The point on the week of PCWorld.fr

These, Free Mobile, HD 7970, Ultrabook, ARM, Medfield... Some of the keywords of the week for a news reviewed and corrected.

This is an incredibly loaded week we will try to summarize here. From elsewhere, as you prevent on, we cannot talk about all the exciting topics this week in our columns. Even with there lot of will, must confess that we are not treated any which could be in the last days. The fault for that, what? Mainly to two major events: the CES in Las Vegas, and the launch of Free Mobile. Two events expected that history to facilitate the life of our small editorial, decided to play at the same time. But in us rolling sleeves, we tried to introduce you to the essential. The week began with, to celebrate the commercial release of the AMD Radeon HD 7970 (mono-GPU the most powerful currently maps), some of this graphics card overclocking tests. Before that could be discovered the first modified versions of the map, at XFX or PowerColor for example.

The Conference Free Mobile, an event so important that it has succeeded in
partly overshadow the CES in Las Vegas...

And then very quickly, it is Free which occupied the front of the stage, eclipsing even at times the these. Indeed, as early as Monday, is - finally! -the end of the rumours about the Free Mobile front and learn that the launching Conference would take place Tuesday morning, with inscriptions in the wake. Needless to say that we have followed, with you, the launch of Free Online Mobile, after which we were able to present two very interesting packages of the new operator, and then try to answer the most frequently asked questions. Finally, at the weekend, it is on competitors of Free Mobile eyes were hijacked. We saw Orange respond through its subsidiary low-cost Sosh, then Virgin Mobile present a real response (which would be ultimately reserved to its existing clients...). And this until SFR react, luis also through its low-cost Red mark, while Zero package also attempted a coup. But it is clear that these first responses to Free Mobile are timid, and that the whole unlimited Xavier Niel to €19.99 (€15.99 for Freebox subscribers) has no equivalent on the market... at least for the time. It is also amused to see Orange dare propose, in this climate, a limited series of its Origami packages, from €49 per month, 24 month commitment. As if the historical operator completely snobait the entry on the market of a new price casseur player.

Dell XPS 13 Intel Nikiski, two significant products of these, portable two...

But this week, it is also and especially the these in Las Vegas that has occupied us much. If it is impossible to summarize everything that happened in the Nevada desert, or tons of new products have been presented. At the time, it lets you browse the tag these 2012 which condensed all these info. Note however that as expected, the show was much revolved around the ultrabooks side computing, with presentations in rules of the Acer Aspire S5, HP spectrum, Samsung Series 5 Ultra or Dell XPS 13, not to mention testing of design at Sony or the very noticed prototype Nikiski at Intel. Also, include the show was the scene of a duel between Intel and ARM, including Qualcomm, leading manufacturer of SoC ARM. Intel took advantage of the show to introduce Medfield, its platform for x 86 processors for smartphones and tablets, what Qualcomm has responded with its SnapDragon S4, while Texas Instruments was its OMAP 5, platform ARM the most powerful of the Texas market. For sure, 2012 a year will be very important in the evolution of mobile solutions, whether on laptops (where ARM account on Windows 8 to be a place) or smartphones and tablets.

Red card: Free Mobile, a launch very frustrating

As they say, who like punished well. And if are you presented with enthusiasm the offers of Free Mobile which, undeniably, mark a turning point in the market of mobile telephony in France, we should also blame the operator for a launch that will remain also marked as one of the largest technical friction to which we have been able to attend. It is simple, while inscriptions were to begin at 9: 30 p.m. Tuesday, January 10, it took several days for Free Mobile to be able to provide on its website for all subscriptions.

And again, sporadically, the servers were still sometimes saturated weekend. While to join the subscription by phone service, better get up early and attempt again his chance to dozens of times... At the time, many people who wanted to be the first to take advantage of the offers of Free Mobile have been frustrated to have to support a Web site that was not working. Which nevertheless allowed to Xavier Niel to his promo around explaining that Free Mobile was assaulted applications and could not respond to everyone, from where the technical difficulties. Strategy marketing as another, even if we still think that Free Mobile had the means to implement a more robust infrastructure, or even implement a system of tail on its subscription servers, to allow all - after waiting - to have a pleasant time to engage with the new operator experience...

And talking not the promise of a reception of the SIM card the next day for new Subscriber before 16: 00. Because several days after successfully to validate their registration, some of our loved ones have still not received their Mobile Free SIM, and still could not access their client area on the site of the operator! However, it would seem that the first SIM are finally parties and that the client space has opened this WE.