Tech News

MSN Messenger 7.0 Released

Posted on April 7, 2005 7:38 AM by Rob Williams

“The newest version of MSN Messenger instant messaging product, released late Wednesday, allows consumers to download free backgrounds, pictures and other content tied to specific ad campaigns. The hope is that users will then share those downloads with other consumers — providing another boost to advertisers, who pay Microsoft for the privilege.”

You can read up on the features of the new MSN Messenger here, and check out the news posting at Yahoo.

ABIT FATAL1TY AA8XE @ Digit Life

Posted on April 7, 2005 7:34 AM by Rob Williams

” It’s no secret that gamers, who try to keep up with the ever increasing requirements to system resources, make up a significant share of people buying hardware for desktop PCs. That’s why it’s not surprising that Abit decided to sign a contract with a famous figure in the world of virtual sport, namely Johnathan (Fatal1ty) Wendel. This alliance has yielded fruit — a series of computer hardware under the title Abit Fatal1ty, which should draw gamers’ attention to Abit products. In fact, there have appeared only motherboards with the nick of this famous gamer so far. The first such model is Abit Fatal1ty AA8XE.”

Check out the review at Digit-Life. They have hi-res images of the board as well.

HIS X850 XT IceQ II Dual DVI VIVO 256MB PCIe @ Bjorn3D

Posted on April 7, 2005 7:30 AM by Rob Williams

“There isn’t much difference between the X850XT PE and the X850XT. They both use the same GPU and the memory on them is the same. The biggest difference is the slight slower GPU and memory speeds as well as being less overclockable.”

Check out the review at Bjorn3D.

The Eidos take over saga

Posted on April 7, 2005 7:26 AM by Rob Williams

“For anyone who might read the more high-brow broadsheet newspapers, there’s been an interesting wrangle going on that concerns us gamers. Eidos, that UK publishing house that brought us Lara Croft’s undisputed assets to delight our joysticks as well as big games such as the Thief series, Championship Manager and the soon to be released Lego: Star Wars, have been in a take over battle for the last two weeks following their announcement earlier this year of an operating loss of £29.2 million up to the end of 2004.”

Check out the read at Hexus.

Google maps lead the way

Posted on April 7, 2005 7:10 AM by Rob Williams

“Online search-engine leader Google has unveiled a new feature enabling users to zoom in on homes and businesses using satellite images, an advance that may raise privacy concerns as well as intensify the competitive pressures on its rivals.”

What an insanely cool tool. Very scary when you can zoom in and see where you live, or have been. Check out the news at Denver Post.

Microsoft man braves Open Source conference

Posted on April 7, 2005 7:08 AM by Rob Williams

“MICROSOFT’S Jason Matusow, director of the company’s Shared Source initiative bravely went where no Vole has gone before yesterday — an Open Source Business Conference.

You have to admire such bravery. He must have known it was going to be tough, in the same way that the handful of soldiers at Rourke’s Drift knew that dealing with the rampaging Zulu nation was going to be a bit tricky. According to Infoworld, here, he does not seem to have done too badly and managed to be heard over the sound of knives being sharpened.”

Haha.. check it at The Inquirer.

Google Continues To Offer More for Less

Posted on April 7, 2005 7:06 AM by Rob Williams

“The Google Search Appliance, on the market for more than three years, now searches up to 500,000 documents for $30,000, with two years of support. Previously, it searched up to 150,000 documents for $32,000.”

For larger companies who use this, it’s a huge value gain. Read more information over at Information Week.

Microsoft boosts web oportunities for advertisers

Posted on April 7, 2005 7:04 AM by Rob Williams

“Every month more than 155 million users log in to the MSN Messenger service.

New “theme packs” in MSN Messenger 7.0, which include backgrounds, emotions, dynamic display pictures and Winks, will now provide marketers with more opportunities to position their brands on MSN.

Advertisers including Sprite and Adidas have signed up to deliver theme packs with the service.”

Viva la Trillian. It’s one thing to enjoy a pop.. but to have it skin your Messanger? Check out the posting at Computer Weekly.

ABIT Fatal1ty AN8 @ Hard|OCP

Posted on April 7, 2005 7:00 AM by Rob Williams

“The Fatal1ty AN8 has 1 PCI-Express x16 slot, 2 PCI-Express x1 slots, 3 PCI slots, and an audio riser card slot. The audio riser card slot is located to the left of the rear panel assembly. Just below the 2 PCI-Express x1 slots are the NBFAN1 header and the nForce4 Ultra chipset. Notice that the chipset itself is actively cooled with a good-sized copper HSF unit. The AUXFAN1 header is located just above the PCI-Express x1 slots.”

I wonder if we will see an SLi version of the board in the future. Check out the review at Hard|OCP.

The State of Linux NVIDIA Overclocking @ Phoronix

Posted on April 7, 2005 6:57 AM by Rob Williams

“Although there are endless varieties of NVIDIA overclocking utilities for use in Microsoft Windows, when using Linux, it’s a bit of a different story. In this article, we’ll share our NVIDIA Linux overclocking successes and failures as we load LinuxHardware’s NVClock on a Prolink 5900XT, Gigabyte 6600GT, Leadtek 6600GT, and even a Riva TNT2.”

Check it out at Phoronix. I’m waiting to just get my 9800 Pro to work in Linux :(

Sunbeam Chameleon @ ThinkComputers.org

Posted on April 7, 2005 6:54 AM by Rob Williams

“With so many colors available to each, it can sometimes be hard to decide what color to order for a particular project. Sunbeam has harnessed the cost effectiveness and small size of LEDs to bring a product to you that is both bright and flexible. No matter the case or idea, the concept behind the Chameleon allows you to “dial in” the right amount of each color to fill your case. Change it to fit your case, change it to fit your mood, turn it off all together. Whatever your wish, Sunbeam designed the Chameleon to fulfill your wishes.”

Check out the full review at Think Computers.

Titan Siberia air cooler heatsink @ A1 Electronics

Posted on April 7, 2005 6:51 AM by Rob Williams

“With a choice of versions for all AMD Athlon & Intel Pentium 4 processors Titan have certainly covered all the bases with this Siberia heatsinks range. Our only gripe as such is the Siberia colour. Unlike the Vanessa S-Type review we reviewed earlier which is a snappy bright metallic blue colour this Titan Siberia is a rather matt blue colour. Maybe it is just our eyes.”

Check out the review over at A1 Electronics.

Bigha Jasper Always @ A True Review

Posted on April 7, 2005 6:43 AM by Rob Williams

“Laser pointers, there is just something about them that peaks our interest.
Officially, they are used in presentations, business or otherwise, for
drawing attention to certain things. There is only so much you can do with
an inferior red laser pointer that is found in any electronic or corner
drug store. Sure, when you first get it, it’s exciting. You use it for a
few days, but once the nostalgia of holding a laser wears off, it ends up
in a drawer somewhere never to be seen again.

A much better alternative to the average boring red laser pointer exists;
introducing the Bigha Jasper green laser. Just how and why is the Jasper
better than the average laser pointer? What can you do with it? Read on and
find out.”

Check out the review at A True Review.

Mikhailtech April 2005 Contest

Posted on April 7, 2005 6:37 AM by Rob Williams

Today, MikhailTech announces a new contest. This time, you have a chance to win a prize pac from XTrac.

Check it out at MikhailTech.

Java is causing problems to FireFox

Posted on April 6, 2005 10:04 AM by Rob Williams

“The Secunia security company has announced the discovery of a vulnerability in the Mozilla suite and in Mozilla Firefox. If a hacker exploits this vulnerability, he is able to obtain private information stored in the computer or typed in the browser. This time we are not dealing with a phishing attack, which are
so common these days, but with the hacking of memory systems, the result being the unauthorized access to stored information.”

I am sure we will see a patch for this in the days to come. You can test your Java vulnerabilities at Secunia, and read the posting at SoftPedia.

Ericsson hacker jailed for three years

Posted on April 6, 2005 10:03 AM by Rob Williams

“Csaba Richter, a 26-year-old IT consultant, pleaded guilty to accessing sensitive documents on Ericsson’s intranet. If the case had gone to trial he stood to go to jail for up to six years on charges of “industrial espionage and illegal use of secret information”.”

Ouch.. three years. Better than six years, I suppose. Check it out at The Register.

Sun’s Schwartz Attacks GPL

Posted on April 6, 2005 10:00 AM by Rob Williams

“Sun Micro President Jonathan Schwartz attacked the GPL at the Open Source Business Conference in San Francisco yesterday.Other than the same old arguments (you can’t make it proprietary later) he adds that it imposes on developing nations “a rather predatory obligation to disgorge all their IP back to the wealthiest nation in the world” — but fails to mention that the converse is also true: the wealthiest nation in the world is similarly, under the GPL, forced to “disgorge all its IP back to the developing nations” as well. Duh!”

*shrug* Check it out at Slashdot.

Microsoft ends SP2 download block feature

Posted on April 6, 2005 9:56 AM by Rob Williams

“Microsoft will next week discontinue a feature that allows organisations to block the downloading of its Service Pack 2 (SP2) security update for Windows XP.”

Now they assume that SP2 is good enough to be used on computers in larger companies. Oh what fun this could bring. Check it out at VNUNet.

Scythe Shogun Heatlane CPU Cooler Overview @ Rojak Pot

Posted on April 6, 2005 9:55 AM by Rob Williams

“Designed for quiet PCs, the new Scythe Shogun features the unique Heatlane technology and a speed-adjustable 12cm fan. This design gives you leading-edge cooling performance, without the noise. This is an ideal solution for those who wish to enjoy the silence of a water cooling system but cannot afford one!”

Check out the review at Rojak Pot.

Aigo P880 20GB MP3 photo player @ The Register

Posted on April 6, 2005 9:53 AM by Rob Williams

“Aigo’s P880 is pitched at the iPod Photo, matching the latter’s picture and music playback facilities, and throwing in a heap of other features for good measure. The P880 is certainly an improvement on Aigo’s other hard drive-based player, the more standard-iPod oriented P750. It’s better looking, sports a funkier user interface and, like the Photo, boasts a colour display – in spite of which, it still manages to offer a better battery life than its stablemate.”

Check out the full review at The Register.

AC Ryan XTOR Tanky Hard Disk Cooler Overview @ Rojak Pot

Posted on April 6, 2005 9:52 AM by Rob Williams

“If you are looking for a quiet PC, it doesn’t help if your hard disk cooler is noisy. AC Ryan takes a different approach with their new XTOR Tanky hard disk cooler by making it from a massive block of aluminium! This allows the XTOR Tanky to passively cool your hard disk!”

Check out the read at Rojak Pot.

Linux versus XP on the desktop: Reg readers speak

Posted on April 6, 2005 9:49 AM by Rob Williams

“A survey of Register readers, carried out by analysts Quocirca, reveals you love Linux on the desktop, but you love Windows XP too.

Almost half the companies surveyed had deployed Linux on the desktop to some extent, with 43 per cent having at least some fully deployed Linux desktops. Another 24 per cent are experimenting with Linux, leaving 33 per cent using only Microsoft operating systems.”

There’s no doubt that Linux popularity is growing.. and that’s awesome. Check out the very interesting report over at The Register.

Bigger phishes ready to spawn

Posted on April 6, 2005 9:46 AM by Rob Williams

“There’s good news about phishing: The growth of new attacks has slowed. But that’s only because attackers are building more sophisticated traps and using advanced technology to perpetrate online fraud, researchers say.”

Not good at all. It’s good that some are legally taking action against this.. but people keep finding new ways to exploit phising.. even now in IM. Check out the read at Read More Comment (0)

Intel commissions Futuremark development @ Hexus

Posted on April 6, 2005 9:45 AM by Rob Williams

“HEXUS has learned that we are close to seeing the first ‘multi-threaded’ benchmark available for consumers. This will enable consumers to see performance of a threaded gaming environment. This benchmark, commissioned by Intel, will be called Mechanoids. It is based on a series of droids moving around the screen which stresses the system in different ways. “

Check out the posting at Hexus.

NGO Creative Modded Driver for SB Live! and Audigy has been released

Posted on April 6, 2005 9:44 AM by Rob Williams

NGOHQ have released some tweaked sound drivers.

MusicDVD Edition:
* Based on the Creative Audigy 2/ZS Beta Driver v5.12.2.1042
* Optimized for Music and DVD Playback.
* EAX may not function correctly for SB Live! Cards.
* Recommended for Creative Audigy I cards.

Gamer Edition:
* Based on the Creative Audigy Driver v5.12.1.383
* Optimized for Gaming and EAX.
* Recommended for Creative SB Live! cards.”

Check them out at NGOHQ.

< Older Posts

Newer Posts >