AMD's ATI 10.3a Catalyst Driver Update
AMD is putting out a new "performance" driver that sports some very aggressive frame rate increases according to AMD. The new "10.3a" driver will soon be released to the enthusiast with a WHQL driver coming in shortly behind that. Interestingly enough, the non-WHQL will have a couple more tweaks than the WHQL version. Let's give you the details.
PowerColor PCS+ HD5870 & HD5850 Video Card Review
We are going to take an in-depth look at the PowerColor PCS+ HD5870 and HD5850 today. Both video cards offer a custom configuration, with higher clock speeds, but you might just be surprised at what these video cards don’t offer you. This is also the first time we’ll be using ALL DX11/DX10 video games for testing.
First Time Gaming Experience with ATI Eyefinity
There has been a lot of talk about getting Eyefinity working with the latest games. We wanted to cover this with the latest and greatest games out in the last couple of weeks. We run Bad Company 2, Supreme Commander 2, and Aliens vs. Predator for the first time and show you what it takes to configure the games for a 3x1 Eyefinity Landscape configuration at 5760x1200.
ASUS P7P55D-E Premium Motherboard Review
ASUS has updated its line up once again with yet another addition to the P7P55D family of motherboards. The P7P55D-E Premium brings the highly anticipated USB 3.0 and SATA 6G features to Intel's LGA1156 platform but what does that mean for the enthusiast?
There is a new stable version of Chrome out now. Also, Google announced the winner of the first $1337 Chromium Security Reward today as well.
Please see the Chromium security page for more detail. Note that the referenced bugs may be kept private until a majority of our users are up to date with the fix. Congratulations to Sergey Glazunov on receiving the first $1337 Chromium Security Reward for bug 35724.
BBSpot has posted a list of the "Top 11 Social Networks You Shouldn't Join." Damn, I don't know, it’s a toss-up between number seven and number nine on the list.
9. CellMates - You probably want to avoid qualifying to join this site.
Remember that Facebook program "Beacon?" Well, the class action lawsuit filed over it has been settled for $9.5 million (of which the lawyers get $3M).
The case concerned allegations Facebook’s now defunct "Beacon" program breached federal wiretap and video-rental privacy laws. Terms of the settlement, in which Facebook denied any wrongdoing, require the site to finance what the deal calls a "Digital Trust Fund" that would issue more than $6 million in grants to organizations to study online privacy
The future of driving is here. Thanks to Grady A. and Edward C. for the link on this one.
According to this, the Skynet bill is getting a rewrite so it doesn’t sound so scary. Oops, did I say Skynet? I meant the "Emergency Internet Control Bill."
Sen. Jay Rockefeller alarmed technology and telecommunications firms last year when he announced a plan for the president to seize "emergency" control of the Internet. Now the West Virginia Democrat is trying again with a new version that aides hope will be seen as less extreme.
I am not sure how funny I would think this was if I was one of the one hundred victims but, since I wasn't, it’s okay to laugh. 
A man fired from a Texas auto dealership used an Internet service to remotely disable ignitions and set off car horns of more than 100 vehicles sold at his old workplace, police said Wednesday.
To provide consumers more comprehensive upgrade services, MSI, the world-leading mainboard and graphic card manufacturer, announced today that all MSI Intel X58-based mainboards will support the latest Intel Core i7-980X Extreme, the 32nm B1 stepping native 6-core CPU. So in the beginning of product design, MSI's total consideration about upgradability is shown, and also the greater scalability to consumers is brought.
AMD today announced the AMD Foundation, in support of AMD Changing the Game, has awarded a $100,000 grant to Games for Change. The funds will be used to sponsor a day-long game design workshop for educators at the upcoming 7th annual Games for Change Festival. Games for Change (G4C) is a non-profit that promotes the extraordinary power of video games to address contemporary social issues, including poverty, education and climate change. As part of G4C’s signature event, the Games for Change Festival, AMD will sponsor a day-long workshop to help middle and high school teachers, non-profit leaders, and others develop social issue game design programs for their school curriculums or after-school programs. The workshop will be held on May 24, 2010, at Parsons The New School For Design in New York City, and is designed to accommodate up to 150 participants.
Distribute two crappy movies on the internet? That’ll be jail time for you mister. Oh yeah, don’t try to use the lame "I’m emo" defense like this guy did either, that just guarantees you’ll get jail time.
Today the verdict came in, and the Court sentenced Adam to two and a half months in prison – the prosecution had demanded four. The defense lawyer had argued for community service because Adam suffers from depression and a troubled childhood, but despite these arguments, the Court decided to opt for a prison sentence.
Cooling
Gelid Solutions Tranquillo @ LanOC
Memory/ Storage
Synology Disk Station DS410j NAS @ HardwareHeaven
Power Supply
Nexus NX-6000 R3 PSU (German) @ Techniq3D
Video
ATI Catalyst 10.3a Performance Benchmarks @ Legit Reviews
If you are a male video game player, please go get a non-gamer friend to read this article to your stupid ass.
The study is the first controlled trial to look at the effects of playing video games on learning in young boys. That is to say, the findings aren't based on survey data of kids' game habits, but instead on a specific group of children that were randomly assigned to receive a PlayStation or not, and followed up for a certain period of time.
According to this article, Internet Explorer 9 will not work on Windows XP. I'm not sure how many people using Windows XP will even care but there you have it, no IE9 soup for you.
"Building a modern browser requires a modern operating system," Internet Explorer General Manager Dean Hachamovitch said at a press conference at the Mix10 event.
Industry standards and innovation took center stage at MIX10, as Microsoft Corp. made a series of announcements that underscore the company’s commitment to interoperability and performance on the Web. Dean Hachamovitch, general manager of Internet Explorer at Microsoft, unveiled the Internet Explorer 9 Platform Preview including expanded support for HTML5, hardware-accelerated graphics and text, and a new JavaScript engine. Together these allow developers to use the same markup and deliver graphically and functionally rich Web applications that take advantage of modern PC hardware through a modern operating system.
Well this can’t be good…Google’s trademark application for "Nexus One" was just denied by the USPTO. Whoopsie. Oh well, no biggy, Google can just buy the company and then it will own the trademark.
Google's bid for a trademark on its Nexus One smartphone has been denied by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, which concluded last week that the name is too similar to a trademark held by Portland-based Integra Telecom.
Big Lag on the PlayStation Move? @ EuroGamer
Bioware Considers Post-Release "Romance Pack" for ME2 @ Kotaku
Kane & Lynch 2 Release Date Revealed @ Shacknews
Sam Fisher surfaces on Twitter @ Joystiq
Steam BFBC2 SecuROM Removal Nears @ Blue’s News
While we are on the topic of driver updates today, make sure you check out our preview of the upcoming ATI 10.3a Catalyst driver update. Hit the link for the list of what is in, what is out and what AMD/ATI says you can expect from its next driver release.
That aside, it is great to see CrossFire support getting addressed in Eyefinity as well as the Bezel Correction feature. We are looking forward to seeing the user response on March 17th and if performance benefits are realized at the gamer level.
NVIDIA has just released new GeForce 197.13 drivers that take care of that fan speed issue that a lot of you were having. Grab the Windows XP 32-bit and 64-bit versions here and the Windows 7 and Vista 32-bit and 64-bit here.
NVIDIA apologizes to any GeForce owners that installed the 196.75 driver and experienced quality issues. For the small number of customers that did experience problems, in almost every case reverting back to our 196.21 driver immediately resolved their issues. We continue to work closely with our add-in-card partners and PC manufacturers to help resolve any additional customer issues not solved by reverting to the earlier driver. Any GeForce owner who has questions about their board as a result of downloading the 195.75 drivers should contact their board supplier.
The fastest site on the internet is the IRS. If you doubt these claims, just go there…and see how fast your money disappears. 
Performance monitoring service Gomez has released its annual list of major websites with the best overall responsiveness as measured by Gomez over the entire year 2009. Surprise winner: IRS.gov, a site that uses images sparingly and pushes off large documents to PDF format for downloading, rather than trying to serve them as Web pages.
Cases & Modding
Cooler Master CM 690 II Advanced Case @ Tweaknews
Thermaltake Element V Full ATX Tower Case @ Legit Reviews
Cooling
Thermaltake SpinQ Heatpipe HSF @ techPowerUP!
ETC.
JMicron JMF612 SSD Processor @ BmR
Power Supply
7-way 600W PSU Round-Up @ MadShrimps
Pictures of what is supposed to be a new Xbox 360 motherboard have popped up in the forums of a Chinese website. I know, I know, these could be totally fake…but they are still fun to look at. Notice the small heatsink for what appears to be a GPU and CPU combo?
The results of a new survey suggest that businesses are planning the move to Windows 7 soon. I guess IT departments are starting to realize you can’t stay on Win XP forever.
A new survey shows that businesses are increasingly planning their move to Windows 7, with more than half of those questioned planning to have some machines running the operating system in their corporations by the end of the year.
During an interview at SXSWi 2010, Twitter CEO Evan Williams said his company wants you to spend less time on Twitter.
"So we have no interest in just increasing the time you spend on the Twitter site – if anything we'd like to decrease it. We want to make Twitter a tool for you that helps you get stuff done."
Wow, I have heard some whoppers before but this one takes the cake.
Then he went on to say that he strongly suggested that I keep the tv service because come May 1, all of the online streaming services would be shut down because the cable TV providers are taking over, and that the FCC regulations are changing so that the cable companies will have total control over streaming video.
And the "can-o-worms" discussion of the day is brought to you by Microsoft’s Aaron Greenberg. While he may have a 100% valid point, there will no doubt be plenty of discussion from both sides on this one.
"We’ve just taken a different strategy. Sony bet on the physical disc, and there are costs associated with that," he told us. "The fact that we’re able to offer a console starting at $199 is a benefit of not being burdened with that cost. Being $100 cheaper is part of the reason why we’re nearly twice their installed base."
Facebook’s traffic has surpassed Google’s? Seriously? I find that fairly hard to believe but, if they say so, it must be true.
In a sign that the web is becoming more sociable than searchable, research firm Hitwise said that the two sites accounted for 14 per cent of all US internet visits last week. Facebook’s home page recorded 7.07 per cent of traffic and Google’s 7.03 per cent.
AMD today announced a robust lineup of forthcoming motherboard and channel products for the soon-to-be available AMD Opteron™ 6000 Series platform. This platform is based on the new AMD Opteron 6100 Series processor (code-named "Magny-Cours") and the AMD SR5690 chipset and will bring the world’s first 8- and 12-core x86 processors to the market.
Honoring the next generation of American innovators, Intel Corporation and Society for Science & the Public today announced the winners of America's oldest and most prestigious pre-college science competition, the Intel Science Talent Search. Erika DeBenedictis, 18, of Albuquerque, N.M., won the top award of $100,000 from the Intel Foundation for her project developing a software navigation system to help improve spacecraft travel through the solar system. Erika's research found that the gravity and movement of planets create "easy transit routes," which will ultimately help spacecraft move faster and with less fuel.
We get a few odd suggestions from our readers now and again but nothing like the folks that run the Pentagon’s website get…you know….like "Why doesn’t the government parachute bears onto Bin Laden?." 
"Overnight, Parachute some bears into areas [bin Laden] might be," the innovator wrote. "Attempt to train bears to take off parachutes after landing, or use parachutes that self-destruct after landing."
Cases & Modding
GMC H-80 Case @ Overclockers Club
ETC.
Mionix Naos 5000 Mouse @ Hardware Secrets
Novatech X1 CA Gaming Notebook @ HardwareHeaven
Overclockers UK Titan Goliath Core i7 Gamer System @ Verdis Reviews
Memory/ Storage
Thecus N5500 NAS @ Boot Daily
Wow, what are the odds of something like this happening? Thankfully I am not a crime scene investigator because you know who I’d blame…Steve Jobs and the iPod. Thanks to [H] forum member Derfman for the link.
He was enjoying a moment to himself on this resort island, jogging on the beach and listening to his iPod. Officials say the Woodstock, Ga., man neither saw nor heard what struck him from behind Monday evening: A single-engine plane making an emergency landing.