Like previous editions, the November 2009 issue simply lists the best graphics card(s) for a particular price point, and explains why it is so. Without further ado, here are the cards:

Price	Card
$55	SAPPHIRE Radeon HD 4650 100253HDMI
$80	HIS Radeon HD 4670 H467QS1GH
$90	XFX GeForce 9600 GSO PVT96OZDFA
$110	Galaxy GeForce 9600 GT 96GFF6VIFCXX
$115	MSI Radeon HD 4850 R4850-2D512-OC
$125	XFX Radeon HD 4870 HD-487A-YWFC
$170	SAPPHIRE Radeon HD 4870 100279-1GL
$175	HIS Radeon HD 5770 (Juniper XT) H577F1GDG
$190	EVGA GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 896-P3-1255-AR
	HIS Radeon HD 4890 H489FP1G
$230	2 x MSI Radeon HD 4850 R4850-2D512-OC in CrossFire configuration
$250	2 x XFX Radeon HD 4870 HD-487A-YWFC
$300	SAPPHIRE 100282SR Radeon HD 5850
$340	2 x SAPPHIRE Radeon HD 4870 100279-1GL in CrossFire configuration
$350	2 x HIS Radeon HD 5770 (Juniper XT) H577F1GDG in CrossFire configuration
$380	2 x EVGA GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 896-P3-1255-AR in SLI configuration
	2 x HIS Radeon HD 4890 H489FP1G in CrossFire configuration
$400	SAPPHIRE 100281SR Radeon HD 5870
$510	EVGA GeForce GTX 295 017-P3-1295-AR CO-OP Edition

For over $510, you can get the most powerful graphics card on the planet

Source

Post from: The Gadget Blog

• Casing: Antec Three Hundred Black Computer Case ($60)
• Power Supply: CORSAIR CMPSU-650TX 650W Compatible with Core i7 Power Supply ($100)
• Motherboard: MSI X58 Pro ATX Intel Motherboard ($200)
• CPU: Intel Core i7 920 2.66GHz LGA 1366 130W Quad-Core Processor ($289)
• Memory: Kingston 3GB (3 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Triple Channel Kit Desktop Memory ($52)
• Video Card: EVGA GeForce 9800 GTX+ 512-P3-N873-AR Video Card ($135)
• Hard Disk: Western Digital Caviar Black 640GB 3.5″ SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive ($75)
• Optical Drive: LG 22X DVD±R DVD Burner Black SATA Model GH22NS30 ($25)

Take note though! This setup obviously does not include a display or a pair of speakers. There’s nothing wrong with using your current ones though.

Post from: The Gadget Blog

Looks like software makers have their own sort of catching up to do, reminiscent of consumers constantly upgrading their hardware to run the latest applications. Ironically, according to IT research firm Gartner, users will be hard-pressed to maximize their hardware, thanks to software that has consistently failed to catch up to multi-core functionality.

Analyst Carl Claunch said: “Many of the software configurations in use today will be challenged to support the hardware configurations possible, and those will be accelerating in the future.”

…Part of the problem, Claunch said, was the speed of innovation in today’s chip design. Chips develop with more cores and each core gets more threads as well, adding to the issue, he said. Each generation turns the same number of sockets into twice as many processors.

The implied solution was that developers should be more forward-looking and start coming out with software that won’t impose any future bottlenecks on computing power. But aside from providing contingencies for future CPU technology (a projected possibility is the 1024-cores running four years from now), the challenge also lies in anticipating the so-called “soft” limits, which according to Claunch, “are uncovered only from word-of-mouth, real-world cases.” Looks like the performance and capability of current and future operating systems are crucial in this situation.

(Image from Wikipedia. Thanks ZDNet!)

Post from: The Gadget Blog

The OpenBook site spells it out like this:

The external panel CAD files for the VIA OpenBook Reference Design are being released under a Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike 3.0 license giving customers the flexibility to bring their own innovative style and brand value propositions to the Mini-Note market segment. This also helps customers reduce product development costs and speed time-to-market.

This is really cool, however I suspect that once you give people a taste of what’s possible, they’re going to demand the whole enchilada, not just the external design, but the internal boards, the BIOS, everything.

I’m convinced that we’re now seeing changes in the way hardware is created and marketed that emulate the way open source software has been produced, not just in the sense of making things available for other people to re-use, but in the sense of how that changes where the real innovation will be taking place.

There’s always going to be room for people like Apple, whose designs are patented (i.e., closed) but typically groundbreaking but there also ought to be a place for folks like Asus, where the design is just a place to start.

Post from: The Gadget Blog