• HP warns of data integrity bug on Itanium processor
• Mod chip crackdown at Christmas
• Intel's "Turbo DDR 400" Canterwood aimed at fast 3D gaming
• Microsoft postpones DirectX 9 date for a week
• Via adds 800MHz, DDR-II to Pentium 4 roadmaps
• AMD reorganizes to push flash into other apps

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Different systems and hardware will generate varying amounts of heat. If you think your system is too hot, try to compare it with similar systems, and see what people come up with. If yours seem a little high, the problem may be inadequate or ineffective cooling.

Why didn't VIA continue their now-commonplace semi-annual "A" update tradition with the KT400? Why isn't it dubbed the "KT333A" as some motherboard manufacturers have "accidentally" listed it as? A sensible individual would reason that VIA had planned on supporting DDR400 memory with their latest chipset, however, with JEDEC slow to ratify a PC3200 standard, and a breadth of variances in "standards" created by memory manufacturers, it would be difficult for VIA to offer official support for DDR400. As such, they pulled DDR400 support before KT400 motherboards ever reached store shelves.

ATI certainly isn't stupid, and they know it would be a huge waste to miss an opportunity like they have now. With the current high-end performance king and their super efficient R300 core architecture, ATI is now bringing their mainstream product to market. The Radeon 9500 Pro is a trimmed down version of the Radeon 9700 Pro, but comes with a much lower price tag, redesigned board architecture, and a new driver set. When we first got the board in the labs, we were expecting the Radeon 9500 Pro to directly compete with the nVidia GeForce4 Ti4200-8X. Fortunately, we found it to be quite a bit more capable than we originally expected.

Let me take you trough some of the features. The mainboard of course is made for Pentium 4 processors with Socket 478 with both 400/533 MHz FSB. Furthermore the board is based on DDR memory up-to PC3200. That's right, we are booting RIMM modules and now see 3x DDR 266/333 memory sockets. The best thing yet is that by setting a Turbo setting in the BIOS you will get full DDR400 support for a lot of memory bandwidth. Furthermore 6x USB 2.0/1.1 ports (4 by supplied cable) and hey .. Promise Serial ATA 133 RAID unit, which supports 2 Serial ATA devices.

Overall the Vantec Stealth 420 Watt Power Supply is a winner. Combining an Aluminum housing with 3 Fan switchable operation along with rock solid performance you cannot go wrong with this unit.

It claims that there's more technical support problems and failure rates with AMD systems compared to Intel systems, and specifies what it thinks these are. It lists lower heat production and better thermal engineering for Intel chips, better quality fans and heatsinks, and processors which shut down "rather than go into thermal meltdown.

Not so long ago NVIDIA did a small refresh to the GeForce4 line, upgrading them to support the new AGP8X graphics interface bus, thus doubling the available bandwidth, in comparison to AGP4X, from the host memory and CPU to the graphics card. The NV25 chip that powered GeForce4 Ti became NV28 and the NV17 chip that was GeForce4 MX moves up to NV18.

The joystick has 10 programmable buttons, eight way hat switch, analogue throttle and a twisting stick. The twist feature is primarily for use in flight sims, its the perfect rudder control as with old joysticks it was always hard to map the rudder to the stick. Logitech have made a big deal out of the use of 2.4GHz wireless technology, what this does is minimize lag, increase data rates, and means that you can have several cordless devices attached to the same computer, with a claimed range of 6m.

High speed CD-RW burners are becoming increasingly more affordable each day as they gain in popularity. Follow Cameron "Sov" Johnson as he takes a look at a 48/16/48 speed burner from OptoRite. You can pick one of these kits up for $100 US, but does it actually work well and most importantly, at its marked speeds? Read on and find out - It might just make the perfect Christmas gift for the geek in your family!

These are the second batch of Cold Cathode Florescent Lamps that I have had the pleasure of reviewing from Sunbeam Tech. and I am even more impressed than I was the first time around. They simply spank the competition in all aspects, so it's safe to say that Sunbeam CCFL's are the best on the market, period.