Diederik ICQ'de me een linkje naar LCDproc, een errug cool Linux en Win32 proggie dat via de seriële poort een LCD aan kan sturen. Langs deze fiets kun je bijvoorbeeld erg leuk de uptime en load op je kast displayen:

LCDproc can use any of the serial ports you've configured in Linux. Like an external modem, it uses your 9 pin or 25 pin RS-232 port. You can specify which port to use on the command line, as well as what value the contrast should be set to.

Currently, LCDproc runs on several platforms, including Linux, Windows, and several other unixes. The display server, LCDd, runs on more platforms than the lcdproc status client.

Other ports will be available whenever anyone decides to port lcdproc. We've already gotten it running on all the platforms the maintainers have access to, so other ports will have to be contributed.

insane schrijft: "Intel zal volgende week op 27 februari de PIII 850 en 866 uitbrengen. Dit is één dag voordat AMD de prijzen fors naar beneden gaat gooien. Toch leuk hoe ze elkaar het leven zuur maken. Intel heeft tevens de Celeron 733 paraat gebracht en kan deze inzetten wanneer ze willen":

According to our information, Intel will play the catch-up game with suddenly virile AMD by introducing 850MHz and 866MHz of Coppermines on the 27th. How many of these processors will be available then is a different matter.

Unfortunately for Intel, we also understand that AMD can, if it wishes to, jump over the 866MHz barrier by releasing its 900MHz Athlon any time it wants.

Meanwhile, our colleagues at German magazine PC Professional have posted information that shows a 733MHz Celeron Intel is readying is being positioned directly against AMD Athlons. But, they report, for the first time the K7 has appeared in the Intel roadmap. Cough.

Dat Celeron 733 verhaal is vreemd want je zou verwachten dat Intel eerst de Celeron 550 tot 700 door de markt laat uitmelken, alvorens naar 733MHz te springen.

The Heatsink Guide brengt het blije nieuws dat ThermalTake binnenkort met een socket370 heatsink op de markt komt die qua design vergelijkbaar is met de HP Polar Logic (thanks TrickTrac voor de tip):

A new heatsink manufacturer has entered the market: Thermaltake. Their first product will be a Coppermine-compatible Socket heatsink, which looks very interesting. It uses a design that is similar to the HP Polarlogic design, but unlike the HP Polarlogic heatsinks, the productions of Thermaltake's heatsink does not involve CNC milling, which means that they can be produced at affordable price.

De site van ThermalTake biedt op dit moment nog weinig zinnige info over deze cooler.

The Register meldt in dit artikel dat de deuren van de CeBIT beurs in Duitsland gesloten zullen blijven voor internetjournalisten, inclusief Dr. Thomas Pabst en journalisten van Reuters. Alleen diegene die als journalist werken voor een magazine kunnen vrij toegang krijgen tot de beurs die over een paar dagen van start zal gaan. Hieronder een gedeelte uit het bericht:

Online journalists will be banned from next week's CeBIT trade show in Hannover, Germany.

According to the powers that be at the Messe, writing for the Internet is no proof of being a reporter.

So if it ain't in print, it ain't worth the paper it's not written on.

So far as British Web journalists are concerned, only those bearing a membership card from the National Union of Journalists (NUJ) will be allowed past the front barricades.

Their print counterparts will, however, be allowed to waltz in without the NUJ card -- which costs £228 per year -- by merely flashing the magazine they work for.

CeBIT's ruling affects online journalists from all over the world, including Dr. Thomas Pabst, CEO of Tom's Hardware Guide, the world's biggest hardware review site, with 1.1 million readers per month.

"It's ridiculous," he said, "that CeBIT is banning all online publications, just to stop small amateur fan sites from getting into the show for free."

It doesn't matter how many CeBITs you attended in the past: if you're an online journalist like The Register's Mike Magee, a 12-show veteran, you're still banned. Unless you wave your union card, of course.

And it doesn't matter how famous or well-established your title is: a Reuters journalist would not be let into the show without an approved press pass, Gaby Doerries, a CeBIT representative, said.

Getting daily by-lines for news stories on the Web is no proof of being a journalist, she told The Register. "Everyone in the world is able to make an online magazine, so it's not proof. Anyone can write down that they are an editor-in-chief."

This discrimination against online journalists means that CeBIT organisers are deciding which press can and cannot attend vendors' stands and presentations.

With exhibitors' fees running into thousands of pounds for each, they are obviously banking on as much press coverage as possible -- both print and online.

Wapzer wilde even kwijt dat 3dfx nieuwe Windows NT4 reference drivers in elkaar gezet heeft voor Voodoo3 2000 / 3000 en Banshee videokaarten. Hieronder de info van de Voodoo3 drivers:

What's new in 1.04.00

1. Fixed problem with OpenGL failing WglMakeCurrent call.
2. Fixed performance issue in StarCraft.
3. Fixed problem with Age of Empires
4. Fixed problem with Age of Empires 2

[break]En hier de updates voor de nieuwe Banshee drivers:[/break] What's new in 1.04.00

1. Fixed issue which caused a slowdown with some Glide and OpenGL applications.
2. Fixed issue with Unreal not running with OpenGL.
3. Fixed issue with Quake 3's brightness control being grayed out.
4. Fixed issue with pulsating circles around edges of jump pads and lighting around skull being corrupted with Q3 test.
5. Fixed issue with fog not correctly displayed on Q3 Test.
6. Fixed issue with Quake 3 Smoke trails and other alpha blended effects that caused frame rate to slow to near zero.
7. Updated OpenGL with miscellaneous bug fixes.

Security Focus meldt dat iemand het voor elkaar gekregen heeft om tussen de extreem ranzige en trage perl code van het populaire Ultimate Bulletin Board (nog steeds in gebruik op ons eigen forum) een bugje te vinden:

Infopop's Ultimate Bulletin Board software (often referred to as UBB) is a popular web board package written in perl. Because of errors in regular expressions that check form input values, it is possible to execute arbitrary commands on a server running UBB. In ubb_library.pl, the variable $ThreadFile is added to the end of a string passed to the open() call (as a filepath) for writing data to the UBB web server's filesystem. Regular expressions are used to make sure the variable data is in proper format:

if ($ThreadFile =~ /\d\d\d\d\d\d\.ubb/)

and in the commercial version:

if ($ThreadFile =~ /\d\d\.[m|n|ubb|cgi]/) { Unfortunately, the regular expressions do not require that ".ubb" be the end of the strings, which means that extra data can be included after ".ubb" and the value will still match the expressions (if $ThreadFile is crafted properly) and be passed to open(). The value for $Threadfile is obtained directly from a "hidden" html form variable called 'topic', making this a remotely exploitable vulnerability.

Thanks xoror voor de link.

JeroenB schrijft dat K7M.com gelanceerd is, een handige site voor de Asus K7M bezitter waar je info, reviews en patches kan vinden over je favoriete Athlon moederplankje. Er is ook een UBB forum aanwezig waar je met je problemen en tips e.d. terecht kunt:

Well, the site is finally completed! This site should turn out to be very informative and helpful to those looking into buying and those who already own an Asus K7M motherboard. We have all the files and reviews you could want, but most important are the FORUMS. The forums will be where the community goes to help each other along on the K7M and other motherboards.

Mace Death Kill schrijft: "AllAdvantage heeft toch maar besloten om hun succes uit te breiden naar diverse andere landen. Nederland is nu 1 van de gelukkigen. In Amerika is Alladvantage al een zeer groot succes geworden, ze betalen 50 dollarcent (89cent) per uur als je online bent, en 10 dollarcent (18cent) per uur voor een door jou aangemeld lid.

Aangezien hier veel tweakers zitten die toch wel bijna 24/7 online zijn, kunnen ze zo nog een beetje hun abbo's eruit halen (Ik heb em er zelf al ruim uit!)"

Voor meer info, check even de website van AllAdvantage!

Jargo schrijft: "Op de site van de Nederlandse ISDN nieuwsbrief kwam ik het bericht tegen dat ISDN Always on definitief niet door gaat. Er komt nu een soort ISDN pre-pay (Block of time) waarmee van te voren belminuten ingekocht kunnen worden":

De ISDN-dienst Always On komt er niet. De kosten om het netwerk geschikt te maken voor deze dienst zijn te hoog. Always On gebruikt het D-kanaal van een ISDN-aansluiting voor datatransport.

[...] ISDN in combinatie met Always On leek in eerste instantie belangrijk te zijn voor ISDN in de concurrentie met ADSL, omdat ISDN in combinatie met Always On net als ADSL een vaste verbinding geeft.

Block of Time moet daarom straks het gat met ADSL gaan vullen. Met Block of Time kunnen ISDN-gebruikers vooraf voordelig een vast aantal belminuten inkopen. Zij kunnen vervolgens zelf bepalen wanneer zij die belminuten opmaken. Nadere gegevens zoals hoe deze dienst er precies uit gaat zien en wanneer deze dienst wordt geïntroduceerd zijn nog niet bekend.

Milenko schrijft dat Bill alweer een patch klaar heeft staan voor Windows 2000 die een heleboel applicaties en vooral games werkend moet krijgen onder Windows 2000. Op deze page kun je de betreffende titels vinden en de update installeren.

Windows 2000 was specifically architected to enable customers to easily add additional application support after the product had shipped for general release. The February 2000 package is the first release of such additional application support and includes software compatibility updates for Windows 2000.

During product compatibility testing prior to release, Microsoft focused on the top volume business applications (thousands of applications run out-of-the-box). With that testing complete, as you can see below, we are now broadening our original focus and have addressed some minor compatibility issues with a few of the more popular home/entertainment/gaming applications. [break] Naast de compatibility update lees ik nu dat er ook een critical update gereleased is. Hieronder de problemen die gefixt zijn in deze patch:[/break]

• Year is Reported Incorrectly on a Non-Gregorian Calendar."
  This update resolves a VBScripting problem where the year is reported incorrectly when using the Wareki or Taiwan date calendar. This problem does not occur if using the Gregorian calendar. This is not a Year 2000 problem, as it affects all dates. For more information on this issue, please visit Microsoft Knowledge Base (KB) Article Q253342.
• "Corrupt Files Generated When Saving as .htm To HTTP Server From Word."
  This update resolves a potential data-corruption problem that can occur when saving files as .htm to an http server from Office 2000 programs, including Word and Excel. For more information on this issue, please visit Microsoft KB Article Q252633.
• "Malformed Hit-Highlighting Argument Security Vulnerability."
  This update resolves a vulnerability that could allow a malicious Web surfer to gain unauthorized access to view files if running Web services and file indexing services. For more information on this vulnerability, please visit Microsoft Security Bulletin MS00-006.

[break]Als laatste nog een handige lijst met links naar Windows 2000 drivers, vers geript van Thresh's FiringSquad:[/break]

• 3dfx' Voodoo3 2000/3000
• ASUS NVidia-based AGP
• ATI Rage 128/Pro
• Creative Labs' NVidia 3D Blasters
• Elsa Erazor III series
• IomegaWare 2.2.1 for Zip, Jaz, and Clik
• NVidia Release Candidate Detonator
• Logitech Mouseware 9.0
• Microsoft Intellipoint 3.1

Hans dirigeert ons richting HardOCP, waar Kyle een review van de nieuwe GlobalWin FKP32 socket370 cooler online heeft staan. In de temperatuur tests bleek de FKP32 net iets minder goed te presteren als de befaamde Alpha socket370 heatsink. Dankzij de lage prijs is de FKP32 toch een goede keus voor PIII-E, Celeron en K6 overclockers:

Well, it seems if you want the BEST PERFORMING COOLER for your Socket 370 CPU, you are going to be looking at the Alpha.

But the numbers are damn close. So close in fact, I was surprised. With all the high-tech aluminum and copper embedded surface on the Alpha I was extremely surprised to see how close the Global Win scores were. We are only looking at 3 degree difference on the outside and a ZERO degree difference on the inside temps. So in a big picture looksee, you have to say the Global Win performed really just as well as the Alpha except for a single degree or two. Not exactly something to get your panties in a wad (again) over.

How bout the other numbers? Price. Yep, this is where the big kicker comes in. I THINK the price of the Global unit will be HALF than that of the Alpha and possibly less, dunno yet, I can't find one for sale. I am told you will be seeing these crop up soon.

Ik weet niet in hoeverre dit nog nieuws is, maar sinds half januari mag de 128-bits encryptie ook geexporteerd worden naar landen buiten de VS. Er is toen al wel aandacht aan besteed in het nieuws, maar er is niet bij gezegd dat je die encryptie nu ook voor alle versies (4.x en 5.x) van Internet Explorer kan downloaden.

Tot slot wil ik nog even opmerken dat je daarna (dus met 128 bit encryptie) niet de Secure Channel Dll update nodig hebt. Als je die toch installeert valt IE weer terug naar 56 bit encryptie.

En als je wilt weten wat voor beveiligingsgaten je nog meer kan fixen in je windows of internet explorer, moet je even hier kijken.

Vleermuis schrijft: "Tresh en z'n Vuurpeloton maken ons vandaag weer blij met een review van de Guillemot Force Feedback Wheel, met dat kikke Ferrari logo. Op het stuurtje valt niet veel aan te merken, maar de pedalen vielen wel tegen. De Guillemot Force Feedback Wheel kreeg een score van 81%":

Looking at this product as a whole package, it is worth buying if you are considering a force feedback setup. The asking price is reasonable, and the wheel was top quality and totally deserves the Ferrari symbol. Functionality of the wheel is easily proved with the sheer amount of buttons and the intelligent placement of them. Force feedback is excellent, and provides a great experience in a variety popular racing games out on the market today. Even the material that is on the wheel feels great and is a pleasure to drive with.

If the Guillemot Force Feedback Steering Wheel setup had a black sheep, it would have to be the pedals. The pedals did not have very many redeeming qualities and, in my eyes, hardly deserve the "Engineered by Guillemot" stamped on them. The flawed pedals make them barely useable, it is sad to see such a great product marred by such simple design errors. Despite the shortcomings of the pedals, the wheel is reason enough to get this setup.

The|Shark brengt Win2k drivers voor Elsa's Quadro kaartje: "Eindelijk zijn er Gloria II drivers uit voor Windows 2000. Tot nu toe merk ik geen verschil met de detonator reference drivers, maar in iedergeval is Elsa er mee bezig":

ELSA GLoria II, Windows 2000 RC3 (build 2183. or newer) BETA-driver for i386 CPUs

File gliiw2kb.zip
Size 924.281 Bytes
Version v5.07.00.254beta

Download via ftp (recommended)
Download via http

Binary schrijft: "Computer!Totaal vertelt in onze moerstaal alles wat je wilt weten als je Win2K gaat installeren of configureren. Heb je Windows 2000 nog niet dan kun je hem met een prijsvraag winnen, moet je alleen wel een tip geven over Windows 2000 (wat klopt hier niet?)":

Om Windows 2000-gebruikers direct de helpende hand te bieden, heeft Computer!Totaal nog tijdens de officiële lancering van Microsofts nieuwe besturingssysteem in de Verenigde Staten, 101 tips online geplaatst op Computertotaal.nl. Tips die niet alleen het werken met Microsofts nieuwste paradepaardje makkelijker maken, maar u ook helpen bij de voorbereiding.

Je kunt de tips hier gaan bewonderen.

Glide Underground trakteert ons op een korte setup guide voor het draaien van een dual monitor setup onder Windows 98. Hieronder vast een voorproefje:

Start by shutting down your computer. Find a free PCI slot (or ISA, eew!), and plug that second PCI video card into it. Hook up your second monitor to it, and turn your computer on. You'll probably notice a strange happening. Your BIOS and Windows startup will most likely be displayed on the second monitor! What's wrong?? This is happening because the majority of motherboards look to the PCI bus first for a video card, instead of first looking at the AGP. If you have an older motherboard, you will just have to live with seeing DOS displayed on your secondary monitor. But if you have a newer motherboard, such as my ABit BE6, there is a particular option in the BIOS for this. Reboot your computer once again, and hit Del (or whatever your BIOS key is). In my particular Award BIOS, the setting is in the Integrated Peripherals menu, but it may be different for yours. Just look for a setting similar to "Boot with: PCI/AGP", and change that to AGP. Now your all set to reboot into Windows.

Bij Sharky Extreme is al een review te vinden van de GeForce Plus videokaart met 64MB DDR geheugen, zoals die momenteel als optie in Dell Dimension PC's gehangen kan worden (zie ook deze posting). Vanwege de verdubbeling van het geheugen presteert GeForce nu nog beter in hoge resoluties met grote hoeveelheden textures en 32-bit kleur.

Because we did not run the testing ourselves and were unable to witness the cards in action, we cannot give detailed or definitive analysis of these results.

What appears to be the case is that, at mid-range resolutions such as 1024 x 768 x 32bpp where memory loads aren't too high, Dell's 64MB DDR SGRAM GeForce 256 runs faster than a 32MB SDR SDRAM GeForce 256 by about the same margin we would expect from a 32MB DDR SGRAM GeForce 256.

But when resolution and texture sizes increase, 32MB of memory is not enough. The 32MB of extra memory on Dell's card not only gives it a huge performance advantage in these situations, it also enables it run at high-quality, high-resolution settings that cause a 32MB SDR SDRAM GeForce 256 (and probably every other 32MB consumer gaming card available) to conk out. Either way, playing at 1600x1200 (providing you've got a large enough monitor) is fast becoming a reality.

Over ongeveer een maand kunnen we ook van o.a. Asus, Guillemot en Leadtek deze Plus versie gaan verwachten .

DrStrange bracht ons dit errug sappig artikeltje van de Australische krant The Age, die schrijft dat de NSA door de Franse inlichtingen dienst beschuldigd wordt nauw samen te werken met Microsoft. Volgens de fransen zijn NSA functionarissen direct betrokken bij de ontwikkeling van Microsoft software en is het Pentagon Steve's grootste klant :

A French intelligence report today accused US secret agents of working with computer giant Microsoft to develop software allowing Washington to spy on communications around the world.

[...] According to the report there was a 'strong suspicion' of a lack of security fed by insistent rumours about the existence of spy programs on Microsoft, and by the presence of NSA personnel in Bill Gates' development teams.

[...] According to the report, 'it would seem that the creation of Microsoft was largely supported, not least financially, by the NSA, and that IBM was made to accept the (Microsoft) MS-DOS operating system by the same administration.'

3D Chipset maakt melding van nieuwe beta nVidia Detonator drivers v3.77 voor Win9x.

Detonator Windows 95 & 98
v3.77
Build date: 02/08/00
Size: 1.6mb

  - Includes a Readme.txt files
  - Coolbits.reg hack works with this version

We finally know what that agp166e.exe file is now for:

AGP166E.EXE
AGP support file for Aladdin TNT2 (not present in PCI driver package).

Downloaden mag hier. (Thanks milenko voor de tip!)

NoWhereMan schrijft dat er bij AnandTech een review te vinden is van de Videologic Sirocco Crossfire speakerset bestaande uit 4 satellites met subwoofer en een versterker. Hieronder een hap uit Jason Clark's conclusie:

This is one serious set of Hi-Fi speakers. These speakers should not be confused for just another set of "off the shelf" four speaker kits. VideoLogic seems to have to put a lot of time and research into putting the proper components together to make a fantastic 4.1 solution. The VideoLogic Crossfire's MSRP is $449 USD. Rumour has it the street price will be below $399.00, which is still higher than most other 4.1 solutions, but considering the features and quality in its package, it is a reasonable price. Although, it would not hurt for the price to come down a little, which it eventually will. Some of you are probably going to wonder if these are better than the Klipsch. Based on the tests performed on the Crossfires, the answer is "yes". The sound quality is definitely more crisp. Even when the amplifier was turned all the way up, there was barely any distortion, and barely any background hiss either - something some of the Klipsch ProMedias tend to have. All in all, you can't go wrong with these speakers. Even though this is a very well-designed package, I have only one gripe: the speaker grills - it's too easy to dent the paper cones.

American Megatrends Inc. heeft enkele weken geleden (ja, oud nieuws ) een met de Promise FastTrack vergelijkbare IDE RAID controller aangekondigd. Het kaartje draagt de naam 'HyperDisk' en heeft ondersteuning voor de RAID levels 0 (striping) en 1 (mirroring). De AMI HyperDisk is sinds begin deze maand verkrijgbaar voor een prijs van 149 dollar:

ATLANTA (Thursday, February 3, 2000) American Megatrends Inc. (AMI), the number one RAID controller manufacturer in the world, today announced the release of HyperDisk™, a new PCI IDE RAID solution for desktops, workstations and entry-level servers.

The AMI HyperDisk solution brings the true RAID concept of high performance, continuous data redundancy and protection to the desktop. HyperDisk is a simple and cost-effective way to increase the performance capability of IDE hard disk drives, allowing users to double their drive performance or double their data security at a fraction of the overall cost of SCSI RAID solutions.

"With AMI’s position as the leader in SCSI RAID technology, it is only logical that we enter the new IDE RAID arena with a product based on the same advanced technology used in our higher-end RAID offerings," said Sanjay Sehgal, AMI’s director of OEM Sales. "In fact, HyperDisk’s low-cost, good capacity and high performance make it a competitor with SCSI RAID."

HyperDisk’s two IDE channels support data striping (RAID 0) and mirroring (RAID 1), making the HyperDisk IDE RAID solution an important tool in today’s computing environment. It provides the user with better application performance every time a file is saved or retrieved and offers greater economy and longevity for nearly every PC made today. There will be little to no downtime in case a drive crashes. HyperDisk also supports fault-tolerant data redundancy during high performance applications at a cost-effective price and uses up to four low-cost UDMA/ATA 66 drives.

HyperDisk makes sense for almost every corporate, retail, industrial, home office and small office environment. It gives users more performance and response from their everyday applications when saving or retrieving a file. HyperDisk also links multiple hard drives to make one virtual hard drive and improves drive performance using data striping.

AMI is offering this low-cost hardware solution in response to the high demand from small businesses, home business owners and other end users. The Manufacturer’s Suggested Retail Price (MSRP) for the HyperDisk is $149 and it will be available February 2000.

CyberJunk86 schrijft: "Sommigen wisten misschien al (er zijn al 48 leden) dat er een nieuwe Tweakers.net ICQ Active List Server opgericht is. Je kunt em vinden op: AL-IN#64885585. Meer info op 't forum":

De Tweakers.net Active List Server is UP. Het verkeerd allemaal nog in giga beta stadium, maar das alleen voor mij echt relevant.

Je kunt joinen door op AL te klikken bovenin, dan komt je List op Active Lists te staan en kun je helemaal onderaan op "Add new Active List" klikken. Dan moet je bij List ID# dit invullen: 64885585 Broadcast staat uit, dus wees nie bang... Alle broadcasts moeten via mij, i.v.m. crap filteren.

Ik heb net b.t.w. gemerkt dat ICQ het niet helemaal trekt, als je de list hebt ge-add moet je ook nog een keer op de list klikken om authorisation aan te vragen...beetje vaag, maar het werkt wel.

Er kunnen maar 400 mensen in mun list, dus wees er snel bij. Vereiste is dus wel dat je regelmatig T.net bezoeker bent maar dat spreekt voor zich.