IT-Code-News: IT News HeadLines (TechConnect Magazine) 28/01/2010

Mushkin intros the Volta and Joule power supply series
Mushkin Enhanced has now announced two new lines of power supplies, the mid-range Volta line which includes 500W and 600W units and the high-end/enthusiast-grade Joule with its 1kW and 1.2kW models. Both Volta and Joule modular PSUs feature a high efficiency, Active PFC (Power Factor Correction), provide ultra-low ripple (1%) and superior voltage regulation (1%) under all load levels, and are cooled by a 120mm fan equipped with red/green/blue LEDs.

"Our new PSUs provide value and enthusiast power solutions. The value conscious builders will be pleased with the output levels and connector options of the Volta series," said Brian Flood, director of product development. "The Joule units will fuel overclocked components with clean power; allowing the most hardcore enthusiasts to reach new speeds and levels of stability. Both units distribute their power responsibly, with up to 85% efficiency."

The 500W and 600W Volta PSUs have a single 12V rail and cost $80 and $90, while the 1000W and 1200W Joule units, with their six 12V rails, go for $225 and $250.

Corel delivers PaintShop Photo Pro X3
Adobe-contesters rejoice as Corel has made available PaintShop Photo Pro X3, a new version of its well-known photo editing software. This latest release provides amateur and professional photographers with tools for photo organization and editing, burning, online sharing, and even for creating HD video slideshows.

PaintShop Photo Pro X3 include the following updates and additions:

- A new Organizer which includes tools for rating, tagging, locating and quickly touching up image files. The Organizer also makes it easy to select images and view them in multiple ways.
- Multi-photo Adjustments - Editing and enhancing is faster than ever now that changes made to an image can be captured and easily applied to multiple photos, removing the tedium of making the same changes over and over again.
- Smart Carver - Quickly achieve impressive results by seamlessly and realistically removing objects and scaling without distorting the image.
- Express Lab - Bringing the most used tools together in one place, the Express lab now adds Color Balance, Local Tone Mapping, Contrast/Brightness, Sharpen and One Step Noise Removal.
- Camera RAW Lab - makes it easy to adjust a variety of settings, such as white balance, exposure, brightness and saturation before processing. Adjustments made to any RAW image can be copied and applied to other RAW images in the Organizer.
- Object Extractor - It's quick and easy to precisely mask fine image details that are otherwise difficult to preserve.
- Project Creato - a one-stop tool makes it easy to create, edit and share projects.

"Photo enthusiasts are taking advantage of the amazing quality and power of today's DSLR cameras and as a result, they need workflow and editing tools that were previously only available in professional photo applications," said Craig Copley, Senior Product Manager for Corel PaintShop Photo Pro. "Now with Corel PaintShop Photo Pro X3, organization, editing and creative projects have come together in a single, affordable package. Whether you're quickly sorting and rating your favorites out of hundreds of photos or sharing using Facebook or Flickr, it's never been faster to create professional-looking results."

Those interested can purchase Corel PaintShop Photo Pro X3 in full for $99.99 or get the upgrade version for $59.99 (limited time offer).

Chieftec details the Bravo Combi mATX desktop chassis
Chieftec has just announced the Bravo Combi (codename CS-03B-B ), a compact new PC chassis that's aimed to be used in space-limited environments. Seen below, the black-painted case measures 440 x 140 x 350 mm, weights 7.9kg, supports micro ATX motherboards and can be equipped with a 300W power supply (DPS-300AB-9C).

The Bravo Combi includes one exposed 5.25-inch bay and two 3.5-inch drive holders, front-placed audio and USB ports, and has support for an 80mm front fan, two 60mm rear fans, and a 120mm side spinner. Chieftec has not revealed the case's price tag or release date yet but we'll keep an eye out for it.

I-O Data presents its HDJ-U series external HDDs
I-O Data is currently preparing up update its storage offer with a new line-up of external hard drive, the HDJ-U. The upcoming drive family is made up of three models, all measuring 46 (W) x 223 (D) أƒآ—x155 (H) mm, all actively cooled (by a silent fan), and boasting USB 2.0/1.1 connectivity.

Set to debut in Japan around mid-February, the 1TB, 1.5TB and 2TB HDJ-U drives are backed by a one-year warranty and will cost about $175, $234 and $484, respectively.

FSP officially unveils its Blue Storm Bronze PSU line-up
The FSP Group has now announced the latest addition to its power supply offer, the Blue Storm Bronze family of, yes, you guessed it, 80Plus Bronze-certified PSUs. Coming in 350W, 400W and 500W 'capacities', the units are ATX 12V 2.3 and EPS 12V 2.92 compliant, have an efficiency of up to 85%, Active PFC, a dual 12V rail design, a sub-1W standby mode, and a blue-colored, thermal coated enclosure.

The PSUs' cooling is handled with a 120mm PWM fan featuring a sound output of under 25 dBA. For starters FSP has rolled out the Blue Storm Bronze 500 which can be found @ Scan with a price tag of أ‚آ£70.49 / $114 / 81 Euro.

Verbatim Europe intros Gigabit NAS drive duo
Hearing the storage-related cries coming from the Old Continent, Verbatim has stepped up to the plate and released two Gigabit NAS (Network Attached Storage) external hard drives which target small office or home environments. The new 500GB and 1TB NAS devices can store/backup files and make them available to network-connected PCs, stream media content to TVs, share files with consoles, and can be set up as iTunes or FTP servers. These solutions also include a BitTorrent client for securely transferring/sharing large data files via a peer-to-peer connection.

"Our aim is to offer professional and private users a drive that they can operate like a file server. Owners of the drive will benefit from being able to centrally manage their digital data and do smart things like viewing the content on a TV via a media player or connecting one printer to the USB port which can be utilised by many users," says Kai Miroschnik, Business Development Manager HDD Verbatim EUMEA.

The 500GB and 1TB Gigabit NAS drives have dual USB 2.0 and Gigabit Ethernet connectivity and are priced at 139 Euro and 159 Euro, respectively.

Acer's GD245HQ 3D monitor to reach Europe next month
Although we were hoping to see it on sale this month, Acer's GD245HQ 23.6-inch 3D LCD monitor has now been confirmed as coming to European retail in February with a price tag of 399 Euro. This new display makes use of a TN panel and has a 120 Hz refresh rate, a native resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels, a 2ms response time, a 80,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio, and a brightness of 300 cd/m2.

The GD245HQ supports Nvidia's 3D Vision technology, is backed by a two-year warranty, and features D-Sub, DVI and HDMI outputs.

Samsung kicks off production of 3D TV panels
South Korean electronics giant Samsung has proudly announced that is has become the first company to begin mass producing panels for 3D LED/LCD TVs. The panels made by Samsung are for 40-inch, 46-inch and 55-inch full-HD 3D TVs that utilize 3D active glasses. These new products feature 240Hz technology which means they operate at 240 frames per second so as to deliver a lifelike picture for both 2D and 3D viewing.

"Recently, 3D displays have captured the industry spotlight," said Wonkie Chang, president of the LCD Business at Samsung Electronics. "Samsung Electronics aims to lead the global 3D TV panel market in pioneering panel mass production for 3D LED and LCD TVs."

Samsung's 3D TVs also feature support for the stereoscopic RealD Format which multiplexes a left eye and right eye 3D image stream into a single channel and enables the delivery of high definition 3D content to any 3D-enabled display.

GeForce 196.34 driver comes to fix overclocking bug
Nvidia has now rolled out a new GeForce driver, version 196.34 (beta), to fix the GPU overclocking bug found in the 196.21 release. This latest driver includes the PhysX 9.09.1112 software and supports the GeForce 6, 7, 8, 9, 100 and 200 series cards, the ION GPUs. Other the the fix, there's nothing new in the GeForce 196.34 but it's still a recommended install. Hit the links below for a download.

- GeForce 196.34 beta (Windows XP 32bit)
- GeForce 196.34 beta (Windows XP 64bit)
- GeForce 196.34 beta (Windows 7 32bit)
- GeForce 196.34 beta (Windows 7 64bit)

OWC introduces its own SandForce-based SSDs
US company Other World Computing has taken the initiative from OCZ and other companies and introduced the Mercury Extreme line of solid state drives equipped with SandForce controllers. Claimed to be "the fastest, most reliable, and longest endurance" SSDs on the market, the new 2.5-inch drives have a SATA 3.0 Gbps interface, a MTBF (mean time before failure) of over 10 million hours, come in 50, 100 and 200GB capacities, and deliver sustained read and write speeds of up to 285 MB/s and 275 MB/s, respectively.

"With over 21 years of high performance memory and storage product development experience, we weren't going to bring a SSD to market until we had a solution that would be worthy of wearing the OWC name," said Larry O'Connor, CEO, Other World Computing. "Over one million customers around the world have come to expect the highest level of performance, quality, and reliability from us. And our customers expect those products to be real and shipping, not just preannounced, so they can immediately begin enjoying newfound performance. From faster boot times, app loading, and overall system responsiveness, our new SSD drive will make any Mac or PC better than new."

The 50GB, 100GB and 200GB Mercury Extreme SSDs are backed by a five-year warranty and cost $230, $400 and $780, respectively.

Thursday, January 28, 2010

IT News HeadLines (TechConnect Magazine) 28/01/2010

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