Apple's Leopard Shows its Claws

Well it appears that Mr. Jobs is at it again. Apple has announced the release date for the newest iteration of the Mac OS-X...codenamed Leopard. It will start shipping on October 26, 2007, for a measly $130. Not too shabby for something that claims to have over 300+ new features. A listing of a number of the fancy new features can be found over at Apple.com

Although I am by no means going to go out and buy this bit o software, I still think the Mac is a decent (yet extremely overpriced) piece of hardware for those who dont really wish to think about their computers. People who have trouble with Viruses, spyware, etc, simply dont educate themselves on how to NOT fall into those traps. Its really simple! The Mac's dont have any magical capabilities to protect against those things, its simply that Windows has a significantly higher market share and thus hackers attack the more popular OS. Ah well, Micropoop needs some competition anyway.

Halo 3 makes 300 big ones

Well since its release on September 25, Microsoft has sucked approximately $300 MILLION from the "casper-esque" army of nerds around the United States. As reported by USA Today....

REDMOND, Wash. (AP) — Gamers around the globe dropped nearly $300 million on Halo 3 in the week since the first-person shooter for Microsoft's Xbox 360 console debuted, the company said Thursday.

Microsoft also said that in the week after the Sept. 25 launch, Xbox 360 console sales "nearly tripled" from the weekly average reported before the game hit store shelves, according to initial reports from retailers worldwide.

More than 2.7 million people have logged on to Microsoft's online service, Xbox Live, to collectively play 40 million hours of Halo 3 with other gamers, Microsoft said.

Halo 3, the much-anticipated last installment of a trilogy, was developed by Microsoft-owned Bungie Studios.

Microsoft said sales hit $170 million in the game's first 24 hours on sale in the U.S., surpassing Spider-Man 3, which grossed $151 million in its opening weekend. Halo 3 sells for at least $60 a copy, while the average price of a movie ticket in 2006 was $6.55, according to the Motion Picture Association of America.

Lovely isn't it? At least the rest of us received a few hours of entertainment from the folks who interviewed the boys waiting to purchase the game at 12:00 AM on its release date. Hilarious indeed

Back in Saddle Again...

Well its time I got back in the saddle again everyone! For the few who MAY have read this little piece of e-beauty I'll begin again posting up any interesting articles or news I come across during my daily internet travels regarding new, old, or just plain weird technology (and other stuff where I feel like it) in our world today. Hope you enjoy!

Google Phone?!

According to recent posting at Tech.co.uk, Google will be having a press conference tomorrow morning regarding a "new product for mobiles." Thats pretty much all the search giant reps are saying but speculation is running everywhere that it could be a possible "Google Phone."

I for one am a huge supporter of Google's free services but it will be interesting to see if they are going to make the jump into the hardware/mobile market with an actual device. I some-what doubt it will be that drastic of an announcement (hype is everything these days) but I wont put any money on it.

I'll be sure and keep everyone posted tomorrow morning.

Customize your Nokia N800

Well I know its been a while folks but work has really been keeping me busy :) But in any case, I'll try to update as often as I can with any buzz I see while flying around the net.

Introducing the Nokia N800! Well its actually somewhat old as it was released some time ago but gadgeteers have drooled over it for a while. I myself have thought it to be a very cool looking device with some excellent potential. Of course, its price has strayed me from ever buying it (searching around it appears to go for a little over $300).

However, a cool little article has been written that details the steps to fully customize the interface and device itself to fit YOUR needs. Give a big thanks to the Wired Gadget Bloggers for finding this.

Read the tweako article here!

VoIP Alt's!

Thanks to MyVoIPprovider.com, a list of 250 alternative VoIP providers has been made available to the masses. This might be useful for those of you who will be affected by Verizon's assanine patent suit.

http://www.myvoipprovider.com

Vonage gets a break...

Apparently the Appeal Courts have decided to allow Vonage to continue to sign-up new customers while it attempts to win the patent suit from Verizon. As report earlier, Verizon had won the patent infringement case and the court had ordered Vonage to discontinue the signing up of any new customers until the case was completely resolved.

Although this is GREAT news for Vonage and its current customer base, it will definitely be interesting to see how things pan out from here on. The ultimate result could change the way other VoIP companies do business as well. If Verizon's patents hold up in the appeals court, it would seriously jeopordize the ability of other companies (such as Packet8 or SunRocket) from continue to provide their service of connecting internet based calls to classic land-lines.

Some analysts and VoIP supporters believe Verizon's claims will ultimately fail, but its still too early to tell. Verizon will be the sole owner of USEFUL VoIP technology if they win.

I for one, hope Verizon loses. Winning would hurt the consumer's severely, basically forcing them to 1 provider for home phone service, which is really whoever "owns" their territory. Talk about a monopoly.

HD-DVD and BluRay Players @ $300

And thus the real price war begins. I can finally say that BluRay and HD-DVD players have hit the sub $300 market (well its probably $299.99 but you know how marketing tricks work). With a significantly improved pricing model, more and more people will be buying the high-def players over the next 6 months. But which one will win? Well according to reports, Wal Mart has purchased a player that will sell at $300 in their stores around the country. This player is your typical home entertainment player that will connect directly to the TV. The BluRay player, however, will be an internal drive for your PC.

Seeing as though most people aren't savvy enough to buy the BluRay drive and then hook their PC up to their TV, I'd say that the $300 HD player has the instant advantage. Additionally, the BluRay player is not even available in the United States market yet but its expected very soon. That wont stop people from importing it from China of course :)

I gotta go Wii

Congrats go out to Nintendo today for having the Number 1 console (based on sales) in the United States for the month of March. Wii sales topped 259,000 units, where only 199,000 and 180,000 units were sold for Xbox360 and PS3, respectively.

Its amazing that even though the Wii doesn't have all this high end gadgetry, its still stomping Microsoft and Sony's consoles. Just goes to show you that its not always about the "flash", its also gotta be fun. And while I cant DIRECTLY comment on the fun portion, from friends of mine that own it, they say it is a blast :)

So Kudos to you Nintendo! Now just start releasing some games..

[Source]

The iPod Rumor mill is in full swing

With the Video iPod being on the market for quite a while now, the rumor mill over the 6th generation iPod are already in full effect. CNet has compiled a few of the following "biggest" rumors that we might see in the next gen device:

1 - iTunes subscription service --> This would basically be a "rental" service where customers can, I suppose, download movies (and possibly music) on a purely rental basis. The file will most likely have some type of built in code that allows it to only last 10 days or something like that. Decent idea but somewhat of a pain if you dont have broadband. And even if you do have it, the time to download a full DVD movie may turn some folks off (like me).

2 - Widescreen Vid iPod --> THIS would be cool. The screen on the current gen iPod is beautiful but as those lovable Texans proclaim: Bigger is BETTER!

3 - Wi-Fi enabled Vid iPod --> This would also be an awesome feature. Of course it would take about a month (or most likely less with the amount of hacker types running around) to figure out how to enable full web browsing which is what I'd want. Based upon the rumors, it appears that this wi-fi feature would simply be for browsing the iTunes library and downloading songs wherever and whenever you want.

4 - 100GB iPod --> Not much to say about this except duhhh. As storage space becomes more advanced (more capacity in a smaller unit), its only logical that Apple will grab a hold of it. Toshiba has recently announced its release of a 16GB flash memory chip (yeah 16GB!) which is supposedly slated for inclusion into the next/newest iPod nano.

There are a few other items including access to movie downloads in the UK and flash enabled interfaces but those are a little less exciting IMO.

For additional info, check out the full article at Cnet.com

Verizon Destroys Vonage

For those of you who haven't heard, Verizon sued the internet phone giant Vonage for patent infringement regarding Verizon's technology over connecting internet placed phone calls to typical land line customers (so VoIP customers calling regular old land line customers). The US Court awarded the win to Verizon and Vonage was forced to pay a large sum in damages. On top of that, Verizon ordered Vonage to cease and desist any additional use of its technology, basically putting Vonage at a standstill.

Now, it appears that Vonage is up a creek without a paddle. They cannot find an alternate technology to solve their problem. What does that mean for you current Vonage customers? Well if you haven't already, I'd start looking for a different provider. Based upon a statement from Vonage, they lose about 2.5% of their customers every month which based upon the estimated 2.2 million customers total, is about 650,000 every year. Not good at all.

As quoted from the article:

Even if Vonage "was somehow able to implement a design around, and was able to ultimately prevail on appeal, it would have no hope of regaining its lost customers, or its lost goodwill, and its loss of revenue would be permanent and …"

The rest of the sentence was apparently removed due to "confidential materials".

[Source]

Apple TV unlocked

I was reading a little article this morning in USA Today about the Apple TV and how its already been hacked to perform much more than originally advertised. As most of us know, the Apple TV is supposed to provide a link between all your digital media stored on your PC/Mac to your fancy High-Def TV, including pictures, movies, and audio. As with all new fancy products, hackers have already ripped it apart and found some nifty new features.

1 - First off, people complained about the lack of storage space. The Apple TV comes with 40GB of space by default. However, just like the original Tivo, people want more. Apparently all you need is a bigger hard-drive (unknown whether it is SATA or IDE) and the proper software update to the drive and you're ready to go.

2 - The Apple TV at its core still has all the components of a typical fully functioning computer but it runs a stripped down version of Apple's OSX. Essentially the same hardware as a laptop (all very integrated components), hackers figured they could get a fully functioning computer for the measly price of $299 (considering Apple's cheapest Mac Mini is $599, this is a good deal). Of course, they were successful. So now it appears that with a little know-how and some time, you can buy you're very own Mac computer for $299 :)

Other features people have worked on is creating a Tivo like box simply by adding a software add-on or two to the Apple TV.

Wondering how you can get all the info on how to do these mods? Well I'd check out the following sites for the necessary info:

Appletvhacks.net
Twenty 08 Blog

Please remember that this will obviously VOID any warranty that Apple provides. However, based upon the low risk of some of the modifications, I'd guess even the most basic techy person would be able to do it.

With that, have fun modding!

[Source]

Nokia E61i shipping...

While perusing through E-Series.org I was extremely excited to hear that the Nokia E61i, the next big "business" phone from Nokia, started shipping in Europe. While I cant necessarily get my hands on one just yet, it shows that within a few months (*crosses fingers*) the E61i will most likely be available here in the US. For those of you who are fans of the device this will surely be a decent upgrade. It comes with updated hardware that reportedly makes the UI a little bit quicker. It also has a slightly different keyboard configuration as well as the highlight: a 2MP Digi-cam on the backside of the device. It also has the standard 3G network support as well as a Wifi adapter built in when youre looking to not spend so much on a cell internet connection.

Check out more of the features at the European launch site.

You can also sign up to be alerted via email of when the USA version of the E61i is released at this site

Shame on you Verizon

Well apparently there is some FINE writing within the Verizon EVDO connection limitations that most people are unaware of. Basically what it says is that the internet service that it is providing through its cell network is severely limited...meaning you can basically only check websites and send/receive emails. According to CyberNetNews, the author of the article had found that people were having their accounts terminated, thats right terminated, for going over the 5GB bandwidth cap per month. When complaining about it back to Verizon, they pointed out that although the plan is advertised as "unlimited" it is still capped at 5GB. The EVDO policy further describes how they came to this magical number, which in my mind is ridiculous.

It makes sense that Verizon wants to cap their internet usage on their cell network. Its probably very demanding on resources and if people are abusing it, the majority of those simply using the phone side of the network could get crappier service. But come on...advertising as unlimited is somewhat ridiculous.

Cingular Im almost certain has something similar. Im in no mood to seriously consider searching through their bible-sized policies for such a limitation but suffice to say if one company has it then most others do as well.

Click here for more...

New Google Mobile Search Site

Google has updated yet another one of their services. This time it is the mobile version of their search page. Updates include a simpler interface, new result page layouts, location awareness, quick links to build a mobile customized homepage and easy access to Gmail mobile.

Simply point your mobile browser to http://www.google.com/m

Nokia PC Suite now for Vista

A new version of PC Suite has been released! The main update it seems is the support for Windows Vista enabled machines. As indicated on Nokia's site, here are the updates for v6.83:

Latest update: Version 6.83
--> New version of Nokia Content Copier lets you select the content types you want to -back up and restore
--> Notification when new phone software (firmware) updates are available
--> Support for Windows Vista added
--> Released 04 April, 2007

You can download the newest version HERE

Biofuels not the Answer?

I'll admit when I first learned of Biofuels (E85/ethanol) I was pretty excited. Being quite the car enthusiast, I thought it a great idea that with E85 cars could easily produce less greenhouse gases while still maintain very decent power output and gas mileage.

However, recent stories throughout the net have been published and backed by various economists stating that Biofuels are not going to be the answer. Their arguments are sound but Im stuck in the middle at this point.

Basically it appears that because the agriculture industry would be in such high demand by the oil companies, lower income areas and other livestock farmers who rely on access to cheap agriculture -- corn for example -- will have to suddenly pay higher prices. This will then effect the price of livestock (chickens, beef, etc) and cause lower income areas to be forced to seek alternatives.

An excerpt from an article in the British "Guardian Unlimited":

"Since the beginning of last year, the price of maize has doubled. The price of wheat has also reached a 10-year high, while global stockpiles of both grains have reached 25-year lows. Already there have been food riots in Mexico and reports that the poor are feeling the strain all over the world. The US department of agriculture warns that "if we have a drought or a very poor harvest, we could see the sort of volatility we saw in the 1970s, and if it does not happen this year, we are also forecasting lower stockpiles next year". According to the UN food and agriculture organisation, the main reason is the demand for ethanol: the alcohol used for motor fuel, which can be made from maize and wheat."

You can read the full article here

360 Elite

Well it appears Microsoft is preparing to release a suped up version of its hit Xbox 360 console, appropriately dubbed the "Xbox 360 Elite."

The basics (according to Engadget.com) are as follows:

- The Elite will be limited quantities only; that may be as much or as little as a couple hundred thousand.
- The case, controller, and Live headset will all be black. It will have all new packaging.
- Elite will cost $479, and will be a 3rd SKU; it will be sold alongside Premium and Core packs.
- Eventually Elite hardware (in white plastics) will take the role of the Xbox Premium. That is to say, after the Elite is launched and sold out, future Xbox Premiums will have 120GB / HDMI.
- We do not yet know exactly when 120GB / HDMI will become the standard for Premium, but it is loosely estimated to be late summer or fall.
- Elite models run cooler than normal 360s, but they are not yet confirmed to have 65nm chips.
- Prices may remain the same with the 120GB / HDMI hardware upgrade in the Premium Xbox, but we may still see a price cut on the line when 65nm chips start shipping.
- The HD DVD drive will not be internal or bundled -- Microsoft never did or nor does not currently have plans to put an HD DVD drive in the 360.
- There are no current plans to integrate WiFi into the Elite or future Premiums (although that can always change).

Daylight Savings Time updater for Nokia E-Series

For those that dont know yet, the US has decided to change the time-frame for Daylight Savings time this year. The short of it is this: the clocks are changed 3 weeks early and returned 1 week later. In support of its US Customers, Nokia has released a patch for their E-Series phones so that they will automatically adjust on the appropriate day.

Click the link below to get the patch from Nokia's site:

DST Patch

Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 for FREE

Have you ever wanted to try another operating system and not felt comfortable enough to deal with a dual boot setup? Well lucky for you, Microsoft has recently announced that for a short while (until 02/28/2007 @ 11:00 PM) they will allow anyone to download a full working version of their Virtual PC 2007 software. Both 32-bit and 64-bit versions are available.

Its MOSTLY aimed at people moving from one Microsoft OS to another but based upon the quick article searches I did, Linux/UNIX can run under Virtual PC :D

Click for download page: Microsoft Virtual PC 2007

Nokia Caught Us....

Well as seen below in my "How to Unbrand your Cingular E62" post, several people have commented that they could not see the "reinstall" option on the Nokia Software Updater. I thought this was a little weird since the re-flash process was so incredibly easy when I did it. So I did a little research and unfortunately, it appears Nokia caught on to the little trick thats been floating around the net. They made a change to their updater that does NOT let you resintall firmware on your phone. This is a shame cause now people will have to wait that much longer for an actual fix to the lovely Cingular Java problems.

So to those that have run into this new problem I am truly sorry. Hold in there though because there are plenty of folks that have the E62 and its only a matter of time before it gets cracked again.

Patience is a virtue ;)

High-Def Players for the PC

Toshiba, one of the big backers of HD-DVD media, recently announced that they will be producing an internal HD-DVD drive for PCs. Currently it is slated to accept both single and dual-layer HD formats as well as DVD-Rs and regular old CDs. Not too shabby! It will connect via a SATA connection which is great to hear. No more IDE cables! Unfortunately, no approximate release date has been announced nor has the company released any information in regards to pricing. Considering the home HD-DVD players are still in the $400+ range, I'd say this wouldn't be too far off upon its release.

Blu-Ray discs have already enjoyed some exposure in the PC market I believe. Although they are still very expensive ;)

Steven Colbert on AT&T to Cingular to AT&T

So first it was AT&T Wireless, then Cingular purchased it, now its back to AT&T??? WTF?!?!?!

In an effort to explain the craziness, Steven Colbert from the "Colbert Report" has put together this little graphic :)

Web Messaging for one and all...

You're at work...you're bored...you're done surfing the internet. What else is there to do since your company has so lovingly blocked chat programs from being installed? Well I give to you Meebo, the browser based chat application!

It supports all the major chat programs (GoogleChat, AIM, MSN, Yahoo) and the interface is very clean and easy to use. From the few minutes I spent on it, it appears you can only sign in to one service at a time but since most people only focus on one service anyway I doubt this would be a big problem. And of course, you could always rectify this problem by opening multiple browser windows/tabs!

The chat windows are all contained within the browser window as well so you can easily ALT+TAB to something else if you're feeling the "fuzz" looking over your shoulder (aka the BOSS).

All in all a great little find on the net.

Technology, In My Opinion....

Im sure we've all come across some point in our computing lives where we have a problem and have totally exhausted our ideas on how to fix it. Well there can still be a light at the end of the tunnel folks. I give you TechIMO.com! I've been a long time reader/poster of this message board and the members have helped me solve all types of issues...Java programming questions, how to troubleshoot Windows, how to get into Linux/Unix, etc. It really is a great community.

Just be sure to read the rules ;)

AllofMP3.com goes mobile!

If you haven't heard of AllofMP3.com then you obviously aren't very savy on the internet or at downloading MP3's. You should feel ashamed (and ripped off) that you've purchased music from the ludicrous iTunes store. $0.99 per song?!?! I laugh!

Well rejoice because now Im here to tell you about the lovely AllofMP3.com site. Hosted and run in Russia (the pirating capital of the world...next to China), this site has thousands upon thousands of songs for you to download and phenominal prices. The cost to you depends really upon what bitrate/quality you'd like to have for the song but it can cost as little as $0.01/Megabyte. Not too shabby eh??

Well I just found too that they have created a mobile catalog browser for the Nokia S60v3 devices! Cool! Now I can browse and download all the best songs whenever I want right from my phone!

Of course, this site wont have EVERY song imagineable but it will have pretty much every well known song you could think of today. Although I listen to pretty obscure songs sometimes, I've been able to find about 90% of the stuff I wanted on their site. It really is the best out there.

There is, of course, a desktop version as well. Both can be found at the AllTunes website.


So what are you waiting for?!?! Get to downloading!

Initial Overclocking results

Well I finally made the first step and overclocked my Core 2 Duo the other day. Nothing really agressive, though. I went from a 266Mhz FSB to 333Mhz, which gave me an ending result of ~2.3Ghz. The memory multiplier I set at 2.0 which will run my memory (for the math challenged) at 667Mhz. Reportedly, my memory runs at 4-4-4-12 timing modes up to 667Mhz but for some reason my Gigabyte S3 motherboard didn't set it at that. So now its running at 5-5-5-15 (well I think tis 15...never remember that last number).

In any case, I haven't done any "official" benchmarks yet but I did manage to install F.E.A.R. which is a pretty standard FPS benchmarker these days. Running at HIGH settings for both CPU and graphics, I pulled out an average of 92 FPS. The lowest recorded was 42 and the highest was about 140. Not too shabby at all!

Since my memory is only set to run at 667, Im a bit leary about running it at any higher speeds. I guess I could test it and see what potential it really has past its recommended speed but Im not looking for much. I know the CPU can do more but right now Im a bit limited by my RAM (it sucks having a budget!).

But all in all the performance out of the box of this CPU is amazing. 500Mhz overclock from stock straight outta the box and without a hiccup at all.

The iPhone already a bomb?

Well with Apple's iPhone announcement a few weeks ago at MacWorld, there was quite the buzz in the tech world regarding the sexy new phone from Apple. I must admit, I fell into it at first. The device is downright amazing looking, but what else would you expect from them? All the features sounded really cool until I started to realize a few things, such as no battery replacement options and the fact that its not a 3G enabled device. Extremely disappointing for me since a key feature I will look for in my next phone is 3G compatibility.

In any case, I recently found this article regarding "13 Reasons to Doubt the iPhone" and thought it a fantastic read.

Check it out here

Unbrand your Cingular E62!!!!

Well its finally happened! After 3+ long months of waiting for someone to fix the JAVA crippling that Cingular placed on the lovely Nokia E62, some smart person figured out how to unbrand/reflash the firmware to the stock Nokia unbranded firmware.

As any of you who own a Cingular smartphone/pda know, its J2ME capabilities were severely crippled due to Cingular's custom firmware installed when you purchase the phone. When using any JAVA app that required access to the net, it would CONSTANTLY prompt you for access to the web. Suffice to say using fun applications like Google Maps became extremely annoying. Well its all gone now thanks to a crafty person who unfortunately I cannot give credit to because I dont know who he/she is!

In any case, on to the good stuff: below you will find the specific directions on how to perform the re-flash.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
1) Download and install Nokia Software Updater (NSU) from:
http://www.nokiausa.com/support/software/update_via_pc_1

IMPORTANT NOTE: Nokia Software Updater is very sensitive to software firewalls. During the many tests I have done, I found that I must completely disable software firewall, as granting full network access to (NSU_UI_CLIENT.EXE and NSL_HOST_PROCESS.EXE) was not enough to make NSU work. So, the bottom line is if you do not want an additional headache and want to receive quick results, then just temporarily disable software firewall before you run NSU in step 6).

2) Download and install Nemesis Service Suite (NSS) software in order to change the phone’s product code from here:
http://www.b-phreaks.co.uk/software.htm

3) Now we are ready to change Cingular's Product Code to Unbranded US_Generic Nokia’s Product Code which will allow us to upload the original (not modified by Cingular) Nokia’s firmware in step 6).

3.1 Connect your phone to USB and choose "PC Suite" mode (same as if you always do when sync your phone);

3.2 Open NSS and click on “Scan for new device” button on the right-upper part of the window;

3.3 Click on the icon “Phone info”;

3.4 Click on “Scan” and wait until you get "...Done" in the status string at the bottom of NSS window;

3.5 Now, in a "Product Data Edit" window check "Enable" next to "Product Code" string and type the next code: 0524513. Then press "Write" button and wait until you get "...Done" in the status string at the bottom of the NSS window;

3.6 Press "Scan" button again (same as you did in 3.4) just to be sure you still can get "...Done" at the bottom of NSS window;

3.7 Right click on a small icon (located above "Device Info" button) and choose "close device";

3.8 Now you can completely close NSS. We do not need it anymore.

4) Disconnect USB cable.

5) At this step we will reset the phone to the factory configuration:

5.1 On your phone press several times Red button, so to be sure you are in an "Idle Screen";

5.2 Press * button

5.3 Press # button

5.4 Press 7 button

5.5 Press 3 button

5.6 Press 7 button

5.7 Press 0 button

5.8 Press # button

At that point you will be asked if you want "Restore all original phone settings". Answer “Yes” and confirm the code (which is 12345 by default. Be careful and verify that you are typing a numbers, but not symbols).

When you provided the right code, your phone will be restarted and you will be asked if to you want a read a tutorial. Answer “No” to save you some time.

6) Now we are ready to update our E62 to Unbranded US_Generic Nokia firmware.

6.1 Connect your phone to USB and choose "PC Suite" mode;

6.2 Connect your phone to a charger;

6.3 Run Nokia Software Updater (NSU);

6.4 Follow the prompts. At the point when NSU says that you already have the latest firmware and if you want to download it again, confirm it with checkmark and let NSU do its work;

6.5 After about 15 minutes, NSU will finish its work, reboot the phone and tell you that your phone software is updated and you are ready to go.

6.6 Close NSU window. Disconnect your phone from USB.

6.7 You should have Unbranded US_Generic Nokia firmware in your phone now.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Big thanks to Chris at EQO Mobile for finding this fix.

NOTE:Please be aware that this will most certainly be against Cingular's rules and they will most likely not provide support if they figured out what you did. How they would figure that out would be unknown to me but I had to say it.

New Year = New Computer

Happy New Year!!!

Well in the spirit of change from 2006 to 2007, I decided to dedicate any Holiday money towards updating my home computer system. I knew that the Core 2 Duo's were the hot ticket this season and being an enthusiast, knew about their excellent overclocking potential. So obviously I had decided on the CPU, but what about the other components? Its been about 2 years since my delve in to the overclocking world and its been well over 5 years since my purchase of an intel based system (crazy I know).

So I spent about a week's worth of research on Toms Hardware, Hard OCP, and other hardware related sites to figure out which combo of parts will give me the best bang for the buck. I finally had decided on the following items (based upon peoples reviews and articles that used these components in overclocking the Core 2 Duos):

Intel E6300 Core 2 Duo @ 1.86Ghz
Gigabyte 965P-S3 ATX Motherboard
1GB (2x512MB) Corsair XMS Dual Channel DDR2
Wester Digital 250GB SATA2 HDD

I wavered back and forth on the video card. Toms Hardware has excellent articles on which video cards are the best for various price ranges and at the time, the one said to be the best for the ~$180 price range was the ATI X1950 Pro. Well I was looking around the net and couldn't find one card under $200. In fact they were all around $220. Too expensive unfortunately (I did have strict budget). I went back to the article and noticed that it had been updated! The new king for the price range was the nVidia 7900GS. According to the article the change was due to the inability of the author to find a 1950 Pro for the designated price :) I doubled checked around the net and the 1950 appeared to perform the same as the 7900GS so I was set.

So I gather all the components, pieced it together and installed Oblivion as soon as I could. I instantly noticed an amazing increase in performance based upon the fact that the auto config put the quality at ULTRA :) Suffice to say that the new hardware really does wonders on games!

I haven't yet tried to overclock seeing as though my current performance is much better than any of the games I currently own can throw at it. I'll have to run some benchmarks soon to let ya'll know of the baselines that I am getting. Then its off to attempt some overclocking and see what this Core 2 Duo is really made of.

Laterz