All Computing components Feeds

Interview: Fatal1ty on games hardware

Patrick Goss — 1210946580

Johnathan 'Fatal1ty' Wendel has explained to TechRadar why he believes that having the right hardware is vital to being a successful gamer, as he launched the latest Creative sound card that bears his brand.

The Creative X-fi Titanium Fatal1ty series has been released, and Wendel, perhaps the most famous gamer in the western world, insists having the latest tech – be it soundcard or a gaming mouse can make a huge amount of difference.

Down to me

“Hardware is incredibly important to being a top gamer,” said Wendel – a 12 times world champion, “which is why, for me, it’s very important that I have the best equipment.

“That’s one of the reasons I teamed up with Creative. When I go into a tournament I need to know that if anything is going to go wrong it’s down to me and not down to my equipment.

Frag 'n' Chips

“Having a processor chip on board the soundcard was so important to me because soundcards took up so much of the computer’s processor.

“You’re not talking about one or two frames, you are talking a huge difference and it’s vital that I see every frame I possibly can because it’s all about my reaction to what I see.

“Titanium range has the Dolby Digital encoding which means that you have an optical output, and it is a native PCI Express card, which means it runs seamlessly on [Windows] Vista.”

Creative unveils Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium range

Patrick Goss — 1210932600

Creative has announced the latest version of its popular X-Fi Sound Blaster sound cards – with the PCI Express Titianium.

Creative is producing two different models – the Champion and the Professional series, with the former offering an external I/O drive for easier headphone connection through the front drive bays.

The PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty range features Dolby Digital live encoding for single cable connection to home theatre systems, accelerated audio for a top gaming experience, EAX 5.0 effects and 3D positional audio.

“Audio plays a huge factor in professional gaming, where every competitive advantage can make the difference between winning and losing,” said Jonathan “Fatal1ty” Wendel, the legendary gamer whose name adorns the range.

“The Sound Blaster X-Fi Fatal1ty edition sound cards significantly enhance any professional gaming rig, enabling us to hear what we can’t see and perform at our highest level.”

Features:

Creative X-Fi processor specifically designed for high-speed PCI Express slots in modern PCs
X-Fi Crystalizer technology, which leverages audio algorithms to intelligently and selectively determine how to restore the highs and lows from sound effects, instruments and vocals and voices that were damaged or diminished during the MP3, AAC, game audio or other compression processes
X-Fi CMSS-3D technology, to create virtual surround sound through speakers or headphones in games or music. In games, you hear your opponents in their exact location. With music, the sound expands so it completely surrounds you.
Dolby Digital support for compelling 5.1 surround sound through a home theatre system
Creative ALchemy to restore EAX and surround sound in DirectSound game titles running under Vista
Certified UAA compliance for maximum Windows Vista compatibility
X-RAM dedicated audio memory to boost performance in select games
THX Certified surround sound for cinematic movie audio playback
PowerDVD software with DTS-ES and Dolby Digital-EX decoding
24-bit audio quality and 109db SNR audio clarity
ASIO recording support with latency as low as one millisecond with minimal CPU load

First look: Samsung's 7-inch add-on display

Dan Grabham — 1210917742

We checked out Samsung’s new monitor gimmick at its HQ in Suwon City, South Korea. It’s a 22-inch display connected to a secondary 7-inch display for keeping something constantly in sight as you work away on the big screen.

The two-panel 2263DX bundle will be available later this month through PC World for under £300.

The smaller screen is, explained Ami Randhawa, Samsung’s UK Product Marketing Manager for displays, designed for those who want to keep a window, such as IM software, always visible while you work on Office apps on the main screen. Perhaps it could be used for keeping an eye on a webcam or even football scores while you work.

It works using Samsung’s UbiSync multiple display tech. That means you won’t need to drive the second display off your graphics card, instead using a USB cable to connect the two. This tech works well for this kind of device, though questions have been raised about its suitability when driving larger monitors – Samsung has previously deployed the tech for other displays.

The extra display can be positioned in various locations using an arm on the back of the main monitor or even completely removed. If you want to use the display in portrait, you will need to alter the orientation in the software that comes with the bundle though.

We think it’s an interesting idea, though quite whether you’d want to have an extra display for such a purpose is another thing. Mind you, if you’re in the market for a new display anyway, it could be something to consider.

Alienware calls for better 64-bit support

Patrick Goss — 1210864112

Alienware’s product marketing manager Marc Diana has called for companies to embrace 64-bit technology, and begin to optimise their drivers for new operating systems.

With parent company Dell insisting that it will be pouring money into gaming PCs, Diana – talking to CNET – believes the emphasis on quad core chips and faster GPUs is distracting companies from developing drivers for 64-bit Operating systems.

Conflab

"If these companies--Intel, Microsoft, Nvidia, ATI, and AMD--if they'd just sit down and realize the performance benefit of optimizing their drivers and software for 64-bit," said Diana.

"I think that would make sense now. We don't feel comfortable shipping a system to a customer with the 64-bit driver support that's out there in the industry."

4 Gig limit

Current 32 bit systems do not allow for more than 4GBytes of RAM, something that is fast becoming a bottleneck to high-end PC gaming rigs.

"Who cares about DDR3 memory? What about giving me 4GB?" adds Diana.

"They're building (software) for something that is inherently very old technology.

"We (need) drivers that are very healthy in the 64-bit space. I'm not saying that 64-bit drivers don't exist. I'm just saying there's not enough software development and support on that end to warrant companies like us to move to 64-bit operating systems."

HANNSG announces low-cost 1080p monitor

Marc Chacksfield — 1210761780

HANNSG, the Taiwanese panel manufacturer, has just announced its latest 1080p monitor, the HG281DJ.

Boasting 1920 x 1200 WUXGA true 1080p resolution, the 28in monitor is ideal for all your HD viewing needs.

Predominately aimed at videomakers, designers and photographers – i.e. those looking for the utmost clarity in their images – the HG281DJ is both PC and Mac compatible. However, as the HG281DJ is kitted out with a 3ms response time, gamers may well want to give the panel a look as well.

Stay connected

Inputs on the monitor are as standard. You get the obligatory HDMI port (with HDCP support), VGA, audio and component.

The only thing that lets the monitor down is its contrast ratio. At just 800:1 we would have expected better. At least the panel is equipped with anti-glare technology and a clean viewing angle of 160 degrees.

The price is right

At £400, this latest HANNSG release is one of the cheapest 28in 1080p HD monitors around. In fact, if we were a filmmaker, at that price we would probably buy two and have a rather nice twin-monitor HD setup.

The HG281DJ is available now from www.misco.uk and comes with a three-year warranty.

The Creative way to give your PC better audio

Marc Chacksfield — 1210693260

Creative’s new addition to its X-Fi range, the Sound Blaster X-Fi Surround 5.1, is the first of its type that allows you to upgrade your PCs basic, built-in audio system to 5.1 surround sound.

The device comes in black and simply plugs into a USB2.0 port to give your computer advanced audio capabilities - ideal for those who are afraid to open up your PCs to see what lurks inside.

Located on the Sound Blaster are gold-plated RCA ports and mini-jack outputs, while there’s also an optical-out for connecting to surround sound systems. A rather stylish remote control is also supplied.

Let the games begin

The X-Fi Surround 5.1 is not only geared towards those who want to immerse themselves in their DVD collection, it’s ideal for gamers too.

Put a game on and Creative’s EAX Advanced HD effects kick in, giving – in theory – a fantastic 5.1 gaming experience.

The Sound Blaster X-Fi Surround 5.1 is out now, priced at around £30.

Review: Razer Mako 2.1 PC speakers

James Rivington — 1210678954

Razer worked with THX audio engineers for a year to design, refine and build the Razer Mako 2.1 speakers. And it's a good job they did, because a world with this product in it is a far better place.

You'll not find a better pair of computer speakers anywhere on the planet. A total power output of 300W makes it among the most powerful 2.1 desktop system we've ever tested.

It's also dead sexy, and has a really cool touch-sensitive control puck.

Bang for your buck

Honestly, there's not a person alive who wouldn't be impressed by this system. But there's a catch... the price.

There aren't a huge number of people who would be willing to spend just over £300 on a 2.1 speaker system. Especially as the dollar price of the same set in the US is just 399.

However, if you've got money laying around. And you need some nice new speakers, you owe it to yourself to give these a chance. If you do, your ears will love you for the rest of your life.

Read our full review

Nvidia: Current CPU-GPU balance in PCs is 'obscene'

Jeremy Laird — 1210341913

Just forked out for a new rig with a fast processor on board? Then Nvidia has some very bad news for you. Your PC is "obscenely" imbalanced thanks to an overpriced, underperforming CPU - probably courtesy of Intel.

It's just the latest salvo in the burgeoning war of words between Nvidia and Intel this year. But what exactly is Nvidia getting at? Talking to TechRadar earlier this week, Nvidia's VP of Content Relations Roy Taylor outlined a developing strategy for leveraging Nvidia graphics technology to accelerate a wide range of PC applications. Very soon, the world will discover just how pathetic conventional CPUs really are.

If Taylor is correct, the initiative will deliver a massive, unprecedented boost in PC performance. We're not talking the 2x or 3x boosts in performance that the PC industry delivers on a regular basis. It could promise as much as 20x or even 100x the performance of todays multi-core CPUs. Yikes.

CUDA cometh

The basic premise is the use of Nvidia's CUDA programming platform (itself closely related to the C programming language) to unlock the increasingly programmable architecture of the latest graphics chips.

On paper, it's extremely plausible. In terms of raw parallel compute power, 3D chips put CPUs to shame. A good recent example is the new room-sized, high density computing cluster installed by Reading University.

Designed to tackle the impossibly complex task of climate modelling, it weighs in at no less than 20 TeraFlops. That sounds impressive until you realise that just a single example of Nvidia's next big GPU, due this summer, could deliver as much 1TFlop. So, a few four-way Nvidia GPU nodes will soon offer the same raw compute power as a supercomputer built using scores of CPU-based racks.

General purpose GPU

A little bit closer to home, one of the early applications Nvidia is promoting as a demonstration of the general purpose prowess of its GPUs is a video encoding application known as Elemental HD.

Downsizing a typical HD movie for an iPod using a conventional PC processor can take up to eight hours or more, even with a decent dual-core Intel chip. Nvidia says the same job can be done in just over 20 minutes on an 8800 series Nvidia graphics board.

"When you look at the question of whether you should transcode video on a GPU or CPU, when you consider it in performance-per-buck terms, it's currently obscenely the wrong way round," Taylor says.

And the solution is simple enough. Don't spend any more money overall. Just spend a little less money on your Intel CPU and a little more on your Nvidia GPU.

Hardware PhysX

What's more, Taylor says plans to support the recently acquired PhysX physics-simulation engine on Nvidia's GPUs are also nearing launch. Before the end of May, a total of eight games with GPU-based PhysX are due to announced. 30 to 40 such titles will be available this time next year.

So, that's it then. The game is up for the CPU and Intel alike? Not so fast. For starters, there's a good reason why CPUs don't deliver the raw compute power of contemporary GPUs.

CPU cores are big, complex beasts, designed to turn their hands to almost any task and make a decent fist of it while not excelling in any one area. GPUs, even the most recent and programmable examples, are still a lot less flexible. When they're good, they're great. When they're not, well, they simply won't do the job at all.

"At the moment general-purpose GPU applications are admittedly very high end. But increasingly people are asking why are scientific research industries including medicine and climate modelling are using GPUs," Taylor says.

The answer is the unbeatable bang-for-buck performance ratio that GPUs deliver. Taylor reckons Nvidia has a large number of partners with consumer-level applications lining up to key into its GPU technology. Several are due to be revealed later this summer.

Waiting game

Until then, however, it's impossible to say whether the benefits will be as spectacular as Nvidia claims. Likewise, we'll have to wait and see just how smoothly it all works. The only non-3D consumer application for GPUs that has been widely tested on the market so far is video decode assist. And that has been a distinctly hit and miss affair.

But even if Nvidia can deliver reliable, transparent hardware acceleration for a wide range of applications with its GPUs, it will still have a huge fight on its hands from Intel.

Intel's intriguing new GPU, known as Larrabee, is due out in late 2009 or early 2010. Apart from the fact that it will be based on an array of cut-down X86 processor cores, little is known about its detailed architecture. But as Intel's first serious effort to compete in the GPU market, it's a game-changing product.

For Taylor, of course, the Larrabee project merely confirms that the GPU is where the action is. “Why does Larrabee exist? Why is Intel coming for us? They're coming for us because they can see the performance advantage of our GPUs,” Taylor says.

He's probably right. It will be a fascinating contest.

Nvidia: Only Brits care about ATI

Jeremy Laird — 1210332780

No one cares about AMD or its graphics subsidiary ATI anymore. Well, apart from we Brits, that is. Then again, nobody loves rooting for a hapless chump quite like the British, either.

At least, that's what Nvidia spinmeister extraordinaire Roy Taylor reckons. Taylor is actually Nvidia's main man for Content Relations Stateside. But he has been kind enough to hop the pond to provide some insight into Nvidia's plans and prospects.

Insight such as this: "The UK is the only place in the world where anyone talks about AMD or ATI". To prove his point, Taylor went as far as showing us a graph representing the entire market for GPUs last year, both discreet and integrated. Astonishingly, ATI did not feature at all.

Where was ATI among the 366 million graphics chips which had apparently been split exclusively between Nvidia and Intel in 2007? "No one cares," Taylor says.

ATI who?

Well, to be more accurate, Nvidia didn't care enough to include ATI in that slide - Taylor did have another showing ATI with 18 per cent of the market, a figure apparently so small as to render it effectively non existent.

Indeed, Nvidia may care just a little more than it lets on, since Taylor was keen to press home the point by quoting two independent surveys (Valve's Steam users and the YouGamers community) which put ATI's market share for DirectX 10 compliant GPUs in the 12-13 per cent range. Ouch.

With what is shaping up to be a killer new GPU due out this summer and ATI still struggling to land an significant punches, there's a real swagger to Nvidia's gait of late. And yet its merciless dismissal of the old enemy ATI is only half of the story.

For Nvidia is now stalking a much bigger beast. The real threat over the next five years will almost definitely come from Intel. Especially now that Intel itself has staked a claim to Nvidia's graphics turf with the upcoming Larrabee chip.

And wouldn't you know it, Nvidia - viaTaylor - has that angle covered too. But that's a whole different ball game. In fact, it's one you can read about later on TechRadar.

Reviewed: Parrot's Bluetooth speakers

James Rivington — 1210079316

When it came to giving the Parrot DS1120 Bluetooth speakers a rating, we found it quite hard. Because as speakers they’re not especially brilliant. But what they do have going for them is connectivity.

You can synchronize any media-playing Bluetooth device with these speakers and they’ll play your music wirelessly; just like a Bluetooth headset but with a lot more punch.

Bluetooth expansion

For £160 you’d expect them to be pretty impressive. Especially considering the fact that with most of us now using Bluetooth-equipped phones, the market for Bluetooth peripherals is expanding.

So what’s the verdict. Are they a must-buy for this summer?

Read our full review to find out