Tech News

GoDaddy.com Dumps Linux for Microsoft

Posted on March 23, 2006 10:32 AM by Rob Williams

Bargain-basement registrar GoDaddy.com has decided to move all its parked domains to Microsoft servers, saying that they’ll provide ‘a technology platform that is security-enhanced, highly scalable and easy to manage.’ This is a shift away from Linux, a decision met with derision by other registrars such as Gandi.net, which greeted the news with the headline ‘Go Daddy and never come back’. Late last year, GoDaddy.com had some ‘issues’, shall we say, with non-Microsoft browsers.

Read all about it at Slashdot.

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ATI and NVIDIA Benchmark Number Problem?

Posted on March 23, 2006 10:24 AM by Rob Williams

ATI contacted Legit Reviews and expressed their concern the benchmark numbers specifically. ATI sent us a chart where they ran the NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GS against the ATI X1600 XT and came up with very different results than what NVIDIA showed us from their testing results….

Check out the full article at Legit Reviews.

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Dell Acquires Alienware

Posted on March 23, 2006 10:20 AM by Rob Williams

Round Rock, Texas, March 22, 2006 — Dell announced today it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Alienware to further satisfy the growing number of consumers and businesses seeking the highest-performance PC products, including those used for gaming and multimedia digital content management. Terms of the planned purchase will not be disclosed.

It’s only a wonder how this will actually help Alienware because they seemed to be doing fine enough without a big brother looking over their shoulder. You can read the full press release here.

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Hardware Roundup for March 23

Posted on March 23, 2006 10:19 AM by Rob Williams

This years Game Developers Conference is fully underway and Greg is getting a lot of work done down there. Be sure to check out his day 1 and 2 reports, and expect far more info in the coming days. The GDC is not the only thing going on though… reviews are also abundant! Hexus, Tech Report and Hot Hardware all take a look at the new high end Intel, the Pentium EE 965 which is clocked at 3.73GHz. As you’d expect, it keeps close to the FX-60, surpassing it in a handful of tests. Tech Report also has a look at the new MSI K8N Diamond Plus motherboard, which is jam packed with many extras. It’s a great looking board, but the northbridge cooler seems huge.

    Peripherals & Power Supplies
  • ICY BOX IB-861 Multi-port Panel – UK Gamer
  • Spire RockeTeer V SP-500W – Phoronix
  • Vantec AVX-100TX AVOX Jukebox – ModTheBox
    Video Cards & Monitor
  • Albatron GeForce 7300GS128 PCI Express – PC Stats
  • Desktop Graphics Card Comparison Guide Rev. 10.4 – Rojak Pot
  • Samsung SyncMaster 214T Silver 21.3″ LCD Monitor – Bona Fide Reviews

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Auto Assault Gold, Launching on April 13

Posted on March 23, 2006 9:47 AM by Rob Williams

NCsoft’s Auto Assault Revs Up, Goes Gold
World’s first massively multiplayer post apocalyptic car combat game blasts its way onto shelves April 13, with four-day head start for
pre-order customers

AUSTIN, Texas, March 22, 2005—NCsoft® North America announced that Auto Assault® has reached gold master status and will appear on retailers’ shelves in both North America and Europe April 13. Also, customers who purchase and register their Auto Assault pre-order boxes will receive the benefits of a special in-game weapon and loot bonus, plus a four-day head start for game play.

Auto Assault, the sixth major online game published by NCsoft, was developed by Colorado-based developer, NetDevil®, LTD. The first massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) in a post apocalyptic setting, Auto Assault combines fast action with the depth of role-playing games and features fully destructible environments. The game is also expected to launch service simultaneously in North America and Europe on April 13. Pre-order customers may participate in the four-day head start beginning at 9 a.m. EST on April 9. Players who wish to participate in the head-start may purchase the Auto Assault pre-order box, currently available at retailers across North America, and register the product at www.PlayNC.com.

“Auto Assault is a dream come true for gamers who enjoy the depth of traditional online role-playing games but crave the fast, frenetic pace of action games,” said Robert Garriott, CEO of NCsoft North America. “This title has everything you’d expect from a MMORPG – all at 100 miles per hour.”

“We are very excited about the upcoming launch of Auto Assault, but this is just the beginning,” said Scott Brown, president of NetDevil and project lead. “One of the reasons we partnered with NCsoft is that they provide the best value to their customers, with free content expansions in addition to other ways to grow their game worlds. Auto Assault customers will be able to enjoy new content for years to come.”

In Auto Assault, players can choose to be a Human, Mutant or Biomek character and set out in a post apocalyptic land in personalized combat vehicles, fighting for the few resources left on a shattered Earth. Combat is extremely fast-paced and challenges abound as players blast through buildings, set fire to forests, and level entire settlements. Player avatars may own many different vehicles, specialize in several crafting disciplines to create truly unique items, and participate in player-versus-player battles both in arena combat and in contested outpost areas.

Auto Assault’s standard edition box will be available at an expected retail price of US$49.99. The Limited Edition, which includes a headset to utilize the game’s voice chat system, will be available for an expected retail price of US$59.99. Both the standard and Limited editions of the game include the first month of online game play. After the first month, players will be charged a monthly subscription fee of US$14.99. Sixty-day game time cards will also be available at many North American retailers for an expected retail price of US$29.99. The game is rated Teen by the Entertainment Software Rating Board.

For more information about Auto Assault, go to: www.autoassault.com.

About NCsoft

NCsoft – North America is headquartered in Austin, Texas and is part of Korea-based NCsoft Corporation. NCsoft, with its own development and publishing offices in Texas and California, also works with subsidiaries and third party developers throughout North America to develop and publish innovative online entertainment software products. In 2004, the company launched two massively multiplayer titles on the same day: Lineage® II and City of Heroes®, and in 2005 the hit games Guild Wars® and City of Villains™ were released. In 2006, NCsoft will be launching other massively multiplayer titles including Auto Assault and Guild Wars Factions™. More information about NCsoft can be found at http://www.PlayNC.com.

About NetDevil, LTD

NetDevil was founded in 1997 under the inspiration of Jumpgate™, the world’s first massively multiplayer space simulator universe. NetDevil is an independent game development company dedicated to the construction of massively multiplayer universes. NetDevil is committed to creating immersive, interactive virtual worlds in unique settings outside the typical fantasy genre. For more information, please visit http://www.netdevil.com.

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PC Power & Cooling Launches The Power Supply Industry First Certification Program

Posted on March 22, 2006 12:50 PM by Rob Williams

Carlsbad, California, USA, March 20th, 2006 — In order to demonstrate the authenticity of its power supplies, create
a standard for quality that consumers can trust, and combat undocumented
and misleading performance claims from other companies,
PC Power & Cooling has established the computer industry’s first and only
certification program for production power supplies.

Read the full release here.

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Hardware Roundup for March 22

Posted on March 22, 2006 11:04 AM by Rob Williams

If you are looking for a good card reader, because they do come quite in handy, then check out Xtreme Computing for their review of Crucials unit. Virtual-Hideout takes a look at a product that many Laptop users would want to consider… or maybe not since this one is subpar.. and problematic. Oh well, they can’t ALL be good. There are many video cards being reviewed today including the eVGA 7800GS, 7600GS, X1600XT and X1900XT. If you want to see a preview of the new Firefox Alpha and don’t want to download it yourself, check out Phoronix for their pictorial.

    Cases & Enclosures
  • Zalman TNN 300 Compact Fanless Case – 3D Gameman
    Cooling
  • Thermalright V1 Ultra VGA Cooler – UK Gamer
    Memory & Storage
  • Crucial Hi-Speed USB 8-in-1 Aluminum Card Reader – Xtreme Computing
    Peripherals & Power Supplies
  • Everglide S-500 Headphones – ModTheBox
  • TypeMatrix EZ-Reach 2030 Keyboard – ThinkCE
  • X-Pad Laptop Desk – Virtual-Hideout

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Sudo vs. Root

Posted on March 21, 2006 12:02 PM by Rob Williams

In Mac OS X, the root account is disabled by default. The first user account created is added to the admin group and that user can use the sudo command to execute other commands as root. The conventional wisdom is that sudo is the most secure way to run root commands, but a closer look reveals a picture that is not so clear.

This article will only interest Linuxheads, but it’s a great read. It mentions Mac OS, but a few linux distros such as Ubuntu only allow Sudo as well. You can check out the full read at Linuxbox Admin.

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3D Realms Interview

Posted on March 21, 2006 11:50 AM by Rob Williams

FiringSquad: As you might know, 3D Realms’ Duke Nukem Forever got the Wired top Vaperware award again this year after having been “retired” from the list by Wired some years ago. After all of this time and all of the silence surrounding the game itself it is still a little frustrating about having a game take seemingly so long to develop?

Scott Miller: Well sure, no one wants to spend so long on making a game, and we’ve definitely screwed up along the way. But in the end, it’ll work out fine as long as we produce a hit. If we manage that, few will care that it took so long.

Check out the great interview over at FiringSquad.

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AGEIA PhysX SDK v2.4 Delivers Dynamic Cross-Platform Physics Game Action for PCs and Game Consoles

Posted on March 21, 2006 11:42 AM by Rob Williams

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. – March 21, 2006 – AGEIA™ Technologies, Inc., the pioneer in hardware-accelerated physics for games, today announced availability of the cross-platform AGEIA PhysX™ SDK v2.4, the latest version of its acclaimed physics API and runtime engine.

You can read the full release here.

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Super Talent Ships 1GHz 2GB DDR2 Kits

Posted on March 21, 2006 11:40 AM by Rob Williams

San Jose, California – March 20, 2006 — Super Talent Technology, a leading manufacturer of DDR and DDR2 memory modules, today announced immediate availability of a 1 Gigahertz, 2 Gigabyte DDR2 memory kit. Super Talent’s new T1000UX2G5 is a matched pair of 1GB PC2-8000 DDR2 modules.

You can read the full press release here.

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ABIT Rises From The Ashes

Posted on March 21, 2006 11:33 AM by Rob Williams

21 March 2006 – Today, ABIT Computer Corporation and Universal Scientific Industrial Co. Ltd. (USI) completed the transfer of the ABIT motherboard brand and related intangible assets to a new joint venture company established by both ABIT and USI. The new company, registered as Universal ABIT Co., Ltd., will tender a consideration consisting of NT$350 million in cash, 20 million units of special shares, and 5 million units of warrants to purchase the above mentioned intangible assets of ABIT, including patents, trademarks, et-cetera. With the new partnership, ABIT receives a strong financial backing from which to continue its core business, and also eliminates the financial straits which began late Q4 2004.

You can read the full press release here.

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Hardware Roundup For March 21

Posted on March 21, 2006 11:32 AM by Rob Williams

If you want to keep your CPU cool with a mammoth cooler, than the CNPS9500 might be worth checking out. The Tech Zone takes a look at it today and seems to love it. Sure, it’s huge but it looks amazing! For the GPU side, Tweaknews takes a look at theVF900, also from Zalman. This cooler proves superior over the stock cooler, taking off 14°C off the max temp. If you are a workstation guru, then you should take a look at the new reviews of ATI’s FireGL V7350 card. Kudos to you if you can take advantage of the full gigabyte of video memory!

    Cases & Enclosures
  • Antec Super LANBoy – Futurelooks
    Memory & Storage
  • G.Skill: 2GB DDR400 Dual Channel Kit – TweakPC
  • OCZ 1GB PC2-6400 EL XTC Platinum Edition – ByteSector
    Video Cards & Monitor
  • ATI FireGL V7350 Early Preview – Hexus
  • ATI FireGL V7350 – X-Bit Labs
  • Leadtek’s WinFast PX7300 GS TDH – Beyond3D
  • NVIDIA SLI Physics Technology Report – Rojak Pot
  • Sapphire X1600 Pro PCIe Video Card – Legit Reviews

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The Sims 2 Open For Business Review

Posted on March 21, 2006 10:58 AM by Rob Williams

For gamers who have always wanted to start their own businesses in the Sims2, this is a perfect solution. After all, what career path can be more clearly defined than heading to college then starting a business, and enjoying the nightlife the whole way through? Perhaps the best part to owning a business is that you don’t have to quit your day job to do it, meaning that your SIM can keep pounding back those thousands of Simoleons on the side, and still make extra money on top of it.

Head on over to Game Pyre for the full review!

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Havok FX Interview

Posted on March 20, 2006 10:10 AM by Rob Williams

Just in time for NVIDIAs physics announcement, Firing Squad has an interview with the Havok FX product manger, Jeff Yates.

Firing Squad: First, what will Havok be displaying at GDC this week?

Jeff Yates – Havok will be showing its upcoming 4.0 release, which will showcase more scalable physics on next-generation console platforms, and two new products: Havok Behavior (a character behavior composition tool and run-time SDK), and Havok FX (a GPU-accelerated “effects physics” SDK that blends seamlessly with Havok’s game-play physics product – we’ll be showing Havok FX at the NVIDIA booth at GDC)

Check out the full interview right here.

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Unreal Tournament 2007 Q&A

Posted on March 20, 2006 10:08 AM by Rob Williams

Epic has always done a great job in supporting the mod community. Will editing tools be available with UT2K7’s release?

Absolutely and we can’t wait to see what the community can come up with. We’ve often felt that a strong mod community can keep a game relevant many years after it’s been released. We hope to see the same efforts for UT2007 and will do our best to support them any way that we can.

This is a short but sweet interview. I can’t wait for this game, the screenshots are a massive tease! Check out the full read at Gameplay Monthly.

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ATI unwraps first 1GB graphics card

Posted on March 20, 2006 10:04 AM by Rob Williams

ATI today unwrapped its latest pair of workstation-oriented graphics chips – including what it claims is the first ever board to support one gigabyte of graphics memory, the company said today. Both FireGL parts are also the first products of their class from ATI to support Shader Model 3.0.

It’s amazing to look at the box and actually see it say 1GB. I can’t still remember when 16MB on the box was the ‘ultimate’ card. Needless to say, I’m sure designers need this type of freedom, especially with todays games. You can read all about it at Reg Hardware.

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New ForceWare for Oblivion

Posted on March 20, 2006 10:02 AM by Rob Williams

NVIDIA has has informed us they will be releasing a new driver on Wednesday March 22nd at NZone. This new version ForceWare 84.25 will contain specific performance enhances to Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion being released Monday the 20th.

This is going to be an amazing game, but just make sure you are equipped with the latest Forceware. It doesn’t appear to be on the NVIDIA site yet, but should be later today. You can check out the news posting about this over at Hard|OCP.

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Kinderstart Sues Google Over Lower Page Ranking

Posted on March 20, 2006 9:58 AM by Rob Williams

KinderStart.com has filed a civil complaint against the popular search engine Google, claiming Google downgraded its search ranking without proper reason. KinderStart claims that its web traffic dropped over 70 percent after Google removed the site from the index. Several other web sites have claimed that Google engages in anticompetitive behavior over the way it ranks web pages.

This is a tough situation to evaluate, really. Nobody pays Google or signs a contract to have their pages indexed.. they just are. So is it really a crime if Google takes a website out of their listing? Check out the full posting at Daily Tech.

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Let the games begin at GDC

Posted on March 20, 2006 9:55 AM by Rob Williams

GDC, as everyone calls it, doesn’t come close in size to E3, May’s industry marketing blowout in Los Angeles, which draws tens of thousands. But many feel this week’s conference is just as important, or more so, than E3– given its endless networking parties and steady stream of panels and keynote speeches involving video game giants like “The Sims” creator Will Wright and Nintendo President Satoru Iwata.

It’s no E3, but it’s likely influential a lot of game devs, and could be why some games out there are just so damn good. If you don’t know what the GDC really is, then check out the full posting over at Cnet.

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Interested in testing out Windows Vista?

Posted on March 20, 2006 9:50 AM by Rob Williams

Lead evaluations for new technologies and understand their impact on your IT environment and their potential for your company by pre-registering here. You will be the first to be notified when the Windows Vista, Office “12,” and Exchange “12” public beta releases become available. Additionally, you will receive updates and information regularly through the Microsoft TechNet Flash newsletter, from the time you pre-register until the launch of the product.

You can sign up here to be notified when public betas become available. Maybe with such a massive beta test, this Windows will be launched bug free? Ha!

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How CRT and LCD monitors work

Posted on March 20, 2006 9:44 AM by Rob Williams

In this article, we’re going to investigate how CRTs and LCDs work, and also examine some of the issues pertaining to monitors, such as Refresh Rate and Vsync as well as looking into our crystal ball to see the future of displays.

Bit-Tech doesn’t just explain how the two work, but actually fully dissect an LCD monitor. This is a great primer if you want to learn about how these displays work and is worth the read just to see what the inside of the LCD looks like. Check out the article here.

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NVIDIA SLI Physics Tech Preview

Posted on March 20, 2006 9:35 AM by Rob Williams

Gamers seem to want a basis in reality with their games. They don’t want characters falling through floors and they want objects to move like they would in the real world. In first person shooter games for example you want bullets from your gun to hit your enemy and inflict damage on different parts of their body, you want them to react to the force of those bullets realistically while you want other objects in the world to react as well. If you drive your car through a building there is going to be a lot of debris, a lot of particles, and a lot of new objects broken off from the materials of the buildings. Gamers want this same level of realism in their games.

This is a good look at what the Havok FX has to offer, in addition to how NVIDIA likes to do things. If NVIDIA is right about how many physics calculations GPU’s can handle, then the AGEIA card may be in trouble. Check out the full read at Hard|OCP.

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BLUETAKE Contest

Posted on March 20, 2006 9:34 AM by Rob Williams

BLUETAKE, the principal company designs and manufactures the end products with Bluetooth® wireless technology, in the reason of service and realizes what customers’ needs, Bluetake start up a new customer service as the system of Product Registration.

If you have purchased any BLUETAKE products recently, head on over to their website and register to enter.

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Hardware Roundup for March 20

Posted on March 20, 2006 9:33 AM by Rob Williams

Happy Monday! There’s a lot going on today, so prepare for a lot of reading. If you like Cooler Masters cases and don’t want to pay too much, you should check out PC Perspectives review of the Praetorian 730. It’s around $100, but well worth it due to the great build quality and styling. Even though the cast lacks a window, it includes three blue led’s that will shine through various openings, including the mesh grill in the front.

Craving a 1GB memory kit? Hardware Logic takes the GeIL Ultra PC4000 for a spin, and found that it’s a good overclocker. The performance isn’t mind-blowing, but it may still be worth a look. If you though Plextor only made rom drives, your wrong! Hot Hardware is taking a look at the Plextor PX-EH25L which is a Network Protected Storage system. It’s not bulky as you would imagine, but rather looks like an over glorified HDD enclosure. Sadly, it’s hard to set up and lacks Gigabit ethernet… odd.

It’s hard to believe that the time is actually upon us… where people can safely have 1TB of HDD space in their PC. That’s what Bjorn3D has in their computer, which consists of two Seagate 500GB Barracuda drives. They take a look at the performance as a single drive and in RAID 0. The day Rojak Pot stops regularly updating their guides will be a bad day. They have updated their Desktop Graphics Card Comparison Guide this morning, so check it out!

    Memory & Storage
  • Corsair TwinX 2048-4000PT – Driver Heaven
  • GeIL Ultra Platinum PC4000 1GB DDR1 Memory Kit – Hardware Logic
  • Seagate 160GB Momentus 5400.3 Hard Drive – Rojak Pot
  • Seagate 500GB Barracuda 7200.9 SATA II HDD – Bjorn3D
    Peripherals & Power Supplies
  • Cooler Master Real Power 550W Power Supply – Big Bruin
  • Logitech MX510 Gamers Mouse – XS Reviews
  • Plextor PX-EH25L-NA NAS Device – HotHardware
  • Saitek P990 Dual Analog Gamepad – Future Looks
  • Slim Devices Squeezebox Network Media Player – ThinkCE
    Video Cards & Monitor
  • Desktop Graphics Card Comparison Guide Rev. 10.3 – Rojak Pot
  • Gainward 7900 GT – Technic 3D
  • Gigabyte Geforce 7800GT 256MB VIVO – XS Reviews
  • MSI NX 7800GT – 3D Chip

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