Yes, the whole internet.

Do you remember the computer that beat Garry Kasparov about 11 years ago? Well, its all grown up now and it thinks that beating the entire system of webhosting is its next trick. Seriously, these IBM folks did the math and believe that their Blue Gene\P system is powerful enough, effecient enough and reliable enough to make it happen. 

I'll admit that getting 4096 processor cores into a single rack is extremely impressive but I'm not entirely sure I want the whole internet in the hands of one company. Read on for the links.

BitMicro announced a 1.6TB (thats Terabyte) solid state drive in a 3.5" size. We're talking about a drive that absolutely eclipses anything on the market both in size and in performance by a huge margin. Since this drive is being marketed at the military you can only imagine how much it will cost. 230MB\sec is the transfer rate, roughly double an average high end harddrive. 

But, seriously, I want one of these! 

Potential for 4 GPUs in one system

This just in, it looks like Apple has decided to increase the capacity of two of their hottest products, the iPhone and the iPod Touch. That makes the iPhone available in two varieties, 8 gb for $399 and 16GB for $499. The iPod Touch is now available at up to 32GB for $499 or as little as 8GB for $299 with the middle ground being taken by the 16GB iPod Touch for $399.

 I think these new release make a ton of sense when you are getting double the capacity for a modest increase in price. 

Intel announced today that their new processor, Tukwila, has surpassed the 2 billion transistor mark. The 2.0 Ghz processor is going to be a server chip rather then a desktop chip. Intel states that most of the transistors in this chip are dedicated to use in the cache rather then increased processor speed which they claim is more efficient and consumes less power then processors of higher clock speeds.

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I know that some of you have been anxiously awaiting some news of the site enhancements I talked about recently. You won't have to wait much longer, it looks like we'll be able to get these changes online quite soon. What exactly are they? Well, a whole lot of fun, thats what they are.

Now, don't think I'm going to spill all the beans now...  Well, maybe one bean.

This just in, Nvidia and Ageia have announced that Ageia will soon be acquired by  Nvidia.  This will give Nvidia access to the worlds only  hardware physic processor, also known as a ppu. What make this even more interesting is that Intel recently completed its purchase of rival physics company, Havok. This certainly leaves ATI\AMD feeling a bit  like a fifth wheel. You'll find the press release below.

NVIDIA, the world leader in visual computing technologies and the inventor of the GPU, today announced that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire AGEIA Technologies, Inc., the industry leader in gaming physics technology. AGEIA's PhysX software is widely adopted with more than 140 PhysX-based games shipping or in development on Sony Playstation3, Microsoft XBOX 360, Nintendo Wii and Gaming PCs. AGEIA physics software is pervasive with over 10,000 registered and active users of the PhysX SDK.

“The AGEIA team is world class, and is passionate about the same thing we are—creating the most amazing and captivating game experiences,” stated Jen-Hsun Huang, president and CEO of NVIDIA. “By combining the teams that created the world’s most pervasive GPU and physics engine brands, we can now bring GeForce®-accelerated PhysX to hundreds of millions of gamers around the world.”

“NVIDIA is the perfect fit for us. They have the world’s best parallel computing technology and are the thought leaders in GPUs and gaming. We are united by a common culture based on a passion for innovating and driving the consumer experience,” said Manju Hegde, co-founder and CEO of AGEIA.

Just a note, it is widely reported the Microsoft has released Vista sp1 and server 2008 to manufacturing (rtm). What that means is the final code has been tested and is now being put on cds and dvds as quickly as possible. You can expect a reasonably quick availability.

Here's a link with more details. http://blogs.zdnet.com/Ou/?p=988