Apple’s attempts to have the anti-trust suit brought against them by the US Department of Justice thrown out of court were denied on Tuesday.

Federal Judge Denise Cote cited previous statements from Apple’s former CEO Steve Jobs as justification for the dispute over e-book pricing to continue.

Jobs’s comment was included in the DOJ’s case against Apple. “We’ll go to [an] agency mode, where you set the price, and we get our 30 percent, and yes, the cusomter pays a little more, but that’s what you want anyway,” Jobs reportedly said.

He added that prices would “be the same” at Apple and Amazon, which the DOJ contested in the suit.

The DOJ’s suit alleges that Apple colluded with book publishers including Hachette, HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster, Macmillan, and Penguin to standardize e-book prices when the publishers should have been competing with one another.

Hachette, HarperCollins and Simon & Schuster were quick to settle, but Apple insisted that the company has done nothing wrong, going so far as to say that they’re eager to begin litigation.

Eliminating the competition

Jobs’s statements were previously known, but it was unclear what importance they would play in the case until now.

“It has everything to do with coordinating a horizontal agreement among publishers to raise prices, and eliminating horizontal price competition among Apple’s competitors at the retail level,” Judge Cote said.

The suit alleges that Apple contacted major publishers in 2009, just before the launch of the iPad, and hatched a plan to force Amazon’s then-low e-book prices up to make Apple’s iBooks store more attractive to consumers.

At the time it was widely assumed that Amazon was selling e-books at a loss in order to stimulate sales of its Kindle devices.

“With the fortuitous entry of Apple into the market for e-books, and the decision by Apple to join the price-fixing conspiracy, that horizontal conspiracy became a potent weapon for engineering a fundamental shift in an entire industry,” Judge Cote said.

If the court rules against Apple and Macmillan and Penguin, the two publishers who have yet to settle, the companies could be forced to implement anti-trust compliance programs and pay hefty fines.

AMD officially unveiled Trinity, the second generation of its A-series APU that is looking to rival Intel’s Ivy Bridge for high-performance chips with low power consumption at an even lower cost.

The Trinity line will launch in five models – three aimed at mainstream notebooks and two targeting the coveted “ultrathin” market, with designs for desktops and all-in-one PCs to follow later on.

The two ultrathin notebook chips, the quad-core A10-4655M and dual-core A6-4455M, use a sparing 25W and 17W respectively.

Additionally, AMD claims battery life lasts up to 12 hours in a “resting” state.

That’s an impressive figure – especially coming from a chip manufactured on the larger 32nm process compared to the 22nm chips Intel adopted for its Ivy Bridge processors.

Piledriving power

AMD is squeezing power efficiency out of a 32nm chip thanks to its new Piledriver architecture.

While built on the less than impressive Bulldozer architecture as a base, Piledriver makes notable improvements in dynamic power management between the onboard CPU and GPU for a 29 percent performance increase over Bulldozer.

This translates to faster startup times – 2 seconds to resume from sleep and 10 seconds for the initial boot to desktop – but also clock speed enhancements.

The quad-core 25W chip has a default CPU speed of 2GHz that can jump up to 2.8GHz in a pinch, while the dual-core 17W chip can bump from 2.1GHz to 2.6GHz.

Speaking of the Trinity’s onboard GPU, AMD will equip Trinity processors with its Radeon HD 7000 line to give it a significant graphical boost.

AMD claims a performance edge against comparable Ivy Bridge processors of up to 150 percent in mainstream games like Starcraft 2 and Dirt 3, though that statistic should be taken with a grain of salt since it hasn’t been substantiated by any third-party benchmarks.

Even so, given AMD and Intel’s respective histories, it’s fair to expect Trinity processors to have an edge.

The final factor for AMD’s Trinity processor is price, which is where the chip shines brightest.

Late to the party?

HP already set the trend for more super-thin notebooks when they announced a series of new Ultrabooks.

And, the Trinity processor may face an uphill battle, with 80 percent of PCs using Intel processors.

What’s more, Intel smartly coined the term “Ultrabooks” for slim notebooks using its low-power processors, providing an easily marketable term for retailers to display.

AMD doesn’t have that yet, with HP adopting the non-standard term Sleekbook for its new Trinity notebook and AMD opting to simply call them “ultrathin notebooks.”

There’s also stiff competition from Apple with rumors of a lower-cost Macbook Air and thinner Macbook Pro slated for later this year.

Where AMD can carve a position in the ultrathin market will be through its graphics capabilities, since slim notebooks aren’t typically known for their gaming capabilities.

And if the price is right, AMD shouldn’t be counted out yet.

Apple could be putting wheels into motion as it slowly starts to gear up towards the iPhone 5 launch later this year.

According to analyst Shaw Wu, the Cupertino-base firm has reduced the number of iPhone orders by 20%-25% for the next quarter.

Wu reckons that the decease is “due to the upcoming 6th generation iPhone refresh likely in the September-October timeframe”.

iPhone 5 arriving September-October

We’ve heard reports that the iPhone 5 – or whatever it turns out to be called – may be revealed in June at Apple’s annual WWDC event.

The June prediction is unlikely if Wu is to be believed, as Apple is known for a fast turn around from announcement to stock in stores – ruling out a 4 month wait from a potential unveiling in just a few weeks time.

Wu also reports that iPad orders has risen from 14 to 15 million units, with the reason given that profitability for Apple’s flagship tablet is improving.

With all of the rumors flying fast and furious in recent days, there’s little doubt that Apple plans to introduce a new MacBook Pro soon.

In fact, sources now confirm that the company will ditch AMD graphics processors in favor of Nvidia.

According to recent reports, Apple’s forthcoming MacBook Pros will make the switch from AMD GPUs in the current models, to Nvidia graphics to complement Intel’s Ivy Bridge processors.

The swap appears to be directly related to the high resolution Retina Display which is anticipated with the new models.

While a “trusted source” confirmed the Nvidia news, it’s unknown exactly which GPU Apple will be using.

MacBook Pro + Nvidia= The complete package

The most likely candidate appears to be the GeForce GT 650M, an upgrade from Nvidia’s 28nm GeForce GT 640M.

“Apple’s riding the wave of innovation by teaming up with top technology companies it has strong relationships with,” remarks MacLife Managing Editor Florence Ion.

“The Mac may not be a gaming machine, but it’s primarily favored by professionals for its software and its technological longevity. Might as well pop in a Nvidia GeForce GT 640M GPU to complete the package.”

ABC News also confirmed that Nvidia GPUs will be used in the next generation of Apple’s MacBook Pro. What’s more, rumors claim the notebook will be thinner and lighter than the previous generation and also feature USB 3.0, the first time Cupertino incorporated the faster version of USB.

Ultrabooks are looking a little thin these days, and Lenovo claims to have made the thinnest and lightest ultrabook yet – the Thinkpad X1 Carbon.

The Thinkpad X1 Carbon is the successor to last year’s 13-inch Thinkpad X1. The name is derived from its carbon fiber frame, allowing the 14-inch ultrabook to weigh in at 3 pound with a mere 18.8mm thin.

It has enhancements over its predecessor beyond form factor. In fact, the larger 14-inch screen allows for a 1600×900 resolution, and the whole thing will be powered by Intel’s third-generation Ivy Bridge processor.

It will also come equipped with a 720p HD camera, USB 3.0 port, a backlit keyboard, and the option of 3G connectivity.

Lenovo will also renovate its Thinkpad X, T, W, and L lines, available in June. Most notably, Intel’s third-generation Ivy Bridge processor will included in Thinkpad ultrabooks, as will RapidBoost technology and backlit keyboards.

Now with 4G LTE

However, the hook is the introduction of 4G LTE for the first time in Lenovo’s Thinkpad ultrabooks, starting with the Thinkpad X230 and T line.

4G LTE connectivity will be available without a contract, served a la carte at $1.99 for 30 minutes of access. Sadly, it seems 4G LTE will not be a feature on the X1 Carbon.

Lenovo is making a big fuss over the Thinkpad X1 Carbon’s size and weight. It’s for good reason, too.

It’s positioned to be the thinnest and lightest 14-inch ultrabook on the market. But that might not be enough, according to rumblings of a thinner MacBook Pro set for later this year.

Word has it that Apple’s 15-inch Macbook Pro is going on a diet, dropping its optical disc drive and Ethernet port for a slimmer figure.

Ultrabooks following the thin trend

While early rumors said the Macbook Pro could reach MacBook Air levels of thinness, the tune has changed to indicate that it will simply be thinner than the current model, but not quite that thin.

A thinner 15-inch Macbook Pro could be dangerous for the ultrabook market, which rose in large part as a response to Apple’s svelte Macbook Air.

There’s still no word on when the new Macbook Pro might arrive, but a launch to coincide with OSX Mountain Lion this summer isn’t too far fetched.

Lenovo is expected to launch the Thinkpad X1 Carbon this summer, though no exact date or price have been given.