During the first day of its Intel Developer forum in San Francisco this week, the chip giant set launch dates for its next generation of microprocessors, demonstrated future CPU designs that support up to eight cores, and looked ahead to the manufacturing processes it will use on chips in 2009. Intel plans to launch new server and enthusiast products this November, and the company has plenty more on tap.
Despite a few shortcomings, Creative's Zen VisionM is a great Apple iPod alternative. I tested a 30GB model of the video-ready music device, which possesses the finest colour screen I've ever seen on a portable player.
PalmOne's new LifeDrive packs almost everything you'd want from a laptop...
Hitachi Data Systems' new Deskstar 7K500 drive marks several milestones in the storage industry: It's the first desktop hard drive to reach 500GB and one of the first to use the speedy new SATA II interface. In terms of how it stores data, though, the Deskstar may be among the last of its kind, as drive manufacturers begin to approach the limits of how densely they can pack data using today's standard recording technology.
Forget the CPU wars of Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) versus Intel. If you're a gamer, the performance competition you've been watching is the battle of the 3D graphics boards.
