Slashdot Mirror

http://www.qantas.com.au/info/flying/beforeYouTravel/dangerousGoods

Here's why: http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2006/07/18/laptop-batteries-suspect-in-plane-crash

Security people also tend to be generally suspicious of batteries, because they're essentially sealed packs of combinations of chemicals, with internal wiring and convenient external electrical contacts.

Sorry if there any errors, or omissions, I am trying to be accurate. A lot has happend in a little over a week.

The following takes place between July 29th and August 7th:

August 07, 2008:
Judge rejects student visa injunction sought by H-1B opponents
Tech workers don't have standing to fight Bush administration visa move
http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9111963

August 07, 2008:
Jobless claims surge to highest level in 6 years
http://money.cnn.com/2008/08/07/news/economy/jobless_benefits.ap/index.htm?cnn=yes

August 06, 2008:
Bureau of Labor Statistics reports big drop in tech jobs
Almost 50,000 IT positions lost in last 12 months
http://money.cnn.com/2008/08/07/news/economy/jobless_benefits.ap/index.htm?cnn=yes

Aug 06,2008:
Yet another visa, this one allows 5000 Koreans to work in the USA each year
http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200808/200808060014.html

August 06, 2008:
Apple sued over treatment of it's tech workers
http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquirer/news/2008/08/06/apple-gets-sued-indentured

August 05, 2008:
Bogus diploma ring busted
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/content/education/chi-diploma-mill-04-aug04,0,2164133.story

August 03, 2008:
July marks seventh consecutive month of job loses
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/227/story/46146.html

August 02, 2008:
Sun to cut between 1000 to 2500 jobs
http://blogs.wsj.com/biztech/2008/08/01/sun-us-tech-market-wont-shine-soon/

August 01, 2008:
Gartner's grim IT hiring outlook
http://blogs.zdnet.com/careers/?p=140

August 01, 2008:
Feds charges man for H1-B fraud
http://www.pe.com/localnews/inland/stories/PE_News_Local_S_visa01.47edb3e.html#

Jul 31, 2008:
More than 3.7 million Americans had full-time jobs chopped to part time
the largest figure since the government began tracking such data more than half a century ago.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/31/business/economy/31jobs.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

July 31, 2008:
Layoffs set for 22,000 California state workers
http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_10046324

July 30, 2008:
WTO Doha talks collapse
India's backdoor attempt to allow more H-1Bs into the USA failed, for now
http://www.economicpopulist.org/?q=content/why-you-should-be-thrilled-wto-doha-talks-collapsed

July 30, 2008:
NY gov slashes spending; state said in "recession"
http://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSN3032764920080730?pageNumber=1&virtualBrandChannel=0

July 30, 2008:
China trade has cost 2.3 million U.S. jobs
http://www.reuters.com/article/politic

Sorry to respond to myself (again), but now that TFA is working, it turns out we've been Inquirered. PC Authority was just reprinting an Inq article, which in retrospect makes perfect sense given the absurdity of the title and the summary.

Even the Inq basically took the story from somewhere else; you can find the source (and far more sensible) article at Information Week.

I suppose in the US you have judges with clue. In the UK it's fuddy duddy old men in wigs who go "What is this 'internet'?".

http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2007/05/17/judge-has-beatles-moment-over-internet

or maybe he didnt:

http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2007/05/18/judge-didnt-have-beatles-moment-after-all

Apparently the original story of the judge saying 'Who are the Beatles?' might be a myth anyway...

I suppose in the US you have judges with clue. In the UK it's fuddy duddy old men in wigs who go "What is this 'internet'?".

http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2007/05/17/judge-has-beatles-moment-over-internet

or maybe he didnt:

http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2007/05/18/judge-didnt-have-beatles-moment-after-all

Apparently the original story of the judge saying 'Who are the Beatles?' might be a myth anyway...

Well, the rumour about their mobo partners dropping chipsets was probably started by the Inquirer (long history of fact deficient articles), they were purporting that Gigabyte had dropped their 700i series chipsets, when, in fact, they had never started making them (as I pointed out here in the first comment).

MOD PARENT UP.

Nvidia is managing badly in other ways, also, than supplying poor quality software; this Slashdot story is not an isolated occurrence. For example, All Nvidia G84 and G86s are bad. Or see All Nvidia G84 and G86 chips faulty?. Or, Nvidia Likely to Confirm Scale of Chip Troubles Soon.

Let us look at the facts. 1. The inquirer,in a story I submitted over a day ago and is still rotting in pending BTW,reported that a several vendors are dropping the 790i chipset due to data corruption issues. 2. Nvidia has had a bad run of chips lately,and since the 790i boards are being pulled,it looks like that bad run is across the board(no pun intended). 3. Nvidia makes a BUTTLOAD of money from SLI,as there are way too many gamers that like having dual Nvidia monsters if nothing else for the bragging rights. 4. And finally the ONLY way you can go Nvidia SLI is with an Nforce board,which even with the economic downturn is still a VERY popular seller,at least it was last time i looked at the sales numbers.

So I think it is quite safe to say that the article is BS. BTW,if you want to read the inquirer story about the canceled 790i boards and which manufacturers are involved,it is right here. But considering they had to set aside 150 million for repairs and replacements of mobile GPUs,to kill the Nforce which is the only way they can sell two high priced boards to the same customer frankly would be suicide. The last thing they would do is a move like this that would make them look weak after the mobile GPU fiasco. So even if they have come up with some way to add SLI to a single board by some kind of drop in chip most likely they'd wait until the whole mobile GPU mess has blown away. But as always this is my 02c,YMMV

The 790i boards are getting pulled as well. You can read about it here. I tried submitting it,but as with everything I've submitted it will rot in pending for 1-5 days until KDawson or one of the old guys submit the exact same story word for word then it will be rejected. So when I find something interesting I will simply submit it in a post and let the mods decide if it is worth reading. Thank you and have a nice day.

This could all be explained if they compiled with something silly like ICC

http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2005/07/13/intel-compiler-nobbles-amd-chips-claim

There is a problem with the chips, there is no doubt about that. However take anything Charlie says about it with a huge truckload of salt. There was a bit of bad blood between Nvidia and Charlie years ago (something like 4 or 5 now), and ever since they've refused to talk to anyone from the Inquirer and Charlie specifically.

It seems these days that all Charlie does is write long article bashing Nvidia. That is unless he's writing an article that's so over the top that his editor has to pull it (yes, believe it or not, there actually is an editor in charge of all those pieces).

Go read dell or HP forums and EE times. Read The Inq only if you want some amusement to see how amazingly slanted of a story can be produced.

There is a problem with the chips, there is no doubt about that. However take anything Charlie says about it with a huge truckload of salt. There was a bit of bad blood between Nvidia and Charlie years ago (something like 4 or 5 now), and ever since they've refused to talk to anyone from the Inquirer and Charlie specifically.

It seems these days that all Charlie does is write long article bashing Nvidia. That is unless he's writing an article that's so over the top that his editor has to pull it (yes, believe it or not, there actually is an editor in charge of all those pieces).

Go read dell or HP forums and EE times. Read The Inq only if you want some amusement to see how amazingly slanted of a story can be produced.

There is a problem with the chips, there is no doubt about that. However take anything Charlie says about it with a huge truckload of salt. There was a bit of bad blood between Nvidia and Charlie years ago (something like 4 or 5 now), and ever since they've refused to talk to anyone from the Inquirer and Charlie specifically.

It seems these days that all Charlie does is write long article bashing Nvidia. That is unless he's writing an article that's so over the top that his editor has to pull it (yes, believe it or not, there actually is an editor in charge of all those pieces).

Go read dell or HP forums and EE times. Read The Inq only if you want some amusement to see how amazingly slanted of a story can be produced.

There is a problem with the chips, there is no doubt about that. However take anything Charlie says about it with a huge truckload of salt. There was a bit of bad blood between Nvidia and Charlie years ago (something like 4 or 5 now), and ever since they've refused to talk to anyone from the Inquirer and Charlie specifically.

It seems these days that all Charlie does is write long article bashing Nvidia. That is unless he's writing an article that's so over the top that his editor has to pull it (yes, believe it or not, there actually is an editor in charge of all those pieces).

Go read dell or HP forums and EE times. Read The Inq only if you want some amusement to see how amazingly slanted of a story can be produced.

There is a problem with the chips, there is no doubt about that. However take anything Charlie says about it with a huge truckload of salt. There was a bit of bad blood between Nvidia and Charlie years ago (something like 4 or 5 now), and ever since they've refused to talk to anyone from the Inquirer and Charlie specifically.

It seems these days that all Charlie does is write long article bashing Nvidia. That is unless he's writing an article that's so over the top that his editor has to pull it (yes, believe it or not, there actually is an editor in charge of all those pieces).

Go read dell or HP forums and EE times. Read The Inq only if you want some amusement to see how amazingly slanted of a story can be produced.

There is a problem with the chips, there is no doubt about that. However take anything Charlie says about it with a huge truckload of salt. There was a bit of bad blood between Nvidia and Charlie years ago (something like 4 or 5 now), and ever since they've refused to talk to anyone from the Inquirer and Charlie specifically.

It seems these days that all Charlie does is write long article bashing Nvidia. That is unless he's writing an article that's so over the top that his editor has to pull it (yes, believe it or not, there actually is an editor in charge of all those pieces).

Go read dell or HP forums and EE times. Read The Inq only if you want some amusement to see how amazingly slanted of a story can be produced.

There is a problem with the chips, there is no doubt about that. However take anything Charlie says about it with a huge truckload of salt. There was a bit of bad blood between Nvidia and Charlie years ago (something like 4 or 5 now), and ever since they've refused to talk to anyone from the Inquirer and Charlie specifically.

It seems these days that all Charlie does is write long article bashing Nvidia. That is unless he's writing an article that's so over the top that his editor has to pull it (yes, believe it or not, there actually is an editor in charge of all those pieces).

Go read dell or HP forums and EE times. Read The Inq only if you want some amusement to see how amazingly slanted of a story can be produced.

There is a problem with the chips, there is no doubt about that. However take anything Charlie says about it with a huge truckload of salt. There was a bit of bad blood between Nvidia and Charlie years ago (something like 4 or 5 now), and ever since they've refused to talk to anyone from the Inquirer and Charlie specifically.

It seems these days that all Charlie does is write long article bashing Nvidia. That is unless he's writing an article that's so over the top that his editor has to pull it (yes, believe it or not, there actually is an editor in charge of all those pieces).

Go read dell or HP forums and EE times. Read The Inq only if you want some amusement to see how amazingly slanted of a story can be produced.

There is a problem with the chips, there is no doubt about that. However take anything Charlie says about it with a huge truckload of salt. There was a bit of bad blood between Nvidia and Charlie years ago (something like 4 or 5 now), and ever since they've refused to talk to anyone from the Inquirer and Charlie specifically.

It seems these days that all Charlie does is write long article bashing Nvidia. That is unless he's writing an article that's so over the top that his editor has to pull it (yes, believe it or not, there actually is an editor in charge of all those pieces).

Go read dell or HP forums and EE times. Read The Inq only if you want some amusement to see how amazingly slanted of a story can be produced.

There is a problem with the chips, there is no doubt about that. However take anything Charlie says about it with a huge truckload of salt. There was a bit of bad blood between Nvidia and Charlie years ago (something like 4 or 5 now), and ever since they've refused to talk to anyone from the Inquirer and Charlie specifically.

It seems these days that all Charlie does is write long article bashing Nvidia. That is unless he's writing an article that's so over the top that his editor has to pull it (yes, believe it or not, there actually is an editor in charge of all those pieces).

Go read dell or HP forums and EE times. Read The Inq only if you want some amusement to see how amazingly slanted of a story can be produced.

All Nvidia G84 and G86s are bad

The short story is that all the G84 and G86 parts are bad. Period. No exceptions. All of them, mobile and desktop, use the exact same ASIC, so expect them to go south in inordinate numbers as well. There are caveats however, and we will detail those in a bit.

Both of these ASICs have a rather terminal problem with unnamed substrate or bumping material, and it is heat related. If you ask Nvidia officially, you will get no reason why this happened, and no list of parts affected, we tried. Unofficially, they will blame everyone under the sun, and trash their suppliers in very colourful language.

When the process engineers pinged by the INQ picked themselves off the floor from laughing, they politely said that there is about zero chance that NV would change the assembly process or material set for a batch, much less an EOL part.

For dessert, there's this article to finish :)

All Nvidia G84 and G86s are bad

The short story is that all the G84 and G86 parts are bad. Period. No exceptions. All of them, mobile and desktop, use the exact same ASIC, so expect them to go south in inordinate numbers as well. There are caveats however, and we will detail those in a bit.

Both of these ASICs have a rather terminal problem with unnamed substrate or bumping material, and it is heat related. If you ask Nvidia officially, you will get no reason why this happened, and no list of parts affected, we tried. Unofficially, they will blame everyone under the sun, and trash their suppliers in very colourful language.

When the process engineers pinged by the INQ picked themselves off the floor from laughing, they politely said that there is about zero chance that NV would change the assembly process or material set for a batch, much less an EOL part.

For dessert, there's this article to finish :)

I think this part of the computing timeline is going to be
one that is well remembered. I know I find it fascinating.

This is a classic moment when tech takes the branch that
was unexpected. GPGPU computing will soon
reach ubiquity but for right now it's the fledgling that is being
grown in the wild.

Of course I'm not earmarking this one particular project
as the start point but this year has gotten 'GPU this' and
'GPGPU that' start up events all over it. Some even said
in 2007, that it would be a buzzword in 08.

And of course there's nothing like new tech to bring out
a naysayer.

Folding@home released their second generation
GPU client in April 08. While retiring the GPU1 core in
June of this year.

I know I enjoy throwing spare GPU cycles to a distributed
cause and whenever I catch sight of the icon for the GPU
client it brings the back the nostalgia of distributed clients
of the past. [Near the bottom].

I think I was with United Devices the longest.
And the Grid.

Now we are getting a chance to see GPU supercomputing
installations from IBM and this one from MIT.
Soon those will be littering the Top 500 list.

I also look forward most to the peaceful endeavors the new
processing power will be used for... weather analysis,
drug creation, and disease studies.

Oh yes, I realize places like the infamous Sandia will be using
the GPU to rev up atom splitting. But maybe if they keep their
bombs IN the GPU it'll lessen the chances of seeing rampant
proliferation again.

Ok, well enough of my musings over a GPU.

-AI

Galinstan's been done before. There was already a liquid metal cooler using Galinstan for a Sapphire Radeon back in 2005.

Twitter is obviously very intelligent, but under-challenged. Give Twitter a challenging job so he has something to do besides be annoying on Slashdot!

However, he should not be moderated down when he makes very sensible comments. If Intel is making money because of anti-competitive prices, then Intel should be sued by the EU, as the story says.

The biggest reason why AMD and Nvidia are near year-to-date lows is because of competition expected from new GPU products from Intel.

If you bought the mini right after release then you paid for the form factor. IIRC, it was one of the smallest form factor computers at the time. I'm not sure you could even get something that small anywhere else at the time.

When it comes to the other machines macs are on par with pricing or priced better to equivalent machines right after updates. I know when I bought my MBP it was within $100 of the same dell, and once I applied my developer and student discount it came in significantly cheaper.

Someone pointed out that Intel processors are BIOS-upgradeable. What about computers based on EFI instead of BIOS, such as all the Intel-based Macs?

The BIOS upgrade works around bugs in CPU and chipset, it does not fix the CPU or the chipset. I doubt that Apple needs to update EFI as it was the first one to officially point out bugs in Intel CPU.

Some Intel CPU's allow microcode update. As far as I know Microsoft and Apple inclided microcode update in one of the patches.

Online genetic testing exposed as a scam

PDF is ISO 32000. It's not just an open format, it's an open standard.

Since 1997, Microsoft has used a front office in Reno, Nevada to avoid paying Washington State over $528 million in software sales taxes.

The Redmond company makes products here but records software sales to PC makers and high-volume customers through an operation in Nevada, where there is no corporate tax. So Washington is missing out on revenue it could use for badly needed infrastructure needs -- like replacement of the 520 bridge.

Slashdot material will also cover accusations of LimitNone being a M$ proxy and the perills of non free software in general. The senseless accusations you are talking about will be half covered by the Wintel trade press as they did with the SCO case.

The statement:

People need to realize that Google is just another large publicly traded corporation that will do whatever it takes to increase its revenue, even if that means risking its reputation among developers." is right out of the M$ FUD book.

The alleged theft is laughable:

The lawsuit alleges that Google's product, called "Google Email Uploader" steals gMove's look, feel and functionality.

There were also Vague accusations of "trade secret theft" but there are several excellent free software tools that have been getting this kind of information for years. No further details were given by business wire. Let's look for more, shall we?

• Wired, same stuff Google has not had time to look over the suit and comment.
• CNet, same kind of thing with market size and potential price thrown in for fun.
• TechTree bare facts, no Google comment.
• The Inquirer does better with a brief statement of facts, without Google comment.
• The Wall Street Journal adds insight by noticing that there is a conflict of interest between small companies and large ones in any business relationship but only applies this wisdom to Google. No comment from Google.
• There are many echos in other papers and blog space which contain even less information than the Slashdot summary.
• Something to spook clueless investors about "another" billion dollar suit for Google without background information about the frequency of such things.

So, we see a one sided media blitz, complete with stock market "advice", but completely lacking in input from Google, technical insight and other information. These are M$ hallmarks.

That's for sure.

Well, it's hardly surprising. According to government records, the only names not yet trademarked are "Popplers" and "Zittzers". I remember the internal confusion at Google back in the day when there were plans to set up a worldwide network of Google hot spots, or Gspots, only to find out that it is nearly impossible to find a name that is both pleasant to the ear, even remotely meaningful and not already taken. Enyone remembers the scandal three years ago? This is another example. And what about our beloved Firefox browser? It had to change its name not once, not twice, but trice to finally get rid of the trademark problems and still any literate person will point out to the Craig Thomas' novel, not to mention the Firefox bicycle company, or the Malaguti Firefox scooter, all of which being much older than any web browser on Earth. But does it mean that people can't use Google to check for any prior art of the name they have chosen for their projects? No. It just means that all of that trademark hysteria of the last one and a half decades, this "get outta my intellectual property!" attitude, it all hurts progress. Because, at the end of the day, isn't progress what it is all about? Shouldn't we just shut up, roll up our sleeves and start making our global village a better place instead of worrying about not hurting someones feelings or not breaking some law? I am really sick of every good initiative being sabotaged by someone who "owns" some "intellectual property". Google is probably one of ten, maybe twenty companies that are more concerned about morals and ethics than profits, yet some Germans have a problem with one of its most popular names and when do they sue? When the name is already known worldwide! This is just too much. Please let me quote a great thinker, George Bernard Shaw: "If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange these apples then you and I will still each have one apple. But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange these ideas, then each of us will have two ideas."

Reading comprehension...anything built on the Unreal 3 engine.

Like one of these many licensees:
http://www.unrealtechnology.com/news.php

Native PhysX Support:
http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2007/05/30/unreal-3-thinks-threading

This isn't true ; while some vendors are not helpful on the driver front, it doesn't prevent kernel hackers from writing drivers. They just have to reverse engineer them a lot more.

Typically if the hardware scratches the itch of a kernel developer, it will get a driver, regardless of how helpful the vendor is being. Webcams being the classic example.

French guy writes drivers for 235 USB webcams

This guy (who isn't even a programmer by trade - he's a radiologist) wrote a USB webcam driver because he bought his daughters a pair of webcams that didn't work in Linux. From there, he realized that much of the code in webcam drivers is applicable to all webcams.. the end result is that his drivers now support a large number of cameras with various chipsets, and that any improvements to the driver code improve the drivers for ALL those cameras and not just the ones from a single vendor.

The Inquirer (yeah, I know, hold your nose) has more believable numbers: 40% yield, $5000 per wafer, 40 good dice. So $125/die. Add NRE, testing, etc.

When there's so many stream processors on a chip, it's going to be big, no doubt. That's why a 55nm version is coming. Cell also underwent a die shrink shortly after it came out.

I've been itching to upgrade, but I guess I'll be waiting some more.

Looks like it's being released right now. Best wait a week or two until the reviews are out and you can compare the two before wasting your valuable beer tokens.

VIA Nano runs Crysis: http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquirer/news/2008/06/09/via-nano-runs-crysis And, Nano wins on specs too Nano http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_VIA_Nano_microprocessors Atom http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Intel_Atom_microprocessors

The death of OLPC is obviously Intel and M$'s fault. Executives from both companies derided the device as a "toy" and failure before it was designed and then did everything possible to kill it. Here are the the short version and detailed original accusation stories. Intel kept up the FUD war, destroying sales that had been committed before the device was complete. Their employees even ran a hostile news site to make bad press.

"Good enough evidence for me! Microsoft caused a nuclear meltdown! Quickly, to the Blogo-Sphere!"

That's only funny if it wasn't even partly true. But here's something really funny:

"The Slammer worm penetrated a private computer network at Ohio's Davis-Besse nuclear power plant in January and disabled a safety monitoring system for nearly five hours"

"TRANSCRIPTS of telephone conversations between utility operators .. include explicit mention of some unknown 'computer problems' at FirstEnergy, the Ohio utility thought to have triggered the regional power failures, in those preceding hours"

"Part of the challenge is we have all of this infrastructure in the control systems that was put in place in the 1980s and '90s that was not designed with security in mind, and all of sudden these systems are being connected to [Internet-facing] business networks" said Brian Ahern, president and chief executive of Industrial Defender Inc., a Foxborough, Mass.-based SCADA security company

No, the problem is putting 'computers' on the Internet that were most certainly designed with security in mind, something the 'computers' most certainly fail at. To put in bluntly, running your SCADA units on Windows over the Internet is the dumbest thing I ever heard of. And that they are still running such designs five years after the great blackout of 2003, demonstrates incompetence and neglience boarding on the criminal

If you want references, try Google and Wikipedia. Perhaps you've heard of them.

I've heard of them. I've heard the accusations. We can't sell to company XYZ becasue of this. What I haven't seen is the smoking gun contract, agreement, etc on this exclusionary anti-competitive practice. That is why I asked for refrences. There are lots of accusations, but no documentation of actual ethics violations. Got some email? Company contracts? Do you make machines? Do you have an exclusionary contract? If so, how about a scan and post?

One company selling quad core chips at a profit for a lower price at a profit while another company is selling a slower part with supply issues for a loss does not make an exclusive contract anymore than trying to sell $12 gas in a market filled with $4 gas. If your gas has a cost to produce of $10 and you have a policy of underpricing the $4 producer by 20%, don't scream monolpoly abuse when your profit is a negative number.

Intel does not have exclusionary contracts that I know of. They do offer volume discounts and rebates. Other than leave little room for a shop to produce both lines without cutting back on the rebates and volume discounts, I haven't seen anything regarding a bonus for having absolutely no other processor. Microsoft is more in this camp where a PC manufacture does indeed get a substantual break only if they buy licenses for 100% of their product. This has been rulled bad boy behavior. Only after anti-trust action are we starting to see non-Windows PC's enter the market. This is not the case with Intel and PC manufactures. Many manufactures carry both Intel and AMD lines.

Oh, refrences,,, OK.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23076019/
http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2006/09/14/dell-amd-boxes-vastly-cheaper-than-intel

Dell boxes with AMD are cheaper, but at a loss for AMD.
AMD can't compete on price anymore as Intel has upped the ante for lower cost to manufacture.

It wasn't bush, it was his attorney general

Apparently an SSD will be part of Centrino 2: http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquirer/news/2008/05/23/intel-bundle-ssds-centrino

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....

Intel obviously sees the threat of the GPU creators, but their attempts at breaking into the GPU market hasn't been very successful.

Their next generation effort is called Larrabee. Which uses multiple x86 cores linked with a ring bus.

It actually reminds me of PS3 SPU setup but Intel is using the GPU functionality as a wedge into the GPU market, instead of pushing it for general computation. But, since standard C code will work on it, you can rewrite the entire stack to be a physics co-processor or fold@home client.

Ultimately, I see the CPU and GPU separation disappear and merge into one chip, much like FPU and sound card functionalities.

But nVidia didn't claim that the GPU would replace the CPU. They even went to lengths to deny it in the article. The version that the poster linked to was void of details, a better description is available at the Inquirer who weren't under NDA.

The hi-light of the press conference seems to be the censored part revealing that nVidia will be fab'ing ARM-11s in the near future in direct competition with the Intel Atom. Looks like they're not planning to go down without a fight...

"Vista suffered 121,380 instances of malware"

I thought Vista with UAC didn't get malware. Didn't Allchin say Vista didn't need any anti-virus software.