CyberJunk86 schrijft: "HardOCP bevestigd nogmaals dat Asus niet verder gaat met de productie van Athlon Mobo's, ze beweren zelfs dat het nooit de bedoeling was om ze in de eerste plaats al te verkopen....":

Well we kicked up a little stink last night posting the information that we had received about the demise of the K7M from ASUS. While I have no way of verifying the truth of the statement it did come from a trusted source. That is all I can say. The K7M was never meant to be sold into retail channels anyway, hence the white box with not pretty pics on it

Yeah, right!....Dat ding zouden ze dus niet gemaakt hebben om via de normale wegen verkocht te worden! Waarom hebben ze dat ding dan gemaakt???? Stelletje intel likkers .

Martijn schrijft: "Ik lees op de frontpage bij AGN Hardware dat de shareware versie Gamespy 2.17 is gereleased. Nieuw is de support voor Wheel of Time en Nerf ArenaBlast. Downloaden kun je op deze page":

Asus heeft meer info losgelaten over hun V6600 Deluxe GeForce 256 kaart (met dat rotjoch op de doos ). Hieronder wat info.

There are a lot of innovative designs in ASUS AGP-V6600 series to prevent any dangerous condition when enjoying the world’s most powerful graphics card. The innovative SmartDoctor technologies from ASUS includes Fan RPM Monitoring, AGP Power Level Monitoring, SmartCooling technology, OverHeat Protection, and Dynamic OverClocking.

Fan RPM Monitoring
When you close your PC chassis, ASUS’ SmartDoctor technology is the only way to ensure you that the fan on the graphics chip is functioning well. The bundled utility reports the exact fan rotation speed with instant report features before the fan RPM breaks down or runs abnormally. So, ASUS offers this extra safety feature to the highest performance GeForce256 GPU card.

AGP Power Level Monitoring
Like high performance sport cars, which need more energy to run fast, the world’s highest performance GeForce256 GPU card requires very much electric power from the AGP bus. There must be a stable power supply from the AGP bus to all the critical components. ASUS’ SmartDoctor technologies can also detect the power level from the AGP bus to AGP-V6600 Deluxe card, including VIO and VCORE, to ensure the stability of customers‘ valuable system.

OverHeat Protection
Thanks to the intelligent monitoring design of the AGP-V6600 Deluxe, the user can safely run the AGP-V6600, even with overclocking, without worrying about overheat that damages your valuable card. With overheat protection, the GeForce256 GPU and other critical components are constantly monitored for temperature. If the heat condition is close to the dangerous level, then ASUS’ SmartDoctor technologies will kick in. This feature is also very important for bad “heat-flow” system but where overclocking may still be done.

SmartCooling Technology
ASUS also unveiled its new SmartCooling Technology in the AGP-V6600 Deluxe. It can optimize the card’s horsepower depending on the actual demands of the user’s applications. The SmartCooling Technology will automatically reduce horsepower of the AGP-V6600 to save power consumption to lengthen the card components’ life when the user does not need the full power of the AGP-V6600, for example, when typing an email and reading data file. If high performance is needed, then the full horsepower of the AGP-V6600 will automatically be restored to the user. This means there’s no performance compromise but the average temperature of the GeForce256 GPU and other critical components is lowered from 8 to 10 degrees Celsius than the competitor’s GeForce256 cards. The lower temperature also makes for a longer components’ life cycle to the users and adds reliability.

Dynamic OverClocking Technology
The overclocking is no longer a fixed setting with the ASUS Dynamic Overclocking technology. This technology can prevent excessive overclocking that can exhaust and shorten the GeForce256 GPU’s life. The new Dynamic Overclocking technology from ASUS can let you overclock in a dynamic way. The overclocking occurs only when you really need the horsepower to run high-speed graphics applications. For waiting state, idle state, interactive state, your AGP-V6600 Deluxe card should be able to take a rest. So, no more fixed overclocking, which is an outmoded and risky technology.

Shipping date and Pricing
The ASUS AGP-V6600Deluxe is scheduled for late November 1999 release, the retail price is USD299. Price and release date may change without notice.

Check 3D Spotlight voor de rest van de info.

Martijn schrijft: "iXBT heeft een best wel lange review van de Creative 3D Blaster GeForce 256 Annihilator online gezet. Ze verglijken onder andere de beeldkwaliteit met de Hercules TNT2 ultra. Ook staan er ontzettend veel benchmarks, oftewel een coole review...":

The new graphics chipset NVIDIA GeForce 256, which symbolizes a new era of 3D computer games, stood the first tests. This chipset contains huge potential and allows redirecting some routine calculations to the graphics coprocessor, which will undoubtedly let game developers focus on higher quality of gaming elements, introduce new effects (such as Cube environment mapping), increase the number of polygons used for scene striving for higher realism and more natural look of the created models. We can't praise NVIDIA GeForce 256 for the way it performed in the today's applications, especially in 32-bit color depth. Besides, NVIDIA Company proved very inconsistent in providing their drivers with the necessary options. However, you shouldn't miss out the fact that this new product costs much cheaper than the first graphics cards on NVIDIA Riva TNT2 Ultra. This advantage undoubtedly makes NVIDIA GeForce 256 GPU and the corresponding graphics cards a really attractive choice. Of course, we understand very well that the today's market is simply buried under the whole bunch of all sorts of graphics cards and it may appear very difficult to comfortably arrange a new transitional product there. You are probably wondering why we call it a "transitional" product, aren't you? In fact we are sure that in spring of the year 2000 the competition will aggravate even more. And tis upsurge won't be caused only by a new product from 3dfx, but also by a new improved NVIDIA GeForce 256 and some mysterious thing from Matrox. Well, let's have patience. Time will show everything. And in the meanwhile if you are longing for a graphics card on NVIDIA Riva TNT2 Ultra then why don't you change your mind and decide on a new NVIDIA GeForce 256 GPU?

N0SP4M schrijft: "Dynalink komt met een externe CD-recorder/writer. Hij lijkt wel wat op een discman, maar in feite is het een 24 speed CD-ROM speler en een 4 speed schrijver. Hij is hot swappable plug & play en is leverbaar in twee versies. Een PC-Card en een USB versie.

Jammer, dat hij niet kan rewriten, maar het is op zich wel een makkelijk ding voor op school. Als ze daar nu Windows 2000 gaan draaien (nu NT4) en nog meer PC's met USB aanschaffen (er zijn er al verschillende) dan kan je alles wat je download gelijk branden . Ff pluggen en branden maar .":

Soon Dynalink will come with a portable CD-recorder/writer. The MiniCDRW424 is about the size of a Discman and works as a 24 speed CD-Rom drive and 4 speed writer. This hot swappable and Plug & Play device will be available in two versions: A PC-Card version and a USB-version (also suitable for Mac)!!

Invasion schrijft: "Yamaha heeft nu ook een 8-speed writer / 4-speed rewriter op de markt gebracht. Informatie is alleen nog maar te vinden op de Duitse site, in Japan en Amerika zijn ze nog niet op de hoogte van hun eigen uitvinding ":

8-ung (let op de Duitse humor/woordspeling) YAMAHA gibt Vollgas.

Die CRW 8424 Serie

Höchste Performance in allen Bereichen. Mit 8- facher Geschwindigkeit brennt der CRW8424 auf CDR Medien, das heißt eine CD ist in 9 Minuten fertiggestellt. Ganze 18 Minuten in 4- facher Geschwindigkeit benötigt der CRW 8424 um CRW - Medien zubeschreiben. In 24 - facher Geschwindigkeit werden CD - Daten ausgelesen. Der 4 MB - große Buffer und die SCSI 3 - Schnittstelle gewähleisten ein optimales CD - Brennen.

8fach CDR / 4fach CRW / 24fach lesen, SCSI - 3 ( Ultra SCSI ), 140 ms Zugriffszeit 4 MB Buffer, Komplett - Kit mit WinOnCD 3.6, Packet CD 3.0, SCSI- / Audio- Kabel Montage Kit.

Beyond3D heeft een vergelijking van de Plam V en Palm IIIx online gezet:

I really like the design of the Palm, it's easily portable and both have good styling. Out of two I personally prefer the V, but each person will have their own reasons to decide which is the best. The Palm Pilots are excellently designed and fast. Not having to wait for a PDA to boot-up should not be seen as desirable, it should be essential and 3Com have covered that.

The range of applications available for the Palm platform is astounding, if you want a specific program, then it probably exists. The drawback is, because of the format of the Palm console applications are basic, functional but basic.

As a PDA the Palm platform excels, just don't expect it to make coffee for you, a PDA is what you get, nothing more, nothing less. The reason for this is the choice of PalmOS over something like WinCE, but this eliminates the boot-up time and allows the Palm to be faster in operation than any of it's competitors. There are downsides to the platform though. Don't expect it to do anything too complex, you can take notes, but you can't write Word documents.

3D Wars heeft een artikeltje in elkaar geschroefd waarin ze de internet performance van een Windoos en MacOS doos vergelijken. Als benchmark werd i-Bench van ZD Labs gebruikt:

While running the tests, all PCs utilized Windows 98 and Internet Explorer 5.0 as their testing standard. All Internet connections were done off of Ethernet cables, emulating the office environment. First of all, the iBook was taken a look at. Weighing in at 300MHz and 64 MB RAM, this notebook fared the worst of all the Macs tested by ZD Labs. While loading a text based page, the iBook performed 73 percent slower than a Dell Notebook counterpart. While loading a page such as this (images, text, banners, etc), the iBook loaded the page 63 percent slower than the same Dell system. When moving up to the iMacs, the performance level got a bit better. While running the G3 at 400MHz, the iMac loaded up text based pages roughly 50 percent faster than its Celeron and K6 counterparts. However, once we brought the ball up to the Pentium 3 and Athlon level, the whole game turned around for the PCs. The iMacs' processors did not even run fast enough to compete with the blazing speed of a P3 at 733MHz. The fastest G3 was nearly 84 percent slower than the fastest P3. Thus, this would not at all be a fair test.

Mijn eigen ervaring is dat er met de G3's (ook iMacs) nog best wel redelijk ge-internet kan worden (dwz: een simpele P200 voelt sneller). De oudere Macs met 200MHz 603 proc gaan _bagger_traag, daar kun je hooguit mail op checken (niet schrijven, die toetsenborden zijn zwaar klote - wat dat betreft zijn de iMac/G3 toetsenborden een grote verbetering).

Alex van Kaam heeft een nieuwe versie van Motherboard Monitor uitgebracht. Hier de soep van Betanews:

Alex van Kaam sends his word of the bug fix of the memory leak in Motherboard Monitor. This program will try to access one or more of the following chips: LM75, LM78, LM78-j, LM79, LM80, WinBond W83781D, WinBond W83782D, WinBond W83783S, WinBond W83627HF, Asus AS99127F, GL518SM, GL520SM, ADM9240, ADM1021, ADM1020, MAX1016, MAX1016a, FMS2701, VIA686A, THMC10 and THMC50 on your motherboard and will try to provide you with information about your motherboard's temperature, voltages, fan speeds and cpu temperature.

MBM 4.12 kun je hier naar beneden lepelen.

Ik lees bij Storage Review dat Fujitsu een stel nieuwe SCSI en ATA drives op de markt heeft geplant:

Fujitsu has joined the flurry of new product announcements with its finally-named "Enterprise" series of SCSI drives. The Enterprise 36LP MAK3364LP, in particular, sounds sweet. This 10k rpm unit features 7.3 gigs per platter, a 4.7 ms seek time, and a 4 meg buffer. Also announced was the 7200rpm Enterprise 18LP MAH3182LP. This unit features 9.1 gigs per platter, a 6.8 ms seek time, and a 4 meg buffer.

Finally, the value-oriented MPF3153AT was announced. This 5400rpm ATA-66 drive features 10.2 gigs per platter, a 9.5 ms seek time, and a 512k buffer. [break] Hier wat spul uit de press release: [/break] Fujitsu, one of the world's leading suppliers of hard drives and computer peripherals, today introduced its new family of enterprise hard drives, including five new models designed for optimal performance and product quality in enterprise computing environments. Designed for the most demanding server and workstation applications, the Enterprise 36LP Series, with a 10,000 RPM spindle speed, provides the industry's fastest maximum internal data transfer rate at up to 62.5 Megabytes (MB) per second. The Enterprise 18LP Series, targeted toward the entry-level server market with a 7200 RPM spindle speed, leverages Fujitsu's technology expertise and design efficiency to offer unparalleled value without compromising quality or performance.

"With the introduction of our new enterprise hard drive family, Fujitsu has once again succeeded in raising the bar on hard drive performance and overall product quality," commented Paul Hansen, vice president of storage products, Fujitsu Computer Products of America. "This product introduction reflects Fujitsu's firm commitment to meeting the diverse needs of our enterprise customers by offering a full range of features and functionality."

The Enterprise 36LP Series: Setting a New Standard for

Performance The 10,000 RPM Enterprise 36LP Series consists of three new hard drive models at capacity points of 9.1, 18.2, and 36.4 Gigabytes (GB). In addition to offering the industry's fastest maximum internal data transfer rate of up to 62.5 MB per second, the series is available with fibre channel or Ultra3 SCSI interfaces. As the industry's leading-edge interface technology, Ultra3 SCSI boasts domain validation, cyclical redundancy checking and a 160 MB per second host transfer rate, ideal for performance-oriented computing environments.

Further, because today's high speed computing processes and bandwidth-hungry applications require faster, more efficient access when reading data, Fujitsu has improved the average seek time on the Enterprise 36LP Series drives to 4.7 milliseconds. The new enterprise drives feature a larger multi-segmented buffer, at 4,096 Kilobytes. Enterprise 36LP Series evaluation units will be available for OEM customers starting in the first calendar quarter of 2000, with volumes shipments targeted for the end of the first calendar quarter of 2000.

XV10: Solid Performance and Value

Leveraging Fujitsu's technology expertise, combined with its vertically-integrated manufacturing model, Fujitsu's new XV10 entry-level desktop drives provide solid performance to meet the needs of today's low-cost consumer PC applications, such as Internet browsing, e-mail, and other basic computing functions. Additionally, with an industry-leading transfer rate of up to 37.8 MB/second, access time of 9.5 ms, and a leading desktop areal density of 7.8 Gb/in2, the XV10 family allows high-speed access to large files, such as digital audio or video, movies, animation, Internet caching and other data intensive entertainment and business applications. A 512 KB buffer and non-operating shock tolerance of 250G also enable these drives to offer peak performance and data protection capabilities.

Crucial to the world's top entertainment device manufacturers, Fujitsu's entire XV10 family provides high-capacity storage with excellent acoustic levels made possible by a unique top cover design first introduced on Fujitsu's mainstream desktop series. The top cover design reduces sound levels to as low as 3.4 bels, making the drives ideal for home-entertainment applications.

These one- and two-platter drives contain a number of proven, cost-optimized features, including an innovative motor, actuator arm, and pre-amp design, as well as modular C++ code and a reduced chip count. These design enhancements and new architecture allow Fujitsu to achieve maximum efficiency without compromising functionality. To that end, the new value-oriented XV10 desktop family is an excellent storage solution for low-cost PC and entertainment device manufacturers, offering optimal performance, excellent reliability, low acoustic noise and competitive specifications.

Geplande prijsverlagingen van Celeron processors gaan niet door omdat Intel kampt met leveringsproblemen, zo bericht The Register:

According to one manufacturer, who declined to be named, supply of Intel processors is pretty poor at present.

He said that Intel had made some Celeron cuts at the end of last month, but the expected cuts have been postponed because of the supply problem.

Intel's introduction of its Coppermine parts has generated huge demand from the market at every level, including PC vendors, distributors and consumers, the manufacturer said.

But there is a dearth not only of the new Coppermine parts but also of Slot 1 parts too. That means that Intel is quite happy to generate additional margin while demand for its parts is high. On the other hand, the manufacturer reports that there is a healthy supply of AMD's would-be Pentium III killer, the Athlon K7.

Ga'ash Soffer van Voodoo Extreme heeft een preview van van de S3 Savage2000 gepost:

Every S3 announcement has always been followed by skepticism. The Savage 2000 announcement is no exception. Unfortunately, the skepticism seems to be warranted. The first announced product, the Viper II, is only clocked at 125mhz. This means 500mtex/sec max fill-rate, hardly more than the GeForce 256. Also, according to other previews, performance is lower than expected and there are many image quality quirks. nVidia does an excellent job with there drivers; 500mtex/sec peak product will have a very hard time beating a 480mtex/sec GeForce. Couple the Savage2000 with S3's great reputation of living up to their spec sheet (sarcasm), things aren't looking good.

Verder heeft Ga'ash een leuke berekening waaruit blijkt dat de memory bandwidth van de Savage2000 te laag is om een fillrate van 300-400MPix/sec (multi-textured) mogelijk te maken. Lees de preview hier.

Bij Sharky Extreme is een review gepost van de Sound Blaster Live! Platinum. Hieronder wat over zijn geluidskwaliteit t.o.v. de Live! en de MX300.

When evaluating the sound quality of the SB Live! we compared it to both the original 1998 SB Live! product, as well as Diamond's 1998 MX300 PCI audio card.

After running the various cards in a battery of areas we found that in the arena of wave-table synthesis, as well as in EAX-supporting 3D applications, there was a definite improvement acoustically with the SB Live! Platinum card versus either of the two previous parts.

Much of the improvement is likely due to driver optimization as well as an improved manufacturing process versus the older cards. In more mainstream areas such as DirectSound and DirectSound3D both of the SB Live! cards and the MX300 performed similarly, with each producing accurate sound sourcing.

In MP3 and wave playback the three cards also tied in terms of subjective acoustic ratings, but the advanced Mixer and reverb functions of the SB Live! cards allows for more customization of the sound playback than the MX300's built in equalizer does.

ZDNET heeft onlangs 3D WinBench 2000 gereleased waarmee je de 3D performance van je poeter kan meten. Versie 2000 maakt nu gebruik van DirectX 7 waardoor ook de T&L performance van bv. de GeForce 256 gemeten kan worden. Een paar benchmarks vind je hier. Om 3D WinBench 2000 te downloaden moet je hier wezen, het proggie weegt 92MB.

Het vervolg op het bekende Theme Park is inmiddels klaar en ligt binnenkort in de winkels. Hieronder een hap uit de press-release van Electronic Arts. Check ook even de officiële site, die is erg mooi gemaakt .

A simple and intuitive user interface makes building and experiencing SimTheme Park a snap. Players can create amazing roller coasters and log flumes with the flexible track-building interface, and build exciting go-kart and water-rapids complete with crossovers, jumps, tunnels and more. Combine that with a huge selection of other rides, from the wacky to the traditional, to create a unique and fantastic park. Try building a bloodcurdling five-loop roller coaster and dare the customers to climb aboard, or lay down the lava fountain to spice things up a bit. A helpful advisor gives instant feedback to help create a successful theme park.

Players can construct their park from four different themes; Space Zone, The Lost Kingdom, Land of Wonders and Halloween. Each theme features a breathtaking variety of rides, concessions, and attractions to build from. With SimTheme Park there is a new thrill around every corner.

After designing the most gut-wrenching roller coasters imaginable, players can jump right in and ride their creations first hand. Only SimTheme Park allows players to take their thrilling creations for as a test ride. The best way to judge whether you need more loops, steeper drops or faster turns is from the front seat and only SimTheme Park puts you there. Would-be park managers must be careful not to design rides that are too extreme, though, or the visitors might get sick.

Apache van Voodoo Extreme heeft op GameFan een preview gedumpt van Half-Life Opposing Force. Hier wat info over de add-on:

Opposing Force sports over forty new levels, divided up into six episodes. With a dozen multi-player levels contracted by the top names in the business, like Ritual’s Richard “Levelord” Grey, Richard “zdim” Carlson, and Eric Reuter (who’s working on the Unreal PlayStation/PS2 project) and many more. Plus, free downloadable Team Fortress Classic levels designed especially for the expansion in mind!

To fill all of these new levels, there are almost a dozen new non-player characters, and nine new types of aliens to frag. Besides the usual mix of Half-Life creatures, there are some mutations of the originals and all new beasts that are much more interesting than those you’ve faced before. On the human side, you’ll go head to head against black-suited commandos, rogue human forces and more. Still not enough to get you interested? Let’s take a look at the new and improved weapons at your disposal.

In all, there’s a whopping 23 weapons available in Opposing Force. Nine new alien-crafted and terran guns are here, but the one I liked the most was the M-249 SAW (Squad Automatic Weapon). Ever imagine yourself being “Rambo” with a heavy belt-fed machine gun? Well this is the one you’ve been waiting for. Other new guns include the Desert Eagle handgun, spore launcher, shock roach, the displacer, wrench and more. All the weapons in Half-Life are also contained in Opposing Force.

De gasten van GA-Source hebben een review opgehangen van de Aureal Vortex SQ2500 soundcard. Hieronder wat info over zijn performance in Unreal:

With a four-speaker setup this card made games sound incredible. In Unreal some of the effects were just phenomenal. Being able to tell which direction those bullets are coming from is definitely a plus. I was surprised no one came along to tell me to turn it down because I was blasting everything so loud.

One of the things that I really appreciated was the cards ability to do the Doppler affect. Since Aureal maps the sound from the source, you actually get to hear the bullets whiz past your ear instead of just hearing the sound they make when they hit the wall behind you. Even though this may not seem like that big of a deal, when taken in conjunction with all the other added affects A3D 2.0 supplies it can completely change the way a game is experienced.

Unreal can be a pretty creepy game at times, but not anything that would make you hide in the corner and suck your thumb for hours. When I first played Unreal with the SQ2500 I was amazed. I was actually on edge, listening for sounds that might indicate a spider around the next corner. The sequence in the first mine where the lights go out was a whole new experience. This is what game immersion is all about.

Lees de review hier verder.

Geez, Hard OCP meldt dat Asus erg binnenkort zal stoppen met hun Athlon mobo, de K7M. Oorzaak: onderdrukking door Intel . Thanks Carnifex voor de tip.

It came to me from a pretty good source in Taiwan, that ASUS will STOP SELLING THE K7M Athlon mainboard very soon. It was directly told to me that this comes under pressures from Intel.