Slashdot Mirror

I bid on a couple at ebay, but they were going for over $30, which I think is a bit high for a used keyboard.

Today I read a review of the Belkin's Nostromo Game Controller n52. It looks to be programmable and can emulate over 100 keys

It is going for $26 (free ship) at Buy.com at the moment: here

I'd report back here on how I like it in a few days, but I fear slashdot will have archived this story by then. I'll post my experience here, if anyone is curious how it works out.

Okay, you must have been the guy that moderated me as a troll (lol). Sorry, didn't mean to push your buttons.

The point that I think some of you folks might have skipped over is the upgrade path. This knocks about $150 (average) off the price of the Intel upgrade path, because you can move to their faster P4 CPUs without having to change socket types. The new Prescott CPUs don't require a mainboard with a new socket (assuming your Intel-compatible board is fairly recent). Think about that: If I want to go from my Athlon XP to an Athlon 64, I have to spend another $150 and tear apart my machine. To the average consumer, this means buying a whole new PC. If I had got a socket 478 board, I would just buy the next fastest Intel chip (or whichever was the best balance or price and performance).

A new Athlon 64 may be comparable to last year's P4 chips, but the newest Intel chips with larger on-chip cache are clearly out in front of anything AMD has to offer. I *am* talking about the most expensive chips, but the current price is not relevant, because my whole point was thinking about future upgrades.

Relevant information
Other relevant information

I'm not an Intel marketing drone, I've provided benchmarks to back up what I said, and I think offered some pretty clear reasoning in the process. Come on guys, don't label me a troublemaker. I'm an AMD guy, not an Intel guy. I just don't want to see AMD fail, because that's where I've put my money (I've owned 6 machines with AMD processors so far, currently three of those are in use).

Okay, you must have been the guy that moderated me as a troll (lol). Sorry, didn't mean to push your buttons.

The point that I think some of you folks might have skipped over is the upgrade path. This knocks about $150 (average) off the price of the Intel upgrade path, because you can move to their faster P4 CPUs without having to change socket types. The new Prescott CPUs don't require a mainboard with a new socket (assuming your Intel-compatible board is fairly recent). Think about that: If I want to go from my Athlon XP to an Athlon 64, I have to spend another $150 and tear apart my machine. To the average consumer, this means buying a whole new PC. If I had got a socket 478 board, I would just buy the next fastest Intel chip (or whichever was the best balance or price and performance).

A new Athlon 64 may be comparable to last year's P4 chips, but the newest Intel chips with larger on-chip cache are clearly out in front of anything AMD has to offer. I *am* talking about the most expensive chips, but the current price is not relevant, because my whole point was thinking about future upgrades.

Relevant information
Other relevant information

I'm not an Intel marketing drone, I've provided benchmarks to back up what I said, and I think offered some pretty clear reasoning in the process. Come on guys, don't label me a troublemaker. I'm an AMD guy, not an Intel guy. I just don't want to see AMD fail, because that's where I've put my money (I've owned 6 machines with AMD processors so far, currently three of those are in use).

The Mac G4 cube case used a thermal chimney to cool the computer. It was a fanless design.

Similarly, the designers of the Mac G5 designed the case so that the computer could be efficiently cooled with a few slow fans.

Most cases for PCs are also designed to meet certain thermal specifications, although that standard is somewhat lax.

Are you serious? Tom? Is that you?

Here:

"There is nothing finer than raising the hackles of delusional AMD lovers. However, today I do so with a heavy heart. This is no time to take aim at the pompous, self-righteous head-in-the-sand-ostriches of the alternative chip lifestyle. One must embrace them, hug them and wipe away their tears.

They are the freaks of low-cost computing, the poor, downtrodden users of products that never seem to be able to match PR numbers to actual performance, now almost beaten into marginality for all time. "
(Ridiculous remarks curteousy of Omid, General Manager, U.S. Operations for Tom's Hardware)

You need some serious psychological help if you're crazy enough to believe that they're actually pro-AMD. They're not just pro-Intel, they're pro-$ADVERTISER. Generally speaking, their articles are skewed towards a select few especially heavy advertisers. They'll even work with different driver revisions and bios settings to maximize the advantage for Intel et al. There was even an article in which Tom himself admitted that he sent the results 'back to the labs for more testing' after the AMD chips performed a bit too well for his tastes. He didn't say why he sent the results back, but when you look at the articles surrounding it and see 9 articles with a pro-Intel slant, 1 with benchmarks that seem favorable for AMD, and the 1 gets the results sent back for 'further testing', you get a good indication of what's happening. Tell me this: why is it that Tom's benchmarks tell such a different story from virtually every other hardware sites'? Is it some massive AMD conspiracy? Why is it that Ace's says one thing, and Tom's says something totally different? (Ace's is a technical-minded person's hangout, as opposed to the consumer-oriented Tom's)

Wake up - Tom's is a propaganda machine serving up dumbed-down consumer grade articles with rigged benchmarks and non-sequitur conclusions.

It's a joke, and quite frankly, it's becoming pathetic.

web sites like tomshardware.com are so pro-AMD and anti-Intel.

Maybe you should read this article at tomshardware.com.

>Yes, INtel is so bad for not mentioning there competitor.

No, they're bad for not mentioning in their PR/docs that they are in fact AMD x86-64 compatible. Okay, let's try this again: Being compatible == good, not mentioning that you are == bad. M'kay?

>Now, if only AMD could make a chip that doesn't melt if you don't have the heat sink on perfectly.

They already do, you ignorant git.

What is it like back in the year 2000?

"I have lost respect for Tom and his publication."

I've never had much respect for Tom; he's an egomaniac. Also, the website sold out to Intel and a number of other advertisers a few years ago (roughly 3). You'll notice a fairly rapid change in the articles if you look in the archives - that is, if you can find articles that haven't been re-edited or removed. They also have a habit of removing the author title or changing it when they decide they don't like the original author anymore.

Tom's is now a joke. It's a site offering dumbed-down consumer grade articles with rigged benchmarks and conclusions that are non-sequitur. Attempts to hide the utter bias have faded with time, with AMD supporters now being openly labled as just a bunch of idiotic, delusional fanboys by some in the staff (Hi Omid!). The benchmarks are done with multiple driver versions, then vetted such that the best possible results for key advertisers can be shown. Anandtech still has a good deal of respect in the community, as well as from me (I'm more important! ;) ). Probably the best site I've run across is Ace's, which offers incredibly in-depth articles to those willing to learn a thing or two.

Here's an excerpt from a recent column on Tom's:

"There is nothing finer than raising the hackles of delusional AMD lovers. However, today I do so with a heavy heart. This is no time to take aim at the pompous, self-righteous head-in-the-sand-ostriches of the alternative chip lifestyle. One must embrace them, hug them and wipe away their tears.

They are the freaks of low-cost computing, the poor, downtrodden users of products that never seem to be able to match PR numbers to actual performance, now almost beaten into marginality for all time.

Of course, they won't admit this. They will howl at the moon, scream obscenities at nice, unassuming columnists with no axe to grind"

They could not but implied that it was common knowledge.

It's not like they never had problems in the past.

AMD could use a push right now, since their 64-bit chips are big, their wafers are smaller, and their process is larger. Check it out on Tom's Hardware. I'm not in the market for a new cpu for 2-3 years, and I'm hoping that AMD will have pushed the market to a more competitive scenario by then. Buffer overflow protection released ahead of Intel looks a good move for the processor underdog.

And you think you have it bad? Look at my misery!

From Rob's Ferrari gush: Part of me wishes this notebook was fueled by the Athlon64 rather than the Athlon XP-M chip.

Heh.

Heh heh.

Heh heh ha ha hee hee ho!

My brand-new Yugo can punk his Ferrari.

Maybe.

I'm sure that having a second monitor to provide extra game info is probably way cool, especially with games like flight sims and driving sims. But how many people really have two monitors?

I bought 3 Hitachi 17" Flat Panel displays just for that purpose. I powered them with a Matrox Parhelia. (Screenshots here, here, and here.

For Flight Sim'ing, the experience is just OK (at best). And that's only if you turn down the settings quite a bit. The video card simply can't handle 3840x1024 resolutions with all the settings maxed out and still manage 60+ frames per second. (Though in flight siming, since the graphics don't change nearly as much as they do in a first person shooter, you only need 25-30 to get a smooth playback.)

I noticed that in first person shooters the extra monitors didn't actually add to the emersion like I thought it would. You still focus all of your attention on the middle monitor. The side monitors ARE good for camping/sniping though. You have a wider field of view so it's harder for someone to surprise you from the side. But when you are running around constantly, the side monitors can almost be more distracting than useful. But it makes for a great demo for friends. Everyone you show it to will want it.

The real problem with triple head gaming right now is lack of graphic processing power. Don't buy the Matrox card for this purpose. You definitely WILL NOT be happy with the results. I most certainly wasn't. And I bought it knowing that for first person shooters it was going to suck, but I wanted it mainly for Flight Simulators. But even in that case it just doesn't have enough power.

Maybe when PCI Express is available I'll be able to buy 3 NVidia/ATI based graphic cards that actually have the kind of power needed for this intense of a workout.

What Tom's Hardware is proposing in this article is a much more practicle use for a second (or third) monitor. Having the second monitor display map data, chat information, statistics, and so on. The second display wouldn't even have to be accelerated in that case. A spare PCI VGA card with 8MB or 16MB of RAM should be sufficient.

I believe Tom's Hardware itself showed a photo of someone playing Quake 3 on three screens when he reviewed the Matrox Parhelia card (which can drive 3 monitors). This was in 2002. Here is the relevant page. and Here is another one

I believe Tom's Hardware itself showed a photo of someone playing Quake 3 on three screens when he reviewed the Matrox Parhelia card (which can drive 3 monitors). This was in 2002. Here is the relevant page. and Here is another one

Tom's Hardware

anything less than this just isn't worth doing

IMHO, these figures are a bit bloated According to this article in Toms hardware, prodution yield is about 30%, it it expected to rise up to 60% after two years of production CPU's are just too complicated to be produced with yield of 98%-99%. Maybe this spokesman was speaking about some other, simplier in design, chips?

IMHO, these figures are a bit bloated According to this article in Toms hardware, prodution yield is about 30%, it it expected to rise up to 60% after two years of production CPU's are just too complicated to be produced with yield of 98%-99%. Maybe this spokesman was speaking about some other, simplier in design, chips?

OK, here are your heat pipes.

And if you want really quiet try one of these

Doesn't matter, because the transfer rates for a 3gig $1100 CompactFlash Type II Card are so incredibly slow (3.5mB/sec). You can buy a 80gig IDE drive that transfers at 58mB/sec for $66.

That's 16 times faster for 1/16th the price. Anyone still want to replace your hard drive with a CF card?

That link which I was supposed to include is http://www.tomshardware.com/cpu/20040201/prescott- 05.html. A really good picture.

www.tomshardware.com/cpu/20040201/prescott-05.html

Don't let the fact that they proclaim the Athlon 64 to be the 'clear looser' in the SPECViewperf discipline because of the poor results in the DX-08 and DRV-09 tests fool you.

Those scores are probably not representative of the true performance of the AMD processor but rather of the early stages of optimization of the Linux support for the Nvidia NForce 3-150 chipset. The very same weakness was observed in the past in other reviews that used Specviewperf on Windows platforms, such as this one from THG. Subsequent versions of the Nvidia drivers have since brought noticeable improvements.

The AMD scores would likely have been much more competitive if a motherboard based on another Athlon 64 chipset like the VIA K8T800 would've been used for this review.

Don't let the fact that they proclaim the Athlon 64 to be the 'clear looser' in the SPECViewperf discipline because of the poor results in the DX-08 and DRV-09 tests fool you.

Those scores are probably not representative of the true performance of the AMD processor but rather of the early stages of optimization of the Linux support for the Nvidia NForce 3-150 chipset. The very same weakness was observed in the past in other reviews that used Specviewperf on Windows platforms, such as this one from THG. Subsequent versions of the Nvidia drivers have since brought noticeable improvements.

The AMD scores would likely have been much more competitive if a motherboard based on another Athlon 64 chipset like the VIA K8T800 would've been used for this review.

Tom's Hardware did a thing a few years ago where they had two running systems, one Athlon and one P4, and they popped off the heat sink while it was under extreme load. The P4 just slowed down and kept on running, while the Athlon actually burst into flames...

Can I overclock it to 5 HGz ?

Tom's Hardware. I believe he used to be a doctor.

That said, I hesitate to count generations before the NES. The Atari 5200 couldn't compete sales-wise with the 2600, so that continued to dominate up to and including the crash (much like how the NES outstripped the SNES for quite a while). So...is that a separate generation, or is that still 2600-land? Furthermore, releases before that time just seem more randomly distributed so that they don't divide well into generations, the industry was much smaller, and the crash just provides a convenient place to start counting. This, I believe, is why most videogame sites basically start counting with Nintendo, i.e.:

Generation 1: NES

Generation 2: SNES, Genesis

Generation 3: N64, Playstation

Generation 4: PS2, GC, XBox

(With all other consoles not being worried about too much as they never gained significant market share).

Toms Hardware just did a roundup of 15 different, name brand power supplies here. To quote their conclusion page, "The efficiency factor of 72% is among the best in the test panel" when talking about one of the power supplies. Even Exeltech, considered some of the best inverters on the market, only see efficiencies in the 88% range, and they don't have to deal with that pesky ATX format. Maybe there has been a breakthrough the rest of us don't know about; if so, could you share?

Toms Hardware just did a roundup of 15 different, name brand power supplies here. To quote their conclusion page, "The efficiency factor of 72% is among the best in the test panel" when talking about one of the power supplies. Even Exeltech, considered some of the best inverters on the market, only see efficiencies in the 88% range, and they don't have to deal with that pesky ATX format. Maybe there has been a breakthrough the rest of us don't know about; if so, could you share?

Tom's Hardware has a few PSU roundups (older, newer) which include noise level testing... as you can see, other "silent" PSUs are much louder than 14db (nor do said PSUs even claim to be that quiet). At best, you're talking about PSU's doing 25 (low load) to 33db (full load), and they tend to get louder as the wattage rating increases. All SilenX PSUs (I believe they go up to 600watta) are rated around 11.5 (minimum) to 14 (maximum) db. So it really is a big difference. I know my "silent" PSU which is around 30db is -much- louder than my 80mm case fan which claims to be 20db.

Anyhow, literally EVERY SilenX review I've read has said they a) really are quiet (much quieter than other "silent" PSUs, apparently) and b) are very high quality.

Also note that you have to buy them from www.silenx.com or (soon) NewEgg. You'll see "SilenX 14db" PSUs on Pricewatch and such, but they are imposter PSUs of inferior build made by a company named Ahanix, whom SilenX is currently involved in lawsuits with regarding this issue, and whose site is a blatant rip-off of Samsung's.

Tom's Hardware has a few PSU roundups (older, newer) which include noise level testing... as you can see, other "silent" PSUs are much louder than 14db (nor do said PSUs even claim to be that quiet). At best, you're talking about PSU's doing 25 (low load) to 33db (full load), and they tend to get louder as the wattage rating increases. All SilenX PSUs (I believe they go up to 600watta) are rated around 11.5 (minimum) to 14 (maximum) db. So it really is a big difference. I know my "silent" PSU which is around 30db is -much- louder than my 80mm case fan which claims to be 20db.

Anyhow, literally EVERY SilenX review I've read has said they a) really are quiet (much quieter than other "silent" PSUs, apparently) and b) are very high quality.

Also note that you have to buy them from www.silenx.com or (soon) NewEgg. You'll see "SilenX 14db" PSUs on Pricewatch and such, but they are imposter PSUs of inferior build made by a company named Ahanix, whom SilenX is currently involved in lawsuits with regarding this issue, and whose site is a blatant rip-off of Samsung's.

This appears to be deliberately skewed- for example, in their recent Athlon64/P4 comparison they ran they used slower memory sticks with 2-4-4-8 memory timings on the Athlon64 versus 2-2-2-5 timings on the P4.

reviews found at:

bigbrui.com, overclockersclub.com, modthebox.com, pcextreme.net, Tom's Hardware, AnandTech.com, etc...

Tom's Hardware has been running a great series of articles reviewing motherboards for the Athlon64. ExtremeTech also has a good review of Athlon64 motherboards. And AnandTech recently wrote up a useful AMD 2004 CPU roadmap.

I've been looking at this a lot lately since I was just about to build a new box. Ultimately, I decided not to go with a Athlon64 (too expensive for the limited benefit), but I did find reading all these articles useful in making that decision.

Tom's Hardware has been running a great series of articles reviewing motherboards for the Athlon64. ExtremeTech also has a good review of Athlon64 motherboards. And AnandTech recently wrote up a useful AMD 2004 CPU roadmap.

I've been looking at this a lot lately since I was just about to build a new box. Ultimately, I decided not to go with a Athlon64 (too expensive for the limited benefit), but I did find reading all these articles useful in making that decision.

IRC, copper conducts heat better than silver...

Last time I checked, that isn't the case. Silver has the best thermal conductivity of all elemental metals (at least all common ones - I don't actually have an extensive list in front of me). Slightly, but not drastically, better than that of copper. And with respect to other to other responses to the parent, the conductivity of aluminum, while better than, say, steel, pales in comparison to that of copper or silver.

See FrostyTech, or Tom's Hardware if you don't believe me.

The use of aluminum is a consequence of price and of system requirements. You can cool a Pentium II, for instance, adequately with an aluminum heatsink because it doesn't put out as much heat. Modern processors, on the other hand, put out more watts of energy which needs to be rapidly sucked away from the cpu and dissipated, so a heatsink with a copper core at the very least tends to be the norm.

Why don't we see more silver heatsinks? Price, of course. Copper is already relatively expensive, but a big block of high purity silver is out of the price range of most people. At that point water cooling probably has a better price performance ratio.

Check out some of the heatsink companies websites, thermaltake etc, to get some graphs and such about the heating properties of their products.

Toms does regular heatsink comparisons, and the copper always beats out the alu of the same type.

Actually, it's MINI-ITX. Not nano.

And the difference is that M-ITX is an ultralight, ultrafeature system: it has onboard everything, but it's too light to play quake.

Whereas this zen thing is supposed to be a normal system in a small package. (didn't get to read the article, appears slashdotted).

Tom's hardware guide reviewed a Jade-something-or-other... here it is. Fully loaded, svideo, composite, dolby, etc etc. Like $1400 I think. But hey! You Pay!

(the previous sentence was stolen from MSs spring ad campaign)

Actually, it's MINI-ITX. Not nano.

And the difference is that M-ITX is an ultralight, ultrafeature system: it has onboard everything, but it's too light to play quake.

Whereas this zen thing is supposed to be a normal system in a small package. (didn't get to read the article, appears slashdotted).

Tom's hardware guide reviewed a Jade-something-or-other... here it is. Fully loaded, svideo, composite, dolby, etc etc. Like $1400 I think. But hey! You Pay!

(the previous sentence was stolen from MSs spring ad campaign)

btw, I've done some digging, and found this document, scroll down to page 33 & 37-39; which I wasn't aware that software could also enable/disable the LME register. /* but then again, I don't know how/what they define 'software' to really mean/be. App & OS, OS not App, App not OS?...*/

/* thing that stikes me most, if the OS wanted to execute something, it got to have the CPU in it's 32-bit mode /* as M$ XP is 32-bit compatible only...*/, meaning that the 64-bit software first has to 'active long mode', execute it's instuction(s), 'deactivate long mode', give back control to OS, OS executes it's instuctions in 32-bit mode.... App then restarts it's cycle again by 'activating...' ... *you get my drift..* /* and is this possible, to begin with? */

... and is this 'activaing / deactivating' any/much efficient in the long run? *anyway, moving along..*
*/

and scroll down/up to page 2: "Defaults can be overridden in most modes using an instruction prefix or system control bit" - page 2 - table 1. "Operating Modes" /* but what's "most modes"? */

But, then again, does their 'proprietary' software do this 'instruction prefixing or system control biting'? is it possible for them to switch to '64-bit addressing' from inside 'legacy mode'?

Looks like he just whipped out a cheap digital camera and started snapping away, which is fine for your dime-a-dozen review site, but this is Tom's Hardware, which I'd argue is one of the largest review sites online (surprised they don't have a magazine yet). You'd think he could invest in a little better lighting or something, especially when it's a review of a product they have in office.

Looks like he just whipped out a cheap digital camera and started snapping away, which is fine for your dime-a-dozen review site, but this is Tom's Hardware, which I'd argue is one of the largest review sites online (surprised they don't have a magazine yet). You'd think he could invest in a little better lighting or something, especially when it's a review of a product they have in office.

You know, from the first picture that Tom shows of the case, I wonder if its really worth 1400 bucks. I mean, come on! It may be quiet, but its fugly! :(

...unless you're running one of these :)

I do think this product would be a lot better with built-in RAID though.

Last time I checked a kleenex is capable of removing water from a damp CD. Definition of Glass
Glass is a transparent, relatively strong, hard-wearing, essentially inert, and biologically inactive material which can be formed with very smooth and impervious surfaces. These desirable properties lead to the very many uses of glass.

Glasses are uniform amorphous solid materials, usually produced when a suitably viscous molten material cools very rapidly, thereby not giving enough time for a regular crystal lattice to form.

A glass is a intermeidate psuedo-phase of matter between a liquid and a solid.

Please note that common glass, SiO2, is just a type a glass. Much the same way that table salt is a variety of salt.

In fact, plastic in many cases is a glass.


The active material in CD-R's is a variety of a chalcogenide glass. Chalcogen

The following is not the best reference but it is really all you deserve. I bold the important bits.
Intel Wants to Move Beyond Flash Many types of digital memory are out there, but each has its Achilles Heel. HDDs need to spin, eat up a lot of power and are relatively slow. RAM is fast but volatile and poses challenges in working well with logic components. Flash memory is getting cheaper but has a limited number of write cycles. Well, according to a recent article on EETimes.com, Intel thinks it can move past the downfalls of the various memory types that are now available with two new technologies that could be successors to flash memory. Both are in the think-tank stage but the goal is a low-cost device with fast read and write times that is easy to manufacture. One of the new memory technologies is polymeric ferroelectric RAM (PFRAM), or polymer memory, which uses two layers of metal strands running at perpendicular angles with a thin polymer sheet sandwiched in between. The second is unified memory (OUM). OUM is built on a silicon wafer but uses a thin film of a special material called chalcogenide, which is used in rewriteable CD-ROMs and DVDs. Inc. owns much of the intellectual property in the field and is collaborating with Intel to make the idea work. Ultimately, Intel hopes to come up with a solution that amounts to what most folks look for in a car: cheap, fast, and reliable.

You should be -happy- you've got an 8500 instead of a 9000. The 8500, even in the castrated models (which the 9100 is one of), often outperforms the 9000 by huge margins. Here's some benches.