Posts tagged Hardware
Dell XPS One released (comparable to Apple iMac)
Nov 16th
There have been rumors about this thing for a while now. I’m not big on rumors, but somehow the ones on the Dell XPS One excited me quite a bit. I purchased a Dell XPS M1710 laptop in September for my studies in Computer Science at college (and also for my own little old pleasure) and I haven’t had a hitch since. I’m happily running Vista and Ubuntu 7.10 on it, too.
The XPS One is an all-in-one machine à la Apple’s iMac. At first glance, the ‘One’ looks classy, but in retrospect maybe a bit over-styled. A bit over priced, too. The low-end model starts at 1499 USD, whilst the high-end rig retails at a whopping 2399 USD (!). We’re all pretty accustomed to Dell’s (too expensive) pricing scheme, I guess, so it won’t surprise too many folks. It’s one sexy device that’s meant for den-usage; that is (not TOO heavy gaming and) media center applications. It comes as a 20″ widescreen and includes a built-in TV-tuner.
Full specs can be found at Dell’s US-based website.
If I’m completely honest, thought, I’d have to admit to the fact that the the iMac is just much more elegant. Expensive as well, it seems to be more justified. Maybe I just like the idea of a cute white’n’silver integrated machine sitting on the desk in the living room. Black is a bit obtrusive for my liking, but hey, tastes differ.
(Apple iMac running Leopard)
Next-gen MRAM
Jul 10th
MRAM is a memory (RAM) technology that uses electron spin to store information. It has been dubbed “the ideal memory” – potentially combining the density of DRAM with the speed of SRAM and non-volatility of FLASH memory or hard disk, and all this while consuming a very low amount of power.
MRAM can resist high radiation, and can operate in extreme temperature conditions.
MRAM requires less far less memory refresh than DRAM – leading to better organized power consumption. It is also speed-competitive with SRAM (the CPU’s CACHE memory). So MRAM can mean much more storage in mobile devices, with longer battery life. MRAM will eventually be made in high densities, and will perhaps replace your computer’s HD – leading to a fast computer that can instantly turned on.
Laser-driven hard drives
Jul 1st
“Ultra-rapid pulses of polarized light fired from lasers, new tests show, can outperform conventional magnetic data writers by as much as two orders of magnitude.
Researchers at Radboud University Nijmegen in the Netherlands think they’ve found another candidate. In laboratory experiments, they used laser light to write data to a magnetic hard drive at very high speeds. The technique works because the photons transmitted by the laser actually carry angular momentum, allowing them to interact with the hard drive. Also, each laser pulse heats a tiny space on the disk just enough to make changing its polarity—thereby storing a bit of data—a little easier. The key is reversing the polarity of the laser pulses, which can produce the equivalent of either a 1 or a 0 of binary code on the disk storage medium.
The researchers managed to transfer data at intervals of about 40 femtoseconds, or quadrillionths of a second, about 100 times faster than conventional magnetic transfers, the researchers report in a paper accepted for publication by Physical Review Letters.”