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* any broken formatting when opening a non-native file format means it's incompatible as far as I'm concerned.

Then you might as well go download Microsoft's ODF plug-in for Microsoft Office Word, find one little error, and then call Word "incompatible" with ODF. If you want to preserve formatting, use a desktop publishing program that's designed to preserve formatting, and then export to PDF.

That's not quite accurate. The company that bought/took the formula was a company that manufactured electrolyte, not a capacitor company. That flawed electrolyte was sold to about a dozen capacitor manufacturers in Taiwan and Japan, who in turn sold the capacitors to probably thousands of companies. It affected products by almost every major computer vendor, including every manufacturer you mentioned in your post.

IBM
http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2003/06/22/ibms-capacitors-are-dodgy-too-but-its-hushed-up

HP
http://news.cnet.com/PCs-plagued-by-bad-capacitors/2100-1041_3-5942647.html

Apple
http://news.cnet.com/Apple-offers-repairs-for-problem-iMacs/2100-1041_3-5841331.html
http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=2071244

While we're at it, Dell, Asus, MSI, Shuttle, ECS, Giga-Byte, Abit, and Compaq.

I doubt you can find any computer or motherboard vendor that didn't get bitten by those capacitors on at least one of their products.

That said, I do agree that buying from a major manufacturer is probably a good idea. The advantage of the more reputable, bigger name vendors is that when bad things happen that are outside their control (as this clearly was), they are more likely to stand behind their products even for people who didn't buy the extended warranty....

"The better one was the Tom's Hardware one where they tested an AMD chip and Intel chip..."

I couldn't find the video on Tom's Hardware but this video was uploaded in 2005 and I found this article from 2001 talking about the video so Tom "Pushed a CPU to Heat Death, Intentionally" seven years ago making this article Not News Worthy.

No magic required...

they're working on it.

First off, I didn't call them deathstars, you did.

Secondly, I didn't say IBM was poor hardware quality. I stated a well known fact that there were issues with those drives, in fact there was a lawsuit about it and IBM settled the suit. So there was something too it. I'm happy you had better results. I didn't enjoy that luck.

I owned 1x75GB and 4x250GB drives. The 75GB failed, and 2 of the 250GB drives failed. Because I didn't read the part about 'no peanuts' my 75GB was voided and it was never fixed. The second time I sent the 2x250GBs in I made sure not to make that mistake, and they were fixed under warranty and worked until I got rid of the server they were in.

I now happen to buy Seagate hard drives for my personal use, but it happens that the reason I do that is IBM no longer is in the hard drive business so my incentive to buy them is not so high any more.

What was that incentive? I happen to work for them. One of those 'eat your own dogfood' kinda things in that if I can work for them, I can use the stuff in my personal projects. That being said my response was a personal one, on my own time, and didn't express any IBM opinion on the matter.

I'm just expressing my own opinion in the original post was rather dubious in nature because I find it hard to believe no one ever had hard disk fail - ever - I've been using computers now for almost 30 years. From my little Atari 800. Saying that in all that time you never had a disk fail says you either never used computers, or you should buy a lottery ticket. I can remember a 10MB hard drive actually smoking in the late 80s in a Compaq Plus, and the excitement of getting it replaced with a 'hard card' that had a whoppin 20MB on it.

Since then, I've had hard disk never fail the entire time I owned a system, and I've had others crash and burn within weeks of getting them. It's impossible to expect something that does the equivalent of a 747 flying over water 2ft above ground at mach 20 or whatever the stat is to not break every once in a while.

Seems to me that the new advancements in diamond manufacturing will pave the way for diamonds to be the next step.

Great articles on it...

http://www.geek.com/81ghz-diamond-semiconductor-created/
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/11.09/diamond.html

Slew

M$ bought a huge chunk of Corel, and probably control the company these days. I'm never seen any analysis of the fallout of this deal, it was a while ago.

Never happened. Each time M$ tried, they got their noses rubbed in the pathetic insufficiency of their cruftware publicly :
http://www.pcw.co.uk/vnunet/news/2113313/hotmail-finally-move-windows x
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/12/12/microsoft_hotmail_still_runs/
http://www.geek.com/ms-and-unisys-dont-use-unix-except-now/

M$ set the server identification strings to say IIS and beyond that stopped trying to fool people about that years ago and hopes everyone just forgets.

Though just maybe the weasel word there is "relative". So yeah, on an absolute level it had its pants pulled down and was pushed over in front of a bunch of laughing girls, but relatively speaking (for M$) it went well.

Don't worry. In a few years it won't just be for high-maintenance ladies anymore. Instead, you'll be able to melt through the surface of the earth while running spreadsheet calculations at lightning speed.

Turning Plants into Plastic--And Replacing Oil in the Process

Ballooning Demand for Plastic Made from Vegetable Resin

Plastic without the petroleum

Starch based plastic 3d printer

Consoles are actually an excellent example of the fact that people who buy cheap systems will avoid paying for software unless they absolutely have to. If this wasn't the case, then they wouldn't have increasingly complex internal DRM systems, there wouldn't have been enough of a market for "mod chips" that bypass said DRM systems for them to exist, and the console manufacturers wouldn't have regarded those "mod chips" as enough of a threat to their licensing revenue to bother doing everything in their power to prevent them being manufactured, sold, or installed.

Here are some links which show (a) piracy flourishes when people can bypass a system's internal DRM, and (b) all three major console manufacturers take this threat very seriously indeed:

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/28984/Piracy-drive-threatens-Nintendo-DS
http://www.thetanooki.com/2007/11/26/r4-chip-costing-nintendo-millions-in-ds-software-sales/
http://www.playnoevil.com/serendipity/index.php?/archives/1355-Nintendos-success-is-breeding-Piracy-Problems.html
http://www.gamersevolved.com/nintendo-ds-tries-to-put-stop-to-piracy.html
http://www.gamingbits.com/content/view/2884/2/
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/emergingtech/0,1000000183,39161307,00.htm
http://www.engadget.com/2006/10/05/sony-busts-down-mod-chip-retailer-with-9-mil-lawsuit/
http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2003/07/31/sony-wins-australian-mod-chip-case
http://www.afterdawn.com/news/archive/4407.cfm
http://www.itwire.com/content/view/13847/532/
http://www.afterdawn.com/news/archive/3401.cfm
http://www.news.com/2100-1040-962797.html
http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=6042
http://www.geek.com/three-people-facing-charges-for-xbox-piracy/

There are countless other similar links that prove how reluctant people are to pay for software on any low-cost platform if they can find a way of not doing so.

If these are anything like the drives I priced from BitMicro about a year ago (you have to e-mail for price) then they are probably many (many) thousands of dollars. AFAIK, BitMicro has catered more to the industrial (hard drives for aerospace) realm.

I'm not sure that any drives they may be making now aren't in the same class, a [price] class that would make consumers shit a purple Twinkie, considering in 2005 their U320 155gb drive was supposed to cost north of $75,000 US.

And, what about this? Why are we dancing around this drive when they already make a 1.6 TB model?

• Blu-ray player sales dominate HD DVD, 3 to 1
• Latest Japanese data shows Blu-ray outsells HD-DVD 9:1
• Blu-ray outselling HD DVD 2 to 1 this year
• Blu-ray Winning Europe 4-to-1
• Sony claims Blu-ray had 95% Australian HD market in October
• Blu-ray Dominates HD- DVD in Holiday shopping
• Disc Sales: 'Pirates' Leads Blu-ray to Decisive Weekly Win Over HD DVD
• PS3 to Go Blu-ray Profile 1.1 With New Firmware Update
• Blu-Ray Wins a Battle in the High-Def War

Anything around here that allows you to hook up to a PC is ridiculously expensive and works like crap, and they still reserve the right to mysteriously cap your "unlimited" usage or to bill you extra if you go over that limit. That's the plans that do allow hooking up to a PC at all. Mine, like many, is "unlimited" for the phone, but I still have to pay per kB to hook it to another device and let that use the connection.

There was a news story not long ago about a guy on a plan like mine in Canada who ran up an $85,000 phone bill because he didn't see the distinction in the fine print. Yahoo, DSL Reports, The Huffington Post, CNet UK, Canada.com, Geek.com, and /.'s own Firehose have had the story, among many other sources.

I can get Sprint, AT&T, or possibly Verizon (haven't check on their coverage and plans here lately for data) here that will allow me to hook up to my PC for "unlimited" data transfer, but it runs about $100 a month on top of a required voice plan, and although most phones will do it only certain phones or a dedicated cell modem is allowed to have the plan. Sprint says theirs is both "unlimited" and "broadband", but they also say it's not to be used to replace a leased line Internet service. So which is it?

Actually with regard to the original Xbox Microsoft had an issue with cost of the Nvidia graphics module in that Nvidia would not drop their prices http://www.geek.com/microsoft-and-nvidia-end-xbox-dispute/ which contributed to the overall losses on the Xbox. This dispute actually forced Microsoft to bring the Xbox360 out earlier than they originally wanted.

I would not say Sony was greedy in keeping the PS2 alive since the sale of each PS3 is a loss (not sure exactly how much though) it makes perfect business sense to offset these losses against the PS2 and at the same time you provide the Gaming market with a cheaper machine than any of the other consoles. While this may not make much sense to some affluent people it is an excellent buy for poorer people who can't even afford a Wii, much less buy games for it. What makes the PS2 such an excellent buy is that good games are still being made for it (OK there are some stinkers as well) that can satisfy just about all gaming needs at a budget price. This is great for people on a limited budget world wide and is also nice for more affluent gamers in that they can save money as well.

As for the poor take-up of the PS3 you should should look at http://vgchartz.com/ and plot the PS3 against the Xbox360 (align the launches) and there is little difference. The Wii is the only console that has literally broken all records for console sales, but how long this will go on remains to be seen.

Actually the only current generation console that you can (sort of) modify is the PS3 since you can use it as a media server and can put Linux on it if you want to run emulators. I do have a Backwards Compatible PS3 (it is annoying to make this distinction now) and my only native PS3 game is Oblivion which is IMHO a great game but I also have plenty of PS2 games (I even buy new ones) that tide me over till the PS3 has more games I like. Sounds weird but a smoothed and unscaled "good" PS2 game on a HDTV really adds to the game play and you can save quite a lot of money doing this, I know I have.

You need to "hear" more before commenting then.
2 second google search found one back in Feb.
http://www.geek.com/chinese-man-dies-after-week-long-gaming-session/


The internet is not that hard. Really.

(Given that last link, expect the RIAA to become part of Homeland Security.)

The Japanese have gigabit with IPv6 to the home already, but this makes that look like dial-up in comparison.

I bought a duo core e6600, new MB, new everything actually. Now whenever I play MP3's or video it will randomly slow down for a second. My friend has the same issue, but with a different brand of motherboard. He is running an e6400 though. updated drivers do not fix this. using a sound card does not fix this. BIOS updates do not fix this. I do notice that when I get the slow down I see a 10% jump in CPU usage on only one of the CPU Usage History graphs from within Windows Task manager.

After reading this:

http://www.geek.com/images/geeknews/2006Jan/core_d uo_errata__2006_01_21__full.gif

I still can't tell if this is an issue with the processor, but I'm betting it is. And if it is does Intel have anything in place for the consumer to fix these issues?

(just got this in my mail from the OpenBSD mailing list)

Various developers are busy implimenting workarounds for serious bugs
in Intel's Core 2 cpu.

These processors are buggy as hell, and some of these bugs don't just
cause development/debugging problems, but will *ASSUREDLY* be
exploitable from userland code.

As is typical, BIOS vendors will be very late providing workarounds /
fixes for these processors bugs. Some bugs are unfixable and cannot
be worked around. Intel only provides detailed fixes to BIOS vendors
and large operating system groups. Open Source operating systems are
largely left in the cold.

Full (current) errata from Intel:

  http://download.intel.com/design/processor/specupd t/31327914.pdf

  - We bet there are many more errata not yet announced -- every month
      this file gets larger.
  - Intel understates the impact of these erraata very significantly.
      Almost all operating systems will run into these bugs.
  - Basically the MMU simply does not operate as specified/implimented
      in previous generations of x86 hardware. It is not just buggy, but
      Intel has gone further and defined "new ways to handle page tables"
      (see page 58).
  - Some of these bugs are along the lines of "buffer overflow"; where
      a write-protect or non-execute bit for a page table entry is ignored.
      Others are floating point instruction non-coherencies, or memory
      corruptions -- outside of the range of permitted writing for the
      process -- running common instruction sequences.
  - All of this is just unbelievable to many of us.

An easier summary document for some people to read:

  http://www.geek.com/images/geeknews/2006Jan/core_d uo_errata__2006_01_21__full.gif

Note that some errata like AI65, AI79, AI43, AI39, AI90, AI99 scare
the hell out of us. Some of these are things that cannot be fixed in
running code, and some are things that every operating system will do
until about mid-2008, because that is how the MMU has always been
managed on all generations of Intel/AMD/whoeverelse hardware. Now
Intel is telling people to manage the MMU's TLB flushes in a new and
different way. Yet even if we do so, some of the errata listed are
unaffected by doing so.

As I said before, hiding in this list are 20-30 bugs that cannot be
worked around by operating systems, and will be potentially
exploitable. I would bet a lot of money that at least 2-3 of them
are.

For instance, AI90 is exploitable on some operating systems (but not
OpenBSD running default binaries).

At this time, I cannot recommend purchase of any machines based on the
Intel Core 2 until these issues are dealt with (which I suspect will
take more than a year). Intel must be come more transparent.

(While here, I would like to say that AMD is becoming less helpful day
by day towards open source operating systems too, perhaps because
their serious errata lists are growing rapidly too).

I agree.

Jonathan *had* to know he might get burned for spilling the beans before Steve. Jobs has a track record of being harsh, almost vindictive in his dealings with companies which betray his trust.

Exhibit A: Samsung runs their mouth about being selected to supply software to drive the next-gen iPod Nano. Apple turns around and drops them.

Exhibit B: ATI runs their mouth about some specs for new macs before Macworld. Apple removes ATI boards from their computers and refuses to offer them as a build-to-order.

Simply put, don't try to scoop The Steve.

Random Pics: HTC Touch iPHONE

Here you go

Sounds like the hardware version of Windows. Every user would be a beta tester.

Welcome to the present.

I think that there's some potential in the idea of placing a thousand 80386 cores in parallel on the same chip.

For crying out loud, they deserve it.

http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/11/03/152232

http://www.geek.com/news/geeknews/2002Nov/gee20021 122017460.htm

All that's old is new again. Can you say Riccitiello for CEO?

Until it died, my Zodiac II doubled as an HP-48 emulator - basically adding another $150 in value to the device for free - with Power48. Honestly, with RPN, a built-in stack-based programming language, and advanced math functions, this is an incredible tool for Palm users. And did I mention it's free?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_diamond#App lications and

http://www.geek.com/news/geeknews/2003Aug/gee20030 827021485.htm

... if you combine them on the same die with a large shared cache and the on-chip memory controller... you can see where I'm going with this. Think of it as a separate CPU, just printed on the same silicon wafer. That means you only need 1 fan to cool it and you can lose a lot of heat producing power management circuitry on the video card.

Obviously this is not going to be ideal for high end gaming rigs; but it will improve the quality of integrated video chipsets on lower end and even mid range PCs.

When Timna was initially finished, RAMBUS was still so expensive that Timna's release had to be delayed so that a (PC100-to-RAMBUS) memory translator could be added. Those of us who followed chipsets back then know how badly RAMBUS and memory translators bombed. The integrated RAMBUS memory controller had to be the biggest reason Timna was cancelled. This might also be a reason Intel doesn't integrate a memory controller onto their current CPUs.

Interestingly, Timna was the first project of Intel's new Israeli design team. Not a great start, but their second project was pretty darned good (Pentium M/Centrino).

That is true, but RIAA's lawyers are not suing people for downloading or sharing non-infringing files. They are going after users after verifying that one of their members' works is being copied. I'm not a supporter of RIAA by any means, and I also understand that some lawyers are better and/or more honest than others. But there are many mechanisms to block truly frivolous lawsuits in the early stages of litigation in the American system. See, e.g. Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, Rule 11.

So when they sued that grandmother who didn't own a computer or another one who never used a computer they had verified they had MP3s?

I don't mean to sound bitchy here, but they have gone for the wrong people in the past so I guess you need some more mechanisms there.

Actually, the bugs I am think of in the most recent processors are really not minor.
In the case of the Core duo processors from the beginning of the year. The first 20
days or so 34 bugs were found of which approximately 15 were regarded as show stoppers.

http://www.geek.com/news/geeknews/2006Jan/bch20060 123034350.htm

I don't know why I am bothering to post this, considering the fact that you are probably
an intel fanboy. BTW, I don't go to Digg or any of those sites.

I don't personally consider that to be particularly stellar. Yes, minor bugs will be in
pretty much every silicon ever released, but finding this many show stoppers in less than
3 weeks really looks like the QA process was somewhat defective.

The government of the USA has already shown a proclivity towards watching its citizens. To be fair, this phenomenon isn't limited to the USA, but Bush has taken it to new levels.

We now know that the government secretly had printer manufacturers embed hidden ID codes on printer's output, thereby removing any possibility of anonymous document creation.

I wouldn't be surprised if some enterprising Bush-ite didn't see the possibility here of having *every* keyboard manufactured with some form of this technology embedded. Imagine if the government could tell what you were typing just by listening to your traffic.

Think of the terrorists we could stop! Think of the children!

I'm sure these had no effect on DirectX taking off:

Microsoft claim shakes graphics world
3D graphics world shaken by patent claims
Standards stalled over royalty disputes
Microsoft clarifies OpenGL position...sort of
OpenGL 1.4 unveiled

http://www.geek.com/techupdate/jul99/pacman.htm/

AMD's 4x4 approach isn't a mere reaction to Core 2 Duo. AMD has been planning this for a long time.

AMD systems don't suffer from bandwidth problems with additional cores, unlike Intel's Kentsfield (quad core).

AMD is opening up hypertransport for 3rd party co-processors. This will totally change the industry with the ability to drop in specialized processors onto boards. These kind of possibilities are going to give EEs a new meaning in life.

You should. There were a lot premature M/B failures because of bad electrolytic caps between 2001 and 2004. http://www.geek.com/news/geeknews/2003Feb/bch20030 207018535.htm

Actually, this is closer to mercata.com's business. With Priceline, the seller can accept each buyer's bid separately, at whatever price each individual offers. Mercata was about group buying power: shoppers offer to buy a product at some price, with the understanding that the final price may go down if enough customers join in on the deal.

The other difference is that Priceline is still around, but Mercata isn't.

Yes, but Intel hardly planned it that way. The incremental "Tejas" P4 CPU cratered, so Intel has had nothing to do for the last 2 years except talk about the upcoming NGMA/Core chips. Not having a competitive product has hurt them quite a bit financially.

http://www.geek.com/news/geeknews/2004May/bch20040 506025030.htm

Do not try this at Best Buy.

I looked through 3 or 4 other versions of this article via google news, and I couldn't find the original press release, but I couldn't find anything mention of why gaming companies would be forced to give large sums of money to an independant, voluntary ratings board. One article mentioned the FTC in the same paragraph, but why would the ESRB have that kind of enforcement power?

I can only see two possibilities, neither of which makes sense. Some contract the ESRB makes companies sign has a "we agree to give you millions of dollars whenever you say so" clause in it, or the ESRB thinks its little label is worth enough that it can extort the money out of them. For companies that make games that would end up being 'M' anyway, wouldn't they be able to just stick their own warnings on the box instead?

Do you have a link? Sounds interesting...

This is what I found by using Google:

http://www.geek.com/images/geeknews/2006Jan/core_d uo_errata__2006_01_21__full.gif

By the second one listed it says 'Could be exploited by a virus'. Interesting! I haven't yet heard of a virus which exploits a bug in the processor to infect systems. Some of the are marked 'Potentially Catastropihc'. I wonder what the list would look like if you made it for other processors. Most of the errors look like they will never happen in practice though.

The last part of the puzzle is how cheap 1080P TV's will get in the next 5 years. It isn't out of the question to hook up a keyboard, mouse and "cheap" 1080P LCD or Plasma TV to a PS3 and have a computer. This is a giant leap forward for consoles, and Sonys first attempt to bridge the gap between console, computer and DVR type of device.
If this is worthwile for users will depend a lot on how open the console is for third-party software. Usually consoles are designed to run only software licensed by the console vendor, and in some cases those vendors will even sue companies that offer modifications. An example where Microsoft went after XBox modders:
http://www.geek.com/news/geeknews/2002Oct/gam20021 004016641.htm

If Sony pulls a similar thing with the PS3, it will remain rather uninteresting as a computer unless they provide all the software an average user might want. Which I don't believe ;-)

At least it's traditional. Best Buy is reported to have had customers arrested for trying to claim an advertised price and in one case for paying with legal tender.

Coincidentally, 2003 is about the time I first heard about this story. It boggles the mind that Slashdot (and Wired for that matter) is presenting this as a new thing.

Here's a reference to it from 2002.

You can even Order your own for the bargain-basement price of $500.

Search for "digital bugle" on Google...this thing has been all over the Internet for years.

After a torrid honeymoon , it looks like Microsoft and Apple are going to war with each other.

Except for the handwriting recognition, they were available five years ago. There apparently aren't many people who share your needs (although I'd count myself in that group).

I actually thought of a way to do this a while ago. The table would consist of a giant set of convex mirrors like the mirage toys with a spinning OLED display at the bottom to sweep the image across 3D space similar to the crystal ball display. The center would have a plexiglass circle with sensors and darkened to not let the room's light in to wash out the image. The users could then pass their hands through the mirage projected onto the table to interact with the game itself.

Unfortunately, even though the projection would appear as if it were suspended above the table, in order to see the image the user would have to actually look into the glass. So it wouldn't be suspended completely in space like Star Wars.