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- Intel Launches Sleek Single-Slot Arc Pro A60 Workstation Graphics Card
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- Maxon Redshift With AMD Radeon GPU Rendering Support Now Available
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Windows Vista Soft Drink
Microsoft commissioned special-edition cans of the Lemon-Lime Talking Rain sparkling water for their employees, complete with Vista logo and an intranet link for them to find out more information about Vista. Guess Microsoft needs to hype up the energy internally as well, since they’re adding these to the stock of other free sodas employees drink.
Ok, so this is not really breaking news as much as it is cool. I think the funniest thing is that it’s just a regular flavoured water. Maybe they should hand out altered cans of Bawls instead to get Vista out on time.
Microsoft Hush-Hush About its Q4 Console Counter Offensive
Teversham also promised a few surprises for its console in Q4, but failed to at least drop a hint as to what could possibly be in store. As far as we know, he could be talking about the already announced external HD DVD drive or some top secret, developed in a locked basement “killer game” that no one was expecting.
I for one can’t wait to see what they have up their sleeves, and I hope it’s not a simple HD-DVD player. I can see why they would mock Sony, but why Nintendo? Chances are Nintendo is going to rule the top if they can get enough consoles ready for launch.
Super Talent Signs Deal with CMTL for Compatibility Certification
San Jose, California – August 1, 2006 — Super Talent Technology, a leading manufacturer of memory modules and flash products, today announced an agreement with CMTL, the memory industry’s leading independent compatibility test lab. As part of the agreement, SuperTalent™ server memory will be qualified on the latest server motherboards from Intel® Corporation.
You can read the full press release here.
Intel Announces NOR Flash Memory Products for Emerging Low-Cost Handset Segment
SANTA CLARA, Calif., Aug. 1, 2006 – Intel Corporation today introduced its first NOR flash memory products aimed at the emerging low-cost cell phone segment. The new products have a new pin sharing package to minimize pin count and are configured to work with low-cost, single-chip baseband and RF solutions from leading chipset suppliers. Major handset vendors are expected to start introducing low-cost cell phones based on Intel flash products this quarter.
You can read the full press release here.
Ultra Products Introduces Sleek, New GRID ATX Mid-Tower Case
FLETCHER, OHIO – August 1st, 2006 – Ultra Products, a global leader in technology solutions, has introduced their new GRID ATX Mid-Tower case featuring a stealth black finish, cool mesh front bezel, and included Ultra V-Series 500W PSU. Retailing for $119.00, the GRID is perfect for the enthusiast looking for the perfect balance of function and style.
You can read the full press release here.
be quiet! STRAIGHT POWER series available in August 2006
Glinde, 27 July 2006. be quiet! the specialist for high-end and low-noise power supplies is expanding its range by the brand-new STRAIGHT POWER series. It is the logical addition to the current high-end DARK POWER PRO series with smart cable management system and the proven ECASO (Enhanced Cooling After System Off) technology.
You can read the full press release here.
Review Roundup for August 2
- Alphacool Cool Answer III – Guru3D
- Conroe heatsink group test – Bit-Tech
- Swiftech MCW60-T Thermoelectric VGA Waterblock – OCIA
- Thermaltake Mini Typhoon – Overclockers Online
- Zalman CNPS8000 Low Noise Heatsink – Frosty Tech
Cooling
- Acronis True Image Backup Software – A True Review
- SilverStone 3.5” Card reader – DragonSteelMods
Memory & Storage
- ECS RS482-M Radeon Xpress 200 – Hexus
- Intel Core 2 Duo Family – TechSpot
- Kontron 886LCD-M/mITX – EPIA Center
Motherboards & Processors
- Altec Lansing AHP612 Headphones – Digital Trends
- Razer Armadillo – Razer Armadillo
- SteelPad S&S Pro Gaming Mouse Pad – ModTheBox
- Be-Quiet StraightPower Series – Driver Heaven
Peripherals & Power Supplies
- GeCube ATi Radeon X1600 Pro 512MB – Think Computers
- LG FLATRON L1752S LCD Monitor – MadBoxPC
- MSI NX7600 GT VT2D256E – HardOCP Enthusiast
Displays & Video Cards
- ASUS A7J Laptop – GD Hardware
- Everglide Gaming Gear Give Away – Big Bruin
- Two Sunbeam Superior Panel Giveaway – Overclockers Online
- Win a Set of XFX 7900GT Cards – Bjorn3D
Complete Systems, Competitions & Etcetera
AMD Takes 25 Percent of Server Market
AMD on Monday said it increased its share of the x86 server processor market to 25.9 percent, a number confirmed by Mercury Research’s Dean McCarron, who tracks market share figures. Intel now holds 72.9 percent of the overall market for x86 processors, while AMD has 21.6 percent.
Things are constantly looking up for AMD. There’s no telling whether the recent availability through Dell has much to do with it, but there’s no doubt AMD is rapidly gaining ground here.
Too old for MySpace? Try Eons
A social networking website for Americans aged 50-plus went live on Monday – complete with an online obituary database that sends out alerts when someone you may know dies and that plans to set up a do-it-yourself funeral service. The founder of internet job site Monster.com, Jeff Taylor, launched Eons.com, a similar site to the popular online teen hang-outs MySpace or Facebook for the 50-plus crowd.
In the social networking scheme of things, it looks like no crowd is going to be left out.
NVIDIA Introduces NVIDIA Quadro Plex
SIGGRAPH 2006—BOSTON, MA—August 1, 2006— NVIDIA Corporation (Nasdaq: NVDA), the worldwide leader in programmable graphics processor technologies, today ushered in a new era of advanced visualization for the professional graphics market with the introduction of the NVIDIA Quadro Plex 1000, the world’s first dedicated Visual Computing System (VCS).
Now this machine is a true graphics beast. “Resolutions as high as 148 megapixels on 16 synchronized digital-output channels and eight HD SDI channels”. One thing I can’t help but notice though, is the fact that the NVIDIA logo is changed up a bit. Does that mean a redesign is in the near future?
E3 Still Alive.. but under new name
the expo will be changing to the “E3 Media Festival.” A different GameSpot article goes further into some of the causes and effects of this story, describing the pressure from companies like Sony, Microsoft, and EA to cut the costs associated with the show, as well as the impact of a smaller show on the city of Los Angeles from disappointed cab drivers to a hard-to-interpret remark by an attorney saying he thought the city wouldn’t “take this lying down.”
The show will be slimmed down and renamed, but what that means to the rest of us is yet to be seen. If this is really going to turn out to be a more ‘intimate’ show, it sounds like they may have even stricter qualifications to enter.
Futuremark now allowing Conroe submissions
We had posted yesterday regarding Futuremark not allowing submissions to their ORB if a Conroe CPU was used. Well, that has since changed and things are good to roll now. If you don’t have a Conroe, you may as well not even consider trying to get to the top :)
LG Kills Hybrid HD/BR Player
It had been reported in March the LG Electronics had shelved plans to release its BD199 Blu-ray player. Instead the company considered working on a hybrid Blu-ray/HD DVD player to cover both sides of the field. Well, it looks as though LG is now falling back to supporting just the Blu-ray disc standard. While it appears that LG won’t be resurrecting the BD199 for a quick release, the company will make an announcement later this year as to its future Blu-ray product plans.
Well, I have to admit that this sucks, because a hybrid player would not only same consumers cash, but make a buying decision even easier. As it stands, it appears Blu-Ray -may- be the way to go due to the higher capabilities. Of course, that’s if money is not an issue.
How’s Windows games on Linux?
If there’s one area where Linux distributions fall behind Windows, it’s games. Most PC games are built for Windows. Where does that leave Linux users? With Cedega, a melding of Wine and DirectX developed by TransGaming. Today, Cedega 5.2.3 officially supports about 50 games, though in reality it can run a lot more.
It would be nice to be able to run any Windows game under Linux without any issue, but it’s certainly not that way right now. The author notes that it’s a true ‘plug and pray’ experience, but it’s certainly better than nothing.
SanDisk Buys M-Systems for $1.35 Billion
In what continues to be a wave of large acquisitions, SanDisk announced today that it has agreed to buy M-Systems Flash Disk Pioneers Ltd. for $1.35 billion in stock. M-Systems is an Israeli competitor of SanDisk. According to SanDisk, the deal brings together strengths of both SanDisk and M-Systems.
It looks like these large acquisitions are not going to end anytime soon. Though it’s not likely to affect anything over on these shores, this is still a rather big gain for SanDisk.
Western Digital Goes High Density
Western Digital’s Scorpio line of 2.5-inch notebook drive platters are being manufactured to utilize the perpendicular magnetic recording method to record bits of data on the platter in a vertical manner to increase the amount of bits that can be written per square inch. When the bits are positioned vertically they take up less surface area as opposed to a horizontal organization. The Scorpio’s new platters will have a density of 80GB per platter to allow Western Digital to compete in the notebook market.
It was a wonder when WD would step up to the plate and offer these top end offerings also. Of course, pricing is not available, so it’s really a waiting game to see how they will compare to the high-end Seagate Momentus and Barracuda drives.
Corsair Enters the Power Supply Market with Two High Performance Best in Class Solutions
Fremont, CA (August 1, 2006) –Corsair® Memory, the worldwide leader in design and manufacture of high performance memory and cooling solutions, today announced the introduction of the Corsair HX Series power supply product line. The HX Series modular power supplies mark a new exciting first for Corsair. As the latest entrant into the power supply industry, Corsair’s best in class, high performance, ultra-efficient power supplies are expected to set new performance expectations for modular power supply solutions.
We knew it was going to happen! You can read the full press release here. You can read the first review over at Bjorn3D.
Review Roundup for August 1
- Icy Dock MB122SKGF-1B and MB722SKGF-B Drive Enclosures – Big Bruin
- Icy Dock MB122 & MB452 Enclosures – Phoronix
- nMedia HTPC 300 Case – Think Computers
- Sansun Galaxy – Motherboards.org
- Thermaltake Muse LAN disk (NAS) – XtremeComputing
- Tuniq 2 Mid-Tower – 3D Gameman
Cases & Enclosures
- Apack Zerotherm BTF80 and BTF90 CPU Coolers – Pro-Clockers
- Thermalright SI-128 CPU Cooler – DragonSteelMods
Cooling
- Western Digital 6GB Passport Pocket Drive – XYZ Computing
Memory & Storage
- Gigabyte 965P-DQ6 – Legion Hardware
Motherboards & Processors
- Corsair CMPSU-620HX 620 Watt Power Supply – Bjorn3D
- Silverstone Zeus 850w ST85ZF Quad SLI PSU – Overclock3D
- Zboard Fang Gaming Board – XS Reviews
Peripherals & Power Supplies
- ASUS EAX1900XTX – HotHardware
- Catalyst 6.7 Comparison – Technic3D
Displays & Video Cards
- 5 Ways to Watch TV on the Computer – Big Bruin
- AlphaShield Pro Hardware Firewall Giveaway – 3D Gameman
- CoolerMaster & OCIA.net August Contest – OCIA
- Guide to Instant Messenger Clients – Digital Trends
- MBHW August Giveaway Sponsored by Spire – Motherboards.org
- Sony PSP – R&B Consoles
- Sony VAIO VGN-TX3XP – BIOS Magazine
- Vadim Fusion Cetus Overclocked Core 2 Duo System – Hexus
Complete Systems, Competitions & Etcetera
Microsoft unveils Vista upgrade matrix
…users of XP Home can do an upgrade install to any of the four Vista versions. However, XP Pro users can only perform upgrade installs to Business or Ultimate. Windows 2000 and Windows XP Pro x64 users can do no upgrade installs at all, and must perform clean installs (either on a fresh hard drive or an empty hard drive partition) for any Vista version.
If you are planning to upgrade to Vista, here is all you need to know. It’s interesting that XP Home offers four upgrade options, while XP Pro only offers two.
Futuremark holding a grudge towards C2D?
There has been a thread going at XtremeSystems for the past few days, regarding Futuremark still not allowing Conroe systems to have their scores uploaded. Originally, Futuremark stated that hardware in testing stages, or not readily available to consumers would not be qualified for submission. However, the NDA for C2D has been up for near two weeks, and they still have not opened the doors. I think the main irony here, is the fact that Futuremark does not allow submissions from ‘future’ hardware. Strange.
Paul Thurrott bought illegal Windows
The key I had used to install Windows was a known pirated key, and required a modified version of winlogon.exe. This surprised me, naturally, since I don’t pirate software, especially Microsoft OS software that I have several legitimate copies of around the house.
We posted last week about WGA giving Paul a hard time, and it appears the copy he had actually was using an illegal key. Even though he purchased the copy online, it proved to be a pirated version. It goes to show… it’s incredibly easy to be fooled.
Study Claims Men Play Female Avatars to ‘Win’
Kathryn Wright, WomenGamers’s consulting psychologist, earlier this decade found that 60 percent of male players who don female avatars, or on-screen personas, do it to gain an advantage in game play. An enthusiast with the online handle Jackpot649 nailed the zeitgeist in his response to the About.com query: ‘I’m a guy, but if I gotta look at an avatar all day, I’d sooner look at a female avatar. Plus, people give you more free stuff.
I don’t have a single doubt that this is completely true. To me, playing as the opposite sex is rather ‘sad’, but it almost makes sense if you want to have an immediate advantage in the game.
50th Anniversary of the First Hard Drive
Over at Newsweek Steven Levy has a column commemorating IBM’s introduction of the first hard drive 50 years ago. The drive was the size of two refrigerators, weighed a ton, and had a vast 5MB capacity. They also discuss the future of data storage.
How ‘hard’ life would be without this great invention. Could you imagine if things haven’t changed much since then? You’d have a refridgerator next to your desk… that holds more than just your beer.
Empty the Recycle Bin in Vista? No problem.
With Windows Vista, the operating system will make “shadow” (that is, backup) copies of files and folders for users who have “System Protection” enabled (the default setting). The feature will be called Previous Versions, and will be accessible via the right-click properties menu as “Restore previous versions.”
I have to admit that this feature could prove extremely useful, considering I have many times deleted or overwrote an all important file. However, as the article points out, this could also prove a huge security risk.
No more E3?
The Entertainment Software Association (ESA) shindig has been a staple of game industry life since the mid-1990s. However, we understand the larger exhibitors have jointly decided that the costs of the event do not justify the returns, generally measured in media exposure. Publishers believe the multi-million dollar budgets would be better spent on more company-focused events that bring attention to their own product lines rather than the industry as a whole.
There’s much debate onto whether there’s any credibility to this story, so take it with a grain of salt. If the E3 really was to be no more… it would be sad to see it go so suddenly. However, Ars Technica states that the ‘cancellation’ is actually a downsize. We will have to wait and see…