IT-Code-News: IT News HeadLines (Overclockers Club) 10/04/2010

F.E.A.R. 3 Announced

In the world of gaming, FPS titles have a very strong influence over the market, as do other genres of games as well. Once of the scariest and horror style games to come to the gaming world, known as F.E.A.R., has produced a large fan based from its psychic gameplay and incredibly in-depth story. The next installment into the series has been announced, known as F.E.A.R. 3. Film director John Carpenter will help write some of the script in the game, with comic writer Steve Niles to help in a co writer position for the game. As the previous titles, the game will be brought to the major gaming platforms, including PC, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360. Gamers can expect a release date somewhere are fall hopefully, with the horror first person shooter to be completed sometime around then.

HP Memristor Discovery Next Disruptive Technology?

It was two years ago this month that HP first presented a paper on a new type of memory based on a heretofore theoretical device called a 'memristor'. Originally envisioned as the basis for a new type of memory, HP researchers discovered the memristor cold also be used in logic circuits enabling the same type of computations to be performed at a smaller scale using less power.

The first disruption comes in the area of memory as HP researchers see new memory devices based on memristor technology appearing on the market within the next three years. This memory would be a direct competitor with today's NAND-based flash memory, but would allow for double the amount of memory and be 10 times faster.

"We are hoping that in three years to have a memristor-based circuit that will have more than twice the amount of storage as a flash memory chip will have three years from now -- and at the same time, have that chip be 10 times faster than a flash memory chip." according to Stan Williams, a senior fellow with HP Labs.

Memristors' potential uses don't end there, however, as HP is also working on using memristors in logic circuits as a sort of turbo boost to transistors. The memristor is not intended to replace the transistor within logic circuits, but rather act as a complementary component. Today's chip designs separate the logic and memory components in a circuit and shuttle data back and forth between the two which requires time and energy. With the new technology the two could be combined within the same circuit, eliminating the need to move data in and out of memory when required by the logic chip. Researchers see the new technology showing up in chips in the next six to eight years.

Super Talent Launches Value SSD Series

Flash memory vendor Super Talent today launched a new series of value-orientated SSDs, the Super Talent VSSD series. The VSSD series are designed to enable an affordable and fast storage solution for consumers, allowing faster boot times, program loading and reduced power usage. The new series feature read speeds of up to 150MB/s and write speeds of up to 100MB/s through the SATA 3Gb/s interface. The VSSD series has been extensively tested in Windows and Linux systems and include a lightweight polymer shell to protect the drives from damage. The Super Talent VSSD series is available now in 8GB, 16GB, 32GB and 64GB versions, and will retail between $65 and $175 for the 8GB and 64GB models respectively.

OCZ Unveils Vertex 2 and Agility 2 Solid State Drives

OCZ has unveiled its two latest 2.5" SSDs, the Vertex 2 and Agility 2. Both drives are designed with enthusiasts in mind and are the successors to the previous Vertex and Agility series. The new drives feature an enhanced controller design enabling better performance. The higher-end Vertex 2 is capable of 4KB random writes up to 50,000 IOPS, where as the lower-end value-orientated Agility 2 features 4KB random writes up to 10,000 IOPS. Both drives have transfer rates of up to 285MB/s read and 275MB/s write and use the SATA 3Gb/s interface. Both models will be available in 50GB, 100GB, 200GB and 400GB variants, all backed by a three-year warranty. The OCZ Vertex 2 and Agility 2 SSDs will ship within the next few weeks, although retail prices have not yet been released by OCZ.

Zalman Shows Off New GPU Cooler

Courtesy of VR-Zone, we have some new information on the latest Zalman GPU cooler, the VF3000A. The new cooler will fit on an ATI Radeon HD 5850 or 5870. It features a copper base, copper heatpipes, and aluminum fins while it measures in at 239 x 98 x 51mm and weighs 430 grams. The cooler also comes with Zalman's own ZM-STG2 thermal compound pre-applied and has two 92mm fans that run at 2500RPM and generate 32 decibels of noise. It also comes with a FAN MATE 2 fan controller for manual adjustments in case it is just a little too noisy for your liking.

No words on availability or price so far, but expect more information on that to follow.

StarCraft II Collector's Edition Contains Goodies, Will Cost $99.99

We may still be waiting for an official release date for StarCraft II: WIngs of Liberty, but Blizzard has announced how much we can expect to pay for the standard and special collector's editions of the game. The standard edition DVD-ROM comes in at $59.99 and will also be available to download through Blizzard's online store shortly after launch, while the $99.99 collector's edition will be limited to retail stores (naturally). So what do you get for your extra forty bucks (and is it worth it)? Well, here is the list:

The Art of StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty, a 176-page book featuring artwork from the game - I personally get a kick from looking through game artwork, though you may not feel the same.
An exclusive 2GB USB flash drive replica of Jim Raynor's dog tag, which comes preloaded with the original StarCraft and the StarCraft: Brood War® expansion set - If you are buying StarCraft II, then you have probably played the original (if not, why are you reading this, go and play it now!), but it's nice to have it included here. Plus it's on a cool dog tag style thumb drive.
A behind-the-scenes DVD containing over an hour of developer interviews, cinematics with director's commentary, and more - again, anything relating to production process appeals to me.
The official StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty soundtrack CD, containing 14 epic tracks from the game along with exclusive bonus tracks - nice, but am I going to choose to listen to game music when not playing? We'll see.
StarCraft comic book issue #0, a prequel to the comic series
A World of Warcraft® mini Thor in-game pet that can be applied to all World of Warcraft characters on a single Battle.net account - I'm not a WoW player, but I'm sure many will appreciate this.
Exclusive Battle.net downloadable content, including special portraits for your Battle.net profile, decals to customize your units in-game, and a visually unique version of the terran Thor unit - It would be nice to see more special content, but I guess we'll see how much there actually is once the game ships.

Anyone who buys either version of the game will be able to play online for free through the new version of Battle.net. Release date information to be announced "in the coming weeks". Is anyone else getting tired of waiting?

Modern Warfare 2 Stimulus Package to Arrive on PS3 and PC in May

Well, it seems that Playstation 3 and PC gamers will not have to wait for long to get the newly launched Stimulus Package. Infinity Ward announced that the Stimulus Package, which adds five maps to Modern Warfare 2, will be hitting in early May for the PS3 and PC. In North America, PS3 gamers will be able to download the map pack on May 4th while gamers in Europe and Australia get it on May 5th. For PC gamers, May 4th is the global launch date so you will not have to wait an extra day to get your frag on. No word on pricing was announced, but expect it to be priced at the $15 point that Xbox 360 owners can get it for.

EVGA Shows 4-Way GTX 480 SLI

EVGA is currently the only manufacturer to produce motherboards that support 4-way SLI configurations. With the retail release of NVIDIA's GTX 480 and 470 cards coming at the start of next week, EVGA has shown that it is possible to run 4-way SLI with the GTX 480 NVIDIA reference design. The company released pictures of the setup running on its X58 Classified board, something that you would previously have needed EVGA's own special edition GTX 285 to achieve.

The cards are pictured running the Unigine Heaven benchmark, though no performance numbers were released to go with them, so we can only make guesses at what the figures might be like for now. Running four GTX 480 cards side by side like that also looks to be a recipe for some mighty high temperatures, though I suspect if you plan on replicating that then you will be able to afford some water cooling to go with it. Not to mention the monstrous power supply that will be required to run the whole thing.

Mitsubishi Announces New 3D DLP TVs

It may seem that 3DTVs have suddenly become all the rage, but the LCD ones are the relative new-comers to the scene. Mitsubishi has been making 3D DLP TVs for a few years now and in fact, it is already on its fourth generation with the announcement of three new models today. The new 3DTVs from Mitsubishi are all DLP TVs, which has been the case for Mitsubishi since it introduced 3D sets, and these TVs are the 638, 738, and 838 models. The big feature of these sets is the addition of something called StreamTV, which is basically just a fancy term for having built-in applications like Pandora, Flickr, and Picasa. However, the 638 model will not have the apps - that is restricted to just the 738 and 838. The 738 will have more video calibration options as well as the ability to hook up a WiFi N adapter. The 838 model is the top of the line and thus has Mitsubishi's proprietary 16 speaker iSP surround technology built right in.

No word on a launch date for the new models, but the pricing has been announced. The nice thing about DLP TVs are the low cost per size compared to an LCD or Plasma TV, and these new Mitsubishi models are no different with the 60" WD-60638 costing $1,199 and all the way up to the 82" WD-82838 for $4,499.

Sheriff Tells Inmates to Pedal for TV Time

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, aka America's Toughest Sheriff, is no stranger to controversy whether it was making male inmates wear pink underwear to introducing female and juvenile chain gangs. In what may seem as an uncharacteristic move for such a tough official, Arpaio is introducing cable television to his inmates, but there's a catch. In order to watch their favorite shows, inmates will be required to pedal a stationary bike equipped with an energy-generator capable of producing 12 volts when pedaled at a moderate speed. Arpaio is making the move after discovering that over half of the inmate population was overweight.

Developers Go Bug Hunting With iPad

A major complaint of many of the 500,000 people who bought the Apple iPad over the past week, was the buggy software and add-ons that were produced for it. Normally we would blame the developers for not testing their product thoroughly enough before releasing it, but today that is not the case. App developers such as Jens Egebland of Vivid Apps have stated that because the iPad is so hard to code for, it feels like they are producing the app while blindfolded. Vivid, along with many other app designers, found that they were unable to actually test their app until they had received their iPad from Apple. This is a major problem because in order to see the app on the iPad, Apple has made it impossible to do without first publishing the app therefore making it available to the public before it has been tested. This is equivalent to a video game developer releasing the game to the public before even seeing the game played on a screen. Some developers in a sense, feel as though they are going bug hunting with the iPad being the net and the jar.

Saturday, April 10, 2010

IT News HeadLines (Overclockers Club) 10/04/2010

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