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MAKER OF EXPENSIVE PRINTER INK HP has announced that it will resume production of consumer tablets after it jumped out of the mobile PC market last year.

According to a report at The Bangkok Post, HP CEO Meg Whitman said at the Global Influencer Summit 2012 in Shanghai yesterday that HP will re-enter the consumer tablet market by launching tablets running Microsoft’s Windows 8 operating system.

Whitman said that the decision was a strategic move aimed at capitalising on the growth in tablet sales.

The company’s EVP for printing and personal systems, Todd Bradley said that HP’s Windows 8 tablets will feature cloud-based technology, enabling users to share and store content online via different devices.

HP suspended its Touchpad WebOS tablet production line in August last year due to poor sales and stiff competition.

However, as highlighted by Whitman, the California-based firm’s plans to merge its printing and PC computer businesses could mean that HP’s business efficiency might improve as sales and marketing teams are combined, products are unified and logistics costs are reduced.

The consolidation will take place among HP’s Southeast Asian operating units within the next three months, Whitman said.

The company believes that its new range of ultrabooks aimed at both consumers and businesses and to be released later this year will be a key product line and help push sales. µ

AMD’s Manju Hegde is one of the rare folks I get to interact with who has an extensive background working at both AMD and NVIDIA. He was one of the co-founders and CEO of Ageia, a company that originally tried to bring higher quality physics simulation to desktop PCs in the mid-2000s. In 2008, NVIDIA acquired Ageia and Manju went along, becoming NVIDIA’s VP of CUDA Technical Marketing. The CUDA fit was a natural one for Manju as he spent the previous three years working on non-graphics workloads for highly parallel processors. Two years later, Manju made his way to AMD to continue his vision for heterogeneous compute work on GPUs. His current role is as the Corporate VP of Heterogeneous Applications and Developer Solutions at AMD.

Given what we know about the new AMD and its goal of building a Heterogeneous Systems Architecture (HSA), Manju’s position is quite important. For those of you who don’t remember back to AMD’s 2012 Financial Analyst Day, the formalized AMD strategy is to exploit its GPU advantages on the APU front in as many markets as possible. AMD has a significant GPU performance advantage compared to Intel, but in order to capitalize on that it needs developer support for heterogeneous compute. A major struggle everyone in the GPGPU space faced was enabling applications that took advantage of the incredible horsepower these processor offered. With AMD’s strategy closely married to doing more (but not all, hence the heterogeneous prefix) compute on the GPU, it needs to succeed where others have failed.

The hardware strategy is clear: don’t just build discrete CPUs and GPUs, but instead transition to APUs. This is nothing new as both AMD and Intel were headed in this direction for years. Where AMD sets itself apart is that it is will to dedicate more transistors to the GPU than Intel. The CPU and GPU are treated almost as equal class citizens on AMD APUs, at least when it comes to die area.

The software strategy is what AMD is working on now. AMD’s Fusion12 Developer Summit (AFDS) in its second year, is where developers can go to learn more about AMD’s heterogeneous compute platform and strategy. Why would a developer attend? AMD argues that the speedups offered by heterogeneous compute can be substantial enough that they could enable new features, usage models or experiences that wouldn’t otherwise be possible. In other words, taking advantage of heterogeneous compute can enable differentiation for a developer.

That brings us to today. In advance of this year’s AFDS, Manju has agreed to directly answer your questions about heterogeneous compute, where the industry is headed and anything else AMD will be covering at AFDS. Manju has a BS in Electrical Engineering (IIT, Bombay) and a PhD in Computer Information and Control Engineering (UMich, Ann Arbor) so make the questions as tough as you can. He'll be answering them on May 21st so keep the submissions coming.

Product Blackberry Curve 9320
Website UK Blackberry
Specifications 806MHz single-core processor, 512MB RAM, 2.44in 240×320 display, 3.2MP camera with LED flash, microSD slot supports up to 32GB, microUSB port, HSDPA and WiFi connectivity, stereo FM radio with RDS, 1450mAh battery, Blackberry OS 7.1, 109x60x12.7mm, 103g
Price £130 on pay as you go

THE BLACKBERRY CURVE 9320 is Research in Motion’s (RIM’s) cheapest Blackberry Curve yet, but this isn’t at all obvious judging by its well-built design, up-to-date software and overall functionality. The Blackberry Curve 9320 is well positioned for success, but we can’t see it tempting teens away from their budget Android handsets.

Design
The Blackberry Curve 9320 doesn’t change the rules when it comes to design, with the curvaceous plastic casing that’s found on all of RIM’s similarly named handsets. However, with its metallic trim around the edge and rubberised touches the phone feels nice and study in the hand, although its glossy plastic battery cover is unlikely to protect the handset from scratches.

In terms of physical buttons and ports, the Blackberry Curve 9320 doesn’t rewrite the rule book. However, the 3.5mm audio jack has been moved to the top of the phone, making it much easier and more functional to connect a pair of headphones to the handset. There’s also a dedicated Blackberry Messenger (BBM) button on the left-hand side of the Blackberry Curve 9320 that instantly launches RIM’s popular instant messaging app. We didn’t really see the point of the key, but this will no doubt be a major plus point for the firm’s teenage target audience.

Other buttons include odd-looking volume controls, a lock switch and a customisable shortcut button, which comes pre-loaded as a camera key.

Screen and keyboard
When it comes to the Blackberry Curve 9320 screen, it becomes more apparent that this is a budget phone. That’s not to say the screen is terrible – it’s a 2.44in 320×240 display that is vibrant enough to please the eye, even though some app icons are rough around the edges. Our main gripe is the screen’s lack of touch sensitivity in this era when almost all handsets feature a touchscreen; we kept frantically tapping the display by accident. Of course, those who are used to using a Blackberry Curve 8530 or 9300 won’t find this an issue.

The keyboard, on the other hand, is typically great. The Blackberry Curve 9320 follows RIM’s tradition of boasting excellent typing hardware, and it made sending emails and updating our social networking status an absolute breeze. It’s worth noting, however, that the buttons are much smaller than those found on Blackberry Bold models, so those with chunky digits might want to steer clear.

ANDROID TABLET MAKER Samsung has finally brought the Galaxy Tab 2 to the UK, which is now available to order from Carphone Warehouse.

The retailer is selling the WiFi-only Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 for a budget £199 SIM free price, and it’s yet to announce whether it will also be selling the WiFi plus 3G model. However, punters can choose whether the tablet comes in a silver or white flavour, the latter of which won’t be arriving in stock until 18 May.

The 7in Galaxy Tab 2 runs Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS) out of the box, not bad considering its sub-£200 price-tag. Under the hood there’s a decent 1GHz dual-core processor delivering the power behind its 7in 1024×600 screen.

Measuring 193.7×122.4×10.5mm, the tablet also features a 3MP camera with HD 1080p video recording, a VGA front-facing camera for video calling, a 4000mAh battery and microSD support for up to 64GB of storage.

At a mere £199 upfront, the Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 looks set to give the Amazon Kindle Fire some competition. µ

I remember the early days of the USB-vs-FireWire wars like they were yesterday, although Wikipedia reminds me that they were more than a decade ago (sigh). USB 1.0 arrived in 1996 but didn't begin to see broad adoption until two years later with version 1.1. When FireWire 400 (aka IEEE 1394a) emerged on Apple systems in 1999, its backers scoffed at USB's comparatively diminutive 11 Mbps peak (and much lower practical) bandwidth.

Intel and its partners' response was swift; USB 2.0 came on the scene in 2000. Its 480 Mbps theoretical peak bandwidth, coupled with Intel's refusal to integrate FireWire support within its core logic chipsets, doomed FireWire to niche status in spite of the subsequent emergence of the 800 Mbps IEEE 1394b variant.

Yet as anyone who's used a USB 2.0 hard drive or flash drive knows, the external bus's read and write performance still leave a lot to be desired, especially for video and other large-file-size material. eSATA attempted to address the issue, but its storage-centric focus left OEMs unwilling to adopt it en masse, from both incremental-cost and incremental-connector perspectives. What the industry wanted was an equally versatile but speedier successor to USB 2.0…

…and now it's got two. Yep, another standards war – except not in the traditional sense, as these two are complementary. The USB 3.0 specification was released in late 2008, with first products available beginning one year later. Designed primarily as a replacement for USB 2.0, it delivers 4.8 Gbps transfer speeds, along with discrete transmit and receive data paths. And courtesy of Intel's Ivy Bridge integration, USB 3.0 will soon become pervasive in a diversity of PC platforms and form factors. But more than a year ago, Intel and partner (and customer) Apple productized a copper-based version of an Intel-proprietary interface called Thunderbolt, formerly known as Light Peak.

Each Thunderbolt port handles 40 Gbps of aggregate bandwidth, consisting of two pairs' worth of distinct 10 Gbps transmit and receive lanes. Thunderbolt isn't so much about enabling the connection of discrete storage devices (although it has been used for just that by many early peripherals), but new PC form factors instead. If you have to give up GigE, Firewire 800 and a gigantic screen to build a sleek Ultrabook, Thunderbolt will give you access to those things via an external display. Did I mention that Thunderbolt carries DisplayPort as well as PCIe? 

To date Thunderbolt has mostly only appeared on Macs, the Apple exclusivity period is now over. This year we'll see the emergence of more affordable second-generation controller ICs, resulting in Thunderbolt showing up in a diversity of PC platforms and form factors.

Anand has done several in-depth Thunderbolt peripheral reviews so far. And today we've got two more products up for evaluation; Seagate's 2 TByte GoFlex Desk HDD coupled with the company's just-in-production Thunderbolt Adapter, and Western Digital's two-HDD Thunderbolt Duo. Let's have a look, shall we?

FUSCHIA NETWORK T-Mobile has become the latest to snap up the Blackberry Curve 9320, following announcements from Orange, Three and Vodafone.

T-Mobile is offering the Curve 9320 for free on a 24 month £15.50 contract, with 50 minutes, 250 texts and 750MB of monthly mobile data. The phone’s also available to buy on pay as you go for £149.99 upfront, when purchased with the usual £10 top-up. 

We’re currently using the Blackberry Curve 9320, which, considering its price, is a great addition to Research In Motion’s (RIM’s) line-up. As to specifications there’s a tactile QWERTY keypad paired with a 2.44in display and an optical trackpad.

With Blackberry 7 OS onboard there’s the usual array of pre-loaded apps including Blackberry Messenger, Facebook, Social Feeds and email, and the phone also features a 3.2MP camera, HSDPA and WiFi connectivity and up to 32GB of expandable storage.

We’ve asked O2 if it will also be selling the latest budget Blackberry Curve, but the network was unavailable for comment.

Check back to The INQUIRER next week for a Blackberry Curve 9320 review. µ

KOREAN PHONE MAKER Samsung has announced the Windows Phone 7.5 Mango powered Omnia M handset for the UK, a larger-screened alternative to the Samsung Omnia W.

Offering similar specifications as the Focus 2 that was announced for the US earlier this week, the Samsung Omnia M features a 4in Super AMOLED touchscreen and runs the latest Microsoft mobile operating system, Windows Phone 7.5 Mango. This sets up the phone with the usual set of pre-installed features, including Xbox Live gaming, Microsoft Office and Windows Live Skydrive storage.

Buyers of the angular Samsung handset will also find a 1GHz single-core processor, a 5MP autofocus camera with flash, a VGA front-facing camera, 4GB of non-expandable storage, HSDPA and WiFi connectivity and a 1500mAH battery.

“Mobile consumers increasingly carry and share a large part of their lives through phones”, said JK Skin, president of the IT & Mobile Communications Divions at Samsung. “They are looking for phones that combine individual style with the ability to consume and share all kinds of content across their ever-growing social networks.”

He added, “The Omnia M meets all these demands, with the enhanced performance and social options afforded by Windows phone and Samsung services.”

Samsung has revealed that the phone will “be available starting in Europe”, although it has yet to announce the UK release date. µ

Now that Panther Point is in full swing, and perhaps Sandy Bridge processor stocks may start to dwindle in favor of Ivy Bridge, market segmentation of motherboards is all too critical.  We have gamers (budget and enthusiast), casual users, audio enthusiasts, HTPC users, storage users, power users, enthusiasts, modders, silent users, overclockers, extreme users or perhaps a combination of many.  Therefore, when it comes to designing a range of boards, a motherboard manufacturer has priority targets.  They can design either a product to go for one target, or a product to cover several.  ASUS have a minimum of 13 boards in their current Z77 lineup (not covering H77), with a few more still to be released.  One of those 13 is the P8Z77-V Deluxe, a high end product focused on power users who want extremes of functionality and the best of most worlds – an Intel NIC (+Realtek), more SATA, dual band WiFi, fan control, provision for Thunderbolt as well as regular ASUS features such as BIOS Flashback, Q-LED, the BIOS itself and AI Suite software.  Even with all of this, it also transpires that the Deluxe is quite good at throughput and IO as well.

Read on for our review.

MOTHERBOARD MAKER MSI has released its first Thunderbolt motherboard based on Intel’s Z77 chipset.

Intel’s Z77 Panther Point chipset has largely the same features as its Z68 chipset, however one startling addition was support for two Thunderbolt channels. Intel told journalists that it didn’t expect many motherboard vendors to make use of this, but MSI has with its Z77A-GD80 motherboard.

MSI’s Z77A-GD80 motherboard is, for the most part, a bog standard Z77 motherboard with support for Intel’s Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge LGA1155 processors, four DIMM sockets, three PCI Express Gen 3 slots supporting three-way Crossfire and two-way SLI, plus four SATA3 ports and four SATA2 ports. However the firm’s standout feature is the 10Gbit/s Thunderbolt controller it has tacked on.

Intel’s Thunderbolt technology has been implemented by Apple and while few other vendors have gone down this route so far, it is likely that the Z77 marks a push by Intel to move the technology away from just being seen as an Apple exclusive. Intel’s 10Gbit/s Thunderbolt interface that uses the PCI-Express bus can be used to drive monitors or storage devices, but there are relatively few of either around at the moment, so MSI also includes mini-Displayport, HDMI and D-Sub video outputs.

MSI’s stab at bundling Thunderbolt in its Z77A-GD80 motherboard is commendable, as the interface is particularly useful for mass storage devices, but without motherboard makers supporting it, devices are likely to remain rare and cost a considerable premium over ones that use USB. µ

WE’VE BEEN LUCKY ENOUGH to get our mitts on the Lumia 900, Nokia’s latest Windows Phone flagship.

As we mentioned in our review, one of the phone’s stand-out features is its slick unibody design, which we managed to get in a vibrant cyan flavour. Within the case, there’s a 4.3in AMOLED Clearblack touchscreen that is undeniably one of the best on the mobile market, and it runs the most up to date version of Microsoft’s mobile operating system, Windows Phone 7.5 Mango.

Other noteworthy specifications include an 8MP camera with HD video, a front-facing video calling camera and HSDPA and WiFi connectivity. µ