Martes, Mayo 31, 2016

AMD Bristol Ridge APUs: Same Carrizo design, 20 percent more performance











AMD has fully taken the wraps off its brand new seventh generation APU architecture Bristol Ridge, which it announced earlier this year. It promises users around a 20 percent boost in CPU performance, and a 37 percent boost in GPU performance over Bristol Ridge's predecessor Carrizo, which launched in 2015. That's standard fare for generational updates, but what's most impressive is that AMD has squeezed this performance out of the exact same architecture as Carrizo: same 28nm transistors, same Excavator-based design.


At the high-end are the quad-core AMD FX, A12, and A10 chips, which come in 35W and 15W variants. Base clock speeds are as low as 2.4GHz in the 15W A10 and as high as 3.7GHz boost clock in the 35W FX. The FX and A12 come with up to eight GCN cores in a Radeon R7 graphics package, while the A10 comes with Radeon R5 graphics. All support DRR4 memory up to 2400MHz (versus 2133MHz DDR3 in Carrizo), which should give the on-board GPU a nice boost given how dependent its performance is on system memory.


At the mid- to low-range are the A9, A6, and E2 APUs, all of which sport a 15W TDP and more conservative clock speeds. Graphics take a cut too, with the A9 featuring Radeon R5, the A6 Radeon R4, and the E2 Radeon R2. Compared to Carrizo, these low-end chips still get a boost in performance, though, with AMD claiming clock speeds that are 1GHz higher, and up to 50 percent more GCN graphics cores. There's also support for HDMI 2.0 (finally), PCIe 3.0, and built in hardware decoding for MPEG, H.265, and VP9 video up to 4K resolutions.


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Lunes, Mayo 30, 2016

India Turns Down Apple's Request to Sell Used iPhones

iPhone-trioIn March, Apple submitted a formal request to the Indian government in relation to selling refurbished iPhones in the country. Today, however, Commerce and Industry Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that she is "not in favor" of accepting that proposal (via The Economic Times).
On Apple's proposal to import refurbished phones and sell in India, Sitharaman said, "We would not be in favour of whatever you may call them -- used but refashioned, remodelled, updated... used goods. We are not in favour of bringing them here."
The decision comes just days after the Indian government decided not to exempt Apple from a local rule requiring that 30 percent of goods sold by foreign companies be manufactured or produced within the country. India last year exempted retailers selling state-of-the-art goods from the rule, prompting Apple to file a new application in hopes of opening single-branded retail stores in India.





Apple is opportunistic about increasing its presence in India, where its market share is estimated to be only around 2 percent. Apple CEO Tim Cook, who visited India earlier this month, said the country provides a "really great opportunity" for growth, particularly after sales in the U.S. and China have slowed. Apple's revenue grew 56 percent in India last quarter, passing the $1 billion mark for the first time.





India has price-sensitive consumers, however, so Apple's inability to sell refurbished iPhones in the world's second most populous country may hinder it efforts to grow in the region. Cook has admitted that iPhones are too overpriced in India, compared to equivalent U.S. pricing, due to local tariffs.





"The duties and the taxes and the compounding of those takes the price and it makes it very high. Our profitability is less in India, it's materially less - but still I recognize that prices are high," said Cook, in an interview with Indian network NDTV. "We want to do things that lower that over time, to the degree that we can … I want the consumer in India to be able to buy at a price that looks like the U.S. price."





At least for now, those plans will seemingly not involve the sale of refurbished iPhones.

Tag: India

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Linggo, Mayo 29, 2016

SoundCloud's free “auto-mastering” audio tool is more of an auto-turd



Enlarge / An artist's rendering of SoundCloud and Landr's new, free "auto-mastering" computer system at work. (credit: Sam Machkovech / Jason Scragz)









First, the robots came for our factory jobs, then for our fast-food jobs. Now, they're aiming their laser-guided sights at... music-recording engineers?


On Thursday, the audio-processing company Landr (founded in 2014) announced its partnership with the hugely popular self-publishing music platform SoundCloud. SoundCloud users can now have their original tunes processed and "optimized" for free by Landr.


This news promises a different kind of audio-related snake oil than we're used to at Ars. We've seen plenty of products advertising instant audio benefits, from cords to pre-amps to DACs, which largely target music consumers. Landr flips its sales pitch by targeting music creators.


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Miyerkules, Mayo 18, 2016

Google I/O 2016: Assistant, Home, Allo, Duo, Android N, and More

Google hosted its annual I/O developers keynote at the Shoreline Amphitheatre in Mountain View, California today, announcing multiple new products and services related to Android, search, messaging, home automation, and more.





Google Assistant





Google Assistant is described as a "conversational assistant" that builds upon Google Now based on two-way dialog. The tool can be used, for example, to ask who directed the movie Avatar, and to ask which other movies he has directed, and Google should be able to isolate the questions from the conversation and provide answers.





Google-Assistant


The new Siri and Alexa rival, compatible with both voice and chat, will be widely available on Android, iOS, in the home, and elsewhere later this year.





Google Home





Google Home is a new Wi-Fi-enabled personal assistant device for the home that enables people to ask Google search queries, manage everyday tasks, enjoy music and entertainment, and more using hands-free "OK Google" voice commands.





Google-Home


The Amazon Echo rival features a clean, color-changing design with no buttons, a speaker on the bottom, multiple room support, remote control of Chromecast and other speakers, compatibility with Nest and other popular home automation platforms, and more.





Google Home can be used to make general searches, check flight statuses, track shipments, set dinner reservations, turn on lights or play music in certain rooms, receive real-time traffic and routing information, check your appointments, and more.





Google Home will be available later this year. Pricing was not disclosed.

Lunes, Mayo 2, 2016

Best Laptop Deals: $750 for MacBook Air

Life is about choices. This aphorism is especially appropriate considering the wide variety of alternative laptop and tablet configurations available. This week, we recognize this basic fact about opt...