Tech News
-
USA Soltek Office Closed
Published: Friday, May 16, 2003 | By: DennisI knew of this for a few days now but decided to wait in posting the news until something drastic happened to make the "rumor" official.
Soltek has decided to move their US offices back to TW.
Update: If you caught my first post on this subject you might have been confused as to the reasons for the Soltek USA branch was closing so suddenly. As it would turn out I was rather confused as well. Here is a paraphrase from a reliable source.
"Here are the problem
1) Newegg
2) Low Sales
3) Payment.
1) As we all know, Newegg is direct with Soltek TW and is actually competition to the US branch. Eigther Newegg plays ball nice and follows a MSRP as they were instructed to many time before. But refused. Causing the US branch's customers like Googlegear low sales.
2) Soltek Really never took-off with the OEM and system builder market and Newegg is taking most of the end-user sales. Hence the reason why the US branch has low sales.
3) The US branch wants to pay with net terms rather than all up front. Soltek TW doesn't want that. That's actually the main argument they are having.
Going by Soltek's attitude, I doubt that they would do net terms and shut down the US branch."
Not having talked with Soltek directly about the matter I cannot confirm or deny any of the items above but we do know that currently the SoltekUSA website is down and I'm willing to bet that it won't be coming back up. -
Impostor 865PE Motherboards in China
Published: Friday, May 16, 2003 | By: Dennis"Although Intel will not release its 865 series (Springdale) chipsets until May 21, first-tier motherboard makers noted that the Springdale-platform market has already experienced some commotion with a batch of cheaper “865PE” boards recently distributed in China’s clone market."
This is strange, I bought an Abit IS7 (Springdale) board from a US based online retailer just last week.
-
Playboy: The Mansion
Published: Friday, May 16, 2003 | By: Dennis"Slipping into Hef's silk pajamas, you'll face the challenges and rewards of building the Playboy empire.
One of those rewards will be building, expanding and living in the Playboy mansion, something that should be pretty straightforward to players of both "The Sims" and world-building "Tycoon" games. As your income increases, you'll be able to add things like tennis courts, a zoo, the famous back lawn and a game house – and extra bedrooms for your guests. Since you're Hef, of course, you'll always have houseguests -- both "celebrities" (such as tennis star 'Borris McEnroe') and Playmates -- and host lavish parties. "
Nice
-
AOpen AK79D Max Review @ Bjorn3D
Published: Thursday, May 15, 2003 | By: DennisI tried really hard to get one of these AOpen boards on the Ninjalane testbench but the deal feel through at the last minute. Not a real loss considering the impending release of the 400 Ultra chips.
" My overall experience with the AOpen's AK79D Max has been somewhat frustrating with a few highlights. The frustrating part was getting it and Windows XP and the nForce2 drivers to play nicely together. Since all that was settled, the board has been very stable and reliable" -
Chaintech 9CJS Zenith Review @ OCTools
Published: Thursday, May 15, 2003 | By: Dennis"The pcb itself is blackish and everything else is colored blue including the bundled rounded cables. Everything as far as I can see with regards to component placement seems very well done here."
As far as Canterwood boards go this one seems to come with everything under the sun and has some pretty good overclocking to boot. -
John Carmack on Doom 3
Published: Thursday, May 15, 2003 | By: Dennis"Carmack wouldn't commit to a specific length but said that he favors the recent trend in the game industry toward shorter games with richer, deeper content packed into the duration."
I hope the game is at least longer than Unreal II. -
Samsung Syncmaster 172W Review @ TweakNews
Published: Thursday, May 15, 2003 | By: DennisI'm still a pretty hardcore CRT guy myself but with the current advancment in LCD technology I might convinced to make the switch.
"Now the real surprise is gaming with this monitor. LCD monitor wise, I have not played on a better monitor than the 172W. The colours are sharp and vibrant, the contrast and brightness are great and guess what, THERE IS NO GHOSTING! I personally like gaming on a widescreen TFT LCD as I have done in the past and I would recommend this one if you are into gaming and LAN parties." -
Exclusive Doom III Benchmarks @ HardOCP
Published: Wednesday, May 14, 2003 | By: Dennis" What we are showing you here today are DOOM 3 benchmarks. We have been asked not to comment on game content seen during this testing. So don't ask, as we are not telling."
Kyle has benched various cards including the new Radeon 9800 Pro 256MB and the GeForceFX 5900 Ultra. This was quite a opportunity.
And now I'm jealous
-
Window Tint Guide @ ModAsylum
Published: Wednesday, May 14, 2003 | By: DennisHere is a mod that we highlighted back in 2001 and again later with the Shuriken - AntecMod Project. Since then I've decided that every Ninjalane case mod will have a tinted window, it just looks cooler.
"After trying (and failing) to tint my window before, I kind of gave up on the idea. That was until I was walking through the automotive department at my local Wal-Mart and came across some "Insta-Cling Limo Dark Window Film" made by Axius. I pulled it off the shelf and threw it in my cart. I figured it was worth a shot since it doesn’t use any adhesive and could easily be removed, just like a vinyl cling on decal."
Cheater.
-
Innovatek Innovaset 2 Review @ Monkey Review
Published: Wednesday, May 14, 2003 | By: Dennis"Liquid cooling, in my opinion is probably one of the most efficient ways of cooling your processor, chipset, video card and/or hard drive. Unfortunately this path isn’t always the most affordable and isn’t always within the reach of the average user."
I just bought the Pentium 4 version of this kit a couple weeks ago, the coolant hose could be a little larger in diameter but I'm not really complaining. The kit I bought also came with the Innovatek radiator that has been rumored to cool better, we shall see.
