W.I.L. Hardware Tech-News Highlights for February 2006

If you want to track something physical, such as counting people passing through a gate, or recording how the temperature changes over time in a factory process, you can use a microcontroller to do the measurement – link.

LED lighting closer than we think, disruptive tech could produce medical advances – link.

Brave new world of the PC of the future may be an enormous muddle just waiting to happen – link.

Systems

ArsTechnica’s latest “ultimate budget box” comes in at apx $525 with LCD – link. Other system guides here.

EndPCNoise’s Fanless Ultra Powerhouse PC goes to extremes for low noise. The sheer size, weight and $2,500 price tag of this system tends to limit it to those who truly need extremely low noise or have deeper than usual pockets – review.

Phoenix makes compelling case for open source BIOS – link.

$100 laptop: great for the world, great for Linux – link. PCs for the poor: Which design will win? – link.

Tux-shaped computer runs Linux – link.

Apple launches Intel Mac Mini – link.

Shuttle’s Pentium M-based SD11G5 SFF machine is so quiet that you can sleep next to it, has great performance, and overall is a great office machine – review.

Beautiful but expensive hand crafted computers reviewed and compared – link.

HP’s Pavilion S7220N is a cute small micro computer, worthy due to its low cost and add-ons – review.

HP’s Pavilion DV5000z Turion-based laptop is great for watching TV and DVD movies. It comes with 1GB of RAM, 120GB HDD, a 15.4” Brightview screen, lots of connectivity options, a surprisingly long battery life, Lightscribe DVD writer, an Express card TV Tuner, and is affordable – review.

Beginners guide to ergonomics and computers – link.

CPUs, motherboards, chipsets

Scientists at IBM say they have figured out how to produce smaller and more powerful microchips than previously thought possible, extending useful life of optical lithography – link 1, link 2.

NEC, Sony and Toshiba join forces over 45nm process technology – link.

VAX and the economics of microprocessors – link.

Intel Pentium M 760 and the AMD Turion ML44 laptop CPUs compared. The Turion is not as bad as it previously was it seems especially when it comes to power comsumption – link.

– AMD

A look at AMD’s Socket AM2 platform, due in late Q2. It will not change the performance landscape by much, unless AMD decides to make some fundamental changes to the architecture – link.

How AMD’s Cool and Quiet works, under Linux in particular – link.

New AMD technology refresh, now called AM2, will bring DDR2 memory to the Athlon64 on-processor memory controller. Will incorporate new socket design – link. Socket AM2-M2 motherboards to cost $5 to $10 more than socket 939 or 754 boards – link.

AMD’s mobile Turion 64 tested on Socket 754 motherboard desktop systems. The Pentium M and the Turion 64 are very similar in terms of power consumption and performance, and both can easily be used in desktop systems. But between the CPU and motherboard you can easily save more than $400 by going with a top speed Turion rather than a similar clock Pentium M. The only problem is that Socket 754 is not long for this world – link.

AMD’s Opteron 165 is a workstation CPU that can work just fine in a regular desktop platform. It is the best value dual-core AMD processor for Socket 939 platforms, however performance lags in traditional desktop applications due to the low clock frequency (1.8GHz) – review.

AMD’s Opteron 165 and 180 CPUs: two cores, one socket, 939 pins. The 180 performs exactly like an Athlon 64 X2 4800+, i.e., exceptionally well, outrunning the Pentium D 950 virtually across the board. The 165 scores higher in the benchmarks than its closest real competitor, the Pentium D 930, but does not have nearly the dominance of the 180 due to its low clock speed (1.8GHz) – link.

ULi concludes its (pre-acquisition by nVidia) AMD chipset portfolio with the M1697 – link.

Asus’s Asrock 939SLI-eSATA2 M1697 chipset-based motherboard comes with eSATA2 connectors and AMD’s AM2 slot for future expansion. SLI works flawlessly and this is certainly the cheapest SLI board out there – link.

DFI’s RS 482 Infinity is based on ATI latest Radeon Xpress/SB450 couple. It has an integrated Radeon X300 GPU core, DVI-D, TV OUT with more connectors that you can count, Realtek’s ALC850, Raided SATA , GbE ports and Firewire. It is a very good overclocker, at a good price – review.

Foxconn’s WinFast 6150K8MA-8EKRS micro ATX motherboard, based on nVidia’s GeForce 6150 + nForce 430 chipset is a very capable little board with an integrated graphics solution that is robust enough for most non-gaming computer tasks, marred only by its very basic accessory bundle – review.

Gigabyte’s GA-K8N51PVMT-9 Geforce 6150/Nforce 430 chipset-based mATX motherboard price, features, and absolute performance should be more than sufficient to fill basic needs – review.

– Intel

The Inquirer guide to choosing your Intel desktop chip – link.

Intel’s server roadmap outlined – link.

Intel pushes Conroe Extreme Edition, Viiv, Averill Pro and Vista, estimates it will be able to shift more than two thirds of its desktop processors to dual core by year end – link. Intel’s Averill “desktrino” platform to ship in pro, lite versions – link.

Intel will release two single core ultra low voltage (ULV) in mid April, clocking at 1.20GHz and 1.06GHz – link.

Intel Merom for mobile pushed out to Q4 – link.

Will core duo notebooks trade battery life for quicker response? Tests of Intel’s new mobile platform Centrino Duo say maybe – link.

Aopen 1915GMm-HFS mATX motherboard is geared towards the Pentium M platform. It comes with a phenomenal set of features despite its small size – review.

– Other

Via’s Epia N10000 Nano ITX motherboard combination is whisper quiet and comes with loads of features, but it is relatively slow, has no DVI port and is expensive. Maybe an underclocked Pentium M might be a better choice – review.

IBM finally talks Power 6 – link.

IBM’s Power6 chip will run between 4GHz and 5GHz – link. Power6 does have a solid chance of taking the unquestionable server CPU performance throne when it arrives in some 18 months – link.

Why Apple really ditched PowerPC – link.

Graphics

AnandTech’s February video card price guide is out – link.

Creative cuts life support for 3DLabs, The Last Mohican of OpenGL – link.

Intel releases specs of next-generation chipset GPU. It is expected to launch next quarter ready for the introduction of “Conroe”, Intel’s next-generation desktop CPU – link.

Via eats Intel share in integrated graphics market – link.

Introduction to SLI (and Crossfire), its relative advantages and disadvantages and its impact on games – link.

ATI’s Linux support still stinks – link.

ATI lastest Catalyst drivers, ver. 6.2, analyzed – link.

ATI’s All in Wonder X1900 is far far better than what the multimedia graphics card competition has for the time being – review.

ATI’s PowerColor X800 GTO 16 graphics card is quiet and cheap, but underperforms the GeForce 6800 GS in most games – review.

ATI’s X1900 series fires back with 384 million transistors and 48 shader units in 16 pixel pipelines, and walks away with both the single and dual card title belts – link.

The latest on AVIVO, ATI’s latest effort to get high definition video on our desktops. The least one can say is that AVIVO does easily surpass everything that has existed until now – link.

Inno3D’s 7800GS mid-range level GPU deliveres a lot of punch for the price – review.

nVidia’s Geforce 7900 GT has 7800 GTX 256 performance for $299 – link.

S3’s S27 is finally available, but X1300 PRO and just announced 7300 GS may be significantly faster – link 1, link 2.

Memory, storage

DDR3 DRAM gets ready for prime time, with first mainstream PC implementations a year off and replacing of DDR2 as the main volume product happening in 2008 – link.

Roundup of 2GB DDR SDRAM memory kits for overclockers – link.

Corsair attacks OCZ heat spreader claims, as memory marchitecture wars begin – link.

When it comes to preserving your digital heritage, backup is only the beginning – link.

– Hard Disk Drives

Seagate’s new 160GB 5400.3 2.5” notebook drive, Momentus, which utilizes the new perpendicular magnetic recording method, has the highest density platters to date – review 1, review 2.

Mobile 2.5” SATA HDDs compared – roundup.

Five 250GB HDDs tested with no winner produced. Samsuiing’s is relatively silent – roundup.

Seagate makes waves in microdrive market – link.

Seagate announces 1” HDD with 12GB storage capacity, due out in Q3 – link.

Seagate’s Barracuda 7200.9 500GB HDD shares the crown of the largest HDDs, does not generate that much noise and heat – link.

Western Digital’s Raptor X comes with 16MB cache, a SATA interface, NCQ and a 10,000rpm spin speed. A clear winner is speed vs. its performance competitors – review 1, review 2. Can SCSI HDDs in RAID-0 compete with a single Raptor? – link.

– Optical Drives

Lite-On’s EZ-DUB is a simple-to-use external DVD writer that requires minimal technical and software knowledge to get up and running, but its software does not work on Windows 9x – review.

Acard’s rackmount storage appliance uses SATA hard drives, but connects to the host system with an UltraSCSI interface. Is this the right mix for small businesses? – link.

Labelflash vs. LightScribe DVD/CD labeling – link.

Ricoh’s EncryptEase media allows password protection and compression on a normal 650MB CD-R with no extra software – link.

Cases, power supplies, cooling

TT Tai Chi compared with CM Stacker 830 in a clash of premium cases. Minor annoyances aside, these cases both cool amazingly well, offer loads of expansion, and look good – link.

Coolermaster’s CM Media 250 HTPC case is made of aluminium and steel, has two 60mm fans, a tool-less assembly fan, four expansion slot and an option of VFD. High end stuff at not so high end price – link.

Thermaltake’s Mozart HTPC casing is a glorified desktop casing with a stylish look and lots of space inside – review.

9 powerful (400W+) ATX PSU models tested. Enermax, FSP Group and Zalman come out the leaders, providing top-quality, easy-to-use, quiet products – roundup.

– Cooling Solutions

Coolermaster’s Aquagate Mini R80 watercooling kit comes fully assembled and the water block includes the pump and the water reservoir, and includes quite a few accessories in order to make installation as painless as possible – review.

Tuniq’s Tower 120 cooler proves to be a much more efficient solution than its more famous rivals, notwithstanding its pretty standard copper footing, three heatpipes, tower-heatsink and a 120-mm fan getup – review.

Two brothers from Asetek’s WaterChill family demonstrate maximum performance against minimal cost – review.

Two new CPU coolers with heatpipes from Arctic Cooling, the Freezer 7 Pro and Freezer 64 Pro, leave mixed impressions, although they are undeniably cheap – review.

Six new cooling solutions (5 liquid-cooling and one air) from Thermaltake effectively extend and enhance the company’s offerings – roundup.

Jetart’s NP6600 is a white notebook cooler, powered by a USB cable, that you will fully appreciate if you have ever dealt with one of those excruciatingly-hot laptops – review.

Eight GPU coolers compared – link.

Arctic Cooling’s Accelero X1 and X2 GPU coolers for nVidia and ATI respectively appear to be way better than the competition right now with cooler temperatures and much less noise, and not unreasonable prices – review.

Miscellaneous components and periferals

Evoluent’s Vertical Mouse 2 is a 5 button mouse with a 1200dpi resolution. Whether you like it or not is something of a personal judgement but it is apparently healthier and makes you less prone to repetitive stress injury – review.

High-end large scale PC LCD futures unfold, to 24 to 30 inches and beyond – link.

Six 16:9 20” LCD monitors compared, with Sony grabbing the top two spots – roundup.

Features and performance of 17” LCD monitors investigated (continuing series) – link.

Asus’s PM17TU LCD monitor is excellent as far as quality is concerned but it still has a lot to prove in front of the competition. It comes with Anti Glare technology – review.

Acer’s “Ferrari” F20 20” LCD monitor is more a showpiece than anything else – review.

How to mod your TFT panel into a TransTFT – link.

Multifunction printers call the tune. Photosmart 3210 from HP and the Pixma MP500 from Canon stand out – roundup.

Plantronics’s DSP-500 USB handset is a quality product in line with the firm’s other offerings – review.

Demand for mobile phones that can do practically everything (play music and TV broadcasts, take pictures, play games, etc.) promise to make this an interesting market this year – link.

How to build a WiMAX network right here right now. The WiMAX technology is due to take off with Intel backing it and Wireless USB so strongly – link.