Tech News

  • Mozilla is the Coolest

    Published: Tuesday, December 17, 2002 | By: Dennis

    "While Microsoft claims to be a champion of innovation, the Mozilla team has developed features that Explorer still does not have. Christopher Blizzard, one of the Mozilla developers, told NewsFactor that it is all about choice. "One thing that Mozilla does better than all the other browsers out there is that we understand that people want to use the Web in their own ways,""
    Speaking as a web developer I'm quite impressed with the advances that the Mozilla team has made over the years.

  • AOpen AX4R+ Review @ Sudhian Media

    Published: Tuesday, December 17, 2002 | By: Dennis

    This is really more of a "what is Granite Bay" article than a review of the AOpen AX4R+ but you can never have too much enough of a good thing. We did visit the AOpen booth at Comdex this year and actually saw the AX4R+ first hand. I was pleasantly surprised to see that the board strays a little from the "typical" reference design.
    "The question now is whether or not moving to a platform that equalizes total bandwidth between the DDR and RDRAM systems will show much of a benefit to DDR. Its possible, in fact, that a single-channel DDR system may provide almost all of the performance of a dual-channel system—a question we’ll be investigating today as well."
    It is possible to reach similar speeds with overclocking but issues with stability become a problem.

  • Soltek SL-85ERV Review @ 3dXtreme

    Published: Tuesday, December 17, 2002 | By: Dennis

    This is kind of a short review of the SL-85ERV but they do make some valid points. Not sure I agree with the perfect 10 score but hey do your own comparison. Here is our review of the SL-85ERV for reference.

  • ASUS P4B8X Deluxe Review @ LostCircuits

    Published: Monday, December 16, 2002 | By: Dennis

    Dual Channel DDR Granite Bay style, as always the LostCircuits review is very informative and basically tells us unless you are a die hard Intel fan you might want to wait for the Springdale release. It will have more features, better speed, and cost less.

    I'm still willing to fork over the cash for one, then get a Springdale later wink smile
    "Other manufacturers as well have announced a handful of boards only. There is a good very good reason for the limited quantity, though, and that reason is that the E7205 as a chipset is targeted towards the workstation market however, it is being pushed into the enthusiast market by the mainboard vendors. Early in 2003, there will be a desktop version of a dual channel DDR board (Springdale) supporting both DDR333 and 400 and that, of course will make Granite Bay-based enthusiast boards obsolete in both performance and production cost. "
    As we mentioned earlier Soltek is only making a total of 900 E7205 based boards using a limited edition gold PCB.

  • Soltek SL-KT400-A4 KT333CF Review @ Overclockers NZ

    Published: Monday, December 16, 2002 | By: Dennis

    This board is being sold as a KT400 enabled motherboard using the VIA KT333CF chipset. This is kind of confusing since it really doesn't do much more than either of the previous two chipsets.

    The Overclockers NZ guys did get the board to run at 197Mhz FSB! So it can’t be that bad. big grin smile

  • Albatron PX845PE Pro II Review @ guru3D

    Published: Monday, December 16, 2002 | By: Dennis

    This board from Albatron is blue, has onboard raid, and a dual bios option. Who else do we know of that has these features? Yes, you guessed it Gigabyte. Makes you wonder if this really is a new company or just a fancy "offshoot".

    All things aside the board does perform quite well and comes with a variety of overclocking options, definitely worth a look.

    Or save some time and get a Gigabyte. wink smile

  • Vantec Stealth 420 watt PowerSupply Review @ 3dXtreme

    Published: Monday, December 16, 2002 | By: Dennis

    I'm sold, peek output for this 420watt unit is 520watts!, Aluminum case, aux power plug, and triple fans.
    "Overall the Vantec Stealth 420 Watt Power Supply is a winner. Combining an Aluminum housing with 3 Fan switchable operation along with rock solid performance you cannot go wrong with this unit...."
    Though as with all powersupplies now days the power cables are numerous and way to long.

  • Netscape 7.01 Released with Pop-up Blocker

    Published: Friday, December 13, 2002 | By: Dennis

    Stop the popups with the new version of Netscape. The only drawback is that many sites, including this one, use popups to extend functionality and Netscape will allow you to add these sites to an exceptions list.

    btw it is true that Netscape 7.x is very similar to the Mozilla style browser which has had popup blocking enabled for quite some time.

    Just be sure to do a "custom" install to disable some of the more annoying "features" that Netscape installs. Get the new version here.

  • Superflower SF-402 Review @ MadShrimps

    Published: Friday, December 13, 2002 | By: Dennis

    phj34r d4 5hr1mp!! big grin smile
    This is one of the cleaner looking ALU cases that I've seen the only drawback would be in cooling. The current provisions are weak at best.
    "I picked the case up @ ColorCase and just brought it home by bike. When I took the case out of the box, I was really amazed by the weight: only 3 kg! The front looked good ( unlike those SF 201’s, yuk) and was nicely finished. The side panels were rather of lower quality and didn’t have a mirror finish at all, but that’s okay for such a cheap housing ."
    I think this says it all.

  • 3 Hercules Sound Card Reviews @ ExtremeTech

    Published: Friday, December 13, 2002 | By: Dennis

    They take a look at the 3 newest sound cards from Hercules including the DigiFire 7.1, Fortissimo 3 7.1, and Muse 5.1. The reviews are informative but have that "biased" feel to them, not to mention the lack of product photos.

    Personally, if given a choice, I would go with the Fortissimo 3 though would have liked to see more digital connectors.