Nightly Tech Reading - tech
(hx) 03:31 AM CEST - Oct,21 2003
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- From cars to medicine, nanotubes may be miracle material -
They are stronger than steel and as flexible as plastic, conduct energy
better than almost any material ever discovered and can be made from unexotic
raw materials such as methane gas. Now the question is whether they can live
up to their promise. In a relatively short time, carbon nanotubes--thin tubes
of carbon atoms that have unusual characteristics because of their unique
structure--have emerged as a miracle material that could revolutionize a
number of industries.
- Water sparks new power source -
A
new way to generate electricity from water which could be used to power
small electronic devices in the future has been developed by Canadian
scientists. It could provide new power for chips The researchers have
harnessed what happens to water when it is pumped through tiny channels.
The team says its "electrokinetic" battery could be further developed to
provide a clean, non-polluting power source that could eventually drive small
devices such as mobile phones. But some experts in the field have cast
doubt over its potential as a useful source of power.
- Nvidia GeForce FX 5950, 5700 to launch Wednesday? -
Nvidia's NV38 and NV36 chips will debut this week if claims made by the
Taiwanese tech press are to be believed. Commenting on graphics card companies
who offer products based on both ATI and Nvidia chips, DigiTimes notes that
one such firm, Gigabyte, will announce cards based on the GeForce FX 5950 and
GeForce FX 5700 on Wednesday this week.
- Creative unveils 60GB iPod alternative - Creative has extended its
Nomad Jukebox Zen line
of hard drive-equipped portable music players with the Xtra - a unit that
packs
in not only an iPod-beating 60GB hard drive but a new display that
addresses one of the key criticisms of older Zens: screen size.
- Epson Stylus Pro 4000 review -
The Epson Stylus Pro 4000 ($1,795 direct) is far and away the best,
fastest, most versatile printer in its class, capable of producing superb
exhibition-quality photo prints, graphics arts proofs, posters, and just about
any other output one could possibly want. With a 17-inch-wide carriage, the
printer will barely fit on your desk, but who wouldn't sacrifice desktop real
estate for this gem?
- KingMAX SuperRAM PC3500 DDR433 Memory Review - PCStats has posted
a review of KingMAX SuperRAM PC3500 DDR433 Memory
- The Optical Mice Rat Race Reviewed - The optical mouse sector has
become a two-rat rat race, dominated by Microsoft and Logitech.
THG tested MS' and Logitech's newest and brightest gear to counter
marketing hype with hard testing data. THG has also threw in for good measure
performance results for the Razer Boomslang, touted by Terratec as the latest
and greatest wireless mouse. For those of us who don't know enough about what
optical mice benchmarks mean, but are afraid to ask, we have included an
optical mice tutorial.
- Toshiba e750 Pocket PC - Personal Computing on the Run - If
you aren't a business person you probably won't find enough reasons to justify
spending $500 US on this type of device - at least not until Pocket PC's
become more mainstream and carry more features such as AM and FM radio, for
instance. However, if you are a business person who is on the road a lot and
needs all your information in your pocket and to be very accessible with the
ability to synchronize important data between the device and your desktop PC,
you should not be without the Toshiba e750 Pocket PC.
- SCSI vs. IDE: Which is really faster? - If nothing else,
everybody agrees on the fact that SCSI is much more expensive than IDE. A
reasonable IDE drive ranges from $100 CDN ($75 USD) to $200 CDN ($150 USD),
and all motherboards these days come with integrated IDE controllers and the
necessary cables. When it comes to SCSI the investment is much higher. After
ordering a hard drive, SCSI controller, cable, and terminator, my wallet was
$700 CDN ($525 USD) lighter. Before anybody would spend this kind of money he
had better be sure that SCSI being faster than IDE is not a myth. So prior to
the purchase
Dechannel did some testing.
- Building the Ultimate High-End Gaming Workstation: Stage 1 -
Anyone can build a gaming system by following a recipe and buying what
everyone else is using. To be at the top-of-your-game at performance system
building, you need to understand what you are doing and why. Almost no one has
the budget to regularly buy exclusively flagship components but knowing how
high-end workstations are designed will help you design a good gaming PC.
You'll be able to cut corners and redirect the money toward a graphics card or
faster CPU depending on your goals. More importantly, if something goes wrong
with your built system, you will have a good idea of where the weak-link in
your system is, and what you need to upgrade.
- WinDVD Platinum 5 review - DVD software players generally
offer better quality and greater ease of use than the standard players bundled
with PCs. Players from market leaders CyberLink and InterVideo add Dolby
Digital 5.1 sound, DTS audio, and smarter power management.
InterVideo's WinDVD Platinum 5 ($69 direct) offers all of these things
plus Hyper-Threading and DivX support, optimized display settings for various
hardware, and new video effects.
- Linux Mandrake 9.2 Final -
CD1 ~
CD2 ~
CD3, enjoy leeching :)
- Updated DirectX Redistributable 9.0b -
This download provides the end-user Redistributable that developers may
include with their product. The redistributable license agreement covers the
terms under which developers may use the Redistributable.
- Remove Hotfix Backup Files 2.0 -
Removes Hotfix Backup files and the Add/Remove Programs Registry entries.
- phpMyAdmin 2.5.4 Final -
phpMyAdmin can manage
a whole MySQL-server (needs a super-user) but also a single database. To
accomplish the latter you'll need a properly set up MySQL-user who can
read/write only the desired database.
- PHP 4.3.4 RC2 -
PHP 4.3.4 RC2 (Linux
~ Win32)
has been released for testing. This release candidate contains only bug fixes,
so it should be quite stable. Please test this release as much as possible, so
that any remaining issues can be uncovered and resolved prior to the final
release.
- DOSBox 0.60 -
DOSBox is a PC emulator with builtin DOS for running DOS Games primarily.
- AntiVir Personal Edition 6.22.00.01 -
The
AntiVir Personal Edition offers the effective protection against computer
viruses for the individual and private use on a single PC-workstation. In
order to make possible an easy operation, the AntiVir Personal Edition is
developed to the essential points.
- Avant Browser 8.02 Build 107 -
Avant Browser (download)
is an upgrade to Internet Explorer. Avant Browser is a fast, stable,
user-friendly, versatile multi-window browser. Avant Browser is freeware.
- kX Project Drivers 5.00.3535 -
The kX Audio
Driver is an independent WDM (Windows Driver Model) driver for all EMU10K1
and EMU10K2-based soundcards manufactured by Creative Technology Ltd. and/or
E-mu Sytems Inc., including the SoundBlaster Live! series, the E-mu Audio
Production Studio (APS) card, and the Audigy series of cards.
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Updated:03:04 PM CEST Jun,20
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