Intel has launched a new AI processor series for the edge, promising industrial-class deep learning inference. The new ‘Amston Lake’ Atom x7000RE chips offer up to double the cores and twice the higher graphics base frequency as the previous x6000RE series, all neatly packed within a 6W–12W BGA package.
The x7000RE series packs more performance into a smaller footprint. Boasting up to eight E-cores it supports LPDDR5/DDR5/DDR4 memory and up to nine PCIe 3.0 lanes, delivering robust multitasking capabilities.
Intel says its new processors are designed to withstand challenging conditions, enduring extreme temperature variations, shock, and vibration, and to operate in hard-to-reach locations. They offer 2x SATA Gen 3.2 ports, up to 4x USB 3.2 Gen 2 ports, a USB Type-C port, 2.5GbE Ethernet connection, along with Intel Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and 5G platform capabilities.
Embedded, industrial, and communication
The x7000RE series consists of four SKUs, all suitable for embedded, industrial, and communication use under extended temperature conditions. The x7211RE and x7213RE have 2 cores and relatively lower base frequencies, while the x7433RE has 4 cores, and the x7835RE has 8 cores with higher base frequencies.
All four SKUs support a GPU execution unit count of either 16 or 32, and Intel’s Time Coordinated Computing and Time-Sensitive Networking GbE features. The x7000RE offer integrated Intel UHD Graphics, Intel DL Boost, Intel AVX2 with INT8 support, and OpenVINO toolkit support.
Intel says the chips will allow customers to easily deploy deep learning inference at the industrial edge and in smart cities, and “enhance computer vision solutions with built-in AI capabilities and ecosystem-enabled camera modules” as well as “capture power- and cost-efficient performance to enable latency-bounded workloads in robotics and automation.”
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A newly-discovered, Microsoft-branded SSD suggests the tech giant may be – or has been at least – exploring new ways to optimize its data center storage.
The leaked images of a Microsoft Z1000 SSD show a 1TB NVMe M.2 drive, apparently boasting sequential read speeds of up to 2,400MB/s and write speeds of 1,800MB/s.
The Z1000 SSD, originally revealed by @yuuki_ans on X, is made up of a mix of components from various companies, including Toshiba NAND flash chips, Micron’s DDR4 RAM cache, and a controller from CNEX Labs, a company best known for its work with data center hyperscalers.
(Image credit: @yuuki_ans on X)
Up to 4TB capacity
Back in 2018, CNEX Labs closed a $23 million Series D funding round led by Dell Technologies Capital which also included Microsoft’s venture fund M12. This money was partially used to fund a proprietary, advanced CNX-2670 controller that delivered 550,000 IOPS, a 25% performance increase over previously available M.2 form-factor SSDs at the time. The CNEX Labs controller in the leaked photos is CNX-2670AA-0821.
The SSD has a capacity of 960GB made up of four 256GB Toshiba BiCS4 96-layer eTLC chips and features a 1GB DDR4 RAM cache made by Micron to boost performance.
The leaked “engineering sample”, produced on May 18, 2020 when much of the world was in Covid lockdowns, suggests the drive is part of a broader portfolio of SSD models. Its design allows for the addition of more DRAM and capacitors, hinting at larger versions.
As Tom’s Hardware notes “several unused solder pads are on both sides of the PCB, presumably for additional capacitors. This implies that there may be larger versions of the Z1000 with 2TB and perhaps even 4TB of room, given that more capacity would require more DRAM and capacitors to ensure data protection.”
This isn’t the first time Microsoft has experimented with hardware design for its data centers, having recently revealed its own-brand silicon hardware in order to help further the development and use of AI in businesses.
We’re approaching that time of the year that everyone dreads – the switch to Daylight Savings Time and the loss of a precious hour in bed that comes with it – and naturally people are asking whether it’s time to ditch daylight savings.
As my learned colleague explains in the article linked above, there’s a whole stack of evidence to suggest that changing the clocks back and forth every year is a truly terrible idea, and the people seem to agree with the experts, with most in favor of sticking to a year-round standard time.
Sounds like a done deal, right? Sadly I’m here to tell you why it’s not going to happen. At least, not any time soon.
Permanent DST in the USA
Here’s the thing: the USA has already tried shifting to permanent DST, and it didn’t work out so well. Back in January 1974, President Richard Nixon enacted year-round DST as a two-year energy-saving experiment in response to the 1973 oil crisis. It was a popular move at first, with 79 per cent of Americans supporting it when surveyed in December 1973.
It didn’t take very long for the public mood to change, however; by February 1974 only 42 per cent were still in favor of the switch. The main reason? The increased danger of traffic accidents involving children going to school on dark winter mornings. The two-year experiment only lasted until October 1974, when the clocks went back as usual.
British Standard Time
The same concerns brought about the end of a similar experiment in the UK a few years earlier. Between 1968 and 1971 the British government introduced British Standard Time, time-shifting the whole country to DST all year round. The move resulted in an increase in road casualties in the morning, but it also transpired that there was a much greater decrease in evening road casualties. This decrease was skewed, however, by the introduction of new laws on drink-driving around the same time.
Ultimately it was the small increase in children getting injured on their way to school that led to the end of this experiment. However, the switch to darker winter mornings also made life harder for farmers and other workers who relied more on daylight to do their jobs effectively.
(Image credit: Getty Images)
Despite this, even in mid-winter half of the population was in favor of remaining on BST; that said, in Scotland 61 per cent wanted to go back to GMT. And this raises an important point: how hard you’re hit by permanent DST depends on just how far north (or south) you are.
For people in the north of Scotland during the British Standard Time experiment, in the middle of winter the sun wasn’t rising until 10am, which is a horribly late start to the day. Where I live in the West of England, the sunrise would have been 9.15am, and I don’t think having an extra hour of daylight while at work would have been much of a compensation.
And I have to say, in the US you have it pretty easy by comparison (except perhaps in Alaska. Sorry, Alaska), because you’re a lot further south. Even then, you’d still be looking at kids having to walk to school on dark winter mornings in most states (even Florida), and even if the overall result was fewer road accidents in total, an uptick in accidents involving children because of a switch to permanent DST would be a hard pill to swallow.
Keep changing the clocks
Obviously I’m talking about switches to DST here, while many are arguing instead for a move to standard time year-round. That has its own drawbacks, though: the sun setting earlier, meaning winter evenings are as dark and long as ever, and rising earlier in the mornings, which would mean a much greater need for blackout curtains in the summer months.
An eventual switch to permanent DST or standard time isn’t an impossibility – more of the world has abandoned it than currently uses it, and there’s a whole swathe of equatorial countries that have never had the need for DST – but the potential risks involved in switching mean that despite the clear benefits, there’s not much appetite for actually doing it.
(Image credit: Getty/pcess609)
Numerous states have voted in favor of permanent DST, but switching hinges on Congress changing federal law to allow them to do this. However while the Sunshine Protection Act for permanent DST passed the Senate in 2022, it failed in the House; it was reintroduced in 2023 but hasn’t made any progress. And it doesn’t help that while there’s a definite mood for a single year-round time, there’s disagreement over whether that time should be daylight savings or standard time, which is proving to be a major hurdle for the Sunshine Protection Act. Ultimately it’s a lot easier to muddle along with what we have, than to effect a change that’ll be unpopular with some.
