Morning Tech Reading - tech
(hx) 01:39 PM CEST - Aug,23 2003
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- Hackers Steal 13,000 Credit Card Numbers -
The Navy has canceled 13,000 credit cards used for government expenses
after discovering that hackers had downloaded card numbers and billing
records, Defense Department officials said. Citibank, the card issuer, has
found no unusual activity in the card accounts since the hacking began in July
and no fraud related to the incident had been reported as of Thursday,
according to a Defense Department official. Officials and investigative teams
from the Navy and Department of Defense are still trying to figure out what
vulnerabilities the hackers exploited and how to prevent such attacks in the
future.
- Feared Attack From Computer Virus Fizzles - A feared Internet
attack resulting from a fast-spreading computer virus fizzled Friday. Security
experts said they contained the virus by identifying and blocking computers
key to coordinating it. Instructions written into the latest version of the
"Sobig" virus, which has caused enormous headaches since it began appearing
Tuesday, called for infected Windows machines to try to download a program
that, until the attack began at 3 p.m. EDT Friday, had an unknown function.
Experts feared the program could have deleted files, stolen passwords or
created rogue e-mail servers for spreading junk e-mail.
But when the appointed time came, all the virus did was visit a pornography
site, said Vincent Weafer, security director with Symantec Security
Response. "There is nothing malicious, just a standard sex site," he said.
- Woman burned by exploding cellphone - A mobile phone has
exploded in a woman's face while she was out shopping. The blast caused
burns to her face and neck. The freak incident happened in Amsterdam earlier
this week. According to local reports, the phone switched itself off when the
33-year-old women dropped the phone. When she switched it back on again, the
phone exploded. Paramedics arrived quickly on the scene to treat her for her
injuries. According to witnesses, the phone concerned was manufactured by
mobile giant Nokia. A spokesman for Nokia confirmed that while the phone
was made by Nokia, the battery was not. Nokia intends to carry out an
investigation into the incident but has warned that some replacement
batteries, while cheaper, lack some essential safety features.
- Nanoparticles to pinpoint viruses in body scans -
An injection of magnetic nanoparticles into your bloodstream could reveal
precisely where harmful viruses are lurking. The particles are coated with
antibodies to a particular virus, so they will form clumps that should be
visible on conventional body scans if that virus is present. The team working
on the technology, from the Harvard Medical School's Center for Molecular
Imaging Research in Charlestown, Massachusetts, have already managed to detect
viruses in body fluids and tissue samples. They hope to be able to detect
viruses in patients' bodies within a couple of years. Much of the technology
has already been tested in humans, so the scientists are confident that it
will be safe.
- Toshiba debuts smallest HDD MP3 player - Toshiba has launched what
it claims is the
thinnest, lightest and smallest hard drive-based portable music player yet
to grace the market. The player, the Gigabeat G20 MEG200J is just 1.27cm
thick, a smidge thinner than the 1.55cm iPod. It measures 8.95 x 7.65cm and
weighs 138g - the iPod is 10.25 x 6cm and weighs 158.76g. Inside its limited
edition dark "sapphire" blue or standard aluminium shell, the Gigabeat packs
in a 20GB 1.8in hard drive.
- AMD to ship Athlon 64s as Athlon XPs - AMD's upcoming Athlon 64
low-end variants, codenamed
'Paris' and 'Victoria', will not be offered as 64-bit processors but as 32-bit
upgrades to the current Athlon XP line. Paris and Victoria emerged earlier
this year, when they were revealed to be cut-down versions of the Athlon 64.
At the time, it was assumed that was simply a matter of their smaller, 256KB
L2 cache. Paris will be fabbed at 130nm, and is due to ship sometime during Q4
2003. Victoria will debut late Q2 or early Q3 2004. However, it now appears
that the chips will not operate in 64-bit mode. The Athlon 64 supports three
modes of operation: 32-bit 'legacy' mode, dual 32/64-bit 'compatibility' mode
and pure 64-bit mode. The last two require a 64-bit OS, and are essentially
sub-modes of the chip's 64-bit 'long' mode.
- ATI R360 Speed and Performance Revealed - According to X-Bit Labs,
ATI's new graphics monster
will utilize a new type of VPU cooler, a more efficient one to cool down the
powerful 0.15 micron R360 VPU running at astonishing 450MHz.. Other
features of ATI graphics cards will remain untouched: the product will come
equipped with D-Sub, DVI-I and TV-Out connectors. Both versions of the R360
with either 128 or 256MB of DDR SDRAM memory will be clocked similarly and
will score 6750 - 7000+ marks in the 3DMark03 benchmark, suggesting that R360
is something more than an overclocked R350 and we should expect architectural
improvements as well.
- MSI-8918 Personal Cinema FX5200 Video Card Review - In the
ATI All-In-Wonder 9700 PRO review we mentioned that ATI held the lead in the
sector of video cards with additional multimedia features. The guys in Santa
Clara have apparently realized that and finally counterattacked. The pioneer
was expectedly Micro-Star International which seems to be the only
manufacturer of video cards on NVIDIA's chips that readily offers additional
features such as a remote control with the MSI FX5600-VTDR128 (MS-8912). The
only thing left to do is to add a tuner and replace the FX5600 with the FX5200
to get... So, meet the today's hero
MSI-8918 Personal Cinema FX5200.
- Chaintech FX71 5600 Ultra Video Card Review -
The Chaintech FX71 5600 Ultra video card has a functional purpose behind
its sexy looks, too. The enclosed design was designed to produce better
cooling for today's demanding graphic processors. By using Gas Turbine
Technology (GT), it can average around 10-15°C better cooling than other
standard methods. The Gas Turbine technology works in the same way, for the
most part, as an airplane engine.
- Aerocool Golden Crown Review -
A cfm rating of 38.41 while only giving off 26dBA of noise is quite
impressive. This comes close to the noise levels of some 92mm fans at the same
dBA. The higher performance fan provides an equally impressive ratio with 51.5
cfm at only 34 dBA.
- Zalman CNPS7000A-CU - HardwarePacers are looking at the
Zalman CNPS7000A-Cu Pentium 4 Heatsink which also fits AMD 462 and 754
sockets. The Zalman CNPS7000A-Cu is a Pentium 4 heatsink that is very
competitive with a pure copper heatsink and a fan that spins from 1350 - 2400
RPM where it can be controlled with a Zalman fan controller. Estimated Price:
49- 65 USD
- P4 Cooler Shoot out - Gamers Depot has posted
a shout out between two of the latest P4 coolers from Zalman and
Thermaltake.
- OCZ EL DDR PC3700 Premier Dual Channel -
OCZ Premier Series PC-3700 features OCZ EVPR Extended Voltage Protection,
a circuit protection feature designed to allow performance enthusiasts to
tweak their systems without the worry of invalidating the warranty. OCZ
Premier Series PC-3700 memory has been optimized for use with the Intel
i865/i875 chipsets in dual channel configurations.
- Gigabyte GA-7VT600L KT600 Motherboard Review - The KT-600 chipset
is NOT going be VIA's saviour. It is 5% slower than Nvidia's nF2 Ultra400 on
average. In extreme cases, i.e.
Q3A demo, the gap is as wide as 14%. In terms of overclocking, KT-600 is
no match for Nvidia's nF2 due to the lack of PCI and AGP locking.
- 3DMark2001SE scores of K8 3100+ - Here is
a chart showing the score obtained by a Tyan Radeon 9700Pro running 512M
Corsair XMS3500c2.
- Soyo P4I875P Dragon 2 Platinum Edition - The price is a bit steep
at
around $190 USD, and the overclocking options are lacking, but that isn't
to say this board is entirely bad. The Dragon 2 PE is packed with storage
options. The PATA and SATA RAID ability is extremely nice, but it is certainly
overkill for a lot of people. The integrated sound and Gigabit Ethernet are
major pluses. The sound quality is just as good, if not better than my Sound
Blaster Live! Extras such as the 6-1 card reader with USB and Firewire are a
great addition if you use a lot of portable devices that require memory card
storage. The software bundle is equally useful with several Norton products.
- Lite-On LTR-52327S -
The LTR-52327S really has a lot going for it. While it is not a real speed
increase in areas like reading or writing, this drive is a killer rewriter.
Additionally, the LTR-52327S is smaller and more attractive than its
predecessors - not to mention the fact that one can find this drive on
pricewatch for a mere 45 dollars.
- Lite On LTN-526 52X CD-ROM Review - When it came time for me to
build a new PC to augment my main PC and take over duties of DivX encoding I
needed a cheaply priced yet reliable optical drive. I chose the
52X Lite On LTN-526 CD-ROM for it's price ($16.99 at NewEgg) and also due
to complete customer satisfaction with all of my other Lite On products.
- A+GPB HSS168 Virtual 3D Headphone Review - When you go to LAN
parties you're usually not allowed to bring your speakers. You are required to
bring a pair of headphones. If you are a casual gamer at home or listen to
music on your MP3 player are you bored of your basic earphones/headphones?
ModSynergy has posted
a review
of A+GPB HSS168 Virtual 3D Headphone.
- IOGEAR GME321R Phaser RF Wireless Mouse W/ Laser Pointer - If you
like trackballs, and need to be able to walk around, sit back / relax, while
still being able to control your computer, this is the
absolute best trackball you can get.
- Firewalls and Internet Security Guide - PC Stats has posted
a new guide about Firewalls and Internet Security.
- Lapping Guide - Ever heard about lapping? Well lapping is a process
of making a heatsink flat. We want the metal-to-metal contact between the
heatsink and CPU die and/or chip to become one. The more contact both have,
the better cooling is achieved.
This guide
is going to be straight forward, telling you how to lap a heatsink of any
kind straight up. So listen.
- Hard Drive Data Recovery Guide - PC Stats has posted
a new beginners guide about Hard Drive Data Recovery.
- System Optimization Guide 2003 - Design Technica has published a
System Optimization Guide.
- BSPlayer 0.86.501 -
BSplayer (download)
is a media player that plays back all kinds of media files ( avi / mpg / asf /
wmv / wav / mp3...) and specialises in video and divx playback.
- 36 Winamp Plugins - Techconnect have posted TechConnect has posted
a list of
36 Winamp plugins.
- Opera Without Java 7.20 Beta 4 - Opera's new looks are complemented
with exciting features such as the Personal Bar and Pagebar, hotclick,
improved window handling, bookmarks search, redesigned preferences, new
shortcuts, extensive drag and drop, and support for Unicode and LiveConnect.
You can download a new beta 4 from
here.
- Eudora for Windows 6.0.0.20 Beta -
Eudora provides easy to use email features plus the extra customization
for the most advanced user. It gives you the best of both worlds.
Version 6.0 has the exact same feeling and features than v5 with the
anti-spam added, so I don't plan to upgrade soon. If you already running
the previous beta, they've disabled the SPAMeliminator, it's only available in
paid mode now.
- MotherBoard Monitor 5.3.4.0 - A new version of
MotherBoard Monitor,
the program that shows the temp of your motherboard and cpu, fans etc.
- VMware 4.0.12 Build 5592 -
VMware Workstation (Win32
~
Linux rpm /
.tar) is virtual machine software for technical professionals. It lets you
run multiple versions of operating systems simultaneously on a single
computer. Quit wasting time configuring hardware, installing software,
rebooting/reconfiguring systems. Spend more time developing, testing, and
deploying applications and delivering support.
- CPUInfo 2.1.0 Final -
CPUInfo shows detailed informations about the processors on the mainboard.
It detects the processor type and manufacturer, the clock ratio, level 1 and
level 2 cache and the processor instruction set extensions.
- I-Worm.Sobig.F Virus Stopper 1.2 - Now is the peak of Sobig virus
epidemic. The worst thing is that you have to download tons of unwanted
messages that infected by this virus.
This
program (download)
is intendend to help you to deal with this infected flood.
- Lite-On CD-RW Firmware - LiteOn have released some
new CD-RW firmware updates for the following drives: Lite-On LDW-401S ( 4X
4X 12X + 40X 24X 40X ) DVD+RW Firmware DR4ES0E.zip (2003/08/05) and Lite-On
LTR-52327S ( 52X 32X 52X ) CD-RW Firmware R52QS09.zip (2003/08/25).
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Updated:10:31 PM CEST Jun,20
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