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The Mac Pro is a nice option IF your needs are not met by a single quad-core processor and 8GB of dual-channel 800MHz ECC DDR2 memory. Unfortunately (IMO), Apple doesn't offer a decent single-processor workstation option that doesn't use FB-DIMMs.

Other replies have suggested three good sites with "system guides" (Tech Report, Ars Technica, and Anandtech), but none of them seem to have specific guides for graphic designers (Photoshop, Illustrator, etc). I think they're still worth reading because their general tips are useful for (comparative) beginners and their guides are regularly updated to keep up with current hardware trends.

In addition to Apple's Mac Pro specs page, you could use Dell's Precision workstation specs pages as a "guide" on which hardware to choose when you build your Photoshop/Illustrator workstation. Dell actually has a "Find Your Recommended Workstation Configuration" page that suggests specific workstations based on application. Their Photoshop and Illustrator suggestions are the same: the "mainstream" Precision T3400 (based on Intel's X38 chipset) and the "advanced" T5400 (like the Mac Pro, based on Intel's 5400 chipset).

If you're buying based on the Intel platform, those are probably the best and most compatible chipsets to build your workstation around. They both can use ECC memory, workstation-class video cards, PCI Express 2.0, etc. The X38 chipset might be limited by its 8GB RAM ceiling. The 5400 chipset might be unattractive because it uses FB-DIMMs and dual Xeon CPUs (when a single Core 2 Quad might do). X38 has decent cheap RAID (0,1,5,10) built into the chipset as well as eSATA and HD audio. The 5400 chipset can use up to 64GB of RAM and usually has legacy PCI-X slots for those older, expensive cards you don't want to throw away.

While this sounds cool, it interests me more because of the fact that the Open Computer Vision algorithms are open sourced and in this case by Intel's research groups. While I might prefer if another microprocessor company was more dominant, there are some areas where Intel's interests diverge from the unholy Wintel alliance, and in these areas they do some really good stuff.

Why do laptops not have any kind of universal form factor similar to desktops? Is it because of the varying shapes and sizes of the cases? Couldn't laptop manufacturers just design the case around standardized hardware, thus making it easier to upgrade them (or are they already doing this?)

I think that Intel has already started that trend with their VBI standard, and so does nVidia with their MXM graphics card form factor.

If you go to this link: http://www.intel.com/design/intarch/celeronm/celeronm.htm there are PDFs at the bottom of the page that detail two 1GHZ processors one at 90nm / 512K Cache and one at 65nm / 1MB Cache both have 5.5W TDP. I have the 90nm version infront of me on a Kontron ETX board, ie something shipping right now. However once you factor in the chipset and memory power requirements its more like 13W at load. 5.5W for 2010 is most likely for a cpu+chipset+memory combo.

Phoenix were not involved in the 1.0 specifications.

Phoenix was involved in the 1.0 spec, regardless of what that PDF says. Most of the work for ACPI was done by Intel and Phoenix.

Your assertion is simply not backed up by available evidence. The best I can find is that Phoenix "contributed" to the 1.0 spec, and produced BIOSes that implemented the early specs. There is no evidence I can find that Phoenix was a leading player in the 1.0 spec. Perhaps you could supply some evidence?

Microsoft were not getting "broken DSDT tables" from manufacturers. Microsoft were shipping software that generated broken DSDT tables.

Do you even know what a DSDT table is? It's a compiled table that describes the system. It's written in a custom language called ASL (ACPI Source Language) and is compiled into AML (ACPI Machine Language) by the compiler. Back in 1998 Microsoft was sent broken ASL from the manufacturers that would not compile unless they tweaked the compiler. If they DIDN'T tweak the compiler ACPI features would not work in Windows (just like they don't work in Linux). What the fuck were they supposed to do?

Nowadays, manufacturers just compile the DSDT tables themselves using MS' compiler, instead of Intel's, because it's EASIER. Once again, how is this the fault of Microsoft? The manufacturers certainly CAN write proper ASL source and they CAN compile them with the more stringent Intel compiler. The fact they the choose not to do so is NOT MICROSOFT'S FAULT. It certainly CAN be done, presumably Apple did this for MacOS.

"Microsoft was sent broken ASL from the manufacturers" makes no sense at all. You are suggesting that manufacturers sent ASL tables to Microsoft for them to compile into binaries, which get sent back to the manufacturer. This picture is utterly wrong.

Microsoft and Intel produced compilers that the manufacturers download. Intel's compiler was written correctly, and gave error messages so that the manufacturers could correct the ASL source and recompile. Microsoft's compiler appears to have been designed to only flag faults that were significant to Microsoft's own OS, and I have supplied evidence that this may have been done on purpose, instigated at board level within Microsoft.

Intel's compiler is available Unix and Linux systems. Linux uses the Intel tools (to create fixed DSDTs), as well as its own code for implementing ACPI functionality.

I would imagine that Apple used Intel's compiler as it would probably work for OSX. Its also very apparent that installing OS-X on non-apple approved hardware will result in exactly the same issues as Linux finds, specifically a series of hardware problems as Apple's AppleACPIPlatform driver trips over buggy DSDT tables.

You will have to supply evidence that using Microsoft's compiler is easier, as both a trivial downloads, and I have used iasl on Linux with no hardships. You will also have to supply evidence that manufacturers are moving to Microsoft's compiler, as my feeling (I cant find evidence either way) is that the big players are moving to iasl as they start offering Linux. I know Compaq used the Microsoft ASL compiler, and clearly people stopped buying their kit for some reason.

I guess I'm saying that it's incumbent upon the Linux people to work around the problems in MS' compiler by re-implementing ACPI in Linux, make their own compiler, or convince the manufacturers to write proper ASL.

Linux has been working around the problem, by supplying corrected DSDT tables where appropriate, and blacklisting ACPI on unfixable hardware.

Bitching about MS doesn't accomplish any

I'm very happy to see something productive out of the Parrot community. They've promised some great things, and we've been waiting a long time to use their offerings. Some people in the community (see article below) have started to doubt the Parrot project's usefulness, but maybe this cool Perl6 development will make them re-think their stance.

Will Parrot ever truly deliver? (http://pinderkent.blogsavy.com/archives/124)

Earlier today I was reading an article about Parrot. Parrot is, as stated on the projects Web site, a virtual machine designed to efficiently compile and execute bytecode for dynamic languages. Parrot currently hosts a variety of language implementations in various stages of completion, including Tcl, Javascript, Ruby, Lua, Scheme, PHP, Python, Perl 6, APL, and a .NET bytecode translator.

So Parrot does sound like an interesting piece of technology. Its understandable how a common runtime for scripting languages could prove beneficial. But will it ever be a platform suitable for serious, production usage? I have my doubts.

Parrot has been under active development for quite some time now. The initial 0.0.1 release was made on September 10, 2001. During 2007, weve seen a release every month or so. So a lot of effort has been put into Parrot over the past six years. It has surpassed one of the major stumbling blocks with many Open Source projects, in that it has managed to build at least some development momentum. Unfortunately for its supporters, Parrot has never really seemed to catch on. I think there are a number of reasons for this.

Stability is probably the first problem. I dont mean stability in terms of the runtime crashing, or anything of that sort. Im talking about concept stability. There has always seemed to be a relatively large amount of change between releases. While this is good, in that there are improvements being made and new ideas being implemented, this causes problems for users who want to build reliably upon Parrot. Individuals and businesses often do not, or cannot, invest the time and effort to track a continually-moving target like Parrot.

The language implementations for Parrot, while many in number, have been of limited use. Looking at the status messages of some of the most promising and practical language implementations shows why this might be the case. Such messages include:

• Incomplete - but all examples and test cases are working. (Amber for Parrot)
• Most of the samples work. (BASIC/compiler)
• Has been broken for a long time. (BASIC/interpreter)
• Parser is pretty complete. Generates PIR for basic Ruby programs (Cardinal, Ruby CVS Head 1.9 implementation)
• Functioning, all samples working, lacks IO routines (Cola)
• Working for some simple forms. Due to some broken features, most of the bootstrapping code has been commented out. (Common Lisp)
• Functioning for handcrafted test cases. Loading frozen state is currently broken. Far from complete. (Parrot m4)
• This project has been abandoned. Any takers? (Pint, an experimental PHP implementation)
• Passes nearly 25% of tcls (lightly converted) test suite, using a Test::More like harness. (Tcl)

So while there are many interesting language implementation projects for smaller or more obscure languages that have reached further stages of completion, the ones that were most likely to be of practical use seem to be lacking. Now, this is understandable. Maintaining a suitably complete Ruby, Python, Perl or Tcl implementati

Search on google for "Intel" and "Larrabee" if you need to know slightly more. Rumors have floated around for almost two years now about that project, with a release date estimated to 2009 or so.

Also, if you need a job in the multicore business, check out http://www.intel.com/jobs/careers/visualcomputing/

In short, visual computing (read gaming) will use all those cores mentioned in the article, word processing will not. Be so sure.
.

There's a story right after this on on the KPC which is $200. You could swap out the HDD for a half terabyte $100 cheapy from Microcenter or rebated somewhere. I believe the motherboard has gigabit ethernet. Although I can't say for sure. I think this is as cheap as you can go without a used/DIY idea and on top of that, it will take up hardly any space.

If you're concerned about heat around the HDD, I would simply suggest a DIY project that moves the HDD to its own enclosure with heat sinks and fans. But one of those would look cute underneath your router or even in your living room.

Think what you want about their intentions regarding OLPC; but Intel has done some great work for education and have been doing it for longer than the OLPC has been around. They create much needed curriculum and training for teachers, and it is all free to access. Check it out here:
http://www.intel.com/education/

Intel's Classmate hasn't piggy backed on One Laptop Per Child in any way, what they're offering is "one computing solution per student", see- a totally different thing.

http://www.intel.com/pressroom/kits/bios/grove/paranoid.htm with 'only the paranoid survive'. Hey, those bleeding-heart commies have taken business that is rightfully OURS, that means war.

I'm fighting back this year by buying more and more from employee-owned (John Lewis, I'm from the UK) organisations, cooperatives (Telephone Coop, local credit union), mutuals (Royal London) and anything else that doesn't have shareholders and then lastly for-profits with a verifiable social agenda and a record of honourable behaviour (harder and harder to find though).

I'm having a hard time explaining that open-source/Windows is an ethical choice too, many people here seem to only understand that in the context of food-miles and sweatshops, not in the context of technology.

As I work for non-profits, they often say 'we get really good discounts from Microsoft', so we don't want any, without considering the deeper implications. I now send them to this: http://www.freegeekvancouver.org/en/node/125 comprehensive and well-stated.

Man, try this for the ClassMate (TM)

http://www.intel.com/intel/worldahead/classmatepc/

Notice any similarities like the graphic at the top?

In the light of Intel's actions, it's really no fun reading

http://www.intel.com/intel/worldahead/olpc.htm

Some of the fun things from there:

Intel prohibits bribes and kickbacks. Intel employees may not offer or accept a bribe or a kickback. Bribes and kickbacks are prohibited either directly or through a third party.

At Intel, corporate responsibility means doing what is right. Respecting people and the world around us. Its how we do business.

Ah, PR is a funny beast.

uni processor would be the 3000 or the 3200 chipset based mobos, but iirc they have the same limitations (8GB). The OP would be better served going with the latest S5400 intel serverboard with a few 54xx series quadcores (12MB cache). http://support.intel.com/design/servers/boards/s5400SF/index.htm

64GB should be enough for anyone ;)

Tyan and Supermicro, which both focus on the server/workstation market, are the only motherboard makers I've heard about releasing motherboards based on the 5100 chipset. If you trust the Intel brand for reliability, then I think this Intel chipset on a Tyan or Supermicro motherboard might be a decent compromise.

• Tyan Tempest i5100X (S5375) - Seems to be out of stock everywhere (searched Google Products), but it's being listed at about $320 to $400. It's a server board, but it looks like it would make a decent workstation (PCIe x16 slot, integrated audio, extended ATX size).
• Supermicro X7DCL-i - In the same price range as the Tyan board, but seems to be available at a few online stores (like this). Standard ATX size, but lacks PCIe x16 slot.

let me give you a hand here:

http://www.intel.com/pressroom/kits/manufacturing/manufacturing_qa.htm

http://www.informationweek.com/outsourcing/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=174906797

I remember reading somewhere (sorry, no link) that Toshiba has taken over or would take over the factory where IBM produces the cell processor for Sony.

Most memory is produced outside the US, here is another interesting table:

http://svtc.igc.org/icrt/corps/inttable.htm

It's a pity that one is not broken down by $amount invested per country.

Intel's desktop processor page
The Dells have either a E4500 or E6550
2.2 GHz clock / 2 MB cache / 800 MHz FSB
2.33 GHz / 4 MB / 1333 MHz
All ship with only 667 MHz DIMMs

Intel's mobile processor page
The iMacs have either a T7300, T7700, or X7900.
2.0 GHz / 4 MB / 800 MHz
2.4 GHz / 4 MB / 800 MHz
2.8 GHz / 4 MB / 800 MHz
All ship with only 667MHz SO-DIMMS

BTW, if a 128MB 2400XT is a joke, then WTF do you call integrated video?
The highest specced XPS ONEs have Mobility Radeon HD 2400's, memory is unlisted
while BASE iMacs have Mobility? Radeon HD 2400 XT's with 128MB GDDR3
The highest end iMacs have Mobility? Radeon HD 2600 PROs with 256MB GDDR3.

The iMac has better specs, flat out. It most likely uses a lot less power and weighs less also. The XPS ONE is a very well integrated _PC_ for sure, and has other nice features the iMac doesn't. I think Dell did a great job with the hardware integration and bundled features, and it is somewhat on par with the iMacs, IF you leave Leopard and iLife out of the picture anyway.

Personally, those speakers have got to go!

Intel's desktop processor page
The Dells have either a E4500 or E6550
2.2 GHz clock / 2 MB cache / 800 MHz FSB
2.33 GHz / 4 MB / 1333 MHz
All ship with only 667 MHz DIMMs

Intel's mobile processor page
The iMacs have either a T7300, T7700, or X7900.
2.0 GHz / 4 MB / 800 MHz
2.4 GHz / 4 MB / 800 MHz
2.8 GHz / 4 MB / 800 MHz
All ship with only 667MHz SO-DIMMS

BTW, if a 128MB 2400XT is a joke, then WTF do you call integrated video?
The highest specced XPS ONEs have Mobility Radeon HD 2400's, memory is unlisted
while BASE iMacs have Mobility? Radeon HD 2400 XT's with 128MB GDDR3
The highest end iMacs have Mobility? Radeon HD 2600 PROs with 256MB GDDR3.

The iMac has better specs, flat out. It most likely uses a lot less power and weighs less also. The XPS ONE is a very well integrated _PC_ for sure, and has other nice features the iMac doesn't. I think Dell did a great job with the hardware integration and bundled features, and it is somewhat on par with the iMacs, IF you leave Leopard and iLife out of the picture anyway.

Personally, those speakers have got to go!

An Excerpt from the article:: "An SC648 chip, with six processors on it, draws around 8 watts of power, which compares to a typical notebook computer CPU needing 100 watts, according to SiCortex CEO John Mucci." Yea, my sister's p4-HT 3GHZ laptop CPU only takes 88 watts max. I guess they meant the average power consumption of the whole laptop, averaging across all models on the market? Well, obviously the statement in the article is bogus. http://processorfinder.intel.com/details.aspx?sSpec=SL7DT [intel.com]

How can you claim something is bogus by stating one single example? You haven't even taken an average of a few chips like you seem to presume they have!

An Excerpt from the article:: "An SC648 chip, with six processors on it, draws around 8 watts of power, which compares to a typical notebook computer CPU needing 100 watts, according to SiCortex CEO John Mucci." Yea, my sister's p4-HT 3GHZ laptop CPU only takes 88 watts max. I guess they meant the average power consumption of the whole laptop, averaging across all models on the market? Well, obviously the statement in the article is bogus. http://processorfinder.intel.com/details.aspx?sSpec=SL7DT

Several items are coming to a head in the laptop market that will drastically reduce power usage.

1) SSD Hard Drive. The hard drive is one of the biggest power consumers in the laptop today, by changing to an SSD, this can be drastically reduced. Yes, they are more expensive and they are smaller capacity than a HD, but in addition to being less power hungry, they are also much faster, smaller, and lighter.

2) Digital Paper Displays. The back lighting required by current LCDs is very expensive to run power consumption wise. They also require power 100% of the time to maintain the image itself even though this is much less than the back light power requirements. As the digital paper displays become more commercialized, we will see them start to take over the laptop market. Digital paper does not use back lighting and does not require power to maintain the image, only to change the image. Thus drastically reducing the amount of power required for the display.

3) Wireless network adapter. There are several changes coming in the Wireless world in the near future that will reduce the power requirements of wireless networking. As 802.11n moves from draft to production standards and the equipment become inter operable, we will see more usage of the N mode networking which will allow for most network cards to run at lower power for the same connectivity we see today. WiMax and other similar technologies will also bring lower power consumption for wireless networking.

4) Sub 40nm chips. As we shrink circuits smaller and smaller, we are finding that they, in general, require less power to operate. In addition, new materials, such as the new High-k materials, are required to allow circuits to operate correctly at this smaller scale and these new materials are also introducing power savings. As RAM, CPU, and main chipset chips are moved to the smaller die size we will find they use less and less power.

5) Non-Volatile MRAM. Another power consumer is main memory. Even if the system is idle, RAM requires power just to maintain the data stored in it. New technologies are just coming to fruition that will create RAM that does not require power constantly but will be just as fast as current RAM offerings and not have the life span problems that Flash RAM has.

Combine all of these changes with the fact that we may see Li-Ion batteries that have 3-5 times the capacity of today's Li-Ion batteries on a size to size or weight to weight ratio, I expect that over the next 5 years we will see personal electronic devices shrink to down to the point where they are practically non-existent

http://www.intel.com/design/flash/nand/z-p140/index.htm

Looks to be a drop-in for a standard IDE PATA hard-drive... cool.

- Eddy_D

Great post owlstead.

You are exactly right in that both PATA and SATA are bus systems that aren't optimal for NAND flash. In fact, there's a lot of noise being generated between the various giants (Toshiba, Samsung) fighting with the smaller guys (Intel, Micron) over who's going to specify the latest bus protocol for NAND SSDs.

If you have access to IEEE pre-submissions, you'll see some proposals being driven by this guy:
http://www.intel.com/pressroom/kits/bios/kgrimsrud.htm

It's similar to the battle for the bus on the other side of the controller, where the smaller players are rallying around ONFI.

I'm not saying Vista with Aero enabled is not a resource hog (especially memory), but I think it's been grossly exaggerated on many highly-moderated Slashdot comments. I do think Vista was released too early and many hardware manufacturers only had flakey Vista drivers when Vista was released. Intel's drivers were fine, though.

Scared yet? You should be.

Microsoft and Seattle can have their stinkin' Starbucks, Grunge, and Pike Street Market. We got Voodoo Doughnuts and Saturday Market, bitches... >:)

/P

Maybe they can talk to their own sales department and see how "Intel Mobile Solutions" can help them be a "Telecommuting Success Story"!!!

http://ipip.intel.com/go/category/events/2006/tysonscorner_2006/

Well we'll see. Even in a two chip package, Silverthorne, depending on the power management and idling features, might net out a better total watts/hour of use. Remember that it will accomplish most tasks much more quickly than a geode will and will probably be able to get back into sleep/idle sooner.
Anyway, XO v2 might not be ready until the follow-on you mention - which should be the Moorestown platform .

As I said on ./ on Fri July 13, OLPC is a project, not a product. Just because the current XO laptop is AMD Geode-based doesn't mean the next gen OLPC product won't be based on the 2008 (less than 1 watt) Intel Silverthorn processors which would likely be the basis of XO v2 - which will be much faster with even lower power draw.
The Classmate is what it is. If a country wants it more than the XO and used some legitimate criteria for deciding, they have the right to do so. Intel certainly looked at what buyers found attractive about the XO in designing the Classmate - OLPC should look at what customers find attractive in the Classmate for XO v2.

Dog-slow video cards can't even ray-trace properly yet.

http://www.intel.com/cd/ids/developer/asmo-na/eng/dc/games/245711.htm
http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2007/04/23/intel-shows-off-raytraced-quake-4

I, for one, welcome our new virtual ray-traced underlings.

FTA:
"...The Intel X48 chipset is a refresh of the X38 chipset aimed at the high end desktop market. It will be the first chipset to support 1600 MHz FSB parts (though current boards do as well in some cases) and will have unlocked bus ratios for improved overclocking ability. So there really isn't much change from the X38 chipset -- and in fact most X38 motherboards aimed at the enthusiast will probably support 1600 MHz FSB processors anyway. For my testing I used the Asus P5E3 Deluxe motherboard based on the X38 chipset to run the QX9770 and it ran without an issue.... http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=484

Sounds like many existing Intel X38 chipset mainboards will work with the QX9770, and I'd bet Intel's DX38BT can run it, (but probably at FSB 1,333MHz) http://www.intel.com/products/motherboard/DX38BT/index.htm

1) is a serious problem though. We can never PROVE it is backdoored unless someone steps forward with those numbers. We can NEVER prove it is NOT backdoored, as we cannot PROVE that no-one has the numbers, so are compelled to treat it as backdoored.

2) is about specific cases where particular categories of mathematical failures actually lead to the compromising of the private key, which is significantly more dangerous. It is not about utilitising typical exploits like buffer overflows to take over and kind of security software. For example, once they private key is known, it may allow the third party to fake messages appearing to originate from the target of the attack.

3) indeed, the problem here is typically relating to very specific edge conditions, eg overflows, underflows, carries which are handled incorrectly, and have been known to go undetected for years. If you do not believe there are issues in the microcode, take a quick look at the current errata list for the Core2Duo, showing many unfixed bugs (and many of them unimportant due to the impossibility of them occurring in modern operating systems).

As for "installing bad microcode", the microcode is something done purely from the software each time the OS boots into volatile memory on the cpu, and so is reset back to the original shipping microcode each time the machine is power-cycled.
If an adversary has access to the booting OS to update the microcode, the adversary already has access to superuser priveleges on your system anyway, so I feel it is irrelevant.

my old Intel digital scope, which has been gathering dust for about 5 years now.

Wow, Windoze only with all sorts of issues. Check out the QX3 support page. Of course, you can's use it with Vista. Too bad, because it's a nifty scope.

This newer scope is cheaper and can be used with an ordinary TV or bt878 capture card.

Then again, you would be surprised by the quality of image you can get with a few simple lenses and an ordinary digital camera. Binocular lenses make for nice macro lenses. The front lens gets you closer to the subject and eyepiece lenses make good macro lenses. Good quality surplus microscopes are also available for $100 or so.

That guy wishes he was Tommi Makinen!

One thing to note: remember the days of before with CPU locks and other various schemes to prevent overclocking by the owner. Now it seems like we've come full circle.

Even Intel is embracing it.

One thing I do continually find funny is the constant disclaimer of "fried" CPUs. Anyone who overclocks a CPU knows it's fairly difficult to actually damage it unless one is doing something incredibly stupid.

Take a look at this old image of the Intel roadmap.

Also, Intel has a tech page where they describe this 2 year cycle.

3,000,000 * $316.50 = 949,500,000

So a bit under 1 billion dollars and this is just using off the shelf hardware. If they used interconnected mainframes or some other high performance hardware it could potentially be cheaper in terms of CPU power.

So do they have a 3 million processor supercomputer? Possibly.

1,000,000 writes/bitfailure / 139.8 writes/year = 7153 years/bitfailure

The reason these types of systems aren't used already is the same as the reason most datacenters aren't supplying our servers with DC power to prevent the loss of 20% of the energy before they even start processing data.... There aren't any standards, and there is a lot of legacy equipment out there. We need intel, and Sun, and a bunch of switch manufacturers to get together and come up with a standard for external DC power supplies and cooling connections.

When TFA is not informative, seek the source. Enjoy.

That's the Intel D201GLY. You might be better off with the D201GLY2. It's faster, fan-free, includes SATA, and it's roughly the same price. I think retailers are clearing stock of the original version right now, which is why the V2 board is a little harder to find. Do a search for it at www.google.com/products/ though (for example) and it'll turn up, again at roughly the same price as the earlier model.

If only it had a DVI output instead of that dinosaur analog VGA output -- and possibly a gigabit network controller -- and I'd really be sold.

That's the Intel D201GLY. You might be better off with the D201GLY2. It's faster, fan-free, includes SATA, and it's roughly the same price. I think retailers are clearing stock of the original version right now, which is why the V2 board is a little harder to find. Do a search for it at www.google.com/products/ though (for example) and it'll turn up, again at roughly the same price as the earlier model.

If only it had a DVI output instead of that dinosaur analog VGA output -- and possibly a gigabit network controller -- and I'd really be sold.

They will be. That this message comes from the former Intel boss doesn't come as a surprise. They want to become big in household medical equipment to make self-support by handicapped and elderly easier. This is big business, with an ever increasing group of consumers and very high financial margins.

Even if we throw in a tag to make legacy javascript viable, every legacy page out there would have to be updated - meaning all of those abandoned or hardly maintained web sites with tons of useful information are going to be broken

How would you all be reacting if there was talk about re-implementing C

or heaven forbid Ruby.

Ray-Tracing is coming...

Virtually no wafer fabs are located in China, for several reasons. The labor needed for a fab is skilled labor, so China offers no real advantages there. There are also a lot of issues regarding the export of "high tech" stuff to China. Most wafer fabs are located in the US, Japan, Taiwan, or Singapore.

Intel is actually currently talking about building a fab in China. In order to stay on the good side of US regulators, it would be an "old tech" 90 nm fab. They would use it to make more "mature" products.

Now, that's not to say they don't have any manufacturing facilities in China. In fact, they have 2 package and test plants located in China. AMD has one as well. These facilities are the next step after fabrication.

Intel provides a full list of where its fabs and package and test facilities are.

I know you were kidding, but believe it or not there are some types of manufacturing that are decidedly not being shipped to China.

Intel's D975XBX2 has Dolby Digital Live encoding on the motherboard (at least with the available XP drivers...I have no idea if it is supported in Linux), and it is over a year old. All their new motherboards also have DD Live.

So, there is no excuse for a add-on card not to have that feature.