Tag Archives: Enterprise IT

IBM z16 : Industry’s First Quantum-Safe System Explained!

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IBM just introduced the z16 system, powered by their new Telum processor with an integrated AI accelerator!

Take a look at the z16, and find out why it is the industry’s first quantum-safe system!

 

IBM z16 : Industry’s First Quantum-Safe System!

On 25 April 2022, IBM officially unveiled their new z16 system in Malaysia – the industry’s first quantum-safe system.

IBM Vice President for Worldwide Sales of IBM Z and LinuxONE, Jose Castano, flew to Kuala Lumpur, to give us an exclusive briefing on the new z16 system, and tell us why it is the industry’s first quantum-safe system.

IBM Z and LinuxONE Security CTO Michael Jordan also briefed us on why quantum-safe computing will be critical for enterprises, as quantum computing improves.

Thanks to its Telum processor, the IBM z16 system delivers low and consistent latency for embedding AI into response time-sensitive transactions. This can enable customers to leverage AI inference to better control the outcome of transactions before they complete.

For example, they can leverage AI inference to mitigate risk in Clearing & Settlement applications, to predict which transactions have high risk exposure, and highlight questionable transactions, to prevent costly consequences.

In a use-case example, one international bank uses AI on IBM Z as part of their credit card authorization process instead of using an off-platform inference solution. As a result, the bank can detect fraud during its credit card transaction authorisation processing.

The IBM z16 will offer better AI inference capacity, thanks to its integrated AI accelerator offering up to 1 ms of latency, expanding use cases that include :

  • tax fraud and organised retail theft detection
  • real-time payments and alternative payment methods, including cryptocurrencies
  • speed up business or consumer loan approvals

As the industry’s first quantum-safe system, the IBM z16 is protected by lattice-based crypto graphs – an approach for constructing security primitives that help protect data and systems against current and future threats.

 

IBM z16 : Powered By The New Telum Processor!

The IBM z16 is built around the new IBM Telum processor, which is specifically designed for secure processing, and real-time AI inference.

Here are the key features of the IBM Telum processor that powers the new IBM z16 system :

  • Fabricated on the 7 nm process technology
  • Has 8 processor cores, clocked at over 5 GHz
  • Each processor core has a dedicated 32 MB private L2 cache
  • The eight 32 MB L2 cache can form a virtual 256 MB L3 cache, and a 2 GB L4 cache.
  • Transparent encryption of main memory, with 8-channel fault tolerant memory interface
  • Integrated AI accelerator with 6 TFLOPS compute capacity
  • Centralised AI accelerator architecture, with direct connection to the cache infrastructure

The Telum processor is designed to enable extremely low latency inference for response-time sensitive workloads. With planned system support for up to 200 TFLOPs, the AI acceleration is also designed to scale up to the requirements of the most demanding workloads.

Thanks to the Telum processor, the IBM z16 can process 300 billion inference requests per day, with just one millisecond of latency.

 

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He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.

 

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How Central Medicare Leveraged Ruckus For Digital Transformation!

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Find out how Central Medicare leveraged Ruckus network technologies to digitally transform and rapidly expand their business!

 

Central Medicare Undergoes Digital Transformation + Rapid Expansion

Central Medicare Sdn. Bhd. (CMSB) is a nitrile glove manufacturer, that started with a single manufacturing facility with 6 production lines and an annual manufacturing capacity of 1.1 billion nitrile gloves in 2015.

Based in Teluk Intan, Perak, Central Medicare has been undergoing a massive expansion and digital transformation plan that started in 2019.

They expanded to 27 production lines delivering an annual capacity of 8 billion gloves in 2020, and 34 production lines with an annual capacity of 11.6 billion in 2021.

 

How Central Medicare Leveraged Ruckus For Digital Transformation!

Peter Cheong, the IT Assistant Manager of Central Medicare, recently shared how they leveraged Ruckus network technologies for digital transformation during their rapid expansion plans.

As Central Medicare added more production facilities, it was becoming complicated to manage the rapidly expanding digital network.

After a thorough evaluation process that included top brands like Cisco, Aruba and Juniper, the IT team decided to leverage Ruckus network technologies for their new digital network.

They started creating their new digital network in 2016, using Ruckus ICX7150 network switches, and Ruckus ZoneDirector 1200 with R500 and R600 series wireless APs.

Both Ruckus switches and wireless APs allowed them to link and manage their different facilities in a centralised, unified manner.

The Ruckus wireless APs also allowed them to create an isolated Wi-Fi network for their customers and suppliers to use, hardening their network security.

The team also liked how Ruckus’ centralised management interface is so user-friendly, making it easy to manage for people who are not IT-savvy.

On top of that, the Ruckus KnowledgeBase is so comprehensive and easy-to-use that they can self-manage their network, without requiring any technical assistance.

All those advantages allowed the IT team to remotely manage their network during the COVID-19 pandemic MCO lockdowns.

The reliability of Ruckus network also shone through during the pandemic – Peter stated that they have not experienced a single failure, since they implemented their Ruckus network 5 years ago.

Central Medicare plans to continue leveraging Ruckus network technologies as they continue to expand their business and production facilities in 2022.

 

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Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.

He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.

 

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KKM : MySejahtera Was NOT Sold To Private Company!

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The Malaysia Ministry of Health has clarified that the MySejahtera app and its data was not sold to any private company.

Here is what you need to know!

 

Claim : MySejahtera Was Sold To Private Company!

Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim claimed that MySejahtera will be sold to a private company – MySJ Sdn. Bhd. through direct negotiation.

The MySejahtera application was rolled out in April 2020, under the Malaysia Ministry of Health (KKM). It was built by KPISoft (now Entomo) as a corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiative.

According to his statement, the government appointed MySJ Sdn. Bhd. through direct negotiation to take over MySejahtera on 26 November 2021.

Then in December 2021, the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) proposed that the government should take over MySejahtera since it is now “an integral part of the national health system”.

 

KKM : MySejahtera Was NOT Be Sold To Private Company!

On 27 March 2022, the Malaysia Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin issued a press statement, clarifying that the government did not sell MySejahtera to any private company.

Here are the key points of his statement on the claims that MySejahtera was sold to MySJ Sdn. Bhd. :

  1. On 26 November 2021, the government decided that MySejahtera is owned by the government, and the Ministry of Health (KKM) was appointed as the main owner of the application.
  2. The government did not pay KPISoft any money for the development of MySejahtera, which was carried out from 27 March 2020 until 31 March 2021.
    This was based on the company’s offer to let the government use the app for one year for free, as a Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiative.
  3. After the CSR period ended on 31 March 2021, the government agreed to extend the use of MySejahtera, and work with KPISoft to expand its features.
  4. On 26 November 2021, the government ordered KKM to form a Price Negotiation Committee comprising of stakeholder agencies to negotiate the purchase and service maintenance of MySejahtera for two (2) years.
    The scope of the procurement and management of the MySejahtera app included operating MySejahtera, system development including additional modules, maintenance, datacenter management and third-party services like Google Map and Places API, as well as SMS services.
  5. On 28 February 2022, the Ministry of Finance approved KKM’s procurement of the MySejahtera app.
  6. MySejahtera data has been under KKM’s supervision from the first day it was used, and the data is processed according to KKM procedures.
  7. KKM does not share MySejahtera data with any government agency, or private companies.
  8. All data from the MySejahtera app are uploaded to a cloud server network, and can only be accessed by the MySejahtera app only.

In short, the MySejahtera app was not sold to any private company, and was purchased by the Ministry of Health with approval from the Ministry of Finance on 28 February 2022.

 

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Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.

He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.

 

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Maybank Online + Banking Services Up + Running!

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Maybank online and banking services were temporarily down, and are now up and running!

Here is what you need to know…

 

Maybank Online + Banking Services Temporarily Down!

At 3:55 PM on 17 January 2022, Maybank sent out an alert that these online and banking services were temporarily down :

  • Maybank2U web and mobile banking services
  • ATMs and self-service terminals (SSTs)
  • branch banking
  • debit card usage

Maybank credit card were unaffected by this downtime.

Just over an hour later at 4:58 PM, Maybank announced that they restored services!

Maybank did not reveal the reasons why those online and banking services went down. However, the downtime does not appear to apply to everyone using the Maybank2U online portal.

When I checked at 4:10 PM, I managed to log into two Maybank personal accounts and a company account. I was also able to transfer money from a Maybank account to another bank.

Fortunately, they were able to restore services very quickly – in just over an hour.

 

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Name : Adrian Wong
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Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.

He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.

 

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Ranhill Selects Maxis As Voice + Cloud Provider!

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Ranhill just selected Maxis as their voice and cloud connectivity provider!

Here is what you need to know…

 

Ranhill Selects Maxis To Boost Voice + Cloud Connectivity

On 12 January 2022, Ranhill SAJ Sdn Bhd (Ranhill) selected Maxis as their voice and cloud connectivity provider, leveraging their portfolio of converged solution capabilities.

Maxis will now connect 77 Ranhill sites across Johor, including their headquarters and water treatment plants through its Managed Software-Defined Wide Area Network (SD-WAN).

Once implemented, the higher bandwidth and resilient network will allow Ranhill to have real-time visibility of their data, allowing them to make quicker and better decisions to increase productivity and efficiency of their 2,000 employees.

“We are pleased to be selected by Ranhill as their connectivity, voice and cloud solutions provider. Through our unique capabilities and experience, we are able to offer Ranhill a fully managed service portfolio from onboarding right up to 24/7 support with greater cost effectiveness and flexibility.  As their partner, we want to ensure that their connectivity needs are met so that they can operate efficiently and have the peace of mind of being well prepared for their digital transformation journey and to Always Be Ahead in a changing world,” said Paul McManus, Chief Enterprise Business Officer, Maxis.

“Selecting Maxis as our service provider and partner is an integral step to realising our vision of becoming a world-class water utility company. By connecting all our sites with the latest technology from Maxis, we will be better equipped to support the people of Johor through efficient management of quality water supply. We now have the necessary infrastructure and platform to unlock the benefits of digitalisation as part of our on-going effort to further enhance customer experience,” said Nor Ifuan Md Nor, Chief Executive Officer, Ranhill SAJ. 

Maxis will also address Ranhill’s voice communication needs, providing high quality voice services, which is particularly important in rural areas.

Maxis and Ranhill are also exploring future collaboration related to Internet of Things (IoT), cloud services and cybersecurity, as part of Ranhill’s next phase of digitalisation of their organisation.

 

Maxis Managed SD-WAN Services That Ranhill Will Use

The Maxis managed SD-WAN services that Ranhill will use, runs on Cisco Meraki technology, which simplifies operational tasks like configuration, management and maintenance through automation and intelligence.

Ranhill will have access to a converged connectivity solution that is flexible, scalable and cost-effective. On top of that, the built-in security in SD-WAN also enables end-to-end secure communications, and network-wide security policies.

 

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Name : Adrian Wong
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Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.

He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.

 

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CommScope-RUCKUS Showcase @ Bayview Georgetown!

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Bayview Hotel Georgetown recently invited me for an exclusive look at their complete CommScope-RUCKUS network upgrade!

Find out what they did, and why they went with CommScope-RUCKUS!

 

CommScope-RUCKUS Showcase @ Bayview Georgetown!

Bayview Georgetown started work on a massive RM 1.7 million digitisation project in 2020, which took several months to complete.

A major part of that project involved the complete replacement of their existing network using CommScope-RUCKUS networking products from end-to-end.

The Bayview team was so happy with the upgrade that they invited me for an exclusive look at their brand new CommScope-RUCKUS network, which now offers guests fast and reliable Internet connectivity at their hotel.

Leslie Lim, the Regional Manager in charge of Information Technology at Bayview International Hotels & Resorts also explained how he designed the new network, and why he opted for CommScope-RUCKUS networking products from end-to-end.

 

Fast, Reliable Internet : A Major KSP At Bayview Hotel Georgetown

Bayview Hotel Georgetown is a 340-bed hotel in Georgetown, Penang. It is one of two hotels run by Bayview International Hotels & Resorts, the other being Bayview Beach Resort which is right by the Batu Ferringhi Beach.

While the Bayview Beach Resort is full of tourists, their Georgetown hotel caters more to business travellers who expect fast and reliable Internet connectivity.

That’s why Bayview Georgetown embarked on a major upgrade of their Internet connectivity in 2020, in partnership with Fortesys – the official distributor of RUCKUS networking products and solutions in Southeast Asia.

Ravaged by the COVID-19 pandemic, the hospitality industry has become extremely competitive. Hotels like Bayview Georgetown will need to rely on the latest networking technologies to get ahead of the competition.

 

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Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.

He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.

 

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Chop Cheong Bee Now A Leader In Smart Farming!

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This is how Chop Cheong Bee has now become a leader in smart farming!

 

Chop Cheong Bee Now A Leader In Smart Farming!

Datuk Jeffrey Ng Choon Ngee, General Manager of Chop Cheong Bee Sdn Bhd (CCB), recently explained how they are now a leader in smart farming.

Having established CCB in 1997, his business has grown from marketing live chickens, to managing 14 poultry farms throughout Melaka that supply Malaysian consumers with 1.5 million chickens every month!

“Traditionally, poultry farming was done manually, with plenty of people overseeing the poultry farms. This method poses numerous risks such as diseases and contact between human and chickens,” he said.

“We use technology to improve poultry farming methods and elevate our production efficiency and output. Our aim was to provide the best care possible for the chickens while minimising the risks of poor production and mortality to reduce the operational costs.”

As a result, CCB was able to establish numerous poultry farms, with the objective of turning those farms into profitable assets with high profit margins.

Among the solutions they implemented was the SAP Business One (B1) business management software, which allowed them to connect and and streamline processes for greater efficiency.

CCB has also implemented Internet-of-Things (IoT) technologies. Data from sensors can be streamed in real-time; such as the amount of feeds and water consumed by the chickens, the ambient temperature and lighting exposure, as well as changes in chickens’ weight and so on.

“The best part about the system is that the workers do not need to be there physically to know all this information. Using a smartphone, the worker can just snap pictures or take videos of the farm, the houses and the chicken and immediately consult with the veterinary experts via text messages or video calls,” explained Datuk Jeffrey. “Our operations are now more efficient than ever before.”

 

Chop Cheong Bee @ SAP Roundtable With Mydin

Datuk Jeffrey was speaking at a media roundtable organised by SAP entitled ‘A Growing ASEAN, A Hungry Population: Building Resilient and Sustainable Food Supply Chains’ held recently.

Also in attendance was Mydin Mohamed Holdings Berhad IT Director Malik Murad Ali who shared on how this homegrown Halal hypermarket and retail chain grew from being a store in Kelantan in 1957 to a nationwide network of more than 50 stores, presence in seven major malls and multiple retail outlets.

Mydin had also digitised its processes to realise greater productivity and efficiencies.

Meanwhile, SAP Malaysia Managing Director Hong Kok Cheong who had hosted the Malaysian session said that tackling food waste in Southeast Asia and Malaysia is an issue should be prioritised.

“There is a growing need for safe, and fresh food and the answer is greater digitalisation efforts and integration, collaboration across industry players – and gaining visibility into where products come from, how long they’ve been in transit, and when they’re set to expire. Retailers and suppliers need to document the who’s, what’s, where’s, and when’s of every aspect of the food supply chain, not only for consumer safety and protecting their brands – so that there’s more accurate traceability standards,” said Hong.

All this leads to supply chain visibility – and more efficient direction of the region’s food sources, especially when it comes to fresh produce.

“Businesses need to have a ‘digital core’ to become intelligent enterprises with streamlined efficiency across operations, integrate with partners and suppliers. This way there’s accountability to stakeholders and consumers – track and manage sustainability, coupled with the origin of food being produced,” said Hong.

 “Long and short of it all, businesses need better visibility to predict demand, consumer tastes and preferences (via intelligent insights), so they can meet the demand with the optimum resources, and avoid overordering/service that can result in wastage,” concluded Hong.

 

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Support my work through a bank transfer /  PayPal / credit card!

Name : Adrian Wong
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Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.

He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.

 

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2021 Acer Chromebook Laptops : What You Need To Know!

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Acer introduced SIX new Chromebook models in 2021, offering a wide selection of affordable laptops with long battery life.

Here is what YOU need to know about the six new Acer Chromebook laptops!

 

2021 Acer Chromebook Laptops : What You Need To Know!

Acer introduced SIX new Chromebook models in 2021, in a variety of sizes and form factors with long battery life.

  • 14-inch Acer Chromebook 314
  • 17.3-inch Acer Chromebook 317
  • 14-inch Acer Chromebook 514
  • 14-inch Acer Chromebook Enterprise 514
  • 13.5-inch Acer Chromebook Spin 713
  • 13.5-inch Acer Chromebook Enterprise Spin 713

In this article, we are going to take a look at the six 2021 Acer Chromebook laptops, to see what they offer, and how they compare with each other!

2021 Acer Chromebook 314

Weighing only 1.5 kg, the 2021 Acer Chromebook 314 (CB314-2H/CB314-2HT) is an ultra-portable laptop designed for students.

Its 14-inch IPS display has a Full HD resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels, and optional touch controls. It supports 802.11ac Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 5.0 connectivity, and comes with a 720p HDR webcam.

Powered by the MediaTek MT8183 octa-core processor, it can provide up to 15 hours of battery life.

2021 Acer Chromebook 317

The 2021 Acer Chromebook 317 (CB317-1H) is targeted at users who want a large display for multitasking and streaming content.

It has a large 17.3-inch display with a Full HD resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels, and anti-glare coating. It also comes with a large keyboard (with optional backlighting) with a numeric keypad and a large touchpad.

There is also space for two full-sized upward-facing speakers to give you a more immersive audio experience.

The 2021 Chromebook 317 is built around the latest Intel Celeron processors with Wi-Fi 6 connectivity, and up to 10 hours of battery life.

2021 Acer Chromebook 514

The 2021 Acer Chromebook 514 (CB514-1W/CB514-1WT) is built around the 11th Gen Intel core processors, with up to 10 hours of battery life.

Thanks to its metal top cover and reinforced design, it is MIL-STD810H rated for military-grade durability. On top of that, its touchpad is protected against scratches and corrosion with a layer of Corning Gorilla Glass.

It supports the latest Intel Wi-Fi 6 wireless connectivity, and comes with two full-function USB Type C ports with Thunderbolt 4, and a backlight keyboard with an optional embedded fingerprint reader.

2021 Acer Chromebook Enterprise 514

The 2021 Acer Chromebook 514 (CB514-1W/CB514-1WT) is built around the 11th Gen Intel core processors, and MIL-STD810H rated for military-grade durability. On top of that, its touchpad is protected against scratches and corrosion with a layer of Corning Gorilla Glass.

It supports the latest Intel Wi-Fi 6 wireless connectivity, and comes with two full-function USB Type C ports with Thunderbolt 4, a HDMI port and a backlight keyboard with an optional embedded fingerprint reader.

It also features a Full HD MIPI webcam, and speakers powered by a Smart Amplifier, with support for DTS Audio.

Its Chrome Enterprise operating system features integrated manageability features to help your company cut costs, streamline operations and reduce security risks by letting you deploy, update and manage all your devices remotely.

2021 Acer Chromebook Spin 713

The 2021 Acer Chromebook Spin 713 (CP713-3W) is the world’s first Intel Evo platform-verified Chromebook.

It features a premium aluminium chassis that is MIL-STD 810H rated for military-grade durability, in a convertible form factor. Its 13.5-inch VertiView display has a resolution of 2256 x 1504, giving you 18% more vertical screen space.

Built around the 11th Gen Intel Core i7 processor, it only weighs 1.37 kg and is less than 17 mm thick. Its fast-chargeable battery lasts up to 10 hours, and can get 4 hours of battery life with a quick 30 minute charge!

 

2021 Acer Chromebook Enterprise Spin 713

The 2021 Acer Chromebook Enterprise Spin 713 (CP713-3W) is the world’s first Intel Evo platform-verified Chromebook with Chrome Enterprise manageability built-in.

It features a premium aluminium chassis that is MIL-STD 810H rated for military-grade durability, in a convertible form factor. Its 13.5-inch VertiView display has a resolution of 2256 x 1504, giving you 18% more vertical screen space.

Built around the 11th Gen Intel Core i7 processor, it only weighs 1.37 kg and is less than 17 mm thick. Its fast-chargeable battery lasts up to 10 hours, and can get 4 hours of battery life with a quick 30 minute charge!

 

2021 Acer Chromebook Laptops : Specs + Price Comparison

Here is a quick specifications + price overview of the 2021 Acer Chromebook laptops :

Specifications Chromebook 314 Chromebook 317 Chromebook 514
Enterprise 514		 Chromebook Spin 713
Enterprise Spin 713
Type Laptop Convertible Laptop
Size 14-inch 17.3-inch 14-inch 13.5-inch
Display Resolution 1920 x 1080 2256 x 1504
Processor MediaTek MT8183 Intel Celeron 11th Gen Intel Core
Connectivity Wi-Fi 5 Wi-Fi 6
Battery Life 15 hours 10 hours
Weight 1.5 kg 2.4 kg 1.5 kg 1.37 kg
Starting Price USD 269.99
EUR 329		 USD 379.99
EUR 399		 USD 599.99
EUR 549		 USD 699.99
EUR 769

 

2021 Acer Chromebook Laptops : Where To Buy?

Here are some online purchase options for the 2021 Acer Chromebook laptops (prices accurate as of 9 Nov 2021) :

United States

United Kingdom

Australia

Malaysia

 

Please Support My Work!

Support my work through a bank transfer /  PayPal / credit card!

Name : Adrian Wong
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Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.

He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.

 

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3 Days Later… Roblox Is Finally Up + Running Again!

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Three days after they fell off the face of the Earth, Roblox is finally UP and RUNNING again!

Roblox’s CEO explains what happened…

 

3 Days Later… Roblox Is Finally Up + Running Again!

Ever since Roblox went down on 29 October 2021, they have been saying that they are “making progress” and even “identified an underlying internal cause of the outage“.

But frustrated kids… and adults who are kids at heart, spent the weekend walking around like zombies because they could no longer get their fix of Arsenal or Piggy.

Just kidding! Many of them turned to Minecraft or Among Us, because who can go a weekend without games?

Anyway…. 3 days later… Roblox finally announced that they “identified root cause and solution” and “are working on getting things back online“.

And about 7 hours later, they managed to get Roblox up and running globally!

 

Roblox CEO On What Happened…

Roblox founder and CEO, David Baszucki, later shared a little on what happened and why it took them so long to get the problems fixed.

  • it was a combination of several factors
  • there was a subtle bug in their backend service communications that is triggered under heavy load
  • a core system in their infrastructure became overwhelmed
  • it was not due to external traffic or any particular experience (e.g. Chipotle promotion)
  • the failure was due to the growth in the number of servers in their datacenters

So it looks like it really did not involve whacking their servers with a crowbar, or praying to them…

The good news is – there has been NO LOSS of player’s data, and your Roblox experience should be fully back to normal!

 

3 Days Earlier… Roblox Went Down HARD

Here’s a quick round-up of what happened three days ago, for people who have no freaking idea what happened.

A couple of days ago, Chipotle announced that they would open a virtual restaurant in Roblox, which will give away free burritos, virtual costumes and exclusive items. There’s even a fun Boorito Maze to try out!

But about 30 minutes after that Chipotle event kicked off, Roblox started experiencing problems, which snowballed until their entire platform and website fell off the face of the Earth.

That was THREE DAYS AGO… and since then, all we know is that they have been working hard to figure out what went wrong, and no, it was not Chipotle’s fault.

Read more : Roblox Down More Than 2 Days, Not Because Of Chipotle!

 

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Name : Adrian Wong
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Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.

He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.

 

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Roblox Down More Than 2 Days, Not Because Of Chipotle!

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Roblox, has been down for MORE THAN 2 days now, but apparently, it has NOTHING to do with the massive Chipotle promotion!

Here is what we know so far…

 

Roblox Down More Than 2 Days

Roblox first experienced issues at around 7 AM on 29 October 2021, which initially affected only Games and Account Information.

But that snowballed and the entire Roblox gaming platform and website went offline, forcing them to issue a terse tweet saying that they are “working hard to get things back to normal”.

Unfortunately, they didn’t seem to be making much progress because Roblox has been down for more than two days!

That’s an eternity for an online gaming platform, especially a massively-popular one for kids… on a weekend!

At about 11 PM on 30 October, the Roblox website announced that it is “currently in maintenance mode to allow for internal work to be completed“.

More than 6 hours later – Roblox remained offline, with another round of assurance that they’re working on the problem :

Did they get locked out of their servers like Facebook earlier this month? Sounds far worse, if you ask me…

Read more : Did 13 Yr Sun Jisu Hack Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram?

 

Roblox Went Down Not Because Of Chipotle

On 26 October 2021, Chipotle announced that it would open a virtual restaurant in Roblox, offering $1 million in free burritos!

Fans would be able to visit the virtual Chipotle restaurant to score a free burrito, by dressing up in new Chipotle-inspired Halloween virtual costumes.

They would also be able to navigate the Chipotle Boorito Maze to unlock exclusive Roblox items!

Some irate players have suggested that Roblox went down because of this Chipotle promotion, a hypothesis that had some teeth because the issues started occurring about 30 minutes after Chipotle promotion kicked off!

However, Roblox later claimed that the downtime was NOT related to the Chipotle promotion :

We know that this outage was not related to any specific experiences or partnerships on the platform.

At 5 AM on 31 October, Roblox shared that they “believe” they identified the problem :

We believe we have identified an underlying internal cause of the outage. We’re in the process of performing the necessary engineering and maintenance work to get Roblox back up and running ASAP. Thanks for your patience.

Well, Chipotle’s fault or not, kids and adults who are kids at heart around the world will be eagerly waiting for Roblox to get back online again!

Until then, enjoy these funny memes and comments by Roblox fans!

 

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Support my work through a bank transfer /  PayPal / credit card!

Name : Adrian Wong
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Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.

He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.

 

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Facebook, Instagram, Messenger + Workplace Down Again!

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Just days after going down for SIX HOURS, Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and Workplace went down AGAIN!

Find out what happened!

 

Facebook, Instagram, Messenger + Workplace Down Again!

Just days after all of Facebook’s services went down for six hours, Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and Workplace went down AGAIN!

At around 3:22 AM on 9 October 2021, they went down again… with people reporting that they were unable to log into their accounts, or send messages.

Fortunately, this time it didn’t take down WhatsApp and it took their engineering team just under 2 hours to get those Facebook services restored.

 

Why Did Facebook, Instagram, Messenger + Workplace Go Down Again!

Again, Facebook blamed another faulty “configuration change” for this downtime, but did not announce any details on what actually happened.

But coming right after an extraordinarily long downtime just days earlier and public testimony by Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen, this new downtime may be shorter but is no less grievous.

It will feed growing opinion that Facebook has too much services under its control, and it’s dangerous and even folly to let a single company control so many social networks and communication services.

Regulators will no doubt be spurred by this new incident to look at breaking up Facebook.

EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager said that the major Facebook outage highlighted the danger of relying on just a few big players, underscoring “the need for more rivals”.

Even Russia jumped into the fray, stating that Russia was right to develop its own Internet platforms and social networks.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said that the recent 6-hour outage of Facebook services “answers the question of whether we need our own social networks and Internet platforms“.

We will be looking forward to Facebook Engineering’s explanation of what happened, and whether it involved cutting through doors to get to their servers…

Read more : Why Facebook, Messenger, WhatsApp, Instagram Went Down!

 

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Support my work through a bank transfer /  PayPal / credit card!

Name : Adrian Wong
Bank Transfer : CIMB 7064555917 (Swift Code : CIBBMYKL)
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Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.

He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.

 

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Was Facebook Taken Down By 13 Year-Old Chinese Hacker?

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Was Facebook taken down by a 13 year-old Chinese hacker?

Take a look at the viral claim, and find out what the FACTS really are!

 

Claim : Facebook Was Taken Down By 13 Year-Old Chinese Hacker!

On 4 October 2021, Facebook and ALL of its messaging and social media platforms went down for about six hours, including Messenger, WhatsApp and Instagram!

Several websites, as well as people on Twitter and Facebook started claiming that Facebook was taken down by a 13 year-old Chinese hacker called Sun Jisu / Sun Ji Su / Sun Jiso / Sun Ji Soo.

There are quite a number of these claims, so just SKIP to the next section for the facts!

International media claimed that “China” was behind the suspension of social media services in the world.

According to Reuters, a Chinese hacker named “Sun Jisu” is responsible for stopping the services of “Facebook”, “WhatsApp” and Instagram, and added that the Chinese hackers are only 13 years old.

The Chinese hacker “Sun Ji Su” has topped the famous search engines and Twitter platforms during the past minutes, after disabling WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook today 2021 in all countries of the world, amid questions among activists about the details of this information.

The Chinese hacker who disrupted Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram around the world. The 13-year-old boy, Sun Jisu, who hacked the three sites and also caused Facebook employees to be prevented from entering the headquarters of the global institution after disabling the electronic portals and caused an economic loss estimated at billions dollars around the world.

Reuters: A 13-year-old Chinese hacker named Sun Jiso has stopped Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram services.
The value of Facebook shares has dropped significantly due to the disruption of the global network of Instagram and WhatsApp.

#NewYorkTimes: The Facebook company refused the cyber attacks on behalf of a 13, Chinese hacker. It is not clear what the problem is with Facebook, Whatsapp, and Instagram. The Facebook company claims that we repair them soon.

Show more
Show less

 

Truth : Facebook Was Not Taken Down By 13 Year-Old Chinese Hacker!

The story of a 13 year-old Chinese hacker taking down Facebook is just fake news created by fake news / clickbait websites to go viral and get money through ads.

Here are the reasons why…

Fact #1 : International Media Did Not Blame China

On one blamed China for the bizarre 6-hour downtime of Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger.

The international media referred to cybersecurity specialists who pointed at DNS failure as the most likely cause, not a state actor like China.

Clickbait / fake news websites intentionally added that false claim to “trigger” Chinese netizens and Sinophiles to share their fake news.

Read more : US Refused WHO Investigation Of Fort Detrick For COVID-19?

Fact #2 : Reuters  + NYT Did Not Report On Any Chinese Hacker

Reuters did not report that a 13 year-old Chinese hacker called Sun Jisu was responsible for the bringing down Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger.

Neither did the New York Times write about a 13 year old hacker attacking Facebook.

These are complete lies that are easily verified with a quick check on the Reuters and New York Times websites.

Fact #3 : 13 Year-Old Sun Jisu / Sun Jiso Does Not Exist

There is no 13 year-old Chinese hacker called Sun Jisu / Sun Ji Su / Sun Ji So / Sun Ji Soo. He does NOT exist.

In addition, that is a Korean name, not Chinese – a mistake that a non-Asian person would make.

Fact #4 : That Was An Old Picture Of Wang Zhengyang

The fake news websites used a picture of Chinese hacking prodigy, Wang Zhengyang, speaking at the 2014 Chinese Internet Security Conference.

Wang Zhengyang was 13 year-old at that time, and would be 20 years old this year – 2021. Here are two more pictures of him speaking at that event.

Wang Zhengyang at 2014 Chinese Internet Security Conference

Fact #5 : Facebook Services Were Brought Down By Configuration Changes

Facebook services were not brought down by a hacker, but configuration changes their own engineering team initiated internally.

Facebook’s Vice-President of Infrastructure, Santosh Janardhan, confirmed that “configuration changes” on their “backbone routers” caused the 6-hour long failure.

Our engineering teams have learned that configuration changes on the backbone routers that coordinate network traffic between our data centers caused issues that interrupted this communication. This disruption to network traffic had a cascading effect on the way our data centers communicate, bringing our services to a halt.

Read more : Why Facebook, Messenger, WhatsApp, Instagram Went Down!

Fact #6 : Access Problems Were Caused By Same Servers

Facebook run their internal systems through the same servers, so they became inaccessible when those servers were taken offline.

This included security systems that controlled the fob door locks, with a New York Times reporter tweeting that Facebook staff were unable to gain access to an unspecified office using their keycards.

However, many Facebook staff are working from home due to COVID-19 precautions, so this was only a big problem for engineers trying to gain access to the Facebook data centre in Santa Clara, California.

At no time was this security issue caused by a hacker. It was due to the same servers that went offline.

Read more : Why Facebook, Messenger, WhatsApp, Instagram Went Down!

Now that you know the truth, please SHARE this fact check with your family and friends!

Also, please STOP SHARING fake stories created by fake news / clickbait websites!

 

Please Support My Work!

Support my work through a bank transfer /  PayPal / credit card!

Name : Adrian Wong
Bank Transfer : CIMB 7064555917 (Swift Code : CIBBMYKL)
Credit Card / Paypal : https://paypal.me/techarp

Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.

He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.

 

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Did 13 Yr Sun Jisu Hack Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram?

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Did the 13 year-old Chinese hacker, Sun Jisu, hack Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram, causing them to fail for more than 6 hours?

Take a look at the new viral claim, and find out what the FACTS really are!

 

Claim : 13 Year-Old Sun Jisu Hacked Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram!

On 4 October 2021, Facebook and ALL of its messaging and social media platforms went down for about six hours, including Messenger, WhatsApp and Instagram!

Some websites and people on Twitter and Facebook started claiming that the failure was due to a 13 year-old Chinese hacker called Sun Jisu / Sun Ji Su / Sun Jiso / Sun Ji Soo.

There are quite a number of these claims, so just SKIP to the next section for the facts!

International media claimed that “China” was behind the suspension of social media services in the world.

According to Reuters, a Chinese hacker named “Sun Jisu” is responsible for stopping the services of “Facebook”, “WhatsApp” and Instagram, and added that the Chinese hackers are only 13 years old.

The Chinese hacker “Sun Ji Su” has topped the famous search engines and Twitter platforms during the past minutes, after disabling WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook today 2021 in all countries of the world, amid questions among activists about the details of this information.

The Chinese hacker who disrupted Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram around the world. The 13-year-old boy, Sun Jisu, who hacked the three sites and also caused Facebook employees to be prevented from entering the headquarters of the global institution after disabling the electronic portals and caused an economic loss estimated at billions dollars around the world.

Reuters: A 13-year-old Chinese hacker named Sun Jiso has stopped Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram services.
The value of Facebook shares has dropped significantly due to the disruption of the global network of Instagram and WhatsApp.

#NewYorkTimes: The Facebook company refused the cyber attacks on behalf of a 13, Chinese hacker. It is not clear what the problem is with Facebook, Whatsapp, and Instagram. The Facebook company claims that we repair them soon.

Show more
Show less

 

Truth : Sun Jisu Doesn’t Exist, Did Not Hack Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram!

The truth is – this is just fake news created by fake news / clickbait websites to go viral and get money through ads.

Here are the reasons why…

Fact #1 : International Media Did Not Blame China

No mainstream media blamed China for the bizarre 6-hour downtime of Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger.

Practically all of them referred to cybersecurity specialists who pointed at DNS failure as the most likely cause, not a state actor like China.

Clickbait / fake news websites intentionally added that false claim to “trigger” Chinese netizens and Sinophiles to share their fake news.

Read more : US Refused WHO Investigation Of Fort Detrick For COVID-19?

Fact #2 : Reuters  + NYT Did Not Report On Any Chinese Hacker

Reuters did not report that a 13 year-old Chinese hacker called Sun Jisu was responsible for the bringing down Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger.

Neither did the New York Times write about a 13 year old hacker attacking Facebook.

These are complete lies that are easily verified with a quick check on the Reuters and New York Times websites.

Fact #3 : 13 Year-Old Sun Jisu / Sun Ji Soo Does Not Exist

There is no 13 year-old Chinese hacker called Sun Jisu / Sun Ji Su / Sun Ji So / Sun Ji Soo. He does NOT exist.

In addition, Sun Jisu / Sun Ji Soo is a Korean name, not Chinese. This is a mistake that a non-Asian person would make.

Fact #4 : That Was An Old Picture Of Wang Zhengyang

The fake news websites used a picture of Chinese hacking prodigy, Wang Zhengyang, speaking at the 2014 Chinese Internet Security Conference.

Wang Zhengyang was 13 year-old at that time, and would be 20 years old this year – 2021. Here are two more pictures of him speaking at that event.

Wang Zhengyang at 2014 Chinese Internet Security Conference

Fact #5 : Facebook Services Were Brought Down By Configuration Changes

Facebook services were not brought down by a hacker, but configuration changes their own engineering team initiated internally.

Facebook’s Vice-President of Infrastructure, Santosh Janardhan, confirmed that “configuration changes” on their “backbone routers” caused the 6-hour long failure.

Our engineering teams have learned that configuration changes on the backbone routers that coordinate network traffic between our data centers caused issues that interrupted this communication. This disruption to network traffic had a cascading effect on the way our data centers communicate, bringing our services to a halt.

He also asserted that it was a faulty configuration change, and no user data was compromised.

Our services are now back online and we’re actively working to fully return them to regular operations. We want to make clear at this time we believe the root cause of this outage was a faulty configuration change. We also have no evidence that user data was compromised as a result of this downtime.

Read more : Why Facebook, Messenger, WhatsApp, Instagram Went Down!

Fact #6 : Access Problems Were Caused By Same Servers

Facebook run their internal systems through the same servers, so they became inaccessible when those servers were taken offline.

This included security systems that controlled the fob door locks, with a New York Times reporter tweeting that Facebook staff were unable to gain access to an unspecified office using their keycards.

However, many Facebook staff are working from home due to COVID-19 precautions, so this was only a big problem for engineers trying to gain access to the Facebook data centre in Santa Clara, California.

At no time was this security issue caused by a hacker. It was due to the same servers that went offline.

Read more : Why Facebook, Messenger, WhatsApp, Instagram Went Down!

Now that you know the truth, please SHARE this fact check with your family and friends!

Also, please STOP SHARING fake stories created by fake news / clickbait websites!

 

Please Support My Work!

Support my work through a bank transfer /  PayPal / credit card!

Name : Adrian Wong
Bank Transfer : CIMB 7064555917 (Swift Code : CIBBMYKL)
Credit Card / Paypal : https://paypal.me/techarp

Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.

He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.

 

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New In MySejahtera : Risk Level, Vax Status + Check-Out!

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MySejahtera just introduced a more prominent display of your COVID-19 risk level and vaccination status, as well as a new Check-out button!

 

New In MySejahtera : Risk Level + Vaccination Status Display

Now that a majority of Malaysians have been vaccinated – 60% of all adult citizens as of 2 September 2021 – the government believes it is time to learn to live with COVID-19.

To that end, the MySejahtera team will be pushing out a new built (version) that will make the display of your COVID-19 Risk Level and Vaccination Status more prominent.

Both are currently “hidden” in your MySejahtera profile, and the update will bring them to the forefront, to make it easier for you to display them.

 

New In MySejahtera : Check-Out Button

One design flaw of the original MySejahtera contact tracing feature is that it only logged when you check INTO a location. There was never an option to check OUT of a location.

Belatedly, the MySejahtera team will be adding a check-out button. You just need to tap Check-out whenever you leave the premise – there is no need to scan any QR code.

With this feature, you will be able to let contact tracers know exactly how long you were within a certain premise.

Without knowing exactly how long you were in a certain premise, contact tracers will not be able to determine if you are truly at risk of being a close contact of a COVID-19 infected person.

For example, if you pop into Village Grocer for 15 minutes and a COVID-19 positive person came to shop an hour later, contact tracers will not know if you are at risk if they do not know when you left the store.

This will inevitably lead to a large number of people wrongly identified as close contacts, when they were never at risk at all.

This new check-out feature will be critical in reducing the number of false close contacts who will be required to home quarantine.

 

When Will These New MySejahtera Features Be Available?

These new features will be available in MySejahtera 1.0.45, with these changes :

  • Enhancements to check-in page to display vaccination status
  • New Check-out feature
  • Minor bug fixes

It was made available in the Apple App Store for iPhone users on 2 September, but only appeared in the Google Play Store for Android users on 5 September 2021.

 

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Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.

He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.

 

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Maxis Awards To Drive Malaysian Social Initiatives!

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Maxis just launched the Maxis Awards, to support outstanding Malaysian social initiatives for the rakyat!

Here is what you need to know!

 

Maxis Awards To Drive Outstanding Malaysian Social Initiatives!

On 2 September 2021, Maxis launched their inaugural Maxis Awards, to recognise and support outstanding Malaysian social initiatives that drive positive impact to the rakyat.

Maxis Awards is a social enterprise programme that seeks out visionary ideas from these Malaysian heroes, and collaborates to bring them to life.

Maxis is committing RM 5 million worth of support to help develop, and promote these winning projects over the course of the next year.

 

Maxis Awards : How Does It Work?

Maxis Awards kicked off last month, with an invitation for enterprises to submit proposals on projects that will drive positive change with a significant impact on the community.

The proposals will be evaluated by a panel of Maxis judges, and shortlisted enterprises will then present their projects to these judges who will select the winners based on these three criteria :

  • innovation
  • role of technology
  • clearly demonstrates added value to the community, either economically, socially and/or environmentally.

Several Malaysian-based projects will be selected in the coming year, with the first two winning projects to be announced later this month.

Maxis will help these winners develop their projects over the next year, from the ideation stage up to the execution and marketing of their projects, including :

  • Maxis Business solutions and technical experts for collaboration, IoT, cloud, voice, network and/or security
  • Cash funding to help cover operational needs
  • Marketing and publicity through the media and Maxis-owned channels.

 

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Support my work through a bank transfer /  PayPal / credit card!

Name : Adrian Wong
Bank Transfer : CIMB 7064555917 (Swift Code : CIBBMYKL)
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Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.

He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.

 

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How To Change Your MySJ ID In MySejahtera!

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Find out how to change your MySJ ID in MySejahtera, if you have a new mobile number or email address!

 

Why Change Your MySJ ID In MySejahtera?

When you sign up for a MySejahtera account, you will be asked to use either your mobile number or email address.

That mobile number or email address becomes your MySJ ID.

If you are switching to a new mobile number or a new email address, you will need to quickly change your MySJ ID.

Otherwise, you may lose access to your MySejahtera account, as all OTP codes will continue to be issued to the old mobile number or email address!

Let us show you how to use that new feature to change your MySJ ID using MySejahtera!

 

How To Change Your MySJ ID In MySejahtera : Video Guide

On 8 July 2021, MySejahtera was updated to version 1.0.38, which lets you change your MySJ ID!

Before you proceed, please make sure you do this first :

  1. If you are switching to a new mobile number, please make sure the new SIM card is inserted and activated.
  2. Please make sure you update to MySejahtera 1.0.38 or later before you proceed.

If you need a step-by-step, pictorial guide, please scroll down to the next section.

 

How To Change Your MySJ ID In MySejahtera : Step-by-Step Guide

For those who prefer a step-by-step guide with pictures, here is our guide on how to change your MySJ ID in MySejahtera.

Before you proceed, please make sure you do this first :

  1. If you are switching to a new mobile number, please make sure the new SIM card is inserted and activated.
  2. Please make sure you update to MySejahtera 1.0.38 or later before you proceed.
  1. Open MySejahtera.
  2. Tap on the Close button on the upper right corner of the default Check-in screen.
  3. Tap on Profile at the lower right corner.

  1. Tap on the menu (☰) at the top right corner of your Profile page.

  1. Tap on the Change MySJ ID option in your Profile Settings.If it’s missing, check to make sure you updated to version 1.0.38 or later.

  1. Key in your new mobile number or new email address twice.
    Use the link at the bottom of the screen to switch between the mobile number or email address options.
  2. Tap Confirm.

  1. MySejahtera will send an OTP (One-Time Password) to your new mobile number or email address to authenticate it.
  2. Key in the OTP sent to your new mobile number / email address to verify your new MySJ ID.
  3. Log out of MySejahtera, if it doesn’t automatically do it for you.
  4. Log into MySejahtera using your new MySJ ID and your previous password (which does not change just because you change your MySJ ID).

That’s it! You have successfully changed your MySJ ID to your new mobile number or new email address!

Don’t forget to SHARE this guide with your family and friends, so they know what to do as well!

 

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Thank you in advanced! ❤️

 

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MySejahtera Now Shows Correct Vaccine Registration Dates!

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It took them almost 2 weeks to fix the issue, but MySejahtera will now show you the correct vaccine registration and assessment dates!

 

MySejahtera Now Shows Correct Vaccine Registration Dates!

After initially showing the wrong registration dates for the COVID-19 vaccination program, MySejahtera will now show you the correct dates!

This will be a real relief for the public who has been thoroughly confused by the wrong dates, and suggestions that their registration did not go through.

Even though National Immunisation Programme Coordinating Minister Khairy Jamaluddin said that the first registration was already recorded, we all want to see it stated correctly in MySejahtera.

As you can now see in this comparison, the registration and assessment dates are now accurately reflected.

 

Haven’t Registered For Vaccine On MySejahtera?

If you have not registered for vaccine on MySejahtera, please do so ASAP! It’s very simple!

We also have a pictorial and video guide for you : How To Register For COVID-19 Vaccination On MySejahtera!

You can also register for vaccination online or by phone!

Online Registration : Malay | English

Phone Hotline : 1800-888-828

So get registered for your FREE vaccination, and be amongst the first to be free from COVID-19!

Note : Do NOT register again online or by phone, if you have already registered via MySejahtera.

 

Wrong MySejahtera Vaccine Registration Dates?

On 3 March 2021, MySejahtera started displaying a vaccination status page, but it only appeared for some people.

For everyone else, clicking on the Vaccine for [Your Name] link just leads them back to the registration process, instead of the status page.

They would have to go through the entire vaccination registration process again, before the status page would appear.

After they re-register for vaccination on MySejahtera, the Vaccine for [Your Name] link will then correctly show the vaccination status page.

There was also concern when users noticed that MySejahtera was showing a new registration date, instead of the original registration date.

 

No Need To Register Again For Vaccine On MySejahtera!

On 4 March 2021, the National Immunisation Programme Coordinating Minister Khairy Jamaluddin, said that MySejahtera is currently updating its vaccination registration record.

Missing Vaccination Status Page?

He assured everyone that all MySejahtera users should see the vaccination status page today.

If you still do not see the vaccination status page, you do NOT need to re-register for the vaccination programme.

Wrong Vaccination Registration Date?

He also said that those who re-registered and received a new date on their vaccination status page do not need to worry.

The appointment will be set according to the first registration date, not the new registration date.

 

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Dell Survey On Remote Work Readiness In Malaysia!

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Dell Technologies just unveiled their inaugural Remote Work Readiness (RWR) Index and survey results for Malaysia!

Take a look at the highlights of what Dell found on remote work readiness in Malaysia!

 

Dell Survey On Remote Work Readiness In Malaysia!

For their inaugural Remote Work Readiness Index, Dell Technologies surveyed over 7,000 working professionals in the Asia Pacific and Japan (APJ) region, of which 1,030 were from Malaysia.

The survey for the Dell Technologies RWR Index was meant to capture data on their readiness and views on long-term remote work.

Here is a summary of the key findings in the Dell Remote Work Readiness survey for Malaysia :

  • 70% already have some experience with remote working before the MCO took effect.
  • 84% feel prepared for long-term remote work
  • Only 43% feel that their employers support remote working for the long term
  • their top 3 concerns were :
    – 33% : their job security
    – 31% : blurring boundary between professional and personal lives
    – 28% : lack the right technology assets to be productive
  • 50% feel their employers are not providing enough tech resources for successful remote work
  • their top 3 tech challenges :
    – 44% : unstable remote network
    – 33% : lack of access to internal company resources
    – 29% : have to use personal productivity equipment and tools for work
  • Only 43% feel that their employers are providing enough HR resources for successful long-term remote work
  • their top 3 HR challenges
    – 47% : lack of in-person communication
    – 38% : lack of learning and development sessions
    – 37% : lack of team engagement and access to HR processes

 

How To Improve Remote Work Readiness In Malaysia

Based on the Dell Remote Work Readiness survey for Malaysia, here are the changes companies should look at adopting for successful remote work :

Top 3 Tech Changes To Consider

  • 42% : Better access to productivity equipment and tools
  • 38% : A stable remote network, including adequate Internet bandwidth, is necessary
  • 36% : Better access to internal company resources

Top 3 HR Changes To Consider

  • 51% : Learning and development sessions, including training for virtual tools and remote working
  • 43% : Access to digital tools for performance review, leave filing, etc.
  • 42% : Team engagement initiatives while remote working

 

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NTT Launches Fifth Data Center In Malaysia – Cyberjaya 5!

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NTT Ltd just launched their fifth data centre in Malaysia – Cyberjaya 5 (CBJ5)!

Here is a quick look at what NTT Cyberjaya 5 offers!

 

NTT Launches Fifth Data Center In Malaysia – Cyberjaya 5

On 3 February 2021, NTT Ltd announced the launch of their fifth data center in Malaysia – Cyberjaya 5 (CBJ5).

Located within the NTT Cyberjaya Campus, this new 107,000 square feet data center is designed for hyperscalers and high-end enterprises in Malaysia’s growing digital economy.

CBJ5 supports 6.5 megawatts of flexible and scalable power, and boasts a Tier IV-ready, compact and modular design, with a cooling wall system that handles up to 15 kilowatts per rack.

NTT clients will have greater access to flexible, scalable and secure infrastructure in Malaysia – a regional data center hub.

“The demand for data storage and managed hosting services is expected to grow exponentially across Malaysia. This fifth data center will meet the expanding needs of organizations to reach their digital business objectives, in particular the FSI sector, as our data center complies with the Risk Management in Technology (RMiT) guideline set by Bank Negara Malaysia. We hope to play a key role in providing the vital data capacity at a high speed to keep Malaysia’s digital ecosystems and the digital economy ticking.” said Henrick Choo, CEO, NTT Ltd. in Malaysia.

 

NTT Cyberjaya 5 : Part Of Strategic ASEAN Hub

CBJ5 is connected to the existing Asia Submarine-cable Express (ASE) and Asia Pacific Gateway (APG) cable system, and will eventually be linked to the upcoming MIST cable system.

The MIST cable system will be available by end 2022 and it is a strategic joint venture for international submarine cables in South East Asia, with Orient Link Pte. Ltd.. It will enable NTT Ltd. to expand its offerings into India and beyond, while the ASE and APG cable systems provide global connectivity from Asia to United States.

This new expansion in Malaysia is part of NTT Global Data Centres division’s growth strategy. Malaysia is a prime data centre market in the ASEAN region, due to the abundant availability of resources, and favourable government policies.

“NTT places Asia Pacific as a tactical key region, and Malaysia – a strategic hub for the submarine cables operated by NTT such as the new MIST cable system, as well as the existing Asia Submarine-cable Express (ASE) and Asia Pacific Gateway (APG). Furthermore, CBJ5 will drive business opportunities in Asia through the upcoming MIST cable system which will link all our large-scale data centers in the region. Our continued commitment to Malaysia will help position NTT as a technologically innovative leader to address the industries of the future,” said Ryuichi Matsuo, Executive Vice President for NTT Ltd.’s Global Data Centers division.

“The pandemic also illustrated the importance of effective connectivity and reliable infrastructure to ensure business continuity. NTT’s global data center platform offers flexible, scalable and secure infrastructure along with a full-stack of customizable solutions that clients can utilize to support their digital transformation needs and maintain critical applications in a comprehensive, hybrid IT environment,” he concluded.

 

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How Honeywell Is Helping Industries Tackle COVID-19!

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Find out how Honeywell has pivoted to deliver new services and products that help critical industries tackle the COVID-19 pandemic!

 

How Honeywell Is Helping Industries Tackle COVID-19

Honeywell have long been a solution partner for critical industries, with over 100 years of global experience in various industries.

In an exclusive roundtable session, Norm L. Gilsdorf, President of Honeywell ASEAN, detailed how the COVID-19 pandemic has created a crisis for critical industries.

On the other hand, it offered Honeywell the opportunity to showcase their expertise in creating new solutions and products to meet the new challenges.

 

Honeywell Products + Services That Help Industries Tackle COVID-19

Honeywell have quickly pivoted to develop these new solutions and products to help critical industries In ASEAN countries and around the world better handle the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Honeywell UV Treatment System

The Honeywell UV Treatment System is a deep ultraviolet (UVC) sanitising system for airlines that significant reduces certain viruses and bacteria on airplane cabin surfaces.

It is roughly the size of the typical airline beverage cart, with arms that extend over the top of seats, to sweep the cabin with UVC light.

The Honeywell UV Treatment System can service an aircraft cabin in less than 10 minutes for just a few dollars per flight for midsize to large airline fleets.

Currently, several major airlines in the ASEAN region are testing this system on their aircraft.

Honeywell Healthy Building Solutions

The Honeywell Healthy Building Solutions are not new, but they go a long way to help companies protect their workforce from COVID-19.

By integrated air quality, safety and security technologies, they help to improve the health of building environments, operate more cleanly and safely, and help enforce social distancing policies.

The same technologies can also be employed in other public and commercial facilities like hospitals, airports, factories, educational institutions, etc. to enhance safety and compliance.

Honeywell Remote Industrial Solutions

The Honeywell Remote Industrial Solutions are being used by customers to handle COVID-19 related constraints and maintain business continuity, while protecting employees.

This software suite, which includes Experion Remote Operations, allow for remote management as well as work-from-home abilities for employees.

Honeywell Forge Cybersecurity Suite helps customers ensure business continuity in the face of mounting cyber threats, uncertain business conditions and supply chain disruptions.

Warehouse and logistics solutions help drive the exceptional growth of e-commerce in the ASEAN region and beyond, during the pandemic. They also support cold chain services for delivering medical products, including vaccines.

Other Honeywell Solutions That Help Against COVID-19

Other Honeywell solutions that help people and industries handle COVID-19 include :

  • Gas and flow sensors for ventilators, oxygen concentrators and respiratory machines;
  • Thermorebellion, a new temperature monitoring solution that incorporates advanced, infrared imaging technology and artificial intelligence algorithms to conduct non-invasive, preliminary screening of personnel entering facilities such as airports, hospitals and plants;
  • Dual layer face masks, personal safety packs and N95 masks.

 

COVID-19 : How To Keep Safe!

Here are a few simple steps to stay safe :

Recommended : Soap vs Sanitiser : Which Works Better Against COVID-19?
Recommended : Surgical Mask : How To CORRECTLY Wear + Remove!
Recommended : COVID-19 Food Safety : Fruits, Vegetables, Takeouts

 

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Kaspersky on APAC Digital Reputation Threats!

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Vitaly Kamluk, Kaspersky Director of Global Research and Analysis for APAC, explores the impact of social media activities on our digital reputation, as well as those of brands and companies!

 

Digital Reputation : What Is It?

Digital reputation is the online version of good old fashion reputation. The only difference is that it is defined by our online behaviour and what people are saying about us, or the brand.

In short, our digital reputation is a combination of our digital footprint, and the impact it has on how other people perceive us, or the brand.

As the world becomes more connected, digital reputation is becoming more than just important – it is now critical to the future and success of any individual or corporation.

This has led to a shift in how people and brands behave online these days…

As Jesmond Chang, Head of Corporate Communications for Kaspersky APAC, shared above :

  • 32% of social media users in APAC use anonymous accounts
  • 50% of social media users in APAC avoid companies that are involved in a scandal, or had received negative news coverage online
  • 40% also stopped using a company’s or brand’s products once they are embroiled in some kind of online crisis.

 

Kaspersky on APAC Digital Reputation Threats!

At the 6th Vitaly Kamluk, Kaspersky Director of Global Research and Analysis for APAC, shared the latest threats to digital reputation in the APAC region, which is precipitated by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“One of the most visible effect of this pandemic is how it forced everyone, from individuals to the biggest companies, to shift a lot of their activities online.

This dependence, triggered by our need to secure our physical health, also pushed us to increase our social media use, either to connect with our distant loved ones, to give support to our community, to entertain ourselves, or to get hold of products and services that we need.

Parallel to this trend is the opening of wider doors for cybercriminals to exploit”

With many employees working from home, cybercriminals have found new ways to exploit this situation :

  • brute force attacks on database servers increased 23% in April 2020
  • Malicious files planted on websites increase 8% in April 2020
  • Network attacks and phishing emails also rose

Kaspersky themselves reported an increase of unique malware samples from 350,000 per day pre-COVID, to 428,000 per day!

With the increased reliance on online services, including remote work and learning, e-commerce purchases and a greater adoption of e-wallets, the 2020 threat landscape appears to favour cybercriminals.

 

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PowerProtect Data Manager Nov 2020 Update: What’s New?

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Dell Technologies just announced enhancements to PowerProtect Data Manager available globally in November 2020!

Find out what’s new in the latest Dell EMC PowerProtect Data Manager!

 

PowerProtect Data Manager : What Is It?

Dell EMC PowerProtect Data Manager provides software-defined data protection, automated discovery, and deduplication for physical, virtual and cloud environments.

Its software-defined architecture allows for greater operational agility, and faster IT transformation, while delivering next-generation data protection.

 

PowerProtect Data Manager November 2020 Update : What’s New?

In its November 2020 update, PowerProtect Data Manager offers these new enhancements :

  • In-cloud workloads in Microsoft Azure and AWS are now protected
  • VMware Tanzu portfolio is now supported
  • Native vCenter Storage Policy-Based Management integrated for VM protection
  • VMware-certified solution to protect VMware Cloud Foundation infrastructure layer.
  • Protection for containerised apps with open source databases, including PostgreSQL and Apache Cassandra, in Kubernetes environments.
  • Customers can now protect Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (EKS) and Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) to back-up Kubernetes cluster-level resources.

 

PowerProtect Data Manager November 2020 Update : Availability

The November 2020 enhancements are available globally with immediate effect.

 

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2020 Dell EMC PowerProtect DP Series IDPA : What’s New?

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Dell Technologies just announced the 2020 Dell EMC PowerProtect DP Series appliances!

Here is what you need to know about the next-generation integrated data protection appliances!

 

2020 Dell EMC PowerProtect DP Series : What Is It?

The 2020 PowerProtect DP series is the next-generation family of integrated data protection appliances (IDPA) from Dell Technologies.

They offer a complete solution for backup, recovery, replication, deduplication, cloud readiness with disaster recovery, and long-term rotation to the public cloud!

The 2020 Dell EMC DataProtect DP series are all-in-one data protection solutions that offer :

  • Storage capacities from 8 terabytes to 1 petabyte
  • Greater efficiency, with up to 65:1 data reduction
  • Up to 38% faster backups, and up to 45% faster restores, compared to previous generation.
  • Instant access and restore of up to 50% greater IOPS, compared to previous generation.
  • Consumes up to 23% less power than the previous generation
  • Cloud long-term retention, and cloud DR-ready
  • VMware integration

The 2020 Dell EMC DataProtect DP series is also guaranteed under the Future-Proof Program, and is part of the Dell Technologies on Demand program.

 

2020 Dell EMC PowerProtect DP Series : Models + Key Specifications

The 2020 Dell EMC PowerProtect DP series consists of four models – DP4400, DP5900, DP8400 and DP8900. Here are their key specifications.

Specifications DP4400 DP5900 DP8400 DP8900
Physical Capacity 8 TB to 96 TB 96 TB to 288 TB 192 TB to 768 TB 576 TB to 1 PB
Physical Capacity
with Cloud Tier		 Up to 288 TB Up to 864 TB Up to 2.3 PB Up to 3 PB
Logical Capacity Up to 4.8 PB Up to 18.7 PB Up to 49.9 PB Up to 65 PB
Logical Capacity
with Cloud Tier
 Up to 14.4 PB Up to 56.1 PB Up to 149.7 PB Up to 195 PB
Max Throughput Up to 9 TB/hr Up to 33 TB/hr Up to 57 TB/hr Up to 94 TB/hr
Drive Type SAS 12 TB SAS 4 TB SAS 8 TB SAS 8 TB
Networking 8 x RJ45, or
8 x SFP		 4 x 40 GbE uplinks
Each Quad SFP port can be split into 4 x 10 GbE
Max. Power 475 VA 2,830 VA 5,480 VA 7,250 VA
Thermal Rating 1,620 BTU/hr 9,300 BTU/hr 17,800 BTU/hr 23,400 BTU/hr

 

2020 Dell EMC PowerProtect DP Series : Availability

The 2020 Dell EMC PowerProtect series appliances – DP4400, DP5900, DP8400 and DP8900 – will be available globally in December 2020.

 

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AMD Instinct MI100 : 11.5 TFLOPS In A Single Card!

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AMD just announced the Instinct MI100 – the world’s fastest HPC GPU accelerator, delivering 11.5 TFLOPS in a single card!

 

AMD Instinct MI100 : 11.5 TFLOPS In A Single Card!

Powered by the new CDNA architecture, the AMD Instinct MI100 is the world’s fastest HPC GPU, and the first to break the 10 TFLOPS FP64 barrier!

Compared to the last-generation AMD accelerators, the AMD Instinct MI100 offers HPC applications almost 3.5X faster performance (FP32 matrix), and AI applications nearly 7X boost in throughput (FP16).

  • up to 11.5 TFLOPS of FP64 performance for HPC
  • up to 46.1 TFLOPS of FP32 Matrix performance for AI and machine learning
  • up to 184.6 TFLOPS of FP16 performance for AI training

2nd Gen AMD Infinity Fabric

It also leverages on the 2nd Gen AMD Infinity Fabric technology to deliver twice the peer-to-peer IO bandwidth of PCI Express 4.0. Thanks to its triple Infinity Fabric Links, it offers up to 340 GB/s of aggregate bandwidth per card.

In a server, MI100 GPUs can be configured as two fully-connected quad GPU hives, each providing up to 552 GB/s of P2P IO bandwidth.

Ultra-Fast HBM2 Memory

The AMD Instinct MI100 comes with 32 GB of HBM2 memory that deliver up to 1.23 TB/s of memory bandwidth to support large datasets.

PCI Express 4.0 Interface

The AMD Instinct MI100 is supports PCI Express 4.0, allowing for up to 64 GB/s of peak bandwidth from CPU to GPU, when paired with 2nd Gen AMD EPYC processors.

AMD Instinct MI100 : Specifications

Specifications AMD Instinct MI100
Fab Process 7 nm
Compute Units 120
Stream Processors 7,680
Peak BFLOAT16
Peak INT4 | INT8
Peak FP16
Peak FP32
Peak FMA32
Peak FP64 | FMA64
 92.3 TFLOPS
184.6 TOPS
184.6 TFLOPS
46.1 TFLOPS
23.1 TFLOPS
11.5 TFLOPS
Memory 32 GB HBM2
Memory Interface 4,096 bits
Memory Clock 1.2 GHz
Memory Bandwidth 1.2 TB/s
Reliability Full Chip ECC
RAS Support
Scalability 3 x Infinity Fabric Links
OS Support Linux 64-bit
Bus Interface PCIe Gen 3 / Gen 4
Board Form Factor Full Height, Dual Slot
Board Length 10.5-inch long
Cooling Passively Cooled
Max Board Power 300 W TDP
Warranty 3-Years Limited

 

AMD Instinct MI100 : Availability

The AMD Instinct MI100 will be available in systems by the end of 2020 from OEM/ODM partners like Dell, Gigabyte, Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE), and Supermicro.

 

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AMD CDNA Architecture : Tech Highlights!

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In addition to the gaming-centric RDNA architecture, AMD just introduced a new CDNA architecture that is optimised for compute workloads.

Here are some key tech highlights of the new AMD CDNA architecture!

 

AMD CDNA Architecture : What Is It?

Unlike the fixed-function graphics accelerators of the past, GPUs are now fully-programmable accelerators using what’s called the GPGPU (General Purpose GPU) Architecture.

GPGPU allowed the industry to leverage their tremendous processing power for machine learning and scientific computing purposes.

Instead of continuing down the GPGPU path, AMD has decided to introduce two architectures :

  • AMD RDNA : optimised for gaming to maximise frames per second
  • AMD CDNA : optimised for compute workloads to maximise FLOPS per second.

Designed to accelerate compute workloads, AMD CDNA augments scalar and vector processing with new Matrix Core Engines, and adds Infinity Fabric technology for scale-up capability.

This allows the first CDNA-based accelerator – AMD Instinct MI100 – to break the 10 TFLOPS per second (FP64) barrier.

The GPU is connected to its host processor using a PCI Express 4.0 interface, that delivers up to 32 GB/s of bandwidth in both directions.

 

AMD CDNA Architecture : Compute Units

The command processor and scheduling logic receives API-level commands and translates them into compute tasks.

These compute tasks are implemented as compute arrays and managed by the four Asynchronous Compute Engines (ACE), which maintain their independent stream of commands to the compute units.

Its 120 compute units (CUs) are derived from the earlier GCN architecture, and organised into four compute engines that execute wavefronts that contain 64 work-items.

The CUs are, however, enhanced with new Matrix Core Engines, that are optimised for matrix data processing.

Here is the block diagram of the AMD Instinct MI100 accelerator, showing how its main blocks are all tied together with the on-die Infinity Fabric.

Unlike the RDNA architecture, CDNA removes all of the fixed-function graphics hardware for tasks like rasterisation, tessellation, graphics caches, blending and even the display engine.

CDNA retains the dedicated logic for HEVC, H.264 and VP9 decoding that is sometimes used for compute workloads that operate on multimedia data.

The new Matrix Core Engines add a new family of wavefront-level instructions – the Matrix Fused Multiply-Add (MFMA). The MFMA instructions perform mixed-precision arithmetic and operates on KxN matrices using four different types of input data :

  • INT8 – 8-bit integers
  • FP16 – 16-bit half-precision
  • bf16 – 16-bit brain FP
  • FP32 – 32-bit single-precision

The new Matrix Core Engines has several advantages over the traditional vector pipelines in GCN :

  • the execution unit reduces the number of register file reads, since many input values are reused in a matrix multiplication
  • narrower datatypes create opportunity for workloads that do not require full FP32 precision, e.g. machine learning – saving energy.

 

AMD CDNA Architecture : L2 Cache + Memory

Most scientific and machine learning data sets are gigabytes or even terabytes in size. Therefore L2 cache and memory performance is critical.

In CDNA, the L2 cache is shared across the entire chip, and physically partitioned into multiple slices.

The MI100, specifically, has an 8 MB cache that is 16-way set-associative and made up of 32 slices. Each slice can sustain 128 bytes for an aggregate bandwidth of over 6 TB/s across the GPU.

The CDNA memory controller can drive 4- or 8-stacks high of HBM2 memory at 2.4 GT/s for a maximum throughput of 1.23 TB/s.

The memory contents are also protected by hardware ECC.

 

AMD CDNA Architecture : Communication + Scaling

CDNA is also designed for scaling up, using the high-speed Infinity Fabric technology to connect multiple GPUs.

AMD Infinity Fabric links are 16-bits wide, and operate at 23 GT/s, with three links in CDNA to allow for full connectivity in a quad-GPU configuration.

While the last generation Radeon Instinct MI50 GPU only uses a ring topology, the new fully-connected Infinity Fabric topology boosts performance for common communication patterns like all-reduce and scatter / gather.

Unlike PCI Express, Infinity Fabric links support coherent GPU memory, which lets multiple GPUs share an address space and tightly work on a single task.

 

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Dell Technologies DT Index 2020 : What’s New?

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Dell Technologies just unveiled the results of their Digital Transformation Index 2020 – DT Index 2020, for short.

Take a look at the key findings of the DT Index 2020!

 

Dell Technologies DT Index 2020 : What’s New?

Dell Technologies has unveiled results from its global study that shows organisations shifting the digital transformation programmes – seen as a critical business driver for recovery – into high gear and are on the path to accomplish in a few months what would normally have taken years.

Additionally, the Dell Technologies Digital Transformation Index (DT Index), updated biennially, indicates organisations are not slowing down even during the global COVID-19 pandemic.

 

Dell Technologies DT Index 2020 : Key Findings

The Dell Technology DT Index 2020 results found that:

  • Eight in 10 organisations have fast-tracked some digital transformation programmes
  • 79 percent of global organisations (86 percent of APJ organisations) are re-inventing business model
  • Overall digital transformation curves for both global and APJ region are moving up the digital maturity scale

That said, organisations globally and in APJ still face barriers in their journey to digital transformation success. The top 3 are:

  1. Data privacy and cybersecurity concerns
  2. Lack of budget and resources
  3. Unable to extract insights from data and/or information overload

“The findings form Digital Transformation Index 2020 provides evidences to propel organisations in the data era despite the challenging climate brought on by the pandemic. By recognising the transformation barriers and investing in the right opportunities, organisations can act immediately to drive new ideas, concepts and solutions to maintain or accelerate growth.” – KT Ong, Country Manager – Malaysia, Dell Technologies.

 

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VMware vSphere 7 Now Supports AMD SEV-ES Encryption!

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VMware just announced that vSphere 7 Update 1 will add support for AMD SEV-ES encryption!

Find out what this means for enterprise security, and the future of AMD EPYC processors!

 

AMD SEV-ES Encryption : What Is It?

SEV-ES, short for Secure Encrypted Virtualization-Encrypted State, is a hardware-accelerated encryption capability in AMD EPYC processors.

Leveraging both the AMD Secure Processor and the AES-128 encryption engine built into every AMD EPYC processor, SEV-ES encrypts all CPU register contents when a virtual machine stops running.

This prevents the leakage of information from the CPU registers to components like the hypervisor. It can even detect malicious modifications to a CPU register state.

 

VMware vSphere 7 Now Supports AMD SEV-ES Encryption!

VMware vSphere 7 Update 1 adds support for both AMD SEV-ES and AMD EPYC processors.

The AMD Secure Processor in the first-generation EPYC processors can handle up to 15 encryption keys.

That increases to more than 500 encryption keys with the second-generation EPYC processors.

ESXi has many layers of isolation within its virtualised infrastructure, but all of that is implemented in software. They still require a level of trust in the hardware, which is where AMD SEV-ES comes in.

A guest operating system that supports SEV can ask the AMD Secure Processor to issue it an encryption key, for full in-memory, in-hardware encryption.

SEV-ES extends that protection to CPU registers, so that the data inside the CPU itself is encrypted. This protects the data from being read or modified when the virtual machine stops running.

Even a compromised hypervisor that accesses the register data cannot make use of it, because it is now encrypted.

Needless to say, adding support for AMD SEV-ES in vSphere 7 will spur the uptake of AMD EPYC processors in the datacenter.

 

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Hitachi Vantara : 2020 HCI Portfolio Updates Revealed!

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Hitachi Vantara just unveiled their 2020 HCI (Hyperconverged Infrastructure) portfolio, with updates to the Hitachi Unified Compute Platform (UCP). Here are the details…

 

Hitachi Vantara : 2020 HCI Portfolio Updates

Hitachi Vantara today unveiled their 2020 HCI (Hyperconverged Infrastructure) portfolio, featuring updates to Hitachi UCP HC and Hitachi UCP RS.

  • Faster provisioning with new Hitachi UCP Advisor
  • Certified support for SAP HANA workloads
  • New Intel Cascade Lake Xenon Refresh processors for increased performance
  • Enhanced lifecycle management capabilities for non-disruptive upgrades

The updated 2020 Hitachi Vantara HCI solutions unify cloud infrastructure management with interoperability across their customer’s environments, whether they are using traditional storage, HCI-powered hybrid clouds or public clouds.

These new HCI offerings include a scalable and simplified foundation for hybrid clouds, allowing customers to rapidly scale-out, when increased datacenter resources are required.

Unified Cloud Management

Customers have the flexibility to build a cloud infrastructure with seamless workload and data mobility across on-premises and public cloud environments.

Hitachi UCP Advisor accelerates provisioning up to 80% faster compared to previous HCI management tools and reduces management complexity across the environment.

Scalable Performance

Greater performance, scale and density support IT departments’ ability to rapidly scale data center resources for business-critical applications and lower operational overhead for better TCO.

The updated HCI platforms provide certified support for SAP HANA workloads on HCI. Intel Cascade Lake Refresh Xeon processors increase performance for workload consolidation while avoiding resource contention issues.

Hitachi HCI solutions help reduce CapEx and OpEx overhead with advanced automation and data efficiency technologies.

Simplified Consumption

Everflex from Hitachi Vantara provides simple, elastic and comprehensive acquisition choices for the entire Hitachi Vantara portfolio, including the UCP Family, with consumption-based pricing models that align IT spend with business use and help lower costs by up to 20% with pay-as-you-go pricing.

Customers can also accelerate time to production with pre-validated and optimized bundles and starter packs, including solutions enabling remote work.

 

2020 Hitachi Vantara HCI Portfolio : Availability

The 2020 Hitachi Unified Compute Platform HC and Hitachi Unified Compute Platform RS are available from Hitachi Vantara and their global network of business partners, with immediate effect.

 

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HUAWEI 5G Aces GSMA NESAS Security Audit : The Impact?

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In a bit of good news after months of bad news, HUAWEI announced that their 5G wireless and core network equipment passed the GSMA NESAS cybersecurity audit!

While that is great news for them, what exactly is the impact on the deployment of HUAWEI 5G equipment globally?

 

HUAWEI 5G Passes GSMA Network Security Assurance Audit!

In a bit of good news after months of bad news, HUAWEI announced that their 5G wireless and core network equipment passed the GSMA Network Equipment Security Assurance Scheme (NESAS) audit!

  • 5G RAN gNodeB
  • 5G Core UDG, UDM, UNC, UPCF
  • LTE eNodeB

Here is a summary of the twenty NESAS assessment categories and the compliance levels of the HUAWEI 5G equipment that were tested :

Prior to passing the GSMA NESAS audit, these HUAWEI 5G equipment also passed the 5G cybersecurity test by China’s IMT-2020 (5G) Promotion Group, using test specifications based on 3GPP International standards for 5G security assurance.

 

HUAWEI 5G Faces Political, Not Technical, Pressures

Passing the GSMA NESAS audit will help assuage the cybersecurity concerns of nations planning, or already implementing HUAWEI 5G network equipment.

However, HUAWEI faces political, not technical, pressures with their 5G network equipment.

The 100% compliance score in the NESAS audit will not change minds in the US, and their Five Eyes partners are unlikely to consider HUAWEI 5G equipment.

That said, passing this audit will nevertheless strengthen HUAWEI’s shield against claims that their 5G equipment pose much greater cybersecurity risks than competing platforms.

It will help them win additional contracts in smaller countries whose concerns are far less about cybersecurity and privacy, and more with costs.

 

GSMA Network Security Assurance Scheme (NESAS)

The GSMA Network Equipment Security Assurance Scheme (NESAS) audit is a standardised cybersecurity assessment mechanism, jointly defined by GSMA (GSM Association) and 3GPP, together with regulators, industry partners, major global operators, and vendors.

This is a voluntary program which network equipment vendors can subject their product development and lifecycle processes to a comprehensive and independent security audit.

The GSMA NESAS covers 20 assessment categories, defining security requirements with an assessment framework for 5G product development and product lifecycle processes. It also uses security test cases by 3GPP to assess the security of network equipment.

 

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Google Cloud Confidential VM With 2nd Gen AMD EPYC!

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Google recently introduced Confidential Computing, with Confidential VM as the first product, and it’s powered by 2nd Gen AMD EPYC!

Here’s an overview of Confidential Computing and Confidential VM, and how they leverage the 2nd Gen AMD EPYC processor!

 

Google Cloud Confidential Computing : What Is It?

Google Cloud encrypts customer data while it’s “at-rest” and “in-transit“. But that data must be decrypted because it can be processed.

Confidential Computing addresses that problem by encrypting data in-use – while it’s being processed. This ensures that data is kept encrypted while in memory and outside the CPU.

 

Google Cloud Confidential VM, Powered By 2nd Gen AMD EPYC

The first product that Google is unveiling under its Confidential Computing portfolio is Confidential VM, now in beta.

Confidential VM basically adds memory encryption to the existing suite of isolation and sandboxing techniques Google Cloud uses to keep their virtual machines secure and isolated.

This will help customers, especially those in regulated industries, to better protect sensitive data by further isolating their workloads in the cloud.

Google Cloud Confidential VM : Key Features

Powered By 2nd Gen AMD EPYC

Google Cloud Confidential VM runs on N2D series virtual machines powered by the 2nd Gen AMD EPYC processors.

It leverages the Secure Encrypted Virtualisation (SEV) feature in 2nd Gen AMD EPYC processors to keep VM memory encrypted with a dedicated per-VM instance key.

These keys are generated and managed by the AMD Secure Processor inside the EPYC processor, during VM creation and reside only inside the VM – making them inaccessible to Google, or any other virtual machines running on the host.

Your data will stay encrypted while it’s being used, indexed, queried, or trained on. Encryption keys are generated in hardware, per virtual machine and are not exportable.

Confidential VM Performance

Google Cloud worked together with the AMD Cloud Solution team to minimise the performance impact of memory encryption on workloads.

They added support for new OSS drivers (name and gvnic) to handle storage traffic and network traffic with higher throughput than older protocols, thus ensuring that Confidential VM will perform almost as fast as non-confidential VM.

Easy Transition

According to Google, transitioning to Confidential VM is easy – all Google Cloud Platform (GCP) workloads can readily run as a Confidential VM whenever you want to.

Available OS Images

In addition to the hardware-based inline memory encryption, Google built Confidential VM on top of Shielded VM, to harden your OS image and verify the integrity of your firmware, kernel binaries and drivers.

Google currently offers images of Ubuntu v18.094, Ubuntu 20.04, Container Optimized OS (COS v81), and RHEL 8.2.

They are currently working with CentOS, Debian and other distributors to offer additional OS images for Confidential VM.

 

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