Writers and Reviewers: Techgage Wants You!

It's that time again. We're seeking to add several new authors to our staff, to ensure that we can continue to provide the best in cutting-edge PC hardware and software news, reviews, and industry analysis. You think you can do what we do? Here's your invitation! We're planning some serious growth in the near future, but we need people that can help make it happen.

All positions for Techgage are voluntary, but can be rewarding. In addition to being a great way to get your fix of the 'shiny-shiny', you get to build your reputation as a knowledgeable authority in the world of PC technology, and you get a cool Techgage.com email address. You'll also join a spirited team of dynamic individuals who care deeply about providing our visitors with the best experience possible.

To be the best candidate for a position at Techgage, we suggest that you:

• Are passionate about PC technology (being opinionated is a plus!)
• Are a "self-starter" who is willing to work independently on projects
• Be able to write with proper grammar, spelling, and punctuation
• Are generally knowledgeable in most areas of PC hardware (CPUs, motherboards, graphics, storage, peripherals, accessories), software (gaming, productivity, operating systems), or consumer electronics (home theater, audio, video, 'connected home' products)
• Have an entertaining writing style

Applicants must submit a writing sample of no less than 1200 words (we can help with this if necessary), or an example of previous work. We'd also like to know what area of PC technology you're most interested in. To apply, send an email to Rob.Williams [at] Techgage [dot] com for consideration.

July 4th Tech Roundup

• Visiontek ATI Radeon HD4870 512MB GDDR5 - Motherboards
• Sapphire HD3870 Ultimate - Pro-Clockers
• ZOTAC GeForce GTX 280 AMP! Edition - Benchmark Reviews

• G.Skill PI 2x2GB PC3-12800 DDR3 Kit - Hardware Canucks

• XTracPads Micro Gaming Mousepad - Tech-Reviews
• Dynapower TL-WR543G & TL-WR642G Routers - Virtual-Hideout
• Aten CS1782 KVM Switch - Overclockers Club

• Noiseblocker BlackSilent Fans - Tech-Reviews
• Vizo SleetDDR Ram Coolers - FusionMods
• CPU Cooler Roundup - DragonSteelMods
• Kingwin Revolution RVT-12025D CPU Cooler - DragonSteelMods
• Scythe Orochi CPU Cooler - HardwareLogic
• ASUS Triton 85 CPU Cooler - Overclockers Club

• In Win B2 Stealth Bomber - Bigbruin
• Sigma SP-700 700W - ThinkComputers

Hitachi Has Plans for 5TB HDD by 2010

The Japanese company announced plans to have a 5TB hard drive by 2010. The technology used, which they call "current perpendicular-to-the-plane giant magnetoresistance" will allow 3.5" drives to push their data density over 1TB per square inch.

It's not clear whether or not these drives will be a simple proof of concept, or be available to consumers for purchase, but we'll no doubt be able to purchase a similar capacity drive sometime in the future. Even if a technology like SSD may be the future, NAND chips will have a hard time catching up.

Solid-state disks may be eating into the territory of traditional hard drives, particularly in laptops, but that doesn't mean spinning platters are on their last legs – particularly not at Hitachi.

The Japan-based company has stated that it plans to have a commercial 3.5-inch hard drive on the market that can hold 5TB by 2010. It aims to achieve this with write heads that use something called current perpendicular-to-the-plane giant magnetoresistance (CPP-GMR).

Source: TechRadar, Via: Neowin

YouTube Forced to Hand Over User History to Viacom

A New York judge on Wednesday supported Viacom's request for Google to hand over data on their users, including their names and their viewing history on YouTube. Initially, their request demanded Google give up the source code for the popular video sharing site, but that particular clause was denied.

The information will be used as evidence against Google to prove that copyrighted content on the web is more popular than original material, which would lead to Viacom to ask for a settlement fee. Google's argued against the ruling, saying that revealing the data would "invade its users' privacy," but the judge responded by saying any concerns were purely "speculative."

As one might expect, the judge's decision has been taken under fire by the Internet community on the whole, who have no say whether or not their data can be used by a third party. The Electronic Frontier Foundation has already taken a stance to support Google and fight the stance because it violates the Video Privacy Protection Act, and word has recently come out that the personal data will not be viewable by Viacom, but by "outside ad visors."

My major problem with Viacom's request is the fact that the very data they're searching for, anonymous video views, are already available on YouTube's own site. It's really a painful process to determine what the most popular videos on the site are, so forcing Google to give away users' names and IP addresses is a blatant attempt to garner evidence to attack their users.

It's hard to disagree that the judge's comment about privacy concerns being "speculative," and not tangible, can only serve to highlight his incompetence. Clearly, if anyone in the equation had any regard for privacy, the whole deal would have been swiftly rejected.

Google will have to turn over every record of every video watched by YouTube users, including users' names and IP addresses, to Viacom, which is suing Google for allowing clips of its copyright videos to appear on YouTube, a judge ruled Wednesday.

Source: Wired Blog

Apple Cuts Price of SSD MacBook Air

As SSD prices continue to fall, we start seeing the drop in price from more and more OEMs. Apple's long been notorious for keeping their price points on their Mac line until a product refresh, but competition no doubt forced their hand.

The top of the line MacBook Air dropped in price from $3,098.00 to $2598.00, a $500 discount. As our source points out, an Air with an SSD drive can be configured for as little as $2,398.00 without any external (refurbished or educational) discount. With OZC's introduction of their more affordable solid-state drives, hopefully we'll see prices drop even further for other products as well.

 With the price of NAND flash memory continuing its steady sequential decline, Apple Inc. this month cut the price of its Solid State Drive (SSD)-equipped MacBook Air by half a grand, AppleInsider has discovered.

Source: AppleInsider

July 3rd Tech Roundup

• DFI Lanparty UT X48 T3R - Ninjalane
• ECS P45T-A Black Edition - t-break
• ASRock K10N780SLIX3-WiFi nForce 780a SLI - ThinkComputers

• Sapphire Radeon HD3850 1024MB - Bigbruin

• Symphonic Designs Tube Amplifier - TechwareLabs
• PowerColor AMD TV Wonder 600 - techPowerUp
• Easy Touch ET-656 Wireless Keyboard & Mouse - Technic3D
• Razer Piranha Headphones - Modders-Inc

• Intel Core 2 Extreme CPU Cooler - Madshrimps
• Sunbeamtech Core Contact - Pro-Clockers
• Nexus HOC-9000 CPU Cooler - Tech-Reviews
• ThermalTake ProWater 850i Liquid Cooling System - Virtual-Hideout

• ASUS Eee PC 901 - Digital Trends
• Gateway P-6831FX - HotHardware
• Dell Vostro 1500 - SpicyGadget
• Lubix UBHS-NC1 Stereo Bluetooth Headset - ASE Labs
• Motorola H680 Bluetooth Headset - Legit Reviews
• iMetal iP-HS2 Isolation Headset - I4U

Microsoft Offers OneCare & Office Via Subscription Model

Microsoft will finally offer their Equipt service this month, a $70 yearly fee that provides Windows Live OneCare and online tools as well as Office Home and Student 2007. The idea is having a bundle where all applications are kept up to date in an affordable package. In this case, if the costs were taken for a year, the bundle is still cheaper than buying a boxed copy of office, with the benefit of antivirus protection built in (for reference, Office costs $150, and OneCare costs $50).

The service will be sold at Circuit City stores nationwide. As Ars points out, the company stresses that they will not be making a complete transition to subscription-based models.

Microsoft has released more details about its new software subscription bundle that went into testing in mid-April. The bundle has been officially dubbed Microsoft Equipt and will be made available in mid-July 2008 at nearly 700 Circuit City stores in the US. Equipt licenses will cost $70 per year and will include Windows Live OneCare, Microsoft Office Home and Student 2007, Microsoft Office Live Workspace, and Windows Live tools.

Source: Ars Technica

Game Consoles Offer Sexual Predators 'Foot In The Door'

As more and more game consoles offer network connectivity and online play, potential downsides to this bevy of networkability have begun to crop up. More recently, 'net-connected consoles are being treated as a new battleground in the sexual predation of children.Sexual predators are turning to online games that offer in-game test messaging and voice chat to lure new victims.

But as the predators move to new types of media to court their prey, police and federal enforcement agents are hot on their heels, moving to Xbox Live and PlayStation Network. Now, if there's a cool law enforcement job to have, it would have to be spending your days playing online games in order to catch sexual predators. You'd be able to get your game on, and do good for society at the same time. Heck, I'd sign up for that.

In Utah, a man was charged this year with sexual exploitation of a minor for enticing a 12-year-old boy he met through an online game into having sex, says Lt. Jessica Farnsworth, field commander of the Utah Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force. She says predators meet kids on a game, "groom them and then try to move off the game."

Source: USA Today

PS3 2.40 Firmware with In-Game XMB and Trophies Now Available

It's been a long wait for PS3 fans who have ached for in-game access to the xross media bar and a comparable achievement system to Xbox Live. Be sure to check out Sony's FAQ and our earlier post explaining the PS3's trophies system if you have any questions.

Source: PlayStation Blog

July 2nd Tech Roundup

• AMD Phenom X4 9950 & 9350e - Legit Reviews

• Sapphire Radeon HD4850 512MB - Hardware Canucks

• Corsair Voyager 16GB & 4GB - Madshrimps
• QNAP TS-209 Pro Gigabit SATA NAS - Benchmark Reviews

• Apple Wireless Keyboard - TheTechLounge
• AXP 2.5/3.5" SATA to eSATA & USB Dock - techPowerUp

• Scythe Kaze Master Fan Controller - Tech-Reviews
• SilenX iXtrema IXC-12HA2 CPU Cooler - ThinkComputers

• Thermaltake XaserVI MX - Rbmods
• Tagan PipeRock TG1100-BZ 1100W - Technic3D
• Corsair HX1000W - PC Perspective
• Type R II 680W - Pro-Clockers
• Tuniq Ensemble 1200W - Overclockers Club

• Toshiba Satellite U300 Notebook- InsideHW
• Gateway P-172X FX Notebook- ComputerShopper
• Samsung CLP-610ND Color Laser Printer - Tweaknews

The Tale of the Dying Distributions

There's no doubt that the popularity of Ubuntu has been nothing short of overwhelming with Linux geeks and newbies alike. It's constantly on the number one spot on DistroWatch.com, and new releases are treated like the second coming for many eager Ubuntu fans. But some shocking news accompanies its success.

Though their means of deduction are far from scientific (unless you consider Google Trends terribly reliable), CodingExperiments took a look at the rising and declining search trends for the major distributions. In short, Debian, RedHat and Slackware seem to be declining dramatically, while openSUSE and Fedora seem to either have spikes during releases, or are showing some growth.

It gets interesting when we come to Ubuntu's history. You might have guessed that it has been growing more than any aforementioned distro, but its trends also show that it will overtake Linux as a search term. In time, this could mean a few interesting changes in the methodology and relevance of separate distributions in the Linux community, but it's too early to make any drastic predictions.

So, what does this tell us? First of all, Ubuntu is pretty close to being considered the face of Linux. Second, it’s the newer distributions like Ubuntu, OpenSUSE, and Fedora that new Linux users are going for. Of course, it’s mainly Ubuntu, but I believe that there could be plenty of new users arrinving at the Fedora and OpenSUSE communities if both distributions work hard to become more user friendly.

Source: CodingExperiments, Via: tuxmachines

OCZ Announces New, More Affordable SSDs

Today, OCZ released their plans to push out their new Core Series SSD lineup. The new disks, available in 32GB, 64GB and 128GB capacities, will sell for $169, $259 and $479 respectively, the cheapest we've seen so far. All of the drives will also have a two-year warranty.

The nice thing about these drives is their uncompromising speed. Read speeds are rated at 120 to 143MB/s, with write speeds at 80 to 93 MB/s. Though the technology is still fairly new, the SSDs are estimated to last for about 1.5 billion hours, rectifying the major complaint with the technology.

As SSDs continue to drop in price, we'll slowly but surely see more products begin to adopt them. Given the alloted time frame thus far, it's only a matter of time until we'll see these products phase out traditional hard drives.

OCZ is looking to trump Super Talent push down-market with faster SSDs at even lower price points. The company today announced its new Core Series 2.5" SSDs which are the most affordable, large-capacity SSDs that we've seen to date. The 32GB, 64GB, and 128GB models are priced at $169, $259, and $479 respectively -- the drives also feature a two-year warranty.

Source: DailyTech

July 1st Tech Roundup

• Super Micro C2SBX+ - Phoronix
• ASUS Maximus II Formula - Elite Bastards
• ASRock X48TurboTwins-WiFi - Hardware Canucks
• MSI P45 Platinum - Overclockers Club

• XFX GTX 280 XXX Edition - MetkuMods
• Diamond HD 4870 512 MB GDDR5 - techPowerUp
• Sapphire Radeon HD 3870 Ultimate - ASE Labs
• ASUS HD4850 512MB - Overclock3D
• ASUS EAH4850 - ComputerShopper

• Kingston DataTraveler HyperX 4GB - TechwareLabs
• HighPoint RocketRAID 2640X4 - TechwareLabs
• Mushkin XP2-6400 4GB DDR2 - Technic3D

• AcoustiPack Ultimate Sound Dampening - Tech-Reviews

• Zalman Reserator XT Liquid Cooling System - HardwareLogic
• SilenX IXTREMA Pro IXC-120HA2 CPU Cooler - Bjorn3D

• Antec Twelve Hundred - Tech-Reviews
• Zalman GS1000 - XSReviews
• Coolmax CUQ-1350B 1350W - JonnyGURU
• Thermaltake Xaser VI VG4000SNA - Tweaknews
• OCZ 800W EliteXStream - Virtual-Hideout

• Lenovo IdeaPad U110 - ThinkComputers

NVIDIA's PhysX Looks to Have Bright Future

For those of you who don't often look at the top of the page, you are missing out on some cool content. One of the most notable would be our in-depth look at NVIDIA's PhysX technology, which is now supported right off of NVIDIA top-end GPUs, with more to be supported next month. Is it worth getting excited over? If developers begin to pick up on the technology, then yes, definitely.

The problem when AGEIA owned the rights to the technology was that they were selling the technology to be tied to an add-in card, which no one wanted to buy. With support built for a GPU, it blows the doors open for support, since everyone has one. Of course, the bigger the card, the better the capabilities, but at least the option will be there. We'll be learning a lot more about this throughout the summer, so stay tuned as we'll keep you up to date.

For those looking for a new tuner, you might be interested in our look at AMD's brand-new All-In-Wonder HD card, which should be available in the weeks to come. It packs in HD 3650 performance and TV tuner functionality into the same card. Sounds great, but the proof of its value will be seen once we get one into our labs.

Lastly, you cannot miss Bill's exhaustive look at 22 different CPU coolers, which he pit against the ultra-hot QX6850 Quad-Core processor. You might be surprised which coolers come out on top, and which fail miserably. It's just too bad that we awarded an Editor's Choice award to a cooler that, as it turns out, has been discontinued even before it could launch. Crazy!

PhysX is getting a lot of attention right now, but the reasons vary wildly. Since we haven't taken a look at the technology in a while, this article's goal is to see where things stand. We'll also be taking an in-depth look at GPU PhysX performance, using both 3DMark Vantage and UT III.

Source: NVIDIA's PhysX: Performance and Status Report

PS3's Trophies System Explained

Playstation 3 gamers have been waiting a while for trophy functionality, like Xbox Live's accomplishments system, but the wait is finally almost over. On the official blog, they've just posted a video explaining everything you need to know about the new system, top to bottom.

Essentially, it's not far different from the Xbox Live accomplishments, but it seems more intuitive (and not so slow to navigate). You can accrue different trophies in supported games, and they will automatically be added to your profile. As you earn more, they will combine with your overall trophies: bronze, silver, gold and platinum. The more you have, well, the better the person you are, of course!

In all seriousness, it looks like a great system, one that's a bit better designed than the accomplishments on Xbox Live, but the biggest downfall is the fact that it's only for certain games going forward, and it appears very few previously-launched games will add the functionality in. It would be possible with the help of a patch, but whether or not developers will care enough to release such a thing is yet to be seen.

No launch date announced for the new firmware that adds this functionality, but it should be very, very soon.

Super Stardust HD, a PLAYSTATION Network-exclusive released in June 2007, will be the first game to leverage Trophies and will offer a variety of trophies. Trophy support in Super Stardust HD will be available for first-time users who purchase the game soon after firmware v2.40 is released, while those who previously purchased and downloaded the title will be prompted to install a free patch.

Source: Playstation Blog