IT Center For Science Upgrades Cray Supercomputer

Finnish IT Center For Science Upgrades Cray Supercomputer To One Of Europe’s Most Powerful

ScienceDaily (Nov. 13, 2008) — Cray Inc. and CSC - IT Center for Science Ltd has announced that CSC's Cray supercomputer has been upgraded to over 85 teraflops (trillions of floating point operations per second). This makes the new Cray XT5 system at CSC the most powerful academic supercomputer in the Nordic countries and one of the fastest supercomputers in Europe.
Later this year, a second upgrade funded under the EU's Partnership for Advanced Computing in Europe (PRACE) initiative will boost the Cray system's peak performance to 100 teraflops. PRACE, which already includes 16 nations, enables European scientists and engineers to access world-class high performance computing resources. The 100-teraflops Cray supercomputer will take one-thousandth of a second to solve a problem that ESKO, the first Finnish academic computer, would have taken 50 years to solve a half century ago.

Nordic researchers will use the supercomputer to solve scientific and engineering problems in a wide range of fields including turbulence and climate change, energy research, materials science, and gene interactions and medical research.

“The first upgrade of the Cray supercomputer ensures that Finnish researchers and engineers will continue to have access to world-class computing resources. The second, PRACE upgrade confirms CSC’s strong position and influence in building European co-operation,” said Kimmo Koski, managing director of CSC. “This powerful resource strengthens Finland's position as an attractive environment for world-class research.”

“We are delighted that CSC Finland's user community and PRACE users will have access to Cray's newest supercomputer technology,” said Ulla Thiel, vice president of Cray Europe. “As one of the most prominent supercomputing centers in Europe with a broad range of computational scientific disciplines, CSC is in an excellent position to maximize the advantages of our system in doing large scale capability computing in a production supercomputer environment and in solving the most demanding scientific problems.”

AMD set to release free software

AMD set to release free software 

 

AMD has announced that it will start to release next month for download a free ATI catalyst driver update that instantly unlocks new ATI Stream acceleration capabilities already built into millions of ATI Radeon graphics cards.
 
Rick Bergman, senior VP and GM, Graphics Products Group at AMD, said ATI Stream is one of the best examples of the power of Fusion, and the announcement is the first major step in taking this important new technology mainstream. 
 
Bergman said for the millions of people that have already purchased an ATI Radeon HD 4000 series graphics card, this is one more way we’re saying thank you and helping them get more out of their investment. “For those who haven’t yet, it’s one more reason for them to go online right now and buy one,” he said.
 
ATI Stream is a set of advanced hardware and software technologies that enable AMD graphics processors (GPU), working in concert with the system’s central processor (CPU), to accelerate applications beyond just graphics. 
 
ATI Stream-enabled software titles for entertainment, gaming and productivity are being released or are under development by a growing list of independent software vendors (ISVs) including ArcSoft and CyberLink.

AT&T Takes TV Mobile With Samsung Eternity

AT&T Takes TV Mobile With Samsung Eternity

AT&T is looking to put TV in the palms of users' hands with its latest device, the Samsung Eternity. 

The Eternity is a 3G touch-screen phone, with support for AT&T Mobile TV, while also tying in a host of other multimedia features. Along with one-touch access to Mobile TV, the device offers a full-touch QWERTY keypad, access to the mobile Web, GPS, AT&T Navigator, AT&T Mobile Music with Napster Mobile and a 3 megapixel camera. 

The handheld comes in black and chrome and features a 3.2-inch touch screen. The Eternity also features haptic support, which offers subtle vibrations to confirm a user's selections while using the touch screen. Three dedicated keys on the lower portion of the device offer navigation short cuts. The Eternity also supports an accelerometer that can automatically detect motion and the orientation of the device allowing for display auto-rotation and the use of motion sensing games and photo scrolling by tilting the device. 

The device centers around Samsung's TouchWiz interface, which offers specially designed widgets to customize and personalize the phone. The drag and drop feature lets users have instant access to functions like a clock, music player, instant messaging, photos and Mobile TV by adding it to their home screens. 

Other key functions of the Samsung Eternity include the 3 megapixel camera with video capture; Video Share calling; messaging capabilities, including mobile email and instant messaging from Yahoo, Windows Life, AOL and more; Bluetooth; and a microSD memory card slot that can support up to 8 GB of memory. 

The Web browser enables navigation with the touch of a finger and supports zoom-in and zoom-out. The device also includes dual-band 3G connectivity and quad-band GSM technology for high-speed data on the go. 

AT&T Mobile TV is a service from MediaFLO USA, a wholly owned subsidiary of Qualcomm Inc. It gives users access to streaming television and sporting events from networks including CBS Mobile, CNBC, Comedy Central, ESPN Mobile TV, Fox News, Fox Mobile, NBC 2Go, MSNBC, MTV, Nickelodeon, CNN Mobile and PIX. 

AT&T said the Samsung Eternity is available through AT&T retailers and AT&T Wireless' online store for $149.99 after a $50 mail in rebate with a two-year contract. Along with debuting the device, AT&T said it will offer a 30-day free trial for new AT&T Mobile TV subscribers.

Acer Incorporated

Acer Incorporated (LSE: ACID) (traditional Chinese: 宏碁股份有限公司) is a Taiwanese multinational electronics manufacturer. It owns the largest franchised computer retail chain in Taipei, Taiwan.[2] Acer is the third largest computer manufacturer in the world (by sales) after HP and Dell Inc.[3] and its product lineup includes desktops and laptops, as well as personal digital assistants (PDAs), servers and storage, displays, peripherals, and e-business services for business, government, education, and home users.

Adobe Systems Incorporated

Adobe Systems Incorporated (pronounced a-DOE-bee IPA: /əˈdoʊbiː/) (NASDAQ: ADBE) is an American computer software company headquartered in San Jose, California, USA.

Adobe was founded in December 1982[3] by John Warnock and Charles Geschke, who established the company after leaving Xerox PARC in order to develop and sell the PostScript page description language. In 1985, Apple Computer licensed PostScript for use in its LaserWriter printers, which helped spark the desktop publishing revolution. The company name Adobe comes from Adobe Creek, which ran behind the house of one of the company's founders.[3] Adobe acquired its former competitor, Macromedia, in December 2005.

As of January 2007, Adobe Systems has 6,677 employees,[3] about 40% of whom work in San Jose. Adobe also has major development operations in Seattle, Washington; San Francisco, California; Ottawa, Ontario; Minneapolis, Minnesota; Newton, Massachusetts; San Luis Obispo, California; Hamburg, Germany; Noida, India, Bangalore, India, Bucharest, Romania.

Since 1995, Fortune has ranked Adobe as an outstanding place to work. Adobe was rated the fifth-best U.S. company to work for in 2003, sixth in 2004, 31st in 2007 and 40th in 2008.[4] In 2007 Adobe ranked 9th on the list of largest software companies in the world