Date: August 29, 2010 Time: 1:30:36 Hosted by Jordan Drake Co-Hosts: Scott Wasson, Cyril Kowaliski, Geoff Gasior Download: MP3 (65.5MB) | M4A (89.3MB) Subscribe: RSS | iTunes
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Show notes
We're back in our classic panel format with this episode, and we've got a lot to cover. After answering the mailbag and a few quick TR community notes, the panel wants to know why Cyril loves his iPhone 4 so much, why Scott still hates his, and what iPhone games we're all skipping work to play. Later, Scott gives us an in-depth look at two very exciting processor platforms from AMD: Bulldozer and Bobcat.

Then, it's on to the reviews. Cyril isn't all that impressed with Samsung's newest 14" notebook, and Geoff has bestowed the Editor's Choice award upon Zotac's newest barebones nettop. Finally, Geoff takes a look at the sexy, bamboo-clad U33Jc 13" notebook from Asus.

Send in listener mail, and we'll answer on the podcast. - jdrake@techreport.com

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Listener mail:

Non-gaming GPU reviews? - from Bernhard - (0:01:44):

"I have a question for the TR crew that has been bugging me for quite a while, concerning hardware benchmarking, particularly graphics cards. I do know that the consumer type cards TR tests are mostly used for games and that most of the regulars on TR are gamers but I have the feeling that there are a lot of people out there that may whip up a game from time to time (I play roughly one or two games per year) but mostly use their machines for work. While I really do love the high quality testing and writing of the TR, I feel that the "pro enthusiast" is a little bit underappreciated as an audience here and really by most tech sites online. While it is possible to find benchmarks and general recommendations for stuff like Adobe's content creation package (which has been using GPU acceleration for quite some time now, but how do different cards stack up?) or transcoders like Mediaespresso (CUDA and Stream compatible), this information is more often than not scattered across forums and vendor sites and hardly conclusive. Long story short, I'd love to know whether TR is considering a wider testing protocol for graphics cards that looks at consumer boards (and perhaps even the pro lines?) also in non-gaming applications. This may prove to be challenging (driver versions, software evolution, testing scenarios, etc.), but I feel that there is a real vacuum waiting to be filled…"

Tech discussion:

Community update: Get ready for a new season of fantasy football (0:09:43)- Read more

Win one of six Metro 2033 copies or an MSI Big Bang mobo (0:10:50)- Read more

My iPhone 4 is awesome (0:12:29)- Read more

The wild and wonderful world of iOS gaming (0:20:48)- Read more

Carmack shows Rage running at 60 FPS... on an iPhone (0:28:32)- Read more

AMD's Bulldozer architecture revealed (0:31:39)- Read more

Advanced look at AMD's Bobcat architecture (0:50:34)

Samsung's R480 14-inch notebook (1:04:16)- Read more

Zotac's Zbox HD-ND22 barebones mini PC (1:11:27)- Read more

Asus' bamboo-infused U33Jc 13-inch notebook (1:17:06)- Read more

That's all, folks! We'll see you on the next episode.