Tech News
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Facebook Hardware Giveaway July 9th - 31st 2012
Published: Monday, July 9, 2012 | By: DennisIt's giveaway time again and I would like to give a big shout out to Gigabyte and Thermaltake for helping me out with the prizes!!. The contest format is a little different this time around, there are three prizes offered and three people will be able to win.
In addition to the 3 prizes if the Ninjalane Fan page reaches 4000 likes then I will offer up a prize from the hardware closet, a EVGA Z68 FTW Overclocking Motherboard. If that wasn't enough a secondary prize will be offered at the 6000 like mark, the famed Level 10 GT. (GT edition *not* the BMW Level 10)
There is 4 things you have to do to win.
1) Fill out the contest entry form
2) Like the Ninjalane Fan page
3) Like the Gigabyte US Fan page
4) Share the contest page with your friendsIf you do all of those things you will be entered to win and be part of the random drawing on July 31st.
Questions and comments can be posted in the Ninjalane Message Forum or posted on the Ninjalane Fan page. Good Luck!
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NL: Review Block - After 4th Edition - Cases Coolers and Gaming Gear
Published: Thursday, July 5, 2012 | By: DennisI hope that everyone had a great 4th of July mid-week holdiay. Twill be awhile until the next one so check out some of this gear you can use to get the most from your system.
Also be sure to check out my review of the Cooler Master Storm Sonuz Gaming Headset. Its a stereo pair with removable microphone and cloth wrapping all around.
Coolers (Used to keep your junk at the right temp)
- Phanteks PH-TC14CS C-Type CPU Cooler Review @ Legit Reviews
- Be Quiet! Dark Rock Advanced CPU Cooler @ Planet Overclock
- Funky Kit Review: Phanteks PH-TC14PE CPU Cooler
- Noctua NH-U9B SE2 CPU Cooler Review @ Hardware Secrets
- Thermaltake Water 2.0 Extreme Liquid CPU Cooler Review @ NikKTech
- Noctua NH-L12 L-Type Low-Profile Cooler Review @ OCIA
- Cooler Master Storm Sentinel Advance II @ LanOC Reviews
Gaming Gear (Stuff for Battlefield 3)
- CM Storm Sentinel Advance II Gaming Mouse Review @ Techgage
- Cooler Master Storm Sonuz Gaming Headset @ Pro-Clockers
- CM Storm Sonuz Gaming Headset Review @ ThinkComputers
- Razer Taipan Ambidextrous Gaming Mouse @ Pro-Clockers
- SteelSeries 7H Fnatic Edition Gaming Headset Review @ Madshrimps
- CM Storm Speed-RX Mouse Mats @ techPowerUp
Cases (also known as chassis)
- Cooler Master HAF XM Mid-Tower Case Review @ HardwareHeaven
- BitFenix Shinobi XL Window Full-Tower Case
- Thermaltake Armor Revo - Snow Edition @ Techreaction
- Rosewill THOR V2-W Full Tower Computer Case @ Modders-IncMore in the hopper so kick back and enjoy the show.
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ASUS Maximus V Extreme @ ocaholic
Published: Thursday, July 5, 2012 | By: DennisOne of the most sought after motherboards in the past two months, the ASUS ROG Maximus V Extreme. This is a Z77 enabled gaming motherboard that moonlights as an extreme overclocker.
The Maximus V Extreme, is ASUS' new flagship model regarding Intels latest Z77 chipset. The guys over there at ASUS ROG put a lot of new features on the board. On the paper it looks like they've moved their flagship ROG board to another level (yet again?). So it's quite understandable that we can't wait to have a close look at this product.
There comes a time when you simply cannot pack any more features on a motherboard but it would seem that ASUS didn't get the memo. Instead they ignore the painful cries and keep shoving more on there. Looking at the specs the motherboard can support 4-way SLI and Crossfire with the help of an onboard PLX chip. Officially making it the second Z77 motherboard I have seen to enable that option.
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Phobya WaCoolIT Bench Table @ PureOverclock
Published: Thursday, July 5, 2012 | By: DennisI'm still working on my test bench design. It may not be as refined as this bench table but it should lend itself well to the type of testing and overclocking I do on a regular basis.
Today we take a trip out of the norm in our typical case review. For those who use a case for your computer and do a lot of hardware changes, watercool or just plain cannot leave your system alone, you may want to think about a change of pace. The change being a bench table, and the Phobya WaCoolIT is a new one we’re looking at today. It packs some style and great features, so grab a frosty beverage and let’s take a look at the functionality of this stylish and large test bench.
I have to admit, the design looks good, might have to give it a test run.
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Google is killing off iGoogle
Published: Wednesday, July 4, 2012 | By: DennisI suspect that anyone reading this may have never heard of iGoogle and is likely one of the reasons the Google camp is killing a somewhat useful extension to their web portal.
An un-remembered time ago Google launched a web portal called iGoogle that gave you a useful front-end to the normally stark and plain searching homepage. The portal allowed you to add "apps" to the page so you could easily get to things like Google news, Gmail, Gchat along with custom things like RSS and flash games. I've been using iGoogle ever since it was first announced and it has been my homepage ever since.
Over the past year Google has been changing things on the Google homepage and eventually dropped the direct link to iGoogle which signaled the beginning of the end. Today they have posted a very short explanation stating that iGoogle is going away in November of 2013 and to pack your shiz and get the flip out. (not their exact words)What's happening to iGoogle?
iGoogle will be retired in 16 months, on November 1, 2013. The mobile version will be retired on July 31, 2012.
How did you come to this decision?
We originally launched iGoogle in 2005 before anyone could fully imagine the ways that today's web and mobile apps would put personalized, real-time information at your fingertips. With modern apps that run on platforms like Chrome and Android, the need for something like iGoogle has eroded over time, so we'll be winding down iGoogle on November 1, 2013, giving you a full 16 months to adjust or easily export your iGoogle data.Check out the iGoogle announcement page for more gory details and the lack luster explanation for the change. Makes you wonder how long it will take for Google+ to find a similar home.
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Reality Show on Mars Could Fund Manned Colony by 2023
Published: Tuesday, July 3, 2012 | By: DennisNot really tech news but technology related. A Dutch company is planning to setup a colony on Mars and exploit the experience by treating it like a reality TV show.
Seems like a good idea, right?
A Dutch company aims to land humans on Mars by 2023 as the first step toward establishing a permanent colony on the Red Planet.
The project, called Mars One, plans to drop four astronauts on Mars in April 2023. New members of the nascent colony will arive every two years after that, and none of the Red Planet pioneers will ever return to Earth.
To pay for all of this, Mars One says it will stage a media spectacle the likes of which the world has never seen — a sort of interplanetary reality show a la "Big Brother."There is no denying how popular reality TV shows are, to a certain degree more popular in Europe, but sending a group of people to a alien planet seems like a plan best left for the film studios and not a real life adventure.
With that being said the only way you could fund something like this in the modern world would be with the private sector with advertising dollars.
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Foxconn reportedly to invest in Indonesia
Published: Tuesday, July 3, 2012 | By: DennisThis is some good news for those living in Indonesia.
Foxconn Electronics (Hon Hai Precision Industry) is said to be planning to establish manufacturing plants in Indonesia as the minister of Indonesia's Ministry of Industry recently revealed that Foxconn is set to invest US$1 billion in Indonesia, and the investment is expected to create about one million jobs, during his attendance of Indonesia Taiwan Chambers of Commerce, according to sources from the upstream supply chain.
This brings company benefits in lowered labor costs and also more efficient transportation into other parts of Asia. The expansion also helps to diversify their product offerings as it relates to raw manufacturing including famous items like the iPhone and not so well know things like CPU sockets and other raw computer components.
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Drones vulnerable to terrorist hijacking
Published: Monday, July 2, 2012 | By: DennisIn a "no duh" moment researchers are claiming that military drones can be hijacked and made to do anything the hijacker wants including taking out any number of targets including people.
“Spoofing a GPS receiver on a UAV is just another way of hijacking a plane,” Humphreys told Fox News.
In other words, with the right equipment, anyone can take control of a GPS-guided drone and make it do anything they want it to.
“Spoofing” is a relatively new concern in the world of GPS navigation. Until now, the main problem has been GPS jammers, readily available over the Internet, which people use to, for example, hide illicit use of a GPS-tracked company van. It’s also believed Iran brought down that U.S. spy drone last December by jamming its GPS, forcing it into an automatic landing mode after it lost its bearings.There are several things that a drone needs to fly and, much like with a human driven aircraft, if any of those systems fails then the mission is in danger. What is being discussed in the news article is the equivalent of placing blinders on the "eyes" of the drone and causing it to become confused. I cannot be certain but communication with the drone is likely encrypted over a secure channel but who is to say that with enough data it cannot be hacked.
These days you can hack a WEP key in a matter of seconds and WPA can fall in a matter of hours. This isn't to say military drones fly via wifi but with enough data you can crack the code. That is the main reason drones fly with a program and not so much with human interaction, remove the ability to run the program and you kill the device.
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Micron to Acquire Elpida Memory in $2.5 Billion Deal
Published: Monday, July 2, 2012 | By: DennisHere is some hometown news.
Hometown being "my" home town considering that the Micron HQ is located about 10 miles from my present location. Crucial, a division of Micron, is also close but not mentioned in the news story.
Micron, based in Boise, Idaho, also announced on Monday that it was buying a 24 percent stake in the Rexchip Electronics Corporation from the Powerchip Technology Corporation for about $334 million. Since Elpida owns a 65 percent stake in Rexchip, Micron will own 89 percent of that company once both deals close.
Elpida, which makes dynamic random-access memory chips used in personal computers and other products, filed for bankruptcy earlier this year amid mounting debt and falling chip prices. Although some analysts questioned Micron’s appetite for all of Elpida, the deal would allow Micron to expand its manufacturing capacity at a relatively low price.Good news for Micron, makes you wonder how that will change the enthusiast memory market considering that Elpida made some of the better chips out there.
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Battlefield 3 Premium Subscriptions Top 800,000 in First Weeks
Published: Friday, June 29, 2012 | By: DennisDLC and micro transactions are the methods that most game developers have adopted to keep their games in the news and fresh with gamers, and why not, its almost free to the players and costs the game developers very little to market.
Within the first two weeks of availability, more than 800,000 players signed up for the Battlefield 3 Premium service, says EA Games chief Patrick Soderlund in an interview with Game Hunters.
The service tied to EA's popular first-person shooter gives players early access to the game's downloads, including the recently released Close Quarters.
Soderlund says the initial response has topped EA's expectations. "We are very pleased with the performance so far," he says.They are offering the DLC on PS3 first (likely because of some grease from Sony) and then open it up for the other consoles and PCs a week later. It would seem that buying a mission pack disk is no longer a viable option.
