Global electronic components distributor Digi-Key Corporation, recognized by design engineers as having the industry's largest selection of electronic components available for immediate shipment, and Fremont Micro Devices USA, Inc., a global leader and supplier of Serial EEPROM and energy efficient power management integrated circuit products, have signed a global distribution agreement."The Fremont Micro Devices EEPROMs hit a sweet spot of the embedded memory space," said Mark Zack, Digi-Key's vice president of global semiconductor product. "This product is a great addition to our expansive offering of electronic components."FMD is engaged in three areas of non-volatile memory development that support the low density and embedded memory market. FMD's patented UltraEE EEPROM technology delivers the best price performance low density memory in the industry. In the past eight years, FMD has captured a substantial share of the EEPROM market and growth is expected to exceed 40% per year for the next three years. FMD offers standard memory products from 2k to 1024k bit densities and customer specific memory products."We are pleased to add Digi-Key as our worldwide distributor of electronic components. They are one of the largest distributors, shipping over 3.4 million orders a year, have a broad product portfolio, and have 40 years of experience serving customer needs," said Alex Woo, president of Fremont Micro Devices USA. "Digi-Key has quickly expanded across the globe and can support our customers' design and production requirements in North America, Europe and Asia. This capability plus the goal of immediate shipment of customer requests for products provides outstanding support."Fremont Micro Devices EEPROM and Power Management devices are available for purchase now on Digi-Key's global websites (http://www.digikey.com/).

Maxim Integrated Products has announced a partnership with RadioPulse to provide ZigBee communication for smart grid solutions. Together, Maxim and RadioPulse will market and develop ZigBee software, highly integrated systems on chips (SoCs), and "smart" transceivers to augment Maxim's current smart grid solutions and Zeus, its recently announced smart-meter SoC.The partnership is already providing more highly integrated smart grid solutions. The tight synergy between the RadioPulse wireless ZigBee software and Maxim's smart, secure IC solutions saves time, board space, and implementation costs for customers. The advantages of this partnership are immediately apparent when compared to existing nonintegrated solutions.

Optimistic about the development potential of intelligent systems - driven by the Internet of Things (IoT) bringing new growth opportunities to the traditional embedded device market, Intel hosted the Intel Intelligent Systems Summit 2012 conference on October 16 and 17 to provide details about this interesting market. For the morning agenda, high-level Intel executives, as well as several of the company's key industry partners such as Microsoft and McAfee, made keynote speeches on related topics. During the afternoon agenda, there were a number of seminars hosted to discuss related topics including retail, security, cloud computing solutions, the latest embedded technologies and software. The conference also provided an opportunity to unveil the latest technology trends and complete solutions for intelligent systems, attracting a large number of industry professionals and students of related academic interest to participate in.Rick Dwyer, Vice President of Sales Marketing Group (SMG) & General Manager of Embedded Sales Group (ESG) at Intel, delivered a keynote titled "Building the business opportunity of intelligent system" by pointing out that in the next ten years, IT devices for industries including medical, manufacturing, transportation, retail, communication, consumer electronics and energy will all take a development direction that makes intelligent designs become a part of all of our lifestyles. The key for the success of this process lies in how we expand computing technology applications to connect all the various embedded systems together.Dwyer emphasized that focusing on both markets of intelligent systems and IoT, industries will provide attractive growth opportunities to enterprises and help them create value. Meanwhile, intelligent system development is also facilitating the changes in the industrial design trends. For instance, embedded systems can provide usage experiences similar to consumer electronics by combining the features such as touchscreen and motion detection; the rapid increase in data volume stimulates the requirement for better connectivity between cloud computing applications and analysis functions for big data; and the virtualization technology will help integrate work loading and establish a secure and trusted platform.According to market research forecasts, shipments of intelligent systems will grow rapidly with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 18% from 2011 to 2016. Total shipments were 1.8 billion units in 2011 with the volume creating more than US$1 trillion in revenues. By 2015, the scale will grow to 4 billion units and generate revenues of US$2 trillion.Dwyer pointed out that the market of traditional embedded devices will continue to be promising with the development of intelligent designs, often accompanied by many challenges. For example, when establishing an IoT design for a smart city, vertical market applications that cover areas including industrial, retail, energy, automation, security and transportation, as well as proprietary technologies from suppliers and IT players are required.Therefore, to realize the vision of the IoT, connecting and managing the networked devices and intelligent systems securely, conquering the connectivity challenges will be the priority. For that purpose, Intel at the Intel Developer Forum (IDF) this year announced its Intel Intelligent Systems Framework (ISF) 1.0 and is aggressively cooperating with partners to jointly establish a comprehensive ecosystem.ISF's main purpose is to simplify the IoT. Currently, the industry is still at an initial stage of establishing a standard for IoT. Through the project, Dwyer pointed out that Intel is committed to accelerating the innovation in embedded systems and unite the whole industry in a big cooperation to create value for enterprises and consumers by utilizing big data and IoT. Currently, more than 200 members have joined Intel's intelligent system alliance and can offer more than 2,500 solutions.In the future, Intel hopes to realize an IoT vision through industry cooperation and create new business opportunities and growth drivers. For embedded device players, the project not only involves hardware, but also provides them an opportunity to expand business to software and services, and further enhance the value they can offer the market. These players should take a more aggressive attitude toward this important opportunity for growth.Intelligent storage solution designed to respond to the cloud computing eraDavid Tuhy, General Manager of Storage Division at Intel, highlighted that the rise of mobile computing has triggered rapid growth in the data volumes used by consumers and small-to-medium enterprises, which has brought increased demand and market opportunities for storage technologies.In 2012, the data volume created by enterprises, consumers and machines will reach 2.7 zettabytes (ZB), with most of the content being unstructured data. For the reasons, new technologies are required to surpass the traditional tools for database to conduct interception, storage, management and analysis to handle the large volume of unstructured data. The statistic also showed that the IP traffic in 2011 was 1.5ZB and will grow to 4.8ZB in 2015, which will bring pressure to enterprise on data storageTuhy pointed out that these statistics indicate that the industry will face BIG Data challenges, bringing even more data volume, storage and traffic demands to the industry players and the rapidly increased data volume will mostly be unstructured data.Tuhy also noted that the industry is bound to develop more innovative technologies to respond to the challenges of storage demand. Meanwhile, the challenges associated with large data volume can also bring profits and new development chances for enterprises. Furthermore, in the future, the role of CIO will transform to becoming a data scientist who helps to create even higher revenues opportunities for a company.Intel can provide complete storage solutions that satisfy consumers, small-to-medium enterprises and cloud computing and enterprise infrastructure service suppliers to respond to the latest storage demands.During the keynote address, Tuhy introduced Quanta Computer and Amplidata's jointly developed scale-out storage reference structure and he pointed out that demand for intelligent storage is currently rising quickly with many intelligent storage functions such as data compression, data de-duplication, automated tiering and thin provisioning all being realized through software; however, for these functions to become possible, reliance of processors with an even higher performance is a must.To handle the storage demands in the cloud computing era, intelligent distributed storage architecture will become the best solution in terms of costs. Currently, Intel has assembled top-end storage players to establish a broad ecosystem to provide storage technologies that cater to the demands of small-to-medium enterprises and large enterprises.In the meantime, in addition to Intel Xeon processors' leading position in the server market, the processors also account for a large share in the datacenter market. Intel will continue to invest in Xeon processors to make sure they are an ideal solution for intelligent storage system.On the other hand, Intel has been aggressively working on the solid-state drive (SSD) business in recent years, as the company is optimistic about SSD device reliability and lower power consumption, as well as the faster performance for system boot up, application startup, file loading and recovery from sleep mode compared to traditional hard disc drives (HDD).Erik West, Channel Marketing Director of Intel's NVM Solutions Group cited IDC report that factors such as technology upgrades, ongoing evolvement of the PC industry, renewal of enterprise server and storage architecture will help the CAGR of the global SSD shipments from 2010-2016 reach 53.3%, while the report also showed SSD annual sales in 2011 of US$5.7 billion, representing growth of 126% year-on-year.West emphasized that the industry is a market with an enormous scale and Intel can provide complete SSD solutions to gamers, enterprise clients and datacenters with solutions which are mainly separated into 300, 500, 700 and 900 series products.Among the product lines, except for 910 series, which is being supplied in a form of PCI Express expansion card, all others are in a form of 2.5-inch devices. Take the 520 series for example, the device supports a SATA 6Gb/s interface with sequential read and write performances at a maximum of 550MB/s and 520MB/s respectively, and random 4KB read and write performances at a maximum of 50,000 and 80,000 IOPS respectively. Additionally, it also features remote management to satisfy demand in the enterprise market.Presently, Intel possesses leading manufacturing process technologies and is already ahead of its competitors in investments of 20nm SSD production. Moreover, through cooperating with Micron Technology, Intel is equipped with a complete set of production technologies from manufacturing, firmware to products for SSDs.Microsoft targets all kinds of intelligent systems with Windows EmbeddedMicrosoft is optimistic about the potential of intelligent system development, with company Marketing Director John Boladian explaining that intelligent systems can collect important employees' and clients' data on various devices and then transmit the data to back-end systems for interpretation to obtain further insight. Such business processes can create new value for the enterprise.According to the definition mentioned, intelligent systems feature three advanced characteristics - management, user experience and analysis - as well as three basic characteristics - identity, security and safety. Boladian pointed out that by 2020, there will be 50 billion networked devices worldwide and with rapid development in technologies for connectivity, handling large data volumes, computing functions, user interface and security, it will trigger changes in industrial and lifestyle applications. Data processing will undergo its own revolution, helping data to become a new currency that affects enterprises' strategic plans and also promotes the rise of intelligent systems.Boladian indicated that the market of intelligent systems has showed strong growth recently and is expected to have a promising future. Microsoft will adopt three strategies for the market. First, Microsoft will try to create better user experience and bring control methods such as Kinect and multi-touchscreen into intelligent systems such as digital signage to allow users to have a similar interactive experience with the intelligent systems as they do with regular consumer electronics; the second is improving the connectivity for cloud computing and the last is to provide intelligent systems a trusted and multiple-architecture-compatible operating system platform in orders to satisfy all the demands from different operating systems and allow for convenience in software development.Windows Embedded system will play an important role in Microsoft's intelligent system strategy, while the company will also push the system in four major industries - retail, industrial automation, medical and automotive. In addition to providing a complete solution for all different types of devices, Microsoft also supplies end-to-end solutions to help connect from end devices to cloud computing applications.Boladian emphasized the importance of the intelligent system market is that the industry will promote opportunities for new types of devices, services and even business growth, while helping related players transform from pure hardware suppliers to professional consultants. In response to the trend, the related players should start considering their future strategies in order to develop differentiated products. Meanwhile, Microsoft will act aggressively to cooperate with industry players to drive market growth.Intel and McAfee merger helps build integrated security solutionsA presentation by McAfee Vice President of Worldwide OEM Sales, Thomas Moore, highlighted that security will be an important cornerstone for realizing a future in which several billion networked devices connected securely worldwide. When reviewing the history of the Internet, it is discovered that the attack methods and targeted networks were always changing and evolving. According to market report, the number of malicious network attacks rose rapidly from less than 10 million in 2007 to 60 million in 2011 - or an average of 70,000 attacks each day and the number is estimated to hit 200 million by 2016.In the past, security solutions were mostly designed to target PC, data center or mail server applications, but with embedded devices heading in a development direction of becoming more intelligent, the related security issues for such intelligent solutions will gradually become increasingly important in the future. For example, network attacks that target applications such as power plants, medical devices, automobiles and retail may result in serious negative effects or losses for a firm.Moore pointed out that device identity authentication functionality is the most basic requirement for security in an intelligent system. Devices must be able to confirm the identity of each communicating device before conducting data exchange. For implementing data security, proper encrypted protection and regular system updates are a must to ensure that the whole network has a secure environment for data transmission and accurate operation.McAfee focuses especially on resolving the security problems of networked embedded systems. For example, NCR has adopted McAfee's technologies to protect its ATM and POS devices, indicating that McAfee has successfully expanded its business from enterprise security solutions to client device applications.Moore pointed out that we are facing close to 70,000 malicious network attacks each day, while this number is counted based on that can currently be managed. In the future, unknown types of attacks are expected to appear. Therefore, developing a device that can protect from these unknown network attacks will be critical to the related players.Moore emphasized that McAfee is an expert in security technologies and has full control of the latest worldwide network security technology developments. Any device that suffers from unknown types of network attack can be given to McAfee for evaluation and analysis. McAfee's White List solution is the best method to protect embedded devices from a security threat, while also even sharing the related data with partners and clients to ensure the safety of the networked devices and jointly promoting the overall development of embedded system security technology.After Intel announced it would acquire McAfee in August of 2010, both sides have been aggressively cooperating on developing new technologies. For example, the major difference between Intel's latest third-generation Core vPro processor series and the previous processor series is the CPU's embedded security protection functions, which integrate Intel's AMT and McAfee's ePO Deep Command technology together.McAfee's ePO Deep Command is an extension of the company's advance endpoint protection management program, allowing clients to remotely repair PCs that have been compromised as well as install the latest security update files and securely conduct data exchanges. Intel and McAfee's cooperation will also create even more and professional security technologies.Macfee's Tom MooreMicrosoft's John BoladianIntel's David TuhyIntel's Erik F WestIntel's Rick Dwyer

Altera has announced a software development kit (SDK) for OpenCL (Open Computing Language), for use with its FPGA, which combines the parallel architecture of an FPGA with the OpenCL parallel programming model. The SDK allows system developers and programmers familiar with C to quickly and easily develop high-performance, power-efficient FPGA-based applications in a high-level language. The Altera SDK for OpenCL enables FPGAs to work in concert with the host processor to accelerate parallel computation, at a much lower use of power compared to hardware alternatives.The Altera SDK for OpenCL offers a unified, high-level design flow for hardware and software development that automates the time-consuming tasks required in typical hardware-design language (HDL) flows. The OpenCL tool flow automatically converts OpenCL kernel functions into custom FPGA hardware accelerators, adds interface IPs, builds interconnect logic and generates the FPGA programming file. The SDK includes libraries that link to OpenCL API calls within a host program running on the CPU. By automatically handling these steps, designers are able to focus their development efforts on defining and iterating their algorithms rather than designing hardware.The portability of the OpenCL code enables users to migrate their designs to different FPGAs or SoC FPGAs as their application requirements evolve. With SoC FPGAs, the CPU host is embedded into the FPGA, providing a single-chip solution that delivers significantly higher bandwidth and lower latency between the CPU host and the FPGA compared to using two discrete devices.The Altera SDK for OpenCL also enables programmers to leverage the massively parallel, fine-grained architectures featured in FPGAs to accelerate parallel computation. Unlike CPUs and GPGPUs, where parallel threads are executed across an array of cores, FPGAs allow kernel functions to be transformed into dedicated, deeply pipelined hardware circuits that are multithreaded using the concept of pipeline parallelism. Each of these pipelines can be replicated many times to provide even more parallelism by allowing multiple threads to execute in parallel. The result is an FPGA-based solution that Altera says can deliver >5X performance/Watt compared to alternative hardware implementations.Altera is working with several board partners to deliver COTS board solutions to customers. Currently, boards from BittWare and Nallatech are designed to support Altera OpenCL. Additional third-party boards will be supported with future releases of the SDK.

Multimedia kiosks have been widely used in many public places due to their accessibility and potential to deliver 24/7 service to large numbers of people. Our customer provides mobile phone, on-line and pay-TV services through multimedia kiosks located in many public places, such as retail stores and train stations, to promote its products and services.Application RequirementsAn important aspect of this kiosk enclosure was to promote brand recognition, so the system integrators designed and created a unique ID. The kiosk had to operate 24/7; thus maintenance and durability issues were critical in order to maximize its uptime. Also, the kiosks needed to be placed in different environments: some indoors, some semi- and some fully outdoors. It was crucial the kiosks could be clearly read under strong sunlight conditions as well as operating in a wide range of temperatures. Last but not least, in order to provide better interactivity with customers, a user-friendly touch solution with quick response times was required.SolutionsAdvantech IDS-3115, together with AIMB-252, more than satisfied all the customer's requirements. IDS-3115 uses an industrial grade 15" XGA, 1200-nit LED panel with excellent sunlight readability. Its bezel-less and open-frame architecture allows for customized face plate design and can easily be rear mounted into an enclosure. Its ultra slim and light-weight design optimizes space and makes for efficient system integration. The -20 ~ 60° C wide-range operating temperature is rugged enough to be applied for semi-outdoor and outdoor environments. Finally, a Projected Capacitive Touch solution was applied to bring quick and instant touch response and excellent user feedback experience. IDS-3115 worked perfectly with Advantech's AIMB-252 board, offering a complete ready-to-use, plug and play solution to customers.Benefits:- Open frame structure with slim design for easy integration- 1200-nit LCD panel provides excellent sunlight readability- Projected Capacitive Touch technology for instant touch response- -20 ~ 60° C wide range operating temp support for semi-outdoor and outdoor environments- Integrated bracket for easy installationAdvantech IDS-3115, together with AIMB-252, more than satisfied all the customer's requirementsFinding more case study articles

Airports make perfect environments for many types of crime, from theft, to smuggling, to terrorism. In recent years, an increasing number of electronic surveillance systems have been deployed in airports and other public venues to enhance security. Video cameras are used to record the huge and transient populations in these locations, and computers supporting these surveillance systems are not mediocre ones.Our customer is a U.S.-based security intelligence solutions provider that helps to secure airports and enterprises with the latest video surveillance technology. When they came to us, they were under great time pressure to release a list of new products, and they needed to partner with experienced manufacturers who could quickly provide them with application-ready systems tailored to their requirements.They turned to Advantech for a high-definition decoder, an IPC which, when used in an airport, could support networked videos for surveillance, as well as display information for infotainment purposes. Advantech took only five months to complete the model, and then it entered mass production.Featuring a high computing power CPU, our customer has been selling this product not only to airports but also to many other locations for different purposes, including use for in-car surveillance in Formula 1 races, where it records both video and real-time biometrics of race drivers.Requirements- Full HD video outputs including TV-out with H.264 compression- 2 RJ-45 + 4 USB 2.0 ports + 2 serial ports- 1 DVI connector + 1 VGA connector + 1 BNC connector (NTSC/PAL composite)- Compact and power-efficientSystemWhen used in an airport, this video decoder is multi-functional. First, it supports video cameras to carry out security surveillance over many expanses and corners of the airport, implementing primary video analytics and routing recordings to system management computers back in the control room.At the same time, it is also connected to kiosks, thin-film monitors or other display installations in the airport where it implements interactive communications with tourists, providing flight, weather, next stop or duty-free information.So the system needs a rich array of video connectors and I/O ports to meet these requirements. To enhance functionality and flexibility, it supports a range of compression standards from H.264 to MPEG-4 to MJPEG, and video outputs from DVI to VGA to traditional CCTV monitors.On the other hand, so that it could be integrated with other systems or into a larger system, our customer wanted it to be compact, as small and thin as possible. They also expected it to be power-efficient and environmentally friendly.In accord with these requirements, Advantech chose appropriate CPU, HDD and other components with careful calculations about power consumption, and put special attention on thermal design. Also, from inside to outside, the computer was designed to achieve the streamlined look that echoes this customer's brand image.ConclusionThe increasing need for security is driving the expansion of the global video surveillance market, which is expected to grow to $37.7 b in 2015, up from $11.5 b in 2008, as Electronics.ca Publications reports.In order to compete, major players in this market continue to expand their product portfolios with the latest technologies, with some making their products more multi-functional to allow for a single system to execute various tasks, as exemplified by our customer in this case.Advantech, with 20 years of experience and profound domain know-how in a wide range of vertical markets, offers the best in Design to Order Services (DTOS), which help our customers introduce new products more easily and with faster time-to-market.Another advantage of partnering with us is that Advantech is the only IPC manufacturer operating a world-wide logistics and technical support system. Leveraging Advantech's network, our customers can deliver longer product life assurance to end-users, and localized service as well.Video cameras are used to record the huge and transient populations in these locations, and computers supporting these surveillance systems are not mediocre ones.Finding more case study articles

PMC recently introduced its PCIe Gen3 high port-count 6Gb/s SAS/SATA RAID adapters. The Adaptec Series 7 family represents the first RAID adapters to take full advantage of PCIe Gen3 bandwidth for a broad range of enterprise and cloud computing applications. With 16 direct-connected solid state drives (SSDs), Series 7 adapters can deliver up to 450,000 input/output operations per second (IOPS) on a 4K random read block size, equivalent to nearly 10x the performance of previous-generation RAID adapters.According to Jared Peters, vice president of Server Storage Solutions at PMC, the adapters are the industry's first native 16 and 24-port RAID solutions, meaning customers can now directly attach up to 24 SSDs or HDDs with a single adapter, eliminating the need for multi-component architectures and taking full advantage of the latest PCIe Gen3 interface.The Adaptec Series 7 family offers up to 16-ports in a MD2 form factor and up to 24-ports in a full-height half-length form factor by utilizing PMC's 24-port RAID on Chip (RoC) and High Density (HD) Mini-SAS connectors. Other advanced technologies incorporated into the Adaptec Series 7 family include Adaptec maxCache 3.0; third-generation Zero-Maintenance Cache Protection (ZMCP); new industry standard High Density (HD) Mini SAS connectors and cables; Adaptec maxView, PMC's PM8015 RAID-on-Chip (RoC), which combines an x8 PCIe Gen3 SAS interface with 24 ports of 6Gb/s SAS/SATA; and one click setup capability allowing RAID, simple volume and physical drive configurations.

GIGABYTE, a rising brand in the notebook industry, launched an array of notebooks and a tablet with fabulous functions and powerful specifications. Each GIGABYTE model is highlighted by the number of ports that is available to give the user complete convenience, sleek innovative design, and Global warranty for a complete peace of mind. By launching a slate S1082, a Convertible Ultrabook U2142, a high performance Ultrabook U2442, and two high-end Gaming Notebooks - P2542/P2742; GIGABYTE has expanded its line and range of notebooks.Introducing the all new Slate S1082 and Convertible Ultrabook U2142S1082Powered by the latest Intel dual-core processor, the 10.1-inch S1082 is an exceptional mobile device to enhance and increase mobile productivity. With Windows 8, a large storage HDD (up to 500GB), and multiple connectivity ports, the S1082 is a powerful tool for work and play. With its excellent design and useful accessories, including a keyboard kit and the D1080 multimedia docking station, the S1082 has exceptional versatility and can be used as a slate, a notebook and even an entertainment center.U2142The 11.6-inch Convertible Ultrabook U2142 comes with Windows 8 or Windows 8 Professional. With convertible multi-touch screen, the convertible notebook can easily be transformed into a tablet. With the latest 3rd generation Intel Core Processor, multiple connectivity ports, and dual storage system this innovative and contemporary design is guaranteed to make its prominence felt in the PC industry.Sleek Ultrabook with Ultra PerformanceU2442With a sleek form factor and weighing just 1.57kg, the 14-inch U2442 is exceptionally designed with an elegant shuttle streamline-design. Powered by 3rd generation Intel Core processors and NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M / GT 640M discrete graphics reaching 3DMark Vantage at 9,587 points this Ultrabook has been designed to bring you ultra-performance. The dual air vent design efficiently eliminates heat and keeps noise to a minimum, effectively keeping the notebook from overheating. It also boasts an automatic light sensing backlit keyboard that adjusts the brightness and allows ease of typing even under low light conditions.Powerful Blu-ray Gaming NotebookP2542GThe 15.6-inch P2542G is a premium gaming notebook that packs incredible power into a sleek form factor to give consumers the ultimate mobility for gaming. The P2542G features a powerful 3rd generation Intel Core i7-3610QM Quad-Core processor and an impressive NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660M GPU with GDDR5 2GB VRAM. The P2542G also has a 1080p Full HD display, Blu-ray Rewritable Drive, THX TruStudio Pro, Intel Rapid Start Technology, either a high-performing 7200rpm HDD or a speedy SSD, HDMI and more.P2742GThe 17-inch P2742G is the complete high-end gaming notebook for gamers. It packs a punch with a blazingly-fast 3rd generation Intel Core i7 Quad-Core processor and a powerful NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660M GDDR5 2GB gaming level GPU that delivers a full throttle gaming experience. Featuring 2 bays for storage, the P2742G provides huge storage capacity up to 2TB and supports superior RAID 0 Technology for lightning speed performance. The P2742G has 1080p Full HD display, THX TruStudio Pro Technology, a Blu-ray Combo Drive*, USB 3.0 and Bluetooth 4.0 to create an incredible gaming environment. Complete with powerful features and amazing performance, the P2742G stands out as the unrivalled gaming notebook.GIGABYTE U2442GIGABYTE U2142GIGABYTE S1082

Acer has unveiled its latest ultrabook products, the M series, offering 10-point touch, frameless HD displays, Intel Core processors, and more than 8 hours of battery life.In a thin and light package, the Aspire M series packs a frameless HD display offering a large viewing area for a full web browsing experience and multimedia enjoyment, while the machines also feature the latest Intel Core processors and graphics, according to Acer.The Aspire M3 is the first Acer ultrabook to pack an Nvidia GeForce GT640M GPU. The M3 also adopts Dolby Home Theater v4 audio enhancement and premium speakers.Meanwhile, Acer has also announced its Aspire S7 series ultrabooks, featuring a unibody design. They also feature Full HD IPS 10-point displays with 1920 by 1080 resolution.The 13.3-inch Aspire S7 ultrabook model's touch display is surrounded by a glossy white Gorilla Glass 2 lid, measuring only 11.9mm thin.The smaller and lighter 11.6-inch model, also with a Full HD touchscreen, features an all-aluminum unibody and aluminum cover with a cross-direction brushed finish to help strengthen durability and repels fingerprints and smudges.The Aspire S7 packs powerful technologies, including third-generation Intel Core i5-3317UB or i7-3517U processors and solid state drives (SSD) in a RAID 0 configuration. An embedded Li-Polymer battery provides up to six hours of battery life, and an optional second battery doubles computing time up to 12 hours.In addition, the S7 ships with a micro HDMI to VGA cable for use with projectors for presentations, and a USB to RJ45 port for connecting to a wired network.Acer Aspire M3 ultrabookPhoto: CompanyAcer Aspire S7 series ultrabooksPhoto: Company

Acer has announced its latest Aspire V5 series touchscreen notebook, featuring a 10-point touch display and a large trackpad, designed to enhance multi-gesture content consumption and to take advantage of the features offered by Windows 8.The 14-inch model includes an optical drive, but is less than 21mm thick and weights 2.1kg, while the 15.6-inch model, also with an optical drive, is thinner than 23mm, and weighs 2.4kg, Acer said.The machines feature Intel's Core family processors and Nvidia GeForce GT series graphics.The V5 series also features Acer Instant Connect, which automatically scans and registers most-visited access points, letting users connect to the Internet in just 2.5 seconds, which is four times faster than conventional methods, the company claimed.Acer Aspire V5 touch notebookPhoto: Company