Month: October 2019

Back in September, AMD announced its 64-core EPYC 7H12 processor – a 280 W TDP behemoth with an increased base frequency designed specifically for the high-performance computing market. Based on AMD’s Product Master list inadvertently published by the company earlier this week, the company may release more EPYC CPUs with an extended TDP.

As it turns out, the EPYC 7H12 will not be the only Rome CPU with a 280 W TDP. AMD’s Product Master document lists the EPYC 7R22 and the EPYC 7R32 with a 280 W TDP, as well as the EPYC 7V12 with a 240 W TDP. We have no idea whether these CPUs are to be released for the wider market, are for OEMs only, or if they are in the plans, or which market segments they will address. Meanwhile, a high TDP might indicate that AMD intends to release more processors for HPC in general or maybe even a specific HPC customer, or they might have a specific feature not available on other processors.

The document also mentions various EPYC CPUs with TDP levels of 180 W or 225 W, but nothing else is known about these processors.

AMD’s 64-core EPYC 7H12 with a 256 GB L3 cache features a 2.60 GHz base frequency, a 3.30 GHz turbo frequency, as well as a 280 W TDP. Compared to the EPYC 7742, the 7H12 has a 350 MHz higher base clock, a 100 MHz lower turbo clock, but a 55 W higher TDP. While the CPU is socket compatible with other Rome processors and support the same features, it is expected to be used primarily in large HPC datacenters that need a maximum sustained performance and that do not care about power consumption.

There is one important thing to note about AMD’s Product Master list, which is an internal document that contains OPN codes along with US ECCN, HTS, and CCATS codes that are required by the US export regulators. The paper lists hundreds of products, yet some of them are potential products that may or may not be released, whereas other are off-roadmap client-specific SKUs not supposed to be generally available. 

At Canalys Channels Forum last week, Lenovo finally revealed launch timeframe for its foldable ThinkPad X1 hybrid notebook that was first revealed in May. The company says that the machine is ready from hardware standpoint, but it needs its software partners to polish off their programs for the innovative unit.

Lenovo’s foldable ThinkPad X1 features a 13.3-inch OLED display featuring a ‘2K’ resolution that can be folded in half to fit it into a small bag. The hybrid notebook can be used in tablet, book, and clamshell modes to serve different purposes. It can also be attached to a stand or a dock for workloads that require a mechanical keyboard and a mouse. The foldable ThinkPad X1 uses an undisclosed Intel processor as well as Microsoft’s Windows operating system and is therefore compatible with a wide variety of software applications.

Milanka Muecke, director of global commercial communications and brand at Lenovo, described the foldable ThinkPad X1 device as a fully-fledged PC that fits in the palm of a hand:

“I have it right here and you can have it in your purse. It looks like a leather bound notebook that you can carry with you all day long, but it is a full performance PC that fits in the palm of your hand.”

Lenovo now expects to ship its foldable ThinkPad in the second quarter of 2020, though it is unclear when it will be revealed from April to June (Note, June is Computex). From the hardware standpoint, the product is sound, but software still needs certain fixes, according to Gianfrano Lanci, COO of Lenovo:

“It will start shipping probably Q2 next year. […] Hardware is ready, but we need to still fix certain things from a software point of view and that does not depend 100% on us.”

The high-ranking executive of Lenovo does not expect foldable ThinkPad X1 to be an immediate bestseller (probably because of price and other factors), but as a new form-factor it will enable Lenovo to tap into emerging market segments. One of the obvious segments that the foldable ThinkPad X1 will address will be high-performance tablets like Apple’s iPad Pro. Meanwhile, Lenovo will ship its device several months before Microsoft’s launch of dual-screen Surface Neo that targets the same segment.

It would be an understatement to say that ASUS’ Chromebook strategy has been a bit odd of late. When they debuted their very-excellent Flip C434 back in January at CES 2019, it seemed they had a clear vision as to what constituted a great Chromebook. The Flip C434 was and is a great example of a great Chromebook that brings nearly everything users would want to the table.

As the months wore on since then, the Flip C434 has been awarded as the year’s best Chromebook from multiple outlets and even seen pretty regular price drops from multiple retailers. As the price slid down, the number of users who considered it only rose. It honestly felt like ASUS won the year in the Chromebook space with their flagship and we only hoped we’d see another awesome Chromebook from the company around CES 2020.

Instead, we’ve had two surprise Chromebooks basically show up out of nowhere in the C425 and Flip C433. With questionable price tags, interesting design choices and odd availability, we’ve honestly been nothing but puzzled by their releases. With the Flip C434 dipping down near $500 on a regular basis, why would you release a nearly identical, mostly plastic version of the same Chromebook at almost the same price in the Flip C433? And at $399 in the C425, why release a mostly-plastic version without a touchscreen and without the convertible form factor? We honestly don’t know just yet and the holiday shopping season could see sharp discounts on both of these models, but there is a clear path forward on the more-premium ASUS Chromebooks, and it is shaping up to be a spec-sheet stuffer.

‘HELIOS’ – THE ASUS CHROMEBOOK FLIP C436

As Gabriel pieced together, the upcoming ASUS Chromebook Flip C436 looks to be a Chromebook based on the ‘Hatch’ family of devices. If we look at this commit file for ‘Helios’, we see clearly that in the model.yaml file that ‘Helios’ is set to be the base variation of ‘Hatch’ that comes equipped with a convertible form factor, stowable pen (possibly), touch screen, a 10th-gen Intel processor, and backlit keys.

What that basic file doesn’t lay out is the addition of NVMe storage in this particular Chromebook, but rest assured a variant of ‘Helios’ will be equipping the faster storage option. We can know this based on the latest commit we’ve found for ‘Helios’:

nvme: Add quirk for Kingston devices running firmware E8FK11.T Kingston NVME doesn’t resume properly from suspend-to-idle.

After resume it doesn’t get the the expected queue interrupts for command completions. With this quirk S0ix is working.

BUG=b:139262583

TEST=ran suspend_stress_test on Helios with kingston NVME.

Clearly, this shows ‘Helios’ being tested with NVMe storage, and as we know from previous implementations of this type of storage, its addition signals high-end internals and high-end hardware. Even if ‘Helios’ doesn’t get NVMe storage across the board, it seems there is a model variation of it that will, and that can only mean a premium design in on the way.

With all the questions around ASUS’ current Chromebook lineup, perhaps they are simply setting the stage and filling out the market with ASUS Chromebooks at every step of availability for consumers so that they can unveil a truly premium Chromebook without feeling like they have nothing to offer the rest of the market. This is clearly the path Acer has used to find a foothold in the market, so it only makes sense for ASUS to try and offer devices across the board for everyone. You can be assured we have our eyes on the Flip C436 very closely and we’ll be waiting to see what it is ASUS decides to deliver later this year or early in 2020.

Kingston on Monday announced its new KC600 family of solid state drives, and no, they’re not of the fancy PCI Express 4.0 variety. They’re not even PCIe/NVMe or M.2 form factor drives—the KC600 line unabashedly gives another go-round to the 2.5-inch SATA form factor. For gaming, there’s nothing wrong with that, and the best SSD for gaming can very well be a 2.5-inch SATA drive when factoring in the cost. Besides, with Black Friday deals right around the corner, prices may drop well below what Kingston is offering at launch.

In most cases, there is virtually no perceptible difference when gaming between a SATA and PCIe SSD. It’s only when performing heavy file lifting, such as transferring 4K videos, that the added performance comes into play (though verifying the integrity of game installations via Steam can be much quicker on an NVMe PCIe drive).

Still, prices have come down for M.2 SSDs (both PCIe and SATA). As an added bonus, they’re smaller and do not require any cabling. So there are still reasons to consider an M.2 drive over a 2.5-inch model, when possible.

As to the KC600 series, these new drives are built around 3D triple-level cell (TLC) NAND flash memory chips, now commonly found on budget-oriented SSDs. They’re offered in 2TB, 1TB, 512GB, and 256GB capacities.

Performance breaks down as follows:

KC600 512GB-2TB: up to 550MB/s sequential read, up to 520MB/s sequential write

KC600 256GB: up to 550MB/s sequential read, up to 500MB/s sequential write

All of the drives sport the same random read and write performance, up to 90,000 IOPS and 80,000 IOPs, respectively. They’re also offered as standalone drives, or part of an upgrade kit that includes cloning software, and backed by a 5-year warranty.

Only a couple of capacities are available at the moment. They include:

KC600 512GB (upgrade kit)—$88.40, Kingston

KC600 512GB (standalone)—$72.80, Kingston

KC600 256GB (upgrade kit)—$59.80, Kingston

KC600 256GB (standalone)—$44.20, Kingston

Kingston notes these drives support a “full-security suite that includes AES-XTS 256-bit hardware-based encryption, TCG Opal 2.0, and eDrive, allowing users to protect and secure their data.” Even so, strictly for gaming, these price points are a bit high. To give just one example, an Adata SU750 512GB SSD can be purchased for $52.99 right now on Amazon, which is nearly $20 cheaper than the KC600 512GB.

Street pricing could change things up once these drives land at places like Amazon and Newegg. Until then, there are better bang-for-buck options out there in 2.5-inch SATA territory.

Intel may have moved onto 10nm process nodes for its Ice Lake processors (CPUs), but it looks like 14nm is still where its focus is for desktop. And, it may not be such a bad thing, as a recent leak has shown what could be a new Intel Core i5 CPU with 6 cores and 12 threads using the new Comet Lake-S architecture, HotHardware reports.

The leak shows an Intel CPU tested on an H400-series motherboard, one we understand to be designed for desktop Comet Lake-S processors using the LGA 1200 socket. Beyond the chip’s 6 cores and 12 threads, it’s shown having a base clock speed of 2.0GHz and a total of 12MB of L3 cache and 3MB of L2 cache.

New life for 14nm

Currently, Intel has already introduced 10nm Ice Lake CPUs and 14nm Comet Lake CPUs for mobile devices, but we haven’t seen desktop versions of these CPUs show up yet. And, while it’s unfortunate that we’re seeing yet another 14nm chip for desktop, Intel appears to be upping the ante to better challenge AMD this time.

AMD’s big push at the introduction of Ryzen, and now with Ryzen 3000, has been dazzling core counts and multi-threading to boost performance that much further. If Intel introduces a 6-core/12-thread Intel Core i5, as this leak suggests, it could be better competition for AMD’s chips than past Core i5 processors, which lacked hyper-threading.

The 2.0GHz clock speed may be a concern, but the leaked chip is likely an engineering sample that’s not running at the speeds production models will hit. Running at a higher speed could help it compete with something like the Ryzen 5 3500, which also boasts 6 cores and runs at a 3.6GHz base clock speed (though has a much heftier 32MB of L3 cache).

When it comes to the top of the pack, though, we’re still waiting for the 10-core Comet Lake CPU spotted in earlier leaks.

Just under a week ago, Apple released a supplemental update to macOS Catalina with various bug fixes and performance improvements. Now, Apple has made a revised version of that same supplemental update available to users.

On its developer website, Apple says that a new version of the macOS Catalina supplemental update has been released today. If you installed the original supplemental update released last week, you might not even receive today’s revised version with Apple focusing on people who hadn’t yet installed the initial supplemental update.

The release notes for today’s update, build 19A603, are exactly the same as last week’s:

Improves installation reliability of macOS Catalina on Macs with low disk space

Fixes an issue that prevented Setup Assistant from completing during some installations

Resolves an issue that prevents accepting iCloud Terms and Conditions when multiple iCloud accounts are logged in

Improves the reliability of saving Game Center data when playing Apple Arcade games offline

The revised version of the macOS Catalina supplemental update likely includes very minor changes and fixes. Apple is also currently beta testing macOS Catalina 10.15.1, which may have provided our first look at the forthcoming 16-inch MacBook Pro.