W.I.L. Tech-News Highlights for H2 September 2004

Hardware

Systems

Small Form Factor PC roundup-- link.

Itronix hopes to shake the GoBook notebook’s “quesadilla cooker” nickname with newest model -- link.

The commoditisation of the PC notebook -- link.

Dell Debuts compact PC -- link.

Gateway PC delivers new motherboard standard, BTX design cools down the company’s new 700GR desktop -- link.

Finding an energy efficient and cheap server for home use -- link.

A “lean computer” might be fine for most users -- link.

CPUs/motherboards/chipsets

Which CPU to use on your ultimate Linux workstation? -- link.

IBM, AMD work to shrink chips, extended collaboration could result in chips built on 32nm technology -- link.

POWER5+ vs. Intel Montecito: The niche battle -- link.

New budget processors comparison between Intel Celeron D and AMD Sempron shows the new Intel chip in a favorable light. The Sempron 3100+ is also much better than its junior mates -- review.

-- AMD

3 AMD Socket A 2500+ rated CPUs compared -- link. Discussion here.

AMD to tweak notebook chip designs to lower power consumption, increase reliability -- link.

Socket 939 motherboard showdown -- link.

AMD launches 90nm desktop processors, accelerates transition to 90nm process technology -- link. AMD transits Sempron to 90nm process technology -- link. AMD launches new Athlon 64 mobile processor, for use in thin-and-light notebooks -- link.

AMD disappointed by Microsoft’s decision to push back a 64-bit Windows -- link.

Athlon 64 3000+ Socket 939 90nm -- review.

If AMD follows its current strategy, it will not keep its lead for long -- analysis.

Via enables PCI Express on AMD64-based computers -- link.

-- Intel

Latest Intel roadmaps -- link.

How Intel could deliver dual core chip prototypes in promised time-frame -- link.

Itanium unsuitable for workstations, Intel says -- link. HP drops Itanium 2 workstations -- link.

New Toshiba notebooks use Intel desktop chips. U.S. buyers still lukewarm to Intel’s Mobile M chip? -- link.

Upcoming Pentium 4 Extreme Edition chips will support a 1066-MHz front-side bus -- link.

-- Other

Via’s upcomimg C7 chips will run at higher speeds, but consume less power -- link.

Erstwhile Motorola chip division Freescale will manufacture a 90nm dual-core PowerPC processor -- link 1, link 2.

Just-released Transmeta TM8800 has been integrated into a new ultraportable from Sharp -- link.

Graphics

AnandTech’s September optical and magnetic storage price guides -- link.

ATI’s Radeon X700 XT midrange chip is pretty good, but basically underperforms nVidia’s GeForce 6600 GT -- review 1, review 2. Radeon X700 XT architecture previewed -- link.

A look at Intel’s latest integrated graphics core -- link.

nVidia’s new GeForce 6600 GT mainstream chip makes it to retail -- link.

XGI starts to make graphics cards based on its own GPUs -- link.

ATI 9700 All-In-Wonder is based on a 2 year old graphics core, but can still handle some of the most demanding games around -- review.

Affordable modern graphics cards -- link.

Are Dell and Intel pushing for looser PCI Express specs? -- link.

S3 Graphics Prepares to jump on the PCI Express bandwagon -- link.

ATI and nVidia have no plans for any more high-end chip updates in 2004 -- link.

ATI Radeon X300 reference PCI express videocard is a good value, as long as gaming is not in your plans -- link.

ASUS Extreme AX600XT vs. MSI PCX 5750 budget PCI-Express card compared. You may want to wait to see if the prices of these two cards drop after the newer 6600s and X700s hit store shelves -- review.

Audio processing on your graphics card? -- link.

Memory

2004 a boom year for DRAM, but 2005-06 look to be a bust -- link.

RAM memory technology overview -- link.

Samsung demos future DDR DRAM and flash memory chips based on 80nm and 60nm processes -- link. Samsung develops 8Gb flash memory chip -- link.

New line of Panasonic flash memory cards will transfer data twice as fast as current cards -- link.

11 memory card readers compared -- roundup.

USB thumb drives as a fashion statement? -- link.

SanDisk announces CompactFlash cards that double the read and write speeds, an 8GB flash card, and a device that allows digital photographers to bypass the PC -- link. 8GB compact flash cartridge available ... for $959 -- link.

Storage

Seagate 160GB Barracuda HDD now sports SATA technology NCQ -- review.

Maxtor expands external HDDs lineup -- link.

Toshiba will begin production on sub-1” hard drive later this year -- link.

Maxtor Atlas 10K V SCSI hard drive is quiet and has large capacity -- review.

Thermaltake SilverRiver external USB hard drive enclosure -- review.

Two microdrive hard disk drives from Hitachi need a serious price reduction in the near future to compete with CompactFlash media -- review.

Seagate’s Savvio offers mobile form factor (2.5” size) for enterprise-caliber storage -- review.

BenQ DW1620 is an elegant, robust DVDR surprise -- review.

Rewriteable version of the next-generation DVD format moves closer to mass production -- link.

Super-fast dual-layer DVD writing -- link.

Miscellaneous components and periferals

Philips Ultimate Edge 5.1 soundcard offers great value at under $50 -- review.

In search of a mid-tower case with useful control displays -- link.

SilverStone Technology Temjin 6 is another BTX style case in an ATX form-factor -- review.

Alphacool NexXxos XP CPU water block -- review.

Viewsonic’s VP912B 19” LCD monitor not too big, not too small -- review.

Acer AL1721hm 17” TFT monitor has many features and a reasonable price tag -- review.

Epson introduces 2 new members of the “Perfection” family of scanners for home users looking to scan film, slides, and negatives: the 2480 PHOTO and 2580 PHOTO -- review.

The AMI Megarac K1 is a new family of keyboard/video/mouse(KVM) adaptors that route all functions over IP ... and overall is highly recommended -- review 1, review 2.

Linksys launches dual-capacity wi-fi gear using both 802.11g and less cluttered band of radio spectrum-using 802.11a technologies (both have the same theoretical maximum bandwidths) -- link.

D-Link DCS-2100+ security camera -- review.

Belkin PC tool kit has it all, even a 3oz. can of air! -- link.

Operating Systems

Linux

Introducing the LinuxPlanet Linux Distribution Guide -- link.

Linux.com’s “CLI Magic” series continues -- Ifconfig. Series index here.

KDE 3.3 usability study and review -- link.

GNOME 2.8 is released -- link.

“The Stealth Desktop” series on using Slackware as a desktop Linux distribution -- Part 1, Part 2, Part 3.

X11R6.8.1 release of the X Window System announced -- link.

ATI readies big Linux driver push -- link.

Linux small business servers -- link.

What is KDE e.V. for? -- link.

AfterStep 2.0 released -- link.

KDE 3.3 and GNOME 2.8 compared, with emphasis on their respective e-mail and collaboration clients -- link.

Linux, the pirate’s friend, says Gartner -- link.

The state of Linux gaming -- link.

The story of Vishal Kashyap, who delivered an open source solution for Primary Agriculture Credit Societies located in the remote regions of Himachal Pradesh -- link.

Linux on desktop will be “cheaper and more secure”, claim vendors -- link.

Where to get the best training in Linux administration? -- link.

BSDs, other Unixes

OpenBSD’s Theo de Raadt talks software security -- link.

Protecting the perimeter with OpenBSD -- link.

Solaris 10 shines in early testing -- link.

Open Source Solaris? -- link.

IBM has put no SCO Code in Unix System V code says M.I.T. computer science professor -- link.

Running ancient UNIX on Nintendo Gameboy -- link.

Other OS’s

Microsoft patches SP2 -- link.

Mr. Gates Goes to Washington -- link.

The Athene Operating System -- link.

Long-awaited Syllable 0.5.4 is now available -- link.

Applications

Open Sourced speech code from “100% behind Linux” IBM does not include Viavoice -- link.

Open Source Software on Windows goes to work -- link.

Why a standard single-file SQL format is necessary and how SQLite can get us there -- link.

Kazaa loses P2P crown to edonkey -- link.

Adobe proposes new image format, Digital Negative Specification, or DNG, as a universal standard for the digital camera RAW format. Also releases a free software tool that converts the RAW formats from more than 65 cameras into DNG -- link.

Star/OpenOffice XML format to become ISO standard? -- link.

Desktop-oriented applications

A look at desktop publishing application Scribus 1.2 -- link. Scribus team interviewed -- link. Discussion here.

Firefox 1.0 preview hits a home run -- link. Mozilla’s Ben Goodger on Firefox’s Future -- link.

NetFront: the fast GTK+ browser you never knew existed -- link.

Microsoft insists it has not lost interest in Web browsers -- link.

Adobe beta tests 18MB Acrobat Reader 7.0 (article contains links to alternative PDF file readers) -- link.

“The Grumpy Editor’s” guide to presentation programs on Linux -- link.

XML-based print publishing with DSSSL and OpenJade -- link.

Hot LyX -- link.

OpenOffice.org macros and add-ons -- link.

Gaim multi-protocol instant messaging client for Linux, BSD, MacOS X, and Windows releases version 1.0 -- link. Gaim maintainer Rob Flynn interviewed -- link.

Krita aims to be a user-friendly image manipulation program. Developers hope to make it part of the KDE office suite KOffice 1.4, scheduled spring 2005 -- link.

AbiWord vs. MS Word -- link.

Programming

Programming language popularity -- link 1, link 2.

Tom Lord, author of the Arch Revision Control System, interviewed -- link.

Road testing 5 RAD tools -- link.

Irrlicht is a fast realtime 3D engine -- link.

Code generation with Codesmith -- link.

5 commercial IDE’s compared -- reviews.

Apache Portable Runtime, the portability library underlying the Apache HTTP Server 2.x, reaches its own 1.0.0 release -- link.

GNUstep 0.9.4, Lesstif 0.93.96 and Fox Toolkit releases -- link.

Dear one-browser Web designers: Don’t say I did not warn you -- link.

Step-by-step development of FLTK applications in Eclipse -- link.

Linux C and C++ compilers -- link.

Mono: A Developer’s Handbook -- book review.

Java 2 Standard Edition 5 is out -- link.

QtRuby and Korundum bring eXtreme RAD to KDE -- link.

Dynamic languages are the future -- link.

PHP 5 OO model in 24 slides -- link.

Security & Privacy

First half of 2004 saw a huge increase in zombie PCs -- link.

VMware creates PC software “condom” -- link.

Sloppy USB use threatens employers’ security -- link.

Is organized crime controlling your PC? Symantec report says Internet attacks for financial gain on the rise -- link.

Fighting online extortion -- link.

Virus-obsessed firms ignore insider risk -- link.

Invasion of the identity snatchers -- link.

Hardening Apache -- book review.

Walmart’s pre-paid gift cards have been hacked -- link.

Holes, patches, defenses, spam

Dangerous exploit targets JPEG flaw, software patch available from Microsoft -- link. Images posted in news groups may install remote control software on vulnerable -- link.

Everything you need to know about honeypots -- link.

SpamAssassin 3.0 released -- link.

Miscellaneous

DIY warriors saluted and sought -- link.

The Inquirer invited to Iceland’s presidential palace -- link.

Will the US election matter to the IT sector? -- link.

What the Internet Bubble got right -- link.

He sold the soul of rock ‘n’ roll and turned FM into a musical wasteland. Now he has 130 satellite channels and says we won’t get fooled again -- link.

The Internet

Amazon’s A9: How well is the hype justified? -- link.

This Wonderful Life is a very impressive animated short -- link.

Tim Berners-Lee and the semantic Web -- link.

Flash mobs a threat to security? -- link.

100GB email account offered, with a 1TB prize to the first person to fill it up! -- link.

RIP the online exchange -- link.

Internet Babylon: Secrets, Scandals, and Shocks on the Information Superhighway -- book review.

Science

Wind power cost premium falls under $0.01/kwh -- link.

Beer found to be as healthy as wine -- link.

Saving Energy Without Derision e-book is intended to be a real-world, no-nonsense, thoroughly documented collection of easy-to-implement recommendations -- link.

Deaf children invent their own sign language -- link.

Rescue rats to find buried victims -- link.

In the beginning there was Darwin. And then there was intelligent design. How the next generation of “creation science” is invading America’s classrooms -- link.

Dr. Bunsen Honeydew and Beaker of Muppet fame have been nominated favorite TV scientist in a poll -- link.

Self-assembling 3D nanostructures -- link.

Zero gravity flights for the rest of us -- link.

Telecommunications

Wi-Fi Toys is a must read for anyone who wants to learn more about Wi-Fi -- book review.

DSL leads the broadband boom -- link.

AT&T announces a number of VoIP initiatives -- link.

Congress debates 411 wireless directory legislation -- link.

You Don’t Know Jack about VoIP provides overview for developers -- link.

Stronger encryption for Wi-Fi -- link.

Skype VoIP software and service reviewed -- link.

The Voice Over IP insurrection -- link.