AMD Fusion pentru acasă

În cadrul CES-ului din Las Vegas desfăşurat în ianuarie, AMD anunţa platforma Fusion, o familie de unităţi de procesare accelerată (APU) care includ într-un singur cip tehno­logie multicore CPU şi grafică compa­tibilă DirectX11 cu performanţe la nivel de grafică discretă.

Este răspunsul AMD la tandemul Nvidia ION - Intel Atom, prima tehno­logie care a transfor­mat netbook-urile în echipamente pentru divertisment multimedia HD. Tot la CES erau anunţate porta­bile care se bazează pe Fusion de la majoritatea integra­torilor cunoscuţi. Contrar tuturor aşteptărilor, primii care au adus în România un laptop bazat pe această platformă sunt cei de la Sony, prin modelul Vaio YB.

Vaio YB este de fapt un Y la o scară redusă, cu dimensiunea ecranului micşorată de la 13,3 inchi la 11,6 inchi. Aspectul său este unul îngrijit care respiră acea eleganţă simplă tipică portabilelor Vaio, cu materiale şi finisaje de calitate, de aici poate şi preţul peste media pieţei. Nu este nici prea sobru, nici prea modern, astfel că se adresează atât tinerilor dinamici şi activi, cât şi celor trecuţi de o anumită vârstă, mai preten­ţioşi şi mai selectivi.

Platforma AMD Fusion care echi­pează acest mini-laptop combină un procesor low-voltage la 1,6 Ghz cu o placă grafică puternică Radeon 6310. Procesorul, alături de memoria RAM de 2GB, poate asigura o func­ţionare corectă în programele de bază pe care le-am utiliza: navigare pe internet, me­sa­­gerie instant, vizualizare sau editare do­cumente office cu un nivel de com­ple­xitate minim/mediu sau oricare alte programe care nu-l stresează prea tare, limitele sale superioare fiind uşor de atins. Dacă utilizaţi frecvent programe solicitante, de genul celor de editare grafică foto sau video la un nivel avansat sau al jocurilor de ultimă generaţie, nu acesta este echipamentul pe care îl căutaţi. Din punctul de vedere al perfor­manţelor sale îşi poate dovedi utilitatea mai degrabă într-un mediu casnic, fiind o posibilă unealtă de studiu pentru elevi sau studenţi sau pe post de un al doilea sistem, portabil. Este uşor, compact şi are destulă putere pentru ceea ce am avea de făcut în condiţii de portabilitate, foarte util în vacanţe. Por­ta­bilitatea este asigurată şi de auto­nomia de aproape 4 ore, în condiţiile în care a fost acceso­rizat cu un mouse fără fir, a fost conectat la reţeaua wireless, iar luminozitatea ecranului era aproape de maxim.

Dar să nu uităm că ne poate asigura din plin şi suportul pentru vizualizarea materialelor video la rezoluţii full HD, acestea rulând foarte bine în progra­mele cu suport pentru accelerare gra­fică. Totul se datorează plăcii AMD Radeon HD 6310, una care manevrează fără efort şi fără blocări conţinut video HD sau jocuri cu o complexitate medie. Poate fi utilizat şi în postură de player multimedia, portul HDMI fiind perfect pentru redarea imaginilor pe un tele­vizor cu diagonală mare. Capacită­ţile sale de divertisment nu sunt susţinute şi de sistemul audio, unul cu speakere mici, conform legilor firii, pe măsura dimensiunilor sale compacte. Aşa că este nevoie de conectarea la boxe mai performante.

Pentru transferul da­telor din reţea avem la dispoziţie cele mai performante tehnologii la ora actuală pe laptopuri - Ethernet Gigabit şi Wireless de tip N. Remarcăm şi pre­zenţa a 3 porturi USB 2.0, de ajuns pentru a conecta simultan un mouse wireless, un hard disk extern şi o imprimantă.

Ecranul de 11.6 inchi afişează o rezoluţie perfectă pentru dimensiunile sale de 1366x768 pixeli. Caracterele şi ima­ginile afişate pe ecran pot fi vizua­lizate confortabil, nu sunt nici prea mici, nici prea mari, nu obosesc ochii. Imaginile sunt clare, luminoase, cu o coloristică vibrantă. Am remarcat faptul ca finisajul lucios nu are reflexii deran­jante în lumina naturală. Tastatura asi­gură din plin suportul pentru redac­tarea fluentă şi rapidă, tastele excelent spaţiate şi feedbackul la apăsare fiind elemente plăcute la utilizare. Touchpad-ul răspunde excelent la comenzile tactile, dar cele două butonaşe sunt puţin cam rigide.

www.imidoresc.ro

Caracteristici tehnice

Ecran: 11,6 inchi ( 29,5 cm)

cu o rezoluţie de 1366x768 pixeli

CPU: 1.6-GHz AMD E-350

Placă Grafică: AMD Radeon HD 6310

Stocare: 320 GB

Memorie: RAM: 2GB

Conectică: Ethernet gigabit; WLAN 802.11b/g/n; Bluetooth(r) 2.1

Altele: Hi-Speed USB 2.0 (x3); 1 xHDMI out; MOTION EYE(r) digital camera

Dimensiuni: 202.8 x 25 x 290 mm

Greutate: 1.46 Kg

SO: Windows 7 Home Premium

Preţ: 2200 lei

Pro

- Poate rula materiale video full HD

- Portabilitatea, este uşor şi compact

- Construcţie de calitate

Contra

- Preţul peste media clasei

Sony unveils 17-inch, 25-inch professional OLED monitors

Sony will soon begin selling a professional monitor that contains the largest commercial organic light-emitting diode (OLED) screen yet produced.

The monitor, which is aimed at the TV and film production industries, will go on sale on May 1 and has a 25-inch OLED screen. A second model with a 17-inch screen will follow on July 1. (See a video report on the monitors.)

OLED is a flat-panel screen technology that rivals liquid-crystal display (LCD). OLED screens have pixels that contain an organic material that emits its own light, so screens using the technology can be made thinner than LCDs and are more power efficient. OLED also handles fast-moving images better and colors appear richer on the screens than on LCD, but large-size OLED panels are expensive to produce.

Sony is positioning the monitors for use in editing bays, satellite trucks and broadcasting control rooms. A high-quality picture is required for these so-called "reference monitors" and Sony said the OLED panels produce an image superior to LCD.

During a demonstration at its Tokyo headquarters, Sony played identical video footage on the new 25-inch OLED monitor and an LCD broadcasting monitor placed side-by-side.

The picture from the OLED screen was noticeably better, with richer and deeper colors. When the screen faded to black, the OLED monitor showed nothing but the LCD monitor continued to glow a light shade of grey because of its backlight.

Like a lot of equipment used in the broadcasting industry, the new monitors won't be cheap. The 25-inch model will cost ¥2.4 million (US$28,840) and the 17-inch model will cost ¥1.3 million. But while they appear expensive compared to consumer-grade monitors, the OLED screens cost only about 10 percent more than the LCD monitors they aim to replace.

Sony's launch of commercial 17-inch and 25-inch OLED monitors is a step forward for the display industry, which has made a habit out of promising bigger OLED screens then failing to deliver.

Despite several technical advances, flat-screen makers have had a hard time perfecting OLED production to the stage where it can reliably make large, flawless screens. Smaller size screens around 3-inches have proved no problem and can be found in many cell phones and portable gadgets, but larger screens have remained a hurdle.

The difficulty was most vividly demonstrated in late 2007 when Sony launched the industry's first -- and still the only -- OLED television. The XEL-1 had an 11-inch screen yet cost US$2,500, which was significantly higher than much larger LCD televisions on the market at the time. Monthly production was set at just 2,000 units.

A few months after the XEL-1 launched, Sony CEO Howard Stringer promised a 27-inch model "fairly soon," but it never appeared. Competitors including Samsung and LG Electronics also showed prototypes and also made promises, but they never got an OLED television to market.

On Wednesday, Sony didn't disclose any plans for OLED TVs.

Xoom 4G upgrade could take more than six days

Users will have to send their Motorola Xoom tablets away for a week in order to upgrade them to 4G, Verizon Wireless said this week.

The Xoom, the first device to run Google’s Android Honeycomb OS for tablets, works on Verizon’s 3G network and became available on Thursday.

When Motorola announced the tablet last month, it said users would be able to upgrade it for use on Verizon's 4G LTE network. At the time, Motorola didn’t say how it would manage such an upgrade.

Users can sign up to receive an e-mail notification from Verizon when the upgrade is available. Verizon said it would be “shortly,” while Motorola said the upgrade would happen in the second quarter.

To get 4G, users are instructed to first back up all the data on the Xoom and then send it in to Motorola. They should expect to be without their device for six business days, Verizon said. That means the process could take a week or more, since six business days would encompass a weekend.

There is no additional cost for the upgrade. The Xoom costs US$600 with a two-year Verizon data contract, or $800 without.

While there are other Android tablets available, the launch of the Xoom is being closely watched because it is the first to use a version of Android designed specifically for tablets. Previous tablets have used older versions of Android that were designed primarily for smartphones.

Hacker writes easy-to-use Mac Trojan

In a sign that hackers, like everyone else, are taking an interest in everything Apple, researchers at Sophos say they've spotted a new Trojan horse program written for the Mac.

It's called the BlackHole RAT (the RAT part is for "remote access Trojan") and it's pretty easy to find online in hacking forums, according to Chet Wisniewski a researcher with antivirus vendor Sophos. There's even a YouTube video demonstration of the program that shows you what it can do.

Sophos hasn't seen the Trojan used in any online attacks -- it's more a bare-bones, proof-of-concept beta program right now -- but the software is pretty easy to use, and if a criminal could find a way to get a Mac user to install it, or write attack code that would silently install it on the Mac, it would give him remote control of the hacked machine.

BlackHole is a variant of a Windows Trojan called darkComet, but it appears to have been written by a different developer. The darkComet source code is freely available, so it looks like BlackHole's author simply took that code and tweaked it so it would run on the Mac, Wisniewski said.

Mac OS X has been gaining market share on Windows lately, and that's starting to make it a more interesting platform for criminals. Wisniewski said that while Mac malware is still very rare, he has seen another Trojan, called HellRTS, circulating on file-sharing sites for pirated Mac software.