HDTV on your PC

Feb 29 2004 @ 10:12AM by haysonw

Most of you out there are already drooling over HDTV on your home entertainment systems, and now you can enjoy that high definition digital experience on your PC with a new HDTV Tuner card from ATI. If you're into capturing episodes onto your pc or are building your own pvr from scratch then this might be what you're looking for.

While we are all sitting and watching the 3D Graphics card battles rage on, in the PC TV Tuner industry, competition is a little less prominent. While a lot of enthusiasts are caught up in the hype of whose video card is faster and which one has the better image quality, there are other developments going in adjacent markets, that sometimes catch us off guard. The latest of these developments is ATi's recent announcement of their new HDTV Wonder TV card that can deliver a High Definition Television experience to the PC.

More news at HotHardware.com

 

OCZ PC-3200 1GB Unbuffered DDR Memory Modules

Feb 25 2004 @ 06:44PM by MikeC

OCZ just announced the release of a PC3200 1GB memory module. They will be offering this kit in single 1GB sticks as well as 2GB dual channel kits.

Sunnyvale, CA, January 28, 2004: OCZ Technology Group Inc., a worldwide leader in high performance DDR memory modules designed for gamers and performance enthusiasts, is pleased to announce the release of PC-3200 1GB Unbuffered DDR memory modules. OCZ PC-3200 1GB DDR memory modules will be shipping in 1GB single module configurations as well as 2GB hand-tested Dual Channel kits. Each module and Dual Channel kit will feature an integrated copper heatspreader to aid in heat dissipation and are rated for CL3-3-3-7 timings at 2.6 volts. OCZ PC-3200 1GB DDR memory modules feature Ultra Low Noise 2 technology (ULN2) to minimize electronic noise and interference.

Full PR Link

 

Evercool CUF-715 Copper AthlonXP Heatsink

Feb 25 2004 @ 06:42PM by MikeC

Frosty Tech reviews a copper HSF unit from Evercool.

"Looking for a little more out of your AthlonXP processor and afraid that stock AMD heatsink just isn't cutting it? Rest assured, there are hundreds of other heatsinks waiting in the wind, and the Evercool CUF-715 is just one such example. This compact Socket A copper heatsink comes with all the features you'd expect from a mainstream cooler; copper base, copper fins, good sized fan, and even a fan guard. It doesn't rank too high in the noise department, and that's always a good thing. The soldered fin design and not-so-classy shiny gold fan blades certainly make this cooler stand out, but just how well does the Evercool CUF715 perform thermally?"

Read the review

 

Abit's Radeon 9800 XT Review

Feb 25 2004 @ 06:40PM by MikeC

HotHardware reviews Abit's variant of the 9800XT complete with the HL2 voucher. ^_^

"Last month, when Abit announced that they'd be introducing a new line of graphics cards powered by ATi's Radeon line of GPUs, we all stoop up and took notice. With Abit's reputation for producing products targeted squarely at enthusiasts, hopes were high that they'd do something to truly differentiate their cards from the competition. Well, we just finished our review of the first Radeon to come out of Abit, their 9800 XT. Click the link below and see if Abit worked their usual magic..."

Read the review

 

nVidia moves to 0.11 micron

Feb 24 2004 @ 11:47AM by MikeC

nVidia announced today that they will be moving to 0.11 micron technology on their next generation graphics cards.

"Santa Clara, CA and Hsin-Chu, Taiwan ? Feburary 24, 2004 ?
NVIDIA Corporation (Nasdaq: NVDA) today confirmed that it will be one of the first semiconductor companies to manufacture select up-coming graphics processing units (GPUs) at Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company?s (TSMC?s) (TAIEX: 2330, NYSE: TSMC) 0.11 ěm (micron) process technology. NVIDIA will combine TSMC?s 0.11 micron process with its own innovative engineering designs, to deliver high-performance and low-power consumption in a graphics processor."

Press Release

 

MSI FX5950 Ultra

Feb 24 2004 @ 09:34AM by haysonw

R&Blackness Mods were lucky enough to receive a blazing fast FX5950 Ultra video card and they put it through it's paces to give us a glimpse of what it's capable of. Decent bundle with this one, so you may wanna check it out if you're looking to upgrade.

Tonite we are having a look at one of the heavy weight champions amongst video cards. MSI sent us their FX5950 Ultra video card for a little test run. This card seems to be a monster by just having a look at the cooler on the card itself. We will compare it to some other commoon cards that are popular on the market at this moment. We will test this in some games and some overclocking of course so this should be interesting.

RBMods has the review.

 

HP Opeterons

Feb 24 2004 @ 06:28AM by MikeC

Well we've been hearing for a while that HP will be offering Opteron servers. Tomorrow morning, HP will announce their line of Opteron servers that they will be offering to the public. Here's some of the skinny:

"Proliant DL145 1U Dual CPU Opteron 248 ? Available ?real soon? (Note: This box is NOT made by Celestica, honest. Please believe me.)
Proliant 848 powered server in Q2
Proliant 248 powered blades in Q2"

They will also be offering some of the Intel 64bit servers as well.

"Proliant Dual CPU Nocona Q3
Proliant 4/8 CPU Nocona Q1/05 - Maybe
Proliant Blades Q3"

The Inquirer has the details.

 

New Intel Prescott

Feb 24 2004 @ 06:03AM by MikeC

Intel offers up a new version of the Prescott. The release of this was very quiet and almost came unnoticed. The new Prescott is a 2.4GHz processor which goes against Intels initial plans for the Prescott. If you remember, the lowest clock speed for the Prescott was due to be 2.8GHz.

"Some reports indicate yield issues with Pentium 4 ?Prescott? processors and inability of a certain number of chips to work in officially specified 2.80GHz ? 3.40GHz speed range. "

Xbit Labs has the details.

 

Upcoming Xbox Live Features

Feb 24 2004 @ 05:57AM by MikeC

Microsoft plans to unveil new featues to their Xbox Live in the upcoming year. Some new features include an email service and network storage. This might be a sign of things to come as there have been rumors circulating around that Microsoft plans to remove the hard drive from the next generation Xbox, reducing size and cost of the new console.

"Other enhancements in the works, Microsoft said, include the ability for game publishers or group of players to create competitions for specific games and new ways to contact friends to play games through the MSN Messenger instant-messaging software."

MSN messenger service on the Xbox. I wonder if MSN Plus! will work with it too. ^_^

News.com has the article.

 

First Kuwait, and next the World!

Feb 23 2004 @ 08:57PM by haysonw

In what seems like The SIMS meets the Real World, the US Army teaming with There.com, are currently in the process of recreating the world using geographical data and realistic physics model to create an imersive environment to allow them to better train their soldiers.

The emphasis in the artificial Earth will be on human interaction rather than conflicts involving lots of military hardware. He said combat will be a part of the game but it is also intended to let the Army simulate intelligence work as well as patrols, planning and working with indigenous populations.

I can't wait till September! Until then, check out the article at the BBC News.

 

AMD Chips to Save Microsoft Buffer Overflow Woes

Feb 23 2004 @ 08:31PM by haysonw

AMD and Intel are working to provide buffer overflow protection at the cpu level to help reduce the probability of security breaches at the software level. While both CPU manufacturers have plans to implement this feature, it appears AMD will be first to market.

AMD's Athlon-64 (for PCs) and Opteron (for servers) will protect against buffer overflows when used with a new version of Windows XP. Intel plans similar features on next generation Pentium chips.

Read more here at New Scientist.

 

Thermal Integration TI-A8641L

Feb 23 2004 @ 07:58PM by haysonw

FrostyTEch.com checks out how well the Thermal Integration TI-A8641L does to keep their AthlonXP chips nice and cool.

Looking over the Thermal Integration TI-A8641L it is easy to draw parallels with Zalman's flower shaped heatsinks. The TI-A8641L is a socket A AthlonXP heatsink which weighs in at approx. 470 grams. The small heatsink is under 60mm tall, and is made from several dozen aluminum and copper fins which have been cut from a sheets about 0.3mm thick. Bolted together, the fins come together to form a cohesive heatsink. The copper fins are located directly over the core of the processor to aide in thermal transmission, and mounted above all of this is a 70mm fan.

Check out FrostyTEch.com for the writeup

 

Enermax CS-10182-BA Server Tower Chassis

Feb 23 2004 @ 07:55PM by haysonw

BigBruin.Com has the scoop on the Enermax CS-10182-BA Server Tower Chassis, a nice heavy-duty case that aspires to be all that a server should be!

The Enermax CS-10182-BA is a very well designed case that incorporates many features that one would look for in a high end case that might carry a price tag higher than $68.00... The quality is unquestionable, and the term "heavy duty" is appropriately used to describe the CS-10182-BA. It?s a sleek, stylish case that is spacious enough to easily provide room for all of your drives and peripherals.

BigBruin has the review.

 

Chenbro Hornet (PC-80566) Case

Feb 23 2004 @ 09:49AM by haysonw

Hardware Pacers has a nice review on the Chenbro Hornet (PC-80566) Case.

"The case can be purchased in two different colors: Yellow or Silver. The front panel is very attractive and stylish. It has a yellow "I" and on the sides there are air holes for case ventilation. On the top there is a lid that covers a 3.5 inch drive bay and can be easily opened by flipping it upwards. On the left side of the case there is a large lid that covers a 5.25 inch drive bay that can be flipped open by pulling on the side."

This microATX case kinda does remind me of a hornet.

Have a look here.

 

Another AMD 64 3400+ Review

Feb 23 2004 @ 09:42AM by haysonw

Bjorn3d did their own review of the AMD 64 3400+ and puts it head to head with it's older brother, the 64 FX-51 and they even thew in a 64 3200+ on the side!

Scott recently benchmarked his new Athlon 64 FX-51 system, so I'm using his numbers to compare to recent benchmarks I did with the 3200+ and 3400+. Refer to the table above if you want to quickly see the difference among these three processors. Also, note that all testing was done on an nForce3 platform (ASUS SK8N in Scott's case with the FX-51 and Chaintech ZNF3-150 Zenith in my case with the 3200+ and 3400+).

An interesting approach to benchmarking, he even left some browser windows and email programs open while benchmarking!

Read more here.

 

PSU Tester

Feb 22 2004 @ 10:41AM by haysonw

Ever been faced with a computer that wouldn't start?

If you've got a computer that's in Paperweight Mode, though, this little box ought to do just fine at telling you whether it's worth yanking the PSU or not. Just unplug the ATX cable from the motherboard, plug it into this tester, and you ought to immediately know whether the failure to proceed is thanks to the PSU or not.

Dan's data does a nice write up on the Connectland-branded ATX Power Supply Tester that doesn't cost much, doesn't weigh much, and doesn't load up a power supply much. Won't tell you if it's squeezing out every possible Watt, but it wil tell you if it's being flakey.

See what Dan has to say!

 

Toys with chips

Feb 20 2004 @ 06:05AM by MikeC

Soon toys will have MHz ratings on them, or something to that effect. At the 101st International Toy Fair, some companies were showcasing some new toys that would have imbeded microchips in them. One of the coolest features I found was an upcoming Batman toy that would interact with the TV show itself.

"The most interesting toy tech demoed at the show was VEIL -- Video Encoded Invisible Light -- which soon will be incorporated into a line of Batman toys being produced by Mattel. A data stream embedded into the cartoon will be transmitted from the TV screen, allowing the toys to interact with Warner Bros. Animation's The Batman cartoon series, set to premiere this fall."

Wired has the article.

 

Apple iTunes "Hack"

Feb 20 2004 @ 06:01AM by MikeC

Well, this really isn't a hack. It's more of a trick to get free legal music off of the Internet. This is part of the Pepsi promotion where a winning cap will give you access to download a free song off of Aplle iTunes. A young man by the name of Jon Gales from Tampa "discovered" that with a little effort and some tilting and twisting, you can figure out which bottle has a winning cap. Pepsi is giving away 100 million free songs, however, you can only download 10 songs a day and 200 in total per account.

(CNN) -- Sharp eyes and a bit of patience paid off Thursday for iTunes fans who figured out a way to "hack" the popular music download service's Pepsi promotion.

CNN has the article.
MacMerc has the trick.

 

Down for the day

Feb 19 2004 @ 03:33AM by redemption

Due to server problems we lost our news for Wednesday, the 18th of Feb. Also all of our article images are broken. We'll try and fix this soon!

 

Intel Showcase

Feb 17 2004 @ 06:40AM by MikeC

Intel is said to show off the future of PCs this week during a conference. It's mostly stuff on 32-bit achitechture melded with 64-bit, but that's hardly news. There's also stuff about data transfers over a new parallel protocol.

"Other papers will detail how Intel has made high-speed oscillators, a key component for radios, out of silicon. Typically, these are made from exotic materials such as Indium Phosphide. By 2005, Intel hopes to be producing silicon radios and, eventually, radios that can roam between different bands, said Krishnamurthy Soumyanath, director of communications circuits research at the company."

All the details at News.com

 

Canucks Crack Down

Feb 17 2004 @ 06:33AM by MikeC

Music companies in Canada are now taking the hint from their US counterparts and are cracking down on music swappers in the land of the North. They asked the courts on Monday to order ISPs to identify potential illegal swappers. So hurry up and hide those MP3s. ^_^

"The music companies, including the Canadian units of giants Universal Music and EMI Music, asked the Federal Court of Canada to order the providers to disclose the identity of 29 large-volume song swappers as they try to stem the illegal downloading of music."

Read the article

Microsoft: "Downfall to the PC?"

Feb 17 2004 @ 06:28AM by MikeC

Well, we all knew this would be the case, but we never really understood why. Well, according to this one guy, Dan Geer, if comparing Microsoft in biological terms, you get a monoculture. Basically saying that since almost everybody is using almost the same version of Windows out there, if a malicious person out there finds a fatal flaw in Windows, he could wreak havoc with even the simplest of viruses.

"In biology, species with little genetic variation -- or "monocultures" -- are the most vulnerable to catastrophic epidemics. Species that share a single fatal flaw could be wiped out by a virus that can exploit that flaw. Genetic diversity increases the chances that at least some of the species will survive every attack."

CNN has the article.

 

Intel Pentium 4 3.2GHZ Extreme Edition Northwood Review

Feb 17 2004 @ 06:19AM by MikeC

Tweaknews.net reviews Intels P4 3.2 GHZ EE processor.

"This is a premier piece of number crunching, L3 cache pumped, heatshot inducing, Photoshop taming piece of screaming hardware that is made in limited numbers and is made for a focused group of specialized users that require power at this level. And as with anything tagged with the "special" designation, it comes with the "special" price."

Read the review

 

UT2K4 Demo Released

Feb 11 2004 @ 03:51PM by MikeC

A little late today, but better than never. Unreal Tournament 2004 demo came out today. Grab it while it's hot. File Planet
File Shack

 

Dead or Alive in Bed

Feb 11 2004 @ 06:23AM by MikeC

Wired reports that Microsoft will be selling a new version of the Xbox in Japan to celebrate the release of Dead or Alive online. This new version doesn't come with any new hardware, it comes with something called a dakimakura or hugging pillow of Kasumi.

"Hugging pillows are printed with life-size artwork of popular animé characters, and are basically life-size teddy bears for adult males, but otaku's relationships with their dakimakura can get a little more personal. "Searching Google Images with the term dakimakura is enough to understand the people who buy these items," said Muto.

"I guess they're supposed to be used ... as pillows to hug, of course ... and for other obscene purposes that I would rather not mention."

Read the article