In a move that really leaves me scratching my head, Microsoft has decided to change their Genuine Advantage program for Windows Vista. Currently, if you go to download certain updates or software from Microsoft, the Windows Genuine Advantage application checks your computer for signs that the operating system is pirated.

If Microsoft believes that you have a pirated copy of Vista, the current implementation stops the Aero interface from working and disables some programs.... [Read More]

DigiTimes

780i (Intel) chipset due to trickle out in December with production ramping up in January

Looks like early boards will ship with DDR2 support and DDR3 will come later.

I don't know if DDR3 will really matter though, as Intel is launching a new chipset in early 2009, so it's like you may as well wait for that chipset before moving to DDR3 if you ask me. :p

My favorite anti-virus company has finally fixed the one complaint I had with their product. Not really that big a deal to some, but NOD32 from Eset consistently comes out near the top or at the top of independent testing. It's a nice small footprint product that doesn't hog resources and runs almost completely silent. It's updated multiple times a day, and the tech support I've received from Eset has been top-notch.... [Read More]

the link takes you here where it breaks down all the reports by 'most popular types' of x, y and z.

Interesting to see who has run 3dMark and reported and what the most popular stuff is. Not terribly surprising, we pretty much knew this stuff, but still interesting to see. :)

I've been doing a bunch of research today for a build, and thought I'd post a few notes that I learned.

The best SATA DVD burner:

Samsung SH-S203B, usually around $34
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16827151153.... [Read More]

Probably old news to some, but this article explains why everyone is confused about temperature reporting for Core 2 Duo and Quad CPUs:

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/22...perature-guide

It is fairly technical.

Both ATI and Nvidia will be fighting over the marget segment that falls between the 8600/2600 level and the 8800GTX level.

Nvidia is launching an 8800GT 512MB which should perform about on par with an 8800GTS for less cost. ATI is also releasing the 2950 which should outperform its predecessor by a healthy amount, run cooler, use less energy and cost less.

Both cards should launch between the end of Oct. and the middle of Nov.


http://www.vr-zone.com/articles/AMD_..._Nov/5298.html
http://www.vr-zone.com/articles/Rade...v_19/5307.html


http://www.vr-zone.com/articles/Nvid...0_GT/5299.html

http://www.techarp.com/showarticle.aspx?artno=454

The QX9650, to be released on November 11, is a $1000 quad-core CPU that won't be of interest to readers of this forum, but the dual-core E8500, E8400 and E8200 that will be released in January 2008 will be, for they are replacing the current E6850, E6750 and E6550, and outperforming them by 10 to 25 percent across the board due to higher clock speeds and larger L2 caches.... [Read More]

Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 ST31000340AS 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM $335

Heard about the 7200.11 drives about a month ago, and it has finally hit newegg! Back then it was supposed to have a $400 price tag, but $335 makes it 33 cents per gig, which makes it not all that more expensive than the 7200.10 drives, which are around 25 cents per gig.... [Read More]

A very complete list of all desktop CPUs:

http://www.techarp.com/showarticle.aspx?artno=337

The AMD chips can be found on the first page, Intel chips start on page 5.

That's right, we just heard about PCIe v2, it isn't even on boards yet, and now they have announced v3.

PCI-SIG Announces PCI Express 3.0 Details

Although it will be finalized soon, they estimate it won't show up in the market until 2010-2011.

Newsletter

A new "G9" (corded) mouse. The new one has changeable grips. (Which I expect will have more faceplates. About damn time someone considered this for mice.) Up to 3200 dpi :eek: But good god, I have my high setting at 1600 dpi. I have no idea why you'd want faster than 2000. :eek: Custom LED coloring... oooh sexy. :D
... [Read More]

rabb1t and I have updated our recommendations to the most current and up-to-date computery goodness. The industry is in a rather slow time as innovation goes, and it's a great time to buy if you're thinking of pulling the trigger. Check out rabb1t's and my choices, and let us know what you think!

All the various builds can be accessed from here.

Where's The Physics: The State of Hardware Accelerated Physics - an article that catches peeps up on the current state of hardware physics acceleration. Ageia's Physics and GPU based physics are discussed.

The Inquirer and a few other sites are reporting controlled leaks from AMD about the upcoming Fusion processor... AMD's first processor with CPU and GPU in the same package.

http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=41208
http://www.digitimes.com/bits_chips/a20070723PB211.html
... [Read More]

It seems that the SetPoint software Logitech uses for their mice/keyboards/gamepads has been updated to a version 4.0. I only discovered this because I skimmed an article about the new 7 button G5. My version 3.whatever was not updating to the new 4.0. After downloading the new 4.0 version from the website I had to "add/remove" the 3.whatever software, restart the system, then install the new 4.0 version. After that it wanted a tiny patch to get to the newest new version.... [Read More]

Anyone else seen this issue? Tom's Hardware seems to have found what seems a rare problem that happens when you combine Vista with the 150 gig Raptor and an Nvidia series 7 or 8 GPU.

If you have a setup that would qualify and run fine, or have problems, let me know. ... [Read More]

DailyTech - Microsoft Readying Vista SP1 Beta for mid-July

Looks like what we heard about SP1 making out out by the Holiday season is correct. :D

Price drop went into effect. Check out the new AMD CPU pricing

Looks like NewEgg already has the new prices going.

http://www.digitimes.com/NewsShow/Ma...ges=PD&seq=222

Today on newegg, the E6700 is $317 and the X6800 is $973 (there is no E6500 or E6800). $317 minus 40 percent ($126) is $191.... [Read More]

:pirate: Ahoy thar maties. Greet ye the Black Pearl...

Evga 680i Black Pearl Motherboard - Intel 680i chipset motherboard pre-equipped with liquid cooling bits on all chipsets and a CPU block.... [Read More]

Well, I waited a little too long...but things are up to date once again! :)

Check out the new systems and tell me what you think.
... [Read More]

Intel's new chipset, the P35, features support for 65nm CPUs, 1333Mhz FSB and DDR3 RAM. It is a replacement of the P965 chipset, so it will have only one PCI-E 16x slot and can have one PCI-E 4x slot. Southbridge is ICH9, which includes 12 USB slots and 8 SATA2 slots.

http://www.neoseeker.com/Articles/Ha...asus_gigabyte/
... [Read More]

Looks like AMD is planning a new brand name, and the long-running Athlon brand will be retired first in the high-end with the new architecture later this year.

So what's the new name of these monsters designed to fight back against the Core 2 Duo? The AMD Phenom (pronounced Fee-nom).
... [Read More]

Well, I played around with the texture quality setting...and the completely WEIRD way that Vangaurd acts continues to baffle me.

I have absolutely no clue why the engine is like this. It doesn't react like it should at all... what you would expect when changing graphical settings based on what you see in every other game in the world is NOT what happens with Vanguard.

I've got a system that was top of the line about 18 months ago... or at least in terms of a good value high-end gaming system. It's by no means a slouch.... [Read More]

Ok, the recommendations are updated. Some cool changes...and some that might seem a little weird.

I moved to DDR2-800 on all three systems now...the prices have come down and there's no reason not to. It really isn't going to perform any better than the slower stuff...but considering it's roughly the same price I can't see a reason not to go with the DDR2-800. Just make very sure the voltage is right...the DDR2-800 can sometimes require a higher voltage than the motherboard will supply by default, and you'll have to set it manually.... [Read More]

Looks like Intel is still working up to DDR3 later this year, as well as their new E6x5x line revision bumping the FSB speeds up to 1333 with their new P35 chipset.

DailyTech article

No news on other chipsets using DDR3 or faster FSB speeds, but I'm sure we'll see them / hear news about them in H2'07.

Ok, I'm going to start this as a sticky and then add to it as I write things up. My first Basic Windows optimization guide is finished... You can read all my long-winded blathering right here -

The Official Fozzik's Hardware Happy Windows Guide Of doooom!!!
... [Read More]

AMD/ATI have released a new version of their video drivers. Version 7.1 comes with some bug fixes and also the ability to do DirectX video acceleration using Crossfire setups. You can download them here.

News out of CES is that Nvidia has another version of the 8800GTS on the way in mid February. This new card will carry the same GPU with the same number of shader units along with the same memory and GPU clock speeds as the current 8800GTS. The only difference will be the size of the RAM, and the price tag.
... [Read More]

Nvidia released the 97.92 drivers today, specifically for the 8800GTS and GTX cards. It looks like quite a few bug fixes have gone into this release, so it may be worth trying them out. You can download them here. I know they've been available for a while...but WHQL certified is always nice.... [Read More]

Not a lot of big changes this month, although the $1500 system gets a new power supply (thanks for turning me on to Corsair)and a new motherboard, and we have a little weirdness going on with X-Fi soundcards. Namely, the XtremeMusic is now only about 3 dollars more than the XtremeGamer, and the Fatal1ty is all the way down to $125 with it's onboard RAM.

These are likely the last recommendations before Vanguard launch... [Read More]

Looks like a new Intel quad core, the "Core 2 Quad Q6600", is at the edge of mainstream affordability. It is set to launch at an ~$850 price tag and settle into it's true price range of ~$550 price range within the next few months.

Looks like the holiday season '07 would be an ideal time if you want to jump onto that quad core train.... [Read More]

Well, the NDA is lifted and pretty soon a whole lot more people will be able to test the power of their rig against the beautiful beast that is the Vanguard graphics engine. I wanted to create a place where folks could come and post up their own performance (and the hardware and settings they are using). If nothing else, it should help the n00b to the game get some idea of what average performance is, so they can pinpoint problems or troubleshoot.

I've been playing Vanguard for more than a year now, and have had acceptable performance on Very High texture settings the whole time.... [Read More]

Today marks the launch of ATI's refreshed lineup in the high end. The X1950XTX is the new top dog, but if a big leap in performance is what you are looking for, you may be a bit disappointed.

ATI's new cards do have some very attractive features, though.... [Read More]

You may want to check out the $1.5k recommendation... big changes.

It was only a matter of time, and I'm really excited about what I was able to do and still stay right near the budget. This system should make any gamer happy happy happy.

Check it out.

We know that ATI has a refresh of its graphics lineup (at least the performance parts) on the way in the next couple weeks. The X1950XTX will be the new top of the line, the X1950XT is set to compete in the mid-range, and now the rumor is that an X1950pro will also be released at the same time.... [Read More]

ATI's first DirectX 10 compliant GPU (codenamed R600) is going to be an updated version of the unified shader core which powers the Xbox 360. The latest rumors out of Asia are claiming that R600 will be stuffed with 64 full physical unified pipelines, making it dramatically wider...and more powerful...than current solutions even from a pure pixel-pushing standpoint.

If this turns out to be true, Nvidia's new G80 (which is set to release before the R600 from ATI) will have to be a big step up in order to compete.... [Read More]

Dell and AMD are both officially announcing what we've heard from the rumor mill for quite a while...the relationship isn't just servers, isn't just laptops, it's the whole fairy tale.

Within the next few months, we will be seeing desktops, notebooks, and a wider lineup of servers...all from Dell and featuring AMD processors. According to the latest news, Dell has put in orders for somewhere between 1.8 and 2.0 million AMD desktop systems... which is a sizable percentage of their annual PC sales.

There have been rumors and more solid bits of info floating around for quite some time about ATI's refresh of their X1900 lineup. We've known this was coming, and it was scheduled for the end of this month.

From what I've been able to gather (if I'm not mistaken), the refresh will involve two cards at first, I new top-end part (X1950 XTX) and a new mid-range (X1950 XT).... [Read More]

Hopefully you won't shoot me. :D

I sat down last night determined to spend the time and get the recommendations updated. After a lot of checking prices, performance, value, and a lot of staring blankly at the wall...I was able to put up two recommended systems, both still AMD.

At the $1k and $1.5k price points, as of right now, AMD is still offering the better overall value.... [Read More]

As I've been reporting, and we've been discussing, for quite a while now, AMD has slashed prices on its entire lineup of desktop processors in order to maintain price and performance competitiveness with Intel.

The new prices can be seen on AMD's website here.Although some of the price cuts aren't quite as large as was being reported, almost all have been cut significantly, and there are some extremely good deals to be had.... [Read More]

Well, it appears to be official. Although the big announcement appears to be scheduled for 8am this morning, I think I can now confirm as fact the rumors which have been flying around for a few months...AMD has purchased ATI.

On the surface, this deal might make very little sense.... [Read More]

DailyTech is reporting here on what might be the new price lineup for AMD's processors, as of the 24th of this month. Techreport also has a useful chart here which shows the potential new prices compared to the Conroe lineup from Intel.
... [Read More]

Considering Intel's massive campaign of hype leading up to yesterday's announcement, these new processors should really come as no surprise to anyone. What is exciting is that we now have independent confirmation from just about every hardware site on the web that in the case of Conroe...you can believe every bit of the hype.

It's been a long time since a great architecture debuted, and really moved the bar upward in terms of value. Intel's little Israeli design team - the one responsible for the great Pentium M architecture - have brought us another winner.... [Read More]

The Inquirer is reporting that a potentially serious issue has appeared with Intel's new architecture. It appears that with certain RAID configurations and controllers, the Core processors cause some serious issues.... [Read More]

The Inquirer is reporting here that certain super secret info leaks point to Dell and AMD inking a rather significant deal, which applies to much more than the previously announced 4-processor servers.

If true, you may be seeing AMD desktops and laptops from Dell as soon as the fourth quarter of this year.... [Read More]

The Inquirer is reporting that AMD may have a trick or two up their sleeve after all for the Conroe launch. The rumor is that all AM2 CPUs have been equipped with a technology which effectively works like Intel's Hyperthreading in reverse - namely it will make two cores work as a single core for applications which are not multi-threaded.... [Read More]

Well, It appears our first real look at Conroe is now up for all to see at PC Perspective.

The results shouldn't come as too much of a surprise, the Conroe's two top speed grades are going to be faster than anything AMD will have on the table... [Read More]

AMD made several very interesting announcements at their technology analyst’s meeting today, and gave out some more juicy details on what's coming.

First and foremost, AMD has announced the 4x4 platform. This has been floating around the rumor mill for the last couple days, and in some ways just seems outright silly...but it appears it's going to actually become a reality.... [Read More]

Well, it's the day. Although most sites don't seem to have their articles up yet...it's just a matter of a few more hours and we'll see all the exhaustive testing and evaluation we can possibly stand.

With Intel letting the Core cat out of the bag so early, they did do an effective job of lessening the punch of today's launch to some degree. But even without taking Conroe into account, this is one of those platform moves that will only really become exciting as future technology is fleshed out.... [Read More]

Well, the timing couldn't be stranger, but it appears that the impossible has finally happened. Dell is planning to begin offering Opteron-based servers.

Nobody is more surprised than me...this move makes very little sense (on the surface at least) for any number of reasons.... [Read More]

Turns out there do seem to be issues with the X-Fi and certain platforms, namely the Nforce 4, working together in high-end gaming systems.

It appears the issue is related to the latency of main memory accesses, and only occurs in certain situations. It shows up as crackles and pops in the audio.... [Read More]

As the excitement builds for E3, we are used to seeing a few companies try to beat the rush and get their press releases out before the noise really starts. As with last year's E3, the consoles are most likely going to take center stage, and Sony decided to have a little get together on Monday.

Although the Playstation 3's specs and pricing have been a much-debated topic, with delays and conflicting information, we now finally have the official word.... [Read More]

Intel is showing off logos today, and releasing the naming scheme for the new Conroe, Merom, and Woodcrest processors. As usual, "scheme" is a very apt description.

Although it might seem slightly less confusing on the surface, the new names don't do much to help your typical computer buyer understand what they are getting.... [Read More]

In light of the newest developments between Sigil, Microsoft, and Sony Online Entertainment, a topic came almost immediately to my mind. I wasn't the only one, and the question that is probably on a lot of your minds too was asked on the official Vanguard Forums.

Now that Sigil has purchased the publishing rights from Microsoft, is there the possibility of a version of Vanguard on other operating systems besides Windows?... [Read More]

Anandtech has the low-down here.

Their conclusion is a lot like what we've been saying here... it's a definitive "wait and see". ... [Read More]

In what may be a very smart move by Intel, it appears their next-generation Core processors will be backwards compatible with at least semi-recent Pentium 4 motherboards. This is somewhat of a break from the status quo for Intel, and perhaps more proof that they really are finally "getting it", at least when it comes to desktop processors.... [Read More]

Anandtech has a great article up today comparing the architectures of the Athlon 64 and the new Intel Core. The article goes into a bit of depth, but keeps things simple and understandable. One thing that becomes very clear is that the Core architecture is definitely much more a descendant of the Pentium III and Pentium M chips. ... [Read More]

A little tidbit over at the Inquirer has the ring of truth...Microsoft may very well be hard at work on a hardware-accelerated physics API.... [Read More]

In an article at ZDNet today (here), CEO of Intel Paul Otellini discusses a large restructuring within the company. He also talks about the upcoming launch of the Core architecture.

It appears from the article that the dates are relatively set, and that Conroe's release will be in July. We may not have nearly as long to wait as I had thought before we can really see what these new chips will do.... [Read More]

Today, Intel announced the newest in their ever-increasing set of computer system brands, VPro. Designed to gather market share into a central and recognizable name, and maybe just squeeze out a bit more competition in those pesky platform markets, the new VPro brand is supposed to do for corporate and business what Centrino did for mobile computing. ... [Read More]

It appears that AMD may be moving up the launch of their new socket and the processors that go with it. Perhaps they finally decided that the 6/6/6 release date might be a bad luck omen after all, and the new date appears to be sometime late in May, possibly May 23rd.

Although the much-anticipated launch may be a little disappointing to some who were looking for a massive leap of Conroe-killing performance, the fact that AMD seems to be on track with production and able to roll the new technology out a bit earlier is a good sign.... [Read More]

The Inquirer is reporting that the first PhysX boards, built by BFG, are in the wild and available for sale. I haven't seen them up on any US sites yet, but it's probably only a matter of a few more days.... [Read More]

There are a few ATI tidbits floating around the web, and possibly some good news for those die-hard fans of CrossFire. Techreport has a blurb up about ATI's new southbridge, the SB600, and also a mention that the Radeon Xpress 200 chipset may be getting a new name.... [Read More]

ATI and Nvidia, in their age-old struggle for supremacy in the graphics market and a place in your PC, are never content to rest on their past efforts. Video cards improve in almost every way at an astounding rate, which doesn't appear to be slowing at all.

Both ATI and Nvidia are settling into their current parts, which are really refreshes of the X1800/7800 generation.... [Read More]

Not like we didn't see this one coming...but it looks like Nvidia has decided to start pulling the rug out from under ATI's slow crawl into the desktop motherboard business.

After Nvidia purchased ULi, the chip manufacturer who has been supplying the south bridges for the current moderately successful ATI motherboards, we knew it was just a matter of time before Nvidia started turning the screws.... [Read More]

Intel looks to be pushing for standardized and modular notebook components. This would allow for much easier upgrades and repairs, and maybe even allow buyers to customize their mobile computer to a much greater extent.

More here and here.

You asked for it, you got it! (I bet you'll be more careful what you ask for next time. :eek: )

I go into some depth about how LCD monitors work, how to pick them out and research... and the common pitfalls that might arise when shopping for a monitor.... [Read More]

Well, I'll be the first to admit when I'm wrong... All the way up until today, I was posting and believing in my hardware-infested soul that physics acceleration didn't make a lot of sense for an MMORPG. Whether it makes sense or not, it looks like we're going to see it.

A joint press release today announced that Vanguard: Saga of Heroes will utilize the PhysX processor from Ageia to accelerate not only client-side physics, like spell effects, but also potentially server-side, for collision and vision calculations.... [Read More]

Nvidia will be releasing their update to the 7-series tomorrow, and it's looking like it will be very fast along with carrying prices that should make users very happy.

Although this launch is not a new graphics processor, it does mark Nvidia's first 90nm production parts, sports some architectural improvements, and should make Nivida much more competitive again performance-wise.... [Read More]

The Pentium is dead, long live Core!

Intel announced today at the Spring 2006 Intel Developer forum that their new architecture would be known simply as Core. I'm not sure they could have thought of anything more boring...it's like naming your dog... dog.

But it is looking like the name is definitely going to be the only boring thing about these new *cough* Core cores.... [Read More]

The Inquirer has the latest round of leaks and rumors from the Intel camp on the performance of Intel's new architecture (codenamed Woodcrest, Merom, and Conroe). Check the story out here.

According to whatever little birds The Inquirer is talking to, these new processors should put Intel back in a commanding position on the desktop - they are affirming a 20% performance advantage through the end of the year.... [Read More]

Extremetech has an article up today which really helps explain what's going on with the power requirements for dual graphics cards. It turns out that providing max power is likely not the issue with many good power supplies...having an unbalanced load is.

It seems you can fix power-related shutdown issues in a lot of cases simply by spreading the load more evenly across the rails.

It's a great read, check it out here.

Next week, FSP (formerly Fortron/Source), a well respected power supply manufacturer, is planning to debut a power supply specifically for graphics cards.

This new addition will fit into a standard 5 1/4 drive bay, will be powered from the wall outlet, and will push 300W and 25A over a +12V rail, specifically for graphics cards.... [Read More]

There's some more concrete information around the web today about AMD's next socket, the processors that will launch with it, and the memory it will support. It looks like good news for performance enthusiasts all around, although we'll still have to wait for hard numbers to see what kind of additional oomph AMD can offer with this new platform.... [Read More]

ATI's newest powerhouse is being officially released today, and the rumors are that stock will be available at plenty of online stores. Most sites don't have their reviews up yet as I write this, they probably have to wait until noon or a bit after for their NDAs to run out.
... [Read More]

Western Digital has just released two new hard drives, the WD1500 and the Raptor X. Both these drives carry the 10,000 RPM spindle speed of previous Raptors, but they have moved up to 150GB in size, they've been packed with 16MB of cache, and have Native Command Queuing support. The Raptor X also comes with a bit of a twist.... [Read More]

It looks like ATI and it's partners are finally releasing the eagerly awaited X1000-series master card, which will allow two X1800XT's or XL's to be linked together for Crossfire.... [Read More]

I posted up the second part of my "How-to" guide on building a computer. Check it out, and tell me what you think!
... [Read More]

Not a particularly busy week, once again...but there are a few things I grabbed onto. First off, let's talk about Intel and the possibility of them getting back into the performance race through the back door.... [Read More]

Anandtech has a review/preview here of a possible upcoming product from Nvidia that could be very nice. The 7800GS already exists internally at Nvidia, but there's no word yet on when or if it will ever be released.

The card looks like it could provide great value in the price window between the 7800GT and the 6800GS... [Read More]

I'm just going to blab for a bit, explain a few things...maybe rant about this and that. This may end up being a weekly thing, we'll have to see if I have anything to say next Friday.

Well, our first week of Fozzik's Hardware is in the bag. It's been a relatively slow week news-wise around the industry, besides the release of the 7800 Ultra (oops, I mean GTX 512MB). I do have a few tidbits that I didn't really think needed their own news item.... [Read More]

Doing my normal cruise around the hardware websites today brought up lots of stories about Nvidia's new card...but there was another story (a few days old) that caught my eye.

Not so much the story itself, because the fact that AMD CPUs are superior for gaming has pretty much been beaten to death by now. What is intriguing is one particular game that was benchmarked. ... [Read More]

Unless anything really unexpected happens, Nvidia today has announced what will be the fastest video card for the rest of this year. The Geforce 7800GTX 512MB has showed up in reviews all over the web today, as well as in various online stores with enough quantity to still be in stock.

The web reviews are pretty much unanimous, and it should come as no surprise...This card is ungodly fast. It is also mind-bogglingly expensive at the moment, but people wanting the best of the best seem to be willing to pay an ever-increasing premium for that short-lived honor.... [Read More]

Well, this is hardware and I am...you guessed it...Fozzik. As you can see, I've already written a couple articles on PCI-Express and Dual-core to get the site started. Also, check out the first two recommended systems, my "laws of gaming hardware", and my links page.

I'm really excited to have the opportunity to do this, and I'd love to make this page a very useful service to the Vanguard community. Feel free to visit the forums and give me suggestions, advice, or just bring up a new topic or ask a question. The more useful and factual information we can get combined into one place, the better this resource will be. I'll be learning right along with you!... [Read More]

A while back I reported that Nvidia had decided to not release an "Ultra" version of their 7800 series. Nvidia has been sitting comfortably on top of the performance graphics heap for several months now, and with ATI's hardware becoming a final reality, Nvidia knew for sure what their competition would be for this round of the war.

But, as many might expect... Nvidia hasn't been sitting on their hands this entire time waiting for ATI to release the R520. ... [Read More]

Today marks the official launch of ATI's next-generation graphics lineup. Strictly speaking, we should really call it "current-gen" instead of next-gen, since for all intents and purposes this product cycle started 6 months ago...and Nvidia has had their products in stores for nearly all of that time.

I don't want to start my comments on too much of a downer, so I'll talk about the R520 parts themselves, and get to the availability a bit later. ... [Read More]

There have been a few more developments from everyone's favorite Canadian graphics chip company, ATI. First off, in case you haven't seen them around the web, ATI has begun a countdown ad campaign, showing roughly 6 days remaining. This is most likely a countdown to the launch of at least some of their next-gen line of graphics processors (maybe all, meaning R520, RV530, and RV515). ... [Read More]

Those crazy Canadian graphics folks with their snazzy red printed circuit boards may finally be launching a next-generation graphics chip in the next month or so.

More details have been floating around the web, and after seeing some things from several different sources, I suppose it's time for an update to the most recent and widely reported set of unconfirmed rumors. ... [Read More]

Sun Microsystems this week announced a new line of x86-64 servers based on AMD's Opteron and dual-core Opteron processors. It seems that at some point, Sun realized what most people probably already knew...Opterons and the platform they run on are quite a bit better than Xeons and their platform in almost all respects. More Bandwidth and strong architecture means higher performance, along with lower power consumption and less heat produced. These startling revelations, and the new lower-cost servers based on the chips, have left Sun Microsystems in a rather silly mood. ... [Read More]

Extremetech.com has a very interesting article up today. They have made an attempt to better assess how processors perform in games, by actually playing said games and recording the results.

The reason this isn't normally done is because it's impossible to get a repeatable test when you just play the game, you can run around the same way, but AI and physics calculations (among other things) are going to be different every time. Extremetech attempts to compensate for this, in order to give a different (and perhaps more true-to-life and important) indication of how Intel and AMD processors perform when it matters.

Check it out...the results aren't very surprising, but it does provide an interesting new view at what you can actually expect when you play the games. The article is here.

Today is the first day of the 2005 fall Intel Developer forum, and it hasn't taken long for the big news to break over the web. Intel has announced their next CPU architecture, and it looks, at least in a general sense, like they are making strides in the right direction.

It is generally accepted, even among Intel employees these days, that the Netburst architecture of the Pentium 4 has run out of steam. We could debate all day long about whether it was ever a very smart architecture at all, but that's beside the point. It carried Intel for several years, and kept them competitive at the least... In some cases it kept them on top of the performance arms race with their chief rival, everyone's favorite underdog, AMD.

After the realization that Netburst was net-bursting with overly high power requirements and barely manageable levels of heat finally sank in with Intel, they went to work in earnest on what would come next. Today we finally get a glimpse of their hard work over the past months, namely a new unified CPU architecture which focuses on higher performance while using less power. ... [Read More]

One of the weird and truly geeky things that I often do is head over to CompUSA to browse around and pester the sales associates. I love asking them questions I know they can't answer...but I almost never buy anything. Generally, their prices don't come close to what you can get online.

With something like computer cases, it's always nice to see them in person and get a feel for what they are like before buying them. I've been working on deciding about what computer case to get (as you all probably know) and I had narrowed it down to two or three choices. I decided to go up to CompUSA today and see if they were stocking any of the ones I was interested in, so I could touch them and sense their mojo.

They happened to have all three in stock, amazingly enough. So I'm standing there taking one of them apart, getting a better feel for the interior layout... and I glance at the price sticker.... [Read More]

With almost every new motherboard coming with fairly fancy sound chips onboard (or at least a fancy codec), many people may yawn or wander off at the idea of a new soundcard technology. What would anyone need that for? I'd ask the same question, and often I have enough trouble just convincing people that a discrete soundcard is a good way to go in a gaming system.

For more than 10 years, Creative Labs has been making soundcards based on basically the same technology. The SoundBlaster processor has seen many improvements and changes, but it's basically the same technology today that it was then. It's about time we had something really new, don't you think?

Within the next couple months, Creative will be releasing four new soundcards based on a completely new sound processing chip, called the X-Fi...and I have to be honest, it only took a few of the details on this new technology to wake me right up.
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For those of us waiting on buying a new video card, there may still be hope that there will be a choice to make in the high end (and mid-range as well, it appears).

ATI finally appears to be ready to start giving up a little information about their next-gen architecture...perhaps the manufacturing problems have finally been nipped in the bud. I wouldn't exactly call it a tidal wave of facts, though... at any rate, those of us interested in having a choice of what video card to buy will take what we can get in the info department.
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Strangely it's almost yawn-inducing at this point, but Nvidia has done a hard launch again, and the high-end graphics market just got a little more interesting. The truth of it is that these are damn good parts Nvidia is putting out. What seems to be taking the luster off of things a little bit is the huge gaping hole where the competition should be. Nvidia is squarely on the top of the market all alone…and I'm sure there are others like me who are getting a little sick of waiting for ATI's answer… especially since ATI "announced" their R520 more than a few months ago.

Basically, the 7800GT is a slightly lower-performing, and therefore lower priced, version of the G70 (7800GTX). It's already in stores online for around $400, and it seems almost every company is overclocking it from its default core and memory speeds to bring it even closer in performance to the GTX.
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This may be the first time we've seen official word that Sigil is playing/testing using AMD processors. Although it shouldn't be too surprising, considering the Athlon 64's dominant performance in games, it is very reassuring. ... [Read More]

Word around the web is that on the 11th of August, Nvidia will release a lower-priced version of their new-generation graphics processor.

What I'm reading is that the 7800GT will have 20 pipelines, run at 400MHz with 1GHz memory, and will be priced to move at $399. $400 is much more reasonable than the $600 price tag for the GTX, and all signs point to the 7800GT outperforming the 6800 Ultra.
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Hello!

I'm so thankful to Oloh and the other members of the Silky Venom staff for giving me the opportunity to try out the idea of a hardware page.

Who am I? I'm just a gamer who spends way to much time learning everything I can about computer hardware. I played with computers professionally for several years, and now I build the printed circuit boards that make up all the guts of computers and other devices.

What I would really like to end up with is a section where as much hardware information as possible is brought together and presented in a readable, understandable, and interesting form… with a focus on gaming computers and Vanguard.

I'll need all the help I can get to make this work. Any and all comments, suggestions, gripes, corrections, questions, disparaging remarks, and anything else are most welcome!

It may be a little while before the webpage goes live, but I'm already working on some of the articles and content. If anyone has a suggestion for an article, or a question they would like to see answered either here or on the new page when it goes live, ask / suggest away.