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 .:Latest Topics |
.:Latest News
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: [H]ard|OCP | Subject: Motherboard
The EVGA X58 3X SLI motherboard takes a while to say but it does tell you exactly what to expect; an X58 chipset capable of handling 3 video cards in SLI/CrossfireX. They do not use the nFORCE 200 MCP, which didn't seem to have had any appreciable effect on the performance during [H]ard|OCP's testing. Perhaps more interesting were two new features, the EVGA E-LEET Tuning Utility and the Watchdog BIOS utility to help those new to overclocking. Check out the final verdit in the full review.
"EVGA brings us its first Intel processor motherboard using the X58 chipset. We've seen quite a few exceptional X58 motherboards so far. Is EVGA's design going to have what it takes to compete with the rest in terms of performance, stability, and overclocking?" Here are some more Motherboard articles from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: BFG Technologies | Subject: System
Lake Forest, IL - January 5, 2009 - BFG Technologies, known as a leading supplier of premium power supplies and 3D graphics cards, is excited to announce its first line of complete gaming and multimedia PCs, called Phobos. These sleek hand-built, high performance machines were designed with the "Graduated Gamer" in mind. This audience is looking for all the performance associated with a high-end gaming system, but none of the hassle related to building and servicing such a system. As a result, Phobos is sold with complementary Concierge Service which includes expert in-home installation and a six month follow up maintenance visit. "Phobos was designed for gamers and media enthusiasts who demand top of the line performance, but may not have the time, desire, or expertise to build or maintain a high end system," said John Malley, senior director of marketing for BFG Technologies. "Our Concierge Service ensures our systems meet those high expectations-delivering Unbelievable Performance without monopolizing our customers' time." Phobos is designed with the highest-end components available, featuring the Intel Core i7 965 Extreme Edition 3.2GHz Processor, two upcoming BFG NVIDIA GeForce GTX 295 Graphics Cards, and CoolIt Contained Liquid Cooling Solutions to keep both the GPUs & CPU cool during the fiercest of gaming battles. BFG Tech also outfitted Phobos to serve as a home theater command center by choosing Windows Vista Ultimate with Media Center, including four hard drive bays, offering RF remote and TV tuner with DVR functionality, a front slot-loading Blu-ray Disc drive, the option for 5.1 or 7.1 surround sound audio cards, and an integrated iPod/iPhone syncing dock. PHOBOS ELITE STANDARD CONFIGURATION
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Guru of 3D | Subject: Graphics Card
The HIS Radeon 4870 ICEQ4+ TURBO is a full 1GB model sporting a fancy third party cooler that drops the temperatures as well as the noise at full. As the running temperatures and fan noise were the two biggest faults of the original 4870, this really is a great step forward. Add into that equation the coming price drop as well as the ~10% overclock that the Guru of 3D pulled off and you have a very attractive product.
"If there was one graphics card spectacular in 2008, it was the Radeon HD 4870 series. Yet this year a good number of games were released that actually make good use of a frame buffer larger than 512 MB. Specifically at higher resolutions with a decent amount of Anti-aliasing and in DX10 games. Suffice to say we'll look at a 1 GB graphics card today. It's based on the Radeon HD 4870 and comes from HIS technology. The all new ICEQ4+ cooling based model. A spectacular looking graphics card." Here are some more Graphics Card articles from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: Phoronix | Subject: Mobile
Samsung has placed a Intel Atom N270, 1GB of DDR2-800 and a 160GB 5400RPM HDD into a shell with a 10.2" WSVGA 1024 x 600 display and called it the NC10 Netbook. Even with it's diminutive size, Samsung has managed to fit an almost full sized keyboard, as well as a 6 cell battery that will keep you going for a long while. Phoronix being who they are, quickly installed Linux to see how compatible the netbook was. See the results here.
"It seems that each and every week there are new netbooks that are introduced, but there are not many differences between most models. Some netbooks will have a slightly longer battery life, a different exterior, or a solid-state drive, but there are more similarities than differences. However, one of the latest companies to join the netbook bandwagon here in the United States has been Samsung with the introduction of the NC10. Is there anything special about this 10.2-inch Atom-powered netbook? We will tell you in this Linux review of the Samsung NC10." Here are some more Mobile articles from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: bit-tech | Subject: Case and Cooling
If there is one place on this planet that absolutely screams wealth, it is Dubai and it's architecture. Why not show off your own style with the Lian Li PC-888 which looks almost exactly like one of the most famous hotels in Dubai. It will even hold a full sized system and cool it as well. You can see the pictures of this case at bit-tech.
"For those who're always moaning that every modern case designs are always just another turn on the familiar black/silver box, Lian Li is here to shake things up with its newly announced PC-888 case, set to debut at CES this week. Inspired by the design of the Burj Al Arab hotel in Dubai, it looks set to continue Lian Li’s tradition of occasionally producing off the wall cases unlike anything else on the market. We think you’ll agree that there’s nothing else on the market that looks anything like it. Some of you may remember Lian Li's "Snail" case, the PC-777, and the PC-888 is in very much the same vein, chucking traditional case aesthetics in the bin with a unique chassis design that’s pitched firmly at those looking for something a little bit special to house their beloved system in. " Here are some more Cases & Cooling reviews from around the web:
Jeremy Hellstrom | Source: The Inquirer | Subject: General Tech
AMD isn't interested in competing directly with the Atom, instead they seem to want to marginalize it. Atom has taken a bit of a beating due to it's lack of support for high quality video, though on tiny screens it could be argued that high definition is not a real possibility. Their new low power processor will be the Neo and according to the specs you can see on The Inquirer, an HDMI output handling 1080p is within the Neo's power. It should also be significantly faster for most applications; think more notebook, not netbook.
"ALTHOUGH MANY punters were expecting AMD to launch an Atom-smasher, things haven't really turned out as they forecast. The company has launched the AMD Athlon Neo, but for all intents and purposes, isn't aiming at the Netbook market... at least not directly. According to AMD, the Athlon Neo will populate the ultraportable, ultrathin segment where users are willing to drop a bit more dosh for the improved performance and user experience. Netbooks, at least the ones currently on the market, target the sub-$500 market (except where SSD options kick in). The 12-inch market is the sweet spot, although AMD considers it'll be popular in +/- an inch size lapwarmers. The Neo will fit all bills in the ultralight market, ranging from $499 to $1499. Not exactly a Netbook is it?" Here is some more Tech News from around the web:
Ryan Shrout | Source: Expreview | Subject: Graphics Card
A post over at Expreview is indicating they have source spilling some proverbial beans about the upcoming NVIDIA GT212 GPU update due in mid-2009. Here's the table of interest:
What peaks my interest here is the idea of the GT212, that we previously thought would be a pretty simple refresh and simplification of the GT200 architecture, getting a 60% increase in shaders - moving from 240 to 384. Another important feature change listed here includes a move from a 512-bit memory bus to a 256-bit bus. While this might at first seem like a dramatic shift backwards the table also lists GDDR5 as the memory format used and that would help alleviate any bandwidth drops with the 256-bit bus while allowing NVIDIA's engineers to keep the chip design smaller even if transistor counts go from 1.4 billion to 1.8 billion. Our source indicates that the number of stream processers increases from 240 (GT200) to 384, and the number of TMUs also increases to 96. Such improvements are fairly significant, kind of like 128 SPs of G92 to 240 SPs of GT200. As the second-generation rendering structure, GT200 features 10 TPCs, and we’re wondering if GT212 would follow this structure. If so, GT212 will feature 16 TPCs, and there’re only 6 TMUs in each TPC, while there’re 8 TMUs in GT200. GT212 is very likely to adopt the third-generation rendering structure - each TPC contains four SMs and 8 TMUs, and there’re 12 TPCs, so there’re 12*4*8=384 stream processors in total. Generally speaking, the stream processors of GT212 increase by 60%, but TMU just increases by 20%. The memory interface of GT212 will reduce from 512bit to 256bit, which is quite similar to AMD RV770. GT212 will aslo use GDDR5 to make up the loss of memory interface. The memory clock frequency of GTX280 is 1107MHz. If the memory bandwidth of GT212 has to achieve that of GT200, its data rate must be above 4.5GHz.The new products are usually superior to previous ones in specification, so the data rate of GDDR5 is supposed to be around 5GHz. NVIDIA and AMD both use GDDR5 on their middle-end lineup, which makes us to worry about the productivity of GDDR5.
Ryan Shrout | Source: PC Perspective | Subject: Graphics Card
XFX sent out a PR email blast letting the whole world know that the XFX Radeon HD 4000 series of graphics are official and should be available any day now. The company has its Radeon products website up and running at has quite a few new cards on the table including:
XFX Radeon HD 4870 1GB 
XFX Radeon HD 4850 512MB 
XFX Radeon HD 4650 1GB Somewhat surprisingly there is not a Radeon HD 4870 X2 product - the one true hardcore enthusiast solution that AMD offers. Hopefully we'll be seeing some kind of super-overclocked model from them soon!
For some, beauty is defined by the level of realism achieved in a game.
From true-to-life smoke and flying rock fragments caused by a lobbed
grenade to reach-out-and-touch it textures on walls and streets to “you
talkin’ to me???” facial expressions on animated characters, nothing
can bring a tear to the eye of a gaming aficionado like a truly
immersive graphic experience. Unless it’s all of that, plus exceptional
price points AND unparalleled technology. In which case, have some
tissue handy, because you’re in for a misty moment.
Introducing XFX’s new Radeon™ HD-powered 4000 series graphics cards powered by ATI GPUs. Crafted from state-of-the-art technologies, their inner beauty is truly frame-worthy. Check out our product gallery today.
Ryan Shrout | Source: engadget | Subject: Storage
I have always been a fan of options, especially when it comes to computers and computing in general. We were big fans of the X58 chipset because it now allows us to CHOOSE between SLI and CrossFire on the same motherboard. I really liked some OCZ SSD hard drives as they had both SATA connections and USB connections allowing you to use them internally or as external drives. This new Verbatim hard drive takes it another step further by offering FOUR connection types: USB 2.0, FireWire 400, FireWire 800 and eSATA II.
Verbatim will offer both a 500GB and 1TB model that use 3.5" 7200 RPM hard drives. Prices are bit on the steep side thoug, coming at $180 for the 500GB model and $250 for the 1TB.
While they aren't the first quad interface external drives
on the market, Verbatim's adding to the bunch with a new 500GB and 1TB
model. Slated to debut at this year's Macworld Expo, the pro audio /
video-grade drives are Mac and PC compatible and tout USB 2.0, FireWire
400, FireWire 800 and eSATA II sockets. Each unit weighs 3.3-pounds and
features 3.5-inch HDDs with 7,200RPM spindle speeds and 32MB of cache.
Grab one right this very moment for $179.99 / $249.99, respectively.
Ryan Shrout | Source: PC Perspective Forums | Subject: Graphics Card
AudioFreak39 points out in a thread in our forums that the pending GeForce 9-series rebranding process has now been unearthed as the GeForce Gx00 series:
GeForce G110 (rebranded 9400GT): http://img246.imageshack.us/img246/3256/63avu9.jpg GeForce G120 (rebranded 9500GT): http://img246.imageshack.us/img246/8676/63bqr5.jpg GeForce G130 (rebranded 9600GSO): http://img168.imageshack.us/img168/4229/63cye5.jpg More information is available, and discussion on the changes, on the sourced forum thread.
It's been quite a while since Nvidia rebranded its cards and we were
beginning to think it has dropped the habit altogether. However,
several leaked ads, courtesy of German retailer MediaMarkt all but
confirm the new naming scheme.
Ryan Shrout | Source: engadget | Subject: General Tech
As absolutely nerdy as this sounds, I actually WANT THIS in my next washer / dryer combo. An enterprising hacker has taken an old wash machine and added twitter support - it actually will twitter when its done with a load of laundry so you can get off your lazy ass and move it to the dryer and continue on with your chores.
There have been so many times that I have put clothes in the wash, been distracted working on the PC and not finished laundry that day that I would actually PAY for this TODAY. Thanks to engadget for the link!
We're truthfully not sure what's cooler: the fact that the above
pictured washing machine tweets when it's done, or the fact that the
above pictured washing machine
still works. We're guessing that the geeks in the crowd would argue
that it's clearly the former, and for those interested in a little
proof / explanation, you can head on past the break for a video
demonstration. But just so you know, it's highly unlikely that your
Twittering washer will have any diehard followers.
Ryan Shrout | Source: engadget | Subject: Storage
If you are anything like me, you've very often wanted to yell at, kick and smash your computer when it starts to act up on you. Maybe it won't POST, maybe it has some nasty spyware or maybe it is just locking and freezing - either way we now have PROOF that yelling at your PC won't do any good. And in fact, we have PROOF that yelling at it actually slows it down.
A post over at engadget alerted me to some crazy people at Sun that found yelling at a hard drive causes enough vibration that it will actually dramatically slow down seek times and increase drive latency. No, really. Here's the crazy people on video to prove it.
Here's a tip for everyone who hasn't made the jump to solid state: try
to be nice to your disk drive. Brendan Gregg from Sun's Fishworks team
wanted to see the effects of vibrations on his disk array, so he
proceeded to shout at it. On video. Yeah, we bet that's pretty
embarrassing for the drive in question, and what results is a sharp
spike the number of I/O operations that take over 5ms to complete.
Moral of the story? Yelling at your computer isn't going to make it run
any faster. How about next time we see how it reacts to Ozzy, Mozart
and warm, gentle nuzzles? We've placed video of Gregg's sadistic
hardware taunts after the break.
Ryan Shrout | Source: PC Perspective Forums | Subject: Processor
While perusing the always fun and impressive PC Perspective Forums, I found an interesting thread looking at some overclocking fun with the new Intel Core i7-920 processor.
BlackDragon24 is the guy doing the overclocking - jump into the discussion and see whats going on and if maybe the Core i7-920 should be your next purchase. 
Been tinkering around with this combo for the past week or so. So far
it is quite evident that these 920 cpu's hit a wall and hit it hard. I
can run 19 x 200 at 1.28vcore and 1.33Vtt under load, but I cannot run
20 x 200 even with 1.4v under load. At 19 x 200, cores idle at around
38C and load near 70C. My memory is rated for 7-7-7-24 but I can only
stabilize 8-7-7-24 for now. I'm not sure if this wall I'm hitting is
the cpu or the board...anyways, some pretty impressive mem bandwidth.
Ryan Shrout | Source: PC Perspective Forums | Subject: Graphics Card
A very interesting discussion has started in the graphics card forum about some leaked NVIDIA drivers (revision 185.20) that adds a new feature called "ambient occlusion". This enhancement apparently is adding some nice visual lighting effects but causes a lot of stress on gaming hardware; HonestJohn saw his Far Cry 2 performance go from about 60 FPS to 45 FPS with the option enabled. There are screen shots included in the thread as well.
Ambient occlusion is a shading method used in 3D computer graphics
which helps add realism to local reflection models by taking into
account attenuation of light due to occlusion. Ambient Occlusion
attempts to approximate the way light radiates in real life, especially
off of what is normally considered non-reflective surfaces. For
example, in the way light through a small crack in the curtain in an
otherwise darkened hotel room can slightly illuminate the entire room,
and not just the path of light passing through the crack itself.
Ryan Shrout | Source: PC Perspective Forums | Subject: Graphics Card
A post in our graphics card forum is indicating news about a closer-than-expected release time for XFX's own ATI Radeon graphics cards. It has barely been 3 weeks since we first learned that XFX was going to add a little red to their green but based on the speed of this release the project has been in the works for a while.
Thanks goes to AudioFreak39 for the tip.
Product lineup:
XFX HD 4350 PCI-E 512MB DDR2 P/N: HD-435X-YAH2 XFX HD 4650 PCI-E 512MB DDR2 P/N: HD-465X-YAF2 XFX HD 4650 PCI-E 1GB DDR2 P/N: HD-465X-ZDF2 XFX HD 4830 PCI-E 512B DDR5 P/N: HD-483X-YDFC XFX HD 4850 PCI-E 512B DDR5 P/N: HD-485X-YDFC XFX HD 4870 PCI-E 512MB DDR5 P/N: HD-487A-YDFC XFX HD 4870 PCI-E 1GB DDR5 P/N: HD-487A-ZDFC
Ryan Shrout | Source: engadget | Subject: Storage
What's that? You are tired of just having ONE of the Intel X25-M solid state drives in your system and just need to spend that $500 you got for the holidays from grammy? Good news for you then: engadget is showing off news of an upcoming A-Data product that will allow you to use a pair of SSDs (or any 2.5" HDDs) in a RAID configuration and also install the pair in a standard 3.5" hard drive bay.
It apparently won't be available until well into Q1 of this year, but it definitely looks like an interesting way to get those SSDs in your gaming rig.
So yeah, the easy part about getting the SSD RAID setup of your
not-so-lofty dreams is the acquisition of A-DATA's newest XPG Dual SSDRAID enclosure. The tough part is smuggling enough cash in through
untraceable means to procure a few 256GB SSDs. For those who don't mind
living dangerously, the aforesaid chassis is compatible with twin
2.5-inch SATA SSDs and / or HDDs mounted on a standard 3.5-inch form
factor drive cage. Users can connect it to a PC via SATA or USB once
those drives have been acquired and installed, but you'll have to wait
until the end of this quarter to see it ship.
Ryan Shrout | Source: Digitimes | Subject: Processor
A source at Digitimes is reporting that VIA plans to have upgraded Nano processors ready late in 2009 and in early 2010. Apparently the Nano 3000 series will be released in Q3 of 2009 and will add support for SSE4 instructions and dual-core Nano 3000-based processors should begin mass production in Q1 2010. While this is definitely good news, we had really been hoping to dual-core processors from VIA much ealier than that in order to keep Intel's line of products in check.
As we saw in our looks at the VIA Nano technology, the processor core itself has some solid potential but VIA's dependency on TSMC and other third-party fabs may be holding it back. VIA Technologies has recently notified its partners that the company plans to launch the next-generation Nano 3000 series CPU in the third quarter of 2009, while engineering samples of a dual-core Nano CPU will be ready in the second half of 2009 with mass production scheduled in the fourth quarter of 2009 or the first quarter of 2010, according to sources at PC makers. Engineering samples of Nano 3000 series CPUs will be completed in the first quarter next year. The CPU will be manufactured under Fujitsu Electronics' 65nm process. The Nano 3000 CPU's specification is similar to that of Nano 1000 and 2000 with the major difference being that the CPU will support SSE4 instructions. As for the dual-core Nano CPUs, VIA is currently evaluating either to use Fujitsu's 45nm process or Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company's (TSMC's) 40nm process, added the sources.
Ryan Shrout | Source: Digitimes | Subject: Mobile
We have posted a fewnews bits over the past weeks about NVIDIA's Ion platform and the company's attempt to get into the world of netbooks by offering up a new chipset solution for more graphics-savvy mobile computing. While the technology is compelling, at least a few sources are saying that Intel is preventing NVIDIA from entering the market by forcing OEMs to buy Intel's core logic chipsets as well as the Atom CPU in a bundle.
HP is asking Intel to relax restrictions on the Atom platform claiming they want to use larger sized screens - something that Intel requires the purchase of faster components to do strictly from a business perspective. As big as Intel is, HP has some weight to throw around and you never know what opportunistic lawyer might have his ear to the tech world either and we KNOW that Intel loves to hear about anti-trust legalities. Hewlett-Packard (HP) is in negotiations with Intel seeking a slackening of its current restrictions which limit the use of Atom series processors only in netbook PCs with up to 10.2-inch panels, according to Taiwan-based notebook makers. HP hopes to use Atom in new mini-note PC models with larger screen sizes In light of competition from Asustek Computer and Acer in promoting netbook PCs, HP's 2009 roadmap shows that the company hopes to enhance its netbook lineup by offering an 11.6-inch model in the second quarter of 2009 and an 13.3-inch model in June 2009, the sources pointed out. Negotiations between HP and Intel are expected to reach a conclusion at the end of January 2009, the sources noted. With its brand image and high volumes, HP stands a chance of obtaining consent from Intel, the sources analyzed.
Ryan Shrout | Source: Mad Penguin | Subject: Mobile
Color me confused, but I just don't get all the excitement I am seeing online today for the announcement of the new "hybrid" storage solution Wind U115 netbook. The system is nice enough:
All this new option does for MSI is allow them to use the SSD for the OS and apps and have storage space for music, movies and large files on the regular hard drive. The Wind has proven to be popular with many netbook fans and in October of 2008 MSI announced that it had the successor to the Wind U100 netbook in the works. MSI has now made the specifications for the U100's new sibling public. The MSI Wind U115 is the world's first hybrid storage notebook. The machine uses an SSD for the OS to get the benefits of fast booting and data access with an internal HDD to provide more storage space for documents, music, and other data. The U115 uses what MSI calls ECO mode to provide increased battery life. A 10-inch LCD is shared in common with the U100 Wind and the resolution is 1024x600. LED backlighting is used on the U115 to improve color and battery life. Inside the U115 hides an Intel Atom Z530 running at 1.6GHz and the netbook runs Windows XP Home. The chipset is the Intel Poulsbo US15W and the machine ships with 1GB of DDR2 533MHz, but can support 2GB of RAM. Two models will be offered that only differ in storage capacity. The lower-end model has an 8GB SSD and a 120GB HDD while the high-end model has a 16GB SSD and a 160GB HDD. The stock battery is a 3-cell unit with a 6-cell option. Wi-Fi offerings include 802.11b/g/n and Bluetooth is optional. The stock webcam is a 1.3-megapixel unit with a 2-megapixel option.
Ryan Shrout | Source: Daily Tech | Subject: General Tech
As CES approaches, more and more companies are going to start "leaking" information about what will be on display at their booths attempting to drum up some enthusiasm. One such "leak" comes from the gang at Dailytech that is reporting that many TVs will be on display that use the Intel and Yahoo technology first demonstrated back at IDF in September.
The idea is that Yahoo! widgets will be available on your TV to allow for a much more interactive experience while watching TV. I first showed you some shots from IDF of the technology in my keynote live blogs (see the day 2 keynote on the first page there) including Flickr, Twitter and on-demand movie trailers all from an easy to navigate menu system. 
Yahoo and Intel are trying to bring a new way to provide information and ads to TV. The Yahoo Widget Channel will be the first piece of software to take advantage of a new processor that Intel hopes to see integrated into the vast majority of TV sets being sold called the Intel Media Processor CE 3100. Both of the companies are keen for consumers to understand that this is not another attempt to turn their TVsinto computers. Intel tried that approach already with its failed Viiv brand. What the Yahoo Widget Channel will do is cater to the TV viewer by allowing them to connect with other people, find more information about actors or shows they are watching and more. The technology will be integrated into a number of TVs that will be seen at CES 2009 next month. Major electronics makers including Samsung, Toshiba, and others will be showing TVs at CES 2009 that integrate Intel's new technology. Yahoo and Intel both say that they are confident in the new technology and fully expect it to catch on, mostly due to the very low licensing requirements they demand for the technology. Patrick Berry, VP of Yahoo's Connected TV Initiative told CNET, "We do not see it [Yahoo Widget Channel] as a niche offering in a few high-end models. We see this as moving into the mainstream. In 2009, we're going to see good penetration into the product lineups of the consumer electronics companies. Beginning in 2010, I think, you're going to see Internet-connected consumer electronics devices dominating the lineup." Want more news? Check out our Archive |
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