It's no secret that Creative Labs is the trendsetter in the "audio for PC" field. Not so long ago the company announced a new generation sound card aka Audigy2, which brought about a real storm in the Web community! So come join Xbitlabs as we take a close look at this solution.

Nvidia the worldwide leader in visual processing solutions, today announced that upcoming retail and OEM versions of NVIDIA Personal Cinema? products will feature DVD MovieFactory 2 and VideoStudio 6, DVD creation and video editing software from Ulead® Systems Inc., a leading developer of video editing, image editing, and DVD authoring software. The robust software package provides consumers with the industry's most complete digital entertainment solution for desktop PCs, and an easy way to create and turn home videos into DVD movies.

Thanks to Darkcrow.co.kr for the heads up!

Well that Card sitting under that cooler is a Matrox Parhelia 128MB Bulk Version and it's whizzing along @ 272MHz / 680MHz! want to know more click on the link below

Voltmodding Matrox Parhelia 128MB Bulk Version

Hexus have posted their 12 card Nvidia Geforce4 TI4200 video card Shootout from 10 different manufactures! Here's a snip.

We have a number of Ti 4200s in for a comparative review today. What's evident is that all of the Ti 4200s boasting the newer, faster 8x AGP standard, ship with 128MB of on-board memory. Further, to distinguish themselves from pre-8x cards with 128MB RAM, these cards have seen a bump in memory speed. We'll see just how each manufacturer approaches this most lucrative GPU, what they bundle with their efforts, how they attempt to outdo each other, and see just how far we can push them. All this on 2 leading platforms. Hang on for the benchmark ride.

Bitsmodding introduced couple of very interesing new products; UV-reactive fans and Cold Cathodes without the inner white wire. Metku.net has a review about these new items so head over there and check them out!

NVIDIA has extended its mobile graphics leadership into the Apple market by providing the graphics processing solutions for two new versions of the Apple® PowerBook?, announced on January 7. Apple?s new PowerBook notebooks will feature either the GeForce4 440 Go with 64MB of dedicated graphics memory or the GeForce4 420 Go with 32MB of memory.

GameSpy have posted their look @ the technology behind Sony's Playstation 3, which is scheduled for a 2004/5 release.

stories surround the PS3 pointing toward the incorporation of a complex microprocessor, a supercomputer-on-a-chip bearing the moniker "Cell." Being championed by the hardware triumvirate of IBM, Sony, and Toshiba, these companies have pledged $400 million to the project.

Cell, scheduled to hit the market in late 2004 or early 05, differs notably from current processors. This finely crafted chunk of silicon will contain multiple chips within a single unit, and will be able to perform in excess of one trillion mathematical calculations a second. Put into perspective, that makes it approximately 100 times more powerful than a 2.5 GHz Pentium 4 CPU!

Today Xbitlabs.com takes a look at small form-factor PCs from Shuttle. They do break all our presuppositions about small and noiseless computers having proven really impressive. For this review, Shuttle provided us with two top-end configurations: for AMD Athlon XP and for Intel Pentium 4 CPUs. All your questions about SFF systems from Shuttle will be answered here!

C]net news.com repots that Intel will increase the speed of the chipset on the Pentium 4 in the coming months, a change that will likely boost the performance of top-end PCs.

The Santa Clara, Calif.-based chipmaker is coming out with a new chipset, code-named Springdale, for Pentium 4 PCs. The chipset runs at 800MHz, substantially faster than the 400MHz and 533MHz chipsets currently available for Pentium 4 computers, according to sources close to the company.

This just in from our good friends over @ VR-Zone.com

Things have gone quite well since we discovered there is a possibility of enabling HT on current P4s. PowerLeap has designed an adapter to allow hyperthreading (HT) on non-HT-ready P4 motherboards. It makes the pre-HT versions of the i845 and i850 allow HT to be enabled.

Click Read More...

Overclocking fans, this one is for you! Xbitlabs.com tests three processors, the AMD Athlon XP 1700+, Intel Celeron 2GHz and Intel Pentium 4 1.8A GHz....they take a look at all three solutions to find out which processors better suits your overclocking needs and offers the best price-to-performance ratio.

LAS VEGAS, Jan. 9, 2003 - Smart wristwatches - which display relevant, customized information broadcast across an innovative wide-area wireless network - will be available in the fall of this year, Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates announced yesterday at the 2003 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES). These first "smart watches," to be created by international watchmakers Citizen, Fossil and Suunto, are built on Smart Personal Objects Technology (SPOT), a new technology platform designed to improve the functionality and usefulness of everyday objects.

Every details were carefully thought of when designing this latest case. It comes fitted with a large window on the side panel, features-enriched interior, multi-functional front HardCano unit and "Thermaltake" logo back-lighted by Electric-LED. The redesigned HardCano unit lets you control up to 4 fan unit's speed within the case. Thus allowing users to turn up the airflow during intensive operations and lowering the noise level when the system is idling. Built in temperature alarm will alert you when temperature exceeds the preset limit. Just another feature to ensure that everything runs smoothly. A 2-Way Lock is a great and convenient way to access the Drive Bays when needed and lock it to provide absolute security. Side panel is also guarded by the locking mechanism for added security. With the traditional case design, users will often need to crawl to the back of the case in order to access USB, IEEE 1349 Firewire, Audio Input/Output ports. Instead of making you come to those ports, Thermaltake has brought these ports to you for easier access.

TechChannel.De hat sich einmal mit der Frage auseinandergesetzt, was für Vorteile AGP 8x/ Pro eigendlich bringt.
Hier ein Ausschnitt aus dem Artikel: Die finale AGP-3.0-Interface-Spezifikation hat Intel im September 2002 verabschiedet. Zu den gravierenden Neuerungen gegenüber AGP 4x zählt die Frequenzverdopplung auf bestimmten Leitungen von 133 auf 266 MHz. Damit erreicht man auf dem Papier eine Verdopplung der Datentransferrate der Grafikschnittstelle von 0,993 auf 1,986 GByte/s.

Diese Tatsache setzen mittlerweile viele Hersteller von Mainboards und Grafikkarten Marketing-wirksam ein. Doch in der Praxis entpuppt sich diese theoretische Verdopplung der Geschwindigkeit als Trugschluss. Denn wie schon beim Sprung von AGP 2x auf 4x bleibt heute bei AGP 8x von dem angeblichen Performance-Gewinn nur sehr wenig übrig - wie unser ausführlicher Test belegt. Den ganzen Artikel gibt unter dem obrigen Link.

ExtremeTech have reviewed the first Serial ATA harddisk available, the Seagate ST3120023AS.

The benchmark results are very impressive, especially the low CPU utilization.
Here's a snip of the review: Overall, we were pleasantly surprised with the performance of the Seagate drive. The benchmarks were, in general, as good or better than those of the parallel ATA version of the same drive. We suspect that performance in general should be pretty good for single drives. Note that you're not paying any premium, either, as the ST3120023AS is priced roughly the same as the parallel ATA ST3120023A. Read the complete review over here and get more information about the upcoming standard over here.

computerboot a Dutch online shop has the Club3D GF FX 256DDR2 DVI/TVO on their website with a release date of 22-01-2003 @ 705 Euros ! if one of our Dutch readers could translate the page that would be much appreciated..... Club3D GF FX 256DDR2 DVI/TVO

The guy's over @ Ocworkbench.com have got their hands on some benchmarks that compare SiS's soon to be released chipset, the SiS746FX, against VIA's KT400 chipset.

The SiS 746FX features an AGP 8X bridge, and a DDR-400 Memory controller, supporting AMD Athlon S2K FSB up to 333 MHz. The SiS 746FX, via the second-generation 1 GB/s Multi-threaded I/O link, interconnects the SiS 963L Media I/O that integrates one EHCI compliant USB 2.0 host controller, 2 OHCI compliant USB 1.1 host controllers, the ATA-133 dual IDE controller, AC 97 V2.2 compliant audio controller, and the Ethernet MAC controller with standard MII interfaced.