RAM's Computer Doctor

Samsung, Microsoft Work Together to Improve SSD Performance in Vista

SanDisk may get some help in its efforts to improve performance in Vista with SSDs thanks to Samsung and Microsoft

Last month, SanDisk took a lot of flak when its CEO complained that its poor solid state drive (SSD) performance was attributed to poor support in Microsoft's Windows Vista operating system. The comments came as a shock to many considering that SanDisk last year proclaimed that its SSDs were "suited to a variety of Microsoft Windows Vista applications" and that the "Windows Vista operating system will run optimally when installed on the SanDisk SSD".

Despite these claims, many brushed aside SanDisk's comments since numerous other manufacturers have introduced thoroughly modern SSDs with significantly higher reads/writes than SanDisk's offerings.

It appears that SanDisk may now be getting some help in its quest to improve SSD performance in Windows Vista. ComputerWorld reports that Samsung is working together with Microsoft to improve the performance of SSDs within the operating system.

"We have been so used to hard drives for so many years, Windows is optimized for that obviously," said Sun Microsystems flash marketing manager Michael Wang.

Forward Insights analyst Gregory Wong went on to add that the sector size of SSDs is generally larger than those of hard drives. As a result, performance can suffer at times.

"My guess is that [Samsung and Microsoft] are maybe working on the OS recognizing an SSD with a 4KB sector size instead of a hard disk drive with a 512-byte sector size," Wong added.

Samsung would provide no details on what exactly will be changed in Microsoft's operating system to better support SSDs, or when a possible "fix" would be made available to customers. Whatever the fix is, it will be beneficial not only to Samsung SSDs, but to all SSDs.

AMD Officially Announces 790GX Chipset

AMD 790GX chipset promises best overclocking available for Phenom Black Edition CPUs

AMD officially announced its new AMD 790GX platform today. The 790GX is aimed at the performance computer users and packs in a host of features. One of the main features of the 790GX is advanced overclocking capability when paired with Phenom Black Edition processors.

The 790GX features AMD's Overdrive interface that allows easy overclocking of the Phenom Black Edition processors. The significant performance increase the platform can deliver to gamers using Black Edition processors is thanks to what AMD calls Advanced Clock Calibration technology.

The 790GX platform uses on-board ATI Radeon HD 3300 series graphics. AMD claims that the HD 3300 onboard GPU is the best performing on-board GPU available. AMD backs that claim up with a 3DMark Vantage score in excess of 2900 -- making the HD 3300 the fastest on-board GPU as of August 6, 2008.

In addition to laying claim to the fastest on-board GPU, AMD says that the 790GX also supports Hybrid CrossFireX technology to pair the performance of the on-board GPU with either an ATI Radeon HD 3400 or HD 2400 series discrete video card. The platform also supports CrossFireX for running multiple discrete video cards at once.

VP and general manager of AMD's Chipset Division, Phil Eisler said in a statement, "Today’s high definition, multimedia applications demand powerful graphics and multi-core processor performance and only AMD is delivering a truly balanced platform that accelerates these workloads. The AMD 790GX chipset contains several AMD innovations that further improves both multi-core AMD Phenom processor performance and motherboard ATI Radeon graphics performance, the result of which are versatile performance PCs that deliver an eye-catching visual experience."

The 790GX platform also integrates features for delivering what AMD calls "The Ultimate Visual Experience for HD." The 790GX chipset supports full HD resolution up to 1080p and supports the latest video formats including VC-1, MPEG-2, and H.264. The chipset uses the AMD Unified Video Decoder to offload HD video playback from the CPU to the GPU. AMD says that mainboards using the 790GX chipset will be available for its add-in partners including ASUS, Biostar, DFI, and more.

In early July, AMD introduced new Phenom parts that the 790GX chipset's overclocking capabilities complement perfectly. At that time AMD introduced its fastest Phenom Black Edition ever called the X4 9950 running at 2.6GHz and retailing for $235. AMD reports that Phenom Black Edition processors running at 2.5GHz stock can be pushed to 3.2GHz and over thanks to its new Advanced Clock Calibration.

VIA Leaves Chipset Business

VIA says there is no longer a place for third party chipset makers

For a long time there have been several manufacturers in the chipset business and the largest of them were Intel, AMD, NVIDIA, VIA, and SiS. VIA today announced that it will be leaving the motherboard chipset business, ceding the market to its competitors.

Custom PC reports that VIA insiders said the company no longer sees a market for third-party chipset makers. VIA's Richard Brown told Custom PC, "One of the main reasons we originally moved into the x86 processor business was because we believed that ultimately, the third party chipset market would disappear, and we would need to have the capability to provide a complete platform. That has indeed come to pass."

Brown says that Intel now provides the majority of chipsets for its processors and AMD is quickly going the same route. Rumors sprang up that VIA was leaving the chipset market at the end of 2007. At the time it was rumored that a former VIA general manager, Chewei Lin, had plans to resign and take 40 VIA chipset technicians with him to ASMedia.

VIA isn't the only long time chipset maker that has seen rumors if it leaving the chipset business surface. While VIA has confirmed that it will be leaving the chipset market, NVIDIA says it is not leaving the chipset market. Rumors circulated at the beginning of August 2008 that NVIDIA would be leaving the chipset business. NVIDIA's Brian Burke quickly quashed those rumors when he contacted DailyTech to say NVIDIA's chipset business was stronger than ever on the back of the new 790i chipset.

Leaving the chipset business should give VIA more resources to commit to its CPU efforts. VIA recently announced its 65nm Nano Processor that it intends to battle directly with Intel's Atom processor.

New and Improved PhysX

Daily Roundup Now with added debris

SOMEONE DROPPED US AN EMAIL pointing out that Driver Heaven, too, has done a great job reviewing the Nvidia Physx pack. Apparently, they’ve taken a 9800GTX+ and tested it with several combos, including on Ageia PhysX card and a 9600GT operating as PhysX. They’ve also included some before and after videos of the PhysX at work. Good work guys.

Danish PCWorld did some thorough research into the “value for money” side of Quad Core processors. Taking a couple of AMDs and another couple of Intel processors, Kenneth squeezed all he could from the processors and came out with a pure “bang-for-kroner” ratio. Like Ken said, you might not be able to read Danish, but the benchmarks are fairly easy to follow. We Googled it anyway.

Extremetech is reviewing three larger than life keyboards, dubbed the Caesar, the Aurora Premium and the Aurora Micro. They all come from Enermax, which is sort of odd, but they all look good and are sure to impress users that are tired of their setups. The prices aren’t all that expensive either, especially the Micro that has the size and looks of a laptop keyboard (ie: low profile keys, no numeric keypad).

PC Watch in Japan reviewed a somewhat MIA Chrome 430GT card. “Woot?!” You say. Yes, these things pop up every now and then and it’s our job to get it to you, no matter how good or bad they perform. In this case, users are looking at a very cheap card (6700 yen is about 60 buckaroos), with the performance of a GeForce 8400GS. It’s got pretty decent HD playback capabilities.

PC Perps is looking into that very discrete launch of the AMD 740G chipset. Less of a bang and more of a whimper than its hulking 790GX brethren, the 740G corrects some imperfections of the 690G by adding the SB700 southbridge and is cheap as chips. Not the best at HD playback, at all, really.

Lost Circuits has an interesting piece of literature for you today. They’ve rounded up a bunch of ATI cards in several different combos and from different generations. From the HD 3870X2 to an HD 4870 OC edition, they’ve got numbers galore. If you own an HD 3870X2 of GeForce 8800 Ultra (they threw that one in for flavour) you probably won’t be too happy to know they gets get their botties kicked by everyone else. Attack of the Killer Radeons.

Consoles Wars

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