| Column: Post-PC Era Won't Stifle PCs Posted: 01 May 2013 05:01 PM PDT "Post-PC era" objections Supposedly, the wild popularity of smartphones, tablets, e-readers, smart TVs, and hand-held videogames has brought us the "post-PC era." To hear some folks talk, PCs are not only in decline, but are almost as doomed as dinosaurs. For proof, they point to slipping PC sales and to troubled PC vendors like Hewlett-Packard. Steve Job talks about the "post-PC era" Maximum PC's editors have objected to this verdict, and so do I. Furthermore, I disagree with the pessimists who fear that weaker demand for PCs will stifle the development of new PC processors and platform innovations. If you are a PC enthusiast—and you wouldn't be reading this site if you weren't—happy days are still ahead. True, 10 years ago, I predicted that desktop PCs were destined to become tomorrow's mainframes. By that I meant PCs would no longer be the most popular computing platform and would be regarded largely as business machines for tasks requiring more processing power than smaller devices can deliver. I didn't say PCs would become extinct. After all, mainframes are still very important, although we often call them by different names ("enterprise servers," "cloud computers," "data-center systems," "supercomputers," etc). 
Are we living in a "post PC era?" (photo credit: thedaringjourney.com) It's also true that PC sales aren't climbing as they once did. But people are still buying more than 300 million PCs a year, and several developing countries still represent a healthy growth market. Frankly, sales would be better if Microsoft hadn't buried Windows 8 under a baffling user interface. As for HP, its troubles run much deeper than lackluster PC sales. The fact is that economics still favor big investments in PC processors. In 2012, people bought 750 million smartphones and tablets, but those processors accounted for only $6.2 billion in sales. Half as many PC processors reaped $31 billion. So although mobile devices are sexy, PC chips earn the big bucks. Tom Halfhill was formerly a senior editor for Byte magazine and is now an analyst for Microprocessor Report. |
| War on Korean Peninsula Could Have "Catastrophic" Consequences to Electronics Market Posted: 01 May 2013 11:47 AM PDT  Korea is a major supplier of electronics parts.
Analysts at IHS iSuppli spent some time pondering what would happen if current tensions in Korea escalate to the point of a war on the Korean peninsula, and what they determined is that it could theoretically cripple the global electronics business. South Korea is a major cog in the electronics supply chain, as it accounts for half of the world's DRAM output, two-thirds of NAND flash manufacturing, and 70 percent of the world's tablet display. IHS iSuppli says chaos would ensue if war were to break out in the region, and that it's such a serious threat, some forward-thinking technology firms are planning for such a contingency in the same way they prepare for other natural and man-made disasters that could negatively impact their businesses. "South Korea now plays a more important role than ever in the global electronics business. And with the supply chain having become more entwined and connected, a significant disruption in any region will impact the entire world. Because of this, it is important for companies to understand the magnitude of South Korea's role in the global electronics market—and to prepare for any contingencies," said Mike Howard, senior principal analyst for DRAM & memory at IHS. Such a scenario could bring about a quick and significant impact on consumers. According to Howard, even just a disruption of six months could halt the shipment of hundreds of millions of mobile phones and tens of millions of PCs. Food for thought. Follow Paul on Google+, Twitter, and Facebook |
| AMD Cuts Desktop Processor Pricing Up to 19 Percent Posted: 01 May 2013 10:57 AM PDT  In with the new, and in with price cuts too!
AMD recently launched a pair of FX-Series Piledriver processors, FX-4350 and FX-6350, and hot on heels of those new chips is a round of price cuts to some older parts. The Sunnyvale chip designer slashed the price of 10 chips in all, most of which received a double-digit percentage discount. In fact, the smallest price cut was 9.5 percent, and the two others that technically don't qualify as double digits were both dropped by 9.9 percent. Here's how the latest price lists shake out: - AMD A6-3600: $95 down to $77 (18.9 percent)
- AMD A8-3800: $105 down to $91 (13.3 percent)
- AMD A8-3820: $115 down to $101 (12.2 percent)
- AMD A6-5400K: $67 down to $57 (14.9 percent)
- AMD A8-5500: $101 down to $91 (9.9 percent)
- AMD A8-5600K: $101 down to $91 (9.9 percent)
- AMD FX-4300: $122 down to $108 (11.5 percent)
- AMD FX-6300: $132 down to $112 (15.2 percent)
- AMD FX-8320: $169 down to $153 (9.5 percent)
- AMD Phenom II X4 965 BE: $91 down to $81 (11 percent)
The AMD FX-6300 stands out as a particularly good deal after the savings, which costs just $4 more than the FX-4300. The FX-6300 is a six-core part clocked at 3.5Ghz (4.1GHz Turbo) with 8MB of L3 cache, 6MB of L2 cache (3 x 2MB), and a 95W TDP. See anything on the list that catches your eye? Follow Paul on Google+, Twitter, and Facebook |
| Newegg Daily Deals: Ultrabook Bonanza Posted: 01 May 2013 10:55 AM PDT  
Top Deal: Today's top deal is a portable Ultrabook with a discrete graphics card for a relatively affordable price. The Lenovo IdeaPad U410 is running for $550 (normally $800) and it comes equipped with a 1.7GHz Intel Core i5 3317 CPU, 8GB of RAM, and a GeForce GT 610M GPU. The laptop also has both a 750GB HDD and a 24GB SSD. Other Deals: Dell Inspiron i15z 15.6" Ultrabook with an Intel i5-3337U 1.8GHz processor and 500GB hard drive and 32GB SSD for $550 with free shipping (normally $750) Sony Vaio T Series 14" Ultrabook with an Intel i5-3227U CPU for $525 with free shipping (normally $700) Lenovo IdeaPad U310 13.3" Ultrabook with an Intel i5-3337U processor and 500GB hard drive and 24GB SSD for $550 with free shipping (normally $680) Toshiba Satellite U945 14" Ultrabook with an Intel Core i5-3227U processor for $480 with free shipping (normally $630) |
| 1,000 World of Warplanes Beta Keys Up for Grabs! Posted: 01 May 2013 10:17 AM PDT  Come get your free game key (first come, first serve).
Looking for a new flight combat MMO action game? Hoping you can find one set in the Golden Age of military aviation? Are you reading this right now? Well you lucky dog, we just so happen to have a whopping 1,000 beta keys for World of Warplanes to give away courtesy of developers Ukraine Persha Sutdia and Belarus Wargaming.net. World of Warplanes is a free-to-play game, but it's currently in closed beta, meaning you need a key to have early access. In World of Warplanes, you're able to build full-scale carriers of virtual pilots offering machines of several key areas, starting from the 1930s with biplanes and on up to Korean War jet fighters. It uses the same game engine as World of Tanks, though it's been customized for aircraft. 
There are several warplane classes to play with, including fighters, heavy fighters, ground-attack planes,and carrier-based aircraft with a total of 59 machines from America, Germany, and USSR. Intrigued? If so, then grab a key and check it out! We've posted all 1,000 beta keys to a shared Google Doc. Since we're dealing with a massive amount of keys, we've opened up the ability to edit and ask that you BOLD a key that you're claiming. That way others know it's no longer up for grabs. We're working on the honor system here and trust that our document won't become defaced or tampered with (keep in mind that it's a possibility, should you decide to access the document from work or a public PC). Should that happen, we'll have to close the document and post the keys in here instead, though we're trying to avoid that because it'll be difficult to manage. So, please play nice! World of Warplanes Beta Keys
Download World of Warplanes Update While the vast majority of readers kept the good times rolling, we ended up having to restrict the document to view mode only after a few NSFW images showed up. Bolded entries are still taken, so if you're hunting for a key, go down the list until you find one that works. We realize this isn't ideal. We'd like to thank the many, many users who were cool about this, and curse the one or two users who ruined it for everyone else. Follow Paul on Google+, Twitter, and Facebook |
| Lenovo Unveils ThinkPad S431 Touchscreen Laptop for Businesses Starting at $699 Posted: 01 May 2013 08:06 AM PDT  A laptop you can touch for well under a grand.
Go ahead Joan Jett fans, touch Lenovo's new ThinkPad S431. Lenovo's latest business friendly laptop sports a 14-inch touchscreen display wedged into a 13-inch frame and encourages finger tapping and swiping with Windows 8. According to Lenovo, it's also dressed to impress customers with an "elegant floating design," offering users a combination of style and substance. "The progressive design of our ThinkPad S431 will help small businesses impress their customers. We pack a punch behind that style, however, as we are committed to delivering genuine substance," said Jerry Paradise, executive director, Think Business Group. "The ThinkPad S431 offers an intuitive Windows 8 experience with the power needed to accelerate productivity." Lenovo says the S431 is one of the first ThinkPads to feature the company's OneLink technology, which allows users to connect to the ThinkPad OneLink dock using a single cable for dedicated video, additional USB 3.0 ports, and a GbE while powering the system. The system comes with 3rd Generation Intel Core processor options, up to 8GB of memory, and 500GB of storage space. Look for the ThinkPad S431 to ship in June of this year. The OneLink Dock will be available May 21. Follow Paul on Google+, Twitter, and Facebook |
| AMD Launches Two New FX-Series Piledriver CPUs Posted: 30 Apr 2013 11:07 PM PDT 
The FX-4350 and FX-6350 are slightly faster than comparable CPUs already in the lineup Advanced Micro Devices has added two new SKUs to its FX family of Vishera-based high-end microprocessors. The chipmaker announced the launch of the quad-core FX 4350 and the hexa-core FX-6350 CPUs in a blog post Monday The FX-4350 and the FX-6350 are essentially slightly more powerful variants of the existing FX-4300 and FX-6300, respectively. Needless to say, that they have much bigger power appetites as well. Boasting a 4.3GHz maximum boost frequency, 4MB of L2 cache, 8MB of L3 cache and 125W TDP, the $122 FX-4350 is said to offer 10 percent better performance than the FX-4300. When it comes to the $132 FX-6350, it features a 4.2GHz maximum boost frequency, 6MB of L2 cache and 8MB of L3 cache. Just like the FX-4350, the FX-6350 has a TDP of 125W and is around 10 percent more powerful than the previous generation. "Unrivaled. Unlocked. Unbelievable. These products might be new, but they are jam packed full of all the things you love about AMD FX processors," the company said in a blog post. "Fully AM3+ compatible, both 4-core and 6-core offerings operate in your 900-series motherboard." Follow Pulkit on Google+ |
