Today the Heterogeneous System Architecture (HSA) Foundation announced six new members. The HSA Foundation is pleased to welcome Apical, Arteris Inc., MulticoreWare Inc., Sonics, Symbio and Vivante Corporation to the membership roster. Each company adds expertise to the HSA ecosystem by assisting with research, development, production, manufacture, use, and the sale of HSA IP and heterogeneous computing software and solutions.

These new members have joined at different levels including: supporter, contributor and associate. Working closely with the founder members of AMD, ARM, Imagination Technologies, MediaTek Inc., Samsung Electronics and Texas Instruments (TI), the new members will contribute to the growing adoption of HSA in heterogeneous computing.

Acer America today announced its entry into the thin client market with a new commercial offering, the Acer Veriton N Series. The new thin and rich clients provide simplified manageability and energy-efficiency in a secure, space-saving form factor for virtual environments. These practical systems are designed for small and medium businesses, call centres and customers in education, financial services, healthcare and government wanting to tightly manage data, while reducing overall costs.

By increasing hardware utilization and consolidation, the Acer Veriton N Series provides superb performance while keeping operational costs and power consumption low. Centralized processing makes it easy to manage data and hardware assets, monitor system access and enforce security policies and procedures, significantly increasing internal data security.
"Our new thin client line will help organizations meet today's reality of ever shrinking budgets by simplifying IT without compromising on business deliverables," said Michael O'Beirne, Acer senior director, commercial product marketing. "The Acer N Series are easy to configure, maintain and manage, while reducing the overall cost of ownership."

AMD (NYSE:AMD) today announced revenue for the second quarter of 2012 of $1.41 billion, net income of $37 million, or $0.05 per share, and operating income of $77 million. The company reported non-GAAP net income of $46 million, or $0.06 per share, and non-GAAP operating income of $86 million.

"Overall weakness in the global economy, softer consumer spending and lower channel demand for our desktop processors in China and Europe made the closing weeks of the quarter challenging," said Rory Read, AMD president and CEO. "We are taking definitive steps to improve our performance and correct the issues within our control as we expect headwinds will continue in the third quarter as the industry sets a new baseline. We remain optimistic about our core businesses as well as future opportunities with our competitively differentiated next-generation Accelerated Processor Units (APUs). Our recently launched Trinity APU continues to gain traction with customers. We are committed to driving profitable growth."

HP today announced its first commercial internet monitor for the U.S. market, revolutionizing guest internet access for the office, and unveiled its first consumer in-plane switching (IPS) displays, redefining visual performance for the home with consistent, vivid color and increased brightness.

"The needs of customers continue to evolve, and HP is well-positioned to meet these new demands by expanding its award-winning display portfolio," said Jun Kim, vice president and general manager, Display Business Unit, HP. "HP's new IPS monitors bring professional-grade technology directly to consumers, while our internet monitor serves as a new tool for businesses to engage with their patrons."

Today at the AMD Fusion Developer Summit (AFDS), global technology leaders came together to announce the formation of the Heterogeneous System Architecture (HSA) Foundation. The HSA Foundation is a non-profit consortium established to define and promote an open, standards-based approach to heterogeneous computing that will provide a common hardware specification and broad support ecosystem to make it easier for software developers to deliver innovative applications that can take greater advantage of today's modern processors.

AMD, ARM, Imagination Technologies, MediaTek Inc., and Texas Instruments (TI) are the initial founding members of the HSA Foundation. The companies will work together to drive a single architecture specification and simplify the programming model to help software developers take greater advantage of the capabilities found in modern central processing units (CPUs) and graphics processing units (GPUs), and unlock the performance and power efficiency of the parallel computing engines found in heterogeneous processors.

Toshiba's Digital Products Division (DPD), a division of Toshiba America Information Systems, Inc., today announced its roadmap of new computing devices designed for Microsoft Windows 8. Toshiba's new mobile solutions showcase the advanced functionality and capabilities Toshiba plans to bring to market while enhancing the experience of the new operating system.

"These inspiring new PC and tablet designs will allow consumers and business users to interact with Windows in amazing new ways," said Carl Pinto, vice president of marketing, Toshiba America Information Systems, Inc., Digital Products Division. "These products reflect Toshiba's long history of engineering breakthrough computing hardware in thin and light form factors and our close relationships with Microsoft and our silicon partners to bring them to market."

Devon IT, Inc., a leading provider of thin client and virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) software and hardware solutions, today announced the FX1 thin client, a dual digital display thin client featuring an ARM-based system-on-a-chip (SoC). The FX1, built around the DM8148 ARM applications processor from Texas Instruments Incorporated (TI), is designed to provide users with an advanced, high-performance thin client at a low price.

"We're seeing widespread interest in the ARM SoC processor for the thin client platform segment, signaling high demand from a variety of industries," says Joe Makoid, President, Devon IT. "It's a cost-effective solution for the delivery of improved performance and energy efficiency in an enclosed, fanless system. Leveraging the high-definition user experience capabilities of Citrix HDX, the FX1 provides an excellent experience for demanding users who require multi-monitor support and high-definition video at a low cost."

Worldwide semiconductor revenues increased more than 3.7% year over year to $301 billion in 2011, according to the latest version of the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Semiconductor Applications Forecaster (SAF). The industry weathered the macroeconomic uncertainties in the U.S and Europe, the earthquake and tsunami in Japan, China's slow down in the second half of the year, and floods in Thailand. Meanwhile, device applications, such as smartphones, media tablets and e-readers, automotive infotainment, notebook PCs, datacenter servers, and wireless and wired communication infrastructure drove robust consumption of semiconductors.

IDC's SAF tracks more than 100 semiconductor companies. Over 40 of these companies experienced year-over-year revenue growth greater than 5%, while about the same number of companies saw their revenue decline by more than 5%.

ASUS displayed its latest sound card, the Republic of Gamers (ROG) Phoebus. This card is designed for multichannel gaming audio. While it might not pack any fancy DSP that doesn't already exist, its AMP circuitry is so designed to give the best positional audio that could come handy with competitive online gaming. With this card, ASUS also brought to the fore C-Media's latest audio chipset, the CMI 8788DH Oxygen Express, which packs native PCI Express support. All PCI Express sound cards launched by ASUS so far feature OxygenHD and ASUS-rebadged AV-100 chipsets, that use legacy PCI, and hence depend on PCIe-to-PCI bridge chips by PLX to function on PCI Express.

The primary DAC for headphone/front-out channel of the ROG Phoebus is TI-BB PCM1792A, with stellar signal-noise ratio (SNR) of 127 dBA. Other main channels are handled by Cirrus Logic, probably the CS5381, with SNR of 120 dBA. There's also a tertiary Realtek ALC889 (110 dBA) CODEC that probably handles an independent set of audio channels, or handles the digital outputs, since it's licensed with a few Dolby technologies. On the AMP side, we spy bleeding-edge OPAMPs, a Texas Instruments 6120A2(?) AMP chip (for the headphones channel), etc.

VR-Zone have been having a little chat with Intel 'sources', who have leaked some juicy tidbits for us to enjoy in the form performance and power news. The upcoming next generation Medfield platform is Intel's first true System on a Chip (SoC) and is designed to compete with various low power ARM offerings in the tablet space. To help achieve this, they've gone through an internal restructure, merging four business units into just one: Ultra-Mobility, Mobile Wireless, Mobile Communications and Netbook & Tablet PC. The business unit is now simply known as Mobile and Communications. It's being run by Mike Bell and Hermann Eul and the first product to emerge from it will be is the 32 nm Medfield SoC solution.

VR-Zone explained that the competition will be "Apple's A-Series, NVIDIA Tegra, Qualcomm Snapdragon, Samsung Exynos, Texas Instruments OMAP and the likes. Out of all the chips mentioned above, only Samsung's Exynos is currently manufactured in 32nm process, just like Medfield."

Despite having a rough year with lay-offs, AMD can end 2011 on a high, as brand survey group Trust Across America that lists out America's top-10 most trustworthy companies, deemed AMD as the fifth most trustworthy American company. The list included just two other tech companies, semiconductor major Texas Instruments at number 9, and printing and digital imaging company Lexmark at number 10.

Trust Across America evaluated its top-10 candidates on five factors it calls "FACTS"; that's acronym for Financial stability and strength, Accounting conservativeness, Corporate integrity, Transparency, and Sustainability. It's quite surprising that other, more financially stable tech companies such as Microsoft and Intel didn't make it to this list.

The top-10 list follows.

Windows (PC) will make its first transition to a machine architecture other than x86 in decades with Windows 8 Windows on ARM (WOA), and Microsoft wants to make absolutely sure that it has a well-oiled ecosystem in place to propel its growth. Currently, Microsoft picked three potent players among ARM processor vendors, Qualcomm and Texas Instruments (that have experience and can ship in Zerg volumes), and NVIDIA (which has demonstrated a lot of engineering potential with its latest Tegra products).

Microsoft reportedly asked the three ARM players to pick two notebook vendors each (one major, and one minor) with which they will work to develop some of the first WOA portable computing devices. Qualcomm selected Samsung and Sony, Texas Instruments chose Toshiba and Samsung, while NVIDIA chose Acer and Lenovo. Among these, Samsung, Toshiba, and Lenovo are the major partners. Surprisingly, Taiwan-based companies have an insignificant role in this ecosystem. ASUS, which has thus far been the largest client of NVIDIA for Tegra processors, has been left out. Now that downstream partners are selected, upstream ODMs such as Quanta Computer, Compal Electronics, Wistron and Pegatron Technology, which manufacture for those companies, are getting their R&D teams in shape to compete for the next-generation platform. The finishing line of ARM's marathon run to get into PCs is in sight.

BIOS developer Phoenix Technologies announced its latest SecureCore Tiano (SCT) version 2.2 UEFI firmware that will be designed for PCs running Windows 8 operating system. The desktop client motherboard BIOS industry is currently dominated by AMI with its AMIBIOS and AMI-UEFI solutions, although Phoenix' AwardBIOS is still found on certain channel PC motherboards. It's with mobile computing devices that Phoenix' firmware solutions get a lot more prevelent. SCT 2.2 is looking to mark the company's bid to return to competitiveness in the PC motherboard BIOS market.

SecureCore Tiano 2.2 is a UEFI BIOS/firmware that conforms to UEFI 2.3.1 specifications, TCG 2.0, 1.2 (Trusted Computing Group) specifications, ACPI 4.0 and 5.0, SMBIOS 2.7, NIST-SP800-147, and USB 3.0 native, making it a feature-packed solution. In addition to Windows on x86 PC platforms (Win32, Win64, WoW64), Phoenix will develop firmware support for the upcoming Windows on ARM (WoA) platform. It is collaborating with ARM majors Qualcomm and Texas Instruments in this regard.

Japanese cooling expert Scythe is releasing new information and details about upcoming products exhibited at IFA 2011 in Berlin. Attendees of the consumer electronics fair IFA 2011 (Berlin, Germany) are able to checkout brand new products from Scythe. Located in the Home Entertainment hall 3.2 at booth number 116 new products are displayed with focus on the Audio segment. Three new Class D Digital Amplifiers PCI Slot Amp (SDAS-1000), 3,5 inch (8,89 cm) sized Bay Amp Pro mini 2000 (SDA35-2000) and the double-decker Kama Bay AMP SDAR-3000 will be introduced to the public.

New Top model from Scythe will be the Kama Bay AMP SDAR-3000 amplifier which is built to fit into two 5,25 inch (13,3 cm) bays of a PC Chassis. Core of this high-end amp will be the Power IC TB2924AFG from Toshiba. Hence allows connection of four different audio sources from which users can choose by switching. More convenient operation is achieved by adding an infrared remote control. Output Power is rated with 16 Watt. Further features are the retro-look analog meters with several different background light colors and one USB Power Charge connector in the front.

Texas Instruments Incorporated (TI) today announced that it is the first semiconductor company to receive certification from the USB Implementer's Forum (USB-IF) for its SuperSpeed USB (USB 3.0) four-port extensible host controller (xHCI). In addition to the four-port host controller, the TUSB7340, TI also achieved certification for its two-port host controller, the TUSB7320. These four- and two-port host controllers support such applications as notebooks, desktop computers, workstations, servers, add-in cards and ExpressCard implementations, as well as PCIe-based embedded host controllers for HDTVs, set top boxes and gaming console applications. Download datasheets, order free samples, and request evaluation modules (EVMs) here.

"The continuing certification of USB products is key to delivering a smooth and effortless experience to consumers worldwide as they purchase and interconnect their new electronic devices using SuperSpeed USB," said Jeff Ravencraft, President & COO, USB-IF. "We are pleased with the commitment Texas Instruments has made to this standard by delivering such a broad portfolio of SuperSpeed USB products, including their most recent four- and two-port host controllers."

Texas Instruments Incorporated (TI) (NYSE: TXN) and National Semiconductor (NYSE: NSM) today announced they have signed a definitive agreement under which TI will acquire National for $25 per share in an all-cash transaction of about $6.5 billion. The acquisition combines two industry leaders in analog semiconductors, each with unique strengths in delivering products to improve performance and efficiency and convert real-world signals in electronic systems. The boards of directors of both companies have unanimously approved the transaction.

"This acquisition is about strength and growth," said Rich Templeton, TI's chairman, president and chief executive officer. "National has an excellent development team, and its products combined with our own can offer customers an analog portfolio of unmatched depth and breadth. In recent years, National's management team has done an outstanding job of improving margins and streamlining expenses, which upon close will increase TI's profitability and earnings per share, excluding transaction costs. Our ability to accelerate National's growth with our much larger sales force is the foundation of our belief that we can produce strong returns on our investment. The combined sales team will be 10 times larger than National's is today, and the portfolio will be exposed to more customers in more markets."

Originally slated for 22 November, AMD's upcoming Radeon HD 6900 series featuring the company's new enthusiast-grade "Cayman" GPU core reportedly ran into delays. A more recent report by VR-Zone suggests that these delays are not because of any yield-issue related to the GPU, but shortage of a new high-grade driver-MOSFET (DrMOS) chip used on the reference board, sourced from Texas Instruments. The said component looks to feature a more compact package compared to the ones commonly made by Renesas and the likes, which is why AMD seems to have chosen it. The TI-made component is in short supply, and is a very recent introduction by its makers. AMD has a knack of using exotic and high-grade components on PCBs of its high-end graphics cards. A driver-MOSFET is a component that combines the driver IC, and MOSFETs into a single package.

Intel Corporation today announced it has signed an agreement to acquire Texas Instruments' cable modem product line. The purchase enhances Intel's focus on the cable industry and related consumer electronics (CE) market segments, where the company's expertise in building advanced system-on-chip (SoC) products, based on Intel Atom processors, will be applied.

Intel plans to combine Texas Instruments' best-of-breed Puma product lines with the Data Over Cable Service Interface Specification (DOCSIS) standard technology and Intel SoCs to deliver advanced set top box, residential gateway and modem products for the cable industry. The objective is to provide cable OEMs with an open and powerful platform for delivering innovative and differentiated products to service providers that improve the video, voice and data content experience at home.

A day into its announcement, Google's ambitious new venture, the Chrome operating system, is receiving support from some of the biggest players in the IT industry. The company also confirmed that Chrome OS will be a free of charge software, requiring no purchase of license to use it. To ensure the OS gets adequate momentum, Google is working with the likes of HP, Acer, Lenovo, ASUS, Toshiba, Texas Instruments and Qualcomm (some of the most relevant names in the netbook industry). The company also detailed about the developer support it plans to spread, with possible pre-release versions towards the end of the year. To the consumer, this means that major computer manufacturers could sell netbooks with Chrome OS preinstalled, with seamless support for their hardware. Early community software development will ensure a good selection of software for the netbook by the time the OS becomes release-grade, ready to be shipped with millions of netbooks.

Intel has announced the formation of the USB 3.0 promoters group, a consortium that aims to create a "super speed personal USB interconnect."

The first members of the promoter group (HP, Intel, Microsoft, NEC Corporation, NXP Semiconductors and Texas Instruments) said that USB 3.0 will deliver more than ten times the data transfer bandwidth of USB 2.0, which tops out at 480 Mb/s. The new interface will be designed to be used in consumer electronics and mobile applications and able to deal with digital media file sizes that are likely to exceed 25 GB.

Intel stated that USB 3.0 will be based on current USB technology and ports and cabling will be backwards compatible; however version 3.0 will offer enhancements for better protocol efficiency and lower power consumption. The development group will also integrate an upgrade path to optical capabilities for USB. A completed USB 3.0 specification is expected to be released in the first half of 2008.