According to Digitimes, AMD has announced the launch of 40nm-based GPUs – the ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4860 and 4830 @ CeBIT 2009. These GPUs support the latest Microsoft DirectX 10.1 games, HD quality multimedia display, and energy-efficient features for long battery life.

The ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4860 supports GDDR5 memory technology with nearly twice the memory bandwidth of GDDR3. ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4860 graphics will be featured in the forthcoming Asustek Computer’s K series notebook.

The second generation AMD Unified Video Decoder (UVD) keeps the CPU free to run social media applications or virus scan while UVD helps process intensive content such as Blu-ray movies. This helps lower power consumption and reduces the need for high fan settings, enabling a quieter and cooler notebook experience. Additional power-saving features include ATI PowerPlay, ATI PowerXpress, and ATI Switchable Graphics technologies.

Initially the ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4860 and 4830 graphics processors are available in Asustek’s high-end notebooks, with models planned for availability beginning in the second quarter of 2009.

Read more here – “Dell‘s Mini 9 hacked with touchscreen“

The images show Dell mini Inspiron running on Ubuntu 8.04, 1G HDD, 493 MB RAM, Intel Atom Processor.

Source: Engadget

Lenovo has also added an option to have built-in support for UWB and 3G broadband (with GPS), these will be tied to the AT&T network.

Press Release:

Lenovo Expands Ultra-Thin, Ultra-Light ThinkPad X300 Notebook PC Family

Delivers Next-Generation Processing, Greater SSD Storage and Enhanced Multimedia Experience

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, NC August 18, 2008

Lenovo today announced the ThinkPad X301 notebook PC, taking the thinnest and lightest full-function notebook in its class, to new heights in performance. Like its predecessor, the industry-acclaimed ThinkPad X300 notebook, the ThinkPad X301 notebook offers cutting-edge features and technologies in a thin and light form starting at less than three pounds and one-inch thin. The notebook offers even greater storage capacity with choices of either 64 GB or new 128 GB solid state drive storage available in September. The ThinkPad X301 notebook provides on average nearly 20 percent better performance over the ThinkPad X300 notebook due to the latest DDR3 memory and the latest Intel Core 2 Duo ultra low volt processor.

“Lenovo continues to push the technology envelope by giving road warriors the latest enhancements in solid state drive storage and digital display technologies with the new ThinkPad X301 notebook PC,” said Sam Dusi, vice president, worldwide notebook product marketing, Lenovo. This announcement extends our commitment to blending ultraportability and functionality, and equipping today’s business users with the most advanced, highest-performing computing tools.

New support for DisplayPort makes viewing high definition content easy and ideal for models with the ultra-thin DVD burner. With support for both DisplayPort and VGA, users can even watch high definition content on multiple displays. Designed for maximum options for wireless connectivity, the ThinkPad X301 notebook offers models with high-speed mobile broadband and WiFi to connect wirelessly to the Internet, and also with Bluetooth and Ultra-Wideband technology to connect wirelessly to other devices. Lenovo offers improved uplink performance by up to 250 percent for models with AT&T mobile broadband over previous ThinkPad notebooks with AT&T mobile broadband. Models supporting WiMAX will be available later this year. Additionally, GPS on notebook models with high speed mobile broadband allow travelers to more easily navigate to the office or airport.

The notebook also includes Lenovo’s ThinkVantage Technologies, unique hardware-software tools designed to maximize user productivity. With Lenovo’s improved Access Connections tool, users can navigate a user-friendly interface to easily find and access Internet and network connections. Also, Lenovo’s improved Power Manager gives users more control over notebook functions to enable longer battery life.

The ThinkPad X301 notebook also continues Lenovo’s focus on environmentally-responsible design. Its 13.3-inch LED backlit display, solid state drive storage and other energy-efficient technologies help make it rated Gold by the Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool. This designation adds to Lenovo’s portfolio of Gold-rated ThinkPad notebook and ThinkCentre desktop PCs.

Pricing and Availability

Pricing for models of the ThinkPad X301 notebook starts at approximately $2,599. The notebook will be available on August 26 through Lenovo Business Partners and www.lenovo.com.

Look for the ThinkPad X301 to be available beginning August 26.

Here are some examples about what to expect from these new Latitude notebooks:

• Excellent battery life: some system configurations can get up to 19 hours. But it’s not just the largest batteries that benefit—we’ve made improvements on battery life whether you use a 6-cell, 9-cell battery or a battery slice. In this video, Jim Leftwich, the engineering lead behind these new notebooks, offers insight into how we did just that.
• All models offer lots of connectivity options: Wi-Fi (802.11n), several mobile broadband options, WWAN, Ultra-wideband and Bluetooth 2.1. Most are WiMAX ready, and can be ordered with an optional GPS.
• All kinds of security options: smart card and fingerprint readers, hardware-based disk encryption, contactless smart card technology. Another hardware-based security feature is Dell’s ControlVault solution that centralizes user identity key management and storage.
• Centralized control via software—Dell’s ControlPoint software allows users to manage battery power, network and connectivity configurations and system security settings all in one place. I’ll blog in more detail about it soon.
• In the coming weeks, we will offer color options on the E4200, E4300, E6400 and E6500 in addition to Mica-Brushed Metal Black: Regatta Blue and Regal Red. The E4200 adds Quartz Pink as an option, and the Latitude E5400 and E5500 are available in Matte Black.
• Slick design that doesn’t sacrifice functionality: our team focused on balancing a aesthetics with durability and functionality.  Besides the looks, these laptops feature full-frame magnesium alloy construction and all-metal hinges. Take a look at this video where Steve Belt from our engineering team talks about how we tested things like the keyboards and the metal hinges on these laptops.

Essential: The features that you need

The Latitude E5400 and the E5500 laptops are designed for customers who want the best value possible in a business laptop. But that doesn’t mean we skimp on features: both models support options like fingerprint readers. The Latitude E5400 supports options like mobile broadband and GPS while the larger E5500 offers options like dual pointing devices. The 14.1″ E5400 starts at $839 and the 15.4″ Latitude E5500 starts at $869.

Mainstream: A balance between top performance, extensive feature set and price

These two notebooks offer the widest range of battery options and overall features. Bottom line, if you’re looking for a feature, either of these laptops probably offer them. These support options like backlit keyboards, LED backlit displays, a battery slice option, a camera or even a 256MB discrete card graphics option. The 15.4″ Latitude E6500 provides support for the stringent Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS). The Latitude E6400 starts at $1,139 while the E6500 starts at $1,169.

Source: Dell

The ThinkPad W700 mobile workstation, Lenovo’s first notebook with a 17-inch display, extends Lenovo’s portfolio of workstations, expanding the offerings from the ThinkPad W500 and ThinkStation S10 and D10 workstations. Since working professionals in the fields of computer-aided design and manufacturing, digital photography and the oil and gas industries become increasingly mobile, they demand the features and performance of a desktop workstation in a mobile workstation. The W700 aims to satisfy those demands with a range of unique elements.

The ThinkPad W700 mobile workstation will be available beginning in September with models starting at $2,978. It is available through Lenovo Business Partners and www.lenovo.com.

A company is now selling what it calls the “world’s cheapest laptop,” which at $130, is not a bad deal if you can bear some hardware limitations.

The Impulse NPX-9000 laptop has a 7-inch screen and comes with the Linux OS. It has a 400MHz processor, 128M bytes of RAM, 1G byte of flash storage and an optional wireless networking dongle. It includes office productivity software, a Web browser and multimedia software.

There’s a caveat though — it has to bought in bulk, in units of 100. The laptop is available on Alibaba.com through the online store of Taiwanese company Carapelli Ltd.

The cheapest laptop to date was known to be One Laptop Per Child’s XO laptop, available at $188 for a limited time late last year. While a technological landmark, it had some hardware limitations like a slow processor and limited graphics capabilities.

The laptop hints towards a trend of lowering PC prices. Last week, a company called CherryPal introduced a $249 mini-desktop, also running a 400MHz processor, with 256M bytes of RAM and 4G bytes of internal flash storage.

In a recent interview with the IDG News Service, former OLPC CTO Mary Lou Jepsen said she would bring out a $75 laptop by 2010. Now running her own company, Pixel Qi, she cited the falling prices of RAM and components as a way to bring down laptop prices.

The low-cost laptop industry’s poster child is Asustek Computer’s Eee PC, which was introduced last year and sold 350,000 PCs in its first quarter. The cheapest Eee PC, for $300, has an 800MHz Intel processor, 512M bytes of RAM and 2G bytes of flash storage.

The U.S. edition of Wind will come in two different versions, one for $549 running Microsoft’s Windows XP. A few things set Wind apart from competitors, including the 1.6GHz Atom microprocessor, larger screen size and a six-cell battery that gives it around six hours of power. Wind also carries an 80GB hard disk drive (HDD) instead of a flash memory-based Solid State Drive (SSD).

The other version of Wind will use Novell’s SUSE Linux OS and cost $399. The Linux device shares the same screen size, HDD and microprocessor as the XP device. But it carries a three-cell battery that allows only around 2.5 hours of power and does not offer wireless data transfer using Bluetooth, which the XP device does. The Linux version also comes with less DRAM (dynamic RAM), 512M-bytes versus 1G-byte for the XP laptop.

Both Wind laptops come in a variety of colors, including black, white and pink, can access the Internet via Wi-Fi 802.11b/g, sport 1.3-megapixel Webcams and three USB (universal serial bus) ports.

There will also be several hardware configurations users can choose from that can make the laptop more or less expensive. For example, Wind can carry up to a 320G-byte HDD, which would cost more.

MSI will market smaller version of Wind with an 8.9-inch screen elsewhere in the world, but not in the U.S., at least not initially.

Probably I should call year 2008 – year of low cost laptop.

Source: PC World