Jawed’s Blog

On April 29, 2006, Pakistan/China had the first test flight of its FC-4 jet fighter. The FC4 is an advanced model of the FC1, which is already being built in cooperation with China. The 13 ton FC1 is also known as the JF17, and is meant to be a low cost ($20 million) alternative to the American F16. The JF17 is considered the equal to earlier versions of the F16, but only 80 percent as effective as more recent F16 models. The JF17 uses the same Russian engine, the RD-93, that is used in the MiG29. The JF17 design is based on a cancelled Russian project, the MiG33. Most of the JF17 electronics are Western, with Italian firms being major suppliers. The JF17 can carry 3.6 tons of weapons and use radar guided and heat seeking missiles. It has max speed of Mach 1.6, an operating range of 1,300 kilometers and a max altitude of 55,000 feet.

The JF17 first flew in 2003, and Pakistani test pilots are now participating in further flight tests. The aircraft is expected to enter service in 2006, but this may be delayed by problems a new engine China is trying to build for the JF-17. Pakistan plans on buying 150 of the JF17s. The Chinese air force does not want to buy the JF17s because so much of the production is outside the country (in Pakistan).

The FC4, with engine, airframe and electronics improvements, is expected to build on the success of the FC1/JF17. The Chinese air force is supposed to get 200 FC4s, if the aircraft gets through development successfully. China is using aircraft like the FC1 to build a warplane development capability. Mistakes are made, but key skills are gained.

The 13 year old name in the PC arena, Pentium is finally bidding farewell as Intel shifts to new nomenclature for its next generation dual-core processors. The step is also being seen as an effort to stop company’s ever eroding market share to its nearest competitor, AMD.

The new processors, named “Core 2 Duo” are expected to hit stores in a few months. The new name will be used for desktop processors based on the “Conroe” chips and for notebook processors based on the “Merom” chip. The two processors would be similar in performance, and power consumption will be the only thing putting them apart, with Conroe chips consuming more power.

The two chips were introduced last year, and the new versions are expected to be launched in a couple of months. The company which boasts of 80% market share in the pc arena, is worried about its competitor, AMD which has been eating into its market share and has come a long way from an unknown name in the industry to gaining a respectable 20 percent market share.

AMD made major inroads into in the year gone by with its Opteron and Athlon range of processors. For the first time Intel has incorporated power consumption into its model numbers. For example, the Core 2 Duo E6800 processor would represent a dual-core Core-architecture processor that consumes between 55 watts and 75 watts of power. Merom and Conroe are both based on 65nm process designs with shared L2 cache and aggressive power management. Conroe and Merom will both be backwards compatible with recently manufactured desktop and mobile motherboards.

Over the last year Intel has put increasing emphasis on its platform brands, such as Centrino for notebooks, Viiv for entertainment PCs and vPro for business PCs. But the company will continue to emphasize the individual processor brands, Intel spokesman, Kircos said. “I think you’ll see equal amounts of marketing around the processor and platform brands,” he added.

Intel executives said in March the Conroe will deliver 40 percent better performance and consume 40 percent less power. During the past few years, power efficiency has emerged as a key selling point, as the costs of powering computers and keeping them cool have grown.

According to sources, mobile chip, Meron will be offered as T5000 (2 MB L2 cache) and T7000 (4 MB L2 cache) series, while Conroe will be named E4000 (FSB800) and E6000 (FSB1066) series. The letters in the sequence number indicate the thermal design power (TDP) of the processor: “T” is used for a range of 25 to 49 watts and “E” for 50 watts or greater.