Volari Duo V8 Ultra 256MB DDR2 for less than $200, Volari V8 Ultra for less than $100

ASUS unveils MyPal A716

ESP10000 and ESP8000: new VIA Eden processors for water-cooled systems

Volari Duo V8 Ultra 256MB DDR2 for less than $200, Volari V8 Ultra for less than $100

It seems that despite not so bright performance results, Chinese makers are going to launch volume shipments of XGI Volari products. I don´t think Chinese companies are short-sighted to invest into unpromising solutions. Most likely, they count on debugged drivers that might be released by the moment the new cards are in retail. Besides, such mainstream solutions will cost considerably less.

So, on February 28 Chinese Lian Guan (Crown Electronic Technology), which facilities are mainly located in Shenzhen, Guangdong, is going to ship two new solutions:

• Crown X Tornado Volari V8 Ultra 128MB DDR (MBGA chips) — 799 yuan ($97)
• Crown X Tornado Volari V8 64MB DDR (TSOP chips) — 666 yuan ($80)

These should be followed in the near future by the following:

• Crown X Tornado Volari Duo V8 Ultra 256MB DDR2 (MBGA chips) — 1599 yuan ($193)
• Crown X Tornado Volari V8 128MB DDR (TSOP chips) — 733 yuan ($89)
• Crown X Tornado Volari V3 Ultra 128MB DDR (TSOP chips) — 399 yuan ($48)

You have to admit that these $193 set by Chinese company for Volari Duo V8 Ultra 256MB DDR2 are very different from the current sky-high price tags (set by Club3D). And the prices of single-GPU DX9 Volari V8 Ultra 128MB DDR and Volari V8 64MB DDR cards are even more bright. Well, considering that when XGI promised to take over up to 5-10% of the graphics market, it didn´t mention the high-end segment. So why not launch the mainstream at full.

Besides, $48 for a DX8.1 card with 128MB DDR is not bad as well though it´s still a rebranded XP4...

ASUS unveils MyPal A716

ASUS officially unveiled its new MyPal A716 PDA featuring 802.11b and Bluetooth controllers, Secure Digital and CompactFlash card slots. A716 supports Smart Power Saving technology claimed to boost operation time up to 19 hours with an additional battery.

MyPal A716 specs:

• Intel PXA255 400MHz CPU
• Microsoft Windows Mobile 2003 OS
• 64MB Flash ROM, 64MB SDRAM (55MB free for Romanic languages, 53MB free for other languages)
• 3.5" transreflective TFT LCD, 240x320, 65,536 colors
• CompactFlash Type II (3.3V), SD slots
• FIR, up to 4Mbps, SIR up to 115.2Kbps
• WLAN 802.11b / Bluetooth
• 1500 mAh (standard) or 3000 mAh (higher-capacity) Li-Ion battery
• Mic and speaker
• Sound recording and playback, 60 fps video playback
• 135x78x17.6mm size with a standard battery
• 197g weight with a standard battery

For the novelty to stand out of other silvery PDAs, A716 has a touch of lilac.

ESP10000 and ESP8000: new VIA Eden processors for water-cooled systems

After a period of silence VIA Technologies announced two new VIA Eden processors for embedded systems, 1GHz ESP10000 and 800MHz ESP8000.

The new products base on the familiar Nehemiah core with improved CoolStream architecture providing lower energy consumption of 7W @ 1GHz. In other words, VIA´s new and faster processors will join the numbers of passively cooled solutions.

ESP10000 and ESP8000 support the 2nd generation of AES hardware encryption, PadLock Security, implying 2 random number generators. Other specs remained the same: 16-stage pipeline, 64KB of 16-way full-speed L2 cache, StepAhead branch prediction, SSE support, 0.13µm process, low-profile EBGA package sized 35x35x1.5mm.

VIA Eden ESP8000 and VIA Eden ESP10000 are already shipping in volume quantities for $85 and $100, respectively.

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