Gisteren beweerde The Tech Report nog dat nVidia S3's graphics divisie wel eens zou kunnen overnemen, vandaag schrijft Electronic Buyers' News dat VIA dat waarschijnlijk gaat doen.

"Via would certainly be the leading candidate," said Jon Peddie, analyst with research firm Jon Peddie Associates, Tiburon, Calif.

A spokesman for Via, a chipset manufacturer based in Taipei, Taiwan, refused to either confirm or deny that talks had taken place. At press time, a spokesman for S3, Santa Clara, Calif., had not returned calls asking for comment.

Nevertheless, such talks would be unsurprising, given that the companies already have formed S3-Via Inc., a separate concern created to combine the companies' respective graphics and core-logic chipset technologies in devices for the low-end PC market. [break]Maar S3 is tegenwoordig ook dikke vriendjes met Intel en nVidia, dus dat zegt niet zo heel veel denk ik.[/break] Earlier this week, S3 confirmed that it is "in discussions with and has received term sheets from several companies relating to the separation of S3's graphics business from the remainder of its businesses."

Thanks insane voor het submitten van dit nieuws.

Sharky Extreme komt ons verblijden met een review van de Klipsch Promedia V.2-400 Speakers. Alle reviews die ik heb gelezen zijn positief over deze speakers en Sharky Extreme brengt daar geen verandering in met een eindoordeel van een 9!

I have been married to my set of Klipsch speakers for several months now, so I am beyond first impressions. Like spouses, even the best of hardware reveals its idiosyncrasies over time, and anyone who is in the market for a new PC sound system should be aware of what it is like to live with this $249 investment day in and day out. But there is a considerable Wow factor to overcome first. Out of the box, these things are as impressive to look at as to watch. The four satellite units are 8.5" high, half as wide and a little more than 5 inches deep. All plastic, each weighs 2.1 lbs. and accommodates the sturdy metal feet packed in with the unit. Removable cloth faceplates reveal a two-way speaker unit with .75" polymer dome tweeters "mated to Micro Tractric Horn," according to the official specs. The midbass has a 3" long throw. The 9.25" x 10.25" x 13" subwoofer pushes out the bass from three sides - the usual flared output at one end plus two side drivers. It also weighs a hefty 17.5 lbs. The set is THX certified, a bit of a nebulous standard, which seems to mean simply that the folks at LucasFilms' THX Labs have agreed the Klipsch speakers provide "theater quality" sound for film or DVDs.

Op The Register las ik dat een ex-Intel medewerker een straf van misschien 30 jaar en een boete van $1,5 miljoen dollar tegemoet kan zien:

A former employee of Intel was charged in California with stealing trade secrets relating to the firm's future IA-64 Itanium chip, Dow Jones reports

Malaysian Say Lye Ow faces an incredible 30 years in prison and US $1.5 million in fines for taking documents and computer files relating to the design and testing of the Itanium 64-bit processor, which is being developed jointly with Hewlett-Packard. He'd probably get off more lightly for stealing State Secrets.

Ow, the wire says, took trade info from Intel with him to a new employer, not disclosed but which apparently is Sun Microsystems, as the documents and hard drives were seized at the Sunnyvale facility of the firm.

The thefts were alleged to have happened in May and July of 1998, but, according to an Intel representative quoted in the Dow Jones' story, had little impact on the firm's current plans for the 64-bit microprocessor.

Misschien een idee om atoom geheimen te stelen, daar krijg te misschien nog minder straf voor...

winnie schrijft dat de ''biografie'' van de maker van het melissa virus, David Smith, te vinden is op deze pagina.

At 30, single and employed on an irregular basis as a computer programmer, Smith met most definitions of a nobody. Admittedly, he dressed smartly and kept in shape, but his outward personability was more than negated by what one of his friends called 'the personality of bread mould'. His love life, as far as anyone knew, had been fairly unremarkable. There was only one girl, somewhere in the past - a willowy blonde whom he seemed to have genuinely fallen for. Her name was Melissa.

Smith settled down in front of a personal computer. It was one of several that he owned. Later, when things became hot, he would have to smash it up with a garden spade, and throw the pieces into a rubbish skip. But this afternoon, as the big East Coast cities of New York, Boston and Washington began to empty, his fingers moved smoothly over the keyboard.

He entered cyber-space using a stolen access authorisation that had been issued by America Online, the giant internet provider, to a customer in Florida called Scott Steinmetz. This allowed Smith to use Steinmetz's e-mail address, skyrocket@aol.com, which he proceeded to do, to devastating effect.

Misschien een goed idee om dit niet na te gaan doen, je bent best wel lang bezig om 900 miljoen dollar te betalen (zijn straf die hij misschien krijg naast 45 jaar achter tralies)...

The Ghost schrijft dat de Federal Trade Commission een officieel onderzoek heeft gestart naar de ''privacy''praktijken van Yahoo en Amazon:

Yahoo is niet duidelijk over haar privacybeleid, zo luidt de kritiek. Het bedrijf verzamelt gegevens van gebruikers en geeft die door aan haar partners, zonder dat de internetter dat weet. Amazon.com zou ten onrechte profiteren van gegevens die door dochterbedrijf Alexa worden verzameld.

De Federal Trade Commission (FTC), verantwoordelijk voor controle op naleving van antitrustregels en consumentenbeschermingwetten, onderzoekt nu of Yahoo en Amazon.com er 'oneerlijke en misleidende handelspraktijken' op nahouden.

Aanleiding voor het onderzoek naar Yahoo is een onderzoek van de California Healthcare Foundation. Deze non-profit organisatie bekritiseerde twee maanden geleden in een rapport het privacybeleid van 21 websites, waaronder Yahoo. Andere sites, als HealthCentral.com en iVillage.com worden ook onderzocht door de FTC.

IceStorm, VROEM!, Bavaria en OverFlow herinnerden mij in viervoud aan het naderende feestje van de 10.000ste nieuwsposting, een moment waar ik zelf ook al enkele maanden naar uit keek . Vijf getalletjes staan ook veel cooler .

Het totaal van 9870 nieuwspostings (rekening houdend met de postings die er in de loop der tijd zijn verwijderd) is niet slecht voor een periode van 16 maanden. In dit tijdsbestek werden drie verschillende interfeesjes gebruikt en twee verschillende database systemen (de nieuwspostings van voor 26 november 1998 zaten in includes). Plaatje afkomstig uit de frontpage posting over het éénjarig bestaan van Tweakers.net.:

Alle nieuwsposters applaus aan zichzelf (en natuurlijk de bezoekers die in iets minder dan een jaar 85.920 reacties hebben gebouwd ).

Josh Walrath van Penstar Systems heeft een uitgebreid artikel geschreven over de huidige situatie en de toekomst van 3dfx. Als we de schrijver mogen geloven is 3dfx met de overname van Gigapixel en de introductie van de VSA-100 scalable architecture weer helemaal on track om op de leading edge van de 3D graphics industrie mee te spelen:

3dfx is in a turnaround period. The new leadership have pointed this company in a new direction, with new tools to achieve future successes with. The business philosophy of delivery above all else is sure to succeed in this very competitive and cutthroat market. This is something OEM’s can depend on, as well as other special interest products (such as the X-Box), and will give 3dfx business due to its ability to deliver on products and features.

The new 3dfx/GigaPixel company is well placed to face the future. If this company achieves even 85% of what it wants, in 18 months this company will be at the top of the pile again. It will achieve this by delivering products on time, access to advanced IP it is willing to license out to interested parties, focusing on the most lucrative aspects of the PC/Mac industry, and still providing support to content developers. One other area that 3dfx is going towards is that of focusing on the major API’s (such as Direct 3D and OpenGL) and moving away from Glide. 3dfx has also recently announced that it will support a new API that will be released at the end of this summer by a company called Intrinsic Graphics, Inc. 3dfx is at the forefront of 3D technology, and has a new business model that looks to be very solid. 1Q 2001 will still show a loss, but 3dfx expects to have a break-even or even profitable 2nd quarter.

Eigenaars van een modern EPOC machientje maken een dansje rond dit bericht van The Register, waarin gemeldt wordt dat Psion een licentie neemt op de EPOC versie van het Opera 4 webbrowsertje:

Psion operatives have made no secret of the fact that the netBook will use Opera, just as soon as the coding's complete. Opera 4.0 for EPOC went into public beta at the end of February, and the product should be finished in the relatively near future.

According to Psion it will be bundled with the netBook and Series 7 ranges, and will be available separately for the 5mx and other models (which it is already, from Opera, of course).

The Register schrijft dat het BIOS van de Epox 7KXA tijdens het installeren van Windows 95 4.00.950 getrashed kan worden. Volgens c't magazine zijn ook andere borden, waaronder die van NMC en AOpen, gevoelig voor het probleem:

Taiwanese motherboard manufacturer Epox has issued a warning that installing a version of Windows 95 on its Athlon 7KXA motherboard which uses a Via chipset can cause BIOS corruption. But a similar problem appears to affect other Athlon mobos using the KX133 chipset too.

According to this Epox page, installing the retail release of Windows 95 4.00.950 (Retail Release) affects the BIOS, meaning that a consumer's PC will not work next time it is rebooted.

Epox is suggesting that the best workaround for the problem is to avoid installing this particular implementation of Windows 95, instead installing OSR2x or later.

Nu.nl meldt dat de aandelenkoers van World Online vanmorgen onder de 20 Euro is gedaald. Er blijkt een handelaar te zijn die massaal aandelen zit te megaflushen :

De koers van World Online is vrijdagmorgen in de afgrond gestort. De koers stond even voor de middag zelfs onder de 20 euro: 19,50 euro, een verlies van maar liefst 5,40.

Hiermee is de introductiekoers in twee weken afgebrokkeld tot minder dan de helft en bereikt het het dieptepunt in zijn korte carrière aan de beurs. "Er is een handelaar die zoveel mogelijk stukken in de markt probeert te beuken", verklaarde een handelaar. Tegen elke prijs.

Beleggers vinden het nu blijkbaar een goed moment om aandelen binnen te hamsteren. NOS Teletekst rapporteert op 14:10 een koers van 23,05:

Soltek introduceert een mammaplank met Voice Diagnosis Technology, waarmee tijdens het booten auditieve feedback over eventuele opstartproblemen kan worden gegeven. Dit idee is enigzins vergelijkbaar met de Postman debugger kaart van Abit (thanks Weazel voor de tip):

Soltek SL-65JV-X, een moederbord dat spreekt Soltek introduceert haar nieuwste Socket 370 moederbord, SL-65JV-X. Gebaseert op de VIA VT82C694X chipset, beschikt de SL-65JV-X over 4 X AGP, 133MHz FSB en Ultra ATA/66. Bovendien is de SL-65JV-X het eerste Soltek moederbord dat VD-Tech (Voice Diagnosis Technology) ondersteunt. Met VD-Tech's voice caution, kan de gebruiker gemakkelijk uitzoeken wat het probleem zou kunnen zijn mocht het systeem niet opstarten.

Inman meldt dat Intel in Austin een grote halfgeleider ontwikkelings faciliteit neer gaat planten. Uit eerdere berichten van de Austin American Statesman (krant in Austin) is al gebleken dat Motorola en AMD niet gelukkig zijn met de plannen van Intel. Beide bedrijven hebben al ontwerpcentra in Austin en zijn bang dat de komst van Intel tot gevolg heeft dat talenten en bedrijfsgeheimen door de overloop van engineers worden weggekaapt:

Intel Corp. (Nasdaq: INTC) has announced plans to build a new semiconductor design facility in downtown Austin. The $100 million, 600,000 square-foot facility will open next summer and will ultimately employ 2,000 people, according to Intel and Austin city officials.

Intel representatives said that after studying locations in the suburbs they decided to build the project in Austin's central business district. The four-block development will include a new parking garage to accommodate the workers.

Thanks VHware voor de tip.

Broekkie bracht ons een interessant linkje naar deze thread op het Beyond3D message board, over FSAA implementatie van Gigapixel. Gigapixel claimt dat het full scene anti-aliasing doet zonder performance penalty. Dat is uiteraard vreemd aangezien FSAA rekentijd vereist en dat moet ergens vandaan komen. Hier heb je een hap uit de eerste posting van deze thread:

So in short for FSAA you need to sample more data (they admit that they use a multisample approach, so nothing special tricky)... this data has to come from somewhere. Hoping for massive cache re-use is one thing but we all know that there is no guarantee for that. And then even if you have the data you need you still need the extra hardware to process all those sub-samples. I mean if they claim free, no hit when turning on this "must" mean that the silicon they use when not doing FSAA is shut down, not used, lost, a waste ? I mean they need some parts of their pipeline 4 times, does it make sense to just throw that silicon away when you disable FSAA ? Like 3dfx said in the past :

"When there is no hit when going to 32 bit color then your 16 bit implementation sucks."

Can't we just say that when GP does free, no hit FSAA that their non FSAA implementation "sucks" ? This of course makes the whole PR sound very different. [break] Vervolgens komen er een aantal interessante reacties van Gary Tarolli en Scott Sellers (beide van 3dfx): [/break] ...the question you raise in terms of texture bandwidth really comes down to the issue of AA implementation. This is the super-sampling vs. multi-sampling issue. Everyone has different definitions of which-is-which, but suffice is to say that one of the approaches actually does a unique texture lookup per sub-sample, but the other approach does one texture lookup for all of the sub-pixels. The latter is what is done in the GP architecture. While it sounds like it could be a noticeable visual quality difference, it has been done at SGI for many generations and we don't see a lot of people complaining about their visual quality... In fact, I would say that the majority of professional AA solutions out there only do one texture lookup (well, to be more precise, perform the number of texture lookups equal to the number of textures being applied the the poly) per pixel, as opposed to the much more expensive approach of one texture lookup per subsample...

Fiets voor het complete verhaaltje richting het Beyond3D forum.

John De Gelas van Ace's Hardware heeft het tweede deel van zijn een tweede '1 GHz: There's a Snake in the Grass!' artikel gepost, over de 1GHz Athlon en Pentium III en de trucjes die AMD en Intel hebben toegepast om hun processors naar 1GHz te pushen. Zo blijken zowel AMD als Intel het voltage verhoogd te hebben en zijn er speculaties dat Intel voor de 1GHz PIII een speciale produktielijn gebruikt waarop met behulp van een aangepast produktieproces CPU's worden gebakken die beter geschikt zijn voor hogere kloksnelheden, ten koste van de yields:

Well, one of our sources suggested that Intel is sacrificing yields (percentage of processors that are working) to get higher speed grades. Intel might be "heating up" the transistors which will result in faster parts, but the yields will be very low. The type of dopant (the Coppermine has very small amounts of Copper dopant), the amount of dopant, and the duration of implant are all values that engineers can adjust to reach higher speed grades at the expense of yields. This is most likely what Intel has done: sacrificed one of their production lines to produce, relatively speaking, tiny amounts of low-yielding 1 GHz PIII Coppermines.

This is also the reason why there are no 900 MHz or 950 Mhz PIIIs. Even Intel can not sacrifice more of their production lines for low-yielding processors.

Movemoor komt met het nieuws dat Microsoft's Active Directory compleet in de war raakt op een Windows 2000 computer met meer dan 51 IP adressen.

IT HAPPENS TO BE the maximum number of IP addresses that can be assigned to any combination of NICs under Microsoft?s Windows 2000. BugNet tests have verified that once the magical 52nd IP address is reached, without any warning or fanfare, Windows 2000 Server?s Active Directory misplaces all of its directory objects.
So who cares?
On the surface this may seem like an obscure limitation of Windows 2000. Why would anyone ever want or need to assign 51 IP addresses? For most Windows 2000 server installations, this will never be an issue. However, there are organizations that are doing their own Internet hosting (i.e. Web, e-mail, FTP services, etc.). This constraint limits the flexibility in providing Internet/intranet services for their organizations on the Windows 2000 Server platform.
ISPs and Web hosters are the most likely to configure that many IP addresses on a server. This procedure allows them to host multiple Web sites on the same computer. Using multiple IP addresses isn?t the only way to create multiple Web hosts on the same box, but it does allow the greatest flexibility for the hosting customers. It is also conceivable for a company, wanting to consolidate services, to run 50+ subnets on a single NIC.

Vage bug hoor...

Hierbij wil graag het nieuwste lid van DPC verwelkomen. --> --> --> Wiho welkom!

Oplettende stats volgers zullen gemerkt hebben dat DPC vandaag 5 plaatsen overall is gestegen, wat het het gevolg is van het joinen van wiho. Wiho kraakt bij Distributed.net sinds 22 juli 1998, en is volgens mij nooit lid van een team geworden. Sinds die datum heeft hij in totaal 7.113.610 blokjes gekraakt , die nu in een keer aan het totaal van DPC zijn toegevoegd

De DPC Hitparade Top 10 overall!

1. 26,807 wiho [Dutch Power Cows](1, Totaal:7,113,610)
2. 272 Andy(2, Totaal:1,908,456)
3. 55,005 Interior Lulu(3, Totaal:1,622,929)
4. 5,192 sienema(4, Totaal:1,224,754)
5. 5,278 Jorma(5, Totaal:963,171)
6. 181 GiLuX(6, Totaal:835,882)
7. 1,564 rc5(7, Totaal:831,021)
8. 6,314 Jurgen Wildhagen (Dutch Power cows Rule --> )(8, Totaal:749,601)
9. 1,165 Teampje KOHA(9, Totaal:711,246)
10. 4,978 Nasty(10, Totaal:711,073)

De DPC Hitparade Top 10 van 30 maart 2000

1. 55,005 Interior Lulu(3, Totaal:1,622,929)
2. 26,807 wiho [Dutch Power Cows](1, Totaal:7,113,610)
3. 19,985 GHaven(32, Totaal:312,579)
4. 17,628 Dennism(108, Totaal:118,594)
5. 6,314 Jurgen Wildhagen (Dutch Power cows Rule )(8, Totaal:749,601)
6. 6,278 Tazzz(215, Totaal:55,709)
7. 6,235 #hekje team(29, Totaal:340,274)
8. 6,149 [eNeRGy] [Dutch Power Cows](15, Totaal:613,886)
9. 5,676 2fast4u(27, Totaal:390,157)
10. 5,278 Jorma(5, Totaal:963,171)

En de nummers 11 tot en met 20:

11. 5,192 sienema(4, Totaal:1,224,754)
12. 4,978 Nasty(10, Totaal:711,073)
13. 4,911 ThE RaVeR(41, Totaal:255,033)
14. 4,600 Eddict(22, Totaal:411,610)
15. 4,463 Chainsaw(18, Totaal:519,198)
16. 4,380 Sir Soes & Shellshock(38, Totaal:269,495)
17. 4,305 TEX(78, Totaal:163,678)
18. 3,942 Richard Zuidhof(26, Totaal:401,592)
19. 3,688 DPC Civility Team(89, Totaal:148,786)
20. 3,614 hendrik(74, Totaal:165,575)

De Top 15 teams van 30 maart 2000

1.( 0) 792,395 Russian Team
2.( 0) 767,084 Slashdot.org
3.( 0) 717,975 AnandTech
4.( 0) 714,209 HackZone Team -- Combined power of Russia and exUSSR countries
5.( 1) 655,770 impulse.irc
6.( 1) 626,524 #DeathMatch
7.( 1) 486,726 The Amiga RC5 Team effort
8.( 1) 407,039 Team Warped (OS/2)
9.( 0) 389,519 Team EvangeLista (Macs Rule! :-)
10.( 0) 384,481 Dutch Power Cows
11.( 5) 303,251 Japan Windows NT Users Group
12.( 1) 295,346 Team Hungary STB+
13.( 1) 279,320 Japan FreeBSD Users Group
14.( 1) 268,692 Libertarians for Privacy (Freedom Works!)
15.( 0) 244,270 CCC.de
69.( 5) 60,679 The #koffie Team

Teams om ons heen (total stats):
20.( ) LinuxNET RC5 (Tot:66,423,492, Gis:68,556)
21.( ) SysOpt.com/Tweakit.com (Tot:65,913,728, Gis:151,714)
22.( ) Team FreeBSD (Tot:65,167,468, Gis:210,619)
23.( ) Team BeOS (Tot:64,344,094, Gis:103,412)
24.( 5) Dutch Power Cows (Tot:60,766,958, Gis:384,481)
25.( 1) Team Germany (*.de / uni.de - German Universities) (Tot:59,070,271, Gis:129,746)
26.( 1) moomin (Tot:56,876,450, Gis:159,071)
27.( 1) TeamUFies (All Hail the Dust Puppy!) (Tot:56,118,973, Gis:193,127)
28.( 1) SEGA Users Group (Tot:54,940,475, Gis:136,747)
(Teams waarvan de score van gisteren ontbreekt, hadden geen score in de top 100!)

Wanneer halen we ze in:
LinuxNET RC5: 18 dagen
SysOpt.com/Tweakit.com: 23 dagen
Team FreeBSD: 26 dagen
Team BeOS: 13 dagen

Dutch power cows is vandaag 10e en heeft een kans van een op 107 om de sleutel te vinden!

Paul van Berlo schrijft: "Gaat weer lekker met die PS2. Wat zullen ze hierna weer vinden....":

PlayStation2: SCEI has been forced to recall the start-up software which accompanied the 1.25 million PlayStation2 units shipped to date, in order to combat a bug that allows the Japanese consoles to play foreign DVDs. The Nihon Keizai Shimbun reports that the use of Japanese machines to play foreign DVDs is forbidden, and that the enforced recall will cost SCEI "substantially", according to a company official. It's also possible that SCEI will have to deal with formal complaints and legal action from U.S. film studios over this debacle. Gamers can return their illegitimate software wither via mail from April 1, or through 8,000 Seven-Eleven stores soon. PlayStation2 will now ship in Japan with software that does not support the playing of foreign DVDs.

Ik ben benieuwd hoeveel er daadwerkelijk ingeleverd gaat worden. Waarom zou je dat als PS2-bezitter immers doen? Sony kan je daar niet toe dwingen lijkt mij...

Op Tweak3D hebben ze een uitgebruide guide gepost van 3228 woorden, over het tweaken van de harddisk en het geheugen onder Windows 2000:

Hard drive and memory tweaks are by far the most abundant type in the most recent release of Microsoft's business oriented OS. This is mainly because Windows 2000 is designed with performance in mind. This performance, however, is specifically aimed at a networking environment and as such includes many features that aren't needed unless you are running a networking server. So, in this guide, we are going to axe all of those extra processes, as well as enabling a few other tweaks to enhance performance.

[...] Tweaking your hard drive and memory settings from within Win2k is quite a bit more complicated than it is from within Win9x, but inevitably it is also more rewarding as well. To my knowledge, Tweak3D has the first Windows 2000 tweak guides up on the net, so it is unlikely you will be able to find complementary information anywhere. However, Windows NT 4.0 tweaks, with a little modification, should be able to be used on your Win2k box - so keep an eye out for them.

De Duitse site Computer Zene kreeg van Acer Labs te horen dat de ALi Athlon chipset in mei gereleased zal worden. Deze chipset is de eerste met support voor DDR SDRAM (thanks DiGiSTORM voor de link):

"The Athlon chipset from ALi will be out around the month of May. And yes, this chipset will support DDR-SDRAM."

DiGiSTORM schrijft dat er op Thresh's Firingsquad een interview te vinden is met Bubba Wolford van 3dfx over Gigapixel en de X-Box. Bubba weet ons onder andere te vertellen dat de 3dfx Rampage ass gaat kicken en dat de eerste produkten met de Gigapixel technologie in 2001 op de markt zullen komen:

FiringSquad: What new technology does GigaPixel bring to 3dfx? Why are you calling it a "disruptive" 3d technology?

Bubba: It is a "disruptive" technology in that it dramatically reduces the memory bandwidth and power requirements to render very high quality 3D. Just as the competitive landscape changed in the graphics business with the transition from 2D to 3D, we believe the market is about to enter another transitory period where some vendors will figure out how to really take 3D to the next step while other vendors will not. With this acquisition, we intend to take the lead and bring to market products which fundamentally change the way 3D is rendered - products that will offer substantially better performance, image quality, and more features than our competition.

VMware heeft aangekondigd dat het een deal met Microsoft heeft gesloten waardoor VMware klanten binnenkort de mogelijkheid krijgen om VMware Ready to Run naar keuze met Win98, NT of 2000 gebundeld te krijgen:

VMware, Inc., the company that is changing the one OS, one machine PC computing model, today announced an OEM agreement with Microsoft Corporation (Nasdaq: MSFT) to distribute Microsoft Windows® 98, Windows NT®, and Windows® 2000 with VMware software. Later this year, VMware will add VMware Ready to Run to its list of product offerings.

[...] VMware 2.0 features a graphical user interface that allows users to flip between applications or operating systems running in virtual machines with a single keystroke. The software runs as an application on top of an existing OS, and supports full virtual machine networking, sound, multimedia, and suspend/resume functionality.

Under the OEM agreement with Microsoft, VMware customers will have the option to buy VMware Ready to Run with their choice of Windows 98, Windows NT, or Windows 2000 preinstalled in a VMware virtual machine.

Wired News meldt dat de partijen in de anti-trustzaak tegen Microsoft van rechter Thomas Jackson tot 6 april de tijd krijgen om overeenstemming te bereiken. Mocht dit niet lukken dan komt de DOJ waarschijnlijk met harde maatregelen:

Jackson has made it clear to both sides he would prefer to see them settle the case, which antitrust lawyers say could last until 2002 or longer with appeals, rather than issue his next ruling.

Wasch said Posner was highly committed to bringing the case to a conclusion. "Basically, this is Judge Posner saying, 'Microsoft has put something on the table. Let's spend some time talking about it.'"

Microsoft has proposed remedies that would force it to change its business practices, but has ruled out a structural remedy such as breaking up the company, sources said.

But Wasch said neither the Justice Department nor most of the states "have taken structural remedies off the table." A structural remedy commonly refers to the breaking up of a company.

Thanks __QW__ voor de tip.

News.com schrijft dat aandeel van AMD in retail markt over de maand februari is gegroeid naar 42%:

AMD's assault on the retail PC market, for the time being, has level off. AMD had 42 percent of the retail PC market vs. 58 percent for Intel. While the figure is nearly level with January, it is a substantial increase over last autumn, when AMD struggled to maintain a 30 percent share.

Thanx DiGiSTORM voor de tip!

Als reactie op positieve verwachtingen over de financiële resultaten van AMD voor het tweede deel van dit jaar, is de AMD aandelenkoers gisteren met circa 8,5% gestegen. Thunderbird en Spitfire lopen op schema en dankzij een grote vraag naar flash chips draait de Flash memory divisie erg goed. Verder wordt verwacht dat de Athlon eindelijk voet aan wal krijgt in de corporate markt, die voorheen vrijwel volledig door Intel werd beheerst:

Shares of Advanced Micro Devices, chief rival to Intel in the market for microprocessors, rose today amid expectations for strong results in the second half of the year.

[...] AMD, which has been on a tear lately due largely to the success of its Athlon processor, should also benefit from forthcoming announcements by major PC makers that they will begin using the Athlon chip in some of PCs slated for the corporate market, Niles said. The Athlon chips should start appearing in corporate PCs late in the second quarter and early in the third, he said.

Intel has long held a virtual lock on that portion of the PC market, while AMD has traditionally been stronger in the consumer market.

Ze voor meer info dit artikel van News.com.

schaduw schrijft: "Bij Tom's hardware guide staat nu een review van SPEELGOED! ook leuk Het is een IntelPlay QX3 Microscoop voor kinderen (Boven de 6), aan te sluiten op je pc. Je kunt er ook filmpjes mee maken, joepie! :

The "intel play QX3 Computer Microscope" is a great children's scientific discovery toy, that is also a lot of fun for parents. It offers such features as 10x, 60x, and 200x magnification, software controlled top and bottom lighting, snapshots (which can either be triggered through software or through a button in the microscope), time lapse mode, and hand held mode (where you can finally clean out the lint in your belly button). Handy accessories also accompany it like prepared slides, a pair of tweezers, sample jars and containment dishes (where you can trap and view live subjects - bwaaa-haaa-haaa-haaaaaa!). The QX3 is such a cutting edge toy, that it quickly makes you realize that we are now in the 21st Century and things are a changin' for us old folks.

I had no luck installing the QX3 on our laptop, which was running Windows 2000. I got the following message when I tried this:

===== Checking Minimum System Requirements =====
Operating System: Windows 3.1 Version 5.0 Build 2195 *** FAIL ***
Disk Type: Fixed Disk. Free Disk Space: 1865 Megabytes - okay
Total physical memory: 128 Megabytes - okay
Paging file size: 303 Megabytes - okay
----- MINIMUM SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS FAILED -----

Volgens bronnen van Techweb zal Microsoft binnenkort een grote reorganisatie aankondigen. Naast een veranderde strategie die erop gericht is om "its line-of-business servers and Internet services into enterprises and hosted environments" te pushen wordt er wat gegoocheld met de positie van een aantal hoge managers:

Microsoft is finalizing a major reorganization designed to push its line-of-business servers and Internet services into enterprises and hosted environments, said a Microsoft insider and others familiar with the situation.

[...] Microsoft management, with a partner-centric focus, will push its forthcoming line-of-business servers -- Windows 2000, SQL Server 2000, Exchange 2000, and BizTalk/Commerce 2000 servers -- to ASPs and enterprise customers.

But while it tries to organize around this line-of-business push, Microsoft will try to unify its server products and Internet services where it makes sense, the source said.

Onze Australische kameraden van Overclockers Australia hebben een review gepost van de Thermaltake Gold Orb socket cooler voor PIII, Celeron en K6 CPU's. De cooler bleek goed te presteren in vergelijking met andere heatsinks, ook al is het temperatuursverschil vrijwel nihil (temperatuur 47C, 1 graad Celcius koeler dan een GlobalWin FDP32):

Well, once again a small cooler surprises us. This cooler is definitely in the same league as much larger coolers. There's not a spectacular price difference - the FDP and FKP are usually just under the AUD$40.00 mark. However, at AUD$33.00 (plus shipping from Western Australia) these units are quite a bargain. They're also ideal if you're short on space. Keep in mind, though, that they are quite wide at the base - for example, the dreaded capacitors on the BP6 foul these heatsinks badly - they can be modified to fit (with a Dremel or similar) but don't as stock. If your motherboard is tight for space around the socket consider the FKP-32. The Golden Orb should fit most slocket adapters fine and I'd be surprised if they blocked ram slots on any motherboard.

Hardware Central heeft een artikeltje gepost waarin zij de voor en nadelen van Rambus bespreken. De argumenten die genoemd worden komen over het algemeen overeen met die uit het Tom's Hardware Guide artikel over de nadelen van Rambus:

All things considered, we do believe RDRAM is a workable technology which may have arrived too soon for its own good. RDRAM is earning rather a poor reputation as a result of its marriage to i820, a reputation we feel is somewhat unfair. And with Willamette’s release should come an entirely new dimension of RDRAM performance, hopefully enough to alleviate any past concerns.

In summary, there are definite and obvious hurdles that MUST be overcome, but if prices can drop, yields can improve and Intel can return with a high-performance chipset release, we see no reason why RDRAM shouldn’t flourish. But can Intel and Rambus really overcome those challenges? So we’re leaving you with the same conclusion as last time--it's just too early to tell.

Ars Technica heeft een artikel geplaatst over de architectuur van de Emotion Engine die Sony gebruikt in de Playstation II. Vrij technisch (zoals verwacht mag worden van Ars Technica ) maar ook erg interessant. Een stukje uit de conclusie:

Not only does the Emotion Engine have horsepower under the hood, but its aggressively new, cutting-edge design means that it's going to take a while for developers to really learn to use all that power. It'll be interesting to see if the PC has caught up with the PS2 by the time PS2 developers figure out how to exploit this hardware to its fullest potential. Although I've stated repeatedly that the PS2's number one application is 3D gaming, neither Sony nor Toshiba (Toshiba designed the Emotion Engine, and Sony licenses it) are going to sit by and let this hardware get pigeonholed in that application space. Sony has invested big, big money (I think it's around $100 million) in developing non-game applications for the PS2. So by the time the PS2 goes stateside, we should see other types of software available for it. This device is going to be the centerpiece of Sony's assault on the world's living rooms, so you can bet they'll milk it for all they can.

"Marc, waar zijn de stats van 28 maart?"
Helaas geen tijd voor gehad, door problemen op het werk heb ik gisteren 14 uur gewerkt.

Goed nieuws: We hebben 1212 leden!

Morgen Megaflush 4!

De DPC Hitparade Top 10 van 29 maart 2000

1. 53,659 Interior Lulu(2, Totaal:1,567,924)
2. 14,626 Richard Zuidhof(25, Totaal:397,650)
3. 6,600 [eNeRGy](14, Totaal:607,737)
4. 6,239 Tazzz(229, Totaal:49,431)
5. 6,024 wildhagen(7, Totaal:743,287)
6. 5,818 #hekje team(29, Totaal:334,039)
7. 5,314 Nosferatu(20, Totaal:448,523)
8. 5,282 Eddict(21, Totaal:407,010)
9. 5,236 ThE RaVeR(41, Totaal:250,122)
10. 5,138 Richard.Oostindie(152, Totaal:83,618)

En de nummers 11 tot en met 20:

11. 5,002 Nasty(9, Totaal:706,095)
12. 4,734 sienema(3, Totaal:1,219,562)
13. 4,554 2fast4u(26, Totaal:384,481)
14. 4,304 TEX(80, Totaal:159,373)
15. 4,259 Jorma(4, Totaal:957,893)
16. 4,086 obiwan(22, Totaal:406,978)
17. 4,034 Frank & Flemming, koeien met gronings gras!(93, Totaal:138,329)
18. 3,882 theo.nieuwstraten(83, Totaal:157,256)
19. 3,857 Chainsaw(17, Totaal:514,735)
20. 3,665 DPC Civility Team(88, Totaal:145,098)

De Top 15 teams van 29 maart 2000

1.( 1) 837,283 Russian Team
2.( 1) 777,497 Slashdot.org
3.( 1) 726,004 AnandTech
4.( 3) 698,680 HackZone Team -- Combined power of Russia and exUSSR countries
5.( 0) 640,959 #DeathMatch
6.( 3) 537,406 impulse.irc
7.( 1) 398,132 Team Warped (OS/2)
8.( 1) 394,519 The Amiga RC5 Team effort
9.( 1) 383,127 Team EvangeLista (Macs Rule! :-)
10.( 1) 349,509 Dutch Power Cows
11.( 2) 314,540 Team Hungary STB+
12.( 2) 284,559 Japan FreeBSD Users Group
13.( 2) 279,616 Libertarians for Privacy (Freedom Works!)
14.( 2) 245,953 L0phT Heavy Industries
15.( 2) 245,582 CCC.de
64.( 0) 61,991 The #koffie Team

Teams om ons heen (total stats):

25.( ) moomin (Tot:56,717,379, Gis:175,731)
26.( ) TeamUFies (All Hail the Dust Puppy!) (Tot:55,925,846, Gis:193,663)
27.( ) SEGA Users Group (Tot:54,803,728, Gis:108,180)
28.( ) Prof. James Challis' Most Excellent UK Team (Tot:54,561,454, Gis:141,515)
29.( ) Dutch Power Cows (Tot:53,292,928, Gis:349,509)
30.( ) AL-Mail Users (Tot:50,873,450, Gis:84,072)
31.( ) Team RimArts UsersGroup (Tot:49,275,703, Gis:65,935)
32.( ) NetBSD Users (Tot:44,662,990, Gis:112,810)
33.( ) SwissTeam (Tot:41,126,400, Gis:82,381)
(Teams waarvan de score van gisteren ontbreekt, hadden geen score in de top 100!)

Wanneer halen we ze in:
moomin: 20 dagen
TeamUFies (All Hail the Dust Puppy!): 17 dagen
SEGA Users Group: 7 dagen
Prof. James Challis' Most Excellent UK Team: 7 dagen

Dutch power cows is vandaag 10e en heeft een kans van een op 116 om de sleutel te vinden!