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:: PC Perspective . News Archive
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.:News Archive ( 7/2008 )
Ryan Shrout | Source: PC Perspective | Subject: Graphics Card
UPDATE for 7/31/08 - I spoke with one of the lawyers for the defendants on this class-action suit and he verified for me all the information that I detailed below. The judge denied class-status to the entirety of GPU buyers and limited it to those who purchased GPUs directly from ATI or NVIDIA online; i.e. only those that purchased on ATI.com. He was adamant in telling me that the Dept of Justice has NOT closed the investigation on either company completely however.
Anyone that knows me personally knows that I have a certain distaste for much the legal system in our country. Frivolous lawsuits, class-action cases, etc are, some of the time at least, a drag on our society. But enough about my personal views on the state of the nation; some interesting news popped into my mailbox today concerning one such lawsuit involving a market I know all too well. In December of 2006, the Department of Justice created a grand jury investigation based on complaints of price fixing from NVIDIA and ATI on the GPUs. Then in November of 2007 a class-action lawsuit was filed in the state of California alleging that NVIDIA and ATI/AMD worked together, staged hidden meetings and communicated in secret to keep prices high for consumers on GPUs and graphics cards. Just this month an email, supposedly from NVIDIA PR lead Dan Vivoli in 2002, communicating with then ATI COO Dave Orton seems to solidify the case: Vivoli wrote, in part, "I really think we should work harder together on the marketing front. As you and I have talked about, even though we are competitors, we have the common goal of making our category a well positioned, respected playing field. $5 and $8 stocks are a result of no respect." "That's not good for the defense," said Alsup after reading the e-mail aloud in the courtroom. "A jury would like to see this," he said.
That is indeed, no good for the defense. I won't get into the many issues that I think make this suit bad from the beginning, such as the market dominating Intel integrated graphics solutions not taken into consideration, but just today some news arrived to me that indicate the plaintiffs and their lawyers have been severely limited in the scope of the charges. Essentially, the grand jury investigating the two companies was unable to find any evidence of price fixing on GPUs. A letter with these findings was sent to Judge William Alsup who then decided that due to the information the grand jury provided, the class-action lawsuit that was being filed against both NVIDIA and AMD was only going to take into account the graphics cards that were sold directly from both companies to the consumers. And since NVIDIA has never sold card directly to consumers, that means that Judge Alsup has essential left this as a class-action suit for buyers of ATI hardware from the ATI.com website. 
Could NVIDIA be off the hook? Is AMD far behind? I am currently awaiting calls from several people involved in this legal battle, mostly lawyers representing the plaintiffs, to verify and update the information presented here.
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Hexus | Subject: Graphics Card
Take a look at the table on the second page of HEXUS' preview of the 9800 GT; compare the new 9800 GT specs to the old 8800 GT specs. Can you spot the difference; I'll give you a hint, it involves a feature only found on nForce motherboards, and is a feature that neither Ryan, Josh or I could find a single good point about when we tried during a previous Podcast. You get no die shrink, no clock speed increases, you don't even get the opportunity to try 3-way SLI, this looks to have been a 8800 GT given a BIOS flash and a new sticker, now being sold as a new card. Even better, Zotac has included hybrid power on recent 8800 GTs.
"Today sees the introduction of the GeForce 9800 GT GPU, priced to compete against AMD's Radeon HD 3870 512 and Radeon 4850 512 cards. So what is GeForce 9800 GT? Why is its introduction important, and how is it likely to perform? Read on to glean the new 'GT's vital specifications, and then take a gander at BFG's pre-overclocked version." Here are some more Graphics Card articles from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Hardware Secrets | Subject: General Tech
The S/PDIF plug is always thought of by many as a useful plug, even with all the uses that it can be put to. In case the neglect is caused by being unaware of the potential in this little plug, Hardware Secrets devoted an article to the tricks and adaptors that can be used to extend the usefulness of your X-Fi card significantly.
They also break down the various models of cards that Creative has produced and which are capable of which outputs.
"Creative Labs has always been one of the most popular manufacturers of sound cards and Sound Blaster X-Fi is their current series of add-on sound cards. Due to the massive amount of readers asking us how to use the digital audio (SPDIF) output from their Sound Blaster X-Fi sound cards in order to connect them to their home theater receivers or digital speakers, we decided to compile this short tutorial listing all Sound Blaster X-Fi models released to date and the available options for SPDIF connection." Here is some more Tech News from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Aselabs | Subject: Storage
Sans' Digital MS1U Media Saver is an enclosure, similar to other mobile HDD cases, that knows a few extra tricks. It has three memory card slots that are compatible with about a dozen different formats, a small LCD to tell you what the device is currently doing and rechargeable batteries so you can use it where there are no plugs. Take the memory out of your camera, stick in the appropriate slot and the MS1U will copy the pictures onto the hard drive, with a seperate folder for each card, just to make it eaiser. ASE Labs also liked that it was smart enough not to copy files it has already seen.
"You are probably like most people when they go on vacation and use a digital camera with a few memory cards. It would be great if you didn't need a computer all the time to constantly backup your photos. The MS1U from Sans Digital is billed as a digital photo bank and it does just that. It takes a laptop (IDE) hard drive and converts it into portable storage for your memory cards." Here are some more Storage reviews from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: OCMODSHOP | Subject: General Tech
48 colours, 5 grays and a 64 sprite maximum were good enough for a hit video game once; and we only needed the 2 buttons. Take a peek at some gaming history at OCMODSHOP as they review Capcom's 1988 classic, Bionic Commando. You can even watch some gameplay and be amazed at the sound track and flashing screen. Try to imagine what the re-make and sequel will look like, both will be arriving to this generation of gamers soon and we can see how they grapple with a game in which you cannot jump.
"With a remake on the way along with a sequel, it got me to reminiscing. Not on what old school remakes were, but when Bionic Commando was Bionic F**KING Commando. Even if you didnt have this game, someone nearby did, and every kid in school had played it. Upon starting the first stage there was always the classic question: How the hell do you jump? This was why Bionic Commando is such a classic though. In an 8-bit world leaned on Mario and virtually every game having an option to jump, Bionic Commando ditched the whole idea and gave you a grappling hook. With this hook was how you got to ledges, hopped over enemies, and proceeded through the levels. By the second area you are so accustomed to the controls you forget that you cant jump-thats good controls right there." Here is some more Tech News from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Phoronix | Subject: General Tech
SplashTop Linux, the tiny little distro found on new ASUS boards and used for their Express Gate instant on has been hacked. At Phoronix they have seen in set up on a USB disk to start non-ASUS boards, running custom applications and starting it as a virtual machine. SplashTop has been talking about releasing an SDK for those interested in working with their kernel, but it looks like they are a little late to the game.
"Last October we were the first to deliver a full-review of DeviceVM's SplashTop which was an instant-on embedded Linux distribution at the time found on a lone ASUS motherboard. Since then there has been a commitment to SplashTop on all ASUS motherboards and even on ASUS notebooks. While ASUS has been the primary partner with DeviceVM up to this point, other manufacturers are exploring this market. One of our few gripes about SplashTop is that it's limited in the current applications available and doesn't allow for much tweaking with no terminal access. However, members of the Phoronix Forums have hacked SplashTop. They have been able to run SplashTop from a USB stick on non-ASUS motherboards, boot SplashTop within a virtual machine, run custom applications, and launch a terminal within this proprietary Linux environment." Here is some more Tech News from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Overclockers Club | Subject: Motherboard
The ASUS M3N78 Pro has a fair number of features on it for a $130 motherboard. Native support for 1066MHz DDR2, HDMI support, Hybrid SLI, solid capacitors, Express Gate technology, and HD audio and video decoding thanks to the GeForce 8300 chipset. On the other hand, Overclockers Club had some difficulty when trying to get an overclock going on the machine, limitations in the RAM settings, the multiplier and the CPU core voltage being limited to 1.30v all conspired to make their lives difficult. They did succeed in the end though.
"Overclocking this board took a lot of trial and error, but I finally managed to get it stable and good to go. The CPU core voltage maxes out at 1.30v on this board, so you are limited in how far you can push it. Also it did not like a multiplier greater than 14x, after that the computer would not even boot. I also had to put the HyperTransport multiplier to 10x to have the link remain stable. Since I could not modify the memory settings, which had a default 1:2 divider, they had a mind of their own. After all of the bumping and resetting of the CMOS I finally got to 2.950GHz stable, and no problems while running the benchmarks. So with that, the overclocked tests will be run at 2.950GHz on the Phenom X4 9850." Here are some more Motherboard articles from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: BFG Technologies | Subject: Graphics Card
Lake Forest, IL - (July 29, 2008) - BFG Technologies, Inc., the leading North American and European supplier of advanced NVIDIA-based 3D graphics cards, power supplies and other PC enthusiast products, announced today the BFG NVIDIA GeForce 9800 GT, 9800 GT OC, and the GeForce 9500 GT graphics cards. All three new BFG graphics cards offer best-in-class price versus performance, and are backed by free 24/7/365 world-class tech support and the best lifetime warranty in the industry. BFG GeForce 9800 GT and 9800 GT OC 512MB PCI Express Graphics Cards
BFG GeForce 9500 GT 1GB PCI Express Graphics Card
The BFG GeForce 9800 GT, 9800 GT OC, and GeForce 9500 GT graphics card are eligible for the BFG Trade Up Program. The BFG Trade Up Program gives registered customers a one time opportunity to upgrade their current BFG graphics card to a more recently released, higher performance BFG graphics card and only pay the difference in cost plus any applicable taxes within 100 days of purchase. Learn more at http://www.bfgtech.com/tradeupprogram.aspx.
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: bit-tech | Subject: Case and Cooling
You won't be able to find it easily in North America, but with quality products like the Dark Power, Be Quiet! should be appearing on our shores in the near future. With the features that are included, it is hard to believe that this PSU can be had for £80. The only thing bit-tech was not impressed by was that RMAs must be sent to Germany, something the company will have to fix to compete in North America.
"Overall it has to be said that Be Quiet! has made a fantastic product - it works, it has supreme efficiency, excellent quality outputs, lots of cable variation (which is perfect for a modular PSU) and is damn near silent to boot. We were really struggling to find things wrong with it because it's really not that expensive when you look at the whole package, and the only thing that grates us is the RMA to Germany - other companies offer better after-sales support." Here are some more Cases & Cooling reviews from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: [H]ard|OCP | Subject: System
On one side is Intel's Atom processor, which can handle multi-threading but systems that use it can only have PCI cards. In the other is VIA's nano, which can only handle a single thread, but has a faster FSB and can handle PCIe 16x quite handily. Either system needs less power to run than the majority of graphics cards. Drop by [H]ard|OCP for a look at what these chips are designed to do as well as who [H] picks as the winner.
You can also get a different look at these two processors in Ryan's detailed review. "A battle of the most powerful processors on the face of the Earth? Nope. Who sucks the least? Not really, but closer. Marketing teams will have you believe one thing, but we are here today to show HardOCP readers what they likely care about. Which one just works better, Atom or Nano?" Here are some more Systems articles from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: PC Perspective | Subject: Graphics Card
Stuck with an ageing graphics card and holding off on picking up the newer game titles until you can manage both a new graphics cards and a new game or three? Ryan just finished a review of the new 9500 GT from nVIDIA, which will get you around 30fps on medium detail in Crysis, and it will do it for less than $100. This card won't give you any bragging rights, but it will certainly give you a good experience for your investment. Check out how it performs against the $120 8600GTS and the $80 HD 3650.
""That being said, the new GeForce 9500 GT did perform very well when compared to AMD's current budget level competition, the Radeon HD 3650. The GeForce 9500 GT was able to play through some of the latest titles at decent image quality settings very well. A line up like Call of Duty 4, Unreal Tournament 3 and Crysis is nothing to sneeze at - especially when you take into account the price point that you'll find this card selling for." Here are some more Graphics Card articles from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: The Inquirer | Subject: General Tech
This story at The Inquirer sheds some light on the strangely high sales of Vista that Microsoft has reported. HP has said that any of the PCs and laptops they have sold recently with XP installed had a Vista license attached to them, even though they did not run Vista. Any and all sales of these XP machines have been counted as a Vista sale, and will continue to be reported as such until Microsoft finally pulls the plug on XP, which they have been threatening to do for a while. Suddenly it seems reasonable that Vista's sales are so high.
"From the 30th of June, we have no longer been able to ship a PC with an XP licence," said Jane Bradburn, a marketing manager for HP Australia. "However, what we have been able to do with Microsoft is ship PCs with a Vista Business licence but with XP pre-loaded. That is still the majority of business computers we are selling today." Here is some more Tech News from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Guru of 3D | Subject: Storage
The OCZ Core SATA 64GB SSD demonstrates what we expected when we first heard of solid state drives. It's just $259, a drop of almost $1000 in about a year, the performance is almost obnoxiously impressive and the lack of moving parts is still a huge advantage. The Guru of 3D predicts the pricing of WD Raptor drives will have to start dropping in price to compete with these drives. In a few years, some techies may not even know what incredible noises a dying platter based HDD can make.
"OCZ Technology has the honor to be the first ever manufacturer to have one of their SSD drives tested here at Guru3D.com, and
we have others in queue as well. Despite the negative spins from traditional HDD manufacturers and a couple of sour SSD
manufacturers who do not have their technology right, let me state .. Solid State Drives are here to stay, and inevitably they
will replace HDDs. And by saying that I do not mean in the next 3 years or so. But think of long term usage, this will be the
faster technology, this will be a high-volume technology and it will be a reliable technology as there are no more moving
parts inside that storage unit.
The SSD technology has advanced to a level where it can compete with even the fastest WS Velociraptor HD, and let us show you exactly that." Here are some more Storage reviews from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Hardware Secrets | Subject: Display
Does keeping up with the recommended refresh in ms on a TFT LCD give you OCD? Take a quick drop by Hardware Secrets for an overview of the LCD market. Without delving too deep into the technical aspects, you can get a good idea of what aspect ratios are available as well as other features that are a must for the gamer or movie fan.
"Liquid-crystal displays (LCD), in the past restricted to notebooks, are now a reality for desktops. The three greatest advantages of this type of video monitor compared to traditional tube-based monitors (a.k.a. CRT, Cathode Ray Tube) are the use of less space on the desk (especially 17" models or bigger), less power consumption and 100% flicker-free, even with a refresh rate of only 60 frames per second (60 Hz). In this tutorial we will explain everything you need to know to make the right choice when buying a new LCD monitor." Here are some more Display articles from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: PC Perspective | Subject: Case and Cooling
Thermalright has added a little style to their Ultra 120 with a nice black nickel finish and an extra fan bracket. Even better is the cooling performance of the True Black 120, which is totally unaffected by the new finish. If you need performance and a little style, and have a few unused 120mm fans, then Lee's latest review will be right up your alley.
"The True Black 120 CPU cooler features a solid copper base, six U-shaped heat pipes and a large aluminum fin array. Although there are physically just six heat pipes, the U-shape configuration results in six evaporator sections (where the heat pipes contact the base and absorb heat from the CPU) and twelve condenser sections (where heat is dissipated into the aluminum fins). As we will see later, this results in a very efficient heat transfer arrangement!" Here are some more Cases & Cooling reviews from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: [H]ard|OCP | Subject: Graphics Card
BFGTech pumped up the clocks on the GeForce GTX 280 OCX to 665MHz and 1458MHz, from the stock 602MHz and 1296MHz, so [H]ard|OCP pitted it against a stock GTX 280 as well as the HD4870. For those who can afford the best, then the OCX is your card. There is nothing faster than it right now, and the next card to beat it will likely be the 4870 X2, which is technically two cards, and might necessitate a
change in motherboards for some users. Keep an eye out for an interesting graphical discrepancy between AMD and nVIDIA in Crysis.
"BFGTech's best single-GPU video card is with us today, ready to be put through its real world gaming paces. We compare it to the stock-clocked GTX 280 as well as ATI's best offering. We had some results that we did not expect and ones that might surprise you as well!" Here are some more Graphics Card articles from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: The Inquirer | Subject: General Tech
It turns out that nVIDIA's odd stance that only certain models of HP laptops would suffer from the G48 and 86 problems is about as believable as most words that come out of a salesman's mouth. The magical ability to heal the wounded chips ascribed to all manufacturers but HP doesn't seem to be working very well at Dell either, with ten models getting a BIOS update. The Inquirer still feels that the true story is that all the chips are bad, and while that may or may not turn out to be the case, nVIDIA would be better off to come clean about the issues like AMD did recently with the Phenom TLB bug.
"IT LOOKS LIKE Nvidia wasn't entirely truthful when it last talked to analysts. The outfit's G84/G86 statement about problems being confined to only HP was just blown out of the water. Dell has now unofficially admitted to the same problem in ten models. The G84/G86 story is just getting messier, and NV is refusing to come clean, mainly because the problems just might sink the company if it does. The short story is that all G84 and G86 chips are bad, period." Here is some more Tech News from around the web:
Josh Walrath | Source: PC Perspective | Subject: Editorial
In Q1 of 2007 Auzentech announced the upcoming availability of the eagerly anticipated X-Meridian. This was a top end sound card with tremendous features, unique engineering, and sound quality that was promised to be the best in the world. A few months later Auzentech released the card to a host of excellent reviews. While the card was not exactly perfect (the analog outputs were a wee bit hot and caused distortion if levels were not adjusted) it was a step up from nearly everything else in the market, including the mighty X-Fi. While other manufacturers like B-Gears, Turtle Beach, and HT Omega all had competing products that were using the CMI-8788 chip, the X-Meridian was the luxury option of the group.
The X-Meridian with its wonderful swappable OPAMPS. About two months after the X-Meridian was released, Auzentech announced that they were no longer making the product available. This left a lot of people scratching their head, as the X-Meridian was selling out at retailers as fast as they were coming in. Sure, Auzentech was not Creative, and they could not endlessly produce as many cards as they wanted, but this announcement seemed rather strange. Here was a product which on paper was superior in most aspects to every other card on the market, which was high end and presumably had some healthy margins to it, and it was taken off the shelves far sooner than anyone expected. When asked Auzentech would not really nail down a reason why they were discontinuing the product. It was odd at the time, as other companies such as B-Gears, HT Omega, and Turtle Beach were all still continuing to ship CMI-8788 chips. The truth finally came out in June of this year, but very few people seemed to notice it. Stephane Bae, President of Auzentech, wrote a little open letter concerning this situation, a full year after Auzentech stopped producing the X-Meridian. The long and short of it is that Asus had negotiated with C-Media for exclusive rights to the CMI-8788 chip after a certain date. This meant that Auzentech would have to purchase a significant number of chips within a week of the original introduction of the X-Meridian to keep that part running for the next few years of its potential lifespan. Considering that Auzentech is still selling the older X-Plosion two plus years after its introduction, we can imagine that Auzentech would have had to throw down a significant amount of money to get the potential supply of product needed for the next several years. At that point, Auzentech had to make the decision to bet the company on that move, or to pursue another route. The other route involved adopting the X-Fi processor from Creative. 
Asus must have made a hell of an offer to C-Media, as Auzentech (and HDA before it) have been very solid customers, and the quality of their products have helped create a new and improved appreciation of C-Media products. I know in talking to other editors several years ago that when C-Media was mentioned, it was often followed by a resounding, “Yuck” from those editors. Two years ago this was the overwhelming feeling towards C-Media, but because of the success of Bluegears (later to be B-gears), HDA, Auzentech, HT Omega, and others, the overall opinion of C-Media sound chips has improved dramatically. With Asus releasing their latest sound cards based around the C-Media chip, opinions have further become more positive towards these products. 
As compared to the X-Meridian, the X-Prelude only has one swappable OPAMP, and it does not fully integrate with the X-Tension DIN from Auzentech. Asus has done a lot to the CMI-8788, not so much in changing the overall chip design, but by improving the software and drivers for the product. The Xonar series features DS3D-GX, which enables “hardware accelerated” DirectSound 3D and EAX in a Vista environment. Previously these effects could only be emulated, since Vista has moved the audio stack away from hardware acceleration. OpenAL on the other hand requires an OpenAL compliant card (namely Creative or Creative based) as well as applications which have been modified and recoded to support OpenAL in Vista. Supposedly DS3D-GX sweeps this aside and allows users to utilize EAX 5.0 (not licensed by Creative, and not officially available except from Creative and the Auzentech X-Prelude) in any application which supports it, regardless of OpenAL support within the application. 
The X-Tension DIN was designed specifically with the X-Meridian in mind. Unfortunately this part was not ready at the time of introduction of the X-Meridian. Due to specifics of the X-Fi chip, the X-Tension DIN is not fully functional with the X-Prelude. I can see how Asus would want to protect their investment in these software technologies. If another manufacturer were running the CMI-8788, then likely some enterprising individual (like Dan of Creative fame- just ask Auzentech what they think of someone modifying their drivers to work on Creative cards which do not have the DDL or DTS licenses) will get these drivers to work on other manufacturers’ cards. But by signing a deal like this with C-Media, the biggest loser is really C-Media and their potential customers. I’m not talking the other manufacturers, but the end users. While Asus is doing well in selling their products, C-Media would likely be doing better by addressing more manufacturers and allowing competing products onto the market. Not every consumer out there is in love with Asus, and brand loyalty with sound cards seems to exceed that of video cards. And when we consider that most onboard motherboard sound is more than adequate for most users, cutting back on potentially interesting products from multiple manufacturers is only going to make it worse. 
While Asus says the Xonar is powered by the "Asus AV200 High Definition Sound Processor" it is in fact the CMI-8788 under the hood. But hey, it does have a metal cover with LED lighting! I really can't complain though, as Asus has made some of the best PCI-E based sound cards yet. Excluding Auzentech from using their high end sound chip was not a very sound business decision from my standpoint, but then again I do not know the details of the agreement from Asus. It could just be that Asus offered a virtual treasure chest to C-Media, and after doing the math for projected earnings by selling the chips to everyone they possibly could C-Media possibly took the better offer? Asus is not exactly a company one can push around, and we could also see other potential products that Asus would give preference to for C-Media chips. Consider that SoundMAX will no longer be developing audio codecs, and with their current relationship perhaps C-Media is cooking up another motherboard based codec that will find a willing buyer with Asus? That would be a serious coup for C-Media, as Asus sells over 1.5 million motherboards a month. If the majority of those were outfitted with C-Media codecs, it could mean a serious boost in the bottom line for C-Media. All theories aside, I am disappointed with C-Media and their exclusive deal with Asus. Other board partners like Auzentech would continue creating unique and viable designs which would further expand the sound card market. As it is, fewer manufacturers and a smaller selection will mean fewer reasons to go outside of integrated audio. You can read Stephane’s entire post here (near the bottom). Thoughts or opinions on the matter? Jump into our Audio Corner Forum to discuss and see what others are saying!
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: PC Perspective Forums | Subject: General Tech
Some days it can be downright frustrating to work with PCs, from external HDD's that need life support systems to BSODs and being eternally stuck in Safe Mode; all of which can lead to "Sudden Lost Interest" syndrome. Even your PSU and peripherals can get in on the act in strange and interesting ways, or heat seems to be unmanageable. Some days even the programs that are supposed to help and protect you won't cooperate.
One way to try to shake off the blues is to pick yourself up a new PC, so that at least the problems you encounter are new ones; to that end Ryan has finally updated our Hardware Leaderboard. Drop by and see what changes he made and let him know what you think in the HWLB forum. If you don't want to do the whole upgrade at once, the Frogs in the Trading Forum might just be able to set you up with a nice replacement part, maybe you can even find someone crazy enough to want to play with your misbehaving components. What ever you do, make sure it stays fun for you and everyone around you ... don't let your PC know how much it is making you suffer.
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Overclockers Online | Subject: Storage
For all those paranoid travellers out there, Kingston has the perfect USB drive for you. Their DataTraveler BlackBox 2Gb flash drive costs almost $100, but it does come certified under the US Government's Federal Information Processing Standard as secure, which can be good for anyone carrying sensitive data. Check out Overclockers Online's full review to see how well it performs.
"All things considered, I was impressed with the Kingston DataTraveler BlackBox. It performed admirably well even though it has to deal with on-the-fly 256-bit AES encryption. Also, the security process is relatively transparent in that all you have to do is put in your password and subsequently, the drive acts just like a normal USB flash drive. The build quality is excellent unlike some older DataTravelers I've owned; I soaked the drive in a cup of water for several minutes and it still worked." Here are some more Storage reviews from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: t-break | Subject: Mobile
The Eee is growing up with the release of the 901 and 1000 models. t-break tried out the 8.9" Eee PC 901, which has a larger SSD along with the larger screen and a battery that is rated to last 5 hours. Probably the nicest change, apart from the 1024*600 resolution; is the processor which is now an Atom running at 1.6GHz. Read the full review to see what else the new Eee has in store for you.
"The Original EeePC 701 by ASUS became one of the most popular products of last year and created an entirely new market for ultra-portable notebooks that cost less than a no-frills budget notebook. ASUS sold almost 700,000 units which obviously was a wake-up call for other manufacturers and we saw products being announced left and right based on a similar form and price factor." Here are some more Mobile articles from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: [H]ard|OCP | Subject: Motherboard
ASUS has expanded their Republic of Gamers line with the P45 based Maximus II Formula; which is sporting an incredibly large and complex cooling system including a clip on fan. The pair of 16x PCIe 2.0 slots will support CrossfireX, DDR2 and it can handle any LGA775 processor out there. Check out it's other features, including the impressive overclock at [H]ard|OCP.
"In its typical fashion, ASUS' latest Republic of Gamers branded motherboard looks to dominate the P45 market. The Maximus II Formula board performs as well as it looks, and seems to be shaping up to give the other Intel boards a run for their money. Did we mention it is themed in blood red and black? Our favorite." Here are some more Motherboard articles from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Digitimes | Subject: General Tech
nVIDIA is really having a lousy month, with anti-trust suits going badly and the ever persistent rumour that something is horribly wrong with their G84 and G86's. nVIDIA's position is that the problem can only occur in specific laptop configurations, but really haven't clarified the exact nature of the problem and why it will not apply to graphics cards. DigiTimes has heard that as a result, many vendors are demanding a recall of all theoretically affected graphics cards.
"Due to Nvidia did clearly explaining the details of the faults reported in its notebook GPUs, some channel vendors have demanded graphics card makers issue a recall for desktop-based discrete graphics cards using the same GPU core, according to sources at graphics card makers. Nvidia has commented that the faulty notebook GPU problem only exists in a few specific notebook models made by specific clients. The company contended that desktop-based discrete graphics card products are not affected by the issue." Here is some more Tech News from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Hardware Zone | Subject: General Tech
Higher quality MP3 players, like the recently release X-Fi Xen can't really show off the quality they are capable of with a pair of $10 earphones. The best quality comes from cans, but not everyone wants to wear something that big, or try to transport them around. Phillips has introduced two new audiophile quality earbud style headphones, which you can see at Hardware Zone. The display it's self is rather impressive as well.
"Audiophiles know that choices are aplenty when it comes to audio peripherals and they'll be even more pleased to know that Philips is adding their fair share into the retail market. Held on the 17th of July at St. James Powerstation, Philips introduced two of their latest inner earphones lineup for your consideration - the Philips SHE9850 and SHE9800 (both of which are catered to specific needs)."
Here is some more Tech News from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Hardware Secrets | Subject: Case and Cooling
The NZXT Khaos is a $400 case, sporting oodles of fans, wheels, mesh on the side panels and bottom, a hinged motherboard tray and many other features. All that does make the case worth quite a bit, if all those extras are what you are looking for in a case. You can drop by Hardware Secrets for a look, and see if you'd prefer to buy a fancy case, as opposed to a high end graphics card.
"Khaos is a top-notch all-aluminum full-tower case from NZXT featuring eleven 5 ¼" bays, eight internal 3 ½" bays (in two hard disk drive cages, each cage using three 5 ¼" bays), three 120-mm fans, one 140-mm fan and space for installing three more fans in the middle of the case. Is it worth paying USD 440 for this case? Let's see." Here are some more Cases & Cooling reviews from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Corsair Memory | Subject: Memory
The TW3X2G2133C9DF DOMINATOR modules represent the very best of Corsair's cutting edge technology in DDR3 overclocking and gaming memory. Ultra fast, selected DRAM chips are housed in Corsair's proprietary Dual-Path Heat Xchange Cooling Technology (DHX) - used in Dell, HP and Alienware gaming systems- for striking speed and performance. The new DOMINATOR TW3X2G2133C9DF memory kit unleashes the high performance potential of NVIDIA 790i-based platforms.
"Our engineers have been working hard to achieve this astounding speed of 2133MHz," said John Beekley, VP of Applications Engineering at Corsair. "This is a tremendous accomplishment to be able to manufacture memory modules at this speed in production volumes," added Beekley. The new DOMINATOR TW3X2G2133C9DF kit is now available in stock for $575 at select Corsair retailers. Corsair memory products are backed by a Limited Lifetime Warranty. Complete customer support via telephone, email, forum and Technical Service Xpress is also available. For more information on Corsair memory products, please visit www.corsair.com.
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Digit Life | Subject: Processor
Drop by Digit Life for a comparison of Wolfdale and Conroe CPU's, both the top models, the E6800 versus the E8500 and the lowest, the E6500 and E8200. The clocks are faster on the Wolfdale chips, but not by so much that the difference is hard to spot, Wolfdale does more per clock; and not just a little bit.
"We shall examine two interesting families of Intel processors with 333 MHz (1333 MHz Quad Pumped) FSB, based on the relatively old (Conroe) and relatively new (Wolfdale) cores. We selected the slowest and the fastest CPU from each series. So, even if you are not interested in core comparison, you still get useful information about performance ranges of these CPU families." Here are some more Processor articles from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Intel Press Room | Subject: General Tech
SANTA CLARA, Calif., July 24, 2008 - As Internet access continues to be added to all kinds of computers and devices, Intel executives outlined a plan to use its chip design expertise, factory capacity, advanced manufacturing techniques and the economics of Moore's Law to usher in a new category of highly integrated, purpose-built and Web-savvy System on Chip (SoC) designs and products. The company also unveiled its first eight such products under its Intel® EP80579 Integrated Processor family for security, storage, communications, and industrial robotics. For the first time, Intel is architecting several of these smarter SoC chip designs based on the same blueprint as the company's existing processors that run the bulk of the Internet, called Intel architecture (IA). The products will offer new levels of performance and energy efficiency versus traditional SoCs, combine multiple functions and will be customized to target the company's traditional computing businesses and several growth areas across Consumer Electronics (CE), Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs) and embedded markets. Intel has more than 15 SoC projects planned internally, including the company's first Consumer Electronics (CE) chip codenamed "Canmore" scheduled for introduction later this year and the second-generation "Sodaville" next year. In addition, Intel's second-generation embedded product line is scheduled to arrive in 2009, with Intel's next-generation platform for Mobile Internet Devices code-named "Moorestown" and featuring "Lincroft," scheduled for release in 2009/2010. Many of these new products will be based on the Intel Atom processor core. All of these chips will provide increased performance and energy efficiency, along with the ability for customization, leading to faster development schedules and time-to-market delivery for customers while bringing more innovation, choice and lower costs to consumers. "We're now able to deliver more highly integrated products ranging from industrial robotics and in-car infotainment systems to set-top boxes, MIDs and other devices. By designing more complex systems onto smaller chips, Intel will scale the performance, functionality and software compatibility of IA while controlling the overall power, cost and size requirements to better meet respective market needs," said Gadi Singer, vice president of Intel's Mobility Group and general manager, SoC Enabling Group. "Best of all, customers and consumers will equally benefit."
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: TweakTown | Subject: Graphics Card
Taking a glance at the nVIDIA 9600 GSO 384MB card, you would think it utterly useless next to the 9600 GT. The GT is on a more familiar 512MB bus, and has a full 512MB of memory, the clock is 650MHz and 1800MHz as opposed to the GSO's 550MHz and 1600MHz. They seem so close together that there is no reason to even consider the GSO. Looking at Tweaktown's review does reveal an interesting fact. The GSO can be had for around $120, the GT for about 20% more (except for a few nice deals currently), but they only differ in performance by about 10%.
"The 9600 GSO has been out for a while now, but we haven’t really seen many of them around. The first one we saw was from
Palit and carried with it a large 768MB of memory with quite a hefty overclock to boot. At the same time, it did have some
issues in our test bed. While we loved the card, we probably didn’t really get to have as close a look as we normally would.
We all know that the 9600 GSO is nothing more than an 8800 GS with a new name, but how does the card sit in the current market? Is it something worth considering or should we just opt for the slightly more expensive 9600GT?" Here are some more Graphics Card articles from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Digitimes | Subject: General Tech
Strap yourself in, the accelerated releases we have been seeing in 2008 are not slowing down anytime soon. Next is Nehalem and the new X58 chipset, both of whom we will be seeing in September and not just before Christmas according to DigiTimes. The socket is changing, so don't worry about investing in a top of the line LGA775 board, though AMD fans will be safe with the AM3, whenever it arrives. Let us all hope that these truncated development times reflect the opinions of the engineers more than the marketing team.
"Originally scheduled to launch in November or December this year, Intel's Nehalem-based Bloomfield processors will now launch in September along with X58 chipsets, sources at motherboard makers have revealed. However, the sources pointed out that CPUs and motherboards will not officially appear in the channel until early October. Since Bloomfield CPUs are not socket compatible with previous Intel platforms, the accelerated launch is not expected to cause competition between the company's own products, although the same cannot be said for AMD's scheduled AM3-based CPU launch, noted the sources." Here is some more Tech News from around the web:
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