Intel i7 Turbo Mode

OK all you relics of computing like me, reach way back into your memory and think of those Turbo buttons on the front of your 486 computers. Remember those? Well Intel i7′s won’t actually have those, but all the processors in the i7 family will have a turbo mode.

So we all know most computer apps don’t use 4 PC cores right? Well all of the i7 chips are quad cores. But what happens when two of those cores are just sitting there picking their nose? Well intel said “Hey, why don’t we take most of the power they would be using if they weren’t slackers and give it to the remaining cores?”. Thus we get turbo mode, the processor uses the same amount of power but when some cores are off it gets to boost the other cores. Actually this is some pretty excellent technology.

Things like this are why Intel now kicks AMD’s ass most of the time. AMD had to abandon a lot of their R&D in the wake of Intel kicking their ass in performance. Now they just struggle to keep up. Five or six years ago AMD led the way because they had the best research and development out there, it turns out that some of those developments were short sighted (on board FSB, really fast, but makes DDR2 terribly complicated to maximize performance for instance).

With the news of Nehalem delays to mass market people are worried, I wouldn’t be, AMD has nothing up their sleeves to fight Intel. It’ll take an entirely new processor architecture, one that’s revolutionary for AMD to regain the performance lead and some of their lost market share.

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A Surprise From Intel

Part of last nights MG was some discussion over what this interesting tablet device teased at IDF was. Well it’s no longer a mystery, it turns out it’s a boring medical tablet. A Panasonic Toughbook to be precise. How exactly is this big news? I mean is it a Transformer? Does it become a kick ass robot to help protect me from the Decepticons? Does it make me pie? Can I say “Bitch, get in the kitchen and make me some pie” in my best Cartman imitation and a mere hour later have some delicious pie? I doubt it.

There is still some hope, maybe the tablet is powered by some super secret Intel processor we don’t know about. I mean there’s already an Atom powered medical tablet, so this would have to be something new. The problem is there doesn’t appear to be anything but Nehalem (code name for Intel’s new Core i7 processors) on the horizon. It seems most likely that Intel was trying to create some buzz just for the sake of buzz, stupid move.

Maximum Geek Vol. 2 Ep. 24

Hey, we’re up early this week, woohoo. We cover a lot and in the end I lay the smack down on Jeff. Here’s what we cover.

• Intel Nehalem, 4 cores, 8 threads
• 6 core Xeon server processors
• AMD kicks some Atom ass link
• Toshiba upscaling DVD player, but is it really a surplus HD-DVD player with new firmware? link
• Hong Kong Lego User Group makes 300,000 brick Olympic complex link
• Vista gets no loving, as many as a third of PC still ship with XP link
• Mobile way more than a minute
  • Sprint Airave, The Good, The Bad and the WTF.
  • Sprint being a dumbass, part deux… Diamond $100 more than the iPhone link
  • HTC Dream approved by FCC, T-Mobile to carry first Android phone this fall link
  • Treo Pro leaked, redacted, leaked… link
  • Intel has something up its sleeve link
  • Game changing hardware link

 

 Standard Podcast [73:08m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Maximum Geek Vol. 2 Ep. 23

OK, we recorded this last week but I’m a big wuss and didn’t post it until today. Here’s what we covered.

• iPhone kill switch
• Flock http://www.flock.com
• Star Trek Online Link

Stay tuned this week for us talking about stuff or something.

 

 Maximum Geek V. 2 Ep. 23 [36:56m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Sprint Airave, The Good, The Bad and The WTF

So, I’ve been waiting for today. Launch day for Sprints big product that was going to keep me with them. The Sprint Airave. For those of you who don’t know, the Airave is basically a cell tower for your living room. It connects to sprint through your broadband connection and gives you very good signal inside your house. I drop calls in my house all the time, I was psyched.

Some quick details, I think the Airave is a bit overpriced at $99 to buy it and then $5 to $10 a month (per phone, $5 to use your existing minutes, $10 for unlimited when connected to the Airave). I was stoked even with the steep entry price of $99.

I showed up at my local Sprint store, credit card in hand. I called ahead to make sure they had it. So I tell the kiosk chick I’m here for the Airave, she stares blankly for a moment and then goes “Oh, those, we’ve got them, we’ll get a salesman with you soon.” Cue me standing around for 20 minutes waiting. The salesman is a nice guy (I worked with him on the whole Q9 fiasco) I tell him I want the Airave he says “It’s not out yet” I say “It came out today and you have them.” He looks a little confused then someone else tells him they do. He goes back and gets me my ticket to getting rid of my home phone.

Now I’m the only guy in the state apparently who knows this is launch day for the Airave. So no one has done an activation of one. This is where the WTF comes in. You see, I have a discount on my account, when Sprint switched over to the new billing system it flagged all accounts with any sort of corporate discount on it as a commercial account. Turns out the Airave isn’t available for commercial accounts (stupid fucking bullshit decision #1). Not a huge deal, 20 minutes later I’m fixed and an individual again. So now we go back to activate the Airave. It still won’t go. Cue Sprint Customer Service Rep Jeremey (nice guy, no complaints about him) calling for some tech support. I stand and listen. 30 minutes later they figure out that the Airave, from an account perspective, is treated like a phone, it requires an open line.

Now I haven’t been exactly good about paying on time, so I’m screwed, I can’t get a 3rd line added. Even though there isn’t actually a phone attached and it’s a whooping $10 a month difference, I can’t get a damn Airave because I can’t have another line. I DON’T NEED ANOTHER LINE, I NEED THE ONE I HAVE TO WORK. So Jeremy is a good guy so he tries calling credit, who promptly dismisses him saying “nothing we can do”. So what exactly is the fucking point of taking up a phone line with the Airave? Bottom line is it’s about equipment tracking and it’s complete bullshit.

So I’m sitting here, unable to use my Cell phone to talk to people because my house is a giant blackhole for all wireless signals. Yay. Fuck you very much Sprint, my contract is up early next year and I’m about to say bye bye. They need to fix some of this shit like yesterday, no wonder they’re self destructing.

Maximum Geek Vol.2 Ep. 22

OK, so we recorded this last week, I meant to get it up last Friday (1 day after the Writerly cast) but I got crazy swamped last week. So here ya go. Here’s what we cover.

• Splashtop hacked
• Cloud computing, Midori is coming.
• Josh loves to touch his touch
• Mobile More Than a Minute
  • More 800w goodness
  • The second (or third or fourth) coming of Palm.
• Microsofts new approach.

Stay tuned, Thursday I’ll be posting a new cast full of techalicious goodness.

 

 Standard Podcast [62:44m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Forget What I Said.

OK, I’ve recently figured out that I was smoking some sort of crack, the two articles I read about Larrabee were misleading. Larrabee actually is a discrete graphics technology (which means a slew of different things). That’ll learn me to assume anything. Expect an indepth discussion on MG tonight and a new article later today hopefully.