ComputerBase has posted up some pic's of Logitech's soon to be released MX518 optical mouse that will replace the MX510!

Motherboard manufacturers have developed 865PE/875P chipsets with Socket T because the performance compared to the 925XE, 925X and 915P/G chipsets doesn't differ much and they can use the older components. The difference between AGP and PCI-Express cards is non-existing but the comparison between DDR and DDR2 at the moment goes to the older DDR memories. That's why the older Springdale or Canterwood chipsets might even sound as a better choice than the newer ones.

ArcticSquad

If you are on the lookout for high performance AGP cards, you are in luck. We rounded up seven ATI RADEON X800 PRO cards from ABIT, Connect3D, GeCube, Gigabyte, HIS, PowerColor and Sapphire for a comprehensive shootout.

Copper Silent 2L AMD Cpu Cooler Contest.

For your Chance to win this great Cooler by Artic Cooling (Copper Silent 2L) Please Post your name in our forum as the prize winners name will be pulled out of a hat by our friends at Justcdr.net.

As already reported before on Slashdot, OnlyNewZ tested in total 32 different cards in Doom 3. The article is now updated to version 0.2 and it includes more pages and a final conclusion as requested. 19 cards are AGP based and 13 cards are PCI-Express. Have a nice weekend!

HEXUS.net welcomes ex-Gainward manager Andy Davies to the team, and celebrates the occasion with a new competition. The winner will receive either an ATi Radeon X800 128MB, or a nVIDIA GeForce 6600GT - the winner decides! To enter, all you have to do is think up a caption for the photos of Andy in this thread. The funniest entry wins. Best of luck!

In partnership with Sunbeam, we are proud to announce another giveaway to our readers. So, head on over to our forums and enter your name.

Click here to enter the giveaway

TrustedReviews has a group test up comparing 19 PSUs from a wide range of manufacturers including Akasa, Enermax, FSP, SilverStone, Tagan, Vantec and more. Check it out!

nVIDIA's GeForce 6 series covers just about the whole graphics market now, from top of the range SLI systems through to the lower-end of the scale. The GeForce Go 6200 and 6600 complete the mobile market. They will make use of TurboCache technology to allow reading and writing of system memory by the GPU, meaning the chip itself requires less graphics memory. Couple that with some nice power saving features and you've a very good reason to play Half-Life 2 on the move. HEXUS.net have an analysis of the product launch.

5.1 is now supported by most sound cards and integrated chipsets. We are now even witnessing the introduction of 7.1 sound. 6.1 or 7.1 sound users aren?t yet numerous, however, and the number of 7.1 speaker sets available in stores tells us it?s still a niche market. It is already difficult to install a 5.1 speaker set around your computer so you can imagine what installation would be like with an additional two satellites. So what is the best 5.1 speaker set on the market? Here is a summary of the latest Altec Lansing, Creative, Hercules and Logitech products to help you make your choice.

SpeedStep alleviates the heat problems of the fast P4 processors, while even faster models are on the horizon. At the same time, DDR2 memory is becoming reasonably affordable, and boards have now had 6 months to age. It's time for our big comparison test, which we kick off with a look at seven different models from companies challenging the market leaders.

Tom's Hardware Guide

From HEXUS.net: "Intel have started the production of their multi-core silicon. The first CPU which we will see from Intel is that of the Extreme Edition.

The CPU will support 2 physical cores and 4 'Hyperthreading' threads. We suspect that we will see the first live demo of this CPU at Intel Developer Forum, in San Francisco at the end of the month. This will probably tie in with a launch of a system from Dell, since Intel have already got a commitment from Dell in regards to supplying it."

Today at HWspirit we've put up one big article about nVidia's SLI technology with the sole purpouse to answer everyone's questions regarding this new technology:

A few of you will have indulged in SLI, much as I am going to shortly, and now you have four lovely DVI connectors to play with. If you've not gone for SLI, but you're wondering about the possibilities available with PCI Express and dual-card graphics, MSI might have the answer with their "Dual Bridge System".

Hexus.net

After posting my AMD Athlon64 vs. Sempron comparison last week I was still puzzled to why the overclocked Sempron 3100+ was able to easily out perform the Athlon64 3200+ in all the synthetic tests but not the real world tests. A large number of readers also thought this was quite strange, so I spent most of this week trying to find out why. The problem seemed to be the Gigabyte K8NSNXP motherboard which featured an out-dated BIOS version. While the board did detect the Sempron 3100+ processor, the board?s 3D performance when using the Sempron was for some unknown reason quite poor.

It has been 14 months since our last Performance PC article was published where we collected the best performing computer parts around and built up one of the quickest and most expensive systems of its time. Today we bring you our much anticipated follow-up taking a look at exactly what almost $5,000 USD worth of hardware gets you. Based around an AMD Athlon 64 system with SLI, we have oodles and oodles of performance to play with. Read on as we bring you our recommended Performance Computing system for Q1 2005

Yonah seems to be the hot topic of the moment, and the only problem I see is that people keep re-treading the same old information as before, usually pilfered from Intel roadmaps. Yippee, I am beside myself that there is yet another slew of stories saying that it will be out "later" at an undetermined clock speed.
That's not the information that the INQ has, and we feel it is our duty to set things straight. First, Intel has Yonahs listed as X20/30/40 and 50 at unlisted clocks. They are unlisted because Intel is not sure how well they are going to bin out yet. The target is 2.5GHz, but one speed bump up or down is entirely possible now, so if there is a 2.33GHz or 2.67GHz part at launch, don't be all that shocked. This would put the X50 at 2.5GHz optimally, X40 at 2.33, X30 at 2.17 and the lowly X20 at a mere 2.0GHz. In case you hadn't guessed by the numbers, the bus is 667MHz. Read on at TheInq

XGI will soon be announcing their native PCI Express chips, the first ones being the XG45 and the XG47.

GamePC have thrown up their NCQ-enabled SATA hard drives comparison! Here's a snip.

Throughout 2004, we?ve seen Serial ATA technology finally move into the mainstream and wallop Ultra ATA/133 technology into the ground. While the transition to Serial ATA has gone fairly smoothly, due to SATA controllers being integrated on every new motherboard and manufacturers charging almost no price difference between SATA and PATA based hard drives, we have seen one major feature of Serial ATA largely overlooked until lately, Native Command Queuing.

It's a familiar problem. Which model to buy? Should I go for the regular or should I pay a little bit extra and get the deluxe model? Well, it always depends on whether or not the higher price is worth the difference in features. Today we are going to evaluate both the Microsoft Wireless Optical Desktop Pro and the Microsoft Optical Desktop Elite for Bluetooth. The Bluetooth model is about $50.00 more expensive than the Pro,but is it worth it?