[H]ardNews 4th Edition

Albatron PX856PE Lite Pro:

What exactly makes the Albatron PX856PE Lite Pro i848P any different than a regular i865 mainboard? There is only one 64 bit memoy controller instead of the regular two on the i865. Check out the PCStats review for all the info, here’s a clip to hold you over:

The Albatron PX865PE Lite Pro which is based on the i848P chipset is built for those out there who are on a budget, or need a good solid board for office environments (ie. without breaking the bank). As the benchmarks suggest, when working on 2D applications (like word processing, etc) the board is approximately 5-10% slower which is not really too bad. In 3D apps, the performance gap is more like 10-15%, but even then the Albatron PX865PE Lite Pro does pretty well relatively speaking.

Shuttle’s P-BIOS:

Shuttle is boasting a 30% performance increase with its new P-BIOS. Damn, a free 30% from a BIOS upgrade? Sign me up.

Shuttle Inc, a leading provider of small form-factor (SFF) computers and mainboards, has posted P-BIOS with Turbo Mode. Design to improve performance on Shuttle's SB61G2, SB62G2 and SB65G2 XPC's by up to 30 percent (individual user results may vary). "P-BIOS gives user’s as much as 30 percent performance increases," said Stan Cheng, vice president, research and development, Shuttle Inc. "This directly relates to better game play, faster frame rates and increased overall performances."

MS Juicing Up Graphics?

You know, I am almost scared to even ask how Microsoft plans to “juice up” graphics in their next OS. But, the truth is they have far more graphics processing power available at the bottom end now than they used to 5 years ago. Things should be interesting to say the least.

The next generation of Windows will use a computer's graphical processing power to present everyday computer images in a manner typically reserved for high-intensity video games. Better use of the graphics processing unit, or GPU, inside a computer will enable much higher-quality visuals for programs on desktop PCs, said Rick Rashid, senior vice president in charge of Microsoft Research, during a presentation yesterday at the company's Professional Developers Conference here.

I got this in from one of our readers who talked about what “graphical changes” there will be in the next OS from MS.

You didn't hear this from me BUT I was at a presentation of Longhorn and talked to the presenter afterwards, he was running longhorn on a 3.06 ghz laptop. New title bars look like a transparent curtain waving in the wind, and it uses zero cpu power, all gpu. Although I'm not sure how useful it is, they showed a Media player whose window was a sphere.