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NVIDIA announces Quadro K5000 for Mac Pro, brings 4K support, 2x performance over Quadro 4000
NVIDIA's Kepler-powered Quadro K5000 GPU will be making its way to Apple's Mac Pro systems, the company announced today at IBC. The professional graphics card made its debut earlier this summer and is slated to ship beginning in October for $2,249. Timing for the Quadro K5000 for Mac isn't quite so firm, with NVIDIA simply stating that it'll ship "later this year," though pricing is expected to be in line with the previously announced flavor. The next-gen GPU is said to offer up to 2x faster performance over the Quadro 4000, while also delivering 4K display support, quad display capability through two DVI-DL and two DisplayPort 1.2 connectors, and 4 gigs of graphics memory. Furthermore, each Mac Pro will be able to support up to two separate cards, should you need the extra power. You'll find full details in the press release after the break.
NVIDIA announces second generation Maximus, now with Kepler power
It's been almost exactly a year since we first heard about NVIDIA's Maximus technology, and today the firm's just announced an update. The second generation of the platform is now supported by Kepler-based GPUs. This time around computational tasks get ferried off to the SMX-streaming K20 GPU ($3,199 MSRP,) leaving the 3,840 x 2,160 resolution-supporting Quadro K5000 GPU ($2,249) to tackle the graphical functions. Want to know when you can get your hands on the goods? Well, NVIDIA says starting December, with the Quadro K5000 available as a standalone in October. Head down to the PR for the full spin and forthcoming workstation / OEM details.
HTC Sense 4.1 reportedly leaked with custom ROM, One X owners taste the future
It feels like just yesterday that we were getting acquainted with the back-to-basics ways of HTC's Sense 4.0. Well-known HTC phone modder Football doesn't want us to get comfy: he claims to have both obtained a leaked version of Sense 4.1's ROM Upgrade Utility (RUU) and folded it into the 2.2 update to his Maximus firmware for the international One X. While it's no Jelly Bean, the Maximus-tuned version of HTC's Android 4.0 flavor appears to give Sense a shot in the arm, taking care of lag in the launcher and live wallpapers in addition to delivering a healthy overall speed boost. That 0.1 numbering gives a good indication of just how light the visible feature set might be, though -- other than an existing update to substitute the virtual menu button for a long-press of the home key, the interface changes are mostly limited to dedicated buttons for switching browser tabs and between different cameras. It's no surprise that HTC hasn't said a word about its own plans; rumors of new One devices, however, can't help but fuel suspicions that Sense 4.1 is just around the bend.
NVIDIA's Project Maximus takes multi-GPU mainstream, 'Virtual Graphics' takes it to the cloud
NVIDIA just wrapped up an intimate press briefing here at SIGGRAPH 2011, where -- amongst other things -- it officially took the wraps off of two major initiatives. Project Maximus and Virtual Graphics are the two main topics of conversation here, and while both are obviously targeting working professionals at the moment, there's no question that a trickle-down effect is already on the company's mind. With Maximus, the outfit plans to stop recommending bigger GPUs to pros, and start recommending "a light Quadro GPU and as large a Tesla as you can get in the system." The overriding goal here is to make multi-GPU technology entirely more accessible; to date, it hasn't exactly been easy to get a finely tuned multi-GPU setup to the masses, but it sounds like a good deal of future flexibility (it'll be "nearly infinitely scalable") aims to change that. Just imagine: dynamic coupling and decoupling of GPUs depending on user load, at a far more detailed level within the application... Update: Regarding that Tesla bit, NVIDIA clarified with this: "What we're saying is for applications that are light on graphics / don't place a heavy demand on graphics, but more so a heavy demand on computational tasks, users will have an option to choose an entry- or mid-level Quadro card for graphics functions, such as the Quadro 600 or Quadro 2000. For certain applications, better performance is achieved by adding a Tesla companion processor, as opposed to scaling up the primary Quadro graphics. Users still require as much graphics as possible." %Gallery-130218%
Gods & Heroes looking for a few good volunteers
Heatwave Interactive has released an internal Q&A session focused on the Praetorian Guards program surrounding its new Gods & Heroes MMORPG. What, pray tell, is a Praetorian Guard? Well aside from the poor bloke that Russell Crowe's General Maximus unhorsed during the first reel of Ridley Scott's Gladiator, a Praetorian is also an elite Gods & Heroes community member "who volunteers [his] time to role-play, [run] events, and coordinate dungeon runs and quests." Guard members also maintain the game's wiki and collect player feedback pertaining to their assigned roles. Sound interesting? Head to the official Gods & Heroes dev blog for a full listing of the positions available as well as the perks and membership guidelines.
ASUS' Sandy Bridge motherboards are pretty, come with Bluetooth and USB 3.0 as standard
We already got an early glimpse at what ASUS is bringing to Intel's upcoming Sandy Bridge party, now how about some glamor shots of the actual hardware? The Taiwanese company has taken the shroud of mystery away from its latest range of motherboards and the first thing that stood out to us was the TUF-looking Sabertooth P67 above. It comes with an extended five-year warranty, "military-grade" electrical components, a litany of thermal sensors, and of course that Tactical Jacket up top. Beyond its obvious visual appeal, the Jacket serves to channel airflow throughout the board, aiding the cooling of more peripheral components. On the more diminutive front, ASUS is showing off a Mini-ITX board, the P8P67-I, that fits everything but full-sized RAM slots within a minuscule footprint. Check it out after the break. Oh, and ASUS is sticking USB 3.0 and Bluetooth connectivity on almost all its future boards. Yay!
Optimus Popularis keyboard finally pictured, still on track for sub-$1000 release
Art Lebedev doesn't have a fantastic track record when it comes to timing, but we'll be damned if those boutique devices don't look hot when they hit the scene -- just check out this first render of the Optimus Popularis keyboard, which the studio informs us will still (despite years in the making) cost less than $1000 when it eventually arrives. We're loving the new chiclet keys with typewriter spacing, even as we mourn the loss of a dedicated numpad in favor of industrial design -- though Art Leb says a press of the FN key will remedy that issue. When every button has a screen built into it, you can put that ten-key wherever you want, right?
Art Lebedev stacks Optimus Popularis keys up against Maximus: smaller, higher res
Art Lebedev gave us an update on its slimmer, long-promised Optiumus Popularis keyboard last month, but the design shop hasn't ever provided many concrete details about it apart from the fact that it won't be OLED-based this time around. We now at least know a bit more about those all-important keys, however, which are said to be both smaller and higher-res than the OLED keys on the Optiumus Maximus -- 15 mm square and 64 x 64, to be specific -- and have a much smaller "inactive" area (as illustrated by the gray border above). Still not much more than that, unfortunately, but this is Art Lebedev, so you can count on a trickle of information to continue right up until the keyboard rolls out at the end of this year / early next year -- assuming it isn't delayed, that is.
Allow me to introduce my shield to your face
Ghostcrawler posted fairly heavily on the Warrior forums the other day, and while Warriors are not especially my territory, something the crabman said reminded me of something I've really liked about Wrath so far. Referencing Gladiator, "Watch how Maximus uses his shield -- he isn't cowering behind it -- he's bashing people in the face with it. Shields should be a viable form of combat, not the option to avoid combat." This was said in the context of Protection possibly being viable in the arenas in the nebulous future (not anytime soon), but it reminded me of general playstyles anyway.To some extent, Warriors have fought like this for quite awhile. Shield Bash, Shield Slam, things like that. It wasn't just Shield Block. However, none of that stuff hit very hard. Sure, Protection Warriors shouldn't be able to rock the DPS with their shield, but Shield Slam was more like Shield Bump. The higher block values and thus higher Shield Slam damage is exciting, and the addition of Sword and Board puts even more emphasis on the shield.
How much would you pay to be the first Optimus Maximus owner?
We wouldn't have expected the first opportunity for consumers to pick up an Optimus Maximus to be in the wild frontiers of eBay, but hey, we'll take what we can get. Currently at $300 with 14 bids, but seeing how fast our pathetic bid was shot down, it looks like there's going to be quite a frenzy when the auction winds down on February 4th.
Apple patents a Maximus-alike keyboard, iMac MacBook dock
Apple's always enjoyed patenting the near-absurd, just to get us speculating in the wrong direction or to give its thousands of patent lawyers something to do during a slow design cycle. We can't really imagine Apple has this pair of "products" prepped and waiting in the wings of Macworld, but it's still fun to look. First off we have a MacBook dock that conveniently looks just like an iMac. Not much explanation is needed, you just slide the laptop into the side of the iMac and start desktoping away on the big screen. The second patent deals with a quite familiar keyboard concept: OLED screens in every key. It's not the first time an Apple patent has overlapped with a Lebedev design, but who knows how it'll go down if Apple tries to build one of these Lebedev-ish ideas -- Apple patented this keyboard concept about a year after the Maximus concept was first shown off.Read - iMac MacBook dockRead - Apple Maximus
Inteset stuffs HD DVD / Blu-ray combo drive in media PCs
Currently, there's just not a whole lot of options when you're scouting a pre-fabricated rig that does both HD DVD and Blu-ray on a single optical drive, but adding one more to mix certainly helps. Enter Inteset, which has just announced that an HD DVD / Blu-ray combo drive will be an option in the firm's Maximus and Denzel media server systems. The machines will reportedly come loaded with CyberLink's PowerDVD Ultra software, support 7.1-channel surround sound, and sport an array of ports including audio in / out, DVI / VGA / component / S-Video, USB, FireWire, and antenna inputs for the TV tuners. 'Course, since the company recommends that you "contact a dealer for pricing," you should assume that this here HTPC won't run you cheap.
First Optimus Maximus prototype key revealed
There it is, the first prototype key for Lebedev's Optimus Maximus keyboard. Unlike a typical dome-switch style keyboard -- the mushy but quiet type which collapses a rubber dome to close the circuit -- a key press on Lebedev's $10 key moves a transparent cap around the OLED display to throw a mechanical cherry-switch. This has the benefit of protecting those tiny OLED displays while potentially kicking back a healthy dose of tactile feedback. Reports are that "key-press is nice" although the first prototypes have yet to arrive in Moscow. Certainly, haptic considerations are incredibly important. But we're wondering about the level of optical distortion caused by the gap between the cap and OLED. After all, these keys will be used as informational widgets so they need to be visible from a variety of angles. When you're paying $1,490 for an OLED keyboard, the "look" is just as important as the "feel."
