Powercolor teases another custom HD 7970

Most probably PCS+ series

In addition to the recently pixellized Powercolor HD 7970 Vortex that we wrote about here, it appears that Powercolor is preparing yet another custom HD 7970 card that will most likely end up to be a part of the PCS+ series

Due to the angle of the photo there is not much to say about the card but the cooler looks a lot like the one previously seen on the HD 7950 PCS+ card except for what appears to be a bit beefier heatpipes. It is a dual slot cooler with two fans and what appears to be three heatpipes

Of course, Powercolor recently showed both the Vortex Edition as well as its liquid cooled HD 7970 LCS card that are yet to appear in retail/e-tail. To be fair, custom cooled HD 7970 are currently quite rare, except for XFX's dual-fan cards. Asus has two cards that are listed but still not available and it is same situation with Gigabyte's triple-fan Windforce HD 7970.

 

Firefox hits version 11

Beta of course

 

Mozilla’s Firefox browser is drawing closer to version 11, as the company launched the beta version for the masses to test. As usual, the browser comes with support for Windows, Mac and Linux

The beta brings capability for migrating Chrome settings, synchronizing add/ons across computers, some CSS and HTML5 properties, etc. Firefox webpage shows that there are already some known unresolved issues, but there should be some more once the general public  jumps aboard and investigates

You can download Firefox 11 beta here

Asus rolls out Radeon HD 7970 DirectCU II TOP

Triple-slot card overclocked to 1GHz

Although it was pixellized and detailed over two weeks ago, Asus has now officially launched its Radeon HD 7970 DirectCU TOP graphics card. Featuring a high factory overclock and a massive triple-slot cooler, the new card also packs a custom PCB that should provide aditional overclocking potential

As noted, the new Asus HD 7970 DirectCU II TOP feautres DIGI+ VRM with 12-phase power design with digital voltage regulators and wider voltage modulation range that should improve overall stability. It also features Asus Super Alloy Power formulation that reinforces capacitors, chokes and MOSFETs for higher heat tolerance and stress resistance. The card also packs voltage measure points, Easy DIY overvolting with VGA Hotwire and GPU Tweak utility

As far as the specs go, you are still looking at Tahiti GPU packing 2048 stream processors packed in 32 GCN Compute Units. The card is factory overclocked to 1000MHz for the GPU while 3GB of GDDR5 memory paired up with a 384-bit memory interface ticks at 1400MHz (5.6GHz GDDR5 effective). The most interesting part of the new Asus HD 7970 DirectCU II TOP is probably the triple-slot dual-fan cooler that packs two 100mm fans. These two fans cool a huge aluminum heatsink that features six copper heatpipes that are in direct contact with the GPU

The new HD 7970 DirectCU II graphics card should be available pretty soon with a price set at somewhere around US $600. Asus also noted that it has paired up the same cooler with the recently relesed HD 7950 graphics card that should be available pretty soon
 







 

Powercolor shows its water-cooled HD 7970

Powercolor LCS HD 7970

Staying true to its lineup, Powercolor has released a picture of its upcoming water cooled Radeon HD 7970, the LCS (Liquid Cooling System) HD 7970. Featuring a single slot full cover water block, the LCS series always had its share of the market

As expected, the card packs 2048 stream processors and comes with 3GB of GDDR5 memory paired up with a 384-bit memory interface. The water block comes from EK Waterblocks and has been the block of choice for all Powercolor LCS series graphics cards. Judging by the previous graphics cards in Powercolor LCS series, we expect this one to have a slight factory overclock as well, with an impressive overclocking potential that, of course, depends on the rest of the water cooling components

Unfortunately, the price or the precise clocks haven't been released, but the card should show up sometimes soon

 

Nanoxia to hit Europe soon

Web page is still offline but products are available - silent fans

Although we didn't hear about Nanoxia lately, two days ago we heard news of its new FX EVO series fans. The company's web portal is not active as of yet (it should be in February), but the fans are already selling. PC-Cooling.de has listed the entire series of seven FX EVO fans, among which are five 120mm and two 140mm fans

All the fans boast a 10 year warranty, with pricing ranging from €13-16. The fans also come with performance enhancing techs such as ECO traction, nano technology bearing, high-end polycarbonat makrolon, balanced rotors and precise scaling of speeds via Intelligent Fan Control. Three 120mm fans from the FX EVO series can, for instance, run at ca.300-1,000 RPM, 395-1,300RPM or 630-1,600RPM. The fans will run after restarting the system, regardless of whether the fan remained at the lowest RPM, i.e. voltage of less than 4V. The impellers can be removed and washed

Five out of the seven listed fans feature “Intelligent Fan Control”, which is a manual RPM regulator that allows for speeds from 3.5V to 12V. Two fans are PWM regulated and come with 4-pin connectors. The PWM controlled fans run in the same power window, although Note their RPM changes linearly, which prevents sudden RPM changes

FX EVO 120mm IFC-1000 RPM

FX EVO 120mm PWM 1000 RPM

FX EVO 120mm IFC-1300 RPM

FX EVO 120mm IFC-1600 RPM

FX EVO 120mm PWM 1500 RPM

FX EVO 140mm IFC-1000 RPM

FX EVO 140mm IFC-1500 RPM

Apart from the new series, Nanoxia now offers a large choice of sleeved modular cables.

Progress made on GTA V development

Take-Two confirms no release date yet

During Take-Two’s financial call the company confirmed that Grand Theft Auto V was “…making great progress” in development, but the company was still far from “determining a window of release.” This news isn’t going to make GTA V fans happy

The analysts that we have spoken with seem to agree with our analysis that GTA V will most likely arrive during Take-Two’s upcoming fiscal year, which ends on March 31st, 2013. Still, knowing that most analysts are speculating about this, Take-Two has remained eerily quiet, which just adds to the mystery

During the call, Take-Two revealed no specifics about GTA V beyond saying that the game …promises to continue Rockstar’s track record of delighting fans and raising the bar in interactive entertainment

AMD cancels 10-core and 20-core Bulldozer CPUs

Terramar and Sepang cut from lineup

 

Beginning sometime later this year, Advanced Micro Devices was expected to launch its 10-core and 20-core Opteron server processors, codenamed Sepang and Terramar, respectively. According to its latest plans, however, the chip giant has decided to cancel these multi-core server chips and will keep its existing server platform for 2012 - 2013 server refreshes

AMD had previously planned to release its 32nm SOI-based Sepang and Terramar chips along with new G2012 and C2012 server platforms this year, both based on next-generation Bulldozer architecture. The platforms, aimed at dual-socket and quad-socket servers, were designed to introduce PCI-Express 3.0 support to the enterprise industry along with triple-channel memory support for 2P server chips

The company has instead decided to keep the existing server platform for its 2012 - 2013 server refreshes, which means that AMD-based servers over the next year and a half product cycle will lack PCI-Express 3.0 slots and triple-memory channel support



AMD's 2012 - 2013 Server Roadmap

When asked why the architectural roadmap changes were made, AMD decided to keep its lips closed regarding particular details. The company has instead claimed that the new lineup "delivers better performance." However, we think the situtation may be due to the fact that 32nm Silicon-On-Insulator process technology is infamously difficult to manufacture without setbacks in the number of good wafer yields that can be produced for server-grade performance and scaling

Razer's Blade gaming laptop sells like hotcakes

US $2,800 is peanuts

Razer's US $2,800 17-inch gaming laptop has been in the news for quite some time and although everyone was sure that this expensive laptop would sell, no-one expected such demand, probably not even Razer

According to post over at Razor's Facebook page, the Blade is experiencing "overwhelming demand" and the first batch was sold in 30 minutes. In case you missed it, the Razer Blade is a 17.3-inch 1920x1080 notebook based on Intel's HM65 chipest, Core i7 2.8GHz CPU, Nvidia's Geforce GT555M GPU, 256GB of SSD storage and Razer unique Switchblade user interface that is actually an LCD touch panel that adapts to various games

Unfortunately, Razer didn't shed any details regarding the size of the firts wave but has promised that it should be back in stock by mid February

You can check out the post here

 

Foxconn to start building smartphones, tablets in Brazil

Terry Gilliam in charge of human resources 

Foxconn is ready to kick off production of smartphones and tablets in a new plant in Manuas, Brazil

The company first started eyeing Brazil in 2002 and it is hoped the investments will help keep costs down, as labor costs in China are on the rise. Brazil is slowly emerging as a major economic power on the world stage and it also represents a rather interesting consumer market in the long run

Some rumours that Foxconn could also set up panel plants in Brazil have not been confirmed. Digitimes claims the company has yet to make a firm decision

More here

Nvidia Geforce 295.51 Beta drivers released

Great news for Geforce GTX 590 owners

 

Nvidia has recently released new Geforce 295.51 Beta drivers, the first beta release from the R295 family of drivers

The Geforce 260.52 Beta driver is dated Sunday, January 26, 2012 and includes support for Geforce 6, 7, 8, 9, 100, 200, 300, 400 and 500 Series desktop cards. It also comes bundled with new PhysX 9.11.1111 and HD Audio 1.3.12.0 software updates



The great news for Geforce GTX 590 dual-GPU owners is that this beta driver finally fixes the issue where the card's fan unnecessarily increases to 100-percent during idle desktop use. We have personally noted this to be a disturbing annoyance with two Geforce GTX 590s in Quad-SLI, where simply opening a YouTube 720P video alongside a couple new Web browsing tabs would put the fan into shock at 100-percent without proper justification

Nevertheless, this beta driver release also fixes instances of driver timeouts while simultaneously watching multiple videos. Of the many enhancements listed, it also adds new "Edit / Delete" context menu options in Nvidia Control Panel for setting custom resolutions

In regards to SLI profiles, Gefore 295.51 Beta now provides support for Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning (2012), Mass Effect 3 (March 2012), 7554 (December 2011), Oil Rush (January 2012) and Red Faction: Armageddon   June 2011

Nvidia Geforce 295.51 Beta Release Notes can be found here, and the drivers can be downloaded below

Geforce 295.51 Beta (Windows 7 / Vista 64-bit)

Geforce 295.51 Beta (Windows 7 / Vista 32-bit)

Geforce 295.51 Beta (Windows XP 64-bit)

Geforce 295.51 Beta (Windows XP 32-bit)

Powercolor launches two HD 7950 graphics cards

PCS+ HD 7950 performs admirably

Following the official launch date, Powercolor has also rolled out two new Radeon HD 7950 graphics cards, the plain one and the PCS+ HD 7950 factory overclocked one with an impressive custom cooler

Spec wise, both cards feature 1792 stream processors or 28 GCN compute units and come with 3GB of GDDR5 memory paired up with a 384-bit memory interface. The plain one works at AMD reference 800MHz GPU and 1250MHz (5GHz GDDR5) memory clocks while the PCS+ version ended up overclocked at 880MHz for the GPU while memory remained at reference 1250MHz

Unlike the plain HD 7950 that uses a single center placed fan, the PCS+ HD 7950 features two 92mm fans that cool a large heatsink connected to the GPU copper base via three 8mm heatpipes. It looks like that Powercolor has improved its PCS cooler and this one, according to what we've seen in some reviews, really performs well in both noise and cooling department

Both cards are already available, and currently Powercolor's plain HD 7950 is already available at Germany retailer/e-tailer Mindfactory.de with a price set at €399, which makes it one of the cheapest HD 7950 cards around. The same retailer/e-tailer lists the PCS+ version with a price tag of €438,95.

 

MSI comes up with its own HD 7950 graphics cards

A total of four cards

Like every other AMD partner, MSI has followed up on the AMD Radeon HD 7950 launched date with a total of four different cards, two based on a reference cooler with center placed fan and two with their quite well known Twin Frozr III dual fan cooler

The two reference cooled card will be known as the R7950-2PMD3GD5 and the R7950-2PMD3GD5/OC. As you would have guessed, first one will stick to reference 800MHz for the GPU and 1250MHz for 3GB of GDDR5 memory while the second one has a slightly overclocked GPU to 830MHz

The more interesting duo are the MSI R7950 Twin Frozr 3GD5 and the R7950 Twin Frozr 3GD5/OC and as you can guess from the name, both feature MSI's quite well known Twin Frozr III cooler as well as Military Class III components. We already seen the Twin Frozr III in action and MSI is saying that this one should keep these cards 10? cooler and 13.7dB quieter when compared to the reference design. Of course, the OC version ended up factory overclocked to 880MHz for the GPU while the same 3GB of GDDR5 memory ticks at slightly higher 1300MHz   5.2GHz GDDR5 effective

All four cards should be already available in retail/e-tail all around the globe

 

Sapphire launches two HD 7950 cards

Dual-fan OC version

Although they were aldready detailed earlier this month, Sapphire has now officially announced its two versions of the new Radeon HD 7950 card. The base model will feature a single fan while the OC version will end up with a much beefier dual fan cooler

As far as the specs go, both models will pack 1792 stream processors packed in 28 GCN compute units and 3GB of GDDR5 memory paired up with a 384-bit memory interface. The base model ends up working at AMD's reference clocks of 800MHz for the GPU and 1250MHz (5GHz) for memory. The OC version on the other hand got boosted to 900MHz for the GPU although memory remained at reference 1250MHz

The Dual-X cooler on the OC version packs two fans that cool a rather hefty heatsink connected to the copper baseplate via five copper heatpipes

Both cards are already available with a suggested price tag of US $449 for the base version and US $479 for the OC one

Today is AMD HD 7950 day

 

Roundup: GTX 580 killer

AMD has finally released its latest AMD Radeon graphics card based on the Tahiti Pro GPU and AMD's new 28nm GCN architecture. By the looks of it and first reviewes, it looks like partners will have no trouble in selling the HD 7950 as it practically renders Nvidia's offering obsolete and uncompetitive

As far as the specs go, the new HD 7950 is based on the 28nm Tahiti Pro GPU that feature 1792 stream processors, 112 TMUs and 32 ROPs, or simply it has 28 GCN compute units (out of total 32 on the Radeon HD 7970 Tahiti XT GPU). The card packs 3GB of GDDR5 memory paired up with 384-bit memory interface. The reference clock for the GPU is set at 800MHz while memory ended up at 1250MHz 5GHz GDDR5 effective

Due to the somewhat lower specs, the card draws less power and thus ends up with two 6-pin PCI-Express power connectors, rather than 8+6-pin found on the HD 7970. The only drawback is the actual price, but due to current situation on the market and lack of competition, we must note that the card is priced according to its performance

When compared to the GTX 580, the HD 7950 ends up on par and even faster in some cases but at a bit lower price, since the GTX 580 is selling at around US $500 while the suggested price tag for the HD 7950 is set at US $449.

According to reviews around the net and our own for that matter, the HD 7950 sounds like a good deal, especially considering the fact that AMD gave a green light to its partners for non-reference cards. The card still overclocks pretty good and is enough for 1080p high-settings gaming

You can check out our review here and found some of the others below

 Anandtech.com
 Techpowerup.com
 Neoseeker.com
 Tweaktown.com
 Hardwaresecrets.com
 Hothardware.com
 Hardwarecanucks.com

MSI spills the beans on Radeon launch schedule

Pitcairn coming in March, Cape Verde in two weeks

AMD is extending its lead over Nvidia with the launch of the HD 7950, the cheaper incarnation of AMD’s Tahiti card. The HD 7950 seems like a very competitive part and it will end up with a much more attractive price tag than the HD 7970.

However, users who are not willing or able to spend €400+ on a graphics card won’t have to wait much longer for AMD’s next generation mainstream and performance cards. According to a launch schedule leaked by MSI, Cape Verde HD 77x0 cards are coming on February 15, in roughly two weeks time. Both will end up with 1GB of RAM and they will run at 900MHz. The HD 7770 will feature 896 stream processors and 56 texture units, while the HD 7750 will boast 832 stream processors and 52 texture units. Both are competitively priced at $149 and $139 respectively

The sweet spot for most users will be mid range Pitcairn cards, which are set to debut sometime in March. The HD 7870 is said to feature 1280 stream processors, while the HD 7850 packs 1408 units. They will feature 88 and 80 texture units respectively and the clocks should be similar to Cape Verde cards

The prices? Well the HD 7870 will sell for $299, while the HD 7850 should cost $50 less, which sounds like a fair deal

More here

Windows 8 ARM Edition seeding to developers soon

February 2012

 

Microsoft's upcoming Windows 8 operating system for the ARM instruction set architecture has now reached a stable build and is ready to be seeded to developers very soon, according to an anonymous source close to CNET

One of the sources has claimed that Windows 8 on ARM (or Windows 8 ARM Edition as we call it) should be seeded to developers in February 2012, adding that the latest compiled Windows 8 build is more than stable enough for ARM-based devices. We believe this news coincides with our recent report that the operating system has entered its final "Pre-Beta" stage and was scheduled to be demonstrated at an internal Microsoft Preview on Monday, January 30th, which is probably where this anonymous source is reporting from

"We haven't heard this directly from Microsoft, but we've heard this from the hardware partners that [Microsoft] is working with. We've been promised something in the February time frame," the person said

Economically speaking, Windows on ARM is expected to be one of the most cost-efficient patforms available in 2012. Several sources have already reported from CES earlier this month that top-tier PC suppliers will be releasing ARM and Intel-based devices with near-identical specs save for their underlying architectures, and that the ARM models will be priced hundreds of dollars less than their Intel counterparts. We have no problem accepting this speculation, seeing that Microsoft's "Windows on ARM" announcement last year during CES 2011 was probably one of the most significant industry announcements to define the next decade

New Xbox and PlayStation coming in 2013 at the earliest

We don’t have to upgrade, they think

The original plan to launch new consoles was to have new Xbox and PlayStation in 2010 but since 2008 was such a wonderful year for the global economy, Sony and Microsoft had to revise their plans to launch new hardware that soon

At that time they pushed the update to 2012 timeframe but Xbox Kinect and partially Sony Move gave these rather old consoles a new breath of life. The sales spiked and pushed the update another few quarters. The timeframe for new consoles we are hearing today is 2013.

We already wrote that both Sony and Microsoft have chosen AMD for its graphics but our sources close to Nvidia are claiming that nothing has been decided yet and that it can change in the blink of an eye. It has happened before, the companies have changed their mind on chipset providers in the past, but so far it seems AMD has won this round
 
Many factors will play a big role and price of a chip will be a massive decision maker. AMD and Nvidia don’t make much money from consoles, but it is good to have many games developed for a console that has your chip. This can make porting to PC much easier, and obviously plays a big role.

So, according to many industry insider sources we talked in the last few weeks, the next generation PlayStation and Xbox won’t be coming this year

Cooler Master rolls out CM 690 II Advanced B&W Edition case

The CM 690 II Advanced with a color twist

Cooler Master has updated its CM 690 II Advanced case with a new edition, the CM 690 II Advanced Black & White Edition. Although it is basically the good old CM 690 II Advanced with a different color scheme, the new Black & White Edition also features a couple of updates seen on recently released cases

The main updates, in addition to the obvious white with black front mesh, top and back, color scheme, are the support for two USB 3.0 internal port (also available on CM 690 II Advanced USB 3.0 edition), larger CPU heatsink cut-out on the mainboard tray for easier CPU cooler mounting, enlarged front and top mesh design for superb ventilation as well as support for dual 120mm watercooling radiatior at the top and bottom

The new Black & White Edition also brings dust-control filters for all meshed areas, support for up to 10 fans, external SATA docking station aka. X-Dock, 1.8"/2.5" HDD and SSD adapter, and rubber grommets for improved cable management

The case does look good as it updates the already decent CM 690 II Advanced and has a rather unique color scheme. Unfortunately, this one is scheduled for launch sometimes in March for around €100/US $130, so we guess that we'll see it at Cebit inall its glory

Desktop Ivy Bridge 22nm to launch in April

Week 14, April 1 to 7th, quad core only

The date is still not final, but we have a launch week now. If all goes as planned, Intel plans to simultaneously launch mobile and desktop Ivy Bridge in Week 14. The launch should take place from April 1st till April 7th, at least this is the current plan that Intel shared with a few partners

On the desktop side, Intel again starts with quad-core parts, following up with dual-core Ivy Bridge 22nm CPUs a month later. The current launch schedule includes Intel Core i7-3770K, i7-3770, i7-3770S, i7-3770T, i5- 3570K, i5-3550, i5-3550S, i5-3570T, i5-3450 and i5-3450S Processors. As you can see there are no Core i3 3000 series planned for the initial launch but the Core i7 and Core i5 3000 series will launch simultaneously with Z77, Z75, H77 and B75 (business) chipsets, previously known as Panther Point

This will put some additional pressure on AMD FX and A8 Llano processors as well as on soon to launch Trinity quad cores. Ivy Bridge was definitely delayed by at least a whole quarter, but it will still be the first 22nm architecture, starting as of April

XFX HD 7950 listed in Germany

Pixellized, €419

AMD’s new HD 7950 is just a few days away and eager retailers are already jumping the gun with early listings

German e-tailer Atelco is listing an XFX reference card, dubbed XFX Core Radeon HD 7950. The card runs at stock clocks, 800MHz GPU, 1250MHz memory and it packs 3GB of DDR5 memory.

The price is in line with expectations and the HD 7950 should offer somewhat better value for money than the HD 7970.

You can check out the listing here, unless it’s pulled in the meantime. Also, if you can't see the photo, blame it on our server guys

Gigabyte HD 7950 up for pre-order

Spotted for $481.58

Gigabyte appear to be the first outfit to get AMD's  HD 7950 into the shops, or at least to pre-order. The Gigabyte branded HD 7950 has been seen on PROVANTAGE, where it's been spotted at a price of $481.58.

The HD7950 is really for those who want a 7970 but can't afford the $500+ price tag, although at that price we would have thought that money was no object anyway. The specs provided are fairly limited. Just the line "HD 7950 3072MB DDR5 384BIT PCI Express DVI" which means you would really have to know all about the HD 7950 to want to pre-order it and we are guessing it is a reference card

Enthusiasm might not be such a good thing.  We suspect that once the beast hits the shops the HD 7950 will end closer to the $400 mark

AMD rolls out Catalyst 12.1 driver

Some AMD HD3D enhancements

Sticking to its driver release schedule, AMD rolled out its Catalyst 12.1 WHQL driver pack that supports all desktop and mobile Radeon HD cards since HD 2000 series as well as its Radeon 3000 and 4000 chipsets. The new Catalyst 12.1 driver brings a rather modest update list mostly focused around AMD's HD3D

The list of improvements start with the aforementioned AMD HD3D technology that now includes support for AMD HD3D with AMD CrossfireX configurations and brings a new Stereo 3D mode over HDMI 1.4a connections with support for 1080p at 30Hz. The new driver also brings applications profiles included in the Catalyst Control Center/Vision Engine Control Center that were already available with the previously released AMD Catalyst 12.1 Preview driver as well as Video UI improvements that include adjustmenet of video color and video quality controls

In addition to the new improvements, the new Catalyst 12.1 WHQL also resolves some of the issues under Windows 7 OS that include games like Dirt 2, Crysis 2, Lost Planet 2, RAGE, World of Warcraft and Tom Clancy HAWX2.

You can check out the full release notes here and the driver pack can be downloaded here

Windows 8 enters final pre-beta stage

Internal Microsoft preview on January 30th

 

Microsoft Windows developer build tracking site Winunleaked.tk has recently updated its Windows 8 build number page, documenting the milestones Microsoft developers have been achieving in the compilation of the Windows 8 operating system. According to the latest numbers, it appears that the company has just released the final pre-beta build, marking another significant milestone in the release cycle of the operating system

The site claims Microsoft's own testers will then vote on which of the next Windows 8 builds will become the "Final Beta," with a voting decision being made on Saturday, January 28th. The final beta build will then be shown at an internal Microsoft preview on Monday, January 30th

The official pre-beta build number is 8189.0.winmain.120120-1830, and according to the site, the next builds for Windows 8 will be labeled as "Beta Escrow" builds. Additionally, the operating system roadmap claims that the "Final Beta" build to be released to the public will be named "winmain_win8b1." For those enthusiasts patiently awaiting the public release, this is the string to search for on Google when the opportunity presents itself

Logitech announces ultraportable Cube Mouse

Hybrid mouse-pointer the size of a small battery

 

During CES 2012, there was one manufacturer's booth we had anticipated to experience but never had the opportunity during the hustle and bustle of the convention. That manufacturer is Logitech, and it appears that the company has announced a particularly interesting hybrid mouse-pointer device for notebooks, tablets and other ultraportable computing devices

On first glance, Logitech's Cube Mouse takes on a particularly unusual shape that marks a radical departure from its traditional lineup of ergonomically crafted products with curved edges and aesthetically pleasing contours. We can't seem to refrain from noticing, but the device takes on more or a rectangular shape than a square shape and probably should have been named the Logitech Rectangle. Regardless, it has been designed specifically for dedicated road workers who constantly desire ultraportability from their presentation setup and hardly use a dedicated mouse for long hours. According to the press release, Logitech states that the device "offers everything consumers want in a mouse and effortlessly becomes a presenter when needed



We journalists at Fudzilla believe the device could be particularly useful when coupled with an ultrabook or similar lightweight form-factor mobile computing device. For instance, the Cube Mouse could be inserted into your non-smartphone pocket right next to your keys and would be small enough to carry around all day without becoming uncomfortable on the go. Logitech has stated that the device is roughly the size of one AA battery, which makes it perfectly ideal for pocket-sized transportation without the need of a carry-on bag

In terms of scrolling smoothness, Logitech has stated that its Flow Scroll software delivers "a smooth scrolling experience similar to your favorite touchscreen smartphone." We will report back on the accuracy of this statement when we can get some hands-on time with the device.

Nevertheless, the mouse comes bundled with a 2.4GHz Logitech Unifying USB receiver for connectivity to any USB-ready computing device with a small-enough form factor to stay plugged into a netbook, notebook or tablet without having to be removed from the device for transportation

Logitech's Cube Mouse will be available at the end of January 2012 in both the United States and Europe with an estimated MSRP of $69.99 when it launches