Content and news by Rob Williams

In case you somehow missed it, we posted our “Best of CES 2008” article yesterday, awarding ten products we saw during our travels a few weeks ago at the event. These are products that deserve recognition, and products you should be on the lookout for once available in the marketplace.

Being the true article-hog that I am, I chose five of the ten products, including Logitech’s latest media-keyboard, the diNovo Mini. If you haven’t seen this yet, you should. It packs all of the functionality of a large media keyboard into something you hold like a Nintendo DS. Included also is DisplayLink’s USB-display technology, which I have tested-out at home and can recommend.

Greg, being a huge networking-buff, has chosen two products that reflect his geekiness, the Logitech Squeezebox Duet and NETGEAR ReadyNAS Duo. Although the product doesn’t interest me particularly, I appreciate the fact that the Squeezebox is designed to work on a variety of OS’, including Linux, Mac OS and others. Anyone out there up to the challenge of having it run through DOS?

Kiersten helps wrap things up with her choices, including an ASUS Eee impersonator, the NoahPad, and also BugLabs BUG system, which is essentially a Linux-based handheld that craves to be hacked. Sounds like something right up my alley! All these products and more can be found in the article, so check it out!

We should make one thing clear: None of the choices here were taken lightly. These are products that left such an impression on us, we continued to think about them long-after our first encounter. If it’s here, it’s a stellar product that deserves recognition.

Source: Best of CES 2008

Choosing a new gaming mouse can be a difficult process, especially given the selection available. In order to help gauge how sixteen of the top mice fare with gamers, a Malta gaming community, playREACTION, brought the entire slew to a LAN gathering and had members of various clans take the mice for a spin. Report cards were passed out as well, so that overall grades could be averaged.

From such a test, you’d imagine that some mice would score upwards of 90%, especially the more common enthusiast models. But as their results show, no mouse broke through the 70% mark. What this proves, really, is that we are all different and one mouse that might be a Godsend to one person may be an uncomfortable choice to someone else. The same would apply to numerous products though, including mousepads.

This year we have witnessed considerable changes in the gaming hardware market. With regards to gaming mice, we have seen the involvement of some new companies that have made the plunge into a saturated but still very deep market area. On the other hand, established companies have made multiple releases of new products over the length of the year and some have even remade old line-ups and enhanced them with more modern technology.

Source: playREACTION

It might be hard to believe, but it’s already been over two years since OpenOffice.org 2.0 was released, with 2.3.1 being the most recent update. Although not too much is even known about version 3.0, it’s roadmap was recently unveiled and shows a September 2008 release, with a beta slated for the end of April.

According to previous reports from OOoCon 2007, the upcoming version will be launched with a slew of new features, including “web 2.0” functionality, an upgraded personal information manager, expanded extension system and focus on portions that will improve usage in a business environment. The goal is to compete with Microsoft Office, which is a very worthy, but lofty, goal.

I live by the mindset that an application doesn’t need to be “pretty” for it to be usable, because quite frankly, OOo is very usable. However, as I’ve mentioned in the past, I can never get over the fact that using OOo makes me feel like I am using a ten-year-old OS. Will 3.0 be the version to get a true fresh coat of paint? I hope so. I think that in itself would increase usage all-around.

Source: OpenOffice.org Wiki

When news broke last week that Microsoft may be considering a purchase of Yahoo!, I think many people, myself included, assumed that Yahoo! was in great shape. The opposite might be true, for the time being, as it appears Yahoo! is having a difficult time converting all their raw traffic into raw moolah. So… layoffs are apparently in order.

According to reports from TechCrunch, layoffs may range between 10 – 20% of the company, which would equate to 1,300 – 2,700 people. Even at the low-end, Sunnyvale will no doubt feel a tad depleted. Of course, given Google’s rising nature, it would be no surprise to see them pick up a lot of the lost workforce. That’s if the layoff will occur, which should be known for sure by the end of the month.

The layoffs will be 10%-20% and are being recommended by the executive team after a recent offsite. The board will make the final decision at a meeting two days before the next earnings call on January 29. Layoffs will likely be announced then.

Source: TechCrunch

Sun Microsystems made headlines last week when they purchased MySQL AB, creators of the MySQL database platform, and not surprisingly, many were confused and unsure of what to expect. It’s all for good reason too – when a huge acquisition takes place, especially where a piece of widely-used software is concerned, people have the right to be curious.

To help clear up questions and concerns, Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz wrote a hearty post on his blog that details all immediate questions, including why the purchase was made, how it came about and potential changes to MySQL. After reading, you might just feel better about the acquisition. There is also a roundtable video at the end of the blog post for all of you interested.

Regarding PostgreSQL: “It grows. The day before we announced the acquisition, and within an hour of signing the deal, I put a call into Josh Berkus, who leads our work with Postgres inside of Sun. I wanted to be as clear as I could: this transaction increases our investment in open source, and in open source databases. And increases our commitment to Postgres – and the database industry broadly. The same goes for our work with Apache Derby, and our JavaDB.”

Source: Jonathan Schwartz’s Blog

Seattle PI had a chat with an “inside source” from Microsoft who knows the ins and outs of the Red Ring of Death, and most importantly, why the dreaded rings appear in the first place. Many people already knew that system overheating was a prime suspect, but the insider notes that it could also be caused by hardware-gone-bad.

Oddly enough, one of the primary reasons has to do with the DVD drive. This strikes me, because you’d imagine that even if the DVD drive failed to function, the console would at least boot up, but that’s not the case. It could be a more deep-rooted issue though, such as one with the DVD controller. Great interview if you want to be told the story from the “source”. It also reminded me that I still have a borked Xbox 360 to return…

RROD is caused by anything that fails in the “digital backbone” on the mother board. Also known as a core digital error. CPU, GPU, memory, etc. Bad parts, incompatible parts (timing problems) bad manufacturing process (like solder joints), misapplied heat sinks or thermal interface material, missing parts, broken parts, parts of the wrong value, missed test coverage.

Source: Seattle PI

We first learned about Larrabee, Intel’s discrete GPU, at last spring’s IDF in Beijing, and then saw it tackled again at this past fall’s event. Although a launch date was never approximated, it was thought that we would be seeing product in the area of mid-2009, but that has now been debunked, courtesy of Intel CEO Paul Otellini at the fourth-quarter earnings conference.

“Larabee first silicon should be late this year in terms of samples and we’ll start playing with it and sampling it to developers,” … “I still think we are on track for a product in late 2009, 2010 timeframe.”

Could we have asked for a better answer? What makes this interesting is the timing. As discovered during Otellini’s keynote in September, both Intel’s processors and GPUs should cross in 2010 and both be based on 32nm, including Nehalem’s successor, Westmere. Of course right now, everything boils down to support and whether or not game developers will exploit all of what Larrabee brings to the table. We will have to wait a few years to find that out, though…

With Larrabee not arriving until 2010, this gives GPU makers quite a bit of time to catch up to multicore x86 in terms of programmability. And by programmability, I specifically mean the kind of improved exception handling and process switching capabilities that GPUs will need if they’re going to compete with a multicore part like Larrabee for the coprocessor spots in commodity-based supercomputing clusters.

Source: Ars Technica

When NVIDIA launched their ESA platform standard in November, hype around it quickly died down. Things just went quiet. But as it turns out, it mainly had to do with full-hardware support not being quite ready, but things have changed since then. At least weeks CES, it was difficult to talk to a hardware company without hearing mention of ESA, so support is definitely on the way from many companies.

Our friends at Tech Report have received an NVIDIA-built system that includes numerous ESA-certified components and saw what it was all capable of. The ESA software proved to be robust even though it has a beta tag attached to it, and given that we are so early in the ESA life-cycle, it’s good to see such great support so far.

The main downside of the entire setup? The amount of cabling required. But, if you are one of those “set it and forget it” people, there should be little maintenance after the initial setup. If ESA catches on, and it has the potential to, you can expect system builders to begin offering complete systems focused around ESA-compliancy, so that a general non-enthusiast user will not have to dabble with the inside of the case.

Source: Tech Report

Since ESA is built around the USB spec, each component must be connected to the motherboard via USB. Internal motherboard headers are the most likely candidates for these connections, but it’s possible that they’ll fill up fast in systems loaded with ESA components. Fortunately, ESA components can be connected via USB hubs. Some chassis manufacturers are expected to include these hubs in their ESA cases to ease the demand for onboard USB headers.

Source: Tech Report

It’s incredible to believe that less than one year ago, a performance DDR2 2GB memory kit would run you at least $300. Back then, it would have been difficult to fathom that eight months in the future, a 4GB performance kit could be had for half that. Today, there is little excuse for not picking up a 4GB kit if you are looking to build a new machine – as long as a 64-Bit OS in the plan, of course.

OCZ has just launched a new Platinum PC2-8000 kit, making them one of the few companies to do so (G. Skill also offers one, while GeIL offers a PC2-8500). Although overclocks will always vary, these modules have been able to go up to DDR2-1100 in OCZ’s lab, varying primarily on the motherboard chosen (ASUS P5K Deluxe performed the best).

I would have killed for a kit like this last year… and now they are so common-place! You can pick up this particular kit when it hits retail shortly, for ~$159.99USD.

Sunnyvale – CA – January 17, 20 – OCZ Technology Group, Inc., a worldwide leader in innovative ultra-high performance and high reliability memory, today announced the PC2-8000 Platinum Edition 4GB dual channel kit, designed to boost the performance of mainstream gaming systems. These new 2GB modules are the ultimate upgrade for entry-level enthusiasts seeking an exceptional overclocking kit at a price point that suits all budgets.

Source: OCZ Press Release

I have no idea how I missed this until now, but the Gentoo website is reporting that version 2007.1 is cancelled in lieu of preferring to put more time and effort into 2008.0. Numerous security issues arose in late Fall of last year, which really held back development of the 2007.1, so it was decided to not waste time and move onto the next version.

Unlike most distros that release upgraded versions every few months, a delay in versions doesn’t really effect Gentoo users, since the system is constantly kept up to date via the Portage packaging system. However, such a delay still doesn’t look good on the distro, thanks in part to other issues that are also currently plaguing it. No one knows what kind of shape the distro will be in months down the road, but for the sake of all Gentoo’s fans, myself included, I hope it pulls itself out of the rut it’s in and get turned around.

Curious why only one release happened in 2007, since previous years had multiple releases? Work began on the release as planned, but vast numbers of security vulnerabilities between September 2007 and December 2007 and reduced manpower left the Release Engineering team constantly overworked, having to rebuild stages and add items to the initial snapshot.

Source: Gentoo Official Site

Real-life deaths as a result of in-game feuds is nothing new, but it doesn’t make things less twisted. Lineage II in particular is an MMORPG game with some of the most obsessive fans in the world, especially in Korea and Russia, with the latest death occurring in the latter.

“Albert” was a member of the Platanium clan, their main rivals were the Coo-clocks (:-|). Days before the new year, Albert’s clan killed a member of the Coo-clocks clan in a virtual battle, and then Albert and a Coo-clocks member agreed to meet in real-life. The rest, is history. It’s not known for sure whether or not Lineage II was the game played, but a screenshot accompanies the source article and the descriptions match up.

The moral of the story? Don’t agree to meet pissed-off people from an online game…

It all started when two clans – the Coo-clocks, made up of mostly students, and the so-called Platanium with more experienced gamers of over thirty – started fighting to wipe out each other on screen… Albert used to spend hours in font of his computer. On the web he had his own clan and a dozen of warriors. Just days before the New Year in a virtual battle his clan killed a member of the hostile Coo-clocks.

Source: Game Politics

It’s not a simple task to unleash a new web-standard and hope that it catches on, but OpenID has just been awarded a huge win – Yahoo! is picking up on the technology. OpenID is a new web-standard for the typical login system. Instead of requiring a username/password, an OpenID site would allow you to log in via your OpenID identifier.

One benefit of OpenID is that your single ID would be universally recognized (assuming all websites pick up on the technology eventually), and since the password is not stored in a centralized location (such as remote web-server), it seems like the perfect solution. However, security risks will no doubt arise as time passes, but with further revisions to the standard, methods should become near-bullet-proof. Once widely adopted, OpenID should prove the ultimate logon-solution. It’s one web-standard I am looking forward to seeing implemented.

Yahoo, which counts its registered users at 248 million worldwide, says that supporting OpenID will mean that OpenID-compatible accounts are available to a total of 368 million Web users. When Yahoo’s support of OpenID goes live, starting with a public beta launch on January 30, this will mean that a Yahoo ID can be consolidated into an OpenID account that will be valid at all partner sites.

Source: The Social

You might recall a few months ago when Dell’s new 3008WFP display was first discovered, and boy, was it about time. Up until that point, Dell’s 30″ monitors were somewhat lackluster. They looked great, but the connectivity was appalling, with a choice of DVI and… that’s it. The 3008WFP, however, was an entirely different story, with a selection of VGA, DVI, component, S-Video, HDMI and even DisplayPort – a technology that’s just beginning to catch on.

I saw that particular monitor at last weeks CES and have to say… I was impressed. The bright picture and high color gamut almost convinced me to pick it up and run off, but alas, I would get tired too quick. We will have a review of that display in the weeks to come.

Now, someone has found out that the 24″ model, the 2408WFP, is also available, for $748. It includes all of the functionality of its 30″ sibling, has 1,300:1 contrast ratio, 6ms response, 102% color gamut and a bright 400 cd/m2 picture. I am not sure how someone stumbled on this… because I can’t even find it through regular methods on their website, but if you are interested in purchasing, you can use this link. One thing is for sure… the $748 price tag is far easier to stomach than the $1,999 one for the 30″ model.

Source: Engadget

It’s hard to deny that the Eee from ASUS has been a huge hit so far, and I’ve come to the conclusion that in order for a product to sell well, it needs to have a ridiculous name that’s also short (Wii, Eee). But that aside, it also proves to be one of the most hackable computers out there. It’s already run many variations of Linux and even Windows XP, so ASUS figured it made sense to officially support the latter.

Sometime in Q1, they will launch brand-new Eee PCs with Windows XP pre-installed. The Eees you can see in the photo below were at CES last week, and were all caught running the OS. Pricing information is not disclosed in the press release, but we were told to expect them at around the $499 mark, but it could (hopefully not) go as high as $599. At that point though, a budget Dell notebook looks all the more tempting, unless you really just after the small form-factor.

“The Eee PC has been a tremendous success since our initial launch in November last year, and our channel customers tell us they want to offer even more options to their end consumers. With the new Windows XP based offerings, we expect to engage with a broader customer base whose existing software and applications require a Windows’ based device, ” said Jackie Hsu, President of ASUS America Channel.

Source: ASUS Press Release

It seems like RFID technology is being thrown around everywhere, and well, that’s because it really is. It’s now in everything from credit cards, to name badges, to car license plates (in Europe) to test papers and even people! Needless to say, not everyone likes the fact that RFID is all over the place, and I’m with that crowd. Privacy is next-to-nil with them, but many argue that the benefits outweigh the burdens.

I will be the first to admit that RFID has it’s uses, though, and here’s a perfect example. Sharkoon has just released a new 2.5″ hard drive enclosure that not only uses 128-bit AES encryption, it also includes a key fob that attaches to your keychain… and of course, it contains an RFID chip. Without this key fob, the data on the hard drive will remain encrypted and unusable, even if the drive is hooked up directly to a computer. In order to go that route, the drive will first need to be unlocked with use of the RFID key fob and then hooked up to the machine.

Sounds complicated, but it’s really not. US release is not mentioned in the press release, but it will soon be available in Europe for a mere €34.

In order to offer customers the best possible protection against data thieves, Sharkoon is expanding its Swift-Case line up of external hard drive enclosures by adding a model with RFID access control. The Sharkoon Swift-Case Securita for 2.5″ SATA hard drives comes equipped with RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) technology that protects against unauthorized access. Within the silver aluminium enclosure sits a RFID transceiver that responds solely to the accompanying RFID transponder. The transponder comes in a simple plastic fob design that attaches securely to key chains.

Source: Sharkoon

If you love to game, then chances are good you also enjoy LAN parties. In fact, can you even be a true gamer without enjoying the occasional LAN? If you live in the Indianapolis area, you might be interested in Stompfest 2008. It happens the weekend of March 29, and our own Greg King will be there showing his support (though we all know he is just dying to get some game time in).

What makes this Stompfest special is the fact that Palit (one of the world-leaders in graphic cards) is sponsoring the event… and that is no joke. Thanks to their support, admission is completely free, as is the chance to win prizes. The only cost to you will be whatever food you buy there, and even then, all proceeds go to the American Cancer Society. Hard to find a downfall, aye?

Be sure to check out the thread on our forums and head on over to the Stompfest website to register.

Thanks to Palit Multimedia, STOMPFEST WILL BE FREE! You heard me. FREE!!! 200+ gamers coming together for FREE fun, gaming, prizes, and more! All proceeds from food will be going to the American Cancer Society. Registration opens in February for this Indianapolis LAN, and the fun will be on March 29th and 30th.

Source: Stompfest

I don’t watch that much television, but one of the shows I make sure not to miss is Top Gear on the BBC. It offers a unique mix of car reviews with hilarious real-world tests, all while being delivered by some witty hosts. So with the success of the show overseas, it makes sense for an American company to bring it over and completely screw up everything the series stands for.

So I might be over-reacting, but I don’t plan to form an opinion until the show hits and we can all judge it first-hand. But, we are talking about a UK-based show that offers UK-flavor, and the fact that it’s British is one of the reasons the show is good. It’s not American. The last time I watched a new series on American television that I liked… I can’t recall. Unless you love reality shows or crime scene investigation, there is not much else being offered.

Prove me wrong NBC… deliver us a Top Gear that doesn’t crash and burn. Despite being skeptical, I am looking forward to seeing the first episode, or at least finding out who the hosts will be. That, is going to be interesting.

Ben Silverman, NBC co-chairman, seems to think it’s a brilliant move. “Top Gear is a proven international hit which fits perfectly into NBC’s lineup of programming with male appeal, including Sunday Night Football and American Gladiators,” he said in a statement. “We’re always looking for innovative ways to partner with our advertisers, and this show offers a great platform for the latest in car culture.”

Source: Inside Line

According to industry tracking website DigiTimes, Intel’s latest high-end Quad-Core offering, the 3.2GHz QX9770, will be delayed until February or March. Originally, the processor was set for launch this month, but has likely been pushed back along with the X48 chipset in order to help sell off what’s left from X38.

X48 is the first Intel chipset to bring native 1600FSB support to the table, which the QX9770 utilizes, so the delay is not a surprise. The Skulltrail platform has not launched either, and since it will use a processor of similar specs to the QX9770, it wouldn’t be unsurprising to see everything launch at once. That aside, is anyone really that upset at a delay for a $1,399 processor?

Intel has pushed back the volume shipment date of its Core 2 Extreme QX9770 processors for the high-end desktop segment to February-March 2008 instead of January as reported previously, according to sources at Taiwan motherboard makers. The quad-core 3.2GHz QX9770, which will be available at US$1,399 in thousand-unit quantities, is to replace the Core 2 Extreme QX9650 processor launched in November 2007, the sources noted.

Source: DigiTimes

MySQL AB, developers of the popular SQL-database platform MySQL, have been acquired by Sun Microsystems, creators of Java, the SPARC processor, Solaris OS, and OpenOffice.org. MySQL is one of the most popular database choices in the world, given it’s cost-free nature and ease-of-use, but the acquisition has many confused as to the meaning and with regards to what changes will be made.

According to the note on the MySQL blog, this is a move that should come appreciated by users because Sun has a superb track record and they are one of the few companies who “get” what open-source means. The biggest question falls back to support, which they claim will “absolutely not” change once the acquisition completes. In fact, they stress that development should only continue improving, given that Sun is chock-full of Solaris and Java experts. It’s difficult to tell what those two have to do with a SQL database, but improvements of any sort will be welcomed.

MySQL is still being managed by the same people, and the charter is still the same. There is no need for reducing the set of platforms or languages. It only makes sense for us to continue to support defacto Web development standards like LAMP, as well as emerging ones like Ruby and Eclipse. This deal is about addition, not subtraction.

Source: MySQL Blog

Who saw this one coming? Alright, almost everyone did, but that doesn’t make the announcement less cool. The Air is a new MacBook offering that promises to be the thinnest notebook on the market. I’ll agree, given the 0.76″ deep measurement when the notebook is in the closed position. It’s thinnest point, presumably the monitor, is only 0.16″ deep.

Despite the thin size, the notebook offers some decent specs, including a 1.6GHz Core 2 Duo, 2GB of RAM, an 80GB 1.8″ hard-drive, 802.11n Wi-Fi, 13.3″ display offering 1280×800, built-in webcam and integrated Intel video. For output video, there is a Micro-DVI port, but the MacBook will include adapters to convert it to VGA or DVI.

The notebook looks real promising until pricing is taken into consideration – $1,799. This is a notebook that has no NIC port (due to size), no user-replaceable battery, no optical drive, no microphone… you get the picture. It’s a good offering for those who want an ultra-portable, but the features it lacks will easily be too much for anyone who needs an all-around offering.

MACWORLD SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 15 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — Apple(R) today
unveiled MacBook(R) Air, the world’s thinnest notebook. MacBook Air measures
an unprecedented 0.16-inches at its thinnest point, while its maximum height
of 0.76-inches is less than the thinnest point on competing notebooks. MacBook
Air has a stunning 13.3-inch LED-backlit widescreen display, a full-size and
backlit keyboard, a built-in iSight(R) video camera for video conferencing,
and a spacious trackpad with multi-touch gesture support so users can pinch,
rotate and swipe. MacBook Air is powered by a 1.6 GHz or 1.8 GHz Intel Core 2
Duo processor with 4MB L2 cache, and includes as standard features 2GB of
memory, an 80GB 1.8-inch hard drive, and the latest 802.11n Wi-Fi technology
and Bluetooth 2.1.

Source: Apple Press Release