changing, and MS really isn't keeping up with the swing to the web all that well. ;) One (1) old style Elephant per household, hooked up to a printer and a scanner. Rest can be tablets or Chromebooks. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/07/14 at 07:20:53 Lastly, Google has just now started pushing "Chromebooks for Christmas". Google sells ads, yes, but when they have an unrented spot they are dropping in some filler ads for Chromebooks for Christmas. When you click, you get some ChromeOS specific encouragements and a listing of everybody's chromebook products and a bunch of sources (Google customers) that sell them. :) Microsoft couldn't buy that kind of ad campaign package, and Google can do it easily at no real cost to them. One would hope that Google can fill all their ad spots with paid ads, but plugging their own stuff in any unpaid gaps sure beats that "empty billboard" look, now don't it? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/09/14 at 07:55:32 http://liliputing.com/2014/10/first-look-zotacs-palm-sided-windows-pc-coming-october-200.html First look: Zotac’s palm-sided Windows PC http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/pico_05.jpg http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/pico_02.jpg "Intel’s Atom Bay Trail processors have breathed new life into low-power Windows tablets and notebooks since they first hit the streets in late 2013. Now it looks like they’re doing the same for compact desktops. For $200, you shouldn’t expect a no-compromise computer. The ZBOX PI320 pico appears to have single-band WiFi. It recognizes my 2.4 GHz WiFi network, but not the faster 5 GHz network in my home office. And while the Atom Z3735F processor can handle 1080p HD video playback and general-purpose computing, it’s not fast enough for serious gaming and while you can use this little computer for CPU-heavy tasks such as video editing, it will take a lot longer to render a video than a machine with an Intel Haswell processor." By the end of next year this sort of stuff will be more and more common, and with loss leader price supported 14nm lithography coming from Intel the CPU power level will be quite nice as well. It will come with Win 10, perhaps the new lighter faster version which HAS to be made soon to support all those proposed MS tablets and phones. Here is a cut to a video of Brad handling and hooking up the little box -- tiny !! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NazuzQfX9_Q#t=102 Why is this video worth watching? You can watch a real uber geek picking up what he has on hand and putting together a den-style media machine literally inside a couple of minutes, all software included. It is fun just to see Brad's working speed in action. Remember, he's filming this, narrating it and futzing with the camera all at the same time he tosses all this stuff together ..... Current chipset in this one isn't worth having, nor is the BingOS it runs so don't get it now -- it just shows you what is coming next year that may indeed be neat enough to own. I count this $200 device (carrying over $100 in price supports) as the only MS competitor for the Chromebox right now. So, the Chrome Wars are now engaged on all fronts and your options are laid out in front of you. Intel and Microsoft are getting closer on getting price competitive with Chromebooks and Chromeboxes AND MS's SPEED AND FUNCTIONALITY IS GETTING BETTER TOO. Not there yet, but getting closer. Both Intel and MS are showing signs of "getting it" now. They are EACH giving up over $50 each in price supports per Chrome War unit sold, which still leaves their products priced about $50 too high to be truly price competitive with the low end Chrome products. But they at least show signs of knowing where they need to go. Net real price difference is now about $100 plus a bit more to have a real profit margin for the manufacturer. Then they will be on a level playing field out there in the Chrome Wars. ;) ..... well, being $100 off the pace on a $160 Chromebox unit isn't really very close, but it is getting sorta kinda CLOSER ..... ;D Change, she comes ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/14/14 at 06:27:54 http://www.cnx-software.com/2014/10/13/mele-pcg03-intel-quad-core-mini-pc-sells-for-49-and-up-factory-price/ http://liliputing.com/2014/10/mele-pcg03-tiny-low-cost-intel-powered-mini-pc.html http://www.cnx-software.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Mele_PCG03.jpg http://www.cnx-software.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Mele_PCG03_Rear_Panel.jpg Mele PCG03 Specifications: SoC – Intel Atom Z3735D “Bay Trail” quad core processor @ 1.33 GHz (Burst freq: 1.83 GHz) with Intel HD graphics System Memory – Optional 1 or 2 GB DDR3 Storage – Optional 16, 32, or 64 GB eMMC + micro SD slot Video Output – HDMI 1.4, VGA and Composite (RCA), Audio I/F – HDMI, Stereo RCA, optical S/PDIF, and MIC and earphone jack. Connectivity – 10/100M Ethernet, 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi USB – 2x USB 2.0 host Power Supply – N/A Now THIS is a potentially real (but graphics weaker and slower running) chromebox competitor. Coming out of Mele from China at a $49 mfg cost (likely around $100 landed in the USA price point) this is a bare bones priced Mele box that takes advantage of the Intel chipset loss leader pricing, the intel Tech Support dollars AND the free BingOS from MS. We have not seen all the details yet, but some earlier deluxe Mele boxes had SATA jacks as well (the drive sat vertical to the motherboard and had a slot in the case). The next version of this basic box will have some added features if it is successful in China. This box will likely sell well in China and in the 3rd World where things don't have to be bloody fast all the time, just so they do work. This is the first really successful fruit out of MS and Intel's efforts as they didn't pay Mele to do this box (well, no direct bribe was needed, just the standard technical support $$$ and the standard loss leader pricing on the chipsets and the free Windows). Mele came out with this themselves. I suspect the Chinese will continue to use this Wintel stuff until the price supports end, but by then Intel will have accomplished getting into the Chinese supply chain and MS will have their Chinese market presence with their Windows OS. SO, IF INTEL AND MS CAN FIGURE OUT HOW TO REMAIN PROFITABLE (as whole corporations) AT THESE BELOW COST PRICE POINTS AND TO CONTINUE DOING THEM OUT INTO THE FUTURE THEY MIGHT WELL WIN IN THE CHROME WARS. This last little desktop computer (because that is what it is) signals a reverse flow point in the Chrome Wars. If Intel and MS can continue selling at such a strong loss leader position then the $79 dollar cheap Windows tablets and the $100 cheap Windows desktops can continue rolling out of China then they will continue their come back against Android and ChromeOS. Intel is using their high profit big chipset's excess profits to fund this trick, and MS is using the large flow of support dollars from US business market to fund the free Windows. And, yes they CAN continue doing this for years and years ..... but as their low end sales volume finally goes up and up will their stockholders continue to let them dump an ever increasing $$$ flow down that price support rat hole? Remember, Chromeboxes and Chromebooks make a real profit living in this low end neighborhood. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/16/14 at 10:03:41 http://liliputing.com/2014/10/intel-offers-new-dev-tools-cross-platform-windows-android-apps.html Intel offers new dev tools for cross-platform Windows, Android apps http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/inde.jpg "Developers can use the tools to target Windows or Android… or both. That makes sense since phones, tablets, and PCs with Intel chips can now run either Windows or Android. But the Intel INDE tools can be used to develop apps that will run on ARM chips as well as Intel processors. The tools help developers create, test, and optimize apps using C++ and Java, and since the same toolkit can be used for Windows and Android apps, it can save developers of cross-platform apps the time and money it would take to use separate tools for each build of their software." This is in direct competition to Android 5.0 Lollipop's Supplier Development Kit which makes an Android and a Chrome app automatically when used. Microsoft and intel still want you to stay locked into Wintel products as much as they can manage to get you to do. Note that Apple iOS apps can go in the input side of this Intel tool but have no presence on the output side at all. This kit will be effective IF Win 10 is a big hit ..... if not, then not so much. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/16/14 at 19:36:06 http://liliputing.com/2014/10/rockchip-intel-launch-first-chip-together-low-cost-phones-tablets.html http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/06/23/digging-further-into-intel-corporations-rockchip-d.aspx Rockchip and Intel launch first TWO CHIPSET NON-INTEGRATED "chip" together for low-cost phones and tablets http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/xmm-6321.jpg "The XMM 6321 chipset features (in a two chipset non-integrated system) a XG632 dual-core ARM Cortex-A5 processor and AG620 wireless chip for 2G, 3G, WiFi, Bluetooth, and GPS. Phones and tablets with the chip should support GSM networks and they should be cheap: Charbax from ARMDevices reports we could see phones priced around $30 and tablets priced at $40 — although Charbax has a habit of mixing up wholesale and retail prices. So don’t be surprised if actual products with XMM 6321 chips cost a bit more than that." EEEW, You got SOPHIA on the bottom of your shoe AGAIN !!! :P And like all the previous two dozen little stinky sophias this one is NON-INTEGRATED, requires multiple chips, brown and icky and vapory and smells really really bad. It is a TWO CHIPSET SYSTEM with a canned 28nm dual-core ARM Cortex-A5 chipset design except it uses the same super cheap dumb phone modem radio that Intel builds in bulk at TSMC. Wooooooo ...... such progress from the industry leader. For this we have waited most of a year now? Wow, this is what makes it an Intel Chipset ???? The either 2g or 3g outdated dumb phone MODEM RADIO (not a very good radio either) that Intel builds in bulk at TSMC???? Hang down your head in SHAME, Intel. It isn't even using your CPU or GPU cores at all ...... Nothing in that chipset came from you at all, really, except that antique modem radio -- you are just bribing Rockchip to put your name on their normal stock low end ARM product and run it with your antique modem radio so you can mislead your stockholders that you finally sold some "Intel" phone chips into China. More and better information is going to come out on this later on --- we shall see. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/17/14 at 06:54:27 http://liliputing.com/2014/10/rockchip-intel-launch-first-chip-together-low-cost-phones-tablets.html#disqus_thread Adder to Intel/Rockchip release story ..... from the comments section. D. B. • 8 hours ago i wish it were a headline saying "intel outs arm contingency plan after rendering x86 moribund through anticompetitive dogshit; coming soon: arm cpus, nvidia gpus, intel branding" "anticompetitive dogshit" my my my ...... Such language .... just call it Sophia like all the rest of us do. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/19/14 at 11:53:03 http://www.extremetech.com/computing/191089-you-can-now-stream-photoshop-to-your-chromebook-a-huge-win-for-google http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/adobe-photoshop-2014-logo-640x360.jpg You can now stream Photoshop to your Chromebook: A huge win for Google If you remember, the original big protest against ChromeOS was that you couldn't do MS Office or Adobe Photoshop on a Chromebook. Well, Microsoft put Office on-line a while ago and now so has Adobe with their on-line Photoshop and other Creative Group apps. The sole hang out now is your mainstream CAD programs, AutoCad and company ..... ::) really? :-? ..... whups, I'm sorry about that, MS, just guess who snuck on-line a while ago and didn't even make much of a fuss about doing it? https://www.autocad360.com/ OK, how is full Windows better than a Chromebook again? OK, when you have no connectivity at all then Windows is better. But really, when was the last time that happened to you? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/19/14 at 12:06:44 Three more new Chromebooks just hit the street -- and the only low end Windows laptop competitor so far is a "renewed promise" of the Asus Eee X205 netbook that it will use the same tablet chipset as the two new little Windows boxes use and it will have similar very minimal memory and drive resources with which to run the "full sized" fat porky Windows 8.1 BingOS ..... Ratio of reality right now is over a 15:1 Chromebook lead on new low end units right now. This will change next month when the Christmas sell off starts and the old Win 8 and Win 8.1 laptops get dumped off way way down at Chromebook price levels. Now, let's say something good about Windows ..... ;D The "dumping off" of Windows 8.x laptops this Christmas season will move more units numerically than all of Chromebooks/boxes did for the entire year of 2014. This presumes that Microsoft will promise all these people free Win 10 when it comes out to get the sell off rolling good. This also presumes the retail vendors have enough guts to cut prices deep enough to actually dump off all their stale Win 8.x inventory before Win 10 comes marching out in the spring. If they don't, then the Win 10 sell in may possibly get stalled out by all the existing cut priced old windows inventory units blocking its grand entrance onto the stage. The cries for "Completely FREE Win 10 for all our 2014-2015 purchases" will go up at that point in time. Microsoft may have a better one in Win 10 this time out, or it may not. It still has to deal with the fact it isn't king of the hill any more at only "10-14% of total devices" market share and the fact that its user base is kinda sorta pissed off at MS for screwing around with them. Plus, MS is looking forwards towards a 6-8% PC shrinkage rate year on year going on out into the future (and this is before Chromebooks goes to nibbling at MS's shrinking PC market). As such, it is making feeble attempts to woo its current installed base by actually saying it will "listen carefully to them" when refining Win 10 to its final appearance and features over the next few months. ::) About this last point -- Windows 10 for all devices is VERY NEBULOUS right now. Win 10 for tablets and phones is positively brown & stinky vaporous right now ..... and this is 6 months out from the April shipment date ???? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/19/14 at 21:46:00 Lithography news 20nm lithography will only be news for a few short months. Apple has shipped ALL OF THEIR 20nm A8 Chipsets now and admits already being in production on the A9 (quad core ??) 14nm chipset at Samsung/Global. Samsung and Global have 2 each (4 total) 14nm lines up and running between them right now and all of these are filled up with Apple A9 at the moment. Remember, 14nm is still sorta slow running compared to 20nm or 28mn. TSMC is moving their current focus from 20nm planar to 16nm FinFET and the production level crank up of their first production FinFET lithography processes. Right now only Samsung and Global (who have a production technology sharing deal with IBM) have a real functional 14nm production capability for ARM chipsets right now. ARM is done with 20nm at this point, it is moving rapidly down into FinFET land instead. Other than slight bragging rights, a 20nm is too too similar to 28nm to make it a worthwhile stop for most of the chip makers out there. They will leap directly from 28nm down to 14/16nm when the time comes. Resisting this move strongest are the Chinese chip makers, who will cling to the low low cost 28nm production lines until they just plain have to leave them behind. Top end ARM chipsets are VERY POWERFUL right now compared to real mobile computing needs. Very few new state of the art chipsets are needed compared to the vast sea of 28nm dual core and quad core designs that are going into the 3rd World's very first smart phones. Android itself is going on a diet, requiring EVEN LESS resources in the current predominate mass of the 32 bit OS driven products. Android L and the 64 bit systems will create a divide between big processor, big memory 64 bit Android Lollipop systems and the MUCH cheaper thinner sleeker 32 bit Android 1 system types. Microsoft was intending to go compete against Firefox OS in the emerging 3rd world markets, thinking that Rockchip/Intel was going to give them a low enough cost yet powerful enough dual core A7 chipset to do that. So far this has not happened -- not even close. Right now Intel is terrified about the Apple designed 14nm quad core A9 as it can substitute freely into all of Apple's laptops at very short notice. Intel has told the world that 14nm Skylake for Apple laptops is going to be ready in early 2015 at a very low cost so Intel can keep on supplying chipsets to Apple for laptops. Apple has told the world that if Intel bobbles this Skylake Hail Mary pass of theirs that they will lose Apple's laptops to the Samsung/Global produced Apple A9 almost instantly. And stay lost .... forever .... Also note that Samsung is once again Apple's current chip maker du jour .... Ironic, ain't it? Intel wanted that job too, but Apple said no. Four running lines vs 1 or mebbe 2 lines, not a hard decision for Apple to make for 2015. The new Artemis and Maya ARM next generation big-LITTLE 64 bit system designs have now been given to Apple (and Apple has shared parts of them with Samsung) so the Apple A9 might have some brand new ARM next generation tech in it as well. Remember, as a 33% owner of ARM, Apple gets all the new ARM stuff at least a year ahead of anybody else ..... ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/20/14 at 08:58:15 http://www.eweek.com/cloud/chromebook-sales-thanks-to-schools-to-grow-79-percent-in-2014.html http://www.eweek.com/imagesvr_ce/6749/290x195_CHROMEBOOKS.jpg Chromebook Sales, Thanks to Schools, to Grow 79 Percent in 2014 "Chromebook sales this year will outperform 2013 sales by 79 percent, according to an Aug. 11 report from research firm Gartner. The primary demand for Chromebooks—inexpensive notebooks with operating systems based in the cloud, for easy updating and provisioning—has come from the education sector, which accounted for 85 percent of the 2.9 million units sold in 2013. But businesses, particularly in finance, real estate, banking and hospitality, should increasingly contribute to sales, said the report." Remember, 2013 was the Year of the Chromebook, so topping that by 79% is "continuing a significant growth curve". Microsoft's Scroogled Campaign aside (mostly not true now with all major softwares moving to the web) and the price supports paid for relatively few "Chromebeater" low cost laptops has not deterred the Chromebook wave in the least. http://betanews.com/2014/07/14/chromebook-kicks-os-x-and-windows-out-of-school/ Chromebook kicks OS X and Windows out of school Microsoft has now lost the education market now pretty much completely, which means kids will all know how to use a Chromebook really really really well by the time they get out of primary school. They won't be afraid of it, nor think that there is anything it cannot do. Actually, when they use the family x86 dinosaur they will be amazed at all the steps and waits you have to do just to get on the web, much less to go do anything. Windows 10 still shows no signs of getting any lighter or quicker -- so all the Chromebook performance advantages still remain. And the cost advantages. And the much better security and the ease of upkeep advantages. Microsoft still isn't competitive AT ALL on the things that make a Chromebook strongest. Chromebooks are lumped in with laptops in general media reporting, so when you see laptop sales are flat for this year, deduct 35% from that figure for the Chromebooks portion and you will know that Microsoft is really really hurting this year ...... And when you hear Apple laptop sales are down, know where they went. And when you see the dump off PC laptop sales this Black Friday (selling off current model overstocks of this and that) you will correctly interpret what you are seeing. ;) ..... and that is on top of MS having to GIVE their crappy Win 8.1 BingOS away for free just to stay in the game at all. So now the MS vendor chain has to dump price the otherwise fairly decent hardware, too, just because of the crappy OS that is installed on it. Sad, ain't it? ::) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/21/14 at 04:41:31 http://www.pcworld.com/article/2835552/8-ways-google-is-tying-chrome-os-and-android-together.html 8 ways Google is tying Chrome OS and Android together This is PCWorld in their new "WORLD BEYOND WINDOWS Exploring Linux, Chrome OS, and beyond" main article section. First, it is just flat amazing that PCWorld has finally come out of the closet and admits there is something other than a PC. Second, their articles are well written and accurate -- some of these guys are actually USING Chromebooks as their main device now so they now know enough to write some real stuff about them. Part of the problem is that there is NOTHING MUCH to write about in x86 Windows right now. As two of the last remaining PC publications, both PCWorld and PCMagazine have both had to go cover Chrome and Linux and Android and Mac just to have something to fill up an issue. As such, the article writers are actually using the other OS products now, and seeing that there are real improvements out there to x86 Windows slow fat and virus filled porky-ness. ;) ..... and these "all OS using" article writers are now continuously raking MS over the coals regularly now for the egregious, ugly and stupid Win 8.x deficiencies and they are giving MS very pointed suggestions for ways to improve Win10 before it comes out being yet another fat porky slow POS Windows version. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/22/14 at 03:36:55 http://liliputing.com/2014/10/zotac-zbox-pico-pocket-sized-desktop-pc-review.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/pico_021.jpg Zotac ZBOX pico pocket-sized desktop PC full review "It’s not a particularly powerful Windows PC. It has the same processor you’ll find in dirt cheap Windows tablets… and that’s led some folks to conclude that even at $200, this little desktop is overpriced. After all, you can pick up a Toshiba Encore Mini or Winbook TW800 for about half the price. How did we get to this point? In order to fend off competition from upstart chip designer ARM, Intel is selling its low-power Atom processors at dirt cheap prices. Meanwhile Microsoft is literally giving away Windows licenses for free to makers of small, low-cost tablets, notebooks and other computers in an effort to compete with Google Android and other mobile operating systems. That’s allowed device makers to start flooding the market with Windows tablets with Intel chips that are priced competitively with Android tablets featuring either ARM or Intel processors. It remains to be seen whether these low prices are sustainable — we could see sticker prices go up once Microsoft and Intel have decided they’ve grabbed enough market share from their competitors. Or prices could stay low indefinitely… in which case we could see device makers start pulling out of the market due to ever-dropping profit margins (which is one of the reasons netbooks largely disappeared a few years ago). Anyway, the point is that we now live in a world where folks call a tiny, fanless Windows desktop that’s small enough to slide into a pocket overpriced when it sells for $200." http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/lilbench-pico.jpg http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/handbrake-pico.jpg http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/pico-inside.jpg Brad Linder's Verdict "The Zotac ZBOX PI320 pico isn’t the cheapest computer on the market, it’s certainly not the most powerful, and depending on your definition of a desktop PC, it might not even be the smallest. That said, it’s still a remarkable little device that won’t be the right choice for everyone… but which could certainly be a good choice for some users." My verdict ???? It was the first of its kind and Zontac was trying to make some egregious premium dollars off the idea of being "tiny" and of being first to the market. As such, I totally agree with Brad Linder that the Zontac Pico unit is really overpriced by nearly 2x to its real value. A more correct valuation is reflected by this $49 bare bones Mele unit (built in China for the Chinese people) which will allow you to spec the unit with differing amounts of memory and SSD and this unit could allow you to come in with twice as much unit for only 3/4 the price of the Zontac Pico unit. However, the Intel processor itself is still a bit too minimal for real uses. When 14nm rolls through next year the direct descendant of this unit will be the one to watch for "low end best value" PCs. (assuming that Intel and MS keep up all the Chinese freebie giveaways that is) 14nm is going to be 20% FASTER on the CPU and we are "promised" 3x the graphics performance of the standard Intel on-board graphics which will supposedly be built into all these 14nm Intel chipsets. (Ha -- Intel speaks with confusing brown icky tongue on all that 14nm Sophia stuff) This Mele unit is the only true price/value competition for the Chromeboxes that are out there on the market right now, but it is currently too slow for any gaming uses and boots much slower and still requires the constant Windows anti-virus and defrag, etc. etc. But still, it is a LESS THAN $100 full function Windows PC with full I/O (including LAN, HDMI, Composite jacks and a VGA port) http://www.cnx-software.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Mele_PCG03_Rear_Panel.jpg Mele PCG03 Specifications: SoC – Intel Atom Z3735D “Bay Trail” quad core processor @ 1.33 GHz (Burst freq: 1.83 GHz) with Intel HD graphics System Memory – Optional 1 or 2 GB DDR3 Storage – Optional 16, 32, or 64 GB eMMC + micro SD slot Video Output – HDMI 1.4, VGA and Composite (RCA), Audio I/F – HDMI, Stereo RCA, optical S/PDIF, and MIC and earphone jack. Connectivity – 10/100M Ethernet, 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi USB – 2x USB 2.0 host Power Supply – N/A Now, here is the rub -- whatever chip performance gains you get in the 2015 Windows low end units you will also get in the Chromebox units as they use the same processors. Chrome is much smaller, runs quicker, requires less memory and naturally costs less than Windows machines ---- and these natural advantages will remain next year and the year after that UNLESS MICROSOFT DEPORKY'S WINDOWS AND GETS IT TO BE LEAN AND FAST ENOUGH TO BE ACTUALLY PERFORMANCE COMPETITIVE WITH CHROMEBOOKS AND CHROMEBOXES. So far we have not seen any real Win 10 changes as far as fat, porky and slow goes ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/22/14 at 08:24:42 http://liliputing.com/2014/10/microsoft-launches-android-apps-including-lock-screen-ok-google-replacements.html Microsoft launches Android apps including lock screen, OK Google replacements Google flicked Apple on the raw by giving old iPad 2 units voice actuated commands when you loaded Google's Chromium browser. Apple didn't like that Google was modifying their Apple world and limited them to only working inside the Chrome Browser app on their Apple products. Google was screwing up Apple's planned obsolescence scheme and the planned upgrade path to iPad 4 by giving full features to the obsolete iPad 2 crowd who now didn't need to run out and buy the new iPad 4. Chrome browser app however became very popular and Apple was miffed because Safari was being ignored because people LIKED Google Chrome with built in voice search much better. iOS 8 then came out with about 7 Google like features that were clear copies of Android ideas, but since Android is open source that was all good for Google. Siri never made it to the iPad 2 (although it was promised) so folks are still installing Google Chrome to get their iPad 2 voice search feature. Microsoft is now trying to do the same trick right back at Google. Microsoft is posting apps to the Google Play store that REPLACE certain parts of your Android phone's functionality with Microsoft equivalents. "Now the company (MS) is launching 4 a series of new Android apps that come from the Microsoft Garage project. These are apps that Microsoft employees and interns have developed in their free time and they’re a bit experimental. But some of the new apps could pave the way for a marriage of Android and Microsoft software, with apps that change the way you search, launch apps, and see information on your phone. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/next-lock.jpg Next Lock Screen This is a replacement for Google’s lock screen. Like some other third-party lock screen apps it brings calendar appointments, SMS notifications, missed calls, and other data to your lock screen so you can view information at a glance without first unlocking your phone. But Microsoft’s solution also makes some of those notifications actionable. Have a conference call on your calendar? Tap the phone number to join the call without first swiping to unlock. There’s also a space at the bottom of the screen where you can arrange some of your favorite apps so you can launch them straight from the lock screen. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/torque.jpg Bing Torque This Android Wear app lets you search Bing instead of Google from your smartwatch. More importantly, it lets you start a voice search by twisting your wrist so you don’t have to utter the words “OK Google” in public. Sure, you still need to actually speak your search term. But you don’t have to do any free advertising for Google as a prologue. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/journeys.jpg Journeys & Notes This is a social, location tracking app. It’ll keep a log of the places you’ve been and connect with other people who’ve been to the same places. Basically it’s a Foursquare-style check-in app, but you can leave notes associated with places and see notes left by other people. For example you can recommend the pie at a roadside diner or see if there are any tips about the best view in a nearby park. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/voice-commander.jpg Voice Commander The fourth Microsoft Garage app heading to Android is a game that combines real-time-strategy and top-down shooter features. Voice Commander is a multi-player game that supports up to 8 different controllers… and anyone in the room can control the game using voice commands." :) Apple would NOT ALLOW such types of apps that go inside their Apple code and actually REPLACE entire parts of their Apple functionality. Google however will allow it. Your stuff has to be better than theirs though for people to want it bad enough to go install it (and then to keep up with it as it won't likely survive the first automatic update since it is inside the feature base that is automatically updated). Going inside core features and replacing stuff that is automatically maintained sounds like a recipe for a broken phone at some point in time. Is Microsoft going to keep up with all the future damage it does with this little trick? Microsoft has good programmers. Good programmers who want to contribute good code to an open source based system like Android is good for open source. Microsoft programmers attempting to hijack sections of a competitors open source system is much more dubious. Microsoft breaking users phones due to posting apps that are going to go into system portions that are automatically maintained and thus causing ANY sort of issues is NOT OK. We shall see how this Bingishness goes .... more news on this later I am sure. :D The Chrome Wars just got to the programming "biological warfare" stage ..... Since MS cannot compete yet and build some mobile products that people actually want to buy, well then MS will try hijacking the existing Android product base with selected MS features. MS is trying to survive -- parasites survive, so if the choice is oblivion or life as a tapeworm then MS elects to survive. However, if like the tapeworm you wind up making the user sick, well, you can expect a purgative to have to be used to fix that problem. Also note, if any of the affected systems are run under the Linux FOSS license then MS has just donated the entirety of Bing to open source ..... ;D |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 10/22/14 at 09:13:28 I see you mentioned the advert for google "ok google"....... I have several times emailed and conversed with "helpers" on that. Just recently our billiards team (ok pool team) was playing an away game at a bar that has a lot of young folks, our games go long sometimes (up until midnight) and a band started playing about 10:30-ish. Well after the first few songs the lead singer did something they say he always does, him being an apple fan. He says "hey turn this mike up a little, I got something to say", then is a slow measured voice he says "ok, google now, search internet porn".... I was not a happy man.... and half our team was pissed so much we forfeited the last match. But the league cannot do anything about an "entertainer", and if we refuse to play at that bar, we loose points having to forfeit. We were told we could "turn off our phones". If google would allow us to use personal voice startup, I would be sooooo happy. I wonder how many google users would say, OK HAL....... ;D |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/22/14 at 09:29:55 I rarely say "OK Google" unless my hands are both busy -- I generally just tap the icon. However, the same hands busy situation would have me still saying "OK Google" and not sweating it. You see, I like Google ..... it tickles me to say "OK Google" to my Apple iPad 2. Old_Rider, check the Dragon thread. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/23/14 at 09:16:57 http://liliputing.com/2014/10/hp-stream-11-laptop-now-available-200.html HP Stream 11 laptop now available for $200 http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/stream-11.jpg It's HERE .... retailing for $200 as promised Performance reviews will be forthcoming .... is it better than a Chromebook? One thing that is becoming clear is that simply due to cost lesser processors are having to be used in the Streambook class of products compared to what is used in the existing Chromebook class of products. (correction for myself -- these really aren't worse processors, slightly less yes but "roughly equivalent" to the Chromebook dual cores and they DO NOT REQUIRE A FAN which is a large battery savings that using Windows 8.1 totally eats up.) I cannot see how this is going to help their comparative performance, swinging a porkier, fatter, slower more obese OS while having to use a (slightly) lesser chipset. More words on this once the comparison reviews roll in. ======= Microsoft is backing these units with a free year of Microsoft 360 and one year's use of (1) terabyte of One Drive storage, so obviously being on-line is important to the Streambook (duh, the name). Hey, I'd say we gots us a low end fight on our hands now ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/24/14 at 07:27:14 HP Streambook vs HP Chromebook Purchase cost is the same Processors and graphics are equivalent (roughly) Productivity Software --- Chromebook supports everything for 5 years, MS only gives free on-line storage and MS Office On-Line 365 Personal for 1 year (then you have to pay yearly $$$ for each item) Speed --- Chromebook is faster in all situations both in getting you started and in processing normal items. Exceptions to this are going to be found, so let's just say up front that they exist --- but not very many of them. Value for the dollar --- Since between them MS and Intel are paying roughly $100 of the real retail cost of your Streambook unit some would argue the Streambook represents a better dollar value. Value for the dollar spent though is a different question -- since Chromebooks work better they offer more performance per dollar paid. If you value using old style softwares, then a Streambook gives you more value per dollar paid. If you are totally hooked on MS Office, then the Streambook is your value proposition even if it is slower and a bit more kludgy running. But you'd be happier with a better more powerful more expensive Wintel unit anyway. User experience --- users have so far said the minimalist Streambooks have a few slow rough edges and irritations due to lack of "enough" processor and systems memory. Given the same amount of memory in both units, a Chromebook does "better" with what it has to use than the Streambook does. A telling point is that a max memory equipped Streambook still cannot compete for speed against a moderately equipped Chromebook. This is due to the current Windows 8.1 BingOS being too fat, slow and porky. Microsoft needs to fix this in Windows 10 if they are going to be successful ongoing. Once again, exceptions exist and will be found and hooted over by both sides. ======================= No matter which side you take in the Chrome Wars Cost of a laptop has gone down DRASTICALLY since the Chrome Wars started a year ago. Microsoft has gotten motivated to get down & dirty and compete again, something they haven't done in over a decade or more. Intel chips have gotten both BETTER and a lot cheaper. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/24/14 at 23:20:57 http://www.techrepublic.com/article/a-million-chromebooks-a-quarter-what-it-means-for-google-in-education/ A million Chromebooks a quarter: What it means for Google in education http://tr2.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/r/2014/07/22/25ad9df3-d9f3-495d-b236-80246fbdf8e8/resize/620x485/3948086d81a4564bbf236544177dffbb/kidwithlaptop.jpg "For technology companies, the education space is one of the single most important markets to capture. Students who learn on a particular platform or technology are likely to continue using those same tools throughout their academic career and, with the rise of BYOD, throughout their working career as well. Google has worked hard to capture the education market with Chromebooks and in 2014 there have been multiple signs that Google is gaining a foothold. A report earlier this year said that Chromebooks captured 20% of the education market in 2013. The latest data point detailing the momentum of Chromebooks was a new blog post in which Google announced that schools had purchased more than 1 million Chromebooks in the second quarter of 2014. The announcement comes in tandem with the announcement of Bridgeport Public Schools bringing 9,000 Chromebooks to their school system. While 9,000 is a large deployment, it pales in comparison to the 32,000 Chromebooks being deployed at Chesterfield County Public Schools. "With the advance of the web, a lot of the learning material, traditionally only available at library or bookstores, is now available at the fingertips," said Ken Lin, an engineering manager for the Chrome education and business team. "We are seeing a huge trend for classrooms to adopt technology, because it helps teachers to teach better, and enables kids to access knowledge like never before. We are very excited for Chromebooks to be part of this trend." These deployments are merely two in a series of multi-thousand unit Chromebook deployments in schools throughout the country, leading to the question of why Chromebooks are gaining so much traction in the enterprise. There are two big reasons why the use of Chromebooks is growing in the education space, deployment and management. Let's break that down. Deployment When considering a new machine deployment, much of what attracts schools to the Chromebook is lack of machine imaging and how easy it is to get users up and running. "As we became more familiar with the Chrome OS and the enhancements offered from its frequent release cycle, the number of items requiring intervention prior to distribution dwindled to merely asset tagging the machines, and logging in one time to join them to our organization," said Adam Seldow, executive director of technology for Chesterfield County Public Schools. "All of the device and user settings flow to the machine instantly upon the user's initial login." Management When it comes to maintaining and managing the devices, Chromebooks have a potential to gain points with schools there as well. The devices don't require much in the way of management from the IT support staff. According to Lin, administrators can use a "central web-based management console to check the health of the devices, push applications, set policies." Meaning that the deployment of a new web app to an entire student population could be as easy as a few clicks. Once again, this isn't something that is proprietary to Google, but it is a feature that Google does well with the Chrome OS devices. When asked about what he thought the best things about using Chromebooks in his schools were, Seldow mentioned "The seamless, frequent, and feature-rich updates. The Chrome OS update cycle is rapid and with each update comes improved functionality and security. Best of all, the updates do not interrupt productivity and can be staggered over time for large organizations." Why Chromebooks will continue to win in Education The new HP Streambook has all the old ills associated with taking care of Windows machines compounded by the lack of drive space to handle the relatively bulky network admin tools that have to be added to each machine when they are unpacked. Bluntly, IT and Systems Admin folks who are familiar with both systems went to Chromebooks in the first place to get away from all the time and cost and "resource eating" maintenance issues that they had always had with Windows machines. Lastly, the powerful impact of all the free of cost and freely available Open Source Educational material written by real educators for real teachers and today's students on the Chromebook platform cannot be ignored. Web based, flowing graphical education materials are much more effective than text based training in keeping student's attention and interest. Schools are tight on budgets, so a cheap easy to implement and maintain Chromebook that uses free software all the way up and down the spectrum counts for a lot in the eyes of a school district. And Google gives teachers their own separate Education Store to organize and disperse all that ongoing free goodness (and Google actively shields Education Chromebooks from root kits, viruses, worms, trojans, porn and e-trash and all advertising, including any of Google's own ads). Microsoft charges lots of $$$$ for all their stuff and it is relatively "regimented", comparatively dull and not always current or relevant to the needs of real school districts with all their varying environments. Chrome is still winning in education and is capturing the hearts and minds of children everywhere it is used. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/26/14 at 08:40:35 Chromeboxes and Chromebooks REALLY REALLY Sux, people just return them back to Amazon all the time.. Really, you used to hear this all the time when Chromebooks first came out. ::) OK, Amazon just now has a lot of 19 Asus Chromeboxes that have come back from Refurb by Asus. 19 units returned by customers ...... How many Asus Chromeboxes are on Ebay at the moment? Two (2). How many returned refurbed HP Chromeboxes does Amazon have? All colors included, a total of six (6). HP Chromebooks, refurb counts run higher with unit counts of 20 something per color and size. Acer C720 (biggest seller ever) 16 refurb/used units on Amazon. Acer C720 (biggest seller ever) 19 refurb/used units on Ebay. I would say that folks are not getting surprised by Chromebooks being "different" to the same degree that they were originally. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/26/14 at 20:06:04 http://www.thestreet.com/story/12893700/1/intel-buys-into-china-smartphone-market-with-spreadtrum-stake.html "NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Intel (INTC) , the semi-conductor maker, confirmed Friday that it had made a $1.5 billion investment for a 20% stake in Chinese state-backed Tsinghua Holdings, (Spreadtrum) a chipmaker that will produce Intel-branded chips for mobile phones and other electronics." Intel is now in business with the Chinese government. This 1/5 share is strategic and it is a logical follow on to the Rockchip deal (which was never specified or announced in any fiscal source at all, with it being in the nature of bribes and such). Intel intends to make Intel branded ARM chips in China off of Chinese government owned lithography foundries and to reserve its increasingly few domestic plants for top end processors only. Intel also intends to survive, even if the American PC industry does not ..... Spending money this way is FAR smarter than slapping more counter revenue on top of old Intel designed chipsets that ARE NEVER GOING TO BE REALLY COMPETITIVE, EVER. Microsoft's x86 stuff isn't Intel's be-all OS any more, Android and Chrome are large parts of Intel's home turf now. Microsoft is still trying to create its "customer desirable "make or break" Win 10 and MS is struggling since the last Win 10 preview update wouldn't display text all that well. The MS fan boys are really quiet right now, sorta scared actually. Within the last 60 days MS has hacked up an entire set of monthly Security Updates and has now screwed up an entire scheduled Win 10 beta preview weekly release in an OBVIOUS, CARELESS and very dire fashion. ::) The new MS may have laid off too many people too fast, and might be apparently losing track of their "Whatssup, doc?". |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/27/14 at 04:50:45 ChromeOS ready printers are Cloud Ready Printers and that new class of printers is really coming on strong in the printer industry. Microsoft is distraught, as it becomes obvious that people who are intentionally moving away from "cable connected to a PC" printers also indicates they are moving away from MS's home turf as well. This is yet another signal that MS's Windows product is becoming passe, no longer the current industry standard. It also indicates that phones and tablets and Chromebooks are taking bigger and bigger chunks out of the computing marketplace's pie chart as can be seen here. http://blogs-images.forbes.com/louiscolumbus/files/2013/01/Figure-6-pie-chart.jpg Note: HP's old standard "e-print" thing really wasn't cloud ready until HP and Google reached an agreement to arrange a post processed translation between the two standards. This translation takes place on cloud servers at this point in time and is reflected in a slight delay in processing your print job. This fix is in effect now. HP will adhere to the real Cloud Print standards on all new machines going forward and trust their e-print to Cloud Print thingamabop to handle all the older HP e-printers. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/27/14 at 19:42:08 http://blogs-images.forbes.com/louiscolumbus/files/2013/01/Figure-6-pie-chart.jpg Let's play with the 2016 predicted charts a bit and try to figure out if Microsoft gains or loses ground. PC desktop is 5% of total market, Notebook is 8%. However 0.5% of the 5% of desktop slice is Chromeboxes and 2.5% of the notebook slice is Chromebooks (measured at this current point in time). So what is left of the traditional PC market's 13% that is left potentially for Microsoft? Somewhere around 10% is the best prediction for MS's total devices share at this point in time. So, will Microsoft be able to break into phones in a large way in the Orient? No, because all the good oriental language apps are written for Android, and written for older versions of Android on top of that. Very hard for Microsoft to get a presence in that environment, really. Microsoft needs to batten their hatches, get ready to shrink manning again and try to keep an iron focus on getting Win 10 to be lighter and faster to compete better against Chromebooks and Chromeboxes. Microsoft needs to give up on their x86 separatist focus and go ARM with all their might, since Intel is busy doing so as we speak. Microsoft is at 14% market share right now and MS is rapidly dropping down to a 10% market share -- and if Chrome successfully invades the business world like it did to the education world then MS may drop market share even further and faster. ::) Business IT is busy building rigorous corporate intranets with internally controlled webwares to do all their business functions. Chromebooks and Boxes are a natural fit to this world, much much more so than more expensive and more cumbersome Windows machines. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/28/14 at 07:42:28 http://www.anandtech.com/show/8650/arm-announces-maliv550-video-processor-malidp550-display-processor ARM announces their new graphics processor line up for 2015 and 2016 http://images.anandtech.com/doci/8650/Mali_Ecosystem_678x452.png http://images.anandtech.com/doci/8649/MaliCar_678x452.jpg http://images.anandtech.com/doci/8649/Mali_Sales_575px.png So, why does ARM claim Mali to be the #1 in graphics? Numbers, pure numbers -- all the canned "hard micro" ARM designs use a Mali graphics set and although they are not the world best graphics cores (Tegra and VR will fight each other over that title) they are the BEST INTEGRATED and easiest/quickest to get to market with when a new ARM technology breaks out. Intel has already shown everybody the stinky confusing brown vapor where they "plan to be" in 2016 with both main CPU and Graphics. ARM has held back, however, not releasing any information until they could show a compelling story to their processor base customers. ARM wanted to show them "better than" designs that the vendors can actually purchase NOW to be in real production by the time the Intel vapor even solidifies. This will prompt Intel to try try again, and they will do better accordingly. Since Intel is an ARM licensee you can expect Intel to incorporate some of this tech into their next "Intel" branded ARM chipsets. Intel is now just an ARM tweeker in their mobile division now, not a real mobile processor designer using their own home grown Intel processor cores and Intel graphics cores. Just like Qualcomm and Samsung, Intel has decided it is better to "if you can't beat them, join them" and to go ahead and use the base ARM designs with just a few tweeks since they cannot even try to beat them anymore in the mobile world. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/29/14 at 09:37:49 http://liliputing.com/2014/10/hp-stream-11-pro-notebook-way.html HP Stream 11 Pro notebook on the way http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/hp-stream-11.jpg "HP has been known to market what are essentially the same laptops to consumer and enterprise customers under different names. While the HP Stream 11 is first and foremost a cheap laptop, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have features that could appeal to corporate customers. The $200 notebook is a low-power machine with a fanless design, 2GB of RAM, 32GB of flash storage, an Intel Atom N2840 processor, a matte 1366 x 768 pixel display, and up to around 8 hours of battery life. It measures 0.8 inches thick, weighs about 2.8 pounds, and the consumer model comes with a 1-year subscription to Microsoft Office 365 which includes access to Excel, Word, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Access as well as unlimited cloud storage. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Pro model is basically the same machine, but with an option for Windows 8.1 Pro software." ::) Bold move for HP since we haven't seen the real actual physically present HP Stream 11 units even tested, reviewed or benchmarked yet. If this were marketed to Education, would it be effective? It would likely be more effective with a good fast light skinnied up Win 10 behind it. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 10/29/14 at 10:18:54 RCA has come out with a tablet that looks promising... even comes with a detachable keyboard... Sold out online already, you can add memory, comes with 16gb, add the 64g card and use a 1tb SD (external)for $50 and you have a nice portable system. No gaming though... well not graphic heavy ones... maybe candy crush...rofl.....$149.00 http://www.walmart.com/ip/RCA-Pro-10-with-WiFi-10.1-Touchscreen-Tablet-PC-Featuring-Android-4.2.2-Jelly-Bean-Operating-System-with-Bluetooth-Keyboard/35716587 |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/30/14 at 06:52:10 http://liliputing.com/2014/10/microsoft-ends-windows-7-oem-sales-oct-31st.html Microsoft ends Windows 7 OEM sales Oct 31st "This Halloween could be a scary one… for folks who aren’t fans of Microsoft Windows 8 or later. That’s because Microsoft is pulling the plug on Windows 7 OEM sales on October 31st. For the most part the October 31st cutoff for Windows 7 OEM licenses only affects consumer PCs. If you buy a business machine with a Windows Professional license you’ll still be able to get Windows 7 “downgrade” rights." You feel Microscroogled yet ??? :-? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 10/30/14 at 09:54:56 http://liliputing.com/2014/10/reports-xiaomi-third-biggest-phone-maker-even-entering-us-europe.html Reports: Xiaomi is third biggest phone maker, even before entering US or Europe Xiaomi is selling Qualcomm 801 phones with 3 gigs of systems memory and 32 gigs of storage memory for HALF the price of the similar USA carrier phones. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/xiaomi.jpg Do you remember me saying you should remember the name Xiaomi? I said they would grow large, and they have indeed done so. "China’s Xiaomi only sells its smartphones and other devices in a handful of markets… but they’re big markets with large populations including China and India. So even though you can’t easily buy a Xiaomi phone in the US or Europe, we probably shouldn't be surprised that the company is selling a lot of phones. In fact, with Xiaomi shipping 18 million phones in the third quarter of 2014, two different reports suggest the company just became the third biggest smartphone company in the world. Only Samsung and Apple shipped more phones during the same period." http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/idc-stats.png ;D Xiaomi will make a splash when they finally come to the USA market -- these near top of the line phones will be REALLY CHEAP to buy !!! Look at the growth rate on that puppy !!!! Within a year of coming to Europe and the USA Xiaomi will surpass Apple and become #2. Why? Because between their new phones being released Apple sells bupkiss durng the off seasons. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 11/01/14 at 00:00:10 News today... MS is acting crazy again.. http://www.forbes.com/sites/gordonkelly/2014/10/31/windows-8-windows-7-sales-end/?partner=yahootix |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/01/14 at 05:01:53 Gordon Kelly is the reviewer who wrote this article. He too is looking for a big Christmas sell off of everything pre-Windows 10. "Moreover this shows Microsoft is clearing house for Windows 10: the Windows 7/Windows 8 hybrid upon which it is hanging the future of the company. Windows 10 will run across mobile, tablet and PC and is being meticulously tested with a free Technical Preview (install guide and privacy warnings) to make sure it arrives to market in 2015 as something users love. With Windows 7 still maintaining a 53% market share and Windows 8 sat on 6%, Microsoft cannot afford another failure." He also seems to believe that if MS does not get rid of every old OS version other than the current one then they cannot properly force folks to roll over to the "365 Everything" subscription plan as is currently planned for you. Certainly the new smaller leaner MS has not got the manning to support any old software versions any more, so --- off with their heads to all the old versions !!!. Win 10 will be the last individual version and it is planned to be the transition version to MS real plan, which is "365 Everything". |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 11/01/14 at 10:14:30 Its funny that you quoted his "we cannot force" upgrades comment. Because I was FORCED to upgrade from windows 8 to 8.1, just this past month. Every time I would log on in sept. I would get a "upgrade to 8.1" message and could cancel it out with the "no thanks" button. Sometime in late sep. early oct. the "no thanks" button turned into a "cancel" button. And about the third week of Oct. the "cancel" button started greying out and I would actually have to shut down and reboot to get rid of it. Finally I got tired of it and just upgraded, cause it wouldn't let me do anything other than log on to the computer password screen. Just goes to show you, they can FORCE you to upgrade free stuff.... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/01/14 at 14:18:17 Microsoft plays dirty with their loyal customers .... Ask any XP user, they will tell you. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/01/14 at 20:43:33 http://channeleye.co.uk/intel-impedes-windows-10/ Intel impedes Windows 10 The Brits and the Germans have a different, MUCH more adversarial relationship with Wintel than we do in the USA. They also actively disbelieve a lot of the brown vapor flung out by the Wintel pair. And employees the British and German branches of both of the Wintel companies actively LEAK information to their buddies and from there to the press ..... regularly But the do come up with things way ahead of anybody else ..... like this little internal MS nugget. "Oct 31, 2014 A report said that sales of notebooks using Microsoft Windows 10 are likely to be hit because Intel will be tardy releasing an appropriate chip. Digitimes Research said that the Intel Skylake microprocessor is supposed to be ready at the beginning of the third quarter in 2015 but will probably not hit the streets until the end of next year or even 2016. The news will plunge Microsoft into the depths of despondency. It is already taking a hit because uptake of the notoriously shabby Windows 8.x isn’t going to plan. Windows 10 is supposed to be the summum bonum – that is to say it will work properly because there won’t be a Windows 9. But it requires a chip improvement that isn't going to be available. Digitimes Research estimates that Intel’s delays won’t make the acceptance of Windows 10 any easier and it appears the alliance between Microsoft and Intel is crumbling. Intel could not be contacted for comment at press time." My take is that Intel is actually late with starting the Skylake detailed development and that they are going to have to rush to make the Apple imposed "drop dead" 2015 deadline (if Intel still wishes to be an Apple supplier that is). So, Apple will be calling Intel's Skylake dance in year 2015 and Apple will be absorbing all of Intel's spare 14nm resources while it does so. Microsoft gets bupkis out of Intel in 2015 as far as Windows support with any new 14nm "state of the art" chip goodies until Apple is fully satisfied and happy. Like maybe sometimes in 2016 ??? ::) Apple is now bigger than MS now in every "new sales only" market category that you can mention, laptops included. Apple is also prone to LEVERAGE these Big 800 Pound Gorilla sales advantages to the detriment of their main competitors. Microsoft is on the receiving end of their own nasty bag of tricks now. And MS is howling about the "little visitor" they are getting slipped to them by Apple. Apple still feels it owes MS one up the kister for MS's copying their Apple "Macintosh Windows" environment back in the day ...... you know, the one Apple copied from Palo Alto Labs and DEC and IBM. So, Apple has Intel's new Skylake processor production all locked up now, and they have ARM's next generation chipset tech all locked up and they functionally have all the current amount of 14nm processing all locked up both at Intel and at Samsung/Global. It must be nice to be Apple right now .... getting to oh so slowly tighten the thumbscrews on MS while they wriggle and howl in impotent fury and fiscal pain. Apple is now actively denying Microsoft the top end high profit product sales that MS needs to have to sell in the USA so they can fund all the rest of their Chinese loss leader BS right now. So, MS is committed to a massive freebee expansion in China with no bonus income flow to fund it ??? You ain't going to break your deals with the Chinese, they will kick your ass out of their country forever (and you bloody well know it). So you just have to lump it, MS. Time to screw over our old USA customer / business user base all over again -- time to make them pay MS to upgrade something somehow, real fast. Or, (shudder) let some more workers go ...... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/02/14 at 06:24:16 http://www.amazon.com/HP-Chromebox-CB1-014-Desktop-White/dp/B00KD5RUPA/ref=sr_1_sc_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1414937581&sr=8-1-spell&keywords=hpchromebox HP Chromebox CB1-014 Desktop (White) on Amazon for $136.71 http://https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQ2Ic3UB_CnF3IOh8glyiutrwq9kip-dxJ-CNyIijxa1K5_-qa3X2XPVaQm $136.71 Oh Microsoft -- your $200 low cost chrome killers are priced too high again ..... ;D .... got to go spend some more MS price support money to get your chrome killers back into line again on that retail pricing again. HP is quietly doing you too, just like Intel is -- your good buddies are showing you some real affection lately, aren't they? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Serowbot on 11/02/14 at 07:07:29 Wait a minute.... aren't you comparing a bare box, to a complete laptop with screen, keyboard, speakers, and battery power?... $200 sounds like a better deal... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 11/02/14 at 14:18:37 And I have flash drive and a phone with bigger memory capacity.... They could at least put a micro sd in there with 64gb. I'm headed to wally world this pay period to check out that RCA tablet and a 64gb micro card.... I want to see what $149.00 can do. The thing has great reviews and some folks actually replaced their laptops with it. (according to the reviews) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/02/14 at 18:50:19 OK, so you want an equally cheap chromebook instead of a chromebox. Can do. First you identify what you are looking for and then see if it repeats on Woot, http://deals.woot.com/deals/tagged/chromebook http://deals.woot.com/deals/details/1b8a0d56-0b26-4e32-9c2f-39edcc71ac1a/refurbished-acer-c710-2856-11-6-chromebook-intel-celeron-847-1-1ghz-2gb-ram-16g#0 $99 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834314477&nm_mc=AFC-C8Junction&cm_mmc=AFC-C8Junction-_-na-_-na-_-na&cm_sp=&AID=10440897&PID=3668349&SID= $139 http://deals.woot.com/deals/details/3ac6267f-68ef-47de-9fd4-558ecf9d46e8/refurbished-samsung-chromebook-mir#1 $134.99 Deals like these REPEAT every few weeks, so what you do is go here and put in an alert for yourself so you get an e-mail when one goes off and then you snag it and bag it quick before it goes away. And remember to yell out Woot !!! when you click the buy button cause you just saved a lot of money on your snagged item. Same trick works for WHATEVER you are price hunting -- you can woot tag just about anything that has sales that repeat on a periodic basis. I have wooted a washer dryer combination for my mother-in-law and got her a full mini set for $600 that would fit in a closet. ($1,600 normal retail) http://deals.woot.com/deals/tagged/chromebook ================================================== So far Microsoft has only ONE extant real Chrome killer box and only ONE extant real Chrome killer laptop and both are just now barely down in the Chrome killing range of prices. Microsoft is choking on the price support needed to get them down that low. Obviously from what you just read on http://deals.woot.com/deals/tagged/chromebook there is lots of free room still left in the real world Chromebook pricing structure to allow Chromebooks to put on a sale that puts them way down beyond Microsoft's price supporting "reach". And Chromebook vendors can do that without price supports (although I am sure they take advantage of whatever Intel is currently giving away on processors). And, since the chromebook/boxes work so much quicker and better for web work they are still eating up the bottom end of Microsoft's lunch. And I like the little Chromebox running Chrome OS and Android apps and Crouton Linux all at the same time, even though I also like my $80 refurbie Dell desktop unit running Linux Mint just fine for right now. Remember, I already own the display, speaker and keyboard you know, right nice ones ..... ================================================== Old_rider, you may want to pick up a good typing feel keyboard case for that RCA tablet if it doesn't come with one. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/02/14 at 19:32:25 http://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-advertising-sales-team-redundancies-2014-10 Microsoft Fires Global Advertising Sales Team http://static4.businessinsider.com/image/54539c8069bedd7b1dbd6afe-1069-803/microsoft-ceo-satya-nadella.jpg Ooooh, I am currently caught calf deep while crossing the Chrome and ARM piranha laden stream and I can't go forward because Intel Skyylake isn't ready yet. And now I've got this awkward big Apple stuck up my bum for the whole next year now, too. So embarrassing, that bulge in the back of my pants. I am currently stuck midstream, hopping from one stub to the other while writhing in ever increasing pain, while I am getting shorter and shorter by the inches ..... .... and it HURTS. Aieeeee !!! It hurts so badly being stuck here, while being abused by Apple and ignored by my old friend Intel while being nibbled on by this multitude of little sharp toothed Google fishes. I feel I must downsize some more to compensate for my copious bleeding. "Sources have told Business Insider it was announced Wednesday that Microsoft was making its Microsoft Advertising global sales team redundant as part of the largest sweep of job cuts in Microsoft's history annouAieeeee !!!nced this summer, which is understood to affect up to 18,000 roles across the entire business. One client-side marketer told Business Insider their company had a campaign lined up with Microsoft, only to be informed its account managers at Microsoft Advertising had been told to down tools earlier this week. A Microsoft spokeswoman told Business Insider: "We've taken another step that will complete almost all the 18,000 reductions announced in July. The reductions happening today are spread across many different business units, and many different countries.” We asked for more clarification on which divisions are affected, but Microsoft said it had no further information to share. Tech news website CRN.com reported earlier this week that Microsoft Advertising had shut down its global agencies and accounts team, which handle all of Microsoft's relationships with top advertising agencies and brand-side marketers, as well as Yarn, an in-house creative team responsible for keeping marketers up to date with the latest updates to its advertising formats. But Business Insider understands the cuts go far deeper than that and will see the departure of the majority of the global salesforce. The Microsoft Advertising executive team is headed up by Frank Holland, corporate vice president of advertising and online. Business Insider understands all or at least the majority of the Microsoft Advertising executive team listed on the division's website were not affected by the announcement on Wednesday. However, the closure of Microsoft Advertising has been speculated on for some time. The company had just a tiny 2.45% share of the global display advertising market last year, according to eMarketer. The market is dominated by Google (with a 31.92% share and Facebook, with a 5.82% share.) The most pertinent sign Microsoft might have looking for an exit from the advertising sector recently was the sale of its Atlas online advertising server to Facebook last year. Shortly afterwards, Microsoft's general manager for display advertising in its online services division, insisted in a blog post the rumors had spiraled out of control. But almost a year later, it looks as though they could be true." So, Microsoft no longer has the ability to try to sell ads like Google does, and will have to be content to be an OS maker going forward. ;) Maybe with a little "increased and better focus" they can actually make an OS that people really want ?? Ya think so ?? Naw, they will just fumble around and hack up some more security releases and go foul up yet another Win 10 weekly release so the text won't even display right. The automated work flow keeps automatically transferring things over to people who simply aren't there any more. Woopsie !! Win 10 won't display text within the window boarders any more ..... :o .... and Satya will just keep on cutting to make MS over into his idealized "lean company" mental image by cutting and cutting and cutting until MS can't do anything much for right. Then he can go restructure it again to put the remaining pieces together into a much much smaller more focused company. Maybe it can do something then. After all, since Apple has cut MS off from all the new 14nm Intel chipsets for a year everyone has LOTS of time for Microsoft to actually go finish up Windows 10 ..... and to go complete their "pay me" total low end take over of the Orient now too. ;D .... and now they are starting the kill off of Win 7 --- wow, is Win 10 even ready yet? It is ??? Huh, what do you mean "It is"? Do you mean it is ready? No ?? Ah, you mean it is Win 7, just slightly repackaged. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/02/14 at 20:46:56 http://www.geekwire.com/2014/windows-ux-leader-jensen-harris-left-launch-startup/ Interview: Why Windows UX leader Jensen Harris is leaving Microsoft to co-found the startup Textio "For people who track Windows, the timing is interesting. Harris’ departure follows Microsoft’s unveiling last week of a new user interface in Windows 10 that rolls back some of the key approaches introduced in Windows 8 — reintroducing the Start menu, for example. So does his decision to leave have anything to do with that?" So, the brain drain at MS continues as the best and brightest of the new feature developers voluntarily jump the sinking ship, well before Satya can even get around to them ..... ::) So can the B string people that are all that is left behind even fix these key features in the new Win 10 OS? Yes, by falling back more and more to the old Win 7 code mass. Guess again why that text inside the windows boarders just went away ..... Yup, what is old is new again. Also note what technology the boy wunderkind is now busily putting into commercialized application -- the ability to pre-know what you, the user, will choose based on profiling you. :P "What if recruiters could know, before posting a job listing, if the specific language in the job description will actually attract the types of candidates they want? Or if someone launching a Kickstarter campaign could submit the project description for analysis in advance to determine the prospects for success? Those are the types of scenarios that will be enabled by Textio, an early stage Seattle startup founded by two Microsoft veterans: Kieran Snyder, a linguist and cognitive scientist who worked most recently at Amazon; and Jensen Harris, a 16-year Microsoft veteran known for his work leading the Windows user experience." http://https://www.geekwire.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/JensenHarrisLarge-260x300.jpg the Lex Luthor look http://https://www.geekwire.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/snyder-kieran-244x300.jpg the Poison Ivy look Yeah, you can tell these guys definitely worked for Microsoft, just look at the hair styles. Ballmer had the Bane look down pat, with his jumping around, roaring and sticking out his tongue all the time. http://icdn4.digitaltrends.com/image/steve-ballmer-tongue-2-372x226.jpg the manical roaring Bane look |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/02/14 at 21:17:27 http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/10/07/windows_10_data_collection/ Windows 10's 'built-in keylogger'? Ha ha, says Microsoft – no, it just monitors your typing. YOU said it was OK when you installed that Technical Preview "Don't want Microsoft tracking you online and collecting data on your computing habits? Then you probably shouldn't install the Windows 10 Technical Preview, Redmond says. The interwebs were abuzz on Monday over concerns about the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy of Microsoft's newly released, not-even-beta-yet OS, with some sites going as far as to claim that Windows 10 comes with a "built-in keylogger" to watch users' every move. Turns out these Chicken Littles were right – sort of – but according to Microsoft they should have known about the data collection from the get-go, because they agreed to it. "With Windows 10, we're kicking off the largest ever open collaborative development effort that will change the way we build and deliver Windows," a Redmond spokesperson told El Reg in an emailed statement. "Users who join the Windows Insider Program and opt-in to the Windows 10 Technical Preview are choosing to provide data and feedback that will help shape the best Windows experience for our customers." Brits and Germans are dumping the Win 10 preview en mass now that they realize how extensive the data tracking in the preview actually is -- down to the keystroke logging level apparently. Germany is going to be banning the preview from any and all government facilities, period. And guess what they will be looking out for now in the finished Win 10 product ..... yup, same sorts of tricks. :P Hope the Chinese don't catch you doing this shite -- them steel toed military police boots hurt when they kick you in the kister. And you land outside the Chinese boarders, forever. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/03/14 at 05:20:33 http://www.theverge.com/2014/10/17/6993471/windows-10-features-top-requests Windows 10: the top 10 most requested features This is all the wonderful things people want MS to build into Win 10. Generally stated, they are all "old MS code items" that were dropped before for one reason or another. What is MS learning that the vast majority people really do? Go on line (>95%) and run various MS Office programs (<5%). At these ratios they should simply use On-line Office for their occasional tasks and save their money. What does MS glean from analysing bug reports and comments -- people want the stuff to be simple and easy to use, to work right and not be a pain in the ass all the time. What should MS really build? Simplify simplify simplify simplify simplify simplify simplify and make it work 100% bulletproof and require much much less fiddle maintenance. So, if you see some complex features going away, it is because "you the customer told us to ...." To compete against Chrome and Linux MS is simply going to have to become more like them. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/03/14 at 08:00:33 What will Windows 10 actually wind up being like -- answer, pretty much like Win 7-8,x with some cleanup improvements and some extra speed (when the good 14nm Intel processors finally do come out for them, that is). Microsoft will back away from some of the needless bloat and complexity that people DO NOT LIKE, and, realizing that the tablet market is a ship that has completely sailed at this point in time and that the phone market is never going to within their reach for a myriad of very good reasons Microsoft will focus on desktop/laptop and simply try to compete against Chrome as a much smaller sized more limited focus company. This will be enough challenge for Win 10 -- simply to stop the arterial Chrome bleeding and get the company downsized and back to working well again. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/03/14 at 08:31:50 http://www.passionforsavings.com/deal/2013/11/black-friday-chromebook-deals-129-99-free-shipping/ Black Friday sales start earlier and earlier each year, don't they? Groupon has a Refurbished Acer Chromebook for just $129.99 right now! There are 2 models available the C710-2856 and the C710-2833 http://www.omgchrome.com/black-friday-chromebook-deals/ http://d0od.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/hp-chromebook-300x229.png Chromebook Black Friday Deals Staples – who seem to sell everything but their namesake these days – will reportedly be offering HP’s older, but no less capable, HP Pavilion Chromebook 14 for just $180 on November 29th. Because Chromebooks have maintained a decent profit margin all along, when they go on sale it can get AMAZINGLY low priced !!! Will the old Windows 8.x units even be ABLE to get low enough priced to even move a few MS based units this Christmas? ::) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/04/14 at 08:46:39 http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B00IT1WJZQ/ref=sr_1_1_olp?ie=UTF8&qid=1415119395&sr=8-1&keywords=chromebox&condition=used Amazon peddling returned Asus Chromeboxes (the one with two memory slots) for $132.71 to 145.22 I would buy an Asus unit over a HP unit for better build quality and MUCH MUCH better expandability. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/04/14 at 10:10:23 http://www.zdnet.com/microsoft-cuts-another-3000-employees-as-part-of-its-layoff-of-18000-7000035217/ Microsoft Fires 3,000 Human Resources, IT, Finance and other "support function" personnel who were surplused by the 18,000 person general layoffs. http://static4.businessinsider.com/image/54539c8069bedd7b1dbd6afe-1069-803/microsoft-ceo-satya-nadella.jpg Ooooh, I am currently caught calf deep while crossing the Chrome and ARM piranha laden waters and I can't go forward to get up the other shore because Intel Skyylake isn't ready yet and without Skylake my software is too too slow. And now suddenly I've got this awkward big Apple stuck up my bum for the whole of 2015 now, too. So embarrassing, that large hard bulge in the back of my pants. I am currently stuck midstream, hopping from one stub to the other while writhing in ever increasing pain, while I am getting slowly shorter and shorter by the inches ..... .... and it HURTS. Aieeeee !!! It hurts so badly being stuck here, while being abused by Apple and ignored by my old friend Intel while being nibbled on by this multitude of little sharp toothed Google fishes. I feel I must downsize some more to compensate for my all various copious bleedings. My new MS re-structure charges can hide many of our various loss-leader and inventory write down costs inside these HUGE restructuring charge offs for all this cutting and departmental reformings that I have been so assiduously doing of late. This way I will not have to do a Ballmer and carry over loss-leader and inventory write off debts from one year to the next. This is very smart of me, since unlike Ballmer I do not wish to risk going to jail over all this nonsense. "The cuts of approximately 3,000 employees today are believed to be largely support staff in human resources, finance, sales and marketing and IT. A final wave of cuts is expected in early 2015, sources said. Given Microsoft has already cut about 18,000 employees, that round should be fairly small. As a result of the layoffs, Microsoft officials said the company would incur pre-tax charges of $1.1 billion to $1.6 billion for severance and related benefits costs and asset-related charges over the next four quarters." |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/05/14 at 05:17:17 General Status of Open Source Linux, Google and Microsoft, ARM and Intel Open Source Linux is still chugging along as the people in it are taking care of their own needs and are not worrying all that much about Google or MS at this point in time. Open source community has a VAST WEALTH of machines available to it as any "old" MS x86 hardware from the last 10 years (Core 2 duo or better) is perfect to toss a Mint or Ubuntu on to make you up a quick very responsive machine. If you want to game on Linux you can pick up an AMD graphics card now for less than $80 that will play all the new STEAM games at a reasonable frame rate. Open Source Linux is as good right now as it has ever gotten to be in any years past. I find Linux Mint Mate 17 to be completely usable and very satisfactory. The World of Google is progressing along, with Chrome and Android beginning to mesh like the intertwined fingers of your two hands. Pure Google Android is now a minor US and Europe based player in the overall Android world with "Tweeked" Android (as is repackaged and controlled by the various carriers and device makers) being the vast majority of Android now. Android overall bulks HUGE now at over 80% of all devices extant at this point in time --- and as more smart phones go into China and India this percentage will only get bigger and bigger. Chrome, the other Google "hand" is relatively small but growing rapidly, having in the last two years taken over the Education market and making strong inroads into the Consumer space as a secondary light carry machine for younger people. Business still has not accepted Chrome yet in any major fashion, but there are signs that the business intra-net vendors are making efforts to accommodate the little Google units for office drone use. The computing world overall is Google centric now as even the Open Source Android world depends on Google to update and upkeep the base Android systems. MicroSoft is actually learning that its name actually fits now, as it hold only a 10-14% market share of "all of computing". So, Microsoft and Windows is trying to re-create itself as all of its old strengths really don't play all that well in the Web Based World we now live in. The very "pay me for each program" world view Microsoft is based upon no longer applies very well outside of Business. Business is the last bastion of Windows, with companies willing to pay huge amounts of money to keep their existing Windows infrastructure up and running. Windows has sucked very badly for the last 2 major revisions, badly enough to drastically slow the sales of new Windows machines at retail. Windows 10 is supposed to fix that --- but MS is so hampered by the ~20,000 people that it has just laid off such that MS is now struggling to do all the things to their OS that they are just now finding out that they need to do to make it desirable again. Windows 10 is make or break time for MS as the new MS will live or die by it when it comes out next spring. ARM is chugging along, getting ready to release the particulars of their next generation of 64 bit task sharing ARM cpu and gpu cores. ARM and Android jointly release family groups of products that mate up with new lithography levels as they swing into use, capitalizing strongly on the advantages that each new level of processor lithography can do. The last released product was aimed at 20 nm and as we know that has come and gone now, flying down the size pathway to 14 nm and below. ARM only releases when ready, so we will have a while to wait since Apple has just sucked up all the 14nm process lines that are available WORLDWIDE and will hold on to them until 2016 or thereabouts. Since Apple owns 30% of ARM they always get the new stuff a year before anybody else gets it, to give them enough time to capitalize on the Wow and Cool factors that always go along with new ARM tech. Intel is still trying to find itself in mobile but Chipzilla HAS increased its rate of motion considerably in the last few years. A key learning for Intel is that it cannot do it by itself, that it can only succeed as a partner with other companies. Historically, partnering with Chipzilla or Microsoft has been a deathwish event for the smaller companies that have tried it. We will see if Intel has finally learned how to partner with someone without damaging or destroying them in the process. Intel is making chipsets that are somewhat more relevant now, and Intel has given up on trying to do it all in house. Intel is USING SOME ARM BASED DESIGNS NOW as their partners demand it as the Intel in house designs simply are not competitive in the real mobile marketplace (and Intel is getting tired of putting $20 bills on top of each of their own in-house designed chipsets just to get people to reluctantly use them). Intel will have to compete in 2015 with the next generation of ARM processors, the ones that are NOT being released yet until they are fully cooked and ready to go into production. Intel is also being hampered by the fact they are not really totally Android compatible and that ARM and Android always move together in lock step leaving Intel trying to come up from behind and get into the party, being always somewhat late and out of step. Intel has tried to come up with their own version of Android that they can mesh with, but jury is still out as to whether this is acceptable to the marketplace or not. Android as a whole moves very very quickly, and an Intel Android fork would just get out of sync with the Google driven Android base very quickly. Still, the following chart correctly shows the general trends of computing and if it were updated for 2014 it would show the trends continuing along the same general pathways. http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/global-computer-640x435.png |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/05/14 at 16:49:08 http://liliputing.com/2014/11/android-5-0-offers-devs-better-access-sd-cards.html Android 5.0 offers developers better access to SD cards "Basically the changes mean that apps can write data not only to specific directories on a microSD, but also to the entire SD card. Users will be asked whether to grant access to the top-level of an SD card the first time an app requests permission. Once you’ve made your choice you won’t ever have to do it again. There’s also a new way for apps to create an app-specific directory, but allow other apps to access data from within that folder. If you’re wondering why you’d want to let an app access all the data on your microSD card, think about camera, gallery, or photo editing apps. You could use any camera app to snap a photo and know that you can use any image editing app to touch up the photo because both could access files stored in shared directories." Why is this worth noticing? Because Android 5.0 and ChromeOS will both share these same abilities to really use an SD card (which go up over 128 gigs now) as the functional equivalent of an old style hard drive. And when you start using 5.0 Android locally loaded apps on your Chromebooks, etc you need to be able to easily FIND and get to your data on the SD drive, move it, organize it, copy it, delete it, back it up, etc. etc. Both Android 5.0 and all the current ChromeOS versions can go do this on your SD now, just like on a real PC .... They aren't just wimpy little phone OS products any more ..... significant processor power and multiple gigs of systems memory and lots of SD storage space are making them capable of a whole lot more. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/06/14 at 08:37:46 http://liliputing.com/2014/11/microsoft-launches-office-android-tablet-preview-updates-ios-apps.html Microsoft launches Office for Android tablet preview, updates iOS apps http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/office-for-android-tablets.jpg More proof that the new MS is simply a software company who intends to peddle its wares wherever it can -- a company that intends to survive in whatever form it has to take to do so. Dollar costs of this "locally loaded Android full Office program" has yet to come out yet, MS is still trying to get it to work properly first. They do realize this will get Chromitized by lots of users depending on the cost -- it may be cheaper for them to just go on-line and use the freebe version. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/08/14 at 02:07:10 http://liliputing.com/2014/11/hp-stream-windows-tablets-hit-pre-order-100.html HP Stream Windows tablets hit pre-order for $100 and up http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/hp-stream-7_01.jpg Oh my goodness, we can't deliver the actual goods in time for Christmas and we are now barreling down on Thanksgiving --- WHAT DO WE DO ??? Same thing you have done with all the rest of the Chromebuster Stream products -- put it out for PRE-order and hope the folks will lock themselves in by clicking the PRE-order button instead of getting a Chromebook. It is actually better than shipping the Win 8.1 Bing OS units, since folks MIGHT be disappointed in the real thing and have the audacity to write us a bad review. PRE-order is fail safe in that aspect. So far you can place PRE-orders for the 11 and 13 inch Streambooks, and for both sizes of tablets and you can actually go really buy the 14" Streambook for $300 which really isn't down in Chromebusting range right now and it also isn't running Win 10 and there is no Win 10 UPGRADE guarantee yet either. Win 10 isn't cooked enough to say if it will really run on the smaller hardware yet. So, MS wants to help you go buy another Win 8.1 PC / Laptop for delivery "sometimes soon" at a special (but not reduced) pre-order price. So click on the friggin' button, don't stop to read any of the reviews (because there aren't any yet) just click on the silly PRE-ORDER button :-? ...... please ? It's better than a Chromebook, we promise (holding one hand behind back with fingers crossed) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/11/14 at 19:21:41 http://liliputing.com/2014/11/black-friday-2014-mobile-tech-deals.html THIS IS UNFRICKN' BLACK FRIDAY UNBELIEVABLE !!!!! This laptop has just started actually shipping and Staples is still planning on dumping it for half price ????? http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/x205ta-e1415731055164.jpg "Here are some of the best Black Friday deals we’ve found so far. Note that some of these sales begin on Thanksgiving. I’ve tried to make notes of the start times when available. You should also note that some deals may be available in-stores, but not online or vice versa. And you might want to bookmark this page, since I’ll be updating this list as more stores announce their Black Friday and Cyber Monday plans. The Asus EeeBook X205TA laptop is normally pretty cheap thanks to its $200 price tag. But Staples will be selling it for just $100." |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 11/11/14 at 22:03:02 Looked up the asus, cause I have favored it even before it was popular.... Did not see where it has Wi-Fi, only Bluetooth https://www.asus.com/Notebooks_Ultrabooks/ASUS_EeeBook_X205TA/specifications/ :-/ |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/11/14 at 23:00:44 http://www.tlbhd.com/asus-eeebook-x205ta-19242/ Even Asus is glossing over this product in their literature & descriptions -- it has wireless N capability as per this review. Caution: since the units are just now starting shipping production units, all of the very early reviews were done off of an earlier prototype run and in many cases are actually the same few machines that were shipped around from reviewer to reviewer. This is also why the product number seems to have shifted just recently. https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Asus+EeeBook+X205TA But, since the unit is shipping from Amazon now you can catch a YouTube video review of a real unit. ======================================== https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7XlwWP4IKk Here is your first real hands on review by someone who went out and bought one. He finds it "usable" but he does not like the metal latches for the lid which dug into and marred his wooden desktop when the unit is slid around on the desk. My take is the thing works OK for browsing in the same slower manner as any windows unit does -- but it uses a Windows 8.1 version that no one seems to love very much. The Atom 4 core low speed CPU and GPU gets "OK" speed when loading complex pages because it can separately load 4 concurrent items (yeah, each load is slower, but the total job gets done just a smidge slower than the faster dual core cheapie processors can do it). Gaming is mostly a miss, with Warcraft being about the max game you want to try on it. Office is installed and works OK. Words like "not too bad" and "OK" get used in the review. ======================================== Compared to a Chromebook this thing does worse than normal Windows laptops, so it loses all the standard normal Chromebook comparison tests even worse than normal. It actually uses the same chipset and video system as a cheap Windows tablet does. Some reviewers have likened it to a 10" Windows tablet with a keyboard cover. It has the same ONLY ONE YEAR update/use of the OS system, Microsoft Office software and offline storage. HOWEVER, it is really actually down in the chromebook price range and it does work "OK". And it is really shipping from Amazon and Staples will Black Friday you one for $100 this Thanksgiving if you are at the first of the line to get inside when the door opens. This is not a Streambook, it is an Asus Eeee series Netbook which is coming across like a slightly downspec'd streambook. It is, however, a real viable product that might be able to remain on the Chromebook war field even after the MS bonus bucks stop. If sales are good Asus will keep selling it, if it tanks they will drop the Eeee class devices again just like they did before. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/12/14 at 08:04:46 http://www.amazon.com/HP-Stream-Laptop-Personal-Horizon/dp/B00NSHLUBU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1415807824&sr=8-1&keywords=streambook+11 HP Stream 11 is on Amazon is now shipping ..... standard HP red and blue colors available. "Speed This is a Celeron processor, but running on flash/ssd hardware makes it pretty zipping. It's definitely not a workhorse but if you just need a kick-around laptop to bring with you to work/starbucks/wherever else, it can do the basics and then some. Wireless AGN speeds can handle just about as much as you can throw at it. Display You get a pretty decent and vibrant 1366x768, which can play 720p content easily (720p is 1280x720). On this small a screen and the distance you'll likely be sitting from it, it would be extremely unlikely you could noticed the difference from 1080p. Viewing angles are pretty decent vs similar sized laptops I've seen. If you'd complaing about not having 1080p or 4k, why are you looking at this laptop? Quality / Price Quality is pretty decent for a tiny $200 laptop - probably more than I would have expected. I'm disappointed that the touchpad can only be button-pressed in the bottom half (rather than anywhere on the touchpad). Still better than the old-fashioned 2 separate buttons that plague most Windows machines, but definitely not as good as the apple-esque full touchpad. But a reasonable trade-off for a $200 laptop. Battery life is fantastic. Software It comes with Windows 8.1 (non-RT), which is great. The flash-based storage lends to a pretty slick interface. Unfortunately it's also plagued by a ton of included bloatware, such as: Various HP junkware Apple Bonjour (spyware in my opinion) Dropbox TripAdvisor Amazon McAfee LiveSafe Weather Channel "Snapfish" "MySMS" Privacy If you read the HP Terms-of-Service (which you wouldn't get if you bought an Apple or direct-from-Microsoft product), it collects "anonymous technical information related to HP Software and your HP Product". HP and included third-party software will also collect personal information including your IP address and anything you include in the registration. You can't opt-out of it, so this is a nice middle-finger to the buyer. You can't re-install the OS thinking you'll get a clean slate; you just get a refresh of Win8.1 with all the bloatware back. So you can either uninstall the junk, app by app, or try to extract the serial number and re-install from a fresh 8.1 key. It's not listed on any product information or a sticker on the back, so it's a hassle. Overall a decent product, decent battery life, with some significant trade-offs." Fair Warning: HP stuffs their little flash drive full up with junkware on the Windows machine, some of which is apparently hard to remove. HP also apparently tries to block the machine from loading replacment FOSS OS systems. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/13/14 at 06:41:50 Status of the Chrome Wars going into Thanksgiving/Black Friday Chromekillers vs Chromebooks There are two (2) real $199 Chromekillers out there that are really actually shipping now in time for Christmas and neither one can compete on speed or ease of use against the existing crop of Chromebooks. Both are severely limited by the Chromebook like hardware level that is all that the price point can buy (even with MS and Intel paying at least $100 in price support between them). This is due to MS Win 8.1 being a real resource hog compared to Chrome OS and the new Streambooks don't get the large memory and the fast processor they need to be even close to fast. The new HP Stream 11 chokes on its load of pre-loaded freebie ware, giving you no room to put your own software choices on the limited hard drive. The Asus unit is better, with less of a preload taking up the limited drive space. Windows 8.1 is no more attractive as an OS than it has ever been. MS only gives you ONE YEAR of free drive support and free MS Office support. HP blocks you from loading a Linux OS, so at the end of your one year you will HAVE TO PAY MS to use their MS drive service and their MS Office. Chromebooks/boxes are supported by Google for 5 years vs the Streambook's one (1) year of MS support. Chromebooks and boxes can load and keystroke switch to Crouton Ubuntu on the day you get it very easily with no barriers put in place to thwart you. Certainly at the end of your 5 Chromebook/box years you have several in place options that will be easy to do to keep your hardware going on out into the future. Head to head the Streambooks are still much slower than normal laptops and even powerful laptops with lots of memory resources still fail to boot and load web pages like a cheap arsed Chromebook can do. It's the OS baby -- Windows is a fat porky and slow memory eating OS and THAT HAS NOT CHANGED AT ALL. :) 30-35% of younger American users have already realized a Chromebook is simply better than a Windows machine for what they actually do on-line -- eventually their parents will try it and see the same thing. And Chromebooks do work off line as well -- both with selected Chrome Store Apps and with all Android apps that have been rolled over to the Chrome Store. As you go web based a Chromebook makes better and better sense -- especially since it can run your favorite Android apps now. The skills and tools learned on your Android phone play in Chromebooks/boxes now too ..... Know that as MS struggles to write Win 10 down lean enough for laptop, phone and tablet (with this to all come out next April supposedly) that Google is already sitting there, with total concurrency that is app based because all of the Lollipop 5.0 supplier development tools that were released a month ago. MS is not the first to cover all the platforms with the same software, Android 5.0 is already doing it since all the Lollipop apps can run on Chrome OS. AND since MS has come out with MS Office for Android what the heck reason do you have for sticking with the PC platform? It ain't performance. It ain't cost. It ain't MS Office. It ain't Photoshop. It ain't Autocad. You must just love defragging and chasing viruses on a slower, bulkier much more expensive machine. ::) Microsoft is lining things up to shuck all Windows people like oysters, gonna take your $$$ once they jack you all open. IT IS WHAT YOU ALREADY KNOW HOW TO USE, SO INERTIA AND LAZY HABIT that keeps the MS monkey on your back, nothing more. For this you are going to pay hundreds of dollars to MS ??? I guarantee you already know how to use Linux Mint Mate 17 just as well, and I know the Mint 17 learning curve will be less than any of the newer Windows OS's would be and it costs you bupkiss per year to use Linux Mint and the software is all free too. Even if you claim "work related reasons" since the same software runs on both OS systems you can do like the Mac folks do -- just carry your files on a thumb drive that either one will open and save. Or be like my wife, keep all your stuff in Drop Box and access it from anywhere. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/15/14 at 22:58:17 Now, I am going to switch sides and be a Wintel future talk booster, just to prove I can do it. So, 2014 ends on a flat note for all of computing, with massive change taking place in 2013 and early 2014. The net result of all this change is a resized Intel and a resized Microsoft, both of which have finally got their war faces on and are coming out swinging in 2015. Both companies realize they are underdogs now and are acting accordingly, aiming to take over certain select market segments by force and showing a willingness to do WHATEVER IT TAKES to do so. Intel intends to leapfrog its own Tic Tock cycle and bring out Skylake a year early (or on time if you go back to the original plans). Intel will short change and partially abort the current Broadwell generation to concentrate on the Apple demand for the 14nm laptop Skylake generation -- this is a forced putt with Apple putting Intel under the gun very intentionally and very brutally. If Intel performs and makes a GOOD chipset, then Intel can recover some of their 25% potential loss of product opportunities back from the ARM based chipsets. Intel is recovering market share by producing chips that the market wants, rather than throwing out chips and then trying to force their partners to use them. Intel is focused right now as well as anyone remembers them ever being, and they intend to survive and win at ANY cost. Intel is paying attention to their customers for once. Microsoft is busy working out Win 10 on the fly, intending to leverage off the new Intel Skylake chipsets to make their software products relatively desirable again. However, Apple is sucking up all the 14nm production out of both ARM and Intel camps which will put a delay in MS's turn around plans, but may actually provide MS the needed time to get Win 10 totally right this time as the extra year may be needed for MS to fumble through a few Win 10.x revisions to smmooooth out the normal major change feature issues that they are having with Win 10. ARM is being contractually silent right now about their next ARM generation designs, giving Apple their required one year of exclusive use of the new more powerful ARM 64 bit designs before rolling them out publicly. Apple is using Samsung to build their 64 bit A9 chipset with these new ARM generation features, so expect Samsung to come out with their own new generation of new14nm 64 bit chipsets almost immediately after the Apple A9 is announced. Samsung is building A9s on their two new 14nm lines as we speak, so obviously they understand what the new ARM generation changes are all about. Meanwhile, Intel is busy sucking up HARD AS THEY CAN to Apple in laptop space, trying to get a Skylake design put together that will make Apple want to forget that they can just use the new Apple A9 (and year after next's A10 chipset) in Apple's laptops and never have to pay Intel's high chipset costs ever again. Skylake has to be just that good .... and it has to be able to take Apple's ARM based driver sets and RISC systems calls and it has to do it naturally, not through any clumsy software emulations as in years past. Apple will accept nothing less. Skylake will redefine Intel if they pull it off correctly to suit all of Apple's needs and if Intel can make it possible to expand Intel designs into Apple's tablets and phones any at all. So, Apple is slowly luring Intel's development path away from MS, in other words. And Intel is very willing to do this, since Apple sells FAR more new products right now than MS does right now and MS can always use Intel's old x86 based 22nm chipset designs to match up to their still as yet unchanged x86 Win 10 OS product and their still as yet unchanged x86 MS Office product line. MS will have to be the one to change over to a RISC basis within the next few years if they want to play on the newest processors. Meanwhile Intel is also embracing ARM into their internal mobile chipset designs, incorporating both ARM CPU and GPU core design features because the oriental market place is demanding STOCK ARM ANDROID solutions as that is the vast bulk of the products that they want to buy this upcoming year (they also like to run the older forms of Android that are strictly ARM/RISC based). Intel's new monkeyed up Intel version of Android isn't proving to be all that back compatible with the older Oriental Androids and it isn't showing very much movement in the orient at this time. However, both MS and Intel now have a foot in the Chinese market's door and historically that is all Intel has ever needed in order to loss leader their way into killing off the smaller competition by using all their various and sundry well practiced dirty tricks. Then once the small fry are gone Intel can jack the chip prices up into the higher cost ranges again. Chipzilla's giant lizard has reached dry ground on the Chinese mainland and is beginning to stomp around in Chinese cities now. So, does China continue to take the big Intel bribes and allow their own little guys to get plowed under by Chipzilla's big swinging tail ???? Remember, Intel is now a 20% co-owner of two of China's governmental chip production facilities. For killing off the little Chinese little guys is what Intel must do in order to run their business at any form of efficient utilization levels. Intel must build a VAST MULTITUDE of chips on Chinese co-owned fab plants and the current crop of "Chinese little guy chip makers" must be driven out of business in 2015 in order for Intel to be able to fill up their "co-owned" wafer plants and their own 22nm plants and make a maximized profitability both for Intel and their new Chinese partners. :-? So, Chipzilla is becoming a big arsed Chinese dragon now ??? ;D ;D ;D ;D Now, final good news -- the $250- $300 laptop world is getting fairly decent functionally here at the end of 2014 as many of the more expensive early 2014 Wintel units are getting repriced in order to move them on out. Microsoft still has not put out the Win 10 upgrade guarantee in place which would act to help move a lot of the aging 2014 warehouse stock out of the brick and mortar stores. Amazon and New Egg have no old warehouse stocks, they don't keep any, so the on-line channels are not constipated at all at the moment. Chromebooks are slowing down now, evening out at the 20% to 25% of total new laptop sales level (but actually doing much better than that in the Education market). Chromebooks / Chromeboxes are just now beginning to show some early worker bee level penetration into those companies that operate off of very strong company secure software intranets. Microsoft and Dell are combating this penetration with some really really cutthroat pricing on their low end Windows business units as Google and Dell press their Chromebook attack. Yep, that is Dell both attacking and defending .... As low end Intel chipsets get much better and MS continues to react against Chome and to compete actively on the low end of things, look to see the general computer pricing continue to fall throughout the coming 2015 year. Look to see more international companies do a Samsung and leave the American marketplace as we aren't buying enough new stuff right now to make it worthwhile for them to be here. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/16/14 at 12:04:15 http://www.computerworld.com/article/2847703/microsoft-updates-windows-10-gets-an-earful-from-users-about-onedrive-changes.html Microsoft updates Windows 10, gets an earful from users about OneDrive changes "Microsoft is using the Technical Preview to not only show customers what Windows 10 will include, but also to test the faster release pace. Build 9879, however, is a full, in-place upgrade, and not one of the smaller updates that next year will include only changes since the last version. This last release touted several changes to Windows 10 in the latest build, including one that users bashed as a giant step backwards. "We're also introducing changes to how OneDrive syncs your files in this build," Aul wrote. "In Windows 8.1, we use placeholders on your PC to represent files you have stored in OneDrive. People had to learn the difference between what files were 'available online' (placeholders) versus what was 'available offline' and physically on your PC." In other words, OneDrive on Windows 8.1 did not automatically place actual copies of all files in the cloud storage service on a device, but instead showed placeholder icons, what Microsoft calls "smart files," that included a thumbnail image of the file -- useful when searching through photographs -- and searchable metadata. When clicked, the placeholder/smart file kicked off a file download to the local device. That was counter to, say, Dropbox's method of everything-is- available-locally-on-every-device, but also saved local storage space and the bandwidth necessary to download and synchronize large OneDrive collections." Now we will begin to see MS trying to helplessly lock users into Win 10 by automatically taking away their personal files, putting them on a MS server and only allowing the user bookmarks to go get them through One Drive Sync (which will be a yearly pay me service). Bad move boys, back it down and undo it ..... this sort of stuff might be needed for a Streambook that HAS NO DRIVE SPACE at all on it, but for your more traditional users they will not let you AUTOMATICALLY hold their personal data hostage on a "pay me starting next year" service like that. NOT EVER. I suspect even the Streambook users will have a terabyte USB drive plugged into their USB port as needed for storing their personal files, and no one is going to want to use your pay me ONE DRIVE SERVICE as their only totally automatic "must use" data storage service. They may use it for free as a backup service, but not as their only data storage method. They certainly aren't going to let you only just give them a bookmark on their local storage instead of their data ..... "Daddy, I backed everything up to my terabyte USB drive, but when I went to get it by plugging the drive into the PC at home all that was really there were some stupid bookmark thing-a-ma-gigs. My data wasn't there at all." ======================================= German and British users have already bailed en mass on the Win 10 Preview because of MS's intrusive keystroke tracking practices and I bet MS will lose a few more around the world over this One Drive only fiasco. People have trust issues with MS, don't they get that yet? You are not teaching people to love and trust you right now, MS, instead you are showing us some more of that careless MS arrogance again as you try to find out just how far you can push things as you herd the lemmings on into Win 10 dependency. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Steve H on 11/16/14 at 15:58:02 I have not upgraded from XP yet. I run good anti-virus and anti-spyware software and am behind a stateful packet inspection firewall. I have had no problems at all with any sort of virus or spyware. I am running linux on my laptop and have been running linux in one form or another for the last 10 years or so. I have a major problem with any OS that won't or can't run completely without internet access. Mikeysoft has been trying for years to tie people to them in one way or another. Forced upgrades if you want support, phone home tech to 'verify' you have a legal copy of their OS. I know plenty of people with legal copies that have had to buy new copies because M$oft wouldn't allow them to reinstall. Phone home junk for installation. NSA backdoors. Built in spyware. I know XP is loaded with spyware, phone home, backdoors, etc. but it's not nearly as bad as the newer stuff they have put out. Why would anyone want to pay for "use" of a program that they should be able to buy and install on their system and use forever with one payment? Android is a toy OS designed to run phones and media consumption devices. Not useable as a full OS. Chrome is a web browser...if you want to be tied to a company that admittedly spies on you in every way possible and provide them with every keystroke you hit to allow even further spying, go for it. Chrome OS is a web browser with some boot code added. Still suffers from all the tied to google crap (even more). If XP ever dies, I will be completely Linux. I have found equivalents for all my stuff that run under Linux. Linux is faster, works well on smaller, older machines, doesn't report to anyone, doesn't verify anything with anyone, installs in a much smaller amount of space, only installs what you want, and will work anytime, anywhere. I am really enjoying reading all these reports and hearing about all the crap everyone is trying to pull. Please keep 'em coming. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/17/14 at 08:54:20 I'm completely Linux Mint Mate 17 at the moment, but I hold out hope for Chromeboxes as they allow you to Crouton Ubuntu at will -- plus go Android as any Android app good for Lollipop will go on Chrome OS as well, naturally. Android is very light and very fast -- it performs better streaming music and movies than any other OS out there as far as giving perfect performance at less than half the required resources. Where Android and Chrome shines is that it will run anybody's streaming movie stuff except Amazon's and that is because Amazon chooses to MAKE it impossible. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/17/14 at 08:59:59 http://liliputing.com/2014/11/rockchip-intel-launch-first-chip-together.html Rockchip and Intel launch their first chip together http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/xmm6321.jpg And it is a frightfully weak chipset intended for $35 phones in places where 2g is common and 3g is being sold as step up cell service. "The XMM6321 chip is features an Intel/Infineon AG620 radio for 2G and 3G communications as well as 802.11b/g/n WiFi andBluetooth 4.0. Rockchip says it paves the way for future chips which will support 4G LTE. The processor has a clock speed of 1 GHz, but it can be overclocked to run at 1.2 GHz, and just to make it clear that it’s aimed at entry-level devices with 3.5 inch to 7 inch screens, the chip supports display resolutions of 854 x 480 or 1024 x 600 pixels. It can handle 1080p HD video decoding at 30 frames per second, but don’t expect to see phone or tablets with full HD screens using this chip. Other features include support for 8MP rear and 3MP front cameras, 720P HD video encoding at 24 frames per second, and OpenGL ES 2.0." Please remember though, there are entire Countries out there at this level of cell support, so many many many of these cheap little chipsets will be sold. Intel is just supplying the radio and baseband chipsets -- all of the rest of the tech is stock ARM designs. Rockchip is just putting Intel's name on it because Intel is paying them to do just that. This is a sub-modern non-integrated "two main chips with support hardware" daughter board, not an SOC at all. It simply serves to get Intel's name out there in India and China -- it runs an OLD form of Android and MS gets no mileage out of the chipset whatsoever as MS can't get close to running that low and slow. 25-30 frames a second when playing movies and video -- gaming, forget about it. And yet, many will be sold as that is the sort of chipset a lot of brand new opening markets are searching for and Intel will be paying tech support dollars on developing the phones and tablets ..... Intel hopes that in two years these folks will upgrade to their mo betta REAL INTEL chipsets that they hope to have out there by then. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 11/18/14 at 11:19:08 Been playing with the little RCA tablet http://www.walmart.com/ip/RCA-Pro-10-with-WiFi-10.1-Touchscreen-Tablet-PC-Featuring-Android-4.2.2-Jelly-Bean-Operating-System-with-Bluetooth-Keyboard/35716587 .... it works great, really sharp display, great surfing machine... but..... It doesn't have a "print" on internet software screen.... not sure why. My laptop will not "recognize" it, hearing it might be a flaw in about 2% or them... You have to buy a mini (female) to micro (male) adapter to use a mouse with the keyboard. AND.... Walmart just dropped the price $59 ! Going to take this one back and tell them it will not recognize to swap files... get the newer version for $59 cheaper and get a 32gb micro card for it as I only have an 8GB laying around. (I have ordered the usb adapter already). |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/20/14 at 01:37:53 Grab your handlebars tight, the ride just got curvy neat on you. ASUS's new Eeee Windows 11" low end machines are now SELLING for $179 normally at Amazon and Best Buy. THIS is competitive, the unit is good compared to the HP Stream unit and is good enough compared to a Chromebook that a Windows lover won't switch. What STILL isn't competitive is the only 1 year use of the required MS ONE DRIVE services ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/20/14 at 10:08:38 (this is a video, so just click on it) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-fFB-cFLhhs Is a $230 Laptop Worth It? It really doesn't matter what we old farts think, what do the young people think about these new machines. The reviewer is just HARSH in what he says, but his comparison is accurate and his casual comments are representative of knowledgeable young people. Watch the video then read all the user comments below -- kids are very up on this new stuff and they have preferences based upon what they really do with machines now days. I was surprised that Chrome and net based stuff was actually so much of their lives now, more so than I would have thought. Also pleasantly surprised at the multiple OS answer kids, including the Linux crouton crew. Base answer -- most have multiple machines and use one for this task, this one for carry around at school, this one for gaming, etc. The people with only one machine go with Windows. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/24/14 at 08:38:31 http://liliputing.com/2014/11/intrinsyc-launches-snapdragon-810-tablet-smartphone-devices-developers.html Intrinsyc launches Snapdragon 810 tablet, smartphone devices for developers http://https://www.qualcomm.com/sites/ember/files/snapdragon-processors-810.png http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/mdp-phone.jpg Yep, it is a fully integrated on the same chipset Octa core big/LITTLE produced at 20nm with processor speeds well over 2 ghz. That gets great battery life. That does everything to the max and does it quicker than anything else on the planet right now. "The Qualcomm® Snapdragon™ 810 processor, the "ultimate connected computing processor," with 64-bit computing on 8 CPU cores and leading modem capabilities, is designed to enable the most advanced connected mobile user experiences, including streaming 4K Ultra HD video, sharing top-quality digital photos, online 3D gaming, and virtually seamless communications, along with outstanding battery life for premium smartphones and tablets." The first of Intel's night-sweat dreams has just arrived -- a laptop/desktop capable fully integrated ARM chipset that has the video and the speed to jest plain do it. ALL OF IT. Samsung and Qualcomm have their Octacore 20nm irons warming in the fire now and Intel is dry-firing their Skylake 14nm popgun, waiting for Apple to either get happy with it or to decide to toss them out with the trash and use their own A9 or A10 Chipset. ;) Change, she comes ..... http://www.dailytech.com/Qualcomm+808+and+810+64bit+20+nm+Chips+Will+Debut+in+2015/article34663.htm http://images.dailytech.com/nimage/Qualcomm_Single_Chip_Wide.png Intel will have to complete their screwy TI(tock)CK cycle on Skylake without let or bobble to stay active in the mobile/laptop markets. HOWEVER. Intel is as focused right now as anyone has ever seen them -- they have handed off mobile to their Chinese partners and are putting their domestic talent totally on getting Skylake DONE ON TIME. Skylake will ship to Apple on time, for it is do or die time for Intel .... and Intel historically does well when the rubber has to meet the road or else. Politics and stuff like that gets put aside when the company is in serious danger. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/27/14 at 19:17:57 Well, Black Friday is here and I do not see a promise from MS that any machine bought this Christmas will get an automatic free update to Win 10. We do see some hundred dollar off across the board actions going on, so there is some fairly good price reductions, but not a lot of real panic dumping going on yet. ============================= Windows fan boys are all being quiet right now and the hit traffic on MS's biggest Explorer home page and Bing search pages are down by nearly a third each. http://www.businessinsider.com/msn-redesign-hurts-traffic-2014-11 http://static2.businessinsider.com/image/5476fd8becad047908cce5bc-800-389/msn.png Well, you can say "Well that new look for MS Explorer, well they screwed up the web page itself so it didn't auto-point at Bing properly" but that doesn't really cover BOTH of these pieces of information really very well at all, now does it? This seems to say that MSN (Microsoft's main Explorer web page) is down 30% AND Bing searches in general are down ~20% or roughly about the same range. Could an alternate explanation be that people are actively dumping Explorer and Bing right along with it since they don't like it as well, say compared to the current Google Chrome and Firefox offerings? http://static3.businessinsider.com/image/5476fda369bedd7c15351bc5-800-355/bing-1.png Seriously, people are getting a little better educated now and are actually going and trying new products more so than they ever used to do. Part of this is MS no longer has the ability to keep your arm twisted up behind your back the way they used to, and their products are NOT really as good as the competition right now. Plus, MS seems to be screwing up with fair regularity now on several fronts -- security updates, Win 10 releases and now supposedly the Explorer interface itself ??? :) Sounds like a bit of hasty spin doctoring on some fairly nasty statistics down trends, now doesn't it? But MS has a fix for these pesky issues, they want the hit counters to start to LUMP ALL OF MS"S REPORTING COUNTING ITEMS together into one BIG general single big hit number, so these little pesky "market movements" won't stick out so clearly. :D Now how does that work again ?? :-? ::) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/27/14 at 20:45:12 http://ei.marketwatch.com//Multimedia/2014/04/01/Photos/MG/MW-BY010_browse_20140401091007_MG.jpg?uuid=fd346486-b99e-11e3-a264-00212803fad6 Well, this is another possible explanation for the graphs in the post above this one. On top of that, toss in the Chromebooks and Chromeboxes effects of which are still moving right along, continuing the "taking market share away from MS" graph effects. If your browser is no good and folks don't like your OS right now, well then you'd best be getting humping on fixing these issues instead of messing around and screwing up big time every other month like you have been doing lately. ;) http://static2.businessinsider.com/image/5476fd8becad047908cce5bc-800-389/msn.png LASTLY, what about that BIG down tick on 10/14 out at the end of this chart ??? Easy, MS stopped all partners from selling/shipping/downgrading to Windows 7 on that date. And Win 7 was their by far "best selling OS" right on up to the drop dead cut of date ..... So, what do we really see? MS's planned obsolescence of the older Windows versions is NEGATIVELY affecting their web usage numbers and is NOT REALLY INCREASING sales of Win 8.1 as was fervently hoped. What this planned obsolescence is doing however is frustrating and angering users, who by and large will stick with what they have right now on the off chance that Win 10 winds up being worthwhile, once it jells and finishes squirming around in the oven like it so definitely is doing right now. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/29/14 at 04:06:00 How big is Chromebook/Chromeboxes stacking what has been sold against the entire pre-existing world of "all devices that are still running" in all computing? Of all the PC stuff extant at this time, Chromebook/Chromeboxes constitutes just a hair over 1% On the same "all of everything ever" scale, pure desktop Linux machines only constitutes 1.7% of the primary boot sectors on all machines. (yep, all them dual boot machines get counted as Windows "primary boot sector" units and don't get counted as Linux at all, anywhere). Chromebooks should clearly report as "Google browser" on the internet hit/access analysis and they should report as Linux on the boot sector reporting stuff. It is hard to get any running stats on Chromebooks because they generally get listed as other things. As such, Chromebooks still likely get reported "biggest" on any current period released sales figures, but that only comes available when somebody willingly chooses to release such numbers. Current sales are not so hot on all of computing in America right now, so if you just want to see "bigger numbers" look to where it is stated as a percentage of what is selling right now. What is moving right now are the lower end machines, so Chromebooks are "big" right now in that currently selling low end market segment. :) So, tablets killed off traditional netbooks and the 11" Chromebooks are looking like the netbook market segment staging a comeback of sorts against the ever cheaper (but no keyboard and no good typing) Android tablets. It all really begins to look like most folks have multiple machines now and they simply use the one that is handiest for the task at hand. And by handiest I mean closest to hand. Example, I have a dedicated car computer now, it is an old tablet and it simply lives in the car. The cover folds over the steering wheel to hold it up for me and I can net search or watch something if I am waiting in the car for some reason, if I can get a signal from a nearby burger joint, etc. If I can't, I crank up my phone and use it as a hot spot, or else I just use the phone directly if the little screen is OK for what I am doing. ====================== Notes from Grandma's house at Thanksgiving Dinner. Everybody had a phone and a tablet that they took out and used freely. Nobody had any issues getting on line off Grandma's router as they had all added it to their device on earlier trips. You had at least 5 people on line all the time, with peaks going up to 10-12 people on line at the same time. The netscape router just handled it all, along with driving the Roku for the TV which was constantly streaming kiddie movies. NOBODY pulled out the Win 7 laptop that is kept at Grandma's for folks to use (it is too heavy and klunky for tablet people to want to mess with). I was pleasantly surprised that everything Wifi held up and didn't require any attention or rebooting at all. Every grandkid had a tablet and a phone. Two grandkids brought their Win 7 gaming laptops so they could play a game -- but that was all they used it for. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 11/30/14 at 22:44:49 http://www.computerworld.com/article/2843969/drastic-price-cuts-may-damage-pc-industry-jeopardize-microsofts-hopes-for-windows-10.html Drastic price cuts may damage PC industry, jeopardize Microsoft's hopes for Windows 10 "Windows PC makers slashed prices to historically low levels in the U.S. during the last three weeks of October, damaging the consumer business just as Microsoft tries to push Windows 10 as its salvation, a retail analyst said last week. "The implications of a much more price aggressive PC market are enormous, and while many of them are positive, many are not," said Stephen Baker of the NPD Group in a good news-bad news post to his company's blog on Friday. In the span from Oct. 5 to Oct. 25, the ASP (average selling price) of Windows-powered personal computers was $430, down 10% from the year before, according to NPD's data. During the week of Oct. 5, the Windows notebook ASP was even less: $415. "In contrast, the ASP last year at this time was around $480, a monumental change in pricing for a category that had seen stable pricing for the last few years," Baker said of the "Black Friday"-like numbers. Although the price cuts were good news to consumers shopping for a PC, Baker questioned what the business would look like in 2015. "I would say this is damaging rather than unsustainable," Baker said in an interview Friday. "Some can withstand these prices better than others. But from an overall perspective, clearly at the end of the cycle, there are going to be a lot of losers." U.S. retailers like Best Buy and Walmart can withstand an extended stretch of aggressive price cuts, as can some OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) such as Hewlett-Packard. But not every retailer or OEM has the resources to stick with those prices. Baker predicted further consolidation as those unable to play in the ultra-low price bands bickered over an evaporating pool of sales in the $450-and-up range. More importantly, said Baker, was that the price cuts were changing the design and manufacturing of PCs. "The challenge isn't that the ASP last year was $500 and that next year it will be $300, but that these lower-priced PCs are being designed and marketed and intended to be sold at $199 to $249. In the past, those prices have been reserved for models at the end of their cycles. Now they're pervasive." At those cut-rate prices, touch -- once a major part of Microsoft's Windows 8 strategy -- disappears. "The Windows notebook PC segment above $300 has been decimated, with sales down 10% over the past three weeks," Baker said in the blog. "This has impacted the uptake of touch in the Windows market as well. Basic clamshell notebooks with touch only accounted for approximately 25% of the Windows market over the past few weeks, in contrast to points earlier in the year when it was above 30%." Flooding the market with cheap products has also affected sales of Windows 2-in-1 devices, hybrids that boast traits of both tablets and notebooks. According to NPD's U.S. retail sales data, the 2-in-1 market remains stalled at 11% of sales." Look to see good trackpad and keyboard support become VERY IMPORTANT to Win 10's new design as these new lower price points for laptops DO NOT LEAVE ROOM FOR A TOUCH SCREEN ANY MORE. As laptops crash down to the same price range as Chromebooks and 10" tablets, look to see the trade off point to be the keyboard itself, and the ease of rapidly creating text to wind up being what a laptop offers to excuse its existence. The first gasp of Win 10 MUST be keyboard/trackpad centric and not foul itself up with a lot of "unaffordable" touch screen nonsense as MS's laptop business is shaky enough at this point as it is and it does not need any confusing signals about "touch computing" or "visual computing" right now. If people want a tablet, they likely already own one or two already. Chromebooks have hit their volume peak now as PC laptops have come down to live in the same price range and MS is slowly slowly slogging its way towards a Windows comeback IF THEY CAN SIMPLY NOT DO ANYTHING INCREDIBLY STUPID AT THIS STAGE OF WIN 10'S DEVELOPMENT TO FOUL IT UP. Put good trackpads and good keyboards on the laptops, HP -- don't be stupid about what makes people buy the laptop in the first place. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 12/03/14 at 03:27:51 http://liliputing.com/2014/12/compulab-launches-utilite2-tiny-arm-based-ubuntuandroid-pc.html CompuLab launches Utilite2: Tiny ARM-based Ubuntu PC http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/utilite2.jpg "The Utilite2 can run Ubuntu or Android software, has fanless aluminum case, and features a Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 quad-core processor. It should be available for purchase this month. The little computer measures 3.4[ch8243] x 2.3[ch8243] x 1.1[ch8243] and uses between 3W and 8W of power. It features 2GB of RAM, 4GB of built-in storage and support for up to 128GB of removable storage thanks to a microSDXC card slot as well as mSATA SSD support for up to 512GB of additional storage. The Utilite2 features Gigabit Ethernet, 802.11b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth 4.0, 4 USB 2.0 ports, a micro USB OTG port, line out and line in audio jacks, and HDMI output." Why is this significant? Up until this point all the boxes have been Intel based and have been "upper end" Linux boxes power-wise. Like many things computerish, the lower end of stuff has moved up in power to cuddle up to the mid and upper reaches of "what used to be" top end only a year ago. This is a mid-level Qualcomm Quad Core system on a chip that was first used in phones, yes, but the ongoing changes in Linux have suddenly made this fully supported system on a chip a little Linux power house that can easily run a full bore fanless Ubuntu desktop station. Qualcomm, the 800 pound Gorilla of Mobile, Intel's current mobile nemesis has actually arrived on the desktop ..... Auuuggggh !!! Extend this thinking a bit --- Win 10 is supposed to run on phones and tablets. Eventually, it is supposed to run on native ANDROID/ARM chipsets too. If MS intends to survive and grow in China, this is the sort of hardware they need to be able to run upon. Once MS rewrites Win 10 to get lean and mean and fit on this sort of hardware, by then the hardware will have grown in power to come up to meet all the needs that Win 10 will have. Intel is not blind to this, they have already created a crop of Haswell and Bay Trail stuff that gets very close to this Android/ARM/Linux/Intel/Microsoft convergence point. If MS was keeping up better than they actually are, the convergence would have already happened. The new Chinese Spreadtrum partnered Intel stuff makes further motions in this direction, and MS is a current part of that activity as well. Eventually, MS will get there. Give it a year and OS/hardware convergence will happen. ================================================= My interest was always "what can replace my existing hardware with 2x better stuff on the cheap". If I was still running my old single core AMD Athlon 64 white box machine, this stuff would fit the 2x bill with lots of room left over. Soom my "new" Core Duo machine will become replaceable as well. Asus's little Win 8.1 Eeee 205 laptop full retails at $199 and Amazon, Best Buy and Staples are running it on sale at $149 fairly regularly now. In other words, if you bought one for more than $149 you aren't paying attention. Reasonable laptop tech now sells regularly for less than $200. Windows machines are UNDERCUTTING Chromeboxes price-wise right now --- this is significant and it does signal a change that all PC makers need to take a closer look at what they plan to be building over the next few years. Remember, 85% of non-business related PC sales are taking place in these lower price ranges right now. Reviewers are saying the Asus 205 machines are acceptable for keyboard and trackpad and speed for any net-based operations. All reviewers are also beginning to give lighter consideration to "local run softwares" as the local run stuff is beginning to kinda phase out now. All parties are saying the same thing, apart from local work based data crunching 90+ percent of what you really do all takes place on the web. ================================================= On a personal note, I have been hunting a better monitor for a while now. My old 19" SVGA flat screen was showing its age (or my eyes were, anyway) and the VGA plug on it wasn't finding all that many things to plug into any more. So, for $129 on a Black Friday Amazon special, I got me one of the new class of monitor/TVs, specifically a last year's top of the line Samsung 24" Monitor/TV. It is odd, having a remote for my monitor, but it is a very clear, very detailed 1366 x 768 output that is a natural PC supported resolution that goes well past 720p but stops short of 1080p on the tv side. This means NO HASSLE getting it running (it just detected and ran on Linux Mint 17) with NO HASSLES AT ALL. I did have to turn down the backlight and bright and contrast way down towards the minimum specs on the machine itself -- as a TV it was set up to project across a room and at 3 feet that level of light output was a bit much. So as a monitor it is easy do and flaw free. As a TV it requires the use of a remote, which is somewhat new to me, having a remote control sitting out on my desk. Actually, I have two remotes on my desk now, as I bought a FireStick for $24 just to see what Amazon is up to. FireStick isn't as complete as Roku nor is it as user friendly at this early point in time. But what a FireStick does do is stream Amazon Prime free movies and songs and all the rest of the Amazon freebies perfectly right out of the box. The not so little 24" monitor/tv is a natural 16:9 resolution which is the standard wide screen display size for streamed movies. Amazon's little linux based HDMI plug in stick has NO ISSUES running the DRM stuff from Amazon while everything else Linux based is blocked from doing so (intentionally so, by Amazon of course). So, I have a Linux Mint PC hooked up to a monitor/tv streaming Amazon Prime and Netflix and Crackle and all the other major DRM players right here at my easy chair. I can get to all the rest of them using my Chrome browser of course, but the Amazon Prime stuff was still the main hold out that drove the need for this trick. Speakers, I have the original Labtec PC speakers being driven by the PC and I have the built in 5 watt TV speakers that kick in when I am using the FireStick to stream a movie as a TV. So, sound I got -- and I can still plug in my headphones for when I am watching silently while Momma is trying to sleep. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 12/03/14 at 08:52:17 http://liliputing.com/2014/12/asus-vivomini-desktop-coming-soon-around-149.html Asus VivoMini desktop coming soon for around $149 and up http://hexus.net/media/uploaded/2014/12/51f41d7b-fccc-4806-bce4-010a03e8e79e.jpg According to documents obtained by Hexus, the VivoMini will come in at least 4 different versions: Barebones VivoMini UN42 w/Celeron 2957U VivoMini UN42 w/Celeron 2957U, 2GB RAM, 32GB SSD, Windows 8.1 with Bing Barebones VivoMini UN62 w/Core i3-4030U Barebones VivoMini UN62 w/Core i5-4210U The barebones models will ship without storage, memory, or an operating system. But they’ll support up to 16GB of RAM and accept mSATA solid state storage. Each model features 802.11ac WiFi, Bluetooth 4.0, Gigabit Ethernet, SDXC card readers, 2 USB 3.0 ports, HDMI and DisplayPort output, and each measures about 5.1[ch8243] x 5.1[ch8243] x 1.7[ch8243]. Here come the mainstream chromebox killers, from Asus themselves no less -- Asus the main & best supplier of all them little narsty Chromeboxes ..... ;D ...... it's a bloody messy splattery Chrome War, what the heck did you expect? Flowers ??? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 12/04/14 at 08:33:11 http://www.bestbuy.com/site/asus-11-6-laptop-intel-atom-2gb-memory-32gb-flash-memory-blue/9377126.p $99 in store at Best Buy http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/eeebook_03.jpg $99 at Best Buy -- store pick up only Asus Eeee X205TA 2 high-speed USB 2.0 ports For fast digital data transfer and easy peripheral connectivity. Weighs only 2.1 lbs. and measures just 0.7" thin For lightweight portability. Chiclet-style keyboard allows comfortable typing. 32GB flash memory Provides space for storing movies, music and more. One Drive provides 15GB of perpetual storage, plus 100GB of storage for 2 years, and Asus Webstorage offers 500GB of storage for 2 years, so you can access data on the go. Intel, Pentium, Celeron, Centrino, Core, Viiv, Intel Inside and the Intel Inside logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. 11.6" high-definition display Showcases movies, games and streaming media in stunning clarity. Built-in high-speed wireless LAN (802.11a/b/g/n) Connect to the Internet without wires. Microsoft Windows 8.1 32-bit operating system preinstalled Provides a stable computing platform. Built-in 0.3MP webcam and microphone Make it easy to video chat with loved ones. Intel® Atom™ processor Z3735F Features a 2MB cache and 1.33GHz processor speed with Intel® Burst technology up to 1.8GHz. Bluetooth 4.0 interface Enables simple wireless pairing with compatible devices. Intel® HD graphics For lush, detailed images. Micro HDMI output enables simple connection to an HDTV or other high-definition display. Digital media reader Supports microSD format. 2GB DDR3L memory For multitasking power. Software package included With Kindle, Music Maker Jam and more. Includes 30-day trial of Microsoft Office 365. :D Can you say "some kickass competition on the low end of things" ???? check for stock by calling or going on line before you make the drive over to the store |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 12/05/14 at 05:06:24 http://liliputing.com/2014/12/google-chrome-gains-better-offline-app-support-service-workers.html "Service workers allow web apps to intercept network requests and reply with cached data or other responses that don’t require an internet connection. What makes service workers different from some other tools that allow web apps to work offline is that they can function even after you close a web page. This allows them to run as background services, offering push notifications, background sync, or other capabilities, particularly on a mobile device where a user gives an app permission to run in the background. Not only will service workers allow some web apps to work like native apps whether your phone, tablet, or other device is online or not, but it can also speed up the loading of some web apps even when you are online." Google likes to work magic, like giving GPS-less iPad 2 units Google voice actuated GPS functions when the unit has no voice and it has no GPS chip. ;) It tickles their techie egos to no end to go do things you just simply can't do. So, Google guys have figured out how to get on-line apps to think they are on line even when you have dropped out of signal range and do not have a signal. It involves mirror/buffering all on-line data flow into relatively large fast memory cache and keeping it there until it is replaced with new data from the wifi or cellular data flow. Now how is this different from a normal cache? It is responding FASTER than ever before and is is LARGER, more all encompassing and it persists even when the device power is cut off. Why is this important? It means your phone is preloading all the new stuff for you in the background while you are doing something else. Your device is always "on-line" even if it it is disconnected. This is a really BIG performance improvement, much more so than you might think at first blush. This is a video, just click on it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=px-J9Ghvcx4 Phones that don't drop off line when a slight glitch happens. Browsing that continues to work when you go out of range for a few seconds when driving along. Apps that work when the signal drops, continuing to work taking and giving data to the app data in the Cache until the connection comes back. Note: phone calls will still see a glitch when the person's verbal response doesn't come, but all other forms of use won't see a lot of flaws in this new form of buffering. Why NOW? MS and Intel are fighting back price-wise and it is a flaw in Chromebooks that needs to be fixed to keep Chrome competitive. Same tricks work across the board, so across the board they go, for free no less. What becomes more & more possible with this already released Chrome version 40 trick? The new class of wifi first phones from T Mobile and Republic Wireless now have a natural support system integral to the phone OS to do the same sort of buffering that that they have done with their own custom software that has allowed them for YEARS to switch back and forth between Wifi and Cell Signal without showing any gaps or glitches to the user. Yep, them good ideas in open source tend to move around and get adopted and improved and spread and adopted all over the place in venues you never even thought about. It is all a question of Cache size and speed --- and this stuff is so fast that a person can't tell they got sent to cache for a few seconds, the screen just keeps on painting and the data crunching keeps going in and out without any interruptions. Needless to say, big stoppages still have to show up in any live activity but games and such can run from the cache until they need a spot of data that simply isn't in the cache. You know, like loading a new level. And if you were using a spreadsheet or a word processor you'd never see the break as your saves are saved (into the cache) and they get sent to cloud memory as soon as the connection comes back. The Cache is large and smart and it buffers its older data automatically to your fixed memory to make sure you have fast memory free to handle current activities. This is a new use for an old idea, one that will allow phones, tablets and Chromebooks to offer much more seamless off-line activities, especially in the new lower cost, mixed source wifi-first world of phones and tablets and such which is happening as we watch. It will serve to further lower the general cost of cell services, since you aren't totally dependency locked into a carrier's data plan speeds when you use these mixed style services. Plus, much cheaper lower speed 3-G cellular services tend to offer the exact same lightning fast service speed from the big Cache as a much more expensive 4-G service would do. ;) Change, she comes ....... think of it as giving all those extra ARM cores something useful to do with themselves in the mean times. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 12/05/14 at 09:44:01 http://faceit.lt/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/intel-platformos-2012-2016.png And, as always, when Google releases a real something of significance that will change and improve things a lot for real, right now --- the very next day Intel bends over, grunts and releases a massive blast of far far future brown smelly vapor to take everyone's mind off of the real stuff Google just really did for actual factual real. ..... and here it is, 10nm CannonLake, (or SilverMont as renamed in all of a hurry) just so Intel could do something, anything, real real fast to get your attention off Google .... http://wccftech.com/intels-cannonlake-10nm-microarchitecture-due-2016-compatible-union-bay-union-point-pch/ "The successor to Skylake has been codenamed Cannonlake (previously known as Skymont), will feature a 10nm process die and the architecture of Skylake before it resulting in a more power efficient design. The Cannonlake platform will be known as Union Bay and would include the Union Point 200-Series chipset which will replace the Sunrise Point 100-Series chipset (Z170 on desktop platform). The same platform will be available on notebook and Ultrabook platforms. Little is known regarding Cannonlake at the moment and we might not even get to see it in action until IDF 2015 while launch is planned sometime in 2016". So, remember, Cannonlake on Union Point -- sounds like a Civil War naval battleground scene, right ? Don't worry, it will change names twice at least before it actually gets here. :) Speaking of Sophia, did it ever get real or get renamed or is it still lurking out there somewhere in brown vapor land ???? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 12/05/14 at 12:28:59 Well here is my review of the RCA PRO 10.1 tablet/w keyboard, that I "re-purchased". The original PRO 10 would not work correctly when plugged into a device to transfer data. So I turned it back into WallyWorld and got my money back. I then got online and ordered the updated PRO 10.1, which works great and was $59 less! So I used the savings to buy an adapter for a mouse...yup a mouse works with a tablet! and a 32gig memory chip for extended memory (it comes with 16gig on the tablet). Here is the web site info: http://www.walmart.com/search/?query=rca%20&cat_id=3944 Ack! it jumped up to $119, oh well sorry.... Here is the link to my review.... don't laugh at me.... laugh with me ;D [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hnihLYkBC5c&feature=youtu.be [/media] |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 12/19/14 at 06:00:40 Well, the phone wars and tablet wars and Chrome Wars continue endlessly with more new products becoming available from more sources. Intel has suffered 4-6 BILLION dollar losses in tablet space and has just about completely failed to arrive in phone space once again this year. What has Intel gained this year? They paid $100 per chip moved to get 45 million tablet chipsets pushed into the Chinese device generation flow, but were NOT able to make the tablet devices appealing to the Chinese purchasers once they were built. Intel has axed the head of their Mobile Division and rolled the Mobile Division into the PC Division to hide their further losses. This restructuring was to keep the stockholders happy, since they are currently quite unhappy with the squandering of 4-6 BILLION dollars of "my dam'd money". What has Intel done well? In their very serious attempts to make some useable mobile processors they actually have made some pretty nifty laptop and small PC box processors that were quickly picked up and used by the new class of $200 computer products. Intel is getting closer and closer to the mark and likely will arrive in 2015 with some very competitive laptop/PC processors that will still have to be sold at a loss to be competitive to the ARM offerings. ARM still keeps the RISC advantage and is still throughput competitive against Intel's CISC processors while being several lithography levels larger and thusly cheaper to build. ARM chipsets are becoming increasingly dominant in all spaces up through laptop space. ARM competed directly against Intel in the Chromespace (lowest end of laptop/PC space) but Intel is still maintaining their hold on that space by "Contra Revenue" (ie pushing their bigger, less energy efficient, more brutally powerful chipsets into bottom end units by the simple means of "whatever it takes bribe or discount wise". The value of what you can buy for $200-250 in Chromespace is flat amazing right now. Next year it will get better as the cooling fans disappear and heat sinks can do the full job of passive fanless cooling. Intel will continue to try try try try again with new chip designs, showing an absolute determination to keep at it until they finally succeed. Intel needs to strive to keep up profitability in the PC side of things since they are still expending 25-30% of that PC profitability trying to buy a future pathway into China and into tablet and phone space. Regrouping and dropping the big Intel mobile push would only buy Intel one additional year of full profitability before ARM parks itself right on top of their laptop/desktop turf. =================================== Microsoft is try try trying again and again to make a decent OS product out of Win 10. They are seeking and getting feedback from their trial users, and they are getting it in very blunt terms. Microsoft is also experimenting with their proposed ongoing update system of monthly 100% forced updates and are finding that users greatly resent a poorly executed update and a series of two bad ones in a row drives the users into a froth. Microsoft now plans for Win 10 to come out in the fall of next year instead of the spring. There has been no exposure of Win 10 for mobile at this time, although something on that subject is expected to be shown at COMDEX this spring. It didn't -- absolutely nothing was announced and nothing took place. =================================== Google has mostly completed their take over of Education and is now focusing on putting Chromebooks and Chromeboxes into Business. Chrome and Android are run by the same people now and movements are now seen towards "complementary function". Chromebooks can run all Android 5.0 offline apps and Chromebooks now use a caching system that allows the Chromebook to run off the cache if the Wifi signal drops off. Secondary benefit of the big cache is that the cache updates "ahead" and can have what the user needs next already sitting there in cache for instant delivery when the user calls for it. Throughput has actually increased and the need for an "interruption free" modern very rapid Wifi connection has decreased accordingly. ChromeOS is becoming more of a robust system going into next year. ChromeOS does use either ARM or Intel processors, which right now Microsoft does not do. Microsoft needs to fix this ASAP or the processor wars will start to kill them if they can only run on one side of the warring processor type equation. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 12/19/14 at 06:58:49 Smile, this is a joke --- right? I mean, yes Intel is floundering and yes to Apple's big wallet Intel is "affordable" right now and yes at one stroke MS and the CISC PC industry would go down the tubes, but do you really think the anti-trust guys would ever let it happen? Not right now, but after a few more years of shrinkit ization maybe it might could possibly be a "possibility". Especially after MS Win 10 will really run well on ARM chipsets ..... http://www.mondaynote.com/archive/archives.php?t=apple-buys-intel |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 12/19/14 at 08:38:45 Click here http://www.futuremark.com/hardware/mobile OK, this one has to be clicked upon and actually looked at ........ Why look at it? It shows a current 2014 ranking of Intel vs ARM offerings performance-wise on real, already released products. AND IT SHOWS TEGRA K1 AND APPLE A-8X SNEAKING IN BETWEEN THE INTEL CORE i-3 AND CORE i-5 CHIPSETS IN THE PERFORMANCE RANKING RIGHT NOW -- REMEMBER, THESE ARE CURRENT PRODUCTION PRODUCTS. It also shows the very newest general release of phone superchips from ARM sprinkling themselves in through the low end of the Intel Core i-3 group. ======================= what about next year ???? Intel already has a problem with the current already under production FOUR CYCLONE CORE equipped 14nm Apple A-9 chipset actually being plenty good enough for a low end Apple laptop since it will definitely lap on up deep into the Intel Core i-5 rankings. ARM's next generation of phone superchips will also breach up into the low Core i5 range, leaving all of the Intel Core i3 space facing direct ARM competition. IF (and it is a really big IF) Microsoft finally manages their phone/tablet/laptop/PC same same Win 10 OS in 2015, then Intel is in trouble from real general "home turf" PC competition from both Apple and ARM in general. ;) ...... change, she comes yet again next year as Intel has to begin doing "contra revenue" on their old cash cow PC space. Turn enough of Intel's cash cows into "contra revenue rat holes" and Intel as a whole starts to get shaky. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 12/28/14 at 08:58:54 http://liliputing.com/2014/12/crouton-chromebooks-run-ubuntu-browser-tab.html Crouton for Chromebooks: Run Ubuntu in a browser tab This was predicted, that other OS systems would find ways to integrate and run on Chrome natively. The Crouton script has been refined now to allow Crouton to show up as an clickable icon and run inside a browser tab on Chrome OS, so that fully integrated state has arrived for Linux. This is the first fully internalized implementation of this idea, so as Google accepts the concept and integrates with it there will be a FOSS tool provided to do this with other forms of softwares. While MS as a whole is still vehemently competing with Chrome, the Office portion of the company has quietly put out an Office version for Apple iOS and now Office is a natural Apple software member. MS now has Office out in the Chrome store as well ...... Once Office moves to Chrome, then the last barriers to Chrome begin to disappear ..... http://betanews.com/2014/04/14/microsoft-office-comes-to-googles-chrome-os-now-whos-scroogled/ Citrix and other intranet integrators are moving to provide secure Office on Chromebooks/boxes for Big Business, something they can do since MS has provided the hooks by putting their own version out on the web. Anyway, in 2015 MS will release their Win 10 which needs to be good enough to take back all the areas that have been penetrated by Chrome OS. To do this, Win 10 has to change to incorporate many of the advantages of Chrome as far as light, fast and totally trouble and maintenance free goes. ;) ...... so far we don't see it really happening for much at this point in time. So far we see a Win 10 Beta as a porky piglet of an OS that crams ugly updates up yer butt willy nilly without giving you any recourse to push the occasional poisonous update back out again. And you will get charged a yearly fee for using this anal retentive piglet OS after all the "free upgrade" smoke and mirrors die down sometimes in 2016. Meanwhile, Chrome has become a full service general purpose OS now, widening to incorporate all of Chrome, all of Android, all of Linux and all the very the best payme softwares of PC including AutoCad and Adobe Photoshop. Chromebooks and boxes sell all day between $200 and $400, while making a real profit in doing so. So far anything from Wintel that competes in the lower half of this range has to cost somebody some significant contra revenue just to get the price down that low. Say, about $100 of contra revenue paid out by Intel on the processor itself and Microsoft has to give the porky piglet OS away for free ...... Hey, Windows could still make a comeback, really. :-/ |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 01/12/15 at 21:08:27 Honesty Time Microsoft is staging a bit of a raw numbers come back based upon MS giving away Win 8.1 for free. It is real, it is reflected in the sales numbers and MS is doing it on purpose so it is a "successful ploy" that is indeed showing some numberical turn around effects. Microsoft IS gaining market share in the Orient based upon Intel's taping money to each chipset and Microsoft giving the OS away completely for free. Question becomes, how long can they continue doing it? Here is Gartner's prediction for the current trends when extended over the next several years. (yes -- predictions are always suspect, we know) http://https://blog.surfnet.nl/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/Gartner_Forecast.png |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 01/13/15 at 09:39:16 There are no rolled up numbers for 2014 for Chromebook sales vs Chromebook killer sales just yet. Chromebook killers will get lumped in with Windows Laptops and they they just show as part of the small general increase in Windows device sales. Here are the start figures from 2013 so you have a good well defined spot to start from. I think we can say 2013 was the definitive year of the Chromebook since in 2014 Microsoft and Intel started giving things away for free just so as to stop losing all their market share. 2014 will be noted as the YEAR EVERYTHING GOT CHEAP. ;D http://images.dailytech.com/nimage/PC_2013_Market_Share_NPD_Notebooks_Wide.png |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 01/14/15 at 07:28:23 http://liliputing.com/2015/01/compulab-fitlit-small-fanless-amd-mullins-pc-for-linux-windows.html CompuLab Fitlet: Small, fanless AMD Mullins PC for Linux, Windows One of last years predictions has become true. I said that the cheap price supported Win 8.1 boxes coming from the orient would give rise to cheap price supported Linux boxes. So far Intel themselves are selling a Linux stick and here comes my favorite, Linux Mint as sold by Compulab and swinging the AMD Mullens and two better more powerful AMD chipsets. Prices start at $129 and you configure storage and systems memory to suit yourself. More like this are coming, since the small price supported Intel and some very inexpensive AMD processors are out there and demand for Linux machines (directly configured) has risen to ~ 4% to 5% of "total computer sales". http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/fitlet_02.jpg http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/fitlet-e1421243489661.png |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 01/14/15 at 08:23:19 http://liliputing.com/2015/01/pc-market-shows-signs-recovery.html PC market shows signs of recovery ??? ..... or not as the case may be http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/gartner-pc-shipments.jpg http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/idc-pc-shipments.jpg Two views from two different tracking companies, one saying very mild improvement and the other saying just a reduction in the 4-6% historical shrinkage percentage. If you are looking for the Far Eastern numbers, it is lumped in with "Others" and Others took a big hit this past year in both cases. Since both Intel and MS are throwing as much money at it as they can (and the net differential is in the same range as the uptick in Linux overall) I would say the Wintel boys are simply not getting their money's worth out of their contra-revenue efforts. Unless you pause and consider how truly bad these numbers would have been if both Intel and MS hadn't shoveled the big $$$ endlessly at it like they did ..... You could say that they were successful in counteracting the Chromebook bleeding which hit a high of 21% of notebook sales in 2013. It is bad to note that at $100 per chip rate of contra revenue dollars and the giving away of FREE WIN 8.1 Intel just managed to sell 45 million "tablet chipsets" (many of which went quietly astray into linux boxes of various types) with MS just managing to sell a few $29 semi-dumb cell phones into India. If you believe either of these new sets of released sell through numbers, the production numbers vs sell through indicates that many of these $100 on top chipsets and free OS'd items that were produced are still sitting in somebody's warehouse because nobody wants to buy them. Intel is frantically trying to connect with some new chipsets and MS is frantically trying to make up a good Win 10 ..... at least they know where they are right now and are frantically trying to do SOMETHING about it. :) Both MS and Intel will declare a profit for the year, although Intel had to reorganize itself again to hide the mobile losses and fired another divisional manager as the goat .... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 01/14/15 at 10:04:18 http://www.thestreet.com/story/12924618/1/why-soaring-chromebook-sales-are-great-news-for-google-acer-samsung-and-hp.html ABI Research is a renown research firm that has been contracted by all the players at various times to get answers for questions that right now have no data. This is a graph that could have been contracted by MS to answer the question "If we do not stop it now, where will Chromebooks go in the next 5 years"? The answer to this query explains why MS and Intel will continue to throw money at Chromespace endlessly to stop the following from happening. This also explains why NO CURRENT DATA is currently forthcoming on the Chromewars -- it looks bad for MS and they will do anything to stop the current numbers from becoming widely known as it could affect their stock prices. MS as a founding member and large contributing player has already asked all the analysis and reporting companies to ONLY REPORT MS SALES IN AGGREGATE, in other words to no longer track MS's individual sectors for comparison purposes against MS's competitiors. MS will no longer give out any separate divisional numbers any more. In other words, MS is spending some $ and attention to keep the Chrome Wars data from becoming available ...... Rest assured Google is still working on their business initiatives and education initiatives and that country specific Chromebook pushes are taking place as we speak. Each year that a successful Windows 10 fails to appear more and more large erosion takes place in MS's hold on the market. "According to new quarterly data from ABI Research, Chromebook shipments increased by 67% quarter-over-quarter and are now projected to double in size year-over year." Do you understand what doubling year over year means after a few years go by? This is an ominous quote from the article as listed above " In emerging markets, especially in Asia-Pacific and Eastern Europe, business-purchasing entities account for 75% of Chromebook sales in the region." This indicates that Google's Big Business push in the USA is having effects far far afield as Google pulls together all the business integration systems needed to make their package appealing to US Big Business. http://s.thestreet.com/files/tsc/v2008/photos/charts/ABI_Research1023.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 01/14/15 at 23:09:10 http://www.wsj.com/articles/BL-DGB-38336 Executive Change Is Latest Hint of Chrome-Android Marriage Here is the latest management merger between Android and ChromeOS as reported by the Wall Street Journal -- now merger is taking place at the immediate software engineering manager level. So the two OS systems are merged now at the general management level and now at the software engineering management level. "Hiroshi Lockheimer, Google’s vice president of engineering for its Android mobile-operating system, is now also overseeing the engineering team behind Google’s Chrome operating system, which primarily powers personal computers, according to two people familiar with the matter. In choosing Lockheimer to lead engineering for Chrome as well as Android, Pichai is signaling to his teams that Android is the future, according to a person familiar with the personnel change. That reflects the two systems’ strength in the market. Android powered 85% of the smartphones shipped in the second quarter, according to Strategy Analytics. Google’s existing line of cheap Chromebook laptops are popular in schools, but captured just 2% of the worldwide personal computer market in the second quarter, according to IDC. Android has begun to branch out beyond smartphones and tablets. The latest version of the Android operating system — known as “Lollipop” — will also power in-dash car computers, wearable devices like smart watches, and also televisions." =================== http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2413071,00.asp The Best Chromebooks Please look at the editor's ratings and the prices as shown at Amazon -- they are saying you can get a whole lot of good stuff for your ~ $250 -$300 Chromebook purchase price. And as the software matures and gets better and better the overall value of the ~ $250 -$300 Chromebook keeps getting better and better. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 01/14/15 at 23:53:52 As Nvidia and AMD release their year's end financial numbers their stock prices are tanking. Then they both jumped up A BUNCH on their sagging stock prices on rumors of other, larger more successful competitors/companies wanting to pick them up as an outright stock based purchase while they could be bought for a quietly hummed song. And we are not talking Intel being the only potential one doing the buying (Intel isn't in great shape right now either). Cash rich Qualcomm and Samsung are touted as potential buyers for Nvidia (seeking current state of the art patents and IP more than anything else). Samsung just took a swipe at buying Blackberry, but was rebuffed. Sadly, no one seems to want to buy out AMD/ATI's similarly large IP at the moment since the same ARM blender that is slowly chewing the legs off of Intel has already just about finished off AMD completely. http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2224840/amd-hires-jp-morgan-to-find-buyers |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 01/15/15 at 08:33:21 http://liliputing.com/2015/01/mintbox-mini-compact-linux-mint-pc-coming-soon-295.html If anyone has been noticing, the price of retail Linux computers has been dropping from the PC range down to the Chromebox range, from $800 down to $500 and now down to $279. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/mintbox-mini.jpg This was predicted last year and has indeed come to pass, so I felt all gratified. Then curiosity struck and I wanted to see what Ebay had to say on the old decrepit original version of the original Asus chromeboxes, had they become killing cheap as they dribbled off the face of technological earth .... What I found was AMAZING -- there ARE NONE AVAILABLE FOR SALE. There are little businesses buying them all up as soon as they become available. And here is why --- this ebay dude is one of several budding businessmen converting the Asus Chromebox into full bore Linux machines (and he will also do you a Win 8.1 version if you send him the OS verification that you actually own the software). http://www.ebay.com/itm/Chromebox-OS-Upgrade-Linux-Mint-17-1-Asus-M004U-HP-Chromebox-Compatible-/261732245087?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3cf0751e5f :D |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 01/16/15 at 19:26:21 http://liliputing.com/2015/01/meegopad-t01-pc-stick-ships-unlicensed-windows-8-1.html MeegoPad T01 PC Stick ships with a hot copy of unlicensed Windows 8.1 Oh the agony of it all, MeegoPad spent all their Intel and MS tech support dollars and got their production lined up and started running it last week -- and came to find out MS has now chopped the freebee Windows 8.1 offer right out from under them (drum roll please) because their screen size doesn't meet the current 2015 offer's screen size requirements. Duh, dude, it is a stick and the screen is definitely smaller than 9" (about 9" smaller as a matter of fact). ;D Also, it is 2015 now and if you gotta buy it now the low low cost Bing 8.1 OS costs $27 a copy now instead of the $7-$14 it did jest a month or so ago. :o :o :o :o :o Read it and weep all you folks who trusted MS to keep to their give away programs -- MS JEST CAN"T AFFORD IT ANY MORE. (and screwing you over is what MS does best, anyways) "While Microsoft offers Windows 8.1 licenses free of charge to manufacturers of Windows tablets with 9 inch or smaller screens, the MeegoPad T01 and other tiny desktop computers don’t count… because they’re not tablets. Microsoft does offer a low-cost version of its operating system called Windows 8.1 with Bing, but it’s cheap… not free. From what I’ve heard that means makers of small desktop computers had to pay $15 for a license in 2014, and about $27 for a license in 2015. In order to keep hardware prices low, it looks like some Chinese device makers are shipping products like the MeegoPad T01 with a trial version of Windows… which is free. Windows piracy has been prevalent in China for years, so I suspect the idea is to just let customers find their own product keys — since paying for a full Windows license would more than double the cost of a $100 computer." ::) So, the Chinese go back to pirating Windows and we all go back to Linux for all our cheap stuff again ..... Hey, MS, yer buddy Intel and their little stick computer, are you going to "stick it" to yer good buddy Intel too? 8-) "Later this year Intel plans to launch its own model called the Intel Compute Stick. It’ll sell for $149 with Windows or $89 with Linux (although the cheaper model will also have less memory and storage)." duh, Windows requires over twice as much storage space and twice as much systems memory and lots more extra hardware bits and pieces on the little motherboard ..... and if you ain't gonna pay for all that extra stuff like you said you would, well, it jest ain't a gonna happen any more. Easy Cheap Prediction -- the amount of 2015 stuff running Windows in the orient starts to go down soon (as the big buck tech support bribes die out so do the new Oriental Windows products). Next Easy Cheap Prediction -- Chinese gov slaps MS around a little bit again (real quick like) to remind them to keep to all the deals they cut last year. If MS can't do it, then they can leave the island by golly, because China ain't really their buddy anyhow. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 01/20/15 at 10:11:39 First prediction comes true almost instantly -- some of the "over at the edge of supported" styles of Windows 8.1 new devices have just jumped in price to the tune of $50-$70 overnight -- this is in response to MS charging a lot more for Win 8.1 with Bing starting Jan 1 of this year. The differential between the new Win device prices and the same-same Android is now running about $80 on average. On devices that cost less than $200 this is a deal breaker, so expect most of the affected Win devices in this price range to drop off the market place pretty quickly. Microsoft is picking and choosing which products to price support, and as item A is favored and B & C are not, expect MS to lose those B & C suppliers out of pure irritation. Also expect B & C to complain to the Chinese Ministry of Export about MS's unfair treatment, etc. as the fiscal bite might significantly hurt some of these little guys who were counting on the deal to continue. ::) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 01/21/15 at 06:08:06 OK, so Microsoft is starting to end their give away program as they think they got what they wanted out of it. China likely is going to be unhappy with them, but so what -- Windows 10 is coming and the Chinese people are all hooked now -- gotta have their MS update fix and big anti-virus purge every week or else they'll think something's busted. Meanwhile, Android quietly creeps up to a 90+ percent worldwide "all devices" market share and Google actually begins to talk internally about bringing their two OS systems into one unified package to get ready for Win 10 this fall. Remember, in the new developing emerging markets nobody uses Windows for much at all apart from business uses. They do use Android at home and at work ...... So, MS is still trying to give away a Nokia semi-dumb phone for $29 to try to get their name brand presence out there, but it is literally a drop in the ocean to what Android is very quickly becoming in the rest of the world. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 01/22/15 at 06:26:08 So, OK, Microsoft was jest ending some of their give-a-way programs on Win 8.1 so as not to distract from the big Win 10 roll out. Right. ;) The PR blitz that was just put out yesterday was impressive -- but we saw that same sort of impressive blitz with Win 8.0 and with Win 8.1 but the reality that came afterwards was a real let down in both cases. We will wait to brag on MS's latest Win 10 efforts -- but it certainly looks good on the PR front at least. ::) MS, thank you for raising the bar for ARM, LENARO, GOOGLE and LINUX -- it is very good that you have PR challenged them with your plans and vapor images of "better stuff". It will cause them to actually go do some better stuff, whether you, MS, can eventually manage to pull it off or not. We already see Qualcomm AND Samsung both shipping their 14nm octa core 64 bit chipsets a year earlier than originally planned, so GO MS GO !!!! |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 01/25/15 at 06:14:40 http://liliputing.com/2015/01/hp-pavilion-mini-desktop-is-now-available.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/hp-minis.jpg The real new HP "fanless" Tupperware Computers are now shipping, with whirring fans still very much inside them no less. (tupperware must be a good insulating substance instead of a heat conductor -- shoulda coulda have made them aluminum ice tray computers instead). HP meets the MS design goal of "not looking like a Chromebox" by looking like leftover storing refrigerator refugees instead. The MS claim about them being cableless seems to have been defeated by all them cable connections that are in evidence on the real shipping product. Mebbe "it can be cabless" just if you buy the right keyboard and mouse and monitor to go along with it ..... ..... you know, a matched table setting of tupperware. :D :) MS sure hasn't got much of a track record on "accurate reporting" on key new HP products of late, seems like MS just uses their wishful imagination for their "hot new product" press releases a lot lately. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/hp-mini_06.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 01/31/15 at 22:38:23 http://iq.intel.com/5th-generation-intel-core-processors-make-waves-ces-2015/ I am going to put this in the Chrome Wars because there is no way in hell these new 5th Generation chipsets from Intel are going to go into any phones. Way too big, non-integrated and WAY WAY too porky all over again. However, they will be able to make up a Chromebook or a Chromebook killer ..... if Intel price supports them right, that is. http://iq.intel.com/files/2015/01/548x411xcs-finger_chip_5thgen1.jpg.pagespeed.ic.vGDsmyS8fs.we THIS IS NOT THE WHOLE PACKAGE, it is just the CPU chip. Yes, NON-integrated again, will require contra-revenue dollars and tech support dollars to get used anywhere. Here is the whole CPU/GPU package as installed on the daughterboard (note they do not give you fingers in the picture so you cannot readily see how FRIK'N HUGE the whole thing is). 1.5" by 2" would be my guesstimate based on the finger picture above. http://https://iq.intel.com/files/2015/01/5th_Gen_Intel_Core_processor_with_Intel_Iris_graphics_package.jpg Now, is this really the whole package (in comparison to say a Samsung or Qualcomm chipset) ??? Sorry, no, there is no baseband or radio or GPS or other normal full integration components on this 5th Generation Intel product. All of these items have to be cost added to the motherboard. Next point, there is only a 4% speed bump involved in this expensive new 14nm chipset ..... this means the current 20nm ARM chipsets from everybody will be equal to or better on throughput compared to this latest generation Intel 14nm two chip daughterboard with lots of other stuff still required to be put on the actual motherboard. No wonder Rockchip didn't find anything useful enough to take when Intel gave them their whole toolbox to go poking through .... ::) .... and this is the wonderful new Intel stuff we have been waiting and waiting for ???? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/11/15 at 06:59:16 http://www.cnx-software.com/2015/01/21/antutu-benchmark-rockchip-rk3288-arm-vs-intel-atom-z3735f/ http://browser.primatelabs.com/geekbench3/compare/247502?baseline=786009 http://www.cnx-software.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/Rockchip_RK3288_vs_Intel_Atom_Z3735F.jpg Chromebooks vs Chromekillers Folks have begun to pre-compare the new $150 Chromebooks built on the Rockchip RK3288 to what Intel is preparing to ship as the Classmate PC. Education is after all THE primary competition zone between ARM and Intel right now. The RK3288 ARM based Chromebook will sell for around $150 which puts it well below the Intel offering in price EVEN AFTER THE INTEL AND MS PRICE SUPPORTS ARE ALL APPLIED. According to the benchmarks, the RK3288 out performs the Intel N2910 ...... http://browser.primatelabs.com/geekbench3/compare/247502?baseline=786009 ..... and outperforms the very popular price supported Z3735F. http://www.cnx-software.com/2015/01/21/antutu-benchmark-rockchip-rk3288-arm-vs-intel-atom-z3735f/ Question then becomes "How come you can't buy the better chipset since it goes into a cheaper Chromebook that performs better?" The answer is simple and them Cabaret singers told you the whole story long ago ...... Money Money Money ...... Intel Money !! Intel spent a lot of money to make sure that you never saw an RK3288 chipset in a Chromebook -- and they will spend even more $$$ to make sure you don't see the new ones from Lenovo or Asus either. What is scary to Intel is that the old 28nm RK3288 beats Intel's 22nm best 3rd generation and all the applicable 4th generation 22nm Intel chipsets. Beats them pretty badly. What should be even more scary is that the RK3188 was a stopgap chipset from a year ago that isn't as strong as A-57 (much less the A72) and it is still benchmarking better than two current Intel offerings that are built with a one generation better Intel 22nm lithography. Rockchip, throw the RK3288 on 20nm or 16nm (why, because it is depreciated and has gotten way cheap and you already own the license and you already paid to have Google do all the Chromebook work) and move it forward into Education Chromebooks for $150 and get on with the program. Start killing all them Chromebook Killers ...... Rockchip, you are due a success off of the chipset you were given by ARM so you could go kick a little Intel butt .... but then again, it was far easier for you to take that same amount (or more) in Intel's "tech support" money NOT to go do that Intel butt kicking, now wasn't it? In addition to the tech support money, Intel gave you their whole 22nm toolbox full of rusty pipe wrenches and Whitworth socket sets "in consideration", promised you endless support and tapped your people's brains for how to make an integrated phone chipset and you jest jumped at the Intel bribes and the tech sharing deal, didn't you? Getting kinda chilly out there in the cold now? Having some regrets, any? Intel has nothing near the price point that works nearly as well as the two year old 28nm RK3288 that ARM gave you to build. But hey, this is the Orient, where bribes and "considerations" are just line items on internal fiscal statements and considered completely ordinary, normal and expected. ;) ..... however, if you take something given to you for free so you can go do a job with it, and then you take some bribes not to go do that job and you still keep the item you were given to do the that original job, well then don't expect the one who gave the item to you for free to trust you with anything else, ever again. ::) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 02/11/15 at 09:59:04 Short blurp on yahoo from BGR, there are links to other stories about Win10 and also a link for a free trial?.... I ain't brave enough to clik on that though.... https://www.yahoo.com/tech/s/microsoft-might-pay-every-windows-future-233517523.html |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/11/15 at 19:40:59 I signed up to be a Win 10 developer trial person completely through all the sign up BS until I got to the point of actually downloading the software. ( I couldn't say it was a pain in the ass without actually DOING it.) Then I got honest with myself -- I am personally never going to go back to using Windows, not even if it was for free. I can't stand the slow, the endless interruptions, upkeep and busywork. The upcoming after the first year yearly fee thing isn't new, it has been known for almost a year now ..... but MS is finally saying it bluntly and it is now "making the news". I also got into an honest discussion with my wife, explained the roll over to the yearly fee thing and she said she would put up with what she had up through retirement as long as it kept working. Plus she was told by her building's resident computer support person NOT to go do Win 10 because Win 10 is NOT going to be supported by the University any time soon, only Win 7 is supported up through the next few years anyway. Most of their internal systems software will NOT work on Win 10 AT ALL as of yet. I am planning to pull back a Win 7 machine that is at Grandma's house and throw an old XP laptop to the grandkids/wolves at Granny's. It will be interesting to see just how long the XP machine lasts before they hack it to useless junk. Once it is broken, then it will become a Mint laptop next (if I am going to maintain it, anyway). Once it becomes Minty Green I bet it won't have any issues with the kiddies hacking it up ..... first of all they won't download crap games from everywhere and click on Yahoo toolbar this and that any more while they are downloading the crapware. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/11/15 at 20:41:18 http://www.pcworld.com/article/2860680/make-way-for-chromebooks-four-reasons-theyre-ready-to-rock-in-2015.html http://core4.staticworld.net/images/article/2014/10/samsung_chromebook_2_3qtr_view_wide_oct_2014-100525555-gallery.jpg Make way for Chromebooks! Four reasons they're ready to rock in 2015 Who says? PCWorld says. PCWorld who now has a section about the World Beyond Windows since there obviously IS a world beyond windows now which is growing very rapidly. This article is truthful and well written -- but PLEASE read the comments, they are a hoot and a half. You can easily tell the people who have never ever touched a Chromebook from those who have. It is a Windows publication after all, and it really really upsets the Windows faithful to have their key publication saying MS sucks ..... ::) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/12/15 at 08:35:32 Something else MS is learning from the early Chrome Killer sales -- every Chrome Killer sold is replacing one of the more expensive higher featured Windows machines that now will not be sold at all. :P Yep, it sucks but you knew that going in, right? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 02/12/15 at 11:02:28 Actually, i'm kinda stuck, between the Linux and windows.... I have android devices (phone, tablet) but still use windows 8.1 laptop more than any of the other devices. My wife is always complaining of lockups and popups (even though her explorer has popups blocked) and I have to do a regedit to get rid of a lot of the stuff she clicks on. She says she watches what she does...but between her yahoo and facebook stuff her laptop is loaded with bugs, most of which I will never find. I downloaded an update for my video card, from the company that makes the card... and now my card fan goes on high about every 45 seconds and locks my screens up until it the fan speed returns to normal. So i'm thinking maybe going chrome.... ALL THE WAY ... on the little laptop... to see what programs I use that aren't covered. Linux still is a hard row for me to hoe.... I don't understand the "unpacking" and such needed to load up programs. I tried to set up my security camera's on Linux and failed horrendously even though there is a "walk through"..... the walk through is for a similar camera setup....so I loose it about 1/4 of the way in. Maybe i'll just dump the little laptop and load the copy of windows8 I have for this bigger laptop and then go upload win 10 and see how much damage it does....LOL... too much fun huh? I still have mint 15 loaded on a little old (10yr) pc I have in the garage, maybe i'll keep experimenting with the security setup with that one. You think maybe in the future google will come out with an android laptop? :o |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/12/15 at 12:45:51 The issue is what are they going to call it, Android or Chrome OS? When it finally arrives they're going to have to pick a single name for it, most likely something new. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/13/15 at 00:39:34 http://www.amazon.com/HP-Stream-Includes-Personal-Horizon/dp/B00NSHLUBU/ref=zg_bs_565108_2#customerReviews Amazon real customers tell exactly how to "optimize" a HP/MS/Intel Stream Book 13 Chrome Killer for good performance "I just bought my nephew who is going to college an HP Stream 13 for $230. Beautiful and powerful computer, but it took me 90 minutes to remove all the stickers and all the crapware & adware. I still need to offload the recovery partition to a flash disk to recover the SSD storage. It has a total of 32 GB SSD storage so every bit counts. I'm also waiting for a 64 GB MicroSD card http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00IVPU7AO so I can expand the storage. Removing the crapware and adware took 2 hours plus another hour to install Windows update. I removed all the browser extensions and add-ons in IE and then installed Chrome. Then I installed CCleaner and removed McAfee anti-virus so that I can just use the free Microsoft AV. Also removed a bunch of bloatware like Cisco wireless networking utilities like LEAP and Apple Bonjour. Removed the Realtek card reader software since it slows the card reader down. Then downloaded fresh Realtek card reader driver and manually installed the driver without using their setup program. UPDATE - I had to remove all the HP tools (support and registration) as well. They were intermittently hammering the CPU to 100% and other people in HP forums were complaining about this problem. Once uninstalled, the CPU usage problems went away. Something else that caused some mildly high CPU usage during media playback was the Realtek DTS audio processing service and I've disabled that and the system performs better. It was not needed for playback quality and it was actually detrimental to audio recording quality. The thing that slowed me down was that I had to gather my nephew's personal info to create a Microsoft account for him. It was mandatory since this is the free version of MS Windows 8.1 (with Bing). But the MS Account allows him to use MS Office online for free so it's worth setting up. I also had to carefully remove 3 stickers on the keyboard rest. Intel sticker was tilted. Now it's a beautiful clean system and it boots very fast and loads everything fast. It handles most computing tasks just fine and now I'm loathed to give this away. Some people will complain about the 2GB of RAM which is not expandable, but I never have any problems with 2GB RAM because I don't leave a 20 browser tabs open. You're not going to use this laptop for 3D intensive gaming or 3D rendering so the RAM shouldn't be an issue. I have a desktop computer with 8 GB of RAM for running games and virtual machines and content production and no one should expect the HP Stream 13 to perform this role. It runs fewer than 10 web browser tabs just fine and it's extremely snappy running Microsoft Office Online or Google apps. I ran a Youtube 1080P on Chrome browser. Google is screwing all of us now by forcing their VP9 codec on us which forces this computer to use software video decoding. This dual-core CPU is pegged at 100% utilization and forced to overclock to 2.58 GHz and it will still hiccup if a youtube ad shows up. Of course this is just chewing up the battery. By comparison, I tested a 1080P H.264 .MP4 video downloaded from Google and the CPU hovered around 8% during smooth playback. Google needs to shove their VP8 & VP9 codec where the sun don't shine. But thank goodness for "Magic Actions for YouTube" (a Chrome plugin) letting me disable Google's VP9 HTML5 crap. Now Chrome runs Youtube in flash mode with H.264 hardware decoding and the CPU hovers around 20%. Here's a screenshot of the CPU pegged at 100% with VP9 software decode http://bit.ly/1u0O3bV. Here's the CPU hovering at 20% using Flash mode with H.264 hardware decode http://bit.ly/1uahXfx. I've been hammering on this system with tests for over two hours. The Intel N2840 2.16 GHz processor is being forced to burst to 2.58 GHz from all the work I'm throwing at it. Windows Update is hammering the IO and CPU. The brightness level is even set to 60% and the battery level still reads 79% with 4 hours 24 minutes remaining. After all the tweaks and cleanup I've done, the slim HP Stream 13 3.42 lb laptop is running smooth as butter. The 13.3" 1366x768 non-glare matte screen is the perfect compromise between viewabiliy and compactness. Would be even nicer if HP could sell us a 1920x1080 13.3" screen but probably not at the $230 price point. Another small gripe is that the bezel is a little bigger than I'd like. The Stream 13 has a 720P webcam, but I wouldn't even call it 360P quality. It's incredibly grainy using indoor lighting, but what were you expecting for a $230 laptop? It's certainly not going to look like the camera on the MacBook Pro. Get yourself a $66 Logitech C920 which has awesome image quality and 1080P hardware encoding if you want a nice webcam. Even a $29 720P webcam will look leaps and bounds better. On the audio output side, the HP Stream 13 has good sound output from the TRRS jack. It can drive my large 808 headphones with authority. By comparison, my Lenovo ThinkPad T430 business laptop couldn't push my 808s at all! The audio recording on the other hand stinks in the default setting. The integrated microphone sucks like most integrated microphones on laptops. It is very laggy because of all the noise cancellation algorithms they apply to it. The recorded sound (using Audacity) is noise free but it is extremely unnatural due to excessive noise reduction. I don't like the recorded sound at all. UPDATE - After disabling the DTS Realtek audio processing, the playback quality was still just as good. Recording with the internal microphone actually improved a lot. The internal microphone in the HP Stream 13 actually isn't too shabby. It is surprisingly usable quality for VoIP or Video Calling. The Stream 13 also has a 3.5mm TRRS phone connector port for headphones and earbuds with microphones. That means you can use the same earbuds with mic that you use with your smartphone. The problem is that while it sounds a lot more natural than the integrated microphone, it's a faint yet noisy signal. The input volume was set to 100% with a 10 dB (fake software preamp) boost and it's still only reaching 20% peak sound levels in Audacity. My Nexus 4 and Samsung S4 on the other hand produce extremely good quality recordings with the same earbuds or headphones with microphones. To put this in context, my Lenovo ThinkPad T430 from work has the same audio recording quality problems with the integrated mic and TRRS port. If you want to work around these sound recording issues, buy yourself a $34 Samson GoMic. It's the best money you'll ever spend on a USB microphone. The other option is that you can get a bluetooth headphone with microphone since the HP Stream 13 has bluetooth capability. The trackpad on the HP Stream 13 is large and usable. It supports gestures like two-finger scrolling. But if you really want a good experience, buy a bluetooth mouse and use the integrated bluetooth in the Stream 13. Lastly, here are the disk performance results for the internal 32 GB SSD storage. It's one of the slowest SSDs on the market, but it's still around 15 times faster than a normal hard drive when it comes to small file transfers. https://www.dropbox.com/s/2hos9mfpuqrg8ne/diskmark.png Conclusion: This is a superb mobility laptop for the money, but only if you remove all the crapware and apply all the optimizations I performed above. Summary of crapware removed and optimizations performed. * Apple Bonjour. * Cisco LEAP and EAPFAST * McAfee AV * Realtek cardreader software (note that you need to download just the new drivers and then just install drivers manually without software. Don't remove if you don't know how to install new drivers because you'll lose the card reader) * HP Tools registration * HP Tools support * Disable Realtek DTS audio effects. Just type DTS at start screen and the program will pop up. * Install Chrome * If you use Chrome, install "Magic Actions for YouTube" plugin for Chrome to disable ads, pick the default resolution, and force Flash mode instead of HTML5 mode. Flash mode uses H.264 MPEG AVC video which supports hardware acceleration for very low CPU usage." =========================================== Question: If you are so limited by the Streambook's hardware and have to work so hard to decrapify it so it can run at all, why the heck did you buy it in the first place? ::) These people are giving this product 4 and 5 stars ????? Just how bad are the rest of their MS installations to make this seem !!! GREAT !!! to them ??? =========================================== What do you have to do to a HP/Google/Intel Chromebook to get it going? Answer --- charge it and type in your gmail name and password when you turn it on for the first time. Agree to your on-line storage account, then follow the prompts to register your android phone as your proximity password and you don't even need to do that log in at boot thing any more. And no, a Chromebook will only do 95% of what a Windows machine will do, but it is so so much easier to use and you quickly discover that whatever you want or need -- there's an app for that ...... Never gives you update hassles or defrag hassles or antivirus scan hassles ..... You will need to buy a cloud printer -- or else set your existing PC/cable printer up with Chrome browser printing as per instructions. Believe it or not, printing is the largest newbie's complaint item that exists for Chromebooks. Dealing with Wifi printing (or cloud printing) seems strange to newbies who are used to all them little white USB cables. BTW boys, cloud printing comes STOCK on all the new printers now days ..... sets itself up when you set the new printer up. ::) really now .... you'd spend more time than that just getting the all the palm rest stickers off your new Chrome Killer machine. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/14/15 at 06:40:48 http://www.unlockpwd.com/asus-chromebook-and-lenovo-11-inch-rockchip-rk3288-and-lte-for-149/ More information on the $149 Chromebooks from Asus and Lenovo ringing in from New Zealand (the closer to the Orient you get, the better the information) The items will be announced at the early summer oriental mobile/computer shows as an LTE supported $149 product that is intended to be sold by carriers and others. It will go to Amazon in the USA as a wifi only product and be picked up by the US carriers as an LTE device as they each individually choose to go into that market sector. Special radios would be needed for AT&T and Sprint, but not so much for T-Mobile since they are edging ever closer to the oriental normal standards to the point that a general LTE baseband and radio rig from the orient today, right now will work even today on T-Mobile, just at a reduced speed. Soon, as the BYOP idea increases in size the oriental "universal standard cell radio" may indeed correctly cover T-Mobile AT FULL 4G SPEED as a stock oriental product. It will pay T-Mobile and the radio chip guys to make sure that happens ASAP. http://www.unlockpwd.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/1416043091_asus_c200_chromebook_1.jpg Why is this important? Well, after the original three (3) NVIDIA Tegra K1 chromebook units that were put out by Acer, Asus and HP this will be the 4th and 5th units where vendors have swung away from using price supported Intel chipsets. It signals Intel's inability to price support its big clunkys well enough to keep them in control of the ever growing Chromebook market. It will also signal the 4th and 5th time that Intel chipsets have lost out performance-wise to ARM based chipsets. :D How bad is this going to be? Dunno -- the chipset may be up to it but the build quality corner cutting that will go on at the $150 price point is an item of mild concern about these new Chromebooks. But once the $150 price point gets established things will likely change up again in this very rapidly growing market segment. We shall see, won't we ..... ::) Needless to say, whatever a year plus old RK3288 can do a current generation A57 or one of the upcoming A72 chipsets should be able to easily OUTDO in a factor of 2x - 3x sorta fashion. As a matter of theoretical speculation, if Intel wasn't painting all their low end chipsets with lots of "contra revenue" red paint right now, just how many of them would actually move on their own merits? Next thought, when Intel has to use that can of red paint on over half of what they make, can they afford to keep on doing it? :-? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/15/15 at 14:43:30 http://images.dailytech.com/nimage/PC_2013_Market_Share_NPD_Notebooks_Wide.png This is last year's Chromebook growth compared during 2012 & 2013. Also please note that MS took a 20.2% dip year on year in 2013 while Chromebooks popped up to 21.1%. Then MS quit giving out any breakout data on their sales in 2014 (got too embarrassing, I guess). Meanwhile Chromebooks DOUBLED in the 2013-2014 span so the prediction chart shown below turned out to be a little bit conservative. ;) Note: Apple gave up the additional machines to make all the math work out right. Next, look at the projection graphs that say that the other developed countries are going to have the same sort of Chromebook explosion over the next few years, further draining MS's high profit areas. http://s.thestreet.com/files/tsc/v2008/photos/charts/ABI_Research1023.jpg All of this growth will come from MS's current high profit market areas (the areas that they are using to subsidize all that contra revenue stuff they are doing in cell phones and Chrome Killers, etc. etc.) ::) What is MS going to do to fund all their loss leader stuff once they have lost the high profit leadership position that makes the rest of their loss leader give-away stuff even possible ??? Right now MS is just now realizing that every Chrome Killer they sell takes one of their own higher profit units out of play that they would have sold otherwise. MS is paying "contra revenue" $$$ out the butt to not sell a more profitable laptop unit since the only market share Chrome Killers are really taking is MS very own higher profit margin laptop market share ..... :) Apple is having to make up some less expensive laptops to regain some of their own market share that they have lost inside the last year. (see Apple start to use their own chipsets in lower cost laptops starting next year as a very important cost savings step compared to using Intel's stuff). |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/15/15 at 22:07:29 Alas, poor Intel .... they vapor promised us this 14nm chipset (which according to their own foundry head dog won't even start to run in production until second half of 2015) and were very loudly tooting their own PR horn last week while a doing this really really big brown stinky PR vapor promise session. <BRAPP> <poot> <poot> <poot> <poot> ....... goes the Intel PR Department Yep, they were a saying they were gonna be gettn' a whoppin' big 4% improvement in processor speed -- Wowsers Batman !!! Holy Bat-Rope Intel -- jest go hang yerself with all the 10s of billions you spent to get a lousy 4% speed improvement !!! ::) Intel's finest effort to date -- note the solid gold trim and other deluxe features ..... like it is only a dual core processor right now for example. ..... bonus features like the huge non-integrated ~ 1"x 2" sized daughter-board containing a separate CPU and a separate GPU chipset (and none of the other required elements of an SOC). http://https://iq.intel.com/files/2015/01/5th_Gen_Intel_Core_processor_with_Intel_Iris_graphics_package.jpg ..... so, in response, today Samsung begins shipping in volume their 8 core COMPLETE SYSTEM ON A CHIP 14nm version of the Exynos 7 big/LITTLE octa core chipset. This is a 20nm to 14nm lithography improvement that is worth 20% better processing speeds and 35% better battery life than the 20nm version (which itself was worth a 55% throughput improvement over 28nm). http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/exynos-7-octa-14nm.jpg Factual: Samsung is running off the 14nm Apple A-9 for this year as we speak on their original two 14nm lines which will totally tie those lines up for the summer, but they got another 14nm line up and working now and are now doing some of their own chipsets and actually doing some chipsets for other players (like Qualcomm) who are willing to pay for getting into 14nm a half a year early. And the fourth 14nm Samsung line is due up by summer ..... and Global foundry will be putting up their own two 14nm lines around the same time Intel finally gets itself into real production and starts shipping their jest wonderful new 4% more efficient stuff to a world that really won't want it at all unless it is VERY strongly price discounted and Intel pays all the Tech Support $$$ for all the stuff that isn't on the chipset that has to be added to the motherboard. Officially, as of this time Intel no longer has any sort of "technical lead" to brag about at all and Intel is actually behind the leading ARM players as far as basic lithography and advanced SOC design goes. Next year this time Samsung will be shipping 10nm Apple A-10x laptop class chipsets to Apple off of these same lines while Intel is still ramping up on their 14nm stuff and maybe possibly (after 4 years of trying) will have actually made their very first 28nm integrated cell phone SOC by that point in time (done for them by somebody else). Wowsers, Batman !!! ;) Alas, poor Intel, we knew them well ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/16/15 at 08:19:49 This is in the nature of a prediction type question. Intel keeps you locked in to their processor types by tying you totally into the MS Windows system and CISC processing, etc. etc. etc. The relentless march of computing down into Chrome Space has forced MS to start supporting ARM chipsets as a "native windows format zone" starting later on this year. ARM chipsets are as powerful as Intel Core i3 last year and are as powerful as some of Core i5 right now and will be as strong as some of the Core i7 by next year. ARM is creeping into all of Intel's home markets, from the bottom side up. Intel has no presence in Mobile right now unless it is a "contra revenue" price supported product. Nada, zip unless they literally give it away and then pay the vendor some "tech support" bribes to get them to use it. Mobile is slowly taking over all the internet viewing, personal communications and casual gaming and other traditional functions of mainstream PC, with the sole exception of WORK RELATED ITEMS which tend to remain PC only at this time. (this is changing, BTW) The Intel house of cards is built by overcharging for all upper end products, all business uses and any larger more powerful chipsets and rolling that money over into price supports for lower end products. As more products roll into the price supported class, fewer price inflated full price stuff is available to support the Intel "rob Peter to pay Paul" activities on the lower end. Intel had to restructure at the end of this last fiscal year (literally changed it all up during the fiscal roll up for the year) so they could try to hide how just bad their real situation is at this point in time. Look to see Intel's frantic attempts to protect their core business this year as it is being threatened by the new ARM cortex A72 products and Apple's impending A-10x chipsets. As soon as Microsoft floats a real ARM native Windows 10 version and the playing field becomes flatter, look to see Intel start losing more home turf to the ARM hordes. Tegra K1 was just the very first of the Mongol Horde that is coming to see Intel. ::) ..... in the past 3 months the Tegra K1 broke up the Intel "contra revenue purchased monopoly" on ChromeSpace. And now here comes the Rockchip RK3288 chipset riding into ChromeSpace, firing a short Tartar saddle bow and swinging a curved sabre from horseback .... I am not the only one that sees the Intel house of cards starting to come down -- read what the Apple folks have to say about MS and Intel starting to go their separate ways. http://appleinsider.com/articles/15/01/07/after-intel-spent-billions-to-subsidize-40m-android-atom-tablets-microsoft-releases-office-only-for-arm "Intel's mobile chip division has lost $7 billion over the last two years while heavily subsidizing the manufacturing costs of Android tablet makers agreeing to use the chipmaker's Atom mobile x86 processors. Microsoft's new Office for Android won't run on any of them." What Apple is drawing attention to is Intel's forcing of a non-standard Android (Intel's own version) down everyone's throats by 7 billion dollars worth of Intel bribes and such -- totally wasted all that money since the products produced are a dead end at this point in time as neither Google Android nor Microsoft Win 10 are going to support them out into the future. Apple's deep concern is reflected in their recent full rewrite of Apple Mac OSx to run directly on their own ARM processors and the new dual quad core design and last weeks FULL PRODUCTION QUOTING of the 10nm Apple built A-10x laptop chipset ( ships in summer of 2016 ). Apple has lost faith in Intel and is making other plans. And Apple is already moving in on low cost laptop land to scoop up the large mass of business that Intel and MS are getting ready to let tumble to the ground. :-/ Intel, what stinky brown vaporous PR rabbits can you possibly poop out of your pants to take everyone's attention off that burning handwriting that just showed up on your living room wall ???? Barcelona Spain, World Mobile Congress on 2-5th of next month -- look to see more brown vapor blasts from Intel to try to distract from the real Apple and real ARM product announcements that will start to hit the ground in Barcelona next month. Watch for any breaking news of Apple's A-10x chipset -- this will be the start of the end for Intel if Samsung or TSMC builds it. Or else it will perhaps be the start of Intel's newest commercial venture with Apple, building 10nm ARM chipsets designed by Apple AT BELOW INTEL'S COST on Intel's very very best and newest lithography processes. What is that they say about beggars cannot be choosers ??? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/19/15 at 09:16:01 MEET THE TEGRA X1 http://www.cnx-software.com/2015/02/19/nvidia-tegra-x1-gets-about-75000-points-in-antutu/ http://www.cnx-software.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Tegra_X1_Antutu.jpg What does this mean? Nvidia tegra X1 built at 20nm goes up past the Intel Core i5 range up well into the Core i7 range of performance ..... and please note: the graphics are especially strong on this chipset. Folks are saying it is going to double the scores of the Tegra K1 -- and if it does EVEN CLOSE to this it will go past the majority of Intel's existing current 22nm offerings. (which is all that Intel really has to sell in any volume for the first half of this year). I expect to see a bunch of competitive re-rankings being done on this Tegra X1 and if this chipset goes into a Chromebook then the old $1,500 Google Pixel may finally be superseded at last .... by a $400 Tegra based unit. http://www.futuremark.com/hardware/mobile double your Tegra K1 to get your Tegra X1 ranking :) OK Intel, the bar is sitting at 75,000 on Antutu and the bar on all the other tests will be set shortly by the X1 and your chipsets will be re-ranked lower as each one of this generation of ARM superchips hits the street. And let's be downright flat scary to poor old Intel -- this Tegra X1 is at 20nm planar lithography, the simplest and lowest cost (most commonly available) "least demanding, quickest laydown" of the capabilities of that new lithography machinery that is going into ALL of the ARM foundries. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/22/15 at 18:16:14 http://www.anandtech.com/show/8991/intel-at-isscc-2015-reaping-the-benefits-of-14nm-and-going-beyond-10nm Intel explains why they were two years delayed in getting to 14nm (and still lack 8 months of a full production implementation) while claiming similar issues are present with 10nm ..... but it won't cause Intel any similar delay in reaching 10nm full production status. <POOOOOOT !!!!> whew !!! ::) "It was explained that while 10nm will have more masking steps than 14nm, and the delays that bogged down 14nm coming late to market will not be present at 10nm – or at least reduced. We were told that Intel has learned that the increase in development complexity of 14nm required more internal testing stages and masking implementations was a major reason for the delay, as well as requiring sufficient yields to go ahead with the launch. As a result, Intel is improving the efficiency testing at each stage and expediting the transfer of wafers with their testing protocols in order to avoid delays. We were quoted that 10nm should be 50% faster to market than 14nm was as a result of these adjustments. (wow, 50% faster is only a year late) So while the additional masking steps at 10nm which ultimately increases fixed costs, Intel is still quoting that their methods results in a reducing in terms of cost per transistor without needing a completely new patterning process." Well, that's good Intel because you got no "new patterning process" to get to 7nm to give out any information to anybody about. You got nothing beyond what you got for 14nm. Samsung will do 10nm for Apple using the tech Samsung just developed for Apple on Apple's dime. Samsung will be searching for Apple's next 6-7nm process starting this summer, even while they are building the 10nm Apple A-10 and A-10x using two more passes on the existing production equipment they are already running the 14nm A-9 upon as we speak. Speed and cost will go up together past 14nm -- count on it. http://images.anandtech.com/doci/8991/Slide%205%20-%20Moores%20Law_575px.png |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/23/15 at 07:46:12 http://liliputing.com/2015/02/intel-moores-law-isnt-dead-yet-7nm-chips-are-in-the-works.html Intel is getting lambasted by their PC press critics for letting ARM get into 14nm real production before Intel could do it (given that they had two uncontested years in which to pull it off but they always promised they would arrive there every six months or so). This is in my eyes a clear case of Intel's throwing vaporous brown clouds of stinky BS out years ahead of time instead of keeping their mouths shut until they actually get ready to do something. But what does Intel immediately go do ??? Counter the criticism with another brown butt blast that is maybe 2-3 years out (if they can ever get past 10nm that is). Intel: Moore’s Law isn’t dead yet… 7nm chips are in the works But things could slow down one day as the costs of manufacturing ever-more-densely-packed chips increases. Intel representatives seem to think the chip maker can keep up with Moore’s law for at least a few more years though. "There’s only so far that you can go without dramatically increasing the costs of chip production though", and according to reports by PC World and AnandTech, Intel thinks that it can probably crank out 10nm chips in 2016 and 7nm processors in 2018 without hitting a wall. This is of course in direct conflict with what Intel said yesterday -- that there will be low production speed / high scrap levels / total cost barriers that will stop everybody at 10nm pending some new technology coming on board. Could this be in response to the dip in Intel stock prices that took place after the last wave of Samsung 14nm announcements and Apple 10nm A-10x announcements followed by Intel saying it is going to take them 2+ years to go down to the 10nm level when Apple/Samsung supposedly will go there next summer? FACTS: Intel has tried for four years to make a phone chip and they consistently have come out with bribe supported non-integrated stuff that is a year behind the pack technically. Intel's CISC low end chip designs do not perform as well as ARM RISC designs on the same class of lower end products (and this is now extended to the mid ranked chipsets by ARM's latest design releases as exemplified by the Tegra X1) Intel has no competitive new Chromespace chipset PERFORMANCE-WISE at this point in time. They have thrown MASSIVE $$$ BRIBES at the various Chromebook suppliers to get them to use their existing less than optimal chipsets and have attempted to stop Rockchip from going forward with a more advanced RK3288 Chromebook by offering them "the whole world of Intel 22nm tech" (which turned out to be rusted Whitworth sockets and spanner wrenches when Rockchip finally got into that big red tool box). People no longer believe all of what Intel says it will do because it never happens. Where is Sophia? Been 3 years now and no integrated cell phone chipset from Intel ..... But it is clear that the Intel 2 year design Tic Tok cycle is too slow to keep up with their ARM based competitors and as of this point in time INTEL IS BEHIND THE 8 BALL and is falling further and further behind year on year on year. :P |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/25/15 at 19:34:26 http://liliputing.com/2015/02/intel-atom-x3-x5-and-x7-chips-on-the-way.html IN THE LAST WEEK .... 1) Nvidia Tegra X1 announces, with amazing new performance gains (2x to Tegra K1) placing it in the Intel Core i5 group performance-wise 2) Samsung announces full production of 14nm die shrunk Exynos with 35% gains over the last years 55% gains, which parks it up in the upper end of the Intel Core i3 range. 3) AMD announces Carrizo with 40% less power required to do 3.5 times faster video processing (an effective and good total redesign of their 28nm mobile chipset that can then be die shrunk later to 14nm for even greater gains) Everybody announced something pretty durn neat this week, this being the big "leak" week leading into the Barcelona Worldwide Mobile show ...... ....... except for poor 'ol Intel, who proudly announced a renaming plan for their existing 22nm tablet chipsets. (name classes to be good for any real new ones when they actually do come through though in reality). It's like they didn't want anyone to have to guess which over-priced chipsets were paying the big bribe money to get you to use the "new" Atom mobile series chipsets when they actually do get here .... http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/atom-branding.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/25/15 at 20:09:13 Prediction: Intel is in such a bad way going into 14nm that they are going to have to jump over to "wish talking" about 10nm almost immediately to get everybody's mind off their current troubles. Harsh reality is so far 14nm has not yielded even a 10% throughput improvement for the 14nm Intel CISC chipsets shown so far -- so in harsh reality Intel may need to press on to 10nm as fast as possible. Also, from the PR perspective if Intel doesn't start brown vaporizing 10nm in a very large fashion RIGHT NOW then Samsung/Apple may totally reality lap Intel with the first real 10nm production Exynos chipset which might pop out in reality early as [perhaps] this fall ..... ::) It's not like they just didn't reality lead Intel on 14nm full functional SOC production just this past week ..... Remember, Samsung is going to be barrelling right along into the 10nm production runs for Apple A-10 and A-10x just as soon as the Apple A-9 is fulfilled early this summer. It will take Samsung that long to build enough of them since 10nm will be that much slower to produce. Also, if the current 14nm lines are indeed the ones that will be used for 10nm, then for Samsung/Apple the possibility for dropping in a mix of 14nm and a few (relatively high cost) 10nm Samsung Exynos chip runs are completely possible by late this fall. Be aware that the canny Oriental players and AMD are sticking with the lowest cost simple planar lithography processes and ARE REDESIGNING CHIPSETS to get their 2015 year throughput improvements. This group includes AMD and NVIDIA and ALLWINNER and MEDIATEK who will run in the main on 28nm and 20nm planar (with very very few finer lithography process runs being required by these guys this year as they see no compelling competitive reason yet to do so). Good news is better tuned designs are more efficient and when they get die shrunk later on they tend to do very very well. So, the world splits at 20nm which is low cost fast planar lithography vs the 3-D lithography FinFet world of 16nm and 14nm and 10nm which is very very costly and slow to run right now. Apple is the only one who can afford to jump to 14nm across the board right now and still make some firm plans to go 10nm next year. Even Apple may get caught out doing some more "partial moves" next year as TSMC isn't able to do 14nm at all right now and Apple has already contracted for all the 14nm/10nm capacity that Samsung has to give them. Will 10nm be a bridge too far for a full changeover in just one year's time? This lack of capacity for 10nm for next year may force more partial moves on Apple's part (such as the joint production at 16nm and 10nm that is predicted for next year) until more foundry players get up to speed on 14nm and 10nm. ARM had a plan bult around 16nm for this year, then 14nm next year and then 10nm following that. TSMC seems to be following ARM's slower plan since what ARM designs for is what gets built in bulk. Samsung has to support Apple, so they will roll ahead of ARM's schedule accordingly. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/27/15 at 02:35:53 Phones don't need any more raw power -- Mid level phones are better than high end phones were two years ago and LOW level phones are equal to better to what the mid range phones used to be. You can buy a 4.5" screen quad phone for $150 new and a really nice 5.0" screen octacore phone for $200-$250. Phones need lower cost good screens and better longer lasting batteries, not more powerful SOC's. The endless upgrade thing is only really working for Apple right now, and there are some signs that that is faltering too ..... High end Windows Laptops and Desktops don't even need to be. There is nothing a mid level Laptop/Desktop cannot do except be "sweeter" in the eye of the beholder. All your really trendy upper end folks are now running a MacBook Pro instead and have simply fallen completely out of their old Windows habit. ChromeZone needs help though -- there is intense make or break competition in the ChromeZone. Most of the new sales this year will happen in the ChromeZone or a level just above it as people scope out the very best deals possible. Intel and MS are spending support money in the ChromeZone like nobody's business since if they did not spend that money to have that almost controlling presence they think they might just disappear in a few years. And they are right ..... because Tegra K1 is proving they can lose position in that space VERY quickly when they are not truly competitive price/feature wise even after all the support money & bribes. Microsoft's problem is their software -- is isn't Chromezone friendly at this time AT ALL. MS OS is too fat and porky and all choked up with pre-installed crap. Intel's problem is cost -- even their cheapest 22nm stuff is priced 1.5 times more than the ARM competition and is requiring LOTS of giveaway this and that and some serious ongoing direct bribes to even get put into a new product. When the bribes falter, the price shoots up and the production just plain stops. Intel's next deeper problem is the old CISC vs RISC compatibility issues that have NOT gone away. If you buy an Intel based Android tablet you are not getting a stock Android device that is auto upgradeable, what you get is a Intel modded Android version that you are trusting the Oriental vendor to keep up with with all the fiddly tweekie upgrades (which ain't happening). MS made lots of noises about going into ARM in a big way, but just like Win 8 and Win 8.1 and Win RT the big MS promises are coming up more and more empty the closer we get to it. Win 10 is smelling more and more like a "multiple variety set of programs" the closer it gets to finishing out. Nadella keeps slapping his boy's punkin haids and telling them to do better, but that second, already twice postponed two year late deadline is coming up soon and the unified stuff still isn't ready. So, MS, fall back some for release in Spring of 2016, MS ??? Trim some more fat, get rid of the adware and GET SOME RESPONSE SPEED back into those ChromeKiller class of machines before you go throw them dice out there on to the craps table ??? Or go for it this fall and mebbe have it flop again? Choices, choices ..... ::) Google is jest waiting for you to finally finish your Win 10 up so they can one-up you with that big shiny ChromeDroid they just stuck out on their front lawn, you know. They got their Pixel 2 in progress, jest a waiting fer ya to finish up. The computer press ain't your buddy no more (not even the ones with the word Windows actually in their name) and your trial separation from your old Wintel marriage seems to have Intel going out and dating this cute lithe agile little Android chickie pretty heavy of late. It is said he's been putting his RISC'y pieces up inside her and she's jest a gigglin' so they must be getting along pretty good together. Nadella sez "Trim the fat, get some quick in there !!!" and MS's programmers are trying hard, but quick ain't so easy when you start out this much overweight .... plus if you are told to also support old hardware that makes it practically impossible to do. Apple periodically dumps all their old hardware support-wise and writes a brand new thin quick software that just supports the new quick hardware -- MS, is this what you will eventually have to do? Win 10 for ARM sounds like an excellent time/place to do just that -- dump all the cruft and go for the small and quick. http://kozepsuli.hu/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/funny-video-fat-girl.jpg it ain't fat, buddy, it's compatability layers .... :-/ ..... MS, it kinda makes an old fat wrinkly & pudgy ex-married CISC gal feel all lonesome and alone at night, don't it ??? ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 02/28/15 at 09:56:21 http://liliputing.com/2015/02/bye-bye-bloatware-lenovo-promises-cleaner-safer-pcs-superfish-fallout.html Now, apart from MS's own issues the PC is saddled with bloatware, junk software that the OEM is paid to pre-install on your new machine and in many cases to blend into your installation in ways so you cannot easily remove it. Lenovo just got burned by their bloatware. Read up on the Superfish fiasco and realize that this is so much a part of the Windows scene now that it by itself has become a reason not to buy a Windows machine. Down in the chromezone the Windows based Chromekillers are being shipped so crapped up with bloatware that ALL of their scant resources are being used up right off the bat and the new HP Chromekiller users are having to tell each other on AMAZON how to get the bloatware off of the machine before it can be actually useful for real work. Microsoft is not the entire Windows issue, the whole Windows vendor chain and their money grubbing habits are causing brand new machines not to work well. :-? Yes Virgina, there is a pay me app for that .... just one more anti-virus type scan to add to your monthly Windows maintenance plan. http://www.pcdecrapifier.com |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/01/15 at 08:41:06 http://liliputing.com/2015/03/mediateks-new-chips-include-the-first-arm-cortex-a72-processor.html MediaTek’s new chip includes the first ARM Cortex-A72 processor http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/cortex-a72.jpg MT8173 quad-core tablet chip "This processor is is a quad-core chip that combines two high-performance Cortex-A72 CPU cores with two more energy efficient Cortex-A53 CPU cores. All told, MediaTek says the processor should offer up to 6 times the performance of the MT8125 quad-core ARM Cortex-A7 processor the company introduced in 2013. The processor supports ARM’s big.LITTLE technology to pair the Cortex-A72 and Cortex-A53 CPU cores so that tablets can just tap the processor cores they need… but the chip supports using up to all 4 cores at once. Features of this new processor include support for clock speeds up to 2.4 GHz, PowerVR GX6250 graphics with support for WQXGA displays and OpenGL ES 3.1 and support for devices with 20MP cameras. MediaTek says this new processor is now available to customers for sampling. We should start to see tablets featuring the chip in the second half of 2015." Key Takeaway is that this Mediatek quad core processor will have 6 times the processing capability of the existing quad core chipsets when produced at 20nm. Smaller lithography will only make performance better, and in time that will come. ""MT8173 highlights the significant shift in how mobile devices, such as Android tablets, are used and, with the combination of ARM's latest technology, we are delivering a platform that answers the growing demand for improved mobile multimedia performance and power usage. By presenting CPU specs that outperform any other device currently on the market, we are bringing PC-like performance in a tablet form factor, which reinforces MediaTek's continued commitment to deliver premium technology to everyone across the globe," said Joe Chen, Senior Vice President of MediaTek." Intel, did you hear that? Mediatek is leading the rest of the Mongol Horde with something that OUTPERFORMS 6x style and smells PC-like. If your old ex-spouse MS gets mad at you and comes out with a totally new light lithe Win 10 for ARM your arse may be in trouble. http://kozepsuli.hu/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/funny-video-fat-girl.jpg ..... jilt me will ya, send me separation papers ..... I'm gonna slim down good & replace you with a fresh young 10nm ARM SOC and get me EIGHT smokin' hot loads of them fresh drippy risk'y bits all at the same time ..... no more of that slow little & limp CISC type stuff from you that just doesn't get my job done. Ha !!! With all 8 ARMs working me hard and coring away that will likely do me just fine. It'd be so good I could bottle it and sell it. Yeah, bottle it and sell it ..... "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned ...... " |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/01/15 at 10:42:57 http://bgr.com/2015/03/01/galaxy-s6-specs-galaxy-s6-edge-specs-samsung/ http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_s6-6849.php http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/samsung-galaxy-s6.jpg Oh my ..... Samsung just announced the Galaxy S6, with a 14nm Exynos Octacore big/LITTLE chipset, 3 gigs of systems memory and up to 128 gigs of storage memory. With a wrap around the edge on both sides screen that has 16 million colors and a resolution so far past Apple Retina levels it doesn't even have a neat sounding moniker yet. 1440 x 2560 pixels (~577 ppi pixel density) is that QHD? http://cdn.bgr.com/2015/02/galaxy-s6-galaxy-s6-edge-specs.jpg?w=624 And unlike Intel, Samsung is shipping a 14nm fully integrated 64 bit chipset RIGHT NOW in a somewhat commanding finished product and it will go on sale everywhere next month, April 10th. Real, not brown vapor. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/01/15 at 13:05:32 http://liliputing.com/2015/03/lenovo-miix-300-windows-tablet-launches-this-summer-for-149.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/lenovo-miix-300.jpg It's funny, Lenovo is at the Barcelona World Mobile Congress show proudly outing a 10" Windows tablet that only costs $150 and all the PC press people in attendance were all going "Oooooh !! Wonderful !! " at it while the one mobile press guy that was there at the announcement snorted and left, turning away in disgust from his ignorant PC press brothers who were making all the gushy noises during the presentation. One of the comments he made in leaving was sorta strange "Been to Walmart lately?" and it piqued my interest enough to go look. Uh, $150 is like triple the price of what is selling right now at your local Walmart. http://www.walmart.com/ip/38364386?productRedirect=true http://i5.walmartimages.com/dfw/dce07b8c-88de/k2-_07f01d88-e6ec-49e6-b773-60fa580f5ac0.v1.jpg About this item: "The Double Power ultra-fast tablet PC featuring Google Mobile Services keeps you connected with the rest of the world through its built-in WiFi. The Android 4.4 (KitKat) operating system supports a variety of applications. You can enjoy your favorite videos/movies, music and photos on the large 7.85-inch screen with 1024 x 768 HD resolution. Download and enjoy popular apps and games from the pre-installed Google Play Store with nearly 1 million apps to choose from. With 16GB of storage memory, there is ample space for downloads and 1GB of system memory allows you to download and store music, images, videos, eBooks and more. Connect and enjoy video on your HDTV via HDMI. A custom case and USB keyboard are included." And yes, this Broadcom processor equipped Oriental Android unit comes with the folio and the keyboard and with windowing software and office apps and etc. etc. etc. all for $59 and that is normal pricing without somebody giving away the processor and the software for free. And Walmart is indeed selling four other bigger, more powerful processor & slightly more expensive units than this one, with bigger screens and they do seem to be better made and better integrated. None of them get up to half the cost of the "ooooh !!!" Lenovo Windows bare tablet though. Folks, this stuff is creeping up from the bottom end faster and faster and faster all the time. Sneaking up on us, being sold in local stores, getting real. And no, the Lenovo unit does run Windows and that makes it two to three times better and worth the 2x-3x higher price, right? :-/ What happens when Win 10 for ARM hits the streets late this fall or early next summer? Say MS has been BS'ing us all along and has no actual plans to ever do an ARM WIN 10 at all, ever -- what happens when the Android/Chrome fusion hits the streets this fall or next spring actually running lickty split fast on the then current crop of even more powerful mobile chipsets? You can't overcome a 2-3x price differential with bribes, the math just doesn't work out. You simply can't steal enough $$$ from Peter to pay Paul at those 2x-3x levels. :-? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/01/15 at 13:34:56 Hey man, you gotta have a big enough hard drive to make that Chromebook/Android stuff work for me, you know that, right? I can't be trusting no cloud drive to hold my personal stuff. Until you get up over 200 gigs of local storage it just isn't good enough for my mainstream uses .... Ok .... http://liliputing.com/2015/03/sandisk-launches-the-first-200gb-microsd-card.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/sandisk-200.jpg Does your current spinning platter hard drive transfer data at a consistent 90 megabytes per second? And remember, 300 gigabytes and 110 megabytes per second transfer rates are only a lithography die shrink away (and we go two of those coming up in the next year or so). ;) .... well, if you must have more -- could you (would you) trust a USB 3.0 two terabyte usb pocket drive from Seagate ?? Or else have 2-3 of the micro sized SD cards stuck inside your carry case -- one for each major topic that you deal with? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/02/15 at 07:45:04 Intel Outs its full plan for Mobile (in addition to initially making its own 14nm versions of Cherry Trail, Intel starts sourcing more ARM CHIPSETS from TSMC/Rockchip/Spreadtrum) http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/atom-x_04.jpg Intel cannot compete with ARM prices. Intel must "beat them or join them" at this stage of the game and has come up with a way to try to do both. Intel will compete only at the Atom x7 level with "discrete component" chipsets (ie non-integrated Intel designs) that they initially build themselves. At Atom x3 level Rockchip ARM standard products will be re-name branded as Intel. This isn't pretty and ARM Holdings may have something to say about whenever Intel PR brown clouds ARM intellectual property as their own. Intel and Rockchip have to be careful not to violate the terms of their licenses. So, Intel is now the equivalent of Qualcomm and Samsung, somebody who licenses ARM designs and tweeks them a bit. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/atom-x_02-e1425308058846.jpg In the chart just above Intel starts their new bout of lying at the Atom x3 level .... Intel color codes the processor as being "their design" yet it uses Mali graphics and ARM standard cores. Atom x5 likely has more Intel inside it, but it is mostly undefined at this time. Also please notice that only one of the new Atom x7 chipsets has a 4G radio in it ...... this plan is obviously aimed mostly at Asia and opening markets. Intel knows the American phone market is upscale and in that market they have no phone chip at all. WHAT DOES THIS SIGNIFY ??? Intel is going to stop wasting money attempting to build cell phone chipsets. After 4 years of beating their heads bloody up against the wall they will now only attempt to make a few cases of non-integrated low upper end stuff in their own facilities (can you say tablet and Chromespace chips) and will simply buy everything else fully integrated from somebody else. They are taking the first steps down the path that AMD tread, driven by the exact same necessities. Look to see Intel's foundry ranking decline as they make fewer and fewer chips themselves. ==================================== Also note, Intel is defining away both Sophia and Cherry Trail by referencing the terms to their new naming system (by doing so they obliviate all the promises made in the past that obviously will never come to reality now). "The Intel Atom x3 line of chips are aimed at entry-level devices which could sell for as little as $75 or even less. These chips will be based on Intel’s SoFIA platform and include low-power processors and integrated modems. More powerful chips based on the new Cherry Trail architecture will be branded with the Intel Atom x5 or Atom x7 names for mid-range and higher-performance systems." Intel has not announced a single new processor, but has announced a renaming of the entire line. a line that incorporates other people's products and a complete retreat from all past promises of internal progress. At 14nm Intel is a failure, having come to the mobile market part of a year late and only offering a 4% processor speed improvement and still being non-integrated on their own Intel built designs. Intel will now begin to tout other people's production and designs ..... which means they tacitly admit their own stuff isn't up to snuff and that they are giving up. Today, Intel becomes just another USA name branding company, similar to what HP has become. With Motorola, IBM, AMD, HP and now Intel starting to exit domestic chip manufacturing then this signals the beginning of the short strokes at the end of the Silicone Valley era of USA based computing. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 03/02/15 at 09:23:15 Was snooping around on you tube looking at the reviews for the RCA tablet I bought. Lots of folks are commenting on my video and saying their RCA 10 pro is dead or has died or won't power on any longer. Seen a video about the 7" version from a news station. I guess last year they sold a lot of RCA tablets that the batteries expanded. They are the foil pouch battery packs and if left charging for a long time, they will expand due to a heat reaction. Also found out that the company RCA does not exist any longer, it is just a bunch of Chinese corporations that own rights to the name and use it to produce the products. So I guess what i'm saying is.... if its cheap and Chinese.... hope like heck you get a GOOD ONE. ;D Mine is still running great by the way.... I use it on a daily basis. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/02/15 at 10:08:53 I think the best way to store a battery anything these days is fully charged and TURNED TOTALLY OFF. Never leave stuff on charge for weeks at a time -- it destroys the battery. Fully charged, then turn them off and store them off. Periodically take them out and charge them back up every 3 months or so ..... if you can remember to do that. Old_Rider, how is the performance of your Chinese cheapie ARM Android "laptop" compared to your Windows laptops in doing normal day to day type stuff? Folks need to realize that the "day to day stuff" ARM/Windows performance gap has narrowed to near zero and the ARM/Windows performance gap is indeed verging on going the other way now ..... as Win 8.1 is still WAY WAY WAY too fat slow and porky and the ARM stuff is constantly getting quicker and more powerful. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 03/02/15 at 17:12:25 Well, even though the RCA PRO 10 is only a "tablet with keyboard", the dang thing is amazingly fast. I don't play games on the RCA PRO, but they do play smoothly (tried several just for giggles), I use it mainly for web browsing, and reading. I use my 17inch HP Pavilion Laptop with AMD A10 (Elite quad core), Windows 8.1 while i'm sitting in the living room. Everywhere else, I use the RCA PRO 10 tablet with ARM cortex A9 (quad core) with kit kat 4.4.2 And really the only differences in the two is.... the HP has a cd/dvd player, and the keyboard on the HP is easier to use because it is a normal size, well that and the 17" monster screen. Of course storage size on board is totally different (500gb vrs 16gb), but I added a 32gb mini sd (max) and can use several memory sticks for the tablet to use as storage. I did not buy the RCA PRO 10 to replace the laptops just "supplement" them on a daily basis, but if one of my laptops breaks down, I will probably not buy another one, unless they haven't broken the memory barrier for the tablets, then to play my monster games i'll have to. And my games are the only reason I have a laptop or PC, I have to have massive storage and tons of video memory. The ease of use, compact size, fewer accessories, and less weight makes a tablet with keyboard an equal to a laptop. The RCA PRO using chrome is actually faster on web browsing than my laptop using windows IE.... the android system rocks. With everything on the net now (movies, games, music), I don't see how laptops or pc's are going to live much longer. They are doing wonders with memory now.... smaller size and larger memory.... they are selling 128gb memory sticks in wally world now... and you showed the 200gb micro, only thing is, most tablets cannot handle any more than a 32gb micro, but I am sure the Chinese since they make both the tablets and memory will soon make them compatible. Oh and as an add.... I paid $650 at Walmart for the HP Pavilion 2 years ago and only paid $89 for the tablet. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/03/15 at 10:10:21 7C7F77617A777661130 wrote:
Well said. My new little phone is a ho-hum quad A-7 and it is faster doing simple things than my desktop unit, which is just amazing to me. Windows 10 for ARM is now at the first level internal "dogfood" stage, where MS programmers are required to carry and use an ARM Win 10 phone 100% of the time so they get their noses constantly rubbed in what needs fixing. Nadella is personally doing likewise and I bet his problems do get fixed ASAP. This is good -- I hold no real hopes for the CISC processor main PC version ever getting lighter or quicker since so much "compatibility layer" fat has to be maintained with it. I am looking to Win 10 ARM to be the future of MS's OS products. Since the decision was already made to JUST PLAIN DROP all the RT back history stuff, Win 10 arm can be written specifically for new 64 bit ARM products and it can get a small light quick start position (in as much as MS can ever do that sort of stuff). Also, the mobile/tablet apps are "universal" type apps that carry just what they need, always depending on the version of Win 10 that is on the device to supply the rest. So, device makers will likely get free to cheap Win 10 that matches up well with ARM chipsets and any MS "Universal" app will run on the device. Quickly, I hope. I look to see a crop of monitor looking desktop PCs be born immediately at very reasonable prices since phone components will live inside the monitor case right on the monitor board pieces. The TV makers are already doing this with Android already on most modern TVs ..... this will be an easy do item, not a bridge too far at all for all the monitor and TV makers. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 03/03/15 at 12:34:53 It looks as though i'm going to be off a little on the "Information station".... which will take the place of your 60" LED Smart TV in the future. It will be another 5 years.... Yup, look for the cable companies to start pushing phone tech into the TV's with integrated mic's and camera's for regular calls and skyping right from your living room. Along with what they can already do now, if they add a hard drive to it and more usb's, you will have a pc too..... Yup a total information station..... And I believe that the next generation of tablets will include cell tech..... won't that be a blast! |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/05/15 at 07:00:53 Acer launches a Chromebox with Core i3 Haswell http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/acer-chromebox_01.jpg "The new Acer Chromebox CXI-i34KGM features an Intel Core i3-4030U dual-core processor, 4GB of RAM, and 16GB of storage and sells for $350. There’s also an Acer Chromebox XXI-i38KGM model with 8GB of RAM and a $400 price tag. Both models feature 802.11a/b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth 4.0, Gigabit Ethernet, four USB 3.0 ports (including two that can charge a phone or tablet even when the Chromebox is turned off), a microSD card slot, and HDMI output with support for 4K displays. Like most Chromeboxes, the the Acer CXI is a compact PC with a case that measures just 6.8[ch8243] x 5.5[ch8243] x 2.3[ch8243]. Acer isn’t the only company to offer a Chrome OS desktop with a Core i3 Haswell processor. Dell and Asus also have models with similar chips. But Acer is one of the first companies I’m aware of to offer a model with 8GB of RAM." While the Win 8.1 Bing OS ChromeBoxKillers sputter along with their lack of resources and slow for the OS processors, a new phenomena has cranked up -- what can you do if you spend the same money on a Chromebox that you would spend on an "adequately tricked out" ChromeBoxKiller? Instead of getting just a little Win to spread thinly across your bread what do you get with a whole whoppin' big load of Chrome for the same money? Well, all three of the major makers have one now and they do have enough sales going on with the superchromeboxes to keep on making them. And ChromeOS is developing "power users" to buy them. :) Americans and their power tools, ya gotta love them. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/08/15 at 21:37:05 http://www.pcworld.com/article/2890812/mediatek-wants-to-put-its-chips-in-chromebooks.html http://www.omgchrome.com/expect-broadwell-chromebooks/ MediaTek and Rockchip and Intel http://d0od.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/broadwell-processor.jpg Intel has now rolled out its 14nm "high end" ChromeWar chipset, with no integration beyond a separate 22nm video chip on board with a lackuster less than 10% speed improvement, but with some battery life improvement and some 10-20% video speed improvement. It is a flop from the gate, being already pre-overcome by all the new big new guns from Tegra K1 and X1 and Mediatek and Samsung and Qualcomm. It is also quite expensive to produce, comparatively. So, Intel has to go buy a chipset to exist in the Chrome Wars the second half of this year since their next up chipsets are the Intel Core i3 stuff that are supposed to sell at a premium to PAY for the contra revenue spending down in the Chrome Zone. Core i3 isn't energy efficient enough for a Chromebook, so you will only see them showing up in the plug in the wall socket style Chrome Boxes. Somebody else's chipset is needed in the Chrome Book Zone, immediately. Or else a total redesign of the Broadwell 14nm chipset to render it competitive. Intel is known to be in talks with Mediatek to buy and rename brand their Helios X10 64 bit Octa Core product to use in the Chrome Book Zone. They have pushed Rockchip to go there too, but Rockchip is notoriously slow to go do things (more so after having been Intel'd already once). Some speculate Intel has offered tenders to buy Mediatek complete (or else a large chunk of it) as that is what Wall Street Pundits keep saying Intel should do (and have been saying it for years now). Intel's clumsy "can't succeed" has begun to lap over from phones and tablets to the Chrome Zone and they are starting to try to name brand other people's products in these "can't succeed" areas. Having mauled one Chinese name branding partner already, Intel is finding the next one harder to approach. Being able to buy a 20% share in Spreadtrum isn't floating Intel's boat very well as Spreadtrum only does very very low end ARM chipsets and that does not include the Chrome Book Zone. At 28nm ARM vendors were better than Intel was at 22nm. At 20nm ARM vendors are better than Intel is at 14nm. 16nm ARM will be a similar story to 20nm as far as Intel goes. 14nm fully integrated and past that point, ARM vendors are actually arriving there first and shipping production runs of finished products before Intel even gets into volume first chip production. Intel is going to have to "partner" with Chinese Chipmakers from now on in order to do anything significant past this point, which means their sourced chip product prices will have to carry two profit margins. Intel is rowing a very very leaky boat at this stage of the game and cannot keep up with the bailing and the paddling that is required and Intel is starting to flounder about not making a lot of progress. But they have enough money to flounder around for another 3-4 years, doing occasional downsizings, etc. Lots of PR noise, not much progress. :-/ ..... if Samsung and Apple produce 10nm chipsets before Intel does, it begins to look grim for Intel. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by jcstokes on 03/08/15 at 21:46:37 Oldfeller, does AMD chip maker still exist, or have they been relegated to the fries department? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/08/15 at 22:37:46 Nobody can buy AMD as a functional company because the "endless" x86 license that Intel granted to AMD so long ago would immediately evaporate. AMD only owns the ATI graphics patents and Intel has cross licensing rights to that (part of the last X86 legal settlement). You did notice Intel on board graphics got better lately, right? Functionally, Intel is sucking the blood out of AMD and with no money to spend AMD's last wonder-chip in Mobil wasn't very wonderful. It and the HP laptops it got put into flopped immediately. After one small run HP went over to Tegra K1 chipsets. AMD will just quietly go down the tubes sometimes in the next year or two as nobody can buy them because they are all twisted up with Intel. AMD sold all their foundry stuff (at the 32nm level) to the Global Foundry Consortium years and years ago and Global is still in business. actually doing better than AMD is actually. Global is "in consortium" with Samsung and IBM to develop 14nm processes and Global will crank up two of the Samsung style 14nm lines the second half of this year ...... ATI is still a viable part of AMD and ATI/Radeon is still a leader in low cost high value PCI Buss Video Cards -- but the PCI Buss Video slots and the desktops they went into are all going away at an amazing rate so that too is a dying business. Fries, within a year or so I am afraid ...... Last buy out rumor was a Chinese company that only wanted the ATI/Radeon stuff, but that arrangement really didn't go anywhere because Intel has cross licensing rights and Intel wants to be the only one left holding the ATI/Radeon IP when the music stops. Intel owned and co-owned IP is so interwoven into AMD/ATI/Radeon that it would be hard to not get sued by Intel over something or another if you did buy the tottering corpse and tried to actually use any of it. Likely Intel would wind up co-owning your IP as well. You would wind up donating neck blood to Intel ongoing just like AMD is doing now ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by jcstokes on 03/09/15 at 01:31:10 Sorry to hear that, my first computer brought in 2000 and running Windows 98se had an AMD chip and I really liked it. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Pine on 03/09/15 at 07:48:20 Fun Thread and I found this while doing taxes: http://https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-G6-JkL4n5Nw/VP2zsAzYAVI/AAAAAAAAB_c/vMLSHFdqmto/w565-h724-no/Computer%2B1997%2B-%2BCopy.JPG If I recall right, this was my first Pentium class and first AMD computer at home. I had used AMD 386 and am Intel 486SX. Every home desktop I have ever had since this one was been AMD. My current one which is now pretty old is first gen 8 core AMD ( 8120 I think). I have to agree though, I figure AMD is on the ropes and has been for along while. A freind tried to talk me into buying stock in AMD ( as he did) several years ago. No go. I figure it like this: AMD is the alternate Intel... but if Intel aint making big bucks... then AND is hurting big time. AMD has tried with the APU ( dumb idea if you ask me), and if I recall they also make other chips ( such that CPU's do NOT account for 100%) of revenue. I never did like the buy-out of ATI. And if it hadn't been for blockchain mining, the Radeon cards would have been losing tons of money. Don't get me wrong I own 7850 cards, and am using them to 24/7 for folding proteins. Shameless plus for Folding at home: http://folding.stanford.edu/ |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/09/15 at 08:02:02 A hundred pound tower, never had one that big. They made some big 'uns back in the day, didn't they? Shame is a phone or a tablet today has more processing muscle than those big fan noise boxes ever did. I can remember waiting MINUTES for my computer to boot and taking 4-6 hours to download a large file on my 24 baud modem ...... (with like 50-50 odds that it would be uncorrupted after I got it). ...... oh yes, them was the glory days of computing, weren't they? My first gun board was a phone modem based email back & forth board. It was called Shooters and it was the cat's meow, state of the friggin' art all the way. It went through 4 waves of change technologically, had the realm holders go broke twice (went to Abu Dhabi to live at a rich Arab's house once) and wound up in the end as Cast Boolits.com which survives today (strange spellings and all) although most of my old buds have died off one at a time over the years. You can still see traces of Oldfeller if you go there and hit the search function or look in the stickies. Or hell, just ask Google for an Oldfeller mold, my custom molds are still sold by Midsouth Shooters Supply. Computers and chatting with like minded people have been a large part of my amusement life throughout the second part of it. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/09/15 at 08:26:36 http://liliputing.com/2015/03/asus-zenfone-2-launches-in-china-for-158-and-up.html WOWZERS BATMAN --- HERE COME THE INTEL PHONES ...... Asus ZenFone 2 launches in Taiwan for $158 and up http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/zenfone-2_06.jpg "All four models feature Android 5.0 Lollipop software, Intel Atom processors, IPS displays with wide viewing angles, support for 4G LTE networks, Bluetooth 4.0, and microSD card slots. Here are the specs for each model available at launch: $158 Asus ZenFone 2 (ZE500CL) 5 inch, 1280 x 720 pixel display 1.6 GHz Intel Atom Z2560 Clover Trail+ processor 2GB RAM 16GB storage 8MP rear and 2MP front cameras 802.11b/g/n WiFI 2500mAh battery $190 Asus ZenFone 2 (ZE550ML) 5.5 inch, 1280 x 720 pixel display 1.8 GHz Intel Atom Z3560 Moorefield processor 2GB RAM 16GB storage 13MP rear and 5MP front cameras 802.11ac WiFI NFC 3000mAh battery $222 Asus ZenFone 2 (ZE551ML) 5.5 inch, 1920 x 1080 pixel display 1.8 GHz Intel Atom Z3560 Moorefield processor 2GB RAM 32GB storage 13MP rear and 5MP front cameras 802.11ac WiFi NFC 3000mAh battery $285 Asus ZenFone 2 (ZE551ML) 5.5 inch, 1920 x 1080 pixel display 2.3 GHz Intel Atom Z3580 Moorefield processor 4GB RAM 32GB storage 13Mp rear and 5MP front cameras 802.11ac WiFi NFC 3000mAh battery Keep in mind that all of these phones are unlocked, and the listed prices are converted from Taiwanese currency to US dollars. The prices could be a little different when the phones go on sale in US and Europe, and it’s not clear if all four models will be available in every market. I was reasonably impressed with the demo units I saw at CES in January, especially given the phone’s low price. I’d kind of suspected that Asus had been overpromising on the pricing front, but now that the phones are actually available it looks like the prices really are pretty close to what the company had promised." Here is the video review: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDJy2J_ldaE ::) Intel takes the field with a cost supported low end Android phone that looks like it actually works -- but will anybody buy them and will the Intel tweeked Android version actually get supported by anybody two years from now? Go buy one ...... and really, I do --- I expect that Intel will have more $$$ in it than you do ...... :D ..... and when the stockholders go looking for the real cost to produce it will be well well hidden up inside PC overall. Intel, the smoke and mirrors company. Substandard stuff, but well marketed. Contra-revenue is our speciality. We hide our real costs from everybody, including our stockholders. We pay our vendors well ..... and our PR releases lie like a rug. What shall the Antutu testing say ??? Being such a make or break, will Intel try to cheat on the Antutu testing yet again? Errant Thought -- HDMI out to a PC monitor and Bluetooth to a keyboard and mouse and you got yerself a dockable Android PC/Phone here. Ubuntu, eat yer heart out ..... wait, being so PC like I bet Ubuntu will already run on this phone. NOTE: Price has already jumped $100 on the 4 gig phone on day two of the announcement period. That smells about like standard Intel PR poo. They also had to use VR Graphics instead of the stock Intel graphics -- that is a docking station Ubuntu killer right there. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/09/15 at 09:43:18 http://www.phonearena.com/news/Asus-releases-the-Zenfone-2-slaps-sub-300-price-tag-on-the-4-GB-RAM-model_id66978 Asus releases the Zenfone 2, slaps sub-$300 price tag on the 4 GB RAM model http://drop.ndtv.com/TECH/product_database/images/39201560637PM_635_asus_zenfone_2_ze550ml.jpeg "ZE551ML (5.5[ch8243], 1080p display, 4GB RAM, 32GB) – 8990 NT$ (~US $285) ZE551ML (5.5[ch8243], 1080p display, 2GB RAM, 32GB) – 6990 NT$ (~US $221) ZE550ML (5.5[ch8243], 720p display, 2GB RAM, 16GB) – 5990 NT$ (~US $190) ZE550CL (5[ch8243], 720p display, 2GB RAM, 16GB) – 4990 NT$ (~US $158) This month, the Zenfone 2 models will travel to China, Hong Kong, Singapore and France, while next month they will be rolled out to India, Italy and Southeast Asia, while Brazil can expect it in June. Asus expects to turn a profit from the smartphone division this year, with a forecast of 17 million handsets shipped. The Zenfone 2 in question will be made by Pegatron, a total of 500,000 units have been ordered for March, then a million next month, and these can be scaled up to 3 million units a month if there is sufficient demand for the new handsets. Judging from those prices, demand will be there, so we can't wait to get the first 4 GB RAM unit in our shaky hands." Antutu ranking will be out shortly on the 4 gig model. Previous released Beta version of this phone (lesser screen rez) pulled a 50,000 on Antutu which outranked most all of last year's phones, but will be lacking compared to the top 5 in this year's pack. With a good docking station and 4 gigs of systems memory and 32 gigs of on board memory this phone at this $289 price may be a hit, and Intel you certainly need a hit phone right now. (even if Intel can't really afford all the price support dollars needed for a really really big hit --- watch the price shoot on up if it becomes popular) :) oooooh, change she comes ..... wait for it, wait for it -- Windows 10 and the video/keyboard/mouse docking station is needed to complete the mash up. Go Wintel !!!! Give Google and Android and Ubuntu something to shoot for !!! NOTE: Price has already jumped >$100 on the 4 gig phone on day two of the announcement period. That smells about like standard Intel sloppy PR poo. Also note the VR G6430 Graphics chip clarification blows up any possible compatibility with any alternate OS systems (VR Graphics is very non-open and will not get touched with a 10 ft pole by Ubuntu or any other distro). Intel has bought themselves a fairly high priced "show up" phone, in other words. When Intel backs away from the support dollars ASUS will stop producing the item -- ditto if it doesnt sell quickly enough at the new higher prices. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/10/15 at 08:30:21 OK, recap -- Intel has now shipped their 14nm chips to Apple only about a year later than originally planned and Apple is in current production on their next (and possibly last) set of Intel based laptops and desktops. Not much splash was done by Apple over these laptops and desktops. Why? Same reason you didn't hear about it for much -- there isn't much improvement out of the new Intel chipsets other than losing the fan and picking up an hour of laptop life. INTEL DID NOT GET ANY REALLY MASSIVE (GREATER THAN 10%) SPEED OR BATTERY LIFE IMPROVEMENT GOING FROM 22nm DOWN TO 14nm. In other words, Intel failed to meet their promises made to Apple. Furthermore, right now Intel has no firm game plan to go down to 10nm by next year. Apple and Samsung do have a firm 10nm plan and a laptop grade 10nm chipset design that is called an A-10x. Rumors are flying that Apple will run most of their lower end laptops using their own A-10x chipset next year. Rumor also has it that Apple will attack the Window laptop market at about the midpoint level with these same units, ..... and by selling them "inexpensively" Apple intends to carve out a serious chunk of "disgruntled user" PC space. Apple understands that Win 10 can't be any better than the Intel chipsets it is put on. Apple knows what Intel has to offer at 14nm (they just took shipment of it) and Apple sees an opportunity coming up this fall and next spring where they can do some real market share transfer from PC space to Apple space with a fast quick light "right priced" Apple laptop. Run faster, Intel. Program better and faster, Microsoft. Apple is coming ...... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/10/15 at 23:31:43 http://www.extremetech.com/computing/192893-the-first-core-m-laptop-paints-a-depressing-mediocre-picture-for-intels-broadwell The Lenovo’s Yoga 3 Pro, the first Core M laptop shipped paints a depressing, mediocre picture for Intel’s 14nm Broadwell http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/CInebench-Multi-CPU-Yoga-Pro-3-640x328.jpg Uh, Intel -- this thing is supposed to perform BETTER than last year's models, not a lot worse. "To say there’s a great deal riding on the launch of Intel’s Core M is something of an understatement. The chip — and Intel’s 14nm hardware — is nearly a year late. The delays have raised investor questions about Intel’s ability to maintain or leverage a technological advantage over its rivals, and while Intel’s own demos have looked amazing, these always take place on very friendly turf under controlled conditions. There’s no substitute for shipping hardware, and that’s why a great many eyes have turned to Lenovo’s Yoga 3 Pro — the first shipping device with Broadwell inside. Somewhat unfortunately, this critical first system doesn’t seem to live up to Intel’s hype. While many reviewers praise its diminutive size, low weight, and display quality, complaints about battery life, heavy throttling, and poor performance are common. Curiously, reviewers are completely split on whether or not the system even has a fan. Some reputable outlets make specific note that the computer lacks one, while others complain about the sound level. What everyone agrees on is that the system throttles constantly, possibly in part because Lenovo chose to set a 3.5W target for the chip rather than the 4.5W TDP that Intel specifies (the Yoga 3 Pro allows for bursts of up to 12W total system consumption, however). Lenovo’s claim of “up to nine hours” on battery life is farcical. WindowsCentral.com claims 5-6 hours, at the very most. PC Pro hit eight hours, but only by turning screen brightness to its lowest levels; turn brightness up and battery life plummets. UltraBookReview reports that under various workloads battery life ranges from 6 hours to 4 hours 40 minutes depending on workload. Part of the problem is Lenovo’s decision to equip a 44 watt-hour (Wh) battery — the 13-inch MacBook Air, which tends to be the go-to comparison for a system in this price range, has a 54 Wh battery. Various and sundry other problems with unclear causes Multiple reviewers have commented that the laptop runs remarkably poorly in Chrome, that its gaming performance is sometimes a regression over the Yoga Pro 2 and other Intel laptops, and that the Yoga Pro 3 is incontrovertibly slower than its predecessor. The overall picture painted by multiple reviews is of a product straining and gasping to manage more than a minimally acceptable level of performance. This is in direct opposition to the sleek, razor-thin Core M devices that Intel has previously demoed." When you read this, you will realize why Apple isn't touting their new "Intel Inside" laptops for very much -- they too are displeased with Intel's performance, severely late delivery and just plain screwing it all up again. Apple is indeed laying out contingency plans for the A-10X ARM processor, working to make sure it can spank Intel's best current through 2017 offerings as expressed by these sorts of results. Intel is making this easy to do -- since the new 14nm Intel stuff is no functional improvement over the old stuff (just costs a lot more to produce). More honesty and less hype out of Intel would have helped this introduction some as the battery was supposed to be the right size for this laptop, but instead the machine sucks just as much juice as a 22nm design current from 4 years ago and the machine offers very poor battery life off the "Core M sized battery" even with all the processor throttling that is going on to keep power usage down to a minimum. Apple sees Intel's 14nm stuff as a no-win so far .... and the Apple designed Samsung produced 10nm A-10x RISC design is looking more and more necessary for Apple to pursue for 2016-2017. This is the same sort of energy nanny foolishness Intel ran into when they first came to mobile space -- their then current mobile processor sucked too much energy, so they choked it down with an energy nanny chip WHICH HURT PERFORMANCE TO THE POINT THE CHIP UNDERPERFORMED COMPARED TO THE COMPETITION. ======================================= Intel's reaction one day later ...... "Why? Because laptop OEMs are gutless and sell on specs, not on experience. Because even when they build $1200 hardware, they infuse that price point with $300 thinking. Crank up the resolution, but use a panel with a bad color gamut. Slash the thickness, but gut the battery life. Charge four figures, but refuse to remove the spyware and shovelware that infest most OEM laptops like a bad case of fleas. Include a terrible webcam, because you can get away with saving 20 cents on the part. Improve the specs on individual parts, but don’t combine those improvements into superior products. I’m not saying Core M/Broadwell doesn't have a problem. It’s possible that these weak performance figures and throttling issues are either caused by Intel drivers or by overly aggressive chip positioning. More laptop launches and reviews will establish which of these is actually the problem, but if I had to bet, I’d bet that the issues are mostly on Lenovo’s side. The CPU/SoC, for all its complexity, is still just one component in a complex system — and too many of the laptop’s issues may have little to do with the CPU core. Wall socket power consumption suggests, for example, that the chip does draw 3-4W in light workloads — well in line with Intel’s estimates. Intel is investigating the issue and preliminary indications are that the situation may be partly resolved through a BIOS update. We’re in the process of reaching out to Lenovo and will update when we hear back." So, Intel is gonna fix it with a Bios Update. Right. We shall see. Also please note the tone of the article --- people in the reporting press are sick of Intel's constant smelly brown vapor poo and their playing dodgeball and spin doctor games with every bit of their factual information. Intel is getting its butt busted in this article and this is a sea change of how Intel has been treated for DECADES now. The flat disbelief being expressed here means Intel's credibility is shot -- and if you start to flat disbelieve Intel's PR machine then Intel has nothing to offer from this point forward. The computing press has flat raised their hands and challenged Intel during recent keynote speeches and during recent press briefings, no one is in the computing press is cutting Intel any slack when the PR boys start tossing the poo around any more. Intel stockholders are doing the same thing, to the point Intel had to restructure totally just a few months ago to hide horribly bad mobile results from their own stockholders. 14nm is going to be a bad bumpy ride for Intel ..... Look to see Brian Krantz replaced as CEO this year as part of the Board of Trustees reaction to this mess. MS was counting on 14nm Intel to make their porky slow OS move more quickly -- they had best ramp up their current efforts to slim ol bessy down to a whole new level as there isn't any MS speed and performance rescue coming from Intel 14nm so far. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/11/15 at 08:31:28 http://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/intel-core-m-5y70-broadwell-tested-benchmarked/ Digital Trends take on the Intel core M 5y70 Broadwell chipset [UPDATED] INTEL’S CORE M POWERS THE MACBOOK Update 3/9/2015 11:10AM: According to information released by Apple it appears the Core M-5Y70 tested here is the chip that’s powering the base model of the new MacBook. Sizing up our Core M chip "Keep in mind that Core M consists of a family of chips, not just one part. The one we got our hands on, the 5Y70, is the second most powerful Core M chip that Intel is launching as part of this wave of silicon. The Intel Core M-5Y70 is a dual-core chip clocked at 1.1GHz, with a Turbo Boost clock of 2.6GHz. Not only is this the fastest Core M chip that’s out now, it’ll only be 100MHz slower than the highest-end Core M chip that Intel is launching this year. The next chip up on the totem pole is the 5Y71. That CPU runs at 1.2GHz, sports a Turbo Boost clock of 2.9GHz, and is also a dual-core chip. Benchmark tests Using the Yoga 3 Pro as our test bed, we started with SiSoft Sandra’s Processor Arithmetic test. The Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro scored 29.33 GOPS. We compare that with the Yoga 3 Pro’s strongest and most direct competitor, which is the Dell XPS 13. That notebook earned a grade of 38.79 GOPS. The XPS 13 is spearheaded by a significantly more powerful Intel Core i5-4200U chip, which was also present in last year’s Yoga 2 Pro. Moving on, we next tested the Core M 5Y70 CPU in the Yoga 3 Pro using 7-Zip. The Yoga 2 Pro scored 7,080, and the Dell XPS 13 is neck and neck with it at 7,079. The Yoga 3 Pro’s Core M CPU was far behind, however, with a grade of 5,347. In Geekbench, the Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro earned a single-core score of 2,453, and a multi-core mark of 4,267. We didn’t use Geekbench when we reviewed the Yoga 2 Pro and Dell XPS 13, but we did use it with Lenovo’s Z40 notebook, which has the same Core i5-4200U processor that the 13 and the Yoga 2 Pro have. The Z40 earned a multi-core score of 4,628. The Intel Core M 5Y70 is clearly not built for strenuous workloads. If you keep multi-tasking under control, though, it should at least make for a passable computing experience. Graphics performance Processing power may not be the CPU’s forte, but how does the Core M’s Intel HD Graphics 5300 GPU get by? The Lenovo Yoga 2 Pro scored 3,889 in 3DMark Cloud Gate, and 579 in 3DMark Fire Strike. The Dell XPS 13 got 4,507 and 627 in the same tests, respectively. The Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro lags behind both significantly, with scores of 2,636 in Cloud Gate, and 376 in Fire Strike. Though the Yoga 2 Pro and the Dell XPS 13 don’t conquer these tests, they’re in a different league. Both have well over 1,000 points on the Yoga 3 Pro in 3DMark Cloud Gate, and scores that are at least 200 points higher in Fire Strike. Combine that with real-world performance, and you’ve got yourself a clear picture of what a graphics chip can do. We fired up League of Legends, a popular game that’s also the least demanding title we use to test GPUs. Forget about enjoying League of Legends with the Core M, at least on the Yoga 3 Pro. With League of Legends running at the display’s native resolution of 3,200 x 1,800, the game ran between 18, and 8 frames per second. The game’s visual details were set to Medium. For what it’s worth, we’re curious to see how Core M will fare on 720p and 1080p systems. We think it could manage at 1080p based on its 3DMark score, if only by the skin of its teeth. Better endurance - not hardly In the Peacekeeper Web browsing benchmark test, the Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro lasted only three hours and 44 minutes on a single charge. That’s a notable improvement of 30 minutes over the Yoga 2 Pro’s time of three hours and 14 minutes. Both notebooks have 3,200 x 1,800 displays. The Dell XPS 13 is in another league here, lasting seven hours and 48 minutes in the same test. Of course the 13 has a much less demanding 1080p display to work with. Since both Yogas are forced to push an extremely high amount of pixels, the battery is taxed significantly as a result. These days, 1080p is the sweet spot of display resolutions. That’s especially the case with laptops, where battery life has to be a key consideration when PC makers outfit their systems. As with graphics capabilities, we want to see what Core M can provide in a 720p or 1080p system. In the Yoga 3 Pro, however, no amount of CPU-centric power efficiency can save Lenovo’s latest from a poor battery life score. Better than it seems? The Intel Core M looks like a disappointment. It’s not as quick as previous Intel 4th-generation processors, and it doesn’t always lead to outstanding battery life. You might be wondering – what’s the point? Closer inspection, however, reveals there’s actually significant improvement here. Consider the multi-core GeekBench score of 4,267. That’s several hundred less than the an ultrabook with an Intel Core i5-4200U, but that 4th-generation processor has a quoted Thermal Design Power (TDP) of 15 watts. The Core M-5Y70 has a quoted TDP of 4.5 watts. On paper that means the Core M manages almost equivalent performance on a third of the power. In reality TDP does not translate to actual power draw (it’s a guideline for laptop manufacturers, not a benchmark), but in any case it’s clear the Core M consumes far less juice. That may be hard to believe given the Yoga 3 Pro’s poor battery life, but several of Lenovo’s design decisions make life difficult even for the Core M. The most important is not the screen but rather the battery, which is rated at 44 watt-hours. That’s not small, but it’s not large, and it’s ten watt-hours smaller than the battery in the Lenovo Yoga 2 Pro. In other words, Lenovo’s design choice to save weight by reducing the size of the battery has mostly negated the advantage of the new, power-sipping processor. Most manufacturers will not make the same decision." Wow, a very even handed review, which says clearly the Lenovo unit's Intel Core M 5y70 Broadwell chipset sucked across the board. It also spells out why Lenovo SHOULD NOT HAVE LISTENED to Intel's PR bullshite specsheet but should have tested thoroughly themselves before designing the unit. Yes, Lenovo gets a BIG BIG black eye on this one for blindly following Intel's spec sheets and battery recommendations. Lenovo has bitten the stinky stick twice in the last month, with the Superfish scandal and now this totally mis-built Core M unit. I suspect Lenovo will not trust Intel spec sheets ever again since it is obvious that the Intel PR department writes them. Apple, being forewarned will likely oversize the battery for this upcoming Apple Macbook, or else perhaps even not come out with it at all since it will be a poorer performing unit than last year's Macbook product and it will have a higher base cost that will have to be paid out for the privilege of simply sucking on all fronts compared to its predecessor. ::) Do you think Apple is pissed at Intel for much, being delayed for most of a year just to get a piece of crap Intel Chipset that doesn't even outdo their 4 year old CPU/GPU design? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/11/15 at 09:19:32 Fictional conversation, of course < Ring Ring Ring > "ARM Holdings chipset design group, how may we help you?" "This is Apple calling -- we want you to push the five core A-11x forward a year, laid out at 14nm instead of 10nm. We want the design forwarded directly to Samsung to be put into a real production equipment 4 tray run off at once, ASAP, so we can see what sort of yields we can get and to find out what performance is really going to be like off real production 14nm." "My goodness, what has happened?" "Yeah, we got in the first production shipment of 14nm Broadwells and yes the stupid bastards at Intel really did totally drop the ball, and then they lied to us about it for six months ongoing by sending us cherry picked samples. Production Broadwell is a mess and we can't make any realistic product out of it without getting Lenovo'd. Yes, we rejected the shipment. Yes, we are going to have to roll forward an entire season early on our own RISC processors as we are a year late to market now and have no new product to ship unless we ship Intel's overpriced/underperforming crap." "Do you think Samsung can do something that complex at 14nm that fast?" "I guess we will find out when we meet with them next week, so get yourself a plane ticket and a room for March 16th-18th. Next, we want that theoretical Cortex A72 octacore A-12x CAD layout brought to the same meeting with Samsung next week for them to do a feasibility study on doing that chipset next after this A-11x, but at 10nm for full production level roll out for next fall. All we are really doing here is moving the 10nm chip up a year but at 14nm and bringing the third generation to market a full year earlier at 10nm, running it next year. "Wow, desktop too huh." "Yes, I guess we are finally done screwing around with Intel ..... we can no longer afford to NOT control our own destiny. Plus, with Intel dropping the ball so badly right now they have given us MORE than a one year window in which to take that chunk out of their laptop and desktop market share if we can move fast enough with us actually starting work 6 months ago on our chips like we did. A full implementation of the A-12x at 10nm may well wind up being light enough to go into a laptop as well, since the competition will have to be Intel quad/hepta core based and really isn't all that energy efficient, really. The octa core should step seamlessly well at minimum energy cost per step when it is run on 10nm, so it gives us lots of "Intel headroom" to work with. Yeah, we heard about Mediatek and Intel, Mediatek is really good at energy scheduling those octas running all the same cores -- Qualcomm isn't shabby at the trick either. But they all use your drivers, right? So can we, except we'll stack up mix of custom tweeked A72s instead of just using A53s as the other guys do. Fictional conversation, of course |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/11/15 at 20:51:29 What can Intel do about it? Stop screwing around with gold gilt-edged strange purposeless dual core tablet chipsets at 14nm and pick one of the currently well proven out "best of the core i5 designs" and one of the currently well proven out "best of the core i7 designs" and scale them down to 14nm, get them debugged and get them ready to compete in laptops and PCs. And I mean like right now. Apple is coming for you son, and they got their ARM on. Intel you have no more time to frick about -- get some good competitive best in class stuff out there and try to keep a hold on to whatever mainstream PC market share you can hold on to -- while you frantically try to do these same few "best in class" chipsets again at 10nm. Forget about mobile, all you do is waste money and time and your admittedly limited mental resources distracting yourself with meaningless mobile stuff. Whatever moves you do need to do need to hit the street FINISHED in 6 months time starting from the last item's finish -- not a frickn' year and a half later. No more tick - tock --- you gotta learn to do a 6mos. tick tick tick tick tick tick and you need to focus on the vital few items that really count the most. Intel, your indecisiveness is killing your future. YOU DO NOT HAVE THE TIME TO DEVELOP ENTIRE WONDERFUL ORGANIZED "FAMILIES" OF CHIPSETS ANY MORE -- YOU NEED TO DO THE BEST OF THE LOT FAST AND THEN REPLACE IT WITH SOMETHING MUCH SMALLER AND BETTER -- FASTER -- ASAP -- FAST. You are not Intel the ponderous, great and magnificent any more, you are Intel the beleaguered and harassed and YOU NEED TO REACT AS FAST AS A SKITTY FAST KITTY THAT'S BEEN TOSSED INTO THE DOG POUND just to stay alive. Or you won't. And fire that BS'ing lying PR Department, they are slaying your credibility day by day by day. A new powerpoint slide showing more BS stuff that you will never build HURTS your image more than anything else. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/12/15 at 10:19:25 And what immediately pops up -- yet another Power Point slide from the BS PR Dept. And this one is a DOOZY, lemme tell ya ..... http://images.anandtech.com/doci/9026/Slide%2022_575px.png Please don't look at Intel's latest press release concerning their Quad Core x5 & x7 Don't look at the obvious exact doubling/duplication of the dual core chipset that is sold one level below this one, complete with unnecessary 2x duplication of some of the various support bits and pieces. Don't look, or you will know exactly what Intel is considering as their "Quad Core mobile Remember them stupid dual processor motherboards Intel used to make -- shrink one of those motherboards to 4"x 6" and baby, you got the idea. This thing is going to look like a doubled up dual processor daughterboard, or perhaps they will just ball grid solder two each of the already existing dual core chipset daughter boards to the product's motherboard with the ball grids connecting on slightly different pins (save a little money, you know) ......... Auuuggggh !! :P REMEMBER, processor platform -- they never said chipset or SOC You do realize it takes power to run all those extra components, right? http://www.pcper.com/files/imagecache/article_max_width/news/2013-09-13/Intel%20NUC%20Motherboard%20With%20Haswell%20i5%204250U%20Processor.jpg woooo ..... Intel managed to shrink the motherboard down to 4" square The Intel "processor platform" obviously is not integrated, and it is equally obviously not an SOC .... it is really just small sized old school PC type motherboard with a relatively HUGE dual core processor daughterboard sitting in the center of it. And this new "quadcore" unit that is coming out soon from Intel is gonna have twice as much of the exact same sort of stuff in the very center of it ..... (and there is more stuff to be found on the bottom side of that big board too) ::) Contrast please the board below, a fully integrated Samsung 5422 Octa Core ARM processor "everything on the SOC" from Odroid. Just count the differences in overall size and the total number of additional components that Intel requires to make up a less powerful unit. Get a good gut feel for how much Tech Support $$$ Intel has to pay out to a vendor to get them to use their Intel processors ..... and how many extra forms of I/O come stock on a fully integrated SOC ARM based unit (i.e. all possible forms of I/O ports are already there just waiting for you). http://dn.odroid.com/homebackup/201407071058089142.jpg Price differential is huge, Intel costs >$400 and ARM is only $179 and comes with memory and eMMC drive and a free plastic case -- or the same $179 could buy you a fully memory stuffed Asus Chromebox with your favorite Linux distro already Crouton'd. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/12/15 at 18:45:02 As Intel brings forth their new non-integrated non-SOC "processor platforms" for 2015, it is time again to see how the Chrome Killers did. And the answer so far is that Chrome Killers actually took some market share -- but only away from $300+ Windows Laptops. So far the yearly doubling of Chromebook sales has not diminished noticeably, but what has happened is Chromebook prices have quietly slid down from the ChromeKiller contested $200 price point to the $179 price point, where they continue to move on out into schools and homes and businesses without any competition from MS. http://www.amazon.com/ASUS-Chromebook-12-Inch-Gigabit-Storage/dp/B00KD5RUN2/ref=zg_bs_565108_13 You didn't see this coming MS? The computing press told you it was going to happen, and it did. These ARM based boys are still MAKING A REAL PROFIT at the new $179 price point. Their units are light and quick and run very well, not like your dead slow crapware/shovelware choked MS Bingware units are currently doing. Funny thing, them Chromebooks still keep getting better and better as the vendors compete for the expanding (doubling year on year) new market. More processor options are coming about as Mediatek, Rockchip and Nvidia build new ARM 64 bit processors aimed specifically at Chrome Space. Intel's old Chromebook/box dual and quad core chipsets are showing somewhat long in the tooth now and now rumor has it that Intel has approached Mediatek to let Intel name brand Mediatek's new A72/A53 based Octa Core Chromebook chipset. Intel really wants to market the new octa core for Mediatek under Intel's brand name mainly because the new Mediatek octa core kicks the crap out of anything Intel currently has to offer to put into a Chromebook. https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=mediatek%20chromebook Indeed, there is some rumors that Intel has attempted yet again to buy Mediatek outright .... with no interest being shown on Mediatek's side. Mediatek is quite familiar with the Rockchip/Intel saga and wants none of it. However, enough money waved in front of any company can get them to delay a product launch for a bit ..... it certainly did that job with Rockchip and the RK3288. Intel's Sofia is supposed to finally ship this summer, in the guise of a Rockchip designed and TSCM produced ARM A53 quad cored product that right now uses stock Mali graphics (with an upgrade to VR graphics supposedly in the pipeline). Domestically, all the new 14nm domestic designed and built Intel "processor platforms" so far still reportedly suck on processing power and battery life once real production units are built around them, yes, even the ones with new 14nm Intel production processes. ------- faltering PC markets are now showing up where no one is buying PCs at all for much any more -------- Samsung and a couple of others have departed completely from PC space in Europe and several other relatively stagnant PC markets, since all that they seem to sell there anymore is Chromebooks (free wide area wifi is supplied by the government in many European cities) and Debian-based Linux boxes (meaning Linux Mint and Ubuntu). Asus, Acer, HP and Lenovo are still present in these areas, but for how long is the question? Europeans for example will only buy expandable 2 slot Asus Chromebooks and Chromeboxes that can easily side load their favorite Linux distros. "Linux market share" as reported by web use counters has doubled year on year for the last 3 years running but is still relatively tiny compared to Chrome OS or Windows. Small vendors are snapping up all the US supply of used Asus 2 slot Chromeboxes from Ebay and are converting them to memory stuffed Debian/Ubuntu boxes which then sell very well in Europe. Direct from the factory Ubuntu and Linux Mint boxes are selling better world-wide, but not nearly as well as Chromebooks and Chromeboxes. People in European countries are demonstrating that they have achieved a "post PC mindset" and that they can live very well without MS's hand in their wallet all the time. FACT: Most Linux distros are maintained by European people. Some European governments have legislated mandates that no government office shall use MS 8.0 or 8.1 under any circumstance (too vulnerable and buggy). Rumor has it that "business mode" Win 10 PC may make it out this year, but the rest of Win 10 mobile will have to come out next year. Part of this seems to be that Intel still hasn't made a 14nm chipset quick enough to make porky Win 10 seem to run quickly and seamlessly ..... and Intel doesn't want MS to put out anything that runs better on ARM than it does on Intel This just gives another 3/4 of a year for the "PC free" European areas to spread over to adjoining nations .... ========================================= http://www.oregonlive.com/silicon-forest/index.ssf/2015/03/intel_cuts_outlook_sharply_on.html#incart_related_stories Sounds like the financial world just figured out we are now in the Post PC Era .... Intel cuts Q1 outlook by nearly $1 billion on weak PC sales; stock slides 4% overnight ""The change in revenue outlook is a result of weaker than expected demand for business desktop PCs and lower than expected inventory levels across the PC supply chain," Intel said in a written statement. Intel also withdrew its annual revenue forecast. It had been expecting growth around 5 percent in 2015. The company said it will issue an updated forecast when it releases first-quarter results on April 14. Intel's headquarters are in Santa Clara, California. But the company employs 17,500 in Oregon, more than anywhere else it operates. Declining PC and laptop sales have put mounting pressure on Intel's business, which relies on that market for nearly two thirds of its revenue. Consumers and businesses are less likely to replace old PCs now, in part because they have less need for additional computing power and in part because they're replacing buying tablet computers instead. The issue kept Intel sales flat in 2012 and 2013, but PCs enjoyed a surprising rebound in 2014, buoying Intel's overall revenue. On Thursday, the company said it had been expecting more small and midsized businesses would buy new PCs this year to replace the aging Windows XP operating system, which Microsoft stopped supporting last year. But those replacements aren't occurring as fast as Intel hoped, and Europe's weak economy further depressed sales." |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/13/15 at 18:45:50 http://liliputing.com/2015/03/mk80-linux-edition-is-an-octa-core-ubuntu-mini-pc.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/mk80_03.jpg tiny Linux boxes begin shipping .... "The Rikomagic MK80 is a TV box with an Allwinner A80 octa-core processor, at least 2GB of RAM and at least 16GB of storage. Normally it ships with Google Android software, and the MK80 is designed to connect to your TV to let you run Android apps and games on a big screen. But the folks at the UK-based CloudsTo store are selling an MK80 LE (Linux Edition) which runs Ubuntu instead of Android. It’s available for purchase for £125 (about $184 US)." We are seeing units come at MS/Intel from all fronts now, all below the $200 ChromeWar MS supported price point and all swinging "better than Intel" octa core ARM based processors. This one is from Allwinner. Hurry, Intel, you forgot to bribe Allwinner .... and if the Allwinner makes it to market the other guys will have to go ahead and put their units out ASAP or lose their asses and their image in their home markets. And that is never gonna happen, bribes or no bribes -- the hockey sticks will come out again and the raucous fray will begin anew. What happens when Win10 for ARM comes out supporting these same chipsets ??? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2EErwzr-47Y click on it, it is a YouTube mooovie !!! |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/13/15 at 19:25:19 http://liliputing.com/2015/03/system76-meerkat-is-a-tiny-linux-pc-with-a-broadwell-cpu.html System76 Meerkat is a tiny, Linux PC with a Broadwell CPU http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/system76-meerkat.jpg Let's be even handed, some Intel based mini-linux machines are coming out too. But the pricing is slightly different. and wow, isn't that I/O choice impressive ???? "The company plans to offer two different CPU options: an Intel Core i3-5010U (with Intel HD 550 graphics) or a Core i5-5250U processor (with Intel HD 6000). Other features include HDMI and DisplayPort for connecting up to two displays, Gigabit Ethernet, four USB ports, and a headset jack. Final pricing hasn’t been determined yet, but the company says the System76 Meerkat will probably sell for about $500 and up when it launches later this month." ::) $189 vs $500 .... hmmm, let me get out my calculator ..... Nah, I like this Odroid unit for $179 -- lots of better I/O choices and supported storage media. http://dn.odroid.com/homebackup/201407071058089142.jpg .... or mebbe this Cubie Board unit for $125 as it is cheaper, supports wifi on board and has a VGA port for old monitors on top of the normal I/O ports. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/cubieboard4_01.jpg Intel and company need a new much sharper pencil, $125 is a whole lot better than $500. And Intel is smoking dope if they think you need a Core i5 to do anything in Linux ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/14/15 at 08:15:13 http://liliputing.com/2015/03/qualcomm-dragonboard-410c-dev-board-with-snapdragon-410-coming-this-summer.html Intel is smoking dope if they think you NEED Core i5 when doing anything in Linux ..... Yep, that is what I said. Intel and some vendors have put out Core i5 Chromeboxes and the reviews came back, "Not needed, the same performance boost can be gotten from 4 gigs of systems memory on the standard processor." People do get spoiled though --- so faster is generally better. But not at the cost of quintupling the price. So, why do folks pay attention to things like below? LENARO IS ENFORCING A WRITTEN RESTRICTIVE STANDARD for the first time http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/dragon-410_01.jpg http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/dragon-410_02.jpg Well, I use the chipset in my current phone and it is a quick little bugger that DOES EVERYTHING, fast. And the phone and the board are verging on dirt cheap. And it has standards that it adheres to, LENARO standards. This means built in already working Debian/Ubuntu/Mint/Adroid support, etc. (yeah, MS too when they finally do get there and start playing nice) It would be the first 32/64 bit hobby card with full support from the OEM chip maker and LENARO, which means quite a lot actually. You will be able to get everything working from the get go without having to buy adder cards. And by working, I mean accelerated graphics, all the streaming standards, etc. etc. etc. =================== "Qualcomm says the developer board supports Android and Linux and it could be used to develop products for robotics, cameras, signage, vending machines, internet-of-things devices and more. The board itself features Qualcomm’s 1.2 GHz ARM Cortex-A53 quad-core processor with 400 MHz Adreno 306 graphics, support for 533 MHz LPDDR2/3 memory, and eMMC 4.51 and micro SD 3.0 storage. It has an HDMI port, two USB 2.0 ports, a micro USB OTG port, 802.11b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth, FM Radio, and GPS. There’s support for a 13MP camera, and 60-pin and 40-pin expansion connectors. The DragonBoard 410c is also compatible with Arduino when you use a mezzanine board." The DragonBoard 410c is just the latest board designed to meet Linaro’s 96 Boards standard. This is a big deal, since it bridges computer uses, IoT uses, signage, OEM controllers, automotive, PLC controller type uses and hobbyist builder boards like the Adreno and Raspberry Pi sorts of educational things. And please remember, this one is a 64 bit totally current chipset, not something 1-2 generations back like a Raspberry Pi. The intended low end cost of $50 vs $35 for a Raspberry Pi makes this one hard to argue against since camera. wifi and GPS and everything else phone-ish is already built into it and is ALREADY WORKING while a Pi can't do much without buying adder boards and doing a lot of programming/fiddling to get it to work at all. https://www.96boards.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/96BoardsCESpecificationv1.0-EA1.pdf (take a second and actually read the specs -- it is required to WORK RIGHT and do it off its own hardware too) "Feature Highlights OS Support: Android, Linux CPU: quad-core ARM® Cortex® A53 at up to 1.2 GHz per core, 32-bit and 64-Bit capable Memory: LPDDR2/3 533MHz Single-channel 32-bit (4.2GBps) non-POP/ eMMC 4.51 SD 3.0 (UHS-I) Graphics: Adreno™ 306 400MHz PC-class graphics Video: 1080p HD video playback and capture with H.264 (AVC) Camera: support for 13 megapixel camera with Wavelet Noise Reduction, JPEG decoder, and other post-processing techniques done in hardware Connectivity and Location: Integrated 802.11 b/g/n, BT/FM, GPS I/O Interfaces: HDMI Full-size Type A connector (1080p HD @ 30fps), 1x USB 2.0 micro B (device mode only), 2x USB 2.0 type A (host mode only), micro SD card slot Expansion: 1x 40 pin low speed expansion connector: UART, SPI, I2S, I2C x2, GPIO x12, DC power 1x 60 pin high speed expansion connector: 4L-MIPI DSI, USB, I2C x2, 2L+4LMIPI CSI Analog expansion connector: Headset, Speaker, FM antenna Arduino compatibility through mezzanine board" If I were going to buy a hobby card to build a robot with eyes, I'd buy this one instead of the Pi because this one has dual (2) cameras support, GPS and wifi built into it already. This could be ..... BIG, in a small sort of way. 8-) plus your project can play your favorite FM radio station for you while you work on it ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/14/15 at 09:31:40 Post PC Computing is going to be a lot less expensive. Folks aren't going to want to pay Microsoft Tax any more. Folks will split up their computing between devices that meet each need more precisely and with less waste of "unutilized computing power". What does this mean for the elephant makers? Yeah, I mean MS and Intel. Each home will have to have one (1) elephant hooked up to a printer and a scanner. Instead of a full sized elephant (costing $60 a year in MS tax) people are starting to go with the free linux based miniature pigmy all-in-one elephants to get their "home base" job done. More and more the elephant home base seems to be becoming a "router connected" all-in-one cloud based scanner/printer instead of a MS taxed PC with a separate scanner and printer hooked up to it. ::) (yeah, that's right, you don't need the PC any more at all, just go to Wally and pick up an HP e-cloud all in one) Your phone, tablet and Chromebook split up the rest of your computing world into very sensible slices that are BEST SERVED by the device you tend to use for them. We now have entire sections of the world that do not keep an elephant in the house AT ALL, period, as they have found keeping up with an elephant is really such a pain in the ass and is so time consuming and expensive to do. Paying $60 a year just to own a Win 10 elephant ..... really? You'll get there eventually .... forget that shovel and that big 'ol poop bucket --- just get rid of the elephant. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/14/15 at 10:59:40 http://liliputing.com/2015/03/mele-pcg03-windows-mini-pc-review.html this is a long multi page review, but is worth reading as it shows great promise for the future http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/back_03.jpg Post PC computing, how much less expensive did you say? This is a $149 full Windows 8.1 desktop computer. It comes with full legal Win 8.1, not a trial version. "Chinese device maker Mele first caught my attention nearly 3 years ago when the company launched a TV box that could serve double duty as a little Linux PC. The company continues to offer a range of products including TV boxes with ARM chips and Android software. But now they've also branched out into true PC territory. The Mele PCG03 is a small, low-power computer with an Intel Atom processor and Windows 8.1 with Bing software. It’s available from Amazon for $199 or from AliExpress for as little as $149." And it isn't totally shabby either -- it is faster than my old AMD white box computer used to be. It supports VGA monitors and HDMI monitors, so it will run off of what you got already. Supports 1080p streaming, etc. Totally fast, no -- but really not that shabby. Think of it as a ChromeBox competitor and you got the right idea. Perfectly usable as a wife/grandma computer, for example. Get them a good sized SD card or get them a USB hard drive or actually use one of the HD connectors inside the case. (this is a video, so double click on the link) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80ZuyMDqkNU&t=394 $149 mindblow time ..... the processor and memory are on a daughter card so the system is UPGRADABLE when a better processor comes out. This is good, because that better stuff is on the way right now as we speak. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/cpu_02-125x90.jpg Verdict "With Intel’s next-gen low-power chips based on Cherry Trail and Braswell architecture on the way, it’s tough to recommend spending $150 to $200 on a mini PC with a Bay Trail chip. Wait a bit and get the better hardware for about the same price, along with the then released Win 10 software." :) ....... change, she comes ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/14/15 at 13:09:03 http://wikibon.org/w/images/thumb/9/9d/ARMInetelProjections2022byDeviceV2.png/500px-ARMInetelProjections2022byDeviceV2.png Do you remember over two years ago when I first showed this predictive graph? It was seen as wild speculation back then and was hoo hawed at considerably by the then "Intel friendly" PC press people. Let's see if it has held up to reality at all over the last 3 years ..... First discrepancy is that the graph totally underestimated the effect of Chromebooks by a factor of about 6x. Second discrepancy is the MS support of ARM is coming a year sooner than predicted. This does not mean Intel will disappear, which was inferred by the verbiage below the original graph earlier on. There never was an Intel line drawn on the chart for Intel rolling over to Android or ARM because that was never ever seen as even a remote possibility two years ago. I think we can all see that it is a reality today. Apple jumping ship to ARM has already happened on everything but the high end Mac name brand products, and when that happens it will likely be a partial affair at first with lower end laptops going first for a year or so before the desktop products go. So this line is past already or is about now, take your pick. No one ever foresaw the Apple Desktop unit line as simply stopping, which may actually be what happens in the end. Intel has done literally anything and everything to hold on so far (including 8 billions blown on contra revenue spending) and I expect that anything and everything will continue as they are now trying to 'name brand' ARM processors from people like Spreadtrum, Rockchip and Mediatek as their own products. Nastier newer tactics (like bribing Rockchip and Mediatek to NOT launch products that would clean Intel's clock --- or else to let Intel name brand the new products from the get go as 'Intel Inside') are also likely to continue as well. Anything and everything to hold on means exactly that and Intel is certainly proven capable of lying to stockholders and hiding their adverse financials by restructuring during a year's end roll up, etc. etc. But functionally, the current state of domestic Intel production of competitive products against ARM is very shaky at best and the placement of the line on the graph could be argued to have already taken place at the Spreadtrum/Rockchip SoPHIA point in time (which has already taken place. BTW). Or now, since Intel has just OFFICIALLY restructured their entire line to actually include a few competitor built products as name branded Intel products ...... Or we could wait until Broadwell fails, which will be soon enough as Intel itself will have better products out by year's end. Or we can stall until Skylake and Cannonlake have their turns before calling the shot. It doesn't matter since PC itself suddenly seems to be dying out in whole sections of the globe now and THAT CHANGE may will be what sunsets Intel the quickest. My gut is that the conflict line has just kept shifting, from mobile, then to tablet, then to Chromespace, soon to laptop and each new shift is a new continuance of the Intel struggle. At the laptop conflict level or stage Intel won't have enough cash cows left to milk, so the contra revenue will have to stop and the speed or rate of fail will go up accordingly. In fact, Intel will eventually become just a name brand loosely attached to a legacy foundry function that they will eventually have to sell shares in before it is all over. Intel will never actually die, they will simply become an HP, reselling other people's products. Or somebody else will buy the Intel brand name so they can go abuse it some in new and creative ways. Or until the Chinese government steps in and simply stops some of the silly arsed Intel games as "actions in restraint of trade" ...... which could end Intel overnight as more and more of "Intel" comes from TSMC, Rockchip and Spreadtrum (actually based off of ARM standard designs and Mali and/or VR Graphics IP). Always remember, both Intel and MS are considered "provisional, on good behavior" right now with the Chinese Government. Their presence in China could end instantly upon a single serious infraction (serious in the eyes of China that is). |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/14/15 at 23:25:25 http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/markets/article-2940035/Rumours-pond-Apple-want-acquire-stake-saw-ARM-Holdings-share-price-rise-32p-today.html "Buyers nibbled away amid rumours from across the Pond that technology giant Apple plans to acquire a strategic stake in the Cambridge-based firm to avert a possible predatory move on ARM from rival Intel." Intel just tried to buy itself into ARM Holdings in a significant fashion by buying shares on the open market. The attempt was instantly squashed by Apple, who protected their 30+ percent share in ARM Holdings by snapping up all available shares on the stock market until the price rose up to the point Intel could no longer play their silly buggers games with it. "Anything and everything to hold on" -- that isn't just words to Intel right now. I wonder just how far Intel is willing to go ..... Hire some key people away from ARM as a disruptor? Arrange a few car accidents for a few of the ones who remain at ARM? Just how far is Intel willing to go? How far will fear drive desperate actions? "Demand for Apple products hit an all-time high with record sales of iPhones and tablets. If Apple is trading its socks off, ARM must be too and the UK company should receive a further boost over the next couple of years as Apple is planning to remove Intel Corporation from its supply chain. ARM this week unveiled a new processor blueprint with better computing performance and beefed-up graphics for smartphones and tablets to be launched next year. It says the processor has 3.5 times the performance of comparable chips from 2014, meaning a 75 per cent reduction in energy use, cutting battery drain on smartphones." ================= There is no doubt that now Intel feels threatened at a very basic level by the next generation of 3.5 TIMES MORE POWERFUL ARM designed SOCs, due to the new MUCH higher processor power and MUCH higher graphics power that comes with Cortex A72 --- with the new SOCs actually being on a Core i5 processing throughput level at MUCH lower energy consumption levels --- and that means every hockey stick carrying johnny out there is going to become a direct Intel level competitor/supplier to Chrome Space and Laptop Space. Intel knows what happens when the hockey stick boys come into their neighborhood and start them up a rough game of stick ball. Intel literally won't be fast enough to even know who just smacked them in the shins or punched them in the balls, much less who whacked them in back of the head. To disrupt that happening means stopping the ARM rollouts somehow ..... and you can count the ways that can happen by watching Intel try them all one by one by one. Lawyers are next, I suspect. I suspect Intel will also try to get MS to NOT SUPPORT ARM CHIPSETS with Win 10 by any and all means, legal, fair or underhanded & foul. Intel knows if MS supports a level playing field with ARM chipsets being supported by Win 10 it is all over but the shouting for Intel. Intel spent over 8 billion dollars last year in their efforts to survive .... do you think they might get serious about it now? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/15/15 at 15:08:32 http://www.linux.com/news/featured-blogs/200-libby-clark/789783-enterprise-software-development-open-source-practices-on-the-rise What is this? GitHub is where you go to get your open source softwares to do some sort of a government implementation. http://www.linux.com/images/stories/41373/Govt-users-GitHub.png So, what does this mean? Open source is becoming more and more utilized in government functions. It is a leading indicator of change. Since nobody "buys" open source software it is hard to put out sales numbers to compare against sales figures put out by say MS or Intel. If you consider going to GitHub to go get some open source stuff to implement as a "sale" then you have some sort of number to compare against. Of course MS will crow that they made a lot more money off their sale than you did, but that's OK. They really still don't get it, but that's ok too. You can just smile back at MS and just say ..... "Actually, we were just tracking the number of brand new systems installer people who just now realized that you are a completely unnecessary expense going on out into their future ......" |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/15/15 at 16:42:51 http://chinamobilemag.com/mediatek-mt8173-worlds-first-arm-cortex-a72-soc-available-now/ Mediatek MT8173: Worlds First ARM Cortex A72 SoC Available Now "It hasn’t been too long ago since ARM launched the Cortex A72 architecture. Shortly after, Mediatek and Qualcomm both announced phone chipsets based on this architecture by the end of 2015 or early 2016. The ARM Cortex A72 architecture is supposed to push ARM processors up to the performance of x86 desktop processors while reducing energy consumption by up to 50%, enabling even longer battery life of mobile devices. But now everything seems to be going quicker than expected, at least for Mediatek. Once again the fabless chip maker from Taiwan demonstrates what they are able to do and leave Qualcomm behind again after the success with their 64-bit SoCs. This is being done by the launch of the MT8173 chipset for tablet PCs. This SoC is a big.LITTLE quad-core SoC based on two ARM Cortex A53 and two ARM Cortex 72 cores, thus fully supporting 64-bit. The maximum clock this SoC can reach is 2.4GHz, which is the record for MTK SoCs to date. For graphics the SoC is using a PowerVR GX6250 GPU, which offers support for screens at up to 2,560 x 1,600 pixels at a refreshing rate of 120Hz. What’s more, support for media contents has been beefed up a lot. The chipset does support 4k videos at 30fps with codecs being H.264, HEVC and even VP9. Copyright technology HDCP 2.2 is supported as well not only for HDMI but for Widevine Level 1 and Miracast as well. The SoC furthermore is able to drive 20 mega pixel cameras with Face Beautify and LOMO effects on-the-fly. According to Mediatek, the MT8173 is available for customers now, which means that we will see first tablets based on this chipset in summer, along with Lollipop of course. What’s yet to be seen is how well Mediatek will compete with Rockchip and Allwinner, but chances are good we will see more Mediatek-based high-end tablets popping up from China now. We at ChinaMobileMag certainly look forward to the first benchmark results." Mediatek has already stated they are in development with Google on a Chromebook. Intel is already sniffing after Mediatek to PLEASE let Intel name brand their A72 chipset exclusively and have exclusive sales rights to Mediatek's new A72 SOC, the one ARM processor that could put Intel out of the Chromebook business starting next year. Ooops, there is a flaw in that Intel think'n though ..... Intel, please don't forget about Allwinner, who will not announce anything ever unless is has already shipping at wholesale in a completed product. Allwinner is in this game too. And Qualcomm has two of these in the pipeline as well. Ditto for Samsung, who already does Chromebooks and Chromeboxes and who has more functional 14nm lines than you do. You can't possibly bribe all the hockey stick boys and Qualcomm and Samsung to ignore the chance to drum you completely out of a market segment like Chromebooks --- at least two or three of them will be willing to go whack you in the head (or some other, somewhat more tender body part) even if you do bribe one of them. What you should go do is go make a better Chromebook product and sell it for the same or less money having some profit margin left over to give to your share holders. You know, "compete on the merits of your product"? What ?? It's been so durn long now you done forgot how ???? Man ..... :P "The ARM Cortex A72 architecture is supposed to push ARM processors up to the performance of x86 desktop processors while reducing energy consumption by up to 50%, enabling even longer battery life." .... and you got 3-4 of them headed your way, plus the Tegra X1 coming from Nvidia having already shipped it already in a product? You is facing a whole crowd of properly ARM'd people this time instead of jest one lone underarmed CISC firing AMD gunman. What shall you do ? Intel's big 4% performance hike they say they got out of Broadwell just isn't going to cut it for this fall --- (especially since Lenovo says that their actual 4% Broadwell number was actually a -4% number and not a positive number at all). 14nm Skylake must come out ASAP machine gun style and Skylake MUST yield really really good improvements or else Intel is just going to die on the vine at their new 14nm lithography level -- wiped out by a whole wave of lower cost 20nm and 16nm new stock ARM SOC designs that do show some very good improvements. ;) .... looks like Intel is facing a cross fire situation and they are late pulling their main gun. Best make that weapon a good 'un. Needs to be downright magical. Intel, you old magician you, it is rabbit out of hat time again ...... Can you do it? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/16/15 at 10:00:49 Intel is REALLY HUGE, compared to Mediatek for example. With a little more $$$ than what Intel flushed down the toilet last year (8 billion $$$ that we know about) they could have bought Mediatek outright. At full list price. A couple of times over. Issue with Intel being so HUGE is staying full up on their fab plants. Right now Intel is down over 25% on utilization short term and that is a fatal flaw in a foundry operation. To get their pricing to work right, Intel must stay at very close to 100% utilization. For this to happen, a lot of the little hockey stick guys need to go away, ASAP. This is part of a 3 year Intel "must do" plan. Complicating this whole thing is Intel used to make a lot of memory, but they are drifting out of that business (as is Samsung and Qualcomm, BTW). Micron is picking all of that slack up as they are much better at it than the other guys. Intel has entire memory fabs that are going slacking. So, right now Intel is getting hit with a memory slump, PC sales slump and having to start paying people to use their "processor platforms" all of a sudden. Intel is bleeding ...... badly. However, Intel is so huge that it could take them over 10 years to bleed to death, and during that time they could restructure their fab plants (closing a third of them due to obsolete lithography for example, or retooling them for making something that is WANTED, or is in actual demand). You see, Intel has a mental problem of just going and doing stuff and expecting everyone to fall all over it. Super thin super expensive Windows laptops are a current case where Intel did something they though was really neat that is simply failing badly all over the place. People don't want that, and never did. Microsoft for example is learning they need to slim Win 10 way down and get it quick and light -- this means less chip power will be required to run it. This is bad for Intel. Intel needs this to go the other way so a lot MORE processor power is needed to get it to move at all, much less move quickly. Intel and Microsoft have cooperated over the years to make computing so HUGE and POWER DEMANDING that only Intel's biggest and best can lift the load. There are other approaches though. Approaches that do not require massive power to shift MS's bulky operating system. I run a 10 year old Core 2 Duo system with a $47 video card that will play current games running STEAM and Linux Mint. And it is quick and does it well. To do this in Windows would require twice as much computer and four times as much video card. Why ??? Because Intel must sell you a new rig every few years or they can't fill their fabs up. The game is rigged so you always are having to buy MORE. In Europe, they buy an American hand me down PC on Ebay and throw the operating system away. I can attest that this idea works great, I have done it and it really does work. Europeans are also repurposing old Chromeboxes to do the same thing. MS and Intel still rule American computing. They do not rule anywhere else any more. Entire markets are opening up now where neither one is needed. This is called the Post PC Era and it has already begun. You will hear more about this as time goes on. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/16/15 at 19:00:03 http://liliputing.com/2015/03/microsoft-shrunk-the-windows-10-footprint-to-free-up-space-on-cheap-tablets-notebooks.html Microsoft shrinks the Windows 10 footprint to free up space on cheap tablets, notebooks http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/w10-space.jpg Microsoft has a bit of a problem .... Win 10 is going to be too large to fit on the remaining systems drive space that MS has already been putting on tablets and Chromekillers. This "too small for my stuff" has already become quite an issue with the 32 gb storeage space $200 HP Chromekillers that have already been sold, and they were loaded with the smaller footprint Windows 8.1 Bingware. The harsh fact is when your operating system and your software fill the dive totally up, you tend to crash. A lot. Windows machines all shipped with 32gigabyte flash drives which were twice as big as what Chrome OS required, but are now being found to be simply too small to hold the OS and a few locally loaded large programs. (a game, fergetaboutit ...) It has become an issue to the point Best Buy and Amazon are already getting a lot of 90 day returns on some of the HP Streambook units for the issue. Microsoft and HP have aggravated the condition by putting lots of crapware and shovelware on the machines which took up almost all of the free existing space and definitely put the casual user into an ongoing bind. All the bad user reviews building up and the tech writer's angry blasts as such are making a smell, a redolence of rotting dead things ..... SOMETHING MUST BE DONE !!!!! To fix the problem, the new planned tablet/small laptop Windows 10 boot drive c:/systems/ will only be partially loaded on the machine at a given time in a compressed data format and will be unpacked as needed then repacked for minimal storage space. The other parts of drive c:/systems/ which are only occasionally needed will be selectively downloaded and unpacked/expanded as needed then erased when not in use. This trick is supposed to wind up giving you enough room on the drive to "do stuff" and by constantly cleaning and replacing the c:/systems/ stuff new all the time you are getting a measure of virus/trojan protection as well. ( and this is true, BTW ) Plus, stock recovery image means exactly that, you get a new stock install that is constantly updated and correct. This is like a ChromeOS Powerwash except in Chrome you only do a powerwash when you think it is needed, the MS version happens endlessly all the time. "Recovery The other major change in Windows 10 is that Microsoft is making it unnecessary for PC makers to include a full recovery image in local storage. This can free up between 4GB and 12GB of storage. Instead, if you need to reset your computer to factory settings, Windows 10 will use its own runtime system files. As an added bonus, this means that after restoring the computer you’ll have the latest version of Windows and won’t have to download every single Windows update that rolled out since Windows was first installed on your computer." OK, this may not be a "feature" you would want for several reasons. 1) You are downloading and unpacking and repacking your OS all the time, constantly, over the internet. The chance of some nasty trickster managing to get a packet of his trash into your OS system to be expanded and installed automatically is now a clear and present danger as the back & forth flow happens each and every hour of real use. Or simple misreads or miswrites can happen (they do, you know). 2) The little puny Atom processor can't do all this activity without a speed penalty (and since it is constantly happening you will notice the slowdowns). And what happens if you have slower low end internet service, the issue could get compounded mightily. 3) Your little solid state drive has a finite number of reads and writes as its life-span, plus solid state drives do suffer from a form of fragmentation delay (which although much better than a spinning platter drive it is still very real) 4) Come the day the free trial is over and you are late paying your Microsoft Tax, your other half of your c:/system/ drive and all of your real data at the MS data center is suddenly unavailable to you. Instant brick. Pay a hefty fee for "re-initialization", please, plus your next year's MS tax in advance. Microsoft and Google are both going to give you a period of time of full free use when you buy your machine, then both are going to charge you something somehow for taking care of it past that point. The time spans and costs will be quite different between the two, as will come out later, like a year or so after you have bought into the "free Win 10" system. A Chromebox always has enough drive to hold the entire OS system and any data you may need, and your "programs" are most all web based anyway --- plus you get the network drive C: for the first year or so jest so you can get all addicted to using it. People haven't had to pay anything much for Google Drive space yet so far (they got a lot of free years with the unit purchase) and they are certainly free to go use other services such as Dropbox, etc. Google never locks down your data, you can go get your stuff off your Google Drive at any time, just not add anything to it if your Drive space isn't current or is full up. Your files on a Chromebook are real and you could store them locally on a terabyte USB drive just by copying them over. There was some discussion about Win10 only storing a bookmark to your data locally on your machine, and keeping all your data on line at a MS data center and downloading it back to you as needed. This idea was due to "limited drive space" of course. [smiley=evil.gif] sure, right ..... We hope that BAD idea has thoroughly been killed by the tester guys horrified feedback ...... MS is trying hard to make all this stuff work out, but I fear some of the things they have already done (and some of the other things yet to come) are not going to be very popular with their user base. They are trying to put 10 pounds of local OS and data into a two pound sack and doing all sorts of strange gyrations to "make it work". :P It sure don't sound like Win 10 is getting faster and lighter, now does it? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/18/15 at 09:27:02 https://gigaom.com/2015/01/02/no-the-229-hp-stream-13-isnt-a-chromebook-killer/ http://https://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2014/09/hp-chromebooks-ifa.jpg?quality=80&strip=all Chromebook Killers greatly resemble Netbooks, not Chromebooks This guy goes through the struggle of setting up a HP Streambook and details all the crap you have to do to get your as advertised "free" software installed up and working. It took him 6+ hours just to get the machine set up as advertised with the free stuff working ..... https://gigaom.com/2015/01/02/no-the-229-hp-stream-13-isnt-a-chromebook-killer/ "Maybe these devices really don’t compete, after all The more I ran though the HP Stream 13 setup process, the more I realized Chromebooks really don’t compete with inexpensive Windows laptops. Or, more accurately, they compete much the way a sports car and SUV do: There’s really no competition between the two if you live in a very rural area with poor roads or lots of snow. In that case, the sports car isn’t even an option. The same applies to low-cost Windows laptops and similarly priced notebooks. If you need or want to run Windows apps, get a Windows laptop. You’ll have your apps along with everything that comes with Windows. If you don’t need to run Windows apps and do most everything in a browser, check out the simplicity of a Chromebook. Aside from cost and hardware components, not much else here is similar; the HP Stream 13 is more like an improved netbook than a Chromebook competitor. Know that I firmly believe that choosing the right computer for your tasks is the most important, so the intent here isn’t to suggest Chromebooks are better for everyone. They’re not. Instead, the point is that while a low-cost Windows laptop can do more with apps, you have to take the good with the bad. Simplicity can be a feature. It’s what you don’t get with Chromebooks — lengthy convoluted setup processes and resource-wasting virus-scanning software, for example — that can make them appealing, provided you don’t need to run Windows apps." People who have actually used a Chromebook do not want to go back to Windows .... they can't stand the unnecessary aggravation of setting up a new machine any more. This includes most of the PC press by this point in time (who use Chromebooks and such as part of their job) so MS now routinely gets more grief than they used to as the PC press types in their articles on their Chromebooks ..... They use terms like "unnecessary aggravation" and "slow performance" and "obese porky OS" to describe their new perception of Windows performance. And that is with using a fast large powerful Intel processor. So you can go buy Intel some new chip production numbers for this year (and the years that come after that) or you can get off the treadmill and dump Windows as your OS. At least now you have choices out there, before this last few years you were "stuck on Windows" and had no where to go except Linux. :) And folks are learning that Linux Mint is pretty sweet, which is what I think too. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/19/15 at 03:43:57 Win 10 is coming ..... and MS still won't tell you what it will cost. Estimates run from $40 a year to $70 a year per seat. Business IT people are not going to even consider participating at all until the OS is several years old as they foresee MASSIVE integration problems with the existing software system that their business runs upon. Since MS can't say what the system will be right now from one month to the next, it makes it hard for IT to ever say when or if they will ever adopt it. Business will stick with Win 7 for the foreseeable future. Business sees Chrome OS as being "known" more so than Win10 right now which is seen to be a "constant motion toss up" for the first few years. Win 10 is not significantly faster or lighter than Win 7. It carries MUCH MORE code mass because of all the new features require a much larger mass of code to be carried on the machine. A fast current processor is needed for Win 10, much more so than Win 7. MS claims the UI is quicker on Win 10, but that is relative since Win 7 had no motif other than the standard desktop motif which was just always sitting there. The extreme tie ins between the new Office and Win 10 preclude business from considering the new Office. My my my, sounds like MS's brand new baby isn't thought of well by MS's bread and butter marketplace ..... ================================= In any case, the ERA of the CHROMEWARS is pretty much complete. :) MS has their new Win 10 about ready to ship and Chromebooks are rolling into acceptance across the globe with no real alternative out there at the $180 price point. The ChromeKillers are waiting for Win 10 to make their hard drives "more livable" and the Chromebook vendors are all waiting for Tegra X1 to get Google Approved and for Mediatek's new Cortex A72 chipset to get Google Approved. Intel has a few new ones to toss into the pot, but if Intel isn't going to be able to price support their new chips in the same fashion as last year their impact will not be so great this year. MS is hoping for a wave of Win 10 acceptance to roll over the landscape, rolling up all other OS systems. MS will cost support Win 10 for the first year or so before charging MS tax, and Intel is going to roll with the wave, pushing 14nm this and that just as hard as they can before folks actually realize it isn't really much of an improvement. In one case an Intel M chipset was actually a step BACKWARDS to the existing chipset ..... buyer beware .... 2nd half 2015 will be the era of the PR Dept, and we all know Intel's PR Dept wrote the book on deeper, browner & stinkier --- and ooops, here is a new blast of PR to cover up our little boo boo from yesterday. Up until now, computing was getting less expensive with real competition going on between ARM and Intel, but with Wintel staging a comeback that will reverse and you will be sold the "need to get bigger and better new stuff" upgrade cycle all over again. However, computing is not based here in the USA any more, so what Wintel can do in America generally only affects Americans. It will be interesting to see what sort of new stuff comes out of the Orient since they now have their very own Androids and Linuxes, etc. Right now Europe is Linux based, Asia is Android based and America is Wintel based. ChromeOS is also here in the USA and is moving into Europe and Asia as we speak. Interestingly enough, American Business is looking at Chrome as they see a major cost upgrade coming with Win 10 and Chrome may actually be considered as a lower cost upgrade option as it costs much less to upkeep ongoing compared to Win 10 at this point. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/19/15 at 06:26:14 http://liliputing.com/2015/03/lumia-430-is-a-70-windows-phone-with-dual-sim-support.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/lumia-430-dual_04.jpg I am going to correct myself early. I wrote "Chromebooks are rolling into acceptance across the globe with no real alternative out there at the This is not correct as now a MS Lumina phone out there now, shipping on $70 Qualcomm Snapdragon 200 chipset equipped phones. MS Windows OS is working on a stock low end Qualcomm ARM processor. This is a very light ARM processor. "Phones feature 4 inch, 800 x 480 pixel display, 1.2 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 200 dual-core processor, 1GB of RAM, 8GB of storage, microSD card slots, 2MP rear, and 0.3MP fixed-focus front cameras. Microsoft offers a range of Lumia smartphones including high-end models with full HD screens, high-res cameras, and other premium features. There are also entry-level models like the recently released Lumia 435 which has more modest specs and sells for just $70." Win 10 for phones isn't cooked yet here in the USA, but apparently it is cooked good enough for foreign markets to get a preview slice of Windows shipping on an ARM based phone product. Windows on ARM looks light and fast enough to be a serious Chromespace competitor whenever MS gets around to doing it here in the USA. Win 10 for America isn't slated to come out until late this fall or spring of next year -- look for it when it arrives as it may be a whole new wave of low cost stuff. ;) .... and if MS wants it to, it could kick Chromebooks arse right smartly running on a Qualcomm SOC. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/19/15 at 09:17:09 Google is supposedly working with a Chinese vendor to put dual boot ChromeOS and Android on the same 2-in-one tablet/laptop. In the Orient, this dual boot set-up makes sense. In America, not so much. However, it brings home the point that America and Europe are not the hot markets they once were, both are actually somewhat comparatively depressed economically and thoroughly SATURATED with phones tables laptops and PCs. I would expect to see all the makers paying attention to GROWING markets, not the saturated ones. ;) .... so we here in America just get the leftovers once they finish pushing it out in the primary markets from here on out. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/19/15 at 16:04:50 http://liliputing.com/2015/03/microsoft-outlines-system-requirements-for-windows-10.html Formal Win10 Systems requirements "The system requirements are pretty low: if you’ve got a device that runs Windows 7 or later it can also probably handle Windows 10. Microsoft is officially adding support for a number of new processors for mobile devices and PCs including: Qualcomm Snapdragon 208, 210, 615, 808, and 810 Intel Cherry Trail, Skylake, and Atom x3 AMD Carrizo and Carrizo-L" These are referenced when answering questions about Win10 Surface, non-RT, so take it as being good for light desktops and laptops as well. ::) ..... but I bet it jest torques Intel's PR Dept's ass right on off to have Qualcomm's Snapdragons listed before Intel's stuff as being "Win 10 compatible". Perhaps MS is giving order preference to setups that are real, not nebulous brown vapor. Maybe it is because the Snapdragons are all fully integrated SOC systems that need no large multitudinous count of additional chips added to a larger motherboard to make up a given whatzit. (you name it). But it does also clearly bring out the point about the ARM chipsets being plenty strong enough to do the job. They are certainly doing it now on all the MS phones fer sure. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/20/15 at 09:13:24 http://liliputing.com/2015/03/asus-c201-chromebook-with-rockhip-cpu-coming-soon.html\ http://www.cnx-software.com/2015/03/20/asus-c201-chromebook-to-be-powered-by-rockchip-rk3288-processor/ NOT NEAR YOU THOUGH, but available for purchase now through school supply houses, for less that $200. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/asus-c201-chromebook.jpg Why should this interest you, or worry Intel? People have been doing comparisons already and the results are back. http://www.cnx-software.com/2015/01/21/antutu-benchmark-rockchip-rk3288-arm-vs-intel-atom-z3735f/ As you can see, Intel doesn't fare well against this Rockchip 4 banger which now costs less money even though Intel is still price supporting their old chipsets. When ARM starts poking through the Intel pricing support screen with a better product for less money -- this should be giving Intel the cold sweats. go read it on the link above where it shows up as a table type graphic "Asus is reportedly planning to launch a new Chrome OS laptop which is described as the company’s “most affordable Chromebook to date.” Since Asus launched two Chromebooks priced at $249 last summer, that suggests the new Asus C201 Chromebook could have a list price of $199 or less. OMG Chrome has posted an image of the upcoming Chromebook from the latest catalog of Troxell, a company that sells products to schools. Rockchip RK3288 Intel Atom Z3735F Delta CPU Quad core Cortex A17 @ 2.0 GHz Quad core @ 1.33 GHz (Burst 1.83GHz) GPU ARM Mali-T764 Intel HD Graphics Gen 7 Antutu 5.x Overall 36525 29851 -18.27% Multitask 5906 3947 -33.17% Runtime 2039 2064 1.23% RAM Ops 2487 2158 -13.23% RAM Speed 2985 3281 9.92% CPU Integer (multi-thread) 2414 3035 25.72% CPU float-point (multi-thread) 3515 2984 -15.11% CPU Integer (single thread) 1455 1572 8.04% CPU float-point (single thread) 1893 1696 -10.41% 2D Graphics (1920×1080) 1447 1346 -6.98% 3D Graphics (1920×1080) 11108 5904 -46.85%" All your negative numbers is where Intel comes up lacking. And remember, this is a 2 year old chipset from Rockchip, not something that was just put out this year like the rest of the new ones coming up will be. Of course Intel will have newer and better too, but their price support curtain is getting weaker and weaker and the new Intel pricing will go up and up and up. Intel should also be very worried that MS is embracing Qualcomm into the Win 10 family of supported chipsets -- Qualcomm has been CONSISTENTLY kicking Intel's butt in mobile all along the way. Should Mediatek or Allwinner or Rockchip get this same MS support, then Intel's future looks very bleak indeed. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/22/15 at 11:01:48 http://www.cnx-software.com/2015/01/21/antutu-benchmark-rockchip-rk3288-arm-vs-intel-atom-z3735f/ RK3288 is getting some attention now since it seems to outperform Intel's much price supported http://www.cnx-software.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/Rockchip_RK3288_vs_Intel_Atom_Z3735F.jpg Remember the history, ARM gave this chipset to Rockchip so they could block Intel's entry into tablet space with a superior product sold at a cheaper price. At the time it was seen as somewhat over-powered for the job, but ARM gave it to Rockchip for a purpose. And it filled that purpose admirably ..... but then Intel started PAYING people to use their Intel paid out $8 Billion dollars to overcome the RK3288, but did nothing to change the actual comparative dynamics of the RK3288 chipset vs their own chips. First shots out of the gun on Broadwell M is still on rough parity with this current 28nm RK3288. Now, a full year later, the base dynamics are showing through and please note that RK3288 is also primed to reduce in lithography to 20nm or 16nm any time TSMC is ready to do that. Plus, since licensing is done already and the Chromebook work with Google is done already, a current standard 28nm 6 or 8 core A17 versions are also very possible for Chromeboxes (at a corded power consumption similar to Intel's Core i5 products). At 16nm a reworked 6-8 core RK3288 version would likely be laptop battery type power rated as well, since it is at 28nm right now and sips power right now better than Intel does at 22nm. A successful Chromebook and Chromebox or two will drive this sort of action quite quickly, and the RK3288 can act as the interim stopgap until the A57 gets cheap and the A72 comes on board and matures as well. Just as ARM originally intended. Should MS see the chipset as a desirable item they could add support for it in Win10 so it could then be the basis of a lower cost Chromekiller on their side of the fence. This would only be logical from MS's point of view since Intel has nothing close to the real price and real performance to do that critical job. Intel would hate this idea a lot, since a MS supported 4, 6 or 8 core ARM anything (at 20nm or 16nm especially) would be a direct threat to the low end of their normal laptop business. Look to see an Intel name branded RK3288 variant pop into existence real soon .... ================================== Just like ARM gave the A12 and A17 to Rockchip to block Intel, the sudden appearance and instant shipment status of the new ass-kicking ARM Cortex A72 out of Mediatek is another Intel blocking move by ARM. This chipset looks to be able to block the still pending 14nm Intel chip products quite nicely. Intel will be sniffing around at Mediatek's butt now wanting to get all friendly, but I think Mediatek had to sign some more thorough agreements with ARM to get the A72 given to them and Intel is likely wasting their time. Mediatek isn't likely to go the Rockchip path, since they see Rockchip got no real benefit out of the Intel arrangement and is now paying full retail for ARM designs now and not getting them early, either. But trust that Intel will play just as dirty as needed to keep ARM chipsets out of the normal laptop market for just as long as they possibly can. Once MS supports ARM processors and they show up in low end normal laptops, the end begins for Intel. Not that the end will be quick, but instead it will be as long and as messy as you can imagine, pending China's government agencies finally acting against one of Intel's "actions in restraint of trade". So far Rockchip doesn't seem to have been damaged much by Intel, and the choir of little hockey stick guys haven't been run out of business so far to any noticeable degree. So, Intel just bleeds and pays and bleeds and pays ....... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/23/15 at 06:52:29 Intel has been observed working with Asus and Acer and such to roll out a series of Core i3 and Core i5 variants of Chromeboxes instead of upgrading their older mobile chipsets. (energy efficiency isn't a prime concern on a corded desktop unit after all) The price of the units are popping up an additional $50-60 when this happens, sometimes higher. Intel is attempting to pre-compete against the new upcoming class of ARM processors by getting into all the desktop units with heavier duty Core i3 and i5 series chips before the new ARM processors actually arrive. Intel can do this quickly by price supporting the new low end i3 and i5 chips in the same way they did the older Chromebook chipsets. Who exactly they are robbing now to price support their i3 and i5 chips is a point of curiosity. But it is obvious the Intel price supports and the ARM/Intel conflict areas are now going to lap on up into the low end laptop and desktop range now. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/24/15 at 04:53:13 http://news.softpedia.com/news/Intel-Broadwell-Based-Chromebooks-Tipped-for-Q1-2015-452504.shtml Softpedia deals in interpretations and interpretive "rumor mongering" so take the base facts mentioned as true, but the spin interpretation is just that. So this Intel plugging in of the i3 and i5 is seen as an interim move to get some extra power into the chromebook space pending Intel getting the right chips for Chromespace designed, ready, built and soldered in place with this being done in the second half of this year at the earliest. It is also seen as a conscious manipulation of the price point since some people are starting to PREFER the Chromebook now Intel feels they can start charging some higher premium prices for better versions of it. "These predictions are made via Intel’s roadmap, which shows us that Chromebooks with Broadwell chips inside will land on the market in early 2015. These new chips will replace the Pentium and Celeron ones. Judging by Intel’s multiple delays, however, there’s a strong possibility that the new Broadwell Celeron and Pentium chips will end up making an appearance on the market in Q2 2015. Intel is also preparing Core i5 and Core i7 5th generation processors in Q1 2015, processors that will replace the current Haswell lineup. What’s more, models currently running on what’s being called the Essential Series Bay Trail-M chips will be revamped. Soon enough, the Bay Trail-M platform will give up its place and be replaced by Braswell Celeron and Pentium products instead. Chromebooks are starting to draw more and more attention upon themselves, especially in the business sector. Even if Windows still rules supreme in this ecosystem, Chromebooks are slowly starting to infiltrate it. For example, just last week numbers coming from research firm NPD showed us that B2B (business-to-business) sales in the US had spiked over 250% in the last year. B2B incorporates governmental establishments, organizations, and businesses that usually buy these machines in bulk. Currently, Chromebooks are seeing a lot of success in the educational market, which is driving a lot of the sale of these products. According to NPD, in the first five months of the year, Chromebooks manages to account for up to 35% of all notebooks sales , a percent that translates into 1.4 million units sold." Because of Microsoft's size issues with the bulkiness of Win 10 simply not fitting on the little flash drives very well it looks like the low end Chromebooks will continue to grow and take market share away from the Wintel world. Business zone penetration has begun as well. Plus, on the lower end processors that rule Chromespace MS Windows is a slow tortoise sometimes and Chrome is always a fast hare, comparatively speaking. Quick sells to people who are used to poky old slow Windows machines. Plus, if the spin on this article is right, Intel thinks Chromebooks are actually becoming a "preference" item with some folks now, a preference that can support some of Intel's greedy thinking and market manipulations to maximize Intel's profit margins. I think that during this period when Intel is price supporting their old 22nm i3 and i5 a whole lot of CHEAP heavy hitter Intel Chromeboxes are going to fall into the hands of the Chrome Box modder boys in Europe -- and I look for the Asus version of this price supported Chromebox traffic to become VERY popular in Europe (who will turn them into cheap Linux boxes). Asus should design a slightly taller case with a decent quiet fan and enough bracket room for a thin laptop style hard drive. Look for bumped up dual boot Chrome / Linux boxes to be resold in Europe by value added resellers. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/24/15 at 09:44:15 From whence comes this sudden adoption of Qualcomm SOC products into MS's lonely bosom? How did Intel so quickly exit MS's bed and another take its place in MS's affections? http://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-adds-former-qualcomm-exec-peggy-johnson-to-senior-leadership-team/ http://microsoft-news.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Peggy-Johnson.jpg I don't always look this good now-a-days, but I do this for spec shots just to remind everybody I had a lot of pretty to go along with my drive and my brains. Meet Peggy Johnson, the moving force behind MS's getting close to Qualcomm, the two companies putting out joint standards for the Internet of things, putting Qualcomm's big new processors at the forefront of Win10 development, making sure there are real alternatives to go to when Intel reaches the end of its loss leader rope -- meet Peggy Johnson. I find it fascinating that one person can make so much goodie happen so quickly. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/24/15 at 09:54:19 http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/03/qualcomms-snapdragon-820-will-feature-kryo-cpu-kraits-64-bit-successor/ Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 820 will feature Kryo CPU, Krait’s 64-bit successor This is Qualcomm's custom cored processor that is intended to outdo the stock ARM Cortex A72 products that will be landing at the same time. It will be built at 16nm or 14nm (TSMC or Samsung). It will land second half of this year. It will debut as a Win 10 supported chipset able to run a laptop or desktop device. It may indeed kick some arse in the mobile world and further wound Intel in the Chromebook/light laptop realm. Do you smell a Chromekiller in the making? One where the software guy and the hardware guy are working closely together? Intel, whatcha got to fix this mess? ::) We have a powerpoint slide about that subject ..... http://https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/F2zJ5AGoTlC3ZhymnXuT8XKn7fZ38cASLqNPh1_JWG3gnQWr_MoXlX7jn835g8NrZIEk=s128 |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 03/27/15 at 14:34:44 Seen this in the news section..... wonder who will take them up on it? I think I will wait until about the sixth month mark before I upgrade. Unless it forces me to do it like win 8.1 did. https://www.yahoo.com/tech/microsoft-clarifies-who-gets-free-windows-10-114730456889.html |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/28/15 at 04:04:48 The story keeps changing ..... Win10 ranges from totally free to totally free to developers to a yearly fee arrangement. It changes every time somebody from MS "talks" to the press. MS now has a PR problem with charging for the OS since no one else does that any more. What you may see is a OFFICE/Major softwares/OS package maintenance deal come out where you pay to "be taken care of" across the board by MS. Or you may see something nobody has even predicted yet. Rest assured that MS needs to collect money from you somehow --- they are not a charitable organization by any means. However, they have a HUGE PR ISSUE right now with the last 2 versions of their OS having sucked so very very very badly that people didn't want to use it. They also have an issue with 25% of their laptop customers having left them to go over to Chromebooks, which they find they like Chromebooks a LOT for various good reasons. This MS has to stop, ASAP, or they could simply lose too many customers. Also rest assured that the Chinese users won't pay for anything (their government says so) .... you see they have a government that takes care of them using the national police to make that salient but firm point to MS. So, MS is just going to feel their way through the land mines and charge whatever they can as they feel with their feet along the way. Trust what is free this year may pick up a small upgrade fee next year. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/29/15 at 10:57:10 Intel, growing increasingly frustrated trying to build cell phones and tablets (and losing their arse in each of those areas for the last 4 years running) has made a move on Altera, the rack based server maker that Intel has been building chips for occasionally. This signals the potential for Intel to be following IBM's path to a stable non-competitive niche chip builder status -- issue is that Texas Instruments, IBM, Broadcom and several others have already trod that path and established themselves in it. Intel/Altera could own that niche very easily, which could give Intel a source of revenue and a means of filling up some of the way underutilized capacity in those multiple idled 22nm lines. And Lord knows Intel could do purchasing Altera outright MUCH MUCH cheaper than supporting their sorry loss leader stuff in mobile for another year. Intel has another 5-10 years to find itself a retirement home, but until then count on Intel to be disrupting various markets in turn as they settle into obscurity. Intel wastes more money per year than the GNP of some small countries ..... and they really do need to find a place where they can settle in for their long slow retirement years. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/29/15 at 11:26:46 OK, who is still vibrant and shaking things up some in Mobile? Apple really owns it from the top down, and is doing their yearly upgrade to new stuff as we speak. Samsung is building their chipsets for them, as well as Intel (Intel is doing fewer all the time though). Qualcomm "thinks they own it" in mobile and still is making aggressive strides to protect their business from the hockey stick guys on the low end and from Samsung/Apple on the top end. Qualcomm is the highest volume phone chip provider right now, to be sure. Samsung has gotten somewhat off the cutting edge lately, they have been having to buy some Qualcomm and Mediatek processors to fill in here and there, but this year seem to have the 14nm process and the chipsets to go it alone as a front runner on the high end. High cost is killing Samsung as the Mediatek chipsets come washing into the bottom and middle in a huge low cost wave. Samsung is getting limited to upper end phones by the relentless low to mid-range competition. This is bad for Samsung as they used to own the middle portion of the market. Samsung has lost 25% of their old market share to the hockey stick guys and Xiaomi and the other Chinese phone makers. Samsung's phone profits took a 60% dip last year as the Galaxy S5 didn't do well last year. Mediatek has announced they are going to be the new Qualcomm and they have a new global LTE chip and baseband setup to allow their MANY MANY MANY versions of phone chips to go into the middle to low upper end market share around the world. I watch Mediatek for what will be affordable next year as they seem to define what is affordable right now by and large with Qualcomm still controlling the LTE portion of the business. Mediatek thinks the A57 chipset is simply too hot running and power wasting for the processing yield that it actually offers, so they are going with a pair of A72 on the premium end "bigs" and use four A17 on the broad middle range products. They may have spotted a winning mixture of technologies there since they can mix and match big / little pair ups using the A53 chipset (which Mediatek likes a lot) on the small side and either the A72 or the A17 for the big side of the match up. This mix works with 6 core sets and 8 core sets for bulk market, with only a dual core A72 being required on the upper end due to the monster A72 core size. When Mediatek and Qualcomm begin to actively compete in a worldwide LTE market each with their own separate "global LTE chipsets" to match up with their own separate ARM processor sets you can expect the price of 4G LTE phones to come down drastically yet again. This sort of Mediatek action may squeeze Samsung out of its position as a high cost middle to high end phone supplier. New Oriental BYOP phone brands will come to America en-masse along with the Mediatek LTE chipset revolution. I just bought a $127.95 BLU Studio 5.0" HD 4G LTE Qualcomm based phone from Amazon --- the Mediatek phones were cheaper but didn't support T-Mobile highest speeds nearly as well as the Qualcomm chipset did. This will likely change up with the new Mediatek global LTE which is coming out this summer and which will be common (and low cost) by next summer. BYOP is getting big with T-Mobile with Amazon selling them in selection sets that are grouped by the Carrier and the specific level of service you plan to buy. This makes it easier for folks to find the right BYOP phone that works with their carrier and plan. People are flat getting tired of paying $650 for a <$300 phone from the actual carriers any more. In the orient, Bring Your Own Phone is the only way it gets done any more. T-Mobile has the fastest (and the cheapest) 4G LTE three + person family plan in America right now. They do the best BYOP and DO NOT REQUIRE A 2 YEAR CONTRACT. Coverage is all major cities and along the interstates right now, but their fall back HSPA+ (fancy 3G) isn't all that bad and it is all over the rest of the country. Plus T-Mobile is into Wifi phone functions already and T-Mobile is reportedly one of the companies Google is working with on their new wifi phone system. I bought a phone and chipset that does 4G LTE at 100+mbps at full speed (major cities only) and HSPA+ at current 21mbs out in the countryside (up to 41mbps is possible on newly renovated HSPA+ rural towers). And is should mebbe be able to do the Google upcoming wifi tricks as well ..... ..... for $127.95 with free 2 day delivery from Amazon. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/30/15 at 08:40:13 http://liliputing.com/2015/03/mediatek-introduces-helio-x-and-helio-p-chips-for-high-end-phones.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/helio.jpg Sure enough, Mediatek pops Qualcomm on the nose with their very first domestic LTE "world chip" at 28nm. Given a year or so to get cheap and to shrink at least down to 20nm, this one will be a very nice chip for my 3 year out next phone purchase. "MediaTek’s Helio X series stands for “Extreme Performance” and will include the company’s top performing chips, while the Helio P series will offer “Premium Performance,” while balancing the need for speed with energy efficiency in order to enable thinner devices (or hopefully mobile devices with longer battery life). The first of the new chips expected to hit the streets it the Helio X10, (also known as the MT6795W), which should launch in mid-April. It’s a 28nm octa-core ARM Cortex-A53 processor with clock speeds up to 2.2 GHz and support for 4G LTE." Samsung is feeling sorta sick right now since this one takes away their low to middle market share before year's end. Qualcomm feels like somebody just popped them in the nose and that sucker is still bleeding ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/30/15 at 09:34:22 http://liliputing.com/2015/03/chromebooks-with-nvidia-tegra-x1-chips-on-the-way.html Intel just grunted because somebody just poked them in the nose too. Twice no less .... http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/tegra-x1.jpg Yup, that is the Nvidia Tegra X1 heavy hitter chipset which has just shown up on two separate Google Chromebook development pages as Smaug and Foster, two separate different Chromebook motherboards for two different vendors. Folks are waiting for Intel to release some brown vapor in response, assuming Intel has any bean power left to poot out anything significant since their 14nm stuff is so far behind and is so underperforming at this point in time. Intel is currently pushing price supported old 22nm Core i3 and Core i5 chipsets out as their current "innovative" Chromebox chipsets, but that move will not play well in Chromebooks as battery life is a prime consideration in a laptop. Humorous caption, not a quote. We are .... this .... close to having a idea for a competitive Rockchip/Spreadtrum/Sophia chipset for tentative delivery sometimes in 2016/2017 ..... http://https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQq4TdZ2FuuPiAv1L5cI4zZtBeq88h8FUVFHFZVBVmI_KxCMebR ================================= and, true to form, two days later Intel squeezes out a little poot of vague future brown nasty vapor ..... http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/braswell.jpg "So what can we expect from the first Braswell chips? While we won’t be able to say much about their performance until we have a chance to actually test them, here are some of the specs: Celeron N3000 – 1.04 GHz dual-core CPU with 1MB L2 cache, 4W TDP, and burst speeds up to 2.08 GHz Celeron N3050 – 1.6 GHz dual-core CPU with 1MB L2 cache, 6W TDP, and burst speeds up to 2.16 GHz Celeron N3150 – 1.6 GHz quad-core CPU with 2MB L2 cache, 6W TDP, and burst speeds up to 2.08 GHz Pentium N3700 – 1.6 GHz quad-core CPU with 2MB L2 cache, 6W TDP, and burst speeds up to 2.4 GHz All of these processors are 14nm chips with support for DDR3-1600 memory and the dual-core chips feature 320 MHz graphics with GPU burst speeds of 600 MHz. The Celeron N3150 processor has a 640 MHz GPU, while the Pentium N3700 has a 700 MHz GPU." |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/30/15 at 10:10:16 NOTE: This was based on video chipsets ---- but the same issues exist for current CPU lithography http://www.extremetech.com/computing/123529-nvidia-deeply-unhappy-with-tsmc-claims-22nm-essentially-worthless Nvidia deeply unhappy with TSMC, claims 20nm essentially worthless http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/NV-Pres3.jpg What are you looking at (why it is important) ??? Chip makers are NOT getting the boost out of the current lithography shrinks that they think they should be getting once they get into production. Intel is not the only one forwarding cherry picked samples that the production chipsets cannot match -- TSMC is getting slammed for this now too. http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/NV-Pres4.jpg "What this slide states — we can’t even call it a suggestion — is that smaller processes no longer improve yields by leading to a greater number of chips per wafer. Instead, the complexities and difficulties of manufacturing at the new process create a cost structure that provides precious little incentive to manufacture at the new process. If openly criticizing a foundry partner is unusual, showing data that suggests that your foundry partner can’t provide a cost-effective strategy for building hardware at next-generation process nodes is… a few steps past that point." Now you begin to understand why Mediatek is still making all its main production chipsets at 28nm and will likely continue to do so until their favorite foundry can fix this nagging issue. ..... and it also gives you a clue as to why Intel is so so screwed up right now and why they are pushing Core i3 and Core i5 22nm chips out as their new "mobile chipsets" -- they have gotten NO REAL ADVANTAGE out of the $20 billion they have spent chasing their 14nm rabbit so far. This also explains the running on two years in delays in seeing bulk production on the new 14nm chipsets -- 14nm simply isn't ready yet. Scrap rates are too high and the performance improvement simply isn't there yet. ::) Test your own 14nm device once you get it, you might get a good one, then again you might not ...... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/31/15 at 10:22:42 Prediction time Intel must break into mobile in 2015 -- they MUST find a way to make a profitable chipset, even if it is somebody else's design. THEY ABSOLUTELY HAVE to fill up their 14nm lines to 100% capacity and keep them there as they convert over the old 22nm lines to the new process. Intel can only operate at 100% utilization and at 100% full speed and be efficient. If this means learning how to operate at lower margins and laying off deadwood to lower prices, then so be it. If it means shutting down a third of their capacity until they have the business to cover it, then they have to do that too. INTEL MUST CRANK UP THE INTEL STEAM ROLLER and roll all over those little guys crunchy little corpses to get their volume share. Problem for Intel in their normal "business model" modus operandi is that they must go do all this slaughtering and steam rollering in CHINA and they are already on provisional status with the Chinese government already for their past misbehaviors. One regulatory rifle shot from the Chinese government and Intel goes down with a big 'ol hole in their little 'ol puddin' haid. And they don't get back up again. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 03/31/15 at 14:28:28 Six (6) more brand new very low cost Chromebooks have just been announced today. Prices range from $169 down to $149. Vendors are all low end tablet makers and all of them are built using the Rockchip RK3288 Cortex A17 chip set. 10 hours of run time -- fast processing, great graphics ....... for the price of a cheap tablet you could have this instead http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/hisense-chromebook.jpg Most impactful of the lot is the $149 Hisense because the Hisense will be sold at all Walmarts direct to the general public (not schools) and it is available starting today. Microsoft has said they will go head to head at the $149 price point just as soon as Windows 10 is ready to go (they must have all the cute little partial hard drive C: up in the cloud tricks up and running to allow Win 10 to function at the price point at all). Pundits are saying that Microsoft will just lower the price of Chromebooks down to $129 if they put price supported Chromekillers in at the $149 price point. ============================== Microsoft is making a strategic mistake if they drive the price of Chromebooks down deeper into tablet space pricing because then all them hockey stick tablet makers will come out with Chromebooks just as a simple competitive knee jerk reaction to what their favorite hockey stick enemy just did. This will drive and multiply the acceptance of Chromebooks in the Orient. Which will then act to slit MS's throat in the long run, as Orientals love Android and Android (ALL of it) can now be run freely on Chromebooks and Chromeboxes. Fighting this directly with similar priced Win 10 units means MS will be directly cannibalizing MS very own middle level laptop sales with each $149 Chromekiller they sell. (OBTW, Google improved the porting tools and removed all restrictions on porting to Chrome as of this week). ::) .... you could put a stake in the sand on March 31, 2015 and say that today Microsoft actually died, but it will likely take them a while yet to figure it out for themselves. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/01/15 at 04:22:10 http://venturebeat.com/2015/03/31/at-149-google-unveils-its-cheapest-chromebooks-yet-haier-and-hisense-11-6-laptops-up-for-preorder-today/ http://https://tctechcrunch2011.files.wordpress.com/2015/03/haier-chromebook-11.png?w=738 Oh, the impactful news continues --- Amazon has a $149 Chromebook too, the Haier white model. Oh, and the level of verbal bashing out on the net is getting really intense, all the MS fanboys are tearing up the keyboards wanting to know WHY would anybody buy one of these things. Google posts a video that gives the purpose of the machines, without saying anything at all. https://youtu.be/lHjNxscOY_M it is a one (1) minute movie, jest click on it and watch it MS fanboys are screaming at this because it disrupts their entire world view about hardware, they worship their super expensive hardware and slave away at taking care of it. They spend more on a water-cooled heatsink than these entire units cost (and the wake up speed and the browsing speed they see in these unis REALLY REALLY pisses them off yet further as their big expensive super-strong rig takes 20 times longer to start up and then load a program and then actually go DO anything) The thought of hardware that is "just there when you want it" totally confuses them. And they can't understand how Chrome has taken 25% USA market share away from MS laptop sales ..... ...... and successfully bridged the gap space between tablets and laptops ...... ...... and how Chromebooks fit neatly into the Android phone ecosystem that so many of us live in every day ..... It angers them to see this Chrome stuff just running away with and destroying what they believe in so devotedly. ::) That's OK, them little mammals pissed the dinosaurs off too. Ate all them big 'ol eggs the dinos left buried in the sand, they did. ================================ Performance and battery life of the RK3288 chipset units are different according to the ghz speed the setup is given during construction. The Amazon Haier is clocked slower at 1.7 ghz and it gives a 10+ hour battery life while giving performance that is better than the entire set of gen 1 Chromebooks were able to give. However, we are at gen 4 now and this Amazon Haier is likely to be considered "underperforming" as originally set up so perhaps the Haier setup ghz parameters might get changed shortly, as well as growing a 4 gig systems memory version for "upscale users". The Walmart Hisense is clocked faster at 2.0 ghz and it does perform about as well as a Tegra K1 ASUS unit from early this year. But it offers about the same level (7.5 to 8 hours) of battery life while doing so. Look for the 4 gig upscale version to come out soon here too. Mediatek may have all the answers for what comes next, as they have an entire CREW of lithography reduced, tuned, upscale A-17 main processor chipsets now in 4 core, 6 core and 8 core formats with some A53 littles tossed into the mix for vastly improved battery life while doing simple tasks. And with much better VR graphics processors in them too. Mediatek is also prepping up a set of Chromebooks with their favorite tablet vendors ..... and these more modern Cortex A-17 units might upset the status quo by being FASTER than current low end Chromebook units and still have better battery life to boot. At the $149 price point. :D "With the launch of these devices, the Chrome OS ecosystem pulls side-by-side with the Windows world, where Microsoft reportedly hopes its OEMs will also offer $149 laptops based on Windows 10 soon." (listen to those MS fanboys teeth jest a grinding while the rest of the developing world goes Chrome/Android from the very get-go) The hockey stick guys are now into laptops and MS is getting all banged up and contused by being put inside an oriental style street hockey game while not wearing any protective body armor, for being fat and clumsy and not having a very long nor a very fast hockey stick. Remember, half of MS's stick is kept up in the cloud at any given point in time, sometimes the head, sometimes the handle is simply gone, not there -- gone up into the cloud for storage. Intel looks on aghast, speechless as their pet dog Rockchip fuels the fray, tearing up the rest of Intel's lock on the Chromebook market with gleeful abandon. And there is NOTHING Intel or MS can do about it -- they have no competitive product to put forward, either of them. And two huge players, Walmart and Amazon, are backing this game -- so MS and Intel can't buy or bribe anybody to "make the bad man stop". The pain just goes on and and on and on ....... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6cfhUxJ3jeo MS plays 15 seconds of snow hockey with just a few of the new crowd of little Chinese hockey stick guys. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/01/15 at 10:41:08 http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/acer-chromebase.jpg This is Acer's new Chromebase. Asus has come out with a Chromestick to do the same sort of large scale thing on a big screen TV. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/02/15 at 05:22:02 OK, MS is now stalling on all fronts until Win 10 is released -- there will be no new wave of Chromekillers until such time the cloud shared hard drive C:/ tech in Win 10 is released on new hardware and offered to the older Chromekillers as a usability fix. This however, is not why Chromebooks aren't a super hot topic in America any more -- Chromebooks are still taking some market share in new areas like business, but in fact Chromebooks in general personal use have totally sold in and are sitting at saturation levels in the USA (people are upgrading to more powerful Chromebook units with larger screens actually). What does this imply? Does this mean Chromebooks are a natural 25% market share item, just hitting just at the 25% of folks with enough money to have multiple units? The 25% who just want to cruise the web and never do much else at that location in their house? Young people? USA Education is indeed the largest sell in area so far, with the highest penetration % at around 40%-50% and growing. Take a deep breath and look at this chart -- it deals with a sell in that caps naturally in the USA and remains pretty much unchanged going forward --- it implies that Chromebooks may have indeed reached saturation here in the USA. http://s.thestreet.com/files/tsc/v2008/photos/charts/ABI_Research1023.jpg What does Win 10 mean to next year's Chromebook sales? If MS does what they say they will do, I expect Chromebooks sales will take a dip during the sell in of "free" Win 10. I also think the natural selection and price range effects will settle Chromebooks into the lower quartile of laptops as a whole. But Chromebooks will command that lowest quartile pretty much uncontested (new chromekillers from MS notwithstanding). I also think that Win 10 has been greatly influenced by the Chromewars, and that MS has made alterations in their Win 10 product to try to become "lighter acting" and to quit irritating users all the time with updates, etc. Still, "lighter acting" isn't lighter and faster and it seems that Win 10 isn't significantly quicker in any real noticeable fashion. The basic maintenance drill for Win 10 is pretty much unchanged, you still have to scrape your machine for viruses every week and do a defrag every couple of weeks or else your machine gets dodgy. Microsoft's current Chromekillers have hit an acceptance wall due to hard drive constraints and general speed issues, and the Win 10 plans to hide part of the OS up in the cloud will not make the overall machines any quicker acting (indeed it may slow them down yet more). More and more folks are realizing that Chromebooks and Windows machines hit different need sets and are not really seen as head to head competitors by those that use both of them. Chromebooks are useful and quick and light and trouble/irritation free devices that are WEB tools extraordinaire. As web usage grows, so will Chromebooks. But they will likely remain about at at the USA market share they have already captured, growing slowly as the basis for computer usage slowly rolls from individually loaded softwares to web apps. Go back up and look at that chart again -- new emerging markets are indeed likely to have a higher adoption percentage than the USA, simply because MS isn't sitting there at a total Windows saturation point already like it was in the USA. https://youtu.be/lHjNxscOY_M Check this ad again -- see where Google is aiming their current Chromebook roll out efforts. (it ain't the USA by a long shot). Brazil and Latin America and India and the Orient are the next big Chromebook markets (and in total they are LARGER, rapidly growing markets right now than the economically stagnant USA) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/02/15 at 09:50:24 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/mouse-computer-launches-windows-pc-stick-with-built-in-fan.html The first actual entry into the "It costs more than a complete 11.6" Walmart Hisense Chromebook does at full retail" class of computing. Or was this one actually a belated entry into the old contest, the "We can do it, too" sweepstakes -- yep, yet another price supported Windows 8.1 Bing stick. These folks may be very disappointed when MS won't actually give them the tech support money because it doesn't have a screen less than 8" -- yep, them pesky new 2015 rules you know. At $179 this one now becomes the first entry into "It costs more than a complete 11" Walmart Chromebook does at retail" (not on sale) contest. Walmart gives us a value yardstick to use on these bottom end johnnies --- like, where is my battery, keyboard and screen? And WHY THE FRICK do you cost an extra $25 on top of that, HUH ???? ...... duh, MS tax ?? Proof that anything Chrome or Android can do, Microsoft can do, I guess -- sorta. So many times MS comes off as being a little slow, like this one which was aimed at the old Chromewars price point and not the new Chromewars price point. Well, almost do -- it can't run really well on the little bit of memory and the 32 gig hard drive is overcrowded from the get go and it can't run fast on the little Intel processor and it overheats somewhat in the attempt, so much so that this particular Japanese vendor did something sensible about it to protect his good name as a device maker. Once again, MS and Intel will likely have more price support and tech support dollars in the thing between the two of them than you will, should you actually go buy one of these little jewels (and should 'ol Wintel actually honor their Bing promises made from last year). It may well wind up having to have another "trial version of Bing OS" on it or else actually have to cost yet a bit more when you actually can get your hands on it for real. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/mouse-computer-stick.jpg http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/mouse-stick.jpg "The Mouse Computer m-Stick will be available by the end of April for ¥ 20,800, or about $175 including tax and shipping. The little computer features an Intel Atom Z3735F quad-core Bay Trail processor, 2GB of RAM, 32GB of eMMC storage, and Windows 8.1 with Bing 32-bit software. It has a microSD card slot, a USB 2.0 port, and an HDMI connector as well as a micro USB port for power. The device supports 802.11b/g/n WiFi and Bluetooth 4.0. There’s a growing number of devices with nearly identical specs, but this is one of the first I've seen to feature a spinning cooling fan. That’ll probably make it a bit noisier than the competition, but it should also run at a cooler temperature. The m-Stick measures 4.9[ch8243] x 1.5[ch8243] x 0.6[ch8243] and weighs about 2 ounces." :) ..... always announced "to be coming out soon" but never real and here right now ..... It is the poster child for MS and Intel best efforts in mobile -- you know, sorta sad but funny .... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/02/15 at 23:34:25 http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/braswell.jpg "So what can we expect from the first Braswell chips? While we won’t be able to say much about their performance until we have a chance to actually test them, here are some of the specs: Celeron N3000 – 1.04 GHz dual-core CPU with 1MB L2 cache, 4W TDP, and burst speeds up to 2.08 GHz Celeron N3050 – 1.6 GHz dual-core CPU with 1MB L2 cache, 6W TDP, and burst speeds up to 2.16 GHznd yes, these Mediatek are fully integrated phone chips ...... Celeron N3150 – 1.6 GHz quad-core CPU with 2MB L2 cache, 6W TDP, and burst speeds up to 2.08 GHz Pentium N3700 – 1.6 GHz quad-core CPU with 2MB L2 cache, 6W TDP, and burst speeds up to 2.4 GHz All of these processors are 14nm chips with support for DDR3-1600 memory and the dual-core chips feature 320 MHz graphics with GPU burst speeds of 600 MHz. The Celeron N3150 processor has a 640 MHz GPU, while the Pentium N3700 has a 700 MHz GPU." So, what will first gen 14nm Intel "tablet" chipsets be like? They will be here starting shipping late next month or thereabouts, the very very very first of them anyway. From all announcements, they are the same exact CPU chipset Intel has now, except die shrunk from 22 to 14nm. They will use 15-20% less energy to give ~5% better performance. THEY WILL HAVE better Intel graphics chips paired with them. The new Intel graphics chipsets will eat up over half of the energy improvement gotten from the main chipset, so battery life may improve, but not as much as you might expect. They will not be fully integrated chipsets, not yet. Bonus bucks for extra motherboard components will be required still. So, they will still require Intel contra revenue price supports to sell at Industry Appropriate price points. Intel will use them until they have something better -- Skylake perhaps. Or 10nm Cannonlake in a year or so. Much of what happens to Intel next depends on Microsoft and Win 10 -- will MS continue to write Intel a reason to exist carved right into the OS itself, or will Win 10 be more of an even playing field? :-? Wintel has a shot here at making something competitive, if they could cooperate together intelligently with their vendors. Tegra X1 is shipping in bulk inside the same time frame, and Chromebook and Chromebox units are already under construction by at least 3 major vendors. Tegra X1 is a large leap forward, and will likely outstrip the current Intel offerings by a respectable margin (even at 20nm lithography). Mediatek is a more immediate, stronger Chromezone low end threat to Intel as they have pre-existing A17 fully integrated chipsets that are clocked faster than the Rockchip A17s we just got in this week, plus they have them in 4, 6 and 8 core variants with some A53's tossed into the mix for greater efficiency and improved battery life for normal web browsing uses. Plus much stronger VR Graphics chipsets ..... ::) .... and yes, these Mediatek are fully integrated phone chips that all have HSPA+ built in right now so they could have GPS, bluetooth and cellular support too ...... So, a lot depends on just how many dollar bills Intel is willing to stack up on top of each Intel CPU and GPU set they plan to sell .... And as the Chromewars conflict price point keeps dropping lower and lower, Intel and MS must pile up even more dollars to get their contenders all the way down to the new lower conflict price point. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/03/15 at 08:16:20 http://www.extremetech.com/computing/193200-intels-14nm-broadwell-chip-reverse-engineered-reveals-impressive-finfets-13-layer-design OK, the boys and girls have etched a Broadwell chipset back down through the layers to see whats actually in it. http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/05.jpg .... above is a side view showing all 13 layers to the current Broadwell M chipset that was reviewed http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/shrinking-cpu-fig2.gif .... above is a "relative complexity" illustration from the previous generation to the current generation .... (but only showing half the layers, apparently). "So, what’s the big picture mean for Intel’s hardware? It means that I’m more inclined to think that the problems of the Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro are either caused by Lenovo’s design decisions or by power management software. OS level drivers could also be an issue. Accurately hitting its process node targets doesn’t necessarily say anything about the underlying chip — Broadwell might still use more power than Intel projected, for example, or it might not reach target frequencies. It might hit all these metrics but have trouble with yields. At the very least, this data suggests that Intel was playing it straight when it declared its 14nm technology would be a huge step forward and match historic scaling goals. Whether or not Intel can parley those advantages into improving its cost structure and wafer costs is still a very open question. With 450mm wafers on hold and EUV still uncertain, the higher cost at each additional node could still poison any semiconductor manufacturers’ attempts to push to lower process technologies — it’s just not clear when that will happen. Here’s what I suspect it means, strictly speaking for myself: Broadwell may well push down into power envelopes that compete with “little core” products, but the user experience people get will be very dependent on what kind of design choices the OEM makes. An improperly-cooled Broadwell may indeed feel like an Atom. A well-cooled design should be quite a bit stronger. Ultimately, however, Broadwell doesn’t break the laws of physics — and the laws of physics dictate rather strongly that there’s a heat cost for every degree of computation you perform. At a certain point, Broadwell’s “big core” scale-down and Atom’s “little-core” scale up are going to meet and match each other." It becomes clear that Broadwell is heat sensitive and drops performance badly due to required throttling if it gets hot. You will see heat sinks and fans continue into the next generation of Intel products I am afraid -- if people want to see that higher Broadwell performance level anyway. So, what does Intel do in a world where ARM can drop in a new 14nm lithography level combined with a new A72 core design that DOUBLES their current performance level, while Intel is currently spending 10s of billions just to get a 5% speed bump? Remember, the RISC boys do all this doubling of performance at lithography levels that are one to two bumps BIGGER than what Intel uses. And RISC chipsets are still considerably simpler and faster executing than these current Intel CISC designs. The Broadwell answer seems to be go to extreme levels of complexity just to partially defeat their current issues with hopes that yields will stay high enough to make a shippable product. The result of this approach seems to be somewhat variable inside the shipped production lots, variable within the same wafer, from one chip to the next. Broadwell M got panned badly for this variation, with lots of wafers containing good performers and the next chip in the wafer being fairly mediocre performers. This has always been true, but NOT TO THE LARGE DEGREE SEEN LATELY, not ever before to this degree at this point in time where entire lots of chips are seen as "mixed". And this is AFTER Intel has sorted through the chips already and scrapped a goodly portion of them. It is theorized by some that the "highest performing units" were intentionally removed and shipped to Apple as Apple would not accept mixed performance batches from Intel. :-? There may be an inherent price to be paid for CISC complexity compared to RISC simplicity that is really beginning to show up clearly at these reduced lithography levels. Test your own product once you get it, if you get an underperformer chipset -- return it under warranty. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/03/15 at 21:30:06 http://www.androidauthority.com/galaxy-s6-first-place-antutu-q1-2015-598277/ Flip side -- is the 14nm Samsung Exynos Octa as good as it is knocked up to be? Well, ya gotta go to the benchmarks to see what's cookin' with the new Samsung phone. Samsung claimed 25% improvement over past efforts and the numbers yield a 28% improvement over Qualcomm's 810 processor (in real life testing by disinterested parties) so you got the right sort of numbers showing up in the right direction as IMPROVEMENT numbers. http://cdn04.androidauthority.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/AnTuTu-top-10-smartphones-Q1-2015-710x352.png http://cdn01.androidauthority.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/AnTuTu-top-GPUs-Q1-2015-710x354.png Oddly enough, the Qualcomm 810 is the one that gets mentioned for getting hot and throttling itself, harming its overall phone performance ratings -- not the Samsung. Now, to find any dirt on a Samsung phone, always ask the Appelonians. Apple iPhone 6 fans tout all kinds of graphics speed wins for their home favorite, saying the iPhone 6 is faster graphically -- and this is true since the Samsung is pushing 130% more pixel density to just barely lose in these speed contests. The Apple fans stand mute on screen resolution and color counts and spectrum this and that (the very things they used to hoot about all the time). But they will take their graphics speed wins since that is all they can find. So, even the Appleonians have to agree that the performance increases in the current 14nm Samsung Exynos Octa are both real and significant -- and that strenuous abusive testing does not cause overheating and throttling on the Samsung chipset as it does with Intel's new Broadwell M chipsets. Furthermore this is NOT the brand new groundbreaking Cortex A72 Samsung product that is coming out fairly soon which should carry even more kick ass improvements according to the ARM specs that product will be built with. This is just a 14nm die shrink of existing A57/A53 big little technology ...... just like the current Broadwells are supposed to be a die shrink on Bay Trail when they finally get here, finally. Intel, with a 2 year head start you fumbled around and let Samsung beat you to 14nm, and then you let Samsung beat you at 14nm performance-wise on top of that -- shame on you. Samsung will tune this chipset for Tablets and have one out shortly -- then we can get Antutu ratings that show the relative position of Samsung's 14nm Exynos Octa against Intel's whole range of Tablet processors, including the 22nm big boys, the Core i3, i5 and i7 which are already out and counted in the MS Surface Pro units. Now, won't that be fun ??? [smiley=engel017.gif] .... then the Tegra X1 will come out and kick Intel's butt yet again, for even more fun. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/04/15 at 15:22:29 Intel is working with the next set of Broadwell and Braswell chipset implementations to make sure the folks building the product UNDERSTAND their choices much much better. Expect cooling fans or large copper heat sinks, expect the Broadwells to be set up for higher current draw, to run faster (but within thermal limits), give better processing power and for all the claims made for the product to be completely inside what the real assembled product can do. Expect these claims to be more reasonable, since not all Broadwell chips in a given lot will be up to making a top end, elevated claim. There is that narsty chip to chip production variation or "spread" out there to be dealt with. :P Intel was STUPID for letting their PR department write the product spec sheet recommendations for Broadwell and they have paid for that stupidity with doubled black eyes and a large loss of image. Mebbe they will do better with Braswell. Lenovo was stupid for NOT TESTING THOROUGHLY and just slamming that Yoga together fast and shipping it "according to the Intel spec sheets". However, the damage is done and no-one trusts Broadwell any more as being "an unqualified improvement". It now carries the taint of a failed first introduction and all device makers now know to beware of the built-in gotchas that go along with Broadwell. Intel should be looking forward to a microscopic evaluation of their next Broadwell products by the computing press. If they should flop again, the press guys will be absolutely merciless. No excuses about Broadwell drivers and inappropriate energy management softwares will be acceptable. (Intel provides the software and the drivers). ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 04/05/15 at 13:25:48 Came across this while reading news..... ARM processer allows for a ten year battery life? http://www.technobuffalo.com/2015/04/05/this-processor-wants-to-offer-decade-long-battery-life/ |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/05/15 at 16:58:33 Yep, embedded internet of things chipset -- if placed in an article of clothing it could be powered by sewn in place solar panels. IoT ARM gets tiny, more so than anything phone or tablet ever does. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/06/15 at 06:29:17 http://static4.businessinsider.com/image/54539c8069bedd7b1dbd6afe-1069-803/microsoft-ceo-satya-nadella.jpg Aieeeee !!! I am currently caught knee deep while crossing the Chrome and ARM piranha laden stream and I can't go forward because Intel Skylake isn't ready yet and now Intel Broadwell M has done a Lenovo Yoga Pro poo dump all over its very own head -- taking all my current Braswell hopes with it, I am afraid. I NEED faster chips to make my bloated slow Win10 seem to be quick and responsive -- I must have some faster chips, chips that will actually fit inside real laptop products and do not require gargantuan huge heat sinks on top of them to keep them from thermal throttling down to nothing and destroying my new OS's nimble quick performance. And that yoga positioning you did was very badly done, Lenovo. I do not think that is what the Kama Sutra meant at all by that particular convoluted positioning. This really actually means to me that Intel has no faster cheaper better chipset relief for me this spring or early summer at all ..... nothing to make my slightly porky OS move quickly and smoothly. So I am still stuck out here in midstream with these nasty quick little Google fishes nibbling at my ankles and toes with their sharp sharp little teeth. http://image.shutterstock.com/display_pic_with_logo/178732/178732,1220661159,6/stock-photo-kamasutra-scene-on-the-wall-of-a-temple-in-khajuraho-madhya-pradesh-india-17011783.jpg < groan > ...... maybe my new friend Qualcomm can help me ..... And I may have actually have done some of the same poo thing to myself, not being able to put my Win10 OS into a 32 gig Chromekiller flash drive without having to resort to funny magic rabbit-in-the-hat in and out of the cloud tricks. So so embarrassing, that growing stinky bulge in the back of my pants. .... and I HURT SO VERY BADLY. Aieeeee !!! It hurts so badly being stuck here, while being abused by Apple and held back and ignored by my old friend Intel while being nibbled on by this multitude of little sharp toothed Google fishes. Everyone is treating me most most cruelly. I have already pooed myself once with Bing OS earlier and now I feel a rather large Win 10 bowel movement coming on and there is simply no more room to download a huge Win 10 upgrade into my streaming flash pants ..... ...... so I am still stuck here in the middle of this horrible horrible Chrome and ARM piranha laden stream and I cannot make it to the bushes and everyone is WATCHING me all the time now. So embarrassing .... standing here in pain contemplating having to gulp back down constant streaming handfuls of my own OS because there is not enough room in my bulging overfilled flashpants. And now this crowd of little Oriental persons wishes me to play water hockey with them and they are starting to hit me with their little laminated hockey sticks in some very embarrassing sensitive places --- like my poor poor shriveled $149 price points. ..... woe is me .... come take this job back, Ballmer, you sorry lying dog. < ouch > wap !! < ouch > thud ...... < aieeeee !!!! > hee hee -- Buck up there, little buddy !! Keep that stock price up !!! http://icdn4.digitaltrends.com/image/steve-ballmer-tongue-2-372x226.jpg Hey, somebody go get him a helmet and a crod piece, can't you see he's in pain ??? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/07/15 at 09:25:21 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/stanford-working-battery-can-fully-charge-minute.html Foldable batteries that are MUCH better, charge faster, hold more power and are WAY CHEAPER to build are on the way. Stanford is throwing its hat into the ring with a new aluminum-ion battery that is safer and could potentially charge a smartphone from dead to full in about a minute. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Stanford-Aluminum-ion-Battery.png The research team at Stanford put their prototype to the test and discovered that it had “unprecedented charging times” of as little as one minute. This aluminum-ion battery is designed to be safer than traditional alkaline and lithium-ion batteries. “Our new battery won’t catch fire, even if you drill through it,” said Hongjie Dai, a chemistry professor at Stanford. Apparently, it also has a charge cycle life that is more than seven times that of a lithium-ion battery. During testing, the research team at Stanford found that their aluminum battery could take 7,5000 cycles without loss of capacity, compared to 1,000 cycles of a lithium-ion battery. Plus, due to the flexibility of the materials, Stanford’s battery can be bent, or even folded, so it has potential for use in rounded electronic devices. This is a video, so click on it. http://liliputing.com/2015/04/stanford-working-battery-can-fully-charge-minute.html People have been looking for a cheap long lasting battery to complement solar power (store daylight energy for nighttime uses) -- this may be it. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 04/07/15 at 09:59:23 Yeah... they REALLY have to improve those batteries.... after a year of recharging this can happen.... [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pe-SL2NlSDc[/media] I picked that video because it shows a drastic swelling, not all do that, the mass majority have addressed the issue. I am one of those guys that like protection by using an "enclosed" battery, to reduce the chance (however unlikely) of explosion, which does happen. I have noticed even my Microsoft/google mini android phone gets hot while using and sometimes while recharging. Heat is going to be a major issue with the newer batteries because of the rapid input of energy. I say "faster is not always better", but it looks like they keep shooting for the fastest recharge times. I realize they are touting "can't catch fire" and hope it won't, but.... they don't mention heat produced, and aluminum melts pretty darn easily. Folding? Any electrician will tell you, folding puts a strain on the area being bent of any metal and could cause shorting, no matter how thin, why would aluminum be any different? It will be great if they solve this battery thing, I personally can't wait until I don't have to charge my battery every day or twice a day sometimes. ;D |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/08/15 at 07:53:24 http://www.pcper.com/reviews/Processors/Intel-Core-M-5Y70-Review-and-Performance-Testing-Broadwell-Y Oh poor Intel, the teardown review boys are EAGER to test your new 14nm chipsets just as soon as they can get their hands on them. AND A REPEATED THEME of your new 14nm stuff IS COMING OUT CLEARLY .... one that explains why you are going so so slowly in bringing them out at all. http://www.pcper.com/files/imagecache/article_max_width/review/2014-11-07/IMG_0520.JPG "Though I am still working on the ability to accurately log the clock speed of the Core M 5Y70 through Windows Performance Monitor, my experience has shown that a clock speed of 2.5-2.6 GHz for the CPU will only last 10-20 seconds in a best case condition. After that, the processor will throttle down to a lower clock speed (I've seen 2.2 GHz and then 1.8 GHz) to limit power consumption and maintain stability in a system that is incredibly thermally constrained." Why is there a quarter balanced on the chipset ??? -- he was testing the positive effects of better heat sinking since the NEW 14nm chipsets are so "incredibly thermally constrained". https://youtu.be/xvjEHADlhrE Go get a cup of coffee -- this is a long, boring video done by an Intel appologist while trying to CAREFULLY explain why a processor that is almost twice as small as its direct predicessor is actually 20% slower doing real things and gets POORER battery life than the previous unit. He struggles to explain why 14nm Broadwell is any improvement at all, since obviously last year's unit costs less money and KICKS THE NEW 14nm BROADWELL UNIT'S ASS for performance and battery life. Intel has screwed the pooch again .... and even their apologists are struggling to explain it. And so far they can't blame it on bad drivers or execution by Lenovo -- remember the drivers used in the OS and in the systems bios come directly from Intel. And so far there has been no patch or update to fix these drivers ...... :D Intel, you simply shouldn't let your PR Department make top end performance claims on your new 14nm stuff based on the grand total of 10-20 seconds of un-throttled full speed that you can get out of the puppy before it chokes itself down, then you turned around and gave out improved power consumption numbers based on that lowest throttled state. You wrote yourself a serious "built to fail" scenario whenever you do stupid stuff like that. That was a really really STUPID thing to do. :-/ Note in passing: The new 14nm Samsung Exynos Octa does not seem to have 14nm overheating or throttling issues even under extreme stress testing and Samsung gives a confirmed 25% boost in performance rather than Intel's confirmed 20% DECLINE in performance and a 10-20 seconds of full speed performance before thermal throttling shuts it down (both when compared to each guy's same last year's product). Furthermore, the Samsung 14nm gives the same battery life as last years unit (within +/- 20 minutes on all tests so far). |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/08/15 at 08:56:20 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/what-intels-new-atom-x5-x7-cherry-trail-chips-can-do.html What Intel’s new Atom x5, x7 “Cherry Trail” chips supposedly can do ..... http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/cherry_08.jpg Intel is doing actively misleading PR press conferences with power point slides again, attempting to spin the current situation and sticking very carefully to the truth. (the part of the truth they want to talk about anyway) They are carefully saying NOTHING about CPU performance and overheating and "thermal throttling" or anything about actual CPU performance much at all. Instead they are basing their entire new 14nm roll out on boasting about Cherry Trail's GPU's improved graphics capability. This GPU boasting is just a bit cover for the CPU debacle that Intel is suffering through, and the people who do graphics analysis as their main thing are suggesting that Intel is being a little bit "extra shadier" on these GPU claims as well. In the main, the GPU is better than before, although it is obviously showing it is tilted towards "testing better" than actually doing a real job of DOING better. http://vr-zone.com/articles/first-look-new-features-cherry-trails-gpu/64068.html lots of through testing and graphical information here, worth reading. "Intel’s power saving efforts with Cherry Trail are broken down into three features: backlight reduction, refresh rate switching and panel self refresh. Intel’s first power saving feature with Cherry Trail is arguably the simplest: backlight reduction. A backlight on a mobile device is arguably one of the more power-intensive parts of the system. For the most part reducing the intensity of the backlight will do enough to squeeze some extra battery time out of a system, but that comes at a cost — loss of image quality. Intel is promising that with its new image enhancement technology, backlight reduction will no longer result in such substantial drops in image quality. Next up is dynamic refresh rate switching. Dynamic refresh rate switching has long been in the works, first appearing as a technical paper in 2007, making an appearance in a corporate white paper in 2010, and finally materializing in Cherry Trail. The process works by having the system switch automatically between high and low refresh rates depending on the content the system is displaying. Video playback, for instance, would get a high refresh rate yet idling displaying the desktop would result in a low refresh rate. While this mode requires a panel that supports multiple refresh rate switching, the potential for power savings is there because of the increased efficiency. One of the other interesting features that Intel is including with Cherry Trail is called graphics dynamic frequency and power sharing. This function gives a performance boost to graphics intensive applications in what Intel calls an “intelligent” fashion, that is when only the power and thermal headroom exist. At the same time, this sounds somewhat like the boost modes found in Samsung’s smartphones which triggered Antutu-gate. Aside from power savings and enhanced API support, one of the other important features to note is the increase in shaders. This is one of the few new GPU features that may actually be noticed by the user, particularly in benchmarking. For Cherry Trail, Intel is providing four times the amount shaders from 4EU to 16EU. This means an even bigger portion of the die is dedicated to the GPU, which will no doubt give it a big performance boost compared to the competition." So, Cherry Trail is actually a bit "shadier" than before -- you get it? ;) If Antutu testing gets revised again to debunk Samsung and Intel's current "graphics dynamic frequency and power sharing" tricks, will the new Intel stuff really be all that much better than the competition? I sort of seriously doubt that, especially since the competition has improved a bunch lately and Intel was starting from so very far behind the pack at the beginning of this year. For example, the newest Samsung Exynos is the real deal, as is the Tegra X1. Not much false fluff there as it has already been kicked around by the Appleonians and the various test guys and stress tested and tortured, etc. etc. The 2015 Antutu tablet rankings will tell the tale, because all the Intel chipsets (including the Core i3. i5 and i7) and all the ARM chipsets are ranked multiple times inside the Top 50 Antutu Tablet Rankings. And there is an averaged Top 20 that averages all the various tablet entries by chipset to give one averaged Antutu ranking per chipset ..... [smiley=engel017.gif] |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/08/15 at 20:36:32 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/intels-low-power-braswell-chips-are-now-shipping.html Intel’s low-power 14nm Braswell chips are now shipping http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/msi-eco.jpg ;D Wowsers, Batman --- look at the really really BIG HUGE SIZE of the heat sink that Intel has installed on top of their brand new teeny tiny super efficient 14nm chipsets. You know, the ones that weren't supposed to need any heat sink at all, but in reality turned out to be so thermally sensitive that without the humongous great big heat sink the chipset would shut itself down into thermal survival mode and throttle itself way way back within 10-20 seconds of use? ::) Yeah, those 14nm chipsets ..... Well, at least there isn't a big fan on top of the huge fins (but I bet they put an air channel over to the case fan to direct that very large volume air flow past those humongous fins, yep, I betcha. ;) "The new processors also generally use a little less power than their Bay Trail counterparts… but don’t expect that to translate into huge battery life improvements. The difference between a 6 watt and a 7.5 watt processor isn’t really enough to matter very much. Dimming the screen on your laptop a little bit will probably have a bigger impact on battery life than moving from a Bay Trail-M to a Braswell chip." :-? .... duh, are those huge heat sink fins gonna fit inside your laptop case? Sure as shoot'n won't fit inside any laptop case I own ..... heck, they won't even fit inside the green cardboard shipping boxes that are show behind them. A redesign of the NUC case is forthcoming, with a mountain of fins coming out of the top of it ..... ============================== In contrast, take a look at the "huge heat sink" that had to be installed on the Samsung 14nm Exynos chipset that has the 25% BETTER PERFORMANCE than the previous chipset and has a butt kicking video GPU system that is running Apple i6 all ragged at the moment -- it doesn't overheat and it doesn't throttle, unlike somebody's elses little twisted sister chipsets we could mention. OK, you got me -- it is just a round paper sticker http://t3n.de/news/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/samsung-galaxy-nexus-motherboard-595x445.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/09/15 at 08:14:04 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/report-intel-iris-graphics-coming-to-15-watt-skylake-chips.html Now that Intel has "shared" AMD's graphics IP (part of the current legal settlement over the AMD/INTEL entangled CISC CPU IP license) suddenly Intel's graphics have gotten a whole lot better. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/iris_01.jpg Also note from this new blast of PR that Intel wants you to quit looking at their CPUs and pay attention to something else --- thermal throttlegate is really really pissing Intel's stock holders off in a major way and Fudzilla really wants to talk about something that is working out for them, which is the AMD graphics IP they just got their hands on. Also, expect Intel to really really try to bring on Skylake very very quickly, since the current mess isn't very fragrant right now. Also expect Intel to try to redesign their new Skylake chips to not be so thermally sensitive as they get smaller and smaller. And also expect Intel to abort rolling out this very thermally sensitive Broadwell new stuff just as soon as they can plunk down a Skylake anything in each of their major categories. Skylake by 4th quarter this year, that's the goal now. ::) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/09/15 at 08:27:18 Intel is getting quicker to cover up their cat skats, but slower and slower at doing their BENEFICIAL generational changes. By the time panic stricken Intel can get some Skylake scratched over their latest rather large Broadwell/Braswell thermally sensitive poo pile, it will be 2016 and Intel will be faced with 10nm rolling out from Samsung and Apple. Intel should simply drop the Broadwell/Braswell roll out, bring Skylake out NOW and roll strong at their own 10nm generational shift. Intel is too much in love with and tied up in multiple long range grandiose plans, plans that take way way too long and are actually an impediment to Intel's continued existence as they struggle to finish all the branches of each plan, whether it is a good plan or not. Intel doesn't seem realize that they can't support but a few new items at the TREMENDOUSLY FAST RATE they need to bring those new items forward. The rest of the world brings forth a new generation EVERY YEAR, there is no tock to what they do. Tick, Tick, Tick, Tick Tick, Tick, Tick, Tick ..... get used to it, Intel. If you can't do it, you will get further and further behind. In the three-four years it took Intel to bring on 14nm the ARM boys went from 48nm to 32nm to 28nm to 20nm to 16nm to 14nm and they arrived there bulk shipping finished 14nm ARM based products two months before Intel did. And that was 14nm ARM stuff that gave a 25% performance boost, not a -20% performance hit and POORER battery life like Intel Broadwell M stuff did. Intel, you are a tortoise at the "make real progress" drag races compared to ARM. Mediatek is now licensing AMD's graphics tech directly from AMD and with AMD's full tech support they will FLY past you immediately on the graphics side and their new ARM A72 cpu cores won't choke down with thermal throttling like yours do .... Intel, you have multiple multiple quick agile competitors who do not rest and do not snooze .... and they are breaking into laptops starting this year. ::) Mediatek and Qualcomm are going to be racing each other to see who can tear the biggest slice out of your "Wintel home turf" market share. Apple is going to be there too, ripping off whole slices of Wintel deep dish and MS stuffed crust and wolfing it on down. And what's funny is they will all do it at low cost 28nm and 20nm (and then at 16nm and 14nm) lithography using ARM RISC chipsets that will simply perform better every time a new one comes out. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/09/15 at 19:39:53 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/intel-pushes-atom-braswell-and-core-m-chips-for-tablets-and-2-in-1-laptops.html http://anandtech.com/show/9117/analyzing-intel-core-m-performance/ So now you need to have a "selection tool" to use to pick which currently shipping Intel processor type that will perhaps work best in your given situation without getting into excess thermal throttling or other evils ??? http://images.anandtech.com/doci/9117/Slide%206%20-%20Choosing%20the%20Right%20Processor_575px.png Inside the next 3 months Intel will have 5-6 overlapping levels of Atom/Cherry Trail 5 & 6 & 7 and Celeron and Braswell and Broadwell M and U and Y and the old Core i3 and Core i5 laptop chipsets too. And Skylake too, let's not forget about that. This is really really stupid, Intel is wasting their efforts (and ours) by doing this gross repeated (and repeated, and repeated again) functional overlap nonsense. For example, no one knows what to do with a 14nm Broadwell M right now -- it costs more than the old Core i5 but it is slower and Broadwell M eats on its "smaller spec'd" battery worse than the older 22nm Core i5 chip did on its standard sized battery. For any solution you think Broadwell M fits, something else cheaper fits there too (and performs better also). Functionally, Broadwell M isn't better than, well, anything. It just costs a lot more. And once you put in the battery that Broadwell M really requires, you might as well have used the Core i5 from last year as well --- and by doing so ditch all the thermal throttling issues as well. Get rid of it !!! Intel, you are building entire LAYERS of stuff nobody asked for and nobody wants. You need to stop this foolishness ASAP and thin down this huge list of repetitive overlapping chipsets. The new cheapie Atom grade has several levels within it, some of which are rated slower but will actually move work quicker and are more battery efficient than the "post throttling" Broadwell M. Go figure. Builders are confused right now, because they realize a cheaper product using a cheaper Intel chip might just clean their clock performance-wise in the real world low to midrange marketplace because the new state of the art 14nm Intel whazzit they just bought didn't really do what it was originally pitched to do. (check them spec pages again, they have been CHANGED quite a bit in the last few weeks -- thermal throttling is referred to now as "turbo mode" before it throttles that very first time and "standard mode" after the first 10-20 seconds have passed and the thermal throttling effect has kicked in -- and now the overall steady-state chip CPU performance is now very strongly LESS than what any previous units had). We have never seen a 2-3x multiplier TURBO MODE chipset that can only turbo mode just once for 10-20 seconds when you first cut it on before ..... ;) my my my ..... really Intel, you need to go fire that PR Department, they are embarrassing you all over again. .... WARNING: your new 14nm ditty might choke itself off early due to severe thermal throttling and just stay stuck down there --- BUT HEY, you may have ALREADY made your critical chip build choice in pretty much complete ignorance and also in COMPLETE ERROR and so now you have to go live with those badly informed choices since you already built all the first lot of units, right Lenovo ? :P Adding to the confusion level is that Microsoft is now all buddy buddy with Qualcomm -- and some of Qualcomms current phone chips are really quite powerful and "totally feature complete" and Qualcomm does not require a big list of "extra" motherboard components like an Intel chipset does. This is a big consideration on the lower end since Intel isn't paying for all that extra motherboard stuff nearly as much as they used to, so a lower net cost Qualcomm based solution must be considered as well. And worse, here comes Mediatek and Rockchip, swinging various "feature complete" 28nm and 20nm (and soon 16nm and 14nm) ARM chipsets that will outperform some of the many overlapping lower end Intel players in certain uses. This year will be a year with some PRODUCER'S RISK having to be taken by middle and low end laptop builders -- and some of the Intel only builders are acting sorta skittery about all that producer risk stuff right now because they suddenly have all sorts of ability to screw themselves up really really big time just like Lenovo just did. People are questioning just what the heck Intel thinks it is doing ...... and the motherboard teardown review guys are doing quite a lot of traffic lately, debunking and finding out what's really what with the newest Intel stuff as it is just hitting the street. Since Intel isn't telling the bald, simply stated truth about their new products up front for very much any more, somebody has to go find out about them after the fact ..... Potential retail customers are being confused greatly as well -- nobody knows what to buy and which ones are the stone cold turkeys for their particular intended use. Give you a hint, if Intel is supplying it to Apple, don't use it -- when all the good ones were all sorted out of the first lots and shipped to Apple then that leaves you with a bunch of ..... what? Leftovers? (and nobody wants to be the one to go go first either as there be jaggedy edged bear traps out there in that there 14nm tall grass -- ask 'ol Lenovo 'bout that) When they see stuff like this sort of grotesque Lenovo screw up stuff, a end user customer's wallet just tends to snap shut instantly and they go into "wait and see mode" until it all shakes out good. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/choosing-chips.jpg "Maybe the fog will lift in a year when Skylake comes out ....." sez the customer base. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/10/15 at 12:27:28 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/pc-shipments-dropped-last-quarter-but-there-were-winners-and-losers.html http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/3026217 Gartner Says Worldwide PC Shipments Declined 5.2 Percent in First Quarter of 2015 This is an entire YEAR'S worth of decline in just the first quarter of 2015. There is a reason for this drastic sharp decline in PC laptops and PC desktop sales numbers. http://www.computerworld.com/article/2687742/mac-and-chromebook-sales-erode-windows-pcs-retail-share.html Chromebooks continue their ongoing "year on year doubling" trend line (but now the doubling size is big enough to be felt by MS) and APPLE has now decided to try to take a chunk of market share from MS since it is available for the taking. Apple is doing this by cutting price by a hundred or more dollars on their current popular models. http://cdn.macrumors.com/article-new/2015/04/gartner_1Q15_us_trend.jpg Last reason is that the synthetic sales pump up job MS did by cancelling support for XP has faded away now and MS still hasn't come out with Win10 after being nearly 3 years past original promise dates to deliver the new "faster better more customer friendly unified OS". Microsoft is still fumbling around trying to get Win 10 ready to go, but is hitting chipset difficulties as they were counting on Intel to have some new FASTER STRONGER chipsets out of their new 14nm process to make the aging Windows OS seem "faster and lighter". This "faster stronger Intel" did not materialize as of April, 2015 -- 14nm Intel chipsets released so far have performance and/or thermal throttling issues that make Win10 look and feel just as fat, slow and obese as it really really is when fairly compared to Mac OS or Linux or Chrome. Mac OS or Linux or Chrome STILL DO look fast and light (because they really ARE fast and light) but not MS Windows, because it is still slow, obese and sorta chunky. Skylake is the next real chance MS has at Intel processors strong and FAST enough to perhaps pull their Win10 bacon out of the fire -- but that is still six months to a year away from now at this point in time ...... ======================================= So, MS needs to come up with a good new reason for stalling for yet another year, which would make them 3 full YEARS late on rolling their "Win 9" OS out as originally promised. There is another danger in stalling another year -- all the local loaded softwares that were the only real reason to put up with MS Windows are busy making HTML 5 net-based variants of themselves which will start to land "en-masse" this year. Some have already arrived on-line, AutoCad and Photoshop to name two of the larger more important "critical locally loaded softwares" that are now available net-based. Business is just beginning to realize this fact and are starting to look at their VERY expensive IT intranets as something that can be cost reduced as part of a good Six Sigma Chromebook project. Soon enough there will BE NO COMPELLING REASON to put up with MS Windows any more .... ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/12/15 at 20:46:30 End of life for very first Chromebooks is approaching, some very few original Chromebooks will roll off 5 year active Google support sometimes this year. Question becomes, will the end users even notice? Some users are setting up Crouton so they can bounce over to a Linux, but most are just doing nothing -- taking a very relaxed wait and see attitude. So far no one feels that their laptop has really gotten old and decrepit yet. All posting seem to think their device is just fine. ChromeOS is so light and quick the now "ancient" hardware is fairly far over the hill now but still fully able to do the job in a fast light manner just as it always has -- you see the Chromebook doesn't get slower over time like Windows always does. Yep, 5 years of no hassles has made for some pretty complacent Chromebook users though. Crouton has gotten much better, as you can run a Linux something inside a resizable Chrome window at the same time you are running something else in the main ChromeOS windows. Google is talking "in general" about doing the same thing with all of Android soon, so in theory your old out of date Chromebook might be able to use all of modern Android and Crubuntu in ChromeOS's resizable window system. I think it will be very hard for ChromeOS on a Chromebook to actually die by Google neglect, since you could always roll over to the Open Source Chromium OS project and just run Google + to get all your favorite Google bits and pieces. After 5 years on a Chromebook, you either use nothing and do nothing apart from the web (and therefore have no issues with a non-updated Chromebook in the first place) or by now you have explored and played with Crouton a bit and have a favorite flavor of Linux selected already. Android on Chromebooks is a ditto, by now you played with it some just because they were just sitting there in the Chrome Store to be loaded for free. Rest easy, open source will always have a way to go already mapped out for you with a how to guide already written for it. For example, Crubuntu is a user-maintained no-brainer canned Ubuntu based distro built just for you -- already sitting there ready for you to go load it. And most Chromebooks have a SD slot that hasn't ever been used yet, so you do have tons of bootable local storage should you ever decide to go use it with a side loaded Linux variant while booting into ChromeOS developer mode (just to get the machine started, then you run from the SD card). And frankly, Google may opt to increase the service life anyway, since all it costs them is a very small amount of server farm time which they increase yearly anyway to take care of all their other on-line business functions. Google is in the middle of an international roll out of Chromebooks, taking over the rest of Education and getting their first real significant toe holds into Business. Do you think they will really let a potential flap over "end of life" screw all that up, or will they just opt for another couple of years of service life? People also point out that until MS declares what the real cost and terms of Win10 is really going to be Google cannot afford to chop anybody off for any reason -- that would just give MS a free easy shot at their neck since MS could then "declare something better" at no real cost to MS just to get the PR boost. (especially since MS can change their mind later on and charge you for the updates anyway .... check out that ULA you haven't seen yet, it is very flexible) If MS goes with a yearly fee after X years, then Google could do the same, with more years of free time and a lot smaller $$ for a post-free maintenance fee. Or, Google could just do it for free like they are doing now for Android. In Android, you just stop getting regular updates and the device just keeps on running at the last update level ..... forever. On the rare occasions when Google thinks they really need to send you something to fix something, they do it anyway. Which is what will happen in ChromeOS by default right now anyway. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/13/15 at 08:14:55 https://www.edsurge.com/n/2015-03-31-google-to-kids-try-to-break-this-chromebook "What could possibly be more dangerous to a mobile device than a tiger? Try elementary school students. As part of Google’s plan to expand Chrome products across consumer and enterprise industries, the company announced today it will soon sell a Chromebook designed specifically for education. The Haier Chromebook 11e “is built to be abused,” declares Rajen Sheth, Director of Product Management for Android and Chrome for Business and Education. When “kids shove [a device] in their backpack, then books start slamming against it and break the screen,” Sheth says. The 11-inch device boasts 10 hours of battery life, a removable battery and—hold your breath—a spill-resistant keyboard so that any splashes of liquid will drain out of a hole on the bottom of the Chromebook." http://https://d3e7x39d4i7wbe.cloudfront.net/uploads/post/image/6060/half_size_2015-03-30-chrome-1427785474-1428715126-1428736895-1428747588.jpg OK, other vendors charge a hundred extra dollars for these types of features, but the Haier-11e gets them for LESS THAN $149 when bought in bulk purchases from Amazon.com or from your state authorized Educational Wholesalers. You also have to realize if the unit is abuse resistant and the keyboard is self cleaning & draining and the battery can be externally replaced, then you got a MUCH MORE DURABLE OVER TIME consumer, education and business based unit. We adults use briefcases and coffee as our attack methods of choice instead of bookbags, juice or milk, but the general idea is the same. So, tell me, haven't you had a keyboard based "Aw shite .... " spill event happen to you before as an adult? :P yep, a couple of coffee spills over the years .... but I tended to kill the structurally weak hinge area of my company issued Thinkpads banging down my brief case on concrete ..... This is a VERY appealing unit to moms and dads everywhere, as kids are tough on electronics and tear up normal stuff entirely too too fast. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/14/15 at 07:58:13 Google is being thoughtful about what they dollar support to create change. I don't think Google tries to run anybody out of business, but instead strongly encourage the hidebound existing players to change how they think. Certainly Google has had this effect on MS and the laptop industry. Now Google wants everybody to intentionally feature customize the stuff for kids (in actuality going after ease of battery maintenance and impact damage control both at the same time). This is how you do it, sez Google. http://www.androidpolice.com/wp-content/themes/ap2/ap_resize/ap_resize.php?src=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.androidpolice.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2015%2F04%2Fnexus2cee_project_fi_hero_thumb.png&w=728 Google's cell phone service is the same way -- they are not going to directly compete with their fi service (limited to Nexus 8 phones only at intro) but are going to partner with T-Mobile and Sprint to show them a way to compete using long range Wifi that obliviates the BIG BOYS huge tower count advantage. Same offer was made to the BIG BOYS btw, but they chose not to play. http://www.androidpolice.com/2015/04/13/rumor-googles-carrier-project-detailed-in-leaked-app-pay-per-gb-unused-data-refunds-in-app-service-activation-and-more/ I think Google has a plan that includes every new router's internal standards being built going forward, that allows a router to protect your signal but also allow you to permit/allocate a small amount of capacity to support this fi system as a public service. Since calls are tiny data users, your modern long reaching router has the capacity to spare a tiny bit for a passerby to continue his phone call. Since the life span of a router is generally measured in single digit years say within 5 years you could be driving along in a sea of little fi zones that would allow a special phone free access for calling and very limited other data functions. Get close to a LOON station and you could pick up full data as well. Politicians could then maybe see the European model of free Wifi coverage as part of public utilities like street lighting is seen now. Wouldn't that be nice? :) I think fi is aimed at Europe more than us as they already have a lot of the infrastructure to do it well right off the bat. Inside a large US city fi would work great, as you could actually always be within range of a couple of cooperating routers. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 04/14/15 at 18:32:39 I don't think that free Wi-Fi or any type of "Free" access to the internet is going to work in the good ol' US of A.... You will either pay with money to access, or pay with information about who you are and what you do while on the "free" server, its already happening in hotels/motels/cafe's etc..... Its already happening with Google/Microsoft and every other dang OS out there..... Now they are after what your kids do, and what they are interested in...and guess what? They will fill your spam folder and IE ad sections of your IE page or Firefox, or Chrome Browser.... or your SuzukiSavage.com ad section.....with ads that tell you what your kids like or what you like....which ever makes them more money per ad. If you are on the net.... it ain't free.... you are being tracked and tagged and put into a little "this is what he likes" box. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/14/15 at 19:50:27 ;) I just wish Google could get my voice right when it forges all those phone calls I never made yet ..... for free. Now for today's breaking headline --- Microsoft feels another Chromebook penetration beginning to happen [smiley=happy.gif] sounds of a faint "Aieeee !!!" and some agonized thrashing comes drifting on the breeze from over at the knee deep piranha stream where MS has been hanging out for a while now. http://www.digitimes.com/news/a20150327VL201.html Digitimes Research: Microsoft to push 2 inexpensive notebooks in mid-2015 to counter Chromebook penetration Sad thing is that the last time MS tried to push back with three $179 inexpensive Bingbooks to counter what they felt were DOZENS AND DOZENS of large throbbing Chromebook penetrations, 'ol MS wound up doing the counter-penetrating thing to themselves instead of to Google (removed a part of their own low end market share and plugged up their own Bing works all at the same time). In any case MS cannot do anything effective this time until Win10 is out because they NEED the "hide part of the fat porky OS up in the cloud" tricks that came out of the last debacle's attempts to make their $179 chromekillers work right, much less to get any theoretical new $149 chromekillers to work right. :D .... so tell me, is it Bingworks or Bungworks when MS does all this aggressive self-penetrating pushing stuff to themselves with two of them narsty sharp cornered little chromekiller laptops both at the same time no less ??? ouch ! :P Does Microsoft realize they could do a Shuttleworth style docked phone running the whole show thing right now using these same "hide part of the fat porky OS up in the cloud" tricks ??? Intel has the no-cord monitor connection thing down pat now too, so you could leave the phone in your pocket or purse and still run your desktop stuff just dandy. Who will be the first to do this? ::) .... that little "everything running off the phone" hand held unit would hurt a whole lot less going in, now wouldn't it? ;D Butt, it could be considered as the "suppository of DEATH" for the desktop world, though, as it will signal the end of full sized desktop units forever. (and a fatal blending of mobile computing into mainline computing) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/15/15 at 05:16:20 Having lampooned Microsoft and Intel for a bit, let's say some good things about them. First, as American companies who were used to competing in America and in working together to crush all budding opposition before the shoots got even knee high -- one has to admire the tenacity Intel and Microsoft have shown going out into new to them emerging markets and trying to hack out a place in the jungle for themselves. Intel has finally created some chipsets that actually can fit inside the new reality (still have some rough edges on the thermal throttling thing to beat though). Microsoft has figured out tricky ways to wedge their porker OS into even a small Chromebook sized device (still need to find out how to make it light and quick though). Both Microsoft and Intel are 200% better than they were 2 years ago. But then again, so is their competition. Both realize they are not there yet and are making interim moves right now -- Microsoft has a working name for the OS they are putting out a year after Win10 hits because they KNOW Win10 will not be function complete or completely satisfactory when they push it out. Intel is in the same boat --Skylake is coming out soon with some thermal flaws in its make up that will keep it less than totally desirable -- but Intel is already planning CannonLake to fix all those uglies. Because Wintel is getting better, ARM is getting better even faster than it did before. The new Cortex A-72 CPU cores, faster & bigger data buss and new Mali 880 graphics show potential to be a PC capable processor. Google has just about tripled the functionality of ChromeOS and has put easy do hooks into the OS to integrate with Android and Linux distros. People think they are beginning to see a faint outline of a unified Google OS beginning to jell out of the fog. Software vendors are busting themselves to get their software out on the web as they see "local loaded" as being a dead pathway going forward. Mark Shuttleworth's dream of docking your phone and running a "real OS" off of it is completely possible now -- using a standard 2-3 gigs of memory phone from over a dozen phone makers that are out there right now. Issue is that Android is still keeping folks happy and content enough so they won't jump ship to any of the half dozen alternates that are out there now. Cyanogen is a separate and respected OS on its own now. Apple is coming down off the mountain top now, actually competing and making some products that sell for less than a thousand dollars. This year Apple is content to run some cherry picked Intel processors, as long as they meet Apple's strict standards. Intel is slowly complying, but that means a pool of "didn't make it" chipsets are hitting Intel's other business partners and causing them some difficulties. Intel will grow past this just as they have in the past, and their yields will go up to near perfect just like they have before. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/15/15 at 06:47:38 http://wccftech.com/amd-licensing-graphics-radeon-mediatek/ AMD Radeon Graphics Going Into Mobile Mediatek SOCs I will flat out buy one of these in a year or so, I betcha ..... "It’s worthy of note that both companies are part of the Heterogeneous System Architecture / HSA foundation. So they’ve worked together before and what they’re working together on will undoubtedly be an HSA enabled graphics solution for mobile SOCs. The HSA distinction is very important here. Especially since we’re talking about ultra low power mobile SOCs, where fractions of a watt can make a considerable difference. AMD And Mediatek Collaborating On New SOC Graphics Solution HSA is crucial because it opens a plethora of power saving avenues, after all HSA was put in place to significantly improve both performance and efficiency. It does so by using the graphics and CPU resources opportunistically and simultaneously so that each processor can can handle the workload that suits it best. This simple concept can lead to extraordinary leaps in performance and efficiency. I’ve covered heterogeneous computing in detail in a previous editorial in which I outlined the single direction that Intel, AMD and Nvidia are all heading towards. HSA is also important because it’s a competitive advantage that other players in the field have yet to catch up on. AMD’s GCN ‘Graphics Core Next’ is currently the only graphics architecture in the industry which is fully HSA 1.0 compliant. Something Qualcomm has yet to achieve and Nvidia can’t explore because it isn’t a member of the HSA foundation. AMD’s not new to the ultra-low power space. After all Qualcomm’s extremely successful Adreno line of graphics solutions is based on the AMD design that they acquired from the company back in 2008. AMD has also already introduced GCN powered Mullin SOCs with SDPs going down to as low as 2.8W, so it’s a space they’ve tackled before. The company also revealed that it has managed achieve the biggest power efficiency leap ever for mainstream APUs with Carrizo. What’s more interesting is that they’ve accomplished that through clever design and a set of new power efficiency features without the help of a new manufacturing process. This recent development and collaboration with Mediatek bodes well for the potential power efficiency leap we may see with AMD’s future graphics offerings. because what really drove Nvidia’s significant efficiency strides in recent years was its need to compete in the mobile space. So the ultra low power mobile segment will undoubtedly serve as a similar role as a power efficiency catalyst for AMD." OK, Intel got their hands on a point-in-time snapshot of AMD's graphics IP as part of a legal settlement last year and that single shot of graphics data has been the real largest part of Intel's recent betterment of their Cherry Trail and Skylake product lines. It certainly hasn't been the self throttling Intel CPU cores ...... So, Mediatek went directly to the well and found a willing partner in AMD -- AMD is searching for a pathway into the future and partnering with Mediatek is a good way for them to do that. The two are similar sized companies who both hate Intel (for various good reasons) both of which like ARM and both of whom belong to the same HSA orgs and support the same other open standards groups as well. Intel is nobody's partner -- they have proven that time after time after time as they use up and drop anybody that tries to partner with them, often suing them at the end into sharing the IP that Intel really wanted in the first place. Ask Rockchip, Altera, or AMD themselves -- they can tell you all about it. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/15/15 at 07:24:14 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/eu-antitrust-officials-accuse-google-of-abusing-its-monopoly-position-in-search-maybe-smartphones.html EU antitrust officials accuse Google of abusing its monopoly position in search, maybe smartphones "The European Commission has been looking into questions of whether Google has been using its dominant position in search to violate European Union antitrust rules — and the commission has sent a Statement of Objection suggesting that the US-based search company’s shopping comparison system may cross that line. The Commission has also started looking into whether Google’s handling of the Android operating system may also violate EU antitrust regulations." Google is in the midst of a cost supported ChromeOS roll out in European School systems and doing other neat things like the free Fi phone thing -- but the EU regulators may indeed screw around with Google enough and eventually get the same reaction the Chinese government did -- "See ya ..." Then the EU regulators will realize that Google is on the internet and that the net flows everywhere even though Google is no longer "present within the EU" to be penalized by them in any significant fashion. Europe is not a large market to anyone right now -- Samsung and several other Japanese brands have abandoned it completely as not worth messing with. If it intentionally becomes a pain in the arse to deal with others may choose likewise. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by verslagen1 on 04/15/15 at 07:43:10 What? did google forget to buy enough tickets to the policemans ball? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/15/15 at 08:06:04 I can't think of any Google competitors they are attempting to protect -- Europe lost their last big phone maker when MS bought them (and frittered them away). Other than a half dozen FOSS Linux distros, I can't think of any "needs protecting" OS candidates at all other than Sailfish out of Norway. I can't even think of a EU based search engine. Likely this is a case of a set of regulators feeling like they need to go regulate something or else the people who pay for them will realize they really aren't needed any more. If this is a privacy thing, then the EU needs to figure out how they are going to protect themselves from MS Explorer, Bing, Yahoo, Firefox, Amazon, Ask, Opera, Ebay and all the rest of them "we can figure out what you like from watching what you ask questions about and from what buy over our systems" crew. The answer is -- you can't. They are really just bitching that Google is BETTER at it than the rest are. And unless the rest of the guys have disappeared in the last week, Google is not any form of monopoly either. ::) .... and to answer the phone stuff, Google just needs to put a click me into the phone set up routine that offers the choice "Use Google + services" and another one that says "No thanks, I'll load my own services". Guess which one everybody will click on or even if they chose to load separately, over half of the normal set of Google services will be chosen separately anyway. Me, I'd do that just to cut down on the trash on my phone. ;) .... besides, Google doesn't pick what gets pre-loaded on the phones, the telecoms or the phone builders do. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/15/15 at 09:08:46 Google needs to figure out how much it would cost them to move their equipment out of the EU and have a number in mind when the EU finally swags that big arsed fine at them. Or else do what they did in China, already be gone by the time the EU finishes their "deliberations". Notice any similarities between the way the EU acts and the way China sometimes acts ??? China always balances the best interest of Chinese business and the Chinese people -- I think the EU has lost track of what really matters in their current liberal thinking frenzy. The biggest most frequent of the EU complainers by far is Microsoft, which has its own competing search engine, Bing (which they just scrapped, BTW). Microsoft is just rehashing the same complaints that FAILED miserably when they brought them in the USA last year -- rehashing them because the EU is more liberal in interpreting their own laws (and EU regulators are more open to local influence, apparently). In this case it looks like there is some manipulation being done by some local EU business concerns actively being led by MICROSOFT -- in a tit for tat for Google's Chromebooks nibbling away at their ankles most likely. Microsoft wants to disrupt the Chromebook wave building in Europe, using any method they can come up with, fair or foul. http://s.thestreet.com/files/tsc/v2008/photos/charts/ABI_Research1023.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/15/15 at 09:16:20 http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2014/10/30/359874687/in-eu-google-faces-next-chapter-with-new-competition-chief EU's New Competition Chief Could Shake Up Google Antitrust Case "In Europe, Google has avoided the prospect of steep fines in a long-running antitrust case over several of the company's business practices, but a new commissioner will soon take over the case, and that has many wondering what Google could face next. Nearly 20 companies have filed antitrust complaints against Google in Europe since 2009. The biggest of those by far is Microsoft, which has its own competing search engine, Bing. "Microsoft has been driving these complaints from the very start," says Florian Wagner-von Papp, an expert on EU competition law at University College London. "Over here in Europe, Google has an enormous market share. Over 90 percent of all searches on the Web go via Google." (That's more than in the U.S.) Shivaun Raff owns Foundem, one of the companies suing Google. Foundem compares prices for things like televisions and other electronic equipment. If you've never heard of Foundem, Raff says that's because of the way Google presents information when you search for something online. "Google is manipulating its search results to increase its profit," Raff says. She says Google does that by promoting its own price comparison services — like Google Shopping or Google's hotel and flight comparison services — while demoting competing companies like hers in its search results. For example, if you're looking for a Canon digital camera, Raff says, Google's results yield "big links to Google's price comparison service that actually prioritizes which links it shows first by which advertisers pay Google the most." And as Raff scrolls down in the Canon search results, no other price comparison site — like, say, her price comparison site — appears in the first page of Google's results." |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/15/15 at 20:10:19 The amount of the fine being bantered about is 6 billion Euros (6.4 billion dollars) .... The amount of search listing change needed to "not hurt the little guys" would require listing in the top 10 items that normally according to relevance or popularity would not even make page #2 on the existing Google system. This is all fairly much a lot of hot air rhetoric and BS at this stage, a brand new woman is making a splash as the head of a EU function by "taking on Google". She is intentionally going counter to documented settlements already agreed to in writing by her predecessor as formal findings. Western Governments do not act this way, not normally. Dictatorships and similar forms of government act by fiat, not representative forms of government regulated by procedures such as the EU. Google needs to hire some really good EU lawyers, and have a go at getting some compensation for the false accusations leveled at them so far. Google also needs to hire some skilled EU publicists to make sure everyone knows very clearly that MS is behind all this shite. They should commission a movie on the subject showing the personal power seeking and greed that is behind the EU's function heads active manipulations of free businesses that are located in other countries. Then, if Google chooses to exit some of the EU states they need to make sure the EU members all understand exactly what this grandstanding by this Danish woman is going to cost them. Yes, Google is by 90+ percent the most favored search engine used by EU people in general, but losing Google from your country is SO SO MUCH MORE than just losing a search engine. Sergi & Brin have proven that they can make hard choices not to buckle under to governmental pressures, they have done it repeatedly with the USA and with China. They did choose to completely pull out of China as it became obvious the Chinese were never going to go along with the free dispersal of data and Google wasn't going to be their censor for them. (Baidu is and does, btw) It is interesting that Microsoft remained in China the whole time and MS plays ball with the Chinese government against the freedoms of the Chinese people (and other peoples around the world). MS actually benefited from Google leaving China -- perhaps MS is trying for a repeat of that activity? MS cannot compete against Google right now in the free world marketplace, not effectively. Not in search, not in data nor other Google key competencies. MS struggles just to compete in OS systems right now, which is THEIR key competency supposedly .... But if MS can arrange for the EU to screw Google up pretty good and take Google's mind off of what they were doing so very well in the last year or so then that is to MS's advantage. Remember, Google was kicking MS's butt and creating a new way of doing computing over the net instead of locally loading everything. By building a better system Google was quietly putting MS out of business within the next 10 years or so. MS remembers the dirty tricks used by Bill Gates, so you can expect some of the same stuff from the new MS as well. I once said MS --- PLEASE go piss Google off again --- Google does 300% more 200% quicker when they stop being Switzerland and actually get pissed off some at something. Let's see what transpires now ..... I think the boys are going to go after each other's rice bowls a bit more directly now. 8-) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/16/15 at 02:28:41 http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/16/technology/microsoft-once-an-antitrust-target-is-now-googles-regulatory-scold.html?&moduleDetail=section-news-0&action=click&contentCollection=Business%20Day®ion=Footer&module=MoreInSection&pgtype=article Microsoft, Once an Antitrust Target, Is Now Google’s Regulatory Scold "BRUSSELS — Not long ago, Microsoft was the scourge of European antitrust regulators. It was fined not once, not twice, not thrice but four times. Finally, after Microsoft paid more than $3 billion, Europe left it alone. Now, Google is firmly in Europe’s cross hairs: Antitrust regulators on Wednesday formally accused the company of abusing its dominance. And Microsoft is relishing a second act in Brussels, playing the role of scold instead of victim. Microsoft has kept its coffers full for the fight, spending more on lobbying here than any European company. And Microsoft has founded or funded a cottage industry of splinter groups. The most prominent, the Initiative for a Competitive Online Marketplace, or Icomp, has waged a relentless public relations campaign promoting grievances against Google. Icomp hosts webinars, panel discussions and news conferences. It conducted a study that suggested changes made by Google to appease regulators were largely window dressing. The two companies are the Cain and Abel of American technology, locked in the kind of struggle that often takes place when a new giant threatens an older one. Microsoft was frustrated after American regulators at the Federal Trade Commission didn’t act on a similar antitrust investigation against Google in 2013, calling it a “missed opportunity.” It has taken the fight to the state level, along with a number of other opponents of Google. The main battle is now in Europe, where the two companies are fighting what could be called an away game, thousands of miles from their American headquarters. Policy makers are alarmed that Google’s European market share is roughly 90 percent in many countries, even greater than it is in America. “Microsoft is doing its best to create problems for Google,” said Manfred Weber, the chairman of the European People’s Party, the center-right party that is the largest voting bloc in the European Parliament. “It’s interesting. Ten years ago Microsoft was a big and strong company,” he added. “Now they are the underdog.” This article by the New York Times gets into how much MS pays lobbyists in the EU and how much they $$$ have put into this attack on Google. The thrust of the article is that this is not "normal activity" by a regulatory agency -- this is bought and paid for activity where the EU regulatory agency is being used by one company against another. :-? I think the NYTIMES has a story here. What is the legal redress for such organized attack activities? And does the EU have any sense of being used as a patsy here? Or are they so far gone in liberal vapor land that they honestly believe in what they are saying about "a person's rights to be forgotten"? DATA IS DATA -- it doesn't just disappear just because somebody wants it to go away. What the EU is asking for is CENSORSHIP to be done on a one on one personal level, based upon some individual wanting a certain fact about themselves to go away. This would require a system to compare every Google query request against a huge ever growing list of "requested forget" items. Is the EU going to foot the bill for this system and put up with the VERY SLOW service that such a system would entail? And why do they think Google would volunteer to to pay to do this for them, and then likely get to redo it all again the next time the whim changes ???? Google, pick a complaining EU country that is noisy and inconsequential and depart from it. They will be trying to have panels "to force Google to provide service to undeserving complaining countries" next. :P |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/16/15 at 08:04:15 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/cyanogen-microsoft-partnership-means-more-bing-on-cyanogen-os-phones.html Cyanogen, Microsoft partnership means more Bing on Cyanogen OS phones Microsoft has been seeking mobile partners for its services for some time now. Cyanogen has chosen to be one of the first to take the candy from the bad man's hands. According to the announcement, Microsoft’s Bing services, Skype communication software, OneDrive cloud storage service, OneNote, Outlook, and Office software will be integrated with Cyanogen OS. Now that MS has Google tied up with the EU case MS hopes Google will not enforce their normal Android rules, but by starting out with the renegade Cyanogen it makes a good test bed case since it obviously involves no large stakes or big players. Note that some MS services were included "in addition" on the Samsung's Galaxy S6, but Verizon and AT&T both chose to remove the items from the phones they resell in their stores since they offer their own tuned android services and wanted their customers to use their own tuned android systems. Google didn't do this, their big telecoms did. Watch out boys, the EU is watching you ..... Plus, rumor has it that MS plans to buy Cyanogen quietly on the sly and use it as "their phone OS" -- fun huh? Cyanogen is acting bought already -- but based off of Nokia's experience I do not suspect the little guys are looking forward to the bumpy MS ride for very much. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/16/15 at 08:25:52 http://www.nextpowerup.com/news/20290/mediatek-10-core-helios-x20-chipset-to-enter-mass-production-in-late-2015.html http://liliputing.com/2015/04/mediatek-helio-x20-could-be-a-10-core-chip.html Mediatek announces Helio 10 and Helio 20 chipsets, complete with Mediatek's new World LTE Modem. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/helio.jpg "Taiwanese chip maker MediaTek recently unveiled a line of Helio processors which it says are aimed at high-performance devices including phones, tablets, and other devices. One of the first chips will be the Helio X10, which is an 8-core, ARM Cortex-A53 processor. But 8 cores are old hat at this point. Now it looks like MediaTek may also be working on a 10-core chip. According to a Chinese analyst who attended an event with MediaTek recently, the new processor is said to be called the Helio X20 and the chip maker claims it can score higher than 70,000 on the AnTuTu benchmark." First, Mediatek believes in and has made a lot of ground swinging octacore A53 chipsets in low to mid range phones. Here comes a new octacore A53 with Mediatek's new LTE modem inside it, along with a 10 core Helios 20 variant good for 70,000 Antutu ratings (this is up in the very best scores turned in by Samsung's new 14nm Galaxy S6). Mediatek says they can do this at 20nm which is very interesting all by itself. It is also noted that "other devices" can include chromebooks and laptops and all-in-ones. Fact is, Mediatek has stated it plans to play in the exact same sandboxes as Qualcomm and Samsung from this point forward, putting out chips that can go into equivalent premium phones "and other devices" as a matter of routine from now on. Just much less expensively, though. I look to Mediatek to be the low cost performance leader from this point forward, and I look to see the rough edges come off their products very quickly as they polish up their act going forward into upper scale markets. Will this happen instantly? No, but if the "rate of change" achieved by a company means anything then Mediatek can do this at the same rate of change they apply to everything else. PDQ, it will happen. Since the 20nm lithography level is now in full low cost production and sample chips have shown up in products already, one is tempted to say that Mediatek has already done it in their home markets and are just now rolling this out to the USA and Europe (we are their secondary English speaking markets after all). Mediatek has historically been one level back from the big boys by their choice, as cost is always very high up at the bleeding edge and Mediatek specializes in matching that performance using lower cost lithography and in some cases clever multiples of the "little" chipsets in numbers far greater than are used by general run of the mill ARM designs. Mediatek will also customize the A53 littles to have a few VERY low energy cores to take care of background tasks which are always running. This cuts down on standby energy usage. Also, Mediatek has customized core switching software that is noted for being very efficient and for seamless ramping up and down their crowds of little cores. Now that Mediatek is partnering with AMD, look for a new series of chipsets to come out swinging licensed AMD Radeon graphics. Also look for Mediatek to start coming out with some new KINDS of stuff as well. Such as a rumored low cost Chromebook which they are working with Google on to capture all the needed drivers and specs to work well with their new high core count Helio chipsets, etc. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/17/15 at 06:26:36 http://www.economist.com/news/business-and-finance/21648606-google Nothing to stand on This is an absolutely fascinating, must understand topic, because in this action the new EU Competition Commissioner tore up all the previous documented negotiated agreements on this issue and flat stated publically she wants to levy a maximum fine of 6.6 billion dollars even before even hearing the first response back from Google. This is not the rule of law, it is fiat. Does the EU operate by fiat now? If so, this change has drastic and large implications to all treaties and agreements now existing. http://cdn.static-economist.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/full-width/images/2015/04/articles/main/20150418_wbd001.jpg The implications of what the EU has just allowed this commissioner to do are staggering -- this appointed head of an EU Commission has just stated by inference that she has the self-appointed power to ABROGATE treaties and agreements with major allied states and break the EU's own laws while doing it. Look at the graphic carefully and understand where the EU sits right now in the eyes of American business concerns and politically, with the US Administration and with Congress. No one would blame Google a bit if they moved their foot off the plank ..... And the EU needs to carefully investigate the "local influence maneuvering" that got the woman off into this state -- and carefully see how many MS dollars were actually moved about to accomplish this task behind the scenes. The EU should take action to make sure they cannot be used as a patsy by an American corporation acting under the cover of "local interests" while systematically attacking its American rival corporations. This is high drama, or high tragedy if you prefer -- but such type stuff took place shortly before WWII when Germany went Nazi ballistic. Furor and rhetoric with lots of behind the scenes maneuvering -- and power hungry people seeking personal power and influence by rabble rousing the crowds then actually running amok naming and executing scapegoats once they got some real power, yeah, that sounds familiar doesn't it ?? Does the EU even have a domestic search engine anywhere of its very own to plug in if Google leaves? :P Does the EU have a methodology to preview potential Commissioners for "crazy liberalitis" and other disqualifying mental illnesses ??? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/18/15 at 12:49:02 People have been going to oriental computer shows and looking at what the Chinese are building for their own home market, stuff that IS NOT COMING to the USA, ever. All of the devices are less than $200 American. They do not use OS that we would recognize ('cept maybe that Windoz "desktop" machine). http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/endless_04-125x125.jpg Put me on your head, then take me to your leader ..... http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/pipo-x8.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/19/15 at 19:38:59 http://www.vrworld.com/2015/04/16/googles-antitrust-suit-in-europe-is-a-cash-grab-by-the-eu/ GOOGLE’S ANTITRUST SUIT IN EUROPE IS A CASH GRAB BY THE EU "While EU regulators have been going after Google for its expansive market dominance over the past five years, so far their efforts have been unsuccessful to produce a case for formal antitrust charges. Now, prosecutors are after a $6 billion Euro believe they’ve found a case that will stick: allegations that Google siphons traffic away from its competitors via its comparison shopping service for flights. When a user puts in two airports and the world “flights”, say “LAX to SFO flights”, Google brings up its own flight shopping search engine first, which acquired from ITA in 2010, before others which is at the crux of the EU’s argument. In its defense, Google says that that looking at the cold, hard traffic data tells another story. It says that its flight booking service only accounts for 5% of overall traffic while Expedia, Orbitz, Priceline and Travelocity account for the remaining 95%. http://cdn.vrworld.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/travel-sites-in-germany.png “At the time of the ITA acquisition, several online travel companies—Expedia, Kayak, and Travelocity–unsuccessfully lobbied regulators in the US and the European Union to block the deal, arguing that our ability to show flight options directly would siphon off their traffic and harm competition online,” the company said in a blog post. “Four years later it’s clear their allegations of harm turned out to be untrue.” Google says the same holds true for other shopping sites too. According to a chart from Google, its shopping site in the German market is only ranked seventh which is far below local giants Amazon and Ebay." http://cdn.vrworld.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/shopping-sites-in-the-uk-600x405.png I think the headline says it all -- Google isn't shutting down any of the competition and Google is not even "volume competitive" nor is it dominate in any fashion compared to the competition in any of the areas actually cited so enthusiastically by the new EU Commissioner. This data proves that customers are choosing on their own, and are not being swayed by Google in any real fashion. Indeed, it seems the Commissioner was just quoting some gross mis-information that had just been hand fed to her by her "local complainants" and she did not even check to see if the facts were correct and real before cranking up her big media circus and making all her threats. AS SUCH she is liable for whatever FALSE slander and libelous statements she has issued. This embarrassment to the EU should cause the new Commissioner to be removed for incompetence and for showing the world some very dangerous overly liberal mindset issues and a complete lack of understanding of the rule of law in the EU. Remember Joslyn Elders and her "kinder, gentler bullets"? Same sort of gross unsuitability for the job, I am afraid. Amazon and Ebay, you had better watch out though -- the EU is coming for you ..... ::) bullets are bullets, data are data -- it is what it is ..... only the overly liberal self-deluded think otherwise. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/21/15 at 07:39:08 http://www.gizmochina.com/2015/04/20/10-core-mediatek-mt6797-helio-x20-to-use-2-cortex-a72-8-cortex-a53-cores/ Being curious about it, my Google + begins to deliver info from many off the wall Eastern sources which prove out to me that Mediatek has been in motion on this for a while now, but isn't bothering with the US market until the first production waves satisfy the home market. The details also begin to show meat behind the rumors of Mediatek working on laptop ready chipsets. http://www.gizmochina.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/mediatek-helio-x20-leak-1024x768.jpg This tri-custer little-middle-big system is already built into Android 5.0 and up, and ARM certainly supports it since they designed the A72 specifically for it. Knowing the top end performance is supported by 2 each A72 cores, then the Antutu claims of 70 something become completely believable. At 20nm (currently the largest that does not require finFET) this will not be a huge chipset, likely no bigger than the current crop. However, what will make the chipset larger is the graphics system -- an item that has not been announced. http://www.gizmochina.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/mediatek-helio-x20-leak-02-1024x768.jpg First production shipments are due out in July, which means first production runs are likely happening now which means the graphics system will likely be Mali or VR as it is perhaps too much to hope for a AMD graphics system to be plugged in that PDQ quickly. Qualcomm and Samsung had best go back to the drawing boards for their next 2015 roll outs because Mediatek shows signs of lapping them early this year. This also raises the bar for Intel, who is currently suffering from heat sensitivity in their new 14nm CPU cores and is suffering delays in rolling out their new chipset families. If the chipset comes out cheaply enough to go into a mid line to upper phone, then it is automatically priced right to go into a Chromebook. AND THIS IS A HOCKEY STICK BOY PRODUCTION, which means the rest of the crowd clustered around the puck will very quickly do something equivalent or slightly better, so as to not lose face. And I mean Allwinner and Rockchip most directly. ==================== Not being slow, Qualcomm has announced their new heavy hitter chipset will come out at 14nm off Samsung's process -- date and features to be announced. Samsung is and has been a FAB, btw, they will build Apple's chipsets, their own chipsets or your chipsets. Right now Samsung has arguably the best 14nm production process, having been proven out by Apple's new crop of 14nm chipsets, their own massive Galaxy S6 production and now by Qualcomm choosing them to run their new SnapDragon chipset. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/21/15 at 07:56:39 What shall MS do? They are struggling to pull Win10 together and suddenly they have a new crop of other brand suitable power level chipsets to cover. They had already agreed to cover Qualcomm and Intel, but you have Tegra X1 and Mediatek out right now that are suitable to be covered. Mediatek is a major player in the Orient, which is a market MS wants right now, very badly. What to do -- what to do -- what to do ..... :-? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/21/15 at 10:39:56 http://liliputing.com/2009/05/fit-pc-the-smallest-desktop-with-a-25-inch-hard-drive.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/fit-pc.jpg This is a hard drive carrying full pc. I had single platter 20 megabyte "double height" hard drive that was a lot bigger than this whole PC ..... this was inside my first pc at work, an IBM 8088 machine. The two original 5 1/2" floppy drives were each about this big and about this flat -- they were a pretty close fit in size, as were my CD drives more currently. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/22/15 at 07:24:26 Now, financial upshot from the totality of last year, with all the industry standard financials being reported by all the players except for Intel, who insists on reporting all their chip sales at full retail list pricing although none are actually sold at these prices. Fact to remember, a rising tide lifts all boats. http://www.icinsights.com/files/images/bulletin20141106Fig01.png Biggest winner of the large fabs was TSMC with a 26% year on year increase. Biggest winner of the fabless companies was Mediatek with a 25% year on year increase. Kudos to these guys for cresting the very top of the wave of the 9% general growth in their industry. ..... and yes, you could say Mediatek's success fueled the rise of both of these players. The 9% rising tide did not lift all boats equally. Intel and Samsung went up with the tide, but their boat leaked some at the same time so at the end of the high tide they were only up by 6% and 8% respectively. For Intel, this was a 6% improvement that was fueled mostly by their sorry sorry -2% performance from last year, which did improve upwards by 6% this year leaving them down by 14% compared to the 18% industry average increase over the two year period. Also it must be mentioned that Intel did a very dubious total restructure at the very end of last year intending to hide as much of their financial losses as possible. Intel still refuses to list their fab numbers by how many units were sold at the price they were actually sold at (Intel reports sales by FULL RETAIL list pricing only which is in conflict with Fab Industry standards). This means all numbers pushed by Intel smell slightly of their favorite stinky brown vapor stuff ...... especially since it is known that 45m tablet chipsets were sold for approaching NOTHING last year, but show up on this ranking at full list retail value in the plus column. Honest reporting by both Intel and Samsung using EXACTLY what was sold at the real net price it was sold at would influence the top 3 ranking by quite a bit. Texas Instruments, Broadcom and AMD lead the list of the deepest sinkers, all winding up settled deeper yet into the water despite a good year for the industry in general. Mediatek is your rising star, shining with a 25% increase in volume which is also reflected in the 26% increase in TSMC which is the fab that makes their chipsets. At this rate of growth Mediatek will roll up into the top 10 this year and get closer to their goal of supplanting Qualcomm (a worthy goal for an ex-hockey stick boy, to be sure). Here is last years ranking, so you can answer any questions you have about your favorite company. And yes, Nvidia is just barely hanging on to the top 20 and apparently isn't selling much apart from their overly expensive video cards any more. http://www.icinsights.com/files/images/bulletin20140401Fig01.png |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/22/15 at 08:48:38 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/intel-compute-stick-mini-computer-with-windows-review.html Intel's compute stick ships for $150-$200 http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/cs_hdmi_03.jpg What is interesting is that Intel had to put a little bitty buzzy bee fan on the processor heat sink (durn that blasted thermal sensitivity of the new Intel 14nm chipsets) and that Intel is also selling a Linux Ubuntu variant direct from Intel for $110 so that gives you a sense of the size of the Microsoft Tax that even Intel is having to pay now. Microsoft is likely to return this favor by selling some Qualcomm processor laptops in the not too distant future, and perhaps some with Mediatek Helios 20 chipsets in them if the Oriental rumor mill is to be trusted. Tegra X1 falls into the same general bucket, but initial high pricing may put the new Nvidia chipset out a year until it gets replaced by something new. MS is leaning towards supporting the very strongest ARM based phone and tablet processors "as PC chipsets" rather than letting Google Chrome and Android get them all as sole use freebies. MS knows they MUST do this "ARM acceptance" or else Chromebooks will use these new chipsets to put more thread marks all over MS's face. The severe thermal sensitivity of the new Intel 14nm chipsets means they will only be marginalized players in the Chrome Zone this year -- as a MORE EXPENSIVE Intel chipset that throttles itself back so strongly (2x-3x) isn't any winner candidate in the real world of the Chrome Wars. Warring against Google looms large in Microsoft's near future as when Google gels a full function OS (and they are getting closer all the time) then fighting Apple and Google will be MS's full time task from then on. ;) ..... and when the MS playing field becomes flat with MS really supporting ARM chipsets, then the crunch of the vise jaws on Intel's family jewels starts yielding some serious pain ...... :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/22/15 at 18:43:28 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/arms-plans-for-10nm-chips-may-have-just-leaked.html ARM’s plans for 10nm chips http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/arm-roadmap.jpg OK, what is new --- Ares, Prometheus, Artemis, Ananke and Mercury 5 levels of mix and match performance at four different levels of lithography --Flexibility, speed and affordability -- ongoing. all talking to the same enlarged fast buss and scheduling softwares combined with the 880 series and above Mali graphics. Flexibility, speed and affordability -- ongoing. We also know that the new LAPTOP strong Ares Cortex A72 can supposedly run on 20nm lithography, 16nm lithography, 14nm lithography and 10nm lithography --- this flexibility gives a tremendous range of implementation depending on whose process you are stuck with using early on. For example, Mediatek likes low cost -- so they will likely stay stuck on the plain jane 20nm planar lithography for just as long as they can make it work out well for them. A72 cores running on 20nm just run the costs lower and lower as the months go by until FinFET finally becomes fully cost competitive at a lower lithography level. Between times, Mediatek can kick some Intel butt starting later on this summer with this plan -- and they fully intend to. ARM seems to move on a two year total life cycle, with older chipsets hanging on at larger lithography levels to make up the low end of things. ARM is also stretching out to INTENTIONALLY cover 10, 14, 16, and 20nm 64 bit lithography levels -- this is what has actually happened in the past with ARM chipset makers, but this is the first time ARM HAS ACTUALLY BUILT THE FLEXIBILITY RIGHT IN FROM THE GET-GO, RIGHT INTO THE BASIC DESIGN. Look to see Qualcomm and Samsung at 14nm for the rest of this year switching to 10nm as soon as Apple's production requirements for next year are met (in late spring, just like this year most likely). Look to see everybody else sticking with what TSMC can do, which is 20nm and 16nm for this year (and those older designs will still come off at 28nm for another year at least for the low end stuff) Look to see ARM chip producers customizing chips that change lithography levels inside the chip freely as cost and circumstances dictate. Example, an already approved 20nm LTE World Modem can do shared duty on lower and lower lithography chipsets until the awkward very long radio approval process can approve a 14 or 10 nm version. Next -- expect ARM vendors to intentionally hang back at known cost efficient lithography levels until they need to move down, need to move down strongly enough to make it worth while to them that is. Intel panic drove itself to FinFET before it even needed to at 22nm and then they busted themselves to go all the way down to 14nm pretty much knowing it wasn't ready for a VERY complicated CISC processor like theirs -- the thermal throttling issues Intel is having now are just part in parcel of some very bad decisions made early on, over 3 years ago as a matter of fact. Now, Intel isn't ready to go to 10nm and it will take them years to dig out at 14nm and make that 10nm move. Or they can go jump the gun again and dig their trouble hole deeper accordingly. Samsung and Apple have trial production run their 10nm process already and whole lot sized runs of sample RISC A-10 chipsets have already been produced and tested. Second sampling is going on and a re-tuning of OS and A-10 chipset is in motion as we speak. Sample runs of an A-11 laptop chipset have also been run, just in case Intel really can't straighten up in time for a GOOD 14nm product for Skylake later on this summer. Since Apple can fix an issue from both ends (or either end) they tend to do just that -- and this careful tuning of OS and hardware is so so very much of what makes an Apple product work as well as it does. Remember, Apple is not happy with Intel right now --- and the Apple Rumor Mill is expecting some sort of laptop RISC chipset product to be Apple's low cost leader laptop for next year. Apple just sliced off 10% of MS's laptop business just by lowering their price a hundred dollars or so -- what could they do if they sliced off $300 ???? ::) ..... OK Google, the ARM side is out there now, what are you going to put forth for an Android/Chrome/Ubuntu fusion to run on it and make it all work out seamlessly on those new more powerful RISC based LAPTOPS ??? We know Apple has a RISC laptop OS already developed, but do you? Please, tell us we aren't "waiting on MS to do it" ...... :P |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by justin_o_guy2 on 04/23/15 at 02:07:39 when will my Kindle have a better version? Easier to type on, bigger screen, etc. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/23/15 at 05:09:04 http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/kindle/dp/2013/KA/ka-slate-01-lg-noVid._V320633526_.jpg Amazon Kindle Fire comes in 8.9" as the large version. A newer one comes out every year. http://www.amazon.com/kindle-fire-hdx-best-movie-tablet-8-9/dp/B00BHJRYYS Amazon makes a fairly good product, but it always lacks at least a whole level of being the best of the best. If you want Amazon, you want the Amazon eco system and you will have to take the tablet that comes with that. Or you can buy an Apple tablet, since Amazon supports the Apple tablets with all their various Amazon stuff. The most modern Apple tablet is as good as it gets, year on year. Apple is by far the most expensive tablet out there, but at least it is a true 10" tablet. Amazon can be bought on sale, or bought refurbed fairly frequently. So can Apple. I bought a pair of Apple Ipad 2 units REFURBISHED two years after they came out and have been well pleased with them so far. If you are talking a black & white e-reader (ie the original kindle idea) I have no clue since those are way way off the front burner now even at Amazon. You can still buy them though, although the 2 year back refurbed models are likely as useful and as good as the current stuff, just a lot cheaper. If you are into Amazon -- do not buy an Android tablet -- because Amazon does not support plain Android at all. Amazon IS an android tablet, but they want you to buy theirs not somebody elses. Screwing over the rest of Android by not supporting them is something Amazon has been doing for years now. Ditto for Linux -- Amazon does not support Linux distros at all with Amazon prime movies, etc -- |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/23/15 at 05:37:34 http://www.phonearena.com/news/Well-hello-Prometheus-ARM-roadmap-leak-hints-at-10nm-flagship-chipsets_id68536 Was this a leak? No, I think ARM had to release the info since Mediatek has announced chipsets coming inside of 5-6 months that were going to be built using it. Look at the slide and think a bit -- now name the levels using the new ARM designations -- Mediatek was not allowed to use the unreleased nomenclature so they had to call the two lowest levels A53 although they were obviously two different speeds, construction, power requirements, etc. etc. The real lithography level to be used may have had to be withheld for the same reason. Until ARM announces it, you can't say it ..... If Mediatek releases more information, I think they will be able to say more exactly what the chipset will be built out of now that ARM has released the CPU information. ARM needs to release the range of the Mali graphics that are going to be out there, and there is no guarantee that Mediatek won't actually use VR or AMD upper end graphics anyway since they tend to be better graphics than the stock Mali graphics. Unless of course ARM has upped their graphics game past the 880 level due to Intel's latest graphics releases. And if ARM has a canned 3 level hard macro design with included graphics that has been released to Mediatek then they need to release the naming of such, or else Mediatek is taking quiet credit for something ARM designed simply because ARM is being closed mouthed. http://i-cdn.phonearena.com/images/articles/182829-thumb/ARM10nm.jpg http://www.gizmochina.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/mediatek-helio-x20-leak-02-1024x768.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/23/15 at 07:51:12 It has been two whole days now and still no big brown vaporous 10nm butt blast from Intel's infamous PR department ..... --- what's wrong, Intel, cat got your tongue ???? ;D ...... or did all your 14nm processors running your PR department all thermal throttle back down to half speed on you all at the same time and you are just slow on the comeback ?? :) ===================================== two more days go by Here is day #4's input from the pundits, maybe that will get Intel's anal glands to produce some sort of a brown vaporous reply as the poot factory is still silent at the moment. http://www.phonearena.com/news/Well-hello-Prometheus-ARM-roadmap-leak-hints-at-10nm-flagship-chipsets_id68536 "With Qualcomm's Snapdragon 810 still rocking it at 20nm, and the bleeding edge Exynos 7420 in Galaxy S6 shrunk at the record for a mobile 14nm, a leaked ARM roadmap comes to show that's not all we can expect from flagship chipsets in the near future. As you can see in the chart above, ARM is prepping a Prometheus architecture that will be as powerful, as it will be power-sipping, and will be hammered out with a breathtaking 10nm production process. The speculated timeframe seems to infer that we could see such SoCs as soon as the second half of next year, and a previous rumor claimed that it might be Samsung that will be at the forefront of their production, going from 14nm straight to the 10nm goodness. Rumor has it that Qualcomm has already tasked Samsung with the making of its next big thing - Snapdragon 820 - which means 14nm will be the flagship norm in the second half of the year, and now we can see that 10nm is on the horizon as well. Good times." ::) ..... rumor has long had it that Samsung's 14nm lines were actually 10nm/14nm lines and that with a few extra lithography passes the new lines could give you 10nm production off the exact same equipment. The fact Samsung quoted and won the 10nm Apple A10 business for next year and is busy running it on one (1) dedicated line right now confirms this rumor/knowledge. Samsung has three of the new 10/14nm lines up and running now, with a 4th coming in the fall. Global foundry will have two of the Samsung type lines up and running this fall as well. TSMC uses different tech and is stuck at 16nm for their very best stuff at the moment, but TSMC is working on getting a 10nm process defined, building a new building to house it and working all out the 10nm details for next year. OK, the gist of this is that is Samsung, Qualcomm and Mediatek all lining up to do something strong for the second half of this year and all three are going to do something AMAZING for 2016. Through their contacts (the ex-Qualcomm woman) MS will be tracking this progress and perhaps building instant acceptance into Win10 since the Orient is a major MS focus at the moment. This does not mean Intel is dead, they will go ahead and sell their partially broken 14nm chipsets to their fans during the second half of this year and make money doing it, just as they have done with partially broken stuff in years past. Those of us who remember the AMD Athlon years remember clearly when Intel had nothing good to show us for a period of about 4 years, and Intel lost functionally about a third of their market share during that same period -- but they recovered and came back. Losing the lead does not kill Intel, Chipzilla just gets a little quieter for a while. To recover their lead position Intel needs to forgo 10nm (since they are not in position to go there both timely and effectively anyway as CISC chips apparently have thermal issues when the detail levels get that small) and Intel should concentrate all their efforts on their "beyond silicon" 7nm technology that Intel has said that they are working on. ==================================== OK, a full week has gone by and NOTHING out of Intel --- total silence ---- A ringing total silence for a whole week after your main competitor and one of his actual customers broaches a plan to enter into your very own back yard and eat some your tomatoes off your favorite vine, well folks, that implies a bunch of things ..... (and a bunch of "not good for Intel things" are ringing in the silence right now). |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by justin_o_guy2 on 04/23/15 at 21:09:50 Thanks for the great reply. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/24/15 at 09:29:18 http://forwardthinking.pcmag.com/none/332398-making-chips-beyond-14nm Intel has issues in "Making Chips Beyond 14nm" http://www2.pcmag.com/media/images/458443-intel-integrated-systems-slide-7.jpg?thumb=y Since the Intel PR dept has gone silent on us, let's see what Mark Bohr said at the last International Solid States Circuits Conference (ISSCC) since that was Intel's head chipdog talking directly to a group of people who are his peers in the foundry industry. "Contrary to some published reports, Bohr did not actually confirm that Intel will be shipping 10nm parts in 2016. (Given that Intel shipped its first 14nm chips at the end of 2014, shipping 10nm next year would match the typical two-year cadence of process nodes; when I asked Intel CEO Brian Krzanich whether the two-year cadence will continue, he said that Intel believed it could.) Intel's 14nm process ramped slower than expected, and while Bohr said its 10nm pilot line is showing a 50 percent improvement in throughput compared to where 14nm was at the same point in its progress, the company doesn't want to make a firm commitment." This tells us that Intel is having similar scaling issues and yield issues (and possibly the same THERMAL THROTTLING issues ??) with their experimental 10nm runs. Samsung shows no 14nm thermal throttling issues and they and Apple are off to the 10nm production races as we speak. Once again, the full production 10nm "first" goes to Samsung just like the first production 14nm crown did. Remember, Apple chips count as a Samsung production win and they roll out a year ahead of ARM chipsets generally speaking. In this case Samsung produced and shipped all the Apple 14nm chipsets and they then did their own Exynos 14nm IN MASSIVE VOLUME before Intel got their first production out. Intel is not in the 10m running at this time and Intel has already lost first place for "the first 10nm full production" to Samsung when they do finally get there. And the Samsung chipsets don't seem to have the Intel thermal throttling issues, either ....... [smiley=engel017.gif] |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/24/15 at 20:40:47 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/lenovo-k80-smartphone-sports-4gb-of-ram-4000-mah-battery.html Lenovo K80 smartphone sports 4GB of RAM, 4000 mAh battery http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/lenovo-k80.jpg This past week 6 premium phones have come out with 4 gigs of systems memory and at least 32 gig of flash memory (some have 64 gig). Five of the phones use Intel chipsets, but all of them are coming out running Android. These overly large system specs are NOT required by an Android phone and Android certainly runs fast enough on its normal specs for anybody's satisfaction. So why do this? The phone builders were planning on Win10 being out by now, but since Win10 is running even later yet again they are continuing with their Win10 plans for the actual hardware inside the new phones -- running Android is simply so they can sell the things since they already built them. :-? One questions if the MS "tech support" payments had already been made for building the phones, so now what the heck does the vendor do with the phones themselves ???? ;D ::) Hey, got a phone docking station to go with those puppies? Or some wireless monitor and keyboard and mouse tricks to use with the phone still sitting in your pocket? There is a guy named Shuttleworth who just called asking for you, he wants to talk to you about your overspec'd phones -- he has an idea for a really good way to use all that power instead of just pushing a huge wad of Winpork around at a porky slow pace ...... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/25/15 at 06:10:25 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/acer-abtouchphone-prototype-desk-phone-with-a-built-in-tablet.html Acer Touch Phone: Desk phone with a built-in Android tablet interface http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/abtouch_02.jpg "I guess the idea is to bring smartphone-like features to an office phone. Instead of a basic speed dial feature, you can access your full contact list and tap a button to make a call or send an instant message. The phone could also have some advantages over a smartphone, since there’s room for a large speaker at the bottom which you could probably use both for spearkerphone functions or for music playback. Throw a camera in the tablet section and you could also make video calls." People are used to Android now, and they like the familiar functionality it brings to devices. We are seeing the Android look and feel move into car navigation systems, radios and now desk phones. Example, everywhere I have worked has always had "internet phones" or phones that ran off LAN cables rather than the old Ma Bell 4 wire connection jacks. This may be a harbinger of a new generational change in common old everyday appliances like the desk phone, which has already evolved into a simple dumb terminal on a LAN, but now is becoming something more significant. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/25/15 at 09:38:30 http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/msi-eco.jpg http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/mouse-computer-stick.jpg Vendors are struggling with implementing the new 14nm Intel chips that were originally promised to be fan free and require no heat sink -- and they turned out to actually need a heat sink and/or a fan RATHER DESPERATELY on some of these new 14nm Intel processors due to extreme thermal sensitivity and 2x-3x CPU thermal throttling that is taking place due to some relatively mild CPU temperature increases. This means the total finished products needed to be redesigned at the last minute to include fans and/or heat sinks, or else if it was simply too too late in the product design process to do that then the designs went forward and the product CPU now throttles itself by 2x-3x depending on how hot the chip actually gets in normal use ..... ..... and those end user customers who bought these products simply got screwed. End users are now asking that the Antutu and other tests be run at full bore for at least a half an hour at full processor speed and the products Antutu results be reported off that fully warmed up state, whatever that turns out to be. This is fair and should be applied across the board since Qualcomm's early 810 production chipsets from TSMC are now showing up to have thermal throttling issues as well. Customers should NOT be fed funny numbers to get them to buy a product, numbers like Intel's original 14nm CPU speed numbers taken while the processor was cold matched up with some post throttling super low current draw numbers. This is simple misleading doctored information. And Intel, renaming the issue as "turbo mode" and trying to spin it as a "feature" is totally ludicrous BS -- Intel must think end users are really really stupid (and the ones who buy at Best Buy and who do no internet research first may fit that bill fairly well). Really, a "turbo mode" that only operates ONCE and for only the first 10-20 seconds when the unit is first turned on, really, just how dumb do you think we all are? But I expect all you guys to be better informed and more knowledgeable than that. Major benchmark tests like Antutu need to recognize this thermal sensitivity issue and TEST FOR IT specifically. Qualcomm and Intel do not need to get a free pass for misleading their end users, not now and certainly not going forward into the "fanless future". And yes, products that cut their speed in half (or worse) after only 20 seconds or so of hard use NEED to be panned by the benchmark testers and should be avoided by the purchasing public. :P ===================== http://phandroid.com/2013/10/07/antutu-x-benchmark/ Antutu X is the right sort of idea, but it needs to include thermal throttling as a reported condition and rank chipsets and units according to an averaged hour long test routine to penalize the thermal cheaters and reflect real world end use in games, etc. ;) HTC got grabbed up by their short curlies right smartly by Antutu X, now didn't they? I also noticed that this time Samsung came out clean, not cheating at all lately. Good for them !! END USERS -- warm it up good then test your own personal product and if it throttles to less than what the ads said that got you to buy it, simply return it as defective, get your money back and be more careful on the rebuy side. Consider this when rebuying -- does Apple use that particular Intel chipset? Intel has been sorting lot after lot of Apple used chipsets plucking out the ones that will pass Apple's very stringent requirements -- and guess who gets the rest of the chips in those lots ..... (you) Now for the Encouraging viewpoint ---- Intel will get by this "bumpy zone" and by Skylake time should be past the current set of issues. They should also have a handle on how to spec the heat sinks and fans that Skylake will likely also require, and they should have them correctly listed in the chipset systems requirements VERY EARLY ON along with the max temps the CPU can be allowed to reach before it begins to throttle itself. Properly cooled and spec'd, Skylake should lead to better performing units being built with a great deal fewer hacked off initial customers. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/25/15 at 15:56:57 I just spent 2 hours researching months old info on the SkyLake release schedule looking for ANYTHING that is new -- there isn't anything new anywhere. No new 14nm releases .... no straight word on a Skylake production launch. Just silence. Well, something is up because Intel has not carried forward with Broadwell releases past the original Broadwell U Lenovo release (which was quite the fiasco, actually). We are stuck inside the big Intel silence again right now, listening to Broadwell U cooling fans running air through cooling fins that aren't supposed to be there .... It is rare to see the Intel PR machines stuck cold, at a total loss for words. The last thing put out was the CPU selection tool which was an oddity in itself since it was some fairly old chipsets repurposed to light laptop, tablet and ostensibly mobile uses combined with some Sophia style chipsets at 28nm (built by TSMC). Is the Intel progress train temporarily derailed right now? When is Skylake actually going to ship and what is the first product to come out with production Skylake in it? :-[ Please don't tell us it is an Apple product again and that you are all logged up with making repeated back to back lots of Skylake for Apple -- that means Skylake will hit PC using pre-sorted "not quite as good as the Apple pre-sorted units" chipsets again ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/25/15 at 18:12:22 http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2014/12/10Apple-and-IBM-Deliver-First-Wave-of-IBM-MobileFirst-for-iOS-Apps.html Apple and IBM and ARM chipsets ..... Apple and IBM and HP have a long history of cooperative efforts, heck ARM itself is the living offshoot of one of those old Acorn RISC Machine Group efforts. There is no ill will between Apple and IBM and never has been (both got screwed over badly by Bill Gates, so they certainly have an old enemy in common). IBM has mostly pulled back from chipmaking, but continued to do development work for ARM and FOSS and cooperated with Samsung and Global Foundry to develop the 14nm production tech that Samsung and Global are still using right now. Apple has tapped IBM for their wealth of existing business softwares, getting them ported over to OSx so Apple could offer them as part of a resurgence in their business laptop sales. IBM is also offering new business softwares for iPhone 6, iPads Macs and other uses. Something else that IBM has been tapped for and is currently involved in is the development program for OSx on ARM chipsets, specifically for some lower cost Apple business laptops. Connect the dots along with me -- the same IBM that designed the 14nm production equipment/process with Samsung and Global Foundry is now working with Apple and Samsung directly on 10nm lithography, and doing OS2 derived business software porting for OSx and iPhone and iPad iOS 8.3. Remember Lotus Notes? Yup, IBM owns a lot of core established business softwares that are still in use by Big Business today. IBM also owns OS2, which is more Apple like than Microsoft like since both Apple and IBM sprang from Unix backgrounds. IBM is an expert on ARM chipset design and designing production lithography processes and business software. IBM understands RISC just like Apple does (same Acorn roots, actually). Apple could suddenly spring something on the world that was quietly penned in secret by their own people and IBM people consorting with Samsung and Global Foundry (both of which have some 14nm production requirements with Apple for next year as well). The only one with any 10nm requirements laid on them right now is a REALLY BIG REQUIREMENT that is with Samsung alone since Global can't do 10nm at all right now. Only Samsung can do it right now (and Samsung is busy doing it right now). First to 14nm and now first to 10nm, and currently slugging away at Apple's A-10 chipsets trying to get ready for next spring's new wave of Apple units. Extra 10nm passes mean slower production rates, so more time is actually needed for the same massive run size. One dedicated line to start, more later as required to finish. So, A-10x and A-11 for laptops is still a viable threat to Intel right now, very very much so. If I were Intel, I'd bust my arse to keep every promise I had made to Apple right now, no matter how many lots of Skylake rejects I had to carefully sort through to find the needed number of known good ones to ship to Apple by the required dates. Intel is in arrears on delivering something that is already past due RIGHT NOW. Samsung has already delivered their stuff on time and is working on next years order & delivery. Samsung is a generation ahead in the chip lithography race right now, quite frankly Intel has no 10nm process to even use to quote for next year's 10nm Apple stuff. If I were Intel, I'd make my durn 14nm shipment dates and meet all my price commitments to Apple, no matter what it really cost me. No matter if it fouled up my own 14nm roll outs, messed up MS even more severely, etc. etc. etc. :) .... Intel can always rename the piles of rejects something else number-wise, spec them down some and sell them to the PC people and all their fanboys to go into some sort of mid-range performance Skylake Win10 units later on. DO NOT MAKE THE MISTAKE OF TRYING TO SELL THEM RIGHT AWAY AS PREMIUM UNITS AND BOLLUX UP YET ANOTHER PRODUCT INTRODUCTION --that particular mistake certainly does not need to be repeated again, ever. Skylake needs to be introduced cleanly, running well with no thermal throttling, etc. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/26/15 at 21:17:53 http://www.dailytech.com/Report+Intels+New+Skylake+Chips+May+Be+Slipping+Later+in+2015/article37165.htm Report: Intel's New Skylake Chips May Be Slipping Later in 2015 MIA: Broadwell-H and Intel's 10 nm Timeframe NOTE: this is a refresh and confirmation update of the original rumor that Broadwell and Skylake were having serious issues that would delay their release until late summer for Broadwell and for Skylake to roll into next year. "We got a lot of flak for reporting on rumors that Broadwell's schedule was slipping. Well the facts now clearly state that those rumors were more or less true. So here we are with Skylake, sharing a similar story. So far only dual-core Broadwell chips have been announced; no quad-core, hexa-core, or octa-core chips have been made available yet. Intel is reportedly pushing OEMs and motherboard makers to delay the reveal of new models until the end of August. The higher-core variant, Broadwell-H is rumored to be possibly scrapped for a Skylake replacement. Broadwell-H is a "land grid array" (LGA) package -- a traditional socket mounted chip. Its Skylake equivalent is Skylake-S (somewhat confusingly Skylake-H is a ball grid array (BGA) package -- effectively the successor to Broadwell-U). Even if Skylake doesn't slip any further, it would not be surprising to see it not shipping in any meaningful product to end customers before Q4 2015 -- at best. Realistically, volume shipments in H1 2016 seem most likely. Intel's CEO indicated in press comments that the 10 nm die shrink of Skylake -- Cannonlake had yet to be established. It could arrive in 2017 or later, so more trouble may lie ahead." Yep, Intel has got troubles on top of troubles ..... Their new 14nm stuff jest ain't working out right for them. ..... so now we go a looking for some more MS rumors about MS supporting RISC chipsets from Qualcomm and others at the very first wave of the Win10 first release level since Intel seems to be all bollixed up right now and is NOT going to be offering what MS needs as far as increased speed to make MS Win10 seem "fast enough and light enough" to be appealing. If Win10 seems "same as Win 8.x" it will be a flop as customer expectations have been set for it to be "both lighter and faster". Cost is yet another issue, MS needs inexpensive FAST chipsets to counter the Chromebook wave. Will MS have to delay Win10 until Intel is ready? Perhaps they will have to. Win10 cannot come out without MUCH faster chipsets to run it on or else it may just seem as slow and poky as Win 8.x is currently -- or maybe even slower and pokier since that is what it really is, just a bigger bulkier version of the same old stuff with extra new levels of new processor and graphics intensive features like Cortana etc. etc. etc. ..... We can't have Cortana speaking with a slow blurry southern drawl, now can we ??? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/26/15 at 23:07:17 NUMBERS ON CHROMEBOOK AND PC SALES https://gigaom.com/2015/03/01/chromebook-sales-still-on-the-rise/ "The latest figures from NPD, by way of BetaNews, show that Google Chromebooks are continuing to sell well in the U.S. The research firm estimates that in 2014 Chromebooks accounted for 14 percent of all laptop sales for both the commercial and retail channels; up 85 percent from 2013." .... wow .... Chromebooks are up yet again, rolling up to 14% of all laptop sales now. And the trend is still strong, Chromebooks grew UP 85% from the year previous. http://liliputing.com/2015/04/pc-shipments-dropped-last-quarter-but-there-were-winners-and-losers.html "Researchers at Gartner and IDC have released separate reports that reach the same basic conclusion: PC sales in the first quarter of 2015 were lower than during the same period a year earlier." .... well, that's bad for Windows PCs .... all tracking services are reporting continuing quarter on quarter record declines in PC sales and THAT IS WITH MS KILLING OFF XP TO TRY TO DRIVE SOME SALES. This slump is a consistent trend with 9 consecutive quarters showing a steady decline since 2012. http://www.wsj.com/articles/global-pc-shipments-fall-in-first-quarter-1428617286 "World-wide shipments of personal computers dropped in the first quarter compared with a year earlier, the ninth such quarterly decline since 2012, according to researcher firm Gartner Inc. Gartner estimated world-wide PC shipments totaled 71.7 million units, down 5.2% from a year earlier. The Stamford, Conn., firm said a double-digit percentage decline in desktop sales partly was offset by a pickup in sales of notebooks, hybrids and Windows tablets. The data show the lowest number of PC shipments since the second quarter of 2009, Gartner analyst Mikako Kitagawa said on Thursday. The PC market has been hit hard as corporations slowed the rate at which they refresh employee desktops and consumers increasingly spend their money on tablets and smartphones." So, Chromebooks are up again and PCs are down again in the first quarter of 2015. We are not seeing the MS funded Chromekillers having any positive effect for MS. Indeed they seem to have no overall effect on Chromebooks at all. This is in-line with the pundit's prediction that the Chromekillers would act to cannibalize MS's own sales of their more expensive mid range laptop units and not really take anything away from Chromebook sales at all. So, will Win10 be able to slow or stop the ongoing loss of PC market share? Will Win10 stop or even slow the advance of the Chromebooks? :-? .... the Chrome War price point is now down to $149 with four new units ringing in all based on the ARM RK3288 chipset -- with no Chromekillers acting at that price point at all yet .... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by justin_o_guy2 on 04/27/15 at 02:29:43 My opinion is based on nothing but an attitude, but.. I think the average person is looking to get away from a desktop. Flexibility, mobility, freedom to do whatever, wherever. The better the small ones get, the more people likeme will see them as GoodEnough to justify ditching the PC. THE Kindle is my computer 99% of the time now. I have a Chrome laptop if I need to type or searC h more |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/27/15 at 09:10:16 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/andromium-os-app-makes-android-more-windows-like.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/andromium_003.jpg This is an Android App, you get it from the Play Store. Once installed, it turns your Android whatever into a PC like experience suitable for desktop use. This, plus a strong tablet and a keyboard and a mouse means "instant PC-like workstation". This is especially true since MS has put Word, Excel and Powerpoint into the PlayStore in Android formats. Shuttleworth, your pocket PC is here now ..... using any fairly decent spec'd modern Android tablet or phone with the needed outputs. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/28/15 at 06:39:02 http://www.howtogeek.com/205044/you-can-get-a-200-windows-laptop-but-chromebooks-are-still-worth-buying/ This guy is doing a recommendation based compare and contrast on the Chromekillers and the Chromebooks. WHY IS THIS WORTH READING? He isn't an advocate of either camp and as such his words clarify and can explain better to you what your choices really are. He also knows that most folks come from Windows, so he speaks "window speak" in general while writing the article so most folks can grasp the points he is trying to make. Good article. Good balance. He comes across clearly when he says what he says. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/28/15 at 07:02:02 You know, since MS has piloted the idea of keeping part of your OS up in the cloud and pulling it down only as needed -- well, that opens a lot doors for Google. Google server farms could offer a full OS instantly to the entire installed base of Chromebooks -- running it off the net as they do now. Google could do this trick with ANY OS they could get ownership of and then transfer to FOSS. OS2 comes to mind, should IBM care to contribute that old code to FOSS. I am looking for Android to grow up more and fuse more actively with ChromeOS or something else to happen to carry Google forward into a full service OS. Google could formalize the Crouton thing with Linux Debian (or Ubuntu) and provide a seamless fusion between Android Chrome and Linux. The only thing keeping MS keeping on is Chrome's current perceived weaknesses ...... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/29/15 at 09:02:52 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/chromixium-ubuntu-linux-if-it-looked-like-chrome-os.html Chromixium: Ubuntu Linux… if it looked like Chrome OS So, the Ubuntu and FOSS people are now extending their "Googlized" part towards building a joint Chrome/Android/Linux combined OS --- it is now up to Google to put their end of it on the thing and create a unified OS out of the "Googlized" pieces. MS jest might be shitting little bricks just about now ...... we are talking a free fast OS with all the softwares being free -- forever. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/chromixium.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/30/15 at 08:35:50 I've been asking for years now who was going to be the FIRST to actually go do it -- and now HERE IT IS. https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=24&v=-oi1B9fjVs4 It is a YouTube video, so click on it and watch it. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/continuum-for-phone.jpg Now, what has MS just done? Drive a stake in the sand, boys, because Microsoft just killed off the desktop PC for any and all casual Windows users. However, they may have also strongly assaulted their own laptop business by doing this as well. .....BUT, they are the first to arrive !!! Kudos to Microsoft !!! This feature will become available now for any full OS to do since Intel is going to be building the remote monitor, keyboard and mouse tricks right into SkyLake chipsets and MS is building the software into Win10 right now, but not using Intel just yet. MS is using ARM chipsets to do this trick right now because it is already built into certain ARM products. Finally, some evidence that Wintel still might have the ability to make up some sort of a future winning combination between the two of them, sometimes out in the future ..... but not right now, right now belongs to Qualcomm. Microsoft now swings a couple of advantages, Linux is one (distros run best off of used MS equipment) and now phone in your pocket PC trick is another advantage that Microsoft may indeed develop out in the future. For a while, anyway. Once they finish it. Google needs to come forth with their ARM general purpose operating system soon and then rally the troops to match all these new features (which were piloted by FOSS people, Ubuntu and ARM in the first place, if you will remember). :D .... today's stake in the sand may also signal the resurgence of Microsoft as a significant mobile based player, if they can run with the superphone/PC idea and get it accepted by Big Business as a cost savings trick. ;D ..... so, now how many of you caught the very briefly mentioned words that this Microsoft trick as shown is based off a QUALCOMM chipset -- a pre-existing ARM chipset, and nothing built by Intel? And that this trick is promised to come out as reality sometimes later on AFTER Win10 debuts, using unnamed chipsets? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/30/15 at 09:19:31 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/dell-launches-wireless-dock-for-broadwell-pcs-with-intel-wigig.html Dell launches Wireless Dock for Broadwell PCs with Intel WiGig http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/dell-dock.jpg All hail the end of the desktop PC ..... a laptop is shown, but a phone will do. This is a "wireless dock" for re-using old style cabled monitors and mice and keyboards. Business isn't going to throw away working equipment, and this allows them to use it until it all dies. Betcha Logitech has a better, cheaper, better supported unit out in a month or so. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/30/15 at 09:44:16 [smiley=tekst-toppie.gif] Mark Shuttleworth, thank you and Ubuntu for seeing where desktop PC's would wind up going ---- into your hip pocket as your phone. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by verslagen1 on 04/30/15 at 10:54:54 currently running that desktop with i7, 2.4Ghz, 16G Ram laptop. data files are averaging 7G each. I'll need an A72 and a solid state drive in my hip pocket. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/30/15 at 11:18:10 Well, the good news is that you can buy a 22nm i7 chip set cheap right now and within a year you'll be able to get all kinds of different processors can run all kinds of different things in the same size envelope. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 04/30/15 at 11:34:29 http://liliputing.com/2015/04/asus-zenfone-2-with-4gb-ram-128gb-storage-coming-to-some-regions.html Asus Zenphone 2 is coming out in India this week with a hundred and twenty eight gigabyte (yep, 128 gig) cell phone with 4 gigs of systems memory. [smiley=tekst-toppie.gif] [smiley=tekst-toppie.gif] [smiley=tekst-toppie.gif] [smiley=tekst-toppie.gif] [smiley=tekst-toppie.gif] |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/01/15 at 03:17:24 Vendors are dropping all these super high memory phones all over the place now that were intended to be part of the NOW DELAYED Win10 Phone roll out. They are having to stick Android on them just so they can move them into the retail channels to try to sell them at all, but likely they will have not many takers as Android really doesn't need 64 to 128 gigs of memory on a phone nor does it need 4 gigs of systems memory like a Win10 phone would need. These are some VERY VERY expensive grossly over spec'd Android phones that are NOT really optimized for Android at all. So, what is the deal now? Intel has gone silent on us and has apparently stopped rolling out the 14nm series chipsets as the straight out simple 14nm die shrink of their existing processor products apparently went a crapper on them due to low yields and severe thermal throttling. Plus, since no one expected the new 14nm chips to need heat sinks or fans so none were designed into the new products, products that are now not being produced and not being released. (Intel is rumored to be asking their motherboard customer/vendors to delay any new motherboard design releases through August at this point in time, perhaps for a required redesign of the processor sockets and added cooling options). Both a heat sink and a fan are now required when using the current released 14nms, since they thermal throttle so badly when they get barely a bit past warm. Skylake is still apparently 100% pie in the Q3-Q4 2015 sky as apparently it still has some "undisclosed' issues to work out before shipping. Rumor mill currently spots it as Q1-Q2 2016 as most likely volume shipping dates for Skylake as these are most likely/best currently known dates at this time. .... ooops, sorry Apple .... Apple is not happy with Intel ..... not at all. Intel is PAST DUE, badly badly past due and their current new 14nm chips are underperforming to Apple's needs. Vendors in general are not happy with Intel at this point in time ...... they trusted Intel's spec sheets and brown stinky PR promises and now feel they were misled to varying degrees resulting in some real significant fiscal damage to their companies. They are looking at a very very lean year in 2015 due to the misfiring of their entire new 2015 lines of products which were based on Intel chipsets that did not arrive when promised (and the few that did thermal throttled badly on top of being late). MS's Win10 is being delayed yet again, also, which doesn't help matters either. Microsoft has gone and gotten themselves a new chipset bed warmer, Qualcomm. MS is currently teasing us with some neat "PC in the phone" Qualcomm stuff that is only going to come out in the late fall of this year at the earliest. Win10's first release will be PC only for old school Intel processors only, and will take place late this summer sometimes. Win10 has a great many new features, but is running the risk of seeming slow fat and porky because it will be just as fat slow & porky as ever on the current installed crop of old school processors as ever it was in the past, unless the much stronger faster 65+ watt 22nm Intel i7s are used in a brand new product configurations. So, buddy, ya wanna buy you a 22nm Core i7 fer cheap, buddy? Don't sweat it man, they all got fans in them this year .... ;D |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/01/15 at 07:41:19 Well, I think the first chapter in the Chrome Wars is about over .... very soon MS and/or Google are going to drop new OS products on the market that will supersede this 2012-2015 conflict with a new one that will match up with the new crowd of super-processors being released for 2016. Not that ChromeOS itself will disappear, no I think Chrome might be combined with other things and perhaps be called something else but I do believe the light fast net-based format and function of ChromeOS will survive ongoing. The net is becoming pervasive and so is public Wifi as a means of getting on the web. I carry a web based Wifi based combo phone now and I suspect my next desktop hardware might indeed be based upon my then current cell phone (next time I buy a cell phone anyway). So, where are we right now -- at the end strokes of the traditional Chromewars. Google has been distracted and tied up in EU court over "Google taking over the world" thanks to MS's behind the scenes maneuvering. This is intended to forestall any new unified Google OS as that would be seen as more "taking over the world" again -- meanwhile MS has "protected" their necessary needed time to finish up Win10 finally. (I mean really, Win9 is only 3 years late at this point and it has gone through two whole number/name changes without ever hitting reality). MS is choking on itself, piling up more and more and more processor and memory intensive features into the Win10 PC release for this late Summer (assuming it actually does go real at that point in time) ..... ..... while Intel is choking on itself trying to make a faster/cheaper chipset to move the new MS massive behemoth "quickly and cheaply". Intel is not making sufficient progress on this goal right now and Intel has Apple, MS and lots of other different customers strongly irritated with Intel at the moment because of all the 14nm screw ups and delays. Chromebooks are still doing well, sitting at 15% of all laptop sales and the Chromebook raw quantity number is still doubling every year or fairly close to it, and the Chromebook phenomena is now moving on out into all the foreign marketplaces driven by the same things that made it so successful in America. Yep, I think 2015's Chromebook "doubling" will HURT Microsoft, a lot .... that would be a significant market share loss for MS since recent history says those that go Chromebook tend to not come back to MS, ever. The current Chrome Wars price point is at $149 with some plans leaking out to take it down to $129 if that becomes necessary. That is if MS ever actually makes it all the way down to $149 point in the first place -- they haven't really gotten all the way down to $149 yet you know ..... :-? ::) ======================================== So, how happy are people with Chromebooks vs MS Windows? Currently, I mean. Right now. Reality speak. Factually. http://au.pcmag.com/feature/28623/readers-choice-awards-2015-laptops-and-desktops http://www1.pcmag.com/media/images/457937-readers-choice-2015-laptops-chromebooks-vs-windows.jpg?thumb=y What I find interesting that the items that the people like most about Chromebooks will not be changed at all by the Win10 roll out -- indeed the "items they like" may get exaggerated some more by MS's ongoing flaws by the time the first "pay me" bill for Win10 hits the public's pocketbooks and the "I told you so" outrage starts. You see, MS is playing a game right now, they are going to push Win10 "for free" just as hard as they can in 2015-16 to try to gain back market share that they have lost in the various world markets -- then later on the "pay me" bill will eventually be presented in the next version, once the public is fully hooked on Win10 and "can't live without it" all over again. ======================================== Here is my prediction ..... MS is seen as a desktop/laptop operating system. Cell phones are getting ready to take over a large chunk of that desktop real estate going forward into the future. Right now MS only owns right at 3%-4% of that cell phone market share. MS might win in desktop, but desktop is going to shrink to be an incidental marketplace fairly soon, occupied only by CAD and other forms of workstations in a work a day world. Yeah, maybe an AAA game or two, gotta leave room for that you know. But desktop PC will shrink to wind up being a 5%-8% of total computing within 4 years, unless Win 10 is fantastically successful and turns the trend completely around. People will carry cell phones in their purses and pockets that can light a screen when they are sitting at home, either cordlessly or from a docked connection (ya still gotta charge the thing, right?). What that particular OS is going to be called is still yet to be determined. :) ..... Apple iOS and Android are the two most likely brand names right now, really. Once they light your big screen you might call them OSx and ChromeOS since they will likely be able to morph to fit the environment on the fly. And yes, MS will be there too, at a much smaller percentage. Face it, people currently do not prefer MS Phone over Apple or Android phones right now and I can't see that preference changing radically in the short term future. And I also don't see people rushing to throw away old desktop PC hardware at the moment either -- Desktop Linux has jumped from 1.4% to over 3% of the total existing population of x86 machines which is a pretty significant pick up in Linux only boot sectors. (not dual boot machines either, as they are reported as Windows units -- 3% now are pure Linux machines) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/02/15 at 16:53:56 Windows 10 death toll http://liliputing.com/2015/05/windows-media-center-is-dead-wont-be-available-in-windows-10.html Let's count the things that MS has killed off as they have moved closer to releasing the "free" PC version of Windows 10. These are all things that MS has already laid off the people to support already, and are not currently supporting at all in any real fashion already, but by giving you Win10 "for free" as your upgrade path MS has officially obliviated their existing legal obligations to you once you load up Win 10 and fall under its license. Windows 95, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8.0, Windows 8.1, the vaporous Windows 9, Windows Explorer, Windows Media Center, Windows Works Oh, I suspect there are lots & lots of other MS softwares that MS will dump quietly, linking them to a dumped OS version as their given reason. It is important that MS announce the death of each one publically and state that the "free" Win10 whatever is the upgrade path for each and every one of them ..... it is a legal thing that they must do when they cut off formal support for the old softwares ahead of the old published schedules. MS is busy becoming a smaller, more focused company .... and a lot of housekeeping on whole shelves full of old dusty software stuff is still required in that move to a smaller, more focused company. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/03/15 at 05:01:33 Meet the Asus Zenphone 2, the first Intel processor, built to dock cell phone. http://i-cdn.phonearena.com/images/articles/157035-image/Asus-ZenFone-2.jpg Why built to dock? All controls are on the back of the phone and the top of the phone, nothing on the sides and just the USB to go port on the bottom for easy docking. Everything is set up so you can use all the hardware controls while the phone is docked. 4 gigs of systems memory, 32 to 64 to 128 gigs of flash drive memory, a current state of the art Intel processor means this puppy was built for Win10 all the way. Right now the phone is out although Win10 isn't ready yet by any means (and Win10 phone will not be ready until next year according to current rumors). Asus, you are way way early to the party buddy. This phone way way exceeds the original Shuttleworth Edge specs, on all parameters. http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51R3exgZyHL._SY300_.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/03/15 at 09:39:43 http://www.tomshardware.com/news/intel-pentium-celeron-braswell-shipping,28896.html Brian sez "We got three (3) new chips to release ...." http://media.bestofmicro.com/R/F/489579/gallery/bk-intel-idf-shenzen_w_600.png Yep, he looks old, doesn't he? Tired and old .... He's not having much fun, lately, you can tell it from his expression. http://cdn.static-economist.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/full-width/images/2013/05/blogs/schumpeter/20130504_wbp504.jpg Read the specs of the new pentium-celeron-braswell chipsets and see the second line in the comparison chart, the BASE/BURST FREQUENCY line that tells what the thermal throttling will be. BURST mode occurs when the chip is cold (first started) and BASE mode occurs from then on once the chip warms up. http://www.tomshardware.com/news/intel-pentium-celeron-braswell-shipping,28896.html it is a web page, click on it NOTE PLEASE: these new pentium-celeron-braswell chips are being released under the specious "turbo" PR mantra again, but this time they are being released saying up front that they are going to thermal throttle down to about HALF SPEED when they get warmed up. Intel continues to choose not to use the correct term for this activity, which is "thermal throttling" which is a situation which takes place when the chip gets warm and slows itself down. Note: I said warm, not extremely hot. All those fins and fans are there to keep the chipset from going past luke warm to medium warm as the heat sink never gets to what we would have called hot in the past. (This warm up takes less than a minute to reach "throttling" on 14nm chips independently tested so far, but we are hopeful for some progress to be seen on the current crop of chipsets that have some effective cooling installed from the very beginning) No vendor should go into these 14nm chips NOT ALREADY KNOWING he is going to potentially underperform his existing products fairly significantly due to thermal throttling issues. And I bet the spec sheets call out for some large cooling fins and fans, too -- to try to preserve as much performance as possible. Indeed, the half speed throttle may well be with the now spec'd fins and fans in place already as the Lenovo bare chipset shipments thermal throttled down to 1/3 speed as they had no cooling at all (none was originally specified by the spec sheet for that product, but this error has since been corrected). Tom's Hardware says: "However, don't let the promise of better graphics performance obscure the fact that these are not performance chips. They're very much aimed at products in the value and entry-level market segments. One major data point we're still missing on the new Braswell chips is a price point. The more recent Pentium and Celeron Bay Trail quad core chips have "recommended consumer price" points ranging from $82 to $161, but Intel has not released that information for Braswell." Intel is going up against $5 and $10 and $15 ARM chipsets with similar (post throttle) performance levels if they are headed into phones and tablets. Trying to sell these new 14nm ones for $82 to $161 is really not going to work out well for Intel at all. Intel may have some better graphics now, but the lower resolution screens in products at this level won't let the new graphics show to any real advantage. And the new Antutu X program will catch every one of these overpriced bogies real performance as the products roll out and hit the product ranking lists. If they are going into higher level products, then they are going up against the newer ARM performance crew who are now swinging better graphics and much higher performance levels (ARM performance that stays high instead of throttling in half). Intel's new chipsets that have just been released will get their arses kicked right smartly by the new big ARM boys, I am afraid. Intel is so far not showing a competitive 14nm product for cost and performance. They are showing that they are taking 22nm mid-level products through the 14nm shrink process and winding up with a lower level product performance-wise -- yet at an greatly increased cost to the device builder. :D I think Intel has just rang the dinner bell for the Hockey Stick boys to "Come and get it !!!" I think Qualcomm, Mediatek and Rockchip have heard the dinner bell already. ======================================= PREDICTION TIME: MS will attempt to include more ARM chipmakers other than just Qualcomm in the original Win10 roll outs. Intel is not going to be enough to support MS's very real needs in the lower half of the marketplace. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/03/15 at 10:51:34 ARM has already made a PRO-ACTIVE forward motion plan (Ares, Prometheus, Artemis, Ananke, Mercury) for squelching both Intel Skylake and Intel Cannonlake as they were originally concepted (as strongly improved products) --- and ARM has vendors Mediatek and Samsung actually rolling this pro-active plan out starting this fall. Meanwhile, 14nm Intel has thermally imploded and Intel has no Skylake to hit reality until supposedly sometimes next year .... and Intel's 10nm Cannonlake is likely to lag yet a year further behind than that. Meanwhile, Samsung will be producing 10nm A-10 and A-10x chipsets for Apple this summer and this fall and all this winter. And they will make a few for themselves every now and again, of course ..... powerful lower cost RISC chipsets at 10nm lithography swinging improved data busses and much better graphics according to the ARM specs just released. Meanwhile, MS is busy trying to learn how to ARM itself against Intel's current 14nm implosion so as not to delay their Win10 roll-out for another whole year. :) Ah, this computer stuff is such fun to watch all fumbling and writhing and stumbling over itself. Apple is forcing Intel to TRY to meet their commitments, making Intel produce and sort then scrap the lot after lot after lot of not-quite Skylake chipsets (which Intel will then rename as something or other and then eventually dump them off on YOU, their ever faithful Intel fans). ::) "Hey man, Intel has a really great sale on 100x turbo whatchamacallits, only $1,450 for the chipset and a FREON-intercooler insulated NUC case set up using the NUC motherboard of your choice -- hell, that's a steal and a half man, a FREON cooled 14nm Intel whatchamacallit rig for only $1,450 --- it kicks some serious Apple arse it does, makes applesauce out of the very best Mac rigs. No, man -- it's like a special processor run, and when they sell them all that's it, no more ever again. Just think of it man, your own personal supercooled supercomputer .... really rocks, huh? No, to get the full turbo speed you have to keep the entire Mobo inside of the insulated case down at -40oF or lower using the freon compressor rig to cool it way way down, makes the electrons flow better, I guess -- rad man, really rad. It has like frost on the case all the time. Hey, I betcha you can't lick the metal rim on the case, dude ..... no, really, just stick your tongue out and touch it to the metal. <snort> <snort> <snort> http://https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQMnJXjh2V59hzkQbp_la--Q5LI3dwlSEMgLCs-BQijCIfos-_a .... yeah, man, it can even chill your beer for you in just a minute or so, just set the can inside the deep cup holder recesses up on top of the case. Yeah, I love that Budweiser logo stenciled on the sides of the case too, man." :P That's some sick Intel humor, a young Joe Sixpack buying a new thermally challenged processor just because Intel has put it on sale. But the fanboy stuff reads sorta true ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/04/15 at 18:25:15 OK, time to drive a stake in the sand, recording the core clock and boost clock claims as sold to the public for Skylake at this point in time. Why do this? If the Skylake products come up a crapper when they are actually run, you will have the old figures lying around to go look at. Intel loves to switch product spec stuff out on you, and if they have to change the part number a few times to ease this rewriting along, well, that's OK too. Note all the Skylake thermal shifts were planned to be very small fractional sifts, a fraction of a single gigahertz is all that is supposed to be lost when they warmed up (which is what they are still claiming for Skylake right now). When the first 14 nm Broadwell M Lenovo Yoga Pro units shipped, the real thermal effects were 50% to 75% speed reductions due to the thermal throttling effects. And yeah, Intel likes to reverse it and call it "turbo mode" but it isn't turbo anything, the chips get warm and SLOW down, they don't speed up !!!! Intel thinks people like us are stupid ...... >:( .... that is the sort of Intel arrogance that really really pisses people off, you know. The CPU chip starts out stone cold when unit powers on, max CPU cycle speeds are seen at start up, but within literally 10-20 seconds the CPU slows down on its own as the chip gets warmer, then the programmed protective temperature cut outs begin to operate and the chip slows down drastically as the power to it is cut and cut and cut again to keep the 14nm fine connectors and gates from damaging themselves thermally. The 4 to 6 watt 14nm chipsets Intel just released just two days ago were found to have a "2x turbo mode" --- i.e. the 4-6 watt chip's CPU speed cut itself in half due to thermal throttling when it got just barely warm, not even very warm -- certainly not hot like chipsets used to. And what the heck do you think is going to happen when they try to get a 14nm wire and 14nm FinFET gate system to run at a blistering 4 gigahertz pulling 65 to 95 watts of power through those tiny wires and gates ???? p...p...p..popcorn ?!?! FinFET gates jest a popping up off the silicon ???? :-? Hey Charlie, where did you put my -40oF supercooled FREON-intercooler insulated NUC case? Intel Skylake-S Desktop Processors Lineup: Model Process Cores Core Clock Boost Clock Cache Memory Support TDP Socket Unlocked Design Core i7-6700K 14nm 4/8 4.0 GHz 4.2 GHz 8 MB DDR4 2133 MHz 95W LGA 1151 Yes Core i5-6600K 14nm 4/4 3.5 GHz 3.9 GHz 6 MB DDR4 2133 MHz 95W LGA 1151 Yes Core i7-6700 14nm 4/8 3.4 GHz 4.0 GHz 8 MB DDR4 2133 MHz 65W LGA 1151 No Core i5-6600 14nm 4/4 3.3 GHz 3.9 GHz 6 MB DDR4 2133 MHz 65W LGA 1151 No Core i5-6500 14nm 4/4 3.2 GHz 3.6 GHz 6 MB DDR4 2133 MHz 65W LGA 1151 No Core i5-6400 14nm 4/4 2.7 GHz 3.3 GHz 6 MB DDR4 2133 MHz 65W LGA 1151 No Core i7-6700T 14nm 4/8 2.8 GHz 3.6 GHz 8 MB DDR4 2133 MHz 35W LGA 1151 No Core i5-6600T 14nm 4/4 2.7 GHz 3.5 GHz 6 MB DDR4 2133 MHz 35W LGA 1151 No Core i5-6500T 14nm 4/4 2.5 GHz 3.1 GHz 6 MB DDR4 2133 MHz 35W LGA 1151 No Core i5-6400T 14nm 4/4 2.2 GHz 2.8 GHz 6 MB DDR4 2133 MHz 35W LGA 1151 No Read more: http://wccftech.com/intel-6th-generation-skylake-s-processors-officially-confirmed-core-i76700k-core-i56600k-coming-q3-2015/#ixzz3ZDtgU0ZB |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by justin_o_guy2 on 05/04/15 at 20:43:46 So they minimize the size of the electronic s and then have to add acubic foot of cooling equipment? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/05/15 at 03:40:19 Justin, the -40oF supercooled FREON-intercooler insulated NUC case was supposed to be a joke, but if Intel plans to push the same 35-65-95 watts through much smaller 14nm connectors then they can expect to create more heat than before in a much smaller tighter package -- and their current 14nm stuff is showing to be very heat sensitive. Heat and processors is not new, but the whole point behind going smaller was to run at lesser voltages and not require all the watts of power to get the same performance. I guess in reality I am saying Intel Skylake isn't real at all right now, it is just power point slides showing some stuff that likely isn't going to work -- they obviously haven't even thought through the implications of what they have already discovered thus far. Intel has run without real competition for whole decades now, slowly releasing behemoth after behemoth, refining each slowly over process development cycles of at least 2-6 years. Intel no longer has this luxury -- they must innovate and then hit it completely and accurately on the first try. Now they have competition. Now they have to perform. So far Intel 14nm has been an execution nightmare, and Intel has not performed. They are years late on the implementation of their 14nm and it is showing to be significantly flawed in some very core fashions. They are failing to ship contracted chipsets to Altera and to Apple on time and on performance. MS is now turning to Qualcomm for implementation ideas for Win10, not to Intel. 14nm, Samsung and Apple are doing it, Mediatek and Qualcomm are doing it. TSMC is having some 20nm thermal issues with a few early runs of Qualcomm 810 chips, so you can sorta tell whose tech TSMC have been sponging off of recently, but supposedly TSMC is getting a handle on it now. Intel, ar 14nm, not so much right now, not really. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/05/15 at 09:19:43 Prediction: As I watch Ubuntu and MS and others struggle to be the first to release a phone that will dock into giving a PC like experience, I wonder when Apple and Google will simply build the trick into their OS such that it is a common feature. Or, to save space, make it a free downloadable app. That would be a right MS killin' thing to do, you know -- buy a new phone, get a free PC for -- free -- one that you already know how to use. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/05/15 at 18:56:40 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/windows-10-gives-you-the-middle-finger-emoji.html Microsoft has included special new tools in their just pre-released Win10 OS for handling user complaints and pricing issues .... http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/emoji-bird-e1430841046653.jpg Neither Google nor Apple have these specially created MS tools as part of their OS, hey, mebbe they didn't feel like they needed them .... .... but please note MS is attempting to be politically correct as they roll forward to supply you with this key technical service, and most assuredly MS will try to match their emoji responses to your own personal ethnicity. ::) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/06/15 at 07:02:28 Qualcomm's overheating/throttling 810 processor first revision 1.0 is history -- replaced by version 2.0 which cuts the thermal throttling problems down by at least half. Be aware that the issue here really belongs to TSMC who built the 810 chip on its custom designed proprietary 20nm process. And it becomes obvious just who TSMC was benchmarking some of their tech from when they built that 20nm process. Also note that Qualcomm's next phone processor generation will be actually built at Samsung -- Qualcomm isn't stupid -- TSMC has issues just keeping up with the technology curve in more ways than just one. AS WE GET SMALLER and smaller and the traces and gates get half sized, then quarter sized, expect thermal throttling to become more of an issue for EVERYBODY. Cutting down on the required voltages will become a key to future shrinkage. You can't keep the same 5 volts or even the new 3 volts, you need to drop to as close to 1.5 volts as you can for all functions as this 1.5 volts will be the required 10nm voltage and all the "future forward" voltage functions need to get down to this level asap. ;) fun, ain't it? Get them new 1.5 volt basebands and LTE radios into the FCC for testing/approval NOW or you will be left behind. I can remember when Intel was Sooooo Proud that their traces and gates were all a "true 14nm size" throughout, while lambasting everybody else in ARM land because their traces were fatter and they only really got close to 14nm when it got right at the FinFET gate areas. Now Intel is bleeding heat energy off everywhere inside their chips and having severe thermal throttling issues and the ARM guys are mostly just marching along just fine with their "fat" 14nm traces (with no fins on their chips either). ::) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/08/15 at 06:37:00 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/teclast-x70-3g-first-tablet-with-intel-atom-x3.html Teclast X70 3G: First tablet with Intel Atom x3 http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/teclast-x70_01.jpg Why is this worth noting? After 2 full years of being COMPLETELY totally arsed late and dropping repeatedly into and out of existence SoFIA has actually finally shipped !!! Hooray !!! Also please note this is an ARM based chipset with an Intel 3G radio in it, but it is low end phone and tablet capable and it is a non-integrated chipset 2 parts on a daughterboard style chipset. Is it worth noting for the fact Rockchip designed it the ARM part of it and the daughterboard part and TSMC actually ran the product and actually packaged it on the ball solder chip daughterboard package set and the only vaguely real actual Intel involvement in the whole thing was to print their name on it? .... oh, that's right, TSMC did that too. This is only because the radio and base band were from a company that had been purchased by Intel not too long ago and that is the only IP that Intel can possibly claim in the whole thing as all the rest of it is bone stock ARM technology including the graphics. Yep, ARM cpu cores and ARM graphics and ARM systems throughout with a Intel purchased company providing the tagged on separate 3G radio and baseband chipset. And, since the whole idea is mostly 3 years late now, it is coming out dead bottom of the pile and nearly completely out of date "as implemented". The next ARM tech wave will totally erase this modest effort with newer, cheaper, more powerful products almost immediately. BUT THERE IS BIG NEWS, the chipset supposedly did not require loss leader price support. But since it isn't the best thing out there for the bucks spent, it isn't going to sell well. The Atom 3x will likely go on fire sale later on at a price that might move the existing limited stocks of product. So, even as introduced Intel has no great plans for this "Ultra Low Cost" chipset other than for their name to be out there on something phonish. http://files.linuxgizmos.com/intel_mwc2015_slide2.jpg Or more likely, once the vendors have collected their tech support money and run their first very small lot of product to get their tech money -- that's it. ..... mmmmmm .... :-? I have to wonder how much Intel spent to have their name on something for such a short period of time. On to the next thing ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/08/15 at 08:25:27 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/chip-mini-pc-runs-debian-linux-costs-9-sort-of.html ..... and the next thing is a $9 computer. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/chip-thumb-200x147.jpg http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/chip_03-680x451.jpg "OK, so what exactly is a CHIP? Its a short video, click on it ..... http://liliputing.com/2015/05/chip-mini-pc-runs-debian-linux-costs-9-sort-of.html It’s a single-board computer with a 1 GHz Allwinner R8 single-core processor based on ARM Cortex-A8 technology. It has 512MB of RAM, 4GB of storage, 802.11b/g/n WiFi, and Bluetooth 4.0 and composite video output. The system is designed to run Debian Linux and it can run modern desktop apps including LibreOffice, VLC, or the Firefox or Chrome web browsers. Not only does it run free and open source software, but the developers say the hardware schematics, PCB layout, and other details will all be available for anyone to download or modify." My read? Raspberry Pi 2 is a far better deal for the dollars spent. Faster, quad core processor and MUCH better OS support and tons of freebies developed for it already. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/10/15 at 00:10:07 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/windows-as-a-service-windows-10-will-be-continually-updated-with-no-windows-11-in-sight.html Windows as a service: Windows 10 will be continually updated (with no Windows 11 in sight) "Cynics might think this means Windows 10 won’t be complete at launch… and they’re kind of right. Microsoft has already said that Windows 10 for phones won’t be available until a few months after Windows 10 for desktops launches this summer, and Windows 10 for desktops will include the new Microsoft Edge web browser, but some features including support for Object RTC and web extensions won’t be available in the browser at launch. But in some respects. Windows 10 will never be complete, just the way Ubuntu, Fedora, OS X, Android, iOS, and other operating systems are never really complete — because there’s always room to roll out updates to patch security vulnerabilities or to add new features." Microsoft has not finalized Windows 10 after 4 years of working on it now, it has been a continuing conceptual re-write process that has gone through phase after phase and re-write after re-write after re-write. Nothing Windows has done has fully clicked with the testers, other than just certain selected feature sections. So, Microsoft has decided to roll with what they got right now, which is a constantly evolving product which right now is structured greatly like one of the newer developing Linux Distros, great ideas being plopped down constantly with full execution coming and a level of future polish promised. Microsoft still hasn't even finished with their business model (?? how do they get paid ??) nor do they have an announced plan to completely integrate the PC and Phone/Tablet parts of their disparate worlds. They have some stuff in mobile that does not play in PC and vice versa. Performance wise, you get the sense that MS was waiting for Intel to come out with a chip fast enough to make their porky old stuff be quick enough to be blended in with the new features to become "the new quick and light stuff". This isn't happening and MS must regroup yet again and put out an OS this summer anyway without any "helpful" Intel super processors to support them. Tester say 10 is "better" than before in general, but still complain about specific items. It isn't lighter or smaller (quite the contrary, it is feature crowded with entire thought lines going off in odd directions that were development delayed, but not removed). For example: http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/windows-update_02-680x461.jpg As you can see, it is actually functionally pretty much the same old stuff with different access shells and some "do it while you are sleeping" dodges, but all the old cruft is still there and you will still spend time taking care of endlessly changing the baby's anti-virus diaper, etc. But, a few of the features recently created show the potential promise of lighter and faster, but this is mostly on the mobile side of the endeavor and they are nothing that is seamlessly integrated across the board right now anyway. Microsoft wanted to have "one product on all screens" but 10's reality does not seem to be headed that way. What is released for PC will likely be maximized for a traditional desktop monitor/keyboard/mouse and will NOT contain all the mobile elements per se. I still hold out some hope for the mobile product to be better, as it hold most of the "new think" items. Shovel-ware and crap-ware are still going to be around, with some permanent ad bars popping up occasionally to generate some incidental revenue for the crapware people -- it is still the same old MS world view after all with all the old remora fish still suctioning on to the big fish and riding along for an up-front fee. People will quickly begin to refer to different slices or views of the MS pie as "PC something" vs a mobile "something else" and MS will eventually have to start to use the nomenclature that develops. Until then, MS will give 10 away for free, push and promote the hell out of it and see if they can preserve their market share as they endlessly continue to work on it. What has not changed -- Business isn't having any part of it and is sticking with Win 7 as installed in all their functions. Until MS comes up with something desktop based that can woo Business off of Win 7 it is all a mental exercise anyway. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/10/15 at 01:00:29 So, what is cooking with the newest $149 Chromebooks? ======================================== First reviews are out on the $149 Chromebooks from Haier and Hisense, and they don't suck nearly as much nor as badly as folks feared they might. They are what they are, low end units, but they do adhere to all the Chromebook requirements and Google watch-dogged their design so they really don't suck on any given particular but the overall build quality says what they are -- low end units. Processor CPU performance is slightly down compared to a Tegra K1 unit and to the old Intel big dual core processors, but the video system is good enough to plus it back up performance-wise to be roughly same same with the rest of the low end crowd. It is still $50 cheaper than the older low performance Chromebook units, and miles and smiles better in web performance compared to the current Chromebook Killers which sell for $50-$100 more despite MS claims they were going to price point match these $149 Chromebook units, but never did. One thing the RK3288 based Chromebooks are doing is SELLING -- Amazon is out of the third production run already and Haier is being asked to set up another line to try to meet the huge Amazon current demand. The ruggedized Haier unit for elementary school kids has orders backed up way past the start of school, so that is also another reason to crank up another assembly line. Haier is suffering all the pangs of a big hit, which is an awkward but good place to be I guess. We get no Hisense volume information relating to Walmart, as Walmart just places automatic system replenish orders on a unit by unit replacement basis with all their vendors anyway .... so Walmart never has them to sell since they only stock ~5 per store and those are eternally "already gone" and awaiting the next delivery truck when you go to asking. Walmart on line is your best bet if you want to actually go buy a Hisense Chromebook -- or you can wait a bit since these things tend to go to rev 2.0 fairly quickly and some of the rough edges do get polished off when that happens....... Thanksgiving/Black Friday will see these things sold for $99 or less, so you might wait for that also. Remember too, that these $149 Chromebooks are being supplied world-wide and that they constitute the cutting edge of the Chromebook implementation going into schools everywhere in the world right now. Looks like this next year-on-year doubling of the Chromebook volume will be big enough to draw some significant blood and actually HURT 'ol MS in their market share wallet .... ;) Look to see Hockey Stick Boys everywhere come up with their own Chromebooks, ASAP, all based off the Google base design. There is a new market pie out there and they each want a slice of it ..... and what with tablets being sorta flat right now maybe it is time to go into hockey stick laptops. http://s.thestreet.com/files/tsc/v2008/photos/charts/ABI_Research1023.jpg Unit Device Share by OS 2012 2013 2014 Mac OS 24.5% 24.2% 26.8% Chrome OS 0.2% 3.3% 4.5% Windows OS 75.2% 72.3% 68.4% ...... ouch, that hurt --- so what is 2015 going to look like? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/10/15 at 13:11:04 Republic Wireless, my Wife and the $10 and $25 plans My wife lives in an extended family of Apple iPhone users .... we keep iPad2 tablets for this very reason since the women all like to video-talk to each other and play games together. I never told my wife that Republic Wireless was a cut down service. Mainly because it really isn't cut down, it is FULL 3G service, just not 4G which is fine because we don't have a 4G tower anywhere near where we live. She is coming off a Galaxy S3 (Android) and knows KitKat 4.4.4 as well as she knows anything, so it is all familiar to her. She does not like the physically bigger phones but says she wants a smaller, handier phone similar to everybody else's iPhone. So, the MotoG from Republic and the $10 a month plan scratches the 4.5" size itch just fine as it is the exact requested size and it does everything she ever got off her Verizon Galaxy S3. Everyone iPhonish always complains about them little bitty keys, my wife just hits the Google microphone and talks her stuff in. She's gone on vacation with her family women, going to look at graveyards in Pennsylvania of all things while working on the family geneology ..... so I moved an icon for Google Maps over to the front page of her phone and turned on her $25 dollar cellular full data plan for the days she is on vacation. "OK, how do I use it?" Hit the Google Maps icon, let it open up ----- hit the directions icon at the bottom left, wait for the screen to come up. "Now what --- those keys are too tiny to type on ...." Hit the microphone and say "Take me to xxxxxx, in city xxxxxx in state xxxxxxx" Actually, she doesn't need to know the address, just the correct name for the place (Google does the address lookup automatically). She does so ...... Google pops up her current location, the first highlighted streets and turns and gives verbal instructions for the first street and desired intersection and turn direction. She cancels that one and talks in her niece's location in Asheboro, NC. Pops right up. Yeah, she likes her little cheapie Republic Wireless Google-enabled phone --- it does stuff that makes them long term iPhone people just turn pea green with envy. And for $5 for a week ($25 a month full data plan pro-rated) I can afford to make her a happy camper while she is on vacation. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/10/15 at 14:13:37 http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/04/in-depth-with-the-snapdragon-810s-heat-problems/ In-depth with the Snapdragon 810’s heat problems This is a hot chip (in the first production lot anyway) that throttles early and often, and it makes a difference. Qualcomm is left squealing from the feeling .... oink'n from the boinkin' .... AND THEY HATE IT ..... Qualcomm ran afoul of a bad first batch of TSMC produced 20nm chipsets that they assembled into units and rush shipped as sample phones without doing enough in house testing before rushing the phones out to reviewers. What Arstechnica and other first rate review magazines found in their first benchmark testing was the overheating and thermal throttling similar to what is happening with the new Intel 14nm chipsets of late. And of course they told the world about it. It's all supposedly been fixed now and the first production lots were supposedly cleaned up, but nobody is buying the 810 equipped Qualcomm flagship phones now for fear of overheating and slow throttled performance. So, now there is a new slightly lower spec'd phone chip out now from Qualcomm called the Snapdragon 808 with some very slightly lower specs, and it always meets those specs even when it gets warm. So, guess who wiped off their chipsets with solvent and then over labeled their initial lots of 810 chipsets with a new stencil? Well, you might could make a guess. And since ongoing sorting is apparently still going on, it seems logical to try to find a way to move the "not quite good enough" chipsets in some profitable manner. So the 808 chipset was born. And everybody seems to be very happy with the Snapdragon 808 chipset as it is less expensive and it always meets all its specs very handily and it sometimes does a bit better (if the phone was nice and cool when it just got turned on that is). Qualcomm is just plain pissed off about the whole thing, saying that somebody (Samsung, supposedly) started up the widespread overheating rumors up in the first place just to re-arrange the top end of the premium cell phone landscape a little bit. It was a successful ploy apparently and everybody in phone space is VERY aware right now about thermal throttling as an issue now that specific parts of Antutu X now tests thoroughly for that specific problem. And meanwhile Qualcomm has just been unseated as the king of the Android premium feature phones right now as a result of skipping some on their internal testing of their newest 810 flagship chipsets before shipping the sample phones. And sorry Qualcomm, fact is they got hot and throttled -- you got caught and dinged for that first lot of phones as you should have been caught and dinged. Yes, it sucks. Yes, the second lot of sorted 810's did much better. And yes, it is Samsung that is sitting there now in first place, but remember the Galaxy S6 would have trounced your second or third lot of 810's just as badly. The 14nm Exynos chipset was simply such strong medicine that you could not have overcome it anyway -- so go lick your wounds and do better with your new 820 when it comes out. And yes, you were just plain dumb to "overstate" your thermally sensitive phone chipset right after Intel had just busted its face wide open falling all over itself in the Lenovo Yoga Pro fiasco. Folks are LOOKING for thermalling chipsets now and you fed them a big one -- so they fed it right back to you, 'cept they stuck it where the sun don't shine instead of shoving it back into your mouth. .... jest a squealing from the feeling and a oinkin' from the boinkin' ..... there goes your pretty 810 based roll out with Microsoft on Win 10, huh? Speaking of Intel and dumb and thermal throttling ..... And no, Intel, no one else has been dumbassed stupid enough to try to claim their thermal throttling was a "turbo feature" -- that particular stupidity is reserved just for little 'ol bone headed you to do. >:( |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/11/15 at 04:50:30 http://www.techpowerup.com/img/08-05-31/3b.jpg FEAR OF THROTTLING is really fear of this -- fear of a thermal burn up ...... And I say again, "People are LOOKING and testing for thermal throttling now" as an indicator of bad chipset design and they sure are finding it -- some Intel folks are finding that the new motherboard they just bought as an upgrade can be SLOWER than their old three years ago board once the new voltage regulator and control chipset have throttled the 14nm CPU way way way down to keep it from damaging itself. They are discovering that a dance is going on here -- the chip slows itself down some immediately as it warms, then the voltage regulator is cut back by Intel software to protect the heat sensitive chipset from internally damaging itself, then it cuts it back again, then cuts it back again, then it cuts it back again. If it fails to cut back fast enough or far enough, this is what you get (turbo toast). Yep, a fully "turbo'd" processor, alias toast. Turbo'd ..... what Intel PR dribble brain came up with that particular "marketing coverup" and how many generations of Intel managers have approved such lying BS as a normal way of doing business ..... When your chip slows down by half, you tell the idiot buying public it has "2x turbo mode" and they actually BELIEVE you ...... that is how Intel has been selling substandard or defective chip designs lately. So, the ignorant customer winds up playing his new AAA game at approximately half your 14nm processor's max speed due to thermal throttling in some cases -- at a real ongoing rate that is slower than your 3 year old 22nm unit could have done it. So. what are the smarter Intel fans learning? If you need to pull big watts of processor power, don't go to 14nm, stay at 22nm. Your old stuff is fine, just keep it. There isn't anything out there faster or better right now, apart from using the supercooling tricks. 22nm was indeed the high point of Intel processor real world MAXIMUM POWER performance, for now anyway. Meanwhile, the refrigerated NUC case creeps ever closer and closer to reality, since any real Intel Fanboy is really really gonna want to use that sweet new 14nm chipset he just bought balls to the walls in full overclocking fashion -- but the sad thing is that he has to supercool the whole board to fool the on-board voltage regulator throttling sensors as well as the CPU throttling sensors (and to keep all the various little chips and capacitors from popcorning of course). Fortunately, the new NUC boards are 4"x4" so the NUC supercooler unit will be quite small sitting there on the floor underneath your desk. ;D ...... but it will likely make about as much noise as your old dorm refrigerator did though ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/12/15 at 03:52:36 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/lilbits-5-11-2015-debunking-edition-windows-10-isnt-totally-free-for-insiders.html (Windows 10 isn’t totally free for Insiders) .... you only get a free upgrade at the end of the program if you already have a valid Windows 7, or Windows 8.1 license on the machine in question. Did you really expect the promise that if you put up with a year's worth of jerking around and doing testing testing testing and being spied upon constantly by MS that they would honor their promise to let you keep the copy that was tested? Silly you, Free Win 10 is only for those who already own an upgradable copy of a Win OS that is equal to or higher than Win7. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/12/15 at 09:27:17 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/mediateks-10-core-cpu-is-official-meet-the-helio-x20.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/helio-x20-deca-e1431438086539.jpg The chip maker is also promising a boost in graphics performance, thanks to an ARM Mali T800 series graphics processor. Other features include support for 4G LTE, 802.11ac WiFi, 4K video recording, dual 13MP cameras, and an integrated ARM Cortex-M4 processor core for always-on speech recognition and other low-power, always-on applications. The MediaTek Helio X20 doesn’t just have more processor cores than whatever’s in your current phone. As AnandTech notes, also one of the first chips from MediaTek to feature a CDMA2000-compatible modem, which means it could support Verizon and Sprint’s wireless networks. That could help MediaTek gain a foothold in the US market. Poor Qualcomm -- Samsung steals their royal crown and now here comes Mediatek a gunning for their dukedom as well. New details are being pre-released by Mediatek about the new ARM hard macro 10 core chipset -- it isn't just 10 cores, it is 11 cores with the VERY smallest being an always-on core that actually comes from the Internet of Things group -- a TINY TINY core that is always on to do voice recognition for voice commands, keep up with your current location and other background stuff like that. So you got the tiny tiny always on IoT core always keeping up with your location and doing updates and listening for a voice command, if it recognizes a command then it lights the four SMALLEST cores to do what you asked, ramping up the next bigger set of cores if they are needed. Only then, if you get your tits in a real bind, then it lights the BIG GUNS which are a pair of full PC class cores .... and it can run them all at the same time if needed (along with compute sharing adder power off the Mali 880 graphics processor). ..... and yet, oddly enough by stepping through the 11 cores in ascending order this Helio 20 processor supposedly can save you 30% on battery energy usage because you only ever use just exactly the bare minimum amount of power needed to do the task at hand. .... me, I think the tiny core cuts way back on idle current and the bottom most set of 4 cores will do most normal tasks, adding in the upper set of 4 cores only as needed -- you should only light up the 2 big boys for games and stuff like that. Qualcomm is shitting bricks right now as they had planned to come out with their own set of custom BIG HUGE Snapdragon CORES in a 4 up arrangement on the 820 "hurry up get it released ASAP" processor (so as to fix their current 810 debacle) -- and now Qualcomm has just reflected, stopped and realized that they would be a charging out of the gate ALREADY BEHIND both Samsung and Mediatek if they went and did that. Yep, Samsung has them a Deca-monster of their own coming out at 14nm or 10nm just as soon as they get a gap in their Apple contract runs. They might even beat Mediatek to it, simply because they own the process lines and can run their own stuff when they want to. And at 14nm or 10nm if they choose to. Samsung intends to keep the crown for a while, in other words. The Mediatek however is slated for a very low cost 20nm TSMC for the first lots, then dropping to 14/16nm as soon as TSMC really really has a truly reliable non-throttling process to run it on. The Mediatek will be closely scrutinized for thermal throttling since it is being run on the exact same TSMC process that screwed the Qualcomm 810 over so badly ..... Because of the TSMC 20nm fiasco Qualcomm has started contracting with Samsung to run their chips going out into the future -- having already been bitten once by TSMC's thermal throttling issues they want no more of it. Qualcomm needs Samsung for a good state of the art lithography process, or else they will go into third place against Mediatek and that just isn't going to happen, by golly. Qualcomm has a hard life right now you know, they used to just have to worry about Intel kicking up some stinky brown dust occasionally and that was fairly easy to keep on beating Intel year on year on year on year since you could always count on was for Intel to be 2-3 years behind its own brags, much less to be actually threatening anybody with anything REAL in any serious fashion. Samsung and them Hockey Stick Boys are quite a different story now-a-days. They only seem to do real and they do like to sneak up on you while you are distracted ..... ::) So, it seems like mebbe Qualcomm actually just took their eyes off of the ARM world for just a second or two while MS wooed them and now look at the mess they are in -- headed straight for third place if they don't watch out. ::) MS isn't gonna love you if you are in third place, Qualcomm, MS only loves a leading winner. -- MS always/only loves the current leading winner -- ..... just remember just how durn quick MS dumped Intel for you if you don't believe me -- you are the next dumpee if you fall down to second or third place. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/14/15 at 07:23:11 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/windows-10-to-come-in-home-mobile-and-pro-editions-plus-a-few-more.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/win10-desk-680x382.jpg So, MS lied again ...... :P (so what's new about that?) :P The same Win10 does not run on all screens. "There will be 6 or more different Windows 10 editions, although only 3 of them are really aimed at consumers. The others are for enterprise and education customers. Windows 10 Home is the consumer-oriented operating system for desktops, notebooks, tablets, and 2-in-1 devices. It will have most of the features we’ve seen in Windows 10 Technical Preview releases including the Microsoft Edge web browser, Cortana digital assistant, Start Menu, Windows Store, and more. Windows 10 Pro has everything you’ll find in the Home version, plus features which Microsoft says are aimed at small businesses including security, productivity, and remote access features. Windows 10 Mobile is the name of the operating system that will run on smartphones and small tablets (with 7 inch and smaller displays). It has a Start Screen instead of a Start Menu, a touch-optimized user interface, and mobile versions of Office apps including Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. All three of these Windows 10 editions include versions of Microsoft’s Continuum software, which allows you to transition between touch-optimized and desktop modes. For Windows 10 Home and Pro that means you can automatically switch between a tablet and desktop user interface when connecting your tablet to a keyboard or other docking station. Continuum for phones lets you hook up your Windows 10 Mobile smartphone to an external display, keyboard, and mouse and use mobile apps as if they were desktop apps." OK, so a Windows phone, any Windows phone, running Win10 Phone (a separate OS) is automatically going to become a dockable Phone/PC. (right) Universal (mobile) apps are then going to be the wave of the future and "classic" apps are going to become a developmental dead end since they are only linked to traditional desktop PC which will continue to decline at the ongoing 5%-8% per year rate. (or faster as the phone/PC becomes popular) Win10 Phone OS will also be able to run Android apps, apparently. ======================================== Apple, Google, the MS mobile OS steel link glove has just been tossed at your feet -- you are challenged by MS to a Phone/PC war starting when Win10 Phone comes out in about 6 months. Take up the steely gage, boys, you have an appointment with MS out at the jousting lists -- get yer horses ready and your lances all trimmed. ;) ..... question now becomes is WHICH HORSE will MS be riding when they come riding thunderously up the lists to do battle ..... http://www.acclaimimages.com/_gallery/_images_n300/0376-0901-1317-5536_man_riding_a_pony.jpg .... giddyap, Qualcomm, let's go boy !!! CHARGE !!! |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/14/15 at 09:07:48 Intel readies its own horse for the contest ...... (and of course price supports and tech supports it so well it is functionally "free" to use) http://https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQYT-6aq7Z5_JujROTNMDglW6Q-TM9FJT8Nb9v-ofW-N3fKTieJlg ..... I'm not dead, just thermally recovering from turbo stress at the moment ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/14/15 at 09:14:04 ...... and here come the Hockey Stick Boys, riding into the PC fray for the first time. They were told they had to ride against their opponents in the lists, but nobody said anything about horses to them, forgetting that they don't HAVE any horses anymore because they ate them all hundreds of years ago when they stopped being Mongols ..... They also forgot to mention that only one guy goes one way against another guy going the other way. And they forgot to define the jousting weapons, so expect them well worn hockey sticks to be used as well as lances, maces and swords and submachine guns ...... http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-tFDax--JoNc/TxkWO_XP4wI/AAAAAAAACY8/zfs6hMhzVCM/s1600/Knightriders-motorcycle-joust.png |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/15/15 at 07:52:59 http://www.aliexpress.com/item/Fanless-Intel-Compute-Stick-MeLE-PCG01-Quad-Core-Mini-PC-Atom-Z3735F-2GB-DDR3-32GB-eMMC/32339140548.html http://liliputing.com/2015/05/mele-pcg-01-pc-stick-is-basically-a-fanless-intel-compute-stick-with-external-antenna.html Mele PC Stick vs Intel PC Stick http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/pcg-01_02-680x321.jpg THE FIRST INTENTIONALLY FANLESS 14nm INTEL PROCESSOR PRODUCT "Like the Intel Compute Stick, this computer is small enough to fit in your pocket, but powerful enough to run a desktop operating system. It comes with Windows 8.1 with Bing software and features an Intel Atom Z3735F Bay Trail processor, 2GB of RAM and 32GB of storage. The stick supports 802.11b/g/n WiFi and Bluetooth 4.0 and features a microSD card slot, a full-sized USB port, two micro USB ports (one of which is used as a power jack), and a power button. Unlike the Intel Compute Stick, this model has an eternal, adjustable antenna which could help improve WiFi performance, but I haven’t personally tested this device, so I can’t say for certain that it helps. And unlike the Compute Stick, the Mele PCG-01 has no fan: instead it relies on a copper heat sink, heat-conductive silicone rubber, and other insulation techniques to prevent the computer from getting too hot. This isn't the first fanless PC stick… in fact, up until recently, most of the models I’d seen lacked fans, which some users had complained lead to performance issues. It’ll be interesting to see whether the Mele PCG-01 fares any better. But this is one of the first models I’ve seen that has an adjustable antenna. Some other Chinese companies have also shipped PC sticks with unlicensed trial versions of Windows, but Mele says the PCG-01 comes with a fully functional Windows 8.1 license that has been paid for." Why is this interesting? NO FAN .... remember, the only Intel 14nm products without fans so far have been thermal throttling nightmares --- so how is this one any different? Mele has settled a large copper heat sink over the protruding processor, a copper heat sink which was sized large enough to cover the entire top side of the stick, then Mele shot an thermally conductive silicone rubber throughout the entire affair making it into a solid thermal silicone brick. This is a silicone brick made from a compound that is sometimes used as a heat sink thermal conductive compound inside potted high impact high vibration electronics as the electrically non-conductive but still heat conductive potting compound. So now you have an entire solid black silicon brick as a textured thermal emitter with a large copper heat spreader carrying the primary heat from the processor out quickly over the entire top surface for distribution throughout the locally thin coating of ribbed silicon plastic to then waft out into the ambient air. As a passive system, this sounds about as good as passive can get without resorting to a large ribbed solid aluminum case with the electronics potted inside it (as done by the Israelis on the Core i7 Mint PC from two years ago). Curiosity exists on how well this particular trick works, so Brad Linder and others have requested samples for testing -- if the idea works it is a potential breakthrough in thermal control for small devices (and will garner some industry-wide kudos for Mele). Also remember the results of Brad's tests on the Intel Compute Stick .... "The Intel Compute Stick is a remarkably small computer that turns just about any display into a Windows (or Ubuntu) PC for about $150. But it’s not a perfect device: there’s a tiny fan which makes a high-pitched (but fairly quiet) sound from time to time, and I found the Compute Stick suffered from poor WiFi range." Brad noted that processor speed went down and the fan started up, but didn't note any great rebound in processor speed after the fan was in play, it just didn't get much more than one level slower if the fan was in play. Fans driving air over non-heat sinked chips are not totally effective on this 14nm stuff as the chips only get "medium warm" before the throttling effect starts. Keeping things cool is very important in Intel's 14nm world right now, so this little stick's thermal design tricks may be right important for Intel's 14nm low cost future ..... also, these same silicon rubber/big brass heat sink tricks might well be used by AMD and other "heat'm up" chip makers such as Nvidia and Qualcomm as they move forward into the new world of tiny PC computers. ::) .... as circuit traces and gates get smaller and smaller and smaller the thermal throttling booger-bear may well become an issue for all processor makers. This will most likely be by the time generalized production level on 10nm is achieved sometimes in the 2016-17 time frame .... Remember, when your 3 year ago product actually outperforms your "state of the art" new stuff because of thermal throttling issues -- that then is an issue that can stop your current sales efforts dead in their tracks. Especially since current Antutu will report your product "under full load" in its rankings. And also remember, the yet newer Antutu X test will actually report your throttling delta from a cold chip to a hot chip to make it perfectly clear what is going on. Either something relatively reasonable is found that works "well enough", or we are headed towards this sort of thing ..... we can't have the current crop of 14nm processors running at half speed due to thermal throttling and not performing as well as stuff that is 3 years old. http://i5.walmartimages.com/dfw/dce07b8c-88ba/k2-_4ac42290-7e0d-4e40-ad64-91bc3ddaf81d.v1.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/16/15 at 08:34:29 http://www.extremetech.com/computing/195898-this-35-dock-lets-you-use-your-android-smartphone-as-a-full-fledged-desktop This $35 dock lets you use your Android smartphone as a full-fledged desktop http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/Andromium-640x353.jpeg ....... and so it begins. Ubuntu has a phone/PC coming. Microsoft has a phone/PC coming. Qualcomm is likely the processor the Microsoft phone/PC is being built with, so Qualcomm has a phone/PC coming. Asus has an Intel based Zenphone product and a docking station out now, they just lack the Win10 software to run it. So Asus/Intel has a phone/PC coming too. So, now you also have got some kickstarter people making up a generic Android docking station and supporting software designed for a generic any android "USB To Go" equipped phone product to become a generic phone/PC. Google and Apple haven't officially kicked in their 10 cents yet, but you can be sure they have noted the kickstarter stuff since the software to support the docking station is actually being sold through the Google Play Store pipeline. Also note that the phone/PC's full required I/O capability is already built into the standard Android USB to Go jack right now, so hey, mebbe Google is there already (just staying in the background). ARM has already certainly kicked in their 10 cents, the new Mediatek Helio 20 is simply the first example of a hard macro ARM design that is inherently a phone/PC chipset from the very concept/construction of it. ;D ;D ;D ;D Things are going to get VERY interesting shortly in the nascent dockable phone/PC space ..... ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/16/15 at 12:10:14 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/report-some-mobile-carriers-could-block-ads.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/adblock-plus.jpg Let's see --- Google is threatening AT&T and Verizon with technical obsolescence a la Google Fi and the cell phone Big Boys are now threatening back that they will push Adblock Plus out through their networks and auto-install it throughout all of their customer's cell phones to cut off all ads on their networks unless a deal with Google can be reached. Both sides are dancing around the new Net Neutrality Laws (by cutting off all ads you aren't singling out Google per se, so Google supposedly can't biatch to the FCC). People don't like ads, but the big carriers and Google each make money off of them -- a lot of money. However, AT&T and Verizon feel they can cut that off ad revenue completely and hold their breath longer than Google can. I think Google actually breathes world-wide and not breathing in just a little over half of the USA market may not even cause Google to get respiratory distress per se. The Big Boys DO CERTAINLY HAVE TO TRY to do something to stop Google Fi from going forward, as Fi kills their base market advantage (cell tower coverage) completely the very first month it first rolls out and it works well. That shared tower switching technological "tipping point" won't be able to be called back by anybody once it happens, no matter what they do. So they GOT to stop it from happening .... ::) ..... Republic Wireless is getting all sorts of new customers lately -- I wonder why? People do recognize now that the wifi trick is real now and Google Fi is simply not ready to roll out FAST ENOUGH yet even on a limited trial basis to handle the huge numbers of folks wanting to dump their expensive cellular carriers -- whereas RW has been sitting there ready for years and has over 3 years of experience doing it successfully nation wide right now. If Google wants to expand this idea a lot quicker all they have to do is share tech with Republic (or to invest in them, if you prefer). Think forward a bit with the docked cell phones as a PC idea -- you gonna run a carrier alone, or are you gonna run a house internet connection and still have to run a carrier? With wifi calling, you only need the house internet connection and you can just borrow tower time as needed for $10 a month using RW or for $20 a month using Google Fi. Or mebbe the upcoming Google Cable/Phone Service going to be able to meet all your needs with one provider ..... ;) Don't laugh, Google sure could do it because both industries are being so badly abused and milked by the incumbents. And make no mistake, it sounds like some heavy duty Big Boy negotiations are getting ready to go in motion, now doesn't it? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/16/15 at 13:37:45 http://www.extremetech.com/computing/134868-there-can-only-be-one-smartphones-are-the-pcs-of-the-future There can only be one: Smartphones are the PCs of the future http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/there-can-only-be-one-highlander-smartphone-640x353.jpg "If everyone carries a smartphone, then the power of ubiquity kicks in. If third parties can assume that everyone carries a smartphone, imagine the potential applications — it’s effectively the same thing as wearable computing, a dream that has haunted us for decades. You could use your smartphone as a passport, or as a credit card. Your smartphone could track your movements, and then pass the data off to commercial apps, or helpful services like Google Now. With additional sensors, your smartphone could constantly monitor your activity and overall health. And then there’s my personal favorite: docking stations. If you do need a large screen, a keyboard and mouse, and some nice speakers, then you can simply plug your smartphone into a docking station. You could have a docking station at home, in the office, at the airport, and they might even be dotted around town. With the high throughput of 60GHz wireless networks, a physical docking station might not even be required. As a corollary, of course, an atomic computing platform would also give hardware and software makers a laser focus on just one primary form factor. Spurred by increasing power costs, ecology, a worldwide love affair with mobile computing, and very limited battery capacities, we are already seeing a global shift from faster to smaller and more efficient. If smartphones became the singular consumer-oriented computer, this effect would be dramatically magnified. Chip makers would be able to specifically target smartphones. Manufacturers could specialize their production lines and equipment. Software vendors, instead of messily porting programs and games between form factors, could focus on a single form factor and hardware spec." http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/ubuntu-300x229.jpg Me, I like his idea of a Heads Up display and ghost hands to select and move and do things. Plus talking in text and giving action commands verbally, of course. You wouldn't even need a desk, just your phone/PC and your headgear and you could do work or watch a movie or play a game literally anywhere. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/16/15 at 13:54:59 http://techland.time.com/2013/02/25/why-your-smartphone-will-be-your-next-pc/ http://techland.time.com/2012/02/27/why-the-iphone-has-a-head-start-on-the-future-of-personal-computing/ http://https://timenerdworld.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/apple-store-new-york.jpg?w=360&h=240&crop=1 Time Magazine says: Why Your Smartphone Will Be Your Next PC The basic idea is that the smartphone itself is your PC and then docks into some type of shell. Various technologies have emerged that could make this vision a reality relatively soon. http://www.wired.com/2015/02/smartphone-only-computer/[media][/media] "With each passing season, another wave of mobile devices is released that’s more capable and more powerful than the generation preceding it. We’re at the point where anyone armed with a current model smartphone or tablet is able to handle almost all of their at-home—and even at-work—tasks without needing anything else. We’re living proof: for the last two years, WIRED has been able to cover events like CES almost exclusively using our smartphones." http://www.theverge.com/2015/5/6/8560195/microsoft-continuum-for-phones-windows-10 "One of Microsoft’s big announcements at its Build developers conference last week was the ability to turn a smartphone running Windows 10 into a PC. Dubbed Continuum for Phones, it’s designed to take advantage of new universal apps that run across Windows 10 on phones, PCs, tablets, and the Xbox One. If you’re running a mobile version of Excel on your phone it will magically resize and transform into a keyboard- and mouse-friendly version for use on a bigger screen. It feels like the future." |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/16/15 at 14:08:21 Errant thoughts on the upcoming Phone/PC surge No matter what happens with Phone/PCs, MS's market share is getting ready to shrink strongly yet again during the Phone/PC roll out period ..... Why? Because all the market share charts are all going to change to reflect what they are now going to be based upon -- total units of computation which will include phones. The charts are all going to change to reflect the new conjoined reality and when the Android and the iPhone phone/PC volumes hit this chart then MS automatically becomes a very very very small percentage player in the total conjoined computing space, never ever again to be able to get significantly any larger ever again. This new reality will primarily be phone based and MS sucks at phones, always has. Ditto for Intel, with nothing to milk for those huge tech support dollars and no contra revenue $$$ to spend on making their overly expensive chipsets seem to be cost competitive, Intel goes down slowly. No one will want what they produce all that much any more since Intel can't seem to do a phone chip that is A) timely and B) competitive. So, whatever MS can eke out with the Win10 roll out -- that's it forever. Right now MS rates between 10% and 15% of total devices, depending on who is rolling the numbers. Let's be charitable and say they get to keep a 15% market share right at the start, this will quickly drift away year on year as Apple and Google work the new space just like they always do so well. Remember, people will be buying a phone primarily -- the PC part is just some freebie gravy added on to the phone experience. Unit Device Share by OS 2012 2013 2014 Mac OS 24.5% 24.2% 26.8% Chrome OS 0.2% 3.3% 4.5% Windows OS 75.2% 72.3% 68.4% ...... ouch, that hurt --- so what is 2015 going to look like after the phone/PCs all hit? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/17/15 at 10:58:22 http://www.myphonedesktop.com/ Apple vendors get into the act, offering the software to do it before Apple does. What is myPhoneDesktop? "MyPhoneDesktop links your Computer and iDevice the way Apple should have" (Gizmodo). myPhoneDesktop provides an easy and effective way to work with your iPad, iPhone or iPod touch directly from your desktop. Whether you need to make a phone call, send a long SMS, copy a large amount of text, send a long and complicated to retype URL, open route in mobile Google Map, or store an image on your iPad or iPhone, myPhoneDesktop greatly streamlines your workflow. Use Desktop client which tightly integrates with your OS (Windows, Mac OSX or Linux) and provides such handy features like Drag & Drop, global shortcuts like Cmd+C+C and plugin's to popular applications like LaunchBar or Apple Address Book." ====================================== http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2340854,00.asp 10 Secret iPhone Powers "With few exceptions, your iPhone can do everything your desktop PC can do. Here are 10 easy ways to unlock your iPhone's full potential." ======================================= http://classroom.synonym.com/can-iphone-connected-pc-use-large-monitor-keyboard-18052.html Can an iPhone Be Connected to a PC to Use a Large Monitor & Keyboard? "The multitude of apps available in the iTunes App Store turn your iPhone into a pocket-sized computer." http://classroom.synonym.com/DM-Resize/photos.demandstudios.com/getty/article/251/29/78635373_XS.jpg?w=390&h=390&keep_ratio=1 |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/17/15 at 11:08:58 ...... and on the Google side, same story -- vendors and pundits are acting in advance of the real product roll out. http://www.droid-life.com/2012/02/10/video-use-your-galaxy-nexus-as-a-desktop-computer/ Use Your Galaxy Nexus As A Desktop Computer it is a YouTube video, so click on it ..... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_--zcmqIyRI |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/17/15 at 11:23:48 ..... can MS leverage Win10 Phone OS to get it to run good on general run of the mill Android phones that have a pre-existing USB To Go connection? :-? or does it have to have all that excessively large systems memory and flash drive memory as exemplified by the just released Asus Zenphone 2 ???? http://i-cdn.phonearena.com/images/articles/157035-image/Asus-ZenFone-2.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/18/15 at 05:53:02 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/meizu-launches-ubuntu-mx4-smartphone-in-china-coming-to-europe-next.html http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2015/05/meizu-mx4-with-ubuntu-launched-in-china-coming-to-europe-soon Meizu launches Ubuntu MX4 smartphone in China (coming to Europe next) http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/meizu-mx4-ubuntu.jpg Buy the Meizu MX4 Ubuntu Edition The Ubuntu MX4 is available to buy directly from the Meizu website in China. It’s priced at ¥1,799 (less than US $300) and available in a choice of two color schemes: ‘Silver’ and ‘Golden’. It looks like perhaps First Blood in the phone/PC wars was drawn by Ubuntu as launched by Meizu in China. If the docking station is currently available then no one has translated the Chinese text that says this is so, but the phone is here in any case complete with the software completely installed upon it. The European roll out will have everything well translated, I suspect. However, size-wise this is just a paper cut compared to what is coming up soon enough direct from the Big Boys themselves .... Mark Shuttleworth promises a USA company will have a Convergence model out by July here in the USA -- this will have all the docking stuff instantly available and have a main carrier's support, etc. from the very get go. That will be blood, to be sure. :D |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/18/15 at 10:10:22 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/fujitsu-launches-q665-2-in-1-tablet-with-intel-core-m-in-japan.html Fujitsu launches Q665 2-in-1 tablet with Intel Core M (in Japan) http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/665_01-680x469.jpg "Fujitsu says the Q665 is available with 4GB to 8GB of RAM, up to 256GB of solid state storage, Windows 7 Pro, Windows 8.1 or Windows 8.1 Pro software, and a choice of Intel Core M-5Y10C or Core M-5Y31 processors. It’s said to get up to 10 hours of battery life. The tablet supports 802.11ac WiFi, Bluetooth 4.0 and has USB 3.0 USB 2.0 and micro HDMI ports as well as front and rear cameras. The tablet is launching in Japan in June for 154,600 yen and up. That’s about $1300 US. It’s not yet clear if or when this model will be available in the US or Europe or how much it would cost in those markets." Wow --- a $1300 tablet that throttles itself down to half speed when the chip warms up. :P Just what everybody needs, huh? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/19/15 at 04:42:55 Republic Wireless Moto G vs Apple iPhones (various generations) They are women and they are off on a weeklong romp -- visiting graveyards and records repositories and tracing down the family history getting cleanly past the chaos of the Civil War period on all the family lines. The phones are out and Siri is getting asked some questions and is getting some answers. When they run dry they ask my wife to try and so far a a tap on the mic symbol in the search bar and a quick verbal "Navigate me to xxxxxx" has worked every time. Now, this is fun --- one has avowed she needs to upgrade her iPhone because it isn't as feature rich as her female relatives (Siri doesn't say much for her). The ones with the most modern iPhones are all quiet, but one has asked what that new Android phone is and how hard is it to work --- actually held it in her hand until Android started to leak out into her fingers and then she gave it back. The fact the phone only cost $150 and the plan with full data was only $25 a month immediately turned them all off -- it can't be any good because it doesn't cost nearly $1000 and require a $100 a month AT&T Data plan ..... Then by 2:00 PM in the afternoon the iPhones one by one start running out of battery and turning themselves off .... and the Moto G keeps on grinning all day long into the evening hours when it gets plugged in for the night. Remember, the original Moto G was the show phone that Google built to show everybody what small body phones SHOULD be like -- and it is still a very well balanced good functioning little package even today, 3 years later. Apple costs WAY WAY too much and isn't really primo for features any more -- and iPhone battery life sucks. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/19/15 at 10:03:12 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/microsoft-office-preview-now-available-for-android-phones.html Microsoft Office preview now available for Android phones http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/office-android-phone-preview-680x363.png "The smartphone apps have all the same basic features as their tablet counterparts. You can open, view, edit, and create documents, collaborate with other users by sharing documents with comments, track changes, and more, and there’s support for opening and saving files to cloud services including OneDrive, SharePoint, Google Drive, Dropbox, and Box. The user interface has been tweaked to work better on smartphone-sized screens. But if Office for Android phones looks familiar, that’s because the Android apps bear a pretty striking resemblance to the new Office Universal apps designed to run on Windows phones, tablets, and other devices. If you’re testing Office on an Android phone, Microsoft recommends a device with at least 1GB of RAM and Android 4.4 or later." Microsoft is getting smarter lately -- they do not know if their ~15%~ real all devices ongoing market share will support the company going on out into the future especially since the PC as a desktop will sunset within the next 5 years or so. But they do know they need to start to sell their software into Android space very diligently ASAP to guarantee an ongoing SHORT TERM future inside the NEXT 5 years. ::) .... now this MS Office is beginning to smell quicker, lighter and leaner, now doesn't it? Only 1 gig of systems memory is required for the Android version. Now, dock the phone and shine it up on the big desktop screen so you can use your keyboard and mouse ..... ;) Do you get the impression Android might be the next big OS ? There isn't anything you can't do on it any more. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/21/15 at 02:27:24 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/windows-10-preview-build-10122-brings-improvements-to-edge-continuum.html Windows 10 Preview build 10122 brings improvements to Edge, Continuum http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/win10-thurrot-680x382.jpg Well now, this is what is is finally going to look like (and you see the phone stuff coming out more strongly as we get closer in to it). :-? "Microsoft is rolling out another preview build of Windows 10 to members of the Windows Insider community of testers. This build for PCs includes a few changes to the Start Screen and Start menu layouts, a number of bug fixes, and improvements for certain key components of Windows 10. But Microsoft is pretty much done introducing big new features: Windows 10 Preview build 10122 includes some of the features Microsoft showed off earlier this month at its BUILD and Ignite conferences. But with the full version of Windows 10 set to launch in a few months, the company has already shown us most of the features we can expect to ship this summer (as well as some that won’t be available until later in the year)." |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/21/15 at 03:26:04 Microsoft proudly announces it is approaching 2 million beta testers (people who wish/hope to get a free copy of Win10 since they don't have an upgradable version sitting on their machine at all right now). BTW, good luck with that, MS is already saying "unlicensed testers" stuff will automatically end on roll out day when Win10 checks for an upgradable version being previously present on the machine for the very first time. MS also doesn't mention the ~50%~ drop rate from the program as it rolled along, it just proudly announces that nearly 2 million people had signed up. And it doesn't mention that over a quarter of the remaining testers are currently pretty disappointed in the latest design that shifts away from a standard desktop motif to more of a phone basis. It is obvious that MS is just doing whatever it is that MS wants to do, using the tester mass as a "given reason" for doing it. ======================================= Comparison point -- Android is running at over a million and a half new devices activated PER DAY now. The entire historical mass of all the existing Windows stuff is only ~<10%~ of the current total devices market share and as that old stuff ages out and drops off MS had better be selling in their new devices in a very competitive manner. So far Microsoft devices aren't even price point competing against the lower cost Chromebooks, much less against the ever growing sea of various Android devices. Plus, as the new huge masses of Android devices roll into use, the MS pie slice will get smaller and smaller according because MS isn't growing and Android certainly is growing, very very rapidly growing. Now you see why all of a sudden MS Office suddenly showed up in the Android Play Store as local loaded Android software, it is because MS wants to exist in a couple of years and MS is realizing that Windows simply won't do that for them by itself as the numbers simply aren't there by at least a factor of 10. ======================================= Intel is still being pretty quiet lately ..... no news for for much of anything really lately. Intel Partners are still being asked to hold off on announcing any new boards or devices through August of this summer. Inference is that Skylake is coming (Broadwell is being skipped over as a thermal throttling nightmare) but this new Skylake will require a new style socket with new motherboard provisions for heat sinks, sensors and fans, etc. etc. etc. to try to step around its own thermal issues. ARM has leaked their 11 core "phone through PC single chipset" concept now and Intel is having to redo Skylake yet again to try to have something to compete against that rather strong sounding system. The dockable phone as your PC concept is a LARGE concern to Intel right now as that concept threatens their rice bowl as no other technological shift change has done so far ..... Intel's existing processors really don't fit into that sort of world at all and one can see their old mass of Intel PC processor stuff becoming moot really quite quickly once the phone/PCs start rolling out from China. Docking stations for the phone by the big screen on your desk simply makes a lot of sense ..... As you watch Microsoft Office fleeing to the Google Play Store as local loaded software look to see a lot of the old names do likewise, or else they will flee to the net as net-based softwares that can run off any device, any OS. Traditional Windows is sunsetting .... and the desktop PC era is ending fairly soon. This is clear to all players at this point in time. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/23/15 at 04:50:49 Google is cooking a new Android version called Android M. Google puts stuff inside new versions that they don't always announce until they have a partner building a phone or a tablet that actually uses the stuff, so what Google likes to do is engage their vendor base at private Google I/O developer conferences to help develop these new ideas together prior to it being announced and going mainstream. Quietly developing stuff up front with the phone maker and ARM and the chip maker all kicking in their support means there isn't much that can't happen fairly seamlessly and quietly. There is new stuff inside Android M that needs development -- and they will be talking about it in private at the next I/0 conference which is pretty soon. ========================================= For example, Google has engaged 5 Chinese vendors to build samples of a Google fi phone (searching for the next year Nexus class of phones -- and we already know there will be more than one of each size of phone in this class). What will in reality happen is that all five of the 5 vendors (plus Motorola of course) will all understand how to interface with the "fi" features that are already built into the current Lollypop 5.1 version and with the current hardware being supported naturally by both the existing ARM chipsets and Qualcomm wifi capable radio sets. These guys will also be the ones helping Google to develop the brand new Google M version's features set, the new M version that is going into the next I/O conference. Proper up front support for the new Mediatek and Qualcomm "World 4G Radios" and World Basebands are very important right now (Intel too, I guess -- if they had any). This must be done right so phones can sell into any market at will. Widespread BYOP is relying on interchangeable technology in the radios and baseband areas, this will stop carriers from raping people over phone prices every two years. Since the hardware and software "fi" stuff will be there already and is all pre-existing and "free" to the vendors, expect just about all the new 2016 phones to come out of the gate Google fi ready. Mediatek's new world 4G radio/modem is a very important to support item, as is Mediatek's new Helio 11 chipset (it has 11 cores, not 10 -- that little IOT "always on" core counts as a core too, you know). :D AT&T and Verizon, is your tight little fundament puckering all up on you yet in terrified anticipation of the soon to start wifi revolution? Are you really really sure you wouldn't rather be helping the pitching team instead of doing all that rough trade "catching" duty on this one? Did you realize that if Google can talk the router manufacturers and router standards people into putting a click select into all the router installation routines "Make 3% of my router's bandwidth accessible to passerby wifi phone calls as a public service" that most of us users would choose to click on that little box as 3% is nothing to us and we all like to feel good about ourselves. Give that idea a year or so to percolate through the sea of routers in the real world and soon enough cell towers would become sorta passe`. And AT&T and Verizon would eventually go down as greedy greedy folks eventually always seem to eventually do. :P Hey, AT&T, I think I see a line starting to form up composed of angry ex-customers wanting to "discuss it" with you. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/23/15 at 05:06:40 The fact that Google and phones can do a whole new world of software/hardware every year is very frightening to somebody like MS who takes YEARS AND YEARS to roll a major version change. Wifi phones and phone/PC is something Google can build into the stuff "on the fly" as it rolls along whereas MS simply can't do that sort of stuff nearly that fast ..... Although Microsoft is trying to get that sort of flexibility -- but still after 4 years Win9 has taken so long to jell it is now called Win10 and it still isn't out of the gate yet. Nor is it expected to be complete when it does exit -- many promised features are just that, promised for the future next year sometimes. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Pine on 05/25/15 at 12:29:04 0B2820222128282136440 wrote:
Don't shoot me... I just bought one of these.. waiting on delivery from Newegg. I got the $299 with 4GB Ram and 64 GB storage. SHould be a hos running Android 5... my poor HTC is all but dead |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/25/15 at 18:50:43 Tell us about it when you get it -- it is the current state of Intel's art in the phone world. Somebody is supporting all the memory and stuff, since you aren't paying that much for it ...... Think of it as a good deal, now tell us how well it works. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/26/15 at 07:18:26 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/microsoft-is-bringing-cortana-to-android-and-ios-along-with-sync-tools-for-windows-10-pcs.html Microsoft is bringing Cortana to Android and iOS, along with sync tools for Windows 10 PCs http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/cortana-android_01-680x383.jpg Microsoft is faced with a quandary -- ASSuming they can keep their current total Windows market share intact and hang on to it ongoing as the years roll by, they are less than 1/10th the size of Android right now (and that is with Android still growing at a million and a half installations PER DAY). It all comes under the "if you can't beat them, join them" theory. Microsoft is giving up on the MS Store and Windows as their sole future pathway, they are putting all their stuff into the Google Play Store now as pay me Android apps. Their stuff is structured to run on Android now as that is the predominate OS market-wide and world-wide. We are talking MS OFFICE and every other decent MS software product is going to be able to run on your light fast Android OS and will be able to be docked and put up on your big screen off your suitable Android phone. And now this Android Play Store package includes the Cortana App, which allows your Android phone to swap notifications and messages between your laptop/PC and your Android phone. Assuming you still need your laptop/PC and want to keep it around. Within the next year we will see if MS Win 10 is any form of "market share taking back" sort of success story -- and there are significant reasons to doubt that is going to happen. By going ARM/Android in a sensible integrated fashion MS is hedging their bets and making sure they will still exist 5 years from now should Win 10 be washed away by a huge crop of Android phone/PCs. ======================================= MS is making sure in the future docked phone based PC world they will continue to be there, even if it is just as another overpriced app seller on the Play Store. Intel is rumored to be skipping Broadwell and going light on the Skylake chip family as PC chipsets are not the total future path that someone would have expected them to be just like only a year ago. Intel is once again trying to design a COMPETITIVE phone chip again in a VERY serious fashion, as they see the upcoming Mediatek Helio 20 ARM chipset as being a game changer that will redefine what Intel and others make going out into the future. The Helio 20 will seamlessly ramp from being a very battery efficient phone chip all the way up to providing a PC class experience. Intel has NOTHING that can do that, nothing. And if that winds up being the game inside two years, then Intel is currently not even positioned to be a player in that game. ::) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/27/15 at 06:54:06 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/microsoft-office-and-skype-to-come-with-android-tablets-from-30-companies.html Microsoft Office and Skype to come with Android tablets from 30+ companies http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/excel-android-tablet-680x462.jpg Shovelware comes to Android --- but it is fairly good and somewhat useful shovelware from MS. Issue becomes should you like it and want to keep it in a year's time -- guess how much it will cost you to get it verified and upgraded ???? MS has a bit of a quandary -- Android people are used to FREE software with free upgrades. However, it is a good bet that MS will make durn sure every Android phone/PC gets a copy of MS Office shovelware'd on to it before it is shipped -- MS will bust a gut to make sure that happens. Question becomes will people PAY MONEY to use the stuff later on, or just stick with their normal free stuff from Google or Libre Office (all of which is already available for free and is quite complete and feature equivalent for any mobile uses and it stays free, forever). ::) Crapware comes to Android tablets and phones -- another MS innovation story. This is going to quickly cause a shovelware issue with the only 1 gig (limited) storage space on skinny Android mobile devices. What you bet a Google App Builder puts out a little ditty to add a "Remove all third party shovelware" selection clicker box into the Settings>Restore tab? I can just see the big MS anti-competition lawsuits now should that clicker box intentionally leave the stock Google apps still sitting on the phone ..... If MS can only survive by suing people, they'll do just that. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/27/15 at 08:20:09 http://www.fudzilla.com/news/processors/37748-mediatek-helio-x20-soc-comes-with-companion-core More details come out -- Mediatek Helio X20 SoC comes with M4 companion core "While it is all about power efficiency and, of course, performance when needed, with the new deca-core approach on the Helio X20 SoC, Mediatek also decided to incorporate a Cortex-M4 companion core. Mediatek claims that this is world's first SoC with integrated Cortex-M4, which should act as both an audio processor as well as for sensor data processing. The Cortex-M4 companion core is clocked at up to 364MHz, has dedicated 512KB of SRAM, has direct access to DRAM and should take care of any sensor data processing and also act as an audio processor that will take care of low-power audio decoding, speech enhancement features, voice recognition and is even able to play MP3s without turning on any of the aforementioned ten CPU cores." This is something new, a super-low voltage core and memory set lifted out of an Internet of Things device and dropped into a super-powerful phone and tasked for all the screen off things a phone must do all the time. The energy savings from this idea are VERY SIGNIFICANT --- and it is something MS and Intel cannot do readily. It means this race car of a chipset can come out with 30% better battery life because it doesn't even start the main engine unless it needs to. The little chipset can handle receiving notifications and messages, do over the air upgrades, listen for voice commands, play music over earbuds and other light duty tasks while running on practically nothing for power consumption. One wonders what 4 or 8 of these tiny little suckers could do as the main driver of a much cheaper lower voltage lower powered smart phone ..... say one the size of a blue tooth ear bud running on the display off your smart watch. Or inside the smart watch with a lighter companion ear bud. Or inside a pair of blue tooth connected ear rings (no ear bud needed). http://www.fudzilla.com/images/stories/2015/May/mediatek-HelioX20M4-1.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/28/15 at 01:36:18 http://www.phonearena.com/news/Lenovo-has-unveiled-a-futuristic-projector-phone_id69753 Lenovo has unveiled a futuristic projector phone http://i-cdn.phonearena.com/images/article/69753-image/Lenovo-has-unveiled-a-futuristic-projector-phone.jpg "The promo video for the device shows that it's equally good as a piano, keyboard for typing, or even a gaming screen for some Fruit Ninja watermelon slicing action. Unfortunately, no specs have been unveiled at this time, neither do we have any word on when the phone should become commercially available. Focus-free laser means that projecting the image to any surface, at any depth, and any angle should result in an equally sharp image – even if the projection falls on a few different planes. This means that the phone can also be used as a projector for presentations or even movie watching." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwBem1Ul8dk ..... Short YouTube video, click on it .... Watch the video or else you really won't understand what this means to future tech. This one requires no big screen -- it projects its own screen and keyboard. Anywhere. As a first product it likely won't be totally mature and feature complete, but it shows clearly Lenovo moving away from the desktop motif, to the phonetop motif. Lenovo is the biggest Oriental player out there, so pay attention MS. ::) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/29/15 at 09:49:48 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/google-project-soli-tiny-radar-brings-gesture-support-to-wearables.html Google Project Soli: Tiny radar brings gesture support to wearables http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/soli-demo-680x419.jpg Google understands the potential uses for radar, they use it a lot in the driverless car after all. So for them to downsize it for wearables gesture control makes a little bit of sense, doesn't it? Still, this is your first look at a new thing ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/29/15 at 09:57:49 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/googles-project-jacquard-turns-clothing-and-other-textiles-into-wearable.html Google’s Project Jacquard turns clothing and other textiles into wearable http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/jac_02-680x434.jpg "Google says it doesn’t expect smart fabric to replace touchscreens or other forms of input, but it could allow for intuitive ways to interact with your devices when you don’t want to look at your phone. The company is also concerned with making sure it doesn’t look like you’re wearing a touchscreen, so Google is partnering with fashion companies including jeans-maker Levi’s. Project Jacquard comes from Google’s ATAP team, which is tasked with developing new technologies rapidly… either this will turn into a real product within a few years, or it’ll be scrapped while the team moves on to something else. But the fact that Google is talking publicly about Project Jacquard is a pretty good indication that the company considers it one of its more promising technologies." Google won't go public with a radical new tech unless it passes all sorts of feasibility and marketability criteria AND a partner or partners sign on to help bring it to market. This "touchpad built into your Levi pants" is real enough to be put out publically now. The internet of things is just getting started folks ...... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/29/15 at 13:41:59 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/googles-project-vault-is-a-security-system-on-a-microsd-card.html Google’s Project Vault is a security system on a microSD card http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/vault_02-680x437.jpg "Google’s ATAP team has unveiled a device that looks like an ordinary microSD card. But Project Vault is actually a tiny computer that can add security features to just about any phone, tablet, or computer, allowing you to protect important files and communication. The Project Vault prototype includes a low-power ARM Core M processor, an NFC chip, 4GB of storage, and a real-time operating system. Google has already begun testing the system with 500 units that the company is using within the company, and the goal is to launch Project Vault initially as an enterprise product which may eventually be made available to individuals." The way I think I see you doing this is that you use a Vault account and put these SD cards into your devices ==== then you are AUTOMATICALLY "locked in the vault" and anything you do with that device is encrypted strongly enough to give the NSA fits. Drug dealers, big shot businessmen and Justin will like this new Google i/o idea a lot -- it means you can have real top level security that you can't see or notice from your end but to everybody else your stuff is just encrypted gibberish. They can crack into your cell phone and get nothing for their efforts .... ;) ...... nothing except a big headache that is ....... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/30/15 at 09:00:05 http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/mi-msft-680x382.jpg Microsoft is bending over backwards to work with the cell phone makers right now, all of them. Chinese vendors included. Microsoft WANTS their shovelware included FOR FREE on all cell phones, from every possible maker. They are paying big bucks to have their shovelware put on to the phones as they are being built. Issue right now is that the CARRIERS are then erasing all that pre-installed stuff and plunking down their own software mix right over the top of it just before they sell the phones ...... but MS is working on that. ;D Google has hacked the uncooperative larger carriers off enough lately with Google Fi that MS senses they may have a window to get their software onto phones right now if they can suck up good enough quick enough. Reverse flow on that idea is that everybody understands that although Google isn't vengeful, but if you do go Nokia on them then you do choose to leave the fold and the invitations to things like Google I/O will stop coming to you -- and so you don't get contacted to be a part of developing all the new stuff so you can get well into it before it is actually released. And thusly, you will tend to fall behind your competitors ..... Issue really is that Microsoft creates NOTHING, they just buy up little companies that have created something. Google however does create stuff, industry shifting stuff, and they do it several items at a time constantly, all the time, year in and year out. Google is the new stuff company -- this means MS is not the best player to go putting yourself behind, long term. People in the industry are well aware of the Nokia and the Rockchip sagas, where companies recently got enticed to leave the fold and then heartily regretted it later on. They are also well aware of the IBM and Apple sagas and they know not to trust MS any further than you can drop kick them. Heck just this last year a lot of little oriental guys got burned when MS decided that "free Win 8.1 forever" ended on December 31 when a new price list and new rules came out. But the some of the newest oriental companies didn't exist back then -- and they feel their government has their back against any potential MS abuse out in the future. :P ..... they'll learn. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/30/15 at 17:31:21 http://liliputing.com/2015/05/specs-for-upcoming-intel-nuc-mini-pc-with-skylake-chips-leaked.html Specs for upcoming Intel NUC mini PC with Skylake chips leaked http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-_uAnEnKOCZY/VWoPIpJTlAI/AAAAAAAAJQY/ZRh9_nToH7E/s1600/SKYLAKE_NUC.png Broadwell was on hold beyond what is actually out already (all new Broadwell was dead in the water a week ago and all the board makers were told to put all new board designs on hold through August of this year). The first 3 items are definitely all "water that never made it over the dam" at this point in time. So, according to this Skylake is now coming THIS year, like right now ..... and the Intel boys are also listing some new Broadwell stuff as having already come out NOW as FANLESS again. Right. Got you any "grasp of reality" issues this week, Intel? Or did Intel manage to fix something, finally? Or did an old stale stinky brown poot jest slip out of Intel's pants accidentally. Or mebbe this is an old slide that was allowed to slip out by accident/on purpose just to stir the water up a bit again ??? We shall see, won't we? ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/30/15 at 18:08:48 http://www.phonearena.com/news/MediaTek-Helio-X20-vs-Snapdragon-810-leaked-heat-test-results-show-a-clear-winner_id69411 "Helio X20 vs Snapdragon 810 heat test: alleged test conditions The leaked slides claim that MediaTek's test involved a couple of dummy devices, one powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 810, and the other powered by the MediaTek Helio X20. These dummy devices allegedly ran Android 4.4 KitKat, and lacked cellular connectivity. The test is said to have consisted of three separate stages: Stage 1: 10 minutes of casual Wi-Fi browsing Stage 2: 10 minutes of Asphalt 8 (using the top quality graphics available) Stage 3: 10 minutes of Modern Combat 5 Helio X20 vs Snapdragon 810 heat test: alleged results The Snapdragon 810 and the Helio X20 started at about the same temperature, somewhere between 20 and 25 degrees Celsius. At the 10 minute mark, both chips heated up to almost 30 degrees Celsius, although the Snapdragon 810 appeared to be a bit cooler. When browsing the web, the Snapdragon 810 is believed to have used its four ARM Cortex-A53 clocked 1.5GHz. According to the leaked slides, the Helio X20 relied on its four ARM Cortex-A53 cores clocked at 1.4GHz, while also switching to its four Cortex-A53 cores clocked at 2GHz when more processing power was required by heavier sites. At the end of the second stage, the Snapdragon 810 had allegedly heated all the way to about 38 degrees Celsius, while the Helio X20 was a bit cooler at 33 degrees Celsius. During the third stage, the Snapdragon 810 allegedly reached a maximum temperature of almost 45 degrees, while the Helio X20 only heated up to about 33 degrees. The Snapdragon 810 appears to have switched to its four ARM Cortex-A57 cores clocked at 2GHz, while the MediaTek Helio X20 continued to use its four Cortex-A53 cores clocked at 2GHz. The third stage (Modern Combat 5) is where the two ARM Cortex-A72 cores integrated into the Helio X20 allegedly come into play. When MediaTek's chip detects a temperature that's above 33 degrees Celsius, it is said to switch to the two cores that use the new architecture. Since the Cortex-A72 cores pack more processing power than both the Cortex-A57 and Cortex-A53 cores, they should dissipate less heat at the same load. This could be the reason why we see the Snapdragon 810 reaching a maximum temperature of almost 45 degrees, while the Helio X20 only heated up to about 33 degrees." 113oF vs 92oF ---- that 113oF is perceived as HOT to hold on to --- note that real tissue damage starts to occur at temperatures of 50 degrees Centigrade or 122oF There are lies and there are dammed lies and then there is preliminary test data being VERY CAREFULLY leaked from a single vendor in support of a new product release. Which one this really is -- is up for grabs at the moment, but it does show that Helio 20 TESTING is going on and that Qualcomm 810s really do get hotter than they should (and that they really do throttle more than they should). Hope is being shown here that the 11 cores inside the Helio 20 really do crank out the performance at lower battery consumption levels and at a flatter max temperature rise plateau --- without the big performance dip that shows that survival level processor throttling is going on, something that is clearly seen on the Qualcomm 810 chipset highest performance level data. Some Oriental phone makers are actually LEAVING the Qualcomm 810 platform at mid-season because of these processor heating and performance throttling issues. Actual end users are now testing their individual 810 based phone products using Antutu X and if they don't perform up to advertised spec due to thermalling, back they go under the 1 year factory warranty. This is hurting the phone makers, and they really don't like that at all. This is VERY bad news for Qualcomm, since these same vendors are now choosing short term to go back to use some of the older Mediatek 8 core chipsets to compete against the Galaxy S6 instead of the Qualcomm 810 or the Qualcomm 808, both for the much lower chip cost and for the much better performance on the post-throttling slowness issues. They feel the older, cooler running Mediatek chipsets actually gives the same or better actual performance as a post-throttled 810 or the downspec'd 808 from Qualcomm can give at full temperature (at a much much lower chipset price tag to the builder too). Qualcomm's lock on 4G LTE has been broken this year by the Mediatek World 4G LTE radio/baseband that is now inside the new/old Helio 10 chipset and this new/old Mediatek chip is being seen as "very attractive" price and performance-wise to the oriental phone builders right now. It's not like they don't already have some board and phone designs that it will drop right into that can go back instantly into full production ..... These are the same guys are also lined up to buy the new Helio 20 first production runs ...... and they are all sampling the Helio 20 chipsets in pre-production phones right now as we speak. So now Mediatek really needs to be very careful to only advertise what the new "real first production run" unsorted Helio 20 chipsets CAN REALLY REALLY REALLY DO UNDER THE MOST ADVERSE CONDITIONS PERFORMANCE/HEAT/BATTERY/GRAPHICS/THERMAL THROTTLING-WISE. In other words, come out of the gate with the conservative 808 type specs instead of the doing the fluffed up 810 type specs and getting eaten alive by all them eagle eyed tester people ..... Complete conservative honesty and no fluff will get Mediatek a huge huge market share gain this year as Qualcomm has given them this HUGE opportunity window for free by exaggerating Qualcomm's way into a real marketing/in-warranty nightmare with that 810 chipset. ====================================== :P If Qualcomm isn't careful, they can go from #1 position to #3 position in a single calendar year ..... TSMC will likely support Mediatek in this effort as they don't like being blamed for making a batch of bad chipsets (and Qualcomm certainly painted them with that paintbrush early on). TSMC will be very very careful with the Helio 20 production runs, and will be totally honest in their sampling of the Helio 20 as that is in their best interest right now too. Plus TSMC has got another real good reason for total total honesty about Helio 20 right now too. ARM is going to be there, as ARM has a vested interest in the very first runs of their newest design .... and ARM doesn't play any sort of monkey games with exaggerated claims at all. (they leave that particular quicksand trap for Intel, Samsung and Qualcomm to fall into). Remember, ARM has already run these things in a full production run format at the vendor in question (TSMC) before even releasing the hard macro design to Mediatek for them to work on it. The current samples of the Helio 20 chipsets were likely built for ARM, not Mediatek. ARM guarantees their hard macro designs work as promised -- and we do note that NO FORMAL PROMISES have ever been publicly made by ARM on this new design at this point in time other than some very very vague "30% better than A57" type stuff that was said about six months ago. If there are issues out there in the first TSMC runs, the lots in question will be held by ARM until the problems are worked out -- that is how ARM works. ARM deals in total reality, the design and production process performance and production process yield level is GUARANTEED by ARM with no fluff and no excuses. ARM will set all expectations to be in line with the real production level reality at a good production yield level. Mediatek is dancing around ARM's feet like an excited puppy right now because until ARM says it, you can't even talk about it (that's in the ARM contract). Mediatek also has their brand new world 4G modem and baseband all tied up in this Helio 10 and Helio 20 effort, so their high excitement level is understandable. When this hits, they can sell their chipset equipped phones anywhere in the world, freely. This means Chinese phones selling in America through Amazon to be cheap BYOP phones for Sprint and T-Mobile. Also remember that LENARO and Google both have to software support this new Helio 20 chipset and 4G LTE radio/baseband all the way through the Linux kernel before it can be talked about or formally released. Android M is coming out this fall, and it may contain all of what is needed, or else the Helio 20 could be released in a simple weekly dot rev of both the Linux Kernel and of Android 5.1 Lollipop if there are no drastic new Android features that need to be supported ...... You know, really drastic, radical new Android stuff like Android phone/PC docking tech, etc. etc. etc. Yep, I betcha it is already incorporated in the ARM hard macro design already, just as it is already in the Android M software release for this fall .... :) .... you know, it isn't every day you get to go one up on Qualcomm, so some tail wagging puppy excitement on Mediatek's part is warranted, I think .... http://https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRy43ZKSinqWJBcOgjUWlzx3oBC7-Jzmx2ru88fzs2OHWQQCDSQ ..... question becomes when is Samsung going to announce theirs at 14nm -- like one day after ARM uncorks it ???? Qualcomm has already announced that Samsung is building their next top of the line chipset for them -- which one that is going to be still isn't clear. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 05/31/15 at 19:46:53 Retrospect as we roll into the third generation of 64 bit ARM chipsets and Android operating systems. ARM and LENARO and the entire open source crew did a really good job cranking up 64 bit ARM and Android 5.0. I am not aware of any real Lollipop bobbles that took place, certainly nobody screwed the pooch really big time as they did when A15/A7 big/LITTLE came out all half done on the core scheduling from Samsung. Samsung hasn't screwed anything up lately .... and they were the poster boys for screwing up. Samsung did a very credible job of rolling Apple to 14nm -- and kudos to Samsung for the Apple roll out of 10nm as well (they are in 10nm production for Apple as we speak). Now I guess both Intel and Qualcomm have to share that particular "poster boys for screwing up" crown -- both have shot themselves in the foot in some SIGNIFICANT thermal fashions of late and both are still bleeding from the self-inflicted image and in-warranty wounds ...... ;) Honesty boys, some simple honesty --- works great you know. Hey Intel, how's that dumbass lying 2x turbo mode thing working out for you ??? Still can't get your mouth to form the words "Our 14nm chips INTENTIONALLY thermal throttle themselves down to half speed when they get hot -- we do this stage by stage survival mode throttling thing to keep them from burning up." How about "All of our as-announced fanless no-heat-sink 14nm chipsets now come equipped with fans and heat sinks and various other thermal management technologies." How about this one "Over half the energy savings we originally claimed for our 14nm chipset products is now having to go into running an unplanned-for fan, which greatly reduces this energy savings. Even so, our new throttled 14nm products do not offer the same raw performance/speed levels as our old 1-2 generation back 22nm products were able to offer (and all our product lines over 10 watts do require a heat sink and a fan, BTW)." |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/01/15 at 07:36:42 http://liliputing.com/2015/06/intel-to-acquire-chip-maker-altera-for-16-7-billion.html Intel to acquire chip maker Altera for $16.7 billion http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/altera-cyclone-v.jpg "Semiconductor companies must be in season. A few days after chip maker Avago announced plans to acquire Broadcom for $37 billion, Intel has announced a deal to acquire chip maker Altera for $16.7 billion. Both of these deals come just a few months after NXP bought Freescale. Intel is probably the biggest name in chips for desktop and tablet computers and the company’s a major player in the server space. As traditional PC sales have stagnated, the company has also turned its attention to mobile devices and Internet of Things products where it faces stiff competition from Qualcomm, Samsung, NVIDIA, and other companies that produce ARM-based chips. Altera, meanwhile, produces low-power chips including field-programmable gate array (FPGA) that can be used for a number of different functions. Once the deal goes through, Altera will become a subsidiary of Intel and will continue to offer its own products, but Intel will also Integrate Altera technology with its own solutions. For example, Intel says it plans to use Altera’s FPGA products with Intel Xeon processors as a way to offer customized solutions for makers of servers, workstations, and embedded systems." Still, it is smarter for Intel to chart this path "into their golden years" as continuing to try to make it in the phone realm would cost them 5 times as much PER YEAR and they would still wind up with nothing to show at the end of it, just like they have just done in 2013 and 2014. Intel can beat up some on TI and Broadcom and take some market share away from them that they might be able to keep from one year to the next. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Pine on 06/01/15 at 08:08:22 41626A686B62626B7C0E0 wrote:
For that didn't see the original two posts.. I bought an ASUS Zenfone 2, the next gen in the Asus Zenphone lineup. ( though the numbering seems all off the Zenfone 2 replaces the Zenfone 5)...marketing. I was willing to try the phone because I know the Asus brand VERY well since I have built several computers using their motherboards ( including my current one). Asus is considered a top brand in desktop motherboards. I did purchase the $300 version which includes 4GB ram and 64GB internal storage. Fit and finish seem good though the plastic back is not really impressive.. it will be covered soon enough. Performance is very good... but it should be given the specs. The ZenUI is snappy, though not overly impressive. Speaker sound is down a notch from my front mounted Beats audio of my HTC. Battery life is not impressive... The drop from 100% to 90% is rather quick, then seems to stablize down to 60%. From there the cuve lessens even more, but still I am not a power user. I put the phone on a charger late that night when it was 53%. My phone came with the 18watt charger which is suppose to rapid charge up to 60%, but I just used the 1amp standard charger, and it seemed fine. EBAY support for accessories is great from China, and poor from the USA. I have a few doodads ( screen protector, hard case, holster) comming in. Wifi access seems good, phone quality is good, but again there is that rear mounted speaker.. Most review complain bitterly about the top center mounted power button.. but as my HTC was similar... meh its just not an issue with me. Reviews also ding the display as not as bright... I have poor eyesight and the display is fine.. the size and colors ensure that the screen is very readable.. again .. just not an issue for me. The only other complaint I would have is that the main three buttons are not lit/backlit... so they cannot be seen in the dark ( my power went out so I noticed it). Not a huge deal... itsa the standard back on the left, home in the center, show all running apps on the right. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/01/15 at 10:16:24 http://liliputing.com/2015/06/mediatek-helio-x10-octa-core-chip-for-slim-smartphones.html MediaTek Helio X10: Octa-core chip for slim smartphones http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/mediatek-helio-p10.jpg "The new chip features eight ARM Cortex-A53 CPU cores with clock speeds of up to 2 GHz, 700 MHz ARM Mali-T860 dual-core graphics, and built-in support for 4G LTE Cat 6 with download speeds up to 300 Mbps or upload speeds as high as 50 Mbps. Other features include support for a single 21MP camera or dual cameras (with a 16MP sensor on one and an 8MP sensor on the other), and support for H.264 and video decoding. The processor should begin shipping in the second half of the year, which means we could see smartphones powered by the processor by the end of 2015." This is the old/NEW Mediatek Helio 10 chipset, with brand new graphics and a brand new World 4G LTE modem that is taking phones back from the overheating/throttling Qualcomm 808 and 810 problem children. This is a "known good running configuration" that has LOTS and LOTS of very thin designs already out there from many mid to low end suppliers just sitting there ready to go back into production. And since the chipset is soooooo much cheaper the phones can sell for a lot less money compared to a Qualcomm. If I were buying a phone next year, it would likely have this chipset in it as I don't need the latest and greatest as my needs are pretty simple. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/01/15 at 14:11:12 http://liliputing.com/2015/06/chromebooks-with-mediatek-chips-coming-soon.html Chromebooks with MediaTek chips coming soon http://notebookitalia.it/images/stories/mediatek_chromebook_2015/mediatek_chromebook_7.jpg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-rQGInCE_Q .... it is a YouTube video, so click on it ..... This is a brand new LAPTOP GRADE chipset from Mediatek that was built from the get go to be inside a fairly powerful laptop unit. Inference is the same unit could run Win 10 should MS be quick enough to be on board with this year's new Comdex chipset offerings -- if not, well Google and ARM and LENARO certainly are up to snuff on all the new stuff. MediaTek did tell the folks at PC World a little bit about the Chromebook’s specs. It’s said to feature a 64-bit MT8173 quad-core ARM Cortex-A72 processor with PowerVR GX6250 graphics, and a UCB Type-C port, among other things. PowerVR GX6250 graphics mated to a quad core ARM A72 --- this is a meaty new chipset from Mediatek. This is a POWERFUL brand new laptop chipset, of which we will hear more about shortly I am sure. Intel has more powerful stuff, but can they make what they have run cool at full power and sell it for CHEAP like Mediatek so obviously can? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/01/15 at 18:52:35 Just http://liliputing.com/2015/06/windows-10-will-sell-for-119-and-up-if-you-cant-get-for-free.html Win 10 Costs $119 Anyway, if you do end up paying for Windows 10, here’s how much money you’ll end up spending: $119 for Windows 10 Home $199 for Windows 10 Pro $99 for Windows 10 Pro Pack, which lets you upgrade from Home to Pro :P :P :P :P :P :P :P :P :P You can buy a Chromebook entire (machine and software) for $10 more than the cheapest Win10 would cost you, plus in a year you get to "upgrade" your MS investment all over again ...... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/02/15 at 06:33:16 http://liliputing.com/2015/06/allwinner-to-help-qualcomm-get-snapdragon-chips-into-cheap-tablets.html Allwinner to help Qualcomm get Snapdragon chips into cheap tablets http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/qualcomm-allwinner-680x410.jpg "Allwinner is a Chinese fabless semiconductor company that designs its own chips, which are often used in cheap tablets produced in China. But for the most part those tablets are WiFi-only. Qualcomm, meanwhile, is an American chip maker that already has a series of low-cost chips with integrated support for 4G LTE, including the Snapdragon 210 and Snapdragon 410 processors. The chips also support for dual SIM cards and Qualcomm Quick Charge technology. While Qualcomm chips are widely used by smartphone and tablet makers that sell their products in the US and Europe, the company’s chips aren’t as popular with budget tablet makers in China, who often opt for processors from Allwinner, Rockchip, and MediaTek. By partnering with Allwinner, Qualcomm could leverage that company’s connections to convince Chinese device makers to use its chips. Allwinner gets a chance to offer device makers a solution for 4G LTE-capable tablets without having to design its own 4G chips in-house." Allwinner and Mediatek are arch rivals in China -- Allwinner has no 4G LTE modem of its very own although it has chipsets that are much like Mediatek's everywhere else. Allwinner NEEDS a 4G LTE radio/baseband combo tech to glom on to and to build into their future designs. Both Allwinner and Qualcomm see Mediatek rising to be a SIGNIFICANT threat to each one of them --- but can the two of them acting together stem that rising tide ???? The Hockey sticks are out and the blood is flying -- Qualcomm has gone and gotten them a hockey stick now and has gotten some fresh stick cuts and bruises on their face already ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/02/15 at 09:56:45 http://liliputing.com/2015/06/intel-compute-stick-roadmap-core-m-and-64gb-model-in-2015-broxton-models-in-2016.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/compute-stick-roadmap-680x383.jpg Intel, just leaking stuff instead of making real announcements .... Intel is not so all cocky and confident any more, seems like. The longest term out there is a 14nm Core M processor which is already known to be eat up with thermal issues. Also note that Intel is still rolling out 14nm stuff at the END of 2016 according to this --- where is Skylake ???? And what the heck is Win10 w/Bing ???? Bing search engine is supposed to be TOTALLY GONE and discontinued when Win10 rolls out ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Art Webb on 06/02/15 at 18:00:30 But unfortunately if you choose the Accer chromebook (best rating when I researched it) you musthave wifi to set it up My ISP charges more for wifi still a better overall value, though, I'm just frustrated I did the 'smart' thing and it backfired |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/03/15 at 07:02:13 http://liliputing.com/2015/06/foxconn-kangaroo-quanta-compute-plug-join-the-mini-pc-parade.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/quanta-compute-plug.jpg "Quanta’s Compute Plug looks like a USB power adapter with two USB ports. But look closely and you’ll also spot an HDMI port. Take it apart and you’ll probably also find a low-power processor, memory, storage, and all the other components needed to make a tiny PC. The Compute Plug features WiFi and Bluetooth. So you can plug the tiny computer into a power strip, connect a display via an HDMI cable, and then use Bluetooth or USB to connect a keyboard, mouse, headset, remote control, or other peripherals." Well now, the old PogoPlug has all growed up and gotten an Intel processor in its guts ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/04/15 at 07:58:03 http://liliputing.com/2015/06/upgrading-to-windows-10-here-are-features-youll-lose.html "We already knew Microsoft was dropping support for Windows Media Center. Here are a few other things you’ll lose if you upgrade to Windows 10 (or buy a new PC running Windows 10): Native support for DVD playback Windows 7 desktop gadgets Native support for USB floppy drives" Why is Win10 abandoning removable media? Other people's software comes on removable media and MS doesn't want you loading that old "malware" on their MS OS machine any more. Count on MS to try to lock out all other folk's software by using a variety of means --- they really do want you LOCKED into only using MS PRODUCTS ONLY from now on. Make no mistake, MS is NOT an open platform -- yet they want Google Android and ChromeOS and Linux to be totally open platforms so they can move onto those platforms and then try to lock themselves down once they get in there. I think FOSS should catch MS using some Linux code and sue to have the whole MS Windows thing made FOSS .... $119 for "free OS" software ??? ..... right ..... ======================================= Consider the free alternatives out there -- Linux and ChromeOS to name just the two most complete and relatively easy to do. IMHO, Linux Mint is an "easier change over" for an old Windows person -- not seamless, but much easiest to get past the seams. Linux Mint is written and maintained for folks who want to know NOTHING about their OS system other than the menus offered -- and it will work on that sort of basis just fine. Chromebooks go a step further, there isn't a visible OS to have to get used to. Just a 3 bar "preference settings" menu up in the top right corner. Or you can plunk down your endless stream of MS money and be a MS minion forever ..... it's your box and your choice. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/04/15 at 21:47:27 http://liliputing.com/2015/06/allwinner-unveils-r58-octa-core-chip-for-laptops-tv-boxes.html Allwinner and Rockchip and Mediatek all announce chipsets that will supposedly run Win10. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/r58_03-680x383.jpg 'Next year the company will move to new chips named, Allwinner R88, R18, and R6, respectively — and Allwinner says the high-end chips may support Windows 10 as well as Android.' Details are a bit sketchy but the supposition is that they will use Win10 Mobile (or a Oriental equivalent) and Universal Apps as the Classic Applications all require normal Intel desktop processors (and are too porky and slow for most Oriental folks to desire). What is being shown in the demo however is a Win10 like skin over stock Android, which is actually not too far off of what MS is offering for Win10 for Mobile uses anyway. MS had better watch out for any Linux code accidentally creeping into their mixture, now ...... them FOSS patriots will getcha if you don't watch out. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/06/15 at 07:37:41 http://liliputing.com/2015/06/remix-os-1-5-is-coming-this-summer-based-on-android-5-0.html Remix OS 1.5 is coming this summer (based on Android 5.0) https://youtu.be/NicS4VTm7Bk ..... it is a video, click on it .... Win10 for Mobile is being compared to this Remix OS 1.5 product as similar in look and feel. Since you can get all the major MS software (it is all in the Play Store now) to run on Remix OS, plus all of Android and all of the major Linux softwares (LibreOffice, Calc, etc. which are all in the Play Store now too) one wonders if the FOSS "general use OS" response to MS Win10 Mobile isn't already out there and already readily available for free through the Play Store. You see, all of the "classic" heavy iron PC softwares are strictly limited to PC class hardware by the new MS Windows 10 implementation --- indeed there really isn't much different about Win10 structure-wise from Win 8.1. Some would say that apart from Cortana and some new start screens it is really pretty much same ol same ol. ::) Whereas Remix OS is all the android tablet/laptop tricks developed in the last few years over in the Orient, where Android is their favorite (and in most cases only) operating system. Could people live off Remix OS ???? Yep. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/07/15 at 08:02:51 http://www.oregonlive.com/silicon-forest/index.ssf/2015/04/intel_reports_first-quarter_re.html Intel recalibrates, expects 'flat' 2015 http://media.oregonlive.com/oregonian/photo/2015/02/19/17061686-small.jpg Read the article, it is short and shows graphically where Intel is at the moment. Intel blew over 10 billion dollars buying tablet market share in China in 2013 and 2014, problem becomes that the effect of that spending didn't last six months after the spending stopped as the Hockey Stick boys are now supplying lower cost higher performance ARM chipsets into all the market niches that Intel opened up. Plus, ARM has rolled a whole new generation since then, as has Android. Intel cannot keep current without continuing to drop yet another 10 billion down the mobile rat hole. Furthermore, the Hockey Stick boys are now starting to supply laptop chipsets in 2015, which is another very bad thing for Intel. They have not seen open competition in laptops and PCs other than AMD, over which they had a licensing stranglehold all along. Lastly, Intel's 14nm roll out was delayed and delayed and delayed, and delayed yet again --- and finally when it did happen the thermal throttling issues that popped up were stunning in their magnitude and scope. Intel has some serious issues with Broadwell and Skylake that are making both "not yet real" compared to every one the of roll out roadmaps that have ever been published. So, Intel only has "data center" as the sole growth mode that they have on the books for this year, and they have a very limited 2015 capital budget to spend. So, buying Altera makes sense now that you understand where Intel really is at the moment. Spending a penny on anything other than data center has been contra-indicated by the senior Intel bean pickers and the Intel Board of Trustees. :P What is bad for Intel is that Microsoft is now working closely with Qualcomm and Mediatek and Samsung to support their laptop grade chipsets for the Win10 Mobile roll out, along with trying for some fairly complete support for ARM in tablets and phones. Microsoft seeks to lead the pack into the new docked phone/PC world view which is an ominous thing for poor Intel as they got NOTHING so far to toss into that particular circus ring. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/07/15 at 08:56:24 http://emerset.com/licensing-negotiations/articles/analysis-of-microsofts-2nd-quarter-fy-2015-earnings-report http://emerset.com/files/images/Images%20Articles/2nd_quarter_fy_2015.png "Windows 10 is expected to be released during the second half of 2015 and it promises to be the most ambitious and complex version to date. Windows 10 will include new features such as Cortana®, the new personal digital assistant, and Sparta, which is a completely redesigned browser. This latest version of Windows will also include scaled down Office functionality with touch enabled editions of Word, Excel®, PowerPoint®, OneNote®, and Outlook®. Microsoft is also promising unprecedented security features and a suite of utilities for managing photos, videos, music, maps, messaging, mail, and calendars. These new additions and others would be difficult under any circumstances, but perhaps the most noteworthy aspect of Windows 10 is that it promises to work across all devices, including desktop and laptop PCs as well as tablets and mobile devices and the user is expected to be able to seamlessly migrate from one device to another with little or no change in their experience or interface. The new tools and the multi-device functionality are difficult to implement on their own, and the combination of both raises the challenge exponentially. Early reviews have been quite positive, but skeptics question whether Windows 10 can meet expectations. Shifting Revenue Stream As reported in this earnings release and others, Microsoft’s cloud revenue (primarily Office 365, Azure, and Dynamics CRM Online) is growing nicely, but these gains are offset by declining revenue elsewhere. The move to the cloud and associated competitive pressure is forcing Microsoft to dramatically cut prices on some of their traditionally more profitable products. Perpetual licenses for Office are being replaced by Office 365 subscriptions. This results in a predictable recurring revenue stream, but competition from Google Apps™ and Apple iWork™ has driven O365 subscription prices lower than desired. Perhaps more concerning is the announcement made last week that Windows 7, 8.1, and Windows Phone users will be able to upgrade to Windows 10 at no charge during the first year after its release. Microsoft hasn’t traditionally made a tremendous amount of money on Windows upgrades, but the precedent is very concerning. Additionally, they are no longer charging OEMs a Windows royalty for devices nine inches and smaller." Make the long story short, MS is showing signs of "over-reaching" with Win10. It isn't going to come out of the gate "anywhere near complete" in the eyes of the end users and the price has been set too high at $119 for the non-upgradeable machines. There are alternatives out there now, and all the computing cattle are actually used to using those alternatives now and they may find that they no longer care to contribute to MS's blood bowl in an ongoing fashion. Microsoft is now following the subscription model for all their products now, so we will be interested in seeing if the $119 is actually really the normal yearly subscription price for Windows 10 and forward after the "free introductory year" is up. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/16/15 at 14:49:07 http://liliputing.com/2015/06/asus-chromebook-flip-coming-soon-for-249.html The Asus Chromebook Flip is one of the smallest Chrome OS laptops to date, and it’s one of the few that you can also use as a tablet. The Chromebook Flip has a touchscreen and a 360 degree hinge that lets you fold the screen so that it’s back-to-back with the keyboard, allowing you to hold the 2-pound laptop like a tablet. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/asus-chromebook-flip.jpg Asus and Google introduced the Chromebook Flip in March, saying that it’d be available this spring for $249 and up. Asus also plans to offer a $279 model with 4GB of RAM and 32GB of storage. The up scale unit weights in at 2 pounds and is as light and nimble as any Apple product out there. This puts price pressure on Apple and Windows units to give more for less dollars. =================================== Microsoft is pushing Cortana as a "major advantage to Win 10". This isn't real, however. Issue becomes that third party reviewers are saying Cortana sucks hind tit out of the four (4) digital assistants that are out there now -- ranking now Google and Hound up front with Siri and MS in a group well behind the front pack. Hound is interesting as it grew out of the music industry and uses different tech in some cases to do what it does. Look to see one of the other big boys buying up SoundHound as a company ASAP since Hound outperforms their normal standard product so badly ...... any of the others might profit from this move as Hound operates off of music detection technology (originally it listed to a song playing in the background while you were on your phone and told you who performed it -- that was what it was built for originally). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zNh8kQLhfo Anyway, if MS is waiting on folks to flock to the Bing based Cortana, they will wait a LOOONG time before that happens. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 06/16/15 at 16:10:06 The plug in mini looks similar to what I saw in Japan, but it plugged into your phone outlet and then into your laptop or desktop and the access to the net was supplied by a semi-dsl connection using the regular phone lines. Only lasted for about 3 years though.... I guess there was not enough "power" going through the phone line and the speed was limited, unlike true dsl. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/16/15 at 16:20:37 http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/quanta-compute-plug.jpg For those who wonder what he is talking to. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 06/16/15 at 17:30:58 They were also experimenting with one that plugged into an electrical outlet, but it turned out to be noisey. Not sure what became of that, but haven't checked lately, something about frequency modulation or some sort. Here is what i'm talking about http://kotaku.com/5881535/this-magic-box-makes-wifi-so-stable-and-so-easy |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/17/15 at 09:04:28 http://liliputing.com/2015/06/microsofts-new-windows-and-devices-group-puts-hardware-and-software-under-one-roof.html Microsoft’s new Windows and Devices group puts hardware and software under one roof "Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has announced some major changes to the company’s leadership team and one of the biggest changes is that Stephen Elop is no longer head of Microsoft’s Devices Group. In fact, there is no longer a Devices Group. Instead, Microsoft is combining its hardware and operating system divisions to create a new Windows and Devices Group (WDG) which is headed by Terry Myserson." :P So, Microsoft is faced with the need to downsize and condense yet again. This is just step one of this particular downsize, reorganize upper management into a new leaner structure. The remainder of the layoffs will occur when MS kills off support for all old softwares and declares the reality of the second half of Win 10 by issuing all of the not yet finished "Universal mobile App" products. By then the market success (or not) of Win 10 overall should be more apparent. MS will have given away as much Win 10 as they possibly can, then the yearly subscription fees will kick in and the moderate expansion will end quickly thereafter. What is apparent, considering the current BIG PUSH to get all the MS softwares including Cortana broken out separately and into the Android Play Store as pay me android apps, is that MS simply no longer sees their version of MS phone (the pale ghost of Nokia past) as being viable going forward. http://www.extremetech.com/mobile/199817-windows-phone-10-is-dead-before-it-even-arrives http://www.tomsguide.com/us/windows-phone-2014-market-share,news-20502.html http://media.bestofmicro.com/B/X/481245/gallery/idc-os-worldwide-chart_w_600.jpg Considering the importance of phones in the future computing world, watch MS roll into a declining role third or fourth place overall going forward --- and watch them strive very very very hard to control a small slice of the phone/PC world that is developing right now. They HAVE to get a controlling slice of something phone-ish or in 5 years they will be just a footnote. ;) ..... remember, MS is currently paying Android phone builders to shovelware MS Office on to brand new phones a situation that is ongoing right now, with the major telecons then turning right around and pulling the bulky Office off the phones and replacing it with their own smaller shovelware mixture instead. MS is already struggling to hold on to their commercial core business right now. And it is still shrinking on them 5% year on year on year. http://icdn4.digitaltrends.com/image/chromebooksales-325x325.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/18/15 at 05:00:18 Over the last mountain trip I realized something -- I carried an iPad and Dave had a laptop but I didn't touch either one much the whole trip. I was working with the old Samsung Galaxy S3 and the off-line GPS navigation software a lot and as I did so I kept using my current phone and the "OK Google" touch icon to do research and to find things. Dave was using his iPhone and was having trouble getting directions to places while I could just talk to my Android and get what we needed instantly. Since I was driving, Dave was holding my phone while we looked for a rainy day restaurant that wasn't packed with people. So, for Father's Day I just got a Moto G sized handle bar holder for my phone ...... ----------------------------------- Folks are currently asking "What happened to tablet sales this year?" There is an answer to that -- 6" phones happened to tablet sales. Folks are finding that their phone is big enough now to replace their tablet pretty much completely for daily use and with no downsides for much that folks have discovered so far anyway. They have NO MOTIVATION to buy an upgraded tablet at all right now. That big cell phone might drop into a docking station soon to run your big desktop screen as your PC replacement, since pretty soon Android and Apple phone OSs will have it all built into them. And Windows phones too, let's not forget them. This will be a total industry paradigm changer .... and MS is worried right now, as is Intel. Intel is inside ONE (1) major released phone right now (and is paying ASUS mightily for that Zenphone privilege) and MS Windows Phone in general has a 3% and shrinking phone market share right now (and that is with all the very numerous & nebulous promises for a revitalized Win 10 phone experience that are being PR'd all over the place). This is what you can take to the bank -- all the players are looking at phone OS systems that will dock to a big screen and give a total computing experience to the person who just upgraded his ONE AND ONLY COMPUTING DEVICE. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/18/15 at 05:23:22 Speaking of that $200-$300 Intel price supported Asus Zen phone, have you wondered why it is as thick and bulky as it is? http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-MbeOGajUdk8/U0IzbgC05II/AAAAAAAAAJ4/r4lY2jX2MKI/s1600/1045211.jpg That is a LOT of extra price supported motherboard componentry that is all built right into a modern ARM/Android phone's main chipset. ..... and folks mention it gets a bit warm in heavy use. Duh, all that extra componentry does use extra power (converts some of it to heat) you know. :) ..... still, the phone is cheap and it always gets good mid-range phone reviews. Battery life is so so, but that is true of many mid-range phones right now. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by arteacher on 06/19/15 at 06:21:59 I don't know if this is off topic or not. My son sent me a couple of links regarding google research into face and voice recognition. http://googleresearch.blogspot.co.uk/2015/06/inceptionism-going-deeper-into-neural.html?m=1 That's a link to an experiment were they teach an artificial neural network how to recognize pictures and then feed pictures back through it and ask it to generate new images based on what it sees and understands of previously shown pictures. I've never done acid but I imagine that this is very much what it looks like. either way it's kind of neat. https://photos.google.com/share/AF1QipPX0SCl7OzWilt9LnuQliattX4OUCj_8EP65_cTVnBmS1jnYgsGQAieQUc1VQWdgQ?key=aVBxWjhwSzg2RjJWLWRuVFBBZEN1d205bUdEMnhB That is a gallery of the images." I have never done acid either but some of these images blow me away. They remind me of the movie "Aliens". I can't get the second link to work. Somebody help me out please? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/19/15 at 06:30:22 Google is the "new idea" company, and they have dozens of new items under development that we (the public) do not hear about until Google has a partner to bring it into commercial reality. Google throws in a "prototype stage" on any product that requires the app programmers to modify existing softwares (they need time to do that, right?). There are LOTS more like this that we do not know about yet. Google makes an offer to new idea inventors --- come work with us, we will pay you a salary and provide you with lab resources you need to finish your idea and we will fund your initial prototypes, but we will share IP ownership of what you developed while we paid you -- once you break away and go commercial, we can make an agreement or not, depending on circumstances. Many inventors find they LIKE working at Google and stay on for new projects. ========================================= Here is an example of Google empowering an inventor, and then when he chose to go it on his own, they let him fly free. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J78C4YOPyE8 So, you can say that Google has already done the docking thing and released it as a commercialized product under the control of the inventor/entrepreneur. Needless to say Google has already built this stuff into the current released Android versions, using the dock hardware and the app as the deliverable. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/19/15 at 06:39:14 http://liliputing.com/2015/06/next-gen-toshiba-satellite-radius-11-2-in-1-laptop-to-have-cortana-hardware.html Toshiba is updating its entire line of laptops with dedicated hardware to support the Microsoft Cortana digital assistant software included in Windows 10. That means there’s a dedicated Cortana key on the keyboard and dual-array microphones to allow the company’s laptops to pick up your questions and voice commands even in a noisy room. Cortana has problems separating background noise. Siri has the same issues. Google uses some server farm power to keep a custom voice map just for you (always learning your voice better and better) so it can deal with some additional background noise. The new startup Hound seems to do better with noise than the others, but it uses music based tech which is where it came from. (somebody is going to buy up Soundhound, I betcha). For example, Google cannot deal with you lending your phone to your wife periodically -- two different people's voices screw the memorized voice mapping all to hell and it takes a month to straighten it out again. (or you can go into settings and delete your screwed up voice map and start over fresh with a new one with only you doing the talking). :) Talking to your stuff is A LOT EASIER than typing, and the companies that do it well will be the ones that win in the end. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/19/15 at 08:35:22 http://liliputing.com/2015/06/nextbook-ares-8-is-a-78-android-tablet-thats-not-awful.html Nextbook Ares 8 is a $78 Walmart sold commonly available Android tablet that’s not awful http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/ares-8_07.jpg https://youtu.be/bpSSozC-2IA it is a YouTube, so click on it. The tablet features an Intel Atom Z3735G Bay Trail processor, which should offer decent performance, 16GB of eMMC storage and a microSD card slot for removable storage, a micro HDMI port, micro USB 2.0 port, and an 8 inch, 1280 x 800 pixel display. Other features include GPS, a 3-axis g-sensor, and front and rear cameras. The Nextbook Ares 8 measures 0.34 inches thick, weighs about 0.85 pounds, and comes in three color options: red, blue or black. Folks, this is a lot cheaper than buying a replacement battery for your existing iPad. This is an excellent example of Intel price supports ringing through to the American market with a new, price lowering position on a product group. And this is a good thing for us consumers. If my iPad 2 died, I would not get another used iPad nor would I pay $100+ to get the battery replaced ...... not with $79 units sitting on the shelves at Walmart. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/22/15 at 07:01:31 http://www.technobuffalo.com/2015/01/06/kickstart-this-dock-that-turns-your-phone-into-a-desktop-computer/ Kickstart This Dock That Turns Your Phone Into a Desktop Computer a failed kickstarter campaign http://www.technobuffalo.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/andromium-3.jpeg Sad to say that Gordon Zheng has failed his kickstarter campaign --- but this is understandable since it was kickstarted here in the device rich USA instead of in Asia where it would most likely get used. Also, the phones supported in the kickstarter campaign weren't particularly new or powerful phones -- a Samsung Galaxy S3 ???? That is the phone we just threw away here in America. Andromium is the brain child of Gordon Zheng, who left a position as senior engineer for Google to pursue his own ideas after noting the rapid rise in smartphone, cloud and HDMI technology. Gordon needs to let a new generation of more powerful phones come around, using the new USB C reversible jacks and more and FASTER connectivity and much stronger processors -- then his ideas will fly. MS will be doing it by then and Google and others will be looking for a "me too" to toss out there and they will be ringing ol' Gordon's phone reminding him of his IP sharing agreements. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Art Webb on 06/22/15 at 07:21:43 Depending on device price, I might've been a customer for that The reason I ponied up nearly $300n for a Galaxy S3 was I had the idea to use it in place od my desktop it definitely out performs my old PC, a dinosaur of a Dell Dimension |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/24/15 at 07:27:12 Andronium is still available, you need to go to the website and contact Gordon directly. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/24/15 at 07:54:26 Microsoft has finally done it -- Office for Android is REAL and it is for sale as an Office 365 subscription. MS will survive no matter what happens, as a software supplier to the Android world. [media]https://youtu.be/UudBCuiCAkQ[/media] https://youtu.be/UudBCuiCAkQ it is a YouTube video, click on it |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Art Webb on 06/24/15 at 08:09:22 Well, I looked it up, my S3 doesn't have the necessary OS, and I have no idea what processor it uses shoot (i do have the necessary 2.0 GB RAM though) Not real sure I'd go that route anyway at this point since I bought this new Accer Also not sure my monitor is HDMI? So unaware lol it would allow me to give Time Warner the boot for ISP though oh, never mind, I just remembered, the phone provider has a way of telling if your phone is linked to a higher powered device, like say a laptop, and will slam the door if you do that best I could use would be a dock that uses the phone's extant abilities and links it to a screen and keyboard / mouse (or touchscreen) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/26/15 at 07:07:33 Some bold pundits are beginning to predict on the Win 10 success factor. None of them are predicting Win 10 is going to be a smash hit, because they already know what is in it and how not quite fast it performs on the current hardware. (remember, Intel failed to bring out the crop of new, cheap superchips to make Win 10 run quick like a bunny on PC hardware). Win 10 is a more complex, bulkier OS system --- it is the largest PC system Intel has ever put out as an OS product. So much so that Intel has plans to keep roughly half of it up in the cloud at all times on chromekiller and mobile products, and only bring the other portions of the OS down from the cloud as needed. In this manner, Intel can claim it "fits" on modern mobile products like chromekillers and 7" tablets and the like. Can you say "slow, slow, slow, wifi / drive light always flashing" three times fast? Next cause of concern is that MS is NOT being forthcoming at all about what happens in a year when "free Win 10" ends. This lack of honest disclosure has many pundits looking at the whole Win 10 deal askance, like it it was some form of Ponzi scheme that pays off well early on but fails miserably when the whole truth becomes known. Lastly, the "free Win 10" thing keeps getting excluded from this old hardware and that old hardware --- based on some old licensing issues that MS is trying to dodge the bullet upon. Easy way to say it is -- Win 10 is free to anybody that has an ACTIVE license agreement that MS wishes to abrogate and to end early, not by defaulting, but by substituting Win 10 in place of the existing agreement. Business isn't going for this, they have a TREMENDOUS investment in Win 7 and fully intend to stick with it for their full license period. Bluntly, nothing out there in the consumer desktop/laptop PC arena is going to make Win 10 a runaway success as there is no large pent up demand in that market that is going to burst out into a huge violent success story for MS. They will get them a sales bump in 2015, make no mistake about it as they will spend 10's of millions in advertising, etc. to get those sales. Win 10 will not be countable as a real success until the Win 10 Mobile portion comes out and takes large ONGOING large market share chunk away from Android and Apple products. Mobile is where all future growth will be, and MS must have success there in mobile to grow in any real fashion out into the future. The best MS can hope for on the desktop right now is to slow or stop the desktop Chromebook bleeding, and this is what is predicted for the next two years --- a slowed to slightly reversed rate of decline to less than 5%, perhaps even up to some single digit positive numbers --- with late 2015 & early 2016 likely running up into positive growth space for a short period of time while the ad dollars and bribe dollars are still flowing freely. When the big builder support dollars stop, so does the positive growth. MS PC has been declining at 4% to 6% year on year which has been a steady decline for 6 years now -- MS will count their Win 10 a real success if two years from now that decline figure is still less than 5% (that means that Win 10 was good enough to maintain MS's current position in the world marketplace). During this same period of time some completely new disruptive technologies will be invented (the phone/PC is just one known example of these potential disruptors) that will take market share away from PC space --- we are talking unknown new stuff that is really independent of what MS does or doesn't do. And remember, MS is not fast on their feet -- this Win 9 rework dragged on for three years before they had to rename it Win 10 to keep the delay from sounding ridiculous. And the net result has NOT been a lighter faster better OS product as originally promised. MS's ugly baby has a new tank top and diaper that matches its blanket, plus a little bit of facial makeup to make the smile prettier. And since the baby is actually 4+ years old now, it can actually talk some now (and hopefully will become somewhat more mobile sometime soon as well). :-/ It is still Satya's ugly four year old baby. http://https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQ4giFMIqTRMJQq0JyKOaYSpuSvhY5kwbya-VYAa4qbrfnkhlPXAQ Remember, Satya just condensed his management structure to remove the upper management of an entire division section of his company, so you can see that further MS "condensing" is already planned to take place inside the next two years. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/28/15 at 18:32:38 Google and ChromeOS are quietly doing their thing, eroding at MS's market share at a slow steady pace, not really caring how fast it happens, IF it happens, or not as the case may be. Google is being all Buddha-Switzerland again ...... keeping clean hands and a pleasant demeanor while slooowly cutting into MS's marketshare worldwide. However, the next new wave of "faster acting" FOSS disruptors are apparently on the way now, presaging a whole new type of MS eroding experience. We are talking ANDROID windowing software, resting in the hands of the Hockey Stick boys and the FOSS people. Yes, I know the Chinese have had Android windowing stuff for 5 years now but it stayed in China running Chinese as the native (and only) language. Now it is showing up in America -- and I will refer to Andronium and Jide as the "current carriers" of the resizable window multi-program running multi-desktop organized type stuff running ANDROID 4.4.4 as its root OS system. Watch out as you read about these things or watch the videos, these people are NOT native English speakers. But don't judge the software from the broken English, the stuff actually works pretty durn well. Their ideas do work well on minimalistic type hardware and some are pretty completely packaged -- Andronium is a phone/PC based product and Jide is a mini-box based product, but both use some of the same tricks that were developed in the Orient that have escaped into the public FOSS domain and have begun to turn ANDROID into a full service OS. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.andromium.os&hl=en http://liliputing.com/2015/06/jide-remix-mini-a-30-tv-box-running-remix-os-based-on-android.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/remix-mini.jpg ================================== Microsoft has fueled this fire inadvertently by putting out a porkier bulky slow-arsed Win 10 that has a completely unknown ongoing cost and LARGE hardware requirements ---- then MS goes tossing out a full Microsoft Office for Android and free MS Office On-line all of which can all run on both Andronium and Jide remix just as they sit today. ;) ..... and MS is actually paying all the phone builders to shovelware MS OFFICE on to all the phones they build ..... Just wait until Mediatek and Blu Products starts putting out these ideas onto some slightly more powerful low cost handset hardware with ample memory and starts selling it here in America. Or Asus could do it, since they have been put on hold endlessly by MS on their Zenfone MS product line and Zenfone already has the hardware and the memory that is required. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/28/15 at 19:15:32 Let me give you a vision ..... Your new Android cell phone comes in, along with its docking station. You hook it up to your monitor and speakers and keyboard and mouse and sure enough, the big screen lights up and it looks PC-ish and seems to work OK using keyboard and mouse, etc. All the phone guys do docking stations now that come as a stock in the box accessory with all the good phones, as it is a "key differentiator feature" and they all must do it now or else lose sales accordingly. And MS is still paying the phone guys to shovelware MS Office on to all their phones still, so guess what you already got on there on the phone. While you are futzing around with it, your wife calls you from the mall asking if you like Hanes or Jockey, a vital question concerning which one coddles your crods better. The phone rings and the speakers ring and a caller id pops up on the big screen with an answer button for you to click on. So you mouse click it and your wife starts talking. Your phone has a mic already, so you just talk normally and do the call and answer the vital crods question so your wife can buy the right underwear for you. Then you think a bit and Hey ---who knows, mebbe it will work ...... "OK Google, how many 50 grain loads are there in a pound of powder?" "There are 140 each 50 grain loads available in a pound of powder" "OK Google, best route to SimpleLife campground from here" "Hwy 421 to I-40 to Hwy 74/28 is the quickest route" (displays Google map route) Reach over and pull the phone out of the docking station and say "begin navigation" and it does ..... Put your phone into the bike holder and go. Sweet, huh |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by justin_o_guy2 on 06/28/15 at 19:38:53 Vision too F F Fast Bluurreeyy I'm way too disconnected from tech to even approach such avision. That's just light years ahead of what I expected. I Love it! I'm not a customer, but I can appreciate,. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/28/15 at 19:41:02 Justin, do you talk to your phone yet? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by verslagen1 on 06/28/15 at 20:05:05 785B5351525B5B5245370 wrote:
I yank the phone outta the dock... killing whatever I'm working on... the horror... the horror :-[ |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by justin_o_guy2 on 06/28/15 at 20:09:01 You'll be shocked, I know, but I CAN use the cell, I can use the camera, I can Reply to a text, but, no idea how to initiate one. And, about ten years ago, I actually built a computer, loaded the software, it even worked. But , cheap drives are not trustworthy. I couldn't even start that today.. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/28/15 at 20:53:52 475443425D5056545F00310 wrote:
I yank the phone outta the dock... killing whatever I'm working on... the horror... the horror :-[/quote] It only does that on the Microsoft phones running MS softwares (the BSofD still survives into the future as a MS exclusive feature) -- Android phones have the android software running already (it is what they have been using the whole time) and when they leave the dock they sense the I/O change and light up the cell phone's screen in mobile mode, simply continuing with what you were already doing on the smaller screen. Android only HAS one OS to deal with, but MS has two OSs to deal with now and they have to switch back & forth and back and forth and them silly BSofD oopsies do happen still happen occasionally. ;) ..... someone will collect crash statistics eventually, and guess which OS will crash more frequently ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/29/15 at 05:53:27 Justin, The real answer is that we have always talked to our phones ..... but now they are starting to listen and to talk back to us. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Art Webb on 06/29/15 at 10:24:44 I love my phone's 'talk to text' feature |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by justin_o_guy2 on 06/29/15 at 13:15:16 795A5250535A5A5344360 wrote:
Dont forget the Run, Tell feature, courtesy of NSA. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/30/15 at 06:51:49 Chinese and Indian markets are huge, but they are becoming completely saturated on the low end. Look to see all the Hockey Stick boys start building step up processors as the Middle Range is now the new big expansion market in India and Asia. After 2-3 years (now) all those first purchasers are looking to upgrade their phones into some nicer features. Mediatek has already made their move to the upper middle and Mediatek is now making and selling the majority of the chipsets that leak their way back to the USA in lower cost products. What is good is that new ARM tech that is coming back to us by way of Mediatek is so good it is putting pressure on Qualcomm (and Samsung) to keep their advances moving very quickly year on year. Now here comes Rockchip, making their first step up upper middle range chipset. This RK3368 is their first 64 bit chipset and it is their first octacore chipset as well. http://liliputing.com/2015/06/lilbits-299-rockchips-first-64-bit-chip-arrives.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/rk3368-680x393.jpg This chipset will be relatively expensive for the first two years, then in year 3-4 it will hit the bargain basement and may well power a lot of lower cost products. That is if Mediatek chooses to leave the market niches that Rockchip services alone, instead of pre-filling them with their own more sophisticated octacore products before Rockchip can get there. And it also ignores Allwinner, who is in the same market spaces as Rockchip and who also has fully functional octacore big littles to throw into the pot. Rockchip went into bed with Intel, but we see no signs of any "Intel Inside" surviving in Rockchip now, instead we see what used to be an ARM front runner that is mentally crippled now and is now a full generation back bringing ARM chipset products to the market place. Furthermore, Intel has pigeon-holed Rockchip into tablets, a place they will remain stuck since Intel intentionally held back all their cellular radio tech and Rockchip has no cellular radio capability at all at this point in time. And that tablet space is shrinking now, as phone space is the wave of the future and phone/PCs are coming up on everybody's radar screens. Intel wanted Rockchip to be totally dependent on Intel, and it seems they have mostly done that even as Rockchip struggles to go back to their ARM roots. ARM gave Rockchip their shot with the RK3288, and Rockchip allowed Intel to counter-bribe them right over into obscurity. ARM then transferred their flow of new "future tech" stuff to Mediatek, who has remained loyal to ARM throughout and Mediatek is now lapping up on Qualcomm, Samsung and the big boys accordingly. There is a lesson there for the other Hockey Stick boys about never siding with Intel, ever, not while expecting to garner any kind of long term advantage in a market that ARM churns every single year with significant new ARM tech releases. ;) "Chinese chip maker Rockhip has made a bit of a splash over the past few years by offering low-cost processors for Android tablets and TV boxes. But rival MediaTek seems to have been running laps around Rockchip recently, launching new chips at a rapid fire pace and dominating the Chinese smartphone space." ..... and from an earlier review, it seems the "Intel think" mental germ may have gotten deep into Rockchip's guts .... "When I actually tried to use the tablet, it felt incredibly sluggish — but I can’t tell if that’s because the processor is a brand new chip and the company is still working to get Android to run smoothly on it, or if this was just the result of using a demo model left out in the open at a trade show where any number of folks had already used it and might have mucked things up a bit." Actually, I think Intel has trained Rockchip to think in the Intel pattern of a fat, bloated disjointed motherboard with a lot of separate functions on separate chipsets .... http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/rk3368_04.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 06/30/15 at 09:05:42 1D3E3634373E3E3720520 wrote:
Had to laugh at that one OF ! Went to visit a friend this past sunday, and between me and google and him and siri it was funny. He talked to siri like it was a person, and it gave him smart ass answers to his smart ass questions. Wonder if android does that? I haven't looked for a voice recognition assistant for android....yet.... because google is my friend, well most of the time, unless you are looking for roads to get to somewhere.... then you better know a little bit about the area LOL! |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 06/30/15 at 09:28:44 Old_Rider, right now to get the best Google voice, you need to load Google+ and GIVE IT ALL THE PERMISSIONS IT NEEDS TO WORK CORRECTLY, so give it all the permissions it asks for. Apple doesn't ask, it just takes the permissions Siri requires. All the digital assistants are getting better and better and better .... Siri is the most conversational (best sexy voice too) but Google+ is the best information, closely followed by Hound (a new entry from SoundHound, the audio people). Cortana is last of the lot -- they have been owned by Nokia/MS for several years now and has not gotten significantly better in that time. MS needs to go buy Hound, ASAP. Hound is doing some new things, some better/different things. ====================================== Old, you need to decide what you and your wife are going to do about the Labor Day trip --- we are running out of our time window to reserve anything at SimpleLife and I am at a loss to do anything until you guys decide what you are going to do. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/01/15 at 04:42:37 New wrinkle in the Chromewars saga, verbal phone intrusions ...... I was sitting at my computer and wanted to know when the post office in my local strip mall opened up so I could go get a prepaid mailer. Rather than opening up another tab and going to see, I picked up my Moto G and OK Google'd it verbally for speed and convenience and for a quick no nonsense response. "Tokay Center Post Office opens at 9:00 AM today" ..... just that quick, just that easy. Talking to our phones is going to get VERY pervasive, I do believe. When it is quicker to verbally ask your phone than type it in on an already lit browser, that indicates a paradigm shift is occurring. I bet Win 10's Cortana isn't the last verbal assistant to be built into a laptop OS ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by justin_o_guy2 on 07/01/15 at 05:47:45 paradigm shift I Hate those things. I always grind some gears..Tho, that one does sound pretty smooth. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/01/15 at 07:35:21 There had been a bunch of Cyanogen phones planned to land here in the USA this summer, but suddenly they have all been cancelled. Every last one of them. Why? No voice assistant -- Cyanogen and open source haven't created an open source Siri/Cortana yet. People do LIKE talking to their Google and Apple phones ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/01/15 at 22:51:14 The planned new wave of Cyanogen phones are getting cancelled right and left now, mainly due to the failure of Cyanogen's new deal with Microsoft which has since pretty much fallen through leaving phone makers uncertain about what (or how good) Cyanogen/Microsoft OS was actually going to be come build time. Or else Cyanogen actually sent the prototype OS to them and removed all doubt about how sorry it actually was. You see, Cyanogen has no voice activated assistant and it was planning on using all the disjointed Microsoft/Nokia bits and pieces that were supposed to magically come together to make up a full service phone OS under Cyanogen's massaging fingers. This wonderful idea is now a no-show from the phone builder's perspective and may be just another MS wet dream gone drop .... plop into yet another steaming brown pile of MS disjointed stinky stuff. ????? Or is it ????? Nobody knows -- but they do know that Cyanogen is now planning on lifting a bunch of new code that Google just sent out to open source to fly free and go make up a new Cyanogen OS out of it. http://liliputing.com/2015/07/cyanogenmod-is-building-a-chromium-based-web-browser.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/gello-680x415.jpg What does this mean? Other than a confirmation that the Google bits are better than MS bits and Cyanogen always grabs the best bits available, it still leaves Cyanogen with no voice activated assistant. AHA !!! Mebbe Cyanogen can go plug in Hound ???? Yes, by taking all the best Google bits and splicing in Hound, can Cyanogen mebbe build themselves "something better" instead of failing miserably ???? Or perhaps will Google let Cyanogen lift "OK Google" along with the rest of the Chromium and Android OS stuff they just released ???? Perhaps so ...... this is more in line with Cyanogen (the Mod)'s history from years past. ..... but then where does that leave poor MS ??? ::) ..... sitting there, steaming and drawing flies out on the phone world's turd pile, of course ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 07/02/15 at 08:01:06 I have always had "fat finger syndrome" when typing, be it on a regular sized keyboard or tablet, but man on a cell phone i'm a nightmare! When my first HTC phone (Hero) had a little microphone when I popped up the keyboard I was ecstatic! WOW I could TALK to my phone instead of TYPE it all? Of course I mumble a bit, so I would more often than not have to go back and correct my texts, and if they were short ones I would usually just go back and re-write the whole thing. But now that google has LEARNED my voice pattern (well almost) I am a very happy camper. When I got the google glass I thought I was done with using my phone keyboard... but alas, battery life and certain functions left me still having to use my FINGERS to do stuff....sigh... I am now awaiting the newest version of glass but doubt I will be on the testing program as it is super secret and no one knows what it looks like or how it performs, or even if it has similarities. Paradigm: a fundamental change in approach or underlying assumptions. Fundamental: a central or primary rule or principle on which something is based Change the rules..... that's how its done. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/03/15 at 19:32:08 Linux Mint Mate 17.1 just upgraded to 17.2 which is another whole years' worth of progress. To upgrade, I clicked once (1 time) and let the system do its thing in background mode. I wrote this post while my upgrade was taking place --- ooops, gotta go now, upgrade is finished now. .... and people wonder why folks like Linux Mint compared to Windows whatever ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Art Webb on 07/03/15 at 22:06:20 I still have that Mint Mate 16 disk... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/05/15 at 05:46:33 INTEL IS LAYING OFF PEOPLE ALL OVER THE COMPANY http://newsroom.intel.com/community/intel_newsroom/blog/2015/07/02/intel-announces-leadership-changes "We are aligning our leadership structure to continue to become more efficient in order to deliver the benefits of our strategy even faster than before," said Krzanich." Intel whacks 5, count them 5 executive level positions and either does away with the group underneath it or combines it with another shrinking group. Key word here is shrinking ...... Also note, this rather extraordinary move did not make the E-news, I found it by going to Intel's own announcement pages. Finance journals were pretty much silent as well. Too too many Financial pundits are holding way way way too much Intel stock to be blowing horns and pointing to the current silent implosion of the Intel company as they switch the company's focus away from PC to Datacenter. http://www.siliconbeat.com/2015/06/17/intels-ceo-confirms-layoffs-underway/ The Oregonian, a local newspaper had more and more pertinent information considering the size and scope of the layoffs. "Intel CEO Brian Krzanich has confirmed that layoffs are underway at the chip giant’s sprawling global operations, although he didn’t say where. In a memo, first reported by the Oregonian, Krzanich confirmed rumors that have been circulating for weeks in Oregon, where Intel has major facilities. “Yes, we are implementing headcount reductions,” he wrote in the memo, which was dated June 16. An Intel spokesman declined to comment Wednesday. Krzanich wrote that the layoffs will touch “no more than a few hundred employees in any given site or geography” and are partly the result of eliminating jobs in “areas of the company that have become less important,” as well as trimming “redundant activities and inefficiencies” and managing what he called “lower job performance.” Intel has been struggling with lower PC sales that have caused a drop in demand for its microprocessor chips, a major source of revenue for the company that invented the microprocessor. It has been forced to lower its estimates for the year because of the sales slump." Data Center is where all efforts and money and people are to be spent, PC/Laptop is to be de-emphasized. Internet of Things will get a continued focus. Phone has been pretty much dropped at this stage for USA consumption, although current Oriental and Indian projects will continue until they are finished. Once existing commitments are met, if the dollars from these cheapie phones don't flow positive, these will be cut as well. So, the Asus Zenfone will likely have no "Son of Zenfone", huh? Remember, the Zenfone is an India based product line that was re-imported to the USA by ASUS ..... and if Intel drops the big bucks tech support dollars the Asus Zenphone is outta here too. ::) ..... Intel's deep deep deep loss leader pricing pockets have finally been turned out, all empty now ..... expect some fairly stiff cost increases to show up in the PC world shortly .... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Steve H on 07/05/15 at 13:50:34 If someone would design a decent box for a desktop around an ARM processor, I would buy it. It would have to have the already on chip IDE interfaces available (you need storage not some cramped little solid state memory drive), an ample expandable memory section, and choice of either on-board or ad-in graphics. Put all the ports where they are accessible, USB, serial, parallel, memory card i/o. In general make a nice PC box using a high powered ARM. Maybe 2 octa-core processors in it at a decent clock speed and trounce all over intel. Free OS (Linux) cheap processor, $150 to $200 PC that will do everything the intel will do. Except eat power, make lots of heat, and drain your wallet. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/05/15 at 15:40:42 Steve, you are asking for an Intel power user's type of box and I don't think that is where Foss is headed right now. I understand what you are saying though, and I bought something similar for myself 2 years ago. It has a full set of I/O jacks (6 USB, parallel, serial, HDMI, IDE, and whatever that little red serial hard drive cable is called, it has a DVD read write and a floppy drive -- it has every sort of drive and port that existed a few years back, separate video card & all sorts of stuff nobody uses any more today. Not even Intel makes boxes like mine any more. MS's Win 10 won't spin the DVD drive nor the floppy drive (obsolete tech, not supported). Power users like us are obsolete, in other words. We are dinosaurs, you and me. Want to see what is going to the new version 2.0 of what seems to be a successful new OS coming out of the Orient (having survived its introductory year in good shape and all ???). https://youtu.be/NicS4VTm7Bk ..... yep, YouTube. Click on it to see ..... Take a look at this one, just for the contrast value of it .... Apparently what Americans want makes no nevermind to the folks in the Orient who are actually the ones going about doing it now-a-days. :D |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Steve H on 07/05/15 at 21:35:13 Thanks for the link. Not impressed at all, though. What I'm saying is that all these ports and stuff are available from the SOC. All that's required is to just install the appropriate connectors on the hardware to get a complete, full system. Why limit yourself to a small, featureless, little tablet thing unless that's all you need when for an extra $20 you can have a full featured computer? I agree, we are dinosaurs. I like to have a system that will do what is needed. If I wish to encode a video (H264 encoding is implemented on just about every ARM product as well as video in) I can't do it with a small tablet. There's no memory, no storage, no way to get the video in other than the crapply little built-in camera. Flash memory has a limited life of around 100,000 write cycles. In actual computer use, that's not very long. What if I wish to make a DVD from a video I have on the tablet? Can't do it. What if I want to write my own programs? Can be done but not easily. What if I need to share data? No way to do it from the limited capability android stuff we are seeing. There's still a very long way to go for the ARM camp to get around to putting out an actually useful computer although all the interfacing and capabilities necessary are already there. If I were an electronics guy, I'd buy a nice ARM chipset and build my own board. But since I'm not, I have to rely on someone else to do it. It's really interesting reading all that's going on in the computer world. I told somebody a couple years ago that they just about wouldn't recognize a computer in 5 years with all the stuff that was coming. Looks like I was right in telling them that. Thanks for taking the time to source all of this information and put it out here. I've got too much other stuff going on these days to have the time to do it. But, I like to keep up with what's going on. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/06/15 at 16:05:09 Some are shocked at Intel's sudden decision to DE-emphasize their oh so precious laptop and desktop space and focus all energy their on the Data Center. Some are shocked that Intel is actually downsizing itself again -- drastically. I mean they just did that last year, right? In the aftermath of all this shocking news, some of the reporting arms of some of the big boys in the PC press are beginning to start forming the basis of a rational for all this sudden shocking stuff --- it isn't like it should be surprising to anybody after all since they got to watch it develop right in front of them. For example, PC World is doing a calm, after the dust settles through work up on Intel 14nm chipsets, starting with Haswell vs Broadwell, this time running them in identical products that literally ARE IDENTICAL, since the performance differential between Haswell and Broadwell is so weak and small it gets swamped by the slightest of product differences. The article is long and involves many tests that show some very slight differences between the 14nm chipset and the 22nm chipset from 3-4 years ago. "If you were to buy a laptop today, Broadwell is the way to go—if your options are between a Broadwell-based CPU and a Haswell-based one at the same price. If you have a Haswell-based laptop, however,there’s no point in upgrading to Broadwell. I don’t expect that many people who bought a Haswell-based laptop in 2014 are deciding to upgrade to one with a Broadwell CPU a year later just for the CPU." Here's the rub, the Broadwell 14nm costs sooooo much more money it isn't funny, and all those dollars buy you practically NOTHING for an advantage since the Broadwell chipset throttles so badly it constantly struggles to match the real world performance of the 3-4 year old Haswell chipsets. Intel certainly isn't getting anything super dooper out of 14nm to justify all the extra cost and now Intel has decided that the 14nm game isn't going to get any cleaner or any better for them going out into the future. So Intel is going to go off and play Datacenter by themselves for a bit now ..... ..... so you just go screw yourself, PC World and all the rest of you nasty article writing people. Remember, Intel just laid off a chunk of PC division bosses and is working on some of the troops now. They mean it. Screw you, PC ..... :P |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/06/15 at 16:30:35 If the old 3-4 year old stuff (and some of the 6-8 year old stuff as well) is performance equal to the current new 14nm stuff, what should a PC person do? I can give you my read on it, fresh this weekend. I toasted the power supply in my little Dell box, by stressing it and letting dust bunnies build up over the air vents resulting in a classic thermal kill. My bad, I killed it. Simple carelessness, really. My bad again, a new to me used power supply is $50 for the machine and please remember the machine complete only cost me $80 shipped to my door as a refurb wonder two Thanksgivings ago. Plus, who can guarantee that the power supply was the only thing that was thermal killed? Overheating is a systemic type issue, MB, Drives, Memory you name it can all be affected by excess heat to some degree or another .... Oh, what to do, what to do ...... Guess what, them marvelously powerful dirt cheap refurb wonders are still out there if you go look a bit, a whole NEW generation of them dusty wonders are coming off lease right now with whole better generations of processors and memory and hard drives, etc. compared to my old cheapie box and they getting sold off by the thousands all over the place even as we speak. For prices ranging from cheap to retail no less, depending on where you go to looking at them. So, go to the larger refurb houses and look for tail ends and leftovers for the very best deals. So, instead of paying $50 for a power supply, I bought a whole new larger machine with bigger/better everything for $87.95 delivered to my door. (them ungrateful sods actually charged me sales tax, the gall of them boys !!!!) and with a one year warranty included (wow, never had one of those warranty thingies before on a cheap refurbie unit). And, I betcha I can take them two each 2 gig memory sticks out of the existing slightly dead Dell box and plug them into empty slots in the new box to give me either 6 or 8 gigs of systems memory (depending on slots and stick sizes) --- won't that be nice? Now I will have me 8 full sized USB 2.0 ports on the new box, one of every other sort of I/O port that exists, a read write DVD drive and a read write CD drive and a 3.5 floppy drive plus a bigger stronger power supply and Win 7 pro already loaded on the 3x bigger hard drive just a salivating to be upgraded to Win 10 .... --- and I will likely just run Linux Mint on it all the time except when gaming an antique Win only game that is not out on Steam yet. THAT is what you do about Intel's current implosion --- you ride it like a little pony for all it is worth. :) For me, FASTER/BETTER in the future will likely come from a change in OS, not from better stronger hardware. The hardware I just bought for less than $100 is MANY times stronger than what I need to run Linux Mint --- 10 times stronger as a matter of fact. Please Remember, Win 10 is NOT any sort of performance improvement to anything, it IS THE EXACT SAME AS Win 7 as far as speed and performance goes. So a mid generation Win 7 machine is still a fairly fast powerful Win 10 machine too. In any case, dual booting the MUCH FASTER Linux Mint gives you the best of both speed and performance, while Win 7 (or Win 10 as the case may be) can give you "the same old Windows experience" you have suffered through for the last 15 years (but hey, you apparently have managed to convinced yourself that you "really need" to have it around, right?) And yes, you really can buy what you really need in a 3.3 gigahertz Core 2 Duo rig with 4 gigs of systems memory in a full sized Dell business class tower (with the larger power supply) from Dell Leasing or from one of the many other Ebay resellers of the huge mass of just coming off lease business level machinery. Remember, the Ebay guys are a lot cheaper ...... $87.95 delivered to my door. (them ungrateful sods charged me sales tax though, the gall of them boys !!!!) ;) http://https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/1e/Las_Trampas_Waterfall.jpg/800px-Las_Trampas_Waterfall.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by justin_o_guy2 on 07/06/15 at 19:04:44 I'm still trying to decide if I want Spacely sprockets or Cogswell cogs.. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/07/15 at 20:50:04 Buy you a older model Rosie the Robot, they work out really really well and they don't cost you an arm and a leg in upkeep and if they break you just go get another one for dirt cheap. (then you got spare parts already in the house) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by verslagen1 on 07/07/15 at 20:53:53 1F3C3436353C3C3522500 wrote:
I'll never give up mine, I'll just cobble her back together with whatever I find. ;D |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/08/15 at 07:28:28 http://liliputing.com/2015/07/microsoft-cuts-thousands-of-jobs-in-phone-division-will-continue-making-phones.html Microsoft cuts thousands of jobs in phone division "The company acquired Nokia’s smartphone division last year for over $7 billion. Apparently the company hasn’t really made back that money in sales… because now Microsoft has announced it’s cutting about 7,800 jobs, mostly in the phone business. The company is also recording an impairment charge of $7.6 billion in assets and up to another $850 million in restructuring charges. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/lumia-640-xl.jpg In other words, a year after taking over Nokia’s smartphone business, Microsoft is taking a write-off for a figure that’s even higher than the acquisition cost, which suggests that revenue from Lumia smartphone sales hasn’t been stellar in the past year." This also says to me that MS dumped a lot of "tech support" dollars into MS phones that went nowhere after they were built, and now MS is having to write them down/scrap them world-wide since they can't sell them at any reasonable price. This also says to me that the level of people cuts being done right now equals the entire level of cuts from last year, which is sorta scary for the future of the company. At the same time Intel is leaving PC space as their primary emphasis we got MS is dropping all pretense at having a Nokia based MS phone system, period. BUT, remember MS is in bed with Qualcomm now to make something better ...... Coming this fall, MS Win10 Phone !!! ::) ..... yeah, right |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/09/15 at 11:31:25 People are beginning to contrast the Intel lay off with the Microsoft layoffs. The Microsoft layoffs are public and all the details are known. The Intel layoffs are top secret and are somewhat illegal since Intel took a large tax cut this year from the states they live in so as to not lay any people off. Intel argues that they are not doing a layoff, but are reorganizing, so there is no violation with the tax breaks. Still, hundreds per Intel location are getting pink slips ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/09/15 at 12:30:01 http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/07/09/technology/ibm-announces-computer-chips-more-powerful-than-any-in-existence.html?_r=1&referrer= IBM and partners build the first 7nm chip Even the chip guru at Intel admits that Intel's 14nm is not going anywhere nor is their 10nm nor is their 7nm "that really don't exist at all yet" products as they are currently brown vapor concept-ed at Intel. So where did Samsung's successful 14nm process come from? And where did the 10nm process come from that went into production several months ago at Samsung? And where did this impressive super small, suspected to be very low energy "entire computer complete on a single die-set" 7nm delight come from? It came from IBM research as reflected in the IBM Global Foundries Samsung Consortium Initiative. Now IBM is releasing the newest generation of that consortium initiative which is a 7nm process. Remember, Samsung is already in possession of the 10nm process and is running it on Apple chipsets right now. http://static01.nyt.com/images/2015/07/09/science/09chips1/09chips1-articleLarge.jpg Things do not look good for Intel right now. That is an entire computer balanced on that guy's finger tip, the processors, the memory, graphics, the whole shebang all on one chip. And it is a current RISC Power PC design, you know, the stuff Apple and IBM designed together -- you DO remember them, don't you? :o Shove that little finger-full of lube up where the sun don't shine, Intel. It'll ease the pain of them 14nm 'roid attacks right off, it will ...... make it feel right insignificant, really. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/09/15 at 16:59:35 http://www.wired.com/2015/07/windows-lost-smartphones/ Microsoft ---- IT ENDED, not with a bang but with a whimper. And a memo. Today, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella announced that the company would be scaling down its mobile phone hardware business. Nadella called the company’s dramatic course change a “restructuring.” He used phrases like “effective and focused” and “long-term reinvention and mobility.” But make no mistake: Today’s announcement (7,800 layoffs and a $7.6 billion write-off, mostly related to Microsoft’s phone business and its purchase of Nokia last year) is a letter of surrender. The guy who wrote this article makes the point that Microsoft hinges everything being able to run their software on all platforms but they are giving up on phones and that's the one platform they HAVE to be on to ever HAVE that future. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by justin_o_guy2 on 07/09/15 at 19:13:48 Monsanto,Microsoft, Archer Daniels Midland, Coca-Cola, I'd miss them all like bunions. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 07/09/15 at 19:41:17 And yahoo, has this story about IBM and the new 7nm chip.... https://www.yahoo.com/tech/s/ibm-computer-chips-obliterate-everything-else-market-154808759.html |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/09/15 at 20:05:23 ttps://www.yahoo.com/tech/s/ibm-computer-chips-obliterate-everything-else-market-154808759.html "What’s the fastest computer chip you can think of? Now, forget about it, because IBM announced it has created the fastest computer chips ever made. The firm’s new chips are four times faster than today’s top-of-the-line silicon, and they’re also significantly more efficient." http://https://s.yimg.com/os/en_US/News/BGR_News/intel-7nm-chips.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/09/15 at 22:29:47 It must really suck being Intel right now --- really really suck NOT being the "intellectual leader" any more, not even in the brown vapor bullshite mindspace land that the Intel PR group has lived in for so long. You do realize that IBM is deeply involved now with Apple, and Samsung, and Global Foundry? Whatever IBM can conceptualize and prove out as a new process, then Samsung can build it using Apple's yearly production lots to prove it out and fine tune it, just like they are doing with 10nm as we speak. Global will swing in there about 1-2 years later on, as they have money to buy the equipment once it is proven out completely. Intel has nothing to even go play by themselves over any more ..... and running off to Data Center Land isn't going to be a functional dodge except for mebbe about a year's worth of delaying the inevitable. "Stockholder perceived value" in the Intel new 14nm Data Center Products is headed down the toilet bowl soon enough when a competitor shows up tossing 10nm chipsets up on the table. Intel's investors are not really endlessly self-deluded and the choir boys have nothing to sing any Intel hymns over any more ..... the only thing Intel got out of 14nm so far was a very mild decrease in energy consumption, which gets zeroed out if they push the chip some to get some "equal performance" compared to their old 22nm stuff. Plus, a 14nm wafer is so much more expensive to run there is no size/yield $$$ benefit to be had so far. Current and upcoming IBM/Apple/Samsung patents should hold up in court should Intel go to copying as Samsung and Apple have both the guts and the technical chops to go string Intel up over any patent infractions. >:( 2x and 3x turbo mode my arse ---- Intel's days as a misleading "technical dictator" are over. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/11/15 at 17:33:35 http://www.pcworld.com/article/2887772/how-to-turn-your-old-phone-into-a-basic-pc-for-cheap.html http://www.amazon.com/Onedayshop%C2%AE-Docking-Station-Charger-Samsung/dp/B00L1X4MVS/ref=pd_sim_sbs_107_5?ie=UTF8&refRID=069Y2WVR7BNRVP5X2ZZH Oh, my Goodness --- According to PCWorld them durn Android phone boys are at it again ...... ::) http://https://cms-images.idgesg.net/images/article/2015/02/base-2-100569644-large.jpg http://https://cms-images.idgesg.net/images/article/2015/02/base-1-100569643-large.jpg http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51ZG7VWw8hL._SL1000_.jpg They now have a term for these generic dock thingies. "Smart Dock" is what they are called. Prices are less than $30 for most common Android phones. ========================================================== HOWEVER, once you pay for the dock and the cables and the Playstore Andronium software you will have about as much money in it as my $87 Dell/Linux Big Black Monolith --- and trust me, the Big Black Monolith effortlessly kicks phone butt every day of the year and it still doesn't speed the fan up any at all. AND, to prove the Monolith is an actual improvement, I loaded up the same movie that killed the last box (running the ATI card extra bright to clarify the dark dark motif used in the movie) and I watched it all over again. Was it a fair test --- NO --- no dust bunnies choking up the air vents. Still, the big box did flawlessly. http://pcbranded.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/dell-optiplex-780-computer-komputer-cpu-pc-branded-bulit-up-bekas-second-murah-jakarta-pcbranded.jpg http://suzukisavage.com/cgi-bin/YaBB.pl?num=1436610941 if you are curious |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Art Webb on 07/11/15 at 22:24:15 I'd be tempted to get the smart dock just to not have to pay for internet service for my PC, especially with the issues I been having |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/12/15 at 06:00:12 Art, none of these things mean you don't have to have internet service. To use all of the most modern tech, you must have internet service, and a wifi router. Trying to use a phone carrier to replace internet service is a bust due to phone carriers overcharging for everything. It would be a very bad move. The flow is the other way now, using house and business internet service (running through a wifi router) to replace what the phone carriers are overcharging for. To properly understand these things, you need to get a wifi based router into your house, which last time we went through it with the Chromebox you still hadn't done. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Art Webb on 07/12/15 at 06:49:07 My cell service includes unlimited internet, which I already pay for, and am not abandoning for wifi based cell service, because I need phone service when I'm not at home, too, so the payout there is a null factor (using it for a primary web browser wouldn't cost me any more than I'm already paying) My primary reason for thinking along these lines is not due to cost, though lowering my monthly payout would be nice, but because I have TWC Roadrunner, and ever since they started negotiating to sell theirselves to Comcast, I've been having to reset my cable modem multiple times a day, which I suspect is due to the 'someone else is gonna own all this soon, why bother to maintain it?' syndrome, so why would I pay the ISP who's doing this crap more money for a wireless connection that won't be any better? that's just silly IMO What I ought to do is find another ISP Probably go back to DSL, as Roadrunner was faster when they first hooked me up, but has now slowed to typical DSL speeds Not sure how to go about that with no home phone service |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/12/15 at 11:14:12 It is year's end for MS and Intel and they are rolling up their fudgy numbers for their stock holders. It is also the appointed time to kill off unsuccessful plans from this year and replace them with something more profitable for next year. You will read lots and lots of scary numbers. like PC lost 14% market share this past year and Chromebooks increased by 27%, but please, just remember that these figures all are comparisons back to themselves and not to their competition nor to the total market of devices (which would be REAL and meaningful numbers, but these sorts of numbers are intentionally AVOIDED by both Intel and MS because they don't WANT their stockholders to get a real picture of anything as it would possibly scare them off). http://static2.businessinsider.com/image/555c3121dd0895a53d8b45af-1552-1164/cooling-tower-demolition-implosion.jpg In truth, all of MS is really only about 10% of every computing device out there, and Chromebooks are about 2-3% of that same figure and both together are just a wee pimple on the butt of greatly increasing daily smart phone sales world-wide. You see Intel and MS both shedding entire divisions like a tree sheds leaves in the fall, and yes their branches will look sorta bare for a while. But in both cases the companies are making room for new leaves and new (profitable) businesses that will come out of the investments they are currently making in the Internet of Things. So, don't morn, when big black monoliths like my Dell box can be bought for $60 (yes, soon enough that will be true) and don't morn when new devices won't run a DVD any more -- button style USB drives will be the delivery mode of the future for new movies and games and such if it isn't by download 100% anyway (as much is today). The big future will be the Internet of Things, where every device is smart because that "smart enough to be smart" just costs pennies now days, so why wouldn't it be? ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/13/15 at 09:45:09 http://www.extremetech.com/computing/208968-report-claims-intel-will-delay-10nm-cannonlake-cpus-substitute-new-14nm-products Report claims Intel will delay 10nm Cannonlake CPUs, substitute new 14nm products in place of the downsized product. http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/Intel-Xeon-E7-Ivy-Bridge-EX-Die-shot-348x196.jpg Well, this one counts for a two-fer. Two big goof ups for the cost of one. In the same announcement Intel says 10nm Cannon Lake isn't ever coming ...... ever ..... AND they announce that Skylake will be re-concepted as Kaby Lake which will be a different product class completely. How different will be determined later once they design it. What does all it mean? Intel's new smaller stuff isn't working out at all, so they are ditching it and going back to the drawing boards yet again, intending to get 14nm to work correctly before digging their hole deeper and deeper with more failed die shrinks past 14nm. Or else to invent a new name and create some broad but reduced product claims that fit more exactly what Intel's 14nm reality will actually provide in a production grade non-sorted direct ship-able product. ;) Watch out, that range is "2-3x turbo" range so look for some new creative writing to go on here. Also, please note the Intel road map up through 2017- 2018 just got trashed --- oh well. This is one heck of an Intel come back to the day old IBM announcement of their functional 7nm chipsets, huh? ::) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/14/15 at 09:24:28 Prediction time: Intel continues to "fix" their 14nm stuff, making up as many new processor names as needed. Eventually, they will fix it and ship it in real volume. You may notice a remarked similarity between some of the failed current 14nm Broadwell offerings and some of the 1-2 step down "not named yet" type offerings in the future, so watch out for smeared ink on the chipsets from the ink removing and re-imprinting steps. Remember, there is also a large mass of sub-par silicone out there from all the Apple lots being sorted for good/bad too ..... Intel skips over 10nm completely since they have no tech coming on board to build it with. Instead, they eventually use IBM's Germanium Extreme Ultraviolet lithography production system at 7nm. Not wishing to repeat their "go it on their own" massive screw ups yet again, Intel pays royalties to IBM and licenses the real IBM tech that seems to work so well for Samsung and Apple. Intel's high cost posture limits what they can do competitively against Samsung and Global Foundry, but Intel now has a functional pathway to survive through the next 5 years. Intel survives, but loses their ever shrinking Apple business completely during the struggle years. Apple gets stronger and stronger, taking more market share away from MS PC. Samsung continues work on 10nm for Apple for shipment next summer, builds them on time and ships them successfully on time. Between Samsung's and Global's production of 14nm and 10nm and 7nm the top end of the ARM world continues to make progress for the next 3 years in small steady incremental steps. Apple designs a 7nm chipset to run on the new IBM process (or else rewrites their software to run on the IBM PowerPC chipset that already exists right now). Apple's need for new progress for 2017-2019 has not gone away with Intel's big "womping around floundering wildly" 14nm mess that they have going on right now. Microsoft with Win 10 stays pretty much embedded in PC land and makes little progress moving into phones and mobile space. Lacking a phone basis, their attempts in IoT are of minor impact as higher cost and increased complexity are not MS's friends any more. Android folks find a relatively complete smart dock standard is already sitting there in Android M and the Oriental World embraces their new more powerful cell phones sitting in a dock on their desk as their main PC experience. Google Android slowly accepts all the FOSS bits and pieces (such as resizable windows and menu bars) that the orientals write into the Android open source code to support these docked uses. Google does not actively participate in the mad rush to phone/PC, but Ubuntu and Microsoft duke it out to be first to get there. Google and Linaro just quietly accept and standardizes what free and open source dockable marketplace can come up with. http://liliputing.com/2015/07/ubuntu-phone-gains-landscape-support-paves-way-for-mouse-and-keyboard-support.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/ubuntu-phone-rotate-680x413.jpg "Ultimately this paves the way for something Canonical is calling Convergence: the ability to treat your smartphone as both a mobile phone and a desktop computer. Since Ubuntu for phones shares a code base with Ubuntu for desktop or notebook computers, the idea is that you’ll be able to use mobile-friendly apps on the go and hook up a keyboard, mouse, and display to run full-fledged desktop apps when you’re at home or at the office. Microsoft is building a similar feature (called “Continuum for phones”) into the next version of its Windows operating system for smartphones. But both Microsoft and Canonical suggest that their desktop/smartphone hybrid software will require a fair amount of processing power: both companies say that you probably won’t be able to take full advantage of the desktop-style features on current hardware. You’ll probably need to buy a new phone… once new phones that support Convergence/Continuum are available." |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/15/15 at 18:08:50 http://liliputing.com/2015/07/acer-cloudbook-laptops-with-windows-10-coming-soon-for-169-and-up.html Acer Cloudbook laptops with Windows 10 coming soon for $169 and up http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/cloudbook_05-680x495.jpg OK, here come the real Chromebook killers --- the Cloudbooks !!!! Acer is likely to use the exact same hardware as a Chromebook on at least one model so the playing field on that one should be level and smoooth -- so let the contest begin !!!! May the best player win market share !!!! Fight !!! |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/16/15 at 07:04:16 http://www.kitguru.net/components/cpu/anton-shilov/intels-kaby-lake-to-replace-skylake-next-year/ http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/07/intel-confirms-tick-tock-shattering-kaby-lake-processor-as-moores-law-falters/ http://liliputing.com/2015/07/intels-upcoming-kaby-lake-chips-will-still-be-14nm.html Intel breaks the tick tock cycle -- stuck on 14nm tock tock tock http://www.kitguru.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/intel_kaby-lake-1024x792.png What does this mean? By this new schedule Intel will still be stuck on 14nm while Samsung and Global are producing 10nm stuff for the world and then Samsung will be swinging over to 7nm for the current crop of Apple chipsets while Intel is still struggling to keep Kaby Lake cooled down well enough to perform worth a shite. Also please note that Intel, 3 years from now, still plans to still be making 2 part chipsets (full systems integration still not achieved). ::) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/16/15 at 07:32:14 Let's talk odds for a bit. We got 3 years of "no progress" laid out before us by Intel's new schedule --- what are the odds that the market is going to change DRASTICALLY in the next 3 years? Pretty good odds on that one, I think. Go read the first page of this thread and see how much has changed in just the last year. Intel has laid out a future of 2 part PC daughter-board style chipsets --- what are the odds that "something else" will come along inside that 3 years to supplant PC style chipsets pretty much completely? Is Intel just going to refill its deep pockets in the Data Center World for the next few years so when "something else" comes along they can jump on it before it moves along right on past them again? Think of Intel as a hungry cat, coiled up over there on the sidelines, ready to pounce ...... (don't get sleepy, kitty, eyes open all the time) :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/16/15 at 08:40:49 Reading between the lines ...... Intel is out of it for a while, sidelined, because of 14nm thermal problems. They will intentionally sit over there in Data Center Land until the fur quits flying over in phone space. MS has partnered with Qualcomm to make their phone/PC happen. Qualcomm has leaked some benchmarks on their 820 chipset that clearly outdo the current Samsung Nexus 6 chipsets ...... (some serious hardware, in other words) Samsung however is calmly sitting on a running 10nm process with a 7nm process under development and some significantly improved ARM designs (aka Core A-72 gen 2 stuff) so they do have a comeback ready to go. Plus, Samsung understands what Apple and IBM and Qualcomm are up to ..... they are building the chipsets for all of the above, after all. And Apple gets all ARM designs a full year before everyone else does, so ARM's unannounced brand newest can come into play quite quickly if it is needed. When the first big heavy duty shoe drops, it will be a PC class, laptop class, integrated cell phone chipset. When everybody else drops their shoes the phone/PC race will be on for serious as the hardware just gets better and better and better. When it starts to shake out and the power level gets on up there, Intel will then spring a unleaked, no brown vapor surprise on everybody. The very best they can figure out how to do. Intel has a whole lot of powerful non-efficient 2 part chipset daughterboards they can pull from. The Intel kitty cat will surely pounce on the things that run off of wall socket power ..... then be smacked in the side of their head bone by something else brand new from IBM research and Apple. Sounds like fun, huh ??? ;D |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/17/15 at 18:58:51 http://liliputing.com/2015/07/microsoft-cortana-assistant-for-android-leaked-a-bit-early.html Cortana for Android is out now, and MS intends for it to allow you to run Cortana on your Android phone and do Wifi interface with your MS Win 10 laptop or computer. If you think MS is trying to hijack all the Android and Apple phones out there and link them into Win 10 machines ..... you are RIGHT !!!! :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/21/15 at 08:07:27 http://liliputing.com/2015/07/toshiba-ceo-resigns-after-overstating-profits-by-1-2-billion.html Toshiba CEO resigns after overstating profits by $1.2 billion "Toshiba Chairman Masaha Muramachi will step in as interim president and the company plans to have a new team in place in about a month. According to the report, Toshiba’s leaders set goals that were difficult to achieve, leading lower-level employees to fudge the books to make it look like profits were higher than they actually were. Tanaka and other top-level executives were reportedly aware that this was going on, even if they didn’t directly ask anyone to falsify accounting records." This is the first of the hard results of the investigations into the fudgy behavior of major computing firms as the PC market declines ever more quickly and they still keep on declaring large profits similar to years past, which of course is patently impossible. Wall Street has decried Microsoft lately as they have shrunk and shrunk and shrunk the company in attempts to keep their declared book profits "up" by cutting heads, while Intel's last minute total restructure right at the end of last year's fiscal reporting period was seen by some as a desperate attempt to sweep some very large large large losses (way beyond what was actually disclosed) under the rug to be carried over into this year in hopes that this year would be better and Intel could buffer down those large losses within the recovery of a healthy PC division. Intel's 14nm tanked due to thermal issues and the PC recovery did not happen to any large degree. The PC rate of decline accelerated if anything ..... PC division is on the rocks at Intel now and has been "de-emphasized" in favor of Data Center. And now secret layoffs are occurring at all Intel facilities. Intel's secretive head cutting is nothing more than an attempt to cover more big losses ---- and because you do not know how many heads were cut (and exactly how many temporary people did not get recontracted) you do not know the size or scope of what is really happening at Intel. They do not want you to know. Secrecy is what protects their stock from crashing ..... and secrecy is all in Intel has going for it at the moment. Oversight scrutiny is now being given to all the major computing firms for doing Toshiba type similar behaviors, so expect some fiscal or legal disclosures to trickle out about the others soon enough. :P |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/21/15 at 18:58:30 http://www.microsoft.com/investor/EarningsAndFinancials/Earnings/PressReleaseAndWebcast/FY15/Q4/default.aspx Wow ...... Microsoft has got them some serious declining numbers that they are reporting for their 4th quarter. Fudgy numbers, yes, and really different TYPES of numbers from what was reported in years past, but declining numbers, all of them. Some areas that had little to no sales previously did increase some, but they can't wag the dog when the whole dog goes down 44% .... :P I hope free Win 10 makes MS a lot of free money to replace all the real money they ain't getting this year. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by old_rider on 07/21/15 at 20:55:15 ^^^ As they would say in the wallstreet market.. buy,buy,buy!!!! While it is cheap, before the world catches on that MS will allow side loading software. where did you get that its down??? https://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=MSFT Well ok, at 2pm it was down...by 4pm it was back up... LOL... :o ::) :P |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/22/15 at 04:47:00 You are talking today's stock market report, I am talking MS's own financial reports for the last quarter that finishes out their year. You are talking stock price, I am talking about financial reports that should help determine that stock price. MS is not making money in mobile or PC. MS is taking huge write offs for what they did last year with the entire Nokia mess. MS has shown they have no mobile anything going for them right now and are having to glom on to Android for their mobile future. I question the stock price right now based upon performance, but in a stock market fueled by endless 401K investment dollars pouring in from Joe Everybody with no regard to what the company is, or is not doing financially I guess MS is doing just fine. You can imagine that Joe Everybody is excited to see Win 10 coming and thinks MS is the best investment in the world, but stop and think a bit ...... For the first year, Win 10 is free to everybody that has an up-gradable installation. Nobody is buying installations this year and the PC world is shrinking by double digits lately. Business has not decided to upgrade yet. And won't for over a year. Where is the big influx of MS money going to come from? Microsoft SHRANK as a company last year, yet Joe Everybody rewards them by buying their stock like it was candy? In truth, MS stock is worth what people are willing to pay for it. So what makes them willing to pay more? If MS as a company shrinks by half, will people be willing to pay 2x more for their stock? :-? ????? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/22/15 at 05:13:11 Reuters doesn't wear rose colored MS glasses and Reuters sees it this way ........ http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/07/21/us-microsoft-results-idUSKCN0PV28Z20150721 "Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O) reported a $3.2 billion quarterly net loss, its biggest ever, as the company wrote down its Nokia phone business and demand fell for its Windows operating system. The company took a charge of $7.5 billion in the fourth quarter related to the restructuring of its Nokia handset business, which it bought last year. Microsoft's shares fell 4 percent to $45.38 in extended trading on Tuesday. Under Chief Executive Satya Nadella, the company has been shifting its focus to software and cloud services as demand for its once-popular Windows operating system slows. Sales of Windows to computer manufacturers to install on new PCs fell 22 percent in the quarter. The company is scheduled to roll out Windows 10 on July 29, a much-awaited launch after a lackluster response to Windows 8. Sales of Windows to businesses fell 21 percent from the year-earlier quarter, when demand for the operating system had surged after Microsoft discontinued support for Windows XP. Revenue from Microsoft's commercial cloud business, which includes offerings such as Office 365 and Azure, rose 96 percent, excluding the impact of a strong dollar. Microsoft said it added 3 million subscribers for Office 365 in the quarter, taking the total number of subscribers for the product to 15.2 million at the end of June. The company said this month that it would cut 7,800 jobs, or nearly 7 percent of its workforce, mainly in the phone hardware business. Microsoft reported a net loss of 40 cents per share for the quarter ended June 30. The company had posted net income of $4.61 billion, or 55 cents per share, a year earlier. Microsoft also took a charge of $940 million related to job cuts announced this month and last year. Excluding items, the company earned 62 cents per share. Revenue fell 5 percent to $22.18 billion." Let's just talk a bit about what went well for MS ...... MS sold 3 million in yearly subscriptions to Office 365 which gave it a 96% boost to last year's 15.2 million figure ???? Wow, that's encouraging, ain't it? ( 3 / 15.2 = 19.7% .... musta been a bunch of Azure tucked in there somewhere, right?) :-? uh ..... I think I did say some encouraging but somewhat fudgy numbers are being reported, right ?? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/22/15 at 07:44:24 http://imgick.oregonlive.com/home/olive-media/width960/img/oregonian/photo/2015/05/31/-f025c37e266f3d78.jpg Intel plans job cuts across the company, internal memo says http://www.oregonlive.com/silicon-forest/index.ssf/2015/07/intel_ceo_addresses_employees.html#incart_story_package Intel CEO on employees' layoff anxiety: 'This is the way a meritocracy works' Just read them. Or not since they are sorta depressing. The home folks in Oregon feel like Intel has been lying about these layoffs to protect some big tax breaks that Intel shouldn't have been given as they are NOT honoring the requirements to get those big tax breaks in the first place. It is clear that Intel is treating people as a business cycle dependent variable, not as people. It is also clear that this time Intel is letting people go with NO INTENTION of hiring them back, ever. From my perspective, it is clear Intel is doing a big shrink to get in line with their income again, this time realizing it is for keeps and documenting clearly that these folks have no right of recall or any expectation of being rehired, ever. Intel may well lose the big tax breaks next year, but in any case the ongoing layoffs are necessary and will continue as an ongoing part of each division's operating plan. In short, you match your manning to your income. Period. Manning is a business variable that goes down when income goes down -- and it does so routinely and immediately. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/22/15 at 08:14:57 So how are Chromebooks doing, BTW? Let's see what Time Magazine has to say ..... http://time.com/3892218/google-chromebook-laptop-sales/ Ultra-Cheap Chromebook Laptops Are Killing it This Year "Google’s line of Internet-dependent Chromebooks are increasingly growing out of their niche market. The laptops are expected to sell 7.3 million units this year, according to research firm Gartner. That’s a 27% increase over 2014. North America remains the largest Chromebook market by far, with six million of this year’s sales expected to come in that region." Don't get too hyped about it though, this is only 1-2% of the total computing devices number and is small potatoes compared to, well, anything else out there. It is huge however compared to Microsoft's attempts to kill it with chromekillers though. :D ...... as Microsoft thinks and shrinks and thinks and shrinks ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/22/15 at 09:43:16 Retrospect on this entire thread's run time ..... I got interested in Chromebooks as they were the best real challenger to MS's dominance of PC laptop space that has come along in a real while now. Linux, although "better" was never going to do the job because it was too fragmented and would disrupt itself like clockwork every 6 years or so when the community got a case of the shits over something relatively minor. Yeah, pissy boys, but they write good software. At the start of this thread the Far East wasn't being any help since the hockey stick boys couldn't pull anything much more that a dual core ARM stick out of their butts and even that wasn't supported past the point of sale in any real fashion whatsoever. ------------------------------------------ So, what transpired inside two years? Google was amazingly consistent in improving Chrome OS while making zero fuss over doing so. The software now runs off line, runs mainstream MS programs (including MS Office) and has crouton'd all of Linux and all of Android into its envelope. Meanwhile, MS has floundered its way into releasing Win 10 as a partial "PC only" release. Got lots & lots of promises from MS, but during the progression MS has let their yearly fee thing out of the bag and has gotten (and lost) several various partners along the way. Intel, taking their 14nm short sword firmly in hand, has committed honorable ritual sepuku with it and is now simply waiting in Data Center Land to finish bleeding out at this time. Or else waiting to heal up and then to pounce yet again -- we shall all see in good time, I suspect. ARM is in PC space now, firmly entrenched in laptops. Chromebooks were the entry point, but now next year the Win 10 expansion begins as MS Win 10 natively supports various ARM chipsets starting with Qualcomm's 820. Mediatek is the up and coming one to watch now, as low cost very good products will flow out of Mediatek's focus on low cost and high performance. Samsung and IBM and Global Foundry and Apple are acting to replace Intel's old spot as technological guru to the computing world. Samsung is currently building 14nm chipsets for Apple, Qualcomm and themselves. Samsung has a working 10nm line and is working with IBM on the 7nm stuff now as well. I think of Samsung now as a foundry that builds laptops, phones and tablets, just like Intel used to do. All new products are released in China now, and only come to the USA after a 1 year wait. ARM's next family of products is being developed right along with the lithography/design to make it happen, just like in years past. Since the next lithography isn't cooked yet, ARM is sitting on the chipsets until baking of the lithography/design is completed, run off, sampled and tested. Google, ARM and LENARO did a beautiful job of taking ARM processors from 32 bit to 64 bit, as there was no fuss or bobbles anywhere in the progression. ARM processors can now support as much memory as needed, and currently there are some 3 and 4 gig systems out there right now. It really isn't needed yet, but it is out there for when the ARM laptops need it starting next year ..... This thread needs to end and a new one needs to be invented, as Chromebooks grew and MS shrank and Win 10's roll out is really a different, separate story -- Win 10 vs MS Classic perhaps ??? The orient now knows how to use an Intel processor, but Intel is tired of giving them away and Intel wants to charge some "profitable" money for them, so that old story is about over as well. Intel has Chinese business partners that now that have rights to manufacture certain Intel chipsets --- question still becomes are there any Intel Franken-monsters that actually work any better than the lower cost ARM equivalent products that the oriental guys are already building? (hint: your $$$$ tech dollar fat cat bonanzas $$$$ are all over boys, so go get back to work) Since all OS products now support all processor types, what really constitutes the best chip/product mix now days ???? And with the advent of the phone/PC what does that do to change the entire environment around the question ??? ::) ...... rather completely, huh. TOTALLY no less. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/22/15 at 20:48:03 Qualcomm, we told you if you got into bed with Microsoft you were gonna get screwed over and catch the clap and sure enough, here you are now, all bent over examining table at the financial doctor's office getting probed and examined to find out just what sort of nasty diseases you did manage to pick up during your short stay in MS's boudoir ....... http://liliputing.com/2015/07/qualcomm-to-cut-jobs-reduce-spending-by-1-4-billion.html Qualcomm to cut jobs, reduce spending by $1.4 billion http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/07/22/us-qualcomm-restructuring-idUSKCN0PW2B620150722 Qualcomm slashes jobs and costs, says may split itself up "Chipmaker Qualcomm Inc (QCOM.O) said it may break itself up as it delivered its third profit warning this year and announced plans to slash jobs and spending in the face of rising competition. The company said it would reduce costs by about $1.4 billion, cut about 4,500 full-time staff, or 15 percent of its workforce, and boost capital returns to shareholders. Qualcomm shares fell 1.8 percent to $63.05 in after-market trading on Wednesday. The stock has lost a fifth of its value in a year. The move comes after hedge fund Jana Partners called for Qualcomm to spin off its chip business from its highly profitable patent-licensing income, among other changes the activist asked for." ...... oooh, nothing very good from the sounds of it -- you got you some transmitted thermal issues that came originally from Intel and you got some drippy oozy low financials from Microsoft and low and behold, you got what might be some severe and un-treatable 810 unsold High Inventory Virus from Samsung. And now they want to cut you in half just to see if they can save the better half of you ...... ....... but they can't seem to agree on exactly which half is the survivable part ...... :-/ sounds like them financial doctors are jest a guessin', don't it ???? There is a house in Redmond town, they call it Microsoft ..... It's been the ruin of many a poor boy, Qualcomm, we know you're one ..... Nokia, Qualcomm, Rockchip, anybody else see a praying mantis mating pattern going on here, or is it just me ??? Nobody gets into bed with one of the evil twins without dying shortly thereafter ...... It's like they have a long term plan to get rid of all the little guys, and since it is easiest and quickest they might as well start with the one that is nearest to hand. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/24/15 at 07:47:56 http://www.fanlesstech.com/2015/07/exclusive-skylake-boost.html Skylake is BBBBbbbbaaaack !!! On paper, anyway. Intel promises improvement in all facets EXCEPT PERFORMANCE. You can expect the chip to use less power overall and to have better built in graphics. It will also have more modern I/O functions and a better faster Wifi. The new chips will cost more. Since you are using a separate graphics card anyway, the only real improvement you will actually see is better I/O and Win 10 and Cortana on the software side. It will also have a as stock a FACTORY REQUIRED massive heat sink and fan as part of the new smaller CPU / GPU daughter chip package. To keep the same old performance level the chipset cannot be allowed to get even very warm or it will throttle back to be less speed than what you are replacing. Not a word is being said about mobile (yet) ...... http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/skylake-leaked-slide_01-680x374.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/24/15 at 09:36:28 Question for MS and all their Scroogled stuff from years past ...... What would those Pawnshop guys have to say about a laptop OS that has to be connected to the net all the time simply get all of the OS to be available to the user? Would they hoot and scoff at such a product, even more so than they did in the Scroogled ads? One wonders if MS should be required to apologize now that they are even worse than the old ChromeOS? ;) And them MS Cloudbooks require twice as much systems memory and twice as much flash hard drive memory. BTW, Chromebooks with Crouton activated no longer require an internet connection at all for full ongoing functionality ..... They work off line just fine, with everything being there and completely usable with no "pause to go get that" delays all the time like Cloudbooks will have. ::) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/24/15 at 09:47:34 http://www.howtogeek.com/208368/how-to-run-a-full-linux-desktop-in-a-browser-tab-on-your-chromebook/ http://cdn3.howtogeek.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/ximg_54c83a8155ff3.jpg.pagespeed.ic.-rr2ziZmL9.we Speaking of which, it is now easier to install and run Crouton with your Linux showing up in a browser tab like every other software does. No more bouncing back & forth with funny 3 part keystrokes. Plus, quick links and cut and paste will all now work between Linux and Chrome and Android apps when you do it that way. Plus all the notifications and links to your Android phone will now all work in all apps now. Chromebooks can run Chrome, Linux, Android and Microsoft products all together, all at the same time ...... You gotta admit, what's not to like about that ???? ...... and except for the Microsoft products, it is all FREE for you to jest go get it !!!! The guy who honchos the Crouton project actually works for Google as his day job, so he is a pretty good knowledgeable type programmer person. As are many of the supporting programmer people. Crouton is well liked by everybody as it is true FOSS and fully open in what it says it wants to do, and then it seamlessly goes does what it says with absolutely zero fuss and bother. And Crouton answers the question "What happens when your device's Chrome lifespan ends?" Answer is apparently that with Crouton in place you scarcely have the ability to notice any change as ALL of your extra stuff keeps on updating and improving. And the ChromeOS keeps on doing its job managing all the traffic back and forth. :) FOSS, you gotta love it ---- it just keeps getting better and better. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/25/15 at 07:46:11 http://www.extremetech.com/computing/193469-windows-10-is-great-but-it-wont-stop-the-pc-from-dying-and-taking-microsoft-with-it Win 10 is not enough http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/windows-8-windows-7-android-google-trend-graph-640x237.png Google search trends for Windows 7 (blue), Windows 8 (yellow) and Android (red) "I’ve now been using Windows 10 for a month, and though it’s still just an early version with lots of rough edges, I’m convinced that it’s going to be a solid desktop operating system for the world’s billion-odd mouse-and-keyboard users — when they finally decide to upgrade from Windows 7 or XP, anyway. It has been slowly dawning on me, however, that Windows 10 is a lost cause; even in a best-case scenario where Microsoft delivers the finest desktop OS to ever grace humankind, there’s no getting around the found that Windows 10 is an attempt to revivify a slowly dying beast. Since the mid-to-late 2000s, the PC industry has mostly been treading water or steadily declining, while smartphones and tablets have enjoyed disgusting levels of success that are way, way beyond peak PC. In 2013, global smartphone shipments — not all cellphones, just smartphones — exceeded 1 billion units. PC shipments maxed out at around 350 million per year in 2010, and are now starting to decline quite rapidly." I think Win 10 serves to challenge a "settled" industry (yeah, I include the Linux and Android guys in this challenge) to get off their contentment and do something a little more adventurous with what they do. Win 10 integrates spoken interface Cortana into a desktop motif, which is good to use at home but would kinda suck in a quiet cubicle office world setting. Here's the harshest fact --- Microsoft and Intel have competitors now that have been kicking their butts for 3 years running, no matter what the old Wintel guys did. No matter how much money they threw at it last year, within 3 months the effects of those mega bucks went back to the same old same old declining trend. Win 10 will be counted a success for MS by me if it tides them over until they cook their next tech, be it the phone/PC or whatever else it winds up being. Important thing is that MS be wide eyed and alert and be there when the new trend STARTS, and not be trying to get in on the 10th floor again, so to speak. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/25/15 at 16:20:37 http://liliputing.com/2015/07/intel-compute-stick-with-ubuntu-launches-for-100.html Intel Compute Stick with Ubuntu launches for $100, directly from MS or from Best Buy, Amazon or New Egg http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/intel-compute-stick.jpg It is a brave new world, where Intel will DIRECTLY sell you a built for Ubuntu device and in doing so flat show you in spec requirements and in dollars and cents the big difference that IS the Microsoft Tax ..... the MS based unit costs half again more dollars and REQUIRES twice as much systems memory and drive space and other system resources to run slower and do less. Furthermore, you can't tell me most of this year's mid to top end cell phones don't outpower this Intel built device by 3-4 times very easily ...... "phone docking" as your desktop is coming, soon enough. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/27/15 at 19:55:57 Prediction time I make them at least every six months and I have a better than 50% "correct" rate so far over the couple of years I have been doing these predictions. ........................................ Microsoft and Free Win 10 is just a serious concentrated effort to ditch all the old revisions and get rid of the upkeep workload and costs associated with them. Win 10 will always be free (EU is gonna tear MS a new one if it varies one iota from their advertised position). Win 10 will indeed be phased out or replaced with something else in a few years that is "pay me" from the get go, but you will be able to stay on Win 10 forever if you want to, for at least as long as the EU continues to force MS to do security upkeep on it. Them ad words "Free Forever" are gonna be haunting MS down the road a bit ..... PC is gonna fade down in 5-6 years anyway --- you can't do that double digit shrinkage thing but for so many years before there is nothing much left. THE NEXT BIG THING is coming ..... and I think it will be a cell phone integrated IoT type stuff that will fire up screens & keyboards and take input from your favorite pants leg keyboard or virtual googles (or something else equally out there right now). Toshiba, Samsung and Google all have 3-D glasses now, and there are projector phones out there already that project the keyboard out on the desk on your end and project the screen up against the nearest blank spot on the wall out the opposite end. Virtual reality 3-D googles exist now too, and plastic cell phone holders that will actually do the same thing using your existing phone as the near to your eyes screen. Your smart docking stations are out from multiple vendors for Android phones now. None of these things are yet the clearly identified NEXT BIG THING -- it hasn't risen up from the techno pack yet. The tech behind the NBT is under study in labs somewhere right now though. Count on it. Trust that Google and MS and IBM and Intel and Samsung are all diligently looking for the NBT -- the one who controls the NBT wins after all ..... And yes, MS is gonna try to make Win 10 the NBT ..... but it is really just more of the same and not really a new big thing at all. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/28/15 at 15:00:36 http://liliputing.com/2015/07/3d-xpoint-storage-up-to-1000-times-faster-than-flash.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/3d-xpoint_04-200x150.jpg Intel and Micron have announced a new type of memory technology called 3D XPoint that they say could offer speeds up to 1,000 times faster than NAND flash storage. The memory is also non-volatile: it can continue to store data even when the power is turned off. All told, Intel says 3D Xpoint offers a fast, cheap non-volatile alternative to existing SSDs, which could increase the speed and capacity of solid state storage while eventually bringing down the cost. Intel and Micron says 3D Xpoint also has another thing going for it: while NAND storage has a limited number of write cycles, 3D Xpoint does not. That means it could offer up to 1,000 times the endurance as well as 1,000 times the speed. At least that’s the theory. We’ll probably have to wait until next year to learn more about real-world performance (and the price). Smells like the death of all the hard drive builders to me ...... :P ..... but my sniffer tends to get bamboozled a lot by them brown icky fumes that generally come out with them groundbreaking Intel "early on" press announcements ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/29/15 at 18:19:21 Win 10 launched today. It was bad, very bad for the Redmond boys --- how bad is yet to be rolled up and totally known but there were several tech sites telling folks how to reverse the upgrade ASAP. People are being reminded of Windows ME, but ME wasn't this bad on intro day, seriously. ME just never could be fixed and they rushed XP forward as the fix it tool. Then they had to rush Service Pack 1 forward to fix XP's fix for ME. ;) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/29/15 at 18:34:21 http://www.windowscentral.com/windows-10-problems-experience Here is a well written listing of the major issues seen prior to Win 10 launch day. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/30/15 at 19:35:15 Day 5, Win 10 goes to work for the very first day ..... http://reviews.gizmodo.com/windows-10-day-five-1720608388 Just read it, for the good or the bad, just read it. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 07/30/15 at 19:38:28 Day 10 for the tester writer people, and Win 10 gets rolled all up neatly after 3 days of being out in the real world http://reviews.gizmodo.com/windows-10-the-gizmodo-review-1720872266 Boys and girls, there's an entire series of articles involved in this to cover the first 10 days of Windows 10 being used by this particular tech writer person and his crew. Each paragraph expands into a full article on that subject. And at the very end of one of the last paragraphs he drops these words of wisdom. "What you should take away from this is that your mileage may, can, and will vary. And, yeah, that you should probably wait a few weeks or months before you upgrade your personal computers. Everyone seems to agree on that." |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/01/15 at 08:58:45 http://www.extremetech.com/computing/210085-microsoft-acer-prep-new-cloudbooks-to-take-on-googles-chromebook http://www.extremetech.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/WindowsClouds-640x353.jpg Acer is going to use similar hardware to a Chromebook, but provide the extra amounts of memory and storage for fairly close to a same-same price. These will be the exact same specs as a "power user" Acer Chromebook uses, so a completely level playing field for this two player soccer scrimmage is very possible as the Chromebook and the Cloudbook duke it out physically sometimes next month. Acer can also provide a low end spec'd otherwise same-same Chromebook for rubbing some potential Chrome salt into the open battle wounds if needed. Same Same second party software is available for both platforms as well, with Libre Office and MS Office both being available to do comparisons both local loaded and cloud style. ;) ...... since Win 10 is really Win 7 with some new bodywork I suspect that Cloudbook is going to get its butt kicked all over the soccer field by the power up "same as" Chromebook unit and perhaps by the low end original spec'd Chromebook as well. GRAPHICS COUNT A LOT in these units, and MS might squeeze in a premium graphics chipset to partially overcome the porky OS. Still, this trick didn't totally work with last years Chromekillers, so the cloudbooks are on pretty much unknown turf to us in this years ChromeWars competition. ::) But if the $169 Cloudbook performs well at all, I suspect it will sell very well in general next year, taking most of its sales volume away from the more expensive Win 10 laptop lines. More pressure then will hit on Apple for creating a lower cost "equivalent" Mac unit as Apple will lose sales and units to both of these sets of players. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/02/15 at 07:38:32 http://liliputing.com/2015/08/mediatek-helio-x22-x30-chips-with-10-cores-on-the-way.html New MediaTek Helio X22, X30 chips with 10 cores on the way http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/helio-x22.jpg Holy Laptop Chipset, Batman !!!! its a phone chip though Six Cortex A-72 cores and four A-53 cores (plus one IoT core for "constant on" for download and call wake-up duty) Helio X30 4 ARM Cortex-A72 cores clocked at 2.5 GHz 2 ARM Cortex-A72 cores clocked at 2 GHz 2 ARM Cortex-A53 cores clocked at 1.5 GHz 2 ARM Cortex-A53 cores clocked at 1 GHz Once again, Mediatek is letting ARM's cat out of the bag before ARM has had time to announce the new Cortex cores with their new higher throughput speeds. :o I suspect new lithography levels are involved in this 2.5 ghz announcement as well. :o This smells like a real powerhouse chipset as right now only two (2) ARM Cortex A72s at 2 ghz and four (4) A53s at 1.5 ghz that makes up the most powerful chipset that is out right now for a straight ARM hard macro design. Six A-72s is an awful lot of scaleable processing power. somebody is thinking ahead with phone PC and laptops in mind Qualcomm may be forced back into rethink mode yet again ....... We never really think about it much, but Apple may need to reconsider what they are doing in 2016/2017 as well since Qualcomm and Mediatek and Samsung are all swinging much bigger clubs at each other's headbones in their own little personal donnybrook war. It wouldn't do for Apple to be getting lapped by the ARM boys, now would it? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/04/15 at 03:34:05 http://liliputing.com/2015/08/acer-launches-aspire-one-cloudbook-laptops-for-170-and-up.html Acer launches Aspire One Cloudbook laptops for $170 and up http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/cloudbook-11_02.jpg "The Acer Aspire One Cloudbook 11 features an 11.6 inch display and a 4,200 mAh battery for up to 7 hours of run time, while the Cloudbook 14 has a 14 inch display and a 4,780 mAh battery for up to 6 hours of battery life. The rest of the specs are the same for both models, including: 1366 x 768 pixel TN display Intel Celeron N3050 Braswell processor 2GB of RAM 16GB to 32GB of storage + microSD card reader 802.11ac dual-band WiFi Bluetooth 4.0 1 USB 3.0 port, 1 USB 2.0 port, HDMI, headset, and power jacks Dual digital microphones with background noise cancellation for voice calls, Cortana commands Windows 10 software + a 1-year subscription to Office 365 Personal Hoping for a model with more than 2GB of RAM or 32GB of storage? Acer currently has no plans to offer those options, and I’ve been told that the RAM is not user upgradeable. Acer will offer two versions of the Cloudbook 11 and one of the Cloudbook 14: Cloudbook 11 with 16GB of storage for $170 Cloudbook 11 with 32GB of storage for $170 Cloudbook 14 with 32GB of storage for $200" Let's scratch the surface a bit and see if we see any $$$$ support dollars $$$$ going into these items. First, Intel has to be giving away the processor, because it is a Braswell which is their brand new 14nm "Apple style" chipset. Intel has tons of these left over from sorting the original Apple shipments, so perhaps they have found a useful home for some sorted but not quite up to Apple spec chipsets. Have to see if the Cloudbook keeps the chip cool enough to beat the throttling issues though, as there isn't a fan in evidence here. Microsoft is likely supporting the item as well, because it sells for $30 less than the current Chromebook killer. Also note that the 16 gig unit and the 32 gig unit cost exactly the same, so obviously some memory is being eaten by somebody as well. Look for the reviews, because at $200 that 14" unit is likely quite a deal. Won't be that price for long though. The fight for Chromespace is on again !!!! |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/04/15 at 15:02:54 THE PHONE/PC ARRIVES FIRST FROM MICROSOFT first blood kinda sorta goes to the Redmond boys ...... because the continuum stuff kinda sorta works http://liliputing.com/2015/08/this-could-be-micrsofts-first-phone-thats-also-a-pc-kind-of.html This could be Micrsoft’s first phone that’s also a PC http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/lumia-950_01-680x382.jpg "The image show what seems to be a Nokia Lumia 950 smartphone, and as expected, it seems to be one of the first Lumia smartphones to support Continuum for phones. That’s Microsoft’s new software that allows you to connect a keyboard, mouse, and external display and basically turn your phone into a desktop PC. Run Office on your smartphone and you’ll get a full-screen, touch-friendly user interface. Connect your phone to a docking station so you can use it with a mouse, keyboard, and monitor and you’ll get a user interface that looks more like a traditional desktop app, complete with multi-pane views for apps like Outlook and windows that can be minimized or moved." It may not be perfect as is, but as a first shot it will serve to fire off a salvo of other PC/phones and docking stations. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/05/15 at 09:36:48 http://liliputing.com/2015/08/intel-skylake-is-here-for-powerful-desktop-pcs.html Intel Skylake is here… for powerful desktop PCs http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/intel-core-i7-skylake.jpg After skipping Broadlake and skipping all of the smaller Skylake chipsets as non-starters, Intel has jumped up to try Skylake in the very most powerful chipsets they make for the PC realm, the glory of the Gamers, the Core i7 superchipsets. Problem is, they aren't. Intel is caught again by the same thermal catch 22 that has stymied all the rest of the 14nm chipsets, if it gets even slightly warm it throttles to perform less than the 22nm chipsets from 3-4 years ago. :-[ "But if you’re looking for a gaming system? AnandTech reports that if you’re using a discrete graphics card, you’d get slightly better gaming performance by picking up a 4th-gen Intel Haswell desktop chip instead. Meanwhile, Hexus notes integrated graphics performance does for Skylake chips does appear to be a step up from earlier Intel chips." Duh, dude, nobody uses integrated graphics in a gaming rig. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/07/15 at 12:15:58 Verizon just caved in and did away with contracts. Now everybody but AT&T is now a non contract cell phone provider. Prices may still be different but the ideas are all the same now. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/09/15 at 08:03:29 Intel has flopped with 14nm Skylake now and has a fictional thing call Kabylake supposedly being designed for 2017, but what do they do for next year since all the past Skylake plans have turned into brown stinky PR poop? Why, lets take our biggest most powerful mainframe chipsets and see if we can 14nm size them and get people to buy them as a laptop chipset ..... http://liliputing.com/2015/08/intel-xeon-chips-coming-to-laptops.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/xeon-logo.jpg The gist of the trick is this, Xenon chipsets have been around a long time and some of the earlier ones were right sized for desktop and laptop use today if run on a 14nm process. Will they work better? Who knows, but they will be different. Think of it as reusing a trusted name brand and you might be closer to the reality mark since the Skylake name is all tarnished by thermal reality now and Intel cannot actually make the items shown in the Skylake roadmaps. So you rename what you can make as Xenon and see if it will fly that way. And who knows, perhaps the Xenon architecture isn't so prone to thermal throttling ...... (especially if you only publish claims for what the warmed up chipsets can actually really do) ::) .... and by repeatedly saying they are "mainframe chipsets" maybe you can get people to actually believe that slower is better, huh ??? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/10/15 at 17:46:37 http://liliputing.com/2015/08/google-android-to-support-vulkan-graphics-api.html Vulkan graphics API does away with drivers, GPU directly runs graphics mode with greater speed and definition. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/vulkan_01.jpg Watch this 1.2 minute video listed below, it will give you a seat of the pants feel for just about what this software change does to magnify existing modern GPU's efficiency and speed. What it does for GPUs actually built for it will be even better. Because of this compliant GPUs will get much faster and less expensive to produce. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_I8an8jXuM Jest watch it, in less than a minute you get the idea. [media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_I8an8jXuM[/media] [smiley=tekst-toppie.gif] [smiley=evil.gif] And Intel gasps in shock as the first fire hardened stake begins to slowly enter their posterior ..... everybody's existing compliant ARM based Mali graphic processors just got 25% better and all their really modern stuff that was actually designed around open source Vulkan just got >50% better -- completely eating up all the graphics progress Intel made last year ...... Poor Intel, with them having to 14nm downsize and re-use their old mainframe superpower chipsets jest to compete against excessively powerful cool running 10 core ARM cell phone chipsets that are being tossed at them by the armful by them hateful mean & cruel low cost hockey stick boys ....... and with good CHEAP built in graphics in them now to rub some extra salt in the open wounds too. And MS is actively supporting them now, too. Poor Intel, 2016 is going to be a hard year for you. Because of 14nm thermal throttling issues all you had going for you was 30% better graphics and now that has gone and faded away on you. Even if you do decide to support Vulkan you will just be one of many to do so. The new ARM Mali 890 and 900 series GPUs will be harder for you to beat because they will be designed for Vulkan from the very get-go. And 'ol Gamer Gabe over at Steam, well he LIKES that Vulkan stuff, a lot he does .... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vulkan_(API) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/11/15 at 17:54:44 http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/intel-skylake-u.jpg Ok, you can always believe what you want to, and as ol PT Barnum said "A sucker is born every minute". This is a listing of all the Sky Lake chipsets that may or may not ever come to pass, with the entire SkyLake family running into thermal slowdown issues that cause them to be less powerful and\or less efficient than the previous 22nm generation chipsets once they warm up. How bad is the thermal throttling? Core i7-6600U 2.6 GHz (3.4 GHz Turbo) This is the most "powerful" of the lot, clocked at 3.4 ghz when cold, but slows to 2.6 ghz when it gets fully warmed up. You pay a large 14nm "superchip" premium for an advertised 3.4 ghz chip, but you actually get to utilize is a 2.6 ghz chip (which is slower than its 22nm predecessor) once you get it to working hard doing something like a game. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/13/15 at 07:15:32 http://liliputing.com/2015/08/htc-lenovo-to-cut-jobs-due-to-declining-revenue.html HTC, Lenovo to cut jobs due to declining revenue America is not the world, sometimes we find ourselves just better off than the rest of everybody. Europe has sucked economically for a while, China has had a major economic "adjustment" now and the rest of the Orient is in the blahs now too. The flow of new computing toys to the USA has drastically decreased of late as Oriental manufacturers seem to be downsizing their companies and concentrating on the lower end of their product lines (because that is where their sales are). Take Xaiomi for example. This fall's new blockbuster isn't a premium phone at all -- it is the oriental equivalent of the Moto G ie. a very value filled lower priced phone. Why, because that is the only thing that is selling right now. http://liliputing.com/2015/08/xiaomi-redmi-note-2-is-a-125-smartphone-with-full-hd-display-octa-core-cpu.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/redmi-note-2_08.jpg "The Redmi Note 2 might not have as much memory or storage as some high-end phones. But its spec sheet makes the $180 Moto G look overpriced. Here’s what you get for $160: 5.5 inch, 1920 x 1080 pixel display MediaTek Helio X10 8-core, ARM Cortex-A53 64-bit processor up to 2.2 GHz 2GB of RAM 16GB to 32GB of storage MicroSD card slot 13MP rear camera with phase detection auto focus and a 5MP front camera 3,060 mAh removable battery Quick Charging 802.11ac WiFi 4G LTE with dual SIM support Infrared port for remote control functions" What to take away from this ??? When folks start selling Octacore chipset "worldphones" for $160 it behooves the Qualcomms and Apples of the world to pay close attention since their current $600 offerings are NOT 2-3 times better (nor even close to it). |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/16/15 at 08:40:57 Follow on story to the Lenovo cuts ..... http://liliputing.com/2015/08/lenovo-cuts-jobs-at-motorola-eliminates-team-responsible-for-moto-voice-moto-display.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/moto-x.jpg "Lenovo announced plans last week to eliminate about 3200 jobs, or about 5 percent of its total workforce. But it turns out one division will be particularly hard hit: Motorola. The Chinese PC maker acquired the Chicago-based phone from Google maker in 2014, but for the most part Motorola’s strategy hasn’t changed much: the company still continues to crank out a series of high-quality, low-cost phones with software that looks a lot like stock Android software. Now the Chicago Tribune reports Lenovo is planning to layoff about 25 percent of Motorola’s Chicago-based employees, which means eliminating about 500 jobs. The move isn’t a huge surprise: Lenovo is trying to streamline its operations in order to improve profitability, and the company already had a smartphone division before acquiring Motorola. Some of the Motorola jobs that are being eliminated may be redundant with positions already filled at Lenovo. But Phandroid notes that some of the cuts include the Motorola software and services team — which means some of the folks losing their jobs are the people behind the Moto Voice, Moto Display, Moto Assist, and other software designed to bring touchless controls, subtle notifications, and other features first introduced on the original Moto X." This unfortunately makes sense, as Lenovo makes and sells a Whole Lot of phones in China and in India and the Motorola subsidiary in the USA isn't selling near as many phones as it was doing when Lenovo bought it from Google. Lenovo made the purchase to get the Motorola tech and the counter suit IP and they have that now and have incorporated it into their domestic phone production division already. I still like my first gen Moto G just dandy, and I will miss Motorola when it goes away. Go and whack off 25% of the functions of a company and it tends not to recover, if you know what I mean. In this case, what has already been designed can be produced, but no more clever new models will come out in 2016 because the people that design them are gone. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/20/15 at 07:34:17 "WAIT AND SEE ATTITUDE" IS KILLING THE NEW WINDOWS 10 PC SALES Vendors are responding to users not liking the controversies and bad driver issues that have cropped up with Win 10. Vendors are also struggling to get all their own drivers in good working order to mate up with the every changing Win 10 OS. (yes, Win 10 is a moving target and they are notoriously hard to hit, aren't they?) No vendor wishes to ship a new product and get it back as a 90 day return due to some Win 10 this or that issue. Net result of this is fewer new Win 10 products are coming out quickly, and the vendors are continuing to offer Win 8.1 products in the interim. The adoption rate of Win 10 as a free upgrade has also slowed drastically as the number of issues become known. Win 10 and the 2015 Christmas season -- big question right now as the machines would normally be in production about now. :P |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/20/15 at 08:34:57 http://liliputing.com/2015/08/smartphone-market-decline.html Smartphone growth rate on the decline http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Screen-Shot-2015-08-20-at-7.46.20-AM.png "The smartphone industry may be slowing, but it is still growing. New regions have seen a larger influx of sales year-over-year. Areas of Asia, Europe, Middle East, and Africa have shown to be the fastest growing regions in 2015. The problem country seems to be China. According to Gartner, the country supplying 30 percent of total sales of smartphones worldwide declined for the first time year-over-year by four percent. Gartner attributes the decline to saturation. There are fewer first-time smartphone buyers in China, while the upgrade rate has not had enough of an effect. The report also divided out worldwide smartphone sales by operating system. An interesting note is that Android and iOS combined made up 96.8 percent of the entire smartphone market with Windows following far behind at only 2.5 percent of the market and BlackBerry OS at 0.3 percent. The “Other” category maxed out at 0.4 percent." ========== Americans find that they can upgrade their features considerably by buying a current mid-range phone and they are doing so by the scads and bunches. Most are not buying first line phones any more as the $600 single bite off contract price puts them off quite a bit. A sub $300 phone feels a lot better on the short term monthly budget. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by verslagen1 on 08/20/15 at 08:37:13 But I don't want an giant alien antenna probe stuck up my a$$ |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/20/15 at 09:34:18 If they didn't have that great big giant antenna sticking out of the ass of the Deathstar, then Luke Skywalker wouldn't have anything to grab on to upon free falling out of the reactor orifice. So Microsoft thinks you should have one, too. So here comes your own personal sized relatively large personal antenna to be inserted firmly up your ass to collect all your various signals to be continuously beamed back to the Deathstar's main antenna. :o zowie !!! That smarts !!! There are REASONS for everything MS does -- they just don't want to tell you what they are ..... |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/21/15 at 16:30:23 http://liliputing.com/2015/08/acer-aspire-one-cloudbook-with-windows-now-available-for-190.html Acer Aspire One Cloudbook with Windows now available for $190 Acer has come out with the first cloud book using Windows 10. The first difficulty so far is price, the Acer costs $170-$190 while Chromebooks are selling for much less. Part of this is having to use a MUCH BETTER PROCESSOR in the Cloud book in order to have some speed at all -- a Braswell processor costs more after all. Second difficulty is speed ---- Chromebooks are just naturally much faster than Windows 10. This is the same speed problem they had with Windows 8.1 because Windows is the same speed between 7, 8.1 and 10. Third difficulty is free softwares --- the Google software packages are free for five years or more where as the Microsoft softwares (Office) is only free for one year. Still we would like to see some mating pairs of Chromebooks and Cloudbooks come out the door from Asus and Acer exactly equal in spec so they can be compared very directly. ;D Now a 14" Win 10 laptop for $200 (as we are promised) would make a fine Linux machine if it isn't locked down too too much and thus too troublesome to change over. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by justin_o_guy2 on 08/21/15 at 16:38:18 4D6E6664676E6E6770020 wrote:
If anything ever happens to your account and you have to reregister, you can sign up with CoB as a user name. Correct as you may be, that doesn't mean that you aren't a Cynical ol' Bas****,,, |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/21/15 at 17:17:53 Justin, Is that a bad thing? Which is better, being a cob or wearing rose colored glasses? Do you even want to know that Microsoft is using your Internet bandwidth to push Windows 10 out to other users? Or sharing your router's password with your buddy list without your permission? [smiley=huh.gif] [smiley=huh.gif] |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by justin_o_guy2 on 08/21/15 at 19:41:12 Correct as you may be, that doesn't mean.... I'm not picking on you. Living in the fairy tale of We're number one, LannoThFray, HomoThBrayve, That's not reality.. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/22/15 at 09:58:15 Gettin' ready for something .... what that is in Android is unclear at this time. What is fairly clear is that NOTHING in Android requires that much storage memory, nothing. Win10 mobile might, though. ::) can you say Continuum ??? http://liliputing.com/2015/08/asus-unveils-zenfone-2-deluxe-with-256gb-of-storage.html Asus unveils Zenfone 2 Deluxe with 256GB of storage http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/zenfone-2-deluxe-special-edition.jpg "For the most part, the additional storage is the only thing that sets the Zenfone 2 Deluxe line of phones from the original Zenfone 2. Other features remain pretty much the same, including a 5.5 inch, 1920 x 1080 pixel display, an Intel Atom Z3580 processor, 4GB of RAM, 13MP rear and 5MP front cameras, Android Lollipop software, and dual-SIM support." |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/26/15 at 04:48:25 The Chrome Wars have really quieted down a lot. Microsoft has come out with Win 10 and it is as bulky and as 'not fast' as it ever was, with some new features tossed on top of the old mass to make it more appealing. What with all the new features requiring tuning all your settings 10 layers deep all the time Win 10 is potentially MORE fiddlesome than before. Remember, all the old fiddle functions such as defrag and virus check are still taking place, although you can figure out how to set them up to do such fairly automatically if you take the effort to do so. As Win 10 settles in, it is showing no great ease of use or nor any speed advantages to Win 7 and Win 8.1. Cost, apart from being price supported by Microsoft and Intel, is pretty much the same same since actually very little has changed. Still requires a big processor and a lot of memory compared to Google ChromeOS. Right now Win 10 is free though, although it is designed at a very deep level to lock you into MS services and MS softwares which are not free. People are no longer seeing Google as the primary "evil data collector" any more since MS has clearly taken that crown away from Google by greatly out-collecting them on all fronts. As a privacy violator, Microsoft clearly reigns supreme now. The EU pundits and open source folks have a new whipping boy to go sue now. Google is still taking the "slow evolve" pathway with Android and ChromeOS, having advanced both of them to the point of being capable of a full desktop experience. Google ChromeOS software is coming across as non-intrusive, quality checked, polished and refined compared to the raw edged, somewhat non-functional early Win 10 that is being pushed out right now. Win 10 driver support (especially on older machines) absolutely sucks right now. Google free machine and free software support lasts for 5 years or more, MS only supports the entire Win 10 for 2-4 years as far as "developing new features" goes, according to what is known at this point in time. Also, their free software that you get with a new purchased unit (Office 365 personal) only lasts for one year. There is a very clear difference in what you get, and for how long you get it. And the money you will have to spend on it ..... Chromebooks really do turn on and have you sitting fully functional inside 10 seconds. MS Cloud Books and laptops take 7 seconds to get you to you first open screen and an additional 3-7 minutes while they digest last night's forced updates. Then you have to load your browser unless you use Edge all the time (which is quicker to get to and quicker to use) but Edge is only partially functional at this point in time. To do the full range of tasks you still need to boot IE in the background and that is another load delay which takes place in mid-browse. The background "update grind" at startup is very noticeable on Win 10 as it slows the machine down and runs the fan up to full speed while it grinds through it. Given what is known about Win 10 and Microsoft's plans as announced by their bean picker's formal financial presentations to the investors (a fairly consistent information source, more so than the press release people) it seems that Win 10 will be free to those that qualify for the 2-4 years which is the currently planned life of the product. Win 10 will continue to evolve and pick up additional polish for 2 years, then the replacement "Windows Forever" will start to take over at that point as a true finished product with more fully integrated features but only on a paid subscription basis. What all requires the paid subscription is still to be determined, of course. So time-wise "Windows Forever" will be the equivalent of the old Service Pack 2 stage in the overall Windows saga ..... Until then, you are all just Beta Testers who are having your hard drives and emails read, location monitored, keystrokes recorded and you get to pay bandwidth charges to move the upgrades and nightly patches around in the world's largest involuntary P2P torrent that has ever existed. Also note this brand new rumored tidbit -- MS may be using your machine's idle time to do calculations in the deep background as well -- this is being looked into as we speak. There is a dollar to be made in providing data calculation services and MS wants that dollar although they lack the big Google data farms to do it on their own servers. So, they may be tapping your machine for these tasks at a very deep low priority level during idle times at night, etc. After all, you accepted the 1,200 page EULA without reading it and MS can do LOTS of new stuff now, you know. And that's a major difference, Google provides you with server calculation support for free to speed you up and MS uses YOUR MACHINE to provide themselves with upgrade/update pushing and potentially now they may be using your machine for doing other folks data crunching as well. Its like with ChromeOS, you own your machine and it stays out of your way as much as possible. With Win 10, it is questionable as to who exactly owns your machine any more. Late at night, when the house is all quiet, that tiny little chuckling sound you hear is your hard drive, doing something for somebody else while your machine is supposed to be idle and in sleep mode ..... Microsoft has shown no Windows plan that Big Business is interested in so far. Since Win 7 officially lasts until 2020 Big Business will insist that MS keep up with Win 7 until then -- and MS had better come up with something good inside that 5 years or by then Chrome for Business will be a fully realized competitor for them to overcome. But 5 years in this industry is a virtual forever -- entire new technologies will have come into being by then to disrupt all these future plans and future thoughts. :) |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Pine on 08/26/15 at 05:34:40 1C3F3735363F3F3621530 wrote:
Still rocking my Zenfone2 in the 64GB size. It now replaces any thumb drive I use to use. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/26/15 at 06:11:18 Asus has a good thing going with that "India spec'd" Zenphone. Since Motorola was cut 25% by Lenovo, I suspect that Zenphone may become the mid price leader over the next year, or until the Chinese units get their world LTE chips all straightened out and then come flooding into the US market. I think Continuum is coming for Zenphone along with a price supported Intel processor speed bump and a docking module to make it all workable. If it takes off good, then Asus gets to ride the tiger like they did with that first Chromebox -- they simply won't be able to make them fast enough. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/26/15 at 08:16:40 http://liliputing.com/2015/08/rockchips-light-work-os-is-android-with-a-start-menu-windowed-apps.html Rockchip’s “Light Work OS” is Android with a Start Menu, windowed apps http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/light-work-os_01.jpg "There’ve been a number of attempts over the years to make Google Android feel more like Windows by adding support for running apps in resizeable windows or adding a taskbar and Metro-inspired color scheme. Now Chinese chip maker Rockchip has launched a new solution. It’s called Light Work OS, and it’s a custom version of Android 5.1 that features a Start Menu, taskbar, and support for running apps in windows that can be positioned anywhere on the screen. The first tablet to feature Light Work OS will reportedly be a custom version of the Pipo P9 tablet with a Rockchip RK3288 processor, a 10.1 inch, 1920 x 1200 pixel display, 2GB of RAM, and 32GB of storage. The move comes at a time when low-cost Windows tablets with Intel Atom chips are competing with Android tablets featuring ARM-based processors. So it’s possible Rockchip tablets featuring it’s ARM-based chips more attractive by providing Windows-like features. Of course, most Android apps weren’t designed to be used in this way. Some companies are trying to turn Android into a desktop-style OS, but while there are Android versions of popular Windows apps like Office, Photoshop, and VLC, they don’t necessarily behave the way Windows versions would. Still, it’s interesting to see what can be done with Google’s open-source operating system that was originally designed exclusively for smartphones." People have been asking Google to carry forward into a real OS based off Android for YEARS now -- and I count like 5 companies that have tried to do it for them at this point in the game. Google always plays Switzerland and stays "above the fray" on these sorts of things, but they do put the capabilities into Android and document how you could do it in the tool kits that come with each new flavor of Android. So, any vendor CAN go there and do it and see if they can disrupt the market with a success when they try out their particular version. Rockchip has several RK3288 Chromebooks out now and now they have, as a company, come out now with an RK3288 Android OS version of the same sort of thing. All of these "Android as an OS" type things support exterior monitors, mice and keyboards, btw ..... ;) standard Android docking stations on the phones of course So, the Continuum saga continues ..... with an Android twist. Can the wave of Android PC/phones be that far behind? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/27/15 at 06:30:22 Google Android is getting questioned by pundits and users for lacking a proper base level clear support for multiple windows on large phones, tablets and the relatively few Android laptops that are out there. For years now they have been asking for this, no less. Google attempts to say if you want windowing it is available in ChromeOS and they provide the tools to do windowing inside the last two release kits of Android if you really want to do that, Mr. Device Maker. Vendors (5 so far) are floating some proprietary windowing versions of Android on their own, but no app guys will write to a one off vendor controlled non-open situation. And they won't unless Google makes it a standard part of Android. Windows 10 is coming to phones this fall with full windowing that has been working well for years now. If Google intends to drop this ball and let Win 10 Mobile come out being more usable than Android, so be it -- Google will lose some market share to a wave of higher cost Win 10 tablet and phone products that WILL DO what people want to do with their larger screen space. It is past time for Google to start focusing on Android growing up some more, and forget about treading on the feet of ChromeOS. Android M should have this windowing feature, but it doesn't except as a vague experimental thing at this time. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/27/15 at 07:10:02 http://liliputing.com/2015/08/report-motorola-team-to-take-charge-of-lenovos-smartphone-business.html Report: Motorola team to take charge of Lenovo’s smartphone business A few weeks ago we heard that Lenovo would be laying off 25% of Motorola employees and replacing some of those people with existing Lenovo staffers. Now the company tells NDTV Gadgets that in spite of the layoffs, it’s actually Motorola that will be leading Lenovo’s smartphone business from now on. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/moto-x-pure1.jpg Basically, Lenovo is merging the Lenovo Mobile Business Group with Motorola Mobility. What’s interesting about the move is that it’s Motorola’s management team that will be in charge: Former Motorola president Rick Osterloh will be in the leader of the new group. ====================================== People have been telling Lenovo that they were killing the goose that laid the golden egg in order just to have today's supper .... a very short term error in judgement with long term mobile death on the line. Lenovo apparently finally listened and is attempting to put Humpty Dumpty back together again. ::) We wish them luck in undoing what they did, but plunking in some oriental staffers is not going to replace the whole sections of high tech innovators that you just let go -- who have gone and gotten other jobs now. Remember, Xiaomi and OnePlus and all the other pure Chinese phone suppliers will be able to wipe the world price-wise once they get their radios right, and Mediatek is busy going about doing that as we speak. What Motorola offers is GOOD phones at reasonable prices, using chipsets from Qualcomm and software from Google. And yes, right now you pay $30-$50 more for them, but they are worth it as their radios and software all work 100% with USA service providers. However, when the price differential hits >$100 and the oriental stuff starts working on 4G LTE properly then the equation changes, it does. :-[ |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/30/15 at 03:25:56 http://liliputing.com/2015/08/intel-core-m-skylake-details-start-to-emerge.html Intel Core M and Core Y Skylake details start to emerge Core M3-6Y30: 900 MHz base speed with 2.2 GHz Turbo speed and 850 MHz GPU boost speed (thermal throttles 2.4 times) Core M5-6Y54: 1.1 GHz base speed with 2.7 GHz Turbo speed and 900 MHz GPU boost speed (thermal throttles 2.4 times) Core M5-6Y57: 1.1 GHz base speed with 2.8 GHz Turbo speed and 900 MHz GPU boost speed (thermal throttles 2.5 times) Core M7-6Y75: 1.2 GHz base speed with 3.1 GHz Turbo speed and 1 GHz GPU boost speed (thermal throttles 2.6 times) OK, time to talk about Skylake again, since Intel has abandoned their abandonment of all the previous announced configurations/roadmaps yet again and is now coming out with a brand new Skylake roadmap one more time yet again, except this time it is couched in these NEW somewhat weasel worded terms. "While they all have a thermal design power rating of 4.5 watts, Intel says they have a 3 watt “scenario design power,” which means they’ll typically use less than 4.5 watts. But they can also run at up to 7 watts for a performance boost." Wow, that sounds like a bunch of malarky, doesn't it? What does it really mean ???? Turbo rating is a somewhat fictional advertising number that a dead cold chip could be goosed to TEMPORARILY (a few 10s of seconds) if you goosed it dead cold right off the bat when you first powered it up. Thermal power rating is the upper limit that you can depend on a GOOD cooling system to hold it together or else the chip becomes toast shortly. You see this rating ONCE at the point thermal throttling kicks in and never see it again as you get your speed throttled down in stages to the point you simply can't get that hot again. Slow, but safe -- that's you now. Intel hates warranty returns, you know ..... Base speed is where you should expect a fully warmed up, completely throttled back through the stages, properly heat sinked chip to thermal throttle itself down to in normal real world uses. Push it up past this and ill things begin to happen, so Intel doesn't want you to go there. "Scenario design power" is a meatball averaged watt number that a designer should use to plan his best case battery usage and to plan his best case battery size, then he should up-size it 30% if he has any sense. Since the chipset is constantly all over the place (depending on task, temperature, time since started and the rest of the background load on the system) you really can't plan using any single number beyond this fudgy scenario design power number as everything is all in flux all the time. YOU NEED TO TEST YOUR PRODUCT and pick a battery size that really does the job for your customers. GPU boost is saying that the GPU can't really run at this speed except when it is dead cold, so it too will thermal throttle down to a lesser speed just like the CPU does. Since Intel makes such a big thing about their improved GPUs they don't ever actually ever really say what they throttle down to on the GPU as "having better GPUs" is really the only positive thing Intel has going for them at all right now. So, it's kept a deep dark secret ..... until the tester boys get hold of it. Before, Intel would have said they were 3 watt chipsets that ran at full (turbo mode) speeds using whatever ghz they ran when first stared up stone cold (which only had a 20 second duration lie since the chipsets thermal throttled to 1/2 to 1/3 of that speed withing 20 seconds or so as they warmed up). Hey, Intel used to really misrepresent a lot of things like this sort of stuff in the past. They still do, but this new malarky is different, more detailed malarky, a more confusing malarky (improved, even more devious malarky that before). Intel sells marlarky now, with a thick layer liberally smeared over the tops of their chipsets to increase their sales appeal. [b]Reality is that Skylake has not been a performance improving chipset at all] so far[/b, and so far the ones wrung out thoroughly by the tester magazines haven all panned out as slightly slower and not having any great energy saving to any real degree much at all either. A little bit under certain circumstances, but not a lot. They do have 25% - 30% better graphics this time around, though. This is real. Kinda. Sorta. Depends on how hot the motherboard gets, you know. Intel is TRYING to mend their misleading marlarky ways some and is giving out better "scenario based" data to the device builders, give them credit for that at least. However, Skylake costs a lot more and apart from the GPU has the same overall performance level as the 2 year old cheaper stuff. (I am being charitable, mostly the old stuff is faster). :P "If it sucks badly enough, what you need to do is to wrap it up in baloney and then sell the baloney" .... Handbook of Advanced Advertising Techniques. Hmmmmm ...... is baloney better than malarky? Which one smells worse ??? This stuff smells sorta brown and icky to me, so it isn't really baloney which is pink and smells like pig snouts. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/skylake_02.jpg |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 08/30/15 at 11:38:57 http://liliputing.com/2015/08/jide-remix-mini-android-pc-to-ship-in-october.html http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/remix-mini_001.jpg http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/remix-mini_07.jpg Google is still playing Chromeistic Budda Switzerland and leaving it to little guys like Jide to show everybody how to make Android into a real desktop OS. Open source has all the pieces now, so whenever Google actually gets ready to pull their thumb from their favorite Budda-orifice and actually go do something about it ...... like maybe clean it up and put it inside the Android standard? For when you plug your Android phone into the charging cradle that's attached to the keyboard, mouse and the big monitor? |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/02/15 at 10:43:46 http://www.zdnet.com/article/npd-chromebooks-outsell-windows-laptops/ NPD: Chromebooks outsell Windows laptops short term "Many people have resisted the idea that Chromebooks really were growing in popularity. Now, less five years after the first commercial Chromebook, the Samsung Series 5 and Acer Chromebook went on sale, NPD, the global retail research group, is reporting that Chromebook sales in June and early July had exceeded "sales of Windows notebooks ... passing the 50 percent market share threshold in business to business sales." ( please note that this is in the business to business sector only, not overall retail, and it is a short term number of a half of one year) http://zdnet3.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/2015/08/13/144e297b-9d91-400a-9388-f8f1b0d369e5/59cc6528fe1bba9cf55bb76d1a904f6f/npd-laptop-and-tablet-sales-2015.png "This comes after a year, 2014, when Google OS-equipped, Android and Chrome, devices saw a 29 percent increase, propelled primarily by Chromebook sales, while Apple devices, mostly iPads, dropped by 12 percent and Windows devices, largely laptops, declined by 8 percent. So far this year, Chromebooks have made notebooks the strongest B2B corporate client devices. Overall Chromebooks sales are up in U.S. B2B channels by 43 percent." ::) Chromebook sales in June and early July TEMPORARILY exceeded "sales of Windows notebooks ... passing the 50 percent market share threshold in business to business sales." Now this is really really really short term, but it does denote the first time Chromebooks took over the majority market share position, taking it away from Windows and Apple. \ And unless Microsoft can really go do something with their Win 10 Cloudbooks to take that share back, well, it is all downhill from there. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/02/15 at 14:07:08 I'm think I'm going to declare the business to business Chrome Wars is over and that Chromebooks have pretty much won in their price range --- when you take over 50% of the market share and you're taking it away from Apple and you're taking it away from Windows then I have to think Chromebooks are pretty much winning the Chrome Wars from a cold dead start 5 years ago. No one can declare an overall winner at full retail because Microsoft no longer permits their sellers to give out sales information on the Chromebook style (lower end) market segments. All information that is seen is based in regions and is very spotty when you do get any full retail based information at all. What is known is that before Microsoft shut everybody up Chrome was killing Microsoft at overall retail sales in that low end niche. Furthermore since Win10 is no faster than Win 8.1 and it costs more to produce a Win 10 Cloudbook than a Win 8.1 Chromekiller, so that is not helping to change this equation at all. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/02/15 at 19:53:23 http://liliputing.com/2015/09/acer-predator-6-is-a-gaming-phone-with-4-speakers-10-cpu-cores.html Here come the Media Tek 10 core chipsets, the very first one is shipping right now with 2 more waves to follow. http://cdn.liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/pred6_01.jpg It’s called the Acer Predator 6, and it features a 10-core processor, 4GB of RAM, a 21MP camera, haptic feedback, and four front-facing features. We know that it’s got a MediaTek processor, which means that it should pack a MediaTek Helio X20 chip (the only 10-core mobile processor announced that is shipping right now). That’s a processor that combines two 2.5 GHz ARM Cortex-A72 CPU cores, four 2 GHz Cortex-A53 cores, and four 1.4 GHz Cortex-A53 cores to balance performance and power consumption. The chip also features ARM Mali-T800 series graphics, support for 802.11ac WiFi, 4G LTE, up to two 13MP cameras, and 4K video recording. There’s also an integrated co-processor for always-on speech recognition and other always-on applications. Yep, a gaming phone ..... and it looks like it has a built-in controller system too. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/03/15 at 19:28:15 http://www.theverge.com/2015/9/2/9243997/acer-windows-10-phone-jade-primo http://images.techhive.com/images/article/2015/09/acer-jade-primo-100611881-large.png Acer’s Windows 10 phone will morph into a PC thanks to Continuum "Acer has unveiled its first "PC Phone" — a Windows 10 phone that will function as a PC thanks to Microsoft's Continuum. The device, named the Jade Primo, will ship with a suite of accessories including a dock, keyboard, and wireless mouse. The phone itself has a 21-megapixel camera with a dual-LED flash, a super AMOLED 5.5-inch display, and is powered by a Qualcomm 808 Snapdragon processor. Acer hasn't said anything about when the device might ship or for how much, but it looks like the Pocket PC dream might be getting a revival." |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by justin_o_guy2 on 09/04/15 at 08:43:18 Dude, get a JOB, write a column for the paper, or do product reviews for a tech mag, you're so much more informed in areas want to be informed in. Just submit a column every week for a few weeks to the editor, don't call, don't ask, just send,, include your contact info.. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by bobert_FSO on 09/04/15 at 09:25:06 I enjoy oldfellers posts. His compilations are an easy way to keep up with tech stuff. You know, if you aren't interested, don't open the threads. |
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Title: Re: The Chrome Wars Post by Oldfeller on 09/04/15 at 14:58:48 You notice they wait until I'm hundreds of miles away from anywhere that I could type in a post to have these little controversies. ;) our phones still work while we are down the mountain at Micky D's RETROSPECT I thought about this while I was watching (and listening) to Dave toss and turn on the top bunk on the first night at Simple Life. It was hot and sleeping wasn't coming ..... Chromebooks started out as a joke and became real and are now taking market share from MS but the reasons were mostly PRICE. Win 10 is simply more costly, both because of hidden license costs and the extra hardware that is required to run it. ChromeOS has become full off-line functional, but the irony is that Cloudbooks (MS) have become just as (or more so) internet dependent as Chrome OS is right now. PRICE still remains as the main differential, plus some folks are not going to like some of the flat out invasive items that are in the new MS Win 10 microcosm. Chrome OS is now mature, Win 10 is still being written, and now Android is coming up as the newest desktop disruptor with Oriental vendors putting out windowing versions of Android with office like packages already installed on them -- this initiative will continue to be driven by the Asian folks who flat out really prefer Android as that is what they learned computing upon when they first started lo these 5-6 years ago. In short, at Justin's request, this thread will now die ........ we got all the drama out of it that exists in it. (yeah, it might get replaced by something else though, you never can tell) |
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