SECURITY...

• Vulnerability prompts forced upgrade for MSN Messenger users - Starting February 10, 2005, the MSN Messenger service will notify customers running a vulnerable version of MSN Messenger that there is an upgrade available. Customers that have accepted this upgrade and have applied the update will be protected from this vulnerability. Customers that have not accepted this upgrade may not be allowed to connect to the MSN Messenger service with a vulnerable version of the client. Clients may be upgraded immediately by installing the update available here - MSN Messenger 6.2.0205 / Windows Messenger 4.7.2009 (SP1) | 4.7.3000 (SP2).
• Teen Sentenced in Microsoft Attack - On Friday a federal judge sentenced a teen to probation and community-service for releasing the so called RPCSDBOT worm which infected computers and directed them to attack the Microsoft.com website. The Microsoft website was taken down for four hours due to the attack in 2003. The Judge Robert Lansik sentenced the teen to 3 years probation and 300 hours of community-service, he also wants the teen to write him a letter every six months describing his community-service activities.
• Microsoft Plots Fixes to IE Browser - Microsoft Corp. recently held a secret Webcast with some of its closest partners to discuss ways in which the company might improve its Internet Explorer browser and customer confidence in the platform. Sources said Microsoft officials discussed potential "fixes" to IE as the company is losing market share to other browsers, such as the open-source Firefox. Though the strategy is still in its initial phases, Microsoft is looking to resolve some fundamental issues with IE's operating system.
• Lavasoft and Pest Patrol removed WhenU? -  According to this thread on Broadband Reports security forum, both Lavasoft and Pest Patrol removed WhenU from their detection databases. Lavasoft removed WhenU's applications from their definitions database sometime in the last month -- it looks like it was probably the Feb. 5 update, but it might have been earlier. It also appears that Pest Patrol removed WhenU from its detections database, though the situation here is a bit murkier.
• Apple attacked for attacking hacks' sources - US Organisation the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) said it has asked the California supreme court to protect three online journalists being forced by Apple to reveal their sources. The EFF said Apple is asking a court to get three hacks to turn over their unpublished materials to the corporation. But, says the organisation, US online journalists are protected by the reporters privilege laws from doing that.
• China net cafe culture crackdown - Chinese authorities closed 12,575 net cafes in the closing months of 2004, the country's government said.
  According to the official news agency most of the net cafes were closed down because they were operating illegally.

OFF-TOPIC...

• NASA: 2005 could be warmest year recorded - A weak El Nino and human-made greenhouse gases could make 2005 the warmest year since records started being kept in the late 1800s, NASA scientists said this week. While climate events like El Nino -- when warm water spreads over much of the tropical Pacific Ocean --affect global temperatures, the increasing role of human-made pollutants plays a big part.
• Altered HIV Attacks Mice Tumors - The UCLA AIDS Institute scientists genetically altered HIV and folded it into an envelope made of another virus called sindbis, which typically infects insects and birds. That turned the altered HIV into a missile that hunted down metastasized melanoma cells in the lungs of living mice.
• Europe launches super rocket - Europe's reputation for rocket engineering got a boost with the successful launch of the Ariane 5 ECA at 21:03 GMT on 12 February. The 50-metre high rocket is Europe's largest, able to deliver up to 10 tonnes of payload into orbit around Earth.
• Hobart man dies testing bulletproof vest - A man whose friends initially said he was killed by gunfire outside a Gary liquor store actually died after he donned what he thought was a bulletproof vest and asked a cohort to shoot him. A friend then shot Daniel Wright with a .20-gauge shotgun, but it turned out the vest Wright had put on Thursday was a flak jacket not designed to stop a bullet. Wright, 20, was mortally wounded in the shooting and died later at a Gary hospital after two of his friends drove him there.
• This must be love - If you're 35 and you've been sleeping on the same pillow for 31 years, you don't take that lightly." This isn't a joke to Raza, or to the many other adults who are deeply attached to the cushions that lull them to sleep each night. Before getting married, Raza told his fiancee, "My pillow is really important to me." She laughed, so Raza reiterated: "No, I'm not kidding. This is really important." Despite the occasional joke about security blankets, "she has actually been very respectful of it," he says. "She knows what I'm like without it."
• Microsoft goes Hollywood: "Halo" to hit big screen - Microsoft may finally be getting into a business where "blue screen of death" could actually be a good thing. The company is going from writing code to writing a movie script adapting the "Halo" video-game franchise, according to a report yesterday in Daily Variety.
• Britney Spears Wins First Grammy -  Pop star Britney Spears won the first Grammy Award of her brief but colorful career on Sunday, taking the prize in the best dance recording category.
• The Credibles! - Check it out! (Flash)

TECHNOLOGY...

• Xbox 2 to Release in Fall of This Year - GamesIndustry.biz has the news that the Xbox 2 will be launched sometime in late fall of this year.
• Microsoft & Nokia Collaborate on Digital Music - Today at 3GSM World Congress in Cannes, Microsoft and Nokia announced an agreement to give Nokia handsets the benefit of Windows Media Audio and Windows Media Digital Rights Management 10. Microsoft and Nokia are working to ensure consumers can enjoy music from the newly-launched Nokia and Loudeye mobile music service platform on both Nokia handsets and Windows XP-based PCs.
• Motorola Unveils RAZR Successors, iTunes Phone - The popular RAZR ultra-thin flip phone which was launched last year will be joined by three more high-tech models, dubbed the RAZR black, the SLVR and the PEBL. The black RAZR, nicknamed BLZR, will be available for the Oscars this spring. The SLVR, a model without a flip, will be thin like the RAZR with Motorola hoping to bring excitement back to monoblock phones, which have lost ground to clamshell designs.
• Motorola, Oakley introduce Bluetooth sunglasses - Available in three frame colors, RAZRWire was developed to meet the needs of active consumers seeking seamless mobility, offering them an integrated easy-to-use design. For cyclists, skateboarders, rock climbers, golfers - practically anyone who is active outdoors - the innovative eyewear encourages hands-free connection while on the go.
• Meet the A1010, E1060, E1120 Motorola communicators - The new Motorola A1010 communicator sports WCDMA 2100 MHz, GSM/GPRS 900/1800/1900 MHz functionality, a large TFT screen with a resolution of 208 x 320 pixels, a 2 MP and a VGA camera enabling 2-way video conferencing, as well as multimedia streaming, capture and playback (MP3, MPEG4). Running Symbian OS 7.0 and the UIQ 2.1 platform, the A1010 is also utilizing the Opera web browser and its small screen and full screen rendering technology. Other software include Picsel Document Viewer/Edit and PIM applications. The A1010 is also equipped with a TransFlash memory slot, A-GPS support for location services, and Bluetooth. The Motorola A1010 is expected to be available in Q4 2005.
• British Broadband Picks Up The Pace - Many BT customers will now have download speeds of 2Mbps, although there are usage allowances of between one gigabyte and 30 gigabytes a month. The new speeds start to come into effect on 17 February for home customers and 1 April for businesses.
• MySQL Network shifts pricing and licensing - The company is expected to announce on Tuesday at LinuxWorld here the MySQL Network, a yearly subscription service, rather than an up-front fee, for the right to use the MySQL software and access the company's support services.
• Sun beefs up Java Comms Suite security - The JSC Suite, which includes System Messaging Server, System Calendar Server, and System Instant Messaging, is designed to provide a platform for deploying email, calendar, instant messaging and other collaboration services. Enhanced features include support for the Secure Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions protocol in the Communications Express web client, which now enables users of the JSC Suite to sign and encrypt messages, resulting in increased client-side security and stronger end-to-end security.
• New Xandros V3 Open Circulation Edition available - The Open Circulation Edition of the Xandros Desktop OS provides a secure, stable Windows replacement for everyday desktop use and everything users need for a carefree Internet experience . It offers free Skype-to-Skype calling worldwide, Firefox browsing, and Thunderbird e-mail with automatic spam filtering.

HARDWARE... 

• AMD cuts chip prices - The company nipped the price of its flagship Athlon 64 4000+ chip by 12 percent to $643. The Athlon 64 3800+ and 3700+ processors were lowered by 34 percent and 30 percent, respectively, to $424 and $329. The Sempron for desktops using Socket A motherboards--the same type of socket used by the company's older Athlon XP chip--were among those cut. The Sempron 2800+ for Socket A boards was clipped by 17 percent to $90. The Mobile Sempron 2800+ for full-size notebooks, meanwhile, dropped 19 percent to $87.
• AMD unveils latest x86 Opterons - According to the firm, the 852 and 252 chips feature performance-enhancing features including support for SSE3 software instructions, and better HyperTransport performance through an increase in bus frequency to 1GHz. AMD also announced its AMD-8132 HyperTransport PCI-X 2.0 tunnel, scheduled to ship for servers and workstations this month.
• Intel ships 2MB cache 64-bit Xeon - The new Xeon DPs contain 2MB of on-die L2 cache, up from the 1MB built into the previous version, and are clocked at 3.0, 3.2, 3.4 and 3.6GHz. The chips are priced at $316, $455, $690 and $851, respectively.
• SanDisk queues up 1GB mini memory card for $100 - Underscoring the dramatic price drops in the market for memory cards, flash memory specialist SanDisk said Monday that it will sell a 1GB mini SD card for $100.
• GeForce 6600 goes mobile - NVIDIA has announced the launch of their GeForce 6600 Go GPU for thin and light laptops. The GeForce 6600 Go GPU is like its desktop counterpart is SM 3.0 compliant and has Purevideo technology. NVIDIA has also announced the immediate availabilty of PCI Express GeForce 6600 Go and GeForce 6200 Go powered laptops from a wide range of vendors
• Intel Xeon 3.6 2MB vs AMD Opteron 252 Database Test -  For dual-processor applications, Intel leads the way in everyday small to heavy transactional applications, whereas AMD shines in the analytical side of database applications "Data Warehousing".
• NVIDIA nForce4 Chipset Series for AMD64 - The new generation of chipsets from this company is represented by three products. The basic modification is "simply" called nForce4, the modification with advanced functionality - nForce4 Ultra, and finally the topnotch modification with intuitive name - nForce4 SLI.
• The ASUS DRW-1604P DVD±RW DL drive - Besides its 16x DVD+/-R capabilities, this drive will write a DVD+R DL at 4x, DVD+/-RW at 4x, CD-R at 32x and CD-RW at 24x speed. It reads DVD-ROM with a maximum of 16x and CD-ROM with a maximum of 40x speed.
• ViewSonic VP171b - up of the ViewSonic VP171b 8ms 17in TFT display which you can find here - Trustedreviews take a look at the ViewSonic VP171b 8ms 17in TFT display.

GUIDES... 

• Curing Laptop Overheating - This article focuses on the true "air breather" laptops/notebooks; those that have case openings, an internal heat exchanger and (usually) a fan.
• Memory Market Overview: February 2005 - New releases, company news, prices, events...@X-bit Labs
• How To Avoid Internet Theft, Fraud and Phishing - Phishing is one of the main scams in the present moment. People set up phoney websites and email addresses. Then they spam Email inboxes with official-looking messages explaining that your account with Company X has encountered a problem and that they need you to login and confirm some details. The email addresses are masked to appear official and the links provided in the email all seem to check out. If you click on the link provided then you will usually be taken to a site that looks for all intents and purposes to be official. When you click 'submit' your details will be sent to a criminal somewhere who will do as they please with your information, such as withdrawing money from a bank account or purchasing things in your name.
• ATI Catalyst 5.2 Performance Analysis - EliteBastards take a look at this driver to see how it measures up against ATI's claims. Another similar article can be found on TweakTown.

SOFTWARE...

• Firefox Preloader Build 366  - This is a little program for people who use Mozilla Firefox on older machines. It is designed to preload Firefox in the background so it will load faster when requested.
• XP Codec Pack 1.0.3 - XP Codec Pack is one of the most complete codec pack which helps you to play all major audio and video formats.
  And... to complete your multimedia experience, instead of 3 or 4 different players you get one, simple integrated player that plays almost all audio and video files: Media Player Classic.
• VirtualDub 1.6.4 Experimental - VirtualDub (changelog ~ download ~ download AMD64 version) is a video capture and processing program. It features fast capturing, process files larger than the 2 gigabyte limit, optimized for linear editing, support for Motion-JPEG, MPEG-1 video and layer 3 audio, real-time and near-realtime video processing, video job queues, and much more.
• Jet-Audio 6.1.1 - Jet-Audio (download) features an impressive home audio system interface, including independent A/V components for Digital Signal Processor, Audio CD Player, Digital Audio (MP3, RA, etc.), MIDI (MID, MOD etc.), and Digital Video (AVI, MPG, MOV, etc.), along with a Mixer and a Remote Controller.
• SSH Tunnelier - Windows - Tunnelier is a friendly and flexible SSH client for Windows which includes state of the art terminal emulation, graphical as well as command-line SFTP support, an FTP-to-SFTP bridge, powerful tunneling features, and also remote administration for WinSSHD. Free for individual use!
• nHancer v1.0.3 - nHancer (NVIDIA Advanced Profile Editor) is a replacement for NVIDIA's own Profile Editor, which is integrated in their driver. With nHancer you can also change the global driver settings, but the focus is on creating and manipulating profiles.

SECURITY...

• Virus warning hits Windows Media Player - Computer users have been warned to be on their guard when viewing images after the discovery of a vulnerability affecting the processing of PNG (Portable Network Graphic) files by popular applications including MSN Messenger and Windows Media Player. The issue affects applications including Windows Media Player 9.0 (when running on Windows 2000, XP Service Pack 1 and Server 2003), Windows Messenger version 5.0 (standalone version that can be installed on all supported operating systems), and MSN Messenger 6.1 and 6.2.
• F-Secure flaw opens door to intruders - The security hole in the antivirus library affects 18 products for desktops, servers and gateways, with the network products at "critical" risk, F-Secure said in a bulletin Thursday. By creating a specially crafted ARJ archive file, an intruder could use a buffer overflow to run arbitrary code on an unpatched machine, said Tony Magellanez, a systems engineer at F-Secure. Update details are here.
• TriCipher Ships Multipart Authentication System - TriCipher Inc., which was spun off from Japanese technology company Nippon Systems Development Inc. in Kansai, Japan, says its authentication technology uses a multipart credential. This works by placing part of the authentication credential on the user's computer, and the other part on the server on which authentication is desired.
• Hewlett-Packard throttles viruses between network and desktop -  Rather than offering yet another hunter for viruses, HP's new virus throttle software takes an unusual approach: It acts as border patrol and aims to contain attacks. Instead of relying on existing virus definitions, the software monitors network connection requests and detects "abnormal" activity that could indicate an attack.
• Windows more secure than Linux - Nash said that Vole compares very favourably with Linux on security. In the year-to-date Microsoft has fixed 15 vulnerabilities affecting Windows Server 2003. However, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 users have had to patch 34 vulnerabilities and SuSE Enterprise Linux 9 users have had to patch over 78 vulnerabilities.
• Proposed Norwegian law limits cross-media copies - The Norwegian government has proposed a new copright law regarding copying music. The proposed law would make it illegal to copy songs from CDs to a different medium such as an MP3 player. It would still be legal to duplicate a CD, as long as it's copied to the same medium.
• Lokitorrent website downed - Despite attempts to raise money to defend itself, it seems that web site Lokicurrent has lost. The website, here, has a notice on it from the Motion Picture Association of America, warning about breach of copyright. The notice says that the site has been permanently shut down by court order because it contributes to the illegal downloading of films.
• Philips developing tools to identify and block P2P video content - Researchers at Royal Philips Electronics are developing new "fingerprinting" technology that could automatically identify and block transmission of digital-video files, potentially handing movie studios a new weapon in its war on peer-to-peer networks.
• Hackers sued for tinkering with Xbox games - According to the complaint, Greiling and Glynn were webmasters of ninjahacker.net, an online forum dedicated to creating custom content and modifications for certain video games. Also included in the suit, filed January 21st in Illinois, are up to 100 anonymous users of the site, whose identities the company vowed to unmask.

OFF-TOPIC...

• Man constructs replica of Apollo guidance computer - CNET News has a fun story about John Poltorak, who spent his free time the last few years building a reconstruction of the guidance computer used in the Apollo space missions: "The AGC is a piece of computing history. It had a 1MHz processor, 1K of random-access memory and 12K of read-only memory. By contrast, typical desktop computers today have about 1,000 times the processor speed and about 500,000 times the RAM, and have dropped ROM for hard drives with millions of times the capacity."
• Falling in Love in Three Minutes or Less - It seems that the heart wants what the heart wants -- and it can figure it out fairly quickly, according to evolutionary psychologists at the University of Pennsylvania. Psychology has often viewed relationships as transactions where people select mates based on substantial qualities a mate has to offer, such as power and money. According to Kurzban, the data show that, when people meet face-to-face, things like smoking preferences and bank accounts don seem to loom large in intricate complexities of attraction.
• Man Arrested Over Valentine's Net Suicide Pact - An American man has been arrested after allegedly trying to arrange a mass online suicide pact for Valentine's Day on Monday. Gerald Krien, 26, was caught after one woman alerted authorities after hearing one of those planning to take part talking about killing her children. Krien, of Klamath Falls in Oregon, had apparently recruited more than 30 people to take part in the pact, which had been arranged through chatrooms. Police are now trying to trace some of those involved in an attempt to make sure they are safe.
• Chinese used diamonds to polish sapphire-rich stone in 2500 BC - Researchers have uncovered strong evidence that the ancient Chinese used diamonds to grind and polish ceremonial stone burial axes as long as 6,000 years ago -- and incredibly, did so with a level of skill difficult to achieve even with modern polishing techniques.
• Tom-Yung-Goong Trailer -  The trailer for Tony Jaa's (star of Ong Bak) new action film Tom-Yung-Goong is now online and ready for visual consumption
• Nuke Test - This is video of an underground nuclear bomb test

TECHNOLOGY...

• Microsoft Delays CRM Update, Again - Microsoft's famously slippery ship dates are sliding once again when it comes to the company's long-delayed Microsoft CRM 2.0 update. Microsoft said this week it is expanding the software's feature set and delaying its release-to-manufacturing until the fourth quarter of 2005.
• Google Offers Assistance To Wikipedia - Google has offered to assist online encyclopedia Wikipedia, by providing some much needed storage and hosting services to the giant non-profit site.
• Cell phones get surround sound -  A new line of multimedia phones has hit the streets in Japan over the past few weeks that incorporates three-dimensional sound technology from British start-up Sonaptic. As yet, the content for it is slim--a fishing game, a handful of sound and video clips--but the technology promises a substantial advance for mobile-phone audio.
• Macromedia Flash On Nokia Mobiles - Nokia is to install a version of Macromedia Flash in its Series 60 mobile platform. The licencing agreement between the two companies will also stretch to other Nokia devices. Tools will be made available to allow developers to produce cell phone flash content with ease.
• First Linux-powered UMTS 3G mobile arrives - The world's first UMTS/Edge smartphone reference design based on the Linux operating system has been unveiled. Developed by a group of companies including Samsung Electronics and Infineon Technologies, the platform is designed to incorporate advanced 3G and multimedia services such as UMTS/Edge dual mode voice calls, video calls and video streaming. It also supports high performance multimedia applications (H.264, MPEG-4, AAC+, MP3), ultra-fast web browsing, stereo loudspeaker with 3D audio and Java-based 3D gaming.
• Sony Movie Unit to Issue Films for PSP Game System - Sony Pictures Home Entertainment said it will release "XXX," "Hellboy," "Resident Evil 2" and "One Upon A Time in Mexico" on April 19 in the Universal Media Disc or UMD format, with additional monthly releases in the future. The unit did not set a price for the movie discs. The small UMD holds 1.8 gigabytes of data, three times the capacity of a CD-ROM. It was designed as a vehicle for games and other media on the PSP.
• Nokia 7710 communicator now shipping - Announced as recently as in November 2004, Nokia has now started shipping the Series 90-based 7710 communicator device in Europe and Africa. Featuring tri-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE 900/1800/1900 MHz connectivity, the 7710 is Nokia's first touch screen-enabled smart device, and features handwriting recognition software similar to that found in numerous Windows Mobile handhelds.

HARDWARE... 

• Toshiba's 17" Satellite P35-S611 gaming notebook - Adding to its existing line-up of P35 gaming notebooks, Toshiba has introduced the Satellite P35-S611, designed as a desktop replacement with a 17" screen and powerful specifications. Joining the existing P35-S6111 and P35-S629 models, the P35-S611 comes with Windows XP Home as opposed to Windows XP Professional, and includes an ATI Mobility Radeon 9000 graphics card less powerful than that of the top model.
• Intel Quietly Adds New Chipsets into Lineup - Intel's i915PL and i915GL chipsets support dual-channel PC3200 (400MHz) memory only, instead of supporting both DDR and DDR2 which is a standard for the i915P and i915G chipsets, but still boast with support for LGA775 processors and PCI Express interconnection. In contrast to usual i915-series chipsets, the i915PL and i915GL support only 2GB of memory, not 4GB of RAM.
• AMD Readies New Opteron Processor for 1000MHz HT Bus - The forthcoming AMD Opteron processor 252 will be clocked at 2.60GHz, will incorporate dual-channel PC3200 memory controller, 1MB of cache and SSE3 technology, something that only Intel Corp.'s chips have sported so far. The upcoming Opteron chip will also sport 1000MHz HyperTransport bus, a speed boost over contemporary AMD Opteron products with 800MHz HT bus, according to CNET News.com web-site.
• DFI LANParty UT nF3 250Gb - The LANParty UT nF3 250Gb comes with 2 IDE ports and allows a total of 4 devices to be installed. The devices can be hard drives or optical drives, whichever you choose. Since SATA hard drives are becoming the norm, the LANParty UT nF3 250Gb offers 4 SATA ports for up to 4 SATA hard drives. The two located right below the CPU socket are controlled by the nForce3 250Gb chipset. The nForce3 250Gb controlled SATA ports allows RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 0+1, and JBOD.
• Sapphire Toxic Radeon X700 Pro and Hybrid Radeon X800 - AMDZone has posted a review of Sapphire Toxic Radeon X700 Pro and Hybrid Radeon X800
• Gainward PowerPack! 6800 - For Gainward, we have mix feelings. The certainly won't impress gamers who are looking for free packaged games with their graphics cards and they certainly won't impress HTPC users with DVD software that many manufacturers include, but modders are a possibility for them. If someone is looking for a red theme, Gainward has the answer.
• Sapphire Hybrid Radeon X800 XL - The Sapphire Radeon X800 XL is a great card. It offers very similar (and sometimes slightly better) performance than a 6800 GT at a price that is very similar. The Sapphire X800 XL (OEM version) can be found for as low as $380 according to our price search engine. A simply packaged 6800 GT PCIe card can be found for about the same. This is going to be a very interesting $350-420 battle over the coming months as PCIe gets more and more popular.
• Chaintech GeForce 6600 GT AGP - The only real drawback with the card was the heatsink not having any contact with the memory chips. This was by design and not accident. The memory chips were declocked 10% with the Chaintech card and I can't help but speculate that the cooling, or lack there of is why.
• NEC ND-3520A DVD Writer - The ND-3520A will write to DVD+/-R media at 16x, DVD+R Dual Layer discs at 4x, DVD+RW media at 8x and DVD-RW discs at 6x. The big news here is, of course, the performance boost in the RW space.
• Samsung CLP-550N Colour Laser Printer - PC Stats has posted a review on the Samsung CLP-550N Colour Laser Printer.
• Divx/dvd portable player Gold G40 - Digital Gamers posted a review of the Divx/dvd portable player Gold G40.
• Kodak EasyShare DX7590 - The 5 megapixel DX7590 replaced the 4 megapixel DX6490 as Kodak's second 10x ultra-zoom digicam. The DX7590 features a Schneider-Kreuznach lens capable of a 38 - 380mm zoom (35mm equivalent). It offers a wide range of still recording modes from full auto to manual exposure in addition to 14 preset scene modes and a movie mode with a maximum resolution of 640x480. Like all of Kodak's EasyShare cameras, the DX7590 has an intuitive menu and controls that lead to a hassle-free shooting experience.
• Apple iPod Shuffle - First the top-end daddy iPod with its big scroll wheel. Then the mid-market girly iPod Mini, which puts the buttons into the scroll wheel. They can hold about 120 or 240 songs encoded at 128Kbps; I managed 220 on a 1GB stick with songs encoded at 160Kbps, still more than enough to get lost in music.
• New MSN Direct Services Found In A Fossil - It's been possible to read the time from your wrist for many decades. But the ability to get news and weather information off your wrist has only been around for a couple of years. We take a look at the latest Smartwatch from Fossil to see what it can do now, and learn what else may be possible in the future.

GUIDES... 

• Blu-ray Disc technology editorial - The fact is that blue-ray technologies and high def won't be meaningful until 2006 and won't be mainstream until 2007. But that timespan isn't deterring the two camps because there will be huge amounts of money involved in licensing fees from the people who decide to produce players, drives, recorders, content and recordable media.
• How Motherboards Are Made: A Gigabyte Factory Tour - As PCSTATS recent trip to Gigabyte's Nan-Ping factory in Taiwan showed us last summer during Computex 2004, there's a lot more to it
• 32 Cards in Doom 3 tested - Version 0.2 - The article is now updated to version 0.2 and it includes more pages and a final conclusion as requested. 19 cards are AGP based and 13 cards are PCI-Express
• Browser speed comparisons - There is a speed war on the web. Browsers compete on many fronts; security, standards support, features and speed. Most people are aware of which major browser fails on three of these, but one of them is still open for grabs.
• Windows XP Tweaking Companion - The Windows XP Tweaking Companion (XPTC) is the complete Windows XP and system optimization guide. No longer do you have to put up with so-called XP Tweak Guides which have a handful of Registry tweaks and some vague optimization advice - the XPTC brings an enormous range of detailed descriptions and resources together in one free 170 page downloadable PDF file.

SOFTWARE...

• Apache 2.0.53 -  Apache 2.0 (download / changelog) offers numerous enhancements, improvements and performance boosts over the 1.3 codebase.
• WinSCP 3.7.4 - WinSCP (download) is an open source freeware SFTP client for Windows using SSH. Legacy SCP protocol is also supported. Its main function is safe copying of files between a local and a remote computer.
• VNCScan 2005.2.10 - VNCScan allows you to remotely control and manage your workstations and servers. VNCScan is the legendary front end to VNC.
• SpoofStick for Firefox 1.05 - SpoofStick is a simple browser extension that helps users detect spoofed (fake) websites. A spoofed website is typically made to look like a well known, branded site (like ebay.com or citibank.com) with a slightly different or confusing URL.
• Winamp Cover Notifier Alpha 1 - Winamp Cover Notifier is an alert that will show a CDs cover and music name everytime Winamp starts a new song. If no picture is found, a default picture will be shown. The alert will be shown next to the Windows clock
• HyperSnap-DX 5.62.04 (shw) - HyperSnap-DX 5 is a screen capture and image editing tool for MS Windows. It captures screens from standard desktop programs and even those hard-to-grab DirectX, Direct3D, 3Dfx Voodoo and Glide mode games
• ZoneAlarm Free 5.5.062.011 - ZoneAlarm includes five interlocking security services that deliver easy-to-use, comprehensive protection.
• CPU-Z 1.27 - CPU-Z is a diagnostic tool that provides information on your CPU, including: processor name and vendor, core stepping and process, processor package, internal and external clocks, clock multiplier, partial overclock detection, processor features, supported instructions sets, L1 and L2 cache information, location, size, speed, and technology.

SECURITY...

• Microsoft Fesses Up To 19 Vulnerabilities, MSBlast-Level Worm Likely  - The company released its largest group of security patches in nearly a year, posting 12 security bulletins encompassing 19 vulnerabilities, 14 of which it marked "Critical." Among them is a vulnerability that one security vendor claims will likely lead to the biggest, baddest worm since mid-2003." ~ MS05-011 (SMB fix) / MS05-009 (WMP9 fix) / MS05-012 (COM structured storage files) / MS05-014 (IE Flaws), etc. 
• First Trojan To Directly Target Microsoft Anti-Spyware - The Register is reporting that the first trojan to specifically affect Microsoft's Anti-Spyware program has been released. Called BankAsh-A, the trojan steals credit card and other info, turns off anti-virus programs (and disables the beta Microsoft anti-spyware software), deletes files on the computer and downloads code from the internet as well as installing more malware on the computer. The trojan runs a key logger on infected computers, which captures all kinds of personal information. BankAsh-A is distributed via spam email. Sophos reports that users banking with Barclays, Cahoot, Halifax, HSBC, Lloyds TSB, Nationwide, NatWest, Smile and others are affected. Sophos are reporting that so far, the trojans has seen limited distribution.
• Symantec Products Hit By Major Security Bug - The flaw affects as many as 30 Symantec products, almost all of the company's software. The company said that users of the most recent versions of its software, like Norton Antivirus 2005, were un-affected. The company added that "The DEC2EXE engine is no longer required to parse compressed files" and that "Symantec had planned the DEC2EXE engine removal from all affected Symantec product versions during upcoming maintenance update. However, it advised all users to ensure they were fully patched. The company is also distributing patches to users via its automated Live Update feature.
• Microsoft to Acquire Enterprise Anti-Virus - Sybari Software - Microsoft announced today that it has signed agreements to acquire Sybari Software Inc. Sybari Software provide security products for more than 10,000 businesses worldwide. Microsoft plans to provide its enterprise customers with significant virus and spam protection.

OFF-TOPIC...

• What's next: a Ph.D. in video gaming? - Video gaming reached official academic status Tuesday when Electronic Arts endowed a chair at the University of Southern California for the study of interactive entertainment. Bing Gordon, Chief Creative Officer and co-founder of Electronic Arts (Research), was named the first holder of the Electronic Arts endowed faculty chair at the USC School of Cinema-Television, according to a statement from the company, the biggest video game publisher.
• "Quantum well" transistor promises lean computing - A transistor that uses one-tenth of the energy of existing components could lead to more powerful, less power-hungry computers within the next decade. Researchers at US microchip company Intel and UK research firm Qinetiq developed the transistor using a novel semiconducting material - indium antimonide. Transistors act as switches or amplifiers in electronic circuits to process information. Indium antimonide allows electrons to speed through faster than conventional silicon-based transistors due to its highly active and greater number of "charge-carriers" - which help relay the electrons quickly.
• Inglorious Bastards (aka Quentin Tarantino WW2 Project) - Quentin Tarantino is working on a World War II guys on a mission flick, like Dirty Dozen or Guns of Navarone. Presumably, the characters will not be simple cardboard figure action heroes, but will also take on some typical Tarantino anti-hero attributes. There is a role written for Adam Sandler, and others possibly for guys named Stallone and Willis.
• Sci-Fi Channel Renews Battlestar Galactica - The Sci-Fi Channel has just announced the renewal of Battlestar Galactica for a second season. The creator of the show has announced that the second season will delve into the religious issues surrounding the Cylons in addition to opening up their society more. The latest episode had 3.2 million viewers, almost twice as many as watched the latest episode of Star Trek Enterprise.
• First Screenshots from Next-Gen Console - French website jeux-france.com has posted the first screenshots from a Next-Gen Console!

TECHNOLOGY...

• Google Launch Google Maps - Google have launched a new, "in-house" designed, map tool for web searchers called Google Maps.
• Yahoo Fires Up Toolbar for Firefox Users - Yahoo released a beta version of its Web browser toolbar for users of the Mozilla Firefox browser on Thursday, offering bookmarks, newsfeeds, and search and translation tools. The beta version of the toolbar requires Firefox 1.0 for Windows and is available as a free download. It also includes features such as the ability to search a site, Yahoo Mail notifications and alerts, and buttons for access to the Internet company's games, finance, news, and sports sites, among others.
• TDK introduces new, photo quality printable DVDs - Printing on the disc is easy - just place it in a disc-printable printer, select your image, press the print button and in just a couple of minutes you'll have a fully customised DVD that looks like a professionally manufactured disc. Designed for ease of use, TDK's Photo Quality Printable DVDs are compatible with all leading brands of disc-printable inkjet printers.
• MGM loses class action suit for 325 defective DVD movies - Specifically, if you purchased one or more of the eligible movies between December 1, 1998 to September 8, 2003, certain MGM widescreen DVDs (DVDs for films shot in the aspect ratio of 1.85 to 1 or 1.66 to 1) will bring you a new movie or $7.10US. A sales receipt is not needed.

HARDWARE... 

• NVIDIA's Forthcoming Intel Pentium 4 Chipset Passes Certification - NVIDIA Corp.'s upcoming core-logic for Intel Pentium 4 processors code-named Crush 19, or C19, has already been certified by PCI Special Interest Group and is currently in the PCI-SIG's Integrator's List, according to the organization's web-site.  The Crush 19 chipset from NVIDIA is currently expected to support various Intel processors, including the most powerful and innovative in LGA775 form-factor with 1066MHz processor system bus as well as EM64T, XD and EIST technologies.
• 1GB OCZ PC3200 EL Platinum and PC3700 Gold dual channel kits - OCZ's latest revision of their PC3200 EL Platinum DDR - The EL term stands for "Enhanced Latency" and the stated 2-2-2-5 memory timings are extremely low for PC3200. Better still, in our testing on nForce3 Ultra, i875P, and K8T800 Pro motherboards, each initialized the memory at these timings using just the SPD setting. This is unprecedented, since even our reference Corsair PC3200LL (2-2-2-5) memory needs a bit of manual tweaking on certain platforms. These timings are rated at a memory voltage of 2.75V, but at stock 400 MHz speeds, the OCZ PC3200 EL was also able to reach the 2-2-2-5 level using our standard 2.6V reference setting.
• 1GB Mushkin DDR2 PC2-4200 CL3-2-2 kit - The PC2-4200 CL 3-2-2 looks almost identical to the PC2-4200 CL 4-4-4 offering. Don't let that suprise you, this ram is new from center up! Don't forget this is DDR2 memory and while physically the same size, DDR2 DIMMs have more pins (240 vs 184 for DDR) and run on a lower voltage (around 1.8-2.0V vs 2.5V for DDR). Mushkin's DDR2 memory is designed for use in the latest generation motherboards.
• MSI K8N Diamond - SLi Motherboard - What really makes the K8N Diamond stand out from the crowd is the onboard SoundBlaster Live! 24bit 7.1-channel audio chip. This is the first time since the SoundBlaster PCI 128 that I have seen a Creative chip on a motherboard. Buying a SoundBlaster Live! 24bit 7.1 card would set you back in the region of L30, so this is not a top of the range solution. However, no other motherboard manufacturer can currently offer a better onboard audio solution.
• BFGTech GeForce 6600 GT OC AGP & PCI-E SLI - BFGTech has put together two very solid video cards based on the NVIDIA GeForce 6600 GT GPU. So far, these are the fastest GeForce 6600 GT-based video cards we have tested in a stock configuration. BFGTech wasn't kidding when they said these cards were "OC" video cards. Both the AGP and PCI-Express versions have a faster GPU and memory frequency than a standard GeForce 6600 GT, and the benchmark results show it.
• Leadtek WinFast PVR 2000 - The Winfast PVR 2000, although trying to turn your computer into a true entertainment machihe, suffers from some problems, the main of which being the high usage of system resources; Unless the card is installed in a dedicated HTPC computer, it will simply consume too many resources and will not allow the user to do any work in the background.
• Chaintech GeForce 6200 TurboCache 32MB PCI-Express (passive cooling) - The Chaintech GeForce 6200 TurboCache is the most budget and good performance that suitable for the low end users. The performance of the GeForce 6200 TurboCache is perform very well in all the benchmarking compare to the ATI X300. But, it lose in Far Cry Benchmark especially in the resolution setting of 1600X1200. For the overclocking, the Chaintech GeForce 6200 TurboCache have an increment of 121MHz for the core and 162MHz for the memory. It brings up from the default at 350/700MHz to 471/862MHz. The only bad thing is the poor bundle, anyway who cares as long as the performance of the graphic card is performing good. The onboard memory of 32MB, it able to sharing the system memory and assign up to 128MB for the graphic usage.
• Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy 4 Pro - If you own any card of the Audigy series it however is not necessary to upgrade at all. The differences are so minor that from a consumers point of view you will not hear the difference. If you are in the market as a professional user and preferably need to record in high quality, well that might make a difference.
• Samsung TS-H552B 16X DVD-R/RW  - VerumMedia has posted a review of Samsung's TS-H552B 16X DVD-R/RW drive.
• Gigabyte 3D Cooler Ultra GT - After spending some time with Gigabyte's 3D Cooler Ultra GT, it's hard (name aside perhaps) to fault it. The manual is good, the bundle contains everything you need, installation is easy with all of the retaining clips easily labelled, and most of all its performance under high load is most impressive. Add to that the nifty looks and addition of an LED, and you have a real winner on your hands.
• Terratec Aureon 7.1 FireWire - The Aureon 7.1 Firewire seems to fall between stools. The sturdy construction indicates that Terratec is aiming at delivering quality and while it succeeds in part, the product as a whole suffers from a lack of focus. Whilst it performs well, it doesn’t offer either enough features for the musician or enough for the gamer to make it a compelling purchase.
• Klipsch ProMedia GMX A-2.1 - HEXUS has posted a review of the Klipsch ProMedia GMX A-2.1 speakers.
• AL Tech AnyDrive Car MP3 FM Transmitter -  Basically it's a USB-driven radio that lets you tune your car stereo to a specified station to listen to music stored on a USB device. It's pretty robust in its abilities (you can also have it transmit audio to a home audio system or PC speakers via FM or direct connection), but those require more accessories.
• 1GB Lexar High-Speed 32X SD memory card - If you purchased a digital camera, chances are the memory card was of low capacity. You will no doubt discover this is simply not enough memory to do any serious shooting. This is where the Lexar 1GB High-Speed 32X comes in.
• Creative Zen Micro 5GB - Creative Zen Micro 5GB - With a removable 12-hour battery pack, 5GB hard drive, FM radio, voice recorder, organizer, DRM 10 compatibility, and ten colors to choose from, the micro-Zen is aimed to compete with Apple iPod Mini

GUIDES... 

• Ars System Guide: HTPC edition - Windows (MCE) 2005 offers an attractive, easy-to-use interface combined with hardware support that makes it easier to build an HTPC that is a true media box: TV recording with time shifting and channel guide, streaming audio, DVD-recording and DVD-playback, radio, web browsing, along with all the functions of a standard PC.

SOFTWARE...

• Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 RC2 - Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 (SP1) Release Candidate 2 (RC2) enhances security infrastructure by providing new security tools such as Security Configuration Wizard, which secures your server for role based operations, improved defense-in-depth with Data Execution Protection, and a safe and secure first boot scenario with Post-Setup Security Update Wizard.
• TweakNow RegCleaner 2.0.7 - After a long period, after installing and uninstalling a lot number of applications, your Windows registry will contain a large number of obsolete entries. This will significantly increase the registry size and thus will slowdown your computer, because Windows will need more time to load, search, and read data from registry. To keep your computer in top performance, it is recommended to periodically clean your Windows registry.
• eXeem Public Beta version 0.21 - eXeem drops Cydoor and will no longer use 3rd party software - eXeem Public Beta version 0.21 has been released. Most of the bug fixes were done to the network system (nodes). They have also fixed the search crash bug. They added a stop function to new files and they are testing out html type of ads in the program. In this release you will not get any mandatory third party software installed with eXeem.
• HyperSnap-DX 5.62.04 - HyperSnap-DX 5 (download) is a screen capture and image editing tool for MS Windows. It captures screens from standard desktop programs and even those hard-to-grab DirectX, Direct3D, 3Dfx Voodoo and Glide mode games.
• ICQ Lite 5.02 Build #2309 Final - release notes ~ download
• Philips DVDR885P and DVDRW416 firmware - Download new firmware for Philips DVDR885P / Philips DVDRW416K/30. More details can be found on CDFreaks.
• ATI Tray Tools - ATI Tray Tools is a small utility that can be found in the windows tray which then allows instant access to options and settings.
• ATi Catalyst AMD64 beta 4 - Next to the release of Catalyst 5.2 drivers ATI also released new AMD64 drivers. Now read this carefully, you need to have a 64-bit (unreleased) Windows XP operating system for this.

SECURITY...

• Browser Exploit That Doesn't Affect IE - Shocks The World - According to a paper recently published by Eric Johanson of the Shmoo Group, users on most Mozilla-based browsers (Firefox 1.0, Camino .8.5, Mozilla 1.6, etc), Safari 1.2.5, Opera 7.54, Omniweb 5 are victim to a complex International Domain Name [IDN] spoof. This new attack allows an attacker/phisher to spoof the domain/URLs of businesses. Every recent gecko/khtml based browser implements IDN (which is just about every browser except for Internet Explorer). The Smoo Group have created a proof of concept where the links are directed at "http://www.pаypal.com/", which the browsers punycode handlers render as www.xn--pypal-4ve.com.
• Hold the Phone, VOIP Isn't Safe - VOIP services have attracted few specific attacks so far, largely because the relatively small number of VOIP users doesn't make them a worthwhile target. But security researchers have found vulnerabilities in the various protocols used to enable VOIP. For instance, CERT has issued alerts regarding multiple weaknesses with SIP (session initiation protocol) and with H.323.
• Spam approaches 95 per cent of all email - The global junk mail plague is to get dramatically worse as criminal spammers take control of victims' PCs and use them as anonymous proxies to send email via their ISPs' mail relay. According to anti-spam organisation Spamhaus the recent increase in this proxy-spam activity is caused by newly engineered versions of stealth proxy-spam software released by spammers. (Ed.note : Yeah, it's pretty sad. That spam costs time and money is hardly new. And totally avoiding spam is virtually impossible - especially for me)
• MCI accused of harboring spammers - Antispam nonprofit group The Spamhaus Project has accused United States-based Internet service provider MCI of hosting a Web site that distributes malicious software used by spammers.
• Damning Kazaa Evidence Released - As the Altnet component in Kazaa software keeps track of when a sponsored result is displayed, if the user downloads it and whether the download is successful, it shows that it can track user's details such as IP addresses and the content they are after (at least what is signed). According to Priit, the Kazaa Media Desktop interface developer, it is technically possible to do the same with any file also.
• Piracy case: log files "don't show downloads" - Universal Music Australia and 30 others are taking action against MP3s4free.net music and charging them with piracy. According to the Sydney Morning Herald, the music industry got a court order to see all the log files from the file sharing outfit. In court they claimed that these were proof that music had been illegally swapped. However, during cross-examination the prosecution's expert witness Gilbert & Tobin IT consultant Shane Pearson conceded that the logs did not show anything. All they proved as that people actually visited the site and searched for files, it did not indicate that they had shared music

OFF-TOPIC...

• New Batman Begins Trailer - You can see the trailer here.
• US brewer adds caffeine to beer - A US brewer is set to exploit Britain's mooted 24/7 licensing laws by launching a caffeine-laced beer. Anheuser-Busch's 4.5 per cent "BE" brew boasts a hit of caffeine equivalent to half a cup of coffee, plus ginseng and Brazilian fatigue-busting guarana
• Take The AQ Test - Psychologist Simon Baron-Cohen and his colleagues at Cambridge's Autism Research Centre have created the Autism-Spectrum Quotient, or AQ, as a measure of the extent of autistic traits in adults. In the first major trial using the test, the average score in the control group was 16.4. Eighty percent of those diagnosed with autism or a related disorder scored 32 or higher. The test is not a means for making a diagnosis, however, and many who score above 32 and even meet the diagnostic criteria for mild autism or Asperger's report no difficulty functioning in their everyday lives.
• Getting with the hottie! - Check out this weird movie! :)

TECHNOLOGY...

• Windows XP "Reduced Media Edition" Revealed - Neowin take a look at Microsoft's answer to the controversial EU decision. Microsoft have been forced to remove their Windows Media Player from Windows XP. The product which was originally named "Reduced Media Edition" is rumoured to be renamed after the EU complained to Microsoft officials about their naming strategy.
• Microsoft: Longhorn beta will arrive by June - The company has said publicly that Beta 1 of Longhorn would arrive by the end of 2005, though internally, the company has been aiming for a release by midyear. The final version of Longhorn is slated for the second half of next year.
• Intervideo unveils new 9 in 1 digital media software suite - InterVideo announced the release of MediaOne, "a powerful new digital media software suite that delivers nine multimedia solutions in one convenient package. In addition to integrating the next generation tools consumers need to easily create, share and protect video, photo, music and data discs, InterVideo's new MediaOne includes several customization features." Note: InterVideo DVD Copy does not bypass copy protection. DVDs containing CSS-encryption cannot be copied.
• Hitachi/Panasonic sign next-gen plasma TV deal - Hitachi and Matsushita (commonly known for its Panasonic branded products) have announced a broad-ranging partnership to develop next-generation plasma TV technology. Under the terms of the agreement the companies will establish standards for PDP module components, and jointly explore whether and how they can work with component manufacturers.
• Cell Processor Details And First Pictures - The multi-core processor claims supercomputer-like levels of performance with clock speeds in excess of 4GHz. A first prototype of the device expected to power the Playstation 3 has a 221mm² die, uses 234 million transistors and is made using 90nm process technology. The version of Cell announced today contains eight 64-bit floating point processors, referred to as synergistic processor elements (SPEs). Along side these is a 64-bit Power processor capable of running two threads. SPEs take 128-bit operands, split into four 32-bit words. Up to 128 operands can be stored in the register file.
• Intel Produces One Chip with Two "Brains" -  Intel on Monday said it had completed initial production runs of a chip with two processors-in-one, setting the stage for mainstream marketing of personal computers with two processor "brains."
• Microsoft says Xbox 2 will not make GDC appearance - The public unveiling of the next-generation Xbox system will not happen at the Game Developers Conference next month, Microsoft has confirmed, leaving E3 in May as the most likely venue for the console's debut.

HARDWARE... 

• Lexar JumpDrive TouchGuard 256MB - Capable of remembering 10 different thumbprints and 200 password combinations, the TouchGuard allows fast access to any protected file or website. It also doubles as an AES-encrypted flash drive with 256MB of storage
• Targus Multi-talented USB Docking Station - The use of USB bus to carry video and audio allows the monitor and speakers to remain connected to the station, freeing users from the hassle of disconnecting an array of connectors. The video mode delivers a maximum resolution of 1024-by-768 at 16-bit color either to expand desktop area or simply to use as primary display.  The other interesting feature is the dual 1,000mA Always-on USB ports, which reduce the time needed to recharge USB electronics; and these ports can continue to recharge devices regardless of the laptop power mode.
• Foxconn e-bot Small Form Factor PC - Due in large part to the single channel memory that the SiS661FX chipset supports, the Foxconn e-bot didn't fare as well against two other Pentium 4 driven SFF PCs such as the Shuttle SB61G2 and Epox eX5-320S. Both of these systems are based around the i865G chipset, which utilizes dual memory channels, providing much more bandwidth for applications to use.
• Mayhem G5 gaming laptop - Performance of the G5 is certainly great if not excellent - only a few other laptops like Dell's XPS notebook can compete in its arena. But potential buyers of the G5 need to understand that all this turbo-boosted action comes at a severe weight and battery-life penalties, the worst we've seen so far.
• Gateway 7200XL - Gateway's flagship desktop, the 7200XL is the first system we have seen using Intel's new BTX form factor rather than the well-known ATX form factor. This means that the system should theoretically be quieter and remain cooler than a comparably equipped ATX based system while still being able to handle the best components out there. And Gateway certainly doesn't skimp in that department either. The 7200XL comes with ATI's Radeon X800 XT graphics card, a 3.4GHz Intel processor, 1GB of memory and more. What makes this system even more appealing is its price tag, only $2199.
• Mushkin 1Gb PC4400 High Perf Dual Pack - OCTools has just posted a review of Mushkin's latest DDR offering, the Mushkin 1Gb PC4400 High Perf Dual Pack. It consists of two matched 512mb DDR modules specifically designed for use on dual channel systems at DDR550.
• A Comparison Of The Latest Pentium 4 Motherboards - THG take a look at seven different models from companies challenging the market leaders.
• Leadtek Winfast PX6800 GT TDH - You can pick up this PCI-E 6800 GT for as low as $339.00. The AGP version of this card can be purchased for as low as $379.00. When looking at the price comparison to a 6600 GT for around $200.00 it will be interesting to see the price/performance ratio between the two.
• XpertVision GeForce 6200TC (PCI Express) - If you are a gamer on the budget, there isn't much of a better choice than the XpertVision GeForce 6200. It's fast, it's cheap, it supports DX9.0 and Pixel-Shader model 3.0.
• Hitachi Travelstar 60GB 7200RPM - If your mobile drive is a 4200RPM clunker, and you are dealing with large files all day, or if you need to boost up your capacity upgrading your hard drive is a simple, and relatively painless operation. The Hitachi Travelstar 60GB 7200RPM model with 8MB cache is a fine choice for the job.
• Plextor PX-716A DVD±RW - The PX-716A is the first drive from Plextor with the ability to write to both DVD-R and DVD+R media at 16x. At this speed, the drive was able to write 4GB of data in as little as 5 and a half minutes. While we've seen a few 16x DVD writers that can do it in less time, they are few and far between. The PX-716A also performed very well with other types of recordable media
• 19 PSU group test - TrustedReviews have a group test comparing 19 different power supplies from a wide range of manufacturers.
• Thermaltake PurePower 680 Watt - Gruntvill take a look at the HUGE Thermaltake PurePower 680watt Power Supply Unit (PSU). This thing is a beast! Not only is this PSU powerful, but it supports all the newer technology; 24-pin ATX, dual PCI-express, and SATA. Topped with the gun-metal mirror finish and almost silent fans, you can't go wrong adding this PSU to your powerhouse PC.
• SilverStone's LC10 HTPC Case - It is very important that an HTPC be quiet so as not to be heard when you are watching TV and listening to music.
  Sitting on my couch, about 10 feet away from the TV and HTPC, with no other sounds present in the room, all I could hear was a gentle "whirring" sound coming from the HTPC. You can definitely hear it with nothing else going on, but as soon as I turned the TV on the sound from the HTPC completely disappeared. Good stuff!
• Altec Lansing XT1: Portable USB Speaker System - If you own a laptop computer and would like a quality stereo speaker system that can be easily packed and taken on your next trip, we recommend that you consider the Altec Lansing XTI USB Portable Audio System. It has a suggested retail price of $129.95, although the actual market price is under $100.00
• Pentax Optio SV Digital Camera - It's not just the dimensions of the Optio SV that remind me of the Ixus 500, the specs are very similar too, with a five megapixel CCD - although the maximum image resolution is slightly lower at 2,560 x 1,920. But where the Optio SV does have the edge over its rival is in the optical zoom department. Whereas the Ixus 500 has a 3x optical zoom, Pentax has managed to squeeze a 5x optical zoom into the Optio SV - that's
  equivalent to 36-180mm in 35mm language.

GUIDES... 

• High-End DDR Memory Prices - This week's High-End DDR/DDR2 price list shows continued price cuts to DDR2 modules, along with some interesting price drops on the dual-channel DDR kit side.
• How Dust Impacts a CPU's Temperature - This article didn't start as an in-depth investigation into dust; it began as a personal investigation into why my CPU temperatures were running so high after a random temp check produced alarming results.
• Setting up SATA drives with the VT8237 South Bridge, or VT6410, VT6420/1 controllers - check it out
• WindowsXP Command Prompt - Unlock the enigma that is DOS, and get a handle on the command prompt in Windows XP. PCstats covers the basics, and some commands you ought to know

SOFTWARE...

• A memory leak occurs in the Virtual Disk Service in Windows Storage Server 2003 (hotfix) - On your Microsoft Windows Storage Server-based computer, a memory leak may occur in the Virtual Disk Service (VDS). When this problem occurs, the VDS consumes the computer's available virtual memory, and the computer's performance decreases. This hotfix does not replace any other hotfixes.
• Debugging Tools for Windows 6.4.7.2 - You can use Debugging Tools for Windows to debug drivers, applications, and services on systems running Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, and Windows codenamed "Longhorn," as well as debugging the operating system itself. Versions of the Debugging Tools for Windows package are available for 32-bit x86, native Intel Itanium, and native x64 platforms.
• Malicious Software Removal Tool 1.1 - The Microsoft Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool checks Windows XP, Windows 2000, and Windows Server 2003 computers for and helps remove infections by specific, prevalent malicious software including Blaster, Sasser, and Mydoom.
• Slackware 10.1 - The final version of Slackware 10.1 (mirrors) has been released.
• ICQ 5 5.02 - With ICQ Instant Messenger you can video/audio chat, send email, SMS and wireless-pager messages, as well as transfer files and URLs.
• DVD Identifier version 3.6.2 - Dvd Identifier retrieves and interprets the pre-recorded information that is present on all dvd media (dvd+r, dvd+r dl, dvd+rw, dvd-r, dvd-r dl, dvd-rw and dvd-ram). Last week's release V3.6.1, caused some compatibility problems with (mostly older) drives due to the new DVD-R dual layer code. This has now been resolved.
• CloneDVD 2.7.5.1 - The new version 2.7.5.1 fixes problems with "The Grudge", "Alien Resurrection" and if "copy without menu" is chosen plays CloneDVD now all selected titles one after the other.
• Motherboard tools updated - GIGABYTE EasyTune 5.02 | MSI Core Center 1.7.3.0 | MSI Live Update 3.68
• zer0point 6697 (NVIDIA) - Zer0point Drivers are modified Forceware drivers, meaning they are NOT supported or endorsed by nVidia, or any 3rd party OEM manufacturers. They are not covered by any warranty or guarantee, and you install them at your own risk. Currently these drivers are for all GeForce based desktop cards.

SECURITY...

• MySQL Criticized in Wake of MySpooler Worm - In the wake of the MySpooler worm that spread via weak MySQL passwords on Windows installations last week, database users criticized the open-source database for lax security lockdown on installation, saying that it should be held to the same high standards as traditional security whipping-boy Microsoft Corp.
• W32/Bropia Worm details - This memory-resident worm propagates itself via MSN Messenger by sending a copy of itself using different file names to all available or online contacts. Thus, users of the said messaging program should not accept or open these files to avoid infection.
• First French P2P "pirate" fined EURO10,200 - Alain Oddoz, a French teacher and one of approximately eight million French people who have downloaded music via the internet, is the first person in France to be sentenced because of illegal file-sharing. In addition to confiscating his computer system and the fact that he was arrested in August 2004 is he condemned to pay EURO10,200 and to take out a series of newspaper adverts to publicize the "crime and punishment".
• Spammers play illegal XP Windows card  - The cheeky spamsters have still to tweak the spelling and grammar on the e-missive, but the general idea is for you to go to a web site and, guess what, enter your credit card details.
• New trick boosts volume of spam, strains Internet, experts warn - A new spamming technique could push the volume of unwanted e-mail to new heights in coming months, straining the online communication system, say several experts who monitor the activity of spam gangs around the world. Illegal bulk-mailers have been able to deploy massive blasts of spam by routing it through the computers of their Internet service providers, rather than sending it directly from individual machines, the experts said.
• Ex-AOL Worker Pleads Guilty - A former software engineer for America Online is charged with selling 92 million screen names and e-mail addresses to spammers. A judge finally lets the guy plead guilty to conspiracy.

OFF-TOPIC...

• Air Force War Game Aims to Test Space Technologies - The U.S. military on Saturday launched a five-day war game to see how space-based assets such as satellite communications and precision bomb guidance systems would fare in a hypothetical war against terrorism in 2020.
• Gizoogle.com - This is really interesting website! Check it out! (thaks NeoNSX)
• Girl who loves Vibrating.. - check it out :)

TECHNOLOGY...

• Bill Gates Interview - German magazine "Spiegel" has conducted an interview with Bill Gates as he speaks about issues of computer security, competition, software bundling.
• Is the Half-Life 2 EULA illegal? - More interesting, perhaps, are the legal agreements that surround a purchase of Half-Life 2. One is that no mention of Steam is on the HL2 box or in the End User License Agreement, yet it is required to play. The second is that where a gamer buys a copy of the game for which the CDKey has already been hacked, he will have to wait up to two weeks to get a replacement from Sierra/Vivendi, since shops will generally not take back opened software. The third is that no copy of the game can be sold without paying Valve a $10 fee to transfer the CD-Key to another Steam account.
• Leaders see video games' chaos reflected in D.C. streets - District of Columbia political, religious and community leaders gathered at a church this week to support a proposed ban on the sale of violent and sexually explicit video games to minors. They summed up their objections in a word: poison.

HARDWARE... 

• Trapped under ICE: Extreme FX-55 overclocking - When you have the fastest CPU (at stock speeds) on the planet, you just have to push it further, although phase change cooling can get your underway, LN2 is bound to give you the edge. Let's pour a few litres on this blazingly fast A64 FX-55 to see how high it can fly.
• Kingston HyperX DDR2 5400 - Kingston HyperX PC2-5400 has opened my eyes to DDR2 memory. My initial thoughts were that the performance increase was not going to be something we would see for sometime. I also had the misconception many do about the CAS ratings and how high all of the DDR2 modules seem to be. Yes there are faster and tighter DDR modules on the market, if you are lucky enough to have a motherboard that supports both and you don't OC, you might just stick with DDR memory. If, however, you want to pump up the FSB, Kingston HyperX will fill that request, and wait for the BIOS updates to show you what it is truly made of...
• EPoX 9NDA3+ Socket 939 (nForce3 Ultra) Motherboard - If you've been looking at the Socket 939 platform for your next big upgrade and still have a workable AGP based video board, the EPoX 9NDA3+ is a motherboard that deserves a very close look. With gaming scores that are nearly on par with the VIA chipset boards available and features that leave others in the dust, it has something for everybody and performs admirably as well.
• XFX NVidia G-Force 6600 GT 128meg AGP Video Card - If you are contemplating upgrading your video card but do not want to spend 400 dollars, take a close look at the XFX 6600GT. This card performs exceptional and at a moderate price. With the new PCI-e board coming out, this is a logical solution to make your current AGP system perform into the next year, saving up for the new stuff hot off the assembly lines.
• BFG GeForce 6600 GT OC 128MB AGP - So is the BFG GeForce 6600 GT OC card worth the money? Absolutely. The warranty, the build quality, the enhanced clock speed, the dual DVI out, the GPU and HSI bridge heatsinks, the effective and quiet cooling system, the low CPU overhead during video playback, the impressive 3D performance and the outstanding display output all add up to make it worth the small increase over the cost of a standard GeForce 6600 GT.
• MSI NX6600-VTD128E Diamond - The real jewel in the crown for this board, assuming it is indicative of these boards as a whole, is overclockability. If the price is right, then this part could become something of a darling for those looking for a bargain in the mid-range video card sector - A board cheaper than a 6600GT but overclockable to beyond 6600GT clocks would be coveted much like the GeForce 6800GT has been at the high-end.
• AOpen Aeolus 6600 GT - This 6600 GT just like all the others has 128 MB's of DDR III memory, and the NV43 GPU. This card also features a maximum resolution of 2048 X 1536 at 85Hz. The NV43 GPU provides 8 pixel pipelines, and 128 bit graphics core. Basically a reference 6600 GT with a different color PCB and fancy looking HSF.
• ABIT RX600 Pro-GURU Video Card - Utilizing ATI's X600 design based on ATI's R380 core, the RX600 Pro-GURU features four pixel pipelines and two geometry engines. At stock speed the RX600 Pro-Guru operates with a 400MHz core and 256MB of high speed Samsung DDR memory running at 600MHz Nothing mind-boggling or cutting edge to be found here, however this card can handle all of today's hottest games at modest settings.
• ATI Radeon X850 XT Platinum Edition review - This card is now ATI's flagship card, and has all the features you would expect from a top of the line card, like VIVO, DDR3 RAM, HDTV Decoding, etc. However no matter what the card is capable of, the main thing people purchase these high end cards for is the gaming. So today I am going to tell you about all the features, and show you how the card performs in some of the most popular games out.
• Seagate 100GB Portable External HDD -  This drive can be found for around $220 out on the e-market. Yes, it is portable and a very good drive, but spending over two dollars per GB of data storage may make many cringe at the thought. This is a product that will suit the needs of many people and that price will not stop them from picking this drive up.
• Winter Audio Reference: On-Board, Consumer, and Pro Solutions - AnandTech take a look at a cross section of the audio industry. The lineup includes two cards from Creative (the Audigy 2 ZS Platinum Pro and Audigy 4 Pro), the Realtek Intel HD Audio solution, and the Echo Audio Gina3G. With these cards, we are covering our bases for the consumer add-in market, professional recording, and onboard audio solutions.
• AOpen Silent Power AO400-12AHN PSU - Maximum peak power output of the AOpen Silent Power AO400-12AHN is 400W. The power supply features over-voltage protection, which apparently shuts itself down to avoid damage in the case of a power surge.
• Zalman CNPS7700-Cu Heatsink Fan - One of the main features of the CNPS7700-Cu heatsink fan (HSF) is the ability to provide excellent cooling along with near silent operation. The large diameter of the heatsink provides extra cooling to other components located around the CPU socket area, like the NB, RAM modules and voltage regulators
• ASETEK Waterchill - Asetek's all-in-one water-cooling kit, WaterChill, offers a fantastic way for new users to enter the arena of watercooling. The setup procedure is easy and well documented, and the results in temperature and noise reduction are more than any air-cooling system could offer.
• Akasa AK-688 Black Knight Heatsink - MikhailTechtake a look at Akasa's AK-688 Black Knight copper heatsink with included 3.5” fan controller/USB hub.
• I-Rocks IR-7220 Optical Mouse - The I-Rocks IR-7220 Beetle is quite responsive. Light weight and very comfortable to use, it should be a “must have” item for anybody with small hands that find some larger mice cumbersome.
• Logitech Z-640 5.1 Speaker Set - If you always listen to music and you don't watch movies or play games on your PC, you should consider something other than the Logitech Z-640. Its mid-range is not impressive and you are going to notice it especially when you listen to music. However, if you don't really care much about its rather lacking mid-range, then the Z-640 can be considered. If you are into gaming and watch a lot of movies on your PC as well as on a budget, the Z-640 would probably be your best choice. Z-640's accurate and solid bass is exactly the type of bass that I like.
• NZXT Nemesis and Nemesis Elite case - The Elite model has a total of three 120mm LED fans (photo). The first is mounted at the front of the case before the HDD cage. It has a 3-pin motherboard connector and is meant to be connected to the LCD display to maintain control as well as monitor the performance of the fan. In fact, the second 120mm fan mounted at the back also has this ability.
• L.I.S. POP Indicator VFD Display - The IT professional can also use the L.I.S. POP Indicator as a display to quickly assess critical information without having to plug in a monitor.
• Logisys White Laser LEDs - Logisys' Laser LED kit consists of the cluster with 4-pin pass-through molex connector, a couple optional installation screws, and some velcro. It's available in white, red, green, blue, and UV. Ours was the white version. As it turns out, white lights (fluorescent or LED), the cool kind, look pretty amazing inside a windowed case with white sleeving and other white painted components. If nothing else, it's certainly a departure from the typical blue.
• Brother MFC-410CN multi function printer - This is a neat little machine, not that much bigger than an A4 page, with a control panel set into its front edge and paper input and output trays below. As with HP's range of ink-jet printers, paper makes a full 180-degree turn during printing. Connection to an individual PC is made via USB or via Ethernet as a network device.
• Acer AL2671W - 26in Widescreen LCD TV - There's no getting away from the fact that the Acer AL2671W is a fantastic display. It's smart, easy-to-use, and delivers great picture quality. The caveats are having only two Scart connections, the lack of six-pin S-Video inputs, and the uncertainty over HDCP support.
• palmOne Tungsten T5 PDA - The battery life of the T5 was not the best I have seen, but certainly was nothing to scoff at. The PDA lasted for about four hours and twenty minutes of use with BlueTooth off and the backlight on maximum.
• Three-CCD semi-professional HDV camcorder - Sony's HDR-FX1E is a true statement of intent. It's only L500 more expensive than the company's DCR-VX2100 and anyone currently considering that model should seriously consider ways of finding the extra money for the FX1E. The FX1E is just as good at shooting DV as the VX2100, so only a small premium is being paid for its HDV capabilities. Sony also has a professional version of the FX1E on the horizon, the HVR-Z1U. Unlike the FX1, there won't be different versions for Pal and NTSC. Instead, one model will support the 25fps and 30fps timebases, along with 24fps via the CineFrame mode. The Z1 could be to the Sony PD170 what the FX1E is to the VX2100 - a killer.

SOFTWARE...

• Marco's Excel Management Macro 1.1 - It's a Microsoft Excel Add-In (download) with a collection of functions which can be useful in an Enterprise environment based on Microsoft Windows operating systems. The main functions are based on retrieving information from Active Directory, modifying Active Directory and getting information from computers through WMI. Although there are more free tools available nowadays (like ADModify), it can be quite convenient to perform certain tasks directly in Excel.
• IBindCFG 0.1 - IBindCFG (download), automate disable/enable binding of ms_msclient and ms_server on nic interfaces IBindCfg version 0.1. Usage: IBindCfg [-interface Networkname] [-dis_client|-en_client ClientName] [-dis_service|-en_service ServiceName] [-dis_protocol|-en_protocol ProtocolName][-verbose]
• Useful tools for Windows - This website has some useful free tools for Windows
• Free Avast! Virus Cleaner - avast! Virus Cleaner is available free for every user. This tool will help you remove selected worm infections from your computer.
• Avant Browser 10.0 Build 121 Final - Avant Browser is a fast, stable, user-friendly, versatile web browser. Avant Browser is a multi-window browser which features with many functions such as Pop-up Stopper, Built-in Google Searching, Safe Recovery, Integrated Cleaner and Advanced Browsing Options.
• Advanced X Video Converter 3.9.18 - Advanced X Video Converter is a comprehensive video software that makes it easy to Convert, Join, and Split video files among AVI (DivX, XviD, MPEG-4 ...), MPEG (MPEG-1, MPEG-2), WMV, ASF, VCD (.dat), SVCD, DVD formats. It can also extract audio track and images from videos.
• Mozilla Sunbird - Mozilla has finally released the official Sunbird Calendar for mass consumption.
• eMule 0.45a - eMule (download full install / updates files only) is a filesharing client which is based on the eDonkey2000 network, but offers more features than the standard eDonkey client, because it's opensource but under the restrictions of the GPL License. (thanks nitrox)
• XP Codec Pack 1.0.1 - XP Codec Pack 1.0.1 includes: AC3Filter 1.01a RC5, AVI Splitter 1.0.0.3, CDXA Reader 1.0.0.0, CoreAAC 1.1.0, CoreFlac Decoder 0.4, FFDShow MPEG-4 Video Decoder 2004.10.12, GPL MPEG-1/2 Decoder 0.1.2.0, Matroska Splitter 1.0.2.4, Media Player Classic 6.4.8.3, OggSplitter/CoreVorbis 1.0.0.0, RealMedia Splitter 1.0.0.9, RadLight MPC Filter 1.0.0.4, RadLight APE Filter 1.0.0.4, RadLight OFR Filter 1.0.0.4, RadLight TTA Filter 1.0.0.2, VSFilter 2.33.
• nHancer (NVIDIA Profile Editor) - The programmer of this handly little tool was very rather unhappy with nVidia's own control panel, especially with its game profile editing module.
• ATI FireGL Display driver 8.083 - ATI's FireGL cards are designed to accelerate 3D workstation applications based on OpenGL and Microsoft DirectX 9.0. With full certification on the leading computer aided design (CAD), architecture/engineering/construction (AEC) and digital content creation (DCC) applications, ATI FireGL is the high performance choice for graphics professionals working in Windows. 
• 2005 New Year Driver Pack Official Released (supports Live, Audigy 1/2/ZS)  - This software pack is a crack/mod based on the original CD of Creative Audigy 2 ZS Notebook & Audigy4 Pro. Please read the followings carefully. They removed the package though. Anyone know a good mirror?

SECURITY...

• 13 patches on 8th February - On 8 February 2005 the Microsoft Security Response Center is planning to release  9 security patches for Microsoft Windows, and other for Microsoft SharePoint Services, Microsoft .NET Framework, Microsoft Office, Visual Studio, and Windows Media Player, and MSN Messenger.
• Windows XP SP2 Vulnerability Patch - Russian company Positive Technologies has released an unofficial utility eliminating vulnerability in SP2.
  FBI's email hacked - The FBI said Friday it has shut down an e-mail system that it uses to communicate with the public because of a possible security breach. The bureau is investigating whether someone hacked into the www.fbi.gov e-mail system, which is run by a private company, officials said.
• Huge security hole in .Net - According to Gosling, the security hole is based upon the fact that several features of the older languages are ambivalent with regards to security: "C++ allowed you to do arbitrary casting, arbitrary adding of images and pointers, and converting them back and forth between pointers in a very, very unstructured way.
• Eudora open to multiple high risk flaws - Security consultancy firm Next Generation Security Software (NGSS) has discovered "multiple high risk vulnerabilities" in the Windows version of the popular Eudora email client. According to NGSS representative John Heasman, versions affected include Eudora 6.2.0 and below. Heasman warned that the flaws permit hackers to execute arbitrary code on victims' PCs via previewing or opening a specially crafted email. Hackers can also run malicious programs by opening specially crafted stationary or mailbox files. Testing by NGSS suggested that these issues have been resolved in Eudora 6.2.1 as detailed here. Version 6.2.1 can be downloaded here.
• Microsoft Internet Explorer .ANI Files Handling ConnectBack Exploit - A remote code execution vulnerability exists in the way that cursor, animated cursor, and icon formats are handled. An attacker could try to exploit the vulnerability by constructing a malicious cursor or icon file that could potentially allow remote code execution if a user visited a malicious Web site or viewed a malicious e-mail message. An attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could take complete control of an affected system.
• Painkiller CD-Key Buffer Overflow - The vulnerability is caused by overflowing the buffer that stores the Gamespy CD-key hash for the online server-side authorization. This buffer is 100 bytes long (the Gamespy CD-key hash is long 72 characters), therefore if an attacker uses a longer hash than 100 bytes he can cause the overflow of the buffer.
• Deceased woman named in file-sharing suit - Gertrude Walton, a deceased eighty-three-year-old woman, was named as the only defendant in a federal lawsuit filed by a group of record companies. They claimed Walton made more than 700 pop, rock and rap songs available for free on the Internet under the screen name 'smittenedkitten.' Needless to say, the suit has since been dropped.
• FBI Unable to Launch New Computer Program -Audit - The FBI has squandered $170 million on a failed computer system agents can use to instantly share information, and seems to know neither how long it will take nor how much it will cost to build one, a Justice Department audit showed on Thursday. In a harsh criticism of the FBI's efforts to fix a shortfall identified after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Inspector General Glenn Fine said the bureau still relies on an antiquated case-filing system that hampers agents' ability to properly do their jobs

OFF-TOPIC...

• Why Does Windows Still Suck? - Why do PC users put up with so many viruses and worms? Why isn't everyone on a Mac?....read on
• Terminator 4 will have no T3 cast - Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines star Nick Stahl, who played John Connor, told Sci Fi Wire that neither he nor his "T3" co-star Claire Danes will appear in Terminator 4. "None of the cast is coming back." Stahl said. "The [T4] story is changing conceptually. I believe it's a jump to the future, so my character will be quite a bit older. That's all that I know. So I'm not coming back, which is a drag." He added that the producers' current plans may not include original "Terminator" series star Arnold Schwarzenegger either.
• Chinese man grows his own chairs - A Chinese man has patented his technique for growing his own wooden chairs. Mr Wu, from Shenyang City, Liaoning province, moulds branches into shape while the tree is still growing. He uses elm trees which are pliant and do not break easily, reports the China Morning Business View.
• Global Warming Could Make Mars a Second Home - Greenhouse gases may be a problem on Earth, but injecting them into the Martian atmosphere could make Mars a second home. A team of researchers has proposed injecting synthetic "super" greenhouse gases into the planet's atmosphere to raise its temperature and melt its polar ice caps to provide conditions suitable for biological life.

TECHNOLOGY...

• Europe may have to wait for PSP - According to reports from Reuters and others, Sony may delay its European PSP launch until April--or later. The reports say SCE is planning to focus on the handheld's presence in America and Japan, given that processor shortages are preventing Sony from producing PSPs fast enough.
• PlayStation 3 Cell chip aims high - Tom Halfhill of the Microprocessor Report has studied patents and other documents relating to Cell, which will be unveiled Monday at the International Solid-State Circuits Conference in San Francisco. He sees a number of chip breakthroughs likely to dramatically boost computing power in everything from game machines to cell phones.
• France's DiBcom unveils first mobile DTV chip -  French fabless semiconductor company has demonstrated working silicon for a mobile TV demodulation chip. The advance comes as France prepares to begin DTV broadcasts from the Eiffel Tower next month.
• Group to Divide Linux Standards Base - The Free Standards Group has decided to move away from a single, core LSB (Linux Standards Base) specification, and is instead going to break this down into different modules that can be combined to give a server or desktop LSB standard.
• Few bugs in MySQL database - A source-code analysis of the MySQL database, a popular open-source program at the heart of many Web sites, revealed few bugs compared with the number found in commercial code, testing company Coverity said Friday.
• Photoshop Cloning Tool Automatically Corrects for 3-D Perspective - Mok3 has introduced a Perspective Clone Brush plug-in for Adobe Photoshop. According to Mok3's Jan. 31 press release, this plug-in lets graphic designers rapidly clone areas in an image with automatic correction for 3-D perspective and simultaneous correction for differences in lighting and scale in the image.
• 1TB Disks This Year? - Holographic Versatile Disc (HVD) will be capable of massive storage, as well as transfer rates of up to 1 GB per second. Optware's announced came less than a week after a similar announcement from InPhase Technologies. InPhase recently began shipping its GDS5000 HVD drives based on WORM (Write Once Read Many) technology. A newer version, the Tapestry HDS-200R will be a fully recordable 200GB drive with 20MB per second transfer – it is expected to hit markets later this year.

HARDWARE... 

• Corsair Ships XPERT Memory Modules with Advanced Monitoring Caps.- Corsair Memory said this week it was shipping its new XPERT memory modules with complex monitoring capabilities that allow users to keep an eye on various critical parameters without using special software or devices.
• AMD Athlon64 vs Sempron comparion part #2 - At the end of the day the Sempron has proved once again that it is a worthy processor at just $140 US. The final paragraph of my original article when something like this "Bottom-line is the Sempron is an excellent budget processor that is certainly capable of getting the job done. The processor is ideal for office based computers, or for those that only wish to play the odd game now and then. If you are building a budget gaming system I would recommend looking at getting a lower clocked Athlon64 processor. Furthermore if you are into overclocking pushing an Athlon64 processor that little bit further should not be a problem".
• Certain MSI GeForce 6800 GT Graphics Cards Do Not Comply to Specs - A Germany-based web-site TechPowerUp claimed late last week that at least some of MSI's retail PCI Express x16 graphics cards sold as NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT products had the GeForce 6800 graphics chips on them. The original NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT graphics chip has 16 pixel processors and 6 vertex processors, whereas the GeForce 6800 graphics processing unit employs 12 pixel and 5 vertex processors, thus, delivering lower performance. TechPowerUp! has follow-up information on the MSI 6800GT's that were delivered with degraded performance - MSI delivered 350 of the cards out to the retail chain and has offered "immediate free replacement or full refund" of those cards. The root cause is still not known, as MSI simply cites an "unknown chip problem" but the translated German press release points to the additional bridge chip of the NV45 package.
• Asus 6600GT SLI - SLI support in games is a total different story, the NVIDIA drivers work in two ways: in AFR (Alternate Frame Rendering) or in SFR (Split Frame Rendering) mode. The first method (AFR) will render the first half on the first card and the second half on the other card. The other method (SFR) splits every frame in two pieces and each card draws one piece. Which method is used depends on each game; NVIDIA selected 100 games and created profiles for each game. If there is no profile for a game then the NVIDIA driver will NOT use SLI. We didnt encounter any problems in the selected tests, but you can always create your own game profiles if there is none present.
• MSI RX600XT-TD128E - PC Modding Malaysia has posted a review of MSI RX600XT-TD128E.
• Dual-Layer DVD Burner Round-Up - HotHardware.Com posted a Dual-Layer DVD Burner Round-Up  - They've got drives from Sony, Plextor, BenQ, Lite-On, and Asus.
• MSI Mega View 561 20GB Portable Media Player  - GideonTech.com has posted a review of the MSI Mega View 561 20GB Portable Media Player

GUIDES...

• Get a 1000 Mb Gmail account for free - Go to gmail.afraid.org and enter your e-mail address. Then you'll receive an invite to open a 1000 Mb Gmail account for free.
• ABC's of DVD Drive Abbreviations - The number of different formats available in DVD drives can be confusing to anyone in the market for one. The list is much longer, but to address a few of the common formats, we have DVD-ROM, DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW, DVD-RAM ,DVD+R DL and DVD=B1RW
• MSFN's Official Unattended XP CD Guide (updated) - Through the course of this guide, you will create a CD that does all the installing for you. The CD will be fully updated with the latest hotfixes, and install all your programs for you.
• Windows XP Backup Strategies For Home Users - This article is intended to introduce the average user to the various backup methods available and to provide a brief overview of these methods.
• Networking Basics - In the article they cover all the basics terms and what they mean and look at different types of networks and how they are set up. A network is a group of computers, printers, and other devices that are connected together with cables
• Beginners Guides: Most Common Ways to Kill a PC - PCstats guides you through the list of the most popular ways by which you will eventually kill your PC, despite your good intentions. This is a good primer for "what not to do" folks. - Version 1.0.0

SOFTWARE...

• DVD2one v1.5.2 - This software is a 3 step program for putting your favorite movies on to one DVD recordable for backup. This version adds checks to verify the consistency of structures in the IFO files and to correct them if necessary. This solves problems with movie-only copy of Alien Quadrilogy. Also adds program chain analysis to detect and remove damaged parts of the DVD for ARccOS disks like Resident Evil Apocalypse, The Forgotten, Little Black Book, The Grudge and Wrestlemania.
• K-Lite Mega Codec pack 1.18 - A new version of the K-Lite Mega Codec pack (download) is available. It includes K-Lite codecpack full, QuickTime Alternative 1.40, Real Alternative 1.30 and BSPlayer.
• Real Alternative 1.30 - Real Alternative will allow you to play RealMedia files without having to install RealPlayer/RealOne Player.
• QuickTime Alternative 1.40 - QuickTime Alternative will allow you to play QuickTime files (.mov, .qt and other extensions) without having to install the official QuickTime Player.
• Easy CD-DA Extractor 8.0 (shw) - All-In-One music software (download) - CD-Ripper, CD-Burner, and Music File Format Converter.
• HDDlife 1.0.14 - HDDlife can work in the prophylactic mode when it checks the health of your hard drives at regular intervals and informs you about the results of these checks in an unobtrusive way. If you get warned about a possible hard drive failure , you will protect yourself against losing your naturally priceless personal data.
• [!] Total Commander v6.51 Final - Total Commander 6.51 (download) is now available for download. This upgrade corrects some problems, mainly with the new functions introduced with Total Commander 6.50.
• RadLinker & RadClocker - RadLinker is a tweaker/linker for ATI Radeon based graphics cards. RadLinker allows you to create a "RadLink", a special kind of shell link (a.k.a. shortcut) to your games/programs that allows you to change it's individual settings. A RadLink will look and act just like a normal shortcut except it's property settings can be custom tailored for your video settings.
•  nHancer (NVIDIA Replacement profile editor) - The programmer of this handly little tool was very unhappy with nVidia's own control panel, especially with its game profile editing module. (requires 1.1 of the .net framework)

SECURITY...

• Antivirus Tools Fool XP's Security Center - Microsoft's Windows XP Service Pack 2 is supposed to improve security. Its Windows Security Center should alert you when your antivirus software is missing or out of date. But in PC World Magazine tests, both McAfee's Internet Security Suite 2005 and Symantec's Norton Internet Security 2005 crippled SP2's ability to deliver accurate alerts immediately after installation. McAfee and Symantec acknowledge that their products intentionally disable the Windows Security Center's messaging feature.
• Mutated Worm Spreads Through MSN Messenger - A new variant of the Bropia worm is fast spreading through popular Internet chat program MSN Messenger. Computer security companies AhnLab and Hauri said Thursday that they found a variant of the virus which infects users of MSN Messenger by sending itself as a picture file. Infected computers slow down to a crawl. The virus automatically sends itself to others in the users list of contacts.
• Limited buffer-overflow in Painkiller 1.35 - The bug is about the buffer that must contain the Gamespy cd-key hash for the online server-side authorization. This buffer is limited to 100 bytes (the Gamespy cd-key hash is long 72 chars), so if an attacker uses a longer hash will be able to overflow the buffer.
• Microsoft: SP2 shimmy's not a flaw - Responding to a Russian security company's claim that it found a way to beat a protective element of Microsoft's Windows XP Service Pack 2, the software giant on Tuesday said it does not believe the issue represents a vulnerability. In fact, the company said the technology highlighted by Moscow-based Positive Technologies was never meant to be "foolproof" and added that the reported flaw does not, by itself, put consumers at risk.
• The "hacker tool" worm that gurned - The Wurmark-F worm, a variant of Wurmark-D which began spreading last month, arrives as a zipped email attachment and displays a picture of an old man pulling an impressive gurn. Meanwhile the worm installs itself in the Windows system folder, along with a new version of the Rbot worm, which spreads via networks without the need for user interaction.
• Heise.de under DDoS attack - German tech publication Heise.de has been targeted by a persistent and determined denial of service attack, it says. The origin of the attack is unknown so far, and Heise's publishing house is offering a €10,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of the attacker.
• Student Logs Teachers Keystrokes - A 16-year-old student has been charged with a misdemeanor for rigging a keystroke-recording device onto a teacher's computer. School district police received a tip from students that the boy was trying to sell answers to final exams. The District Attorney's Office has charged the teen with breach of computer information, a Class B misdemeanor punishable by a fine of up to $2,000 and up to 180 days in.

OFF-TOPIC...

• Antarctic ice sheet is an "awakened giant" - The massive west Antarctic ice sheet, previously assumed to be stable, is starting to collapse, scientists warned on Tuesday. Antarctica contains more than 90% of the world's ice, and the loss of any significant part of it would cause a substantial sea level rise. Scientists used to view Antarctica as a "slumbering giant", said Chris Rapley, from the British Antarctic Survey, but now he sees it as an "awakened giant".
• Mirror that reflects your future self - In Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray, the eponymous subject keeps his youthful looks while the vagaries of age are visited upon his portrait in the attic. Now a digital version of Wilde's idea is being developed to show you what you will look like in five years' time if you take no exercise, eat too much junk food and drink too much alcohol. At Accenture Technology's lab in Sophia Antipolis, near Nice in France, a flat-screen LCD TV linked to a set of cameras and a powerful image-processing computer replaces the portrait described in Wilde's novel.
• Sex and the single robot - Scientists have made them walk and talk. There are even robots that can run. But a South Korean professor is poised to take their development several steps further, and give cybersex new meaning. Kim Jong-Hwan, the director of the ITRC-Intelligent Robot Research Centre, has developed a series of artificial chromosomes that, he says, will allow robots to feel lusty, and could eventually lead to them reproducing. He says the software, which will be installed in a robot within the next three months, will give the machines the ability to feel, reason and desire.
• UPN Cancels "Star Trek: Enterprise" - UPN and Paramount today jointly announced the show's cancellation. The show's series finale, which may feature Jonathan Frakes (William T. Riker) and Marina Sirtis (Deanna Troi), will air on Friday the 13th of May. The show's fate was probably sealed when last Friday's episode reached only 2.5 million viewers - but even so, the people at EnterpriseFans.com are still trying to raise money for a fan campaign to save the show." 

TECHNOLOGY...

• Microsoft Goes It Alone With MSN Search; Bill Gates Writes Open Letter Online - Microsoft yesterday unveiled its first, 100% Microsoft-built search engine, MSN Search. Prior to this, Microsoft had relied upon Yahoo's algorithms and search results. MSN Search uses search technology developed by Microsoft alone. They are however still using Yahoo's sponsor advertisement mechanism powered by Overture.
• T-Mobile & Microsoft launch first 3G device - Today, at the T-Mobile International Press Conference in Bonn, Germany, T-Mobile and Microsoft announced the MDA IV - the first Windows Mobile based 3G device. The T-Mobile MDA IV, is just 100 centimeters squared and offers users access to Pocket Outlook, Pocket Word, Pocket Excel, Pocket Internet Explorer and a choice of GPRS, UMTS and W-LAN connectivity options. The device is expected to be available this coming Summer, prices will be available around that time too.
• Sun Launches Vision of "The Network is the Computer" - Sun have announced their plans to offer businesses a simple way of doing I.T., by utilising the power of grid computing. For the price of $1 per cpu hour, business customers can tap into massive computer grids run by Sun
• Gainward drops out of graphics card business - Taiwan-based TNC Industrial has decided to sell the Gainward brand and branch Gainward Europe GmbH to Palit Microsystems for US$1 million and the net worth of the branch office at the end of 2004 (as certified by a CPA).
• Get 1GB of wireless data for $10 - A new variation of its OFDM based wireless data technology, known as Flexband, has been launched by America's Flarion. The company estimates Lexband will enable existing cellular operators to offer subscribers up to 1GB per month for just $10 per month. That figure assumes around 600 users per cell.
• MP3.com alum to launch DRM-free music service - The brains behind the original MP3.com and Linspire is gearing up to launch a new online music service called MP3tunes that offers DRM-free downloads
• HP's 'Crossbar Latch' to Replace Transistors? - Researchers at HP have come up with a new signal technology they claim could replace transistors in computers one day. In a paper published in Tuesday's Journal of Applied Physics, three members of HP Labs' Quantum Science Research (QSR) group demonstrated what they call a "crossbar latch." A latch consists of a single wire acting as a signal line, crossed by two control lines with an electrically switchable nanoscale junction where they intersect. The technology is so small, HP claims thousands of the strands could fit across the diameter of a human hair.

HARDWARE... 

• Gigabyte to introduce new dual-GPU graphics cards in February - Gigabyte Technology plans to introduce a series of dual-GPU graphics cards built using Nvidia GeForce 6600 chips, following the December launch of its first dual-GPU model, the GV-3D1, according to market sources.
• OCZ Technology & GeIL Shrinks DDR2 Latencies, Boosts DDR2 Performance - OCZ PC2-5400 DDR2 Enhanced Bandwidth Platinum Edition are designed to function at 667MHz speeds with CL4 2-2-8 latencies, which is significantly lower compared to the company's previous-generation PC2-5400 flavour that could operate with CL4 4-4-12 settings. Also GeIL offers 533MHz DDR2 memory modules with CL3 3-3-8 latency settings in capacities of 256MB, 512MB and 1GB for single-channel packages as well as pairs of such modules as dual-channel bundles. Pricing for such memory is unknown.
• 1GB OCZ EL DDR PC 3700 Gold Rev. 3 dual channel memory - If you are not looking to spend too much too much money on high end RAM, want to run your FSB at around 230-260+MHz, and don't have a lot of Vdimm to spare, then the OCZ PC3700 Gold Rev.3 is what you want. Reasonable price, great overclockability with great timings, and great looks.
• GeCube SilenCool X700 PRO 256MB - GeCube pull off silent X700 PRO running with aplomb, for competetive money, by not going overboard on the bundle. If it lies in your price range and silence appeals, be sure and consider it.
• GeCube Radeon X800XL & X850XT Graphics Cards - TweakTown compare the performance of two new ATI Radeon high-end graphics chips - the Radeon X800XL & X850XT through retail cards from GeCube. After examining each card they compare the performance of each against an nVidia GeForce 6600GT and 6800 Ultra which are what ATI's new cards are aimed at competing against.
• Leadtek PX6600GT Extreme Version 6600GT PCI-E VGA - Overclockers New Zealand has posted a review of Leadtek PX6600GT Extreme Version 6600GT PCI-E VGA.
• HIS X700 Pro IceQ Turbo VIVO - The point of HIS's IceQ line of boards is providing this high-performance cooling so that the board does not have to be modified to get every last bit of performance out of it. Bjorn3D has already taken a look at a couple (X800 Pro and X800 XT) of these solutions from HIS, and today I am pleased to present another one - the X700 Pro IceQ Turbo VIVO.
• SapphireTech Hybrid X800 256MB PCIe Video Card - The X800 comes stock clocked at 390Mhz Core and 350 MHz (700MHz effective) memory. I can already tell you that the Samsung GDDR3 RAM on this card is seriously under-clocked at 350MHz since it is rated for 500MHz (Samsung Part#: K4J55323QF-GC20). With a healthy overclock and the extra 4 pipelines this should be a nice card.
• NCQ-enabled SATA hard drives comparison - Maxtor DM10 vs. Seagate 7200.8 - The Seagate Barracuda 7200.8, unfortunately, is somewhat disappointing to us. While the drive performs fairly well, only about 5-10% slower compared to our DiamondMax 10, there are no killer features here which elevate the 7200.8 over Seagate's previous generation drives. The drive still just performs “ok”, and was audible louder during testing compared to the DiamondMax 10. While the drive does boast a terrific five year warranty, it can't make up for the fact that the drive runs louder, slower, and is more expensive compared to the DiamondMax 10.
• SunbeamTech Light-Bus & Laser LEDs - When the loud noise of your water cooling radiator fan rig or high performance heatsink fan bothers you a lot, the fan controller (rheostat) will come to the rescue. When your modded case does not have enough lighting or too much lighting, Sunbeamtech has the Light-Bus for you. In fact, this Light-Bus serves a dual purpose duty in controlling the fans and light intensity plus more.
• Dlink DWL-2100AP Wireless Access Point - D-Link's latest DWL-2100AP wireless AP claims to push the standard 802.11g 54Mbps speed up to 108Mbps when a compatible D-Link card is used.
• Logitech MX 3100 Cordless Desktop -  The mouse, keyboard and software are all damn good. Yes, there are improvements that can be made on the software side, but I expected that it will happen sooner rather than later. The keyboard on the other hand, could use a little work. The buttons were really too small, and detracted from what would otherwise be a very good package.
• Microsoft Optical Desktop with Fingerprint Reader - The really clever thing, though, is that whenever you come across a dialogue box or frequently used website that requires a username and password you can do the same. Just dab one of your registered digits onto the reader, fill in the boxes and whenever that logon presents itself again, all you have to do is scan your finger and the software fills in the username and password boxes for you.
• Samsung CLP-550 Laser Printer  - ipKonfig.com takes a look at the Samsung CLP-550 Laser Printer.
• AJP G220 laptop - This G220 is based on a Celeron M processor running at 1.5GHz. This, in combination with the Intel i855GME chipset and the Intel PRO/Wireless 2200BG 802.11b/g wireless network card, means that it gets the Centrino branding. Perhaps AJP could have put together an even more affordable machine if the G220 had used a different chipset and wireless solution, but the fact is that the Centrino branding sells.
• Japanese Rechargeable USB Flashlight - Japanese Sanwa is selling a USB powered portable flashlight. About the size of a flash drive, the miniature flashlight powers a single LED light for four continuous hours that can be controlled by an On / Off switch, with an even longer charging time of 4.5 hours.

GUIDES...

• Top Ten Survivor Tips for Active Directory - This 6-page white paper is an easy-to-read compilation of practical information from BMC Software's customers and its own technical staff - including information that you won't find in Microsoft's Knowledge Base. This is for IT managers who dream of really controlling their Active Directory environments.
• Using Visual C++ Express to Build Secure Applications - Review some of the new language and library features available in the Microsoft Visual C++ 2005 Express Edition that will help you to more efficiently produce secure and reliable code.

SOFTWARE...

• VIA Releases Automated Game Updating Tool - VIA Technologies and GameShadow today announced the launch of VIA Grease Monkey, an easy-to-use desktop application that ensures up-to-the-minute updates for all of the most popular PC games, eliminating time-consuming online searching and waiting for important updates to download. By simply clicking on the desktop icon, VIA Grease Monkey carries out a comprehensive scan of a user's library of PC games, automatically generating a list of the latest patches, maps, drivers and other key gaming information necessary for the ideal gaming environment. VIA Grease Monkey then provides direct downloads of all the selected updates through a high speed connection, simply and efficiently.
• Unofficial Windows 98 SE Service Pack 2.0 RC1 - It contains all Windows98 SE updates from Windows Update site and more. It is a self-extracting and self-installing pack like Microsoft's update files. Thus, you cannot choice files individually. However, the pack installs only required fixes for your system.
  Uninstallation is possible from Add-Remove Programs,
• Microsoft Terminology Assistant 1.0 - Microsoft Terminology Assistant (requires the 1.1 NET runtime) is an windows-based assistant tool to find the translated terminology and its definitions. The TA tool can grab the text on your screen and you can use your mouse cursor to point to the words you are going to query. The tool provides "Dictionary" feature as well. You can input any text you'd like to find and see the definition immmediately.
• Promqry 1.0 - Promqry can accurately determine if a modern (Windows 2000 and later) managed Windows system has network interfaces in promiscuous mode. If a system has network interfaces in promiscuous mode, it may indicate the presence of a network sniffer running on the system.
• Weather Pulse - Weather Pulse (download) is a weather monitoring tool that that displays detailed weather information for selected US cities, as well as popular satellite images from around the globe. It includes weather alert options, 10 day forecast, hourly forecast, detailed forecast and more.
• SkinStudio 4.5 - SkinStudio (download) makes it easy to create new visual styles, you can even draw up your ultimate masterpiece and import it as a template, highlight each part with the mouse to modify virtually any part of the Windows XP interface
• CCleaner v1.17.90 Final - CCleaner (Crap Cleaner) (download) is a freeware system optimization tool. That removes unused and temporary files from your system - allowing Windows to run faster, more efficiently and giving you more hard disk space.
• Tray Helper 4.7 - Tray Helper it's freeware application with many features (f/e: email checker, auto mail responder, anti-spam, popup-killer, event reminder and more).
• MSN Toolbar Suite 2.0.1.1203 Beta - The MSN Toolbar Suite combines several great programs that speed up your search tasks and help you surf the Web. There's now an MSN Toolbar for Microsoft Office Outlook, the MSN Deskbar in the Windows taskbar, and an MSN Toolbar that works in both Windows Explorer and Internet Explorer.
• MuzicMan v5.0 Build 023 - MuzicMan (download) makes your MP3 music more accessible and easier to manage than anything else around.
• DU Meter 3.07 Build 200 - DU Meter (download) is an award winning utility from Hagel Technologies which provides an accurate account of the data which is flowing through your computer`s network connection at any given moment.
• BlindWrite Suite 5.10 - Blindwrite Suite (download) is the best set of tools to reproduce or clone any CD, even protected ones. Blindwrite Suite is the most powerfull tool to create a perfect copy from your original CD for personal private copy.
• DropToCD (DataCD/DVD) 3.04 - DropToCD (DataCD/DVD) is a very easy to use tool to create a data CD/DVD based on drag & drop technology. Just drag & drop files and folders to a little window and hit 'Burn disc' from popup menu to burn a CD or DVD. Simple as 1, 2, 3. You can create and burn multisession, bootable disc or ISO images, erase rewritable, view and extract sessions from multisession discs and more.
• AnyDVD 4.5.7.2  - The new version 4.5.7.2 fixes a problem with unrecognised disk changes and disables the information window by default.
• Realtek ALC AC97 Audio Driver v3.69 - Realtek has a new AC97 audio driver online in the version of 3.69. The driver supports all ALC series audio chipsets from ALC100 up to ALC850 mainly used as onboard sound on various motherboards.

SECURITY...

• Flaw found in Windows XP Data Execution Prevention - A Russian security company claims it found a way to beat a security measure in Microsoft's Windows XP Service Pack 2 (exploit), a major update aimed at securing customers' PCs.  The SP2 measure, known as Data Execution Protection, is intended to prevent would-be attackers from inserting rogue code into a PC's memory and tricking Windows into running the program. However, in a paper published Friday, Moscow-based Positive Technologies said two minor mistakes in the implementation of the technology allow a knowledgeable programmer to sidestep the protection
• Juniper routers exposed to attack - Networking company Juniper Networks is encouraging customers to upgrade their routers to fix a serious vulnerability in its operating system.  Juniper's M- and T-Series routers are affected by the flaw in the version 6 series of Junos, which makes them vulnerable to denial-of-service attacks. Such an attack could allow a hacker to gain access to the router and crucial areas of a company's network.
• Broadcast crash in Xpand Rally 1.0.0.0 - The problem is caused by an unchecked memory allocation controlled by the attacker that can decide the exact amount of data to allocate through a 32 bits number in his packets. If the memory to allocate is too big the malloc() function will fail and no instructions will check it so the game will try to write into a bad memory zone (0x00000000).
• MSBlast.b Hacker Gets 18 Months In Jail - Citing neglectful parents and an Internet that she said was a "dungeon" for lonely people, a federal judge Friday afternoon sentenced Jeffrey Lee Parson, a teen hacker who created 2003's MSBlast.b worm, to 18 months in prison, less than half the time prosecutors had requested. U.S. District Judge Marsha Pechman added three years of supervision after his release, and ordered him to perform 100 hours of community service. A restitution hearing will be held next month to decide what amount Parson, 19, must pay Microsoft and several individuals to make up damages for his worm.
• Researchers: We Cracked Car Alarm System - Researchers said Saturday they have found a way to crack the code used in millions of car keys, a development they said could allow thieves to bypass the security systems on newer car models. "We stole our own car, and we bought gas stealing from our own credit card," said Avi Rubin, a professor of computer science at Johns Hopkins who led the research team.

OFF-TOPIC...

• DOOM: The Boardgame - It is for 2 to 4 players, playable in 1 to 2 hours, based on the groundbreaking DOOM 3 computer game by id Software.
• Cute Blonde Bunny Video - A video of a cute blonde girl transformed into a Bunny!
• Several casting announcements for Pirates of the Caribbean sequels - Taggart star Alex Norton (The Count of Monte Cristo) has joined the "Pirates of the Caribbean" sequels cast, reports the Daily Record. The 55-year-old actor will play Edinburgh sea captain Sam Bellamy. "I've only just heard that I got the part of Captain Bellamy. I'm really excited," said Norton, "I start filming in Los Angeles next month. We then head out to the Caribbean island of St Vincent in June and July."
• First Amendment no big deal, students say -  The way many high school students see it, government censorship of newspapers may not be a bad thing, and flag burning is hardly protected free speech. It turns out the First Amendment is a second-rate issue to many of those nearing their own adult independence, according to a study of high school attitudes released Monday.
• Terrorist explosive blows up without flames - An explosive sometimes used by terrorists does not burn when it detonates. Instead, its molecules simply fall apart. Triacetone triperoxide (TATP) has been used by suicide bombers in Israel and was chosen as a detonator in 2001 by the thwarted "shoe bomber" Richard Reid. Now calculations by Ehud Keinan from the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa show that most of its explosive force comes from a rapid release of gas rather than a burst of energy.
• Bill Gates Handwriting Analyzed - The BBC is reporting that a doodle left behind at a Davos press conference given by Tony Blair, Bill Gates and Bono shows the writer to be: "an unstable man" amongst other things.

TECHNOLOGY...

• Bill Gates and Paul Allen are in a rare head-to-head fight - Since leaving Microfost in 1983 Paul Allen has pretty much stayed out of cofounder Bill Gates' way. Aside from buying into cable companies and funding a small, unsuccessful foray into educational software, Allen has focused his investments on things Microsoft doesn't invest in--like sports teams, music museums and the film industry. Now, for the first time, Allen is competing directly with Gates for the same business: set-top-box software that lets cable companies offer digital video recording, video on demand and, eventually, shopping.
• Microsoft To Rename Media Free XP - Microsoft have agreed to change the name of "Windows XP Reduced Media Edition." The European Commission have asked Microsoft to rename the media free edition after fears that the name would discourage people from purchasing the edition. The name is now unknown and Microsoft and EU officials are working together to come to an agreement on the new editions naming scheme.
• Wireless gaming firms play for big stakes - Wireless gaming is poised to become the most lucrative and prevalent wireless data application, industry experts have predicted. According to the latest research from IDC, gaming will overtake ring-tones in 2005 as the biggest US wireless money spinner and generate sales of nearly $1.5bn annually by 2008.
• Blackberry use "can damage thumb" - Sales of the L200 gadget, which can be used to email, page and phone, have boomed in recent years with celebrities such as David Beckham using them. But US and UK doctors said repetitive use could cause arthritis or harm tendons in the thumb.
• More Detail on Firefox 1.1 Plan - Ben Goodger, the lead engineer for Mozilla Firefox, has updated the Roadmap with more detail on the 1.1 Plan.
• Google is now a domain registrar - Google is now an ICANN-accredited registrar of domain names, providing it with yet another potential line of expansion. The fast-growing search provider is approved to sell names in seven top-level domains (TLDs) including .com, .net, .org, .biz., info, .name and .pro.

HARDWARE... 

• X850XT available in Canada - You can get some cards of those desirable but expensive cards in Canada. You can find one here but it will cost you $645 but we are not sure which one US or Canadian. You will get Sapphire X850XT 256M PCX with 256M DDR TV-Out DVi-i VIVO Bulk edition for the money. This card is in stock and you can buy it now while it lasts.
• VIA's PT880 Pro and PT894 series chipsets - TechReport take a look at all of VIA's new chipsets, plus performance test results for the enthusiast-oriented PT894 chipset. Another reviews can be found on Hexus.net and TweakTown.
• NVIDIA's nForce4 Professional Launch - nForce4 Professional 2200 is the same physical CK8-04 product that nForce4, nForce4 SLI and nForce4 Ultra. It's just advertised as a Pro 2200 to the mainboard components by on-package configuration. Each variant shares the same feature set and performance and all that distinguishes them is their CPU support and whether they officially support SLI. It's an adaptable ASIC that NVIDIA can customise for four markets and four price points, using a single fabricated bit of silicon.
• SuperWorkstation 7044A-82 - Supermicro's Super Quiet Technology - I'm really impressed with the SuperWorkstation 7044A-82. When you consider the hardware that's installed inside of this beast, you'll be amazed at how quiet the system can run. The fan speed control mode that I settled on was "4-pin Quiet Workstation". I really couldn't discern much (if any) of a difference between that and "4-pin Super Quiet Workstation" therefore I decided to take the slight increase in fan speed.
• Intel 3.46GHz EE CPU - The chaps over at T-Break take a look at Intel's 1066MHz FSB based Extreme Edition CPU clocked at 3.46GHz and find out how it compares to the current crop of AMD and Intel CPUs.
• ABIT Fatal1ty AA8XE i925XE Motherboard - This is the most overclockable Intel P4 board that money can buy to date. Finally, here's an extreme board that can go the distance as long as you have the right components to go with it. We've never seen any board that can overclock like this out of the box and with such ease".
• XFX GeForce 6600 GT Dual-DVI - XFX, intelligently, also knew that bigger NVIDIA partners would probably steal the limelight unless it did something special to its package. A pre-overclocked GPU speed was always unlikely, so XFX has gone with video RAM that runs at a full 20% faster than the default 1000MHz. That extra memory bandwidth, totalling 19.2GB/s off only a 128-bit bus, is the reason why XFX's effort is between 5-10% faster than the competition in the majority of our benchmarks. 
• HIS X700 Pro IceQ Turbo VIVO 256MB PCI-E - Overclockers Online take a look at a card sporting ATi's mainstream PCI-E solution, the HIS X700Pro IceQ Turbo VIVO 256MB PCI-E. This card from HIS is a very impressive package. The card is enhanced with a great cooling solution, software, performance, and features.
• OCZ 520W ModStream Power Supply - OCZ offers two versions of their ModStream, the OCZ-450 and the OCZ-520. Bjorn3D's review sample was the OCZ-520 that produces 520 watts but is capable of a peak load of 620 watts.
• 500W Ultra Products X-Connect PSU - In terms of performance, the X-Connect by Ultra Products passed even my high expectations for a good quality PSU; after all, I have personally gone through about 12 of them in my system alone due to unstable voltages, cable clutter and shier noise of the unit.
• Samsung SyncMaster 243T 24" LCD monitor - Although it seems very attractive to gamers due to its size, it won't provide the best gaming results because it wasn't designed with that in mind. It is a bit weak in the contrast ratio department, which can affect such tasks as editing extremely dark or bright videos, but overall, it is a very convenient monitor to use. This monitor doesn't come light on your pocketbook; you could even buy a good LCD TV with that money!
• Canon EOS 20D Digital SLR camera - Probably the most notable change however is the newly developed 8.2 megapixel sensor that delivers images up to 3,504 x 2,336 pixels in size, in the same 3:2 aspect ratio as conventional 35mm film.

GUIDES...

• Intel Centrino Overclocking Guide!  - It is surprisingly easy to overclock. But as you will see, not always successful.
• U.S. Army Guide to Code Breaking - This manual presents the basic principles and techniques of cryptanalysts and their relation to cryptography. Cryptanalytics is the art and science of solving unknown codes and ciphers.
• A Faster, Better Behaved Windows XP  - Another Windows XP guide!
• Microsoft opens Office 2003 XML schemas - Microsoft offers open and royalty-free documentation and licenses for the Microsoft Office 2003 XML Reference Schemas. These Reference Schemas include Spreadsheet (the schema for Microsoft Office Excel 2003), FormTemplate Schemas (the schema for Microsoft Office InfoPath 2003), Wordprocessing (the schema for Microsoft Office Word 2003), and and DataDiagraming (the schema for Microsoft Office Visio 2003). The Schemas provide developers and representatives of business and government a standard way to store and exchange data stored in documents.
• Disable Hyperthreading on heavy used Virtual Server 2005 servers - Several people internally at Microsoft have commented that you should turn off Hyperthreading when you're running Microsoft Virtual Server 2005, especially under load. It appears that the overhead of scheduling between logical processors gives either no performance gain or even possibly adverse performance effects when the host OS is under a "high load".

SOFTWARE...

• Crap Cleaner 1.17 - CCleaner (Crap Cleaner) (download) is a freeware system optimization tool. That removes unused and temporary files from your system - allowing Windows to run faster, more efficiently and giving you more hard disk space. The best part is that it's fast! (normally taking less that a second to run) and Free. (thanks ally russell)
• CineBench 2003 - CineBench 2003 is the free benchmarking tool for Windows and Mac OS based on the powerful 3D software CINEMA 4D R8. The tool is set to deliver accurate benchmarks by testing not only a computer's raw processing speed but also all other areas that affect system performance such as OpenGL, multithreading, multiprocessors and Intel's new HT Technology.
• MultiRes 1.49 - MultiRes works very much like a 32-bit version of the venerable Microsoft QuickRes 16-bit applet for Windows 95, with administrative scripting facilities and extended capabilities to handle refresh rates and multiple monitors
• OpenGL Extension Viewer 2.15 - The extension registry is maintained by SGI and contains specifications for all known extensions, written as modifications to the appropriate specification documents.
• NVIDIA SDK 8.5 - This release of the NVIDIA SDK includes hundreds of code samples, effects, and libraries to help you take advantage of the latest in graphics technology.
• nVidia nTune 2.00.23 - NVIDIA nTune (version 2.0 of the NVIDIA System Utility) is an easy, fast and safe performance optimization and monitoring application available for your PC. With NVIDIA nTune your system can automatically adjust to maximum performance settings for intense gaming or will detect that you've inserted a DVD and will set the system to quiet operation.
• Intel Chipset Identification Utility 2.91 - The Intel Chipset Identification Utility provides an easy way to identify the specific Intel chipset that is located on your motherboard.
• ForceWare 71.80 Win2000/XP - This new driver set was found on NVIDIA's FTP server by one of our forum members. It has been released for NVIDIA's professional card lineup, the Quadro series but the driver supports the entire range of graphice cards to date. These drivers are date stamped at the 20th of January 2005 making them the absolute newest set to date. These drivers are not WHQL (Microsoft tested) signed but do have support for all NVIDIA graphics cards.
• SiS AGP driver v.1.19a - SiS have released a new AGP driver version 1.19a dated 25/01/05.

SECURITY...

• MySQL worm hits Windows systems -  A worm that takes advantage of administrators' poor password choices has started spreading among database systems.  The malicious program, known as the "MySQL bot" or by the name of its executable code, SpoolCLL, infects computers running the Microsoft Windows operating system and open-source database known as MySQL. The worm gets initial access to a database machine by guessing the password of the system administrator, using common passwords. It then uses a flaw in MySQL to run another type of program, known as bot software, which then takes full control of the system. Update: the worm had essentially stopped spreading on Friday, after the systems infected with the program were cut off from the control of several central computers.
• New Bagle Worms Making the Rounds - Two new versions of the Bagle e-mail worm are spreading on the Internet and through peer-to-peer file sharing networks, according to warnings issued on Thursday by antivirus software companies. The latest Bagle variants, Bagle.AX and Bagle.AY, are the 50th and 51st versions of the original Bagle worm, which appeared in January 2004. Like the first Bagle, sometimes spelled "Beagle," versions AX and AY spread in executable files and infect machines running Microsoft's Windows operating system, antivirus companies say.
• Microsoft Preps Next Windows Update - Microsoft is preparing to beta test the next revision of Windows Update dubbed v6, or version 6 of the technology. Testing of Windows Update v5 ended late last year and is now operational for all Windows users. Newsgroups for v6 are expected to open within the coming weeks
• Microsoft to axe Windows 2000 security upgrades - Microsoft has confirmed that there will be no equivalents of its Windows XP Service Pack 2 to boost security on earlier operating systems.The announcement leaves the 50 per cent of Microsoft customers not currently using XP with the choice of upgrading or relying on platforms that will become increasingly less secure.
• Winamp Squashes Critical Security Bug - America Online Inc.'s Nullsoft unit has quietly rolled out a new version of the popular Winamp media player to plug multiple critical flaws that put users at risk of code execution attacks. The fixes were included in Winamp version 5.08c after a warning was issued last November by private research firm Security-Assessment.com.
• Norwegian Student Ordered to Pay for Hyperlinks to Music - The AP reports that Norway's Supreme Court ruled Thursday that a student whose Napster.no homepage (no relation to the U.S. Napster, apparently) had links to free Internet music files must compensate the music industry. The around 170 links to mp3s will cost its creator $15,900.
• Teen Sentenced for Unleashing Blaster Worm - A federal judge sentenced a teenager to a year and half of prison on Friday for releasing a variant of the Blaster worm that was used to attack more than 48,000 computers. Jeffrey Lee Parson, 19, appeared in U.S. District Court in Seattle, where he was also ordered to perform community service, pay restitution and be placed under supervision for three years following the sentence.
• UK police arrest tsunami donations hacker - The Metropolitan Police has arrested a 28 year-old man from east London over alleged attempts to hack into the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC) tsunami donations website. The alleged attempt took place on new year's eve and was identified and blocked by BT, which runs the site's secure payment system. Police arrested the man in London's Bishopsgate and stated that they are currently examining his computer equipment for evidence.
• Man sentenced over banned game - A New Plymouth man has been sentenced for copying and distributing a banned computer game where the player takes on the role of a convicted murderer .Christopher William Jones has been fined $2,400 and had two computers destroyed after pleading guilty to selling the Playstation 2 game, Manhunt.
• Man raided by armed cops for using wrong browser - Londonder made a tsnuami-relief donation using lynx -- a text-based browser used by the blind, Unix-users and others -- on Sun's Solaris operating system. The site-operator decided that this "unusual" event in the system log indicated a hack-attempt, and the police broke down the donor's door and arrested him.

OFF-TOPIC...

• Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Screening Reviews - Initial reviews are up at Ain't It Cool News from a "work-in-progress" screening of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy in Pasadena, CA. Reaction seems mixed-to-positive, mostly due to some uneven performances.
• Episode III Opening Crawl - Here's  the opening crawler text for Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith, currently scheduled for a May 19th, 2005 release." In related news, here's a link to a 6.5 minutes funny parody of Star Wars: Episode III.
• MGM's DVD Class Action Settlement - "Apparently all of MGM's 'theatrical wide screen' DVD releases for the last few years have been the pan-scanned versions with the top and bottoms cut off. I checked this against my copy of CQ, and it's true. The list (PDF) of butchered movies includes almost every Woody Allen film, Silence of the Lambs, and Ghost World, just to name a few. If you own any of the eligible movies, you have until March 31 to either opt to exchange your copy for $7.10, or a new DVD from MGM, presumably in its proper aspect ratio." (thanks Slashdot.org)
• Microsoft has a record quarter - For the quarter ending Dec. 31, the company reported $10.8 billion in sales, a 6.5 percent increase from the previous year, while profit more than doubled to $3.46 billion, or 32 cents a share after factoring in stock-compensation expenses.
• Unusual Arctic cold raises fears for ozone hole - The seasonal hole in the Arctic ozone layer could be the worst ever this year if the current cold conditions persist, scientists are warning. Temperatures in the Arctic ozone layer are now the coldest for 50 years and have been consistently low for two months. The ozone layer blankets the Earth at an altitude between 15 to 30 kilometres. It is part of a zone called the stratosphere, and absorbs ultraviolet light
   

TECHNOLOGY...

• Google, Yahoo Turn On Video Search - Google has officially unveiled a prototype video search that scours the closed captioning text of television shows. Results are displayed with a still image of the video, along with snippets of text that contain the search terms. Yahoo, meanwhile, has ramped up video search efforts of its own in response to Google's move.Still in early beta testing, Google Video has been indexing since December television programming from PBS, Fox News, CSPAN, as well as local San Francisco channels including ABC and NBC. Until licensing is ironed out, users will not able to view the full video clip nor read a transcript of the program.
• 8mb Broadband in UK From UK Online -  The UK Broadband market could see another high speed shake up from UK Online. The company has just announced plans to launch an 8 megabit broadband service in the UK. With a massive download speed of 8mb, the service comes with a somewhat limited upload speed of 400K yet has an impressive content ratio of 33:1. The service is capped at 500GB per month, and will cost only L39.99 per month. Cable rival Telewest offer a 4MB service for L50.00, which comes free of any caps on usage. UK Online will be offering new sign ups a free wireless ethernet router before the 21st February.
• Apple / Pepsi in 200 Million iTune track giveaway - Apple plan to give away around 200 million free music tracks with Pepsi’s soft drinks and products, the promotion will start at the end of January. As with the similar deal done with Apple last year codes will be printed on various Pepsi products and each winning code can be used to redeem a free music track.
• Sony PlayStation 3 Playable by May, Says Report - Sony Computer Entertainment Inc reportedly said its PlayStation 3 console will be functional by May, 2005, confirming earlier available information.

HARDWARE... 

• AMD readies launch of Sempron 3300+ 754 - It's no secret that AMD is set to convert all of its cut down Sempron microprocessors to a 754 pin format during the course of this year. But TheInqurer's information is that a 754 pin Sempron 3300+ is rolling out this quarter, while it will also produce a Sempron 3200+ using 939 pins for certain accounts only. How imminent is the 754 pin 3300+? Some motherboard companies have already released updates to 754 board BIOSes during this week.
• nForce 4 TCQ Data Corruption Issue? - It appears there might be a data corruption problem when enabling TCQ on the nForce 4 chipset at least with the Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe.
• NVIDIA's nForce Professional preview - The 2200 MCP and the 2050 bring the latest technologies to the Opteron platform. These technologies include PCI-Express, Gigabit Ethernet, SATA-II, USB 2.0, and 7.1 AC'97 audio. Let's start by showing you which features each of these chips support.
• Shuttle XPC SN95G5 - Let's break right into the basic system specs of the SN95G5: Nvidia nForce3 250 Ultra chipset, Socket 939 - AMD, Athlon64/FX CPU, Two (2) ATA-133 ports, Two (2) SATA-150 ports, Realtek ALC 655 6 Channel Audio, One (1) PCI slot, One (1) 8x AGP slot, SilentX 240W power supply.
• Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe AMD Athlon Motherboard - The Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe motherboard comes packed with all the features you expect including: two PCI Express x16 slots, Dual-channel DDR memory, Serial-ATA 3Gb/s bandwidth, RAID, Dual Gigabit LAN, 8-channel audio and more. The nForce4 supports PC3200 (DDR400) memory in dual-channel configuration using unbuffered DDR or ECC memory. The A8N-SLI Deluxe motherboard has a wide range of overclocking adjustments to allow you to get the best overclocking performance including voltage adjustments & Asus AI overclocking software.
• DFI 855GME-MGF motherboard - The 855GME-MGF is DFI's latest motherboard creation that is based around Intel's mobile socket mPGA479M technology. DFI chose to use the Intel 855GME chipset, boasting full support for all Pentium M and Celeron M-based mobile processors, DDR RAM operating in Single Channel mode up to speeds of 333MHz officially, and onboard Intel graphics. The 855GME-MGF is feature complete, only requiring a socket mPGA479M based processor, DDR memory, and a PSU for a functional system
• nVidia SLI Technology - Introduction and 6800 Ultra Performance - You can complain all day long about the price of a top end SLI setup but there is no denying that two GeForce 6800 Ultra's in SLI is going to give you the best gaming experience around. This setup isn't for people with a 17" CRT or LCD that can only support 1280x1024. This setup is for people who own 21" CRTs that play at 1600 and above or Wide Screen LCD owners wanting to game at 1920x1200 without having to worry about having to drop to 16-bit or sacrifice a bit of image quality for a smooth frame rate. With an SLI setup you can play with it all turned on and still be smiling.
• A8N-SLI Deluxe - SLI Video Card - The A8N SLI Deluxe is Asus' latest and greatest offering for the AMD64 socket-939 platform, utilizing the nForce4 chipset. Asus worked hard to make this board one of the first to market sporting the newest nVidia nForce4-SLI chipset. They also added a huge list of features and accessories that would make anyone in the market for a new system drool. Although at the extreme end of overclocking, the Asus A8N-SLI was not the top dog, it still did allow for a great stable overclock.
• Gigabyte 3D1 - Aside from that, the question as to whether the Gigabyte 3D1 is a worthy purchase leaves us with the same question as purchasing two 6600GTs in SLI - Is it better to get two 6600GTs for your money, or a single 6800GT. From Hexus.net's benchmark results, that seems to vary on what settings you intend to game at - The 3D1 often seems to have the upper hand in scenarios where raw power is required, but throw anti-aliasing and anisotropic filtering into the mix, especially at high resolutions, and suddenly the 6800GT and particularly the 256MB of dedicated memory for the GPU it offers seems a much more sensible proposition.
• MSI GeForce 6600GT PCIe Video Card - MSI's GeForce 6600GT offering comes in two flavors, the NX6600GT-TD128E, and the NX6600GT-VTD128. The only differences between the two are in price - $187 for the TD128E and $222 for the VTD128, and also in the fact that the VTD128 features VIVO capability while the TD128E doesn't.
• Maxtor's DiamondMax 10 hard drive NCQ gets 16MB of cache - Despite its strong desktop application performance and speedy transfer rates, the DiamondMax 10's performance in IOMeter is uninspiring. IOMeter is a veritable playground for command queuing, and while the DiamondMax 10's performance improves with NCQ enabled, the drive can't keep up with the Barracuda 7200.7's transaction rates or response times. To Maxtor's credit, the DiamondMax 10 consumes fewer CPU cycles than the Barracuda 7200.7 when command queuing is enabled, but the I/O performance is still a step behind, making the drive less attractive for low-end server and multi-user applications.
• Seagate Momentus 5400.2 100GB Hard Drive - The 2.5-inch Momentus 5400.2 100GB drive offers extreme storage capacities along with remarkable performance (for notebooks). The 100GB version is estimated to retail for around $200 US with the 80GB retailing for just $140 US.
• Corsair Voyager: Bouncy Flash Drive - Unlike Verbatim Store 'n' Go series, Corsair's Voyager 512MB version is priced around $57.00, which makes it 22.8 percent affordable than the Store 'n' Go Pro, which retails for $70.00. You may find another flash drive that is less than the aforementioned price, but with Corsair's 10-year warranty and their reputation in the industry, $57.00 is a superb price. Of course, if you are usually careful with flash drives, feel free to invest in a less costing model, since failure rates of flash drives are practically unheard of.
• Does Hercules' Fortissimo 4 Deliver at 24 Bits? - The Fortissimo 4 is really an update of preceding versions and it delivers no pleasant surprises. However, its performances will live up to the demands of gamers and DVD film buffs who demand high-quality sound for a $70 price point. Further, its main advantage, of course, is that it can handle applications that use 24 bit sound, which is becoming more and more indispensable. IN addition to its generous software bundle, the card does not disappoint.
• CTX INTERNATIONAL X701A 17" LCD Monitor with Speakers - Even though you may not be looking for a monitor that is reliable when gaming. This is an important aspect to a lot of people who are currently monitor shopping. This monitor has a 14ms response time, which means you can get your game on with out looking for ghosting. Because you won't find any. I have played a number of newer games using this monitor and even though the price is low, the quality is quite the opposite. CTX impressed me again.
• APC Back-UPS CS 500 - TargetPC have take a closer look at APC's Back-UPS CS 500 Uninterruptible Power Supply and surge protector.
• Socket's GPS Nav Kit - Are you planning a trip to a place you've never been before? Well, now you can add a complete in-car navigation system to your Bluetooth enabled Pocket PC or laptop wirelessly with Socket's GPS Nav Kit. This handy GPS Device uses MyNavigator software that makes trip planning quick and easy and with audible "turn by turn" instructions.
• DSC-L1: Sony's Latest Ultra-Compact Digicam - When it comes down to it, the Sony DSC-L1 falls just short of being great. There are several areas in which this camera excels. For example, it has a stylish and solid metal body. In our tests, it proved to have both decent resolution and incredible battery life. In addition, the camera is very fast. With respect to startup, write speed, and shutter lag, this camera is one of the most responsive ultra-compact digicams around. On the other hand, the L1 leaves something to be desired when it comes to image quality.
• Aigo P880 20GB MP3 Player - Aigo has created a curious product in the shape of the P880 - it has more features than most MP3 players, but the design, implementation and navigation let it down. Strange decisions like having no USB connectivity from the cradle are bizarre and take a lot of shine off the product. The P880's photo party piece is also let down by occasional failure to read SD cards, while the actual process of copying images from an SD card is convoluted at best
• Sony PlayStation Portable (PSP) review - The fascia of the PSP is dominated by the 4.3in TFT screen and I can pretty much guarantee that you've never seen a display like this on a hand-held device before. The screen has a 16:9 widescreen aspect ratio, making it ideal for watching movies as well as playing games, with a resolution of 480 x 272 and a full 24bit colour depth. The screen also incorporates Sony's X-Black coating, so the image is amazingly bright and vivid. The image produced by the PSP display is just breathtaking, and I've yet to show this device to anyone that hasn't been impressed by it.
• Sony launches a new portable DVD station MV-700HR - Sony Europe has announced the launch of a new portable DVD player for 2005 -  The Sony MV-700HR. Sporting a new portable concept, different from current laptop syles, the Sony screen faces out, taking up less space and provides a convenient new way to watch movies on the go. It comes in 2 colors, silver and black with a 7 inch TFT screen.

GUIDES...

• Volume Expansion Using Diskpart.exe (updated) - Description of how Microsoft IT regularly uses the Diskpart.exe utility to dynamically increase disk volume capacity on servers running Microsoft Windows Server 2003 and Microsoft Windows 2000 Server. The Diskpart.exe utility extends disk volumes without downtime or application interruption, thereby increasing availability and decreasing costs.
• Reset lost virtual BIOS password - In a physical machine, you can often move a jumper on the motherboard or remove the battery to reset the CMOS. Obviously a virtual machine doesn't have anything physical like this, but the answer posted up was to "remove the virtual battery". You can't, although I did look through the .vmc (Virtual Machine Configuration) file for a battery setting :-)

SOFTWARE...

• phpMyAdmin 2.6.1 Final  - phpMyAdmin (changelog) 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.
• Spybot Search and Destroy Detection Update 2005-1-27 - Update your Spybot S&D detections without the need for the included WebUpdate.
• Unofficial Windows 98 SE Service Pack 2.0 Beta 3 - This contains all updates from Windows Update site and more. It is a self-extracting and self-installing pack. It contains only operating system updates not Internet Explorer, DirectX, Media Player or their updates.
• eXeem Lite 0.19 - Developers this week released a spy-ware free version of popular P2P app eXeem. The official version of eXeem, which entered into public beta this week, is contaminated with an adware app called Cydoor. eXeem Lite 0.19 is smaller - 1.9MB compared to 2.5MB - and promises file trading without search hijacking and pop-up ad bombardment. Unlike eXeem, eXeem Lite is also available to Linux users (who need to run the app using WINE). (thanks ally russell)
• AutoHotkey 1.0.25.09 - AutoHotkey is a simple yet powerful hotkey (shortcut key) scripting language for Windows. You can customize your keyboard, joystick and mouse with a free automation tool that is backward compatible with AutoIt v2.
• AntiVir Personal Edition 6.29.00.03 - 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.
• WinAMP 5.08d - Nullsoft WinAmp (download full ~ lite) is a fast, flexible, high-fidelity media player for Windows. This new version fixes Critical Security bugs in in_mp4.dll and enc_mp4.dll and libmp4v2.dll, n_cdda.dll, HTTP Seeking corrected for webservers that refuse to return Accept-Range.
• PCMark04/3DMark03&05 patches - PCMark04 Upgrade Patch 1.3.0, PCMark04 Benchmark (Build 1.3.0), 3DMark05 Upgrade Patch 1.2.0, 3DMark05 Build 1.2.0 (Full Version), 3DMark03 Upgrade Patch 3.6.0, 3DMark03 Build 3.6.0 (Full Version).
• CloneDVD v2.7.1.1 - This latest version 2.7.1.1 (download) support automatic shutdown of your computer and there have also been some minor changes to how the software works
• ATI Tray Tools 1.0.1.500 - ATI Tray Tools is a small utility that can be found in the windows tray which then allows instant access to options and settings.
• nForce 6.37 Beta Drivers - These drivers are the mainboard chipset drivers for all nVIDIA nForce based mainboards for Windows 2000/XP/2003 Server.
• TC NVIDIA Optimized Driver v0.5 - This driver (based on the leaked Forceware 71.50) is been created by NVIDIA Corporation and Modified by TechConnect Magazine.

SECURITY...

• Microsoft Plans Restrictions on Fixes - Microsoft Corp. plans to severely curtail the ways in which people running pirated copies of its dominant Windows operating system can receive software updates, including security fixes. The new authentication system, announced Tuesday and due to arrive by midyear, will still allow people with pirated copies of Windows to obtain security fixes, but their options will be limited. The move allows Microsoft to use one of its sharpest weapons - access to security patches that can prevent viruses, worms and other crippling attacks - to thwart a costly and meddlesome piracy problem. (FYI, they already launched the scheme first at the end of October 2004 for Czech, Chinese and Norwegian versions).
• BlowSearch to Offer Encrypted IM - BlowSearch  plans to launch early next month the BlowSearch Secured Messenger, an IM service that offers different levels of encryption to prevent malicious hackers from intercepting the communications. BlowSearch Secured Messenger lets users aggregate into its interface buddy lists from the four main public IM services: America Online's AIM and ICQ, Yahoo's Yahoo Messenger and Microsoft's MSN Messenger.
• Cisco patches IOS - Cisco has released a fix for a denial-of-service vulnerability affecting versions of IOS software. According to a security advisory found here, the bug affects all Cisco devices that are configured for IOS Telephony Service, CallManager Express or Survivable Remote Site Telephony services.
• Alabama Spammers Settle Case - Two members of an alleged spamming ring paid Earthlink an undisclosed amount to settle a lawsuit, agreeing also to stop sending unsolicited e-mail, the Internet service provider said Tuesday. The two, Damon DeCrescenzo and David Burstyn, were sued last year by Atlanta-based EarthLink Inc., which claimed they were part of a multi-state spamming operation that spewed more than 250 million illegal e-mails.
• Malaysia plans jail for disc peddling pirates - Malaysia's government is proposing mandatory jail sentences for producers, distributors and vendors of bootleg movies and music compact discs. A high level meeting to review the 17-year-old Copyright Act will be held next week. It will decide on whether to incorporate the mandatory jail clause and a range of other new penalties, Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Minister Shafie Apdal said.
• Cctde - Covert Channel and Tunneling Over the HTTP Protocol Detection - The main goal of this project is to provide a way to register and disclose informations leading to the detection of unauthorized tunnels and covert channels embedded into the HTTP protocol but the concepts could also be applied to the detection of arbitrary data flows inside other high level protocols. Located between a mandatory HTTP proxy server and the HTTP clients (or before the NACS if no proxy exists), cctde is trying to detect if someone on the internal located network is using a CC|T (Covert Channel OR Tunneling) tool to bypass the NACS.

OFF-TOPIC...

• Do game designers burn out like rock stars? - Take Doom III. Like every Pink Floyd album after The Final Cut, it is a technical masterpiece, utterly devoid of verve, invention or the sheer folly of youth. Could it be that John Carmack's obsession with amazing graphical effects is similar to the way in which middle-aged rock stars start to "experiment" with the latest technology and trendy genres - Peter Gabriel with world music, David Bowie with Drum N Bass, Dave Stewart with, oh god, don't even go there.
• Watching brain waves could quantify libido - Monitoring the change in specific brain waves could be the first quantitative method for measuring libido, new research suggests.

TECHNOLOGY...

• Patent reveals secrets of Xbox 2 - A patent has shown up at the US repository (patent) of such thing$ that gives us some more clues as to the nature of the technology that Microsoft and ATI will employ with its next generation Xbox and the R520 component. The patent is for a method and apparatus for determining a processing speed of an integrated circuit.  The patent appears to confirm that the R500/R520 part will be something substantially different to anything we've seen in the past.
• What's next for next-gen consoles?  - We may not know when they will be released, what they will be called or even what they will be able to do but one thing is certain - they are coming. Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo are all expected to release new machines in the next 18 months.  The details of PlayStation 3, Xbox 2 (codename Xenon) and Nintendo's so-called Revolution are still to be finalised but developers are having to work on titles for the new machines regardless.
• Nanobot could fashion microprocessors - According to nikkei.net, AMS and the Pennsylvania State University startup, Micromechatronics, will create a three centimetre square robot which it says will be able to move in nanometres. And the report adds that AMS is contemplating creating nanorobots which could be used to build microprocessors.
• Samsung Starts Mass Production of XDR DRAM - The Samsung 256Mb XDR DRAM incorporates Rambus' Octal Data Rate process that transfers data at eight bits per clock cycle, while cranking up the transfer speed to an industry-leading 8GB/s per XDIMM. To transfer data in a stable manner at the extremely high speeds, Samsung is utilizing Differential Rambus Signal Level (DRSL) technology.

HARDWARE... 

• VIA 2GHz C7 CPU to debut Q4 - VIA's next-generation x86-compatible processor, "Esther", which has been designed to take the chip family beyond 2GHz, will ship in Q4, online reports suggest.
• HIS launches overclocked Radeon X850XT card - In contrast to other X850XT cards, HIS' product comes with an overclocking software that increases the core frequency from 520 to 540 MHz. Fan speeds can also be adjusted to decrease below 20dB or provide an additional 11 degrees Celsius of cooling performance.
• HIS X700 Pro IceQ Turbo VIVO 256MB review - HIS pulled together a terrific bundle to accompany the X700 Pro, including a detailed installation manual and setup CDs. The first CD provided the necessary drivers to get the card installed and working properly. The second disk included the iTurbo software which enables the card to run at a predetermined overclocked rate and allows for manual overclocking as well. Additionally, HIS included a series of software titles, including Video Studio, 3D Album and Counter Strike: Condition Zero.
•  MSI NX6800-TD 128 - The performance of this MSI NX6800-TD128 graphics card is very good as seen in all benchmarks, running games at 1024x768 with Anti-Aliasing and Anisotropic Filtering set to AA4 and AF16 is great performance for sure and definitely great image quality.
• Digest 2004: Sound Cards - Like in the year 2003, sound cards manufactured in 2004 could be divided into two categories: entertainment and professional. The first one included cards suitable for the majority of users preferring realistic 3D sound in games and downloaded MP3 files with unusual effects. The second category of experienced users that was constantly growing included owners of high-quality acoustic systems.
• JAHT 5-port Gigabit SOHO switch - Techniz.co.uk takes a look at the JS-3005GD which is five-port 10/100/1000Mbps Ethernet switch, with a 10Gbps non-blocking, 8k MAC Address table, and 802.3x, full-duplex flow control.
• BenQ M310 wireless mini optical mouse - The M310 has a couple of power saving features that help extend battery life and two AAA sized batteries are estimated to last for more than 3 months. By default, the mouse is powered up when the wireless receiver is ejected from the mouse and is automatically switched off when the receiver is stored.
• Samsung CLP-550 printer - Trustedreviews have posted a review of the Samsung CLP-550 colour laser printer.
• iRiver PMC-120 Portable Media Center review -The iRiver PMC-120 offers a 3.5in screen with a resolution of 320 x 240 and a 20GB hard disk, providing a theoretical maximum of 80 hours of video storage if recorded at native resolution at 500kps. iRiver has experience of producing portable media players with its PMP-120 and PMP-140 Linux based devices having been available for some months. The PMPs offer support for AVI, ASF, and versions three, four and five of the DiVX codec - without any need for transcoding. By contrast, this unit, the PMC-120, only supports video files encoded in WMV format.
• Samsung Releases The YH-999 Portable Media Center (UK) - The device features a 3.5" colour TFT LCD screen, video out capabilities and a built-in speaker for headphone-free viewing. The YH-999 plays Windows Media Video (WMV9) files at 320x240 resolution and 500kbps. The device allows for around 80 hours of recorded TV to be stored on its 20GB HD.
• ViewSonic NextVision N3000w -TrustedReviews have posted a review of the ViewSonic NextVision N3000w 30in TFT TV/Display which features a wide range of input options.

GUIDES...

• A mini-guide to Mac OS X for new Mini owners - As anyone who has ever switched platforms will attest, there is always a bit of a learning curve involved. Differences in how applications and the user interface behave can be great, and even when there is similarity across platforms, the small differences can be just as maddening.

SOFTWARE...

• Tenomichi 3D Edit review - Like Pinnacle Liquid Edition, Tenomichi's software harnesses the power of the system's 3D graphics accelerator. But it does so at a much more fundamental level. In particular, it takes advantage of the power of DirectX 9 Shaders. Essentially, a DirectX 9 adapter is required, which currently doesn't include any of Matrox's graphics cards. An ATI Radeon 9550 or Nvidia GeForce FX 5700 is the bare minimum. The software is best used with Windows XP Service Pack 2, although Windows 2000 is supported.
• MySQL 4.1.9 - MySQL (download ~ changelog) is the world's most popular open source database, recognized for its speed and reliability.
• NVTweak v1.7.1 - NVTweak unlocks many extra options in the nVidia control panel/driver, including but not limited to - Overclocking, AGP & Hardware settings, Fan control, Temperature settings, Debugging, Twin View, Video Mixing Renderer, OpenGL 2.0 support, 3D viewer types (for 3D Stereo drivers), and more. This tweak is intended for use with GeForce/Quadro cards and ForceWare 55.xx - 7x.xx 3D Stereo drivers. NVTweak is not fully compatible with Windows 98/Me or driver versions older than 55.xx.
• NeroVision Express 3.0.1.27 -  This new version adds support for the NeroDigital file format and MP3 files with an image.
• Ad-Aware SE Personal 1.05 - This latest version (January 25, 2005) simply incorporates the latest definition files. There is no need to download it if you already have Ad-Aware 1.05 installed.

SECURITY...

• New Worm Piggybacks on MSN Messaging - A new worm called "Bropia.A" spreads through the MSN Messenger and Windows Messenger instant messaging clients, security firms report. The worm loads a Trojan horse that can log keystrokes, collect system information and spread IM spam.
• Tsunami E-mail Hoaxer Jailed - A hoaxer who e-mailed the families of people caught up in the Asian tsunami telling them their relatives were dead has been jailed for six months. Christoper Pierson, 40, from Lincolnshire, was arrested on New Year's Eve after sending 35 e-mails.
• PayPal Leaking Customer Email Addresses - Most emails sent from corporations have "removal" links to comply with anti-spam legislation in the USA. On clicking the link sent out by PayPal, users can remove themselves from future mailings from the company. However, the system used to do this suffers from a lack of proper input validation and security. By changing elements of the URL (example), a malicious user can reveal other PayPal user's email addresses. The problem exposes a serious flaw in the system.
• Trojan Horses Take Aim at Mobile Phones - Two new Trojan horse programs threaten to render some Symbian-based mobile phones totally useless. The programs, Gavno.a and Gavno.b, masquerade as patch files designed to trick users into downloading them, says Aaron Davidson, chief executive officer of SimWorks International. Although almost identical with Gavno.a, Gavno.b contains the Cabir worm, which attempts to send a copy of the Trojan horse to other nearby Symbian-based phones via short-range wireless Bluetooth technology.
• Software glitch leaves Cisco routers vulnerable - Cisco Internetwork Operating System (IOS) Software release trains 12.1YD, 12.2T, 12.3 and 12.3T, when configured for the Cisco IOS Telephony Service (ITS), Cisco CallManager Express (CME) or Survivable Remote Site Telephony (SRST) may contain a vulnerability in processing certain malformed control protocol messages. A successful exploitation of this vulnerability may cause a reload of the device and could be exploited repeatedly to produce a Denial of Service (DoS).

OFF-TOPIC...

• Steve Ballmer pitching Windows 1.0 in a TV commercial spoof - Here's a video clip from 15 years ago of Steve Ballmer pitching Windows v1.0 on a television (T.V.) commercial/advertisement as a spoof. Another cool movie can be found here.
• The Lost 1984 Mac Video - Never seen video footage of the introduction of the Macintosh in January 1984 was published for the first time on the Internet today.
• Suicide bomber sells VW Polo - hoax ad takes internet by storm - The spoof ad opens with the suicide bomber leaving his home and jumping into his VW Polo. The bomber parks at a busy London restaurant where carefree diners crowd the pavement. Cut to the terrorist sitting in his car as he pushes the button to detonate his bomb. The blast is contained within the car, saving the diners. The ad ends: "Polo. Small but tough".
• Where are London's missing mobiles? - Close to 100,000 mobile phones mysteriously vanish in London each year, a survey published today has claimed.
• US stem cell research in jeopardy - US stem cell research faces an uncertain near future after scientists reported that existing stocks of such cells are contaminated - and therefore useless for treating people - while the US administration has terminated federal funding for the extraction of fresh cells. The problem is that current stocks have taken up a "non-human molecule called N-glycolylneuraminic acid or Neu5Gc" - probably when they were grown in a lab culture containing animal-derived materials from mice and calf foetuses. Neu5Gc is found on the surface of animal cells, but the human immune system attacks it - the major reason for transplanted animal organ rejection in humans.
• A Countdown To Global Catastrophe? - The countdown to climate-change catastrophe is spelt out by a task force of senior politicians, business leaders and academics from around the world - and it is remarkably brief. In as little as 10 years, or even less, their report indicates, the point of no return with global warming may have been reached.
• Machine learns games "like a human" - A computer that learns to play a "scissors, paper, stone" by observing and mimicking human players could lead to machines that automatically learn how to spot an intruder or perform vital maintenance work, say UK researchers. CogVis, developed by scientists at the University of Leeds in Yorkshire, UK, teaches itself how to play the children's game by searching for patterns in video and audio of human players and then building its own "hypotheses" about the game's rules.
• Robot soldiers deployed in Iraq - The US Army is deploying the first robotic soldiers in Iraq next month. More than 18 of the remote-controlled robotic snipers, with machine guns for noses, will go into action. Apparently the robot is a conversion of the Talon robot, which has been in military service since 2000 and defusing roadside bombs in Iraq. Each one costs $200,000, and is armed with either the M249, which fires 5.56-millimeter rounds at a rate of 750 per minute, or the M240, which can fire about 700 to 1,000 7.62-millimeter rounds per minute.

TECHNOLOGY...

• Microsoft Accepts EU Decision - Microsoft announced today that it will not appeal against the European Union's court order compelling the company to remove Windows Media Player from the Windows XP operating system in Europe.
• Bill Gates plots a Windows future -  In the first part of a two-part interview, Stephen Cole of the BBC's technology show Click Online talks to Microsoft founder and chairman Bill Gates about the "digital lifestyle".
• Quarter Billion Songs Sold - Apple today announced that they had sold a quarter billion (250m) songs from their iTunes music store. At a rate of 1.25m songs being sold daily, the store expects to be selling approx. half a billion songs annually.
• BBC Re-launch Radio Player - The BBC has today announced a re-launch of their popular online Radio Player software. The player is being re-launched with a variety of new features being made available, including list of the most popular shows and contextual lists to aid listeners find other shows they might enjoy. Listeners will also be able to listen to the BBC's local content as well as popular radio shows that were previously un-available online
• Mozilla Firefox Lead Engineer Joins Google - Ben Goodger, Lead Engineer for the popular browser Firefox has announced that he is no longer paid by Mozilla, and has joined Google. In a posting on his blog, Ben noted his role will remain unchanged at Mozilla. "I will continue doing much the same work ...with the new goal of successful 1.1, 1.5 and 2.0 releases". Ben, 24, has been working on Firefox since Summer 2003 after the demise of Netscape browser development. Before working on the Firefox project he spent time with America Online/Netscape contributing to a range of their Netscape products (6, 6.1, 6.2, 7.0, 7.1). In related news,  Firefox has this morning hit 20 million downloads. Learn more about the roots of Firefox and about the 19-year-old who co-created the browser in this article.
• Windows 64 to arrive in April - Sources claimed Microsoft is planning to introduce its 64 bit operating system for Intel and AMD processors (iAMD64) on the 29th of April. The sources are close to Microsoft. It appears there will be a release to manufacturing version of WinXP 64 in March. That's the stage before the CDs get stamped out and the boxes get printed.
• TI unveils mobile on a chip - Texas Instruments has sealed a deal with Nokia which will see the mobile giant incorporate TI's Digital RF Processor (DRP) single-chip mobile phone technology into future handsets.

HARDWARE... 

• Kingston Tests DDR2 Memory at 866MHz - Memory maker Kingston Technology has showcased DDR2 memory modules running at 866MHz, setting the world’s record for memory speed operation. The company, however, said it would not launch such high-speed products into mass market shortly, as currently only a few mainboards can handle even 750MHz memory clock-speed.
• AMD64 VIA K8T890 Performance Preview - T-Break have posted a preview of A new VIA K8T890 PCI-E AMD64 based Soltek motherboard.
• nForce Professional Technology Overview - For both servers and workstations, NVIDIA is offering two solutions for the market. Today, NVIDIA is announcing the nForce Professional 2200 and nForce Professional 2050 chipsets (the latter being an I/O companion chip). Designed specifically for the AMD Opteron platform, both chips are scalable PCI Express MCPs. Since they are based on a single-chip architecture, they are cost effective solutions for the business market.
• ASUSTeK Computer A8N-SLI Deluxe nForce4 SLI motherboard -  If you're looking to replace your current motherboard, or even build a system from scratch, the model you choose can have a serious impact on your system's overall performance. ASUSTeK Computer's (ASUS) A8N-SLI Deluxe nForce4 SLI motherboard is about as powerful as they come, offering support for Socket 939 AMD Athlon 64 processors and nVidia Scalable Links Interface (SLI) graphics cards.
• Inno3D GeForce 6600GT PCI-E & AGP - In the end, the Inno3D 6600GT PCI-e is a great card with a reasonable price tag. Best of all, the PCI-e version supports SLI and both of the AGP and PCI-e versions it supports SM3.0. On the other hand, the Inno3D 6600GT AGP was quite disappointing as it did not overclock at all and we had to downclock it to stabilize it. So we would not recommend the AGP version for you yet. Hold your horses until we get a new sample from Inno3D. Nevertheless, the CoolerMaster GPU cooler isn’t quite effective when compared to the reference model but the rubber pads around the core provided excellent support for the heatsink thus preventing it from wiggling off. Besting in each tests, the Inno3D 6600GT PCI-e should be on your Intel LGA rig or even on your NF4 rig that supports PCI-e. With a better cooling installed, we would be seeing the Inno3D 6600GT PCI-e scoring beyond the 10K mark in 3DMark03!
• D-Link Air Premier 802.11a/b/g Wireless Network - With that network, Internet and file sharing worked well for small files, but when streaming videos off of my server to the wireless clients, things got choppy at times. So I started my search for a faster wireless solution. This led me to the local Best Buy where I picked up a D-Link DI-784 Wireless Router. I chose this router due to the ability of it being able to work with 802.11a/b/g. This would let me set up the network independent on the cards I used for the wireless network. This router also has full support for WPA security, which is stronger protection than WEP which also is a plus.
• Multifunction roundup - The multifunction market is changing. Prices are falling, printing rates rising and ink costs have gone down. In this test BeHardware put the Canon MP390, Epson RX425 / CX4600, HP PSC 1350 and Lexmark P6250 up against each other.

GUIDES...

• Installing ATI Silencer 4 on x800 Series Cards - The instructions are pretty good, but this is 100% idiot proof. Step by step instructions on how to install an ATI Silencer 4 on your X800 Series Video Card. The Card used in this guide is a Gigabyte X800XT.
• Using Linux For The First Time - There are many, many Live CDs available. Some of the best-known ones are Knoppix, Gnoppix, Mepis, SuSE Live CD and Mandrake Move Live CD. These are all freely available, and you can use any one you like. For the purposes of this article, we will be using the Mepis variant of Live CD.

SOFTWARE...

• Mobile Net Switch 3.1 - Mobile Net Switch enables you to use your computer on more than one network with the click of a button. Mobile Net Switch allows you to automatically select the correct drive mappings, printer settings, IP settings and much more. This new version adds support for Firefox and improves network connection handling.
• Windows File Protection Switcher 0.8 Beta - Windows File Protection Switcher lets you disable and re-enable Windows File Protection (WFP).
• Kerio Personal Firewall 4.2.0 Beta - Kerio Personal Firewall (KPF) (download) helps users control how their computers exchange data with other computers on the Internet or local network. Kerio Personal Firewall is a necessity for all desktop computers connected to broadband Internet, using DSL, cable, ISDN, WiFi or satellite modems.
• SPAMfighter Standard 3.2.5 - A tool to remove spam from your Microsoft Outlook or Outlook Express.
• Harden-It 1.2 - Harden-It is a new lightweight software release from YASC .ltd and Zoller Thierry. Harden-it was designed to harden your Windows installation against numerous attacks
• MemTest 3.1 - MemTest is a RAM reliability tester. It evaluates the ability of your computer's memory to store and retrieve data.
• BSPlayer 1.02 - BSplayer (download) is a Windows player that plays back all kinds of media files ( avi / mpg / asf / wmv / wav / mp3...) and specialises in video and divx playback.
• DivXToDVD Converter 0.4.2.71 - DivxToDVD converts your movie files from a wide range of formats (AVI, XVID, MPEG, and DIVX) to compliant DVD structures (VOB and IFO).
• AnyDVD update 4.5.6.2 - AnyDVD is a driver, which descrambles DVD-Movies automatically in the background. This DVD appears unprotected and region code free for all applications and the Windows operating system as well. With AnyDVD's help copy tools like CloneDVD, Pinnacle Instant Copy, InterVideo DVD-Copy, etc. are able to copy CSS protected Movies.
• Codec 7.8i - This codec pack includes DivX Pro 5.2.1, XviD 1.1.0 Beta1, Ligos Indeo XP Codec 5.2820.15.58, AC3Filter 1.01a (rc5), Fraunhoffer IIS Mpeg Layer-3 DirectShow Decoder 1.9.0.311, Fraunhoffer IIS Mpeg Layer-3 ACM Codec 1.9.0.305, Ogg Vorbis 1.1 (rc1), Ogg Vorbis DirectShow Filter 0.9.9.6, Ogg Vorbis DirectShow Filter Decoder 1.0, Ogg Vorbis Audio ACM Codec 0.0.3.6, DivX AntiFreeze 0.4.
• RadLinker 2.028 - RadLinker is new tweaker/linker for ATI Radeon based graphics cards.
• Xtreme G 67.66  - This is the Xtreme G driver which includes many performance and Image Quality tweaks. These are modified NVIDIA ForceWare drivers for Windows 2000 & XP.
• Forceware 71.25 Windows 2000/XP - A new Forceware with build 71.25 appeared on the web today. These drivers are date stamped at the 10th of January 2005. These drivers are WHQL (Microsoft tested) signed but do not have support for all NVIDIA graphics cards, only series 6 and a few Quadro's are supported

SECURITY...

• Worm Masquerades as CNN Headline Alerts - A new e-mail worm masquerading as news headlines from CNN has the ability to log keystrokes and open backdoors for new threats, anti-virus vendor Sophos Inc. said in an advisory. Researchers at Sophos said the worm, identified as W32/Crowt-A, takes its subject lines and message content from headlines gathered in real-time from Time Warner's CNN Web site. The worm's subject line and attachment share the same name, but continually change to mirror the front-page headline on the CNN site.
• Virus masquerades as email from security firm - An as yet unnamed mass-mailer worm which masquerades as an alert from IT security firm BitDefender has been discovered spreading in the wild. The infection, which comes in an email message with a spoofed 'from' field ([email protected]), prompts users to download harmful executables from a Romanian website.
• Researcher Pokes Holes in Microsoft Patch - Microsoft's first software patch for 2005 does not adequately fix the critical vulnerability it was intended to address, according to a warning issued by IT security services firm GeCAD NET. The flaw is still exploitable in Windows XP Service Pack 1 or Windows 2000 Service Pack 4, even when fully patched and up-to-date (MS05-001 included), Avram warned. Users of Windows XP SP2 (Service Pack 2) are not vulnerable to the attack method.
• US peer-to-peer pirates convicted - New Yorker William Trowbridge and Texan Michael Chicoine have pleaded guilty to charges that they infringed copyright by illegally sharing music, movies and software. The two men faced charges following raids in August on suspected pirates by the FBI. The pair face jail terms of up to five years and a $250,000 fine. In a statement the US Department of Justice said the two men operated the central hubs in a piracy community organised across the Direct Connect peer-to-peer network. The piracy group called itself the Underground Network and membership of it demanded that users share between one and 100 gigabytes of files. During its investigation FBI agents reportedly downloaded 84 movies, 40 software programs, 13 games and 178 "sound recordings" from the five hubs that made up the larger piracy group.
• "Evil twin" could pose Wi-Fi threat - Researchers at Cranfield University are warning that "evil twin" hot spots, networks set up by hackers to resemble legitimate Wi-Fi hot spots, present the latest security threat to Web users. Attackers interfere with a connection to the legitimate network by sending a stronger signal from a base station close to the wireless client, turning the fake access point into a so-called evil twin.
• eXeem opens new file-swapping doors - Called eXeem, the software aims to merge the speedy downloads of BitTorrent with the powerful global search capabilities of Kazaa or eDonkey. The first public version of the program was released by a company called Swarm Systems but has been associated with SuprNova, a Web site that, until recently, drew millions of people seeking free content online through the popular BitTorrent software
• Big names gang up on digital pirates - A group of the world's largest consumer electronics manufacturers are developing a digital rights management (DRM) standard to stop pirated material being played on their home entertainment systems. The alliance, including Samsung, Sony, Philips and Matsushita Electric Industrial (Panasonic), has joined with DRM developers Intertrust Technologies to form the Marlin Joint Development Association (JDA).
• Review: Microsoft's Anti-Spyware Tools Ineffective - check it out.

OFF-TOPIC...

• Mr. Potato Head Feels the Dark Side of Force - A spud on the dark side. That's how toy maker Hasbro Inc. is promoting its latest Mr. Potato Head figure, Darth Tater. The toy spud will be available next month, ahead of the May release of "Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith," the latest installment in that film series. Darth Tater will come with a light saber, cape and helmet, in addition to the regular Mr. Potato Head accessories such as eyes, mouth and nose.
• Titan a 'Flammable' Moon Covered in Liquid Gas - Saturn's moon Titan is covered by "dirty" ice ridges and seas of liquid natural gas, a team of scientists said on Friday after a week of research into data from the space probe Huygens.
• Why some people entice mosquitoes - It was already known that some people produce "come and get me" smells which appeal to the blood-suckers. Rothamsted Research, in Herts, found those less likely to be bitten produced odours which masked these scents. The natural repellent could be used to protect everyone from the bugs, suggests the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council.
• Ex-girlfriend Deletes Lineage Character and Gets Arrested - A jilted Japanese girlfriend logged onto her ex-lover's Lineage account with his username and password. Once there, she deleted his game data including all the items, weapons and clothes he had collected. Although the boyfriend did not suffer financially he reported the misuse of his account to the police. Police then reported the woman of Toyama Prefecture, to the Fukushima District Public. Prosecutors

TECHNOLOGY...

• Xbox Live! Passes 1.4 Million Subscribers - The success of Xbox Live! comes after a successful Christmas period for the US giant, with highlights including the Xbox becoming the only platform to witness year-to-year growth during Q4 as well as the full 2004 calendar year, whilst the overall market saw a dip in year-to-year comparison.
• Microsoft Research's C-Omega - Microsoft Research has produced a data-oriented programming language by merging C#, XPath and SQL.
• Playstation 3 details - You can read it for yourself here. The Cell is set to be unlocked at a techie conference in February. See this slide. It purports to show Mr Cell will run at 4.60GHz, at 1.3 volts, and have 6.4Gb/s off chip communication.  (thanks TheInquirer)

HARDWARE... 

• Intel's 64-bit P4 Processors Begin to Emerge in Retail - Akiba PC Hotline web-site reports that a number of stores in Tokyo, Japan, sells Intel Pentium 4 processors models 3.20F, 3.40F, 3.60F and 3.80F with EM64T capability enabled. The chips come in black and white retail packaging and are positioned primarily for uniprocessor servers and workstations. The central processing units cost approximately $299, $311, $449 and $755 for 3.20GHz, 3.40GHz, 3.60GHz and 3.80GHz speed-bins respectively.
• Western Digital to Ship 6GB 1" Hard Disk Drives - Western Digital announced it would enter the market of miniature hard disk drives aimed at handheld consumer electronics, such as players, phones or cameras. The company's first product for the market will be 6GB HDD in 1" form-factor that will ship in Q2 2005 and will become one of the world's largest HDD of its size.
• BenQ announces three hard disk DVD recorders - Digitimes is reporting that BenQ has announced three hard disk (HDD) DVD recorders. The models, DE305S, DE305H and the DE305P all use double-chip modules whit one chip for recording and another chip for playback this to avoid signal noise and delays. The recorders support only recording to the DVD+R(W) format, others like Lite-On have already released dual format HDD DVD recorders.
• ABIT Okays Repair of Faulty Mainboards, but Claims No More - ABIT Computer said Friday it admits certain issues with it mainboards, and claimed its most-recent products were problem-free, following lawsuits launched Thursday. The firm said it would reimburse or repair free of charge some of its outdated mainboards for its clients, but said its mend it products based on certain documents and experts'claims and provided that those mainboards were not tortured by overclockers – enthusiasts who practice rising mainboards and processors clock-speeds in a bid for high performance.
• Acer Ferrari 3200 and ASUS A4S00K comparison - X-bit Labs compared the two powerful mobile solutions from ASUS and Acer, which differ in their design, dimensions, weight and price, but have similar configurations. So who is the winner of this comparison? The ASUS A4S00K has been faster in more tests and it is also preferable from the price/performance ratio standpoint. The Acer, however, boasts a high performance, too, and its ergonomic properties and wide functionality match those of the ASUS.
• Acer TravelMate 8100 Centrino notebook - All in all, the Acer TravelMate 8100 is still an excellent notebook with great performance. Save for a SATA hard disk drive and an Expresscard slot, features we were expecting in a performance 'Sonoma' notebook, the well endowed TravelMate 8100 is able to deliver the performance while offering you a complete suite of wireless connections for work and play in almost every location in town.
• Dell Inspiron 700M Notebook  - The 700m has a look that's a little bit different, a little more elegant, than most Dell. Gone are the dull blues and grays, and we are left with a case that resembles the slightly battered offspring of a Powerbook and an iBook.
• 1GB Kingston PC2700 SODIMM - This particular stick is built specifically for Dell Inspiron notebooks (hence the "KTD-INSP5150/1G" label on the sticker). To fit 1GB onto a single board, Kingston used a total of 16 small modules, each 64MB in capacity.
• Corsair Flash Voyager 512MB - Hi-Techreviews.com has posted a review of the Corsair Flash Voyager 512MB memory.
• eVGA e-GeForce 6600 GT PCI-E - nVNews has posted a review of eVGA's e-Geforce 6600GT PCI-E in an SLI setup.
• MSI RX800PRO-TD256 - MSI's RX800PRO-TD256 does not vary much from the ATi-based card specifications and Radeon X800 graphics processor on which the device is based. However, a lot of games bundled with the not-so-shabby card at least merits a second look. These are Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, Uru Ages Beyond Myst and XIII. The Japanese bundle comes with Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow instead of Prince of Persia.  To round the bundle off, MSI also includes a CD with 14 game demos. Unfortunately, none of the games are new.
• BenQ PB 6100 projector - Once you get used to having a projector at your disposal, playing games and watching movies is never the same again. I think most hardware enthusiasts will take the plunge eventually. Big is good! So how does the PB6100 fare? Though it doesn't blow me away, I've mostly warmed to using this projector with the one, albeit large, caveat regarding the visual anomalies caused by the DLP rainbow effect. If you have a room where light can be strictly controlled, have at least 14' to throw the image, and can place the projector 12" - 18" off the floor with some ventilation room in the rear, the projector does a very good job for the money. If you can't really fulfill these requirements you either have to make trade-offs that frankly are not worth it, more appropriately, look elsewhere.
• Sony MDR-V700DJ Headphones - The Sony MDR-V700DJ headphones produce serious sound for the most demanding audio-philes. And with a $149 price tag, they'd better. Designed for live DJs, the V700DJ headphones are perfect for professional live performers and casual mixers alike. Their superior sound works well for casual home use as well.
• Saitek X52 Flight Control System - TrustedReviews take a look at the Saitek X52 Flight Control System which is one of the best flight stick setups you can get for under L100 and it even has a built in LCD display.

GUIDES...

• How to assign a drive letter or directory to a shadow copy - Adi Oltean has posted a really cool method to assign a drive letter or directory to a shadow copy. This will allow you to access files that are otherwise exclusively opened by an application. Please note, this will only work on Windows Server 2003 and not in XP because it does not have shadow copy. The ability to do this is extremely useful! This might even let me backup SQL Server's data files without any external tools or shutting down SQL Server.
• Deploying Windows XP Service Pack 2 in Enterprise Environments  - The guide describe planning and implementation considerations for deploying Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2) in enterprise environments.
• XP Myths - Myths Regarding Windows XP - A fiction or half-truth, especially one that forms part of an ideology. There are numerous Myths floating around the Internet regarding Windows XP, especially relating to Optimizations and Security. Hopefully this site will debunk some of these.
• Sharky Extreme's January value gaming PC buyer's guide - The holiday season has now passed, and for those who weren't lucky enough to find a new system in your stockings, the time has never been better to assemble a new gaming system.
• Ultimate PC Building Revisited - Here's an article about building the ultimate PC. This being an Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe system. The first problem is that when you want to put 4 Gig of RAM in the system (4) 1 gig sticks which the system is supposed to be able to handle. Only (2) sticks are ever seen but yet the RAM in my article was on the QVL list originally for running with 4 sticks in Dual Channel mode but if you go look now they changed it from their original QVL list and removed a V from the third column for the Kingston 1024 RAM???

SOFTWARE...

• Kernel 2.4.29 - Check changelog here and download at Kernel.org.
• Ethereal 0.10.9 - Ethereal is used by network professionals around the world for troubleshooting, analysis, software and protocol development, and education.
• GAIM 1.1.2 - 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.
• nVIDIA SLI - Test your own Games with SLI - A very cool application was created by 3DChipset forum member; Andrew Poison that lets you - the user - select if you wish to play a game (that is not offically supported in the NVidia SLI-Supported Games List) in SLI mode or not. You can select between AFR and SFR. You can also select to use just a single GPU.
• AutoPatcher XP January 2005 - This release is based on the all-new AutoPatcher 5.0. Although it was made with Windows XP SP2 (English) in mind, it will load on any Windows version or language, showing only the items which match the running environment.
• FileZilla Server 0.9.4e - A lot has changed since the last release of this FTP server. The most important change is the improved list of connected users which now displays more details like the current active transfer details (file, progress, speed)
• Secure-It 1.22 - Secure-It is a local Windows security hardening tool, proactively secure your PC by either disabling the intrusion and propagation vectors proactively or simply reduce the attack surface by disabling unimportant functions.
• Exeem 0.20 Public - eXeem is a brand new Peer-To-Peer program, which is based on the BitTorrent idea. eXeem eliminates the need for trackers as nodes in the program will be taking their role. eXeem also features easy publication of files to the network as well as a rating and comments system. eXeem contains NO SPYWARE.
• DVD Region+CSS Free 5.65 - DVD Idle has updated its DVD Region+CSS Free software to version 5.65.  They added support for the Settec ALPHA DVD and support for a new version of the Sony ARccOS protection.
• RightMark Memory Analyzer 3.46 - The RightMark Memory Analyzer (download) provides the detailed, stable and accurate measurements of the most important low-level characteristics of the CPU/Chipset/RAM subsystem of your PC. Seven types of tests are implemented in the current release of the RightMark Memory Analyzer suite, that allow you to determine the following low-level parameters of the platform.
• CloneCD v5.1.0.0 - This new version (download) fixes some blacklisting issues with CloneCD Tray.
• Hmonitor 4.2.1.2 - Hmonitor has much more functions than MotherBoard Monitor, for example, including thermocontrol features and COM/PerfMon API support.
• Driver Cleaner Professional Edition - Driver Cleaner Professional Editon is a program which helps you to remove parts of drivers that are left after uninstalling the old drivers. The program is for ATI, nVidia, Creative, Realtek, SIS, 3Dfx, S3 and more drivers.
• xpy 0.86 - xpy is a small tool which disables the default threats of a windows xp installation. besides the classic antispy features, xpy closes recent security holes like the remote procure call (rpc) service and the distributed component object model (dcom).
• Intel Application Accelerator RAID Edition 4.7.0.6815 - This driver provides support for high-performance Serial ATA RAID 0 arrays and redundant RAID 1 arrays on select Intelr 915, 925, 865, and 875 chipset-based platforms on Windows* XP or Windows 2000.
• Plextor PX-716A v1.04 firmware - Plextor Japan has released a new firmware for its PX 716A. Version 1.04 enables besides 8x speed for DVD+RW and 6x speed for DVD+R DL also 2x speed for DVD-R DL.
• Forceware 71.21 Win2K/XP - A new Forceware with build 71.21 appeared on the web today. Props to the bro's @ osnn.net for noticing them. These drivers are dated the 6th of December. These drivers are not WHQL (Microsoft tested) signed but do have support for all NVIDIA graphics cards, as they are not an official release they should be treated with the same care that you should maintain when using all beta software.

SECURITY...

• Computer Worm Exploits Tsunami to Spread Virus - A mass e-mail posing as a plea for aid to help the victims of last month's Asian tsunami disaster is actually a vehicle for spreading a computer virus, Web security firm Sophos said Monday. The worm appears with the subject line: "Tsunami donation! Please help!" and invites recipients to open an attachment called "tsunami.exe" -- which, if opened, will forward the virus to other Internet users. It could also initiate a denial-of-service attack against a German hacking Web Site, Sophos said, in which the site's server would be bombarded with messages, putting it out of action.
• Microsoft will patch Windows Media Player to fix the DRM exploits - One week after saying it had no plans to change the way WMP (Windows Media Player) handles the download of DRM licenses, Microsoft now says it will release an update in the next 30 days to help thwart the threat of spyware infection. The about-face comes amid reports that malicious hackers are rigging .wmv files and using the anti-piracy mechanism to infect computers with spyware, adware, dialers and computer viruses
• Worm poses as porn-purging program -  A new mass-mailing worm which tries to scare naive users into running it by saying pornographic content has been found on their PCs has begun doing the rounds. Users are told that adult material on their PC can be hidden by running an attached program called "Evidence Cleaner", actually the Baba-C worm. Baba-C turns the frequent trick of offering malware posing a XXX-material on its head by offering to remove adult content from Windows PCs. The end result is much the same though. Users duped into running Baba-C further the spread of the worm and open up backdoor access to their Windows system.
• Experts warn of trick to bypass IE download warnings - The warnings came after the hole was identified on the Bugtraq Internet security discussion list by someone using the name "Rafel Ivgi." The hole affects Internet Explorer Version 6.0.0, including the version released with Windows XP Service Pack 2. The vulnerability allows malicious attackers to bypass warnings designed to inform users when a file is being passed to their computers using a specially-crafted HTML Web document.
• Word and Excel have RC4 flaw, claim - According to this this report (PDF), there's a serious security flaw in Microsoft Word and Excel. The stream cipher RC4 [9] with key length up to 128 bits is used in Microsoft Word and Excel to protect the documents. But when an encrypted document gets modified and saved, the initialization vector remains the same and thus the same keystream generated from RC4 is applied to encrypt the different versions of that document. The consequence is disastrous since a lot of information of the document could be recovered easily.
• Linux fights off hackers - Linux systems are getting tougher for hackers to crack, security experts have reported today. A study by not-for-profit IT security testing organisation Honeynet Project has shown that, on average, Linux systems today take three months to fall prey to hackers, up from 72 hours in equivalent tests conducted between 2001 and 2002.
• State bill could cripple P2P - A bill introduced in California's Legislature last week has raised the possibility of jail time for developers of file-swapping software who don't stop trades of copyrighted movies and songs online. The proposal, introduced by Los Angeles Sen. Kevin Murray, takes direct aim at companies that distribute software such as Kazaa, eDonkey or Morpheus. If passed and signed into law, it could expose file-swapping software developers to fines of up to $2,500 per charge, or a year in jail, if they don't take "reasonable care" in preventing the use of their software to swap copyrighted music or movies--or child pornography.
• FBI stops using Carnivore wiretap software - The FBI has effectively abandoned its custom-built Internet surveillance technology, once known as Carnivore, designed to read e-mails and other online communications among suspected criminals, terrorists and spies, according to bureau oversight reports submitted to Congress. Instead, the FBI said it has switched to unspecified commercial software to eavesdrop on computer traffic during such investigations and has increasingly asked Internet providers to conduct wiretaps on targeted customers on the government's behalf, reimbursing companies for their costs.

OFF-TOPIC...

• Bill Gates 1983 Photo Shoot - The Monkey Methods blog has posted two images it characterizes as "Teen Beat" photo shoot that Mr. Gates underwent in 1983 :) (thanks Bink.nu)
• Micromachine grows its own muscles - A micromachine that walks using muscles that it grew for itself has been developed in a US laboratory. The remarkable device could eventually lead to muscle-based nerve stimulators that let paralysed patients breathe without a ventilator, or to nanobots that clear away plaque from inside the walls of a human coronary artery.
• Nostalgia Central - Most families own a box or a scrapbook full of tokens and mementoes of their lives. Every object unlocks an attic in the mind, a storehouse of reminiscence. Nostalgia Central is a scrapbook providing a trip from the Swinging Sixties, via the Mirror-balled Seventies, to the Day-Glo Eighties.

TECHNOLOGY...

• Picasa Goes 2.0 - Picasa, the Google-owned photo-sharing service, has gone live with version 2.0 of its software. The service's new edition includes some basic photo-editing tools, including the ability to brighten dark images; CD burning; integration with Blogger; a collage-generating tool; and the ability to send pictures easily through Gmail.
• Seven Longhorns to debut in May 2006? - According to one Redmond watcher, the next version of the Windows operating system, Longhorn, will be ready for manufacturing in May 2006 and will ship to the public in seven different versions.
• Software Remotely Controls PCs by Cell Phone - Toshiba has developed software to remotely operate a PC using a mobile phone over a cellular network. The software, called Ubiquitous Viewer, is installed on the mobile phone and on a client computer running Windows. The software recreates the desktop of a PC or notebook PC on the mobile phone's screen. The user can use the PC via the mobile phone to complete tasks such as reading e-mail messages and editing documents.
• More Details about NVIDIA and Sony Joint Developments - X-bit Labs have conducted an interview with NVIDIA's Vice President of Corporate Marketing, David Roman, who kindly agreed to answer a few questions about the cooperation with Sony and about the situation with Playstation 3 related projects.
• N-Gage to quietly dis-Ngage? - The INQ's Nordic mole claims Nokia is plotting to get rid of its entire Bochum, Germany facility by Q1 2006. That's not just N-Gage R&D we're talking about, it's the production facility as well. Nokia was refusing calls at press time. Sven Mole was pretty much adamant that this is the end for the N-Gage as we know it, although Nokia could easily switch N-Gage production elsewhere.

HARDWARE... 

• Stolen AMD CPUs spotted in Croatia? -Crotian journalist Theo Valich claims that you can buy stolen AMD CPUs in his home land of Croatia. You can buy Athlon XP 2600+, 2800+, 3000+ and 3200+ B grade CPUs all based on the Bsrton core. They are all about %15 to $20 cheaper than you would have to pay for non "B grade" CPUs.
• NVIDIA Ships Entry-Level GeForce 6 for AGP Bus - NVIDIA Corp. quietly announced it had begun shipments of its entry-level GeForce 6200 visual processor units for AGP 8x bus.
• Intel's dual-core CPUs to set new record high in power consumption - Intel's upcoming dual-core processors once again will test the limits of power consumption. According to documents seen by Tom's Hardware Guide, the Smithfield CPUs are rated at a thermal design power of 130 watts, an increase of 13 percent from today's Prescott processors.
• Ultra High Performance Memory Roundup A64 Socket 939 - While socket 754 is certainly not dead, the upgrade path to socket 939 was eased with the rollout of Winchester core CPUs coming in at price points starting at $150. The Athlon 64 for socket 939 enjoys a dual channel memory controller versus its 754 brother that makes due with a single channel controller. While the single channel controller is not the performance albatross that some might think, every little bit helps, and a few percentage points here and there can add up in the end.
• AOpen i855GMEm-LFS motherboard - TrustedReviews take a look at the AOpen i855GMEm-LFS which is a motherboard for Pentium M processors.
• GeForce 6600 GT Video Card Round-up - Personally, I felt MSI offered the best all round packages sporting the best performing cooling solution on one of the best looking PCB boards. The card also comes at a very affordable price tag of $210 US and easily offers the biggest range of software titles. The MSI NX6600GT-VTD128E really is an impressive board that is well worth every penny.
• Albatron GeForce 6600GT PCIe - Albatron GeForce 6600GT comes in two flavors, the PC6600GT and the PC6600GTV, the only difference between the two being the PC6600GTV's VIVO capability. We'll be reviewing the PC6600GT and comparing it to the XFX GeForce 6600GT, as well as ATI's mid-ranged Radeon X700 Pro graphics card.
• ATI RADEON X800 XL - However, this is one of these value for money products that will kick your PC's gaming ass for real. It offers twice the performance over the Radeon 9800 Pro series for example.
• OCZ PowerStream 520W PSU - Legit Reviews has posted a review of the OCZ PowerStream 520W PSU.
• Zoom ZoomTel X5v 5565 VoIP ADSL Router - The most impressive aspect of this Zoom is the quality of the VoIP calls, although I only made a few VoIP calls - this was due to the fact that I only had one other person to call, and that was thanks to Zoom supplying me with two units. All the calls were crystal clear with no background noise. Add to this the fact that you can use a normal handset, and not have to even power your PC on, and the ZoomTel starts to look pretty attractive.
• Logitech MX1000 - Please note that the CCD sensor in the MX1000 is the same as in the MX510. It has a resolution of 30x30 pixels and a "processing" rate of 5.8 MPixels/second. 5,800,000 / (30 * 30) = 6444 images captured and processed per second. Not bad. The MX300/500/700 samples 5250 images/second. The movement information is broken down into a stream of 125 packets/second to the host pc. Typical cordless mice run at 60 packets/second or less.
• Belkin Wireless Keyboard and Ergo Optical Mouse  - Dev Shed take a look at the Belkin Wireless Keyboard and Ergo Optical Mouse, which they hope will remedy the situations described above.
• PistolMouse FPS - Despite its shortcomings, the PistolMouse is an exceptional mouse for $39.99. But when it comes to features and software, this unit is as basic as a mouse can get. So those who love to tweak their mouse to their liking outside of a game or running program, you may want to look elsewhere. However, if you just want to have a sturdy, reliable mouse, that just oozes cool, then the PistolMouse is a welcome addition to any gaming rig.
• Saitek Cyborg Evo Wireless Joystick  - TheTechLounge checked out the Saitek Cyborg Evo Wireless Joystick
• Samsung SyncMaster 711T 17" LCD Monitor - Compared to the multifunctional Samsung SyncMaster 192MP 19" Display reviewed earlier on BFR, the 711T gets back to the basics offering just two input modes at an extremely high contrast ratio of 1000:1. For those unfamiliar with the term, the "contrast ratio" is the measurement of the difference in light intensity between the brightest white and the blackest black. While most 17-inch LCDs today offer 600:1 contrast ratios, the SyncMaster 711t provides a super-high 1000:1 contrast ratio.
• Vosonic Xs Drive Super VP6210 - Not only is the VP6210 a music and video player, but it is also a portable storage device capable of reading over 10 types of portable digital data cards. Capable of playing four video formats (to include MPEG, MOV, and AVI) as well as four audio formats, this Multimedia Viewer is capable of fulfilling the needs of most high demand users. With amazing features and capabilities, the VP6210 is amazing; however, if anything is lacking in this product it is battery life.

GUIDES...

• Athlon 64 Overclocking - AuphanOnline.com has posted an article on Athlon 64 Overclocking.
• Driver XP - A Windows XP Driver Guide v1.0.1 - Installing the latest drivers improves system performance and application compatibility. Updated drivers include numerous bug fixes as well as system optimizations.
• Catalyst 5.1 Driver Comparison - TweakTown compared Catalyst drivers 5.1 against the two previous versions (4.11 and 4.12) in their usual array of benchmarks.
• ATI CATALYST 5.1 Performance Analysis - Also Hexus.net has posted its "ATI CATALYST 5.1 Performance Analysis". Yet another comparsion can be found on rage3d.
• RAIDers of the Lost Benchmark  - XYZ Computing has just posted a new article called "RAIDers of the Lost Benchmark".

SOFTWARE...

• Total Commander v6.50 final - Total Commander (download ~ changelog) is a file manager for Windows. This new version features "Two file windows side by side", multiple language support, enhanced search function, compare files / synchronize directories function, Quick View panel with bitmap display, ZIP, ARJ, LZH, RAR, UC2, TAR, GZ, CAB, ACE archive handling + plugins, Built-in FTP client with FXP (server to server) and HTTP proxy support, Parallel port link, multi-rename tool, Tabbed interface, regular expressions, history+favorites buttons and humbnails view, custom columns, enhanced search.
• Picasa 2 - Picasa is software that helps you instantly find, edit and share all the pictures on your PC. Every time you open Picasa, it automatically locates all your pictures (even ones you forgot you had) and sorts them into visual albums organized by date with folder names you know. You can drag and drop to arrange your albums and make labels to create new groups.
• Harden-It - Harden-It is a Network and System hardening tool for Windows, by hardening the IP stack your Network can sustain or completely thwart various sophisticated network attacks.  The program allows you Harden your server's TCP and IP stack (Netbios, ICMP, SYN, SYN-ACK..), Protect your servers from Denial of Service and other network based attacks,Enable SYN flood protection when an attack is detected, Set the threshold values that are used to determine what constitutes an attack, etc.
• TaskInfo 6.0.1.130 (shw)-  TaskInfo2003 is combination of Task Manager and System Information Utility, It visually monitors different types of System information in Windows 95/98/ME/NT/2000/XP
• FileZilla 2.2.10 - FileZilla (download) is powerful Open Source FTP/SFTP client with many features. It includes a site manager to store all your connection details and logins as well as an Explorer style interface that shows the local and remote folders and can be customized independently.
• Nero Burning Rom 6.6.0.6 - Whether you're an Expert or Standard user, Nero 6 Reloaded (mirror1 ~ mirror2 ~ mirror3) makes your digital media projects a breeze to complete. To get the major update of Nero 6 Ultra Edition Major Update – Version 6.6, you will have to download all 6 update-packages. If you are only interested in the update of Nero Version 6.6, please download package 1 and package 2 in order to get the full functionality.
• Codec Pack 1.8.0.141 - X Codec Pack is an small/essential codec pack for viewing/encoding movies. It includesDivX Codec, XviD Codec, AC3 Filter, DivX AntiFreeze, DivXG400 and Video Inspector.
• VideoInspector 1.2.2.72 - VideoInspector is a tools designed to provide you with as much information as possible about your video files.
• DU Meter 3.0.7 Build 196 - DU Meter is an award winning utility from Hagel Technologies which provides an accurate account of the data which is flowing through your computer`s network connection at any given moment. This readout is presented in both numerical and graphical format, in real time.
• Style XP 3.0 (shw) - Style XP (download) is theming software that helps customize the way your Windows XP, Windows XP Service Pack 1, Tablet PC, or Server 2003 system looks.
• Intell Installation Utility 6.3.0.1007 - A new release of the Intel Chipset Installation Utility is now available which includes latest software for Intel USB, PCI, IDE, ATA and AGP chipsets.
• VIA Vinyl Stylus Audio driver v580a - This driver supports all VIA southbridges with integrated sound plus several audio codecs.
• VIA Audio (Envy 24 Family only) driver v442a - This driver supports VIA Vinyl Envy24 controllers: MT/DT/GT/PT/HT-S ( Envy24GT Envy24HT-S Envy24MT Envy24PT )
• VIA Ethernet (VT82xx) driver 40F - This driver supports South Bridge integrated VT8231, VT8233, VT8235 & VT8237 ( VT6107 VT610731 VT8233/A/C VT8235 VT8237 ) and VT6107 Rhine Fast Ethernet Controller ( VT6106H VT6106L VT6106S
• VIA Ethernet (VT6105/L/LOM and VT6106) driver version - 24 - This driver supports VT6105/L/LOM and VT6106 series Rhine Fast Ethernet Controllers ( VT6105 VT6105L VT6105LOM ).
• Intel Pro 100/1000 drivers 9.2 -  Intel has released version 9.2 (Win2k/XP ~ Win9x/ME ~ NT40) for their Pro100 and Pro1000 series network adapters.
• ATI Optimized Driver v1.9 - TCMag designed this driver to provide the maximum performance and Quality. Features: Based on the offical Catalyst WHQL 5.1, Removed OpenGL selection prompt (avaliable in the start menu), OpenGL Driver switcher has been updated, Few Bug fixes, Installer has been fixed, Added ATITool 0.23 to the package.
• Forceware 67.66 Win2K/XP official beta - For Windows 2000/XP, this is an official Beta NVIDIA release as found on their FTP servers.

SECURITY...

• Scots man held over DDoS charges -  27 year-old man suspected of launching denial of service attacks is to appear in a Scottish court today following his arrest on Friday, 14 January in a joint operation between Scottish police and the US Secret Service. Police searched housesin Elgin, north east Scotland and seized some computers.
• Gambling Sites Battle DDoS Attacks - Many of the gambling sites suffering DDoS attacks are in offshore data and hosting centres, so any large scale data flood could knock out access to many more sites than just the one the criminals were targeting, said Mr King. This overspill effect was only likely to grow as attacks grow in size and scale.
• BREED's game servers vulnerable - The game server can be easily crashed through the sending of an empty UDP packet. In fact if the packet size is equal to zero, the game passes a NULL pointer to the function used to parse the packet's content.
• Apple iTunes Playlist Parsing Buffer Overflow Vulnerability - Remote exploitation of a buffer overflow vulnerability in Apple Computer Inc.'s iTunes music player allows attackers to execute arbitrary code. The problem specifically exists when parsing playlist files that contain long URL file entries.

OFF-TOPIC...

• Welcome to Titan - After a seven-year, four-million-kilometre journey, the European Space Agency (ESA)'s Huygens probe is now sitting on Titan, Saturn's largest moon. The probe landed on Titan's surface Jan 14, 350 years after it was discovered. The probe has begun sending data, including first pictures and audio, which sounds like some celestial heartbeat. ~ Titan's orange squash has scientists gasping / Color Photos Reveal Details of Titan's Surface
• Religions in World of Warcraft? - Landover Baptist Church say (thanks Slashdot) Christian game enthusiasts around the U.S.A. are turning the world of Azeroth inside the new video game, "World of Warcraft" into a mission field, where virtual battles are fought and real souls are won to the Lord Jesus Christ.
• EA Considering Sims TV Show - Reuters is carrying the news that Electronic Arts is considering creating a television show based on "The Sims". The show would allow viewers to vote on what the avatars in the show would do: "One idea could be that you're controlling a family, telling them when to go to the kitchen and when to go to the bedroom, and with this mechanism you have gamers all over the world 'playing the show."
• Celebrity Soundboards - There're various audio clips/quotes from celebrities in TV shows and/or movies.
• Biology Meets Microchips to Make Tiny Robots - Rat cells grown onto microscopic silicon chips worked as tiny robots, perhaps a first step toward a self-assembling device, researchers working in the United States reported on Sunday. They described a new method for attaching living cells to silicon chips. They then and got the combined entities to move like tiny, primitive legs
• One last, long campout for "the Star Wars guy" - Jeff Tweiten lives on a periwinkle blue, fold-out futon on the sidewalk in front of the Cinerama Theatre. He is not homeless, but camping out for 139 days. Waiting. For Godot, you wonder? An organ transplant? The end of the world? Tweiten is waiting for "Star Wars: Episode III -- Revenge of the Sith," which opens May 19.

TECHNOLOGY...

• OpenOffice.org Mac OS X Delivery Schedule - No engineering work has been performed on Quartz or Aqua development within the OpenOffice.org project since mid 2003. For the last year and a half all engineering work focusing on a native Mac OS X OpenOffice.org version has been concentrated in the NeoOffice/J project, using a combination of Java and Carbon technologies to replace X11.
• Microsoft, Alcatel team to make calls from the desktop - French telecommunications company Alcatel Thursday said it has signed a deal with Microsoft to help develop applications that allow users to make phone calls from their computers. Istanbul is the front-end application for Microsoft's upcoming Live Communications Server 2005 product, which links LCS 2005 with users' telephones.
• Sony PSP "update" adds office apps, browser, email - Sony may be preparing to release its first PlayStation Portable (PSP) update, if a file that briefly appeared on the web this weekend is what it purports to be: a leaked copy of an early version of the update code. Whatever its provenance, the software certainly includes some interesting features. In addition to the usual bug fixes, the update is said to add not only a web browser and an email program, but a word processor and a spreadsheet. At this stage, the translations from the original Japanese exploration of the alleged PSP update file doesn't make it clear whether these are fully functioning office apps - or simply readers put in place to handled emailed attachments. Given the device's nature, we suspect that latter, but early talk of a PSP keyboard accessory has led some observers to suggest they're the real thing.
• Apple hoping music fans follow iPod to Mac mini computers - The diminutive Mac mini, available after Jan. 22, is a full-blown computer, complete with a 1.25 GHz PowerPC G4 processor, 256 megabytes of RAM and a 40 gigabyte hard drive. But the price tag and lunch-box-sized packaging include no room for peripherals of any kind. Consumers can, however, spend an extra $100 for a double-sized 80 gigabyte hard drive and a slightly faster 1.42 GHz chip. Or, as some naysayers are noting, consumers can spend around $599 on an entry-level Dell or Gateway system, which would include a monitor, keyboard and mouse.
• Dual-Layer Standard May Disappear Soon - Dual-Layered (DL) DVD writers may be affordable, but the question of concern is the media prices. The price per DL media averages out to $10.00, which is shockingly high. We talked to manufacturers at this year's CES about prices and what they thought about DL media in general. The replies we received were far from positive and disappointing. According to a few blank media providers, DL standard may not have a bright future ahead of it. The reason is the upcoming Blu-Ray and HD DVD standards that are supported by world's top most corporations. Due to the aforementioned standards, DL simply appears to be redundant and more of a filler in the industry until Blu-Ray and HD DVD emerge in mass quantities. As far as prices are concerned, you can probably expect them to drop $6.00 to $4.00 per disc, but not much lower than that.

HARDWARE... 

• 754 pin AMD mobile Semprons range complete - Japanase site Akiba PC Hotline said that socket 754 mobile Sempron chips at ratings of 2600+, 2800+ and 3000+ are for sale. These chips, according to site, consume 62W and are for sale at Y10,800 (~$105), Y13,800 (~$135) and Y14,800 (~$145) respectively.
• Logitech readies top gaming mouse - Logitech is about to change gaming peripherals once again with a new mouse. One of the things it did not announce at CES was the new 518 mouse. This successor to the MX510 gaming mouse combines the best of the older one, the laser technology from the MX1000, and has a new twist. The twist is adjustable DPI, intended for the gamer. The 518 has a hardware switch that will instantly change the sensitivity from 800 to 1200 to 1600DPI.
• Abit's Fatal1ty-AA8XE motherboard - At over $220 online, the Fatal1ty-AA8XE is far from cheap, but it's no more expensive than other premium 925XE motherboards. With plenty of OTES cooling, a decent cable bundle, a tweak-filled BIOS, and uGuru delivering the best hardware monitoring around, the Fatal1ty-AA8XE is definitely a premium board worthy of any Pentium 4 overclocking enthusiast.
• Winfast NF4UK8AA-8ERKS NF4 Ultra Board - This board, NF4UK8AA-8EKRS supports the Socket 939 for AMD Athlon 64 processor, 4 GB DDR400, USB 2.0, PCI Express 16x, 8 ch audio, 1394, GbE LAN, NVRAID, SATA. The board also comes built in with overclocking features like voltage adjustments for VDIMM, VCORE, Vhtt. FSB is adjustable to 300MHz.
• Sapphire Radeon X800 (R430) - One thing that can be noted on this board is that it features full 2ns GDDR3 RAM, which is the same RAM used on the X800 XL and numerous other higher end boards. Given that X800's RAM is only running at 350MHz this represents a fairly serious underclock of that RAM and board vendors could very well just utilise DDR memory closer to those ratings. As such, while we believe initial board samples will use 2ns GDDR3 RAM this may not continue further into the lifetime of the board.
• ATI Radeon X800 Pro - Viper Lair has posted a review of the ATI Radeon X800 Pro
• Asus Extreme N6800 GeForce 6800 Ultra PCIe - Even in single card scenarios, the GeForce 6800 Ultra PCIe proves itself to be a faster overall card compared to ATI’s Radeon X800 XT, although this may be a hollow victory. ATI’s next generation Radeon X850 XT cards will be shipping in early February and will likely give ATI the performance edge to best the 6800 Ultra in single card systems. When SLI is added to the mix though, there is simply no question that dual 6800 Ultra PCIe cards perform much faster. Keep in mind though, in order to truly see the performance benefits of such a high-end SLI system, resolutions and image quality settings must be set at ultra-high levels.
• LG GSA-4163B Triple Format Double Layer DVD Writer - This one-of-a-kind triple format DVD writer gained quite a bit of interest since its release. The successor to the 4120B was the 4160B, which did not bring enough new features worth an upgrade consideration. LG Electronics has recently released their latest DVD writer, the GSA-4163B. This new drive finally offers 4x double layer writing and should compete well with all other 4x double layer writers currently on the market.
• Seagate 5GB Pocket Hard Drive -  While it is not as small as a USB flash drive, it is extremely portable and convenient thanks to its retractable USB cable.
• Corsair Flash Voyager Flash Memory Drive - Adrian Rojak take a look at the Corsair Flash Voyager USB flash memory drive. In particular, the 512MB model.
• Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 LGA775 P4 Heatpipe Cooler - Tweaknews.net has posted a review of Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 LGA775 P4 Heatpipe Cooler.
• Arctic Cooling Freezer 64 review - The Freezer 64 utilizes a patented fan that creates almost no noise. Hopefully, this heatsink will be just as effective as their VGA Silencers were.
• Superpower XP03P Gaming Case - Hi-techreviews.com has posted a review of the Superpower XP03P Gaming Case which looks like something betwen a Power Mac G5 and a Star Wars battle pack.
• Thermaltake Xpeaker Panel - MikhailTech take a look at Thermaltake's bold attempt at a decent built-in speaker system dubbed the Xpeaker.
• PolarFLO TT AMD, Intel Water Block - These PolarFLO TT water block kits come with all the necessary fixings & screws/spacers to install including the necessary 'Y' tube adapter.
• Buffalo USB WiFi Adapter - Although the WLI-U2-KG54AI-3 doesn't have any flash storage that you can make use of, it does have 4MB of storage embedded, and it's here that the drivers are stored. When you plug the device into your USB port, it recognises the 4MB storage area as a CD-ROM with an ISO image on it. The WLI-U2-KG54AI-3 then initiates some kind of ISO extraction utility, and loads the drivers seamlessly.
• BatteryFree Wireless Optical Mouse - PDAToday has posted a review of the NB-30 BatteryFree Wireless Optical Mouse and EasyGo Optical Mouse From A4 Tec.
• Lexmark P6250 All-in-One Inkjet printer, scanner, fax - Being a multifunction device, and a photo-orientated one at that, the P6250 comes with quite a bit of software. There's the All-in-One Centre, which offers easy access to a series of common tasks, such as transferring images to your PC from the card reader or scanner, sending images via email and, of course, viewing and printing them.
• Dell Axim X50v PDA - There are three new Axims in the X50 range - a basic one offering a 416Mhz processor, a QVGA screen, 64MB of ROM and Bluetooth - a 520MHz version with 128MB of ROM and integrated Wi-Fi - and at the top-of-the-range, and the X50v, which offers a 620MHz CPU and a 3.7in screen boasting full VGA (480 x 640) resolution. Dell is also now offering a bundle with a GPS solution as well.

GUIDES...

• TI-Calculator Turbo Page - Curently, the TI-81, TI-82, TI-83, TI-85, TI-86, TI-89, TI-92,a nd TI-92 Plus can be accelerated. The 81, 85 and 86 can be accelerated to approximately 2-3x their normal speed, about 18 MHz. The TI-82 and TI-83 can also be accelerated to about 1.5-2x normal speed. They only about double their speed to around 12 MHz. The TI-89 and 92 can be accelerated to around 20 MHz!
• Medium Business Guide for Backup and Recovery v 1.0 - This guide provides referential guidance on implementing techniques to protect against data loss due to hardware failures, software corruption, or accidental deletion.

SOFTWARE...

• Novell offers free SuSE 9.2 download - Novell said it is making SuSE Linux Professional 9.2 available as a free download. Novell said the version differs from the LiveDVD version, is a fully installable version, and is not time limited. (thanks DistroWatch)
• Bugzilla 2.18 Goes Gold - Bugzilla is server software designed to help you manage software development. It contains many new features, a huge number of bug fixes, some security updates, and more. It is also the first Bugzilla version to run unmodified on Windows. In parallel, security release 2.16.8 and a new development snapshot 2.19.2 have been announced.
• Delete Doctor 1.1 - Delete files that are difficult to delete, such as some files left by viruses and trojans, or files with corrupted file names. This program can also delete files like the "index.dat" files, which store Internet history, by scheduling them for deletion upon system restart.
• GMail Drive 1.0.5 - GMail Drive creates a virtual filesystem on top of your Google GMail account and enables you to save and retrieve files stored on your GMail account directly from inside Windows Explorer. GMail Drive literally adds a new drive to your computer under the My Computer folder, where you can create new folders, copy and drag'n'drop files to.
• CloneDVD v2.6.2.3 - Elby/SlySoft has released an updated version of the CloneDVD. This latest version addresses a problem with the automatic update check, that was introduced in the previous CloneDVD version.
• SpeedFan 4.20 - SpeedFan (download) is a freeware program that monitors fan speeds, temperatures and voltages in computers with hardware monitoring chips. SpeedFan can even access S.M.A.R.T. info for those hard disks that support this feature (almost all :-)) and show hard disk temperatures too, if supported
• Koepi`s XviD Codec 1.1.0 Beta 1 - XviD (download) is an ISO MPEG-4 compliant video codec. It`s no product, it`s an open source project which is developed and maintained by lots of people from all over the world.
• 3dfx Voodoo 3/4/5 alpha 22 (SFFT) - Did you know it's still possible to play Half-life 2 and Doom 3 on an old 3dfx card? For the few of you still running them, there are some new 3dfx Voodoo 3/4/5 Alpha SFFT drivers. These drivers are Windows 2000/XP compatible and I've recompressed the archive towards 1,7 MB. The archive has both Windows 2000/XP drivers for 3dfx Voodoo 3, 4 and 5 graphics cards.
• ForceWare 70.78 Win2000/XP - Originally released as Quadro fx1400 drivers from Dell this is a NVIDIA Forceware driver targeted at the professional cards. The .inf file has been modified to make these drivers compatible with all graphics cards. This set is not WHQL, ), nView comes in a seperate directory with it's own setup file. The drivers are date stamped on the 23rd of November.

SECURITY...

• Worm plays games with victims - The worm, known as Cellery.A, uses a playable version of the Russian video game to attract victims. While people play Tetris, the worm attempts to spread to networked hard drives and other accessible systems on a company's network that use the Microsoft Windows operating system, the firm stated in an advisory.
• Froogle/Gmail Hack Warning - An Israeli hacker has uncovered a flaw in Froogle, Google's price-comparison service, which could allow access to users' Gmail accounts. Nir Goldshlager, who discovered the flaw, warned that URL-embedded Javascript could end up causing personal information to be revealed. If users execute the script by clicking a link, they would be redireted to a malicious website. From there, hackers can read a user's cookie. It may contain personal information, such as purchase histories, or the username and password used to access Google services - such as Gmail.
• Are feds spying on web users' browsing?  - The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) said that it has filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the FBI and other divisions of the Department of Justice (DoJ). The EFF said that it wants to the government departments to disclose whether they have been using provisions of the US Patriot Act to spy on Internet users' browsing without taking out a search warrant. In a statement, the EFF said that Section 216 allows the government to track pen registers or trap and trace devices, known as pen traps. These pen traps collect information about phone numbers dialled, but don't record their content.
• Microsoft: No Plans to Tweak DRM Download Mechanism - Microsoft Corp. says it has no plans to change the way its Windows Media Player handles the download of DRM licenses. Security experts warn that crackers are rigging .wmv files to use the DRM (digital rights management) features of Windows Media Player to browse sites infested with malware. The WMP software includes an option to "acquire licenses automatically for protected content." When a user tries to play a DRM-protected file, the software triggers an Internet Explorer browser session and walks the user through the installation process.
• Secure your Emails - for FREE - Munich-based Company Ciphire Labs today released a new version of their "Ciphire Mail". This is an email-encryption tool, which uses standard, well-known cryptographic algorithms.  It works in conjunction with your existing email client. Ciphire Mail operates seamlessly in the background and does not interfere with normal emailing routines. It encrypts and decrypts email messages, and can digitally sign each message to provide authentication and guard against identity theft. Ciphire Mail is the first out-of-the box solution to match power with ease of use.
• FBI May Have to Scrap New Computer Program - The FBI said on Thursday it may have to scrap a new $170 million computer program designed to allow agents to share information instantly and fix a main problem identified after the Sept. 11 attacks. The software is already outdated and inadequate, with the bureau able to use only about one-tenth of the program, an FBI official said on condition of anonymity.

OFF-TOPIC...

• Upgrade Planned To "Tron" V2.0 - Dark Horizons is reporting that there will be a remake of "Tron" movie, the 1982 film about a computer programmer who gets sucked into the world of a computer program. Lee Sternthal said the new conceit is that the computer programmer gets trapped in a cyberworld, so that the film can utilize the Internet.
• Boring Becomes Elektra - It's not as bad as Catwoman, but the superhero/martial-arts flick Elektra certainly could use a little more juice.
• Titanic Voyage Reaches Its End - After a seven-year trek covering 2 billion miles, the Huygens probe lands on Saturn's mysterious moon Titan. Now a short period of intense work begins
• "Smashing hole" in comet may reveal key to solar system - The "smashing" of a hole in a far away comet by a NASA spacecraft July 4 this year might reveal frozen remains from the early years of the formation of the solar system, reports Xinhua.  According to scientists, NASA's 'Deep Impact' spacecraft will "smash" a hole in Comet Tempel 1, which is about 132 million km away from the earth, at a speed of 37,000 kmph. The craft, launched Wednesday from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, will release a 372-kg projectile one day before the craft runs into the comet.

TECHNOLOGY...

• Macworld Conference & Expo 2005 - The Macworld Conference and Expo 2005 opened this morning with a keynote by Apple Computer Inc.'s CEO, Steve Jobs. Jobs eased his way into the keynote with a quick update of Apple's worldwide retail presence which has grown to 101 stores since 3.5 years ago. Jobs noted that the stores serve over a million visitors a week - "that's 20 Macworlds a week," Jobs said.
• 2004 Digest: Mobile Technologies and Communications - Let's start our summary by checking how much the number of mobile users changed. If you remember, it was a mobile phone that was listed among the most unloved and still the most useful inventions of mankind.
• Samsung Phone Senses 3-D Movements - Samsung Electronics has developed a cell phone that can sense movement in three dimensions and respond to those movements by performing actions such as dialing numbers or ending a call, the company says. The SCH-S310's motion sensing system allows users to, for example, draw a number three in the air to dial a three, says Samsung. Shaking the phone twice will end a call or delete a message. Other movement functions programmed into the handset include a sharp move to the right or left to tell the built-in MP3 music player to skip forward or back a track, while drawing a "O" or "X" in the air makes the phone say "Yes" or "No" out loud, the company says.
• Sony PSP to ship in UK on 18 March - Amazon - Sony will release the PlayStation Portable (PSP) in the UK on 18 March. So claims Amazon.co.uk, which has now begun taking pre-orders for the in-demand handheld games console
• Mobile Personal Server - Dual CPUs in Your Pocket - This portable computer plugs into another computer via USB, and regardless of the host's operating system will take over the keyboard, mouse, monitor, and network connections without leaving a trace, providing access your web-enabled applications virtually anywhere. The specs are impressive for such a small unit, featuring dual 425MHz PowerPC processors, 1GB of flash or a 20GB hard drive, and 64MB of DRAM. Security is also embraced with a biometric scanner for file encryption, and a 2048-bit encrypted VPN connection to Realm System's SBOA router allows for updates (or can disable a stolen unit entirely.)

HARDWARE... 

• Intel Preps 3.50GHz Server Chips with 8MB Cache - Intel's Xeon processor family for multiprocessor (MP) applications will finally be updated in Q1 2005 with chips code-named Cranford that contain 1MB of L2 cache, but operate at 3.66GHz, much higher than today's 3.0GHz. In server environments clock-speed does not necessarily mean performance crown, as server software is seriously dependant on cache size and from that perspective Intel's Xeon MP 3.0GHz with 4MB L3 cache may be a better choice for certain types of server deployments.
• Intel's Pentium 4 570J, just shy of 4GHz - Hardware Analysis take a look at the Pentium 4 570J and try to answer the question whether 200MHz extra clockspeed helps it to reign supreme and beat the fastest Intel processor to date - the Pentium 4 Extreme Edition 3.46GHz.
• GeIL Ultra Platinum Series PC4200 (DDR533) and PC4400 (DDR550) - These memory modules will be a gift for overclockers due to their ability to work synchronously with the FSB at frequencies up to 280-285MHz. When choosing between these two particular kits, which are actually very similar, you may want to pay special attention to their price as the guiding factor.
• G.SKILL Extreme Series PC4800 512mb Dual Channel Kit - The Extreme Series PC4800 512Mb Dual Channel DDR Kit showed tremendous potential for overclocking. The ability to run at aggressive timings at high speeds is something that overclockers have been waiting for for a long time. Running CAS 2.5-3-3-7 at DDR562 is indeed quite an achievement.
• ABIT Fatal1ty AA8XE - The AA8XE is the first motherboard from the ABIT Fatal1ty series of products with official support for Intel's latest 1066MHz based processors. If you are looking for a motherboard that is going to get you the speed crown in every "e-penis" benchmark out there, this motherboard is not for you. If you are wanting a rock solid Pentium 4 gaming platform that will allow you to overclock into MHz territory before unknown, the ABIT Fatal1ty AA8XE should be on your very short list.
• MSI NX6600GT-VTD128 Geforce 6600GT AGP Video Card - This card is compatible with 8x/4x AGP motherboards only, and will not physically fit in AGP 2X or earlier slots. It comes equipped with 128MB of Samsung GDDR3 BGA memory on a 128-bit memory bus.
• Dangerden TDX775 Socket 775 Water Block - This is the standard package from Dangerden. It's a white box that covers the block and the accessories. The block is pretty small I have to say and the question is if it will be able to cool the processor as well as the bigger Asetek block. The mounting accessories are packed in a small zip lock bag.
• Verbatim 90X Store 'n' Go PRO USB 2.0 Drive - For reliability, Verbatim's new Store ‘n' Go Pro drives feature an on-board 32 bit ARM-7 microprocessor that manages I/O operations and many of the drive's technical features. An advanced wear-leveling algorithm is used to distribute writes evenly among flash storage cells
• Aspire Chameleon Series 550w PSU - Aspire USA has produced a fine power source with the Chameleon 550w PSU. Strong stable power with a bit of panache. The changeable colors of the LED fan and UV reactive cable sheathing and connectors will be the pride of many windowed case owners. This in addition to the unit's adjustable fan speed and its ability to run virtually silent, make it a top choice for an upgrade or replacement component to anyone's system. The only real negative aspect observed was the restrictive rear exhaust.
• A4Tech Wireless Mouse -  This little optical mouse claims to use the latest wireless RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) Technology and to save the environment from pollutants by never using batteries. How cool is that? This mouse gets its juice from the mouse pad via electromagnetic induction.
• HP Photosmart 8450 Printer - We were disappointed that this printer didn't achieve either its black or colour ink-yield claims, falling short by over 100 pages in each case. HP used to be very conservative in its estimates, but its new print cartridges don't hold as much ink as the previous generation and, even with the same test pages, we can't achieve the usage HP does. Even so, the printer produced a text cost of 3.4p per five per cent black page. It isn't the cheapest you can go, but is fair for the quality of print, and the figure of 33.3p for a 20 per cent colour page with photo highlights is also reasonable.
• Commodore 64 DTV - Hexus.net has posted a review of Commodore 64, or rather the new DTV which is essentially the C64 within a retro-style joystick.
• Sony Ericsson V800 cell phone - TrustedReviews take a look at Sony Ericsson V800 3G mobile phone.

GUIDES...

• Driver XP - A Windows XP Driver Guide v1.0.0 - Installing the latest drivers improves system performance and application compatibility. Updated drivers include numerous bug fixes as well as system optimizations. It is recommended for optimal system stability to only use Official drivers and not Beta or Prerelease versions. Performance differences between driver versions including Beta or Prereleased drivers is negligible

SOFTWARE...

• Microsoft Windows Anti-Spyware (beta) Software Review  - Where the Microsoft beta stands head and shoulders above at least the free antispyware apps is in the area of prevention. The real-time protection agents block vulnerable system areas from being subverted by spyware, malware and browser hijacking programs, hopefully preventing most future spyware infestations. This seems like it would be very effective, especially coupled with the (we assume) frequent updates and feedback from the SpyNet community.
• Ciphire Mail tool - Ciphire Mail operates seamlessly in the background and does not interfere with normal emailing routines. It encrypts and decrypts email messages, and can digitally sign each message to provide authentication and guard against identity theft. Ciphire Mail is the first out-of-the box solution to match power with ease of use.
• FirePanel XP 1.5.7.0 - FirePanel XP is an extension of the Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 firewall that uses a kernel-mode, stateful packet inspection method.
• VMware 5.0 Build 11888 - VMware Workstation (download) is powerful virtual machine software for the desktop. Optimized for the power user, VMware Workstation runs multiple operating systems -- including Microsoft Windows, Linux, and Novell NetWare -- simultaneously on a single PC in fully networked, portable virtual machines.
• MP3 Goes 5.1 - Fraunhofer has released its new MP3 Surround codec (download), allowing full 5.1 audio to be easily compressed and downloaded. And to encourage use of the new format, free encoders are being made available until the end of the year.
• DivXToDVD 0.4.0.67 - DivxToDVD converts your movie files from a wide range of formats (AVI, XVID, MPEG, and DIVX) to compliant DVD structures (VOB and IFO). You can then burn them with CopyToDVD (or other DVD burner) and watch the movie via a DVD Player. At this time DivxToDVD allows to convert a .AVI or .DIVX etc to a compliant DVD format set of files. This way you can watch a Divx or a AVI on a regular home DVD Player.
• OPN64 v0.3.0 - OPN64 (download) is an intelligent program designed specifically to translate the three codes found on, or around the core of AMD Processors. What you can expect the program to do, can be found in either or the screenshots in the screenshots section.
• ForceWare 71.40 Win2000/XP beta  - This is the absolute newest set of unofficial NVIDIA drivers available. The drivers are date stamped on the 16th of December.

SECURITY...

• Hacker penetrates T-Mobile systems - Securityfocus is reporting that a hacker known by the alias "Ethics" successfully penetrated T-Mobile's systems for at least a year. Twenty-one year-old Nicolas Jacobsen was charged last October after an elaborate sting between a Secret Service informant and IRC chatrooms. Jacobsen obtained U.S. Secret Service e-mail, customers' passwords and Social Security numbers, and downloaded candid photos taken by Sidekick users, including Hollywood celebrities like Demi Moore, Ashton Kutcher, Nicole Richie, and Paris Hilton. Jacobsen could access information on any of the Bellevue, Washington-based company's 16.3 million customers, including many customers' Social Security numbers and dates of birth, according to government filings in the case. He could also obtain voicemail PINs, and the passwords providing customers with Web access to their T-Mobile e-mail accounts. He did not have access to credit card numbers.
• Bawdy holiday worm preys on prurience - The virus, dubbed by Sophos as Wurmark-D worm (or W32/Wurmark-D), is being distributed via a mass e-mail campaign which offers a New Year's message in the form of an attached photograph of naked bodies. Labeled as an "amusing file," the attachment carries the destructive worm along with a graphic image of naked men and women whose bodies have been aligned to form the words "Happy New Year."
• Hackers use DRM to plant spyware - According to anti-virus vendor Panda Software, two new trojan horses -- dubbed WmvDownloader.a and WmvDownloader.b -- had been planted in video files seeded to peer-to-peer file-sharing networks like eMule and KaZaA. The trojans took advantage of a new anti-piracy features in Windows Media Player 10 and Windows XP SP2 to trick users, said Panda. Another article can be found here.
• Windows ANI File Parsing Proof Of Concept - This document demostrate an exploit of vulnerability in USER32.DLL's handling of Windows animated cursor (.ani) files that will allow a remote attacker to reliably overwrite the stack with arbitrary data and execute arbitrary code.
• Gmail glitch yields access to messages - The programmers, part of a community site dedicated to the Unix-like FreeBSD operating system, found that an improperly formatted address allowed Gmail users to retrieve the message body of the last HTML-formatted e-mail processed by the server.
• Finding bugs in software will get you jail - French security researcher who published exploit codes that could take advantage of bugs in an anti-virus application, could be imprisoned for violation of copyright laws.
• The US Army is mad, and gunning for you - A filing on a forum from Phil DeLuca at America's Army game project indicates that the US Army is not at all happy at people s0dding about with its code. DeLuca said that the US Army is very unhappy with hackers and others breaching its licence agreements, and it knows who these people are. He said: "When you tamper with the [America's Army] game not only are you breaking the EULA, you're misusing Army property, and worse, you're misusing US Army computer programs and equipment".
• Microsoft Turns to External Patch Testers - Looking to improve and possibly speed up the creation and release of software security patches, Microsoft Corp. is implementing a closed beta program for external testing teams. The formalization of Redmond's new Security Update Validation Program clears the way for external patch testers to get "limited and controlled access" to security updates ahead of public release.

OFF-TOPIC...

• Robots will win the World Cup by 2050 - Japanese robotic boffins think that by 2050 they will be able to create a team of robots who could beat any international football side.
• NASA craft to study comet - A NASA spacecraft blasted off Wednesday on a six-month trip to smash a hole in a comet and give scientists a glimpse of the frozen primordial ingredients of the solar system. The craft, Deep Impact, should end its 268-million-mile journey to Comet Tempel 1 on July 4. Some hours after takeoff, the spacecraft placed itself in a protective sleep mode because of an unknown problem, and flight controllers were reviewing sensor data, NASA said. The comet will be more than 80 million miles from Earth when the collision takes place -- on the sunlit side of the comet, NASA hopes, in order to ensure good viewing by spacecraft cameras and observatories. The resulting crater is expected to be two to 14 stories deep, and perhaps 300 feet in diameter.
• Early universe bears imprint of Big Bang's echo - The early universe rang with the sound of countless cosmic bells, which filled the primordial darkness with ripples like the surface of a pond pounded by stones. The wave fronts later served as spawning grounds for galaxies, astronomers announced Tuesday.
• First ever earthquake movie created - A pioneering technique using data from GPS receivers has been used to make the first movie of an earthquake. The animation shows the Earth's surface deforming during a magnitude 8.3 quake in September 2003 off the coast of Hokkaido in Japan.

TECHNOLOGY...

• CES 2005 coverage - @ TechReport, @TGH, Photo Report @ HotHardware, @ AnandTech (chipsets, motherboards, and memory), DDR & DDR2 plans, Prototype Blu-ray Disc, HD-DVD player
• First details on Windows XP Media Center Edition 2006? - According to AnandTech the next version of the software is definitely going to add support for CableCard, which means you'll be able to plug digital cable directly into the box and natively record HDTV programming. Windows Media Center XP 2005 did add support for HDTV tuner cards, but they're only able to record over the air HDTV broadcasts.
• Multi-chip packages to power Sony PlayStation Portable - Samsung Electronics today unveiled multi-chip package (MCP) technology which will be incorporated into Sony Corporation's PlayStation Portable (PSP) game system and and next generation consumer devices. With a MCP processing rate of 1.3GB per second, the MCP devices supplied for the Sony PSP have a capacity of 64 megabytes and consist of 256 Mb NAND flash memory and high-speed mobile DDR (double-data-rate) DRAM memory.
• Samsung developed new digital TV receiver chip - Samsung Electronics announced developed a new digital TV receiver chip, that enables digital TV receivers to acquire and track signals in harsh environments such as multi-path channel conditions, dynamic conditions with multiple signal variations and where the overall receiving capability is weak.
• Digital Cameras: How Low Can You Go? - For less than $100, you can expect to get a digital camera with very limited features. The lens is likely to be fixed-focus, which means that it tries to keep the entire universe in focus at the same time but can't do justice to any one part of it, resulting in poor-quality (andr potentially grainy or blurry) pictures. Most sub-$100 cameras lack an LCD, too, forcing you to rely on an optical or electronic viewfinder to frame shots.

HARDWARE... 

• NVIDIA adds AGP, PCI-E graphics card variations - NVIDIA has added new AGP and PCI Express graphics products to its lineup. For budget-minded gamers, the GeForce 6600 AGP will face off against the Radeon 9600 XT in the $149-$199 price range. The 6600 AGP carries a core clock of 300MHz and memory clocked between 250 and 275MHz, depending on board manufacturer discretion.  For PCI-E, NVIDIA has introduced the GeForce 6800 LE PCI Express. Cards will be priced between $229 and $279, right between ATI's new Radeon X800 and X800XL. The 6800 LE PCI-E is clocked at 325MHz core and 300MHz memory and comes with a 256-bit memory bus and full SLI support.
• Cinego D-1000 instant theater DLP projector with DVD player - This is an all-in-one, plug and play portabe DLP projection system. It features an integral DVD player, speakers and even a detached subwoofer. This would be ideal if you are just living in an apartment or are even in a dorm room, whatever, you can just whip this puppy out and in minutes, you are watching your movies on the big screen.
• Mesh Elite 560 DVI-Xtreme PC - The core of the Elite 560 DVI-Xtreme is quite easy to guess, as the model name refers to the CPU, a Pentium 4 560 3.6GHz processor. To accompany the processor, Mesh has included a generous complement of RAM - 2GB of Samsung PC4200 533MHz DDR2 memory in a four by 512MB module configuration. The only downside to this is that there are no free memory slots, but 2GB of memory should be good enough for a fair while.
• Corsair XMS Xpert Preview - Hexus.net take a brief look at a sample of the evolution of the XMS line, in the form of the XMS Xpert range. Final speeds and latencies haven't yet been decided for these products but, to be honest, that isn't what makes these memory modules unique...
• EPoX 9NPA+ Ultra Mainboard - EPoX 9NPA+ Ultra is going to be an interesting product due to the chipset used and the efforts of the EPoX engineers invested into its development. Combining a lot of useful features with excellent overclockability, this mainboard is going to make a good buy (we think its price won't be very high).
• Abit v Epox - Socket 939 - Bit-Tech have 2 motherboards sporting AMD's Socket 939. The first, Abit's AV8 3rd Eye, uses Via's K8T800Pro chipset. The second, Epox's 9NDA3+, uses the Nvidia Nforce 3 Ultra. They are pitting these two together to see which works out the better - whilst both Via and Nvidia have announced successors to the chipsets we're working with here, you'll still be hard pressed to actually buy them
• NVIDIA GeForce 6200 - Beyond3D takes a look at NVIDIA's NV43 based (non-TurboCache) GeForce 6200. Another review can be found on Digit-Life,
• XFX GeForce 6600GT PCIe -  In VRZone tests without Anti-Aliasing turned on, the GeForce 6600GT is clearly the fastest card, running every game tested from Doom 3 to Unreal Tournament 2004 faster than the ATI Radeon X700 Pro. However, when Catalyst A.I. is turned on and combined with Anti-Aliasing and Anisotropic Filtering in high resolution gaming tests, the benchmark results flip towards ATI's corner. This happens in every game we tested except for in Doom 3, where the GeForce 6600GT runs .7 FPS faster than the Radeon X700 Pro with AA and AF turned on at 1600x1200x32.
• Sapphire Radeon X850 XT PE - Just to recap briefly, the X850 XT PE, codenamed R480, is a 16 pixel-pipeline and six vertex pipeline VPU, backed up by 256MB of GDDR3 memory. Unlike the recent X800 XL, which has been shrunk to 0.11 Micron process, this part is still based on TSMC 0.13 Micron process. However, experience has enabled ATI and TSMC to optimise the process enabling higher clock speeds to be achieved. The core is running at a new high for ATI of 540MHz, while the memory is up to 590MHz or 1.18GHz effective.
• LG GSA-4163B DVD recorder - LG GSA-4163B DVD is excellent DVD±R/RW/+R9 DL and CD-R recorder, which also support the DVD-RAM format.
• Seagate ST650211USB HDD - The release of this pocket storage device from Seagate into the market offers users a much broader choice of solutions like that, because there haven't been that many of the in the market so far.
• Corsair Flash Voyager USB 2.0 Drive - Corsair has done a good job with the Flash Voyager drives. They are the fastest USB Flash drives I have looked at. The software security feature is nice since it does let you look at both the secure and unsecure partitions at the same time. The rubber covering of the drive provides the drive with a protective cover that keeps the device from damage from water and being banged around.
• Creative SoundBlaster Audigy 4 Pro - 3DVelocity has posted a review of the Creative SoundBlaster Audigy 4 Pro sound card.
• SilenX 400w 0dBA Luxurae PSU - The SilenX website says that this power supply can to operate for 100K Hours @ 25C MTBF (mean time between failures) which basically means the average time before the device fails. The lifespan of this system will be lower in most situations since your temperature is normally going to be higher than 25C. Some features added to protect your system include: Short-Circuit Protection on Outputs, Over Voltage Protection (3.3V/4V 5V/6V 12V/14V), and Over Power Protection (105%~150% of max load). Along with these nice features this power supply uses a passive PFC (Power Factor Control).
• Thermaltake PurePower 680W Power Supply - From my experience, the Thermaltake PurePower 680W seems like a very solid power supply. It offers more than enough connectors, a great finish, colorfully sleeved cables, and plenty of stable power. In addition, it features three +12V rails that provide 38A of power. An SLI system would require a lot of power, and the PurePower 680W might just fit the bill nicely in the right case.  
• ATake Pipe VGA For Dual Heat-Pipe VGA Cooling Kit - BigBruin.Com has posted a review of the ATake Pipe VGA For Dual Heat-Pipe VGA Cooling Kit.
• MSI SW8G 8-Port Gigabit Ethernet Switch - PC Stats has posted a review of a MSI SW8G 8-Port Gigabit Ethernet Switch.
• Altec Lansing MX-5021 speaker system - These speakers are a 2.1 channel, THX certified set of speakers designed for high quality audio listening and even a bit of gaming.
• I-Rocks X-slim Keyboard - Small, clean and generally understated in appearance; this keyboard will look equally at home on a desk in your office or in front of a tricked out gaming system.

GUIDES...

• Understanding audio compression: MP3, WMA, Ogg, and more - A digital copy, however, is not a "curvy line". Instead, it's similar to a bar graph, or "connect the dots" depending on how you choose to display the end result. There is a series of singular points of data, with only certain available values for both. The scale along the bottom follows regular intervals, depending on the sampling rate.
• RAID 0 - good or bad for games? - RAID arrays still has dominance when it comes to professional multimedia applications. It offers *much* faster I/O performance then a stand alone drive. The advent of SATA could be a herald of some technology breakthrough looming in the not-too-distant future. When you add Native Command Queuing into the mix the performance only increases.
• 5 Reasons to Update Windows XP to Service Pack 2 - BigBruin.Com has posted 5 Reasons to Update Windows XP to Service Pack 2.
  Windows XP Tweaking Companion - Version 1.02 Update - The Windows XP Tweaking Companion (XPTC) has been updated to Version 1.02. The changes in this version are minor, mainly improvements in formatting and some minor tweak revisions and clarifications.
• Doom 3 Performance results - OnlyNewZ selected in total 32 different cards, 14 NVIDIA cards and 18 ATI cards. 23 cards are AGP and 9 cards are PCI-Express.
• NVIDIA Forceware Comparison (61.77 - 66.93 - 67.03 - 67.50) - NVIDIA Forceware Comparison (61.77 - 66.93 - 67.03 - 67.50) NVIDIA released some new drivers lately on NVIDIA nZone and ofcourse the latest official 66.93 WHQL drivers. The drivers have new features, performance improvements and ofcourse several bugfixes for games and more. Also a good brief description of known issues associated with the official released drivers is included to inform the users about bugs that could appear with different configurations in certain applications.
• Basic Applied Cryptography - The Tech Zone has posted a guide on Basic Applied Cryptography.

SOFTWARE...

• Windows XP Professional X64 Edition RC1 review - Unfortunately, there is still the lingering matter of driver and software incompatibility issues. Much like there were compatibility issues when moving from 16-bit Windows to 32-bit Windows variants, we will also see some when moving to 64-bit. Microsoft's WoW64 system does an incredible job of letting you run 32-bit software at full speed in a 64-bit environment, but there are still edge case scenarios where 32-bit software won't work off the bat. The 64-bit driver situation is looking pretty good so far, and most platforms will have necessary 64-bit driver support when the OS is released.
• Update for Windows XP (KB890831) - After you install Windows XP SP2 and then try to run MSN Messenger, the input method editor (IME) may not respond or run as expected. Dowload patch.
• Outlook 2003 Junk Email Filter Update - This optional update provides the Junk E-mail Filter in Microsoft Office Outlook 2003 with a more current definition of which e-mail messages should be considered junk e-mail. This update was released in January 2005.
• OpenOffice.org for Windows 2.0 (Snapshot Build 1.9.m69) - OpenOffice.org is the open source project through which Sun Microsystems is releasing the technology for the popular StarOffice productivity suite. It is an international office suite that will run on all major platforms and provide access to all functionality and data through open-component based APIs and an XML-based file format. It establishes the necessary facilities to make this open source technology available to the developer community.
• CorelDRAW Graphics Suite 12 Updates - CorelDRAW Graphics Suite 12 Service Pack 1 (download) || CorelDRAW Graphics Suite 12 Full/Upgrade EPS Fix (Multi-lingual) (download)
• The 46 Best-ever Freeware Utilities (Updated) - There are a lot of great freeware programs out there. Many are as good or even better than their commercial alternatives.
• Win32Whois 0.9.2 - Win32Whois (download) is a small and efficient Whois client. It is able to retrieve domain information for most of the common TLDs (top level domains). It has it is internal list of servers that it connects to in order to provide a detailed report on a requested domain.
• Microsoft Malicious Software Removal Tool - The Microsoft Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool (download) checks Windows XP, Windows 2000, and Windows Server 2003 computers for and helps remove infections by specific, prevalent malicious software - including Blaster, Sasser, and Mydoom. When the detection and removal process is complete, the tool displays a report describing the outcome, including which, if any, malicious software was detected and removed
• HyperSnap-DX 5.62.02 (shw) - HyperSnap-DX 5 (download) is a screen capture and image editing tool for MS Windows. It captures screens from standard desktop programs and even those hard-to-grab DirectX, Direct3D, 3Dfx Voodoo and Glide mode games. HyperSnap-DX 5 can capture frames from many software DVD players and other video playing software
• XP-Antispy 3.93 - XP-AntiSpy (download ~ mirror) is a little utility that let's you disable some built-in update and authetication "features" in WindowsXP. For example, there's a service running in the background wich is called "Automatic Updates". I don't know what this service transfers from my machine to other machines on the internet, especially the MS ones.
• Winamp software updated to v5.08c - According to the changelog this version, 5.08c, fixes a critical security bug (download full ~ lite) so users of Winamp 5 are recommended to upgrade.
• DVD Region+CSS Free 5.62 - This new version now also supports the new type of the Sony ARccOS copy protection which was found on movies like Resident Evil - Apocalypse.
• CloneDVD updated to version 2.6.1.3 - Elby has updated its CloneDVD software to version 2.6.1.3 (download). Besides some sound additions and other improvements brings this new version support for 4.85GB Extreme Extended DVD-R.
• VirtualDub 1.6.3 - VirtualDub (download ~ Intel / AMD64 version) is a video capture and processing program. It features fast capturing, process files larger than the 2 gigabyte limit, optimized for linear editing, support for Motion-JPEG, MPEG-1 video and layer 3 audio, real-time and near-realtime video processing, video job queues, and much more.
• Vstudios Xtreme G 67.65 - This is the Valance Studios Xtreme G driver which includes many performance and Image Quality tweaks. These are modified NVIDIA ForceWare drivers for Windows 2000 & XP
• DNA-Force 1.0.7124 - These are modified NVIDIA ForceWare drivers based on the ForceWare 71.24 release.
• ATITool 0.0.23 - ATITool is an overclocking utility designed for ATI video cards. Design target is to write a light-weight application for the enthusiast - so no questionable registry tweaks.