Creative Releases Notebook Audio Card Suitable for Wireless Streaming

External audio solutions for notebooks is nothing new, but as we've found out in the past, it's rarely that impressive. The new Sound Blaster X-Fi Notebook audio card might change some minds though, as it's equipped with the proven X-Fi chip and plugs into virtually any ExpressCard slot.

What makes this one noteworthy is that it allows for wireless operation. Essentially, you could plug it in, sit on the couch free of any cords and still be enjoying your music from the speakers of your liking - at least ones that use simple RCA jacks or line-out, 5.1 listeners are out of luck.

The audio card itself will retail for $89.99, while the Wireless Receiver retails for $69.99. The latter isn't required if you have no interest in being truly wireless, or if you sit at a desk all the time and don't mind being plugged in.

You can place up to four speaker systems with Creative Wireless Receivers up to 100 feet away from your notebook and your audio will play wirelessly with no delays or dropouts, without requiring a wireless network. You can also set up individual zones to control playback independently in specific rooms.

Source: Creative Press Release

AMD Launches "Power of Fusion" Campaign

So... AMD almost gave me a heart attack this morning. In my inbox laid an e-mail from the greenest company in Sunnvale, boasting the "Power of Fusion". Considering that up to now, Fusion has been the term thrown around about for their CPU/GPU hybrid chip, it definitely made me jolt my coffee. Well as it turns out, this Fusion has more to do than just with that Fusion. 

AMD today coins the term "The Future is Fusion", which is the focal point for a new campaign that focuses on AMD's family of technologies, from CPUs to GPUs to Chipsets to whatever else. It goes even further than that, though. From the release: "Fusion is the AMD working philosophy that marries innovation with collaboration, and is the process by which AMD and its partners can enable next-generation technologies that change the way we live, work and play."

What that means exactly, I'm unsure, but it's clear that AMD is keen on continuing their great industry relationships while solidifying new ones. The release also mentions their Fusion CPU/GPU architecture, which we still don't know that much about. With AMD's sudden gung-ho attitude on all things Fusion, that might change, very soon.

Another notable part of the announcement is a new utility called "Fusion for Gaming", which is an all-around performance tool for, you guessed it, gamers. The software of course requires a PC with an AMD processor, and allows both automatic and manual overclocking for your CPU and AMD-based GPU, while the Overdrive portion can track the temperatures, stability and so forth.

Profiles can also be created, with some being able to shut down certain processes that might be running in the background. The goal is to slim the PC down as much as possible, so as to make the gaming experience as pleasurable as possible. This same 'enabled' profile can also affect the overclock automatically. Once you are done gaming, you could simply undo what was done.

AMD is truly taking this campaign seriously, and they probably need to. Whether or not it's going to revitalize their image like they hope it will, we won't know for a while, but so far they seem to be off to a good start. Now if only we could learn more about the Fusion architecture itself...

An example of "Fusion" in the AMD product roadmap is its Fusion Architecture - the stated intent to combine the photo-realistic imagery made possible by its graphics processing units with the processing power of its central processing units. The company believes its new "Fusion" brand concept captures the benefits of this same collaborative initiative across a range of technology platforms, partner relationships, employee teams, and market segments.

Source: AMD Press Release

Turn Your PC Into a Mac... With a Dongle?

When Apple first announced that Intel processors would be used in their machines going forward, it became obvious to many that hacking OS X to run on your PC would have to be made much easier. Although projects existed before that announcement to run OS X on your non-Apple machine, the result was lackluster in all regards. But, things changed when moving over to the x86 scheme of things, that's for sure.

I didn't realize things have gotten this easy, though. Over at Gizmodo, Matt Buchanan gave a new 'dongle' a go, of all things, which allows a user to install OS X on their PC with absolutely no hassle. Well, there might be some hassle, but it's minor, and the biggest caveat is that you need to use supported hardware, which at this point in time, is a small list.

It's noted that the OS installed just fine, though, and even the updating system works like a dream. Unlike a 'Hackintosh', this dongle tricks the system into thinking it's a legitimate Apple machine, so the updating process is no issue. Whether or not Apple has the ability to patch their updater for this specific type of hack is yet to be seen, but you can be sure they are investigating. Oh, and if there is another downside, it might be that the dongle will set you back a cool $150.

Okay, there was a slight hitch. My video card, an Nvidia 8800GT, isn't supported by the firmware EFiX ships with. EFiX already has the update on the site, but its updater is only coded for 32-bit Windows. If, like me, you run Vista 64-bit, you will have to install Vista 32-bit on the drive you intend to put Leopard on, just to update the stupid firmware.

Source: Gizmodo

Tech Roundup - September 18, 2008

• Intel Core 2 Duo E7200 - Overclockers Club
• MSI P45 Platinum - XS Reviews

• ATI Catalyst 8.9 Analysis - XP & Vista - TweakTown
• BFG GeForce GTX 260 896MB MaxCore - PC Per
• Sapphire HD 4850 512 MB - techPowerUp
• XFX GTX 280 XXX - i4u

• Corsair 4GB and 8GB Voyager Mini USB Flash Drive - Legit Reviews
• Tagan ICY BOX IB-NAS4220-B NAS - Virtual-Hideout
• Team Group Xtreem DDR3-1866 2GB - TweakTown

• MSI Star Mouse GS-501 - Metku
• OCZ Alchemy Elixer Gaming Keyboard - Hardware Logic

• Sunbeamtech Core Contact Freezer Cooler - Overclocker Cafe

• Thermaltake Spedo Advance Chassis - Overclock3D
• Thermaltake Toughpower QFan 500W Power Supply - JonnyGURU
• Thermaltake Xaser VI MX Mid-Tower - Think Computers
• Thermaltake VI-ON USB & e-Sata Drive Enclosure - Bjorn3D

• Jazz Elite HDV-188 5MP HD Video Camera w/3" Screen - Test Freaks
• Top 20 Worst Fashion Gadgets Ever Part 1: From Bad to Atrocious - Digital Trends