Is ThunderBolt the Answer?

This article is a reprint from www.cnet.com

Intel's long-awaited Light Peak technology, now known formally as Thunderbolt, is finally available on its first consumer device, and the company today unveiled more details about when we'll be seeing it in consumer PCs and gadgets.

First unveiled at the Intel Developer Forum back in 2009, the data transfer tech promises to replace a handful of ports with one that can do more things, and do them faster.

Its first inclusion in a computer is in Apple's MacBook Pro line, which refreshed earlier today with Thunderbolt ports across the line (see CNET's hands-on here). Intel followed up a few hours later with a press conference about the technology, as well as its plans to bring it to computers and devices over the next year or so.

To help readers better understand what the technology is and why it matters, CNET has put together this FAQ.

What is Thunderbolt?

Thunderbolt is Intel's new input/output technology that promises to bring transfer speeds that exceed what is currently available with USB 3.0, as well as extending that speed across several devices at once. In terms of where you'll see it, Thunderbolt will appear as a new port on laptops and PCs, as well as on devices that support it.
Intel unveils Thunderbolt (photos)

The technology itself makes use of existing DisplayPort and PCI-Express data protocols to open up what you can do with a single port into multiple uses and at high speeds. This includes "daisy chaining" up to seven Thunderbolt-equipped devices together, while retaining full speed across all of them at once.

How fast is it?
Thunderbolt currently runs with a top speed of 10Gbps, though promises to one day top 100Gbps in data throughput when it moves from a copper wire to optical fiber. In the interim, copper wire has both speed and cable length limits, keeping cable length at 3 meters or less. The data transfer is also bidirectional, meaning it can both transmit and receive data at the same time, and at its top speed.

During Intel's press conference about the technology this morning, the company demonstrated it working on a MacBook Pro, pulling four raw, uncompressed 1080p video streams through a Thunderbolt storage array, and feeding into a Thunderbolt-attached display, all the while topping more than 600MBps in its transfer speeds. An earlier test of just file transferring had gotten it up to 800MBps.

To put this in perspective of what's been available up to this point, that's twice as fast as the theoretical limit of USB 3.0, 20 times faster than USB 2.0, and 12 times faster than FireWire 800.

Here's a demo from this morning's Intel press conference that gives you an idea of what it's capable of in a video editing and viewing work flow, as well as a file transfer:

Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-11386_3-20036033-76.html#ixzz1F05eb4HW

Joe Carretta

HP Wary about Consumer Spending after Earnings Fall Short

An article<http://news.cnet.com/8301-31021_3-20034982-260.html?tag=topStories2> on CNET<http://www.cnet.com/> stated that HP<http://www.hp.com/> is optimistic, but wary of upcoming consumer spending.

Hewlett-Packard today reported that for the first quarter of 2011, the company brought in revenue of $32.3 billion. That's an increase of 4 percent from a year ago, but slightly below what Wall Street was hoping to hear. This was a bit upsetting for Wall Street analysts who were expecting revenue between $32.75 billion and $33.59 billion, and earnings per share between $1.26 and $1.32.

HP CEO Leo Apotheker released an upbeat statement on the earnings report: "I'm pleased with our EPS and margin expansion during the quarter. Going forward, we have the opportunity to further capitalize on our customers' demands for higher value-added solutions...HP has a powerful portfolio, including exciting, recently announced cloud and connectivity offerings. We are focused on leveraging these strengths to extend our leadership and accelerate growth."
During a conference call with reporters this afternoon, HP executives gave a couple reasons for HP's miss: the company's enterprise business didn't resign or land the same number of big enterprise contracts it expected, and the consumer PC market grew slower than previously anticipated.
"We had good growth in commercial sectors and we gained share in the U.S. enterprise sector however, it was offset by continued softness in the consumer PC market," Apotheker said.
As a result, HP today revised its full year 2011 revenue forecast slightly downward from $131.5 billion to $133.5 billion to between $130 billion and $131.5 billion. CFO Cathie Lesjak explained, "We continue to remain cautious about the consumer spending environment, particularly with PCs." The enterprise business, she added, will "grow behind yearly seasonality." In other words, it will be slower than HP anticipated several months ago.

Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-31021_3-20034982-260.html#ixzz1EjH7NVKT

Joe Carretta

I'm Pretty Sure This is How Skynet Started

For those of you who are fans of Jeopardy; there is a new champion in the house.

IBM supercomputer Watson blew away the competition Tuesday night during its Jeopardy showdown with the game show's former champions Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter, commented Ian Paul on PCworld.com.

The computer was able to answer 13 of the first 15 Jeopardy clues virtually uncontested, with one answer going to Jennings and another problem that all three contestants got wrong. Watson ended the broadcast with $35,734, followed by Rutter at $10,400 and Jennings at $4,800. The competitors will square off again Wednesday night for a final Jeopardy battle.

Watson has been having some trouble on some advanced wordplay questions, and goofed on a final Jeopardy question but still blow away the human competition.

Joe Carretta

Nokia partnered with Microsoft

A recent CNN article discussed Nokia has teamed up software giant Microsoft, the two companies plan on combining their efforts in hopes of increasing market share. A part of new agreement establishes that Nokia will be adopting Windows phones as its smartphone platform and Bing will be the default search engine on all Nokia phones. In regards to Nokia, they will provide software for mapping and other programs that will be added to Microsoft’s offerings.

Early Friday morning the two chief executives announced that this strategic partnership will be long-term. Like Nokia, Microsoft‘s share of the smartphone segment begin to crumble. According Gartner, last year Nokia had dropped to 37.6% from 46.9% the year before. Since this downturn both companies have begun efforts to revamp their smartphone platforms. Microsoft developed a new smartphone late last year called Windows Phone 7. In Nokia’s case, the new system MeeGoo will be dropped in support of the Windows Phone 7. With this alliance, experts believe that both companies chance of success will improve.

Please refer to link for the full article: http://www.cnn.com/2011/TECH/mobile/02/11/nokia.microsoft/index.html

Josh Rush

The Daily Bursts Onto the Scene

A new brand of newspaper is calling into the question the very definition of the word.

The Daily, is a revolutionary media product built specifically for the iPad by some of the best in the business to bring you a package that’s smart, attractive, and entertaining. On Wednesday, February 2, Rupert Murdoch, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of News Corporation, announced the launch of The Daily on the iPad. Also present were Jon Miller from News Corporation, Eddy Cue from Apple..

The Daily is free for two weeks from the time you download it to your iPad, and then becomes available through Apple’s iTunes subscription service and via the iPad App Store for $0.99 a week or $39.99 a year.

The device is looking to capitalize on the emerging marketplace for tablet computers that has swept the corporate and personal landscape. Executives who no longer wish to carry around a laptop now have the exact same capabilities on a device that is a quarter of the size and weight.. and not to mention looks pretty cool.

Slowly fading from the marketplace are the traditional Blackberry and laptops that have ruled since the turn of the 21^st century.

Social butterflies, as well as the business hungry corporate professionals are gravitating towards this new device, due to its expanded functionality. TNS has been seeing a reflection of this in its growing demand for iPad, and iPhone support, and has been circulating these devices around our engineers in rode to familiarize them with the new technologies. TNS has engineers that are competent in both MAC and Windows technologies, making us a one stop shop for all of your IT needs.