CES 2008

BigStage founder Jonathan Strietzel mugs in front of Steven Harwell's avatar.

(Credit: Rafe Needleman / CNET)

LAS VEGAS-- Intel CEO Paul Otellini's CES keynote was sparkling. In contrast to Bill Gates' pastel portrait of the future, Otellini presented a concrete vision of a personal, reactive Web, and the challenges to creating it (Silicon, Infrastructure, Context, and Interface). For a full rundown, see Dan Farber's writeup on ZDNet.

Intel loves where the Web is going. The more interactive and personal it gets, the more processing power is required and the more new chips Intel sells, for both servers and local workstations. The most interesting (and newest) product that Otellini brought to the stage in his keynote was an automatic avatar builder made by BigStage.

BigStage creates a model of anyone's head by using just three photos--head-on, rotated a little, and rotated a little more. The company processes these pictures on its own servers and ends up with a model that knows which pixels your eyes are (so it can move and blink them), where your mouth is, and so it. In the Intel keynote demo, BigStage found Jonathan Strietzel created an avatar of Smash Mouth singer Steven Harwell. It was eerily good--much better and less creepy than avatars I've seen previously.

The technology comes from a CIA-funded project at the University of California. It was originally intended for scanning surveillance cams, since at its core it measures the three-dimensional geometry of key points on a face, for example between eyes, or the shape of a person's cheekbone. The fact that the algorithm can extract a complete 3D model from only three images, and with what is now reasonably inexpensive computation (this is where Intel comes in) is what makes it commercially viable.

BigStage hosts the avatars and is looking at several ways to get them out onto the Web, to populate the virtual world with facsimiles of real people, instead of the cartoons that live there now. People will likely be able to create widgets of themselves that they can embed on blogs and social networks, and perhaps in existing virtual worlds like Second Life and gaming networks like Xbox Live. The company is also doing deals with brands and music labels. Strietzel told me that a big public product will be available that lets users put their mug in the "most popular music video of all time." (Thriller, right?)

I hope the company delivers on its demo. Look for public examples of BigStage technology in April or May.

See also: Gizmoz, Digimask.

Samsung's Q1 Ultra Premium UMPC

(Credit: Samsung)

Samsung's 2-pound entry into the ultramobile PC category has some faster hardware in the form of a 1.33GHz Intel ultra-low voltage Core Solo U1500 processor.

The Korean electronics giant introduced the Q1 Ultra Premium UMPC on Monday at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. The system still splits the QWERTY keyboard onto separate sides of the 7-inch, 1024x600 touch screen, but the keyboard keys now are larger for easier typing, Samsung said.

The model's predecessor, the Q1 Ultra introduced last May, used Intel's earlier-generation 800MHz Ultra Mobile Processor.

The Q1 Ultra Premium costs $1,399, including Windows XP Tablet Edition, and Samsung is lowering the price of preceding models.

Other features include 1GB of memory, an 80GB hard drive, an SD flash memory card slot, a 1.3-megapixel camera, a fingerprint reader, a lithium-ion battery that will last "up to 7.5 hours," and 802.11b/g and Bluetooth 2.0 wireless networking.

A Skulltrail-based Alienware. We've seen a lot of these new Alienware designs at CES.

(Credit: CNET)

Intel had three different high-end PCs to show us at the show this morning. Two were based on its forthcoming dual-quad-core enthusiast motherboard, code-named Skulltrail. The other was based on Intel's X48 chipset, which is the 1,600MHz front side bus version of X38, which itself came out last November to coincide with Intel's new Core 2 Quad 9000-series chips. We were suitably impressed at the benchmarks Intel ran for us, as well as the overclocking and cooling of each.

The problem is that each platform is going to be a hard sell, as they're dependent on other technologies to help them achieve their full potential, and that synergy is proving difficult in both cases. Skulltrail especially.

Skulltrail's dependency is software. It's only now that we're starting to see games and other applications take full advantage of quad-core CPUs. But because Flight Simulator X is the only title out right now with eight-core support, we have a hard time believing that the truly hardcore gamers will be willing to drop the $6,000 or $7,000 on a decked-out Skulltrail system (a ballpark figure, but likely charitable). Intel points out that you don't need to populate both CPU slots, and that you can always upgrade later. But at the end of this year we expect to see Intel's next-gen Nehalem CPUs, which could very well include a standalone eight-core model. At that point, dual-quad-core becomes tough to justify. Digital media professionals might be able to make a case for Skulltrail as they have more applications on hand that will actually use eight cores. Gamers will be better off waiting until the software catches up, but by then they'll likely have newer hardware to choose from.

A DIY Skulltrail system, overclocked and fan-cooled.

(Credit: CNET)

X48's problem is less difficult. The basic problem is that Nvidia mostly keeps its dual graphics card SLI technology to itself. That leaves Intel with ATI's CrossFire, which is a fine competitor to SLI technologically, but ATI hasn't released fast enough Radeon graphics cards to compete with the highest-end GeForces from Nvidia. Thus, the best pair of 3D cards from Nvidia will always beat the best pair from ATI, at least today.

We hear R680, code for a forthcoming high-end graphics chip from ATI, will bring ATI back to high-end competition. But until that happens (and assuming Nvidia makes no similar updates, a bet we wouldn't take), any desktop based on Intel's X48 chipset will only be able to compete on CPU speed. It will always lose out on 3D power because right now Crossfire can't compete with SLI on the high-end. Skulltrail, for its part, doesn't have that issue, because Intel was able to make it both SLI and Crossfire capable.

While Intel's high-end platforms have some hurdles to overcome, we still saw some things we liked. Although it requires two fans and a 1,200-watt power supply, the Skulltrail system interior we saw looked relatively tidy, a vast improvement over QuadFX, AMD's nonstarter 2x-dual-core platform from 2006. We were also impressed to see Skulltrail overclocked to 4.0GHz (default is 3.2GHz) and remain passively cooled in a system running two midrange ATI cards. The Nvidia version, with two 8800 GTX cards, was also overclocked, but required liquid cooling.

HP announced a CES revamp of its ubersize desktop replacement late last week. Now that Intel has unveiled its new line of laptop chips, we bring you more details and hands-on observations of this high-end laptop.

While some PC makers endeavor to make ever smaller and lighter machines, HP gets credit for going the other way, creating one of the largest laptops ever seen--the massive HDX. With a huge 20-inch display and weighing more than 15 pounds, the HDX is a glorious example of conspicuous consumption. Even better, unlike Dell's similar XPS M2010, HP continues to update the system regularly--the latest version (still just called the HDX) is the third model we've seen since last spring.

The new HDX debuting at CES offers 512 MB Nvidia GeForce 8800M GTS graphics and the latest Intel Penryn processors, and offers a choice of either HD DVD or Blu-ray drives--although the recent Warner/Blu-ray deal makes that less exciting than it was a week or so ago.

Getting a chance to run some benchmarks on a Penryn HDX with the Nvidia GeForce 8800 just before CES, we didn't really see more than a modest performance boost from the new parts--but as with any prerelease hardware, new drivers are often required to unlock the real potential, so it may be a few days or weeks before useful updates are available.

The HDX may be so big that it's a laptop in name only, but the original model from last year was a constant conversation piece around the CNET office. Look for the revamped HDX to be available online sometime in January, starting at $1,999.

Let the 45nm processing begin!

(Credit: Intel)

Intel introduced its Penryn mobile processors today, and Dell sent us a Latitude D630 with one of the new chips last week to test against an identical Latitude with a previous-generation Merom chip. As we found last year when we tested the first Penryn desktop chip, the Core 2 Extreme QX9650, performance gains aren't immediately evident. While the Penryn mobile processor we tested, the Core 2 Duo T9500, boasts a more efficient 45-nanometer manufacturing process, it really is just laying the foundation for architectural advances that Intel will release later in the year with Nehalem. Compared with the previous-generation Core 2 Duo T7800, which our second Latitude D630 test system was running, the two chips feature the same 2.60GHz clockspeed and operate on the same 800MHz frontside bus of Intel's 965 Express chipset. The Penryn chip does serve up 6MB of L2 cache to the Merom chip's 4MB--along with support for the SSE4 instruction set, which aids audio, video, and 3D processing.

On our standard benchmarks--that don't support SSE4--we saw incremental improvement at best. The Penryn system was no faster than the otherwise identical Merom system on our Photoshop CS3, Cinebench, and Quake 4 benchmarks, and we saw only a modest 12 percent bump on both our multimedia and iTunes tests. Intel last week told us we wouldn't see sizable performance gains until we started mucking about with applications with SSE4 support such as Adobe Premiere Pro CS3 and DivX Pro 6.8.

The smaller 45nm chip design should result in improved battery life, as should Deep Power Down, a new power management setting Intel released with these Penryn chips that cuts the power of the processor when it's idle. (After one battery drain test, however, we saw only an eight-minute advantage.) According to Intel, Deep Power Down will also help reduce power leakage between transistors, which becomes more of a concern each time the manufacturing process shrinks and more transistors are packed more closely together in a smaller space. Intel's shift to Hafnium-based, high-k metal gates, which Intel trumpets as the biggest change to how transistors are made in 40 years, also will help prevent transistor power leakage.

Penryn is also helping Intel get green. The chips are lead free and will be halogen free later in this year.

Mobile Penryn: pricing and specs
Intel Core 2 Extreme X9000 -- 2.8GHz, 6MB shared L2 cache, $851
Intel Core 2 Duo T9500 -- 2.6GHz, 6MB shared L2 cache, $530
Intel Core 2 Duo T9300 -- 2.5GHz, 6MB shared L2 cache, $316
Intel Core 2 Duo T8300 -- 2.4GHz, 3MB shared L2 cache, $241
Intel Core 2 Duo T8100 -- 2.1GHz, 3MB shared L2 cache, $209

Dell expects to begin shipping the Latitude D630 with the T9300 and the T9500 in February (the T8100 and T8300 won't be listed online but will be available by request). The T9300 and the T9500 will replace the T7700 and T7800 chips currently offered on the Latitude D630 for the same prices. Dell said that Penryn updates to its consumer Inspiron and XPS laptops will soon follow.

(Credit: Intel)

Here's what we find most interesting about Intel's new additions to its Core 2 Quad line later this quarter. Of the three new quad-core desktop chips it announced this morning, only the 2.5GHz Core 2 Quad Q9300 has a low enough price at $266 to compete with AMD's Phenom 9500 ($251) and 9600 ($283). True, Intel's previous generation Q6600 ($266) will likely drop in price, and it's faster than either current Phenom, but it wasn't quite the crushing blow to AMD's 2008 hopes we thought we might see.

Intel has dominated AMD at the high-end for a while now, and even after AMD squares away its higher-end Phenom issues, it's likely that Intel will hold its performance lead. That leaves AMD to rely on price drops to stay competitive. And while quad-core CPUs are still by no means mainstream, they're getting there, simply because of pricing. You've been able to buy a quad-core desktop for less than $1,000 for almost six months.

Despite the pricing listed above, if you look online, you'll find a Phenom 9500 for around $200 in real world pricing. We have to believe the desktop vendors are getting deals as well, which makes it easy for Gateway, HP, and others to look to AMD to bring quad-core PCs into Best Buy. If Intel's pricing doesn't get more competitive, consumers might come to think of AMD as the quad-core leader, simply because its chips are in the most affordable quad core systems, the ones that non-enthusiasts might actually buy. And it's not like Phenom is a bad CPU, it's just not as fast as Core 2 Quad. But if you can get a Phenom for significantly less, it starts to look more appealing.

Of course we like this kind of competition. It puts powerful technology into more hands because of lower prices. But it seemed like with the expansion of its Core 2 Quad 9000-series, Intel had a chance to really dominate the quad core market. But as long as AMD can avoid dropping prices too low (thus completely killing its profits), it could hold onto its bang-for-the-buck prize a bit longer.

CES is not exactly a chip-maker's show, since chips look sort of lame next to flashy cell phones and 100-inch plasma televisions.

Still, Intel and AMD both plan to descend on the desert this week and each company is making some news. Intel has more than a dozen new chips to announce, and AMD has a new logo.

First off, Intel plans to unveil 16 chips on Monday, the same day CEO Paul Otellini delivers an afternoon keynote address at The Venetian Hotel. The five Penryn-class Core 2 Duo notebook processors are probably the highlight, the first of Intel's notebook chips to use the company's 45-nanometer manufacturing technology.

The notebook chips are available immediately, setting the stage for next week's Macworld, when Apple CEO Steve Jobs is expected to unveil one or more Macbooks based on Intel's chips. The rest of the new processors are for servers and desktops; the server chips are available immediately, while desktop chips will follow later. Intel is closing in on shipment totals of 1 million 45-nanometer chips after launching its first such processors last November.

Otellini is expected to focus more on Intel's low-power and Mobile Internet Device initiatives, which represent some of the company's most ambitious goals for the rest of the decade. Intel has spent a lot of time talking about its desire to get inside of future mobile computers, and it will probably highlight upcoming MIDs based on its Silverthorne processor during the keynote.

AMD has much less to say, given that right now, its priorities center on fixing its Barcelona and Phenom processors and getting those ready for prime time. Still, the company plans to discuss its upcoming Puma notebook platform during the show.

Turion Ultra is going to be the processor brand delivered with the Puma platform, which will also incorporate ATI Mobility Radeon graphics chipsets from AMD's graphics division, said Bahr Mahony, director of mobile business for AMD.

One interesting feature on certain Turion Ultra notebooks will be the ability to turn the discrete graphics on or off, depending on the need for graphics performance or battery life. Some of the platforms will include the Mobilty Radeon HD 3400 graphics chipset, which can toggle between the two modes.