[H]ardNews 7th Edition

XFX GeForce 6600 DDR2:

We have a brand new video card evaluation posted today for your viewing pleasure. Head on over and see what our man Brent had to say about the XFX GeForce 6600 DDR2

When we talk about the value end of the video card spectrum, we are mainly talking about cards in the $99 to $149 level. At this level, you can’t expect the gaming performance at the same level of mainstream or performance enthusiast cards, but with the new technologies that each new generation of cards brings to the table, they just might give you a solid, enjoyable gaming experience.

ASUS Extreme N7800 GT:

Lost Circuits seems rather impressed with the ASUS Extreme N7800 GT that they have on the test bench today. We posted an evaluation of this card’s big brother, the Extreme N7800GTX TOP a few months ago, you can check that out here.

nVidia has dominated the midrange sector with the GeForce 6600GT series for quite some time while ATI still maintained the lead in the high end market segment. However ATI's lead vanished into thin air few months ago with nVidia's introduction of the 7800 series of GPU based on the G70 core.

ECS KN1 SLI Extreme:

For those of you shopping for a new Athlon 64, SLI motherboard for your next PC upgrade, techFEAR has a handy review of the ECS KN1 SLI Extreme posted today that you should definitely have a look at. Here is a quote:

techFEAR put the ECS KN1 SLI Extreme motherboard on the test bench and ran it through our testing cycle. With ECS recently refocusing their energy on filling new-found gaps in the enthusiast market, the new KN1 SLI Extreme is one of the company’s first entry into this highly competitive space.

DFI Infinity NF4 Ultra:

After reading the review above you decide you need an Athlon 64 board but SLI isn’t your thing, then check out this review of the DFI Infinity NF4 Ultra at Overclockers Online.

The build quality is great and the components that are used are top notch and seem to be almost the same as the LanParty Ultra-D. I have basically compared these two motherboards throughout the review and have come to the conclusion that the Infinity nF4 Ultra is almost the same model but without the options or accessory package.

[H]ardNews 6th Edition - [H]ardForum [H]appenings

[H]ardForum [H]appenings:

Welcome to another edition of [H]ardForum [H]appenings! I like to think of Mondays as Moddays, so let’s start things off with a few of the cool mods we currently have going in the Case Modding forum. Not all case mods have to be complicated. Sometimes, just adding a little chrome is just what you need to spice up that old case. Maybe “easy” isn’t in your nature. Then how about making a full on arcade machine? This guy did just that and it looks kick ass. Not into modding but you want something to do during the holidays? How about LAN’ing it up with a bunch of [H]’ers? Those of you in the Houston area on December 10th can stop by this LAN. There is a LAN party the same day in Bryan, Ohio for those of you in that area. Moving on to the hot deals of the day. Smoking hot Deal of the Day is this 300GB SATA hard drive for only $89.99, no rebates. Get them while the getting is good. Runner up in the DotD category is this 20.1 widescreen LCD for $379. Don’t forget, you can also enter to win a free Xbox 360 at ClubIT just for signing up. As always, have a good time in the forums, we’ll see you in there.

[H]ardNews 5th Edition

Asustek To Spin Off ASUS-branded Business:

DigiTimes is reporting that Asustek plans to spin off its ASUS branded business while aiming at getting the new business listed on the New York Stock Exchange.

Asustek’s own-brand operation is expected to turn into a new independent company, which will set up a headquarters in Singapore and will aim for listing on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in the future, according to the sources. Asustek declined to comment on the report, which contradicts previous reports stating that it would spin off it’s manufacturing arm.

Blu-ray Dogged By Cost:

According to this story, Blu-ray will be a lot more expensive than its rivals for the foreseeable future. That wouldn’t be such a big deal except Blu-ray is leading the next-gen DVD format wars. Ugh.

Blu-ray appears to have the lead, with most major movie studios saying they'll release films in the format next year. That's led to new concerns about mass production of DVDs in the new format. Since it represents a major break with past DVD and CD techniques, some worry Blu-ray will be expensive to support--at least in the short term--and could jack up prices for consumers.

[H]ardNews 4th Edition - Mods & Ends

Cooling:

Zalman CNPS9500 LED Heatsink @ Viperlair - Zalman VF700-Cu LED @ Maximum CPU - Thermalright XP_90C & Antec Tricool 120 @ Hardwareoverclock Austria - AeroCool AeroEngine II-BBP @ ClubOC - Thermalright V-1 VGA Cooler @ Techniz

Etc.:

Vantec Nexstar GX USB Drive Enclosure and Hub @ BigBruin - Bluetake BT510 Mini Mouse and BT009Si Bluetooth Adapter @ Techgage - Logitech MX610 Laser Cordless Mouse @ CoolTechZone

Cases & Modding:

SilverStone LC16M HTPC Case @ Bjorn3D - Nikao Black Dragonfire Case @ Pro-Clockers - XG Ninja 2 Case @ Maximum CPU - Antec SLK2650-BGE Case @ Gamepyre

[H]ardNews 3rd Edition

Microsoft Game Studios Dyno Tests:

[H] reader “Scoriox” sent me this link to actual photos of the Microsoft Game Studios dyno testing a Lamborghini and a few Ferraris (F50 and a Maranello) for the audio in Project Gotham Racing 3. Pretty damn cool stuff just seeing the cars strapped to the dyno with microphones pointed at the exhaust.

[H]ardNews 2nd Edition

GeForce Go 7300 Benched:

The folks at HKEPC have taken the GeForce Go 7300 around the block a few times. The article is in Chinese so you will no doubt need a translator if you plan on doing more than looking at the pretty pictures and fancy benchmarks. Here is a translated quote to get you started:

Geforce Go 7,300, main attack basic level multimedia motion computer market, substitution existing NV44M core Geforce Go 6,200 statuses, because under 90 奈 metric systems regulations help may cause the power loss greatly to reduce, therefore G72M will have the better province electricity performance and the reduction compared to NV44M the load which will radiate to the motion computer.

O.K., so maybe that translation doesn’t help much, have no fear, the pics and graphs are still universal.

Xbox 360s Shipped Weekly:

There are some retailers out there telling people that Microsoft will not be sending out new consoles until next year. That information, according to Microsoft, is flat out wrong. While some of you may dismiss what Microsoft is saying as “damage control” or whatever spin you might think is being put on it, I can say first hand that my local BB already has a second shipment in, we snagged two consoles this weekend for use here in the underground bunker. I expect these “second round” consoles to go just as fast as the first, but this seems to shoot holes in the “next year” rumors.

I double checked with the retail team, and while I can’t speak to each retail outlets specific distribution strategy, I can tell you that we (Xbox) have a weekly replenishment strategy. That means that we have new shipments of Xbox 360s being sent out each week. If you hear that a store won’t get Xbox 360 from Microsoft until next year, you may want to gently remind your source that we in fact ARE shipping consoles out each week.

Die Floppy, Die!

To most of us, the floppy has been dead for years, that isn’t stopping OC ModShop from editorializing on the reasons the floppy should be laid to rest. I’m not sure why there is a chick with a gun in all the pictures…but I like her…err, I mean, it.

There are ways around having to use the floppy, but these methods are band-aids and does not fix the source of the problem (that the industry is supporting this antequated hardware). I was so near retiring the floppy disk in my systems that I hadn't used one in years... until a few weeks ago when I ended up buying three.

[H]ardNews 1st Edition - Press Releases

Confirma Selects ATi’s FireGL To Power CADstream:

ATI Technologies Inc. today announced that its award winning FireGL(TM) workstation graphics solutions have been selected by Confirma, the market leader in computer-aided-detection (CAD) for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). FireGL workstation graphics are now being integrated into CADstream, the standard in CAD for MRI. CADstream automates the processing of MRI studies, providing higher quality imaging studies, lower costs for radiology practices and improved communication tools for physicians and patients.

1TB Iomega Desktop XL HDD:

Iomega Corporation today announced the Iomega Desktop Hard Drive XL Series, a compact four-drive enclosure with 1 terabyte (TB) of capacity*. Designed for creative services professionals and others who require the fastest editing speeds possible in today's small office and tech-savvy home office, the Iomega XL Series 1TB drive delivers advanced capacity and performance and includes Dantz Retrospect Express software for a complete data backup and disaster recovery solution.

[H]ardNews 5th Edition

Fab18 Factory Tour:

HardwareSecrets takes you on a tour of Intel's Fab18 Factory in Kiryat Gat, Israel. A factory that makes 90 nm Pentium 4 chips, chipsets and flash memory.

Due to its huge size – Fab18 has the size of two soccer courts – and to the very high cost of building and maintaining a clean room, instead of the entire factory being a huge clean room, only the parts needed to be operated under a clean environment use clean rooms. So the factory has several clean rooms. The area behind the clean rooms are called “chase”, and is where the process tools, electricity, exhaust, etc are located.

Exploitation 360:

ArsTechnica looks at the dark side of bundling. When supply is short and demand long why sell just the product when you can bundle it with other items you want to sell? Of course there is an ethical line that shouldn't be crossed.

When customers arrived at the store, however, they were given fliers that said that the advertised prices were incorrect, and that the store was instead offering more expensive bundles. Now it would cost a couple of hundred dollars more to get the Xbox 360, although you were getting more, too. In ethical terms, this is what's known as a bait and switch.

SDRAM Season:

DigiTimes has a short piece on how pressure to make memory manufacturers bottom line look good in the last quarter just might translate into lower prices for SDRAM. Which would be a nice Christmas present for geeks everywhere.

Sources at Hong Kong based memory trading houses indicated that both Hynix and Micron have start releasing a considerable amount of DRAM into the spot market, which has led to a drop in spot prices. The reduced prices have already edged to the same level as production costs, signifying the severe margin pressure that memory makers are facing, industry observers commented.

[H]ardNews 4th Edition

Symantec Pulls LC 5:

In a case of deja vu another entry where Symantec pulls software, in this case the software is a commercial version of L0phtCrack a password auditing and cracking tool that is no longer available to anyone outside the US or Canada. The Register has an exclusive.

Symantec's restrictions recall the dark days of the crypto wars when users outside the US were not entitled to buy products featuring strong ciphers. These rules, relaxed by the Clinton administration and following a long running campaign by cryptography experts and net activists, are once again rearing their head. Symantec's response to our reader (below) suggests the policy was imposed on it by the US government.

This would be nearly pointless since nearly identical security tools are readily available in the opensource community.

Life in 360 Degrees:

Scott over at DesignTechnica has exploded his eyeballs, after a marathon shakedown of the Xbox 360.

Allow me to explain. The next-generation multimedia console hardcore gaming enthusiasts and casual audiences alike have waited years for is finally here – and I can’t get enough. Consider the highlights of my schedule this past week: two showers, three bathroom breaks, one change of clothes, and roughly 86 hours spent sitting rapt in front of a 46” Samsung HDTV.

He seems lucid, I wonder if there will be any permanent disabilities?

The Sony Legacy:

Micheal over at The TechZone is obviously a Monty Python fan, as he looks on the bright side of the Sony BMG rootkit scandal.

Sony's actions to secretly install software and cripple your computer to "protect" their music is one of the starkest illustrations to date of the actual harm consumers face in a DRM world. No longer can people say that those who warn of DRM scares are alarmists or conspiracy nuts. The risks are real and Sony drove that point home.

Don't forget to pickup a few cans of conspiracy nuts for the holidays, you never know when some alarmists might drop by.

[H]ardNews 3rd Edition

Symantec To Dump Sygate:

A mere three months after Symantec bought Sygate Technologies they are discontinuing the free version according to Brian Krebs. This after Kerio announced its discontinuing Personal Firewall as of December 31st.

Important Notice: Effective November 30th, 2005 all Sygate products and forum support will be discontinued. For technical assistance, please email SMBSupport@Symantec.com. Thank you and we look forward to assisting you with the wonderful line of Symantec products.

Its Coming:

Hold on to your hats and make yourself some popcorn, Firefox is planning a mass marketing drive to coincide with its release of version 1.5, with Tuesday very likely the release date. They are encouraging users to make videos of why people should switch. In my experience fanatics are nothing if not entertaining.

"People can create the video and upload it to the Mozilla site. The video will then be reviewed and put on our Web site, with a link from their location." The videos will be hosted on the SpreadFirefox community marketing site, which will display a world map with a dot marking each location where a video has been created.

Oops Sorry About That:

As a new bonus feature I-O Data Device has added a Trojan to some of their HDP-U series hard drives according to The Register. This isn't the first time manufacturers have dropped the ball, past infection vectors have included HP, IBM and Dell.

Affected products are in the following range of serial numbers: 4957180059693 HDP-U40 YBS0000001xx - YBS0005520xx; 4957180059709 HDP-U60 YBT0000001xx - YBT0001000xx; and 4957180059716 HDP-U80 YBV0000001xx - YBV0002480xx

[H]ardNews 2nd Edition

Color Me Secure:

PC World reports that Internet Explorer, Firefox, Opera, and Konqueror have agreed on new browser standards to make surfing more secure, these include color coding the address bar much like Firefox does now when visiting a secured site. As well as restrictions on popup windows.

Developers in Toronto also agreed to improve browser security by no longer allowing pop-up windows to be displayed without an address bar or a status bar. This will make it harder to mistake them for other types of Windows messages, Staikos said. "You'll always know that a window belongs to a Web browser," he said.

Open Secrets:

ZD Net discusses why open source projects are not publicized in part one of this two part series. From competitive advantage to just avoiding a Microsoft FUD campaign the reasons vary but it is fairly certain what does get publicized is but the tip of the iceberg.

One of the catch-all explanations frequently rolled out to explain why companies are reluctant to talk about software deployments is competitive advantage. "If a company is using an open source product for a new application and is reaping some kind of financial reward from doing it, or is making its business more streamlined, it won't want its rivals knowing about it."

DFI LanParty NF4 :

Tech Power Up reviews the DFI LanParty NF4 SLI-DR Expert for the AMD64.With features like integrated Gigabit Ethernet, 8 Channel Realtek ALC850 Audio and SATA-II support with onboard RAID 0, 1 and 0+1. They seem rather excited.

[H]ardNews 1st Edition

Sobering News:

NewsInferno is calling the Win32Sober.Y worm the worst of the year, the fast moving worm has all but choked some mailboxes, including one of mine.

Apparently only affecting computers running the Windows operating system, “Sober X” tells its victims that the government has found them visiting "illegal" Web sites and asks them to open an attachment to answer some official questions. The email also includes an authentic phone number for the FBI or CIA.

other subject messages include: Registration Confirmation, Your IP was logged, Your_Password, hi_ive_a_new_mail_address, smtp mail failed, Mail delivery failed, Paris_Hilton_&_Nicole_Richie.

"This particular virus is a mass-mailer worm and is the largest one we have seen this year. It's as bad as it gets. With this particular type of virus on your system, there is a high probability that your personal information will be stolen."

Good thing my AV caught it and that Im never tempted to open attachments from folks I dont know.