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The perfect iPad Air clone has arrived: this tablet dual-boots Android and Windows 8.1, has 3G connectivity, aluminum unibody, and $200 price
Posted: 31 Dec 2014, 07:29, by Victor H.Tags: Android+ Tablets+
The perfect iPad Air clone has arrived: this tablet dual-boots Android and Windows 8.1, has 3G connectivity, aluminum unibody, and $200 price
The Apple iPad Air 2 has set the gold standard for tablet design and functionality, but with so much competition from all sides, it’s only logical to expect a similarly great alternative. Or at least, a clone.
The Onda V919 3G Air is exactly that - an unoriginal copy of the iPad Air and unsurprisingly it’s coming from China. What’s more shocking, though, is that it is a well made tablet with an amazing value for the money.
While you'd need to shell out $500 for a basic, 16GB iPad Air 2 with no cellular data connectivity, the Onda V919 3G Air costs $193, offers 64GB of internal storage, and features 3G cellular data connectivity.
CAPABLE OF DUAL-BOOTING ANDROID 4.4 KITKAT AND WINDOWS 8.1Most impressively, the Onda V919 is capable of dual-booting Android 4.4 KitKat and Windows 8.1, and you can switch between the two with the press of a button. This is made possible by some clever work down to the BIOS level, and results in an unprecedented freedom when it comes to the operating system.
For all else, the Onda V919 3G Air is an iPad Air 2 clone: it features an all aluminum unibody, a 9.7-inch 4:3 display with a resolution of 2048 x 1536 pixels, and overall very similar looks.
The big difference comes in the system chip that powers the whole show: the iPad Air 2 is powered by the tri-core Apple A8 system chip, while the Onda V919 3G Air features a 64-bit Intel Bay Trail-T Z3736F quad-core solution with clock speeds reaching up to 2.16GHz. The Bay Trail chip is a great option delivering solid single-core performance, and it comes with 2GB of RAM, a reasonable amount that allows some flexibility with multitasking.
In case you’re wondering about any storage concerns (the 64GB of internal storage here might look good on a single OS machine, but with dual boot a lot of that allowance is eaten up by the OSes), you also have the option to plug in up 128GB microSD cards.
Finally, the 3G connectivity supports WCDMA bands, and you can also place calls while surfing the web on this tablet. There’s also a 5-megapixel main, rear camera, and a 2-megapixel front cam. Not bad for a tablet that costs less than $200, is it?
You must be kidding. Banks warns you as to what to own and what to sell. I guess it is a new year and bank know what you own and they have a new charter to advise clients on what to own.
Some news about Intel. Yield issues on 20nm are all over the news.
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Tech Today: Intel to Apple’s Rescue? GrubHub Rising, GT Advanced Bonuses
By Tiernan Ray
Here are some things going on today in your world of tech:
Could Intel (INTC) be in a position to be Apple’s (AAPL) savior? That intriguing bit comes from Drexel Hamilton’s chip analyst Rick Whittington, from a note on Micron. In passing, Whittington notes problems had by Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM) and Samsung Electronics (005930KS) trying to produce 3-D transistors.
Intel has mastered 3-D transistors, and so, writes Whittington “btw, very good for Intel if neither Samsung or TSM can do FinFET this next year; puts them in line to supply Apple’s internal foundry needs; more likely TSM/Samsung operate FinFET under very low yield output, keeping capacity tight.”
Intel shares are down 2 cents at $36.74.
Speaking of semiconductors, chip equipment analyst Robert Maire with Semiwatch today continues his theme that something is wrong at contract manufacturer Global Foundries. Yesterday, I wrote Global refuted notions there was any delay in its plan for chip making just because it is “warehousing” some chip-making tools.
Maire today calls that just a bunch of PR spin: “Because our yields are so good and our ramp so fast we decided to deliver the tools to a warehouse rather than the fab where they can be used….. I have a bridge for sale in Brooklyn…..” Maire reiterates some tool makers are going to see a revenue shortfall.
Shares of food delivery service GrubHub (GRUB) are up 21 cents, or 0.6%, at $36.08, after Barrington Research’s Jeff Houston late yesterday raised his rating on the shares to Outperform from Market Perform, with a $43 price target, lauding management and writing that “ given how convenient and compelling its services are to hungry diners, we believe that it will continue to create incremental demand that was non-existent through the traditional alternative, i.e., takeout menus in kitchen drawers.”
Shares of wireless networking equipment maker Aviat Networks (AVNW) are up 3 cents, or 2%, at $1.51, after Needham & Co.’s Richard Valera reinstated coverage of the shares with a Buy rating following the retirement announcement on Christmas eve of its CFO, Ned Hayes. That departure had concerned Valera, as had a number of “material weaknesses with respect to financial controls” that he said were revealed in the company’s 10-K, published just two days before Hayes retired.
But Valera has spoken with the company’s management and he’s “comfortable that the company is unlikely to have to restate any prior financial results.”
Valera’s colleague, chip analyst Quinn Bolton, this morning raised his price target on Sigma Designs (SIGM), to $8 from $7, and reiterated a Buy rating, writing that next week’s Consumer Electronics Show should highlight how the company is an excellent “play” on two key themes in electronics, 4K television sets, and Internet of Things.
Bolton notes Sigma’s “SX6” video processor for converting video to 4K; he also lauds its “Z-Wave wireless mesh networking” products for connected homes.
Sigma shares are up 19 cents, or 2.8%, at $6.60.
Another semi name getting a lift today is Skyworks Solutions (SWKS), up $1.27, or 1.7%, at $74.13, after D.A. Davidson’s Thomas Diffely reiterated a Buy rating, and raised his price target to $85 from $75, writing that two “drivers” will remain in place the next couple of years, the rise of LTE networks in China, and “increased complexity of RF content in the latest generation smartphones.”
GT Advanced Technologies (GTAT), the bankrupt sapphire tools producer that had tried and failed with Apple to produce large quantities of the material, has requested in bankruptcy court that it be allowed to pay millions in bonuses to key executives in order to help get its business going again. As Peg Brickley of The Wall Street Journal reports, after letting go 800 workers, the company said morale is low, according to a filing yesterday.
And if you’re looking for a current Apple supplier, Jefferies & Co. today distributes a note from Fubon Research’s Sean Ryan Hsiao, who initiates coverage of Taiwan’s CviLux (8103TW) with an “Add” rating, and a $65 price target in New Taiwan dollars.
CviLux, according to Hsiao, may see revenue rise 17% this year, thanks to “the initial shipment of file protector storage products to Apple.” Hsiao doesn’t go into detail as to what those file protectors are.
Yes. The bottom line is very important. But top line suggests growth and is equally important. Intel is a very profitable company and no one can deny that.
That is a bad news for Microsoft but not a great news for Intel either-low priced processors.
See the highlighted paragraph. Global Foundries having trouble with 14nm.
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Tech Today: Amazon Mobile Commerce Surges, Short Interest Moves, Apple Chip Jockeying
By Tiernan Ray
Here are some things going on today in your world of tech:
The Nasdaq Composite is up half a percent at 4,800.07 after a day off from trading. Gainers include Apple (AAPL), up 85 cents, or 0.8%, at $112.86; Facebook (FB) up 7 cents at $80.84; and Intel (INTC) up 18 cents, half a percent, at $37.62.
R.W. Baird’s Colin Sebastian, reiterating an Outperform rating on shares of Amazon.com (AMZN), raised his estimate for the company’s membership in its “Prime” program to more than 30 million paying members, citing Amazon’s own press release this morning stating it had a record holiday season, with more than ten million people joining Prime.
Amazon also reported that “Nearly 60 percent of Amazon.com customers shopped using a mobile device this holiday.”
Amazon shares are up $3.56, or 1%, at $306.59.
Speaking of online commerce, IBM (IBM) released eta it collected for retailers for Christmas Day that reveal “strong mobile sales,” with all online sales up 8.3% but mobile traffic up 57%, accounting for 34.8% of total sales, up from 20.4% last year. That means desktop computers were still 65% of all online sales, leading IBM to assert ” The Desktop is Not Dead.”
Shares of 3-D printing technology maker 3D Systems (DDD) are up $1.57, over 5%, at $32.11, as short interest rose above 35%, notes TheFlyontheWall.
In other short-interest news, CLSA’s Srini Pajjuri notes that semiconductors saw an overall decline of 1.6% as of mid-December, which is on top of a 4.3% decrease in late November. 44% of companies sampled showed increases in short interest, while 56% saw decreases. The biggest short-interest increases were for Cypress Semiconductor (CY), NXP Semiconductor (NXPI), Kulicke & Soffa Industries (KLIC), and KLA-Tencor (KLAC). The biggest decreases were for Marvell Technology Group (MRVL), Broadcom (BRCM), Intel, and Texas Instruments (TXN).
Shares of bandwidth provider Akamai Technologies (AKAM) are up 38 cents, or 0.6%, at $64.72, as some expect the company may benefit from Sony’s (SNE) decision on Wednesday to stream online the controversial film “The Interview.”
B. Riley’s Sameet Sinha writes today that “While it is not possible to estimate the potential benefit to Content Delivery Networks such as AKAM and Limelight Networks (LLNW), we would call this an incrementally beneficial event, which should contribute to 4Q14 on top of some of the larger and broader secular trends in online video.”
Longtime semiconductor equipment observer Robert Maire of Semiwatch this morning warns that tool makers could be hurt in Q1 because contract chip maker Global Foundries is diverting shipments of equipment to make chips at 14 nanometer dimensions to a warehouse.
“We have confirmed through numerous sources that over the last two weeks Global Foundries has stopped deliveries of tools for 14nm to its fab and instead is having the tools housed at a nearby warehouse,” writes Maire.
“We hear that tool makers are told that the fab facilities are not ready and it sounds like a one to two quarter delay,” writes Maire. “Some tool makers are speculating that the delay could also be related to financial issues or yield issues or a host of other odd rumors.”
Maire opines this may hurt Samsung Electronics (005930KS) in its bid to win back Apple’s chip business in 2015. he thinks “part of the pitch to Apple by Samsung was the availability of an independent, US based supplier.” That means Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (TSM) may hold onto Apple’s business longer, thinks Maire.
I was not thinking of extreme consequences like bankruptcy. It is a slow death. As far as I remember AMD is not making insignificant money on APUs sold to MSFT/SNY.
Any decline in sales of these consoles(which is happening)is going to put additional pressure on AMD.
What is there left for AMD to suffer? It has already sucked up so much money from Intel, Abu and investors. It wasted all that money.
http://blogs.barrons.com/techtraderdaily/2014/12/17/the-pcs-not-dead-says-citi-raising-estimates/
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The PC’s Not Dead, Says Citi, Raising Estimates
By Tiernan Ray
Citigroup’s Jim Suva today offers an upbeat, contrarian view of the personal computer market, writing that unit shipment growth may return in the next few years, rather than expectations for a decline.
After an onslaught on of tablets, everyone jumped on the “PC is dead” theme, writes Suva: “With PC units declining by a record 10% in 2013, investors and industry analysts were quick to dismiss the PC as dead, many predicting the market to perpetually decline by double digits as we enter the ‘post-PC era’.”
“Not so fast,” writes Suva: the PC is never going to return to double-digit growth, but he sees it being just flat this year, rising 1% in 2016, and then 2% in 2017, versus consensus expectations for a 2% decline the next two years.
Basically, some of the reasons for decline, such as Apple‘s (AAPL) iPad, are moderating. At the same time, the modest rebound in sales that was attributed to companies buying machines before Microsoft‘s (MSFT) Windows XP went out of support, was not the whole story, so people have underestimated the staying power of the PC longer-term, he thinks.
Enterprises are generally returning to buying PCs after a hiatus, he writes:
Fast forward a year, the pessimism has certainly moderated as PCs are set to decline by only 2-3% in 2014. That said, this market is still by and large viewed as a secular decliner with most estimates looking for market contraction for the next 2-3 years (IDC at 1-2% decline through 2017). At this point, the key reason why investors are still skeptical on any growth in PCs near-term is the notion that 2014 demand was artificially buoyed by a rush to replace PCs running Windows XP—which Microsoft officially ended support in April, and with no such catalysts in 2015, the market will continue to decline or maybe worsen given difficult comps. Although we admit that this will be a modest headwind for growth in 2015, the potential impact will likely be much smaller than investors believe. Although we fully acknowledge that the PC market is beyond the period of growing 8-12%, our analysis indicates that this market has the potential to grow low-single digits, at least for the next 2-3 years [...] Corporate PCs in emerging markets (EM) will start to grow again given an aging installed base and steady employment growth; cannibalization from tablets has diminished significantly; and the headwind following the recent demand uplift from Windows XP expiration will be modest. We detail our analysis in the following section.
In particular, emerging markets went on a spending spree before 2011. Combined with slowing macroeconomic trends, that binge last decade led to extended lifetimes in which companies in emerging markets held onto PCs:
Our analysis indicates that the annual 7% decline in commercial PCs in EM (27% of total PCs) since 2011 can be entirely blamed on the aging of the PC installed base. We estimate that the PC replacement cycle stretched almost 1.5 years during that period to currently above 4.5 years. To put this into context, this is worse than the 1 year increase we witnessed in the US — which happened during the depth of the recent recession (2Q08-1Q09). We believe this aging of the EM corporate PC installed base can be attributed to two factors: 1) following a spending spree on PCs during much of the last decade, we believe the average age of a EM corporate PC had contracted to 3.3 years by 2011, well below the normal 3.8. In other words, there were more new PCs in the workforce than necessary; and 2) a deteriorating macro and IT spending.
Exactly. When you own practically 90% of the market. Other companies and groups will see opportunities.
Or it is a ploy on part of Rackspace to extract better pricing.
Warning is built into stock price.
There was am article a few days back. AMD is losing big time to NVDA in graphics.
How does it matter? It is still part of Intel P&L. Intel has clearly stated that it will pursue mobile despite losses in short run. Short run could mean different time frame for all of us.
Invest in Intel based on that.
That is more bullish than others.
These are all embedded markets Intel serves-microcontroller based.
Intel cost to produce must be less that $0.50. This helps in capacity utilization. One of the slides(SS)showed that factory utilization close to 100%.
I am glad that you are brave enough to accept the reality. Stock market is expectation-Intel forecast exceeded expectation.
IoT has $2B revenue. Which other semi company has that kind of revenue growth.
Even MCG in 2015 will not have contra from new products.
I am sure you have seen Stacy's presentation posted by WBMW.
Intel CEO: Focus on adjacent businesses like datacenter, IoT will fuel growth
ZDNet By Natalie Gagliordi
3 hours ago
In his second turn as CEO on Intel's investor day, Brian Krzanich was careful to craft a message that teetered between bullish and pragmatic.
Krzanich admitted that while 2014 was a year of many records for the chipmaker, not all were worth boasting. Most notably, the revelation that Intel's mobile and communications group would suffer losses in the billions for the year.
Read this
Five big questions for Intel
Five big questions for Intel
Read more
"We are not proud of it, but we aren't ashamed of it, either," Krzanich said. "We understand it and we have plans for improvements."
So, going forward, Krzanich said Intel will move into profitable adjacent businesses like datacenter infrastructure and IoT to stabilize the company's bottom line and ultimately grow shareholder returns.
Although Intel has already become invested in growing its datacenter business, Krzanich was clear that the company plans to deliver on its promise to increase the segment's compound annual growth rate.
"The datacenter is Intel's next big business," Krzanich posited. "It's a $14 billion business and we will grow it at 15 percent rate."
The potential bottom line benefits lurking in the booming IoT space are not lost in Intel, either. Krzanich said IoT is Intel's next big business behind the datacenter, as evidenced by the company's decision to break IoT out into its own segment earlier this year.
And much like the datacenter, Krzanich said Intel's experience in IoT thus far sets the company up for success.
"We have been in this business for many years, so it's one we are very familiar with," he said.
Intel will also focus more on wearables, following up on a promise made to shareholders last year that the company would not be absent from markets in the future. Krzanich noted the company would not pursue an Intel-branded device, but rather partnerships, like the one it has with Fossil, to handle a device's internal heavy lifting.
If all goes as planned, Intel expects to issue a shareholder dividend of 96 cents per share, according to the company's full year 2015 business outlook. Intel was more vague on its revenue prospects, however, anticipating growth in the "mid-single digits."
Other highlights from Krzanich's keynote:
The PC market is stabilizing. "The botton line is that almost everybody is saying the PC market is stabilized but we believe we can actually make this grow," Krzanich said.
The Cloudera investment is paying off. Krzanich said the idea of the parternship was "to open up the details of how our systems work and to allow the two to build systems on top of each other."
Integration continues to drive the company, especially in mobile. Krzanich used Intel's SoFIA product as an example, which is the company's chipset technology designed for entry-level smartphones in emerging markets. The CEO said SoFIA was the first time Intel was able to synthesize its Atom core so that it was defined in the software, which he said allowed for more partner integrations.
Intel will continue to work with key parnters in foundry. Krzanich said in addition to Panasonic, foundry will open to more partners next year.
That was by one-two analysts. They tried to make it a big thing to have their clients a chance to buy Intel stocks.
Did u cover your shorts? In your heart all of you naysayers were expecting Intel to guide lower.
You know math- you can do it and see how that is a big deal.
Oh, I forgot you are one with math of Xeon $1000.00< ARMY $100.00.
I like both of these and probably true in both situations.
Same old 2-3 analysts. Nothing new here.
Shakedown for sure. Who is next to fold. AMD is done. AMCC may be the next to go. Intel is here too to make money and it has been doing for so long. GM are in high 50% to close to 60%. at times there are 60%+.
Then why complain about contra revenues. Accept the fact and move on. When Intel thinks that it can't make competitive products it will quit. If it can afford to invest it will do as long it make sense.
Everything is fair in love and war. AMD got creamed by Intel(your favorite-I had forgot to mention that). Why not creamed Intel?
It deserves that as it did to others.
Then why it is not doing it to gain in servers. There are tons of ARMy players-apple, Qualcom, Samsung, Broadcom, AMCC, Cavium, and of course AMD. Together they have more money that Intel. All of them together can offer contra revenues to Facebook, Amazon, Google, Twitter etc. etc.
I completely agree with you. It takes positives away fro the rest of the businesses.
Or let two Chinese investment carry the most of the burden of designing it and selling in China.
We will see with time.
with in less that 24 hours of the announcement, judgement has been passed.
Intel spent $1.5B(20%) to invest in a Chinese company and collaboration with Rockchip.
Make up story as we go along.
He came from Infineon and that was a much smaller company relative Intel.
he may have some thing to contribute from technology perspective but not good enough from running that business.
He will be given another assignment within Intel if he wants it. That is what the statement states.
There is not much to read except headlines. Here is more on this from Bloomberg.
Management has its prerogative to organize as its fit but this one looks suspicious at best.
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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-11-18/intel-to-merge-loss-making-mobile-business-with-pc-division.html
This wearable bracelet will be available in early Dec.
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http://blogs.barrons.com/techtraderdaily/2014/11/17/intel-and-partner-opening-ceremony-show-off-500-smart-bangle
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Yes. This was pointed out by SA bloggers. With a couple of downgrades, this was bound to happen. Same bears will find something on Thursday again to down grade ir. But every time it has come up big.
More information about Amazon's recent announcement In Las Vegas on AWS web conferencing.
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Intel announced an exclusive Haswell processor designed specifically for Amazon Thursday during AWS re:Invent 2014 conference in Las Vegas. Amazon said the new processors are the backbone of its new EC2 instances in Amazon Web Services.
Intel’s senior vice president and general manager Diane Bryant took to the stage during Amazon vice president and CTO Werner Vogels’s keynote to drop the news. Bryant didn’t share a lot of details, but she said that both Intel and Amazon engineers collaborated on the chip to make sure its built to handle Amazon’s vast cloud infrastructure.
“Now your customers have the highest-performing EC2 instances on the planet,” said Bryant.
The Haswell processors are designed for Amazon’s new compute-optimized EC2 instance, which the company is calling C4. In a blog post detailing the C4 instance, Amazon explained how the new instance was created with the Haswell processor in mind and that the chip “runs at a base speed of 2.9GHz, and can achieve clock speeds as high as 3.5GHz with Turbo boost.”
The C4 instances will come in handy for people running compute-heavy workloads in the cloud for applications like online gaming, risk analysis or graphic rendering programs.
This makes another move by Intel to create custom silicon for companies. In July, Intel announced that it made an exclusive version of its Xeon E7 x2 processor for Oracle, which Oracle uses to run its Exadata Database Machine X4-8. That custom processor allows for Oracle’s machines to be controlled through software, which Oracle engineers can use to distribute resources when needed.
While this isn’t the first time Amazon has touted its use of Intel processors (AWS instances display the familiar “Intel Inside” corporate branding) this does highlight the fact that Intel is actively learning what its customers need and sees big business in providing custom designs.
Whether Intel will be making specialized chips for legacy companies like HP, IBM or Dell remains to be seen. However, there’s no doubt Intel is serious about providing specialized chips, like the upcoming silicon it announced at this year’s Structure event that contains both a Xeon processor and field-programmable gate array.
This came from an article on SA:
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Jefferies wrote a piece on October 27 titled "Did Intel 'Stuff-the-Channel' with 12 million CPU's?" Here is their lead in comment:
"We don't think so. The difference between INTC's YY PC-MPU growth rate (15%) and IDC+Gartner (-1% to -2%) has lead some to believe that INTC stuffed 12 million MPUs harum-scarum into the channel. We think the difference is due to share gains from AMD (3.3 mu), growth in detachable form factors not counted by IDC (1.9 mu), with the balance (6.6 mu) being whitebox growth and inventory build of ~1 week. We view recent weakness as a particular buying opportunity."
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Great find. It is just starting and soon it will be very obvious to all that it is extremely difficult to do this. To compete with Intel on process is not easy and it will burn a big hole in your pocket.
If 20nm is difficult and having yield issues, watch when YSMC/Samsung/GF enter 3D and lower nm.
I am not sure I agree with you. Intel customer service is one of the best.
Arrogance on part of Intel is its belief in its technology.
These comments were made at Amazon Web conferencing and not a PR job by Intel as fpg stated. He will make up any lie to promote his agenda.
Wish he will speak with his money insated. Talk is cheap.
First company that touted these ARM servers chips-AMCC is no where to be seen.
Its stock price is lowest in last 12 months-close to $6.00.
None of these small companies can keep up this development cost as you stated.
One should learn from you how to read these comments. Very strange.
Some of you are were really surprised that it came out. You were looking for opposite outcome to this so that you can be proven right. Finally truth has come out and it is not pleasant for some of you.
How come you could be so far behind others in bashing Intel? No surprise here.
This was expected out of you. For one time believe what the head of the group is saying.
At every opportunity, you are here to find fault.
How can this be true? Did we not hear a few days back that Intel is very arrogant?