The answer is pretty simple: at this stage with current drivers and version of the game NVIDIA's GeForce 6800-series is the best thing you can buy for Doom III. ATI's RADEON X800-series also delivers nice performance and astonishing gameplay, but based on the benchmark numbers we have to say that it is much behind the rival. Older-generation hardware will hardly be a good choice for Doom III, however, keep in mind that we tested with "high quality" settings set, while "medium quality" may offer higher performance, but with a bit compromised image quality.

To tell you the truth, even on a rather mainstream machine you are going to experience the game in all its glory. For instance, we tried to run the Doom III on a machine powered by Intel Pentium 2 .40GHz processor, i875P-based mainboard, 1GB of dual-channel PC3200 memory, ATI RADEON X800 PRO graphics card and SB Live! audio card and the game performed astonishingly well with quality settings set to "high" and anisotropic filtering 16x activated from the drivers.

It is interesting to note that some of the graphics cards working at high (but still stock!) frequencies produced artifacts and even BSODs in Doom III. So far we have experienced only one such issue with a top-of-of-the-range contemporary graphics card from a manufacturer that we do not name at this time.

• Microsoft Security Bulletin Re-release, August 2004 - Subsequent to the release of this security bulletin, Microsoft was made aware that the update provided for Windows XP customers running the new version of Windows Update, Windows Update Version 5, did not contain the final release code for the vulnerabilities addressed in the security bulletin. Microsoft has corrected the update and is re-releasing this bulletin to advise of the availability of a revised update available to Windows Update Version 5 customers. Customers who are utilizing Windows Update Version 4, the vast majority of customers, are not affected by this revision.
• Two Americans arrested for DVD piracy in China - Two Americans, including a member of a wealthy New York City family, have been arrested in China, where the authorities said an investigation into their business activities had led to the seizure of more than 210,000 counterfeit motion picture DVDs and nearly $100,000 in cash. Randolph Hobson Guthrie III, 37, and Cody Abram Thrush, 34, were among six people taken into custody on July 1 through a collaborative effort of Chinese and US investigators.
• RFID Hack Could Allow Retail Fraud - A German consultant has released a tool that its creator says will allow modifications of the code stored within RFID tags, theoretically allowing consumers to wreak havoc in future retail deployments. The RFDump software allows a user equipped with an RFID reader, a laptop or PDA, and a power supply to rewrite the data stored in ISO 15693 tags, the most common tags used to host the EPC (Electronic Product Code) information traditionally stored in bar codes
• Federal courts cause 321 Studios to shut down - The maker of several CD and DVD copy programs announced that the legal system has made it impossible to continue.
• Mozilla puts bounty on bugs - A string of high-profile flaws in browser software prompted the Mozilla Foundation to announce on Monday that it would offer $500 for every serious bug found by security researchers.
• School for Hackers - A presentation on how to be the first to exploit new flaws in Web server software was deemed "just as cool for white hats as for black hats" attending the Defcon 12 conference here over the weekend. The session offered new tools, as well as insight into the mindset of the so-called black hat, or malicious hacker, community, said one enthusiastic attendee, who works for a security consulting company that secures Web servers for the financial sector. The two presenters, German security consultants "FX" and Halvar Flake, spoke about taking advantage of new-found holes, known as zero-day Web-based vulnerability exploitation.
  Linux potentially infringes 283 patents - According to this article over at ZDNet, Linux potentially infringes 283 patents, including 27 held by Microsoft but none that have been validated by court judgments, according to a group that sells insurance to protect those using or selling Linux against intellectual-property litigation.
• Windows Server 2003 "R2" release delayed until q1 2006 - According to Bink.nu, the current release Windows 2003 "R2" is set to end of 2005 but more likely be Q1 2006. Why? well same as the Longhorn delay: the developers are occupied with Windows XP sp2 and Windows 2003 sp1.
• Intel develops agile radio chip - Intel has unveiled a chip designed to meet the demands of future radio sets by switching between different networks and frequencies based on availability or local government regulations. The chip maker showed off the 90nm complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) silicon transceiver with an integrated frequency synthesizer last week
• Hard Drives Get Faster, Smarter (NCQ technology) - Part of the latest Serial ATA specification, NCQ requires an NCQ-capable hard drive and either a motherboard or a PCI adapter card with NCQ support. PCWorld tested a preproduction version of Maxtor's NCQ-ready 300GB DiamondMax 10 hard drive with a 16MB cache ($259), using an NCQ-capable reference PCI card from Silicon Image.
• Get Aboard the PCI Express - The most significant new feature in the 915 and 925 chip sets is the PCI Express bus. The old bus worked at 133MB per second, and read and write tasks had to share that bandwidth. In contrast, PCI Express X1 provides dedicated bandwidth for read and write tasks, at 250 MBps each. And the PCI X16 slot, a longer slot for add-in graphics cards, performs at up to 4 GBps--or nearly twice the 8X AGP's 2.1 GBps. This should spur development of more-powerful cards that handle more data and deliver smoother, more-realistic effects for gamers and graphics pros. The new and old buses should coexist for a while, so users won't have to throw out all of their old cards.
• AMD Athlon 64 3000+, Budget Gamer's Perspective - ViperLair take a Athlon 64 3000+, and see how it compares against the A64 3200+ for gamers on a budget.
• Mushkin PC3200 Special Edition Memory review - The Mushkin "Special" series is based on the now extinct Winbond BH-6 memory chip, they offer extremely low timings, when booting up with SPD set they'll select CL2 2-2-5 by default!
• Leadtek NV40 cards, the A400 GT TDH and A400 TDH review - Starting off, the noise levels produced by a card should be low and Leadtek does well in this department claiming under 30dB... With that said, we had excellent luck overclocking the GT to past Ultra speeds- the core went up to 410MHz while the memory overclocked to 1.15GHz. The standard 6800 also did well, but not as well as the GT. We managed to overclock it to 400MHz core and 840MHz memory.
• Sapphire Radeon Toxic X800 Pro VIVO review - GotApex has posted a review of Sapphire Radeon Toxic X800 Pro VIVO.
• X600 XT vs. 5900 PCX : Mid-Range PCI Express Cards Compared - Despite all this, the GeForce PCX 5900 card performs quite well for a mid-range product, thanks to the fairly high-end NV35 graphics architecture which this card is based off of. This card bested the X600 XT PCIe in the majority of our benchmarks, and should be a much better performer in newer titles such as Doom3 compared to ATI's chips. In addition, the card was very overclockable, as we were able to squeeze 15-20% higher performance levels with simple GPU and DDR clock speed boosts through Windows
• Cooling / PSU reviews  - AeroCool Jetmaster Jr Gaming Case | Recycle Your old thru board heatsink | Asetek WaterChill Antarctica KT03A-L30 | Gigabyte 3D Rocket-Pro Cooler PCU22-VG HSF | Silverstone SST-ST30NF PSU | Zalman Reserator 1 | 3R Systems - Poseidon WCL-02 120Cu Liquid Cooler
• Lite-On's new DVD Burners - Burning at 12x and with Dual Layers - The 1213S is a great burner but as you can see when compared to the 8X burn time on the 832S there really isn’t too much of a difference. If you’re looking for a burner now we would recommend looking at the 12X but if you are thinking about upgrading from your current 8X we wouldn’t recommend it as the speed difference really doesn’t warrant the purchase.
• Lian Li CR-03 6-in-1 Card Reader review - The unit itself is very simple yet elegant. It's encased on all sides by brushed aluminum so it looks good even if you choose to leave it out in the open. The front has four slots for the respective cards along with a green LED indicator for each slot. And of course there's the printed Lian Li logo. You can remove the top panel via a pair of screws around back. The internal view is pretty simple: a couple processor chips, card slots, a 5-pin connector and a red LED. I'm guessing the latter is for diagnostics (in case something isn't working), though fortunately I haven't seen it in action.
• AOpen MVP Player review - TrustedReviews have posted a review of the AOpen MVP Player which is a new type of digital video player based around a 2.5in hard drive.
• Lite-On LVW-5005 All-Write DVD Recorder review - DVD recorders continue to gain popularity but not just for computers. DVD recorders are becoming major components in consumers' home theater setups. It's no surprise that many of the big names in consumer electronics, like Panasonic, Pioneer and Toshiba, have released DVD recorders, but some of you might be surprised to see Lite-On enter this fray for your hard-earned cash. Lite-On is a name most of you probably know from inexpensive yet good-performing optical drives, such as CD-RW and DVD-ROM drives.
• VirtualPC 2004 vs VMWare 4.5 - Ars Technica has posted an interesting comparison shootout between Microsoft's VirtualPC 2004 and VMWare Workstation 4.5.
• Windows XP Security Guide 1.3 - The Microsoft Windows XP Security Guide provides several levels of security guidance for customers interested in hardening deployments of Windows XP for desktop and laptop clients in their environment.
• Troubleshooting File and Printer Sharing in Microsoft Windows XP 1.1 - This article describes how to enable file sharing, share folders and printers, connect to shared folders and printers, and troubleshoot common problems with folder and printer sharing.
• A quick tweak guide for DOOM 3 - TechReport has posted a few helpful tweaks for the game: 1) To turn on vsync, hit ctrl-alt-~ to bring down a game console. At the console, type "r_swapinterval 1". Then hit ~ to close the console 2) Disable AA 3) Choose the best settings for your system.
• Doom3 seems to be protected by Macrovision SafeDisc 3.20.022 - Before, people discussed that the game would be SecuROM or even StarForce protected but it seems that Macrovision has won the deal as the pictures show that SafeDisc 3.20.022 is on the disc. Screenshots of two different people can be found here and here.
• How To Run Doom 3 on Windows Server 2003 - Though this tweak has been confirmed for Windows Server 2003, it should work for Windows 98 and Me.
• Catalyst 4.9 brings support for Doom 3 - Computer Base are reporting that ATI will add suport for Doom3 in Catalyst 4.9, which are in an alpha stage and should be out in the middle of September (thanks Warp2Search)
• Copy URL+ 1.1 - The Copy URL+ extension for Firefox and Mozilla makes it possible to copy the current document's address to the clipboard along with additional information such as the document's title, the current selection, or both.
• PlexTools Professional 2.16 -  Plextor has released version 2.16 of Plextools Professional.
• Intel Pro1000 MT 9.0 Final - Intel Network driver v9.0 Final is available.

What we learned today was that NVIDIA's backing of Doom 3 is definitely not unfounded. At press time we weren't able to get a working GeForce 6800 GT or Ultra graphics card running on the AGP bus, but we'll be getting those in later this week. Still, the standard GeForce 6800 was able to run Doom 3 almost as fast as the Radeon X800 XT Platinum Edition, a card almost double its price.

• Is Real's 'hacking' of iPod legal? - Code-crackers risk fines and prison time when they defeat copy-protection technology, but such draconian rules likely don't apply in the case of RealNetworks and its iPod "hack," legal experts said. Efforts by both code-crackers and Real could undermine Apple Computer's plans for its popular digital music player and its iTunes Music Store, which together have put Apple so far ahead of the competition that companies such as Real appear ready to do virtually anything to catch up.
• Hackers plan global game of "capture the flag" - If everything goes as planned, for 72 hours next February hackers from all over the United States will hit targets across the Internet in the largest mass attack to date. But the affected systems won't be corporate Web servers or networks, they'll be computers set up and maintained by other hackers as part of a capture-the-flag game. When the digital dust clears, the team from either the East Coast or the West Coast will be named winner.
• DNS opens networks to data attacks - The security hack essentially uses data transferred by domain name service (DNS) servers to hide additional information in the network communications. DNS servers act as the white pages of the Internet, invisibly transforming easy-to-remember domain names--such as www.cnet.com--into the numerical network addresses used by computers. Moreover, corporate security measures, such as firewalls, tend to ignore DNS data because they assume it's harmless, said Dan Kaminsky, a security researcher for telecommunications firm Avaya and a speaker at the Defcon hacking conference
• Mozilla User Interface Spoofing Vulnerability - A vulnerability has been reported in Mozilla and Mozilla Firefox, allowing malicious websites to spoof the user interface. The problem is that Mozilla and Mozilla Firefox don't restrict websites from including arbitrary, remote XUL (XML User Interface Language) files. This can be exploited to "hijack" most of the user interface (including tool bars, SSL certificate dialogs, address bar and more), thereby controlling almost anything the user sees.
• The File Sharing Experiment - The file sharing experiment is an attempt to catalog some financial figures about how much revenue the industries backing organizations such as the RIAA, MPAA, and SPA have gained by file sharing. The file sharing database consists of a list of items and prices which contributing users have both purchased, and would not have purchased if they hadn't first downloaded/shared identical or related files. The ultimate goal is to show what (if any) significant revenue the RIAA, MPAA, and SPA have to credit to the file sharing community, and hopefully convince some of the organizations supporting them that their money would be better spent taking advantage of this market rather than trying to exterminate it.
• IBM's eFuse technology portends adaptable chips -  IBM Corp. unveiled new chip technology on Friday (July 30) that it said is able to adjust its own functionality and perform trade-offs between performance and power consumption without human intervention. The technology, called "eFuse," is said to combine software algorithms and microscopic electrical fuses to produce chips able to regulate and adapt to their own actions in response to changing conditions and system demands.
• DiVX to move 20 million CE devices by Christmas - If anyone out there thinks that there is room and enthusiasm for film download services like Movielink and CinemaNow, but ones which are properly run and which actually want to grow, they could do worse than take a long hard look at what DiVX is up to. The 100 man start up is on its third round of funding and has already passed into profit and is getting ready for a massive Christmas that could quadruple its revenues overnight. The company has been working for three years towards a scenario when CE manufacturers bundle the DiVX MPEG 4 based-codecs into equipment that is sold in retail. So far it has sold 2 million such devices, but reckons it will sell another 18 million by Christmas. Big jump.
• Intel Preps New “Extreme Edition” Chips for Socket 478, Socket 775 - Apparently, Intel's slightly outdated Socket 478 infrastructure will see a number of fresh high-end processors, something that Intel did not want to introduce initially, such as, Intel Pentium 4 Extreme Edition 3.60GHz, Intel Pentium 4 "Prescott" 3.60GHz and even Intel Pentium 4 "Prescott" 3.80GHz processors. Furthermore, the company will also introduce Celeron D in mPGA478 packaging at up to 3.46GHz speeds in addition to a yet another entry-level Pentium 4 chip with 2.26GHz clock-speed, 533MHz processor system bus and 512KB of cache.
• Suunto's n3 Adds Web Access to Watch Wear - THG takes a look at the Suunto n3 watch, which besides telling time, uses Microsoft's DirectBand technology to wirelessly download news, weather and other information in real time for $9.95 a month. But is the whole package really ready for prime time?
• SimpleTech PC3700 Nitro Dual-Channel Kit review - Adrian's Rojak Pot has just posted a review of the 1GB SimpleTech PC3700 Nitro Dual-Channel Kit.
• Gigabyte CPU coolers review - TrustedReviews have tested a couple of Gigabyte CPU coolers, namely the GH-PCU31-VH 3D Cooler Ultra GT & GH PCU31-SD Cooler Ultra.
• Zalman ZM80D-HP GPU Cooler - The ZM80D-HP expands on Zalman's already excellent design by adding a second heat pipe that connects the front and back plates. The second heat pipe is especially nice, in theory, for cooling newer GPUs that give off more and more heat. The ZM80D-HP also includes heat sinks for the memory on your graphics card. The heat sinks for the memory are built to size so they will definitely fit with the heat pipe installed.
• Microsoft Wireless Optical Mouse review - This mouse is very comfortable and does its job well. For $35 it is a good deal as wireless technology is not that cheap to produce. Personally, I like the feel of the mouse and I dig the smooth-action scroll wheel, though it does take some time to get broken in.
• New Gaming Keyboards: Which Is The Best For You? - Finding the right keyboard is crucial, and THG takes a look at some for you.
• Guite to Upgrading Your PC - PC Review has published a guide with tips on the best value upgrades for your PC, along with suitable recommendations based on current technology and prices.
• Mydoom, Zindos, and Doomjuice Worm Removal Tool (KB836528)  - This tool (download) helps to remove the Mydoom.A, Mydoom.B, Mydoom.E, Mydoom.F, Mydoom.G, Mydoom.J, Mydoom.L, Mydoom.O, Zindos.A, Doomjuice.A, and Doomjuice.B worms from infected systems
• PDF Tweak Utility - This tool Enable/Disable the plug-ins as needed, Turn off all Updates features, Disable the splash screen during program startup, Remove the My eBooks folder created in My Documents, Turn off the advertisements for Adobe products in the upper-right corner of the toolbar, Remove PrintMe and Adobe Reader icons, Disable Browser Integration, Disable confirmation dialog when closing Adobe Reader, Better speed for LAN and Cable connection, Clear Adobe Reader Recent Files History, Restore to original settings at any time.
• AeroBrowser Beta One - AeroBrowser is a free next-generation web browser based on the look of Longhorn. It is small in filesize, completely spyware free, and doesn't track your history. It is based on the IE engine, but future releases will include dual-engine switching capability with both IE and Gecko.
• Google Toolbar 2.0.113 - The Google Toolbar (download winxp/2k ~ win9x/me) increases your ability to find information from anywhere on the web and takes only seconds to install. When the Google Toolbar is installed, it automatically appears along with the Internet Explorer toolbar.
• CCleaner (Crap Cleaner) 1.12.063 - CCleaner (Crap Cleaner) is a freeware system optimisation tool. That removes unused and temporary files from your system - allowing it to run faster, more efficiently and giving you more hard disk space.
• Fresh Diagnose 6.70 - Fresh Diagnose (download) is an utility designed to analyze and benchmark your computer system. It can analyze and benchmark many kinds of hardware, such as CPU performance, hard disk performance, video system information, mainboard information and more.
• Hmonitor 4.1.4.3 - Hmonitor has much more functions than MotherBoard Monitor, for example, including thermocontrol features and COM/PerfMon API support.
• CS Fire Monitor 1.4.4 (free) - CS Fire Monitor (download) is a complete professional monitoring system which reports on a computer's bandwidth, CPU, drives, hardware, IP, memory, netsats, processes, services, software & tasks.
• PowerStrip 3.52 - PowerStrip (download) provides advanced, multi-monitor, programmable hardware support to a wide range of graphics cards - from the venerable Matrox Millennium I to the latest video cards. It supports multiple graphics cards from multiple chipset vendors, simultaneously, under every Windows operating system.
• Systernals PendMoves tool - There are several applications, such as service packs and hotfixes, that must replace a file that's in use and is unable to. Windows therefore provides the MoveFileEx API to rename or delete a file and allows the caller to specify that they want the operation to take place the next time the system boots, before the files are referenced. Session Manager performs this task by reading the registered rename and delete commands from the HKLMSystemCurrentControlSetControlSession ManagerPendingFileRenameOperations value. Pendmoves.exe is able to view these pending operations, Movefile.exe is to use this mechanism yourself.
• A-Tuner 1.9.5.6177 - A-Tuner is a small tool for changing Anti-Aliasing (including all unofficial modes), Anisotropic Filtering, Vsync, MipMap LOD (Level Of Detail) Bias settings on your ATI and Nvidia cards and should work with Nvidia Detonators 23.11 - 61.77 and ATI Catalyst 3.0 - 4.8 for Windows 98/ME/2000/XP.This applet dumps the contents of the pending rename/delete value and also reports an error when the source file is not accessible.
• ATI Tray Tools v1.0.1.358 - ATI Tray Tools is a small utility that can be found in the windows tray which then allows instant access to options and settings. Quite handy and quite a small download.
• Sound Blaster Audigy 2/ZS Drivers 5.12.01.444 - Creative has released an updated Sound Blaster Audigy 2/ZS drivers (EU mirror) for WinXP. (Note: unzip it into a folder and run ctzapxx and it will also work with the Audigy 1)
   

• E-voting critic calls on hackers to expose flaws - Speaking at the Black Hat Security Briefings here, Rebecca Mercuri, a fellow at a Harvard-affiliated research center and a noted e-voting critic, called the current voting process a statistical game of shells, one that e-voting machine makers are playing for profits. To hold voting machine makers to their promises of security, hackers should try to circumvent the systems and reveal their problems, she said. She pointed to a $10,000 reward promised by e-voting proponent Michael Shamos, a computer scientist at Carnegie Mellon University, as additional incentive.
• Deutsche Telekom Passport hole exposes 120,000 - Deutsche Telekom this week was forced to suspend all activities of its Online Business Service Operation Centre (OBSOC), a German version of the Microsoft's Passport system, which enables customers to order and pay for online services and products.
• Off-topic: Countdown to X Prize flights begins - Paul Allen and Burt Rutan hope to see their history-making spacecraft claim the $10 million Ansari X Prize for private spaceflight on the anniversary of the Soviet Union's launching of Sputnik nearly half a century ago. SpaceShipOne, the rocket-plane built by Rutan and funded by Allen, plans to make its first attempt on Sept. 29 and complete a required second trip into space in less than half the two-week minimum. Rutan said they want to make their second attempt on Oct. 4 -- the same date that, in 1957, marked the beginning of the first space race.
• Off-topic: Acne bug's nasty secrets spotted -  The newly completed genome sequence of the acne bacterium Propionibacterium acnes has revealed thousands of genes that give the organism the potential to cause skin disease.
• Off-topic: ATI may sponsor F1 Jordan team - TheInquirer has learned that ATI is talking sponsorship with the famous Jordan team. Interesting industry isn’t it. Ferrari has AMD on its helmets and cars and HP is all over BMW cars while Intel sponsors Toyota.
• Apple blasts RealNetworks' iPod "hacker tactics" - Apple has claimed that RealNetworks has adopted the "tactics and ethics of a hacker" by developing software allowing iPod owners to download music from RealNetwork's RealPlayer Music Store. RealNetwork's Harmony software tool allows music from the RealPlayer Music Store to be transferred to any music player, including Apple iPods.
• Intel delays 4GHz chip until next year - Product plans that the Santa Clara, Calif.-based company released to PC makers on Thursday stated that the 4GHz chip, originally slated for the fourth quarter, won't appear until the first quarter of next year. Company spokesman Howard High said the delay will help ensure that the company can deliver an adequate number of chips when the product is launched.
• Intel short on 3.6GHz chips - Intel's flagship desktop processor, the 3.6GHz Pentium 4 560, is in very short supply, an Intel spokesman confirmed. The chip came out in June, along with the company's latest desktop chipsets, the 915 Express and 925 Express.
• AMD Substitutes Athlon 64 FX-51 with Athlon 64 3600+? - AMD may be preparing a new microprocessor in PGA939 packaging to broaden the lineup of offerings for the emerging infrastructure. The new chip will have 1MB of cache and 1000MHz HyperTransport bus, representing a lower-speed bin of the AMD Athlon 64 FX-53 microprocessor. Mainboard maker ECS has updated the list of supporting chips for latest mainboard based on VIA K8T800 Pro chipset for Socket 939 processors with AMD Athlon 64 3600+ product name. The SKU with 1MB of cache and 1000MHz HT bus has not been announced yet, but a mentioning by a mainboard maker may indicate a short release of the processor.
• Microsoft Demonstrates New Hard Drive Search Tool - Microsoft demonstrated for the first time on Thursday a search engine that looks for information on computer hard drives as well as information on the Web.
• ATI on Shader Model 2.0b  - As Crytek developed the now historical 1.2 patch for the game and included Shader model 3.0 ATI had to do something and get some money into game to convince Crytek to make new patch and include Shader model 2.0b for ATI cards. According to TheInquirer, some things could be made much faster in Shader model 2.0b once it's done and that some effects can be rendered with fewer passes. You can, for example, process four lights with Nvidia Shader model 3.0 while with 2.0b you can do three and with the current Shader model 2.0 just two.
• AMD Sempron review - The Sempron is a completely different animal to the Duron as the Socket-A variety runs at 333MHz bus speed and features 256KB Level 2 cache memory - the same amount as the previous generations of Athlon XP processors. As with all Athlon processors the Level 1 cache is a generous 128KB. The Barton core was given a boost to 512KB to improve the performance when Intel upped the cache memory in the Pentium 4 processors.
• Corsair XMS3200XL Pro Twin-X - Go Corsair go! Corsair makes some of the best memory around, and of course we all know that, but why is it so good?
• XGI Volari V8 Ultra review - 59Hardware.net has posted a review of the XGI Volari V8. This entry-to-mid-level videocard is intended to compete with the likes of ATI's 9600SE.
• SMC Barricade g High-Powered 2.4GHz 54Mbps Wireless Broadband Router with USB Print Server review - The SMC Barricade g SMC2804WBRP-G is reasonably priced and has a good feature mix. Wireless throughput vs. range was very good, with speedy performance even at my worst-case test location.My main concern is with my failure to complete any WAN-LAN router performance tests. This problem could just be due to Qcheck's incompatibility with SPI + NAT firewalls, or it could foretell problems with getting Virtual Servers to work.
• XConnect Power Supply review - According to Ultra, the X-Connect uses the X-Cable technology, and that incorporates 4 points. First the molded cable core and connectors will eliminate loose wires. Second, the technology uses premium tinned-copper braiding sleeve, not just your ordinary tinned-copper braining sleeve! Third, and the most interesting one, the X-Connect power supply has a UV translucent effect, not only will your watercooling fluid, IDE cables and fans glow, so will your cables! Lastly, the technology must have superior strength and flexibility for the life of your system. Ain't that great, it almost sounds like lifetime warranty!
• Razer Viper Optical Mouse review - It will give you the same handling, but with a huge dose of speed and precision. In all types of games and even your every day tasks the Viper performs well above par. Yes, the lack of extra buttons is a stinker, but this mouse for most users may only be used for gaming where extra buttons are not needed as much. The mouse is a little pricey and runs right around the $50 range.
• BTC M993 4D Wireless Ergo Office Mouse review - The BTC M993 is a magnificent mouse that any user would desire. The BTC M993 features an Office button, the ability to recharge and a 800 DPI optical engine. The mouse features everything that any person requires. The mouse is exceptionally great and is recommended to anyone who desires a comfortable mouse and develops computer graphics.
• Logitech diNovo Media Desktop review - Perhaps the biggest draw for the diNovo will be the appeal to the Home Theater PC crowd, where the elegant design and great range make it a perfect match for most users. Whether you are an executive who wants a classy piece of hardware, a home theater fanatic, or an average user that demands quality, you will love the Logitech diNovo.
• Altec Lansing VS3151 Speakers - The VS3151 speakers feature a unique design; a complete overhaul from the rest of the product line by Altec Lansing.
• Batman Begins Trailer - The trailer for the Batman Begins is available on the Warner Brothers website.
• Spybot-S&D v1.3 detections update - This updates the detection rules. Only needed if you do not want to use the update function integrated into Spybot-S&D. (thanks NeoNSX)
• DirectX 9.0c Redistributable for Software Developers - Multilingual - Here's a link to the Redistributable for Software Developers version of direct 9.0c for download instead of the websetup as people will want to keep a full download of it handy (thanks ally russell)
• SlySoft releases CloneCD v5.0, adds DVD read/write functions - SlySoft has released CloneCD 5.0 (download beta) which seems to have been updated with some of the CloneDVD features as the software now fully supports the reading and writing of most DVD formats. (thanks CDFreaks)
• FlashFXP 3.0.0.1015 Final (SHW) - FlashFXP (download) is the most powerful and popular FTP & FXP Client for Microsoft Windows 9x/Me/NT/2000/XP on the market today
• Fraps 2.2.5 - Fraps is a tool that lets you monitor current framerates in a corner of the screen for programs using DirectX or OpenGL technology. It also allows you to easily take screenshots of games, make movies of gameplay, and manually determine the average framerate between two points. This new version adds support for final DirectX 9.0c and fixes slow DX9 video capture with anti-aliased games and nvidia 61.76/61.77 drivers.
• Lame 3.96.1 Stable - LAME is an educational tool (download ~ changelog) to be used for learning about MP3 encoding. The goal of the LAME project is to use the open source model to improve the psycho acoustics, noise shaping and speed of MP3.
• KeyTweak 2.01 - KeyTweak makes use of Microsoft's Scancode Map registry key to remap your keyboard.
• Intel Desktop Control Center 1.2.0060 - Intel Desktop Control Center (download) enables you to perform stress tests to verify system stability and to conduct performance testing to measure the impact of system configuration changes. The easy-to-read system gauges provide feedback so you can observe the effects of various system modifications in real-time.
• ATI Catalyst 4.7 Win98/ME - This unified driver has been further enhanced to provide the highest level of power, performance, and reliability.

• 4,677 Viruses In First Six Months of 2004 - A firm specializing in the development of anti-virus and anti-spam software said Wednesday that 4,677 new viruses were written in the first six months of 2004 -- an increase of 21 percent over the same period last year. The major viruses were Sasser, which had a 26.1 percent share of viruses, and variations of the Netsky virus, said Sophos analyst Graham Cluley.
• Zindows Worm Follows MyDoom's Path - Antivirus companies have issued warnings and software updates for a new Internet worm, dubbed Zindos, that infects machines already compromised by the MyDoom.O worm and attacks Microsoft's Web site. Zindos.A takes advantage of an open back door in Windows machines that contracted the MyDoom.O worm that appeared Monday.
• See What You Share on P2P - A Showcase of Material Found on Peer-to-Peer Networks throughout the World. Here you will find Everything from Raunchy Personal Photos to Confidential Police Reports.
• Green card scam couple jailed - A Florida husband and wife team who made millions from victims through a long-running Green card visa lottery scam have been sent to prison and ordered to pay massive fines. John Romano, 30, of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, was sent to jail for 37 months by US District Judge James Cohn last Friday after pleading guilty to mail fraud offences in connection with the scam. Romano's wife, Hoda M. Nofal, 29, began a six-month sentence in April after pleading guilty to obstruction of mail offences related to the same racket.
• Details of Microsoft antivirus software leak out - Microsoft representatives in the United States refused to comment on functional elements or a potential production time frame for the antivirus package. However, Mirail said the Microsoft antivirus software will utilize two different means of detecting destructive files, the first of which will reference a regularly updated list of known viruses to check for potential infections. The second antivirus tool will analyze computer systems to assess whether they have been hit by a virus in the past and attempt to give end users an idea of how at risk their computers might be for future problems.
• Chinese authorities shut down 700 porn sites - Apparently, 224 "suspects" have been detained since July 16, which was when the porn shutdowns began. However, no further details have been revealed.
• Off-topic: FCC Looks Into Regulating Violence on TV - The FCC is considering getting into the business of regulating violence on television (broadcast and cable/satellite).
• Off-topic: Mystery of solar jets solved - Analysis of high-resolution movies of the Sun has cracked a 125-year-old mystery - what produces jets of matter that spurt upwards from the solar surface at 20 kilometres per second. The jets, called solar spicules, are about 500 kilometres across and reach several thousand kilometres high. They rise from the photosphere, the visible surface of the Sun, into the solar atmosphere. They are also ubiquitous, with some 100,000 active at any one time. Yet, until now, no theory has explained their behavior.
• Nintendo DS Gets Sleeker Final Design - The final design of the system is viewable on Nintendo official site (screenshot) - looks sleeker and far less chunky, but still a bit awkward (thanks Justin Hancock).
• Unholy row erupts over Creative Doom 3 patent - A deal Creative announced with id Software the other day appears to have more to it than meets the eye of the storm that's forming round it. That's according to web site Beyond 3D, Creative already owns the rights to a software patent on the face of it similar to Doom 3 shadowing. That site claims that Creative's behaviour is inexcusable, and it emailed id Software's John Carmack to see what he had to say.
• Glitch hits DirecTV TiVo boxes - The glitch apparently is caused by a software upgrade, version 3.1.0c, that was first downloaded by DirecTV TiVo set top boxes earlier this month, according to postings to a number of TiVo community sites.
• ATI promises Doom 3 performance boost - According to TheInquirer, ATI is doing something about performance on Doom 3 but that it hasn't done anything to its Open GL driver for almost a year now since there were no really significant games last year which used Open GL. The ATI lad confirmed these claims. It's certainly time to do something about it as Doom 3 is close to materialisation and released in just a week. The ATI claims that we could expect some performance boost with a new driver release.
• IEEE 802.11 Wireless LAN Security with Microsoft WinXP 1.1 - Microsoft has posted revision 1.1 of the IEEE 802.11 Wireless LAN Security with Microsoft Windows XP guide.
• ATI Catalyst Tweak Guide - This guide is more than just about how to perform a few advanced tweaks with the Catalysts. Whether you use the official Catalysts or the Omega drivers, this 10-page guide has something for you. It covers the entire driver installation, setup, troubleshooting and tweaking process from start to finish.
• DirectX 9.0c Control Panel - 3Dcenter.de have posted the DirectX 9.0c control panel for Windows 98/ME/2000/XP/2003.
• PHPMaker 2.1 - PHPMaker (download) is an automation tool (for Windows) that can generate a full set of PHP scripts quickly from MySQL database. Using the generated PHP, users can view, edit, search, add and delete records in the database easily on the Web.

• MyDoom opens door for attack on Microsoft - MyDoom.M, a new variant of the prolific worm, came to life Monday and quickly wreaked havoc on Google and other search sites, thanks to a novel method the worm's creator devised to propagate the pest. But security experts said Tuesday that the worm was quickly dying out, with infections peaking a mere 12 hours after the worm was released. MyDoom.M leaves behind significant potential for collateral damage from infected and unrepaired PCs, however. Besides propagating itself, the worm's main purpose apparently was to open a "back door" so that infected PCs could be used to host other malicious programs, according to researchers at security giant Symantec. The first of those parasites, dubbed the Zindos.A worm, was released Tuesday with the intent of crippling Microsoft's main Web site.
• US Navy preps "Gestapo" server removal - The US Navy has a real battle on its hands in the form of a proxy server named Gestapo. Last month, one Edward Campbell - an independent reporter - discovered a proxy server of dubious distinction lurking in the Commander Naval Reserve Recruiting Command (CNRRC) in New Orleans. It seems that the server named "gestapo.cnrrc.nola.navy.mil” has been pinging various websites, including one of a fellow reporter who had been looking into "cyber-stalking of Muslim journalists". And, in fact, there is evidence of the Gestapo server popping up in a number of places.
• Are P2P networks leaking military secrets? - The "See What You Share" site has been online for a week and has published photos ranging from a crashed military jet to a screenshot of a spreadsheet file that appears to include names, addresses and telephone numbers of marines. The site's operator, a 30-year-old named Rick Wallace, wrote in a blog posting that he is trying to help the military understand how serious a security risk unmonitored peer-to-peer file sharing can be. (CNET News.com)
• Hackers attack advertisers - According to the Washington Post, DoubleClick's Internet servers began to receive a flood of bogus Web page requests, creating a bottleneck that blocked many major sites from displaying ad images. This meant that it became harder for users to reach certain pages, such as the Internet's 40 most-visited Web sites.
• Fake e-mails fool users 28 percent of the time, study finds  -Anti-spam firm MailFrontier Inc. showed 1,000 consumers examples of so-called "phishing" e-mail as well as legitimate e-mail from companies such as eBay and PayPal. About 28 percent of the time, the consumers incorrectly identified the phishing messages as legitimate. One very well-distributed PayPal look-alike e-mail, which claimed credit card information needed to be updated, fooled 31 percent of users surveyed, she said.
• Judge blocks sales of unlicensed DVD chips -  California judge has ordered a multimedia chipmaker to stop selling versions of its products that were used in DVD-copying devices. The Motion Picture Association of America said Monday that it had found chips from ESS Technology, based in Fremont, Calif., inside a device that allowed DVDs to be copied. Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Maureen Duffy-Lewis issued an order Friday that blocked the manufacturer from selling its chips to any other device maker producing similar products.
• Off-topic: Researchers seek simpler software debugging - Funded by $1.2 million from the National Science Foundation, Whyline -- short for Workspace for Helping You Link Instructions to Numbers and Events -- is designed for programmers of all kinds, from hard-core professionals to weekend Web designers. Their work is part of a larger, nationwide project -- called End Users Shaping Effective Software, or EUSES -- to make computers friendlier for everyday users by changing everything from how they look to how they act. Ultimately, perhaps, error messages will be easier to understand than "general protection fault" or "fatal exceptions."
• Off-topic: Hitchhiker's Guide Trailer Online - The 2005 Hitchhiker's movie trailer is available in AVI or RealMedia formats. The movie trailer doesn't reveal anything, but looks cool. (thanks Slashdot.org)
• Off-topic: Space images show relentless Bangladeshi floods - Satellite images have revealed the devastating impact of recent flooding in Bangladesh, with two thirds of country submerged in water. Pictures taken by the NASA satellite Aqua on 22 July show water covering areas of Bangladesh and eastern India. Three weeks worth of torrential rain have resulted in the worst flooding that the impoverished nation has seen for 15 years. So far, 400 people have been killed by drowning, collapsing buildings and disease resulting from the floods.
• New S.Korean Cell Phone Lets Parents Track Kids - Parents in South Korea will now be able to track their children by using a device in a new mobile phone that has been designed for kids. SK Telecom Co. began selling Wednesday colorful cell phones with antennas that look like human ears and a built in tracker using the global positioning satellite (GPS) network. The firm, the top mobile operator in a country where three-quarters of the people carry at least one mobile phone, put a price of around $86 on the handset. The phone has four buttons to save phone numbers of key contacts, such as Mom and Dad.
• SlySoft Acquires Licence on CloneDVD - The software producer SlySoft announced that it acquired the licence of CloneDVD 2 which is restricted to distribution via the Internet only. The version sold by SlySoft, is totally identical to the original by Elby and will complete the range of products by SlySoft.
• Motorola-led team unveils technology to link GSM, Wi-Fi - Motorola, Avaya and Proxim have announced network equipment and software they said will allow users to roam seamlessly between GSM and Wi-Fi networks without dropping voice calls.
• Microsoft Delays 64-Bit Windows - Windows XP 64-bit Edition for 64-bit Extended Systems and Windows Server 2003 for 64-bit Extended Systems now will not be available until the first half of 2005, a Microsoft spokesperson has confirmed. The 64-bit Windows XP client was originally due in early 2004 but had already been delayed; the server software was scheduled for late 2004.
• Microsoft prepares SQL Server 2005 for AMD64 - Microsoft has unveiled a beta version of its forthcoming SQL Server 2005 database featuring support for AMD's 64-bit Opteron with Direct Connect Architecture. The company said that running its database on AMD's 64-bit platform would offer customers a cost-effective alternative to enterprise Unix-based systems.
• Does Intel Lindenhurst chipset have DDR-2, PCI Express problems? - According to various sources, Intel's "Lindenhurst" chipset, scheduled for introduction next week, is proving problematical.Lindenhurst, which comes in several varieties and is formally named the E7520, supports the EM64T "Nocona" microprocessor. System integrators and vendors claim that there are problems getting both DDR-2 memory and PCI Express to work with the 800MHz chipset, scheduled for launch on the 1st of August.
• AMD Unveils Low-Cost Processors - AMD based six of the new Sempron desktop chips on the seventh-generation Athlon XP core and one on its eighth-generation technology. The six chips using the seventh-generation core support a 333-MHz frontside bus and include 256KB of Level 2 cache, half the amount of Level 2 cache found on the Athlon XP chips. They range in clock speed from 1.5 GHz to 2 GHz and will carry model number ratings of 2200+ to 2800+. The 2200+ and 2300+ target only emerging markets and will sell for $39 and $45 in quantities of 1000; the remaining chips will ship globally and will sell at prices from $61 to $85 in quantities.
• Motorola E398 GSM900/1800/1900 Triband Phone review - OCWorkbench has posted a review of the Motorola E398 GSM900/1800/1900 Triband phone.
• Sony U-70 review- is that a PC in your pocket? - The Sony comes in two flavors, the U-50 & U-70. There are three differences between the two models which are otherwise identical. The U-50 comes with a Celeron 900 MHZ processor, 256 MB of RAM, and Windows XP Home Edition. The more powerful U-70 comes with a Pentium M processor running at 1 GHZ, 512 MB of RAM, and Windows XP Pro Edition
• HP Compaq nc4010 review - The model on review is the DY883AA but HP offers a wide range of different models with various processors speeds, hard drive sizes and connectivity packages to suit any and all needs. The nc4010 DY883AA is placed towards the top end of the range - with a 1.6GHz Pentium M processor, 512MB of DDR SDRAM and a 40GB hard drive this is a pretty reasonable configuration. There is also a spare memory slot for future upgrades and you can add up to 1GB of additional memory.
• AMD's Socket A Sempron 2800+ and the Socket 754 Sempron 3100+ review - AMD has just released its latest processor line, the AMD Sempron. The Sempron is designed to replace the Duron line of lower-performance, inexpensive processors aimed at home and business desktop users. Available in both Socket A and Socket 754, the Sempron offers good performance for its price, and has good potential for overclocking. Another review can be found at TechReport, HotHardware
• AOpen Aeolus 6800 Ultra DVD256(E) review - To be quite honest, the noise of the Aeolus 6800 Ultra was absolutely dreadful. Sounding like a quartet of Rolls Royce RB211 turbo-fan engines producing the full 60,000lbs of thrust - and that's just in 2D mode - the Aeolus was in real danger of turning my entire street deaf.
• MSI PCX5750-TD128 PCI-E videocard review  - The MSI PCX5750-TD128 is a PCI-Express x16 solution based on the venerable nVidia GeForcePCX 5750 core, and comes with 128MB of standard DDR memory running at 500MHz.
• HIS Excalibur 9550 VIVO review - Even though you may be able to buy that new 6800 or X800 video card, not everyone can afford it or even needs that kind of power. That's why, the ASE Labs has checked out the HIS Excalibur 9550 VIVO video card.
• ATi's Mobile Radeon 9800 review - Admittedly, with its new mobile flagship, which has eight pixel pipelines, four vertex shaders and a 256-bit memory interface, ATI manages to make technology history and once again claim the performance crown. It's also true that with this high-end graphics chip, the 3D performance gap between a desktop PC and a similarly equipped notebook narrows even more than with its predecessor, the MR9700. And yes, when compared to a notebook with the Mobility Radeon 9800, a desktop PC equipped with a mainstream graphics card less than a year old, such as the ATI Radeon 9600XT, clearly ends up with the shorter end of the stick.
• OCZ PowerStream 470W Power Supply - Chad looks at the OCZ PowerStream 470W Power Supply to see if it is worth your hard earned money.
• HD Guard Pro review - HD Guard Pro creates a small “snapshot” of the hard drive, BIOS and your CMOS. The size of that file is just 1.4 MB on a 12 GB hard drive. Your computer works as normal, and you won’t notice anything unusual. However in the background HD Guard works to protect your computer from accidental destruction, abnormal shutdown, Windows blue screen conditions, registry errors, etc.
• RedOctane Ignition DDR Platform review -  This pad is well designed and provides a balance for DDR players. The hard foam insert isn't going to wear-out any time soon and the surface underneath the pad is non-skid so it won't be scrunching up or sliding. And the feel of the pad is unbelievable; it's probably the most conformable pad yet.
• Logitech Quick Cam for Notebooks Pro review  - The Logitech Quick Cam for Notebooks is a good value Camera suitable for the traveller who wants to communicate and have a cam on his/her notebook.
• Build Silent PC Guide (updated) - The "Build a Silent PC" guide has been updated.
• Office System 2003 Service Pack - Microsoft this week made available for download its first Service Pack for Office System 2003 (standalone installer ~ admin installer), which features fresh capabilities to its OneNote and InfoPath applications, along with improvements to overall speed and performance and a collection of previously announced security fixes
• Junk E-mail Filter for Outlook 2003 - 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. By installing it, you help the Junk E-mail Filter provide you with a higher level of protection against junk e-mail. This update was released in July 2004.
• McAfee Stinger 2.3.5 - Stinger is a stand-alone utility used to detect and remove specific viruses. It is not a substitute for full anti-virus protection, but rather a tool to assist administrators and users when dealing with an infected system.
• W32.Mydoom@mm Removal Tool 1.0.9.1 - This tool will Terminate the viral processes; Terminate the viral thread running under Explorer.exe; Delete the files; and Delete the registry values added by the worm.
• BayesIt! 0.5.8 - BayesIt! (download) is the official anti-spam filter for The Bat! email client.
• WinRAR 3.40 Beta 3 - WinRAR (download) is a powerful archive manager. It can backup your data and reduce size of email attachments, decompress RAR, ZIP and other files downloaded from Internet and create new archives in RAR and ZIP file format
• ICQ Lite 4.1 Build #1801 - A new version of ICQ Lite is available for download.
• 1by1 1.45 - 1by1 (including mpglib.dll 0.92 ) is a very small sized player which is not only small: It plays whole directories without any playlist.
• WinAmp 5.04 - Nullsoft Winamp (download full ~ lite ~ pro) is a fast, flexible, high-fidelity media player for Windows. Winamp supports playback of many audio (MP3, OGG, AAC, WAV, MOD, XM, S3M, IT, MIDI, etc) and video types (AVI,ASF,MPEG,NSV), custom appearances called skins (supporting both classic Winamp 1.x/2.x skins and Winamp 3 freeform skins), audio visualization and audio effect plug-ins (including two industry dominating visualization plug-ins), an advanced media library, Internet radio and TV support, CD ripping, and CD burning.
• Macromedia Flash MX 2004 update v7.2 - An update (download) for Flash MX 2004 and Flash MX Professional 2004 is available.
• ATi Radeon Beta Catalyst 4.8 - We really shouldn't call these Catalyst 4.8, it's just a newer build released after the 4.7 release from ATI, station-drivers.com leaked them onto the web. There is no word on performance just yet, however rumors promise nice performance bumps.
• LiteOn SOHR-5238S firmware update - A new firmware for the LiteOn SOHR-5238S ( 52x 32x 52x ) CD-RW is available for download.

• MyDoom variant slams mailboxes, search engines - The new version, variously dubbed MyDoom.M or MyDoom.O, was first detected early Monday morning and quickly went on a tear, flooding many mailboxes with hundreds of messages. It has also slowed Google, Yahoo, AltaVista and Lycos to a crawl, because once it infects a PC, the virus automatically performs Web searches on those search engines. Among other antivirus firms, McAfee explains (more details) one way to remove the virus from an infected computer. You also check this article called "How to Avoid the Latest 'MyDoom' Worm".
• McAfee Names Worst Viruses - Here are McAfee's top ten threats of the year so far: Exploit-MhtRedir.gen (also known as Download.Ject or Scob), VBS/Psyme, Adware-Gator, Adware-180Solutions, Adware-Cydoor, Adware-BetterInet, W32/Netsky.d@MM, W32/Netsky.p@MM, W32/Netsky.q@MM, W32/Mydoom.a@MM
• Junkware 101 - Overclocking HQ have published their latest article which looks at removing spyware, ad-ware, Trojans and hijackers from your PC.
• Newest "Suicide Trojan" Is Arnold's - Sophos reports that the same folks who brought you the Osama Bin Laden "suicide photos" have replaced that hoax with one that supposedly brings you suicide pictures of California Governor and movie strongman Arnold Schwartzenegger. The messages deliver the same Hackarmy Trojan as the Bin Laden messages did.
• Biz: Microsoft's MSN May Not Beat Google - But even with this new focus on searches, Danny Sullivan, the editor of Search Engine Watch, said that Microsoft will have a tough time catching up with Google. "To shift market share, Google has to get bad and they have to get good," he said. "People will not go to Microsoft, even if Microsoft is better than Google -- if Google is good enough."
• Biz: Google searches for $135 per share - Google has finally setup a price range of $108 to $135 for shares of its company. With these high prices Google hopes to make $2.7 billion and $3.3 billion dollars. Eventually you can buy these shares on the NASDAQ exchange under GOOG. Still $108 to $135 is a pretty high price range, and I it's surely not meant for everyone.
• Off-topic: Smart jacket handles mobile calls and MP3s - Semiconductor maker Infineon continued its adventures in wearable computing on Monday by showing off a men's jacket that includes a built-in MP3 player and can link up with a mobile phone over Bluetooth The article was developed in partnership with Rosner, a German clothing manufacturer, and is called the mp3blue. It contains an 'electronic module' which includes the MP3 player, 128MB of memory, a rechargeable battery and a Bluetooth transmitter that lets the user connect to their mobile.
• Off-topic: US nuclear clean-up carries major risks - Over the last 50 years nine reactors at the 1500-square-kilometre site have produced 67 tonnes of plutonium for the US nuclear weapons programme. In 2002 the US Department of Energy (DOE) embarked on a 30-year, $50 billion clean-up, which includes emptying more than 190 million litres of liquid radioactive waste from 177 underground tanks.
• AMD knocks up to 30% off Athlon 64 prices - AMD adjusted its desktop processor pricing today, cutting what it charges for Athlon 64 processor by up to 30.9 per cent while increasing the cost of its Athlon 64 FX chip and some Athlon XP parts to compensate. Gone from AMD's official price list are the XP 2200+ through to the 2700+. The list now shows only the 2800+, 3000+ and 3200+.
• Toshiba, NEC To Release Details of New DVD Format To Rival Blu-ray - The HD DVD format allows the recording of more than eight hours of high-resolution movies on a single ROM disc, using a blue-laser diode and advanced video compression technology, the statement said.
• Longhorn Gets HD-DVD Compatibility - Microsoft announced this morning that Longhorn, the company's next-generation OS, will include support for High Definition DVD (HD-DVD), the video-playback format that's expected to succeed DVD.
• HP Unveils New IPaqs - T-Mobile's product, the IPaq Pocket PC H6315, will cost existing T-Mobile customers $600; a $100 rebate offer will bring the price down to $500 for those who activate a new T-Mobile account. This model uses a Texas Instruments OMAP 1510 processor, and has 64MB of SDRAM and 64MB of Flash read-only memory, with 55MB available for file storage, plus an SD expansion slot. It has a 3.5-inch color screen, and comes with a built-in camera and basic image-editing and organizing software. It also includes a snap-on keyboard for composing messages.
• Seagate Ups Drive Warranties To 5 Years - Seagate have just announced that they are going to standardize on a five year warranty for all of their hard drives, including desktop and notebook units.
• Creative and id Software make loud Doom noise - Creative Technologyand id Software have today announced an agreement, enabling Creative to develop EAX Advanced HD 3D audio for future licences. Additionally, an agreement has been reached allowing for Creative's patented shadowing technique to be used in the Doom 3 engine.
• Tricks up their sleeves - ATI, nVidia and Far Cry 1.2 - In the last few weeks, we've seen a host of sites running tests with the beta 1.2 Far Cry patch, showing the gains to be had from running the Shader Model 3.0 path. But, that's only part of the story, and today we'll be looking at the bigger picture - Namely, how the Far Cry 1.2 patch affects both nVidia and ATIs current hardware. If you though the update was all about nVidia, you'd be very wrong...
• DOOM 3 [H]ardware Guide Coming - id Software and HardOCP will be publishing more benchmark results for Doom 3 throughout the upcoming week. The results, which were accumulated based on 65 hours of testing, will be revealed in their "DOOM 3 [H]ardware Guide - "GF3, TI4600, 5800, 5900, 6800, 680GT, 6800U are all coming this week. As well as 8500, 9600XT, 9800Pro, X800Pro, X800XT."
• AOpen Aeolus 6800 Ultra DVD256 - While the 6800 GT is no-doubt a better value buy, there's still a lot to be said for the full-speed 6800, especially given one or two games titles that are about to rear their awesome-looking heads.
• nVidia 6800LE review - The card is identical to the standard 6800 as far as looks and size are concerned, however, its slightly under-powered. With a little help from Scott Wasson at The Tech Report, we believe that the number of pixel pipelines has been reduced from 12 to 8 although we haven’t received any info from nVidia. The core has also been dropped from 325 to 320 although memory size and speed remain identical to the 6800 - 128MB/350MHz (or 700MHz DDR). We asked for a price indication and were told that the card should be about 30% less than the standard 6800 which would put it at under US$200- a very sweet spot.
• LiteOn SOHW-832S review - Looking at the specs, the 832S will write to DVD+R DL at 2.4-speed, DVD+R/-R at eight-speed. DVD+RW/-RW at four-speed, CD-R at 40-speed and CD-RW at 24-speed. These are pretty healthy specs, and the fast CD burning capability means that there is little need to have more than one optical drive in your system again a big advantage to the small form factor user
• Optimize XP - A Windows XP Optimization Guide v1.6.6 - This guide is not designed to be used in combination with other Windows tweaking guides or other Windows tweaking software. It is also not designed to be used in parts.
• Catalyst 4.7 Driver comparison - Radeonthetop.com have posted their Catalyst 4.7 Driver comparison.
• Windows XP SP2 Pre-RTM Build 2162 download - Last week (the 14th to be precise), Microsoft released Windows XP SP2 build 2162 to beta testers to collect last-minute feedback before Windows XP's biggest update hits RTM sometime in the first half of August. Please note that this is a beta product and does not reflect in any way the final RTM product will be. Use caution if installing on production systems.
• DirectX 9.0c Redistributable - This download provides the DirectX 9.0c end-user multi-languaged redistributable that developers can include with their product. The redistributable license agreement covers the terms under which developers may use the Redistributable. For full details please review the DirectX SDK EULA.txt and DirectX Redist.txt files located in the license directory.
• DVD Shrink 3.2.0.14 - DVD Shrink is software to backup DVD discs. You can use this software in conjunction with DVD burning software of your choice, to make a backup copy of any DVD video disc.
• FFDShow MPEG-4 Video Decoder 20040725 Alpha - FFDSHOW is a DirectShow decoding filter for decompressing DivX, XviD, WMV, MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 movies.
• FarCry Benchmarking Utility v1.2.1 - The HardwareOC FarCry Benchmark is an easy-to-use tool, that makes Far Cry video card benchmarking fast and easy.
• dgVoodoo 1.30 - DgVoodoo is the ONLY Glide wrapper available which allows you to play Glide-based games on any DirectX 7 capable video card, and works for BOTH Windows and DOS games. This allows you to play all-time classics such as Tomb Raider, GTA, Red Baron 3D, UT or Carmaggeddon in Glide mode.
• VIAHyperion 4-in-1 v4.51Pro Beta - This driver has not been officially "released". Test show better performance than the Hyperion 4.51v version driver, on recent VIA chipsets such as KT600, KT880, P4X400, PT800, PT880. This driver contains an IDE performance driver and IDE filter driver. This driver does not pass the Microsoft HCT and has no digital signature. Remeber it's only beta, try only at your own risk.

• Virus Purporting Bin Laden Suicide Hits Web - A virus purporting to show images of Osama Bin Laden's suicide popped up on the Internet on Friday, designed to entice recipients to open a file that unleashes malicious software code, security experts said. The virus was attached to a message that was posted on over 30,000 usenet newsgroups and is not being spread via e-mail, said Web security vendor Sophos.
• Interim Release 1218 Windows Server 2003 SP1 available for beta testers -  FYI, a new build of Windows Server 2003 SP1 has been released to beta testers this evening.
• Windows Server 2003 Security Guide 1.3  - The Windows Server 2003 Security Guide provides guidance to assist in hardening Domain Controllers, Infrastructure servers, File servers, Print servers, IIS servers, IAS servers.Certificate Services, and bastion hosts.
• Off-topic: GPS Coke Can can obtained and X-rayed - Remember the Coke can that's been disrupting Army and government operations all over? The one that's got the cellphone/GPS transponder inside that allows you to collect on a new Chevy SUV? The one you damn near gave yourself diabetes trying to find, not even because of the prize but because, come on, look at it! Yeah, that one. Well, lucky lucky, someone got their hands on one and had it dissected and exposéd via X-ray. They were even thoughtful enough to compare it side-by-side with an improvised explosive device (IED), which is what everyone was so concerned about (just not us). (thanks Slashdot)
• Off-topic: ET first contact "within 20 years" - If intelligent life exists elsewhere in our galaxy, advances in computer processing power and radio telescope technology will ensure we detect their transmissions within two decades. That is the bold prediction from a leading light at the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence Institute in Mountain View, California.
• Off-topic: Bright idea: LEDs poised to replace light bulbs - A recent advance in light-emitting diodes may illuminate the path to replacing light bulbs with LEDs within the next five years, according to researchers. Fred Schubert, a professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (Troy, N.Y.), claims to have invented a 99-percent efficient reflector that promises to speed the replacement of light bulbs with LEDs. "Until now, all lighting systems, especially incandescent bulbs, generated more heat than light. But our 99-percent efficient reflectors for LEDs makes them the first candidate for light-bulb replacement that generates more light than heat," said Schubert.
• Off-topic: Army rations rehydrated by urine - Would you eat food cooked in your own urine? Food scientists working for the US military have developed a dried food ration that troops can hydrate by adding the filthiest of muddy swamp water or even peeing on it. The ration comes in a pouch containing a filter that removes 99.9 per cent of bacteria and most toxic chemicals from the water used to rehydrate it, according to the Combat Feeding Directorate, part of the US Army Soldier Systems Center in Natick, Massachusetts.
• Off-topic: Halo 2 Theatrical Trailer -check it  out.
• Playstation chipping mod banned in the UK- A British court has upheld a plea by Sony to ban the sale of modified Playstation 2 chips. That, according to the BBC, follows Sony bringing a case to the High Court using the European Union's directive on copyright, which faced a great deal of opposition before it was issued last year. The report said that David Ball, who sold Messiah mod chips for the Playstation 2, has been banned from selling mod chips. The ruling means that using them, selling them or advertising their sale here is also illegal.
• Microsoft needs 7,000 resumes - Microsoft expects to hire roughly 6,000 to 7,000 workers over the next 12 months, the company said Friday, though it is unclear how many of those hires will be filling new posts.
• MP3 creator returns with 3D sound - Karlheinz Brandenburg, director of the Fraunhofer Institute for Media Technology, along with a team of co-developers, is in Los Angeles this week showing off his new "Iosono" technology to representatives of Hollywood studios and giants including Disney. Brandenburg is credited with much of the work leading to the MP3 format, also developed at Fraunhofer. He and his team are touting their new product as true "three dimensional" audio, which can give the impression of, for example, a horse galloping through the center aisle of a movie theater, or pinpoint a noise so that it sounds exactly like a person shouting from outside theater walls.
• How many dead LCD pixels are OK on a screen? - In fact, there is an ISO specification which covers this particular problem. The ISO 13406-2 standard deals with this problem, and classifies pixel faults as Types One , Two, and Three, as well as fault clusters. Type One is a pixel in a stuck high state, Type Two a pixel in a stuck low state, Type Three is when a pixel or subpixel is abnormal for another reason, and a fault cluster is two or more pixels or subpixels with faults within a five by five pixel block.
• Seagate and Maxtor post losses - It seems that hard drive companies are falling on hard times. On Tuesday, Seagate announced a net loss of $33 million for Q2 2004. On Wednesday, Maxtor reported a similar loss in the amount of $26.1 million for the same time period.
• Intel to bundle ATI-based VGA cards with 915/925 motherboards - Intel and ATI Technologies plan a co-marketing initiative called "Driving Change," which will target the channel and bundle ATI own-brand add-in-board (AIB) clients with Intel own-brand motherboards, according to sources at Taiwanese motherboards makers. The plan, which will kick off on August 2 in North America and Europe, will offer channel distributors discounts of US$20 or US$30, depending on the motherboard models. A discount of US$30 is being offered for an ATI Radeon X600-based graphics card bundled with an Intel BOXD925XCV, BOXD925XBC or BOXD915PBLL motherboard. An ATI Radeon X300-based graphics card bundled with an Intel BOXD915PCYL, BOXD915PCY or BOXD915GAGL board will be US$20 less than the list price, the sources added.
• Sapphire releases the TOXIC X800 PRO VIVO - Developed for the enthusiast, Sapphire believes in empowering our family of hardcore tweak addicts by including a built-in calculated performance enhancements with the inclusion of the A.P.E. , TMR and Lethal Cooling technologies . The Automated Performance Enhancement (A.P.E.) allows for the optional increase of memory clock speed to pre-tested levels while maintaining the hardware's health.
• HP offers up Compaq X gaming PC - HP will offer two different Compaq X variants based on specific Intel and AMD processor platforms. The Intel-based GX5000T series features an ASUS P4C800-E motherboard, and there are four Intel Pentium 4 processor options ranging in speed from 2.8GHz to 3.4GHz. The AMD-based GX5000Z series features an MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum motherboard; processor options include the AMD Athlon 64 3500+ and 3800+ as well as the AMD Athlon 64 FX-53.
• An All-Around Athlon 64 System for $1,500 - ExtremeTech has posted an article about building an Athlon 64 system for $1,500.
• TR's CPU decoder ring - The following chart lists a large number of processors, and gives you just about all the pertinent details of each one. Wondering exactly what the differences are between the two types of Athlon XP 3000+, or what the heck a Pentium 4 550 is?
• ASUS P5AD2 Premium i925X Motherboard - Based on the Intel i925X chipset, this motherboard is so feature-packed that ASUS is actually marketing it as a motherboard suitable for entry-level servers and workstations! But will this bold stab at both the workstation/server market as well as the hardware enthusiast work? Let's find out.
• Socket 939 Roundup - Based on top performance, the full implementation of the nForce3 Ultra features, value, overclocking performance, and flexibility, the MSI K8N Neo2 emerges from a class of top Socket 939 Athlon 64 boards.
• ABIT AV8 (Socket 939) - It looks like ABIT tried to cut costs this time around, cutting a few corners here and there but ending up with a good motherboard at the end. It's not the best all around Socket 939 motherboard out on the market, but is cost effective and a great overclocker.
• Cheap PCI-Express cards roundup - Digit-Life compared Gigabyte GV-RX60X128V, MSI RX600XT-TD128 based on ATI RADEON X600XT and Gigabyte GV-NX57128D, MSI PCX5750-TD128, Leadtek WinFast PX360 TD based on NVIDIA GeForce PCX5750. The characteristics themselves make it clear that these cards are of the middle level in the price range within 110-160 USD.
• HIS' X800 IceQIIs Cometh - THG benchmarks the Excalibur Pro IceQ II VIVO and XT PE IceQ II VIVO to gauge how well the vendor harnesses the X800's power.
• RAID 5 Scaling Tests With Up To Eight Drives - Costs are no doubt an important factor for SATA storage. THG tested several configurations using up to eight drives from RAIDCore, Raptor and Western Digital to determine the best price/performance ratio. 
• Toshiba SD-R5272 8x DVD±RW review - The drive had no problems reading pressed and CD-R media at 40x, but slowed to 24x when reading CD-RW discs. Toshiba's new drive also reached a maximum DAE speed of 24x. This is pretty slow considering most of the 8x DVD writers we've looked at have been able to rip audio CD's at 32x or faster. As a writer, the SD-R5272 performed reasonably well. With its 32x CD-R and 16x CD-RW writing speeds it wasn't as fast as some of the other drives we've tested, but its writing quality was very good.
• Windows XP Service Pack 2: Install With Care - The real surprise with Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2 isn't potential compatibility issues, but the mayhem that can occur when SP2 is downloaded onto a system. CRN Test Center engineers evaluated a release candidate two (RC2) version of SP2, and upon completion of the install on three out of five systems, the machines blue-screened. A message stated that "winserv" was missing. The blue screen occurred on both Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) and Intel platforms, and all systems were running Windows XP Pro with Service Pack 1 installed. Every possible avenue to get back into Windows failed.
• CATALYST 4.7 has an issue with 3DMark03 - DriverHeaven is reporting that ATI has withdrawn its latest CATALYST 4.7 driver from Futuremark certification because of a documented display corruption problem with 3DMark03.
• Kerio MailServer 6 released - Kerio MailServer 6 introduces integration with Outlook allowing for shared calendars, contacts and tasks. New Kerio WebMail features drag-and-drop, right-click menus and keyboard shortcuts. (thanks Shaitan's Blog)
• FarCry Benchmark v1.1 - The HardwareOC FarCry Benchmark is an easy-to-use tool, that makes video card benchmarking fast and easy. You can select different resolutions, rendering engines, detail levels and much much more by one click.
• Siriel4 game engine 0.9 - Siriel4 is game engine for adventure, arcade, maze like games. The main goal of this engine is to provide tools and scripts for easy game creation. Game creators only write the necessary scenario descriptions for the game in a scripting language (such as Lua) and do not have to care about such low-level details as animation loading, etc
• MultiRes 1.47 - MultiRes 1.47 is a small, free, 32-bit alternative to QuickRes, with refresh rate and multi-monitor support for up to nine display devices under Windows 9x/Me and Windows NT/2000/XP.
• Lookout V1.2  - Lookout is lightning-fast search for your email, files, and desktop integrated with Microsoft Outlook. Built on top of a powerful search engine, Lookout is the only personal search engine that can search all of your email from directly within Outlook - in seconds...
• GNOME 2.7.4 - The GNOME project (download) provides two things: The GNOME Linux desktop environment, an intuitive and attractive desktop for end-users, users, and the GNOME development platform, an extensive framework for building applications that integrate into the rest of the desktop
• The Bat! 2.12.03 (SHW) - The Bat is powerful email client with a friendly, neat interface.
• nLite v0.98.4 - Mainly, it's a little bit of a slipstreamer, customizer, reducer and iso creator all in one package. Works for every version of Windows XP installation, so far tested up to slipsteamed SP2 build 2162. To avoid confusion, this is for pre-installation, not like XPlite which is post installation customizer. This version still could be buggy, if you encounter any critical errors please report it and use 0.97, it's quite stable.
• Hyper-Threading Technology Test Utility - If  the Hyper-Threading Technology Test Utility has returned a non-passing result for the tested desktop or notebook system, this area will provide guidance in understanding the results and steps to resolve potential system issues.
• Tray Helper 4.3 - Tray Helper is free application with many features (f/e: email checker, auto mail responder, anti-spam, popup-killer, event reminder and more).
• HyperSnap-DX 5.60.02 (SHW) - HyperSnap-DX (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, 3dfx, Voodoo and Glide mode games.
• Fresh Download 7.10 - Fresh Download (download) is an easy-to-use and very fast download manager software that turbo charges downloading files from the Internet, such as your favorite software, mp3 files, video files, picture collections, etc. Unlike any other similar utilities, this software is 100% free, no charges, no banners in the software, no spyware.
• Foobar2000 v0.8.3 - Foobar2000 (download) is an advanced audio player for the Windows platform. Some of the basic features include ReplayGain support, low memory footprint and native support for several popular audio formats.
• SpeedFan 4.14 - 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. SpeedFan can even change the FSB on some motherboards.
• Nvidia ForceWare 62.20 Beta - This time again, and props to them, Neowin.net was able to grab and leak ForceWare drivers, this is build 62.20 for Windows 2000 & XP. The files are dated 07/15/2004 and will work with the entire range of Nvidia graphics cards.These fully support and NVIDIA graphics card and bare in mind they are not WHQL qualified so please be careful. Mirror: Guru3D.
• LG 4040B firmware A304 - This new firmware supports 4X speed for LG DVD-R 8X Media and improves the readability for 8cm DVD-R/RW media
• Lite-On CD-RW firmware - LiteOn have released a new DVD Dual and CD-RW firmware updates for  Lite-On SOHW-1213S, Lite-On SOHW-832S, Lite-On SOHW-812S, Lite-On SOHW-832SX, Lite-On SOHW-812SX and  Lite-On SOHR-5238S.

• BT blocks 20,000 attempts a day to access child porn - Thousands of people are being stopped from accessing hardcore child pornography on the internet every day because of a new filtering system. British Telecom, which introduced the technology, said it was blocking more than 20,000 attempts to download paedophile websites each day.
• DVD Pacific - Stolen Card Numbers? - A number of DVD Pacific users in Australia have recently (in the last week and a half) had fraudulent charges appear on their credit cards. Has anyone here had a similar experience? (thanks Tero Koiranen)
• National Hi-Tech Crime Unit smashes online extortion racket - The UK's National Hi-Tech Crime Unit has worked with Russian authorities to smash a racket responsible for extorting thousands of pounds from online sport bookies. Three men were arrested in St Petersburg and south west Russia on Tuesday following months of collaboration between the NHTCU and Russia's Ministry of Internal Affairs computer crimes department. Bookies have been hit with denial of service (DOS) since October 2003, with cyber criminals bringing web sites down by bombarding servers with thousands of messages in a bid to extort money from them.
• Cell phone glitch throws off GPS - Satellite-tracking features on some Motorola cell phones haven't been working for the last few days, and some people believe the culprit is a Y2K-like software bug.  Nextel Communications and Motorola said they are aware of what they describe as a "software issue" that affects the assisted global positioning satellite location services inside possibly hundreds of thousands of Motorola phones. A-GPS (Assisted Global Positioning System), as it's known, determines a location using a combination of software on the phone and information from satellites and the cell phone network.
• Hotmail Storage upgrade - 2GB For Free & Pop3 Access - Microsoft have begun increasing free users accounts to 250MB storage and their paid subscribers to 2GB of storage. It appears you can get 2GB of space free by registering an @msn.com email address. MSN Premium accounts with @msn.com .NET Passport can use the following server: POP3: pop3.email.msn.com, SMTP: smtp.email.msn.com.
• Autumn's the time for 512MB graphics - An Nvidia and ATI Autumn refresh will bring you 512MB of memory and we remember that ATI actually said something about delivering 512MB cards by the end of this year.
• Prices of 19-inch LCD monitor panels to drop more than US$20 - Prices of 19-inch LCD monitor panels are expected to drop by more than US$20 next month, according to Taiwan-based LCD monitor maker Amtran Technology. Currently, 19-inch LCD monitor panels range in price from US$340 to US$370.
• Toshiba to Introduce Quick-Start Multimedia Laptop - Japan's Toshiba Corp. is launching its first multimedia laptop with a much clearer display and quick-start video and TV functions to carve out a position in the promising field, a company official said on Wednesday. With the "Qosmio" line to be unveiled on Thursday, Toshiba seeks to benefit from expected growth in demand for multimedia computers that can play and digitally record TV programs, DVDs and other video and audio materials from the Internet.  The laptop will have a 15-inch LCD screen that is brighter and clearer than other LCD televisions, said Oscar Koenders, Toshiba's head of marketing of computer systems in Europe.
• Intel's 90nm Pentium M 755 review - AnandTech takes an in-depth look at Dothan's latest incarnation, the Pentium M 755.
• Gainward CoolFX 6800 Ultra / Connect3D X800XTPE review - The card is very expensive, water-cooling tends to be though so this is of no surprise to us and to be honest it’s not really a concern. Some people may say “I’m not paying L600 for a graphics card” but your not, your paying for the card and a water-cooling setup which can be further updated to include CPU cooling (Gainward also sell the CoolPC kit). If you were to buy a standard
  6800U and a decent water-cooling kit you’d be looking at a similar price, not guaranteed 450 mhz/1200mhz and you’d have to do all the hard work of removing/attaching the components yourself. For these reasons the Gainward CoolFX 2600 Ultra/ Golden sample is excellent both in performance and value. Another review can be found on TGH.
• BFG GeForce 6800 GT OC review - BFG has come to the 6800 GT party with an excellent card that does everything it should and a whole lot more. I've owned many, many gaming cards in my computing life - from a 3dfx Voodoo Banshee to this 6800 GT. My personal favorite has been a Visiontek GeForce3, until now. The BFG 6800 GT OC has taken my gaming experience and kicked it up several orders of magnitude, affording me performance, compatibility, stability and image quality beyond my wildest expectations.
• ATI Radeon X600 XT review - The Radeon X600 XT's downside comes into play when Anti-Aliasing and Anisotropic Filtering are enabled. Like almost all mainstream level cards before it, the Radeon X600 XT has trouble scaling well with AA and AF enabled at high resolutions. With the Radeon X600 XT priced at just over $200, the card's main competition will be from NVIDIA based GeForce FX 5750 cards, which are priced around the $185 mark
• Samsung’s 243T 24 Inch LCD Display - The 243T is an impressive model, but at around $2,500 a pop, these screens are well out of the budget range of most users. Still, it’s a fun product for us to dream about one day having on our desks.
• AirPort Express - Looking rather like a PowerBook AC adapter, the AirPort Express is a multipurpose device that can act as an 802.11b/g wireless access point, serve as a bridge to extend the range of your AirPort Extreme or Linksys WRT54G (more on that later), stream music from iTunes to a home stereo system, and finally, share a single USB printer via 802.11b/g. All this for US$129.
• Cuttermaran 1.58 - Cuttermaran is a cut program for MPEG1 or MPEG2 video streams. The streams can be cut without recalculation. The asynchronous between audio and video will be minimized.
• SpeedswitchXP 1.4 - SpeedswitchXP is a small applet that sits in the system tray and allows dynamic switching of the frequencies of mobile Intel and mobile AMD CPUs under Windows XP.
• RightMark 3DSound 1.20 - A new version of RightMark 3DSound is available for download. What's new: functionality was considerably extended: all main features of ЕАХ4 Advanced HD were added - Environment filtering (Obstruction, Occlusion, Exclusion), Environment Reflections, Environment Panning, Multi-environments, Environment Morfing...
• Zoom Player 4.01 RC2 - Zoom Player Standard (download), a flexible feature rich Media Player that for all its features and goodness remains bloat-free.
• NEC ND-2510A firmware 2.06 - This firmware should continue the pattern from 2.05 of bitsetting to DVD-ROM for +R DL discs by default.

• Credit risk for customers after firm's PCs stolen - Intuit, a provider of financial software and services, is warning 47,000 customers that their credit-card data may be at risk after computers were stolen from a company office. According to a letter sent to customers last week and a notice recently posted on Intuit's Web site, the theft happened in early June at the Omaha, Nebraska, office of ItsDeductible, a software maker acquired by Intuit last year to be part of its TurboTax tax preparation business. Thieves broke into the office during the weekend of 11 June, according to the notice, and took several items, including a PC with password-protected customer data. Inuit spokeswoman Julie Miller said the records on the PC contain personal data, including credit-card details, for about 47,000 customers who purchased ItsDeductible products between December 2002 and November 2003.
• The new face of cybercrime - Most spammers do not intend to sell. All they want is to "phish" your credit card number. Messages now zip around the Internet purporting to come from trusted companies and asking you to "verify your account." The victim is taken to a Web site that looks genuine but is run by a fraud ring. Besides the direct loss from the stolen card numbers, this fraud damages confidence in Internet security.  This is the new face of cybercrime. Whereas hacker vandals once coveted bragging rights, professional hackers have profit in mind. What's more, they are considerably more determined and have better resources than vandals. A new approach is necessary, and we must unlearn some of the lessons drawn from hacker vandalism.
• Filipino phone phreakers foiled - A gang of eight suspected of ripping off the Philippines' main phone company and its customers of millions over the last six years have been arrested by local authorities. The Manila-based syndicate allegedly exploited security loopholes to obtain free access to telephone calls at the expense of customers of the Philippine Long Distant Telephone (PLDT). The process - known as phone phreaking - involves electronic manipulating phone systems, normally by sending additional control codes down phone lines. The gang is accused of reselling this free access for illicit gain.
• Opera: Multiple spoofing vulnerabilities - Opera fails to remove illegal characters from an URI of a link and to check that the target frame of a link belongs to the same website as the link. Opera also updates the address bar before loading a page. Additionally, Opera contains a certificate verification problem.
• Unreal Tournament 2003/2004: Buffer overflow in "secure"  - The Unreal-based game servers support a specific type of query called 'secure'. Part of the Gamespy protocol, this query is used to ask if the game server is able to calculate an exact response using a provided  string. Luigi Auriemma found that sending a long 'secure' query triggers a buffer overflow in the game server.
• Off-topic: Speaker system lets flowers sing - An audio technology that turns plants and flowers into loudspeakers has been developed in Japan, although some experts remain sceptical about the idea. The speaker system, designed by Let's Corporation, a technology firm based in Okayama, southern Japan, mimics the way conventional audio speakers work. But it uses flowers instead of the conventionally used cone made of paper, plastic or metal, to generate sound waves. Flowers are inserted into an acrylic tube containing a magnetic coil and an oscillating component. Applying an alternating electrical current causes the tube, and the flowers, to vibrate at high speed, producing audible sound.
• Microsoft Expands Access to Windows Source Code - The Redmond, Wash., company said on Monday that all the MVPs within the Microsoft platforms community and living within the 27 eligible countries worldwide will now be able to access Windows source code at no cost.
• Verbatim 16x DVD+R media in September - Verbatim is working closely with the verification authorities and expects to begin manufacturing certified 1-16X DVD+R media shortly after specifications are released later this month. Sample 16X media has already been provided to five of the leading burner manufacturers that are tuning their drives to Verbatim's high-performance media.
• No 60GB iPod - official - There is no 60GB iPod in the pipeline, Apple vice president of hardware product marketing Greg Joswiak has confirmed.
• Intel Unveils Power-Saving Processors - The three new Pentium M chips are all based on the Dothan core, Intel's code name for the processing engine behind its 90-nanometer Pentium M processors. These chips have twice the Level 2 cache of their Banias predecessors, with 2MB of storage as well as faster 400-MHz front-side bus. Intel's new processor numbering system applies to the new chips. The Pentium M Low Voltage 738 processor runs at 1.4 GHz, the Pentium M Ultra Low Voltage 733 runs at 1.1 GHz, and the Pentium M Ultra Low Voltage 723 chip runs at 1 GHz. The new chips cost $284, $262, and $241, respectively, in quantities of 1000 units.
• AMD Sempron specifications revealed - The Sempron's front side bus will have a 25 percent increase as compared to the lower end Athlon XP processors that operate at 133 front side bus.
• Samsung SGH-E100 review - The SGH-E100 is pretty bog-standard under the hood. Dual band 900 / 1800 MHz GSM and GPRS Class 10 are coupled with IR to take care of connectivity. The two LCD screens, one monochrome 96 x 64 and one 16-bit TFT running at 160 x 128, are admittedly excellent. Each is adjustable for contrast or brightness, neither of which seemed to impact battery life, which gave a modest 3 days of average use in comparison to the 9 days claimed by Samsung. Thankfully, the AC adaptor is small enough to take it with you anywhere.
• PNY Verto GeForce 6800GT 256MB review - When you get right down to it, the PNY Verto GeForce 6800GT is an excellent card, considering you can get up to 6800 Ultra performance. It plays all of my games at the highest image quality without breaking a sweat, and leaves room to breath in. I’m especially excited that when games come out with Pixel Shader 3.0 support, the 6800GT will be able to let you enjoy the benefits, mostly performance-wise, as the upcoming v1.2 patch for Far Cry indicates. Another review can be found at EliteBastards.
• Leadtek WinFast A400GT TDH (GeForce 6800 GT) - The Leadtek WinFast A400GT THD is another great package from Leadtek. The card's performance puts it in a heated battle with the X800 PRO. With Doom III now Gold, we are waiting for its arrival to test the A400GT THD on a game I have been waiting for since I saw the preview back when GeForce3 just came out. It is clear that the new generation video cards need a new generation of games.
• Albatron FX5700P Turbo and Gainward Ultra/980 SilentFX Professional -  The memory clock at 500MHz gives you a slightly underwhelming 8GB/sec of GPU-to-memory bandwidth. Albatron aren't interested in following the basic specs too much though. So while they keep the core clock at 425MHz, the memory runs at 650MHz on the P Turbo, for 10.4GB/sec or a full 30% increase over basic spec.
• Twenty One Hard Disk Drive with 160GB Storage Capacity - X-bit Labs take a closer look at the performance and features of 21 hard disk drives from such well-known storage device manufacturers as Western Digital, Samsung, Seagate, Maxtor and Hitachi. They recommend purchasing the Maxtor drives for work with streaming video/audio content, the Hitachi and Western Digital drives for work with common Windows applications. Samsung's devices can be characterized as "universal" - they don't seem to have any obvious weaknesses.
• Toshiba SD-R5272 8x DVD±RW review - One of the best things about Toshiba's new writer is its price. The SD-R5272 is one of the more affordable 8x DVD±RW drives currently available.
• Plextor PX-712UF review - Overclockers Online have posted a review of Plextor PX-712UF. "What I can say is that this drive is very sweet. If you already have the 708UF, then don't upgrade quite so fast. However, if you're in the market for a very fast external drive, then this may be it. With the 8MB Buffer, you don't need to worry about creating a coaster while running all your favorite applications" They also have posted a review of Plextor ConvertX PX-AV100U. The PX-AV100U is the entry ConvertX model and the article aims to provide you with an idea of how well this device performs in converting analog sources to various digital video formats.
• HP Compaq nx9110 review - Getting down to brass tacks, what you get for your money is an Intel P4 3.2GHz CPU with 512MB of DDR333 RAM, a 60GB 4,200rpm HDD and a DVD writer. The DVD writer will burn DVD+R discs at four-speed, DVD+RW media at 2.4-speed, write CD-Rs at 16-speed and burn CD-RWs at 10-speed. On the video side the screen is a stunning 15.4in widescreen display capable of a 1,280 x 800 resolution, fuelled by an ATI Radeon Mobility 9000 graphics chipset. Audio is also well catered for courtesy of HP’s JBL Pro integrated speakers ­ the overall effect is excellent.
• Far Cry Benchmark v1.1 - The HardwareOC's Far Cry Benchmark is an easy-to-use tool, that makes video card benchmarking fast and easy.
• Public folder RSS Feed Event sink - Glen Scales created an Event sink for public folders so when a new mail or post arrives into that folder it will fire a script that updates a feed with the last 7 days of posts.
• Opera v7.53 (b3850) final - Opera (Win32 w/o Java ~ Win32Java ~ Linux) introduces the looks and the performance of an exceptional Web browser. Opera's user interface has received a major overhaul with the new start-up dialog, and new default buttons, skin and panels in a blue and white color scheme that can be changed back to classic Opera look or another design. At start-up you can select a single or multiple document interface (SDI/MDI).
• Codec Pack All in 1 6.0.1.7 - This package contains all you need to see DivX movies: DivX, XviD, AC3.
• Fraps 2.2.4 - Fraps (download) is designed as a generic tool for DirectX and OpenGL games. In its current form Fraps performs many tasks and can best be described as: Benchmarking Software, Screen Capture Software and Realtime Video Capture Software. This new version adds preliminary DirectX 9.0c support, improves Fraps graphics for systems using large size DPI setting and fixes keyboard response delay encountered by some users.
• YMPEG 1.2 - YMPEG (download) offers you the most simplest way to encode or convert your favorite videos. YMPEG is a first Freeware MPEG Codec which can integrate itself with Windows and offers seamless encoding from your favorite application (VFW).
• nLite v0.98 Beta - Mainly, it's a little bit of a slipstreamer, customizer, reducer and iso creator all in one package. Works for every version of Windows XP installation, so far tested up to slipsteamed SP2 build 2162. To avoid confusion, this is for pre-installation, not like XPlite which is post installation customizer. This version (changelog) still could be buggy, if you encounter any critical errors please report it and use 0.97, it's quite stable.
• Intel Processor Frequency ID Utility 7.1 - This version of the Intel Processor Frequency ID Utility has been updated to support the new Intel Xeon Processor, Pentium 4 processors, Mobile Intel Pentium 4 processors, Pentium III processors, Mobile Pentium III processors with Intel SpeedStep technology, Pentium III Xeon processors and Intel Celeron processors with 66, 100, 133, 400, 533 , and 800 MHz system memory bus products, as well as adding new processor identification functionality (CPUID).
• ATI Radeon DNA-DRIVERS 2.7.4.7 - These are modified/hacked ATI Catalyst drivers (based on the official CATALYST 4.7). The drivers have been optimized with two things in mind, better Image Quality and more/stable frames per second when compared to the official Catalyst drivers from ATI - download.

• 1st pocket PC worm asks if you want to infect - Duts is a 1520 bytes long program, hand written in assembly for the ARM processor. When an infected file is executed the virus asks for permission to infect: "WinCE4.Dust by Ratter/29A Dear User, am I allowed to spread?". When granted the permission, Duts attempts to infect all EXE files in the current directory. Duts only infects files that are bigger than 4096 bytes and have not been infected yet. As an infection marker the virus writes the string 'atar' to the Windows Version field of the EXE header.
• Exposing click fraud - Internet marketers facing higher advertising fees on search networks are becoming increasingly concerned about a form of online fraud that was thought to have been contained years ago. In one recent example of the problem, law enforcement officials say a California man created a software program that he claimed could let spammers bilk Google out of millions of dollars in fraudulent clicks. Authorities said he was arrested while trying to blackmail Google for $150,000 to hand over the program. He was indicted by a California jury in June.
• "Deceptive Duo" Hacker Charged -  A 20-year-old Northern California man suspected as being one half of the high-profile "Deceptive Duo" hacking team is scheduled to appear in court on Monday to face charges of breaking into government computers and defacing government Web sites. Robert Lyttle, who allegedly teamed up with 22-year-old Benjamin Stark and hacked into computer systems run by the Department of Defense and the National Aeronautic and Space Administration (NASA), faces a maximum statutory penalty of 10 years if he is found guilty, authorities announced.
• Government spy HQ seeks IT experts - UK spy chiefs are looking to recruit skilled IT professionals in the ongoing battle against terrorism and other threats.Applicants with IT and networking skills can expect a move to the spy base General Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) to be worth as much as L43,000.
• Microsoft pays Lindows.com $20M to end trademark fight - Lindows.com said Microsoft will pay $20 million to settle a trademark dispute between the companies, according to a Monday regulatory filing. Under the settlement, Microsoft will buy the rights to the Lindows.com domain name along with other related sites.
• MACROMEDIA Announces FlashPaper 2 - Macromedia has announced the release of Macromedia FlashPaper 2, a simple way to convert printable files into universally sharable electronic documents. FlashPaper 2 enables any application to create documents that can be instantly viewed within any web browser.
• Macromedia looking to compete with Sun in the mobile phone game market - Macromedia began marketing its embedded Flash product in phones last month when it launched Flash Lite 1.1 in at the end of June. According to company senior director of mobile and devices, Anup Murarka, Flash is more suitable than Java for a variety of display sizes and resolutions, for companies with smaller memory requirements, shorter development schedules, the need for lower costs and cross-platform compatibility.
• Sneak preview of next-gen Korean 2 megapixel Windows CE smartphone - WindowsForDevices has received exclusive advance information on a new dual mode Smartphone (image) to be introduced initially in the Korean market this fall. The prototype device, codenamed "Flint," features dual network CDMA/WiFi support with a built-in 802.11b module, and full-motion video from its integrated 2 megapixel camera. Flint runs Windows CE 4.2 on a 500MHz Samsung S3C2440 processor with 256MB of Flash and 64MB of SDRAM. The 2.5 inch transflective LCD boasts 256K colors with QVGA resolution.
• Apple Rolls Out Cheaper iPods - Apple introduced today lower-priced versions of its iPod digital music player with longer battery life, positioning itself against rivals trying to use lower prices to undercut iPod sales. Apple said the new model iPod has up to 12 hours of battery life, compared with eight hours in previous models. Poor battery performance in some iPods has drawn criticism. The 20-gigabyte model, which can hold about 5,000 songs, has a list price of $299, lower than the previous price of $399 for a 20-gigabyte iPod. The 40-gigabyte model costs $399.
• AMD pops out two notebook chips - AMD released two notebook chips Sunday, building on a recent surge of sales of processors for portables.  The Athlon 64 3400+ is largely aimed at performance users. It runs at 2.2GHz and comes with 1MB of cache. Gamer-PC maker Alienware will insert the chip in a notebook later in the month.
• ATI Preps to Offset NVIDIA's GeForce 6800 GT - A report over China-based web-site GZeasy.com claims that the new graphics chip from ATI will be called RADEON X800 GT and will be a down-clocked RADEON X800 XT graphics processor with 16 rendering pipelines. The so-called RADEON X800 GT visual processing unit will function at 425MHz and will carry 256MB of GDDR3 memory clocked at 900MHz onboard. Initially the new RADEON X800 product will be offered for systems with AGP 8x port.
• Frontier Labs L1 20GB MP3 Player / Jukebox  - While the L1 may not be an iPod-killer in the eyes of many, it is definitely worthy of your consideration. The 20GB L1 is in the same price range (~$300) as the 15GB iPod and $100 cheaper than the 20GB iPod. 
• Looking ahead to Intel's 925XE chipset and FSB1066 - While Corsair, Crucial and Samsung are already starting to deliver DDR2-667, Intel is also getting ready to ship the 925XE this quarter, which offers 266 MHz FSB and will be the basis for the Pentium 4 720 with 3.73 GHz. TGH already took a look at what benefits the FSB clock increase will bring. Also, TGH benchmarked with 280 MHz FSB and DDR2-730.
• ForceWare 62.01 Performance Comparison - Dark-Tweaker has posted some benchies for Nvidia's latest Leaked ForceWare 62.01 Drivers plus a performance comparison against ForceWare 56.72 , 61.32 , 61.40 , 61.72 and ForceWare 61.80.
• DOOM 3 Theme Song - Tweaker's blog/music site has the full version of the DOOM 3 Theme song.for your listening pleasure.
• AnyDVD 3.9.2.1 - 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.
• FFDShow 2004-07-18 - FFDShow is a DirectShow decoding filter based on the original DirectShow filter from XviD for decompressing movies with a rich set of video postprocessing filters. For video decompression it uses the libavcodec from the ffmpeg project and to enhance visual quality of low bitrate movies it uses the postprocessing code from mplayer. FFDShow can also be used as a separate postprocessing filter for other decoders.
• dgVoodoo v1.23 - dgVoodoo is a Glide Wrapper that uses Direct3D 7 to implement the Glide2.4 API. dgVoodoo provides support to run Windows-based and DOS-based applications that use Glide. DOS applications can be wrapped without VESA emulation under Windows XP too.
• ATI Radeon BIOS Tuner v1.3 -  Eugeny Azarov has released his ATI Radeon BIOS Tuner (RaBiT) which allows to control Memory Timings (RAS-to-CAS, tRP, RAS#, CAS#, tRbs), and more.
• [!] Official nForce WHQL Drivers v4.27 - Version 4.27 of NVIDIA's nForce drivers (WinXP ~ Win2K ~ Win98/ME) have been officially released (thanks BloodUK)
• BIOS Updates -  A lot of new motherboard BIOS updates from last week can be found at PCTuning.CZ (Czech website with many download links).

• Security Researchers Debunk Atak Worm-Al Qaeda Link - A new variant of the Atak worm, initially dubbed Atak.B, has been reported by most antivirus companies. However, the buzz around the malware - with its reported connection to the terrorist group Al Qaeda - may be greater than the threat itself, security professionals observed.  Security researchers generally categorized the threat level of this new variant as low, thanks in part to the minimal risk presented by the original Atak.A worm. Either variant affects only PCs running Windows 95 through Windows XP.
• First virus for Windows CE surfaces - A virus that infects Windows CE has been developed--the first such bug discovered for the handheld operating system, according to one firm. BitDefender, based in Romania, stated that it has discovered a "proof of concept" virus for Microsoft's operating system for smart phones and other handhelds. The malicious code's author, who uses the pseudonym Ratter, is part of the 29A VX group that created a virus for the Symbian OS. BitDefender said it is the first known Windows CE virus. Microsoft could not be reached for comment.
• Cool Ways to Give IE the Boot - According to analyst firm WebSideStory, there has been a 1 percent drop in Internet Explorer use over the past month, from 95.73 percent on June 4 to 94.73 percent on July 6. It's the first time WebSideStory has ever seen Internet Explorer usage take a dive.
• Tokyo development to enable quantum encryption in net designs - The University of Tokyo's Nanoelectronics Collaborative Research Center and Fujitsu Laboratories Ltd. have jointly developed technologies that generate and measure single-photons in data transmission wavelengths, a development that could make quantum encryption a reality in networking designs. To enable data transmission using quantum encryption, a single-photon generator capable of limiting emission of photons to one photon per pulse is required. The problem, however, is that the technology to generate single-photons did not exist for wavelengths, such as 1.3 and 1.55 micron, used in practical optical fiber transmission.
• Medal of Honor remote buffer-overflow - The problem is a classical buffer-overflow located in different parts of the game code, but the first function vulnerable is the manager of the queries/replies that checks for slashs and NULL bytes but doesn't check the size of the values before copying them in a new buffer.
• Off-topic: Is I, Robot Our Future? - The sci-fi thriller introduces a new generation to Asimov's robot future. But is it plausible?
• Off-topic: Remake of Tezuka's Popular Story Turns Into Denial? - Did the Disney studio steal Kimba and rework it as their "original story", The Lion King?
• Off-topic: Oops ... Britney's got cellulite - The pop princess is planning to marry on November 20 - and has already got in some practice for her wedding night, as some pictures show. And as the pair sunbathe by the pool, Britney reveals that she too can't avoid the dreaded orange peel. Although just 22, she clearly has a spot of cellulite on her bum.
• Off-topic: Plutonium cancer risk may be higher than thought - Plutonium may be many times more dangerous than previously thought. The cancer risk from exposure inside the body could be 10 times higher than is allowed for in calculating international safety limits. Several tonnes of plutonium have been released into the environment over the last 60 years by nuclear weapons tests and nuclear plants.
• Microsoft teams with Fiat to develop communication system for motorists - The two companies intend to develop easy-to-use telematics systems for Fiat and its Lancia and Alfa Romeo models through this alliance. The new system, expected to be launched by next year, would enable motorists to communicate with the outside world, Microsoft said in a statement released today. According to media reports, the new partnership with Fiat Auto is Microsoft's first direct deal with an automotive manufacturing company for its automotive business unit.
• Xbox Live Reaches 1 Million Users - Microsoft has signed up more than 1 million users to its Xbox Live online gaming service - a feat the software giant boasts it has accomplished in less time than HBO, America Online and TiVo.
• Bluetooth without a Bluetooth phone, from Motorola - As the demand for Bluetooth increases, many users are faced with an unwelcome high price for Bluetooth phones. Motorola's answer is to offer its current users an alternative, the Motorola Wireless Adapter DC600. The lengthily named Motorola Wireless Adapter DC600-S9874 plugs into the serial port of a large number of Motorola handsets as well as the headphone jack. Sporting its own Bluetooth radio, it then provides Bluetooth access to any phone functions that would be accessible via the headphone jack or serial port.
• Kingston HyperX PC3200 CL2 1GB DDR review - GideonTech has posted a review of Kingston HyperX PC3200 CL2 1GB DDR Kit.
• Radeon 9800SE Vs. GeForce FX 5950 Ultra comparison - Rojak Pot has posted a comparison between modded Radeon 9800SE and. GeForce FX 5950 Ultra.
• ASUS AX800PRO/TD/P review - Performance was simply excellent, sitting head and shoulders above the test Radeon 9800 XT in terms of raw benchmark numbers. Image quality, long an ATI forté, was subjectively excellent too. I also have to make special mention of the 2D picture quality on my Sony G400 CRT monitor, from both VGA and converted DVI outputs.
• VisionTek X800 Pro review - The X800 Pro packs literally nine times the power of any card in the Geforce 4/Radeon 9500 series when AA/AF are turned on. If you are on a steep budget, I would suggest you wait a while until the X800 series is in huge stock and 9800 Pro prices start dropping, and then grab one of those. For those of you with 9800 Pros, it is a more difficult decision.
• MSI XA52P CD-RW+DVD-ROM Serial ATA Combo Drive review - Overall, we are impressed with the MSI XA52P. With obvious care taken during the fabrication process, users should enjoy a long period of trouble free operation. We also liked the fact that this drive had a SATA interface. Though it did not increase the performance, the trouble free installation and minimal cabling will surely be attractive features to the average computer user and case modders alike. The XA52P is also a quality CD burner, that's able to record a full CD in less than 3 minutes.
• Logitech Cordless MX Duo Elite Desktop review  - Tweaknews.net has posted a review of Logitech Cordless MX Duo Elite Desktop
• Sharp AQUOS 20” LC-20B4U review - Bytesector has posted a review on the Sharp AQUOS 20” LC-20B4U TV.
• Konica Minolta Page Pro 1300W review - Longhorn News has posted a review on the Konica Minolta Page Pro 1300W laser printer.
• Benchmarking UT2004 - Mike Chambers has published an article with instructions on how to benchmark Unreal Tournament 2004.
• GameJackal: A First Look - GameJackal is a product that has been designed to remove the need of having to always use your CD to play your games. I can here the cry going up "Have you never heard of Virtual Drives". Well yes I have. The difference here though is about 700mb of disk space. GameJackal make a small profile, as small as 30kb up to 40mb which it uses to run the game instead of using the entire image like a virtual drive does.
• Fuse 0.7.0 - The Free Unix Spectrum Emulator (Fuse) is an emulator of the 1980s home computer and various clones. It emulates the Spectrum 16K, 48K, 128K, +2, +2A, +3, +3e, and SE, the Timex TC2048 and TC2068, the Pentagon, and the Scorpion. Almost all the common Spectrum emulator file formats are supported, including .rzx input recordings, .tzx tape images, and .szx and .z80 snapshots.
• GGZ Gaming Zone 0.0.9 - The GGZ Gaming Zone (GGZ) is an Internet gaming center. Players login and sit at tables where they can play their favorite games and chat with other players. GGZ can support multiple rooms with varying skill levels.
• HardTCP "Hardening TCP/IP" + SOURCE - The tool (download) supplies a simple GUI for Hardening Stack Tcp/ip os Windows againg many Dos attack. It is designed for all versions of Windows XP, and all version of Windows 2000.
• PowerArchiver 2004 9.0 Final - PowerArchiver (download) is an award-winning archive utility for the Windows family of products that provides support for most compressed and encoded files, as well as access to many powerful features and tools though an easy to use interface that seamlessly integrates with Windows Explorer
• Jet-Audio 6.0.5 - 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.
• BSPlayer 1.00 - FinalBSplayer (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
• GAIM 0.80 - Gaim (download) 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.
• Style XP 2.11 - 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. Style XP can manage and rotate themes, visual styles, backgrounds, and logons, which are freely available at ThemeXP.
• Fresh UI 7.15 - Fresh UI (download) is the fresh solution for configuring and optimizing Windows. Loaded with hundreds of useful hidden settings, this software covers the customizing and optimizing technique that you'll be glad to know: Customizing Windows User Interface, Optimizing system settings, Optimizing hardware settings, Customizing Windows application settings, and Control user environment with policies.
• Flexbeta FireTweaker XP 1.0 Beta - Flexbeta FireTweaker XP is a tweaking and optimizing software for Mozilla Firefox. Flexbeta FireTweaker XP bundles more than 20 different tweaks to optimize or customize Mozilla Firefox. FireTweaker XP does not contain any spyware or adware, it is 100% clean for your tweaking pleasures. FireTweaker XP currently supports Windows 98/Me, 2000, Xp and 2003.
• Radeon Omega Drivers v2.5.58 - The Omega Drivers v2.5.58 for Windows 2k/XP based on the Catalyst 4.7 are ready.

• After you install Security Update 839645, you may experience sharing violations and increased network traffic under Windows XP - After you install Security Update 839645, you may experience one or more of the following: The ToolTip feature may give the same file properties for files that are located on the network as for files that are located on your local computer. You may experience sharing violations if you try to open a file on a network share while another user is using ToolTip with the same file. You may experience an increase in network traffic. (Ed.note: I would recommend to disable tooltips completely)
• Windows XP SP2 Build 2162 released to tester s- Microsoft have released a new build of Windows XP SP2 to official beta testers this evening. Although it was announced that the next build would be RTM it seems Microsoft want to gain some last minute feedback before the RTM in August. This build is interim between RC2 and RTM and will not be made available to public preview.
• Online Hacker Shop Shuts Down - An online shop that was selling the source code for two computer programs has abruptly suspended its operations, citing a "redesign" of its "business model." The Source Code Club opened its doors on Monday, using an e-mail posting to an online discussion group to advertise the availability of source code and design documents for two products: the Dragon intrusion detection system (IDS) software from Enterasys Networks and peer-to-peer server and client software from Napster, now owned by Roxio. By Thursday, the group's Web page displayed a message saying the Club had ceased operations due to "fears our customers faced." According to Information Week, the group offered the Enterasys Dragon IDS 6.1 source code for $16,000 and the Napster code for $10,000 saying that it was flogging business intelligence.
• Microsoft Shuts Down Spammer - Microsoft has won an almost $4 million verdict against a California man for trademark infringement, false advertising, and "cybersquatting" stemming from a spam campaign to distribute a desktop toolbar program on recipients' Windows desktops.
• Oxford hackers face punishment - Two students from Oxford University are facing disciplinary action after hacking into the university's computer. They could be fined L500 or be suspended after infiltrating the system and publishing their story in a student newspaper. First-year students Patrick Foster and Roger Waite say they wanted to expose the weakness in the IT system.
• Police seize church computers - Police have raided a seminary near Vienna, confiscated computer kit and arrested a priest they think was involved in a child porn ring. They are believed to have uncovered some 40,000 pornographic photos and numerous videos on the computers. Some church officials are also concerned that some of the photos show candidates for the priesthood kissing, fondling each other and playing sex games with their instructors.
• Half-Life 2 Arrests Follow-up - Investigations are continuing, with those involved found to have links with similar crimes. Valve is preparing to sue the hackers for damages, while working towards an end-of-summer release date for Half-Life 2 - widely considered the most anticipated shooter in PC gaming history.
• Sony to Test-Produce Blu-Ray Discs in U.S. - Sony Corp. plans to set up test production lines for Blu-ray Discs in the United States this autumn, company officials said Wednesday. The trial production facility will be set up in Sony's digital versatile disc plant in Indiana. It will make a single-layer Blu- ray Disc with a storage capacity of 25 gigabytes and a 50GB dual- layer type.
• The Sad State of the PC Audio Industry - While Creative does appear to have monopolized the audio market, who's fault is that? Sure we can all blame Creative, a company I have a personal vendetta against, but it really isn't their fault. While they are far from having a superior product, their Audigy 2 just simply works in games and works well at that. The Audigy 2 holds the crown as the gaming card because it's practically the only gaming card available. Competition drives the market, with a lack of serious competition; Creative doesn't have to do much to keep their crown.
• Weekly Buyer's Guide: Mid-Range System - July 2004 - AnandTech has updated their Weekly Buyer's Guide: Mid-Range System for July 2004.
• Crucial Unveils DDR 500MHz, DDR2 667MHz Products - Initially Crucial will offer 4 memory module types in the Ballistix lineup: PC3200, PC4000, PC2-4200 and PC2-5300. Every Crucial Ballistix module comes with a custom-designed aluminum heat spreader, dome decal case badge and decorative sticker. The following SKUs are available now from Crucial's online store: Crucial Ballistix PC3200 (400MHz), CL2 2-2-6, currently priced at $74.99 for 256MB, and $138.99 for 512MB; Crucial Ballistix PC4000 (500MHz), CL2.5 4-4-8, currently priced at $77.99 for 256MB, and $144.99 for 512MB; Crucial Ballistix PC2-4200 (533MHz), CL3 3-3-10, currently priced at $118.99 for 256MB, and $228.99 for 512MB; Crucial Ballistix PC2-5300 (667MHz), CL4 4-4-10, currently priced at $124.99 for 256MB, and $238.99 for 512MB.
• Sony Ericsson launches K500, S710a, and Z500i - The first of the new phones is the K500. Measuring 102 x 46 x 14 mm and weighing 80 grams, the K500 is targeted at multimedia users. The candybar-designed phone sports a 128 x 160 pixel 16-bit color TFT display specifically intended for gaming, which is backed up by 12 MB of RAM for users to install either 2D or 3D Java-based games. The battery is rated for up to 8 hours of talk time or 300 hours standby. They also have unveiled the P910 smartphone which combines PDA, email, web browsing and mobile phone.
• Samsung SGH-D410C Phone review - HardwareZoom has posted a review of the Samsung SGH-D410C Phone.
• Radeon 9800 Pro Warning - ATI for sure launched a cheap version of the Radeon 9800 Pro ($170-$180) graphics card. Fantastic price, yet a way too low price. It's a Radeon 9800 pro alright, yet equipped with 128-bit memory where it should be 256-bit. Basically frame buffer bandwidth is cut in half and despite full eight pipes it's placing itself in the mid-range segment as core and memory clocks are lowered also. This will have a serious effect on overall performance.
• Nvidia said to be working on GeForce 6800 LE - Nvidia is preparing a lesser version of its GeForce 6800 chip, the latest version of the company's drivers are reported to reveal. According to Chinese-language web site GZeasy, version 62.01 of Nvidia's drivers, which leaked out of the company recently, lists the GeForce 6800 LE among the supported GPUs.
• ABIT AA8 DuraMAX & ASUS P5AD2 Premium Shoot-Out - HotHardware has posted a shoot-out between two high-end i925X motherboards from the Abit and Asus, the AA8 DuraMAX and the P5AD2 Premium.
• Corsair TwinX-1024 3200XL PRO: nForce3-250 v. Intel-875 - The Madshrimps take Corsair latest memory for a spin on an Athlon 64 and Intel Prescott system. Do tight timings still provide the best performance? "For those looking fondly back upon Winbond BH-5 days, I say to you smile, better days are here. I give Corsair's Twin-X1024 3200XLPRO 10 out of 10. The memory ran completely stable, albeit an AMD or Intel system. While the price may seem slightly high, the fact is your getting several products in one aesthetically unique package; PC3200-LL, PC3500-LL, PC3700-LL and PC4000 all running from CAS 2.0."
• Massive memory module mega test - TrustedReviews let us know they have compared 18 pairs of dual channel memory kits.
• HIS x800XT IceQ II (LE) review - It's full name: HiS Excalibur x800 XT IceQ II VIVO 256 MB GDDR3 (Limited Edition) with Video In and Out (VIVO) and of course that lovely IceQ II cooling solution.
• HIS Excalibur 9550 VIVO review - Viper Lair has posted a review of HIS Excalibur 9550 VIVO.
• Gainward FX 5900XT Ultra/1100X - TrustedReviews have posted a review of the Gainward GeForce FX 5900XT Ultra/1100XT Golden Sample graphics card.
• XGI Volari V8 Reference Card review - PC Stats has posted a review of XGI Volari V8 Reference Card.
• BFG Technologies GeForce 6800 Ultra OC review  - The 6800GT is a very viable option for all but the most serious of gamers in that most GT owners are coming close to reaching 6800 Ultra reference design speeds or better. BFG gives their 6800 Ultra a bit of a core boost but the memory is where a serious gamer has some nice headroom to get even more bandwidth. The dual DVI outputs are exclusive to the 6800 Ultra as well.
• Philips PSC725 Ultimate Edge 24 bit Soundcard - It's based on the Envy24 GT chipset from VIA, and capable of 24 bit resolution with 96 kHz sample rate.
• Plextor PX-712SA DVD Writer review  - T-Break has posted a review on the Plextor PX-712SA DVD Writer.
• Aopen's XC Cube review - Aopen's XC Cube Barebones is unbeatable design- and feature-wise. With a Linux OS that comes included, five seconds are all you need to get the DVD player, TV/radio tuner and other goodies up and running.
• Lilliput 7" Wide Screen VGA TFT LCD with Touch Screen review - The 7" VGA TFT LCD display features a resistive touch screen, making it easy to view and control basic applications with one compact device.
• i-rocks 800 dpi Optical Mouse review - Budah's LAN room take a look at the new i-rocks IR-7300 optical mouse.
• Logitech Bluetooth Cordless MX Duo review - Design Technica has posted a review of Logitech Bluetooth Cordless MX Duo.
• X-Trac MadWax review  - The typical gamer may try different mice to find the performance edge they're looking for, but the serious gamer knows that it goes a lot further. While a good mouse is part of a serious competitor's arsenal, what liesunderneath is just as important. X-Trac has come to the rescue with MadWax. It's designed to keep your mousing surface ultra-slick surface and requires a minimum of upkeep while keeping your mouse gliding along smoothly.
• Nikon D70 Digital SLR review - PyroPort.com takes a look at Nikon's D70 Digital SLR.
• 5 Windows processes described -  I am not a Geek explains 5 Windows processes: lsass.exe, csrss.exe, smss.exe, spoolsv.exe, and internat.exe.
• Doom3 Wallpapers - Doom3Center have posted three new Doom3 Wallpapers.
• PDF SpeedUp for Adobe Reader 1.00 - PDF SpeedUp (download) allows you to significantly speed up the time it takes to load Adobe Reader. If you notice that when the Reader starts it loads many plug-ins which you may or may not need, this program simply disables the plug-ins and loads only the absolute necessary ones so the program starts quickly.
• Google Toolbar 2.0.112 - Search Google from this toolbar as well as block popups, autofill forms and more.
• Pop Goes The Gmail 1.0 - Pop Goes the Gmail is a program that sits between the http://gmail.com web server and your email client, converting messages from web format into POP3 format that a program such as Outlook Express or Thunderbird can understand.
• DivX 5.2 + Dr.DivX 1.05 - DivX (changelog ~ DivX5.2Win2k/XP ~ DivX5.2Win98/ME ~ Dr.DivX v1.05) is a package that includes all the DivX codec, player, utilities, and documentation that you need to play DivX files. DivX codec is based on the MPEG-4 compression standard. This codec can reduce an MPEG-2 video (DVD format) to ten percent of its original size. DivX is a digital video compression technology based on the ISO MPEG-4 standard.
• BlindWrite Suite 5.2.1 (shw) - 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.
• Nvidia ForceWare 62.11 Beta - The files are dated 07/09/2004 and will work with all ranges of Nvidia cards. I haven't had time to test these fully and remember they are not WHQL so please be careful about using them on production systems.
• Nvidia nForce1/2/3 System Drivers 5.03 WHQL - Station-Drivers has posted a new set of nForce drivers (mirror) version 5.03 WHQL for windows XP/2k supporting the following chipsets:  nForce 220, nForce 220D, nForce 415 and nForce 420D nForce2 and nForce2 400 nForce2 Ultra and nForce2 Ultra 400 nForce2 400R and nForce2 Ultra 400Gb nForce3 150 and nForce3 PRO 150 nForce3 250, nForce3 250Gb and nForce3 PRO 250. You can also find a nice remix pack here (download) because there are some newer files in the 4.40 beta. (thanks Warp2Search)
• Volari BIOS v1.02.20 - Here's a new BIOS for the XGI Volari Series, version 1.02.20.

• Two critical MS security bulletins - Vulnerability in Task Scheduler Could Allow Code Execution (841873) || Vulnerability in HTML Help Could Allow Code Execution (840315)
• Another important MS security bulletins - Vulnerability in Utility Manager Could Allow Code Execution (842526) || Vulnerability in POSIX Could Allow Code Execution (841872) || Security Update for IIS 4.0 (841373) || Vulnerability in Windows Shell Could Allow Remote Code Execution (839645) || Cumulative Security Update for Outlook Express (823353)
• Download.Ject Removal Tool - Microsoft has released an updated Trojan detection and removal tool (download) to help PC users clean up after the sophisticated malware attack that loaded keystroke loggers and other malicious code on infected systems. The 118 KB removal tool has been programmed to remove the payload delivered by the server-side Download.Ject Trojan. The Download.Ject Trojan, also known as Scob, exploited vulnerabilities in Microsoft's IIS 5.0 servers and Internet Explorer (IE) browser to distribute malware programs.
• Stealth virus is stealthiest of all - There's a new mass mailing virus in town, and it's built to make life for AV researchers even more difficult. Atak uses a variety of tactics in its attempts to escape antivirus analysis. Its main trick is to check to see if it's being run in a debugging environment. If so, it exits to avoid detection. The ploy prevents casual perusal of the code by researchers and (potentially) rival virus writers. A possible bug, related to the way Atak checks its activation date, prevents it from being run in a "sandbox". A sandbox is a virtual environment commonly used by AV researchers to look at the behaviour of malware in a safe environment.
• File-sharing thrives as Net users find new outlets - Internet users download twice as many films, games and music as they did a year ago, despite a big crackdown on the activity, according to a study on Tuesday. Better broadband Internet connections and compression technologies mean larger files can be downloaded more rapidly, creating as big a piracy headache for movie studios as for music labels.
• Industry Deal Set on Allowing Limited DVD Copying -  A group of media and technology companies including Microsoft Corp. and Walt Disney Co. have agreed in principle to allow consumers to make legal backup copies of next-generation video discs and share their content on portable devices. The group, which also includes International Business Machines Corp., Intel Corp., Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. Ltd. and Time Warner Inc.'s Warner Bros., will not have any technology to license until the end of the year.
• DNS changes to take minutes (instead of hours) - VeriSign is to rapidly update Domain Name System (DNS) records every few minutes instead of only twice a day. From 8 September changes in the .com and .net zones will take an estimated five minutes to propagate across all 13 .com/.net authoritative name servers. The old systems will remain there for those who don't want to make the leap forward.
• Off-topic: Achieving 1,194 Miles Per Gallon - Engineering students at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology designed a fuel efficient one-person vehicle that achieved 1,194 miles per gallon of gasoline in the Society of Automotive Engineers' Supermileage Competition, conducted last weekend near Detroit.
• Xbox 2 revealed at X04? - According to many reports flying around the internet Microsoft are set to reveal the successor the xbox console at this year's annual X04 event in Europe. Microsoft continues to refuse or comment on the speculation regarding the Xbox’s successor despite several key developers already confirming that they are in already possession of Xbox 2 development kits and that game development for the next gen console is also well underway.
• Bill Kills DVD - Microsoft founder, Bill Gates in an interview with a German newspaper predicted that DVD's would be obsolete in 10 years at the latest. The reason for this he said, "These things can scratch or simply get lost." Asked what home entertainment would be like in the future, Gates said, "DVD technology would be obsolete in 10 years at the latest. If you consider that nowadays we have to carry around film and music on little silver discs and stick them in the computer, it's ridiculous." Gates' vision of television of the future was: "TV that will simply show what we want to see, when we want to see it. When we get home, the home computer will know who we are from our voice or our face.
• Samsung slashes 17-inch LCD monitor prices in Europe - Samsung recently cut prices of its 17-inch LCD monitor panels for the Europe market by 20% to US$240, sources said. Samsung Taiwan was unavailable for comment and Taiwan TFT LCD makers remain doubtful about the rumor. The Taiwanese companies suspect the price cuts are for Samsung’s second-tier inventories and expect the incident to have little impact on the projected US$270-290 price range for 17-inch LCD monitor panels in the third quarter of this year. The Taiwan-based makers pointed out that it is unlikely that Samsung will cut prices of its A-grade panels this early and that prices of the segment may not drop to US$230-240 until year-end.
• AMD to raise prices on CPUs - AMD is going to raise prices in a little over a week. Before you wonder if the sky is falling or not, it isn't, trust me. On July 26th, prices on 2800+ and up Athlon XPs will go up. In a not quite as cunning as they might think plan, it won't really affect you much.
• Playing DVD movies in your Microsoft Smartphone - Dutch software company Makayama released "DVD to Mobile (Smartphone Edition)" (homepage). This software lets users convert a DVD to a Smartphone and watch it in great quality, with stereo sound and in full screen landscape mode. A memorycard as small as 128 Mb is sufficient to store a full length feature film. Users can watch their DVDs on the go, on any Windows Mobile-based Smartphone, such as the Orange SPV-series, from a postage stamp size memory card. The software installs an encoding package on a PC with Windows XP, and a free player on the mobile phone. Users insert a DVD in the drive of their PC and with only two clicks, the software turns it into a super small movie file, which will play on the provided mediaplayer. The headset or the built-in speaker can be used to listen to the sound. Subtitled and foreign language DVDs are also supported.
• Toshiba Unveils Laptop With Instant-On TV & DVR - Toshiba has unveiled a new laptop, Qosmio, that allows users to watch TV or a DVD without booting the OS.
• CRTs vs. LCDs - Hardcore gamers and creative pros may have some problems with LCDs though. Ghosting and accuracy is still a problem compared with CRTs. Gamers may find ghosting distracting. Creative professionals may find the comparatively lower contrast, color accuracy, and picture accuracy to be problems that outweigh the benefits of LCDs.
• JetAudio iAudio4 review - TheTechLounge take a look at JetAudio's iAUDIO 4 MP3 player/recorder/FM tuner/voice recorder.
• Diamond SupraMax LE 56K PCI Fax Modem review - In this day and age a serious internet connection is required for any type of modern computer usage. At one point I was known to have reasoned that 28,800 baud was all that a man would ever need in his internet connection. Sadly this is not the case. In this ultra digital age Diamond has bestowed upon us the SupraMax LE 56K Fax Modem. Finally here is a modem that will allow me to receive faxes and now connect to the internet at blazing speeds. Now keep in mind that 56,000 baud is not possible due to constraints on conventional phone lines. However the speeds achieved are close enough.
• Cape Red Kit CPU Single HTF 2.0 Rad: Water Cooling Kit review - This kit was a little bit more complex to install but thats because the kit was designed with every detail and failsafe mechanisms required in a retail kit, no external power sources are needed, the pump runs off a 12v rail and turns on and off when the pc is powered on or off. The radiator is a 20 pass system that provides optimal performance using the 8mm tubing and pump configuration.
• S3's DeltaChrome S4 Pro GPU preview - The DeltaChrome S4 brings S3's DirectX 9-class shaders and component HDTV output to lower price points, but is the DeltaChrome S4 fast enough to take on ATI and NVIDIA's low-end offerings? TechReport have compared a DeltaChrome S4 Pro with a GeForce FX 5200 Ultra and Radeon 9550 to find out.
• AOpen GeforceFX 5900XT review - All in all, even though the AOpen GeforceFX 5900XT’s bundle was lacking it's still a great buy for anyone on a budget desiring a video card with great performance and decent overclocking abilities. AOpen has produced a real winner with this video card.
• I-Rocks IR-7100 and IR-7300 800 DPI Optical Mice review - The I-Rocks IR-7300 and 7100 offer good performance for what they are, very reasonably priced optical mice. They look nice and perform well, but lack some of the features of higher priced mice, like extra programmable buttons. They also lack that durable feel that many higher priced mice have. If your budget is of utmost concern, and you need performance but not a lot of buttons, the I-Rock mice are just what the Doctor ordered.
• ADS Tech Instant TV USB 2.0 TV Tuner - The convergence of electronic entertainment devices such as TV's, DVD players, and stereos with personal computers is finally starting to happen. Purpose-built computers with direct support from Microsoft in the form of Windows XP Media Center Edition are available now. Even better news for the do-it-yourselfer is the availability of devices and software to create your own Home Theater PC (HTPC). Building a low budget HTPC was on my list of summer projects and this effort was greatly facilitated by the arrival of ADS Tech's 'Instant TV' USB 2.0 TV Tuner.
• Onix Rocket Tykes 5.1 speakers review - Onix's Rocket Tykes are truly a gem among micro speaker systems. If you are looking for a tiny speaker system with little sacrifice in sound, you may not need to look any further than the Rocket Tykes. Overall, the Tykes are pleasant to listen to and quite adept for movies or music. They are also very versatile, with the ability to be used in many situations where space and installation are a challenge.
• Annoyances of the Computer World Article - This article is intended to be a more in depth look at spyware and other annoyances of the computer world, however Kamikaze Badger's message is a good stop for anyone looking for some basic information that contains feedback from OCC members.
• Unreal Tournament 2004: 64 Bit Performance - The 5332 drivers were released on January 21st while the 6106 drivers were released on June 30th. This leaves about 5 months for development. While Linux gaming is rather undeveloped I think the performance and availability gap is closing between windows and Linux. With the development of executables and drivers Linux will scare away less and less people of the gaming scene. Also with the help of Wine X we start to see more and more games working on Linux.
• Unofficial multiregional Hack for the Kiss 450, 470, 1500 & 1504 DVD Players - download.
• Hyper-Threading Technology Test Utility - Systems that pass all three tests have Hyper-Threading Technology enabled. For more information on HT Technology, visit the overview page for a demonstration. If the Hyper-Threading Technology Test Utility has returned a non-passing result for the tested desktop or notebook system, this area will provide guidance in understanding the results and steps to resolve potential system issues.
• phpMyAdmin 2.6.0 Beta 2 - phpMyAdmin is a tool written in PHP intended to handle the administration of MySQL over the Web. Currently it can create and drop databases, create/drop/alter tables, delete/edit/add fields, execute any SQL statement, manage keys on fields.
• PHP 4.3.8 Final - This release (changelog) is made in response to several security issues that have been discovered since the 4.3.7 release. All users of PHP are strongly encouraged to upgrade to PHP 4.3.8 as soon as possible.
• PHP 5.0 - This release represents a milestone (changelog) in the evolution of PHP. It sports the new Zend Engine II, a completely re-worked object model, and many many new features.
• XPlite/2000lite 1.3.0246 - XPlite and 2000lite are powerful configuration utilities for Windows creating a modular Windows operating system where YOU are in control.
• NV 4.40 ref drivers for NF2/NF3 - OC Workbench has posted NV 4.40 reference drivers for NF2/NF3.

• Microsoft Products Fail to Restrict "shell:" Access - Jesse Ruderman has reported a vulnerability in MSN Messenger and Microsoft Word, allowing access to the Windows "shell:" functionality. The problem is that the programs fail to restrict access to the "shell:" URI handler. This allows malicious people to invoke various programs associated with specific extensions. It is not possible to pass parameters to these programs, only filenames, thus limiting the impact of launching applications. The Windows "shell:" URI handler is inherently insecure and should only be accessed from a few trusted sources - it may even pose a threat through Word documents. Multiple exploits in Internet Explorer also utilise "shell:" functionality. This is related to a similar issue in Mozilla.
• Windows XP SP2 RTM defenitely in August - Microsoft expects to finish work on Service Pack 2 for Windows XP next month, with the much-anticipated security focused update available to users shortly after that. The head of Microsoft's Windows client business, senior vice-p-resident Will Poole, is expected to announce Microsoft's plan to end work on Service Pack 2 (SP2) and release the code to manufacturing in August during a keynote speech at the company's Worldwide Partner Conference in Toronto.
• Delayed Windows SP2 Denies Access to Illegal CD Keys - SP2 will include an enhanced Windows Update feature. The new update service includes smart downloading technology that will allow users to interrupt the large SP2 download and resume it later, especially useful for users of dial-up Internet connections. The latest test version of SP2 is 264MB, though the final version is expected to be smaller, insiders say. This time around Microsoft may have found a much more destructive way to get rid off Illegal copies of WindowsXp than Service Pack1. Users installing SP1 on illegal copies would simply get a 'This is a pirated copy' error message. But now Microsoft has armed itself with a huge list of illegal CD keys ensuring that SP2 does not install. CORRECTED: It has been rumoured that the boot sector of the OS would be modified rendering the OS unusable.
• Open source kills jobs, says Gates - In muted tones, Microsoft's chairman warned governments and companies that open source software is not the way to go if they are in the business of creating jobs and intellectual property. Bill Gates was on the Malaysian leg of a whirlwind Asian tour, which included a speech on his vision of “seamless computing”, when he voiced his concerns over the growing goodwill towards open source, especially in Asia.
• British Military: iPods Pose Security Risk - Music fans, beware: Britain's Ministry of Defense has become the latest organization to add the iPod to its list of high-tech security risks. The pocket-sized digital music player, which can store thousands of songs, is one of a series of banned gadgets that the military will no longer allow into most sections of its headquarters in the UK and abroad. Devices with large storage capabilities -- most notably those with a Universal Serial Bus (USB) plug used to connect to a computer -- have been treated with greater suspicion of late by government agencies and corporations alike. The fear is that the gadgets can be used to siphon information from a computer, turning a seemingly innocuous device into a handy tool for data thieves.
• KPN launches Microsoft phone - Sierra Wireless and KPN have announced a global first with the commercial availability of the Voq Professional Phone, a Microsoft Windows Mobile-based Smartphone with full QWERTY thumbpad.
• Corn-Based CDs Delayed - Sanyo Electric has delayed the introduction of an optical disc based on a polymer derived from corn that was announced last year as a more environmentally friendly alternative to plastic discs. The disc, dubbed "MildDisc" by Sanyo, was to have been offered to customers from December last year and volume production was due to begin in the first half of this year but this has been delayed while Sanyo refines the technology, says Ryan Watson, a spokesperson for the Osaka-based company.
• New AMD64 Processors May Deliver Higher Performance - The new Athlon 64 microprocessors with code-named Oakville and Winchester cores are reported to be a bit faster compared to the current Athlon 64 processors, the web-site claims citing its sources. The wire says that two Athlon 64 3500+ in PGA939 packaging were compared to reveal if there are any differences in speed, but mo actual performance numbers are given at this point. While AMD is now quiet about peculiarities of its 64-bit chips produced at thinner fabrication process, earlier this year representatives for the Sunnyvale, California-based chipmaker said that quite natural capabilities of future-generation Athlon 64 and Opteron microprocessors could be SSE3 technology, improved pre-fetch mechanisms as well as thermal throttling. AMD did not disclose any actual time-frames for this improvements to arrive.
• NV41 to replace 6800 standard - Nvidia's NV41 won't be any kind of boom chip but will have just one goal. To be cheaper then NV40, Geforce 6800 non Ultra or standard, as the graphics chip firm dubs it.  It seems that Nvidia 222 millions of transistor chip clocked at 325MHz is expensive to produce and it's, in theory at least, similar to all NV40s with four pipelines disabled. That makes its pipeline number fall from sixteen to twelve.
• NV43 is Nvidia's mainstream card - NV43 is happily taped out in Taiwan and some early prototypes are available as we speak. If you are a "good" customer of course. Nvidia is not rushing into the marchitectural swirl as it will first play with NV43, its mainstream cards and then with NV44 its entry level, low end cards. Both chips will be 110 nanometre or should we say 0.11u (micron) marchitecture? [No, Ed.]  This card will also have eight pipelines and memory and a core that rocks at 400+MHz but still less then ATI's RV410 chip. Nevertheless we've heard that it can reach 8000 3dmarks.
• Intel's 865/875 Superior Performance Song Remains the Same - TGH has tested no less than 16 mobos in combination with 13 memory modules.
• LG's GSA-4120B Dual Layer DVD Writer review - The LG GSA-4120B is definitely an impressive DVD writer - the performance is very strong and the flexibility unparalleled. This drive really does have every base covered - you can write to dual layer discs, you can burn DVD+R at 12-speed when the media becomes available, the eight-speed DVD-R performance is the best I’ve seen, CD writing performance is first rate, and you can use DVD-RAM discs (at five-speed no less) as well. But most amazing of all is that, yet again, LG has managed to bring all this to market at an unbelievable price.
• Philips' Ultimate Edge sound card review - With 24-bit/96kHz audio across six output channels, the Philips Ultimate Edge looks like a pretty compelling value at $70, and that's just the suggested price. Expect street prices to dip below that level as online retailers jockey for position, potentially making the Ultimate Edge and even more compelling value for those looking for a true 24-bit sound card.
• GameDr Xcelerator Motorized Disc Repair System - NewsTechInfo take a loot at GameDr Xcelerator Motorized Disc Repair System. The product promises performance and scratch-free discs, but does it really work?
• Dell Laser Printer 1700n review - The Dell Laser Printer 1700n offers high-quality output and a network connection at a notably low price.
• Joint Operations Tweak Guide - The Joint Operations Tweak Guide has a truckload of setting descriptions, advanced config file tweaks and troubleshooting tips, as well as links to important resources to ensure you get the most out of this game.
• The Complete ATI Radeon 9800XT Voltage Modding Guide - Adrian's Rojak Pot has published his latest guide for voltage modding your ATI Radeon 9800 Pro.
• Microsoft Windows Media Player 9 "Quits Unexpectedly" Patch - When you are playing content from a network source, Microsoft Windows Media Player 9 Series may quit unexpectedly (crash) if Windows Media Player briefly loses the network connection and then tries to reconnect. If you are using Windows Media Player together with a host application such as Microsoft Internet Explorer, and Windows Media Player is embedded in the host application, the host application may quit unexpectedly if the network connection is lost.
• Apache 2.0.50 - The Apache HTTP Server Project is proud to announce the release of version 2.0.50 of the Apache HTTP Server. This version of Apache is principally a bug fix release. Of particular note is that 2.0.50 addresses two security vulnerabilities: A remotely triggered memory leak in http header parsing can allow a denial of service attack due to excessive memory consumption and Fixes a mod_ssl buffer overflow in the FakeBasicAuth code for a (trusted) client certificate subject DN which exceeds 6K in length.
• Great Collection of Mozilla/Firebird Hacks - check it out!
• Best Mozilla/Firefox/Thunderbird Extensions - The following extensions for Mozilla, Firefox and Thunderbird are MR Tech Approved and tested. Please note Firefox & Thunderbird are currently going through an Extension/Theme installation process change, so you may have some issues.
• Yahoo! Messenger 6.0.0.1710 - A new version of Yahoo! Messenger 6.0.0.1710 is available for download.
• Safe XP 1.4.7.10 - Safe XP is a *FREE* software to allow users to quickly tweak various security and privacy related settings in XP. The options include Media Player settings, Services settings (error reporting, time synch, remote registry etc.), as well as and option to remove items from the Start menu, network security settings and more.
• Supertrick XG 1.5 - Supertrick XG (download) edits a file within Windows called "HOSTS." By editing this file, you can block access to certain websites. Using this trick you can block websites that serve ads or ones that might compromise your privacy and security. This also speeds up the loading time of websites, because the ads don't have to be downloaded. This is the main feature of the installer. It does not overwrite the file, it makes additions and upon uninstallation, it gives you a choice to clear the entire file or to removes only the entries added during installation. Along with containing over 30,000 malicious or otherwise undesired sites Supertrick XG also adds malicious domains to the restricted sites zone in IE. It also contains eDexter that will replace 404 images with a small image of your choice.
• CloneCD v4.3.3.1 - CloneCD (download) is a powerful CD-Copy program. It writes in Raw mode, which allows it to have total control on the data written. Therefore, it will produce real 1:1 copies of your CDs
• Intel INF Update Utility 6.0.1.1006 WHQL - The Guru of 3D has posted an updated Intel INF Update Utility.
• Nvidia ForceWare 62.01 Beta - The files (download) are dated 07/02/2004 and will work with all ranges of Nvidia cards. I haven't had time to test these fully and remember they are not WHQL so please be careful about using them on your PC.
• Nvidia Omega Drivers v1.5672 - A new Nvidia Omega Drivers v1.5672 are available. They are based on the official 56.72 drivers.