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Subject: Processors | January 16, 2017 - 04:11 PM | Jeremy Hellstrom
Tagged: kaby lake, sandy bridge
Not too long ago the release of a new processor family meant a noticeable improvement from the previous generation and the only question was how to upgrade, not if you should upgrade. Like many other things, that has passed on into the proverbial good old days and now we need reviews like this one published by [H]ard|OCP. Is there any noticeable performance difference between the two chips outside of synthetic benchmarks?
The test systems are slightly different as the memory has changed, the 7700K has 2666MHz DDR4 while the 2600K has 2133MHz DDR3; both CPUs are clocked at 4.5GHz however. Their results show actual performance deltas in productivity software such as HandBrake and Blender, justifying the upgrade for those who focus on content creation. As for gaming, if you have no GPU then you will indeed see performance increases; but nothing compared to buying a GPU.
"There are many HardOCP readers that are still running Sandy Bridge CPUs and have been waiting with anticipation of one day upgrading to a new system. One of the biggest things asked in the last month is just how the 2600K stacks up against the new 7700K processor. So we got hold of one of our readers 2600K systems and put it to the test."
Here are some more Processor articles from around the web:
- 26-Way Intel/AMD CPU System Comparison With Ubuntu 16.10 + Linux 4.10 Kernel @ Phoronix
- Intel Core i7-7700K & i5-7600K Kaby Lake @ Kitguru
Subject: Processors | January 3, 2017 - 03:54 PM | Jeremy Hellstrom
Tagged: z270, overclocking, kaby lake, Intel, i7-7700k, core i7-7700k, 7th generation core, 7700k, 14nm
Having already familiarized yourself with Intel's new Kaby Lake architecture and the i7-7700k processor in Ryan's review you may now be wondering how well the new CPU overclocks for others. [H]ard|OCP received three i7-7700k's and three different Z270 motherboards for testing and they set about overclocking these in combination to see what frequency they could reach. Only one of the chips was ever stable at 5GHz, and it is reassuring that it managed that on all three motherboards, the remaining two would only hit 4.8GHz which is still not a bad result. Drop by to see their settings in full detail.
"After having a few weeks to play around with Intel's new Kaby Lake architecture Core i7-7700K processors, we finally have some results that we want to discuss when it comes to overclocking and the magic 5GHz many of us are looking for, and what we think your chances are of getting there yourself."
Here are some more Processor articles from around the web:
- Intel's Core i7-7700K 'Kaby Lake' CPU @ The Tech Report
- Intel Kaby Lake i7-7700K & i5-7600K Review @ Hardware Canucks
- Intel Core i7-7700K vs 6700K: 22 Games, RX 480 & GTX 1080 @ techPowerUp
- ntel Kaby Lake Core i7-7700K Performance & Z270 Chipset Overview @ Techgage
- Intel 7th Generation Core i7 7700K Processor Review @ OCC
- Intel Kaby Lake Core i7-7700K IPC @ [H]ard|OCP
- Core i5-6400 @ Hardware Secrets
- FX-4300 @ Hardware Secrets
- AMD's New Ryzen CPU - SMT and IPC @ [H]ard|OCP
Subject: Processors | January 2, 2017 - 05:33 PM | Scott Michaud
Tagged: sandy bridge, Intel
OC3D is claiming that Intel is working on a significantly new architecture, targeting somewhere around the 2019 or 2020 time frame. Like AMD’s Bulldozer, while there were several architectures after the initial release, they were all based around a set of the same basic assumptions with tweaks for better IPC, reducing bottlenecks, and so forth. Intel has also been using the same fundamentals since Sandy Bridge, albeit theirs aligned much better with how x86 applications were being developed.
According to the report, Intel’s new architecture is expected to remove some old instructions, which will make it less compatible with applications that use these commands. This is actually very similar to what AMD was attempting to do with Bulldozer... to a point. AMD projected that applications would scale well to multiple cores, and use GPUs for floating-point operations; as such, they designed cores in pairs, and decided to eliminate redundant parts, such as half of the floating-point units. Hindsight being 20/20, we now know that developers didn’t change their habits (and earlier Bulldozer parts were allegedly overzealous with cutting out elements in a few areas, too).
In Intel’s case, from what we hear about at the moment, their cuts should be less broad than AMD’s. Rather than projecting a radical shift in programming, they’re just going to cut the fat of their existing instruction set, unless there’s bigger changes planned for the next couple years of development. As for the unlucky applications that use these instructions, OC3D speculates that either Intel or the host operating systems will provide some emulation method, likely in software.
If the things they cut haven’t been used in several years, then you can probably get acceptable performance in the applications that require them via emulation. On the other hand, a bad decision could choke the processor in the same way that Bulldozer, especially the early variants, did for AMD. On the other-other hand, Intel has something that AMD didn’t: the market-share to push (desktop) developers in a given direction. On the fourth hand, which I’ll return to its rightful owner, I promise, we don’t know how much the “(desktop)” clause will translate to overall software in two years.
Right now, it seems like x86 is successfully holding off ARM in performance-critical, consumer applications. If that continues, then Intel might be able to push x86 software development, even if they get a little aggressive like AMD did five-plus-development-time years ago.
Subject: General Tech, Processors | December 15, 2016 - 12:29 PM | Jeremy Hellstrom
Tagged: leak, kaby lake, intel 200
Tech ARP have an interesting story posted today, it would seem they pried the specs of the upcoming Kaby Lake processors and accompanying Intel 200 chipset. The top chip, the $349 Core i7-7700K will have 4 cores and 8 threads running at 4.2 GHz, with an 8 MB L3 cache and a TDP of 95W while the non-K version will have it core clock dropped to 3.6GHz, TDP dropped to 65W and price lowered to $309. The chipsets will encompass series similar to the previous generations from Intel, including the LGA 1151 Z270, H270, Q270, B250 and Q250 series. There is no information on the socket the server level C422 and high end X299 boards will use in this leak, but we are sure you can extrapolate from existing rumours and innuendo. Follow that link for the entire lineup.
"As AMD gears up to launch the AMD Ryzen desktop processor in early Q1 2017, Intel has finalised the launch plans for their desktop Kaby Lake processors, and the accompanying 200 Series chipsets.
Although Intel has been extremely secretive, we managed to obtain the specifications and launch details of the desktop Kaby Lake processors, and the 200 Series chipsets. Check it out!"
Here is some more Tech News from around the web:
- Ashley Madison is getting off lightly just like its clients @ The Inquirer
- Microsoft quietly emits patch to undo its earlier patch that broke Windows 10 networking @ The Register
- PC vendors trying out Qualcomm/Windows products @ DigiTimes
- Uh-oh! Microsoft has another chatbot – but racism is a no-go for Zo @ The Register
- Delete your account: Yahoo admits to another hack affecting one billion customers @ The Inquirer
- Docker opens up crucial container plumbing code cunningly disguised as 'boring infrastructure' @ The Register
- Malvertising Campaign Infects Your Router Instead of Your Browser @ Slashdot
- Top 7 Videos from ApacheCon and Apache Big Data 2016 @ Linux.com
Subject: Processors | December 8, 2016 - 09:00 AM | Josh Walrath
Tagged: Xilinx, TSMC, standard cells, layout, FinFET, EDA, custom cell, arm, 7nm
Today ARM is announcing their partnership with Xilinx to deliver design solutions for their products on TSMC’s upcoming 7nm process node. ARM has previously partnered with Xilinx on other nodes including 28, 20, and 16nm. Their partnership extends into design considerations to improve the time to market of complex parts and to rapidly synthesize new designs for cutting edge process nodes.
Xilinx is licensing out the latest ARM Artisan Physical IP platform for TSMC’s 7nm. Artisan Physical IP is a set of tools to help rapidly roll out complex designs as compared to what previous generations of products faced. ARM has specialized libraries and tools to help implement these designs on a variety of processes and receive good results even on the shortest possible design times.
Design relies on two basic methodologies. There is custom cell and then standard cell designs. Custom cell design allows for a tremendous amount of flexibility in layout and electrical characteristics, but it requires a lot of man-hours to complete even the simplest logic. Custom cell designs typically draw less power and provide higher clockspeeds than standard cell design. Standard cells are like Legos in that the cells can be quickly laid out to create complex logic. Software called EDA (Electronic Design Automation) can quickly place and route these cells. GPUs lean heavily on standard cells and EDA software to get highly complex products out to market quickly.
These two basic methods have netted good results over the years, but during that time we have seen implementations of standard cells become more custom in how they behave. While not achieving full custom performance, we have seen semi-custom type endeavors achieve appreciable gains without requiring the man hours to achieve fully custom.
In this particular case ARM is achieving a solid performance in power and speed through automated design that improves upon standard cells, but without the downsides of a fully custom part. This provides positive power and speed benefits without the extra power draw of a traditional standard cell. ARM further improves upon this with the ARM Artisan Power Grid Architect (PGA) which simplifies the development of a complex power grid that services a large and complex chip.
We have seen these types of advancements in the GPU world that NVIDIA and AMD enjoy talking about. A better power grid allows the ASIC to perform at lower power envelopes due to less impedence. The GPU guys have also utilized High Density Libraries to pack in the transistors as tight as possible to utilize less space and increase spatial efficiency. A smaller chip, which requires less power is always a positive development over a larger chip of the same capabilities that requires more power. ARM looks to be doing their own version of these technologies and are applying them to TSMC’s upcoming 7nm FinFET process.
TSMC is not releasing this process to mass production until at least 2018. In 1H 2017 we will see some initial test and early production runs for a handful of partners. Full blown production of 7nm will be in 2018. Early runs and production are increasingly being used for companies working with low power devices. We can look back at 20/16/14 nm processes and see that they were initially used by designs that do not require a lot of power and will run at moderate clockspeeds. We have seen a shift in who uses these new processes with the introduction of sub-28nm process nodes. The complexity of the design, process steps, materials, and libraries have pushed the higher performance and power hungry parts to a secondary position as the foundries attempt to get these next generation nodes up to speed. It isn’t until after some many months of these low power parts are pushed through that we see adjustments and improvements in these next generation nodes to handle the higher power and clockspeed needs of products like desktop CPUs and GPUs.
ARM is certainly being much more aggressive in addressing next generation nodes and pushing their cutting edge products on them to allow for far more powerful mobile products that also exhibit improved battery life. This step with 7nm and Xilinx will provide a lot of data to ARM and its partners downstream when the time comes to implement new designs. Artisan will continue to evolve to allow partners to quickly and efficiently introduce new products on new nodes to the market at an accelerated rate as compared to years past.
Subject: Processors | November 30, 2016 - 06:52 PM | Scott Michaud
Tagged: kaby lake, Intel, core i7 7700k
Someone, who wasn’t Intel, seeded Tom’s Hardware an Intel Core i7-7700k, which is expected for release in the new year. This is the top end of the mainstream SKUs, bringing four cores (eight threads) to 4.2 GHz base, 4.5 GHz boost. Using a motherboard built around the Z170 chipset, they were able to clock the CPU up to 4.8 GHz, which is a little over 4% higher than the Skylake-based Core i7-6700k maximum overclock on the same board.
Image Credit: Tom's Hardware
Lucky number i7-77.
Before we continue, these results are based on a single sample. (Update: @7:01pm -- Also, the motherboard they used has some known overclock and stability issues. They mentioned it a bit in the post, like why their BCLK is 99.65MHz, but I forgot to highlight it here. Thankfully, Allyn caught it in the first ten minutes.) This sample has retail branding, but Intel would not confirm that it performs like they expect a retail SKU would. Normally, pre-release products are labeled as such, but there’s no way to tell if this one part is some exception. Beyond concerns that it might be slightly different from what consumers will eventually receive, there is also a huge variation in overclocking performance due to binning. With a sample size of one, we cannot tell whether this chip has an abnormally high, or an abnormally low, defect count, which affects both power and maximum frequency.
That aside, if this chip is representative of Kaby Lake performance, users should expect an increase in headroom for clock rates, but it will come at the cost of increased power consumption. In fact, Tom’s Hardware states that the chip “acts like an overclocked i7-6700K”. Based on this, it seems like, unless they want an extra 4 PCIe lanes on Z270, Kaby Lake’s performance might already be achievable for users with a lucky Skylake.
I should note that Tom’s Hardware didn’t benchmark the iGPU. I don’t really see it used for much more than video encoding anyway, but it would be nice to see if Intel improved in that area, seeing as how they incremented the model number. Then again, even users who are concerned about that will probably be better off just adding a second, discrete GPU anyway.
Subject: Processors | November 28, 2016 - 09:26 PM | Scott Michaud
Tagged: amd, Zen, Summit Ridge
Guru3D got hold of a product list, which includes entries for AMD’s upcoming Zen architecture.
Four SKUs are thus rumored to exist:
- Zen SR3: (65W, quad-core, eight threads, ~$150 USD)
- Zen SR5: (95W, hexa-core, twelve threads, ~$250 USD)
- Zen SR7: (95W, octo-core, sixteen threads, ~$350 USD)
- Special Zen SR7: (95W, octo-core, sixteen threads, ~$500 USD)
The sheet also states that none of these are supposed to contain integrated graphics, like we see on the current FX line. There is some merit to using integrated GPUs for specific tasks, like processing video while the main GPU is busy or doing a rapid, massively parallel calculation without the latency of memory copies, but AMD is probably right to not waste resources, such as TDP, fighting our current lack of compatible software and viable use cases for these SKUs.
Image Credit: Guru3D
The sheet also contains benchmarks for Cinebench R15. While pre-rendered video is a task that really should be done on GPUs at this point, especially with permissive, strong, open-source projects like Cycles, they do provide a good example of multi-core performance that scales. In this one test, the Summit Ridge 7 CPU ($350) roughly matches the Intel Core i7-6850K ($600), again, according to this one unconfirmed benchmark. It doesn’t list clock rates, but other rumors claim that the top-end chip will be around 3.2 GHz base, 3.5 GHz boost at stock, with manual overclocks exceeding 4 GHz.
These performance figures suggest that Zen will not beat Skylake on single-threaded performance, but it might be close. That might not matter, however. CPUs, these days, are kind-of converging around a certain level of per-thread performance, and are differentiating with core count, price, and features. Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to have been many leaks regarding enthusiast-level chipsets for Zen, so we don’t know if there will be compelling use cases yet.
Zen is expected early in 2017.
Subject: Processors, Mobile | November 17, 2016 - 07:30 AM | Ryan Shrout
Tagged: snapdragon, Samsung, qualcomm, FinFET, 835, 10nm
Though we are still months away from shipping devices, Qualcomm has announced that it will be building its upcoming flagship Snapdragon 835 mobile SoC on Samsung’s 10nm 2nd generation FinFET process technology. Qualcomm tells us that integrating the 10nm node in 2017 will keep it “the technology leader in mobile platforms” and this makes the 835 the world's first 10nm production processor.
“Using the new 10nm process node is expected to allow our premium tier Snapdragon 835 processor to deliver greater power efficiency and increase performance while also allowing us to add a number of new capabilities that can improve the user experience of tomorrow’s mobile devices.”
Samsung announced its 10nm FinFET process technology in October of this year and it sports some impressive specifications and benefits to the Snapdragon 835 platform. Per Samsung, it offers “up to a 30% increase in area efficiency with 27% higher performance or up to 40% lower power consumption.” For Qualcomm and its partners, that means a smaller silicon footprint for innovative device designs, including thinner chassis or larger batteries (yes, please).
Other details on the Snapdragon 835 are still pending a future reveal, but Qualcomm says that 835 is in production now and will be shipping in commercial devices in the first half of 2017. We did hear that the new 10nm chip is built on "more than 3 billion transistors" - making it an incredibly complex design!
Keith Kressin SVP, Product Management, Qualcomm Technologies Inc and Ben Suh, SVP, Foundry Marketing, Samsung, show off first 10nm mobile processor, Snapdragon 835, in New York at Qualcomm's Snapdragon Technology Summit.
I am very curious to see how the market reacts to the release of the Snapdragon 835. We are still seeing new devices being released using the 820/821 SoCs, including Google’s own flagship Pixel phones this fall. Qualcomm wants to maintain leadership in the SoC market by innovating on both silicon and software but consumers are becoming more savvy to the actual usable benefits that new devices offer. Qualcomm promises features, performance and power benefits on SD 835 to make the case for your next upgrade.
Subject: Processors, Mobile | October 20, 2016 - 11:40 AM | Ryan Shrout
Tagged: Nintendo, switch, nvidia, tegra
It's been a hell of a 24 hours for NVIDIA and the Tegra processor. A platform that many considered dead in the water after the failure of it to find its way into smartphones or into an appreciable amount of consumer tablets, had two major design wins revealed. First, it was revealed that NVIDIA is powered the new fully autonomous driving system in the Autopilot 2.0 hardware implementation in Tesla's current Model S, X and upcoming Model 3 cars.
Now, we know that Nintendo's long rumored portable and dockable gaming system called Switch is also powered by a custom NVIDIA Tegra SoC.
We don't know much about the hardware that gives the Switch life, but NVIDIA did post a short blog with some basic information worth looking at. Based on it, we know that the Tegra processor powering this Nintendo system is completely custom and likely uses Pascal architecture GPU CUDA cores; though we don't know how many and how powerful it will be. It will likely exceed the performance of the Nintendo Wii U, which was only 0.35 TFLOPS and consisting of 320 AMD-based stream processors. How much faster we just don't know yet.
On the CPU side we assume that this is built using an ARM-based processor, most likely off-the-shelf core designs to keep things simple. Basing it on custom designs like Denver might not be necessary for this type of platform.
Nintendo has traditionally used custom operating systems for its consoles and that seems to be what is happening with the Switch as well. NVIDIA mentions a couple of times how much work the technology vendor put into custom APIs, custom physic engines, new libraries, etc.
The Nintendo Switch’s gaming experience is also supported by fully custom software, including a revamped physics engine, new libraries, advanced game tools and libraries. NVIDIA additionally created new gaming APIs to fully harness this performance. The newest API, NVN, was built specifically to bring lightweight, fast gaming to the masses.
We’ve optimized the full suite of hardware and software for gaming and mobile use cases. This includes custom operating system integration with the GPU to increase both performance and efficiency.
The system itself looks pretty damn interesting, with the ability to switch (get it?) between a docked to your TV configuration to a mobile one with attached or wireless controllers. Check out the video below for a preview.
I've asked both NVIDIA and Nintendo for more information on the hardware side but these guys tend to be tight lipped on the custom silicon going into console hardware. Hopefully one or the other is excited to tell us about the technology so we can some interesting specifications to discuss and debate!
UPDATE: A story on The Verge claims that Nintendo "took the chip from the Shield" and put it in the Switch. This is more than likely completely false; the Shield is a significantly dated product and that kind of statement could undersell the power and capability of the Switch and NVIDIA's custom SoC quite dramatically.
Subject: Processors, Mobile | October 18, 2016 - 11:32 AM | Sebastian Peak
Tagged: SoC, Snapdragon 653, Snapdragon 626, Snapdragon 427, snapdragon, smartphone, qualcomm, mobile
Qualcomm has announced new 400 and 600-series Snapdragon parts, and these new SoCs (Snapdragon 653, 626, and 427) inherit technology found previously on the 800-series parts, including fast LTE connectivity and dual-camera support.
The integrated LTE modem has been significantly for each of these SoCs, and Qualcomm lists these features for each of the new products:
- X9 LTE with CAT 7 modem (300Mbps DL; 150Mbps UL) designed to provide users with a 50 percent increase in maximum uplink speeds over the X8 LTE modem.
- LTE Advanced Carrier Aggregation with up to 2x20 MHz in the downlink and uplink
- Support for 64-QAM in the uplink
- Superior call clarity and higher call reliability with the Enhanced Voice Services (EVS) codec on VoLTE calls.
In addition to the new X9 modem, all three SoCs offer faster CPU and GPU performance, with the Snapdragon 653 (which replaces the 652) now supporting up to 8GB of memory - up from a max of 4GB previously. Each of the new SoCs also feature Qualcomm's Quick Charge 3.0 for fast charging.
Full specifications for these new products can be found on the updated Snapdragon product page.
Availability of the new 600-series Snapdragon processors is set for the end of this year, so we could start seeing handsets with the faster parts soon; while the Snapdragon 427 is expected to ship in devices early in 2017.
Subject: Processors | October 10, 2016 - 02:25 AM | Tim Verry
Tagged: SoC, Intel, FPGA, Cortex A53, arm, Altera
Intel and recently acquired Altera have launched a new FPGA product based on Intel’s 14nm Tri-Gate process featuring an ARM CPU, 5.5 million logic element FPGA, and HBM2 memory in a single package. The Stratix 10 is aimed at data center, networking, and radar/imaging customers.
The Stratix 10 is an Altera-designed FPGA (field programmable gate array) with 5.5 million logic elements and a new HyperFlex architecture that optimizes registers, pipeline, and critical pathing (feed-forward designs) to increase core performance and increase the logic density by five times that of previous products. Further, the upcoming FPGA SoC reportedly can run at twice the core performance of Stratix V or use up to 70% less power than its predecessor at the same performance level.
The increases in logic density, clockspeed, and power efficiency are a combination of the improved architecture and Intel’s 14nm FinFET (Tri-Gate) manufacturing process.
Intel rates the FPGA at 10 TFLOPS of single precision floating point DSP performance and 80 GFLOPS/watt.
Interestingly, Intel is using an ARM processor to feed data to the FPGA chip rather than its own Quark or Atom processors. Specifically, the Stratix 10 uses an ARM CPU with four Cortex A53 cores as well as four stacks of on package HBM2 memory with 1TB/s of bandwidth to feed data to the FPGA. There is also a “secure device manager” to ensure data integrity and security.
The Stratix 10 is aimed at data centers and will be used with in specialized tasks that demand high throughput and low latency. According to Intel, the processor is a good candidate for co-processors to offload and accelerate encryption/decryption, compression/de-compression, or Hadoop tasks. It can also be used to power specialized storage controllers and networking equipment.
Intel has started sampling the new chip to potential customers.
In general, FPGAs are great at highly parallelized workloads and are able to efficiently take huge amounts of inputs and process the data in parallel through custom programmed logic gates. An FPGA is essentially a program in hardware that can be rewired in the field (though depending on the chip it is not necessarily a “fast” process and it can take hours or longer to switch things up heh). These processors are used in medical and imaging devices, high frequency trading hardware, networking equipment, signal intelligence (cell towers, radar, guidance, ect), bitcoin mining (though ASICs stole the show a few years ago), and even password cracking. They can be almost anything you want which gives them an advantage over traditional CPUs and graphics cards though cost and increased coding complexity are prohibitive.
The Stratix 10 stood out as interesting to me because of its claimed 10 TFLOPS of single precision performance which is reportedly the important metric when it comes to training neural networks. In fact, Microsoft recently began deploying FPGAs across its Azure cloud computing platform and plans to build the “world’s fastest AI supercomputer. The Redmond-based company’s Project Catapult saw the company deploy Stratix V FPGAs to nearly all of its Azure datacenters and is using the programmable silicon as part of an “acceleration fabric” in its “configurable cloud” architecture that will be used initially to accelerate the company’s Bing search and AI research efforts and later by independent customers for their own applications.
It is interesting to see Microsoft going with FPGAs especially as efforts to use GPUs for GPGPU and neural network training and inferencing duties have increased so dramatically over the years (with NVIDIA being the one pushing the latter). It may well be a good call on Microsoft’s part as it could enable better performance and researchers would be able to code their AI accelerator platforms down to the gate level to really optimize things. Using higher level languages and cheaper hardware with GPUs does have a lower barrier to entry though. I suppose ti will depend on just how much Microsoft is going to charge customers to use the FPGA-powered instances.
FPGAs are in kind of a weird middle ground and while they are definitely not a new technology, they do continue to get more complex and powerful!
What are your thoughts on Intel's new FPGA SoC?
- Microsoft Goes All in for FPGAs to Build Out AI Cloud
- Microsoft Focusing Efforts, Forming AI and Research Group
- Stratix 10 Architecture Video
- Are FPGAs the future of password cracking and supercomputing?
Subject: Processors | October 1, 2016 - 06:11 PM | Tim Verry
Tagged: xavier, Volta, tegra, SoC, nvidia, machine learning, gpu, drive px 2, deep neural network, deep learning
Earlier this week at its first GTC Europe event in Amsterdam, NVIDIA CEO Jen-Hsun Huang teased a new SoC code-named Xavier that will be used in self-driving cars and feature the company's newest custom ARM CPU cores and Volta GPU. The new chip will begin sampling at the end of 2017 with product releases using the future Tegra (if they keep that name) processor as soon as 2018.
NVIDIA's Xavier is promised to be the successor to the company's Drive PX 2 system which uses two Tegra X2 SoCs and two discrete Pascal MXM GPUs on a single water cooled platform. These claims are even more impressive when considering that NVIDIA is not only promising to replace the four processors but it will reportedly do that at 20W – less than a tenth of the TDP!
The company has not revealed all the nitty-gritty details, but they did tease out a few bits of information. The new processor will feature 7 billion transistors and will be based on a refined 16nm FinFET process while consuming a mere 20W. It can process two 8k HDR video streams and can hit 20 TOPS (NVIDIA's own rating for deep learning int(8) operations).
Specifically, NVIDIA claims that the Xavier SoC will use eight custom ARMv8 (64-bit) CPU cores (it is unclear whether these cores will be a refined Denver architecture or something else) and a GPU based on its upcoming Volta architecture with 512 CUDA cores. Also, in an interesting twist, NVIDIA is including a "Computer Vision Accelerator" on the SoC as well though the company did not go into many details. This bit of silicon may explain how the ~300mm2 die with 7 billion transistors is able to match the 7.2 billion transistor Pascal-based Telsa P4 (2560 CUDA cores) graphics card at deep learning (tera-operations per second) tasks. Of course in addition to the incremental improvements by moving to Volta and a new ARMv8 CPU architectures on a refined 16nm FF+ process.
|Drive PX||Drive PX 2||NVIDIA Xavier||Tesla P4|
|CPU||2 x Tegra X1 (8 x A57 total)||2 x Tegra X2 (8 x A57 + 4 x Denver total)||1 x Xavier SoC (8 x Custom ARM + 1 x CVA)||N/A|
|GPU||2 x Tegra X1 (Maxwell) (512 CUDA cores total||2 x Tegra X2 GPUs + 2 x Pascal GPUs||1 x Xavier SoC GPU (Volta) (512 CUDA Cores)||2560 CUDA Cores (Pascal)|
|TFLOPS||2.3 TFLOPS||8 TFLOPS||?||5.5 TFLOPS|
|DL TOPS||?||24 TOPS||20 TOPS||22 TOPS|
|TDP||~30W (2 x 15W)||250W||20W||up to 75W|
|Process Tech||20nm||16nm FinFET||16nm FinFET+||16nm FinFET|
|Transistors||?||?||7 billion||7.2 billion|
For comparison, the currently available Tesla P4 based on its Pascal architecture has a TDP of up to 75W and is rated at 22 TOPs. This would suggest that Volta is a much more efficient architecture (at least for deep learning and half precision)! I am not sure how NVIDIA is able to match its GP104 with only 512 Volta CUDA cores though their definition of a "core" could have changed and/or the CVA processor may be responsible for closing that gap. Unfortunately, NVIDIA did not disclose what it rates the Xavier at in TFLOPS so it is difficult to compare and it may not match GP104 at higher precision workloads. It could be wholly optimized for int(8) operations rather than floating point performance. Beyond that I will let Scott dive into those particulars once we have more information!
Xavier is more of a teaser than anything and the chip could very well change dramatically and/or not hit the claimed performance targets. Still, it sounds promising and it is always nice to speculate over road maps. It is an intriguing chip and I am ready for more details, especially on the Volta GPU and just what exactly that Computer Vision Accelerator is (and will it be easy to program for?). I am a big fan of the "self-driving car" and I hope that it succeeds. It certainly looks to continue as Tesla, VW, BMW, and other automakers continue to push the envelope of what is possible and plan future cars that will include smart driving assists and even cars that can drive themselves. The more local computing power we can throw at automobiles the better and while massive datacenters can be used to train the neural networks, local hardware to run and make decisions are necessary (you don't want internet latency contributing to the decision of whether to brake or not!).
I hope that NVIDIA's self-proclaimed "AI Supercomputer" turns out to be at least close to the performance they claim! Stay tuned for more information as it gets closer to launch (hopefully more details will emerge at GTC 2017 in the US).
What are your thoughts on Xavier and the whole self-driving car future?
- NVIDIA Teases Xavier, a High-Performance ARM SoC for Drive PX & AI @ AnandTech
- Tegra Related News @ PC Perspective
- Tesla P4 Specifications @ NVIDIA
- CES 2016: NVIDIA Launches DRIVE PX 2 With Dual Pascal GPUs Driving A Deep Neural Network @ PC Perspective
Subject: Processors | September 27, 2016 - 07:01 AM | Scott Michaud
Tagged: overclock, Bristol Ridge, amd
Update 9/27 @ 5:10pm: Added a link to Anandtech's discussion of Bristol Ridge. It was mentioned in the post, but I forgot to add the link itself when I transfered it to the site. The text is the same, though.
While Zen is nearing release, AMD has launched the AM4 platform with updated APUs. They will be based on an updated Excavator architecture, which we discussed during the Carrizo launch in mid-2015. Carrizo came about when AMD decided to focus heavily on the 15W and 35W power targets, giving the best possible experience for that huge market of laptops, in the tasks that those devices usually encounter, such as light gaming and media consumption.
Image Credit: NAMEGT via HWBot
Bristol Ridge, instead, focuses on the 35W and 65W thermal points. This will be targeted more at OEMs who want to release higher-performance products in the holiday time-frame, although consumers can purchase it directly, according to Anandtech, later in the year. I'm guessing it won't be pushed too heavily to DIY users, though, because they know that those users know Zen is coming.
It turns out that overclockers already have their hands on it, though, and it seems to take a fairly high frequency. NAMEGT, from South Korea, uploaded a CPU-Z screenshot to HWBot that shows the 28nm, quad-core part clocked at 4.8 GHz. The included images claim that this was achieved on air, using AMD's new stock “Wraith” cooler.
Subject: Processors | September 19, 2016 - 10:35 AM | Sebastian Peak
Tagged: Socket AM4, processor, FX, cpu, APU, amd, 1331 pins
Image credit: Bit-Tech via HWSW
AMD's newest socket will merge the APU and FX series CPUs into this new AM4 socket, unlike the previous generation which split the two between AM3+ and FM2+. This is great news for system builders, who now have the option of starting with an inexpensive CPU/APU, and upgrading to a more powerful FX processor later on - with the same motherboard.
The new socket will apparently require a new cooler design, which is contrary to early reports (yes, we got it wrong, too) that the AM4 socket would be compatible with existing AM3 cooler mounts (manufacturers could of course offer hardware kits for existing cooler designs). In any case, AMD's new socket takes more of the delicate copper pins you love to try not to bend!
Subject: Processors | September 13, 2016 - 06:51 PM | Tim Verry
Tagged: GLOBALFOUNDRIES, FD-SOI, 12FDX, process technology
In addition to the company’s efforts to get its own next generation FinFET process technology up and running, GlobalFoundries announced that will continue to pursue FD-SOI process technology with the addition of a 12nm FD-SOI (FDX in GlobalFoundries parlance) node to its roadmap with a slated release of 2019 at the earliest.
FD-SOI stands for Fully Depleted Silicon On Insulator and is a planar process technology that uses a thin insulator on top of the base silicon which is then covered by a very thin layer of silicon that is used as the transistor channel. The promise of FD-SOI is that it offers the performance of a FinFET node with lower power consumption and cost than other bulk processes. While the substrate is more expensive with FD-SOI, it uses 50% of the lithography layers and companies can take advantage of reportedly easy-to-implement body biasing to design a single chip that can fulfill multiple products and roles. For example, in the case of 22FDX – which should start rolling out towards the end of this year – GlobalFoundries claims that it offers the performance of 14 FinFET at the 28nm bulk pricing. 22FDX is actually a 14nm front end (FEOL) and 28nm back end of line (BEOL) combined. Notably, it purportedly uses 70% lower power than 28nm HKMG.
A GloFo 22nm FD-SOI "22FDX" transistor.
The FD-SOI design offers lower static leakage and allows chip makers to use body biasing (where substrate is polarized) to balance performance and leakage. Forward Body Biasing allows the transistor to switch faster and/or operate at much lower voltages. On the other hand, Reverse Body Biasing further reduces leakage and frequency to improves energy efficiency. Dynamic Body Biasing (video link) allows for things like turbo modes whereby increasing voltage to the back gate can increase transistor switching speed or reducing voltage can reduce switching speeds and leakage. For a process technology that is aimed at battery powered wearables, mobile devices, and various Internet of Things products, energy efficiency and being able to balance performance and power depending on what is needed is important.
22FDX offers body biasing.
While the process node numbers are not as interesting as the news that FD-SOI will continue itself (thanks to marketing mucking up things heh), GlobalFoundries did share that 12FDX (12nm FD-SOI) will be a true full node shrink that will offer the performance of 10nm FinFET (presumably its own future FinFET tech though they do not specify) with better power characteristics and lower cost than 16nm FinFET. I am not sure if GlobalFoundries is using theoretical numbers or compared it to TSMC’s process here since they do not have their own 16nm FinFET process. Further, 12FDX will feature 15% higher performance and up to 50% lower power consumption that today’s FinFET technologies. The future process is aimed at the “cost sensitive mobile market” that includes IoT, automotive (entertainment and AI), mobile, and networking. FD-SOI is reportedly well suited for processors that combine both digital and analog (RF) elements as well.
Following the roll out of 22FDX GlobalFoundries will be preparing its Fab 1 facility in Dresden, Germany for the 12nm FD-SOI (12FDX) process. The new process is slated to begin tapping out products in early 2019 which should mean products using chips will hit the market in 2020.
The news is interesting because it indicates that there is still interest and research/development being made on FD-SOI and GlobalFoundries is the first company to talk about next generation process plans. Samsung and STMicroelectronics also support FD-SOI but have not announced their future plans yet.
If I had to guess, Samsung will be the next company to talk about future FD-SOI as the company continues to offer both FinFET and FD-SOI to its customers though they certainly do not talk as much about the latter. What are your thoughts on FD-SOI and its place in the market?
Also read: FD-SOI Expands, But Is It Disruptive? @ EETimes
Subject: Motherboards, Processors | September 7, 2016 - 08:08 PM | Tim Verry
Tagged: Zen, Summit Ridge, Excavator, Bristol Ridge, amd, A12-9800
This week AMD officially took the wraps off of its 7th generation APU lineup that it introduced back in May. Previously known as Bristol Ridge, AMD is launching eight new processors along with a new desktop platform that finally brings next generation I/O to AMD systems.
Bristol Ridge maintains the Excavator CPU cores and GCN GPU cores of Carrizo, but on refreshed silicon with performance and power efficiency gains that will bring the architecture started by Bulldozer to an apex. These will be the last chips of that line, and wil be succeeded by AMD's new "Zen" architecture in 2017. For now though, Bristol Ridge delivers as much as 17% higher per thread CPU performance and 27% higher graphics performance while using significantly lower power than its predecessors. Further, AMD has been able to (thanks to various process tweaks that Josh talked about previously) hit some impressive clock speeds with these chips enabling AMD to better compete with Intel's Core i5 offerings.
At the top end AMD has the (65W) quad core A12-9800 running at 3.8 GHz base and 4.2 GHz boost paired with GCN 3.0-based Radeon R7 graphics (that support VP9 and HEVC acceleration). These new Bristol Ridge chips are able to take advantage of DDR4 clocked up to 2400 MHz. For DIY PC builders planning to use dedicated graphics, AMD has the non-APU Athlon X4 950 which features four CPU cores at 3.5 GHz base and 3.8 GHz boost with a 65W TDP. While it is not clocked quite as high as its APU counterpart, it should still prove to be a popular choice for budge builds and will replace the venerable Athlon X4 860 and will also be paired with an AM4 motherboard that will be ready to accept a new Zen-based "Summit Ridge" CPU next year.
The following table lists the eight new 7th generation "Bristol Ridge" processors and their specifications.
|CPU Cores||CPU Clocks Base / Boost||GPU||GPU CUs||GPU Clocks (Max)||TDP|
|4||3.8 GHz / 4.2 GHz||Radeon R7||8||1,108 MHz||65W|
|A12-9800E4||4||3.1 GHz / 3.8 GHz||Radeon R7||8||900 MHz||35W|
|A10-9700||4||3.5 GHz / 3.8 GHz||Radeon R7||6||1,029 MHz||65W|
|A10-9700E||4||3.0 GHz / 3.5 GHz||Radeon R7||6||847 MHz||35W|
|A8-9600||4||3.1 GHz / 3.4 GHz||Radeon R7||6||900 MHz||65W|
|A6-9500||2||3.5 GHz / 3.8 GHz||Radeon
|A6-9500E||2||3.0 GHz / 3.4 GHz||Radeon
|Athlon X4 950||4||3.5 GHz / 3.8 GHz||None||0||N/A||65W|
To expand on the performance increases of Bristol Ridge, AMD compared the A12-9800 to the previous generation A10-8850 as well as Intel's Core i5-6500. According to the company, the Bristol Ridge processor handily beats the Carrizo chip and is competitive with the Intel i5. Specifically, when comparing Bristol Ridge and Carrizo, AMD found that the A12-9800 scored 3,521.25 in 3DMark 11 while the A10-8850 (95W Godavari) scored 2,880. Further, when compared in Cinebench R11.5 1T the A12-980 scored 1.21 versus the A10-8850's 1.06. Not bad when you consider that the new processor has a 30W lower TDP!
With that said, the comparison to Intel is perhaps most interesting to the readers. In this case, the A12-9800 is about where you would expect though that is not necessarily a bad thing. It does pull a bit closer to Intel in CPU and continues to offer superior graphics performance.
|AMD A12-9800 (65W)||Intel Core i5-6500 (65W)||AMD A10-8850 (95W)|
3DMark 11 Performance
|PCMark 8 Home Accelerated||3,483.25||3,702||Not run|
|Cinebench R11.5 1T||1.21||Not run||1.06|
Specifically, in 3DMark 11 Performance the A12-9800's score of 3,521.25 is quite a bit better than the Intel i5-6500's 1,765.75 result. However, in the more CPU focused PCMark 8 Home Accelerated benchmark the Intel comes out ahead with a score of 3,702 versus the AMD A12-9800's score of 3,483.25. If the price is right Bristol Ridge does not look too bad on paper, assuming AMD's testing holds true in independent reviews!
The AM4 Platform
Alongside the launch of desktop 7th generation APUs, AMD is launching a new AM4 platform that supports Bristol Ridge and is ready for Zen APUs next year. The new platform finally brings new I/O technologies to AMD systems including PCI-E 3.0, NVMe, SATA Express, DDR4, and USB 3.1 Gen 2.
According to Digital Trends, AMD's AM4 desktop platform wil span all the way from low end to enthusiast motherboards and these boards will be powered by one of three new chipsets. The three new chipsets are the B350 for mainstream, A320 for "essential," and X/B/A300 for small form factor motherboards. Notably missing is any mention of an enthusiast chipset, but one is reportedly being worked on and will arive closer to the launch of Zen-based processors in 2017.
The image below outlines the differences in the chipsets. Worth noting is that the APUs themselves will handle the eight lanes of PCI-E 3.0, dual channel DDR4, four USB 3.1 Gen 1 ports, and two SATA 6Gbps and two NVMe or PCI-E 3.0 storage devices. This leaves PCI-E 2.0, SATA Express, additional SATA 6Gbps, and USB 3.1 Gen 2 connection duties to the chipsets.
As of today, AMD has only announced the availability of AM4 motherboards and 7th generation APUs for OEM systems (with design wins from HP and Lenovo so far). The company will be outlining the channel / DIY PC builder lineup and pricing at a later (to be announced date).
I am looking forward to Zen and in a way the timing of Bristol Ridge seems strange. On the other hand, for OEMs it should do well and hold them over until then (heh) and enthusiasts / DIY builders are able to buy into Bristol Ridge knowing that they will be able to upgrade to Zen next year (while getting better than Carrizo performance with less power and possibly better overclocking) is not a bad option so long as the prices are right!
The full press blast is included below for more information on how they got their benchmark results.
Subject: Processors | September 6, 2016 - 03:05 PM | Ryan Shrout
Tagged: Zen, single thread, geekbench, amd
Over the holiday weekend a leaked Geekbench benchmark result on an engineering sample AMD Zen processor got tech nerds talking. Other than the showcase that AMD presented a couple weeks back using the Blender render engine, the only information we have on performance claims come from AMD touting a "40% IPC increase" over the latest Bulldozer derivative.
The results from Geekbench show performance from a two physical processor system and a total of 64 cores running at 1.44 GHz. Obviously that clock speed is exceptionally low; AMD demoed Summit Ridge running at 3.0 GHz in the showcase mentioned above. But this does give us an interesting data point with which to do some performance extrapolation. If we assume perfect clock speed scaling, we can guess at performance levels that AMD Zen might see at various clocks.
I needed a quick comparison point and found this Geekbench result from a Xeon E7-8857 v2 running at 3.6 GHz. That is an Ivy Bridge based architecture and though the system has 48 cores, we are only going to a look at single threaded results to focus on the IPC story.
Obviously there are a ton of caveats with looking at data like this. It's possible that AMD Zen platform was running in a very sub-optimal condition. It's possible that the BIOS and motherboard weren't fully cache aware (though I would hope that wouldn't be the case this late in the game). It's possible that the Linux OS was somehow holding back performance of the Zen architecture and needs update. There are many reasons why you shouldn't consider this data a final decision yet; but that doesn't make it any less interesting to see.
In the two graphs below I divide the collection of single threaded results from Geekbench into two halves and there are three data points for each benchmark. The blue line represents the Xeon Ivy Bridge processor running at 3.6 GHz. The light green line shows the results from the AMD Zen processor running at 1.44 GHz as reported by Geekbench. The dark green line shows an extrapolated AMD Zen performance result with perfect scaling by frequency.
Subject: Processors | September 2, 2016 - 01:39 AM | Tim Verry
Tagged: IBM, power9, power 3.0, 14nm, global foundries, hot chips
Earlier this month at the Hot Chips symposium, IBM revealed details on its upcoming Power9 processors and architecture. The new chips are aimed squarely at the data center and will be used for massive number crunching in big data and scientific applications in servers and supercomputer nodes.
Power9 is a big play from Big Blue, and will help the company expand its precense in the Intel-ruled datacenter market. Power9 processors are due out in 2018 and will be fabricated at Global Foundries on a 14nm HP FinFET process. The chips feature eight billion transistors and utilize an “execution slice microarchitecture” that lets IBM combine “slices” of fixed, floating point, and SIMD hardware into cores that support various levels of threading. Specifically, 2 slices make an SMT4 core and 4 slices make an SMT8 core. IBM will have Power9 processors with 24 SMT4 cores or 12 SMT8 cores (more on that later). Further, Power9 is IBM’s first processor to support its Power 3.0 instruction set.
According to IBM, its Power9 processors are between 50% to 125% faster than the previous generation Power8 CPUs depending on the application tested. The performance improvement is thanks to a doubling of the number of cores as well as a number of other smaller improvements including:
- A 5 cycle shorter pipeline versus Power8
- A single instruction random number generator (RNG)
- Hardware assisted garbage collection for interpreted languages (e.g. Java)
- New interrupt architecture
- 128-bit quad precision floating point and decimal math support
- Important for finance and security markets, massive databases and money math.
- IEEE 754
- CAPI 2.0 and NVLink support
- Hardware accelerators for encryption and compression
The Power9 processor features 120 MB of direct attached eDRAM that acts as an L3 cache (256 GB/s). The chips offer up 7TB/s of aggregate fabric bandwidth which certainly sounds impressive but that is a number with everything added together. With that said, there is a lot going on under the hood. Power9 supports 48 lanes of PCI-E 4.0 (2 GB/s per lane per direction), 48 lanes of proprietary 25Gbps accelerator lanes – these will be used for NVLink 2.0 to connect to NVIDIA GPUs as well as to connect to FPGAs, ASICs, and other accelerators or new memory technologies using CAPI 2.0 (Coherent Accelerator Processor Interface) – , and four 16Gbps SMP links (NUMA) used to combine four quad socket Power9 boards into a single 16 socket “cluster.”
These are processors that are built to scale and tackle the big data problems. In fact, not only is Google interested in Power9 to power its services, but the US Department of Energy will be building two supercomputers using IBM’s Power9 CPUs and NVIDI’s Volta GPUs. Summit and Sierra will offer between 100 to 300 Petaflops of computer power and will be installed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory respectively. There, some of the projects they will tackle is enabling the researchers to visualize the internals of a virtual light water reactor, research methods to improve fuel economy, and delve further into bioinformatics research.
The Power9 processors will be available in four variants that differ in the number of cores and number of threads each core supports. The chips are broken down into Power9 SO (Scale Out) and Power9 SU (Scale Up) and each group has two processors depending on whether you need a greater number of weaker cores or a smaller number of more powerful cores. Power9 SO chips are intended for multi-core systems and will be used in servers with one or two sockets while Power9 SU chips are for multi-processor systems with up to four sockets per board and up to 16 total sockets per cluster when four four socket boards are linked together. Power9 SO uses DDR4 memory and supports a theoretical maximum 4TB of memory (1TB with today’s 64GB DIMMS) and 120 GB/s of bandwidth while Power9 SU uses IBM’s buffered “Centaur” memory scheme that allows the systems to address a theoretical maximum of 8TB of memory (2TB with 64GB DIMMS) at 230 GB/s. In other words, the SU series is Big Blue’s “big guns.”
A photo of the 24 core SMT4 Power9 SO die.
Here is where it gets a bit muddy. The processors are further broken down by an SMT4 or SMT8 and both Power9 SO and Power9 SU have both options. There are Power9 CPUs with 24 SMT4 cores and there are CPUs with 12 SMT8 cores. IBM indicated that SMT4 (four threads per core) was suited to systems running Linux and virtualization with emphasis on high core counts. Meanwhile SMT8 (eight threads per core) is a better option for large logical partitions (one big system versus partitioning out the compute cluster into smaller VMs as above) and running IBM’s Hypervisor. In either case (24 SMT4 or 12 SMT8) there is the same number of total threads, but you are able to choose whether you want fewer “stronger” threads on each core or more (albeit weaker) threads per core depending on which you workloads are optimized for.
Servers supporting Power9 are already under development by Google and Rackspace and blueprints are even available from the OpenPower Foundation. Currently, it appears that Power9 SO will emerge as soon as the second half of next year (2H 2017) with Power9 SU following in 2018 which would line up with the expected date for the Summit and Sierra supercomputer launches.
This is not a chip that will be showing up in your desktop any time soon, but it is an interesting high performance processor! I will be keeping an eye on updates from Oak Ridge lab hehe.
Subject: Processors, Mobile | August 31, 2016 - 07:30 AM | Sebastian Peak
Tagged: SoC, Snapdragon 821, snapdragon, SD821, qualcomm, processor, mobile, adreno
Qualcomm has officially launched the Snapdragon 821 SoC, an upgraded successor to the existing Snapdragon 820 found in such phones as the Samsung Galaxy S7.
"With Snapdragon 820 already powering many of the premier flagship Android smartphones today, Snapdragon 821 is now poised to become the processor of choice for leading smartphones and devices for this year’s holiday season. Qualcomm Technologies’ engineers have improved Snapdragon 821 in three key areas to ensure Snapdragon 821 maintains the level of industry leadership introduced by its predecessor."
Specifications were previously revealed when the Snapdragon 821 was announced in July, with a 10% increase on the CPU clocks (2.4 GHz, up from the previous 2.2 GHz max frequency). The Adreno 530 GPU clock increases 5%, to 650 MHz from 624 MHz. In addition to improved performance from CPU and GPU clock speed increases, the SD821 is said to offer lower power consumption (estimated at 5% compared to the SD820), and offers new functionality including improved auto-focus capability.
Enhanced overall user experience:
The Snapdragon 821 has been specifically tuned to support a more responsive user experience when compared with the 820, including:
- Shorter boot times: Snapdragon 821 powered devices can boot up to 10 percent faster.
- Faster application launch times: Snapdragon 821 can reduce app load times by up to 10 percent.
- Smoother, more responsive user interactions: UI optimizations and performance enhancements designed to allow users to enjoy smoother scrolling and more responsive browsing performance.
Improved performance and power consumption:
- CPU speeds increase: As we previously announced, the 821 features Qualcomm Kryo CPU speeds up to 2.4GHz, representing an up to 10 percent improvement in performance over Snapdragon 820.
- GPU speeds increase: The Qualcomm Adreno GPU received a 5 percent speed increase over Snapdragon 820.
- Power savings: The 821 is engineered to deliver an incremental 5 percent power savings when comparing standard use case models. This power savings can extend battery life and support OEMs interested in reducing battery size for slimmer phones.
New features and functionality:
- Snapdragon 821 introduces several new features and capabilities, offering OEMs new options to create more immersive and engaging user experiences, including support for:
- Snapdragon VR SDK (Software Development Kit): Offers developers a superior mobile VR toolset, provides compatibility with the Google Daydream platform, and access to Snapdragon 821’s powerful heterogeneous architecture. Snapdragon VR SDK supports a superior level of visual and audio quality and more immersive virtual reality and gaming experiences in a mobile environment.
- Dual PD (PDAF): Offers significantly faster image autofocus speeds under a wide variety of conditions when compared to single PDAF solutions.
- Extended Laser Auto-Focus Ranging: Extends the visible focusing range, improving laser focal accuracy over Snapdragon 820.
- Android Nougat OS: Snapdragon 821 (as well as the 820) will support the latest Android operating system when available, offering new features, expanded compatibility, and additional security compared to prior Android versions.
Qualcomm says the ASUS ZenFone 3 Deluxe is the first phone to use this new Snapdragon 821 SoC while other OEMs will be working on designs implementing the upgraded SoC.
Subject: Processors | August 22, 2016 - 05:37 PM | Jeremy Hellstrom
Tagged: amd, a10-7870K
Leaving aside the questionable naming to instead focus on the improved cooler on this ~$130 APU from AMD. Neoseeker fired up the fun sized, 125W rated cooler on top of the A10-7870K and were pleasantly surprised at the lack of noise even under load. Encouraged by the performance they overclocked the chip by 500MHz to 4.4GHz and were rewarded with a stable and still very quiet system. The review focuses more the improvements the new cooler offers as opposed to the APU itself, which has not changed. Check out the review if you are considering a lower cost system that only speaks when spoken to.
"In order to find out just how much better the 125W thermal solution will perform, I am going to test the A10-7870K APU mounted on a Gigabyte F2A88X-UP4 motherboard provided by AMD with a set of 16 GB (2 x 8) DDR3 RAM modules set at 2133 MHz speed. I will then run thermal and fan speed tests so a comparison of the results will provide a meaningful data set to compare the near-silent 125W cooler to an older model AMD cooling solution."
Here are some more Processor articles from around the web:


text:
Photography by: Natasha J BellaModel: Natasha J BellaPost processing by: Natasha J BellaTaken at: The Photo House StudioTags: bare, Beauty, beauty dish, flowing, hair, portrait, self portrait, selfie, shoulders, studio, wind machineGroups: (Invite) None
Added 1493242631 by Natasha J Bella.
Taken in my own studio
with remote and tripod.
Canon EOS 760D
Sigma 35mm 1.4

domain: artistic


text:
The Optimus has established itself as a reliable, high-performance car based on solid engineering and innovative design. The new Optimus GP draws on that experience where important and is completely new where the demands of nitro power dictate. Fundamentaly, that means a whole new design of the main chassis and drive out to the front and rear differential gearboxes. The chassis itself is aluminium as is most of the top chassis. Only around the engine installation do DHK move into their own unique way of chassis bracing.
The durable, .21 class, rear-exhaust, pull-start engine is mounted longitudinally and transmits its power via an SG style crankshaft, aluminium, 3-shoe clutch and metal bell gear into the centre differential using a composite moulded main gear to absorb vibrations and reduce noise. Fuel is stored in the uniquely mounted, fast-fill tank that is designed to avoid the cracking that so many do in an impact.
The ergonomic, 2.4gHz radio system has its receiver in a water-resistant box and connects to a metal geared, ball-raced, 9Kg steering servo and a 3kg throttle/brake servo. A combination of power, precision and reliability that you would expect fromn DHK.
Fully metal, differential gearbox gears, fully metal shocks and shock towers are just part of the advanced specification that sets the Optimus GP apart from the competition.
Specifications Fuel Tank Capacity 150cc Length 493mm Width 307.7mm Height 172mm Weight 2,900g Radio System 9kg Metal Gear BB Steering, 2kg Throt/Brake Radio System 2 Channel 2.4GHz Wheel Base 330mm IC Engine .21 Class (3.5cc) Gear Ratio 9.43:1 Ground Clearance 35mm

domain: hobby


text:
'Ice Age: Continental Drift' review: mostly nutty
Ice Age: Continental Drift
Somewhere near the nutty start of the nutty "Ice Age: Continental Drift," Sid the Sloth (voiced, as usual, by a nutty John Leguizamo) delivers the movie's most charming and self-aware bit of dialogue. Not to say the nuttiest.
Describing his similarly nutty adventures in the previous installment of the franchise, he tells his toothless granny: "We fought dinosaurs in the Ice Age! It didn't make sense, but it sure was exciting!"
And that says it all about the fourth installment of the animated series that follows a rambunctious band of multi-species buddies as they encounter all sorts of excitement in the distant past. No dinosaurs this time, but something even more ludicrous occurs: Pangaea breaks apart about 200 million years late. As dramatized in the opening sequence, it's snapped into pieces by Scrat the squirrel in pursuit of an acorn at the Earth's core, thus driving plate tectonics into an unstoppable centrifugal frenzy.
Meanwhile, up on the crust, woolly mammoths Manny (Ray Romano) and Ellie (Queen Latifah) bicker with teen daughter Peaches (Keke Palmer) over a cute proboscidean with frosted hair (Drake) and his clan of snotty friends (among them Nicki Minaj). When the super-continent cracks cataclysmically beneath them, Manny, Sid and Diego the saber-toothed cat (Denis Leary) get separated from the gang, bobbing away on an ice floe. Then pirates appear.
The good stuff: Wanda Sykes as the aforementioned gummy grandma, her innate crustiness finding a perfect match in this small, cranky, animated leaf-eater.
The less-good stuff: the pirates, who are so blandly and predictably drawn that they sap all the personality out of Peter Dinklage (as an ugly ape skipper), which isn't easy. And the plot, which just barrels forward with very few surprises.
"Continental Drift" also includes a short that is a hilarious and silent "Simpsons" tale tracking baby Maggie's day at the Ayn Rand School for Tots, where she encounters a paste-eating loser and a butterfly assassin. It's only a few minutes long, but those few minutes boast more imagination, pathos and suspense than the entire film that follows.
Amy Biancolli is a Hearst movie writer. E-mail: email@example.com

domain: entertainment


text:
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domain: design


BYU tennis: Junior Travis Fillmore advances in consolation bracket
LOS ANGELES – Junior Travis Fillmore won in the final match of the qualifying back draw of the Southern California Intercollegiate Championships at UCLA’s campus on Saturday.
Fillmore first topped Othar Kordsachia from Loyola Marymount, 6-3, 6-1 to advance to the final round of the back draw. He then defeated UCSD’s Horea Poritiu, 6-4, 3-6, 10-7 to claim the victory in the consolation bracket.
“The tournament was a great way to finish the fall season,” BYU head coach Brad Pearce said. “I was proud of the way our guys performed individually and as a whole.”
This tournament featured 10 point tie breaks, which awards a victory to the first player to score 10 points and win by two.
The Cougars will open the regular season by hosting Weber State on Jan. 11.
Aaron Sorenson is the tennis sports information director at BYU.
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text:
Browse genres/themes ?
Browse the Encyclopedia by genre and tags. Each game has one main genre: Action, Fighting, Puzzle, Adventure, RPG, Sports, Strategy, Simulation, Party, Racing, Arcade. You can search multiple tags and filter games by platforms, scores, or release dates.
Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters
Sports 29 March 2011
Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 12: The Masters is the fourteenth installment of the golf simulation cycle developed by developers from Electronic Arts. This time the main arena of the competition are the Augusta National golf courses and the Masters tournament played there. The player has the opportunity to play the champions of this sport, headed by the company's Tiger Woods series, and test their skills of sending the ball into the hole.
Worms Crazy Golf
Arcade 25 October 2011
A spin-off from the bestselling Worms series, this is an original combination of the series' typical mechanics with a classic golf game. The object of the game is to hit balls into holes, but this has nothing to do with the elegance of the sport.
Hot Shots Golf: Out of Bounds
Sports 25 March 2008
Hot Shots Golf is another part of the famous series of golf games. This time Japanese developers created a work dedicated exclusively to PlayStation 3 platform.
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09
Sports 26 August 2008
The next installment of the popular series of sports games dealing with the subject of golf. Edition 09 stands out above all because of the character of the personal trainer, who gives the player many valuable tips.
Sports 01 June 2010
Mini golf simulation, based on three-dimensional graphics and advanced algorithms imitating the physics of the game world.
Hot Shots Golf: World Invitational
Sports 22 November 2012
Everybody's Golf is an arcade simulation of golf, in which good fun and spectacular performance on the golf course is of the greatest importance.
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 14
Sports 26 March 2013
The next installment of the popular golf simulation produced by EA Tiburon studio. The title allows you to play your part in the most famous sports discipline and games on the most popular golf courses. Production takes advantage of the capabilities of the Kinect sensor and the PlayStation Move controller.
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 13
Sports 27 March 2012
Golf simulator with sports licenses. In this version of the series, the developers focused on improving the hit system and adding a few other features. One of the novelties is the mode in which we relive the important events from Tiger Woods' career. The production also cooperates with motion controllers.
John Daly's ProStroke Golf
Sports 05 October 2010
A realistic golf simulator, featuring an advanced engine responsible for mapping golf course conditions.
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11
Sports 08 June 2010
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11 is a sports game made by EA Sports with golf enthusiasts in mind. Players have the opportunity to play the roles of Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy and take part in the cycle of prestigious PGA Tour golf competitions. The game is characterized by a considerable realism of simulation, but the creators also thought about the facilities for beginner golfers.
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10
Sports 08 June 2009
Another part of a well-known series of golf simulators signed with the name of the very famous Tiger Woods. In this version, the authors put more emphasis on recreating the atmosphere of the competition and introduced a few new tournaments.
Sega Golf Club
Sports 11 November 2006
The Golf Club series, created by Sega, has been known only to gaming salons visitors. After developing several editions for coin-op machines, the corporation decided to release also a version for PlayStation 3.
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 08
Sports 18 September 2007
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 08 is the next installment of the world's most popular game about sport for the rich - elite golf. Behind the production of the title is Hypnotix, a band belonging to Electronic Arts, which so far has marked its presence in the industry with the creation of the Outlaw Golf series.
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 07
Sports 14 November 2006
Another calendar year can't do without the next installment of the popular golf branded by EA Sports. The Tiger Woods PGA Tour 07, in addition to standard audiovisual upgrades, also offers a range of more or less innovative ideas to tempt lovers of this elite sport to buy the next episode of the series with Tiger Woods in the lead role.

domain: game


Looking for a string stop for an 05 Mathews Feathermax. I know the bow is a little older so i'd like to make sure whatever string stop i buy is gonna work for this bow. Any recommendations on what i should look for?
A forum community dedicated to bow and crossbow owners and archery enthusiasts. Come join the discussion about optics, hunting, performance, troubleshooting, styles, reviews, accessories, classifieds, and more!


Unfired ( other than factory) Trijicon HD front sight (factory front night sight included) Surefire X300-B NO TRADES Price - $ ? Will accept highest offer Will only respond to serious offers
1958 in 38 spl looking for trades our cash
I have a Custom Kimber will a ton of Wilson Combat parts and ceracoated, too much to list. Have to see for yourself. Comes with 2 mags and a holster.
In good condition looking really to trade but cash will do manufactured date 1974
Gen 4, Glocck 19, Unfired. Suarez International flat face trigger Extended slide stop Trigger guard undercut 3 holsters. All kydex, IWB. 10rnd Mag Front Nightsight Box, and all original parts and accessories FTF on Efa10 in Hudson/Worcester area
Looking to buy or trade for a synthetic benelli montefeltro forend. I do have an almost flawless grade A walnut set i MIGHT be willing to trade for with $$ to me. I might have something firearm related we could trade for as well.
WTB S&W model 60 snub nose, in 357 with a stainless finish. If you have one you are looking to sell let me know. Thanks
Sig P239 in 40cal. Gun is in excellent cond. Comes with Sig night sights. Houge finger groove grips as well as stock ones. 3 holsters and 5 mags. This also has the Sig nickel accents installed by the Sig pro shop.Just sits in safe. Might consider trade for a compact 9mm.
Like new Ruger SR9. 2 mags. Case and all the paperwork that came with it. Looking for something smaller.
For sale is an Anderson AR15. Rifle has 18 inch barrel with m-lock freefloat handguard and mid length gas system,also a magpul fixed stock. Comes with 2 pre-ban mags and proof of provenance. Price is not negotiable, cash only and not really interested in trades . Thanks for looking, feel free to inquire with any questions. Rifle must be sold face to face on an EFA-10 form, I can come to you if ...
Got some Glock 17 stripped frames in! $110 each out the door. Email is best method of contact
Mint Condition, unfired, Daewoo K2 Rifle...you know you wanna be a roof Korean! All Laws followed
For sale (No Trades) is a smith and Wesson M&P45 with Trijicon HD night sights and an Apex Carry Trigger. Has about 100 rounds through it. Comes with box and 2 mags. 14 round mags available for law enforcement. I will cover the transfer at Precision Point Firearms. Anywhere else you cover the transfer.
1911ct e-series s&w. comes with 3 8-round magazines, carrying case, all original papers & accessories. crimson trace laser is installed in this model and it is really nice on the e-series line. $875 ftf efa-10 or transfer via ffl on your dime. I also have ammo I can sell separately if interested. feel free to send questions open to trades as well, not really looking for other handguns but pleas...
I am selling my pre ban Glock 17 with the slide modified by Wetwerks. This slide is setup for a Trijicon RMR. The coating was done by Paper City Firearms. I am also including one 10rd mag. Please note the front sight post is not included. I am asking $850 cash, not interested in trades. Transfer can be done at Nicks Sport Shop or another nearby FFL. Thanks
Selling a like new Mossberg MMR AR-15 5.56. comes with two factory pinned 10rd mags and 1 single ten round. It's registered and legal to transfer. Comes with a case and is super clean. Less than 30rds put down it, I just cleaned more packing grease off it. Looking for $1,500 obo or trades including a Glock 19+extra gen3+
Rode fine still does just needs new tube for the back land will be all set to ride bike is worth like 150 brand new selling for 50 lmk ASAP don t need it been sitting in my basement for a a long time taking up space good bike to ride around with to Cruze
18 cycle age group 6-10 years.
Good condition. No issue with Tires


text:
Directed by Itsuki Imazaki (Ai Mai Mi)
It has been a little confusing, since the first PV was posted as "a plan of April fool" yesterday. But the director Itsuki Imazaki today confirms that the anime adaptation project based on Choborau Nyopomi's four-panel comedy manga Fushigina Somera-chan/Magical Somera-chan is real, and is already in production.
The manga was serialized in Ichijinsha's Manga Palette Life from its 6th to 38th issue published in April 2011, then compiled in two tankobon volumes. The print editions are now out of print, and only the Kindle editions are available. The story follows everyday life of Somera Nonomoto who can use the strongest kenpo Nonomoto Mahou-ken which is inherited from her mother, with her younger sister Kukuru.
The anime adaptation is produced as the third part of "Choborau Nyopomi Theater" following the two TV
anime adaptations of the author's another popular manga work Ai Mai Mi. According to the director, he is
already working on storyboards, but the voice cast and on-air schedule are not decided yet.
1st key visual
Manga tankobon 1st and 2nd volume covers
© Choborau Nyopomi/Ichijinsha

domain: literature


text:
About this Service
I am a Senior Psychotherapist, Group Analyst, and Supervisor and have extensive experience with more than 20 years in various clinical settings. I am genuinely interested in my client’s unique experiences. My aim is to support clients through difficulties in life so that they can have a better understanding of themselves as well as realise internal and external resources to fulfil their life expectations.
Experience, Focus Areas and Condition Specialisations
- Adoption Related Issues
- Anger Management
- Cultural or Race Issues
- Eating Disorders
- Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
- Self Esteem
- Brief Therapy
- CBT (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy)
- EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing)
Main Client Groups
- Young People
- Online Therapy or Counselling
- Telephone Counselling
As an experienced Senior Psychotherapist, Group Analyst and Supervisor, I provide psychotherapy and counselling for people with mental health issues. I have extensive experience with more than 20 years in various clinical settings (NHS, Family Action and IMECE Women’s Centre in the UK, Amita Mercy Medical Centre in the USA) and client-centred environments, notably within the National Health Service (NHS) in the UK to support different client groups. I have been supervised by Melanie Klein`s daughter Josephine Klein and Sophie Boswell for some time.
Moving a lot throughout my life has enabled me to experience of many different cultures, traditions, and values and helped me grow to be a culturally sensitive psychotherapist. I value difference and welcome everyone who would like to get support from my psychotherapy practice. I invite clients from all backgrounds, ethnicities, cultures, identities, religion, disability, sexuality, age, and gender.
My therapeutic approach is psychoanalytic informed by intercultural and transcultural concepts. I also have training in different approaches and thus, integrate these in my clinical practice. I often combine my psychoanalytic training with Eye-Movement Therapy (EMDR), Solution-Focused Therapy, Mindfulness and Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) to meet the unique needs of my clients. My professional work and participation in different courses have enabled me to deal effectively with a wide range of client needs, colleagues, and management in a variety of settings. I have a strong commitment to provide effective psychotherapy service, and this has been displayed within the diverse roles I have undertaken.
I generally see clients once a week and sometimes more often if needed.
I provide psychotherapy and counselling in English, Turkish, Albanian and Macedonian.
This practitioner prefers to be identified as: Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist

domain: psychology


I'm not really glad that you feel my pain because that means your having problems too! Anyway, 1.260 is by no means bare minimum. I load my XTP's to the same factory OAL as the Federal EFMJ's at 1.240. I hear many guys going even deeper.Originally posted by GUNNER:
I've exactly the same problem with a brand new TRP.
My reasoning is powder residue after alot of shooting. It feed fine for a while when the gun is clean, maybe 50rds. Perhaps a poorly buffed feed ramp.
I'm not sure about the little "tit" in the middle of the follower in the mag either.
I've had UMC 230 FMJ do the the same also. Have tried different ammo, DITTO.
Bullet seating out of spec? I have measured some rounds to be seated below COL 1.260. I think that a bare minimum for most 1911s.
Maybe not enough taper crimp?
I can't figure it quite yet. Thought you'd all have some answers. I'm miffed right now.


text:
Sunday, March 6, 2016
This weekend was a birthday weekend for me, so I thought it would be fitting to share a birthday card and some bright, sunny colors. This card uses Mama Elephant's Charmed stamp set.
I started by stamping the owl and the banner onto some marker paper. I colored them in with Copics, using a few of the colors I've been meaning to use for ages - a peachy orange, pink and ivory. Once my pieces were colored, I fussy-cut them with sharp scissors, leaving a small white border.
I trimmed a piece of white cardstock and pulled out a starry stencil. I used my mini ink blender and Wild Honey distress ink to add some stars. I went for a gradual effect, layering the color strongly in some areas, but not in others. I matted this piece of cardstock (using foam tape) with another white rectangle that was slightly larger. I adhered both to a yellow top-folding A2 base (4¼x5½").
I grabbed a cute Simple Stories chipboard frame and adhered it down with glue. I added the owl inside the square with foam tape, then layered the banner over the bottom edge.
As a last touch, I scattered a few orange, yellow and clear sequins around the card.
Thanks for reading!


text:
More and more life stories of your old friends are appearing each week on a new, free website being overseen by Mike Marsden.
Go to www.classreport.org to find the Colonia High Class of 1968 website. There's no charge to take a look, or to register to write up your story and add photos. Contact information on the website will allow you to connect with many old friends.
Besides the fun and intrigue of finding out what happened to everyone over the past 40 years, the Class of 1968 website is being used to organize a class reunion tentatively scheduled for Fall 2008.
The big news is that Woodbridge High Class of 1968 may be joining us for a fun weekend. A beach town on the Jersey Shore is the top choice so far for the reunion location.
Please tell other classmates you know to join in. We're working hard to bring everyone together and every new name brings us closer to connecting with everyone.
Classreport.org pledges to never sell names and addresses to third parties and to let the website be administered exclusively by Colonia High School Alumni. Other alumni classes from Colonia High School can be accessed at classreport.org/usa/nj
Colonia High School Class of 1968 Reunion Website Committee
Mike Marsden - Sheri Baron - Chris Cook

domain: news


text:
| Mar 6, 2013
| 3:15 AM
"Look out! Here comes Audrey II!!" A man-eating plant from outer space is arriving soon at Harford Technical High School.
Harford Technical High School's Cobra Theatre Company will be presenting Howard Ashman and Alan Menken's campy musical "Little Shop...
| Jul 20, 2011
| 8:07 PM
Infinity Theatre Company continues its first full summer season with "Little Shop of Horrors," a 1982 dark musical comedy with book and lyrics by Howard Ashman and music by Alan Menken. With this terrific production, Infinity fulfills its promise to bring...
| Dec 2, 2013
| 6:30 PM
Before I saw "Frozen," Disney's altogether splendid new animated feature, I couldn't remember the last time I'd emerged from such a movie actually humming the soundtrack. Forced to guess, I'd say it was 15 years ago with "Mulan," a modest charmer whose...
| Nov 20, 2013
| 8:35 AM
(FRESNO, Calif.)-- The impetuous Sofia, the latest princess to join Disney royalty through her Disney Channel series "Sofia the First," has always been able to turn to the other members of the animated royal court in times of trouble. In the Sunday prime-...
| Nov 6, 2013
| 12:30 PM
On a Monday afternoon in early September, conductor Tim Davies is putting an 81-piece orchestra through its paces on the Warner Bros. scoring stage. On the bigscreen behind the musicians, a carrot-nosed snowman comforts an ailing princess inside an ice-...
| Sep 29, 2013
| 8:00 AM
This Is the End
Sony, $30.99; Blu-ray, $40.99
Available on VOD beginning Tuesday
A generation of comedy stars has been dominating movies for the last decade by playing "themselves," so it was only a matter of time before they went all-in on the...
| Aug 30, 2013
| 8:30 AM
A certain luminescent Genie will take the Broadway stage this spring – along with Princess Jasmine, Prince Ali and Jafar -- in a new, musical adaptation of Disney’s 1992 animated film, “Aladdin.”
"Aladdin" will join other...
| Jul 1, 2013
| 4:49 PM
When you've been reviewing theatrical productions for a few years (and in my case, quite a few), you develop a certain fondness for particular shows that only turn up once in a blue moon on a local stage.
Two of my personal favorites in that category are...
| Jan 7, 2013
| 4:30 PM
Disney's Broadway lineup will get shaken up this spring, with "Mary Poppins" said to be shuttering in March -- to be replaced, word has it, with the tuner adaptation of "Aladdin."
"Poppins" has not attained the kind of consistent big-money sales of mega-...
| Jun 5, 2013
| 2:10 PM
It's the time of year for audacious new musicals. Even before the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center in Waterford gets going with its slate of readings of brand new musicals at the 2013 National Music Theater Conference, and even before the International...
| Jan 6, 2013
The holidays are behind us, and it's time to turn our attention to what's shaping up as an exciting first quarter in the Hampton Roads arts arena. Several premieres are coming our way, and some major talent is dropping by. Here's a look at some upcoming...
| Dec 18, 2012
| 7:27 AM
This is not your mother's "Sister Act."
The mega-successful Whoopi Goldberg movie vehicle from 1992 (and the sequel in 1993) has a whole new get-down-tonight, 1970s vibe for the stage musical "Sister Act the Musical," which is coming to the Broward...


text:
One of the reasons I like the DS is that aside from arcade, many of the games are either simulations or role-playing games. For instance, you don’t see games like “Professor Layton” being developed for the Xbox because console players want the action-it’s like if you have a hot convertible, you’re probably more likely to whisk about with the top down whereas if you’re riding a horse-driven buggy, you’d probably take a more leisurely ride even if you could go faster. Today, I was surprised to see Syberia added to the DS game list. The game was released for the PC several years ago (I started it but could not finish it after I upgraded my new computer because the game was not Vista compatible.
But now that smartphones such as the iPhone support a similar touch-screen interface, how could a DS differentiate itself? If more and more games are available on the iPhone, would it threaten the DS? After all, why would you carry around a phone, a media player, and a portable game device all separately?
Nintendo has obviously been thinking about this. Its tactics for the DS and Wii echo that of the general industry trend in converging applications to one device only Nintendo is more subtle than Microsoft is with its Xbox 360. I say subtle because they’re not adding new applications yet, just expanding what they could work with. The new Personal Trainer: Cooking isn’t a game at all, it’s a guide with lots of recipes. Using Nintendo’s speech recognition software, one can place the DS in the kitchen and not have to touch it while it tells you how to prepare a meal. What a great idea! So many times I’ve seen my sister work in the kitchen with her iMac open on the counter. It’s also great that you can download more recipes. Another net-friendly “game” for DS is Club Penguin, in which
Kids can earn coins while playing on the Disney Club Penguin Nintendo DS, which will seamlessly transfer into their online accounts via a wireless connection.
How cool is that?


text:
The Bulls face a tough test when they travel to Scunthorpe to face Bottesford Town on Saturday.
Bottesford currently sit 7th in the league, just 2 points behind The Bulls.
'The Poachers' have gone 6 games unbeaten and will go above AFC if they win the game. Bottesford just missed out on promotion last season finishing 3rd behind Cleethorpe Town and Shaw Lane Aquaforce.
The Bulls will be wanting to keep their own unbeaten record going which stands at 11 league games, the last time The Bulls lost was to Bottesford 2-1 at home at the beginning of December.
For those travelling the ground address is:


HVAC units need to be upgraded to ensure that they can keep up with the indoor comfort requirements of your household. The good news is that you can easily get expert HVAC installation in Braselton, GA from Clark’s Heating and Air when you’re ready. Here are some tips on upgrading your HVAC unit.
Tend to Air Leaks
There are a few things you need to prepare for when considering an HVAC upgrade. Taking care of any air leaks in your home is a great first step to help you avoid paying for unnecessary HVAC repairs.
Get the Right Size
Getting the right size HVAC unit is essential as it ensures efficiency. If you choose the wrong size, you run the risks of fires, mold growth, carbon monoxide leaks, and other harmful toxins, not to mention higher utillity bills. You can ask about the size that’s appropriate for your home when you get HVAC maintenance.
Various factors determine what size you need your HVAC system to be. As long as you have already plugged up any air leaks, you should consider things such as your climate zone, number and types of windows you have in your home, as well as your ventilation system and requirements for it.
Choose the Type You Want
There are different types of HVAC systems you can choose. When you hire a professional for HVAC services, you can discuss whether a split system, heat pumps, zoned system, single or multi-stage furnace or single-stage or two-stage air conditioner is right for you. Split systems tend to be the most popular and best for most homes.
If you live in Georgia and need HVAC repair from a trustworthy and reputable company, contact Clark’s Heating and Air at your earliest convenience.


text:
Assembly Hall Exterior, Upper Drotsang Monastery
Object Use: Religious
Material: Cotton | Stone | Wood
Cultural Region: Amdo
Date Range: unknown
Source: Private Collection (Gray Tuttle)
Notes: This monastery should not be confused with the lower (original) Drotsang Monastery, just down the valley. For details on the history of these two monasteries, see Louis Schram's 'The Monguors of Kansu'.

domain: history


In the first eight months of 2015, Renault exported 9,500 vehicles from Russia, up 20% on the same period in 2014, but vehicle and parts exports from other Renault-Nissan Alliance partners in Russia are lagging, notably Russian carmaker AvtoVaz.
The Renault-Nissan Alliance owns a controlling 74.5% of AvtoVaz, after its purchase back in 2012 of a 67.1% stake in the Russian carmaker’s holding company – Russian state technology conglomerate Rostec.
According to the vice president and chief operating officer of Renault's Eurasia region, Jean-Christophe Kugler, the company has launched the export of tyres from Russia to Romania. There are also components being shipped from the Togliatti plant to Turkey, but these are only Renault parts and not those made by AvtoVaz.
“We have introduced a new position – director of exports – to explore the full potential,” said Kugler. “We mean not only the delivery of finished vehicles, it can be components and parts. It is good for us and for our suppliers, and in order to cover part of the fixed costs that we are facing here [in Russia] all the time.
“However, we are talking only about Renault and we are not talking about AvtoVaz,” he added. “While exports are a new direction for us, we are so far talking about shipments to countries such as Romania, Turkey and Vietnam, but not in Europe.”
In terms of vehicle exports, AvtoVaz had an ambitious target of doubling the volume of deliveries abroad to 100,000 cars per year. Instead, the Russian carmaker could only hit 50,000 cars this year, even lower than the figure for 2014.
Both Renault and AvtoVaz have been affected by currency fluctuations within the Customs Union of Russia, which includes Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Armenia. Devaluation of the Russian ruble resulted in a drop in sales in Kazakhstan of 34% over the first seven months of this year.
"Exports are important for us, but the most correct thing is to do is export in the right way,” said AvtoVaz’s president, Bo Andersson. “In the past, it destroyed our reputation, not improved it. Because if you do not have the correct partners, nothing will help you."
He added that the short-term target for AvtoVaz was to regain its position in the post-Soviet Union regions, including in Ukraine.
At the same time, industry experts have noted that Renault-Nissan and AvtoVaz have not managed to agree on the joint use of distribution centres. Previously, it had been suggested that Renault-Nissan would offer AvtoVaz its distribution network abroad to help the Russian carmaker in cutting logistics spend on export supplies. No progress on this plan has been reached however.
Nissan has so far not managed to launch export supplies.


Bold Valuable Tech is extremely pleased to announce our collaboration with Dassault Systèmes.
Through this collaboration, Bold will be able to leverage Dassault Systemes product range including 3DExperience, CATIA V5 and SolidWorks, to provide innovative solutions to our customers. All thanks to our trusted ally Technia.
About Dassault Systèmes
Dassault Systèmes is a leading provider in the PLM market, defined as 3D Design, simulation, digital manufacturing and collaboration software. They are reputable across the globe as a trustworthy 3D Design and Engineering Simulation software provider with their own CATIA, SOLIDWORKS and SIMULIA brands.
About Bold Valuable Tech
BOLD is an engineering services company that provides technical expertise to global customers in the field of light weight structures and battery pack development. One key factor to our growing list of achievements in finding innovative solutions to our partners’ challenges lies in our testing and simulation abilities.


One of North Texas' busiest hotel companies is constructing an office project.
NewcrestImage is developing an 80,000-square-foot, four-story building in Grapevine for its new headquarters.
The company will occupy about 20,000 square feet in the building, which is part of NewcrestImage's 52-acre SilverLake Crossings development.
"Our hotels provide travelers with a comfortable, upscale home on the road," Mehul Patel, chairman and CEO of NewcrestImage, said in a statement. "Now our proven attention to quality and innovation is creating premium class A office space to serve as a signature home for our corporate office, as well as for tenants who value being located in a walkable multi-use neighborhood."
The SilverLake Crossings mixed-use project is on State Highway 26 and Bass Pro Drive in Grapevine. It includes 400 apartments and 30,000 square feet of retail and restaurant space on a 15-acre park.
NewcrestImage is building four hotels in SilverLake Crossings — the first of six planned.
Cushman & Wakefield is marketing lease space in the office building.
"NewcrestImage will deliver an office building that offers companies the appeal of the SilverLake Crossings work-live-play master plan," Cushman & Wakefield's Chris Taylor said. "Today's tenants want to locate their office within a special and unique environment with multiple walkable amenities that help them attract and retain employees."
NewcrestImage will be moving from its current Lewisville headquarters to the new office building next year. The company operates more than two dozen hotel properties in 10 states and is developing 15 others.
The company's newest North Texas property is hotel combination AC Hotel and Residence in Frisco Station.


Scientists recently discovered something about auroras they never knew before. “Our jaws dropped when we saw the movies for the first time,” said Larry Lyons of the University of California-Los Angeles,(UCLA) describing how sometimes, vast curtains of aurora borealis collide, producing spectacular outbursts of light. “These outbursts are telling us something very fundamental about the nature of auroras.” These collisions can be so large, that isolated observers on Earth — with limited fields of view — have never noticed them before. It took a network of sensitive cameras spread across thousands of miles to get the big picture.
This network of 20 cameras, set up by NASA and the Canadian Space Agency was deployed around the Arctic in support of the THEMIS mission, the “Time History of Events and Macroscale Interactions during Substorms.” THEMIS consists of five identical probes launched in 2006 to solve a long-standing mystery: Why do auroras occasionally erupt in an explosion of light called a substorm?
The cameras would photograph auroras from below while the spacecraft sampled charged particles and electromagnetic fields from above. Together, the on-ground cameras and spacecraft would see the action from both sides and be able to piece together cause and effect—or so researchers hoped. It seems to have worked.
The breakthrough came earlier this year when UCLA researcher Toshi Nishimura assembled continent-wide movies from the individual ASI cameras. “It can be a little tricky,” Nishimura said. “Each camera has its own local weather and lighting conditions, and the auroras are different distances from each camera. I’ve got to account for these factors for six or more cameras simultaneously to make a coherent, large-scale movie.”
The first movie he showed Lyons was a pair of auroras crashing together in Dec. 2007. “It was like nothing I had seen before,” Lyons recalled. “Over the next several days, we surveyed more events. Our excitement mounted as we became convinced that the collisions were happening over and over.”
The explosions of light, they believe, are a sign of something dramatic happening in the space around Earth—specifically, in Earth’s “plasma tail.” Millions of kilometers long and pointed away from the sun, the plasma tail is made of charged particles captured mainly from the solar wind. Sometimes called the “plasma sheet,” the tail is held together by Earth’s magnetic field.
The same magnetic field that holds the tail together also connects it to Earth’s polar regions. Because of this connection, watching the dance of Northern Lights can reveal much about what’s happening in the plasma tail.
THEMIS project scientist Dave Sibeck of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. said, “By putting together data from ground-based cameras, ground-based radar, and the THEMIS spacecraft, we now have a nearly complete picture of what causes explosive auroral substorms,”
Lyons and Nishimura have identified a common sequence of events. It begins with a broad curtain of slow-moving auroras and a smaller knot of fast-moving auroras, initially far apart. The slow curtain quietly hangs in place, almost immobile, when the speedy knot rushes in from the north. The auroras collide and an eruption of light ensues.
How does this sequence connect to events in the plasma tail? Lyons believes the fast-moving knot is associated with a stream of relatively lightweight plasma jetting through the tail. The stream gets started in the outer regions of the plasma tail and moves rapidly inward toward Earth. The fast knot of auroras moves in synch with this stream.
Meanwhile, the broad curtain of auroras is connected to the stationary inner boundary of the plasma tail and fueled by plasma instabilities there. When the lightweight stream reaches the inner boundary of the plasma tail, there is an eruption of plasma waves and instabilities. This collision of plasma is mirrored by a collision of auroras over the poles.
Movies of the phenomenon were unveiled at the Fall Meeting of the American Geophysical Union today in San Francisco.