By Kevin Tu - Source : Tom's Guide

Representatives from the House proposed a new bill that would force retailers to check official identification from anyone purchasing video game titles rated “M” or “AO”. Representatives Jim Matheson and Lee Terry introduced a bill this week pushing for government regulation, just as the Federal Trade Commission released a report that found retail stores selling violent video games to children despite pressure for stores to check identification.

Matheson and Lee’s bill would include requirement of identification checks and stores to post explanations of what the ratings mean. Stores found violating the law would be fined $5,000 per violation by the FTC.

"Many young children are walking into stores and are able to buy or rent these games without their parents even knowing about it. Many retailers have tried to develop voluntary policies to make sure mature games do not end up in the hands of young kids, but we need to do more to protect our children," said Terry. Some stores currently already attempt to enforce age verification before game purchases. Best Buy for example, recently pressured its retail stores to check identification during the first week Grand Theft Auto 4 was launched. Wal-mart appears to already have ESRB ratings posted at their stores and has programmed its cash registers to automatically prompt for identification checks.

Illinois and Louisiana have attempted in the past to enact similar laws, but faced fierce opposition and were struck down as being unconstitutional. It appears Terry and Matheson would like to try their luck again on a nation-wide level.

"As a parent, I know that I’m the first line of defense against my kids playing Mature-rated video games," Matheson said in a statement. "But parents can’t be everywhere monitoring everything and some reasonable, common sense rules ought to be in place to back parents up."

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By Wolfgang Gruener - Source : Tom's Guide US

Redmond (WA) - Microsoft continues its practice to announce Office service packs that are scheduled to become available via Microsoft Update automatic distribution at least 30 days in advance. SP1 for Office 2007 has been released in December of last year and is now ready to be distributed via the company’s Automatic Update service.

According to a message posted on Microsoft’s "Office Sustained Engineering" blog, the company will begin distributing SP1 automatically via Automatic Update beginning June 16th. Microsoft plans to ramp the distribution gradually, which means that not all users will see the update right away. The company expects "enormous" demand, but noted that "10’s of millions of downloads" have been delivered since December 8, 2008 - the date the service pack was posted to the firm’s Office 2007 SP1 is a massive, 218.3 MB heavy patch collection that addresses a total of 441 issues (including those published prior to December of 2007) in the software suite, according to the update list. The most heavily patched applications are Outlook (103 patches), Excel (86), Office (62), Access (36) as well as Powerpoint and Word (26 each).

Details of the update are provided in the Knowledge Base article 942995.

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By DigiTimes - Source : Tom's Hardware US

Cooler Master has announced the Hyper Z600, noiseless CPU cooler. The cooler’s X shape design retains rapid heat transfer and creates a lower backpressure, forcing air to pass through quickly, according to the company.

More here at Digitimes.

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By Bestofmedia Team - Source : Tom's Hardware

Windows XP Service Pack 3 finally arrived to our computers this week… And is now killing AMD machines, according to Jesper Johansson, former program manager for security policy at Microsoft.

The problem relates to machines with SP3 installed rebooting and then not allowing users to get so much as Safe Mode. The problem is mainly affecting AMD users who bought their machines from HP. Johansson attributes the problem to the way that HP puts images of Windows onto its machines, using the same copy for both Intel and AMD boxes.

"Because the image for both Intel and AMD is the same all have the intelppm.sys driver installed and running. That driver provides power management on Intel-based computers. On an AMD-based computer, amdk8.sys provides the same functionality," says Johansson.

Some other OEM’s beside HP have the same practice, and presumably their users will be seeing the same issue.

There is another problem with SP3 that has not yet been tracked down to anything so specific that is causing random hangs and system crashes, though at least one can get into Windows itself (unlike the lucky AMD users.)

Windows service packs causing mayhem and havoc is not a new phenomenon – indeed, AMD machines got hit with a similar bug back in 2000 when any machine running over 350 MHz crashed and burned after a new service pack was released – and we may wait a few weeks for all of the kinks to get sorted out.

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By Jane McEntegart - Source : Tom's Hardware

Reports show that Toshiba has high hopes regarding its presence in the SSD Market over the next few years and is committing to having 50 percent of the SSD market under its belt in as little as two years time.

At its corporate strategy meeting for fiscal 2008 in Tokyo on Thursday, Atsutoshi Nishida, president and CEO of Toshiba Corp said the company plans on having half of the market share for Solid State Drives by 2010 or 2011.

Recent months have shown the company has a huge interest in the SSD market. Over the last year Toshiba has invested in MLC (Multi-Level Cell) NAND memory and on top of that President of Toshiba Semiconductor, Shozo Saito last month predicted that a quarter of all notebooks would have an SSD drive by 2011 so it’s no surprise to hear the company has plans to be a play a big role in the future of SSDs.

According to Tech-On, Toshiba’s SSD development team is comprised of members from many different divisions rather than being made up solely of staff from the Semiconductor Co branch. Members of the project were brought together from Toshiba Semiconductor, Toshiba’s PC and HDD departments and R&D.

"I asked the related sections of the HDD business that might compete against SSD technology for their support and gained it,” Nishida said. “I told them that unless they provided their expertise and complete cooperation, the company would not make any further investment in HDD technology."

The company also thinks that not many of the competitors will be able to keep up with Toshiba in the field of MLC NAND Solid State Drives however with the pace of the SSD market being what it is we’re not sure whether or not Toshiba could be a little quick off the mark with such a statement. Recently we published a review of the Memoright SSD MR25.2-032S which showed remarkable performance figures so while Toshiba may be standing stomach to the tape it’s definitely not alone in the race.

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By Kevin Tu - Source : Tom's Hardware

The DRAM market has a glimmer of hope after a dreadful 2007. Analysts expect a rebound in 2008 as DRAM supply begins to normalize. Global third-party DRAM module suppliers are expected to see a rise in shipment this year to a total of $8.9 billion, a 9 percent gain from $8.1 billion last year. In 2007 DRAM manufactures ramped up production and invested heavily in new fabs, as they essentially bet their business on the success of Microsoft Windows Vista to drive demand. Unfortunately, Vista had a lukewarm introduction.

“Last year was disastrous for the DRAM chip industry, due to an acute oversupply and the resulting price plunge," explained John Lei, analyst, memory/storage IC systems for iSuppli. “This caused global DRAM chip revenue to decline by 7.3 percent. The poor conditions in DRAM chips led to even worse conditions in the DRAM module business. The third-party DRAM module makers bore the brunt of the downturn, because they lost market share to their chip suppliers.”

With the market oversaturated with supply and no killer application looming in the future, third-party suppliers suffered large revenue declines in 2007. “Looking at the Top-10 third-party DRAM module maker rankings for 2007, there were two groups of companies: those that were able to keep their heads above water, and those that were swamped by the market-downturn deluge,” Lei said.

Kingston, known as the world’s largest third-party memory supplier, fought hard to increase revenue 1.1 percent in 2007. Ranked number 2, Smart Modular Technology saw revenue drop of 3.5 percent. However, the biggest success story went to number 6 ranked Apacer Technology. Apacer reaped the benefits from parent company Acer’s acquisition of Gateway as it expanded its business by 24.4 percent.

While most of the leading third-party suppliers fought to keep their heads above water, many of the second-tier suppliers are being forced or considering to leave the DRAM market. “Although market conditions are set to improve soon due to the inevitable price rebound, it’s uncertain how long these companies can stay in the business given the top-tier suppliers’ aggressive moves to expand their market share,” said Lei.

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By Bestofmedia Team - Source : Tom's Guide

The Solid State Drive will completely replace the traditional hard drive in the coming ten years. This is the conclusion we’re drawing as the capacity of flash drives goes up and their prices come down.

SSD’s increase performance, by accessing data much quicker, and lower power consumption – with no mechanical parts moving around they’re quicker and draw less power. The main issue for the adoption of SSD’s today is their high prices – only 32 GB SSD’s are really priced in the consumer field.

However, according to an article published today on Tom’s Hardware that compared several flash drives, SSD’s with capacities of 100+ GB will soon reach the $500 mark, and prices will only fall further from there. The costs of SSD drives are coming down as the price of flash memory does as well. Today’s prices will be halved, at least, by the end of the year making solid state drives a much more attractive buy.

You can read Tom’s Hardware’s review of some very impressive SSD kit here.

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By Bestofmedia Team - Source : Tom's Guide

Google is moving ahead on its plans to integrate display advertisements into image searches, moving beyond the days of displaying only text-ads on Google.com itself and none at all in image searches.

Google currently displays no ads, text or otherwise, in its search results after users were turned off at the idea, something that Google estimates costs it $200 million a year in revenue. Since acquiring DoubleClick in March however Google has the technology and wherewithal to move forward on smartly integrating visual ads into image search results.

Google AdSense does display image advertisements on third party sites, but what the company is proposing now is a much bigger initiative that will see image advertisements on Google’s own properties, as well as more advanced ones on AdSense.

“We haven’t found a proper way to monetize image search to date,” said Google VP Marissa Mayer, who oversees search products, in an interview with Bloomberg. “You may see us roll out an ads-image search in the future, but when we do you’ll know that’s because we found a way that ultimately enhances user happiness with the product.”

Google could net anywhere from $1 - $2 billion a year in revenue, according to some industry analysts, if it integrates visual ads into its own search results. With Google’s stock price falling the company needs to roll out this new kind of a money-generating service, rather than yet another “We’ll figure out how to make money on it later” type product the company is famous for.

The company has trialled some mock-ups of how to display the ads to users, but hasn’t tried them out on anyone yet. Expect the company to move quickly on this one.

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By Christian Zibreg - Source : Tom's Hardware US

Chicago (IL) - Apple has a history of not being the most environmentally-friendly company out there and with more and more eyes focusing on climate factors that include, for example, a company’s carbon footprint, the Silicon Valley darling may feel under increasing public pressure in the future. The latest to criticize Apple’s environmental efforts is ClimateCounts.org, which hands Apple the worst climate scorecard in a ranking of twelve leading electronics and computer companies.

Apple’s PR had a good start into the week with a Consumer Reports magazine article that ranked Apple first in technical support. The second half wasn’t so great as a ClimateCounts.org report put Apple at the other end of the spectrum in terms of 22 climate and corporate performance tools that are claimed to "cover companies’ track record on measuring their climate change impact." Criteria include efforts to reduce global warming pollution, publicly disclose climate protection efforts and take positive or negative positions on public policy relevant to climate change. Climate Counts said it relies on the publicly available climate information on each company, self-reported and through "credible third parties".

This means that the statistic are more than likely to deviate from the actual eco friendliness as the actual climate footprint was not measured. We interpret the report more as a status of a companies’ declared eco-friendliness targets, not as actual achievements in a climate preservation. Still, the ranking reveals that there are companies that take the topics of climate change and global warming much more seriously than others in terms of making them a part of their communications strategy.

ClimateCounts.org aims to force companies to clearly state their environmental efforts and provide this information to customers as a tool that contributes to their purchasing decisions. "Business is being pushed by consumers to do its part to solve the climate crisis. The scorecard allows consumers to make good climate decisions in their everyday purchases, and it’s having an impact," said Gary Hirshberg, ClimateCounts.org chairman. Hirshberg is also the CEO of organic yogurt maker Stonyfield Farm, which finances the campaign.

At least in this survey, Apple doesn’t look great. The Cupertino-based company ended up with only 11 out of a maximum of 100 points for its ecological and climate efforts. Apple’s results fall far behind other tech companies: IBM is at the top with 77 points, followed by Canon (74), Toshiba (70), Sony (68), Hewlett-Packard (68), Motorola (66), Hitachi (51), Samsung (51), Siemens (51), Dell (49) and Nokia (37). ClimateCounts.org claims that Apple has no publicly stated climate impact review information available, there are insufficient efforts to reduce the climate impact, there is no climate policy stance and very little reporting on its emissions available.

This is not the first time Apple has been slapped by the green movement, ecological awareness groups and consumer advocates for not doing enough to preserve the environment. Greepeace has been among the more vocal groups to criticize Apple for its environmental impact, but recently noted that Apple has been making progress: The organization’s most recent "Guide to Greener Electronics" lists Apple in the middle of the pack of surveyed companies - at the same level as Sony Ericsson, LGE, FSC and Hewlett-Packard. According to Greenpeace, Samsung and Toshiba are the greenest examples of the group, while Nintendo, Philips, Microsoft and Panasonic are described as doing the least to protect the environment.

Apple only recently started using non-toxic materials in its products, but that clearly isn’t enough when compared to other IT companies. There is a notable discrepancy between Apple’s stated environmental efforts and its actual results in preserving the environment compared to other players in the IT industry.

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By Jane McEntegart - Source : Tom's Hardware

Just hours after AT&T announced free unlimited WiFi access for iPhone users all traces of the offer disappeared from the website.

AT&T recently took over WiFi access for Starbucks and some Barnes & Noble stores from network provider T-Mobile.

Last week iPhone users reported that they had been availing of free WiFi access at several branches of both stores by simply entering their phone number, though there had yet to be an official announcement from AT&T and sure enough a day later, the free WiFi was switched off. AT&T then requested a user name and password from customers at hotspots where they had surfed for free the previous day.

The AT&T website yesterday stated that iPhone users would have unlimited free access to all 17,000 AT&T WiFi hotspots including those located at Starbucks branches. The website noted (under “plans”) that all subscriber plans included unlimited AT&T WiFi access.

"Unlimited Data (e-mail and Web), 200 SMS text messages and access to AT&T’s more than 17,000 Wi-Fi hot spots, including Starbucks* all for use in the U.S. *Wi-Fi available at U.S. company operated Starbucks locations equipped with a hot spot”

However by 5pm CDT anything that might suggest iPhone owners could surf for free had disappeared from the website. We figure there have just been some crossed wires on when the service is supposed to launch; although that begs the question of how AT&T managed to switch the service on, switch it off, announce it and then pull it from the site before getting things in order.

At the time of print a spokesperson had yet to get back to us regarding the chopping and changing of information on the site but media reports suggest the company is remaining silent on the issue. We’ll keep you posted on what they say when they get back to us.

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By Mark Raby - Source : Tom's Guide US

Redmond (WA) - More than 140 million Vista licenses have now been sold, which averages out to around three copies every second since it went on sale last January.

"That’s a very rapid sales rate," said Bill Gates in a news conference, reports the Wall Street Journal.

However, critics are quick to point out a couple things that make the Vista sales number defy actual consumer demand. First off, almost all new computers come with Vista pre-installed, so a new PC equals a new license of Vista.

Even people who opt for the Vista-to-XP downgrade actually buy a copy of Vista, even though they may never touch it. Microsoft did not say how many of the licenses were for upgrades from XP.

Microsoft is struggling to convince consumers that Vista is strong and is the new wave for operating systems. Many people are clinging to their copies of XP, which is the longest-running and most-installed operating system by far.

The software giant recently released the first Service Pack for Vista, which has given new attention to the OS, but only for true enthusiasts.

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By Christian Zibreg - Source : Tom's Hardware US

Chicago (IL) - We are still scratching our heads over Apple’s $278 million acquisition of chip developer P.A. Semi. Following a rather strange wave of opinions that Apple wants to develop its own iPhone processor, there is now the first real piece to a puzzle that, perhaps, one day will reveal what advantage Apple sees in the company.

It seems that there may be more to this acquisition than meets the eye. You remember how media outlets embraced theory that Apple is breaking away from Intel, building a P. A. Semi-based iPhone. The problem with this idea, however, is the fact that these 65 nm 2 GHz dual-core processor (PWRficient PA6T-1682M) consume between 5 and 13 watts of power, as opposed to the iPhone’s current 620MHz ARM processor rated at somewhere between 180 and 450 milliwatts. Even if P. A. Semi would have made galactic advances in its chip design, this processor is just too large and too power-hungry for a cellphone.

The general speculation has been that Apple snapped up P.A. Semi for its engineering talent. Others have suggested that the company may have even done this deal to boost its stock price, since just a few dimes of gains would have made P.A. Semi break-even deal for Apple. So, even if we know that Apple would be insane to develop its own mobile chip - with Intel, Samsung and ARM pouring billions of dollars into this segment - this acquisition remains a mystery.

The next round of speculation could be supported by an interesting find by Peter Clarke of EE Times Europe.

Clarke claims that a "source" said that Apple has been an investor in P.A. Semi before. There are no public records to provide proof and Clarke while Clarke mentions that "strategic investors sometimes prefer to go unlisted", he notes that there is no substantial evidence to support the claim.

There appears to be a certain likelihood that this information could be true, as reports published in 2005 stated that Apple was interested P. A. Semi. Back then, Apple announced its transition to Intel architecture, a move that Mr. Clarke describes as "bad news" for P.A. Semi, whose architecture is based on a PowerPC license from IBM. Of course, we are deep into speculation here, but it is generally possible that P. A. semi may have been working on some processor project that was killed simply because of Apple’s move to Intel.

The theory here is that this switch has left P.A. Semi without a future key customer. In the years that followed, P.A. Semi spent most of its venture capital funding and essentially ran out of money. Clarke wrote that Apple apparently saw "another opportunity" for P.A. Semi-designed chip: "The only way to get the project funded was for Apple to pay off the other investors and bring P.A. Semi in-house," Clarke’s source said.

So, what kind of chip could that be? Your guess is as good as ours.

A processor for desktop systems and notebooks? A cellphone processor? Unlikely. An Apple TV engine? Maybe.

If there is really a processor in the planning, then common sense suggests that P. A. Semi will leverage the experience it has in the embedded market, possibly for multimedia applications. Combine that with the thought the Apple is moving deeper into the consumer electronics space and you end up at a perhaps completely new product category for Apple.

So let us add to the speculation: Our bets are on an Apple TV, not today’s box, but rather a LCD TV. Any thoughts?

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By Humphrey Cheung - Source : Tom's Guide US

Tokyo (Japan) - The Japanese government has proposed a new tax on iPods and other digital music players. The so-called Copyright Tax would add approximately $1 per device and the estimated $9.5 million annual proceeds would be distributed to recording companies and artists. In Japan, Minidisk and DVD players are also subject to a Copyright tax and it seems the law makers are just trying to level the playing field.

A similar proposal was floated in Japan in December 2005, but was quickly shot down.

Read more ... International Herald Tribune.

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By Mark Raby - Source : Tom's Guide

Washington (DC) - The National Association of Broadcasters, which has voice numerous concerns about people not being informed of next year’s digital TV switch, is now calling on George W. Bush to help inform citizens.

The organization’s CEO David Rehr has sent a letter to the White House, highlighting the fact that the digital TV switch is less than 300 days away.

On February 17, 2009, the government will pull the plug on all analog TV signals. This means anyone with an old TV and is still relying on antenna reception will be unable to watch anything.

Anyone with cable or satellite is already covered for the switch, but all others need a digital converter box. Consumers can apply for a coupon from the government that is good for $40 off a converter, which cost between $50 and $70.

Rehr said that millions of Americans will be affected and are still not aware of the looming change. "We are respectfully requesting your assistance in informing American households about the transition," he wrote in his letter to the president.

One suggestion Rehr reportedly made was that Bush and/or Vice President Dick Cheney appear in a TV ad informing citizens about what will happen next February.

"The DTV transition will fundamentally change the way the American people get news about their communities, emergency situations and entertainment. We want to enlist the help of the federal government and the Administration to ensure that happens as seamlessly as possible," said Rehr in the letter.

According to a report from the FCC, over one million digital TV converter coupons have already been redeemed, but several million more will need a converter because they are still using analog TVs with no digital service.

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By Wolfgang Gruener - Source : Tom's Guide US

Real Networks today said that it plans to spin off its casual games business into an independent company and distribute shares of the newly created games company to its shareholders. The newly created firm could go into an initial public offering with up to 20% of the shares being sold.

According to Real Networks, the games business division reported 2007 revenues of $108.5 million, up 26% over 2006.

The company anticipates that spinning off its casual games business will result in "two more flexible and focused companies".

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By Mark Raby - Source : Tom's Guide US

Redmond (WA) - Microsoft has started a new initiative that it hopes will make mobile phones more affordable for people in developing countries, in a move similar to the highly publicized "One Laptop Per Child" program.

The company already has a shell of a project called Fone+, which has been moving at a snail’s pace since it was first unveiled a few years ago. However, with the technologies for under-priveleged countries coming back to the spotlight, it decided to move Fone+ forward with a vengeance.

The move comes as Microsoft’s "Unlimited Potential Group," which focuses on developing nations, appointed a new boss. Craig Mundie, chief strategy officer at the software giant, said in a press conference in Indonesia, "All phones go from dumb to smart, and I think that’s a major focus for us in terms of how we can bring access to the Internet and some of these technologies ... to this rural population."

Mundie pointed out that mobile phones can do a lot of things other than communication, specifically go online and become more connected with the world. "It’s a lot cheaper than having to buy a whole separate computer," noted Mundie.

A project called OLPC (One Laptop Per Child) has been making a lot of headway, with third-world countries ordering low-cost computers by the thousands. It has also been dominating the market in those countries, leaving less room for other players like Microsoft.

"We continue to explore and look at both phone-up models and PC-down models as we look for the right devices for emerging markets," said Mundie.

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By Christian Zibreg - Source : Tom's Guide US

There is an interesting feature in Mac OS X we haven’t known about so far: A user has found that the OS lets you run a screen saver showing off your Twitter friends. It is not really an official feature, but rather a programming example that comes with the Leopard developer tools. With few easy steps, users can take the code and turn it into a regular OS X screen saver.

The "hidden Twitter feature" can be found in the Twitterverse Quartz composition: Quartz composition is described be Apple’s developer documentation as a piece of code that processes and renders graphical data - such files are often created without writing a single line of code, but through the Quartz Composer development tool instead. The developer tools on the OS X Leopard DVD include various Quartz composition example files. Twitterverse is one of them.

The "The Twitterverse.qtz" file cannot be executed by itself, but needs to be dragged from the desktop onto the preview in the Screen Saver tab of the Desktop & Screen Saver preference pane available in the System Preferences. Add your Twitter username and password in the screen saver options and you are ready to go. The screen saver will show a wheel with your Twitter friends and their tweets, as illustrated in Thomson’s Flickr stream.

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