As part of our good will of sharing free software, utilities and demos etc, here is another one to the collection.
CPU-Z is a nifty little piece if freeware that gathers information about various parts of your system, very handy for when you’re looking to improve performance or overclock your machine.
CPU
Name and number.
Core stepping and process.
Package.
Core voltage.
Internal and external clocks, clock multiplier.
Supported instruction sets.
Cache information.
Mainboard
Vendor, model and revision.
BIOS model and date.
Chipset (northbridge and southbridge) and sensor.
Graphic interface.
Memory
Frequency and timings.
Module(s) specification using SPD (Serial Presence Detect) : vendor, serial number, timings table.
Here at eTeknix, we like to make sure that we keep all our drivers and software up-to-date and so we like to pass all of this onto you as well. Nvidia have just released their latest drivers for their Quadro range of cards.
Head over to http://www.eteknix.com/downloads/nvidia-quadro-drivers-8/, where you can download the version 259.81 WHQL drivers for Windows XP 32-bit, Windows Vista 32 & 64-Bit and Windows 7 32 & 64-Bit. You can also find there all the information about what is included in these newly updated drivers.
The AMD Radeon HD 6870 1GB is one of the latest graphics cards from AMD and is aimed at the mid to high range market. It was launched to take over from the successful HD 5770 and gives a slight performance boost as well as featuring improved AMD Eyefinity with support upto 6 monitors, an improved renamed version of ATI Stream Technology to balance your CPU/GPU power and also 2nd generation DirectX11 for support with the latest games whilst giving show-stopping quality graphics.
If you are in the market for a new graphics card with the latest technologies and fantastic power, then this is well worth looking at.
Galaxy Microsystems manufacturer of Nvidia based graphics cards have announced today the Galaxy GeForce GTS 450 Hall of Fame graphics card, the fastest GTS 450 card on the market.
Our new GTS 450 Hall of Fame edition demolishes the competition with a core clock of 1000Mhz. said Shane Vance, US Sales, Galaxy. Our custom cooler, Samsung 0.4ns GDDR5 memory and Galaxy designed board allow us to achieve these insane speeds.
The Galaxy card comes with a new complete custom cooling solution to keep the cards overclocked temperatures down. The cooling solution features 2 aluminium PWM fans and 4 huge copper heatpipes to keep the Nvidia chips cool with the clock speeds that will devour today’s games. It also features a 3+1 phase power supply to deliver the performance.
To achieve this Hall of Fame title, Galaxy has upped the GF106 core clock up from the stock speed of 783MHz to a round 1,000MHz. This means that the 192 shaders will tick over at a blistering 2,000MHz – a 28% increase over the reference frequencies. To top this all off, the 1Gb of GDDR5 has had its speed upped from the stock MHz to a blistering 4100MHz.
The only downfall that we can see is that with the huge heatsink and fans that have been attached to the fully custom board, there is no rear exhaust holes on the card to vent the heat from the card out of the case.
With all this performance, we can certainly say that this is the fastest GTS 450 that you can buy on the market, but unfortunately we will not be seeing it in the UK just yet and is only available in America for the time being. All we can hope is that Galaxy’s European partner KFA2 will match this performance and release an equal card for us over here in Europe.
Either way though this is a massive achievement for the graphics card market. And has earned its rights for our hall of fame!
After a 4 year legal battle with the Federal Court of New York, the Peer-to-Peer file sharing site Limewire has had its servers shut down for the last time.
This is latest client to fall in recent years after Napster, Kazaa and Morpheus in the legal battle against illegal music downloads and infringement of copyright laws. The Limewire software though is still widely used and is believed to be the largest client of its type to use the Gnutella network for P2P activity. The use of the client will quickly fall however as the shut down of teh relay servers means that the client will be unable to search the network for others that are sharing a particular file.
Anybody that now goes to the Limewire official site, which was founded in 2000 by a former Wall Street trader Mark Gordon, will now be faced with a legal notice informing them that the site is under a court injunction for illegal activity
LEGAL NOTICE THIS IS AN OFFICIAL NOTICE THAT LIMEWIRE IS UNDER A COURT-ORDERED INJUNCTION TO STOP DISTRIBUTING AND SUPPORTING ITS FILE-SHARING SOFTWARE. DOWNLOADING OR SHARING COPYRIGHTED CONTENT WITHOUT AUTHORIZATION IS ILLEGAL.
Following the placement of the injunction the Record Industry Association of America (RIAA) said: “For the better part of the last decade, Limewire and Gorton have violated the law”
“The court has now signed an injunction that will start to unwind the massive piracy machine that LimeWire and Gorton used to enrich themselves immensely.
“In January, the court will conduct a trial to determine the appropriate level of damages necessary to compensate the record companies for the billions and billions of illegal downloads that occurred through the LimeWire system.”
The LimeGroup who owns the site and client rights appeared to acknowledge their defeat in the courts.
“We are out of the file-sharing business, but you can make it known that other aspects of our business remain ongoing,” said LimeGroup spokeswoman Tiffany Guarnaccia.
The new Mac OS has been announced to be with us next summer, but is this OS twitching our whiskers?
The advertising statement that Apple are using is certainly a reason to be:
We took our best thinking from Mac OS X and brought it to the iPhone. Then we took our best thinking from the iPhone and brought it to iPad. And now we’re bringing it all back to the Mac with our eighth major release of the world’s most advanced operating system.
There’s not a lot that we know about the new OS yet, but what we do know is that this new release is to be one of the fastest and smoothest systems to date. Lion as it is code named is to have access to the new Mac App Store which is also in development (don’t worry though as you can still buy an install software as before), there are also similarities to the iPad in how apps are launched and switched. The new desktop will look the same, but a new feature known a Launchpad, which sits in your dock, once launched will give an iOS feel to the way apps are launched, much like we are used to on the iPhone and iPad (including the folders feature that is now available through iOS4.0 and above).
There is also a new way of seeing what your Mac is running – Mission Control. With a simple swipe gesture on the touch-pad, you’ll be taken to an overview of what is running, your open windows grouped by app, thumbnails of your full-screen apps, dashboard and any other spaces that you may have open, all arranged in a nice sleek view. From there you can go to any App or area with a simple touch of the pad.
The last feature that we know of is running apps in full screen mode, at last we can take full advantage of all the space that the screen has to offer, whether surfing the net, viewing photos or making videos; now there’s less clutter to get in the way.
What do you think about this upcoming release? Is this OS going to be the new Alpha Male? Post your thoughts below or over on the forums at eteknix.com.
The AMD Radeon HD 6850 1GB is aimed at the mainstream to enthusiast market and has a lot of improved features including 2nd generation DirectX11 and AMD Eyefinity.
It has taken over from the 5750 and includes the rebranding that AMD have invested from dropping the ATI brand. Due to this, the card has renamed features and also support for upto 6 monitors.
If you want a card that is reasonably priced and gives great performance, then this is a card worth looking at.
This case has fantastic white styling and brilliant functionality with a completely tool-less design. It’s considered a mid-tower chassis, but will house the latest full size ATX motherboards, and plenty of storage devices too.
It is made by Xigmatek and is based off of their previous Midgard case which is a very successful selling case. It has a very high build quality and some quirky features to match. It comes with some fans pre-installed but optional extra sizes and locations can be filled too.
Our friends over at Futuremark have released their second trailer today, for the upcoming, well anticipated, LONG overdue 3dMark 11.
3DMark 11 will be highly devoted to DirectX 11, by utilising DirectX 11 hardware to show various effects including advanced tesselation. 3DMark has always been an insight into the future and generally shows us how games will look in the next coming years.
Straight away from viewing the video, you will notice the lens flare of light gleaming through the gaps and the individual leaves on the trees swaying as the camera pans round with so much detail.
This is still a tech demo, and as with all demo’s, the developer has complete rights to change or modify it before its final release, so whether the above scene makes it into the final version is anyone’s guess.
I bet Antec are happy with the above still, clearly showing off their brand name in big bold letters.
If this trailer (which personally is better than the first deep sea trailer) is anything to go by, it really does show what is capable with the current technology with regards to hardware and software collaboration. This is the future, today!
Following our recent article on AMD’s two new cards, we though it would be nice to give you some information on pricing and availability from some of the UK e-tailors.
ASUS Radeon HD 6870 OC 1Gb – £214.99 (£182.97) – Pre Order
HIS Radeon HD 6850 1Gb – £149.99 (£127.65) – Pre Order
HIS Radeon HD 6870 1Gb with Free CODMW2 Game – £199.99 (£170.20) – In Stock
Sapphire Radeon HD 6850 1Gb – £159.99 (£136.16) – In Stock
Sapphire Radeon HD 6870 1Gb – £204.99 (£174.46) – In Stock
XFX Radeon HD 6870 1Gb – £178.22 (£151.68) – Pre Order
Gigabyte Radeon HD 6870 1Gb – £201.72 (£171.68) – Pre Order
MSI Radeon HD 6870 1Gb – £202.90 (£172.68) – Pre Order
Asus Radeon HD 6870 OC 1Gb – £207.60 (£176.68) – In Stock
Sapphire Radeon HD 6870 1Gb – £204.07 (£173.68) – Pre Order
ASUS Radeon HD 6850 OC 1Gb – £158.25 (£134.68) – Pre Order
XFX Radeon HD 6850 1Gb – £133.57 (£113.68) – Pre Order
MSI Radeon HD 6850 1Gb – £158.25 (£134.68) – Pre Order
Gigabyte Radeon HD 6850 1Gb – £159.42 (£135.68) – Pre Order
Sapphire Radeon HD 6850 1Gb – £159.42 (£135.68) – In Stock
XFX Radeon HD 6850 1Gb – £151.99 (£129.35) – Pre Order
XFX Radeon HD 6870 1Gb – £195.99 (£166.80) – Pre Order
Asus Radeon HD 6870 1Gb – £197.45 (£168.04) – Pre Order
Sapphire Radeon HD 6870 1Gb – £176.45 (£150.17) – In Stock
Sapphire Radeon HD 6870 1Gb – £198.99 (£169.35) – In Stock
XFX Radeon HD 6870 1Gb – £198.99 (£169.35) – Due Soon
Sapphire Radeon HD 6850 1Gb – £158.99 (£135.31) – In Stock
XFX Radeon HD 6850 1Gb – £153.99 (£131.06) – Due Soon
Sapphire Radeon HD 6870 1Gb – £204.99 (£174.46) – Due Today
Sapphire Radeon HD 6850 1Gb – £159.99 (£136.16) – Due Today
XFX Radeon HD 6850 1Gb – £179.99 (£153.18) – Overdue
Sapphire Radeon HD 6870 1Gb – £204.45 (£174.00) – In Stock
Sapphire Radeon HD 6850 1Gb – £159.80 (£136.00) – Order On Request
With the 6800 series launch on the verge of happening, we at eTeknix can’t get the news out to you quick enough.
We have been inundated with emails and messages about AMD, Nvidia and their partners, as everyone seems to be up to something. This time round it’s PowerColor showing off a few pictures of what we can assume is the 6850 with its new revamped PCS cooler.
Even though the picture has has the model number wiped out, we are still pretty sure we know what we’re dealing with due to the single power connector.
From the picture, we can see a nicely sized heatsink and 92mm fan to keep it cool in stylish fashion. As we all know, PowerColor’s coolers have always given us quiet yet powerful performance, especially when looking at the older 5850 PCS+ and if that is anything to go by, this should be a big hit.
After hints for some time that a new redesigned MacBook Air was on the way, last night Steve Jobs – CEO at Apple, revealed the companies lightest and thinnest MacBook to date.
The new Air is to come in two variants. The smaller 11.6″ features a 1366 x 768 LED backed screen – remember that to get this resolution with the current Air you need a minimum of the 15″ screen, so there’s another vast improvement straight off, and the bigger brother of the two will size in at 13.3″ packing a 1440×900 resolution out of its ultra thin LED screen.
Its not just the screen that is amazingly thin. Both models are no more than 1.7cm thick when closed and to beat that, they’re only 0.3cm at the thinnest point! They’re also light as a feather, the 11″ is only a mere 1.06Kg and the 13″ just tips the scales at 1.32Kg.
Both laptops will come with 2Gb of DDR3 RAM (upgradeable to 4Gb) and a NVIDIA GeForce 320M GPU with 256Mb of DDR3 SDRAM shared also with its main memory. The 11″ comes with an Intel Core 2 Duo processor at 1.4GHz 3Mb L2 Cache and 800MHz FSB or the option of a 1.6GHz variant, the larger 13″ has a 1.86GHz Core 2 Duo with 6Mb L2 Cache and 1066MHz FSB, or a 2.13GHz option.
The most notable change with the new Air compared to the old is the lack of a hard drive entirely. The new Air is only available with a Solid State Drive ranging from 64Gb & 128Gb in the 11″ to 128Gb & 256Gb in the 13″. We already know SSD to be an expensive option on the current air but Steve Jobs has already hinted that Apple is planning to eventually make solid state drives the standard for notebooks.
So what are the pro’s and con’s of these new drives over the current standard?
These new drives have no moving parts which has a number of advantages in its own right. The drives do not need to spin up from standby to access data, which now allows for the almost instant-on experience from standby like we currently have with the iPad. The drives are also drastically smaller than a traditional drive, which means less space is needed in the case and also no caddies or cages are needed to mount them in as they attach directly to the motherboard.
The drives are also more robust, because there are no moving parts, they are more resilient to shock and vibration meaning that there is less of a chance of data loss or corruption due to knocking the drive during use/transit.
The drives also run a lot cooler as there are no moving parts to generate heat, contrary to this there are no fans as Jobs likes quiet machines, although we’ll see if the new chassis design has sorted out the cooling problems that was found on the original Air.
On the flip side though flash drives do have their drawbacks, mainly their cost. Per Gb you’re going to find more Gb per £ in a traditional hard drive than you will in a Solid State Drive for a while to come, but this is to be part expected with new technologies.
This bang per buck approach is therefore noticeable in the prices for the new Air. With the 11″ you’ll either pay £849 for 64Gb of space of £999 for 128Gb. similarly on the 13″ £1099 will get you 128Gb of space and £1349 will supply 256Gb.
So with the prices in mind, what other features will you be seeing for the price tag?
With the 11″ you’ll be getting a healthy 5 hours of battery life and 7 hours on the larger 13″ – although this is not as much as the MacBook Pros battery life, we do have to remember that a smaller chassis means a smaller battery, but this is where the SSD has its advantage, because the new Air draws less power, it can harvest more life per ratio of battery space. Both now allow for a standby time of up-to a month with the almost instant awakening – this feature taken from the iPad.
You’ll also be getting wireless 802.11 a/b/g/n connectivity and Bluetooth 2.1 with EDR (Enhanced Data Rate), plus 2 USB 2.0 ports (although I’d personally like to have seen at least one 3.0 compatible port), a mini-display port, headphone port, built in microphone on the side and the standard magsafe connector for power. The 13″ model also has an SD card reader built in.
Obviously we’re not going to get an optical drive as expected from the features of the current Air but plugging in a drive or using a shared drive from another PC or Mac solves this. The other feature that I’ve noticed that was missing was the availability of Ethernet connectivity. I personally would rather have this this in as shifting large amounts of data over wifi whether it be g or n can be quite time consuming although buying a 3rd party USB to LAN adaptor may solve this.
Due to the fact that there is no optical drive, Apple is including a USB recovery key should you need to reformat and install OSX when there is not optical drive nearby for use.
Whilst the overall specs are not the most performance breaking, this shows that Apple are taking a step back in order to make a bigger step forward in laptop design and practicality.
What do you think of the new release from Apple? Air you views below or over on the forums at eTeknix.com
With the 6800 series launch on the horizon, there have been several claims about price cuts on the GTX 460 and 470 cards from the green team and with the 470 prices already falling in the past weeks, it seems the rumours were right and the GTX 460 will follow suit.
The GTX 460 is one of the most competitive cards around, giving users a slight edge over comparable priced cards from AMD and with its 4th month of sales in tact, it seems more price cuts are to be done to the mid-range beast of a card. The card originally hit our stores in July and since, has dropped around £50 since its launch, but it seems that another £10 or so shall be shed from its fatty price tag.
These price cuts should be across the whole range of GTX 460 cards including the 768MB and 1GB versions but exact figures are hard to guesstimate, so we will have to wait, just like you.
Other sources are also giving the same information to regards to AMD’s 6800 series cards, before they are even out, exclaiming that they will be cheaper than first anticipated.
The front of the packaging on the Xigmatek Midgard White Knight Chassis shows clear information on the case and comments on the fact that it’s a pure white case and gives some of the main features backed by a mountain themed background.
The sides of the packaging list the main features and specifications in word and picture format.
Opening the box up shows the polystyrene protection, as well as a clear plastic bag around the case.
Just over a month ago, the Chrome devlopment team promised regular updates with regards to their fantastic browser. They haven’t let anyone down and have been true to their word by releasing Chrome version 7 to the stable channel.
Generally speaking, you would expect a lot of new features and bug fixes, but in such a short amount of time (1 and a half months) the new features had to take a back seat, but you can still experience these new features on the devlopers channel build, which is currently using Chrome version 8. Amidst the lack of new features, the developer team have managed to fix a very large number of bug fixes from the previous version, which in turn gives the user of the new Chrome 7 a more fluid and relaxed time, whilst using the browser. In fact, according to Google, 826 bugs were rectified, which is quite outstanding considering the small time frame.
A full list of bugs can be found on the release blog.
Whilst, featres weren’t the top priority, the dev team did manage to add a few little ones, including HTML5 parasing algorithm, AppleScript support on Mac OS X for UI automation, File API, directory upload and also improved the site blocking features too.
Personally, i would have preferred the version number sticking within the ‘6’ range until more features were included, as consumers do use version numbers to identify the power etc… behind software.
The latest stable build of Google Chrome can be obtained here, and is available for Windows, Linux and OSX platforms.
After many rumours of a second iPad being in the pipelines, it has been revealed that a trademark submission has been made to the European Trademarks and Designs Office by Cupertino for a second 30-pin docking port to be placed on the side of the iPad. This new feature will allow users to dock the iPad into a more natural horizontal position rather than the portrait only dock on the current release.
This seems to be another piece of ingenuity from the mastermind behind most of Apples success stories Jonathan Ives, who along with Apple CEO Steve Jobs are said the have signed the submission to the European offices.
Steve Jobs did make a statement though, that users should not hold their breath about the possibility of a smaller 7″ version of the iPad.
The reason we won’t make a 7-inch tablet isn’t because we don’t want to hit that price point, it’s because we think the screen is too small to express the software,” Jobs said, according to Apple Insider, adding, “As a software driven company we think about the software strategies first.”
Jobs said he believes
“the current crop of seven-inch tablets are going to be DOA, Dead on Arrival.”
According to Steve this is because the tablets are “too small”
We’re not holding our breath on this statement though as he has been known in the past to be misleading abput upcoming products from the firm; he had mentioned in the past that there were NO plans to develop a new TV interface, however a mere 4 months later, the updated version of Apple TV was launched.
There are also a number of other rumours surrounding the next generation of iPad, but following the design sketches that were sent along with the submission, it seems that the overall design of the iPad will remain unchanged. Other features that are said to appear are two integrated cameras (one front facing and one on the rear) and Facetime, much like the iPhone4. Even though these are not Apple’s most radical updates seen to a device, it does show that they are listening to the consumer market in creating a device that has more like a tablet come desktop screen.
If there was a 7″ model alongside the current 9″ despite the submitted sketches, the only real benefit I personally see would be at the retail price, although if Facetime and the two cameras were included, the price to the end user would not be that dis-similar from what the current iPad is retailing for.
What are your views on the current iPad and what would you like to see with the next generation of iPad? Post you comments below or over on the forums at eTeknix.com
In this day and age, there are so many enthusiasts out there longing for more power and performance, but there’s a price to pay with this. You can’t just turn things up and not monitor them.
In short, you can’t overclock something and expect it to just work without keeping tabs on it. That’s where software like GPU-Z comes into play.
The new version of GPU-Z gives support for the newest GeForce graphics cards, including the GeForce GT 430.
Among other tweaks and fixes, the changelog is as follows:
Improved support for AMD Radeon HD 6850 and HD 6870
Added support for NVIDIA GeForce GT 430, GT 420
Fixed default clock reading on Fermi architecture cards
Added voltage controller support for Colorful iGame GTX 460
Added PCI Vendor detection for Colorful
Added TMU count and die size for GF106
Synchronization mutexes are global now
Improved stability when running multiple instances of GPU-Z / Fixed “the driver has been marked for deletion” error
You can download the latest version of GPU-Z from here.
Computer giant Dell has released a new range of 7 LED backlit widescreen LCD displays ranging from 20″ upto 24″ all of which are HD ready and 5 Star energy compliant.
Out of the 7 displays, there 2 20″ entry level variants, the IN2020 which is VGA (D-sub) only and the IN2020M which also features a DVI port. Both of these screens have a modest native resolution of 1600 x 900 pixels, a 5ms response time (time of which it take to change from full black to full white) and a dynamic contrast ratio of 8,000,000:1. All of this is surrounded in a glorious high gloss black bezel.
The other 5 studio branded displays are Full HD capable and pack the same specifications as the entry level screens but instead have a larger native resolution of 1920 x 1080.
These screens come in a range of 3 sizes – 21.5″, 23″ and 24″. All of these come with VGA and DVI and even HDMI on the ST2020L, ST2320L and ST2420L models.
Prices start at £139.00 for the IN2020 and go upto £229.00 for the top end ST2420L from Dell direct and are available to buy now.
All week long, we have posted information about Nvidia based cards, as well as speculations about AMD based 68xx series cards, and finally we have some product shots of the 6850 and 6870 cards direct from AMD, and after a conference call with the graphics giant, we have a bit more insight to these highly anticipated cards. Shame we can only share so much with you.
You can see from the picture, the rough sizing of the card based on the fan and pci-express connector dimensions.
From this view, we can clearly see the connectors on the card which includes two mini-DisplayPort, HDMI and two DVI ports. This leads us to believe that their is more to eyefinity that AMD have currently let on.
We can clearly see the single CrossFire connector which rules out any four-way graphic configurations, unless AMD have something up their sleeves for users wanting that?
The styling on the card is simple yet elegant with the theme being passed on from the 5770 and 5850 based cards that we already know and love.
The card comes with a single 6 pin PCI-express power connector, which leads us to believe that this card will have a TDP of sub 150watt. We may be wrong, but we are simply calculating from existing AMD cards.
Barnes & Noble are currently working on the biggest update ever for its Nook e-book reader which is a stylish device similar to the Apple iPad. The update is only known at the moment as version 1.5 and will provide a lot of new and improved features, including:
Faster performance overall
Faster page turning
Password encryption protection
Customized library
Last page syncing across all Nook based devices
B&N aren’t letting too much out in regards to this update, but our sources tell us that it’s due to be rolled-out in late November, maybe even early December.
Earlier this month, the big news from Nvidia was all about their upcoming budget range of GeForce GT 430 1Gb cards, of which we have reviewed Inno3D’s flavour. Through all this though, it seems that Nvidia have sneakily been releasing their new range of cards, namely the GeForce GT 440, into the OEM market to give manufacturers a DirectX-11 compatible card for mid-range PC use.
Going by release specifications, the card is to come in two specifications, but this only varies in the memory specification.
The graphics clock is set to 594MHz and with the processor clock at 1189MHz & 144 CUDA cores, this is buy no means a basic card. As mentioned, the memory is where this card has 2 variations, one aimed to make the card an affordable option with 1.5Gb of GDDR3 at an effective 1600MHz clock and the other option designed as a high end option with 3Gb of GDDR3 at an effective clock of 1800MHz.
Both options are packing a 192 bit-memory bus and 43.2Gb/sec of bandwidth, but the 3Gb option does seem to be a bit overkill, considering the memory clock is not that much greater than the 1.5Gb’s, but this will inevitably help out OEM manufacturers & Nvidia stand out on the specification sheets for the retail market.
The cards are SLi ready but their only support is with an identical card from the same manufacturer. The cards are supporting of Nvidia’s PureVideo® and CUDA technologys and are also PhysX ready so are more than capable on paper of HD video. As standard, the cards come with HDMI, VGA, and DVI connectors and support a maximum resolution of 2560 x 1600 over the digital ports and 2048 x 1536 over the analogue VGA.
The HMDI port supports 1.4a and GPU accelerated Blu-Ray 3D (Playback requires a compatible software player) but x.v.Color, HDMI Deep Color and 7.1 digital surround sound will be added in a Release 260 driver.
With all these features in mind, the boards are designed with a single slot fitment and the total power draw from the system is a mere 56W which in turn keeps the cooler sizes down to a minimum.
Only thing that is missing from Nvidia’s information is the exact price of this card, however with the card aimed at OEM’s rather than the retail market, the cost should be kept quite low.
What’s you view on this new quiet release from Nvidia? Post you thoughts below and over on the eTeknix forums.
The box for the XFX Radeon HD 5770 1GB Single Slot Graphics Card follows the same styling that we see on most XFX products, but this time, in a slimmer, more stylish packaging. Due to this card being single slot, the packaging reflects that by being a sleek, slim box.
The front of the box also lists some of the main features including AMD Eyefinity and 5 star XFX support.
The rear of the box lists the main features and gives information on this card as well as giving more detail on the premium support from XFX.
The sides of the box clearly lists the minimum specifications, serial number details and a bit more about the features.
Opening the box up shows us a clear window displaying the card itself, and once the inner box is opened you will find a door hanger with relevant support details, driver installation CD, quick install guide, installation guide giving more detailed instructions, and the graphics card inside a plastic casing.
Nvidia have released a new driver Version 260.89, which is the first WHQL certified release from its 260 series driver.
This can be downloaded from www.Nvidia.com in preparation for when the GeForce GTX 460 competes against ATI’s latest offering the Radeon HD 6800 series later next week .
The new drivers are said to improve performance in the 400 Series GPU’s and will introduce official support for the GeForce GT 430.
The new driver version when tested increased performance with a boost of over 10 per cent in at least eight games including S.T.A.L.K.E.R, Dirt2 and Far Cry 2.
The new software released by Nvidia also introduces support for Blu-Ray 3D when connecting to a 3DTV with a HDMI 1.4 interface and lossless HD audio as well as a new driver installer and an updated surround setup wizard.
The driver adds 3D Vision streaming support for Firefox 4 and Google Chrome web browsers as well as adding support for 3D monitors and 3D projectors .
See below for a full list of changes in the new driver release
New in Release 260.89
New GPU Support
Adds support for the newly released GeForce GT 430 GPU.
Performance
Increases performance for GeForce GTX 400 Series GPUs in several PC games vs. v258.96 WHQL drivers. The following are examples of some of the most significant improvements measured on Windows 7. Results will vary depending on your GPU and system configuration:
GeForce GTX 480:
Up to 10% in StarCraft II (2560×1600 4xAA/16xAF Ultra)
Up to 14% in S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat (1920×1200 4xAA/16xAF)
Up to 16% in S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat (SLI 2560×1600 4xAA/16xAF)
Up to 6% in Aliens vs. Predator (SLI 1920×1200 noAA Tessellation on)
GeForce GTX 460:
Up to 19% in StarCraft II (SLI 1920×1200 4xAA/16xAF Ultra)
Up to 15% in Battlefield Bad Company 2 (SLI 2560×1600 4xAA/16xAF)
Up to 12% in S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat (2560×1600 noAA)
Up to 9% in Aliens vs. Predator (1680×1050 4xAA/16xAF Tessellation on)
Up to 7% in Metro 2033 (1680×1050 noAA Tessellation on)
Up to 11% in Dirt 2 (SLI 2560×1600 4xAA/16xAF)
Up to 12% in Crysis:Warhead (SLI 1920×1200 4xAA/16xAF Gamer)
Up to 13% in Far Cry 2 (2560×1600 4xAA/16xAF)
Up to 12% in H.A.W.X (SLI 1920×1200 4xAA/16xAF SSAO Very High)
Up to 5% in Just Cause 2 (1920×1200 4xAA/16xAF)
Up to 22% in Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena (1920×1200 noAA)
Up to 5% in 3DMark Vantage (Extreme Preset)
Blu-ray 3D
Adds support for playing back Blu-ray 3D discs when connecting your GPU to an HDMI 1.4 3D TV. Playback requires compatible software application from CyberLink, ArcSoft, Roxio, or Corel. For more information,NVIDIA Blu-ray 3D website.
HD Audio
Adds lossless DTS-HD Master Audio and Dolby TrueHD audio bitstreaming support for compatible Blu-ray movies with GeForce GTX 460 GPUs*.
Adds high definition 24-bit, 96 and 192 KHz multi-channel audio sampling rate support for compatible Blu-ray movies with GeForce GTX 400 Series ,GT 240, GT 220 and 210 GPUs*.
Upgrades HD Audio driver to version 1.1.9.0.
*Note: A Blu-ray movie player update may be required to enable these new features; check with your movie players software manufacturers for more details.These features are only supported on Windows 7.
Installation
New driver installer with enhanced user interface and new Express and Custom installation options.
Express fast and easy one-click installation
Custom customized installation
Option to perform a clean installation (completely removes older drivers from your system prior to installing the new driver).
Option to choose which driver components (ie. PhysX or 3D Vision) to install.
Improved installation time for multi-GPU PCs.
NVIDIA Surround
Updated NVIDIA Surround setup wizard
After first setup, wizard allows users to jump to any setup step.
Improved display connection diagrams and tooltips.
Improved UI for setup and arrangement of displays.
Improved bezel correction setup experience.
Adds help page to highlight which in-game resolution to select (e.g. how to pick bezel corrected resolutions)
Option to dedicate an extra GPU to PhysX or to drive an additional display.
Allows for portrait or landscape setup directly from the setup wizard.
Updated 3D Vision Surround and NVIDIA Surround game support list. Please visit the 3D Vision Surround web page for a full list of supported games.
NVIDIA 3D Vision
With Release 260 drivers, the installation process for 3D Vision has changed. Please view this knowledgebase article for more information on the changes.
Adds NVIDIA 3D Vision streaming support for Firefox 4 and Google Chrome web browsers.
Adds support for Sony’s 3D Sweep Panorama picture format added to NVIDIA 3D Photo Viewer (Sony digital cameras that can capture 3D Sweep Panorama pictures include NEX-5/NEX-3, Alpha a560/a580 and Cyber-shot DSC-WX5/DSC-TX9/DSC-T99 models).
Adds support for new 3D Vision Desktop LCD monitors: BenQ X2410 and NEC F23W2A
Adds support for new 3D Vision projectors: Sanyo PDG-DWL2500 and ViewSonic PJD6251
Drakensang: The Dark Eye updated in-game compatibility text
Mafia II updated profile to properly for 3D Vision-Rating
StarCraft II fixed profile to properly recognize the retail game executable name and match the 3D Vision rating of Good
Super Commander fixed HUD elements
TRINE new profiles fixes that allow the game to be rated 3D Vision-Ready when used with the TRINE patch v1.08, available via Steam.
NVIDIA SLI
Adds or enhances SLI profiles for the following PC games:
City of Heroes: Going Rogue
Alien Swarm
Dead Rising 2
Front Mission Evolved
Kane and Lynch 2: Dog Days
LEGO: Harry Potter
Other Improvements
Adds support for OpenGL 4.1 for GeForce 400 series GPUs.
Upgrades PhysX System Software to version 9.10.0514.
Improves compatibility for older PC games (DirectX 7 to DirectX 9) running on Windows 7 (examples: Gothic, Gothic II, Falcon 4.0: Allied Force, Links 2003, Independence War II – Edge of Chaos, and X2: Wolverine’s Revenge).
Adds drag and drop display arrangement support to the Set up multiple displays page.
Includes numerous bug fixes. Refer to the release notes on the documentation tab for information about the key bug fixes in this release.
Users without US English operating systems can select their language and download the International driver here.
Additional Information
Supports the new GPU-accelerated features in Adobe CS5.
Supports GPU-acceleration for smoother online HD videos with Adobe Flash 10.1. Learn more here.
Supports the new version of MotionDSP’s video enhancement software, vReveal, which adds support for HD output. NVIDIA customers can download a free version of vReveal that supports up to SD output here.
Supports DirectCompute with Windows 7 and GeForce 8-series and later GPUs.
Supports OpenGL 3.3 for GeForce 8-series and later GPUs.
Supports single GPU and NVIDIA SLI technology on DirectX 9, DirectX 10, DirectX 11, and OpenGL, including 3-way SLI, Quad SLI, and SLI support on SLI-certified Intel X58-based motherboards.
Now it’s time to bring you a bit more information on the 6870 and it’s Barts XT codenamed GPU. It has now come to our attention that it will have a total of 1120 shaders. The 6870 and it’s baby brother 6850 will both use arch 5D shaders which lets AMD run the core clock at the standard 900MHz yet gain performance through more shaders with better technology.
Due to these shaders, we have been informed that you will expect a 15 to 20 percent better score when compared to the GeForce GTX 460 which as we know is what AMD are pitting their 6870 card against.
Overclocked GTX 460’s will obviously still be in their element but you will be sacrificing more money for that slightly better performing card, as we would expect anyway. I mean, nothing in this world is free, right?
Early benchmarks figures that we featured already showed that the 5850 and 6870 were very similar with regards to performance, giving the 6870 a 5 percent lead over its predecessor. The 5870 however, is still faster on all acounts, giving a clear cut performance win over the newer cards. Maybe a new benchmark that utilises the new technology on the cards is needed?
A lot of hype on the internet is assuming that the 5800 series cards will be phased out shortly after the 6800 series launch due to AMD not wanting to compete with itself. How true is this? That’s anyone’s guess.
One thing we do know is that from studies, it does show that users buy products with higher numbers, due to this, we can only assume that the 6870 will outsell the 5870 due to its numbering.
The past week has had us all at the eTeknix building geared up for a graphics launch, with the new offerings from AMD due to launch on 22nd October.
I will be honest, i think the battle between AMD and Nvidia is fantastic, it reminds me of the good old days and how things used to be with a bit of friendly competition. Whereas lately it was generally AMD releasing the new ground breaking cards, and Nvidia doing the same, but slightly better. Not being a fan boy here, but that is simply the facts!
So now that you know that, you can only assume that the 6850 and 6870 being launched on Friday will be blown out of the water by something new from the green team. Our sources tell us that is exactly how it is, and it comes in the form of a card called the GeForce GTX 580.
From what we’ve seen, it seems that the new GF110 based card will feature a FULL 512 CUDA cores, 128 texture units and the thing that we’ve been waiting for a while – A speculated 512-bit memory interface.
We, at eTeknix have been waiting for a card with a higher memory bus for quite some time, and this rumoured card will give us just that, which in our eyes will show off Fermi’s FULL potential.
Whether this is all true, who knows? I’m guessing Nvidia does, and if it does turn out to be fact over fiction, I know what I’ll be asking Santa for Christmas!
Intel updates their price list today showing clear price cuts on its desktop and mobile microprocessors.
Processors that saw the price decreases were the Pentium E5700, E6700 and Core i3 550 all being cut by 13- 15%.
Other Intel processors such as the Celeron dual core E3400 was cut by a whopping 21 percent leading the forefront on cheaper Intel CPU’s.
Also among these cuts, the i7 640LM and 660UM also saw the decreases, but sadly only by 6 percent and 9 percent.
As you can see from the above pricing restructure, the majority of the processors were once the top models in their categories before being overthrown by newer models.
Due to this new pricing structure being put in place, it now means that there is a lot of confusion in the Intel world. Explaining this in some more detail, we can clearly see that due to the price cuts, the above models are now the same prices as their slower brothers. For instance, the E6600 and E6700 are now the same price, the same with the E3300 Celeron and E3400 are also the same price as each other.
Now call me dumb here, but what one are you going to buy?
We tend to run competitions as frequent as we possibly can and in return we hope to be able to get the eTeknix community more active once again.
This time around we are giving away a Sapphire Radeon HD 5830 (Game Edition) Graphics Card and 2 premium memberships to eTeknix, as well as a mystery prize for the runner-up!
The Sapphire Radeon HD 5830 1GB (Game Edition) Graphics Card has many great features including a 800MHz core clock speed, 1GB of GDDR5 memory running at 4000MHz and also comes with a Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 voucher code to get you started.
All of the following entry details will apply from now until the competition end date on Saturday 20th November 2010 at 8PM GMT, where the winner will be selected using the following criteria.
You MUST be a member of eTeknix. You can register here!
You MUST comment on this thread with the words “I want to win a Sapphire HD 5830”
For EVERY 10 forum thread replies, you will get 1 point!
For EVERY 10 website comments, you will get 2 points!
For EVERY 10 created forum threads, you will get 2 points!
For EVERY website referral signup, you will get 1 point! – When the user signs up, be sure they put your username in the “Referrer” field.
Rules and Regulations
As ALWAYS spam will NOT be tolerated and offending user(s) will be subsequently dealt with!
The winner will be the member with the most points at the close of the competition!
In the event of a dispute, the judges’ decision is final and no discussion will be open for it!
The winner will be notified via their registered email address no later than 14 days from the closing date of the competition!
The first prize is a Sapphire Radeon HD 5830 1GB (Game Edition) Graphics Card and premium membership to eTeknix.
The second prize (runner-up) is a premium membership to eTeknix and a mystery prize!
The competition is open worldwide and all shipping costs and cost of prize(s) are covered by eTeknix!
In any event that the above prize offered is unavailable due to circumstances beyond our control; we reserve the right to offer an equal or greater specification alternative without any hesitation!
No entrant details will be passed on to any third-party companies!
Prize draws are not open to eTeknix staff, affiliates, supplies or sponsors!
Double posting on your own thread will not be counted (this is when you reply after your OWN reply)!
If a user is found to be creating or using multiple accounts, that user will be disqualified from the competition and subsequently dealt with!
By entering into this competition, you are hereby accepting the above mentioned terms and conditions of the competition!
Last but not least, have fun, enjoy and good luck!
