Content and news by Rob Williams

SAN JOSE, Calif. Oct 25, 2005 — Less than a month before Microsoft Corp.’s Xbox 360 hits store shelves, International Business Corp. revealed details of the microprocessor that powers the long-awaited video game console.

The IBM-built chip features three customized PowerPC computing engines that can each handle two simultaneous tasks at clock speeds greater than 3 gigahertz. It was customized for Microsoft in less than 24 months from the original contract.

Check out the full news posting over at ABC News.

During a recent meeting with representatives from Eidos and Crystal Dynamics, we were given a guided tour through a small portion of one of Tomb Raider: Legend’s levels by the game’s producer. The level, which will be the second in the finished game, was set in a large underground tomb that was more reminiscent of the environments in Lara Croft’s first adventure than of anywhere you might have spent time in her subsequent outings. The underground tomb was impressively lit by shafts of light coming through cracks in the ceiling, and on the few occasions in which Lara found herself in darkness, she was able to turn on a small shoulder-mounted torch.

This game seems to be coming along great.. I can’t wait to give it a go. Hopefully it will not be so dull like the last one. Read the full preview at Gamespot.

New York, NY – October 25, 2005 – 2K Games, a publishing label of Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. (NASDAQ: TTWO), and FIRAXIS Games, the world renowned video game developer, today announced that Sid Meier’s Civilization IV for the PC has shipped to retail stores in North America. Sid Meier’s Civilization IV will be in retail stores in Europe on November 4.

Finally you strat buffs have your new addiction! Check out the full press release here.

SANTA MONICA, Calif., Oct. 25 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — Soldiers … strap up those boots, tighten that buckle and grab your helmet, it’s time to return to battle as Activision, Inc. (Nasdaq: ATVI – News) has shipped Call of Duty® 2 to retail outlets nationwide. Powered by Infinity Ward’s proprietary new engine, the sequel delivers an unparalleled portrayal of the chaos and intensity of war with life-like authenticity, amazing special effects, advanced A.I. technology, the most realistic squad combat and explosive action. Call of Duty 2 for Windows® PC is rated “T” (TEEN — blood, mild language and violence) by the ESRB and carries a suggested retail price of $49.99.

Check out the full press release over at the Activision site!

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. – October 25, 2005 –AGEIA™ Technologies, Inc., the pioneer in hardware-accelerated physics for games, today announced that Rob Herb has joined the AGEIA board of directors, effective immediately. Mr. Herb is a managing director at BA Venture Partners (BAVP), a leading Silicon Valley venture firm. His broad expertise in semiconductors and components for consumer electronics will provide invaluable assistance to AGEIA as the company approaches the launch of its first product, the AGEIA PhysX processor.

Read: Full Press Release

Feeling down in the dump? Well then this might not be the review for you. Reason being, this power supply is very VERY blue! It’s made by FSP Group, which has been around since 1993 and currently is the 10th largest power supply vendor world-wide. They are focusing on green power products and looking forward to strengthening their product line as well as the range. The unit which I received for review is the Blue Storm 500 with (passive) PFC, they also have three smaller sizes and these all have the option to have PFC or not.

Head on over to Think Computers for the full review!

Ultra Products has a new fan controller called the Fan Commander which can control up to seven fans, and monitor three temperature probes. Controlling all your fans in one location will help you save time while also achieving the perfect balance between noise level and cooling performance.

Check out the full review at Big Bruin.

Class, sleek and powerful are just a few words that I can think of to describe anything that comes from Silverstone. From the TJ line of cases to the ST series of power supplies nothing says quality like Silverstone. Another one of their quality products is in our lab today, The Strider ST60F 600 watt power supply. Boasting a boatload of power and modular cables, this maybe your next power unit.

Head on over to Pro-Clockers for the full review.

Today we have the opportunity of looking at one of there Digital Cameras the 8.2 million pixel Caplio GX8 Digital camera, now normally we wouldn’t be looking at digital cameras at this end of the scale as normally they come with a price to match. However the Caplio GX8 is in that end of the scale but without the price, averaging a street price of 300 GBP and 500 euros it is signifently cheaper than other 8.2 MP cameras that are on the market today. Does that mean the features have been cut. Well that’s what we are here to find out.

Check out the review at Xtreme Computing.

There’s no question we’re overwhelmed by gadgets. To simplify our lives a bit, manufacturers are creating devices that do double or triple duty like the Treo 650 cell phone/PDA. Other examples are camcorders that tout their digital still attributes, so they not only take videos but photographs as well. In this case, the theory being you can carry one less gadget, put your digital camera on eBay and just use a single device.

Check out the full review at Design Technica.

An autoexec.cfg file is a text file that you can edit with your settings and have those settings run every time Quake 4 starts without any interaction from you. You simply create a new text file in the Quake 4q4base folder (the same location as the Quake4Config.cfg) and save it as autoexec.cfg.

This is a great reference guide, I may even print it out! Check it out at Viper Lair.

Now powered by an AMD Athlon 64 X2 4800+ (dual core and overclocked) and overclocked NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GTX SLI, the basic canons of performance that we saw in the development 3XS Chameleon have been cemented and improved. Still wearing coats of paint more expensive than a decent spec PC, the fully-loaded Chameleon has been used and abused by us over the course of the last few days.

This is no doubt one of the most gorgeous looking cases I’ve ever seen. Check out the full review over at 3D Xtreme.

It might be a little strange to be testing out the Jetart JAK801 Socket 754 AMD Athlon64 heatsink, but remember there are plenty of single-channel DDR Socket 754 processors out there, and lots of Sempron’s too. The Jetart JAK801 is an all-aluminum extruded K8 heatsink with a pretty standard set of accouterments. Its 15x70x70mm fan operates at a single speed, and is not temperature responsive.

Check out the full review at Frosty Tech.

While fancy plastic and steel cases are now the order of the day, aluminium cases still have a high-end niche in the market and have retained a lot of their initial cachet. Gigabyte seems to have a hand in every conceivable PC market these days, and cases are now no exception. Today we’ll be looking at the company’s first stand-alone computer chassis, the high-end Gigabyte 3D Aurora aluminium case which is designed to especially accommodate watercooling systems. Let’s see how it measures up.

Head on over to PC Stats for the full look.

Rather than synthetic ‘stress test’ benchmarks which don’t test the CPU and cut out sound, we’ve gone into a deeper level of detail, with our real-world experiences chronicled across a whole range of high-end and mid-range graphics cards and CPUs.

We’ve combined a frame-rate test with a guide to ‘best playable settings’ for the cards, giving the graphics card buyer a far more detailed idea of performance than simple synthetic benchmarks alone.

Check out the full benchmark analysis at Bit-Tech!

Lacking any fancy LED fans, powering up the Thermaltake Swing Case was uneventful. The Thermaltake Swing Case is the perfect marriage of budget, usability, and looks. This Case has room to grow, so as an entry level Case the Swing would be an ideal purchase. Also, with its $60 price tag it’s within reach of many peoples’ budget – our only ding was that it doesn’t include a Power Supply Unit. In any case, the Thermaltake Swing fits its’ price point perfectly giving the user features found on more expensive Cases.

Check out the full review over at 3D Xtreme.

Regular readers will know that the majority of my day is spent attached to my beloved Apple PowerBook. A 1GHz G4 machine with 768MB of RAM and Radeon 9600 graphics, it’s my daily workhorse, despite the prevalence of high-powered PC workstations round here. Why? Well, it’s all about OSX, for me.

My PowerBook goes with me absolutely everywhere. It’s been around the world more times than I can count, to innumerable Starbucks coffee houses, to parks, gardens, exhibitions – everywhere I think I might be able to find 5 minutes to answer email.

Check out the full destruction over at Bit-Tech.

As soon as we ended our call with Seagate, we went ahead and placed the order for the 500GB version of the 7200.9 with 16MB of cache. Being the newest and highest capacity in Seagate’s line of hard drives, we chose to look at it exclusively. For now, we will compare the 500GB drive’s performance to some of its older predecessors, like the 7200.7 120GB model, and the 7200.8 400GB model that we looked at a few months back, both with 8MB cache and the first generation 1.5Gbps transfer rates.

Check out the full review over at Anand Tech.

ATi has finally got their act together and released the long over due X1800 series along with the X1600 and X1300 series. This means the previous generation X800 and X700 graphics cards that have served us so well for so long will begin to fade away. However, before that happens there will be a number of bargains appearing on store shelves. Already the Radeon X800GT and X800GTO parts are selling well thanks to their excellent price vs. performance stance. However, the original 12 pipeline Radeon X800 products have come down considerably in price and only cost a fraction more than the new X800GT cards.

Head on over to Legion Hardware for the full review.

“Uwe Boll is the perfect producer-director to make POSTAL,” affirmed Running With Scissors’ CEO Vince Desi. “He understands the subject matter and has an appreciation and affinity for controversy and political incorrectness. POSTAL has always been about reason and insanity, violence and motivation; producer-director Uwe Boll is simply the right guy to bring that vision to the screen.” The man behind the camera, Hollywood outsider Uwe Boll ranks POSTAL as his personal, all-time favorite video game. “I see it like a mirror for our society — funny, violent, absurd!” he declared. “So then the movie must be powerful, strange, and so full of the game’s political incorrect outrageousness that if we do it correct, we will all probably end up in jail!”

The movie will start shooting in 2006 for a 2007 release.

Check out the full news post at Shack News!