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Engineer Calls Off-The-Shelf Components 'Unsafe' for Aircraft

Pressures to use commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) over military-grade components in civil avionics systems could endanger the operation of aircraft systems, Andrew Chugg, senior principal engineer in the radiation effects group of Matra BAE Dynamics, warns in a technical paper. He says shrinking transistor sizes could be putting such COTS parts at increasing risk of failure during what the avionics industry calls single-event effects (SEEs). This is where naturally occurring radiation is high enough to interfere with equipment and potentially cause it to malfunction if the parts are not sufficiently radiation-hardened.

Read the full story on: EE Times

 

ATI Offers Details on Radeon 9000 for Mac, Quells All In Wonder Rumors

Following details posted late last week on MacCentral, graphics card and chip maker ATI Technologies Inc. recently provided more details about its forthcoming Radeon 9000 Mac Edition card. The Radeon 9000 Mac Edition card is tantalizingly close to release as a retail product. Equipped with a 4x AGP interface, the Radeon 9000 Mac Edition is the first ATI retail card to feature an Apple Display Connector (ADC), suitable for connecting the card directly to a new Apple Cinema or Studio Display. The Radeon 9000 Mac Edition also has a second monitor connector -- a Digital Visual Interface (DVI) -- that enable it to drive a separate digital flat panel display. ATI also downplayed suggestions that it is planning to release an All in Wonder card for the Macintosh, while stopping short of refuting such rumors all together.

Read the full story on: MacCentral

 

Intel Is Kicking Silicon at AMD

Intel executives still remember well the fall of 1999, when it began to lose part of its stronghold on personal computer chips. To Intel's surprise, Advanced Micro Devices unveiled its Athlon family of chips that, based on several independent tests, offered better performance. From 1999 to 2001, AMD increased its global market share for PC processors by 8 percentage points, from 13% to 21%, according to tech consultancy IDC. Intel's piece, meanwhile, shrunk from 84% in 1999 to 79% in 2001. That defeat doesn't carry quite the same sting for Intel today, even though AMD intends to ship its Clawhammer chip, said to be as revolutionary as the first Athlon, in the first quarter of 2003. In a reversal of fortune for Intel, the clouds over AMD are thickening, and a better chip might not dispel them.

Read the full story on: Business Week Online

 

Some DRAM Selling Below Cost, Micron Says

U.S. memory giant Micron Technology, Inc., said that the "sweet spot" of the market had shifted to double-data-rate SDRAM, and that certain products are now selling below cost as inventories and other factors are taken into account. Micron said that DRAM prices had plunged 30 percent during its fourth quarter ended Aug. 29. Historically, memory prices decline rapidly over time, partially offset by manufacturing shrinks. Micron said it is bringing on 0.13-micron and 0.11-micron lines to help offset near-term manufacturing costs.

Read the full story on: ExtremeTech

 

Networked Video gets a Chip

ViXS Systems of Toronto, Ontario is now sampling its XCode video networking processor to early customers. XCode is an integrated circuit (IC) that adjusts video MPEG formats, bit rates, and resolutions on the fly over any IP network, wired or wireless. The XCode processor can format MPEG1 to MPEG2 to MPEG4 and reduce or increase bit rates from QCIF to standard resolution to high definition and back. It will provide real-time Quality of Service (Qos) over IP networks even with bandwidth limits or variations -- it makes sure a full 30 frames per second (required for full-motion video) makes it to the display destination.

Read the full story on: Internetnews.com

 

Motorola's New Chip Will Bring GPS to All

Motorola is unveiling a global positioning system chip it says is the first GPS satellite sensor small enough and hence cheap enough for practical use in consumer-electronics devices such as cell phones and notebook computers. The Instant GPS chip will give users of such devices the ability to tap into a satellite system and pinpoint their geographic location. Measuring only 49 square millimeters, or less than half the area of a Pentium 4 processor, the chip will sell for roughly $10 in volume quantities, said Tim McCarthy, business director for GPS at Motorola's Automotive Group's Telematics Division. That should let device makers add GPS for about a quarter of the cost of current multiple chipsets, which run about $40.

Read the full story on: CNET News.com

 

Release Set for Sharper Digicam Chip

The first digital camera to use a new type of chip that promises sharper images and better color is finally set to arrive in stores, later but cheaper than expected. Japanese high-end camera maker Sigma announced that its SD9 single-lens reflex camera will go on sale Oct. 21 priced at $1,800 for the camera body only. The camera was originally expected to go on sale last March priced around $3,000. The SD9 will be the first camera to use the X3 image-sensor chip from start-up Foveon, a Silicon Valley chip designer that has touted its design as offering dramatic improvements in image quality. Current image sensors can only record a value for one primary color per pixel. Each pixel on the X3 sensor can record values for all three primary colors, resulting in sharper images with greater color detail, according to Sigma.

Read the full story on: CNET News.com

 

TeraLogic Sees Opportune Timing In DTV Chip Launch

After struggling for six years in the sluggish U.S. digital HDTV market, TeraLogic Inc. is claiming an opportune breakthrough with a highly-integrated chip that arrives just as the FCC has mandated the inclusion of digital tuners on some upcoming TVs. TeraLogic is rolling its Generation9 HDTV decoder, manufactured in a 0.13-micron process by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd. and scheduled for sampling in the first quarter of next year. The chip integrates a universal digital TV decoder, a 64-bit MIPS CPU, a 100-MHz audio DSP and enhanced copy protection features. Priced at $35 each in 10,000-unit quantities, the chip is compatible with TeraLogic's previous-generation HDTV chips.

Read the full story on: EE Times

 

HP Cuts Price on DVD-Rewritable Drives

HP on Monday lowered by $100 the cost of its dvd200i and dvd200e, effective immediately. The 200i is an internal drive and will now sell for $349, while the dvd200e is an external drive and will cost $449. HP spokesman Dean Sanderson said the price drop indicates the drives are selling well and the company expects the upcoming holiday season to be significant for selling more units.

Read the full story on: CNET News.com

 

VIA Fills KT333 Shortage with Remarked KT400

VIA Technologies will launch a remarked KT400 product to fill up the supply shortage. However, motherboard makers are wary about the change, as the remarked chipset cannot be applied on PCBs used for the former KT333. The major specification difference between the current KT400 and the remarked version lies in their AGP technology support. The present KT400 supports AGP 8x, while the remarked chipset offers only AGP 4x graphics function. VIA said that shipments of the remarked KT400 will begin at the end of this month, or early October.

Read the full story on: DigiTimes

 

Live Large with Big Drives

Today, PC users are faced with a pressing hard-drive size limit: 137GB. Hard drive and computer makers are working together to break this limit using Big Drives technology, which will let computers work with hard drives that can store petabytes (PB, or millions of gigabytes). PC Magazine looks at the reasons for hard drive size limits, explain the benefits of Big Drives technology, and show you how to support the new standard on your PC.

Read the full story on: PC Magazine

Copyright © 2004 Ziff Davis Media Inc. All Rights Reserved. Originally appearing in ExtremeTech.

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