Tech News
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Websites Give Deals Based on User Information
Published: Monday, December 24, 2012 | By: DennisThis is an interesting story, and something I have noticed but didn't pay much attention to in the beginning.
A key difference: where Staples seemed to think they were located.
A Wall Street Journal investigation found that the Staples Inc. website displays different prices to people after estimating their locations. More than that, Staples appeared to consider the person's distance from a rival brick-and-mortar store, either OfficeMax Inc. OMX +1.34% or Office Depot Inc. ODP -2.31% If rival stores were within 20 miles or so, Staples.com usually showed a discounted price.The question I would have is, does this reflect in the store?? I think not.
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PowerColor PCS HD7870 Myst Edition Graphics Card Review @ HardwareHeaven.com
Published: Monday, December 24, 2012 | By: DennisSeems like they are trying to sell a video card based on what games it can play. Sound familar?
PowerColor are taking the Tahiti GPU, usually used in 7900 series cards, and pricing/configuring it at 7870 level. Call it Tahiti LE, 7950 Light... or 7870 Myst with PCS+ cooling. Today we take a look at how it performs in games like Far Cry 3, Assassin's Creed 3 and Hitman Absolution.
Back in the early days having games included with your graphics card was a real value addition and proof that the card will run the latest titles. These days it really doesn't matter.
Sad how things have changed.
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Sparkle GeForce GTX 650 Ti review @ Guru3D
Published: Friday, December 21, 2012 | By: DennisGonna let the Guru tell you about this one.
We review and benchmark the Sparkle GeForce GTX 650 Ti Dragon series and perform an in-depth test with the latest games available. This graphics card is launched to fill the gap inbetween the Radeon HD 7770 and Radeon HD 7850. Aimed at a pricetag of roughly 150 EUR this product comes with 768 shader processors. Sparkle applies a custom PCB and their dual-fan cooler. Next to that you receive a factory overclock right out of the box. Let's check it out shall we ?
In looking at the card the first thing that comes to mind is that the PCB is HUGE! The cooler is full length with dual fans with a shroud designed to vent outside the chassis. Of course there is a huge gap in the cooler to ensure when the fans ramp up it can still cool the GPU. At this point the GPU will be at its hottest and will dump that air back into your chassis.
As I suggested in my 3-way review of the GTX 650 Ti I felt the lack of SLI and small nature of the "reference" PCB lended the card well to being a dedicated PhysX processor and not a viable solution to your "average" gaming needs.
Mainstream, yes, but for your average gaming rig get a card that can be expanded and offers a good level of performance like the GTX 660 Ti and above.
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ASUS Says: Intel likely to figure a way to keep LGA design for CPUs
Published: Friday, December 21, 2012 | By: DennisThe rumor that LGA is going away made the headlines a month ago and was even the subject of the NInjalane Podcast were we talked about the leaked roadmap and how the slide may have been leaked on purpose to gauge market reaction.
Well Joe Hsieh, Asustek Computer vice president and general manager of motherboard/desktop business claims that removing LGA from the Intel lineup isn't good for business but will be good for "their" business.
Commenting on Intel's reported plans of abandoning CPU socket designs and changing to directly soldered CPUs after two years, Asustek Computer vice president and general manager of motherboard/desktop business Joe Hsieh has said that the issue will not be as bad as people think, and Intel is likely to adopt a strategy to allow the both methods to coexist.
Hsieh noted that even if Intel's ball grid array (BGA) packaging plans enter the desktop industry, the industry will continue to live on as motherboard makers will figure out how to handle and respond to the change.The part that makes this Digitimes post interesting is that shortly after the rumors died down Intel announced that they will be supporting socketed CPUs for the foreseeable future.
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Were the Mayans Right? - Not Likely
Published: Friday, December 21, 2012 | By: DennisAccording to this news posting (that I created at 8:30am local time) the world didn't end and thus far the sky is still clear. Of course there is still time for asteroids to attack or the sun to get blazin' hot and the moon to crack but I'm thinking its prolly not going to happen.
At least today.
I forget where I read it but someone wrote in an article once that the 12/21/12 date doesn't account for changes in the western calendar and that the transition period depicted actually occurred a couple years ago. Personally, I find that hard to believe but whatever makes them sleep better at night.
So, crack open a beverage, fire up a gaming rig or tap an LN2 tank. Whatever you do enjoy the day like it should be,
A Friday!!
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The New SEO Landscape @ i7
Published: Wednesday, December 19, 2012 | By: DennisI just posted a new blog article talking about how SEO has changed over the years which almost mirrors this marketing article over at i7. Its worth a read if you are curious about the "behind-the-scenes"
Remember the good old days when you could write an article, create a keyword rich meta title, strategically place your well researched keywords in headings and throughout your content (watch that keyword density!). Then fire up your favorite link building service or software to pepper the web with 1000’s of inbound links, all with keyword rich anchor text, and maybe use some paid blog network service like Build My Rank to create inbound links, and that was SEO?
I remember those days, it was good. It was also cowboy days of the internet where you could get away with almost anything and still come out on top while the honest guys/gals were left struggling to make keywords meet.
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NL: Review Block: Cases and what we have already reviewed
Published: Wednesday, December 19, 2012 | By: DennisThere comes a time in the review site circle of life when "other" sites send you news of products that have already been reviewed. Sometimes I am the one sending out the late review and other times it is the other way around. Nothing wrong with that and for the most part google doesn't give preference to "first post" rankings anymore.
Or do they?
Chassis Reviews
- Review: Cooler Master HAF XB @ Ocaholic
- Cooler Master HAF XB Mid Tower Review @ Hi Tech Legion
- Silverstone SUGO SG08 @ techPowerUpAs you may have guessed reviews of these products already exist on this site and can be found by browsing the Review/Case section or by clicking the links below.
NInjalane Reviews
Cooler Master HAF XB Case Review @ Ninjalane
Silverstone Sugo SG08 Case Review @ NinjalaneAs always, more reviews to come along with some "real" news you might want to read.
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2012 Budget Mini-ITX Desktop PC System Build Guide @ Legit Reviews
Published: Wednesday, December 19, 2012 | By: DennisWe all love system guides. They outline what gear you need and in some cases show you how it all goes together. Legit Reviews has a MiniITX system guide up using an interesting combination of parts, most of which are from Asus.
Imagine that?
Are you looking to build a new PC and thinking about using the Mini-ITX platform? Today, Legit Reviews shows you how to create a SFF system and stay under the $650 price point. The system uses an Intel Ivy Bridge processor, a Kingston 120GB SSD, and an ASUS GeForce GTX 650 video card just to highlight a few of the main components. This system should be able to easily tackle normal usage scenarios during the work week and then switch roles to a nice gaming machine on the weekends. Read on to check out the build!
There are several ways to go when building a MiniITX system and the decision normally comes down to your chassis choice and how powerful you want things to be. The Bitfenix Prodify used in the Legit built is a really nice case but quite tall (for what it is) and limits where you can physically put the case. Now if you used a chassis like the Silverstone Sugo SG08 then you can have full length video card support, great cooling AND still be able to put the system on a shelf and out of the way.
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GIGABYTE GeForce GTX 650 Ti 1GB Review @ Techgage
Published: Tuesday, December 18, 2012 | By: Dennisthe nVidia GTX 650 Ti is such a great card that I almost feel bad saying you should use it as a dedicated PhysX processor, especially if you already have a great GPU setup.
Be sure to check out our GTX 650Ti 3-way roundup for more details.
NVIDIA does such a great job filling holes in its product line-ups, that sometimes it manages to fill a void we didn’t even know existed. The GTX 650 Ti is a perfect example of this. This GK106-based card sits close to the GTX 660, and with GIGABYTE’s overclocked GV-N65TOC-1GI, we’ll see if we can close the gap even further.
I was fortunate enough to get overclocked samples from Gigabyte and can honestly say, clock for clock, they are faster across the board. Of course, assuming those clocks are higher than stock and faster than the competition, for which they are.
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Cisco Shopping Around the Linksys Division
Published: Monday, December 17, 2012 | By: DennisBack in 2003 Cisco bought Linksys as a way to better their market position and finally break into the mainstream. For the most part it worked but, as with most corporate take-overs, the parent company alienated the established user base by making it difficult to support older "legacy" devices. (corporate agenda getting in the way)
For instance, say you needed a driver for a Linksys network card. Normally you would visit the website, click support or products and download the driver you needed. The only problem was, since your network card wasn't a router or network switch it was no longer supported. I guess that is one way to obsolete the legacy of the company you paid 500 Million for.
The unit may attract the interest of TV set makers seeking a recognized brand and technology, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the process isn’t public. Linksys is likely to fetch much less than the $500 million Cisco paid for it in 2003 because it is a mature consumer business with low margins, the people said.
Cisco wants to sell Linksys as part of its strategy to exit consumer businesses while expanding in corporate software and technology services. Chief Executive Officer John Chambers eliminated 7,800 jobs over the past year and closed businesses such as the Flip video-camera unit amid a slowdown in sales growth after a foray into consumer technologies backfired.Most large tech corporations have found money in corporate software and services due to the low overhead and high profit margins. IBM made the switch already and HP tried to change over but decided their legacy in hardware was too difficult to abandon. It is only a matter of time before Cisco makes the leap, and with any luck will be stuck dissolving Linksys because I doubt anyone will want to buy it.
