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.

This is probably the most beautiful phone ever!

It comes from a new company called Neonode! When I first saw this phone I was very impressed!

It's so small: Only 88x52x21 large! And you get a digital camera too!

The greatest thing I suppose is it's screen, a touchscreen of 256k colors with a resolution of 176 x 220 pixels.

Also it has 16MB of build-in memory which can be upgraded with a SD Memory Card.

To celebrate the new year, Monster Game, a division of Monster Cable, has announced the XG SSGS-500 5.1 surround sound gaming speaker system for Xbox and PS2. This Dolby Digital-ready 5.1 speaker set features five satellites with two drivers each and an 80-watt max subwoofer (40 watts RMS) boasting a 6.5-inch long-throw driver housed in a bass-enhancing ported wood cabinet. The total power of the speaker set is 130 watts(65 watts RMS)

Thanks to Neowin.net

Just spotted this @ Nvnews.net.

The February 2003 issue of Maximum PC, and PC Gamer, contain previews of NVIDIA's GeForce FX. The Maximum PC web site has posted their preview, which states that a "beta" GeForce FX sample was hand-delivered to them by an Alienware representative.

There's a story over @ The Inquirer.net that should put a smile on a few faces...

IT WON'T JUST BE CREATIVE that will have Nvidia GeForce FX (NV30) graphics cards out by the end of the month, according to reliable sources in the distribution channel! Specifications of one card we've seen show it has full DirectX 9 support, 128/256MB of memory, 16GB/s bandwidth and a memory clock of 500MHz (1GHz DDR II) running at two nanoseconds, and rendering 350 million rather than the 325 million triangles of the Radeon 9700 Pro.

Looks like a bright minded computer geek has found a solution to bypass ATI's locking mechanism to prevent 9700 and 9500 Pro cards from overclocking, which basically shouldnt be an issue because they share the same R300 core GPU/VPU. Kip Hardina therefore is offering modified VGA card BIOS files to be flashed on the corresponding hardware. According to his findings a comparison of the 9700 Pro BIOS, the 9700 non-pro BIOS, and the 9500 Pro BIOS showed only one hexidecimal value that is keeping the 9500 Pro and 9700 non-pro from overclocking.

Update: Just click on the pic for the link.

Another motherboard has appeared with the SIS 655 chipset. Gigabyte has recently updated their site to include the new GA-8SQ800 Ultra motherboard. The strange thing is that the motherboard supports dual channel DDR400 rather than the DDR333 that the SIS 655 is supposed to support (Interesting, eh?) No mention of a release date yet. Hopefully soon because ASUS will be launching their own SIS 655 based motherboard (the ASUS P4SDX) any day now. More details can be found here.