Apple achieves milestone 25 billion App Store downloads

Apple has reached a landmark figure of 25 billion downloads in its App Store and is offering a prize of a $10,000 iTunes gift card to one lucky user to celebrate.

The Cupertino, California-based company began its countdown last week, achieving the major milestone over the weekend when Chunli Fu of Qingdao, China downloaded the free trial version of Disneys game app Wheres My Water?Fu will now receive the huge iTunes gift card as thanks from Apple for helping it reach its record goal. $10,000 will be more than enough to encourage her to buy the full version of the game, and dozens more, as well as thousands of songs, films and other media.“We’d like to thank our customers and developers for helping us achieve this historic milestone of 25 billion apps downloaded,” said Eddy Cue, SVP of Internet Software and Services at Apple. “When we launched the App Store less than four years ago, we never imagined that mobile apps would become the phenomenon they have, or that developers would create such an incredible selection of apps for iOS users.”The record was achieved by users of the over 315 million iOS devices across the world, with over 550,000 apps on offer. The App Store launched in 2008 and broke the one billion download barrier within a year. Only four years later it has grown that figure by more than 25 times.

Apple to make official iPhone 5 announcement on September 12

An anonymous source has reported that Apple may unveil the latest iPhone on September 12. The iPhone 5 will be Apple’s next flagship smartphone, which is rumored to have a larger screen, thinner dimension, and better overall processing power.

A supposed leak of a fully assembled iPhone was found earlier, but it was unconfirmed whether the smuggled device was the real deal.

The iPhone 5’s official announcement is perhaps Silicon Valley’s most anticipated news of the year, and its almost a no brainer that Apple will take advantage of the increase holidays spending to boost sales of their cash cow device.

The anonymous source also said that the September 12 date might change; so don’t get excited just yet.

We’ll know in about a month and a half whether or not Apple decides to lift the lid on their next-gen smartphone. We have our calendar circled and will keep you posted.

Source: iMore

ASUS Releases New VENTO TA-U Series Cases

ASUS today released the new VENTO TA-U Series chassis that comes with a unique frame welding technique to provide lightweight yet strong reinforcement for the whole frame. The case supports four 12cm LED fans: a front intake fan, a rear exhaust fan, and two side fans.It features pre-drilled liquid cooling pipe holes that allow users to prepare for future liquid cooling options.

Press Release :

Taipei, Taiwan, February 2, 2009 – ASUS, leading producer of PC chassis, today released the new ASUS VENTO TA-U Series chassis. Targeting users who require a chassis that provides excellent functionality as well as trendy aesthetics, the VENTO TA-U Series utilizes an exquisitely handcrafted aluminum body and features exceptional ventilation for both performance and stability. It also allows users to enjoy hassle-free installation and optimized scalability—making it the best choice for gamers and power users alike.

Exquisitely Handcrafted Quality Design
The VENTO TA-U Series utilizes a unique frame welding technique to provide lightweight yet mechanically strong reinforcement for the whole frame. The sturdy design incorporates an aluminum body with brushed aluminum finishing on the faceplate as well as the top panel; while the optical drive bay is exquisitely framed with a diamond-cut technique. The faceplate is also overlaid with an anode treated bezel and the delicate VENTO logo name plate that exudes a premium and luxurious feel. The side panel also supports two transparent 12cm LED fans to radiate a cool blue lighting during operation—further enhancing the overall look and feel.

Maximized Thermal Efficiency for Continuous Operation
The VENTO TA-U Series provides support for four 12cm LED fans: a front intake fan, a rear exhaust fan, and two side fans—allowing fresh, cool air to be drawn into the casing for exceptional cooling capabilities (VENTO TA-U2 cooling fin edition supports an additional three LED fans on the top of the chassis). Heat generated from the system is expelled immediately via the rear fan, while side venting holes deliver even more cool air to circulate into the chassis—lowering CPU and video card temperatures. The VENTO TA-U Series even features pre-drilled liquid cooling pipe holes that allow users to prepare for future liquid cooling options. This maximized thermal efficiency enables long and continuous operations for the most powerful processing platforms and increases overall system performance and stability.

User-centric Design for Easy, Hassle-free Installation
Incorporating several convenient design features, the VENTO TA-U Series is user-friendly and easy to assemble. These features include trimmed and folded metal edges that protect fingers from scrapes and cuts. The ASUS screwless design allows users to easily and quickly install the ODD, HDD and PCI cards tool-free, without requiring screws or extra tools. The added space in the chassis also accommodates either a single graphics card of up to 315mm or SLI / Crossfire cards of up to 300mm. One of the four 5.25” racks can even be converted into 3.5” via a supplied bracket for more flexibility in the users’ setup. Furthermore, rubber shock absorbers in the side cover and foot stands eliminate vibrations that cause excessive noise for quiet and comfortable operation.

ATi R420 Benchmarks

The gaming and enthusiasts community are going crazy over the leaked RadeonX800 Pro and XT benchmarks. It seems like the ATi cards are fairly pretty wellagainst the GeForce 6800 Ultra but Radeon X800 XT seems a little poor inprice-performance aspect at this point of time. Interestingly, there is a switchprovided by ATi to enable Temporal Anti-Aliasing. Ironically, Far Cry seems tofare better with the R420 than the NV40. Check out more info here :

Beyond3D
3DCenter
ComputerBase
Meristation

ATi R580 In Final Sampling Stage

ATI is currently in the final stage of testing its R580 GPUs with customers and is expected to launch the flagship chip in early 2006. The new chip, which entered the tape-out stage in the middle of the third quarter, is now in volume shipments for sampling. ATI will also be enhancing its entry-level GPU product line on the 80nm production node, with new RV560, RV535, and RV505 chips.

Apple's new iPad already torn down, contains some news

Trust iFixit to send a member of their team to Australia just so they could be the first to tear down Apples new iPad. Although much is already known about the new hardware, iFixits teardown did reveal some interesting design changes that give us some interesting revelations of potential future products from Apple.

As it goes, most mobile devices that use ARM processors – with the exception of some of the Tegra 3 based tablets – use an SoC with support for a PoP package for the DRAM and this was also the case with past iPads from Apple. However, the new A5X SoC has reverted from this and gone back to a more traditional approach with the DRAM mounted on the same PCB as the rest of the components. Although its not entirely clear as to what kind of packaging Apple is using for the A5X, its clear that were looking at a larger chip and its obviously running a fair bit hotter than the A5, judging by the heat spreader on the chip.

The new iPad appears to use a standard dual-channel memory configuration with a pair of 512MB Elpida LP-DDR2 DRAM chips. The network chip has of course been upgraded to the same BCM4330 as the iPhone 4S and beyond dual-band Wi-Fi support it also offers Bluetooth 4.0 + HS connectivity and an FM transceiver. The 3G/4G modem is Qualcomms MDM9600 which is pretty much par for the course when it comes to 3G/LTE modem solutions at the moment.

The change to a new package for the A5X SoC suggests that Apple might be trying out some new hardware designs inside the new iPad and considering the rumours that Apple are working on an ARM powered MacBook Air, this isnt too farfetched. The simple reason for this is that a larger device wouldnt need to use such a highly integrated PCB as a phone and moving away from a PoP package has some other advantages, such as the ability to improve the cooling of the SoC. Well see how things evolve, but as far as what Apple is planning for the future, no-one knows but Apple itself.

Source: iFixit

Apple working on iPad game controller

Apple is working on a game controller for the iPad, which could see a further rise in the popularity of mobile gaming and a bigger threat to consoles.

AnandTech reports that Apple is secretly developing a project to bring a physical controller to the market, but qualifies this by saying that its in the early stages and thus may not make it into reality.The plans appear to be a response to Googles introduction of controller support for Android last year, which gave it an edge for those who like to play mobile games but arent keen on touchscreen controls.Project Fiona - PC Gaming Tablet Concept by RazerGaming on the iPhone and iPad have become extremely popular over recent months and will likely only grow with the addition of full high-definition displays to the latest iOS devices. Games are also moving away from the purely casual approach of the likes of Angry Birds to full immersive games like the enhanced edition of BioWares classic RPG Baldurs Gate, which is set to release on the iPad and other platforms this Summer.Of course, part of the success of mobile gaming is its portability, which is somewhat negated by the need to lug around a controller. Apple might also be inclined to develop a proprietary controller rather than allowing a wide range of existing controllers to work with its devices. The controller might even be reserved as a feature for the next iPad rather than simply adding the functionality into existing tablets.Source: CVG