In August, Intel is releasing its latest Core based Merom processor. At that time, Merom coupled with the existing products is spirit of ¡§Napa Refresh¡¨. But the full power of Merom is only brought till the release of Santa Rosa platform in 2007 Q2!

Though I'm stuck on the 11x Multiplier and 380+MHz FSB choke on the DFI 975X Infinity, I decided to do some Cross-Fireage overclocking for the hell of it. Setup Consists of Intel Core 2 Duo X6800, DFI 975X Infinity, ATi Powercolor X1900 Cross-Fire running mildly chilled water and 2 x 512MBCorsair 5400UL @ CL4-3-2-1 480MHz! It scores some impressive 3D Mark performance numbers with "only" 4.2GHz Conroe!

Part II of the Multi-GPU World Tour involves the selection of ATI and NVIDIA GPUs for Entry Level ($1000 US / £650 GBP), Enthusiast ($2000 US / £1300 GBP) and Bleeding Edge (unlimited) price brackets. Read on to find out what choices were made, and why.

Bit-Tech

Everything you need to know about Intel ViiV and AMD Live! standards for digital entertainment PCs and the difference between them.

Hardware Secrets

This is the introduction to a nine part series covering the multi-GPU space from both ATI and NVIDIA perspectives. Nine sites around the world have combined to work together to achieve what we feel is the definitive Multi-GPU roundup of products and technology. We look not only at the cards being presented, but of the entire ecosystem of parts supporting this technology. We compare 6 full multi-GPU systems from ATI and NVIDIA, and try to expose the strengths and weaknesses of each setup. Here is a direct quote from my introduction to the series.

With the advancing of Intel and AMD, VIA C7-M define its focus on UMPC market. C7-M has the advantage on its power and size, making it suitable for power-limited UMPC instead of performance based Intel Pentium M ULV and AMD Turion ULV. C7-M 779 (1GHz/128KB L2/400MHz FSB) for example, it consume at a maximum of 3.5W, average on 0.75W, and 0.25W only in C4 mode.

Rumour has swirled for a while now about S3 Graphics not creating any D3D9 Shader Model 3.0 part, instead going straight to building a D3D10 Shader Model 4.0 GPU, given the proximity of their dev schedule to the release of Microsoft Windows Vista.

HEXUS

Elite Bastards have an explanation of some new technology which should be making its way into NVIDIA's next-generation G80 architecture - The 'multi-function interpolator'.

At Computex 2006, we had the chance to see a new memory module from GeIL. EVO ONE is its name, and it is the enthusiast?s wet dream. These days, memory plays an important role in running today?s games and applications. However, some motherboards can be a bottleneck when it comes to high performance memory. Most of the motherboard manufacturers today are drawing voltage from the 3.3v rail to power memory modules. Only one manufacturer is using the 5v rail, which allows the user higher overclocking.

Sources indicates that AMD Athlon 64 FX-64 is lunching in Q4, clocked at 3GHz, possessed 1MB x2 L2 Cache, and kept in 125 TDP. It is expected to price at US$1031, while AMD Athlon 64 FX-62 will drop to US$999, fighting with Intel Core 2 Extreme X6800. As expected, Intel also plans to release new Intel Core 2 Extreme into this war.

According to the latest white paper for AMD?s CPU, the frequency multiplier for the upcoming 65nm products included AMD Athlon 64 FX, AMD Athlon X2 (Brisbane) and AMD Sempron (Sparta) have been changed to 0.5x. The integral multiplier limited a 200MHz (by Hyper-Transport Bus) separation between each existing model. The change of the multiplier could lower the separation to 100MHz, making the product line be more flexible.

Check out this case mod that hails from Brazil! There's some incredibly detailed window work, outrageous orange UV paint, old-school analogue gauges and great attention to detail.

Bit-Tech

While most people are happy with a working-out-of-the-box Dell, some just don't rest until they have squeezed every last bit of performance out of their rig. When you're disassembling your refrigerator to use the compressor to cool your videocard, or when you catch yourself stealing liquid nitrogen at the lab, you might be one of them. Today we interview the current world record holder of the popular benchmark application 3dmark01 and 3dmark03, micutzu of crazypc.ro. For those who are wondering, he scored 76144 ('01) and 53069 marks ('03), that's more than twice the speed any prebuilt computer can offer you!

Lexar has identified a potential issue in JumpDrive FireFly products sold between April 1 and May 31, 2006 in the U.S. in the following capacities: 256MB, 512MB, 1GB and 2GB and JumpDrive Secure II 1GB products sold at Fry's in the U.S. between May 16 and May 31, 2006. We are recalling these products in cooperation with the US Consumer Product Safety Commission and following the consumer safety guidelines.

AMD released an updated schedule for 65nm production, where AMD Athlon 64 FX, AMD Athlon X2 (Brisbane) and AMD Sempron (BHrisbane) are the only left. Single-core Athlon 64 is going to fade out soon, and therefore AMD would only provide dual core processor for mainstream and performance needs.

Sources indicate that AMD plans to release Athlon 64 X2 3600+ earlier from Q4 to Q3, probably few weeks after the price-cut on July 24. Targeting on Intel Pentium D 945 (3.4GHz/2MB x2 L2/800MHz FSB/No VT), Pentium D 915 (2.8GHz/2MB x2 L2/800MHz FSB/No VT), and the upcoming Core 2 Duo E4200 (1.6GHz/2MB/800MHz) and Pentium D 925(3.0GHz/2MB x2 L2/800MHz FSB), X2 3600+ is expected to priced in $130~149.

In part 1 of our nForce 570/590 SLI roundup, we take a look at four different nForce SLI motherboards for AMD's brand new AM2 socket. Inside you'll find motherboards from ASUS, EPoX, Foxconn, and Gigabyte.

Xpentor has an article over AMD's 4x4 Platform speculative performance against Intel's Flagship Core 2 Extreme!

Xpentor

The Speedlink Thebe2 SL-8736 Headset is a multimedia headset, compliant with franchises such as MSN, Skype, as well as the WCG (World Cyber Games), which is the e-sports equivalent to the Olympics.

Read the Full review at: LucidLAN

Intel hints that Conroe is going to release at B-2 Stepping as Intel Core 2 Duo processor. As for the previous version, a problem was found to make the system full loaded. It?s only solved in the new stepping. We don?t encourage anyone to buy the engineering sample from the web. The retail version is going to release in the end of this month, and it?s much stable.