octo-core
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Samsung quietly reveals a Galaxy S5 variant with an eight-core processor
So that's Samsung's new flagship smartphone, the Galaxy S5. The company makes the majority of the components itself, but what happened to those home-grown Exynos processors? Well, Samsung tells us that the GS5 will come in two variants, one with the 2.5GHz quad-core Snapdragon 801 chip (the model that we tested out at MWC), and another with a 2.1GHz octo-core Exynos 5 processor. Samsung did the same with the Galaxy S4 last year, but we didn't pick up any huge differences in performance when we compared the two phones. The LTE-capable GS4s never left Korea, however, so we'd predict a similarly limited roll-out for any Exynos-powered GS5s.
Apple Mac Pros: now with 8-cores
So long Woodcrest, hello Covertown! Rumored since October, Apple finally got around to loosing an octo-core Mac Pro -- that's 8-cores of Intel processing power spread across 2 of Intel's latest Clovertown quad-core chips. Arriving just in time for Adobe's Intel optimized Creative Suite 3.0. Quad-core models are still available with processor speeds maxing out at 3GHz. Prices start at $2,499 for 2.66GHz quad-core action or tack on an additional $1,498 for a total of 8-cores running at 3GHz. Shipping now -- hoozah!
Alienware's MJ-12 8550 workstations sport up to eight cores
It's always a lucky day for the writer who gets to cover a new Alienware release, because you wouldn't be doing your readers justice without building your own fantasy rig on the retail site and seeing just how high you can jack the price up. So today is especially thrilling, because we got to throw together two $12,000+ workstations without breaking a sweat: the Intel Xeon-powered MJ-12 8550i and AMD Opteron-powered MJ-12 8550a. This being Alienware and all, you can load up either machine with two top of the line chips, creating either a 2.8GHz quad-core Opteron 2220 monster or an outlandish 1.86GHz octo-core Xeon 5320 beast. Add to that 1GB GDDR3 NVIDIA Quadro FX 5500 graphics (or 2 FX 4500's in SLI on the 8550i), 16GB of 667MHz DDR2 RAM, up to four HDD's (max storage: 3TB; max coolness: 600GB worth of 15,000 RPM drives), and two dual layer burners -- and well sir, you've got yourself quite a workhorse right there. Unfortunately for the average consumer whose games and apps aren't optimized for multi-core processors, these specs wouldn't really translate to blazing fast performance for day to day tasks -- plus both rigs only ship with XP, which might be a dealbreaker in and of itself. Since not everyone is gonna want to blow twelve grand on their email and web surfing box, (much) cheaper configurations are available, with both the "a" and the "i" starting at $2,550.
