Tracking Firefox 3 Downloads Instantly

Firefox 3 is here, and a world record attempt is being made. I am not sure what the previous record was, but I think the results so far are going to give the browser a great chance at it. When's the last time you saw millions band together to download a new browser, anyway? With Firefox 2, perhaps, but since then, the browser's worldwide usage has only gone up.

The Mozilla folks have put up a cool page that allows you to track their progress so far, and even offers the ability to narrow it down to a specific country. At the time of writing, the worldwide downloads have topped 7,000,000 and still seems to be going up rather fast. So far, the USA have been responsible for over 2.4m, while Germany comes in second, at close to 500K. At this rate, it's looking like it might just hit 7.75m before the 24hr mark, but my math has always been horrible, so don't quote my estimation.

Please download Firefox 3 by 11:16 a.m. PDT (18:16 UTC) on June 18, 2008. That's 11:16 a.m. in Mountain View, 2:16 p.m. in Toronto, 3:16 p.m. in Rio de Janeiro, 8:16 p.m. in Paris, Madrid, Berlin, Rome and Warsaw, 10:16 p.m. in Moscow, and June 19, 2008 at 2:16 a.m. in Beijing and 3:16 a.m. in Tokyo.

Source: Spread Firefox

Toshiba Includes Dedicated Multimedia Chip in Upcoming Qosmio G55

Toshiba's upcoming Qosmio G55 notebook looks to employ a Quad-Core processor, but it might not be what you think. It's not from AMD, nor Intel, but rather the result of a collaboration between IBM, Sony and Toshiba. Based on the Cell processor, used in blade servers, this Quad-Core chip operating at 1.5GHz (256KB cache per core) will be used to enhance your multimedia experience.

I've emailed Toshiba to get specifics on exactly why this chip will help improve multimedia tasks, but from what I understand, it would be similar to Intel taking their SSE4 instruction set and putting it on a dedicated processor. Whether or not this means you will need specially-equipped software to take advantage of the enhancements, I'm unsure, but hope to have an answer soon.

Still, this idea is interesting, and no doubt intriguing for hardcore multimedia buffs. It seems a little odd to chuck this in a notebook, but the Qosmio G55 is a desktop replacement, so using it as the initial platform to test the waters isn't a bad idea. Well, that, and not to mention that Toshiba doesn't deal with desktop systems. I'm still trying to surmise the usefulness of the chip though, because once mobile Quad-Cores hit the mainstream, it might have less of an appeal. But, faster is faster, so it might always have a place somewhere. Adding four extra dedicated cores can't be a bad thing, right?

The Japanese company says that the processor achieves what many high-end graphics processing units (GPUs) from the likes of Nvidia and AMD now feature: transcoding acceleration. Transcoding, or converting--movies, for example--from one format to another, can be extremely time consuming, sometimes taking hours.

Source: C|Net News

June 18th Tech Roundup

Motherboards & Processors
• Asrock A780FullDisplayport - Pro-Clockers
• ASUS P5E64 WS Evolution X48 - Big Bruin
• ASUS Rampage Formula - InsideHW
• ECS A770M-A AM2 - Pro-Clockers

Displays & Video Cards
• EVGA GeForce GTX 280 1GB FTW Edition - Motherboards.org

Memory & Storage
• Buffalo LinkStation EZ 500GB Network Storage - Overclockers Online
• Mushkin Ascent DDR3-2000 - Bjorn3D
• OCZ Reaper HPC 2GB PC3-10666 - circuitREMIX
• Super Talent Project X PC3-16000 2GB - Hardware Logic

Peripherals & Gadgets
• Altec Lansing M812 Wireless Speaker System - TechwareLabs
• Cyber Snipa Sonar 5.1 Gaming Headset - Think Computers

Cooling
• Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 LP - DragonSteelMods

Chassis & Power Supplies
• In Win Powerman Commander 1200 Watt - Tweaknews
• OCZ Stealth X Stream 600W - Overclockers Club
• Sigma Unicorn Mid-Tower - Modders-Inc

Competitions, Complete Systems & Et cetera
• Contest: Cyber Snipa - XSReviews
• JVC Everio S GZ-MS100 - Digital Trends