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.

Vivendi bets on video games with Activision deal

LONDON (MarketWatch) -- The video-game giant forged by the tie-up of Vivendi's game unit with Activision Inc. will be home to best-selling titles "Guitar Hero" and "World of Warcraft" and could have enough scale to challenge current leader Electronics Arts Inc.Vivendi , whose activities span recorded music, pay TV and mobile telephony as well as games, on Sunday announced the $18.9 billion deal with computer-games pioneer Activision.
The French group will own a majority stake in the combined company -- to be called Activision Blizzard -- which will rival Electronic Arts.The deal will be carried out in two steps. First, Vivendi's game unit, Vivendi Games, will merge with Activision and Vivendi will purchase $1.7 billion worth of Activision shares for $27.50 each, giving it 52% of the new company.
Then, within five days of the deal closing, Activision Blizzard will do a $4 billion all-cash tender offer to buy up to 146.5 million of its own shares, raising Vivendi's stake to 68%. The deal will bring together some of the hottest franchises in the game sector. Activision publishes the "Guitar Hero" series -- one of this year's best-sellers -- as well as the popular "Tony Hawk" and "Call of Duty" series. Its business model is based on selling games for a one-time fee of $50 to $60.
Vivendi, meanwhile, is a big force in online and PC games played by people all over the world at the same time. The company owns Blizzard Entertainment, which publishes the popular "World of Warcraft" online multi-player game. Most "Warcraft" subscribers in Western markets pay $15 a month to play, while users in Asia typically buy cards that let them play the game for various time periods.
The overwhelming popularity of "Warcraft" is what led Activision to consider doing a deal with Vivendi, rather than trying to crack the multi-player market on its own.
"We didn't feel we could deliver an audience experience like they have done," Activision Chief Executive Bobby Kotick said in an interview. "As we began to talk, we realized we had these incredible synergies and a common belief on how the market would evolve."
Kotick will run the combined company as CEO, while Vivendi Games CEO Bruce Hack, will serve as vice chairman and chief corporate officer. Vivendi does deal as euro nears all-time high versus dollar
Once combined, Activision Blizzard will have annual sales of about $3.8 billion for the current fiscal year. Electronic Arts, by contrast, is expected to generate about $3.9 billion in revenue for the fiscal year ending in March, according to consensus estimates from Thomson Financial.
But analysts noted that Activision will now have a big lead in the market for online, multi-player games that are especially popular in the Asian markets, including China.
The big prize in the deal is indeed "Warcraft," which is by far the biggest game in the sector, with about 9.3 million subscribers globally. The game accounts for the bulk of the $1.1 billion in annual revenues generated by Vivendi Games.
"When you look at it, there are only about 15 million people worldwide playing online multi-player games, and more than half of them are Vivendi customers," said Michael Pachter, video game analyst with Wedbush Morgan.
Pachter called "Warcraft" a "phenomenon," against which EA will have a hard time competing.
"There's something about 'Warcraft' that is different from every other online game in that it is so much better then any others at getting customers into the game and getting them to stay there," Pachter said. "Activision is taking a big chunk of the market that EA was trying to get into."
Societe Generale analysts also welcomed the deal from the point of view of Vivendi, saying it will reduce its reliance on the "Warcraft" franchise.
It added that the transaction is struck at a time when the euro is near an all-time high against the dollar and still leaves Vivendi with some financial flexibility.
Santander analysts also stressed the benefits of the deal for Vivendi, saying Activision is a "good quality assets" with renowned licenses. It also noted that the games sector currently has stronger growth than the media sector, in which Vivendi operates, and said synergies between video games and telecom assets are possible.
"All in all, apart from a deal in the French telecom sector, we believe this merger is one of the best deals that Vivendi could have done," the broker concluded.
Dan Gallagher is MarketWatch's technology editor, based in San Francisco.Aude Lagorce is a senior correspondent for MarketWatch in London.

Activision Blizzard

December 2, 2007 - Until today, Sunday wasn't generally regarded as a big news day in this industry. But that changed this afternoon when Vivendi and Activision announced that they were joining forces to create the largest game publisher in the world. The new company, Activision Blizzard, will not only own some of the most prestigious brands in gaming (Warcraft, Call of Duty, Guitar Hero, Crash Bandicoot, and others) but will also have a tremendous PC/console diversity in their catalog and stronger penetration into Asian and online markets.To get a few more details on this deal and to find out just what it means for the Blizzard brand in particular, we recently spoke with Blizzard Entertainment's president and CEO Mike Morhaime.IGN: Thanks for joining us, Mike. I know you're busy today so we won't take up too much of your time. Tell us in general terms what this is all about.Mike Morhaime: Basically, Vivendi announced earlier today that it's going to be contributing Vivendi Games, which includes Blizzard, valued at 8.1 billion dollars plus 1.7 billion dollars in cash in exchange for 52% of Activision Blizzard, which will be the new company once Vivendi Games is injected into Activision.If you look at Activision and Vivendi Games, I'm sure you'll notice that they're very complimentary businesses. Activision has a firm track record on the console side of the business with very strong franchises like Guitar Hero, Call of Duty, and Tony Hawk. Blizzard Entertainment is number one on PC and online. We've got the number one MMORG in the world with over 9.3 million subscribers. We have great geographic penetration in North America and Europe and we're the only western publisher that has a significant penetration in to Asia. We have the number one brand in Korea, China and Taiwan. So when you combine these two companies together, what you get is the world's largest and most profitable video game publisher that is the leader across all platforms, all categories and all geographies.From a development standpoint, at Blizzard Entertainment one of our values of course is commitment to quality. Activision is structured with independent studios and they give their independent studios quite a bit of autonomy. They believe very strongly, like we do, that the way to run a successful business in this industry is through developing high quality games. That's the only way to develop long-term value in your franchises and your businesses. Ultimately the only way to win is to create great games. I think that the combination of these two companies provides us with a very diversified, stable structure with which we can reward talent and continue creating awesome games.IGN: We saw in the release that Vivendi could own as much as 68% of Activision Blizzard by the time the deal is over. Who actually is in charge and what's the management system like? Do you think the new management will preserve the independent approach to managing their developers?Mike Morhaime: When you say "managing their developers," the Blizzard Entertainment structure remains unchanged. I will remain president and CEO of Blizzard Entertainment reporting to Bobby Kotick who is CEO of Activision Blizzard. As far as development and publishing, Blizzard Entertainment will continue to be a publisher of computer games and will continue to be developing and maintaining our intellectual properties as we always have.IGN: Do you know if the new company is planning to publish titles under the Sierra or Vivendi brands?Mike Morhaime: That, I don't know. I think that there's going to be a lot of discussion about what the brand strategy will be going forward. On the Blizzard Entertainment side it's very clear that the branding strategy is what it's always been. The Blizzard Entertainment brand will remain unchanged.IGN: Do you anticipate that Activision Blizzard will gain access now to some of Vivendi's television and film properties that aren't a part of the deal?Mike Morhaime: I don't know about television or film but I do know that Doug Morris [Chairman and CEO of Universal Music Group] will have a seat on the Activision Blizzard board so there are potential opportunities with Universal Music for things like Guitar Hero.IGN: Are there any plans to cut divisions or staff that have been made redundant by the two companies coming together?Mike Morhaime: I think it's really too early to talk about stuff like that. I do know that's not our reason for doing the deal. We felt that the two businesses are very complimentary and I think there's going to have to be an evaluation of projects that are in development and there will be a green light process going forward. Projects that don't look like they're going to be profitable won't get green lit.IGN: The deal indicates that Vivendi as it currently stands is worth 8.1 billion dollars. What's the value of the new combined company?Mike Morhaime: We're estimating the value of the new company at 18.9 billion. The way we calculate that is 8.1 billion dollars plus 1.7 billion dollars in cash divided the stake that Vivendi will be receiving which is 52%.IGN: How long has this deal been in the works? Who approached whom?Mike Morhaime: There have been discussions going on for the better part of a year. Originally Bobby Kotick gave Bruce Hack, CEO of Vivendi Games, a phone call. They met for lunch to chat about potential things the two companies could do together. Very quickly, it became very clear to both of them that there was a potential opportunity to combine the businesses because they were so complimentary.Then Vivendi was brought in and met with the Activision guys and was very impressed. I've met several times with the Activision guys and we've talked at length about Blizzard's philosophy on game development and game publishing and all the things that are important to us at Blizzard. We found that we shared a lot of the same values. We feel pretty comfortable with the Activision executives and feel like they're going to continue being supportive of the way that Blizzard Entertainment runs their business. IGN: It sounds like there are plenty of advantages to the deal. Is there anything about being part of an even larger company that you feel you'll need to watch out for in the future?Mike Morhaime: There isn't really anything right now. I think the biggest change for us is more spotlights from financial press, which we really haven't had to deal with in the past because we've been really insulated from that in the past. One of my jobs as CEO of Blizzard Entertainment is to insulate the developers from that distraction so we can focus on making games like we always have.

Britney and Paris top Santa's naughty list

NEW YORK (Reuters) - When Britney Spears and Paris Hilton open their stockings on Christmas Day, they shouldn't be surprised to find a lump of coal. A poll of American children released on Wednesday found that the two high-profile celebrities should top Santa's naughty list.
By contrast Disney star Hannah Montana, played by country singer Billy Ray Cyrus's daughter Miley, was overwhelming deemed the "nicest" celebrity among children aged 2 to 12 while actress Angelina Jolie was the choice for teenagers 13 to 17.
The online survey of 1,107 children was conducted by E-Poll Market Research, which specializes in celebrity and brand research, to gauge children's attitudes about nice, naughty, and the seasonal question of who makes Santa's list.
Spears, whose stint in rehabilitation, panty-less pictures, and custody battle for her children has won headlines globally, was awarded top "naughty" honors with younger and older children.
She was followed on the list by Paris Hilton who spent three weeks in jail this year on a driving violation.
The two women beat out Swiper the Fox from the television show Dora the Explorer, the Grinch from the book "How The Grinch Stole Christmas" and Darth Vader from Star Wars among children 2-12.
For teens, Spears and Hilton topped Lindsay Lohan, who spent 84 minutes behind bars this year for a drunken driving and cocaine-possession conviction, and Beyonce.
When asked what makes someone nice, children mentioned "cleaning up and doing chores," "sharing" and "being honest and polite" as ways to impress Santa.
On the flip side, they mentioned "not listening to parents," "being mean and bullying" and "being snobby" as behaviors exhibited by those headed for the naughty list.