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Archive Updated (0 Comments) (link)  Saturday, 7-November-2009  15:51:52 (GMT +10) - by Agg Our two recent articles reminded me that I've been a bit slack about updating the OCAU Content Archive in the Wiki. So I've gone through and added all the in-house articles since last time I did it, and they're also listed below: 2009 OCAU Server Upgrade Lynnfield i5 or i7 - This is the Question Kingston SSD vs Western Digital VelociRaptor Radeon Shootout Phenom Shootout ATI Radeon HD 4890 in CrossfireX AMD Live! HTPC Attack of the Fake USB Sticks AMD Phenom II X4 810 AMD Phenom II X4 940 Black Edition and Radeon 4670 GIGABYTE Core i7 920 Overclocking Guide Silicon Power 64GB 2.5" SATA SSD Intel Core i7 - Nehalem Arrives Intel Skulltrail - Dual Quad-Core Computing for Desktops AMD Spider Platform AMD Media Event Report OCAU Pix (1 Comments) (link)  Saturday, 7-November-2009  14:52:50 (GMT +10) - by Agg You may have noticed already, but we now have a free image hosting service for people with OCAU Forum accounts. You can use the QuickLink ocau.com/pix to get there quickly. Anyway, use your forum login, upload pictures, receive forum code to put them into threads. Easy! There's a multiple upload feature and even a "rehosting" feature to grab pictures from elsewhere on the net. You can organise them into galleries if you like. If you tick the "public" box, they will be browseable on this page. Saturday Morning Reviews (0 Comments) (link)  Saturday, 7-November-2009  09:53:10 (GMT +10) - by aftahours Laptop/Systems: Cooler Master SNA 95 on InsideHW ASUS Eee PC 1101HA Seashell 11.6-inch Netbook on TweakTown ASRock ION 330HT-BD Nettop on TweakTown Medion Akoya E3211 - 13.3in CULV Laptop on TrustedReviews ASRock ION 330HT-BD on OCWorkBench Toshiba Satellite T135 Win 7 CULV Notebook on HotHardware.com PSU: OCZ Z Series 650 Watt Power Supply on OCIA.net Sapphire PURE 1250W Modular PSU on Bjorn3D Enermax Galaxy EVO 1250W on PureOverclock Case: NZXT Gamma Budget Case on OcModShop Lancool Dragonlord PC-K58 on techPowerUp Thermaltake Element Q Mini-ITX case on Metku.net Motherboard: Asus P7P55D Deluxe Motherboard on Techspot MSI NF980-G65 Motherboard on Neoseeker MSI P55-GD65 Motherboard on TrustedReviews ASRock M3A785GXH/128M Motherboard on Legit Reviews Cooling: Thermolab BADA Heatsink on Frostytech Thermaltake SpinQ VT CPU Cooler on RWLabs Dynatron Genius on OCC Videocard: Sparkle GeForce GTX 260 Plus 1792MB Video Car on ThinkComputers.org Gigabyte GeForce GT220 on Bjorn3D HIS Radeon HD 5850 1GB Video Card on TweakTown Sapphire HD 5750 1 GB GDDR5 on techPowerUp Leadtek Winfast Geforce GT 220 1Gb on Madshrimps Storage: LiteON iHAS424 Dual-Layer DVD Writer on PCStats Synology DS209 Advance NAS Enclosures on Pro-Clockers Misc: Cooler Master Lab Test Bench V1.0 on Madshrimps Star Wars: The Force Unleashed - Sith Ultimate Edition (PC) on Gaming Heaven Pantech C790 Reveal Mobile Phone on Testfreaks Athlon II X3 435 Triple Core Processor on TechwareLabs Misc Pics (19 Comments) (link)  Friday, 6-November-2009  14:32:31 (GMT +10) - by Agg Friday again! Time flies..                               And this last one from Mindy, with a story: I'd briefly like to introduce you to TUNE! FM's new team member. He's yet to be named but we've established that his preferred sleeping space is inside our on-air Google Radio Automation server, on an AudioScience (Balanced) Soundcard! AMD Phenom II X4 965 BE 125W (0 Comments) (link)  Friday, 6-November-2009  14:30:52 (GMT +10) - by Agg AMD recently released a new revision of their Phenom II X4 965 BE CPU. This CE Revision is intended to use less power and run cooler - hopefully allowing more overclocking. Coverage on BenchMarkReviews, OCClub, LostCircuits, Guru3D, NeoSeeker, PureOC, HotHardware, ExtremeOC, DriverHeaven, XbitLabs, PCPerspective and PCStats. Discussion here. Friday Afternoon (1 Comments) (link)  Friday, 6-November-2009  14:23:11 (GMT +10) - by Agg New York's Attorney General has filed an antitrust suit against Intel. "Intel has engaged in a systematic worldwide campaign of illegal, exclusionary conduct to maintain its monopoly power and prices in the market for x86 microprocessors," the suit asserts. "By exacting exclusive or near-exclusive agreements from large computer makers in exchange for payments totaling billions of dollars, and threatening retaliation against any company that did not heed its wishes, Intel robbed its competitors of the opportunity to challenge Intel's dominance in key segments of the market. This illegal behavior was highly detrimental to consumers, competition, and innovation." Mike noticed an interview with Australia's first gamer rights political party on Kotaku. Established in the wake of the controversial banning – and subsequent censorship – of Left 4 Dead 2, the Gamers 4 Croydon party plans to run against South Australian Attorney-General and R18+ videogame opponent Michael Atkinson in next year’s state election. I caught up with party founder David Doe to discuss those plans. BoingBoing have a leaked copyright treaty, and are quite concerned about it. The internet chapter of the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, a secret copyright treaty whose text Obama's administration refused to disclose due to "national security" concerns, has leaked. It's bad. Timbot spotted a French gaming magazine firing consoles through walls. I'm not sure why. :) The District 9-esque gallery of cockroaches infiltrating data centers (above) is clever, but the "Overheating" photo shoot of products being thrown through a wall out of frustration is definitely the main highlight here. Google Dashboard now centralizes privacy settings, thanks Rezin. Google has launched Dashboard, which enables users of its products - such as Gmail, YouTube and Blogger - to centrally manage privacy settings and monitor how much data is stored on Google's servers. Fancy a crack at game development? Epic have released a free Unreal Development Kit. Gears of War and Unreal developer Epic Games today released its Unreal Engine 3 dev tools as a free download, aimed at providing noncommercial and educational use of the technology that powers many PC, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 games. Steve Jobs has been crowned CEO of the decade by Fortune. In the past 10 years alone he has radically and lucratively reordered three markets - music, movies, and mobile telephones - and his impact on his original industry, computing, has only grown. NismoR31 sends word that voting is now open for OCAU Iron Photographer for October. Below we have every competitor’s entry listed anonymously. Voting is simple. Select your single favourite entry and the winning OCAUer will be revealed at the end of the month. Official October 2009 Theme: "There Is No Theme". Interesting Forum Threads (0 Comments) (link)  Thursday, 5-November-2009  21:21:43 (GMT +10) - by Agg Here's a quick snapshot of what people are looking at in the forums: Unboxing Corsair Obsidian 800D in Overclocking & Hardware. Gigabyte Readies GA-EX58-Extreme2, USB 3.0 and SATA 6 Gb/s in Overclocking & Hardware. Asus P55 Premium with SATA3 and USB3 in the house! in Overclocking & Hardware. New Silverstone Fortress FT02 coming soon! in Overclocking & Hardware. Are ESD wrist band necessary for taking your motherboard out? in Overclocking & Hardware. CPU at absolute zero? in Overclocking & Hardware. Chopping some power bills in Electronics. AMD v nVidia - nVidia moving away from gaming in Video Cards & Monitors. Just got home from Nvidia/EVGA's launch for GTX 275 Co-op PhysX in Video Cards & Monitors. Shrimp's eye points way to better DVDs in Storage & Backup. Forza Motorsport 3 Discussion + Custom Car Pics in Microsoft Consoles. VIA introduces new 3000 Series Nano CPUs in VIA Hardware. We're overpriced: Telstra CEO admits in Networking, Telephony & Internet. Why don't some websites have www anymore? in Networking, Telephony & Internet. The future of piracy? in Games. Email your Attorney General with one click (almost) in Games. Pyramid builders - how did they do it? in Science. 150 years after Darwins "Origin of Species" 50000 free copies ...but in Science. Passenger accidentally ejects from plane in Current Events. Logic Puzzle - Blue Eyes in The Pub. Thursday Afternoon (4 Comments) (link)  Thursday, 5-November-2009  17:45:09 (GMT +10) - by Agg From Wessam: Just stumbled upon this - looks like there's approximately a week to get your opinion in. A written submission process is underway by Australian Government Advisory Council on Intellectual Property: Review of Patentable Subject Matter. ACIP are currently seeking public comment to an options paper with a submission deadline in electronic form or hard copy of Friday, 13 November 2009. Cluey OCAUers would be suggested to read up on it here and here for the relevance of this submission process to software patents. JC spotted this video on AusGamers that shows a bit more clearly the difference between the censored and uncensored versions of L4D2. For those wondering how they did it, I assume they recorded an in-game demo then played it back in both versions and used video software to split the screen. Clever stuff, anyway. ArsTechnica meanwhile show how you can play as "infected" in the L4D2 demo. The Left 4 Dead 2 demo is a great time, but the lack of versus mode play with the new infected is something of a disappointment. You won't have to wait until the game launches on the 15th, however; a clever chap out there has created a plug-in to allow you to play competitive games with the demo, and to try out the new special infected. If the Zombie Apocalypse does kick off, I'd hope to have a car like this to get around with. The TRAX STI is an experimental automobile that starts with Block's competition-ready Subaru WRX STI before ditching the tires, adding snow cat tracks, and upgrading to some next-level suspension to create the ultimate backcountry shred car. Maybe with cannons and flame-throwers on the roof instead of a snowboard rack, though. ArsTechnica also have an article about the possibility of an x86 CPU from nVIDIA. The idea has cropped up again in an analyst note from Doug Freedman of Broadpoint AmTech, in which Freedman claims that NVIDIA has been hiring former Transmeta engineers to work on a secret x86 processor that will appear sooner rather than later. Phoronix have a Linux Graphics Survey. For the past two years we have hosted an annual Linux Graphics Survey in which we ask well over 20,000 users each time their video card preferences, driver information, and other questions about their view of the Linux graphics stack. This year we are hosting the survey once again to allow the development community to get a better understanding of the video hardware in use, what open-source and closed-source drivers are being used, and other relevant information that will help them and the Linux community. Thursday Afternoon Reviews (1 Comments) (link)  Thursday, 5-November-2009  14:12:23 (GMT +10) - by Agg Video Cards: Sapphire HD 5870 and HD 5750 Vapor-X on OCClub. Sapphire Radeon HD 5870 Vapor-X on LegitReviews. AMD Radeon HD 5750 Overclocking Guide on LegionHW. Sapphire Radeon HD5750 and HD5850 CrossFire on BigBruin. Sapphire Radeon HD 5750 Vapor-X on Motherboards.org. ATI Radeon HD 5850 on XbitLabs. Asus EAH 4890 on XSReviews. Sapphire Radeon HD5770 CrossfireX on Hi-TechReviews. Sapphire HD 5770 on NeoSeeker. Audio Visual: HP Photosmart Premium TouchSmart Web multifunction printer on DigitalTrends. amBX speakers on DriverHeaven. Canon PowerShot S90 digicam on DigitalTrends. OXX Digital Vantage DAB+ Portable Digital Radio on RamblingThoughts. Haupauge HVR-1800 TV Tuner Card on TechWareLabs. Panasonic Viera TX-P58V10 58in Plasma TV on TrustedReviews. Asus 24T1E - 24in LCD TV Monitor on TrustedReviews. Memory: Corsair Dominator 4GB 1600MHz DDR3 Dual Channel Memory on FutureLooks. Kingston HyperX 8GB Kit 1600MHz on Bjorn3D. Storage: Corsair Flash Survivor 32GB USB Drive on VelocityReviews. AXUS FiT 500 RAID box on TechWareLabs. Qnap TS-219P Turbo NAS on TestFreaks. Seagate Cheetah 15K.7 SAS 2.0 6Gb/s 600GB Hard Disk on Tweaktown. Kingwin F-35 External SATA Hard Drive Enclosure on Tweaknews. Patriot Torqx 128GB SSD on Motherboards.org. Verbatim TUFF-CLIP 8GB USB Drive on BonaFideReviews. 2009 OCAU Server Upgrade (15 Comments) (link)  Thursday, 5-November-2009  04:22:08 (GMT +10) - by Agg I finally got around to finishing the article about our recent server upgrade and hosting change. I'll warn you now it's fairly long and waffly, but for interested people it'll give you some insight into the behind-the-scenes workings of a fairly busy website. If you just want the shiny pictures, they're on page 2. :) Click for the article! Geek Recipes (6 Comments) (link)  Wednesday, 4-November-2009  14:58:20 (GMT +10) - by Agg It's been a while since I've done this, but here's some more yummy stuff from our Geek Food forum: Baked Beans from Scratch by scon Butter Chicken by RETARD Marscapone Crepes by RETARD Chili Dougs by doug81 Fish&Chips w/ Tartare by RETARD Choc Self-Saucing Pudding by CyberBeat Steak & Mushroom Pie by ApathyGates Bacon Carbonara Pasta by RETARD Strawberry & Coconut Slice by RETARD Wednesday Afternoon (7 Comments) (link)  Wednesday, 4-November-2009  13:49:35 (GMT +10) - by Agg SemiAccurate take a look at a 100-core CPU. TILERA IS CLAIMING to have the first commercial CPU to reach 100 cores, and while this is true, the real interesting technology is in the interconnects. The overall chip is quite a marvel, and it is unlike any mainstream CPU you have ever heard of. BoingBoing report that an independent poll has found heavy illegal downloaders buy more music. This is in line with many other studies elsewhere and is easy to understand: people who are music superfans do more of everything to do with music: they see more live shows, listen to more radio, buy more CDs, buy more botlegs of live shows, buy more t-shirts, talk about music more, do more downloading -- all of it. On a related note, TechDirt cover a 60 Minutes report on movie piracy. Except they don't show any proof whatsoever that organized crime has anything to do with movie piracy at all. They just claim it, talk about Mexican gangs, and then assume it must be true. But, of course, most of the report actually focuses on the internet and file sharing of movies -- which completely goes against the claim that organized crime is "making its money" off of video piracy. Hector Ruiz, former CEO of AMD, has resigned as Globalfoundries Chairman amid allegations of providing information to inside traders. Mr. Ruiz provided information about A.M.D.’s efforts to divest its foundry operations to one of the defendants in the case, Danielle Chiesi, according to news reports. Ms. Chiesi shared that information with her then-employer, the hedge fund New Castle Funds, before passing it along to Mr. Rajaratnam of Galleon. Games.on.net have a video showing the differences in the censored Australian version of L4D2. For instance, we miss out on the zombie riot cop character, because even killing an undead cop constitutes violence against an authority figure. It was that sort of content that got the otherwise fairly tame Marc Ecko's Getting Up: Contents Under Pressure banned outright. The NSW Government has called for two new green datacentres for their IT needs. Over 30 agencies supporting dozens of data centres are currently in use by the NSW Government, which plans to move them all into the two efficient facilities by 2011. The request for tender will be released in early 2010, and will be issued as a 10 year contract, with two blocks of five year extensions for the design, construction and maintenance of the facilities. Tweaktown give us a little preview of SATA 6G and some issues with it so far. So what of SATA 6G? - It eats up a hefty 600MB/s (theoretical) running on a single PCI-e Gen 1 lane, which means you lose 350MB/s; something you are bound to notice. But there is something even larger at stake here. When we tested the external PCI-e x1 SATA 6G controller on the ASRock P55 Deluxe, we saw performance that was less than 100MB/s when this controller was plugged into the only PCI-e x1 slot. Phoronix compare CentOS 5.4 vs. OpenSuSE 11.2 vs. Ubuntu 9.10, performance-wise. With the release of CentOS 5.4 last month to bring this community enterprise operating system on par with Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.4, we decided it was a good time to see how the server / workstation performance between this new CentOS release compares to that of Ubuntu 9.10, which was released last week, and also how it performs up against the release candidate of OpenSuSE 11.2. HWZone checked out the "Power of 3" platform. Intel and NVIDIA have allied themselves in the battle against AMD with the introduction of the "Power of 3" platform. Simply put, it is any combination of Intel's P55 chipset and Core i5 processors, and NVIDIA's graphics card. Today, we are going to pit it against an all AMD system to see if it is really the superior setup. Wednesday Afternoon Reviews (0 Comments) (link)  Wednesday, 4-November-2009  12:10:19 (GMT +10) - by Agg Portable: Lenovo ThinkPad SL510 on TechReviewSource. Gigabyte M1022 Booktop on HWZone. Motherboard & CPU: Gigabyte GA-P55 UD3R LGA1156 on OCClub. AMD Athlon II X2 240e Processor on TechWareLabs. MSI 785GM-E65 AM3 board on iXBTLabs. AMD Athlon II 620 X4 on OC3D. AMD Athlon II X4 620 & Sapphire PI-AM3RS785G on Bjor n3D. GIGABYTE P55-UD3P Motherboard Overclocking Test on MadShrimps. AMD Athlon II X3 425 2.70 GHz on TechPowerUp. Software: Left 4 Dead 2 Demo Impressions on OCModShop. Cities XL PC game on GamingHeaven. Dragon Age: Origins PC game on GamingHeaven. Input Etc: VidaBox Wireless HTPC Media Keyboard with Laser Trackball on LegitReviews. Cooler Master Sentinel Advance Gaming Mouse on Modders-Inc. Logitech G500 Gaming Mouse on DigitalTrends. EFO Wireless Handheld Keyboard and Touch Pad on DragonSteelMods. Thrustmaster Ferrari Wireless Gamepad 430 Scuderia on I4U. Razer Naga MMO Laser Gaming Mouse on HWZone. Cooling: Zalman CNPS10X Extreme CPU cooler on RBMods. Tital Skalli CPU cooler on PureOC. Arctic Cooling F Pro PWM & TC Case Fans on DragonSteelMods. Cases: NZXT M59 Classic Series on BonaFideReviews. Antec Mini Skeleton-90 Open Air Mini-ITX on Tweaktown. Thermaltake DH202 HTPC Chassis Video on eTeknix. NZXT Gamma on HWSecrets.

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