First iPhone 4S Gets Delivered to Germany - Pictures

Germany appears to be the place where the first lucky iPhone 4S buyer lives, though no one can be sure others didn’t already receive one but failed to take the pictures and upload them to the web.

9to5 reveals that while Germany is proud to have unboxed the first customer-ordered iPhone 4S with pictures, Italy is even a more exciting place to be if you like the technicalities behind the glass plates of the new iPhone.

A tech-site from pizza-land has compared the 'spare parts' from an iPhone 4S with the hardware of its predecessor (the iPhone 4), and found quite a few differences.

Screw placement is different, the proximity sensor has an additional part and it’s also placed differently, better glass covering the camera, harder glass on the back, and more.

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Revolutionary Supercomputer 'Titan' Makes Liberal Use of NVIDIA Tesla

While it is busy promoting consumer graphics, NVIDIA has also snared a deal on the supercomputing front, where it has sealed a contract through which the “Titan” will use its Tesla accelerators.

GPU computing modules have gained a role in supercomputing thanks to their immense parallel processing capabilities. 

NVIDIA's series of such products bears the name of Tesla, of which the Tesla M2090 will be used for the upgrade of the Jaguar.

Based at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), this supercomputer, which was once at the front of the Top500 list, will be upgraded with 960 such GPUs as part of the first phase of creating the Titan.

The ultimate goal is to enable peak performance of more than 20 petaflops, two times faster than the current top HPC installation, the Japan-based K.

The 960 Tesla will act as complements to the multi-core CPUs of the Cray XK6-based supercomputers.

“Oak Ridge’s decision to base Titan on Tesla GPUs underscores the growing belief that GPU-based heterogeneous computing is the best approach to reach exascale computing levels within the next decade,” said Steve Scott, chief technology officer of Tesla products at NVIDIA, referring to computing performance levels of 1,000 petaflops. 

“The Tesla GPUs will provide over 85 percent of the peak performance of Titan. You simply can’t get this level of performance in a power- and cost-efficient way with CPUs alone.”

Speaking of energy and cost efficiency, the Titan will be three times more efficient than K.

As for the second phase (will start in 2012), Oak Ridge intends to go as high as 18,000 Tesla GPUs based on the next-generation “Kepler” architecture.

“All areas of science can benefit from this substantial increase in computing power, opening the doors for new discoveries that so far have been out of reach,” said Jeff Nichols, associate laboratory director for Computing and Computational Sciences at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. 

“Titan will be used for a variety of important research projects, including the development of more commercially viable biofuels, cleaner burning engines, safer nuclear energy, and more efficient solar power.”

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Intel Prepares New Sandy Bridge ULV Celeron Processors

In the first quarter of next year, Intel will expand its product portfolio with two new Celeron processors based on the Sandy Bridge architecture that are targeting ultra-low power and ultra-thin computers as they feature an ULV design.

Intel has designed the first one of these chips, the Celeron 867, so that it would replace the previous Celeron 857, built around the same Sandy Bridge architecture and introduced in the third quarter of this year.

Just like its predecessor, the new Intel CPU sports two computing cores, which this time are clocked at 1.3GHz, but it also includes an on-board dual-channel DDR3-1333 memory controller and an integrated GPU.

This has a base frequency of 350MHz and a maximum Turbo clock speed of 1GHz, but it supports only basic feature set dropping even ClearVideo support, not to mention more advanced technologies such as Quick Sync or InTru3D.

In addition to the single processing core, the Celeron 867 also sports 2MB of Level 3 cache. Its TDP is set at 17W.

As it’s the case with all the other Sandy Bridge-based Celeron processors launched by Intel, the 867 also lacks support for some of the more advanced technologies found inside higher-performing second-generation Core processors like Turbo Boost or HyperThreading.

When it will arrive in the first quarter of 2012, pricing for the Celeron 867 will be set at $134, which is the current price of Intel's Celeron ULV 857.

In addition to the 867, Q1 2012 will also mark the introduction of the Celeron 797, that features the same specifications as the 787 is meant to replace, but comes with a 100MHz higher clock speed as it runs at 1.4GHz.

According to Fudzilla, around the third quarter of 2012 Intel plans to replace all its Celeron CPUs with faster models that will most likely still be based on the Sandy Bridge architecture as the Ivy Bridge Celerons aren't expected to arrive until later next year.

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Android Apps Can Run on Desktop PCs Now

The Android Market was already available for access from desktop PCs, and, starting today, applications developed for Google's Android platform are also available for these computers, courtesy of the new BlueStacks App Player for Windows PC.

Android is becoming the leading mobile operating system on the market at a fast pace, with about half of the users who purchased a smartphone in the past three months said to have chosen an Android device. 

The number of applications and games available for these users is also on the rise, with over a quarter of a million already confirmed by Google themselves. Starting today, these apps and games are available for both Android and non-Android users as well. 

Not all people out there have an Android device on which to download, install and run application, and this is where the new BlueStacks App Player comes into play. 

Available in an alpha flavor at the moment, the software offers users the possibility to easily access Android applications on their PCs, as well as on any Windows-powered laptop or tablet they might own. 

One of the main benefits that this application arrives on the market with goes to the developers of software for Google's Android operating system, which have now a wider user base to reach. 

“The openness of Android is enabling innovation around the world. We are grateful to Google and others for their contributions,” Rosen Sharma, president and CEO of BlueStacks. 

“This is also a social equalizer in the US and countries like Brazil, India and China, where a large percentage of the population who can only afford smartphones can now enjoy and benefit from the ubiquity of apps on the Android platform.”

“We look forward to getting feedback from our users on the alpha release,” Rosen Sharma continued. 

The new BlueStacks App Player for Windows PC is available for download as well, via this link.

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BlackBerry Network Still Down - 10/11/2011

As originally reported yesterday, BlackBerry users have been hit hard by an outage that initially affected Europe, Middle East and Africa.

We have received hundreds of reports from unhappy BlackBerry users who were unable to use BBM, email accounts, Internet, or any other application that requires data connection, including Facebook, Twitter and App World.

Research in Motion stated that the problem only affects EMEA countries, it appears that the outage spread and is now affecting both Americas, as well.

Fortunately, it appears that the services are coming back up in some regions, as some users already reported full restoration of BlackBerry services.

At 6AM UTC BlackBerry services were fully restored in Romania (Orange), Netherlands, and UK (partially).

Unfortunately, the network is still down for BlackBerry owners in Canada, Africa and Middle East. Additionally, outage reports have started to come in from US-based users as well at around 2AM UTC on Oct 11th.

It's been 24 hours since the first reports about the outage came in and RIM has yet to make any official statements regarding the issues that are now affecting its users at a global scale.

If you're affected, let us know in the comments and make sure you state your location.

UPDATE: UK is still struggling, as BB services in London have not been fully restored yet; emails and BBM work sporadically and only for receiving. Germany continues to be in the dark completely, however.

UPDATE 2: BlackBerry owners in South Africa are seeing services being fully restored.

UPDATE 3: I have reached out to all RIM media contacts for an official statement and will update everyone as soon as one is provided.

UPDATE 4: Just received a reply from RIM's EMEA PR: "Yesterday, some BlackBerry subscribers in the EMEA region experienced delays with BlackBerry services. The issue was resolved and services are operating normally. We apologize to those customers who were impacted for any inconvenience". That doesn't seem to be the case, however, based on reports we've been receiving from users.

UPDATE 5: Starting 9:15 AM UTC, several members of our team have noticed BBM and email delays (Orange Romania). Wondering if these delays and recent US outage reports could mean that RIM has moved all customers to the US infrastructure while it struggles to fix its EMEA network. 

UPDATE 6: 11:00 AM UTC - outages are starting to return to most territories that were restored over the last few hours. Reports have come from South Africa, the UK, Portugal, Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands and we've noticed it at Orange Romania as well.

UPDATE 7: 11:50 AM UTC - downtime recurrence reports start coming from the Middle East (Qatar) and Africa (Nigeria).

UPDATE 8: 12:30 AM UTC - BIS now affected in Greece as well.

UPDATE 9: 1:50 PM UTC - outage reports coming from India, Egypt, Dubai and Italy.

UPDATE 10: It appears that Turkey never recovered since yesterday's outage

UPDATE 11: Users in Spain and Switzerland report BB services are down for them as well.

UPDATE 12: BlackBerry owners in Romania using Orange's network are receiving apology text messages. Translation: "We apologize if the BlackBerry service is temporarily unavailable. The service provider - RIM - will resolve the issue as soon as possible." (original SMS screenshot in the attached gallery)

UPDATE 13: We've received a follow-up from RIM's PR: "Some users in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, India, Brazil, Chile, and Argentina are experiencing messaging and browsing delays.  We are working to restore normal service as quickly as possible.  We apologise for any inconvenience this has caused."  Again, this doesn't seem to be entirely correct, since we're getting outage reports from other territories  as well.

UPDATE 14: BB services have started again to go up and back down intermittently. For some users, certain services work while others have long delays or are unavailable completely.

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AMD FX-8150 Processor Gets Previewed and Benchmarked

Just a few more days are left until AMD will make official its highly anticipated FX-Series of desktop processors, and the company's flagship CPU based on the Bulldozer architecture, the FX-8150, was just put through a series of extensive benchmarks that compare its performance with that of the Core i7-2600K.

The FX-8150 is the most powerful of the three FX-Series processors AMD plans to launch and it includes four Bullodzer modules for a total of eight processing cores.

These are paired together with 8MB of Level 3 cache as well as with 8MB of L2 cache memory and the CPU also packs a dual-channel DDR3 memory controller supporting speeds up to 1866MHz.

AMD has set the base clock speed of the FX-8150 at 3.6GHz, but when less than half of the cores use the Turbo Core technology can raise its operating frequency up to 4.2GHz.

In comparison, the Core i7-2600K features quad processing cores with Hyper-Threading support, also 8MB of Level 3 cache memory and a 3.4GHz base clock speed with a 3.8GHz maximum Turbo.

Despite the higher clock speed and core count of the FX-8150, the AMD processor seems to be no match in front of Intel's chip, which managed to outpace its competitor in all the benchmarks run by Lab 501.

This includes highly threaded applications like Handbrake of CineBench R11.5, which should have favored the eight-core AMD CPU.

Furthermore, the FX-8150 also loses in front of Intel's chip when it comes to power efficiency as it requires no less than 129W when running in full load compared to the 93W of its competitor.

Outside of the usual performance tests, the preview also investigated the overclocking potential of the FX-8150 and the maximum SuperPi stable frequency reached was 5066MHz. However, total system stability could be achieved unless this was dropped down to between 4700-4800MHz.

AMD will release the FX-Series processors on October 12, and the FX-8150 is going to be priced at $245 US, about 182 Euros, which makes it $72 cheaper than Intel's Core i7-2600K.

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Intel Xeon E5 Sandy Bridge-E CPUs Launch Schedule Unveiled

At this year's IDF conference, Intel made public the fact that it has delayed the arrival of its first Xeon E5 server processors, but nobody back then knew when these CPUs will arrive. A recent report however has managed to uncover the chip maker's plans regarding this new series of CPUs.

Previously, the Xeon E5 product families were scheduled for a Q4 2011 release, but CPU World has find out that Intel's current roadmaps place the launch of these chips in the second Q1 of 2012.

Just as their naming scheme implies, Xeon E5-1600 CPUs are to be installed in uni-processor machines while products in the Xeon E5-2600 range support dual-socket configurations. 

Despite this difference, both of these Xeon CPU series will be compatible with Intel's socket R motherboards (LGA-2011).

Just like their desktop counterparts, the CPUs released in the Xeon 2600-series will feature HyperThreading, Turbo Boost technology, as well as the AVX and AES instructions, but they will also receive support for VT-x / VT-d / VT-c virtualization.

Next to the Xeon E5-2600 series, Intel also plans to release the Xeon E5-2400 processor family which also supports dual-socket systems and is compatible with LGA-1356 motherboards (socket B2).

As the E5-2400 processors will be based on the Sandy Bridge-EN architecture, they carry a tri-channel memory controller, compared to the quad-channel controller available in LGA-2011 chips.

Together with these three processor series, Intel will also introduce a quad-socket version of the Sandy Bridge-EP, dubbed the E5-4600, the launch of which has now been postponed for the second quarter of 2012.

All Xeon E5 processors will use the C600 chipset, code-name Patsburg, that we detailed in a previous report.

Sandy Bridge-EN and Sandy Bridge-EP CPUs feature as much as eight processing cores, pack up to 20MB of shared L3 cache, have a TDP rated between 80W and 150W, and support one or two Quick Path Interconnect links, depending on the model.

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AMD FX-Series Water Cooler Gets Pictured

There have been a lot of rumors going around lately about AMD's and Intel's plans to bundle their upcoming high-performance processors with water cooling kits, and recently such an AMD FX-Series CPU was spotted by a Chinese publication.

The retail box pictured on the XFastest website is clearly marked as belonging to the FX-Series and on its back AMD has mentioned that it includes not only a CPU, but a liquid processor cooling system as well.

Opening the box, one gets to see that the cooler bundled with the Bulldozer CPU is almost an exact replica of the Antec H20 920, which was launched earlier this year.

This is understandable considering that both solutions were actually developed by Asetek, which is well renowned for its high-quality closed loop CPU water coolers.

To distinguish its solution from other products based on the Asetek design, AMD has branded the water block of the cooler with the FX logo and also added a customizable RGB LED for illuminating the block and pump assembly.

Together with the cooler and processor, AMD also provides a pair of fans for the 120mm radiator, which should be setup in a push-pull configuration, as well as a custom software used for controlling fan speeds.

No information regarding the processor that is included in the bundle is available, but most probably this will be the FX-8150, AMD's flagship desktop Bulldozer processor. Pricing is also unknown.

AMD's first FX-Series chips will be released in just a few days from now, on October 12, and the initial lineup will include three processors.

Two of these, the FX-8150 and the FX-8120 pack four Bulldozer modules for a total of eight computing cores, while the latter, the FX-6100, sports a six-core design. All the chips will feature an unlocked multipler for providing enthusiasts with higher overlocking headroom.

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Intel Plans Ivy Bridge Xeon E3 CPUs for 2012 Release

Together with the consumer version of the Ivy Bridge processors, Intel will also release a series of Xeon E3 chips that will be based on this 22nm architecture, which are expected to launch at about the same time as their desktop counterparts.

The Ivy Bridge Xeon processors will make part of the Carlow platform that will also include the C216 chipset, also known under the code name of Panther Point.

The upcoming Xeon E3-1200 v2 CPUs will utilize the same LGA 1155 socket as the current Sandy Bridge-based server chips, but for now the specs of the processors are still unknown.

Intel's Ivy Bridge processors are a die 22nm shrink of the Sandy Bridge chips and feature the same architecture which will receive a series of improvements.

In the consumer version of the architecture, these improvements include a better GPU with DirectX 11 support as well as 30% more EUs than the HD 3000 GPU used in the current second generation Core processors.

Other CPU features include better AVX performance, an integrated PCI Express 3.0 controller as well as native USB 3.0 support thanks to the Panther Point chipsets, that are expected to enter mass production in the final week of December 2011.

Right now, we don't known which of these features will head towards the Xeon E3 CPU lineup, but it's highly unlikely that the massively improved graphics core will make its appearance in more than a few E3-1200 v2 processors.

In the current version of the Xeon E3, only four out of the nine processors released by Intel come with integrated graphics support. On a plus side, all the chips support ECC memory, which is also expected to happen with the Ivy Bridge CPUs.

According to CPU-World, the second version of the Xeon E3 server processor line is expected o arrive in March or April of 2012, together with the consumer Ivy Bridge processors.

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A Quick Look Behind the Symbian Belle OS

Nokia has already unveiled to the world their latest flavor of Symbian, called Symbian Belle, and also unveiled the series of features and enhancements it is set to bring along. 

However, the same as with any mobile OS out there, there are things that are not visible when one uses a handset running under a specific mobile OS or another, and the video above is meant to present some of these things that are connected to Symbian Belle. 

What you will see in the short clip includes interviews with the designers behind the new mobile platform. 

They will explain the vision, observations, learnings and processes involved in the creation of the user experience that Symbian Belle has to offer. 

We all know that Symbian does not have too long to live, and Belle is one of the latest platform releases that users can enjoy on Nokia handsets.

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