Windows 8 RT download from January at a price of 85 dollars?

According to the latest rumors circulating on the Web, Microsoft will begin distributing the "mass" of the OEM version of Windows 8 RT alone from January 2013. As many of our readers already know, this new version is designed for the ARM platform and will find wide use on tablet PCs and touch screen devices of last generation that will use the much talked interface Metro.

Currently Microsoft has imposed a number of restrictions for Windows 8 RT, making it available only to a certain number of producers, among them include: ASUS and Lenovo (both in collaboration with Nvidia), Toshiba working with Texas Instruments, HP and Samsung engaged in designs with Qualcomm. All other OEMs will have to wait, at least for now, the month of January, when the Redmond company will release for all Windows 8 RT.

This step will allow for greater availability and proliferation of devices Windows 8 RT resulting in a (hopefully) lower prices, and currently there are rumors that the license for each ARM device has a cost of $ 85 . For the moment we can do is wait until October, when, with the debut of Windows 8, will also appear in the first models of Tablet PC-based Windows 8.

TSMC produces an ARM processor from 3GHz

TSMC , also known as Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, reserves some surprises. The last announcement of the company regards the place of positioning a milestone in the history of ARM processors: TSMC has been able to produce a processor, built-process 28Nm , which operates the incredible frequency of 3.1GHz .

 

This processor is a candidate to be the fastest ever produced with the architecture firm of Cambridge, and probably will remain so for quite some time. TSMC has stated that it is a dual core processor architecture with Cortex-A9 (the same as the NVIDIA Tegra 2 and Exynos on the Galaxy S II) and the frequency was "achieved under typical conditions" using a production process called HPM ( h igh p erformance for m obile applications ).

This process has been developed for tablets and other devices for world consumer , and the clearest demonstration of the ability of that process is this CPU. It would be interesting to have benchmarks to see how different are the performance compared to a normal processor operating in the 1-1.5GHz range. As stated by Cliff Hou, vice president of TSMC, "This work shows that ARM and TSMC can meet the market demands for high performance", so it may be permissible to see this line of solutions used in ultra-thin notebooks with ARM processors. I can not wait.

Processor ARM Cortex-A9, manufactured by TSMC 28 nm standards, working under normal conditions at a frequency of 3.1 GHz

According to the company TSMC, test dual-core ARM Cortex-A9, manufactured using 28 nanometer process technology, 28HPM, demonstrated the work at 3.1 GHz, "in typical conditions."

Fabrication process HPM, optimized by the criterion of performance and is designed for the production of chips for mobile devices. In other words, it allows you to combine high performance and low power consumption (reduced leakage currents).

Making a test chip is part of an effort TSMC, whose purpose is to demonstrate the capabilities of single-chip systems, produced at each level of technology development.

According to TSMC, 28-nanometer processor, clocked at 3.1 GHz, twice the performance of a similar product made by TSMC 40-nanometer process technology.

Microsoft: ARM-version of Windows 8 will not support x86 applications

As you know, the next version of desktop operating system, Windows 8 will run as usual on x86-Intel and AMD, and chips based on ARM architecture from companies such as Qualcomm, NVIDIA, or TI.

This is a great victory for the British company ARM - she managed to shake a few before the unbreakable alliance of Intel and Microsoft. On the other hand, Intel and Google have recently reported a partnership within the operating system Android, which previously relied almost exclusively on the platform, ARM. Will Intel moderate consumption of their processors? Analysts divided on this issue. However, the market reacted differently: the value of shares in ARM September 15 increased by $ 11.5 (1.92%) to $ 610.

Other news about the ability to run Windows applications on Windows 7 8 was announced at a meeting of financial analysts, Microsoft's. President, Windows and Windows Live Steven Sinofsky (Steven Sinofsky) responded to a direct question: "I believe it was said that if something works on PCs with Windows 7, it can run on Windows 8. Also, since the first demonstrations at CES and in time we are quite clearly indicated that the products will not be ARM support any x86-application. "

So, next year there will be products on the market with Windows 8, which will run on chips ARM. As reported by Windows Tips and News, "They will work differently, to execute other software and get some updates" . In all likelihood, it will increase some technical chaos in the minds of consumers.