SECURITY...

• Smartphone Users Offered Free Antivirus - Smartphone users have today been offered free antivirus and anti-spam software for their handsets - but only for a limited period. The offer from security firm Trend Micro is only open to devices that use the Windows Mobile 2003 operating system, but a version for Symbian and Pocket PC devices will be out in January. The software package protects against viruses and SMS spam and needs regular updates. The company said that the offering will be free, but only until July 2005.
• The Cost of Virus Protection Rises - Gasoline and milk aren't the only things that cost more these days. The cost of keeping your antivirus software current has been rising, also. But while leading antivirus software vendors Symantec and McAfee have been hiking annual subscription fees for stand-alone products, they've kept those charges flat for product suites that bundle antivirus utilities with firewall, intrusion-detection, and spam-control software. The idea is to encourage customers to move over to these suites.
• Targeted, Mass Distributed Mail Bombing : Theoretical DoS - Mail "Bombing" is perhaps one of the oldest and certainly considered one of the "lamest", that is to say; ineffective and immature, methods of "attack" available to the would-be "script kiddie" or otherwise malicious user online. Simply dating back to the first time someone realised hundreds of irrelevant emails sent to someone else's inbox could be an extreme, and most importantly time wasting, annoyance.
• Firefox's biggest obstacle is lazy programming - Peter Tippett, chief technologist at security risk management firm Cybertrust, said Firefox will probably gain market share with home and small business users but will struggle in the enterprise because corporate applications have not been built to work with anything but IE. "An individual can easily switch to Firefox. But doing that on a corporate level is a disaster. All kinds of internal applications are dependent on IE. They never tested them against Firefox or Mozilla because they never thought about it and now they are kind of hooked – that was Microsoft's plan," said Tippett.
• Upgrade to Windows 2000 SP4 now - Research group Gartner has advised its clients to upgrade their Windows 2000 systems to SP4 as soon as possible, after Microsoft announced last week that it would not release any new service packs for the aging operating system
• Changing Patch Habits With Microsoft  - In enterprise IT departments, the regular patch cycle has led to a number of changes. Many administrators say the change has given them time to test patches comprehensively and has upped their confidence in the updates they deploy. "The real issue is that you have to test patches, and how quickly we move on one is a function of the severity of the problem," said Adam Hansen, manager of security at Sonnenschein Nath & Rosenthal LLP, a Chicago law firm with more than 2,000 users in 11 offices. "I can plan for resource allocation better now. I plan on at least one critical patch every month, and I haven't been disappointed. And I can package the patches together once they're tested and push them out in a pack."

OFF-TOPIC...

• From cell phone to sunflower - Materials company Pvaxx Research & Development, at the request of U.S.-based mobile phone maker Motorola, has come up with a polymer that looks like any other plastic, but which degrades into soil when discarded. Researchers at the University of Warwick in Britain then helped to develop a phone cover that contains a sunflower seed, which will feed on the nitrates that are formed when the polyvinylalcohol polymer cover turns to waste.
• California teenager shines with electricity invention in science competition - Aaron Goldin has won the Siemens Westinghouse Competition for creating a device that converts ocean wave energy into electricity. Goldin made his first prototypes by using a tape recorder, an answering machine and other appliances from his home. One of the judges praised the 17-year-old for demonstrating great independence and originality for his gyroscopic device.
• The post-PC era is upon us - IBM is trying to sell its PC business. Korea has already launched a programme called "The Post-PC Era." Jonathan Schwartz, president of Sun Microsystems, told the New York times: "We've been in the post-PC era for four years now." Can we really manage without the PC?

TECHNOLOGY...

• New consoles could up price of sports games - Prices for Take-Two Interactive Software's sports video games will likely return to higher levels once new game consoles arrive in late 2005 or 2006, the company said Monday.  Take-Two, in partnership with Sega Sammy Holdings, has been selling its popular ESPN sports games for $19.99 for Sony PlayStation 2 and Microsoft Xbox game consoles. Until last year, those games were published by Sega alone and sold for around $40.
• Net file-sharing doesn't hurt most artists - Most musicians and artists say the Internet has helped them make more money from their work despite online file-trading services that allow users to copy songs and other material for free, according to a study released Sunday.
• Microsoft unveils free SQL management tool - Microsoft today unveiled a technical preview of SQL Server 2005 Express Manager, a newly developed free database management tool and the second Community Technology Preview of the SQL Server 2005 database. In addition to quality and performance enhancements, Microsoft promised that the latest SQL preview code will introduce 64-bit support for SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services and SQL Server 2005 Integration Services on top of the 64-bit support already included for the database engine.
• IBM Unveils World's Smallest SRAM Memory Cell - IBM today announced it has built a critical component for a high-speed computer memory that is about ten times smaller than those currently available, potentially enabling a major system performance boost for critical business applications.
• Switches Drive Down Prices For 10-Gbps Ethernet - Falling prices for 10-Gbps Ethernet switches may spur a new round of network upgrades by businesses looking to provide more speed for bandwidth-hungry applications. Hewlett-Packard and Alcatel today will introduce several aggressively priced 10-Gbps switches, joining a host of other major networking vendors' faster and cheaper switches introduced in recent months.

HARDWARE...

• Intel updates price list - Intel updated its microprocessor menu yesterday, adding a number of juicy new items to its bill of fare. So now we see the 775-pin 3.46GHz Pentium 4 Extreme Edition with its 1066MHz frontside bus, pricing at a less-than-compelling $999, the same as the 3.4GHz/800MHz FSB version. And there's the Pentium 4 570J with its 1MB L2 cache, 3.8GHz clock frequency and Execute Disable Bit (EDB) support. It's priced at $637. The new Celeron 345J also supports the EDB, though it's also available as the EDB-less Celeron 345. Both run at 3.06GHz over a 533MHz FSB and contain 256KB of L2. Both cost $127.
• Intel's New E0 Prescott Stepping: Improved at Idle, but Throttling Under Load -The new Thermal Monitoring 2 is a nice feature TM2, however, it's a literal clock throttle that reduces clockspeed to 2.8 GHz in order to cool the CPU down. If TM2's clock reduction is insufficient, TM1 is still available to shut the CPU off and cool it more drastically. We attempted to force TM2 to occur, but Throttlewatch only reported TM1 events when we created conditions meant to deliberately throttle the CPU. We noted a periodic drop in clockspeed as monitored by WCPUID's real-time clock monitor, but even set to a refresh rate of half a second, it never caught more than a flicker of change (from 3876 to 3650 for example).
• Nvidia's Nforce 5 details enlarged and expanded - According to TheInquirer, the Intel Nvidia chipset will support both 800 and 1066FSB for P4 Intel CPUs. It will support socket 775 CPUs based on Prescott, a new 2MB 600 core and future dual core Smithfield CPUs. The chipset already has support for Intel's 64 bit marchitecture.
• Plextor PX-716 DVD+/-R/RW Ships with Roxio Easy Media Creator - Roxio announced today that Plextor has selected Roxio's Easy Media Creator 7 Basic DVD Edition software to ship with their new PX-716 series 16X DVD+/-R/RW recorders.
• Albatron K8Ultra-U motherboards support Windows XP 64-bit edition - Albatron Technology announced today the availability of two new Athlon 64 motherboards. The K8Ultra-U and the K8Ultra-U Pro are both designed for the upcoming Windows XP 64-bit operating system.
• Cisco lifts lid on 'mini' 640Gbps router - Cisco has released the latest version of its CSR-1 intelligent router aimed at service providers. The 'mini' CRS-1 8-slot single-shelf system has half the slots of the firm's existing CRS-1 router but is half the size and can process 640Gbps of switching capacity compared to the larger model's 92Tbps.
• AMD Athlon 64 3000+ (Winchester) - Our off-the-shelf sample was utterly stable at just under 2.4GHz, cooled only by the supplied reference heatsink. All it took was a slight rise in core voltage and a motherboard capable of scaling with the processor's heightened driven clock. Overclocked benchmark results were on a par with a standard Athlon 64 3800+, a processor that costs almost 4x the L110 3000+ retail price. S939 is soon to enjoy the performance benefits that SLI-capable chipsets can deliver, so faster CPU speeds become even more important due to the number of games that will become system-bound with a pair of fast SLI cards working in tandem.
• ABIT RX600 Pro-Guru 256MB PCI-E video-review - The ABIT RX600 Pro-Guru 256MB PCI-E Video Card is a product targeted at the casual gamer. It has a core speed of 405MHz and a memory speed of 257MHz. There is an interesting feature which enables the core speed to increase to 500MHz by simply changing jumper position. Also, the vGuru software is loaded with features.
• XFX's GeForce 6600 GT AGP 8x - These 6600 GT cards are being sold for hundreds of dollars less than nVidia's 6800 and ATI's X800 line of graphics cards, yet deliver performance levels which are actually very close in modern games. As for the card itself, the XFX GeForce 6600 GT is an odd looking card but it gets the job done. It's small, doesn't consume a lot of power, and is stable.
• Leadtek Winfast PX6600TD PCI-E - Leadtek claims that the WinFast PX6600TD uses an Ultra Cooling System, but we beg to differ. The cooler on the GeForce 6600 GPU is a conventional aluminium heatsink with radial fins, although the fan is a relatively large 55mm diameter unit, compared to the standard size of 40mm that is used on many graphics cards.
• Saitek PC Gaming Keyboard review - LAN Addict is looking at a USB keyboard from Saitek.
• Motorola's Bluetooth Wireless Headsets: the HS-810 - Legit Reviews take a look at one of Motorola's Bluetooth Wireless Headsets: the HS-810

GUIDES...

• A Windows XP Optimization Guide v1.8.2 - This guide is designed to be performed top to bottom, in sequence since some steps are required to be performed before others. Before using this guide make sure your system meets Microsoft's Official: Windows XP System Requirements.
• USB Mouserate Switcher v0.1 - Increase USB port sample rate to 250hz or 500hz boost precision and improve mice accuracy.
• Xmas Gifts - Here're some cool Christmas gifts for the geek who has everything..and for those that can't have it but want it anyway...USB Mini Desktop Aquarium / Geekman Action Figure  / Datasurfer PC Workstation / Mouse Pad CD Player / MP3 USB Watch / Caffeine Sampler / Cooler Master2 Multi Function Panel (thanks WinOSCentral)
• Bjorn3D 2004 Holiday Gift Guide - check it out!

SOFTWARE...

• OpenOffice 1.1.4 RC - OpenOffice.org (download version for win32 ~ linux) is the open source project through which Sun Microsystems is releasing the technology for the popular StarOffice productivity suite.
• StarFuck v0.81 - This small tool (Russian website ~ download) will allow you to install/use Starforce protected CDs w/o Starforce crap :)
• Process Explorer v8.60 - The Process Explorer display consists of two sub-windows. The top window always shows a list of the currently active processes, including the names of their owning accounts, whereas the information displayed in the bottom window depends on the mode that Process Explorer is in: if it is in handle mode you'll see the handles that the process selected in the top window has opened; if Process Explorer is in DLL mode you'll see the DLLs and memory-mapped files that the process has loaded. Process Explorer also has a powerful search capability that will quickly show you which processes have particular handles opened or DLLs loaded.
• Ultimate Boot CD 3.1 - You need the Ultimate Boot CD if you want to: 1) Run floppy-based diagnostic tools from CDROM drives. 2) Free yourself from the slow loading speed of the floppy drive. 3) Consolidate as many diagnostic tools as possible into one bootable CD.
• Nero 6.6.0.3 changelog available - Ahead has released several changelogs of applications that were updated with Nero update 6.6.0.3.
• AnyDVD 4.3.0.1 - SlySoft released a new version 4.3.0.1 of its popular AnyDVD. This new version adds support for an older version of the Sony ARccOS copy protection and the option to remove annoying adverts and trailers has been greatly improved.
• ZoneAlarm 5.5.062.004 - ZoneAlarm barricades your PC with immediate and complete port blocking. And, then runs in Stealth Mode to make your PC invisible on the Internet - if you can't be seen, you can't be attacked.
• PowerStrip 3.55 (shw) - PowerStrip 3.46 provides advanced, multi-monitor, programmable hardware support to a wide range of graphics cards.
• GAIM 1.1.0 - Gaim (download ~ changelog) is a multi-protocol instant messaging client for Linux, BSD, MacOS X, and Windows. It is compatible with AIM (Oscar and TOC protocols), ICQ, MSN Messenger, Yahoo, IRC, Jabber, Gadu-Gadu, and Zephyr networks.
• TightVNC for Windows 1.3dev6 beta - TightVNC is a client/server software package allowing remote network access to graphical desktops. You may allow yourself to access your machine from everywhere provided that your machine is connected to the Internet. It is optimized to work over slow network connections such as low-speed modem links. Can work remotely almost in real time in most environments.
• Asus PC Probe 2.23.06 - Asus PCProbe is a convenient utility to monitor the computer's vital components: fan rotation speeds, voltages and temperatures.
• CPU-Z 1.26 - CPU-Z (download) is a freeware utility that provides some information on your CPU.
• nForce2 C0/C1/C2 Cooling Patch V2 - Allow nForce2 chipset based motherboards with AMD cpus to use C2/C1 idle state (S2K bus disconnection without HALT detection) reduce idle/load temperatures by 1-10c degrees!