- Qualcomm Launches Snapdragon 4 Gen 2 Mobile Platform
- AMD Launches Ryzen PRO 7000 Series Mobile & Desktop Platform
- Intel Launches Sleek Single-Slot Arc Pro A60 Workstation Graphics Card
- NVIDIA Announces Latest Ada Lovelace Additions: GeForce RTX 4060 Ti & RTX 4060
- Maxon Redshift With AMD Radeon GPU Rendering Support Now Available
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PURE Tempus-1XT DAB Radio Review
With well over 20 products, PURE looks to offer a bigger spread of DAB radios than any other maker – and a wider variety, too. As well as table-top models, pocket-able and personal-stereo-style portables and a CD/DAB micro system, there’s even a separates tuner to go with hi-fi systems. Prices start at under £50 and go up to over £200. We’re looking today at a compact, mains-powered table model, the Tempus-1XT, that sits in the middle of the range and can be had for a bit under £100.
Check out the full review at Hexus.
HyperKore X-Treme Gaming System Giveaway
How would you like to win a custom built X-treme gaming system? HyperKore, CPU Magazine and Modders-Inc are giving you that chance. We are not talking about an average PC we are talking about a full blown hardcore gaming monster! All you have to do is go to the contest page, read about the system, read the rules, and enter the contest. What are you waiting for? GO DO IT NOW!
Sir! Yes sir! Check out the contest at Modders-Inc.
Antec Take 3 Quiet 3U Rackmount Chassis Review
The Antec Take 3 itself is a super solid rackmount server case and should provide any user with many years of trouble free service. It’s built like a tank and once the hardware is installed, it’s not going anywhere. It’ll also remain very quiet thanks to the extra noise and vibration dampening Antec has designed into the Take 3.
Check out the full review at Virtual-Hideout.
Intel Core Duo T2400 + Linux
Intel’s Core Duo T2400 has a maximum operating frequency of
1.83GHz, 65nm process, 2MB of L2 cache, and 667MHz FSB; however, how
does this dual-core component fare under Linux? We have taken a look at
the Intel Core Duo T2400 in conjunction with the Lenovo ThinkPad T60,
and have comparison results today against the previous Pentium M 750
1.83GHz.
This looks like a sweet laptop. The 2GB of ram is definitely drool worthy. It doesn’t blow benchmarks away in terms of 3D, but it does substantially better than the M 750 also tested.
SilverStone SG01 Evolution SFF Case Review
The SilverStone SG01 Evolution Small Form Factor Case is one very impressive product. As a matter of fact, it’s one of the best SFF cases on the market today. It’s all aluminum so it’s lightweight, with excellent build quality and design. One limiting factor many SFF cases have is poor air circulation. This is not the situation here due to the number of fans and way they are implemented. The case comes with two 5.25″ external drive bays and two 3.5″ internal drive bays. They include two 80mm fans but two optional fans can be installed. They also have an optional carry bag so you can easily transport the case. No question about it, this product has LAN Party written all over it! Watch the Video to find out more…
Check out the full review at 3D Gameman.
Kingston HyperX 2GB PC2-6400 C4 Memory Kit Review
Kingston offers PC2-6400 CAS Latency 4 memory in their standard series and in an NVIDIA “SLI Ready” line that features Enhanced Performance Profiles (EPP). Total kit capacity is 2GB (2048MB) which is ideal for high performance platforms. Each module pair has been tested to run at DDR2 800MHz at low latency timing of 4-4-4-12 at 2.0V. The SPD is programmed to JEDEC standard latency 800Mhz timing of 5-5-5-15-2T at 1.9V so you are sure that the system will post every time…
Check out the full review at Legit Reviews.
Corsair Twin2X2048-8500C5 2GB PC2-8500 Memory Kit Review
With 2.2V and the default CAS latency timings of 5-5-5-15, the Corsair Twin2X2048-8500C5 memory was able to clock all the way up to 276 MHz without incident. Anything higher and the motherboard refused to boot into WindowsXP. It’s not the fault of the memory, the Foxconn nForce 590 SLI motherboard simply doesn’t go any higher. We’re doing things a bit backwards here but since the Corsair Twin2X2048-8500C5 is sold as high speed, high latency memory we decided to mainly focus on how the memory performed at its intended settings. Thus the memory timings were set at 4-4-4-12…
Check out the full review at PC Stats.
Prey.. Xbox 360 or PC?
We’ve been pouring hours into the final version of Prey for both the Xbox 360 and PC. We’ve been getting a lot of questions on which version we prefer. We take both versions through their paces and give you a crapton of direct feed widescreen videos and break down some of the main differences between the two.
After reading the article, I am definitely sold on the PC version. Wall walking is confusing enough on the PC, but paired with a gamepad it could be a nightmare.
Announcing GDC London
WHEN: 2-4 October, 2006
WHERE: 195 Piccadilly (BAFTA Headquarters)
GDC London will focus exclusively on advanced techniques in game development, with a special focus on the UK. The event will build on the 2006 GDC theme of “What’s Next” by narrowly focusing on key next generation console development issues.
Alex Aguila Alienware Interview
FiringSquad: First it’s been a few months since Dell acquired Alienware. Overall how has the transition been like from your point of view?
Alex Aguila: The transition has been moving swiftly. I think it’s important to state that both companies could not start aggressively sharing and executing on best practices until the acquisition was officially approved by the government, which happened on May 8th. But since then, both companies have been “off to the races” and are prioritizing the most important initial activities that our customers will benefit from.
Another quality interview from the guys at FiringSquad. Dell owning Alienware still seems a bit odd, but the future appears bright.
Rayman Raving Rabbids coming to PC
Sofia, Bulgaria – June 29, 2006 –Today Ubisoft, one of the world’s largest video game publishers, announced the opening of a new studio in Sofia, Bulgaria. Alexandru-Ion Radu, recently named director of recruitment and training at Ubisoft’s Romania studio, has been appointed manager of the new studio, reporting directly to Sébastien Delen, managing director of Ubisoft Romania.
Even though this game is looking sketchy to me, it will be great to be able to play in on the PC in high resolution. You can read todays press release on the official site.
Why Linux has failed the beginner
A common theme that I have heard when people explain to me why they have no real desire to try Linux is the perceived learning curve. When pressed, the person being asked will eventually divulge that they were told that it was simply too difficult to learn. Finally when pushed into giving their “source” of this information, the truth ultimately comes out – they heard about it from another disheartened user speaking about their feelings with regard to one particular distribution.
I agree with everything that is said here. Even though distros such as SuSE offer an easier entry, Linux in general needs to pull its act together if it’s ever going to be actual competition to Windows. I think this has been well known for a while, though.
R580+ becomes Radeon X1950XTX
This is rather evolution than a revolution, just slightly faster and that’s it. The faster one, Radeon X1950XTX is set to replace the current-fastest ATI Radeon X1900 XTX while the new Radeon X1950XT aims to replace X1900XT cards. We still don’t know about the clock speeds but we know that the new cards comes with GDDR 4 memory. They are set to be released at some point in September/October timeframe.
With such a small leap, it doesn’t seem worth it to get excited. Although, it will be interesting to see how it lines up price wise compared to the obviously faster 7950GX2.
Turning Wine into Windows on a Mac
CodeWeavers is in early testing with CrossOver Office for Mac now and plans to release a final version of the software in July or August. CEO Jeremy White said he would have liked to have seen his product out before the rivals. “It’s unfortunate we couldn’t get it out before,” White said in an interview. “We would have loved to have been the only solution out for a while.”
I have heard personal reports about the beta software, and it seems pretty reliable. Although, it has only been tested with office type software, such as Outlook and Word. Half-Life 2 is on the list for support though, so this may be a program worth waiting for.
Spain lays the smackdown on piracy
..it gets worse; instead of going after those breaking the law, they’re placing criminal liability on the ISPs, if they’re seen as facilitating file trading (which probably means not automatically blocking any network that could be used as such). Of course, this won’t work because it places the burden on a party that’s unable to stop the activity.
Digging deeper into this case, it seems that blank CD’s will have a special tax applied. Not only that, but also flash media and other blank media sources. If that wasn’t bad enough, holding the ISP liable for their users actions is. I think it’s quite obvious that this is not something easy to stop, so this is only going to make things harder on the Spanish ISP’s it seems.
Office 2007 go away, come again another day
Ars Technica reports that Microsoft Office 2007 has been delayed again, this time into early 2007. ‘Based on internal testing and the beta 2 feedback around product performance, we are revising our development schedule to deliver the 2007 system release by the end of year 2006, with broad general availability in early 2007.’ Tough bit of timing after this week’s online preview of Office 2007.
This is somewhat of a shock considering how stable the beta version is, arguably. Instead of pushing back dates, Microsoft should take a step in 3D Realms shoes and just label everything, “When it’s done”.
Microsoft Sued Over WGA
“The Seattle PI is reporting on a lawsuit being brought against Microsoft in response to their WGA spyware. Groklaw is also covering the story. Although there are a lot of similarities to Sony’s rootkit, the actual harm done is less concrete. It’ll be interesting to see how this turns out.”
Somehow I doubt a petty lawsuit is going to stop WGA, but it would be nice. Not that I disagree with Microsoft trying to protect their software, but they need to find a better way. Preferably one that doesn’t waste the time of completely legal users.
Microsoft Ultimate Windows Vista Keyboard Announced
The new Bluetooth-based wireless keyboard is aimed at making your Windows Vista experience even more pleasurable with such features as a backlit keyboard with ambient light sensor and proximity sensing to power down the lighting when you leave the room. Even more impressive is the included pad that charges your mouse when not in use. It’s probably using some kind of induction charging system similar to what’s used in A4Tech’s BatteryFree Mouse.
I am not usually one to put down a product before even touching it, but what are they thinking? No numpad, wired keyboard, bluetooth mouse and an odd shape. Doesn’t sound like an ultimate keyboard to me. Maybe they should call this a Tolerable Media Keyboard instead.
OCZ Technology Launches the PC2-8000 Titanium Alpha VX2 Series
Sunnyvale, CA—June 27, 2006—OCZ Technology Group, a worldwide leader in innovative, ultra-high performance and high reliability memory, today announced the PC2-8000 Titanium Alpha VX2 Edition, a special extremist series of modules specifically geared towards the high-end overclocking community. Carrying on the OCZ Voltage eXtreme (VX) legacy, the PC2-8000 Ti Alpha is the first high-voltage DDR2 product that offers enthusiasts the performance edge they crave. With the arrival of AM2 CPU technology and the impending release of Intel Conroe, the high-speed Ti Alpha VX2 is an unparalleled memory solution for the latest DDR2 platforms.
Whew, these modules would be fun to play with. Check out the full press release right here.
Hardware Roundup for June 30
- Cooler Master Ammo-533 Case – Modders-Inc
Cases & Enclosures
- Thermalright HR-01-K8 w/ Blue Fan Duct – Think Computers
Cooling
- Crucial Ballistix PC2-5300 DDR2-667 2GB – PC Stats
Memory & Storage
- M2N32-SLI Deluxe – Hard|OCP
- MSI K9N Platinum – Legion Hardware
Motherboards & CPU’s
- Apevia As550w-bk Power Supply – Red & Blackness
- Cooler Master iGreen 500 – Overclockers Online
- Everglide Gaming Products Roundup – Virtual-Hideout
- Pyramat S2000 Sound Rocker – GameApex
- Razer Armadillo – XYZ Computing
- Soundmatters FULLstageHD Audio System – A True Review
- Speed-Link Medusa 5.1 Pro Gamer Edition – techPowerUp!
- Ultra Products X2 550W Power Supply – XYZ Computing
- XG Lazer Laser 2500 DPI Mouse – Bjorn3D
Peripherals & Power Supplies
- Connect3D Radeon X1900 GT- Hardware Secrets
- Inno3D GeForce 7600 GST – Overclocker Cafe
- Gainward Bliss 7900 GT 512 MB Card – Technic3D
Video Cards & Monitor
- Cellular Services Comparison – Digital Trends
- Dell XPS M1710 Notebook – HotHardware
- rock Pegasus 650 Dungeons And Dragons Online Laptop – Hexus
- Sidekick 3, Harmony 720, and The Face Sucking Scarf! – Digital Trends (Podcast)
Etcetera, Complete Systems & Contests
Can the Xbox 360 controller get any simpler?
While Microsoft’s XBOX 360 has no trouble reaching an older target market, the company is looking to expand its reach to a younger demographic. Those looking to just hop in and game may be a bit intimidated by the controller’s overabundance of functions. Said Microsoft XBOX head Peter Moore of the XBOX 360’s controller, “Shoulder buttons, triggers, analog sticks, d-pads – I mean, there’s a lot going on there.”
It sounds like this will be suited for kids or people with very small hands. At least that’s what I gather considering Moore brought his daughter into the equation. I wish my daddy could design a special controller just for me!
Heroes of Might and Magic – Assassin Video
The second of three videos showing different playing styles in Dark Messiah is a video on stealth, the Assasin video. Hide in the shadows, sneak up on your opponents and dispatch them quickly!
This game is looking fantastic.. a true RPG’ers RPG. You can ‘sneak’ up and grab the latest video from the official site, or if you have Steam, you can grab them from there also.
Day of Defeat Source Updates!
The Free Map Pack introduces a new gameplay style, Detonation, in two brand new missions (Jagd, Colmar). In addition to the new missions and gameplay style, the Summer 2006 Update also introduces new technical features and gameplay enhancements to Day of Defeat: Source. Some of the new gameplay enhancements – such as spawn clip adjustments, improved hit location detection, and weapon balancing – were made after reviewing the player statistics gathered since the stats (www.dayofdefeat.com/stats) feature was added to DoD: Source earlier this year.
Finally, the time has come. All of you who couldn’t sleep due to the anticipation of the game can now relax and go kick some butt. If you are unsure of what’s new, you can read our impressions here. If you just want to see a list of updated features, jump on over to the official site.
Glory of the Roman Empire Review
As I began rambling about on in the introduction, this is essentially the city building RTS equivalent of Rome: Total War. Everything is done well enough, and historically accurate enough to my limited knowledge that the game was vastly enjoyable to me. Though those first three lines don’t seem like much, this is definitely a title I’d recommend to seasoned RTS players. Overall a fun game with a few downfalls.
If you enjoy Roman Empire based RTS games, this one could be for you. I must say, it has some gorgeous visuals!
Mile High Pinball N-Gage Review
You wouldn’t expect a games developer to proclaim too loudly that their latest release is a load of balls, but for Bonus.com the boast is justified. Mile High pinball is a daunting 5,280 feet of non-stop ball flipping action peppered with power-ups, super slo-mo’s, multi-balls, multipliers, bosses and extra terrestrial baddies all played out behind an atmospheric if slightly twee soundtrack and on some of the most decorative tables you’ve ever set eyes upon.
Contrary to popular belief, the N-Gage is still alive and kicking! It’s uncertain how many future titles will be released, but this one sure has potential.