So CES is this week. Palm launched new stuff. Intel launched new stuff. AMD launched new stuff. More importantly, NVIDIA launched new stuff.
NVIDIA has succeeded again in releasing another SoC that everyone wants. Hopefully they succeed this time at actually delivering it to everyone who wants one. Last time Tegra's only notable design win was the Zune HD, a largely forgettable media player that...well, everyone largely forgot about shortly after its release. But that was all it had. Earlier at the start of this blog I had gushed at the possibilities of its use in smartbooks, only to be disappointed at the close of the year by the absence of said smartbooks. Turns out Mobinnova (and others) was simply waiting for Tegra 2, and for good reason. Packing two out-of-order dual-issue FPU-enabled ARM Cortex A9s, it beats the shit out of Tegra 1. Every demo of a tablet (I guess some are calling those "slate PCs" now) or smartbook using Tegra showed a sluggish running system. The thing was simply not meant for full-sized computing endeavours, and let's face it, we're not even talking full-sized demands here. But Tegra 2 should have no problem handling any Firefox-browsing aspirations, and hell even some HD media and gaming on the side. Cooler still, it's built on 40nm. Usually side products like this--chipsets, bridge chips, NVIO, whatever else NVIDIA makes that's not a GPU--get second class manufacturing, but not this time. I guess it's a sign NVIDIA's really taking this seriously, and if worst comes to worst, I think they're banking on supporting themselves on this little "side product" if at all possible. Apparently they see the mobile SoC market as being worth billions, overshadowing any other market they've ever been in, so it could very well be the next big thing for them. Well, the only other big thing for them aside from GPUs. For now let's hope Tegra 2 makes it into some kickass products that we can actually buy.
OK so there are other things this week. AMD's got their DX11 mobile shit, rubbing it in the face of their competition who's going stagnant by the minute. Google's got their new phone, giving the iPhone the ol' "me too!" treatment that everyone else is giving it, and decidedly not blowing the smartphone market away. Intel is showing off some Moorestown stuff, beginning their encroachment of ARM's market. They're also showing off some wireless HD stuff, which isn't real wireless HD, in the way that it's not home theater material. It's more a video streaming thing for PCs, similar to StreamMyGame, only not shitty. It's costly though, since it requires custom hardware for the TV, and a new computer with the technology. Palm is talking up their Pre Plus, whose claim to fame seems to be expanded internal flash (whoopi), and migration to the Verizon network. It'll still be more interesting if (when) iPhone makes the move to Verizon, as at least when iPhone gets an upgrade, it's a real upgrade. Palm is also talking up new apps and games, but while it's nice gaming is being taken more seriously on cell phones now, until they work on framerate issues, up the ante in quality, and figure out a decent solution for controlling them, they'll still be clunky and irrelevant. But Palm gets the homebrew nod, and that's a pretty big deal in Apple's face.
What else...oh yeah. They demo'd Fermi, as promised, and it was just as much a letdown as feared. I suppose we should be impressed that it's functional at this point, and that it supports DX11. The only tidbits we get is more confirmation of the Q1 release timeframe, and that it's "ramping up hard", which sounds like some sort of innuendo. They also announced 3D Vision Surround, which is pretty much the realization of what I mused about in my rambling about the 5970. Then I talked about Eyefinity and 3D Vision getting together, but this is even better, because it's real and will actually work. All except no one cares, because they can't even get full HD monitors out with 120Hz support, or hell, they can't get the two or three that are out down to a reasonable price. So who the eff is going to have three of them? Oh well, more gimmicks to use up that excess GPU power, just like 32xAA and PhysX and whatever else they've got planned. Oh, and there also this pretty cool gaming netbook from Alienware, called the M11X. It's got a better GPU than Asus's UL80v, also CULV-based, so if it's priced the same, it should actually be a pretty interesting product, long as you can choke down the chasis design. Over $800, though, and it'll price itself out of the market.
CES isn't over so maybe there will be something more interesting in the next couple of days.
