Asus ENGTX460 OirectCU TOP

The GeForce GTX 460 from Asus came in too late to make it into last month's roundup, but we couldn't pass up the opportunity to get a closer look once we saw the angular heatsink shroud paint­ed blue with white pinstripes, evoking the iconic Shelby Cobra.

Under the hood, Asus overclocked the GF104's core clock to 775MHz, which is a full 100MHz higher than the stock clock of the 1 GB GTX 460. The memory clock also got a boost from 1,800MHz to 2,000MHz. The shroud covers a substantial aluminum finned heatsink with three heat­pipes, and as we hinted above, it's one of the more attractive we've seen. However, because of its open design, some of the heat this card generates ends up circulating throughout the case. But because the GTX 460 is the twice removed second nephew to the silicon-boiling big daddy that is the GF 1 00 Fermi, heat is not an issue you need to worry too much about. The backplane of this dual-slot card features a pair ofDVI ports and a mini HDMI port. Bundled extras include a 4- to 6-pin PCI-E power connector, a DVI-to-VGA adapter, a DVI­to-HDMI adapter, and a CD wallet.

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In Win Dragon 81ayer

Meet an mATX mini tower in the vein of Frank Frazetta. This Dragon Slayer is just an airbrushed side-panel mural away from total awesomeness. In Win says that the hexagonally per­forated steel motif is meant to evoke chain mail. We see in it ye olde hex pa­per, much beloved among turn-based gaming nostalgists.

Breezy is the Dragon Slayer. Beyond its quartet of included fans, its perforated and filtered side panel has rubber mounting grommets for up to four more 120mm blowers. There's another paneled vent on the floor to accommodate your bottom­feeding power supply.

 

In Win pulls off a largely tool-less design here. The pin brackets for the drives have twist locks that are color-coordinated with the fan rotors, grom­meted drive rails, and expansion card retainers. The consensus around the lab calls the hue matte neon yellow, if not chartreuse   The front SuperS peed USB 3.0 connector termi­nates in a long cable meant to loop out the back through a rubber-lined hole, thence to mate with an unattached and suitably fast female port, such as on the motherboard or a daughtercard.   two Hi-Speed USB ports and the usual HD/AC97 jacks round out the front gallery. Slaying any dragon requires adaptability, and thus In Win allows you to repurpose the drive bays in a number of ways. Rest assured that if you need to mount an SSD or prefer to use multiple burners, you're covered. The hardware packet even includes several incon­spicuous, peel-and-stick cable tamers . by Marty Sems

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Bigfoot Networks

 

 

Bigfoot Networks may not be a household name among general PC consumers, but in hardcore gaming circles the company's gaming net­work cards have earned a solid reputation, including the company's latest effort, the Killer 2100. Unlike "dumb" NICs that cause "huge, unpredictable latency spikes" during gameplay, Bigfoot states that the Killer 2100 "has latency in microseconds" thanks to its NPU (Net­ work Processing Unit) that offloads game data from the CPU and Windows. The card evidently impressed Alienware enough for the game system builder to announce in mid-August that it's offering the Killer 2100 in Aurora, Aurora ALX, Area- 51, and Area­51 ALX systems. Alienware's Frank Azor stated the NI C-system combo "represents a lethal combination-maximizing performance for more frags, faster leveling, and higher scores.

 

You know about Moore's Law and the power-consumption, pro­gramming, and architectural roadblocks making it more difficult to double the number of transistors on an integrated circuit approxi­mately every two years. So does DARPA. Thus, the agency recently announced a UHPC (Ubiquitous High Performance Computing) program that "directly addresses major priorities expressed by Pres­ident Obama's 'Strategy for American Innovation,'" including the exascale supercomputing Century Grand Challenge, energy-efficient computing, and worker productivity. With the goal to "reinvent computing," UHPC will involve developing "radically new computer architectures and programming models that deliver 100 to 1,000 times more performance" but are easier to program than present sys­tems. Intel, Nvidia, MIT, and Sandia National Laboratory have been tabbed to build UHPC prototypes by 2018.

 

Samsung's BD-C8000 ($499.99) may very well be the "world's first portable Blu-ray player with 3D capability," but don't get too excited just yet. Although the netbook-Iooking BD-C8000 will give you 1080P HD video on its 1O.3-inch screen, what it won't give you is 3D viewing while on the go. For that ability, you'll need to connect the player (HDMI 1.4a integrated) to a 3DTV. On the plus side, the BD-C8000 does build in Wi-Fi and is Netflix-ready. It also includes 1GB built-in storage and access to the various goodies that make up Samsung Apps (YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, Pandora, etc.). Battery life, meanwhile, is rated at three hours .

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The Mac Pro Upgrades

Apple's desktop workstation, the Mac Pro, now features up to 12 CPU cores for what Apple says is a 50 percent performance improvement on its predecessor. "In terms of the processor, we're adding Intel's latest generation Xeon technology, the Westmere generation of products," says David Moody, Apple vice president of worldwide Mac hardware marketing, referring to the Intel code name for the processor line. The new chips feature a 32-nanometer process that can fit up to six cores on a single die.

The new Mac Pro features a pair of either quad-core or six-core Intel Xeon processors, with up to a 12MB Level 3 (L3) cache and speeds ranging from 2.66GHz to 3.33GHz. "The combination of the cache and the integrated memory controller provides outstanding memory band­width and improved memory latency," Moody told Macworld. The new Mac Pro also features Turbo Boost, which allows the system to dynamically boost CPU speeds up to 3.6GHz, and Hyper-Threading, which allows the system to create up to 24 virtual cores. A first for the Mac Pro line, customers can slip a 512GB solid-state drive (SSD) into one or all four of the drive bays. By filling all four drive bays with SSDs, users can create a striped RAID. The ATI Radeon HD 5770 graphics card with 1GB ofGDDR5 memory is now Custom Rig Apple says that there are 1.3 billion possible configurations of the Mac Pro.

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Barnes & Noble’s Nook: More Than the Basics

 

DON’T WRITE OFF Barnes
& Noble’s Nook (bn.com) as
just another e-reader. @is is
no thoughtlessly slappedtogether
oEering—it’s the
bookseller’s attempt to capitalize
on all the mistakes it
believes Amazon has made
with the Kindle, in the form
of a better product at the
exact same price.
In the Nook, all of the
things you’d expect—Wi-Fi,
an online bookstore, the
ability to mark notes—are
paired with unusual features,
such as a touchscreen, a color
navigation display, and a way
to lend e-books to friends.
Its $259 price is important
at a time when e-readers are
trying to break into the
mainstream. @ough Amazon
popularized e-readers,
rivals such as iRex, Plastic
Logic, and Sony are trying
to muscle in. Sony oEers
three diEerent models, with
progressively better features
and larger screens. @e other
two companies are vying for
customers with deep pockets,
oEering a magazine-style
experience on screens the
size of computer paper.
In contrast, the Nook is
geared toward the average
user. It isn’t a high-priced
business tool, and it isn’t
feature-deXcient, either. But
it does give the e-reader
market a kick in the pants.
Here are just a few of its
most intriguing features।
Big Battery, Decent Storage
BARNES & NOBLE claims that the Nook lasts ten days on a charge.
It’s not clear how the company arrived at that calculation and whether
Wi-Fi was on for the duration, but it’s safe to say that you could
take this device on a long flight. As for storage, the Nook’s 2GB can
carry up 1500 e-books, same as the Kindle.
Powering the Nook is Android 1.5. Users can stop reading on the
device and then resume on select BlackBerry and Motorola phones
with a free Barnes & Noble e-reader application. I also like the ability
to load photos onto the Nook to serve as screensavers.
Touchscreen Navigation
NOT ALL OF the Nook’s screen
is touchable. The top portion is
a regular E-Ink display, but the
bottom part is like the touchscreen
of a smartphone, allowing
you to navigate menus and
giving you a virtual keyboard for
typing in your notes.
By including a color touchscreen,
the Nook stands out
next to the bland gray hues of
other e-readers. When you
browse through your library,
the e-books scroll by in a way
reminiscent of the iPod’s Cover
Flow feature. The Nook also
works as an MP3 player.
The Form
THE NOOK MEASURES 7.7 by
4.9 by 0.5 inches, giving it similar
dimensions to the Kindle
(Amazon’s product is a little
taller and wider, but slightly
thinner). The actual screen real
estate, however, is the same 6
inches after you account for the
navigation touchscreen.
Accessorize!
IT’S NOT UNHEARD of to throw a
cover on an e-reader to make it more
book-like, but the Nook is getting
fancy with contributions from Kate
Spade New York, Jack Spade, Tahari,
and Jonathan Adler (pictured). With
Nook in hand, you just might become
part of the newest fashion trend. 

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V3 Gaming PC Avenger

 

v3 Gaming PC is a new boutique startup that was created by employees who previously worked at Vigor Gaming. V3 Gaming tells us they're working with vidia on its 3D Vision compliance, and by the time you see this review, it's likely V3 Gaming wiLl be selling systems with 3D Vision Surround capabilities. At press time, V3 offered three systems: the Avenger, the Convoy, and me Crave-with me Avenger being the top-of-the- line model. Our Avenger is certainly a luxury build, as it features two Zowc GeForce GTX 480s in SLl and a Zowc GeForce GTS 250 for dedicated PhysX processing. Other lavish hardware includes an Intel Core i7-980X running at 4GHz, two 80GB Inrel X-25M SSDs in RAID 0, 6GB ofDDR3-2000 RAM, and an Antec Twelve Hundred case with a black vinyl wrap that both proteas and adds to the look of me system. V3 Gaming points out that you can remove the vinyl wrap and paint the base chassis if you prefer to mod me exterior of the system. We found that the darkness of the black vinyl exterior, which is nonreflective, en­hanced the appearance of the blue light­ing effects inside the case. There are blue LEDs in the three 120mm fans in the front of the case, me two 120mm rear exhaust fans, and the 200mm fan at me top of the case. The mass of lights created a dim blue haze over the syscem interior, Cable routing was smartly done, and we like mat me builder covered some of me brighdy colored cables with electrical tape . V3 Gaming performs both me over­clocking and RAID setup as a free ser­vice. The Avenger sent to us featured an Asus PGX58D-E motherboard with a GGbps SATA interface, and with the Intel X-25M RAID 0 setup, me sys­tem was able to deliver a 308.4GMbps transfer speed in me Physical Disks test of SiSorrware Sandra 20 I 0 Lice. The Avenger was a strong gaming PC, with 81. 7 fps in Dir 2, 10G.97fps in Far Cry 2, and 42.4fps in STAL.K.E.R.: Call OfPripyar. Our only qualm with the Avenger was the amount of heat coming from the graphics cards. We would have expect­ed a fan on the side panel near the graphics card, but V3 Gaming opted not to use one. And when we put our hand on the Avenger's side panel, we could feel that the whole side panel was warm. That being said, we didn't experience any overheating issues during our benchmarking or burn-in tests, and V3 Gaming backs every sys­tem with a three-year warranty. Performance of me Avenger was top­notch, and we like that V3 Gaming offers overclocking free, a practice mat some boutique builders have gone away from. We also expect that V3 Gaming wiLl offer a wider variety of systems in the near future

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HP buys Palm

 

 

HP, one of the largest computer manufacturers in the world, has bought smartphone manufacturer Palm for $1.2 billion (around £800 million), paying £3.80 per share. The transaction has been approved by the boards of directors at HP and Palm and is expected to close by 31st July, pending shareholder and regulatory approval The deal will also see HP inherit Palm's estimated £270 million of debt, which will be paid off using Palm's cash assets.

Rumours surrounding the struggling smartphone maker were swirling long before HP formally announced the acquisition. In fact, ever since the Palm Pre smartphone received a lukewarm market reception, industry pundits have said it was a target for acquisition. Reports suggested the company was working with Goldman Sachs to find a buyer.

The firm's critically acclaimed WebOS mobile operating system was seen as Palm's prized asset and heavily influenced HP's decision to go ahead with the acquisition. HP said the combination of its "global scale and financial strength" with Palm's webOS platform "will enhance HP's ability to participate more aggressively" in the smartphone and connected mobile device markets. HP is no stranger to the smartphone market, having produced a variety of Windows Mobile-based iPaq smartphones for business users, which weren't particularly successful While the deal provides a lifeline for Palm, it remains to be seen whether HP can take two fairly unsuccessful smartphone business units and reinvigorate both companies' offerings, enabling them to compete on a global scale. The major competition for HP and Palm will come from Apple's hugely successful iPhone and the rise in popularity of handsets based on Google's Android operating system. Both are relative newcomers, so it will be interesting to see how Palm manages to compete with HP's backing. Brian Humphries, senior vice­president of strategy and corporate development at HP, said HP plans to "double down on webOS" and intend to "scale it across multiple connected devices". Palm chairman and CEO Jon Rubinstein said he was "thrilled by HP's vote of confidence in Palm's technological leadership" and said the computer manufacturer was "the perfect partner to rapidly accelerate the growth of web OS". During the conference call following the acquisition's announcement, Todd Bradley, executive vice-president of HP's Personal Systems Group and the man tasked with overseeing Palm's integration into HP, There have been suggestions that HP will drop Windows 7 from the HP Slate, a Tablet PC unveiled by Microsoft's Steve Ballmer earlier this year, in favour of webOS. A report on TechCrunch.com claimed that the decision had already been made because of disappointment with the performance and usability of Windows 7 in a touchscreen-only environment. These suggestions haven't been confirmed by HP, however, and it's not even clear if the HP Slate is still coming to market. However, it's unlikely that HP would release the Slate with webOS instead of Windows 7, as the two platforms have such widely different hardware requirements. HP chief executive Mark Hurd later announced that webOS would be making its way to both slate form factor devices and - somewhat bizarrely - web­connected printers soon after the deal has been closed, but didn't mention the Slate's fate. The move to webOS on the company's Tablet devices would, in many ways, make good sense: one of the major reasons Apple's rival iPad slate has proved so popular is because of its custom-built streamlined operating system. For every user who bemoans at its limitations there are 10 who are happy that it is fast, attractive and just works. In contrast, HP's original decision to use Windows 7 would result in a more flexible - but more complicated - device. Of course, if H P can afford to develop two different slate platforms, there's no harm in that. Windows-based tablet PCs haven't enjoyed much success in the past, though, and, even with Windows 7's specific touchscreen optimisations, it's still an operating system primarily designed for keyboard and mouse inputs. Palm was one of the earliest smartphone manufacturers and has one of the most complex corporate histories ever. Palm originally created the Palm Pilot PDA and was acquired by US Robotics in 1995. US Robotics was bought by 3Com in 1997 and spun Palm off as its own entity in 2000. Palm then split itself in two: PalmOne became the handset manufacturer, while Palm Source was responsible for maintaining the operating system. To further complicate matters, several key members of the Palm board of directors left in 1998 to set up Handspring, a Palm OS PDA manufacturer. Handspring was purchased by PalmOne in 2003 and then, in May 2005, PalmOne bought all the rights to the Palm name and once again became Palm. In recent times, the company has struggled against rivals such as Apple, HTC and BlackBerry manufacturer Research in Motion.

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