Weekly News Roundup #8
Monday
Microsoft releases Windows 1.11 via the Windows Store
https://hexus.net/tech/news/software/132464-microsoft-releases-windows-111-via-windows-store/
A nice little bit of fun for a Monday, Hark back to when times were simpler and computers had as much processing power as today's smart bulbs! Suffice to say if you have some time and want to make me feel old download this and have a play with ooooold windows.
Tuesday
Huawei on Hongmeng: It will take "many years" to build an ecosystem to compete with Android and iOS
https://www.pocket-lint.com/phones/news/huawei/148575-huawei-interview-hongmeng-android-ios
After reading this it does seem that their new os won't be around for a while, It will take a lot of development time taking something developed originally for IoT and then making it work as a phone OS. There is also the issue of using something designed for one task to do another, I have worked in situations where this has both worked well and worked horribly! Only time will tell if Huawei can manage to pull this development off without a hitch.
Wednesday
Who's been copying AMD's homework? Intel lifts the lid on its hip chip packaging to break up chips into chiplets
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/07/10/intel_chip_packaging/
This has to be embarrassing for the PR guy at intel who came up with the “AMD glues together CPU’s” line. This line was directed at the EPYC line of Server CPU’s when they were challenging Intel’s in terms of price per core, With EPYC Rome coming they will also be offering similar IPC per core making them even more attractive to end-users. This result mush have shaken intel enough to start to move in the same way as producing chiplet CPU’s means a single error in your core will not write off the entire CPU die, instead you can (using AMD’s terms) either disable the error core in the CCX and use that in one of your lower CPU’s or bin that small die completely without bining other working parts. This has been extremely cost-effective for AMD and Intel is now learning their lesson.
Thursday
Nvidia FrameView all-in-one benchmarking app launched
https://hexus.net/tech/news/graphics/132602-nvidia-frameview-all-in-one-benchmarking-app-launched/
I don't know how much use this could be from one of the big players in the GPU market. As it could be seen that using a tool made by 1 player may skew the results of the other. If they could make this software open source so that the code could be inspected it might make things better, But this is unlikely so I doubt you will be seeing results from this from any of the third-party reviewers in the near future. I think if this where to be spun off to an impartial 3rd company it might get more widely accepted for testing.
Friday
Rumour: AMD Radeon VII has been declared end of life
https://hexus.net/business/news/components/132671-rumour-amd-radeon-vii-declared-end-life/
This is an odly short lifetime for a product, However not supprising. With a rumored higher end RX5xxx card coming out it would make sense for amd to end “production” of this card, When i say production i mean that the VII was a good way to sell Radeon Instinct chips that had minor defects. The new rumored cards are going to be chaeper to produce as they wont have the VII’s HBM2 memory which should leave a larger margin or more likely lower price for the increased performance of the new cards. The stop in AMD selling thease cards will hopefully mean they have less of the Defects to sell in their Instinct line and are getting better at 7nm or rather TSMC are. We will have to wait for the official announcement of the discontinuation and the announcement of hopefully a higher spec RX5xxx.