The lads over at DailyTech have managed to get their hands on a sample of ATI’s upcoming Radeon HD 2900XTX video card. This card represents the cream of ATI’s graphics line up and comes equipped with 1GB of GDDR4 video memory and measures a staggering 30cm long and is pitted head to head with Nvidia’s 8800GTX.

DailyTech gave it a good going over and were more than a little disappointed with the results as the 8800GTX out classed it in all tests. Turns out the 8800GTX was a factory over clocked model, but generally speaking we find the performance differences between stock units and factory over clocked units aren’t that great as card manufacturers tend to err on the conservative side. Given the fact the 2900TX actually sports more memory, faster core clock speed and faster RAM than even the over clocked 8800 you’d expect the Radeon to beat it at least once somewhere along the line.

Check out their benchmark scores here then let the ATI/Nvidia fanboy flame war roll.

Posted by Scott Bartley at 10:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

The HD-DVD Group has fired back at the sales figures we quoted earlier in the week with their very own collection of statistics. They’re trumpeting the fact that overall sales of high-def movies are pretty much neck and neck with HD-DVD sitting on 998,059, just a couple of thousand behind the Blu-ray camp who’ve just ticked over the magic one million number.

That’s all well and good but the fact is, Blu-ray has outsold HD-DVD by a considerable margin in the quarter just gone which indicates Blu-ray currently has sales momentum where HD-DVD is falling behind despite having a two month head start on Blu-ray — this must be a worrying sign for the HD-DVD group despite their rosy rhetoric.

Still, the news isn’t all bad for HD-DVD and they continued their rebuttal by saying they are in fact winning the battle of the players. Sales of dedicated HD-DVD players are out-stripping stand-alone Blu-ray players by four to one (they don’t count sales of PS3). HD-DVD players also tend to undercut Blu-ray players on price by a significant amount, so if you’re holding out waiting for a clear winner, be prepared for a long wait because there’s still plenty of life left in this format war yet.

Posted by Scott Bartley at 5:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I’ve just returned from a breakfast meeting at Microsoft’s swanky new digs in Auckland’s Viaduct Harbour where a bunch of scruffy journalist types were given a hands on demo of a bunch of new and existing products from their peripherals department — keyboards, mice, webcams, headsets that sort of stuff. Some of it, the Wireless Entertainment Desktop 7000 and Habu gaming mouse for example, I’ve already reviewed (see the April 2007 issue), the best stuff however is still in the works.

Besides some rather scrumptious nibbles we also had a video call hookup with various product bosses in Redmond Washington. While the Microsofties wouldn’t tell us if the partnership with Razer will spawn any further gaming products after the Habu mouse and the Reclusa keyboard, it does at least look like Microsoft is finally taking PC gaming peripherals seriously again. After jettisoning their excellent Sidewinder business years ago PC gamers were left feeling decidedly unloved at that point in time. Even so, don’t be expecting a return to the Sidewinder glory days of old because according to Bill Jukes, Product Marketing Manager, Entertainment and Gaming Devices Division, there are no plans to resurrect the old line of joysticks (no money in that apparently), instead keyboards, mice and Xbox 360 controllers that plug into a PC are where it’s at these days.

Here’s a rundown.

Microsoft Wireless Entertainment Desktop 8000
The top of the line variation of the Entertainment Desktop range includes a wonderful backlit keyboard and a magnetic docking station that recharges both the keyboard and mouse and includes a three-port USB hub. Since it’s designed with the living room rather than the office in mind the keyboard has a fancy-pants touchpad thingy that you can use instead of the mouse (for those times you’re reclining in your lounge watching TV via your Microsoft powered home theatre PC). I got to spend a few brief minutes trying it out and can report it’s comfortable, incredibly well featured, rather sexy and, most probably, mind-blowingly expensive. While official prices haven’t been set it’s shaping up to be in the $499 bracket which places it squarely in competition with Logitech’s super-cool Dinovo Edge.

Microsoft Reclusa
One for the gamers. The, perhaps aptly named, Reclusa is also backlit (Microsoft recognize the strange fascination we PC gamers have with the dark), features programmable buttons, macros, bumper buttons, jog dials and even a detachable padded wrist rest. Realizing that gamers tend to care not for wireless-ness the keyboard is of the wired variety and includes sexy sounding gold-plated USB ports to plug extra peripherals into. Microsoft continue their collaboration with Razer through the inclusion of Razer Hyperesponse Gaming Key Action to reduce latency.
There was no demo unit of this keyboard to try this morning so we’ll have to wait till the proper review unit arrives so see how it goes. At this stage it looks like it’ll retail for around $129 placing it, again, in direct price point competition with Logitech and the G15 gaming keyboard.

Microsoft LifeCam NX-6000
A wired USB webcam with 2 megapixel resolution costs $189 and is designed to clip conveniently to the top of your notebooks display. As with the 1.3 megapixel VX-6000 it’s heavily skewed toward interacting with Microsoft products such as Windows Live Messenger and Vista although it will of course work with other software too.

Posted by Scott Bartley at 1:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Blu-ray has surged to an early lead in the high-def format war by outselling HD-DVD for the first quarter of 2007. According to sales figures compiled by American trade publication Home Media Magazine, for the period January 1 to March 31 Blu-ray sold 832,530 units compared to just 359,300 HD-DVDs. Further to this seven of the top ten high-def best sellers are Blu-ray.

While HD-DVD is far from dead in the water in these early days, the stats nevertheless make for some uncomfortable reading if you happen to be one of the large corporations backing the HD-DVD format. However, industry reaction to this 70/30 split is not one of surprise. Blu-ray has Sony Pictures, 20th Century Fox and Disney exclusively backing the format whereas HD-DVD has just one exclusive studio backer in Universal. Warner Bros and Paramount are supplying movies on both formats.

While the magazine makes no comment on the penetration of Blu-ray and HD-DVD players it seems to us that Sony’s Blu-ray equipped PS3 gaming console must have had at least some impact on the success of Blu-ray, after all, if you owned a shiny new PS3 you’d at least want to buy one or two Blu-ray movies just to check it out.

Read the full Home Media Magazine report here.

Posted by Scott Bartley at 1:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Ben Heckendorn over at Engadget has just posted pics and details about his second generation Xbox 360 laptop. Apparently this one is thinner and lighter and sports some essential upgrades. If you’re interested in (seriously) voiding your warranty then stay tuned to Engadget because he’s also working on an in-depth tutorial on how to build your own. Scary.

Posted by Scott Bartley at 11:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (60)

My endeavors in getting my Windows Vista PC talking to the Xbox 360 have at last made some progress. After trying four different TV tuners I’ve finally struck one that works under Vista. To be fair technically the first three tuners also worked under Vista in the sense they had digital tuners in addition to their analog ones — and it was the analog portion that doesn’t work under Vista.
Anyway, the Hauppauge Win TV-PVR 500 MCE ($250 from this website) is Vista certified and worked a treat.

Installation couldn’t have been simpler, I plugged it into a vacant PCI slot, booted Vista which then detected it, installed the appropriate drivers (no disc required) and was ready to go. I fired up Media Centre which promptly detected the fact I had a new tuner card and ran me through the tuning process. It even detected the dual tuner functionality and asked me if I wanted to tune both of them.

With this done I fired up the Xbox 360 in the lounge (which is connected wirelessly to my Airport Extreme wireless router), hit the Media Centre button on the remote that came with the Xbox and selected Live TV. It worked perfectly; I could record one channel while watching another, pause and rewind live TV all from the comfort of my Xbox 360 environment. The only thing missing is an EPG (electronic programming guide) so I could actually find out when my favourite TV shows were on. Who’d have thought the various TV stations in this country wouldn’t like us all to know exactly when they’re scheduling their content?

Getting back to the tuner, what the Hauppauge doesn’t have however is any kind of digital tuner, which means it’s no good for my Freeview aspirations. Fortunately the kind folk at Ingram Micro who’ve supplied the PVR-500 also sent through a couple of USB-based Vista-ready digital tuners which I’ll be trying as soon as Mr Sky-installer comes and puts a dish on the side of my new house.

Posted by Scott Bartley at 1:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (9)

When Microsoft roll out the Xbox 360 Fall update — which will of course be the Spring update for us southern hemisphere types — it’ll allow Xbox LIVE users to instant message contacts on a PC via their Xbox. As of May 7 Windows Live Messenger and Xbox LIVE will become one big happy family merrily chatting away via voice, video or text. Ironically it’s the text version that’ll cause keyboard-less Xbox gamers the most grief, but never fear consolers, you’ll soon be able to get your QWERTY on too when Microsoft release their teeny tiny keyboard. It attaches to your existing controller and looks pretty sweet to us. We’ll let you know for sure once we get hold of a review unit.

Here’s the list of other updates the "Fall" update will provide:

- A richer Achievement notification pop-up will showcase the name of the unlocked Achievement and the gamerscore value without needing to leave the game to check the Achievements list.

- Enhanced family settings features for Xbox LIVE communications enable different defaults for video chat and voice chat.

- A new Xbox LIVE Marketplace blade lets Xbox LIVE members access the content they seek from one place on Xbox LIVE.

- Updates to Xbox LIVE Arcade allow owners to quickly see which Xbox LIVE Arcade games their friends are playing and join in the fun. Xbox LIVE members can also compare progress of leaderboard scores and Achievements directly with all friends on their friends list. Expanded ‘Tell a Friend’ capabilities make it easier than ever to boast about Achievements and high scores.

- A new option in Auto Downloads provides faster access to the entire collection of free, trial-version Xbox LIVE Arcade games.

- New progressive download controls provide easy access to optimal viewing options by letting people fast-forward, rewind, pause and resume as their video is downloaded from Xbox LIVE Marketplace.

- Extension of the background download functionality will allow owners to set their Xbox 360 console to turn off automatically after downloads are complete.

Posted by Scott Bartley at 4:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If you’re wondering why we’re featuring a 15-inch MacBook Pro in the Hot Products blog when they’ve been around for some time now, well, it’s because I’ve switched. That’s right, I’ve splashed out on a shiny new MacBook Pro laptop with a 2.33GHz Intel Core 2 Duo CPU, 2GB RAM, 200GB hard drive, glossy 15-inch widescreen display and a Radeon X1600 video card. Ok so technically it’s my wife’s shiny new MacBook Pro but I still get to play with it all the same.

You may have also noticed we’re currently being beaten over the head with those smug Apple TV ads that make all sorts of outlandish claims about how much better Macs are than PC’s, in light of these childish (albeit frustratingly amusing) ads, I thought I should report on my first few hours as a Mac owner.

Thursday morning, a big brown box arrives from a company called Tech Com Computer in Shanghai. That’s funny, I don’t remember requesting any review product from these guys? Of course it’s actually my MacBook Pro cunningly disguised as a boring delivery of PC components. Anyway, I pull it out, plug it in and boot it up. The next seven or eight minutes are taken up by me having to fill out untold pages of user names, addresses, phone numbers and even some potentially confusing screen asking me to enter a DNS server address.

So far so Windows XP.

When I finally get to the desktop I’m presented with an automatic update screen telling me I have a good 300MB or so of operating system and application updates to download.

What the…? I’m still waiting for this OS to differentiate itself from Microsoft’s efforts but anyway…

I tell the thing to go ahead and download and install this list of patches only to be greeted by a dialog box asking for me to enter my user account password before it’ll proceed with the install. It does this for each update.

Hang on? Wasn’t Apple deriding Microsoft in the latest TV commercial for the way Vista’s User Account Controls turn personal computing into a minefield of dialog boxes
(it does by the way)? Hmm.

Now, being a PC user I’ve come to expect this kind of behavior from a brand new machine as it starts for the first time, and to be honest I was expecting to see my MacBook Pro follow much the same routine as it did. It’s just that with all Apples television advertising of late telling us how awful Windows is, well, I guess even I’d started to believe the Jobsian propaganda machine. Of course, as much as old Steve tries to portray his Mac as some kind of Windows trouncing wonder box, whaddya know… turns out a Mac is just another PC.

Posted by Scott Bartley at 12:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (27)

Now that New Zealand’s very own Freeview digital TV platform is all set for a launch on May 2 it got me thinking about the humble TV tuner card again. I’ve had one of these toys in my PC for years on and off, but to be honest it’s always been bit of a gimmick. A toy. Something I’d get a kick out of for a few days then never use again. However, now that free to air digital TV is about to begin broadcasting and my Windows Vista equipped home PC (dual booting with XP I might add… I’m still not ready to switch fully to Vista) has the wonderful (mostly) Media Centre functionality built-in, I thought it’d be cool if I could finally combine all the technology in my house in the way that Microsoft intended (well, without all that DRM rubbish anyway) and in a manner I want.

Here’s the set up, I have an Xbox 360 in the lounge that is connected wirelessly to my Vista Media Centre PC in the spare room. If I add a digital TV tuner card to the mix I should in theory be able to stream that TV feed to the lounge via the Xbox 360 since it of course doubles as a Media Centre Extender device.

That’s the theory anyway because there are a few digital potholes to avoid on the road to broadcast bliss.

First, as I’ve discovered in early tests, Vista doesn’t like all TV tuner cards (when it comes to analog TV signals at least). Your old analog tuner card that worked perfectly under XP may not work under Vista. It’ll install fine, it just won’t find any signals.

Second, satellite based digital TV (DVB-S) like we’re getting in New Zealand (through a dish on your roof) isn’t compatible with Vista’s Media Centre. No, Vista only likes terrestrial (DVB-T) digital broadcasts, the type you can receive through an ordinary UHF aerial. DVB-T is on the cards for New Zealand but not until 2008. Fortunately some DVB-S cards can apparently trick Vista into thinking it’s getting a DVB-T feed. We’ll see how that goes when my first batch of review cards arrives.

Third, there’s no electronic programming guide. Even though Microsoft were demonstrating a working EPG using a test feed of Canwest channels (TV3 and C4) at their glitzy Vista launch in Wellington back in January, there’s still no official guide.

So keep an eye on the Hot Products blog because amongst the regular selection of new and interesting tech posts, I’ll be making regular updates on my progress. Feel free to offer any advice if you’ve tried this path yourself. I’m particularly interested in hearing which TV tuners work best with Vista.

Posted by Scott Bartley at 3:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)