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Tech News for Friday November 17th 2000

Carnivore Can Read Everything.
Posted: 11/17/2000     Source: Wired  Added by: Kim Heise

Doesn't the government have better things to do than sit and read email looking for something or other?. I surely don't want my tax money going to any "big brother" projects. This is why less government is a better government.

The FBI's controversial e-mail surveillance tool, known as Carnivore, can retrieve all communications that go through an Internet service, far more than FBI officials have said it does, according to a Bureau documents and a recent FBI test.

An FBI official involved with the test stressed Friday that although Carnivore has the ability to grab a large quantity of e-mails and Web communications, current law and specific court orders restrict its use.

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Intel To Unveil Pentium 4 Chip Monday.
Posted: 11/17/2000     Source: TechWeb  Added by: Kim Heise

Monday is the big day for Intel when it plans to launch the Pentium 4 processor (yawn). Nothing overly interesting about the new CPU other than it has some additional multi-media instructions and a smaller core which explains the higher clock speeds.

Folks, we're still looking a fancy 386 processor here.

Intel Corp. will unveil its much-anticipated Pentium 4 chip Monday, company executives said.

The processor, which features a number of enhancements over its Pentium III predecessor, will debut at clock speeds of 1.4-GHz and 1.5-GHz, making it the fastest PC processor on the market -- at least for a while.

Pentium 4 will hit speeds of up to 2 GHz by the third quarter of next year, the company said.

Denial of Service Attacks Planned For Christmas.
Posted: 11/17/2000     Source: Newsbytes  Added by: Kim Heise

Whatever happened to "We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year"? Looks like maybe several Grinches' plan to put some coal in our stockings.

X-Force, the research and development (R&D) team of Internet Security Systems [NASDAQ:ISSX] (ISS), has warned that hackers are planning an online attack-fest this coming Christmas.

The attacks, if they occur, will take the form of distributed denial of service (DDOS) invasions, a hacker flooding technique used earlier this year - and since - to effectively flood out a major Web site and prevent normal users from gaining access, ISS said.

The technique was used in February of this year when Amazon, Buy.com, CNN Interactive, eBay and a number of other high-profile sites were downed by hackers, apparently using DDOS applications known as "Trinoo," "Stacheldraht" and "TFN2K."

FileFunnel - Coming Soon From the Makers of GetRight.
Posted: 11/17/2000     Source: eFront/BetaNews  Added by: Kim Heise

GetRight is one of the most innovative Windows programs out there that allows you to recover HTTP downloads and also allows for multiple downloads simultaneously for the same file. The company has a new product planned called "FileFunnel". See below for details:

A new application is currently being developed by the same people who brought GetRight to the net. The new application, dubbed FileFunnel, "is designed to act as a bridge to convert between "other" protocols and the "web" protocols HTTP and HTML," according to the software's Web site.

The application works right through your browser window, allowing you to currently search Napster, with many more to come in the future. Through the software you can either download the file with GetRight, or stream them directly to Winamp, Windows Media Player, or any other MP3 player while the file is downloaded. View a screenshot of the application here.

For more information visit www.filefunnel.com. The product has not yet hit beta, but keep checking back as BetaNews will tell you the second it hits the net.

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Whistler and Itanium Hardware Compatibility Lists Released.
Posted: 11/17/2000     Source: eFront/BetaNews  Added by: Kim Heise

Microsoft has released the hardware compatibility list for Windows Whistler and Intel's Itanium processor. This is rather humorous because who can guess what hardware will be in our desktops in six months for now. I would love to meet that person and purchase stock accordingly.

Microsoft has released a lenghty list of hardware that has been tested and certified as compatible with the Windows Whistler operating system, which is currently in its Beta 1 phase, and for the Itanium processor currently being developed at Intel. Itanium is the first 64-bit processor from the chip giant Intel. The list of hardware for the Itanium has been tested with the Whistler beta as well. The Redmond giant warns that the lists are "neither complete nor comprehensive" and "also, computers and devices on this list have not been tested in all possible configurations." For more information visit Microsoft.

Toshiba Releases DVD-RAM Video Recorder With Hard Drive.
Posted: 11/17/2000     Source: eFront/BetaNews  Added by: Kim Heise

Another very impressive product from Comdex.

Japanese electronics company Toshiba has unleashed its latest creation to the public, but only in Japan before Christmas. The new device, a DVD-RAM video recording unit, comes complete with a 30GB hard drive on top of the 4.7GB DVD-RAM drive. With the unit users will be able to record television programming and edit video footage directly from the hard disk and store it to a library in the DVD-RAM for later playback. Much like the TiVo or ReplayTV, users will also be able to playback certain parts of a video while the device is still recording. The new technology comes at a hefty price however, weighing in at 270,000 yen ($2,481 USD). For more information visit Toshiba.

Comdex Report: Day 3.
Posted: 11/17/2000     Source: ARS-Technica  Added by: Kim Heise

Ars-Technica who has been on site at Comdex and has written up a final report from the show. A very worthwhile article to read.

Wednesday of Comdex has come and gone, and Ars has worked up its last Comdex report for the year. We've got Bluetooth, a host of storage devices and a nose-on test of Digiscents.

Pentium 4 debut: NO SMP!
Posted: 11/17/2000     Source: ZDNET  Added by: Kim Heise

The Pentium 4 processor is not designed for multi-CPU systems but that doesn't mean that motherboard manufacturers are not going to figure out how to run the chip in SMP (symmetric multi-processing) mode. Several motherboard companies figured out how to run the Intel Celeron in SMP mode.

Intel Corp. hopes to quench consumers' thirst for power with the launch Monday of the Pentium 4, but it is also counting on attracting workstation users in what appears to be a marketing turnabout for the company and some PC makers.

The Pentium 4, to be introduced at 1.4GHz and 1.5GHz clock speeds, features a new architecture designed not only to provide faster frequencies but to boost performance of multimedia encryption, such as that involved in audio and video editing.

But while Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) contends the chip is well suited to handling 3-D applications regularly utilized by workstation users, computer makers will only be able to offer single-processor systems until possibly the second half of next year, when Intel will introduce a dual-chip platform.

Intel's promotion of a single-CPU workstation stands in stark contrast to the chip maker's previous promotions of dual-processor systems as the ideal workstation solution.

Odd gadgets draw ogles at Comdex.
Posted: 11/17/2000     Source: CNN  Added by: Kim Heise

Every year at Comdex a whole slew of bizarre (and mostly useless) gadgets are displayed much to the awe of onlookers. Unfortunately (or fortunately - depending on your perspective) most of these products never make it to the consumer market.

VoiceTel Systems is showing here a prototype of a hands-free remote-control unit that is controlled by the user's voice. The user can order the unit to pick up a ringing phone and take a message, and in the future, it will be able to control household devices and alarm clocks. According to VoiceTel, the user can soon plead with their alarm clock for just a few more minutes of sleep.

Aimed at the nuclear family, 3Com is touting its Audrey gadget here. Audrey is a device that is supposed to reside in the kitchen and keep track of a family's whereabouts. It features e-mail functions, a Web browser and a calendar. It also lets the family members scribble messages to each other on the screen in their own handwriting. In addition, Audrey features a type recorder and loudspeaker to send and receive recorded messages.

Another cool gadget shown here at Comdex is the Magic Stick, a pen-sized device that is a combined scanner, mouse and PC pen. It is developed by Swedish company C Technologies AB.

Xybernaut is showing its wearable PC here at the show. The user can wear the computer around their waist, for example. The PC is touch or voice activated.

Comdex: iRobot is real-life R2-D2.
Posted: 11/17/2000     Source: CNN  Added by: Kim Heise

One of the "gadget" highlights at Comdex is a new robot with some fancy tricks and a nasty price tag.

iRobot, the closest thing yet to a personal R2-D2, is roving Comdex 2000.

Looking like a sportier version of NASA's Mars Rover, the first wireless, Web-connected robot sees, hears and speaks for you.

"I was inspired to go into this field by seeing 'Star Wars' and the R2-D2 character," said Helen Greiner, co-founder of iRobot. "We wanted robots to be friendly and for people to think of them as a helping hand around the house."

iRobot has a digital video camera and a built-in sonar so the operator can "see" from the viewpoint of the robot. It also has a microphone and speakers, through which the operator both listens and speaks. A Web browser enables it to be controlled from anywhere in the world; from within the room, iRobot functions by remote control.

The 45-pound robot is agile, avoiding obstacles and climbing stairs using its front flipper. The operator steers it by pointing and clicking to a destination. And iRobot's beady laser eyes and limited animation make it look friendly -- a trait its makers fully intended. It can make eye contact with a seated person by standing up and extending its neck, and has a small vocabulary to express itself.

SHAREWAVE'S Wireless Technology unveiled.
Posted: 11/17/2000     Source: Sharewave  Added by: Kim Heise

11 Mbps speeds over wireless

Hopefully it does not take forever to reach the consumer market.

NETGEAR’s Wireless11X products are the first commercially available home networking products to support high-fidelity multimedia at 11 Mbps data rates.  The products also offer a range of up to 150 feet through multiple walls and ceilings. All of NETGEAR’s Wireless11X products incorporate ShareWave’s Series 2000 family of high-performance wireless network controllers.  In addition, NETGEAR’s products include ShareWave’s Whitecap™ network protocol, wireless LAN technology designed to specifically address home networking requirements for multimedia support, ease-of-use and reliability. Whitecap efficiently manages a network of different devices and digital content such as cable and xDSL modems, residential gateways, PC’s, TV’s, mobile pads, set-top boxes, digital audio and video jukeboxes, and other information appliances and servers.  ShareWave is also developing Whitecap with a forward interoperability path to the IEEE-802.11 (Wi-Fi) wireless LAN standard.

nVidia "Crush" motherboard chipset details.
Posted: 11/17/2000     Source: 3D News  Added by: Kim Heise

Details on nVidia's new motherboard chipset has been floating around the net. I wish they didn't integrate video onto the motherboard because it creates major head-aches when you plan to use something else.

• PC1600/PC2100/PC2600 DDR SDRAM support
• Integrated graphics based on GeForce2™ MX
• External AGP 4x support
• 800Mbps interbridge LDT bus designed by AMD®
• ATA-100 support
• 10Mbps/100Mbps Ethernet controller
• AC'97 interface
• 5 PCI slots
• USB 2.0

Micron to ship fastest DDR DRAM modules next year.
Posted: 11/17/2000     Source: SemiBIZNews  Added by: Kim Heise

All you will hear next year is DDR DRAM and 64bit processors. Those are going to be the two hot topics of 2001.

BOISE, Idaho -- Micron Technology Inc. expects to start shipping double data rate (DDR) 334-MHz PC2600 SDRAM modules--the fastest DDR memory yet--in the second quarter of 2001, an official said today.

Jeff Mailloux, Micron's DRAM marketing manager, said the company is currently shipping 334-MHz DDR chips to graphics-card makers, as well as 374-MHz and 400-MHz DDR SDRAM chips. For PC modules, he said, Micron is working on packaging the 334-MHz DDR in a new fine-pitch ball grid array (BGA) package, as well as modifying some timing signals on the chip itself.

He expected a prototype PC2600 module would be finished soon. After testing and qualification, the new highest-speed DDR module would be ready to ship in the second quarter of next year, said Mailloux in an interview with EBN.

No DRAM price hike soon.
Posted: 11/17/2000     Source: SemiBIZNews  Added by: Kim Heise

Typically RAM prices fall through the floor every now and then. Soon after the surplus dries up the prices jump back up. I'm not sure on how to "read into" this press release but it appears as if RAM prices won't be climbing back up soon. I do have my doubts.

NEW YORK -- Steve Appleton, chairman of Micron Technology Inc., doesn't see DRAM prices turning around from current low levels for the rest of the year, and perhaps into the first quarter of 2001.

During a luncheon interview at the New York Stock Exchange, Appleton said OEM contract prices have dropped to $4-to-$5 due to large amounts of memory chip inventory still existing in the market. "About half of our OEM customers still have DRAM inventory on hand that they must bleed off. Until they get rid of this inventory, we won't see much change in price," he told EBN in the interview.

The Micron chief executive said the current DRAM inventory buildup resulted from rival DRAM makers trumpeting threatened memory chip shortages for the fall. "Customers did what they always do. They ordered heavily to have enough DRAMs on hand for their fall production. When the shortages didn't happen, they were left with large stocks that had to be worked down."

Appleton said the flip side is that half of Micron's OEM customers have worked off their inventories and are back in the market again. "But now they can buy DRAMs at a very low price. So we are seeing many of them expanding the memory size of their PC products. Up to now the previous higher DRAM prices have caused the memory content of PCs to flatten out. Now we are once again seeing the memory content start to increase again."

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USB or FireWire?
Posted: 11/17/2000     Source: CNET  Added by: Kim Heise

This is a rather dumb question: USB or FireWire? It's sort of like asking which one to choose: The 350HP car or the 10HP car?. You will most likely find more 10HP cars on the road but that does not mean that they are the better cars. The whole question should be: Who is marketing the product better? USB or FireWire?

FireWire products are undoubtedly superior over USB in terms of sheer performance but marketing has done a terrible job of educating the public and pushing FireWire products.

Most consumers have never heard of FireWire products.

Who wins the slugfest could determine whether USB 2.0 or IEEE 1394 emerges as the dominant means of connecting peripherals and other devices to PCs.

The current version of USB, or universal serial bus, has largely supplanted older serial and parallel ports for connecting peripherals, such as printers and scanners, to PCs. But USB's relatively slow data transfer speed of 12 megabits per second (mbps) has limited its use for demanding tasks, such as transferring video from digital camcorders to PCs. USB 2.0, by contrast, transfers data at up to 480 mpbs.

IEEE 1394, the more established high-speed connectivity technology developed by Apple, transfers data at up to 400 mpbs.

When USB 2.0 will reach the market en masse and how it will compete against IEEE 1394, also known as FireWire, is uncertain. Those delays mean FireWire may not be displaced by USB 2.0, as previously projected, and quite possibly could slow down the adoption of USB 2.0.

Tech News for Tuesday November 14th 2000

Windows 2000 and DirectX 8.0 review.
Posted: 11/14/2000     Source: Tweakers Asylum  Added by: Kim Heise

The Saint over at Tweakers Asylum has posted a review comparing Windows 2000 and DirectX 8.0 video performance. Here's a clip to wet your appetite:

"Well, due to high demand I was forced into doing another DirectX 8 Showdown
this time under Windows 2k. I didn't want to do it, but you all made me..
lol.. (OK, actually I have no life and was excited to do it. There are you
happy now??) I had heard from several people that the combination of DirectX
8 Final and the leaked NVIDIA 7.17 drivers were giving a nice boost in
performance. So I decided it was worth looking into. Once again I was
somewhat surprised by the results. Lets check it out, shall we??"

ATI readies Radeon for Mac laptops.
Posted: 11/14/2000     Source: ZDNET  Added by: Kim Heise

nVidia just announced a GeForce video processor for laptops and now ATI gears up for a Radeon release for Mac laptops. This will be a major boost for both Mac and x86 clone laptops in the video performance area.

LAS VEGAS -- As Nvidia Corp. shows a new portable implementation of its GeForce2 graphics processor at Comdex/Fall '00 here, archrival ATI Technologies Inc. is making plans for a mobile version of its Radeon chipset, which is currently available only in desktop implementations.

ATI (Nasdaq: ATYTF) has already provided samples of Radeon mobility products to some customers, although it won't say if Apple is one of them. ATI's Rage Mobility, based on the earlier Rage 128 technology, drives the graphics in Apple Computer Inc.'s PowerBook and iBook. "We see four pillars in the graphics market: desktop, mobility, consumer electronics, and integrated," ATI spokesman Brian Hentschell told MacWEEK. "ATI wants to win in all of these segments."

Record shop lets clients burn CDs.
Posted: 11/14/2000     Source: ZDNET  Added by: Kim Heise

The music industry is going to love this. Watch the lawyers on both sides getting ready for a major battle.

A Dutch record shop allows consumers who want to burn their own compact disks to select as many as 74 minutes of music and charges about $1 a track.

ALMERE, Netherlands -- Free Record Shop BV, a unit of Free Record Shop Holding NV, wants to defy predictions that the Internet means the death of music retailers.

"Our mission is to distribute entertainment, and that's what we are determined to do," says Eric Benjamin, the unit's commercial director, standing at the entrance to one of the company's 175 Dutch retail outlets in this town east of Amsterdam.

Pioneer Demonstrating New CD/DVD-R/RW Combo at Comdex.
Posted: 11/14/2000     Source: IXBT-Labs  Added by: Kim Heise

Recording your own DVD discs sounds very attractive. Unfortunately no price was announced but you can be rest assured that it is not cheap. Give it a couple of months and maybe by the end of next year it will be more affordable.

At Comdex Fall shows a brand new device with ATAPI interface representing a combination of CD-RW and DVD-RW drives. That means that this device can read and write DVD-R, CD-R, DVD-RW and CD-RW disks and thus only read common CD and DVD discs. Writing will be carried out at 2X speed for DVD-R, 1X for DVD-RW, 8X for CD-R and 4X for CD-RW discs.
We are sorry that there is nothing known about the launching date and the price of such a combine.

Spinoff claims chip combines voice with ADSL.
Posted: 11/14/2000     Source: EBNews  Added by: Kim Heise

If the company can actually move this to the market via a major hardware vendor then this would be a significant technological break-through. Let's see what happens.

Legerity Inc., Austin, Tex., today announced what the company claims is a new chip technology that enables simultaneous voice and Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line (ADSL) services over traditional telephone lines.

Legerity - the communications chip spin-off of Advanced Micro Devices Inc. - said its chip set technology could transform some one billion voice-only telephone lines worldwide into afull-fledged broadband network that supports both voice and data services.

The company was somewhat vague about its product plans, however. "What we'renannouncing is a new technology," said Homer Lloyd, director of marketing for Legerity. "We will announce products based on this technology within the next couple of months," said Lloyd in an interview with SBN.

According to Lloyd, however, the company's IC technology will bring new capabilities to two different types of equipment on the network: Class 5 switches and digital subscriber line access multiplexors (DSLAMs). The Class 5 switch resides in the central office and handles voice traffic.

Older Palms to get wireless Web access.
Posted: 11/14/2000     Source: CNET  Added by: Kim Heise

I still don't see an actual connect fee anywhere - in other words how much does it cost per minute/hour etc...?

Expect a whole slew of new products from Comdex this year.

LAS VEGAS--Delivering on its promise to connect its older handhelds to the wireless Internet, Palm on Monday said it has started shipping a $40 kit that allows Palm III, Palm V and m100 handhelds to connect to the Internet by using a cell phone as a wireless modem.

In an evening press conference at its Comdex booth, Palm also showed off a revamped Palm.net portal, dubbed MyPalm, that will allow users of Palm VII and Palm VIIx wireless handhelds to surf the Web, schedule meetings and access standard Pop3 email accounts, the kind used by most dial-up Internet service providers.

The mobile Internet kit also includes the latest version of the Palm operating system, version 3.5. The upgrade will also be available later this week as a $14.95 download or for $19.95 on CD-ROM.

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Netscape 6 finally ships.
Posted: 11/14/2000     Source: CNET  Added by: Kim Heise

A couple of days ago several sites posted the new browser up for download and then retracted the links for unknown reasons. Hopefully this time it's official.

I have not looked at the new browser but will download it shortly.

More than two and a half years after unveiling its source code to the world, Netscape Communications on Tuesday will release a browser built on that open source.

Netscape, a division of America Online, is touting the release of Netscape 6 as a major milestone and a springboard for future growth, despite the fact that many analysts and observers long ago called the so-called browser war in Microsoft's favor.

Pentium 4 1.4ghz benchmarks.
Posted: 11/14/2000     Source: Ctrl-Alt-Del  Added by: Kim Heise

If these benchmarks are what we can expect from the much hyped Pentium 4 then we are all going to be in for a major disappointment. Now keep in mind that the benchmark package used does not fully recognize the Pentium 4 processor so future benchmarks may show varied results.

However, these early benchmarks show the 1ghz Athlon CPU besting the Intel Pentium 4 in most benchmarks.

The benchmark were done with a Pentium 4 running 1.4 Ghz and 256 MB RDRAM. The "Spy" hehe, managed to enter the restricted area of an high-tech company, and ran SiSoft Sandra 2000 to give you these nice screenshots. As you will see, the results are really good for the memory Benchmark but for the rest of it, the Benchmarks results where not has impressive...

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New Navidad Virus creating major problems.
Posted: 11/14/2000     Source: BetaNews  Added by: Kim Heise

Ouch - this is a particularly nasty virus that prevents your system from running any ".exe" programs. This means pretty much every program on your machine since we don't see too many ".com" programs any more. The ".com" is not related to the internet in any way but refers to DOS programs using less than 64kb of memory. How many Windows packages can you  point out that use less than 64kb of memory?

Navidad, the Spanish word for Christmas, is not spreading the holiday cheer this Christmas season. The new virus packs a lot of heat, and can render your computer system completely useless via blocking all .exe execution. McAfee sent out the word last week, and ZDNet reported more on it today as computer users around the globe need to be warned about this very malicious virus.

The McAfee virus warning is as follows:

******* VIRUS ALERT - W32/Navidad@M ********

Dear McAfee.com Dispatch Subscriber:

W32/Navidad@M is an Internet worm that spreads using the Windows email program Outlook. McAfee AVERT has given it a risk assessment of MEDIUM-ON WATCH, due to a significant increase in infection levels worldwide.

The email can come from addresses that you will recognize. Attached is a file named NAVIDAD.EXE and when it is run, it displays a dialog box entitled, "Error" which reads "UI". A blue eye icon then appears in the system tray next to the clock in the lower right corner of the screen, and a copy of the worm is saved to the file "winsvrc.vxd" in the WINDOWS SYSTEM directory.

If your PC becomes infected with the W32/Navidad@M worm, all subsequent emails addressed to you will be responded to automatically with an email from your address with the W32/Navidad@M worm as an attachment.

Click here for detection and removal instructions: -> http://clinic.mcafee.com/clinic/ibuy/campaign.asp?cid=1956

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Corel Previews WordPerfect Office 2002.
Posted: 11/14/2000     Source: BetaNews  Added by: Kim Heise

WordPerfect has swapped more hands than any other program I can think of and it still lives today. Corel is gearing up for a new release sometime later next year.

Corel Monday gave the press at COMDEX a special preview of WordPerfect Office 2002, in addition to announcing the release of Corel Draw 10. The office suite features Corel WordPerfect, Quattro Pro, Presentations, CorelCENTRAL, and Paradox. "Today's preview demonstrates early evidence of our continued commitment to develop a suite that addresses our customers priorities," said executive vice president Graham Brown. WordPerfect Office 2002 is currently beta and slated for release in the first half of next year.

Corel expects this to be the biggest upgrade since WordPerfect 5.1. The engine powering the software has been redesigned and the suite now includes utilities to recover damage files. Standards compatibility has been increased and Corel touts continued Microsoft Office support.

The suite will also come complete with Pocket Oxford Dictionary through a partnership with Oxford University Press.

WordPerfect Office 2002 will ship in several versions, yet to be announced. Like Microsoft Office, a subscription service will be available for the suite upon release, charging users for only parts they use.

Examining Microsoft "Whistler" operating system.
Posted: 11/14/2000     Source: WinSuper Site  Added by: Kim Heise

Microsoft's new "Whistler" operating system is going to have some very useful features. During the operating system install all the latest OS patches will be downloaded before the full install is complete.

On the other hand Microsoft will be "having their hands in the cookie jar" every time someone installs the new OS.

All versions of Whistler Beta 1 include a new feature called Dynamic Update that is invoked in the early stages of Setup. This feature optionally checks the Windows Update Web site before Setup proceeds, allowing you to download the latest updates and fixes before the operating system is even installed.

Cyber Home AD-M512 DVD/CD/MP3 Player.
Posted: 11/14/2000     Source: Hardware Central  Added by: Kim Heise

Having a single unit that renders DVD video, audio CD's and MP3 audio can be very useful when you consider how many wires it reduces behind your entertainment system.

Now let's add a popcorn machine.

DVD/CD players are nothing new and can be had for as low as $199. However, most of those devices can only play DVDs or CDs and usually don’t come with extra features, like the ability to play Video and MP3 CDs. But the Cyber Home AD-M512 does offer these added features, and on top of that it has full Dolby Pro Logic, 5.1, and DTS Dolby Digital support. That means that it has separate outputs for front, rear, and center speakers, and a subwoofer. And there’s more: the AD-M512 also has coaxial and optical digital-out, a S-VHS and coaxial video-out, and to top it all off a SCART connector for A/V connectivity.

DirectX 8 Uninstaller.
Posted: 11/14/2000     Source: Tweak Town  Added by: Kim Heise

Unless your video card has full DirectX 8.0 compliant video drivers then the new update from Microsoft will not do you too much good.

Several users have reported incompatibilities with various software titles and so Tweak Town was kind enough to develop a DirectX 8.0 uninstaller.

Be warned that Microsoft does not endorse this program and usually only reformatting your system will remove DirectX from your computer.

Click the "More" button below for download locations.

Evolution Of Operating Systems.
Posted: 11/14/2000     Source: SystemLogic  Added by: Kim Heise

Operating system sure have come a long way over the years. What does bothers me is that operating systems are becoming over bloated and you need insane hardware to run these new flavors. I think OS developers are becoming far to comfortable with powerful computers and don't clean/tweak the code enough for optimal performance.

SystemLogic has written an article discussing the evolution of operating systems. Maybe it's time for a revolution.

In today's world of computing most of us take a lot of things for granted. One of those things is the operating system we use. All I hear out there are complaints about the problems of operating systems. We truly don't know how good we have it and how far we've come from the early days of operating systems. Whether you're a OS/2, Windows or Unix/Linux guy, you'll appreciate how much operating systems have evolved since the birth of computers.

Seagate Highest Capacity Hard Drive.
Posted: 11/14/2000     Source: Seagate  Added by: Kim Heise

The 180GB drive space is very impressive but for $2,195 - that is a little steep. That is what happens when you get "baby" technology and you are the company who holds all the cards.

Seagate Technology today announced the Barracuda 180 -- the world's first disc drive to store a massive 180 Gigabytes -- the largest single-drive capacity in the world. This 180-Gigabyte drive can store the equivalent of a stack of text documents that is virtually three times the height of the Empire State Building. The Barracuda 180 satisfies the requirements of large critical storage applications such as data warehousing, e-commerce, data mining, and audio/video. The Barracuda 180 also delivers a record low cost-per-gigabyte with the largest capacity ever offered on a single drive. The Barracuda 180 will ship to the distribution channel in volume during the first quarter of 2001.

Already in its seventh generation, Seagate's Barracuda family is synonymous with unmatched quality and reliability, important factors when storing business-critical information. The Barracuda 180 continues this tradition with its low idle power consumption of less than 10.3 watts, and its low acoustic rating of 3.7 decibels -- making it the quietest half-height disc drive ever. Additionally, Seagate is introducing its Rotational Vibration Protection System that monitors drive movement in relationship to the cabinet or the drive mounting system and provides feedback to the drive's servo system, reducing positioning errors resulting from rotational vibration within the cabinet or mounting system. The Barracuda 180, like all of Seagate's high-end enterprise class drives, includes a full 5-year warranty with a Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF) rating of 1,200,000 hours.

The Barracuda 180's design is leveraged from members of Seagate's award-winning Cheetah family, including the Cheetah X15, the world's fastest disc drive. As a result, the Barracuda 180 is well suited for working with A/V applications. The Barracuda 180 spins at 7,200 RPM, has a formatted data transfer rate of up to 47 Mbyte/sec, and will be available in the industry-standard Ultra160 SCSI interface. For A/V-specific work, a 16 Mbyte V-code cache option will be offered. Single evaluation unit Suggested Retail Pricing (SRP) for the Barracuda 180 is $2195. Actual street pricing will vary, and will be determined by Seagate authorized resellers.

Tech News for Monday November 13th 2000

Cable industry adds 690,000 broadband users.
Posted: 11/13/2000     Source: ZDNET  Added by: Kim Heise

I had no idea the cable modem market was that vast but when you consider how difficult it is to obtain DSL connections in most areas, it is certainly not surprising.

U.S. cable companies signed up about 690,000 new subscribers for high-speed Internet access using cable modems during the third quarter of 2000, the National Cable Television Association said Monday. That brings the number of Americans who connect to the Internet using cable modems to about 2.95 million. The industry group said cable companies expect to sign up 3.6 million cable modem customers by year-end 2000, well over double the year-end 1999 total of 1.6 million.

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GM's OnStar to Offer Personalized Traffic Info.
Posted: 11/13/2000     Source: Yahoo  Added by: Kim Heise

Having an onboard computer system in your vehicle informing you of road and traffic conditions would be a most welcome feature. The growth rate here in Colorado is crippling our major freeways and I can imagine that the OnStar system would be very useful. I would one of the first to stand in line assuming the price is not outrageous.

General Motors Corp. (NYSE:GM - news) said on Monday that its new OnStar Virtual Advisor service will offer personalized traffic reports beginning early next year so drivers can check road conditions up ahead or for their favorite route home or to the shopping mall.

OnStar said it has reached agreement with Etak Inc. and Westwood One Inc.(NYSE:WON - news), which provides traffic information to hundreds of U.S. radio and television stations, to offer tailored reports on road congestion and accidents to its customers.

The service will be available beginning in the first quarter next year, starting in the Northeast United States before rolling out across the country.

The traffic information service will cover 65 major U.S. metropolitan areas where 92 percent of the U.S. population resides.

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NVIDIA to enter mainboard chipsets market.
Posted: 11/13/2000     Source: ix-bit Labs  Added by: Kim Heise

I don't know why all of nVidia's press releases today make me rather nervous. There are two issues that make me nervous: a) The company is trying too hard to attract buyers to the stock and b) Is the company spreading itself out far too thin to maintain the excellent video products and services it has in the past?

I hope I'm incorrect on both counts.

We ve found out some details concerning mainboards chipsets that NVIDIA is about to manufacture. It s entirely possible that its chipsets called Crush will be already announced in November. In the first version of Crush that will be made for both Intel Pentium III and AMD Athlon processors there will be used NV11 (GeForce2 MX) as an integrated graphics core. But later NVIDIA plans to improve the performance of this graphics core. Crush will support PC1600/PC2100 DDR SDRAM.

The first to be launched in mass production is the version for Athlon as NVIDIA has presently no license from Intel.

Crush’s major advantage in comparison to classic chipsets will be its system memory bus with the width of 128 bits as opposed to the classic 64 bits. So DIMM modules in Crush-based mainboards should be installed in pairs, but that will lead to some increase in memory subsystem performance. As for the graphics core performance, it is expected to be two times greater than that of the present integrated chipsets.

Thus the specs of NVIDIA Crush will surpass all the integrated chipsets existing on the market. And its price will correspond to that of i815E (about $35). However, NVIDIA plans to make Crush OEM market-oriented. So there won’t be many Crush-based mainboards on sale. Nonetheless all the leading mainboards manufacturers - ASUS, MSI and Gigabyte - include mainboards based on this core logic in their roadmaps.

Firms Work Toward Voice-Enabled Unified Messaging.
Posted: 11/13/2000     Source: InternetNews  Added by: Kim Heise

It would be practical at times to send and receive email over your standard telephone using standard voice communications. I'm not sure how practical it would be for cell phones since future models will undoubtedly have email support.

Unified messaging specialist Tornado Development has paired its technology with that of MIT-powered speech technology expert SpeechWorks.

In a deal that can characterize the firms as proud parents of voice-enabled unified messaging upon its completion, the firms will bring the solution to market in Q1 2001. Specifically, SpeechWorks bundled its widely-recognized speech recognition capability to Tornado's UM engine Tornado Messenger.

SpeechWorks, which made significant inroads in the biometric realm in September when it promised to offer speech verification technology in conjunction with its scads of speech recognition products, lets consumers direct their calls, obtain messaging information and conduct a transactions by speaking over any phone, any time.

SpeechWorks' Speechify™ application is a next-generation TTS engine that converts text into natural-sounding spoken words.

With Tornado Messenger, service providers can give end-users access to all of their messages from standard and cellular telephones, personal computers, Web browsers, wireless handsets and personal digital assistants.

With voice-enabled UM, end-users will be able to streamline all fax, voice, e-mail messages and address book information, from any phone using spoken commands. Examples of this include commands such as "e-mail this to Joe, "forward to Mary," and "call Dad at home."

DesktopX 0.60 Nearing Release.
Posted: 11/13/2000     Source: BetaNews  Added by: Kim Heise

If you have not tested the current release of DesktopX then you should take it for a test drive or wait until the new beta version ships. Keep in mind that the package is still in beta so be warned.

DesktopX replaces your Windows 9x/Me/NT/2000 GUI with a wide variety of new features such as animated icons.

For those of you users who raved about DesktopX a few weeks ago when it was initially released, you can get excited because Brad Wardell sent word that DesktopX version 0.60 is nearing release to the public. The other exciting news is that if you own Object Desktop, you can download version 0.55 of DesktopX right now. Key improvements in this version include COMPRESSION of graphics IN MEMORY, New GDI/System resource management system, a new graphics engine, a few usability modifications, and some bug fixes. Visit Stardock for more information.

NVIDIA Announces GeForce2 Go.
Posted: 11/13/2000     Source: Electic Tech  Added by: Kim Heise

It's about time a company develops a video processor for laptops that is somewhat usable for 3D acceleration. The problem is that fast video processors create significant heat and consume more battery power.

In a move that redefines the mobile PC market, NVIDIA® Corporation (Nasdaq: NVDA) today introduced GeForce2 Go™, the industry's first graphics processing unit (GPU) designed for the mobile market. The GeForce2 Go sets a new standard for 2D, 3D, and multimedia for the enthusiast, consumer, and corporate mobile PC -- finally bridging the performance gap between desktops and notebooks.

GeForce2 Go allows business users, artists, and gaming enthusiasts to create, present and entertain anywhere, anytime. As the world's first mobile graphics processor supporting transform and lighting in hardware, GeForce2 Go delivers breakthrough 3D rendering power, up to ten times faster than that of standard notebooks, processing more than 17 million triangles/second and 286 million pixels/second with a memory bandwidth of 2.6 GB/second. Available in configurations of up to 32MB of DDR SDRAM memory, GeForce2 Go is the first to offer DDR memory on the notebook for responsive graphics.

Intel to announce two new Celeron chips today.
Posted: 11/13/2000     Source: Electic Tech  Added by: Kim Heise

I fail to see the selling point for the Intel Celeron processor. You can purchase a beefier AMD Athlon or an Intel P3 for not much more money. I think Intel is trying to market to a low-cost consumer alternative but the line has become very blurred with the cheap prices on higher performance components.

Intel Corp. will announce on Monday its fastest-ever Celeron microprocessors that are slated for personal computers costing less than $1,000 and cited research claiming that it has 94 percent of the U.S. retail market for cheap desktop PCs.

Santa Clara, Calif.-based Intel is introducing two Celeron chips, one running at 766 megahertz and the other at 733 megahertz. Both use Intel's 0.18 micron manufacturing process, which allows the company to fit more transistors onto a single chip and to get more of them out of a single silicon wafer.

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Microsoft Visual Studio.NET Beta 1 is now available.
Posted: 11/13/2000     Source: MSDN  Added by: Kim Heise

Heads up for those of you foaming at the mouth waiting for Microsoft's .NET development tools. I have a feeling that the .NET technology is going to be a very powerful web application environment.

Microsoft Visual Studio.NET Beta 1 is now available. This release is the first chance for customers to take a look at the forthcoming innovations of Visual Studio.NET, which establishes a complete development environment for building applications on the Microsoft .NET Framework, Microsoft's next generation Web application development platform.

Developers can stay on the cutting edge of the Microsoft .NET evolution by subscribing to MSDN Subscriptions Services. Not only will MSDN^® Universal Subscribers receive all Visual Studio.NET betas prior to the public release, subscribers will also immediately receive many key Microsoft technologies.

Cellular 2.5G nearly ready for prime time.
Posted: 11/13/2000     Source: EBNEWS  Added by: Kim Heise

We're certainly getting closer until our cellphones will provide enough bandwidth for working on the web without waiting forever to stream multimedia applications. I would love to make a joke regarding the increased radiation (which has not been officially confirmed) and something about hair-loss prevention companies that are going to make a bundle. I think you get the idea.

“We're committed to delivering the best experience possible for the mobile user,” he said. “I think we all agree that if you look at Internet-enabled phones today, the experience leaves a lot to be desired. A lot of work is being done to put in place rich, end-to-end applications that'll deliver a great experience.”

Part of the problem with 2G Internet-enabled phones is the current data rate of about 9.6 to 14.4 Kbits/s. The 2.5G GSM/GPRS systems promise data rates as high as 115 Kbits/s, and 3G handsets are claiming rates of 384 Kbits/s.

But 2.5G handset data rates are likely to be somewhat less than 115 Kbits/s, according to Analog Devices' Grant. “To get 115 Kbits/s, it requires simultaneous transmission and reception, and that's just not being done now,” he said. “The sweet spot looks like 56 Kbits/s downstream and 14.4 Kbits/s upstream, but that gives the handheld gadget the same kind of data rates that people are using on dial-up 56K modems.”

DRAM prices still falling.
Posted: 11/13/2000     Source: EBNEWS  Added by: Kim Heise

If you haven't purchased additional/new memory for your computer now then what are you waiting for? As soon as the surplus dries up prices are going to soar again.

This week, workhorse PC-133 8x8 64-Mbit chips plunged below $3.50 on Asian spot markets, and $3.85 on U.S. commodity markets, while PC-100 8x16 128-Mbit fell to $9.80. Contract OEM pricing followed the commodity market lower, reportedly dropping to about $5 for 8x8 64-Mbits, and below $11 for 128-Mbit SDRAMs.

Only a month ago, 8x8 PC-133 SDRAMs were selling for $5.50 and 8x16 PC-100s were at $15.50 in spot markets, according to American IC Exchange, Aliso Viejo, Calif., and NECX, Peabody, Mass. That marks a 36% price fall in the past 30 days for both types of mainstream memory.

Advanced Micro Devices shows its plans for 2001.
Posted: 11/13/2000     Source: EBNEWS  Added by: Kim Heise

AMD has a couple of very exiting new products lined up for next year. Take a look and see for yourself.

The Athlon and Duron will give way to the Palomino and Morgan in 2001, improved Athlon cores with 256 Kbytes and 64 Kbytes of on-chip cache, respectively.

Both processors will feature an improved Athlon core with lower power and microarchitectural improvements. But the Palomino will also reach only 1.5 GHz in the second quarter of 2001, about 500 MHz below Intel's plans for the Pentium 4. According to AMD's own tests, that won't matter: a 1.2-GHz Athlon will outperform the Pentium 4 at 1.5 GHz in most benchmarks, according to Dirk Meyer, vice president of engineering at AMD's computational products group.