Hardware Canucks News

Today begins a new dawn in the processor marketplace, with the world’s first ever consumer available hexa (6) – core CPU  being officially unveiled; the Core i7-980X Gulftown.

The Intel Core i7 980X represents the next step forward in technology, taking the crown away from dual and quad cores as the premiere line and launching into a new realm where multi-threaded power is the true focus. While the actual release date is still some time away, all information that has been not-so-silently bottled up over the recent months can now come to light

Gulftown is currently, the only high-performance processor based on Westmere technology; a 32nm migration of Nehalem architecture. It boasts six-cores operating at 3.33GHz, each with 64 KB L1 & 256 KB L2 caches and a shared 12MB L3 cache. Integrated technologies include; Hyper-Threading, allowing for 12 threads, Turbo Boost offering speeds up to 3.6GHz,  integrated memory controller and dual QPI links. The processor works on the LGA-1366 platform along with the x58 chipset that has existing support on most motherboards through a BIOS update.

Obviously we encourage you to read our full review available here but if your just looking for the Cliffs Note version here you go… it kicks ass. In nearly every benchmark run – synthetic or real-world – Gulftown shows that it is the number one processor available on the market. In applications that can take advatange of multiple cores, the unit excels – and then some.

The price for so much power? Its MSRP is set at $999 USD and should be available in late March, early April. Sure it’s not cheap, but bleeding edge never is.

Check out the full Hardware Canuck’s Review: http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum/hardware-canucks-reviews/29632-intel-core-i7-980x-gulftown-six-core-32nm-processor-review.html

Galaxy not long ago announced a plan to create a dual GPU card based off of nVidia’s GTS250 (G92b Core).  Not normally known for their unique designs it will be interesting to see if this engineering sample takes flight.

Using a Single PCB design the Galaxy card will feature a single 80mm fan per core as opposed to a  more traditional centre mounted fan that we see on other dual GPU cards.  Although this design will still allow some of the generated heat to be blown back into the case, it should not be a problem on those with proper airflow.

Clock speeds out of the Box are said to be 600/1500/1000 MHz (core/shader/memory), which is typical of G92b cards available today. Each core will also be linked to 512MB of GDDR3 memory giving 1024MB available in total for this card. Power requirements are good as well with only two 6-pin connectors needed (Unlike the older GX2’s which required an 8-pin and 6-pin).

In a market clouded with new arrivals and Fermi on the horizion it is interesting to see a design like this come forward. However given the potential in budget builds and folding builds the Galaxy Dual GTS250 will find its place and perhaps pave the way for more designs like it and not just from Galaxy.

Pricing and availability are yet to be known.

NVIDIA and Epic Games, Inc. today announced the addition of NVIDIA® 3D Vision™ technology support to Unreal Engine 3.

Today’s announcement means that licensees of the world’s most successful game engine will be able to take full advantage of integrated 3D Vision™ technology support and offer an unprecedented level of immersion in their upcoming games.  Epic’s popular Unreal Development Kit (UDK), a free version of Unreal Engine 3, will also benefit from the addition of 3D Vision support, bringing a theater-quality 3D development platform to the more than 200,000 current users worldwide.

 
“Having the number one 3D engine on the planet embrace 3D Vision is fantastic news for UE3 licensees, UDK users and gamers,” says Tony Tamasi, vice president of content and technology at NVIDIA. “It’s now easier than ever to add state-of-the-art stereoscopic 3D effects to your Unreal Engine 3-based creations.”

 
“The combination of Unreal Engine 3 and 3D Vision makes already amazing games even more jaw dropping,” said Mark Rein, vice president at Epic Games.  “If you haven’t seen Unreal Engine 3 in 3D, you won’t believe how realistic it is!  We’re excited to offer this technology for free to our licensees and can’t wait to see what people create with it.”

 
Facts about NVIDIA® 3D Vision and Unreal Engine 3:

-  Epic Games and NVIDIA have worked together to integrate “out of the box” support for NVIDIA® 3D Vision technology into Unreal Engine 3

 
-  Unreal Engine 3 is the engine that powers some of the most successful games in the marketplace including: Gears of War and Gears of War 2, Shadow Complex, BioShock 2, Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2,  Borderlands and Batman: Arkham Asylum.

-  The updated version of Unreal Engine 3 and UDK will be available in the near future for all licensees allowing games developed with that revision (or later) to deliver “out of the box” support for 3D vision.

-  3D Vision is the world’s leading consumer 3D solution and supports PC gaming, photographs, videos, Blu-ray 3D, and 3D Web browsing.

-  3D Vision consists of wireless, active-shutter glasses and wireless USB emitter and can work with compatible 120Hz desktop LCDs, 3D TVs and projectors. A NVIDIA GeForce® 8800 GTX or higher GPU is also required.

 
Additional Quotes:

“Epic and NVIDIA share a commitment to advancing the state of PC gaming. The addition of 3D Vision support to our Unreal Engine 3 will dramatically enhance the gaming experience. We are very excited to see the future of gaming in 3D.”
- Mark Rein, vice president of Epic Games.

 
“3D really brings a new level of immersion to games, and we are ecstatic that Unreal Engine 3 licensees will be able to offer this 3D capability in their upcoming titles. Epic and NVIDIA share a common philosophy in that we love PC gaming. This will further solidify the PC as the preeminent gaming platform. ” 
- Phil Eisler, general manager of 3D Vision technology at NVIDIA.

It has been a long time coming.  Intel’s six core processors have been talked about since the Nehalem architecture was first introduced and with the Core i7 980X, Gulftown has finally seen the light of day.  Naturally, this new processor is expensive but with six physical cores and 12 threads, can it perform up to everyone’s expectations?

Lately, there has been a lot of talk about upcoming overclocked and 2GB HD 5800 series cards which will see the light of day in the next few months.  In this sneak peak, we take a look at the ASUS HD 5870 Matrix that has high clock speeds as well as a massive amount of memory and a new custom design which ASUS will use to replace their reference HD 5870 cards with.

One of the more common complaints heard about the recently released Cooler Master 690 II Advanced, was the lack of an optional side window, leaving the quality black interior and excellent cable management hidden behind metal.

Starting this month, Cooler Master has begun shipping limited quantities of its windowed side panel through its own CM Store with a price of $19.99 USD. The panel fits both the Advanced and Basic models and includes a single space for a 120mm fan.

Cooler Master is shipping to both Canada and the USA, however, costs to major urban centres in the great white north hover around $20 USD. No word yet on if North American retailers will be stocking the panel.

The unit can be purchased from the CM Store: http://cmstore.coolermaster-usa.com/product_info.php?products_id=460

OCZ  today unveiled the OCZ Onyx SATA II 2.5″ Solid State Drive (SSD) Series, an ultra-affordable MultiLevel Cell (MLC)-based solid state storage solution designed for consumers looking to take advantage of flash-based storage technology. Offering a faster and more durable alternative to traditional hard drives in a cost-efficient SSD, the Onyx delivers reliable performance without the high price normally associated with SSD drives.

“As new technologies become available, OCZ continues to expand both our enterprise and consumer SSD lines, and one of our goals is to make SSDs more affordable to end-users. Our new Onyx series SSD does exactly that and is a perfect solution for netbooks, laptops, or home desktop PCs,” commented Ryan Petersen, CEO of the OCZ Technology Group. “Designed to offer the best of both worlds, the new OCZ Onyx SSD delivers the speed and reliability of solid state storage to mainstream consumers at an aggressive price point that makes the technology more accessible to customers who want to take advantage of all the benefits of the SSDs without incurring the high cost normally associated with the solution.”

With a sub 100 dollar MRSP (read $99.99) the aggressively priced Onyx 32GB SSD delivers an enhanced computing experience with faster application loading, snappier data access, shorter boot-ups, and longer battery life. Onyx SSDs feature HDD-dominating access times, up to 125MB/s read and 70MB/s write speeds, 64MB of onboard cache, TRIM support and unique performance optimization to keep the drives at peak performance over the long term.

It seems the “nice” Canadians aren’t being so nice when it comes to Microsoft’s perceived monopoly in the marketplace.

A B.C. Provincial Supreme Court judge has approved a lawsuit to be classified as class action against Microsoft Canada that alleges anti-competitive practices and could seek more than $1 billion in damages.

The plaintiffs, Pro-Sys Consultants, are launching the lawsuit – mimicking that of many similar cases in the U.S.A – claiming that the Redmond giant started its unfair practices in the 80’s when it began setting up computers with its own OS to dominate the market and drive competitors out of business. They argue that once it had little competition, Microsoft raised licensing fees, forcing users to pay more due to the artificially inflated price.

The initial scope of the suit will only include B.C residents who purchased a license for Microsoft operating systems or bought a computer with a Microsoft OS pre-installed since January 1994, however the plaintiff’s may work with lawyers in other provinces to seek approval in their courts.

Spire has been slowly making in-roads for the PC accessories market. With their initial success it is not surprising to witness their next generation of cooling solutions. Let the Eclipse begin.

Coated in a beautiful dark nickel finish and sporting twin BlackStar fans the Eclipse is sure to shine in any case with a windowed panel. Looks aside it has a winning combination of features that should really give the long reigning CPU Coolers something to sweat about.

Five 8mm heatpipes come into direct contact with the CPU giving more than enough transfer area to wick heat away. Coupled to these heatpipes are 46 individual aluminum fins to aid in the heat transfer. Notable as well is how tightly packed the sides of these fins are on the leading edges. This should almost act like a shroud in directing the airflow through the cooler and not losing airflow through its sides. Of course one needs higher powered fans to usually do that, something the Eclipse looks to feature.  Both BlackStar fans bear unique resemblance to something Coolermaster offers, and if this is the case this cooler has a lot of potential to shine.

Compatibility is just as important in this day and age, and as such the TherMax Eclipse comes ready. Intel Support is everything 775 and onwards, while AMD is 939 and up. This should give builders past and present something to look forward to when it hits store shelves.

Availability is slated for this month with an MSRP of 52.99USD.

Finally, a bit of closure. Newegg has opted to show some more transparency in the case surrounding counterfeit Core i7 920 processors recently sold by the retailer.

The company has publicly released a statement acknowledging misinformation regarding the units being demo boxes, pinpointing the exact source of the fakes, and clearing D&H Distributing’s good name.

Newegg is currently conducting a thorough investigation surrounding recent shipments of questionable Intel Core i7-920 CPUs purchased from Newegg.com.

Initial information we received from our supplier, IPEX, stated that they had mistakenly shipped us “demo units.” We have since come to discover the CPUs were counterfeit and are terminating our relationship with this supplier. Contrary to any speculation, D&H Distributing is not the vendor that supplied us with the Intel Core i7-920 CPUs in question.

Newegg’s top priority is to proactively reach out to all customers who may have been affected to ensure their absolute satisfaction. We have already sent out a number of replacement units and are doing everything in our power to resolve the matter promptly and with the least amount of inconvenience to our customers.

We have always taken pride in providing an exceptional experience for each customer, and we apologize for any inconvenience to our valued customers. We take matters like this extremely seriously, and are working in close cooperation with Intel and the appropriate law enforcement authorities to thoroughly investigate this incident.

While both Intel and Newegg will be pursuing the real culprits in the coming weeks, this announcement puts to rest much of the internet speculation about cover-ups and dishonesty, and this news writer in particular is relieved to finally put the case to rest.

The server market always gets the cool stuff first. Intel is readying to launch its first 8-core processor to combat the already launched AMD 8 and 12 core Opteron units.

Named the Nehalem-EX, these octo-core chips are manufactured on the 45nm process, featuring  8 physical cores each support two simultaneous threads through Hyperthreading. It includes 4 integrated  DDR3 memory channels, 4 QPI links, Turboboost, 24MB shared L3 cache and a total of 2.3 billion transistors.

The chip is targeted towards four socket servers allowing for up to 64 virtual cores and are intended for data-intensive applications.

In seemingly outdated technology, Intel is looking at launching its six-core Westmere consumer level lineup within the next few months and AMD is said to be following close behind with a hexa-core product of its own.

I wonder if Intel will be using the updated cooling design recently seen in select models of its Core i7 920 lineup?

In a story that has made headlines everywhere, Newegg, last week, admitted that a portion of their Intel Core i7 920 inventory was in fact crudely made fakes that were delivered to a few unfortunate buyers. [Read Original Report]

The company released a press statement claiming that this was a result of “demo boxes” mistakenly shipped by one of their long term partners; a story which many just don’t buy.

Intel has now released a preliminary press statement, acknowledging the existence of the counterfeits and promising an investigation on their end.

“Intel has been made aware of the potential for counterfeit i7-920 packages in the marketplace and is working to identify how many and/or where they are being sold, the examples we have seen are not Intel products but are counterfeits. Buyers should contact their place of purchase for a replacement and/or should contact their local law enforcement agency if the place of purchase refuses to help.”

In private statements released to various members of the press, Intel has firmly denied that these are any sort of officially sanctioned demo units.

The two reports seem to directly clash, and leave enormous questions as to exactly how the fakes managed to make their way into Newegg’s inventory.

In a wild turn of events, distributor D&H, who was originally mentioned as a possible source for the counterfeit processors by Kyle of HardOCP, has sent cease and desist orders to the website requesting a take-down of the news and retraction of any mention of D&H Distributing from articles, threatening further legal action.

The contradicting stories, legal threats and general oddities surrounding the entire debacle have only served to fuel the wildfire of speculation.

Newegg has handled the matter with its buyers exceptionally well, taking a proactive approach to ensure any possibly affected customers have been contacted, but has their handling of the press and transparency in regards to the truth been a bit of a surprise to you?

If you weren’t pay close attention to the GPU market a few months ago, you may have missed the launch of the GT 240 series since the launch wasn’t preceded by any of the usual marketing or release day fireworks.  As such, not much attention has been paid to this card but in this roundup we take a look at six cards from four of NVIDIA’s board partners.

In an almost surreal tale of events, USA electronics retailer Newegg has discovered a reported 300 counterfeit Intel Core i7 920 CPUs in its inventory, some of which were inadvertently shipped out to buyers!

Initial reports of the fakes began yesterday when at least 5 separate incidents, totaling  9 fake processors cropped up on Youtube, HardOCP and the Overclockers.com forums. The recipients of the fakes had all purchased the CPUs from Newegg.com within the past few days.

We contacted Newegg and a representative confirmed that they did in fact receive “incorrect inventory” in the form of  fake processors from a vendor and that they were working to rectify the matter as quickly as possible. Unfortunately further questions about how they intended to resolve the matter with the unfortunate purchasers or details about where the counterfeits came from and how they managed to slip by screenings were ignored.

The pictures below, taken by the unwitting buyers, tell the story. The heatsink had been swapped with a rather crude epoxy or clay like molding of the stock Intel HSF, with a picture of the fan’s top part attached. The CPU was layers of of metal  and PCB with a fake IHS on the top and a sticker attached with typical Core i7 information. The box itself was riddled with spelling errors, and to bypass the security seal the box was printed with an “Intel Factory Sealed” sticker look alike with a clear sticker attached over top.

Intel does provide “security” windows on its packaging in order to verify that the CPU and fan are in the box, however, it does not show the full components.

It is expected that Newegg will replace the processors very quickly and an investigation into the perpetrators of such a unique crime will likely begin. No others reports of fake CPUs from North American retailers have been heard and a source with retailer NCIX.com confirms that the company has already checked their stock and found no fakes.

If the rumoured HardOCP number of 300 counterfeit units is accurate, it would represent a street value price of over $85,000 USD.

Update (03/05/2010 4:30PM PST) Newegg has released an official statement regarding the incident, attempting explain the ordeal as a shipment of “demo boxes” by a supplier.

Newegg is aware of a shipping error that occurred with certain recent orders of the Intel Core i7-920 CPU. After investigating the issue internally it appears one of our long term partners mistakenly shipped a small number of demo boxes instead of functional units. Our customer service team has already begun proactively reaching out to the affected customers. In line with our commitment to ensure total customer satisfaction, we are doing everything in our power to resolve the issue as soon as possible and with the least amount of inconvenience to our customers.

Pictures and information from the following sources:

http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1500534

http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php?p=6422351#post6422351

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54tDqM5-6RU

http://www.mixedmartialarts.com/mma.cfm?go=forum.posts&thread=1605914&forum=2&page=1&pc=19

http://www.overclock.net/rants-raves/682686-newegg-issue-fake-i7-920-retail.html

NVIDIA is  recalling driver update 196.75 WHQL, released March 2nd, due to a issue causing GPU fans to stop working thereby allowing the card to overheat to the point where they completely burn out.

Game producer, Blizzard, first noticed the problem when it began receiving a high number of tech support requests about malfunctioning and overheating video cards. A quote from a representative stated:

“We’re getting reports where users are getting intermittent low FPS after installing these drivers. It seems that it is related to the fan control included in these drivers not working correctly and is causing the video card to overheat on 3D applications. This will affect Warcraft 3, World of Warcraft and StarCraft 2 Beta. Please uninstall the drivers and revert back to the older ones.”

The driver’s can no longer be found on NVIDIA’s website and the company has issued a press statement requesting users reverted to the previous 196.21 WHQL certified drivers.

“We are aware that some customers have reported fan speed issues with the latest 196.75 WHQL drivers on NVIDIA.com. Until we can verify and root cause this issue, we recommend that customers stay with, or return to 196.21 WHQL drivers. Release 196.75 drivers have been temporarily removed from our Web site in the meantime.”

If you recently performed the driver update, we recommended that you immediately roll back to a prior revision, even if you have not yet noticed any issues.

Driver Download

Windows XP: http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_196.21_whql.html
Windows XP 64-bit: http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp64_196.21_whql.html
Windows Vista/7 32-bit: http://www.nvidia.com/object/win7_winvista_32bit_196.21_whql.html
Windows Vista/7 64-bit: http://www.nvidia.com/object/win7_winvista_64bit_196.21_whql.html

With the 890 Chipset fast approaching retail shelves we are seeing more and more the offerings from all of AMD’s board partners. With the 890GX board already seen webwide from Gigabyte, we get to take a look at their higher end offering in the form of the GA-890FXA-UD5.

Based solely upon AMD’s 890FX chipset and SB850 southbridge this board adds a lot more functionality to the higher end user. Expansion slots come in the form of 4 PCI-e 16X lanes (Electrical 8X when all are populated or 16X when Alternated), 2 PCI-e x1 and a solitary PCI lane.  Power delivery to the CPU comes in the form of 10 + 2 phase VRM with the plus going towards the DDR3 memory positions. This is double of what Gigabytes 890GX board has, and should help those out who enjoy overclocking.

Six Internal SATA 6GB/s ports are available all controlled through the SB850 chip and an additional GSATA2 controller provides support for the twin 3GB/s and IDE connections. At the Rear panel we have 8+2 Channel Audio, gigabit Ethernet connections , Firewire and USB 3.0/2.0 positions.

Pricing is not yet known although we should expect to see this board in the comming months.