Computex 2007: AMD's Barcelona and Other Products
by Gary Key on June 11, 2007 4:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Trade Shows
abit
abit was displaying the new version 3.0 of their µGuru panel that features WiFi support. This enables you to control tuning aspects and software applications with the new remote control unit from anywhere in the room. So, if you're sitting in a recliner on the other end of the room and suddenly feel the need to modify your system overclock, you no longer need to get up and cross the room.
While abit showed off an impressive lineup of P35 motherboards that we will review shortly, we found a little gem hiding in the back room of the display booth. The new AN-M2HD is based on the just released NVIDIA 7050/630i chipset combination and should be an excellent overclocker for current AM2 processors as verified in early testing. We will have more on this motherboard and the X38 lineup shortly.
ASUS
ASUS offers a complete line of products for the PC and always has some interesting technology to view at the various tradeshows.
The ASUS XG Station was first shown at CES this year and is a complete external drop in solution for your notebook. The system was demonstrated with an NVIDIA 8600GT and should be ready for market shortly. The delay was caused by additional programming requirements for Vista compatibility along with certification for the latest video card choices.
The ASUS M3A32-MVP Deluxe is based on the upcoming AMD RD790 chipset that features full support for AM2/AM2+ processors, HyperTransport 3, CrossFire, and DDR2-1066. The chipset is coming along well although we expect a couple of additional silicon spins before an estimated release date in late September of this year. Hopefully, AMD will be on schedule this time with a chipset introduction, though as mentioned earlier the new Agena based processors may not be available until December. One of the new features that ASUS was touting is the memory heatpipe system that is attached to the Northbridge heatpipe unit. Whether this will make it into in production is unknown at this time, but early thermal results are promising. Unfortunately, the current system only works with two DIMM slots occupied.
MSI
MSI had several new products in their booth this year but the Crystal 945 Touch panel PC caught our eye for those who like an all-in-one PC combination. The unit features the 945G/ICH7 chipset combination, 2GB of DDR2-667 memory, Pentium 4/D support, an 8-in-1 flash card reader, support for 2.5" IDE HDD and Slim design ODD units with a 17" touch screen panel. We found the system was very responsive and intuitive to use for a Windows based PC and it offers a fairly small footprint.
Shuttle
Shuttle was very excited to show off their new SFF unit, the SX38P3 Deluxe. The SX38 is based on Intel's new X38 chipset. Shuttle has managed to fit this chipset along with CrossFire capabilities into a revised SFF case that features their OASIS cooling technology. The system also features dynamic overclocking, 802.11 b/g WiFi, Bluetooth, Fingerprint recognition, and an 80%+ efficient certified power supply.
abit was displaying the new version 3.0 of their µGuru panel that features WiFi support. This enables you to control tuning aspects and software applications with the new remote control unit from anywhere in the room. So, if you're sitting in a recliner on the other end of the room and suddenly feel the need to modify your system overclock, you no longer need to get up and cross the room.
While abit showed off an impressive lineup of P35 motherboards that we will review shortly, we found a little gem hiding in the back room of the display booth. The new AN-M2HD is based on the just released NVIDIA 7050/630i chipset combination and should be an excellent overclocker for current AM2 processors as verified in early testing. We will have more on this motherboard and the X38 lineup shortly.
ASUS
ASUS offers a complete line of products for the PC and always has some interesting technology to view at the various tradeshows.
The ASUS XG Station was first shown at CES this year and is a complete external drop in solution for your notebook. The system was demonstrated with an NVIDIA 8600GT and should be ready for market shortly. The delay was caused by additional programming requirements for Vista compatibility along with certification for the latest video card choices.
The ASUS M3A32-MVP Deluxe is based on the upcoming AMD RD790 chipset that features full support for AM2/AM2+ processors, HyperTransport 3, CrossFire, and DDR2-1066. The chipset is coming along well although we expect a couple of additional silicon spins before an estimated release date in late September of this year. Hopefully, AMD will be on schedule this time with a chipset introduction, though as mentioned earlier the new Agena based processors may not be available until December. One of the new features that ASUS was touting is the memory heatpipe system that is attached to the Northbridge heatpipe unit. Whether this will make it into in production is unknown at this time, but early thermal results are promising. Unfortunately, the current system only works with two DIMM slots occupied.
MSI
MSI had several new products in their booth this year but the Crystal 945 Touch panel PC caught our eye for those who like an all-in-one PC combination. The unit features the 945G/ICH7 chipset combination, 2GB of DDR2-667 memory, Pentium 4/D support, an 8-in-1 flash card reader, support for 2.5" IDE HDD and Slim design ODD units with a 17" touch screen panel. We found the system was very responsive and intuitive to use for a Windows based PC and it offers a fairly small footprint.
Shuttle
Shuttle was very excited to show off their new SFF unit, the SX38P3 Deluxe. The SX38 is based on Intel's new X38 chipset. Shuttle has managed to fit this chipset along with CrossFire capabilities into a revised SFF case that features their OASIS cooling technology. The system also features dynamic overclocking, 802.11 b/g WiFi, Bluetooth, Fingerprint recognition, and an 80%+ efficient certified power supply.
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Kooky Krusher - Monday, June 11, 2007 - link
Ok, so I started reading this article in hopes that there would be some glimmer of light for Barcelona, but I was saddened by the fact that there just isn't any...yet. I'm not big on placing myself in any one chip maker's camp, but man! AMD can't buy good PR right now. At least abit and shuttle made me smile. As an SFF builder and absolute NUT, I'm happy about any kind of matx/SFF news.erwos - Monday, June 11, 2007 - link
I agree - I'm drooling at the idea of stashing one of those Hitachi combo drives into an SX38P3.Let us not even speak of the debacle that is Barcelona and the HD 2900XT. Just not AMD's year, it seems.
Bjoern77 - Monday, June 11, 2007 - link
right now i'm more worried about the lack of competition in the video card market. the r600 more or less failed to deliver, therefor nvidea keeps the price up. Especially the dx10 mid/lowrange price/performance sucks. Especially if you want to build a new pc now, cpu/memory/storage is so damn cheap, but a suitable gpu...ok, and than i can start to worry about BArcelona again, because if it fails cheap cpus will be history for a while.neweggster - Wednesday, June 13, 2007 - link
True but look at it this way, by the time Dx10 becomes a major part of the gaming market share you will start to see an even battle between Nvidia and ATI. So for now any midrange card will suffice for Dx9 gaming, a 7600gt runs really great for the price right now for a midrange offering. Just because the GPU and memory gets faster doesn't mean the performance gap increases enough to make older models obsolete from being defined as midranged or whatever.You can still add 10 new models with all progressively increased performance and a older video card models will still be considered midranged. Take into consideration current game performance, across the board a 7600gt will still be midrange to me for years to come till we start seeing DX10 games dominating the market where the high end cards start to define the gap in performance vs models.