NOAA Super Computer Goes Live

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has rolled out two new supercomputers that are expected to improve weather forecasts and perhaps help better prepare us for hurricanes.

The two IBM systems, which are identical clones, will be used by NOAA’s National Weather Service to produce forecast data that’s used in the U.S. and around the world.

One of the supercomputers is in Reston, Va.; the other is in Orlando. The NWS can switch between the two in about six minutes.

Each is a 213-teraflop system running a Linux operating system on Intel processors. The federal government is paying about $20 million a year to operate the leased systems.

“These are the systems that are the origin of all the weather forecasts you see,” said Ben Kyger, director of central operations at the National Centers for Environmental Prediction.

NOAA had previously used identical four-year-old 74-teraflop IBM supercomputers that ran on IBM’s AIX operating system and Power 6 chips.

Before it could activate the new systems, the NWS had to ensure that they produced scientifically accurate results. It had been running the old and new systems in parallel for months, comparing their output.

The NWS has a new hurricane model, which is 15% more accurate in day five of a forecast for a storm’s track and intensity. That model is now operational and running on the new systems. That’s important, because the U.S. is expecting a busy hurricane season.

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IBM Still Talking Up SyNAPSE

IBM has unveiled the latest stage in its plans to generate a computer system that copies the human brain, calculating tasks that are relatively easy for humans but difficult for computers.

As part of the firm’s Systems of Neuromorphic Adaptive Plastic Scalable Electronics (SyNAPSE) project, IBM researchers have been working with Cornell University and Inilabs to create the programming language with $53m in funding from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).

First unveiled two years ago this month, the technology – which mimics both the size and power of humanity’s most complex organ – looks to solve the problems created by traditional computing models when handling vast amounts of high speed data.

IBM explained the new programming language, perhaps not in layman’s terms, by saying it “breaks the mould of sequential operation underlying today’s von Neumann architectures and computers” and instead “is tailored for a new class of distributed, highly interconnected, asynchronous, parallel, large-scale cognitive computing architectures”.

That, in English, basically means that it could be used to create next generation intelligent sensor networks that are capable of perception, action and cognition, the sorts of mental processes that humans take for granted and perform with ease.

Dr Dharmendra Modha, who heads the programme at IBM Research, expanded on what this might mean for the future, sayng that the time has come to move forward into the next stage of information technology.

“Today, we’re at another turning point in the history of information technology. The era that Backus and his contemporaries helped create, the programmable computing era, is being superseded by the era of cognitive computing.

“Increasingly, computers will gather huge quantities of data, reason over the data, and learn from their interactions with information and people. These new capabilities will help us penetrate complexity and make better decisions about everything from how to manage cities to how to solve confounding business problems.”

The hardware for IBM’s cognitive computers mimic the brain, as they are built around small “neurosynaptic cores”. The cores are modeled on the brain, and feature 256 “neurons” (processors), 256 “axons” (memory) and 64,000 “synapses” (communications between neurons and axons).

IBM suggested that potential uses for this technology could include a pair of glasses which assist the visually impaired when navigating through potentially hazardous environments. Taking in vast amounts of visual and sound data, the augmented reality glasses would highlight obstacles such as kerbs and cars, and steer the user clear of danger.

Other uses could include intelligent microphones that keep track of who is speaking to create an accurate transcript of any conversation.

In the long term, IBM hopes to build a cognitive computer scaled to 100 trillion synapses. This would fit inside a space with a volume of no more than two litres while consuming less than one kilowatt of power.

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Are Russian Hackers Exploiting Android?

Russian mobile malware factories are working with thousands of affiliates to exploit Android users, a security company has claimed.

According to Lookout Mobile Security the system is so efficient that almost a third of all mobile malware is made by just 10 organisations operating out of Russia. These “malware HQs” are pumping out nasty toll fraud apps, largely aimed at Android users, which force the user to call premium rate numbers the report said.

Thousands of affiliate marketers are also profiting from the scheme and helping spread the malware by setting up websites designed to trick users into downloading seemingly legitimate apps. Affiliates can make up to $12,000 a month and are heavy users of Twitter.

The report’s release at the DEF CON 21 conference in Las Vegas indicated that Lookout Mobile Security are working with the spooks to bring the crooks down. The malware HQs had gone to great lengths to obfuscate and encrypt their code to make detection tricky, but their advertising was pretty brazen.

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Samsung’s Eight-core Chip Goes Hacking

A Samsung eight-core chip used in some Galaxy S4 mobile devices is now available for hackers to play with on a developer board from South Korea-based Hardkernel.

Hardkernel’s Odroid XU board has incorporated Samsung’s eight-core Exynos 5 Octa 5410 chip, which is based on ARM’s latest processor designs. Samsung recently announced a new eight-core chip, the Exynos 5 Octa 5420, which packs faster graphics and application processing than the 5410. The 5420 has not yet been shipped yet, however.

The Odroid board is priced at $149 through Aug. 31, after which it will be offered for $169. Samsung for many months has said that a board with an eight-core chip would be released, and has shown prototype developer boards at conferences.

Odroid-XU will provide developers an opportunity to write programs tuned for Samsung’s octa-core chip, which has been a source of controversy. Analysts have said the eight-core design is overkill for small devices like smartphones and tablets, which need long battery life.

The eight-core chip design also takes up a lot of space, which prevented Samsung from putting LTE radios inside some Galaxy S4 models. Qualcomm, which hesitantly moved from the dual core to the quad-core design on its Snapdragon chips, on Friday criticized eight-core chips, calling the idea “dumb.”

Despite the criticism, the board will give developers a first true glimpse of, and an opportunity to write and test applications for, ARM’s Big.Little design. The design combines high-power cores for demanding applications with low-power cores for mundane tasks like texting and calling.

Samsung’s iteration of Big.Little in the Exynos 5 Octa 5410 chip combines four processors based on ARM’s latest Cortex-A15 processor design, which incorporates four low-power Cortex-A7 CPUs. The Cortex-A15 is ARM’s latest processor design and succeeds the previous Cortex-A9 core, which was used in popular smartphones like Apple’s iPhone and the Galaxy S3. Samsung said the eight-core chip provides a balance of power and performance, with the high-power cores kicking in only when necessary.

The board has an Imagination Technologies PowerVR SGX544MP3 graphics processor, 2GB of low-power DDR3 DRAM, two USB 3.0 ports and four USB 2.0 ports. Other features include Wi-Fi, Ethernet and optional Bluetooth. Google’s Android 4.2 operating system is preloaded, and support for other Linux distributions like Ubuntu is expected soon. The board has already been benchmarked on Ubuntu 13.04.

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Is nVidia Working On A Tablet?

According to a report over at Tabtech.de that managed to spot an unknown device in the result page of the GFXBench, Nvidia might be gearing up to release a phablet or tablet.

The device is listed as Nvidia Tegra Note Premium and scores just slightly lower than the Nvidia Shield in GFXBench. It feature Tegra 4 clocked at 1.8GHz and has a resolution of 1280×800 which probably points out to a tablet rather than phablet but everything is possible. It was running Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean when it was tested.

At Computex 2013 back in June, Nvidia showcased a rather unique device that was used to demonstrate pressure-sensitive functions of a stylus and which might be the device that showed up in the GFXBench results. The 1280×800 resolution is not impressive and far off from what the competition currently has to offer, but then again Nvidia might want a cheaper tablet or phablet on the market.

In any case we will surely keep an eye out for Nvidia’s Tegra Note Premium, whatever it turns out to be.

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Intel Launches 530 Series SSD

Intel’s new SSD 530 series was detailed a while ago, but now it is finally official. Intel has formally announced the new drives in three form factors: mSATA, M.2 and 2.5-inch.

The drives will be available in a wide range of capacities, starting at 80GB, through 120GB, 180GB, 240GB, 360GB and 480GB for 2.5-inch drives. As for M.2 and mSATA drives, they will be available in 80GB, 120GB, 180GB and 360GB capacities.

Intel’s new 530 drives are based on 20nm MLC flash and the brains behind the brawn come from LSI, in the form of the SandForce SF-2281 controller. Although transfer speeds will vary depending on capacity, the fastest 530-series drives will deliver read speeds of up to 540MB/s and write at 490MB/s. As for random performance, they boast 41k IOPS in random read and 80k IOPS in random write.

Intel also says the 530-series is its most power efficient storage product to date, which is hardly surprising, but it is good news for notebook vendors who will use mSATA units.

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PayPal Extend Bug Bounty

PayPal is expanding its bug bounty program to individuals aged 14 and older, a move intended to reward younger researchers who are technically ineligible to hold full-fledged PayPal accounts.

PayPal’s program, which is a year old this month, only applied to those 18 years and older. Under the old rule, participants in the program were required to hold valid accounts, which excluded minors, said Gus Anagnos, PayPal’s director of information security.

In May, 17-year-old Robert Kugler, a student in Germany, said he’d been denied a reward for finding a vulnerability. PayPal said the bug had already been found by two other researchers, which would have made Kugler ineligible for bounty.

In an apparent miscommunication, Kugler said he was initially told he was too young rather than the bug had already been discovered. Nonetheless, PayPal said it would look to bring younger people into its program, which pays upwards of $10,000 for remote code execution bugs on its websites.

Those who are under 18 years old can receive a bug bounty payment through a PayPal student account, an arrangement where a minor can receive payments via their parent’s account, Anagnos said.

Anagnos said other terms and conditions have been modified to make its program more transparent, such as clarifying which PayPal subsidiaries and partner sites qualify for the program.

PayPal pays much less for vulnerabilities on partner websites, which have a URL form of “www.paypal-__.com.” A remote execution bug found on that kind of site garners only $1,500 rather than up to $10,000 on the company’s main sites.

Like other bug bounty programs run by companies such as Microsoft and Google, PayPal will publicly recognize researchers on its website with a “Wall of Fame” for the top 10 researchers in a quarter. Another “honorable mention” page lists anyone who submitted a valid bug for the quarter.

Eusebiu Blindu, a testing consultant from Romania, was one of the researchers listed on the Wall of Fame for the first quarter of this year.

“I think Paypal is the best bug bounty program, and I am glad I participated in it from the first days of its launching,” he wrote on his blog.

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ARM & Oracel Optimize Java

ARM’s upcoming ARMv8 architecture will form the basis for several processors that will end up in servers. Now the firm has announced that it will work with Oracle to optimise Java SE for the architecture to squeeze out as much performance as possible.

ARM’s chip licensees are looking to the 64-bit ARMv8 architecture to make a splash in the low-power server market and go up against Intel’s Atom processors. However unlike Intel that can make use of software already optimised for x86, ARM and its vendors need to work with software firms to ensure that the new architecture will be supported at launch.

Oracle’s Java is a vital piece of software that is used by enterprise firms to run back-end systems, so poor performance from the Java virtual machine could be a serious problem for ARM and its licensees. To prevent that, ARM said it will work with Oracle to improve performance, boot-up performance and power efficiency, and optimize libraries.

Henrik Stahl, VP of Java Product Management at Oracle said, “The long-standing relationship between ARM and Oracle has enabled our mutual technologies to be deployed across a broad spectrum of products and applications.

“By working closely with ARM to enhance the JVM, adding support for 64-bit ARM technology and optimizing other aspects of the Java SE product for the ARM architecture, enterprise and embedded customers can reap the benefits of high-performance, energy-efficient platforms based on ARM technology.”

A number of ARM vendors including x86 stalwart AMD are expected to bring out 64-bit ARMv8 processors in 2014, though it is thought that Applied Micro will be the first to market with an ARMv8 processor chip later this year.

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The DoD May Share Airwaves

The U.S. Defense Department is proposing to share some of its radio airwaves with private industry, a nod to growing pressure from the wireless industry and the Obama administration that federal agencies ease their control of valuable spectrum.

In a letter released by the Federal Communications Commission on Tuesday, the Department of Defense offers to share the airwaves it now dominates in the slice of frequencies from 1755 megahertz (MHz) to 1780 MHz with spectrum-hungry wireless and Internet companies.

The military would rearrange its systems within that slice of spectrum as well as the 2025-2110 MHz band and compress programs into the 1780-1850 MHz band that it would retain.

The Defense Department uses the airwaves for programs such as pilot training and drone systems and has faced criticism from some in the industry and in Congress for resisting efforts to open those airwaves for commercial use to satisfy growing demands posed by data-hungry gadgets and services.

The Pentagon had pointed to its own need for airwaves as its use of drones and other reliance on wireless technology grows. It also had estimated the process of moving its programs to new frequencies would cost more than $12 billion.

Under the new plan, the Defense Department drops the cost estimate to $3.5 billion by compromising on sharing slices of airwaves without completely clearing any of the spectrum bands.

In the letter, originally sent on July 17 to the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, which oversees federal airwaves, DOD Chief Information Officer Teresa Takai called the proposal “a workable balance to provide access to the 1755-1780 MHz band most desired by the commercial wireless industry while ensuring no loss of critical DoD capabilities.”

The NTIA, in its own letter to the FCC, said it had not had enough time to review the proposal and could not yet endorse it.

The FCC, with NTIA’s help, is preparing for several auctions of airwaves to take place in coming years, including one that would sell off chunks of federally controlled spectrum. They will be the first reshuffling of airwave ownership since 2008.

Congress has required the FCC to auction off the 2155-2180 MHz band by February 2015 and the industry has sought to pair up that slice of spectrum with the valuable 1755-1780 MHz band, arguing it would collect more money. Lawmakers in the House of Representatives have introduced a bill to ensure such pairing.

The FCC has been drafting a notice of proposed rulemaking that would seek public comments on how the FCC should auction those federally owned or already cleared airwaves to the wireless companies and an FCC official said the agency’s notice will address the Pentagon’s new proposal.

President Barack Obama last month directed federal agencies to look for ways eventually to give up or share more of their airwaves with the private sector. This followed his June 2010 call to open up 500 MHz of federal spectrum for commercial use.

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SanDisk Debuts Wireless Flash Drive

SanDisk on Monday announced a line of wireless flash drives that can hold up to 64GB of data.

The new drives include the Connect Wireless Flash Drive — a thumb drive — and the Connect Wireless Media Drive, a larger, but still pocket-sized storage device. The Connect Wireless Flash Drive comes in 16GB and 32GB capacities; the Connect Wireless Media Drive comes in 32GB and 64GB capacities.

The Connect Wireless Flash drive is 3.07-in. x 1.04-in. x 0.54-in. The Connect Wireless Media Drive is 2.6-in. x 2.6-in. x 0.52-in.

The Connect Wireless drive family allows users to not only store but share and stream files across multiple mobile devices. They offer up to eight simultaneous device connections and three media streams, and support separate streams of 720p video content at 2MB/sec to three or five devices concurrently (for the Flash Drive and Media Drive, respectively).

According to a SanDisk spokesman, video streaming performance isn’t affected by multiple streams because device limits are set at a point that supports the streams without degradation. Devices can connect to the drives up to 150 feet away.

The Connect Wireless drives work with all iOS and Android devices, and Kindle Fire tablets, as well as PC and Mac computers. The drives are compatible with Windows 8, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP and Mac OS 10.6 or higher

Movies, music, photos and documents can be loaded onto the wireless drives by simply dragging and dropping the files, which can then be accessed via the SanDisk Connect apps. Those apps are available for download from the App Store, Google Play Store and the Amazon Appstore for Android.

The drives contain an internal router, so no external router or Internet connection is needed to stream media. In order to use the drives, mobile device users simply download SanDisk’s Connect App.

The drives run on lithium-ion batteries. A single charge provides up to four hours of wireless streaming, with streaming data protected by Wi-Fi Password Protection (WPA2).

“With the new SanDisk Connect product line, we’re raising the bar on what consumers can expect from personal storage,” said Dinesh Bahal, vice president for product marketing for SanDisk.

The SanDisk Connect Wireless Flash Drive is available in 16GB or 32GB capacities for $49.99 and $59.99, respectively. In the U.S., it is available for preorder on Amazon.com, Newegg.com and Micro Center, with availability at Best Buy starting in August. It will also be available for preorder on Amazon.com in Germany and UK.

The SanDisk Connect Wireless Media Drive has a retail price of $79.99 for 32GB or $99.99 for 64GB storage capacity. It is available for preorder in the U.S. on Amazon.com, with availability in Germany and UK in the fourth quarter of 2013.

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