Content and news by Rob Williams

“Since it first revealed a month ago that it was pulling a U-turn by releasing a new version of Internet Explorer independent of Longhorn, Microsoft has been unwilling to share many particulars about its forthcoming browser.

Will Internet Explorer (IE) 7.0 have tabs? Will it comply with the Cascading Style Sheet (CSS) 2.0 standard? Exactly how will it make browsing more secure? Will it ship in 2005?”

Microsoft is not telling anybody anything at this point. Chances point to yes, that they will implement tabs.. since that’s almost the norm now. Hopefully as well it will support CSS 2.0. We can just hope that 7.0 will not have as many bugs as 6.0.. or we are in for another big headache. Check out the article at Microsoft Watch.

“We like to start our Guides by explaining what the target market is, just to avoid confusion. There are numerous ways to tweak any system within a given budget, and more often than not, we hear comments about why we didn’t use product X or forgot to mention feature Y. For some people, specific features and upgrades are going to be important, while others are really just interested in a decent computer that will handle the typical tasks that they are likely to perform.”

Definately a good read. Check it out at AnandTech.

“Ciarelli is 19 years old, a freshman at Harvard. But he’s been a journalist since middle school. In 1998, Ciarelli launched an Internet site — they weren’t called blogs back then — called Think Secret, where he serves up news and rumors about his favorite electronic gadgets: the products of Apple Computer Inc.”

As with anything, doing something that a company doesn’t like, such as leaking info.. will catch up to you. Check out the full news post at Boston.com.

“When it comes to notebooks, size matters. A couple of years ago if you told me I’d be enjoying DOOM 3 and Half Life 2 on a thin mobile notebook I would have given you a confusing stare. Times are changing though and technology is ever progressing. Notebook graphics chips have evolved to mirroring counterparts in the desktop video card world.”

If you are thinking of your next notebook having a X700, first check out the review at Hard|OCP.

“The day that you’ve been waiting for is finally here. Let’s check out the winners!”

Check it out at the Rojak Pot to see who won!

“Today 3DXtreme has the pleasure of looking at the two newest products in the Sunbeam family. These products are the mid-tower Samurai ATX Case and the full-tower Transformer ATX Case. Neither Case comes with an included Power Supply Unit, however the pricing reflects that at mere $56 and $99.”

Check it out at 3D Xtreme.

“Today, video card upgrading is one of the most popular investment. With
some many to choose from, it is hard to make up one’s mind. A top end card
can cost you well over $500USD, some topping up at $750USD. But, if you
are like me and on a tight budget, you are probably looking for something
to tide you over till those X850’s and Ultra’s become reasonably
affordable. Here is the ATI X700Pro.”

Check it out at Pro-Clockers.

There are a couple updates with Auto Assault this week! First off, they have announced the launch of their forums! You can access them at: http://boards.autoassault.com They are great looking forums, and I have made a couple posts there myself already. The also have update their Recon section, with a new article, Comment (0) -->

“There are a few 6200 AGP boards on show at NVIDIA’s partners, here at CeBit in Halle 24. Inno3D have one up for example, but Point of View’s is a bit different, since it’s not NV44A, rather NV44 and BR2. With its molex feed for power, it’s more than just a basic cheap board for the masses, rather for the tweaker on a budget. It’s one of PoV’s first boards back from production and it’s more a qualification sample than one that’s currently in mass production, but they decided to take it to CeBit and they hinted it might clock a bit.”

Check it out at Hexus! Check these out as well:

SLI running with odd BIOS ROMs at Prolink’s stand
PixelView champions MXM

“Most people end up compromising with a midrange laptop that does most or all of what they want, but without the utter sleekness that three grand will get you. Today we’re going to take a look a Gigabyte’s G-Max N203 laptop in “Ruby Red”, which fits neatly into this midrange category. Features and portability are this 1.6GHz Centrino-based laptop’s primary strengths, but it can also hold its own in the office computing department, as we will see a little later in the benchmarks. The ‘Ruby Red’ N203 (which we reviewed) comes with a 1.6GHz Pentium M processor and 256MB of memory.”

Check it out at PC Stats.

“I had a chat with NVIDIA yesterday in a meeting where they admitted slight frustration at certain pockets of press claiming that nForce4 SLI Edition for Intel Pentium 4 is a paper launch product, while also expressing bewilderment at being asked by the same hacks why it’s not called nForce5.”

Check out that article at Hexus. Also, you can check out these articles:
FIRST LOOK – RAPTOR-GAMING M2 Mouse
S3’s OmniChrome can’t be sold in the UK?
TV tuners take over CeBit.

“Tired of getting fragged left and right? If you are questioning your fragging skills, maybe it’s time to take a look at your mouse.

Today, we will take a look at the Razer Diamondback professional gaming mouse with its incredible 1600 DPI resolution and 16-bits data resolution! This could be the mouse that will make you the Fragmeister!”

Check it out at Rojak Pot.

“The Matrix Orbital MX5 series included nearly every LED feature an enthusiast could imagine. It will be interesting to see what can be packaged into the brand new MX6 line. Today we have the exclusive honor and privilege of introducing you to the Matrix Orbital MX610!”

Check it out at Phoronix.

Over at NGOHQ, they have released a new IceMat Siberia review. They have also released a tweaked version of the new Nvidia 64-Bit driver.. and you can check that out here.

“To our way of thinking this PolderbitS sound recording & editor software package represents really great value-for-money. You get all the functions you need to make and edit your sound recordings along with a great choice of recording qualities to choose from.”

Check it out at A1 Electronics.

“On average, the X800XT-PE is about 5% to 10%, give or take a couple percentage points faster than the X800XT. Assuming you are lucky enough to grab an ATI X800XT-PE, the difference will be smaller. Basically, if benchmarks are your thing, the X850XT-PE is the fastest card ATI has to offer.”

Check it out at Viperlair

“For the second installment of this PCstats guide, we’re looking at something a little more permanent. We’re going to take one of the most popular and easy to use free Linux distributions, SUSE Personal 9.1 and explore the process of installing Linux onto your hard drive as a full operating system. We’ll look at how to configure your desktop using the KDE desktop manager, get a grasp on your personal files in the Linux file system and connect to the Internet for web browsing and email. We’ll also teach you how to make Linux co-exist peacefully with your existing Windows installation, so you can use both. This particular version of Linux was chosen because its small footprint and easy to use configuration tools make it an excellent way to reduce the often-daunting learning curve that the Linux OS can present. We firmly believe that learning to use an operating system productively is the first and most important step in achieving full familiarity and expertise with that system.”

Check it out at PC Stats.

“The ATI TV Wonder Elite is based on the very powerful ATI Theater 550 Pro chip. The large analog tuner of previous generation TV Wonder products is replaced by the small Microtune MT2050 Digital Tuner. This tuner not only is capable of TV but also FM radio. For convenience, the Remote Wonder Plus remote control is included. The only downside to this product is the weak software package, Power Cinema. Watch the Video to find out more…”

Check out the review at 3D Gameman!

“Choosing the best PC hardware available for your budget can sometimes be a confusing and time consuming ordeal. Time these days is at a premium, and not everyone has enough of this precious commodity available to trawl countless reviews thus enabling them to make good, informed buying decisions. Don’t expect in depth detail on the products chosen. The article would end up being 50 pages if it were. This is a quick look at what’s hot at the moment. Think of it as a point in the right direction.”

Check it out at Pro Overclock!

“Gigabyte has come up with a very interesting alternative to the dual card SLI option; what they’ve done is placed two nVidia GeForce 6600GT cores and two sets of memory onto a single videocard PCB! Like a regular pair of SLI compatible cards, the two individual cores split the PCI Express 16x bus and each core gets a direct PCI Express 8x connection to the rest of the system though one standard PCI Express x16 slot. Each of the GeForce 6600GT cores on the GV-3D1 are supported with dedicated sets of 128MB of Samsung GDDR3 memory each, for a total of 256MB GDDR-3. The GV-3D1 has its cores clocked at 500MHz apiece, but the memory runs at 1120MHz – a full 120MHz over stock speeds. We’ll see later what kind of performance benefits this can produce.”

Check it out at PC Stats.