February 2004 Archives

Magic has become Alex's favorite game. I have to say, I can see why, it certainly is addicting. The fact there are so many different decks means that the games are really totally different. Pretty different from other games where they get to be more or less the same. Right now he's a magician with the Storm Deck, but I see now there's a site to learn more like Londes for instance!

Cool!

Calvin's latest stumper while playing hangman. I was totally stumped by the Kaboom word. Grace does a nice imitation of Dad's groans as he tries to get 120 degrees of flexion.

StorageReview.com - Tiki. Now that I've got my hard drives lined up, I'm curious how to measure performance. For instance if I go to RAID-0, is it really worth the trouble.

The StorageReview.com FAQ at least tells you some benchmarks to avoid. Most are not great, surprising given the impact of disk on performance. Best freeware one is h2benchw from c't magazine apparently.

Well, in the last six months, I've lost the power supply of all three pieces of network equipment. Not their fault, but a good reminder of where the vulnerabilities are in today's equipment. Someone at Google told me that their top two failure spots were power supplies and hard drives. The other sad thing is that with computer component prices the way they are, it doesn't make economic sense to replace a power supply. For instance, I have two 8-port Netgear FS-108 switches (they've been great), both have 5 volt 3 amp power supplies. The problem is that supplies cost $20 from Netgear and you can get a brand new box for about $40. So, what's the sense. Also lost the supply on my original Linksys BEF41 router. Caused it to suddenly hang. Another case, where another router is cheaper than finding a supply. Only hope I have now is that new network equipment I've bought draws much less power. The new D-Link 624 and the Linksys routers for instance draw less than 1 amp (compared with 3 amps), so hopefully the supplies are less stressed also they should be cheaper to replace with a Radio Shack equivalent.

Well, I finally got my Onkyo TX-DS989 back from the shop. I shorted out the speaker cables and blew the amplifier sky high. Had to go back to the authorized service center. Anyway, to prevent this in the future, I'm using banana plugs for all my speaker cables. They won't then just short randomly as I can lock these in. I do lose my bi-wiring as a result unless I can find banana cable y-connectors. That is, something that is a single plug on one side and two recepticles on the other. Pretty hard to find, but searching google, did find some great places to get odd cable bits: * "Home Grown Cable":http://www.homegrownaudio.com/index.html. These guys remind me of BetterCables before they got really big. They sell Do-it-yourself banana plugs, but no banana recepticles. * "Radio Shack":http://www.radioshack.com/search.asp?cookie%5Ftest=1&find=banana&SRC=1&image1.x=0&image1.y=0. It's amazing how these guys have survived. Here are all their banana plug accessories. One cool thing they do is real-time inventory into their stores. So, you can see if you want some strange connector that such and such a location has it in stock. They have one model for "stackable":http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog%5Fname=CTLG&product%5Fid=274-734 hookups and another "dual":http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog%5Fname=CTLG&product%5Fid=278-308 set that might work as well. * "Audio Gear":http://www.audiogear.com/Audio-Adapters-Banana-Plugs.html. They have nearly every type of connector to any other connector known to man. Just no banana to two banana's. They do have stackable banana connectors though, so you can take a bare wire, put it into the connector and then put another banana over on the top of it.

Well, we were looking at the macro figures on computer investment and so forth. The Bureau of Economic Analysis has a completely open website for reviewing this, here are some amazing things we found: * "Computer Expenditures":www.bea.gov/bea/dn/comp-gdp.XLS . They actually pull on in Excel format, the Excel format no less all kinds of measures of computer sales by personal consumption, private fixed investment, government spending and then of course what goes out as imports and what comes in as an import into the system. * "Chained Dollars":http://www.larouchepub.com/other/2000/ref_quality_adj_2742.html. There is a very complicated thing that they do that make the numbers hard to understand. They apply something called QAM (quality adjustment measurement) to these numbers. So, if some spends 10% for a computer that is 10% faster, then they say there hasn't been any inflation. This is how they are adjusting to constant dollars (the so called chained 2000 dollars). This factor with computers is amazingly high. So using nominal dollars is probably the right way to look at things. Does say that inflation is understated and production is overstated for computers because they imput gigantic price declines (that is the assumption is that in 1980, people would have wanted to buy a mainframe, but in 2000, they would buy a PC, so price has fallen a ton, when in reality no one could have afforded a $1M mainframe). * "Capacity Utliization": * "Acronyms":http://www.acronymfinder.com/. There are boatload of acronyms in all the BEA data. Acronum Finder is a great way to figure out SAAR means Seasonally Adjusted Annual Rate

OK, my favorite quote from Sun Tzu and the right summary for a marketing playbook in his conclusion

Generally in warfare:

If ten times the enemy's strength, surround them;

if five times, attack them;

if double, divide them;

if equal, be able to fight them;

if fewer, be able to evade them;

if weaker, be able to avoid them. ?

OK, in two of my installations, I have the system disk on E and the data on C. Kind of inconvenient since the other three are the other way. The disk partitions are also the wrong size, so I need to reinstall on C drive and then shrink the C and enlarge the E.

While you can buy Partition Magic for about $40 to do this, that seems kind of a lot for two one-time operations. Here are some freeware alternatives from Linux Rulez

• System Rescue CD. This is a dedicated Linux bootable CD that has partition management on it, a ghost/drive-image utility and various file system tools. Perfect for rescuing and resizing. I tried it on my Shuttle SS-51G. It booted, but wasn't stable in the graphics mode for qparted unfortunately. Easy to use though. I think this is because I'm using an oddball SiS motherboard graphics controller.
• Knoppix. This bootable Cd runs Linux and has a copy of QTparted on it. This one is stable. Hard as heck to actually get to qparted. You have to figure out a root password (Start/Knoppix/Root sheel), then type passwd and create a root password. Then choose Start/Run as Different User and type in qparted. Main problem is that it doesn't seem to see my disks.
• Diskdrake. Based on Mandrake Linux distribution, it is a utlity that lets you create, delete, format and resize NTFS partitions in the latest Mandrake release. It is a little strange, but you essentially startup as though you are going to install Mandrake, use the disk partition utility and then escape out of the install.
• Linux-NTFS. This is an open source project that adds NTFS partitions to Linux. They have a utility called ntfsresize to do this. Most of the stuff in the examples is based on this.
• QTparted. This is an open source version of partitioning software. It is also Linux software, so best gotten in a Linux distribution.

Well back to work. The ACL tear sure hurt for three weeks and I have to admit I was completely zonked out. Amazing what I spewed on this blog, so I take it all back. Now that I'm back with 1,000 email messages, this whole spam thing has taken on a new urgency. I've been using an iMac as my main machine and Entourage for accessing Exchange. The base spam filter in it doesn't seem to work worth a darn, so I'm off to search for add-ons. There aren't many for the Mac. Here are some observations.

• Mac Mail. The mail that comes with jaguar actually has a Bayesian spam filter in it. It reads IMAP which is great but not the rest of Exchange so to use it I'd have to use Entourage for calendar and contacts and Mac mail for the rest. A nice UI though as usual.
  *

The Furrygoat Experience: HDTV Goodness. Hat tip to John Ludwig

Here's the latest listing of HDTV channels in Seattle. I watched the NBA All-star pre-game on ESPN. Wow, was that clear. Also, InHD is not bad as demo stuff. Main issue is that KOMO-4 in particular seems to have an audio sync problem. Funny lags.

See Titan TV for program times.

• Channel 100 Mariners
• Channel 104 KOMO-4 (ABC)
• Channel 105 KING-5 (NBC)
• Channel 106 KONG-6
• Channel 108 KCTS (PBS)
• Channel 113 Q13 (FOX)
• Channel 114 WB22 (WB)
• Channel 173 ESPN-HD
• Channel 549 HBO HDTV
• Channel 574 Showtime HD
• Channel 664 InHD1
• Channel 665 InHD2

Well, now that the Onkyo is back, time to get the downstairs system working and also to get the outside speakers on line. Here is what I need. Thanks also to Steve for some other choices: * "Outlaw 7100":http://www.outlawaudio.com/products/7100.html. A very reasonable $800 for a 7 channel 100-watt per channel amplifier. I need six channels worth in the rec room. We have two pairs of Axiom Audio M22tis, a pair of in ceiling paradigms and a pair of outdoor speakers. * "Parasound Halo Pb 3":http://www.audiorevolution.com/equip/halo/index.html. I need a low cost two channel pre-amp.. The folks at Audio Revolution like this one. It just needs to take digital input from a CD player and an MP3 tuner, looks like it is analog input only. Oh well and $800 * "Onkyo TX-NR801":http://www.ecoustics.com/bbs/messages/1/9839.html. This is a 7.1 reciever with 100 watt output and it can play MP3 over the internet. Pretty cool. About $900 ofor all of it. Alternatives for speakers: * "Axiom Audio": . Got these for Connie's rec room.Very reasonable price and they sound good too. Now need a set of left, center, right for a mini-home theater. Good reviews at "Audio Revolution":http://www.audiorevolution.com/equip/axiomepicgrand/. Good ones are the M22ti for left and right and VP100 for center. They'll need stands too. This room is small, so don't need a subwoofer and even "Ask Men":http://www.askmen.com/toys/mrtech_60/86_tech_gadgets.html like them. Also they are like at "Audio Review":http://www.audioreview.com/Axiom+Speaker+Company/MCL_1225crx.aspx where the M3Ti is particularly popular * "AV123":http://av123.com. Another internet-only shop. Got good reviews from folks on their quality. People seem to like their Rockets. They have a pair similar to the M3Ti for about the same price. * "Ascend Acoustics":http://www.ascendacoustics.com/. Another internet-direct speaker seller.

Outlaw 7100. Good review of the 7100. Inexpensive and they liked it.

Brad Choate: MT-Textile does that???. Wow, Brad does it again with very cool with additional commands like automatic link creators to connect to amazon, imdb and google. Nice work!

Finally getting around to this (and lucid enough to do it). Basically, comment spam is overwhelming all my sites. 24 of the last 25 comments were spam generated. If you're having the same problem, here is what you have to do: # Install Movabletype Version "2.661":http://movabletype.org. This installs a comment throttler at least. There isn't an installer, so read the upgrade instructions carefully. The tools I used BTW are smartftp and pkunzip to get the tar.gz files and then to upload them to tqhosting.com # Install MT "Blacklist":http://www.jayallen.org/comment_spam/. This tools is incredibly valuable as it prevents know spam from getting in. The main issue is that there isn't an automatic way to update the black list. Sigh. # Install MT Blacklist "Autoupdate":http://www.jayallen.org/comment_spam/2003/12/update_your_blacklist_now. You have to install an /etc/cron job to do this, so more work. Fortunately, Mark over at tqhosting.com has installed cpanel which makes it easy to create such a job. It basically runs at a specified URL at a specified time. YOu can use "PHPEdit":http://www.phpedit.net/products/PHPEdit/ to edit the file. # Install MT "Textile":http://www.bradchoate.com/mt-plugins/textile. This is a great way to make nice looking content without having to type in HTML. Also install "SmartyPants":http://www.daringfireball.net/projects/smartypants/ if you want the curly quotes to look nice. # Install MT "Plugin Manager":http://manager.mt-plugins.org/. This manages the many plug-ins that MovableType has now. It does require a bunch of libraries that you can find at "Cpan":http://search.cpan.org/

Since I've been descending into geekdom, might as well go all the way, the current rage is to water-cool your CPU. Since heat is the biggest enemy when overclocking, folks have been using exotic cooling to get much better performance. If you nitrogen cool your Pentium for instance, you can get to 4GHz from a stock 2.4GHz part. Pretty neat. Some interesting sites to study: * "Overclocking.com Reviews":http://www.overclockers.com/articles373/. An interesting set of reviews that compares performance of air-cooled vs. water-cooled. Most interesting result is that water cooled systems aren't orders of magnitude more efficient. For instance, the Corsair "Hydrocool":http://www.overclockers.com/articles373/waterkit.asp is the current watercooling kit leader at $215 for the kit. It cools at 0.22C/Watt (that is for every 1 watt of CPU power, temperature rises 0.22 degrees Centigrade) at 57dBA, in comparison, the Thermalright "SLK900":http://www.overclockers.com/articles373/socketA.asp which is the current leader in air colling for AMD is the same 0.22C/W. Now it is very loud at 74dBA (for comparison, really quiet is the Thermaltake Silentboost at 21dBA). The big benefit is really that it is more efficient and quieter but at a higher price and complexity. With a reasonable noise level of say 50 dBA, for instance the Volcano 11+ runs at 0.44C/W, so it is half the efficiency at equal noise levels. * They also point out that the higher the case temperature, the hotter the unit. My case is about 30-35 degrees C, so that's why people put in case fans, to try to get the temperature down, so its all about differentials. Most folks though won't run their CPUs absolute maxed out at 100 percent CPU utllization even when playing games, so even a quiet fan isn't too bad as long as the machine isn't stressed. Looking in more depth at the Corsair, here are some reviews: * "Corsair Hydrocool 200":http://www.overclockers.com/articles746/. This seems to be a good compromise kit. Made by corsair, so you don't home brew it. Nice interface system and its self contained, plus good performance. * "Fast Lane":http://www.fastlanehw.com/reviews.php?action=view&revid=89. Main note is that it won't work with Athlon 64 yet (:-(). good performance. * "Nordic Hardware":http://www.nordichardware.com/reviews/cooling/2003/CorsairHydrocool/. Similar review and evaluation. Pricier than DIY, but works well and easy to install. * "Mod The Box":http://www.modthebox.com/review264_1.shtml. Review from Canada, they basically like the installation ease of the unit and it was decent at temperature, but loud for a watercooled system. * "HardOCP":http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NDUxLDM=. They tested it against the EXOS and like the EXOS better. Better cooling and better waterblock apparently. For the Koolance, these folks have been around for a while: * "Mod The Box":http://www.modthebox.com/review200_1.shtml. Liked the unit better than the Corsair. You do need to buy the waterblock extra and the waterblock from Koolance was flat and hard to fit. Good performance. * "HardOCP":http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=Mzc2. They liked this much better than the Corsair. Cooled about 4 degrees Celsius better. * "Pimprig":http://reviews.pimprig.com/cooling/koolance_exos_alum_and_blocks.php. He does a nice comparison test vs. the Corsair, a ThermalRight SK7 aircool and a home-brew system. Unlike HardOCP, he found the EXOS and Corsair have about the same performance. But it is much quieter and it has two pumps so it is more fail-safe. * "Monkey Review":http://www.monkeyreview.com/reviews/review.php?num=238. Yet another review. He found the setup easy, One point he makes is that the diode in the CPU is up to 30 degrees C higher than the socket diodes normally used for testing. [For instance, my own machine runs at about 47 degrees at maximum from the CPU socket while the CPU diode is reading nearly 77 degrees, so there's your 30 degree difference]. Most of the benchmarks on this page are run against the CPU socket not the actual on-die thermister (only late model Barton Athlons have it apparently). * "The Wizards":http://www.the-wizards.com/catalog/. They sell the EXOS for $199 plus another $35 for a CPU-200G cooling block

Well, I finally got my Onkyo TX-DS989 back from the shop. I shorted out the speaker cables and blew the amplifier sky high. Had to go back to the authorized service center. Anyway, to prevent this in the future, I'm using banana plugs for all my speaker cables. They won't then just short randomly as I can lock these in. I do lose my bi-wiring as a result unless I can find banana cable y-connectors. That is, something that is a single plug on one side and two recepticles on the other. Pretty hard to find, but searching google, did find some great places to get odd cable bits: * "Home Grown Cable":http://www.homegrownaudio.com/index.html. These guys remind me of BetterCables before they got really big. They sell Do-it-yourself banana plugs, but no banana recepticles. * "Radio Shack":http://www.radioshack.com/search.asp?cookie%5Ftest=1&find=banana&SRC=1&image1.x=0&image1.y=0. It's amazing how these guys have survived. Here are all their banana plug accessories. One cool thing they do is real-time inventory into their stores. So, you can see if you want some strange connector that such and such a location has it in stock. They have one model for "stackable":http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog%5Fname=CTLG&product%5Fid=274-734 hookups and another "dual":http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog%5Fname=CTLG&product%5Fid=278-308 set that might work as well. * "Audio Gear":http://www.audiogear.com/Audio-Adapters-Banana-Plugs.html. They have nearly every type of connector to any other connector known to man. Just no banana to two banana's. They do have stackable banana connectors though, so you can take a bare wire, put it into the connector and then put another banana over on the top of it.

Well, I've gotten the new power supply and it sure has helped. Here is where I am: # System runs stably at 198MHz, but won't pass Prime95's validation suite. Backing down the memory to 191MHz seems to make the system super stable. I'm guessing that it is the cheap RAM that is the problem. The system won't run stably at all at 200MHz even with the CPU running at 166MHz. # It sure does run hot! Motheboard Monitor and Superfan both report temperatures of 75-77 degrees C when running flat out overclocked at 191MHz FSB. The thermal limit is just 85 C,. This is for the sensor on the CPU die. The socket reading is more like 50 degrees C. I'm not clear on how accurate these readings are, but it does run hot. I'm using the Thermaltake Silentboost, which is very quite BTW. # Antec TruePower 550. Wow, this is a super quite unit. It monitors itself and turns its fan on as needed. The Enermax 350 that I had was supposed to be motherboard controlled in terms of fan speed, but it always ran flat out on the ASUS A7N8x. # Disk runs very hot when spinning. The new Western Digital WD2500PB has a thermal sensor in it that the system can read. Gets as hot as 55 degrees C when it is defragging. Don't know what the thermal maximum is, but it is too hot to touch when jamming away. # Overlclocking of the video card is also stable running at 455MHz Ramdac and 815 MHz for the video memory. This is compared with a normal 300/700 system. # Benq FP991. Got this monitor. Wow, it is amazing. Running it in portrait mode. The 19 inch monitors are just right for a full page display. Still not as elegant as the old Radius monitors on the Macs (whcih would sense when you pivot them), but pretty neat. # Next steps are to power up the Promise RAID controller. This will give me a sense as to whether it is this controller that is causing IDE to hang. Rerun stability tests # Also installed a USB 2.0 connector set in place of the floppy. This will make it easy to put a USB floppy in for emergency booting and also to stick a USG Flash drive in for personal data.

Well, I had thought that the Outlook 2003 spam filter would obviate the need for external spam filters, but either I don't understand it or I it doesn't work well. Basically, it doesn't seem to work in cached mode and it seems to require you to click before it fliters things. In any case, I did a quick search for "Outlook Spam Filter":http://google.com/search?q=outlook+spam+filter and here's what I found: # "Outlook Spam Filter":http://www.outlook-spam-filter.com/. NOt surprising it is the #1 hit. Bayesian, White and black list, keywords too. # "Cloudmark":http://www.cloudmark.com/. One of our investments (!!!) Nice that it is the #2 hit. # "Spam Bully":http://www.spambully.com/. Another commercial package. Similar features with other folks . Bayesian as well. # "SpamBayes":http://starship.python.net/crew/mhammond/spambayes/. A freeware Bayesian filter. Nice freeware package. Great management tool. Let's you look at multiple inboxes, you can see spam scores as an outlook field. Also, if you drag email from a Junk E-mail or Junk Suspects field, it automatically notices and updates itself. # "Microsoft Outlook 2003":http://reviews-zdnet.com.com/AnchorDesk/4520-7297_16-5093279.html?tag=adts. A good discussion by Coursey about how Microsoft's filter works. # "Spam Assassin for Outlook":http://sourceforge.net/projects/saoutlook/. This is an Outlook add-in rather than a server side program. Spam Assassin is an open source spam filtering package. Kind of a cool idea, but hard to figure out how and if it actually works.

Well, here's what I've learned about really debugging a PC that is crashing. Script for future use: # Get a device count and estimate power supply requirements. Make sure the power supply is adequate to the job. Otherwise, go get another one. # Run memtest86+ overnight. Make sure the basic CPU and memory systems don't have issues. Nothing much else will work otherwise. # Boot up Windows, run Prime85 and Superpi overnight to make sure that the machine is stable with Windows. This starts to test the hard drive for the first time. # Exercise the hard disks. Run Sis Sandra in burn in mode. Hope that you don't see any crashes. # Now its time to figure out what's wrong with the software. That's the hard part.

I had great hopes for this integrated graphics system. Might save me from having to buy AGP cards. Unfortunately, the data shows that a $50 AGP card easily beats it. And it is 2-3x slower than a state of the art $200 card. These kind of integrated solutions are good for office applications though and casual gamers. Some other interesting stats on the state of the graphics market from "Jon Peddie Research":http://www.jonpeddie.com/about/press/MarketWatch_Q403.shtml on the share in the graphics market shows how much progress Intel has made by just bunding graphics into its chipsets. BTW, the overall market was 62M grahpics devices increasing 11.2% QTQ. Mobile graphics (12.2M) grew 26% QTQ vs. 8.1% in desktop. | Rank | Graphics Supplier | Q4'03 Market Share | | 1 | Intel | 31.7% | 63% | | 2 | ATI Technologies | 25.2% | | 3 | Nvidia | 24.7% | 2.0% | 58% | | 4 | VIA Technologies | 9.02% | | 5 | Silicon Integrated Systems (SiS) | 8.3% | | 6 | XGI | .5% | | 7 | Matrox Graphics | .48% | | 8 | 3Dlabs (Creative Technology) | .03% | Somewhat different numbers come from "Mercury Research":http://www.mercuryresearch.com/ (A buddy from Biz school BTW), but they show how different shares are between discrete and integrated: | Vendor | Discrete | Integrated | | Nvidia | 58% | 2% | | ATI | 38% | 0.9% | | Matrox | 3% | 0% | | SiS/XGI | 1% | 15% | | VIA | 0% | 20% | | Intel | 0% | 63% |

If you're working with color pictures, getting the right color on the screen is pretty hard. Fortunately, several sites produce things called ICMs, these are used by Windows to correct colors for you. For the displays that I support, here are the ICMs. You also have to set brightness (really black level) and contrast (really white level) properly as well, usually, the defaults are overblown, so turning them down makes a big difference: * Benq FP-991. Set the monitor to sRGB profile in hardware, then turn down brightness and contrast to zero to get to 100 nits (the right display level). Finally, load the ICM from the "X-bit":http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/other/display/response-4_6.html review. BTW, 100 nits is probably too low for many office settings, so just turn up contrast slightly. In my own office, about 25 on the scale is about right. * NEC 1760V. With this model, drop brightness to 50% and contrast at 40-45% to get to 100 nit. Choose the sRGB color settings. It's ICM is from "Xbit":http://www.xbitlabs.com/images/other/response-5/icm.zip.

"USB Speeds Explained":http://www.kingston.com/products/MKF_530_HS2_overview.pdf. Well, I'm finally getting one for Connie. Talk about a confusing market. There are basically three standards: * USB 1.1. This is very slow. 1Mbps * USB 2.0 Full-speed. This is 12Mbps * USB 2.0 Hi-speed. This is 480Mbps Many folks are saying just USB 2.0 and making you think they will go at 480Mbps. So watch out. There is about a $7 price difference. Kingston sells a USB 2.0 256MB drive for about $67 for USB 2.0 and $74 for USB 2.0 high-speed. Kingstons are nice in that they have a 5 year warranty (of course whos going to not lose their flash drive in 5 minutes :-) All the drives are plus or minus $1 so right now the sweet spot pricing is (according to newegg.com): | Capacity | Price | $/MB | | 128MB | $45 | $0.35 | | 256MB | $74 | $0.29 | | 512MB | $168 | $0.33 | | 1GB | $250 | $0.25 | So on a cost per bit basis, the 256MB and the 1GB (surprisingly are actually cheaper. Part of that is because Kingston has a great price on 1GB right now. Other vendors are at $300. There is also a claim that actual transfer speeds can vary. I'm confused by that, Perhaps because of flash speed or more likely interface design. There are certain USB 2.0 controllers that can't hit 480Mbps I've read. Net, net, the Kingston isn't a bad choice and it has a key ring holder so you have a chance of not losing it :-)

With miniturization, it's fascinating to see all the things people are building with USB. Here's a small summary: * "Memory + Wifi":http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleid=1533. Gigabyte GN-WLBZ201 and the TwinMOST "B241":http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/69/34565.html is a USB 1.1 device (so kinda slow) with 32-256MB of flash memory plus a 802.11b card inside of it. Great idea for older laptops. Two in one. * "Security Tokens, Fingerprint scanner and more":http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/54/34656.html. Great Register overview of some of the cool uses of the technology. Security tokens are Aladdin eToken, RSA SecuID6100, "WISeKey":http://www.wisekey.ch/ fingerprint scanner * "Key Computer Xkey":http://www.key-computing.com/ has a processor and has the Seaside Exchange client inside of it so that you can walk up to any machine, hook up to your email, this gets store on flash and leaves no trace on the host computer. Cool. It has an ARM processor on it so it is expensive, I'm wondering why it needs ARM probably because the client scatters bits of registry gunk everywhere otherwise.

Someone recently came by for career advice. Like I somehow have a smart view on this :-) Anyway, I thought I'd write down the usual advice I give someone. _Now I sound like the guy in the Graduate who said the future is, "plastics"_ Anyway, here you go Jonathan. Have fun! OK, so what should you do? # Figure out who you are. Harder than it sounds, but I've had great success with books like "What Color is Your Parachute?":http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1580085415/qid=1076521721//ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl14/103-9079206-1114251?v=glance&s=books&n=507846. A great advice book. # "Myers-Brigg":http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/JTypes2.asp online is a good one to get a sense of what basic personality type you are. # "Personal Sytles and Effective Performance":http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0801968992/qid=1076522672//ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl14/103-9079206-1114251?v=glance&s=books&n=507846 that gets you into the way of working and relating to people. # Find a Mentor. What's next, well, usually, that leads to some set of profressionals that might work for you. My advice now is to go find some people have been doing the job for a while. Decide if you like them. Figure out what they do. If you're lucky spend a day trailing them and see if it sounds good. It's amazing how many jobs which are great on paper, dull in reality. # Find a great program. Find someone who recruits in the profession you picked. Its a great way to find out the current gouge on what people think about schools and backgrounds. A good pre-test to see what jobs there are and what people are looking for. .If you're going to school, it can tell you what programs to get into. # Get a personal board of directors. Longer term advice than Ruthann gave me a long time ago. The basic idea is that you need a small set of people who can be your sounding board. # What's your playbook? Like marketing a product, you, in essence, are like a product. So, the key questions are, what is the playing field? What gap are you trying to fill. My buddy, Ken, once told me, every job, I tell people the three reasons this job is perfect for me and the three reasons I'm the only one for this job. Then there is what play are you running to fill the gap. Are you in a drag race for the job, so if that guy got an A, you are Phi Beta Kappa? Are you in a platform where this job fits logically because you have been building for it for since Kindergarten? Are you in a stealth play where the job makes sense because there is a new niche opening up? Are you in a best of both worlds where you are the only person with both a MD and an MBA? # Taking High return/low risk choices. Can help you balance the classic, shall I take a risk on this new thing or stay pat on what I'm doing now. A career is like financial investing. If you play it safe your whole like, then you are guaranteed a low return. But, if you make the wrong bets, the same things happens, you lose. Its all about making the right bets where your risk is low and the return is high. The first president of Apple said, that the early success of Apple was all about taking "apparently big chances." That is risks that were large for others, but uniquely small for him..

Since I've been getting rid of these floppy drives in my machines, I was wondering what else can fit into them, here are two good candidates: * "4-Port USB Hub":https://www.rogerssystems.com/store/moreinfo.cfm?Product_ID=765. $20 and it is much neater than an external hub or "SIIG":http://www.siig.com/product.asp?partnum=JU-H41B22&category=USB. * "USB and Firewire Hub":http://www.cables4computer.com/leftlinks/Product_Links.asp?M1=USB%20and%20Firewire&sub1=Hubs&sub2=USB. $99 and you can get a Firewire and USB 2.0 hub to stick in that floppy port. Made by "Koutech":http://koutech.com * "Six-in-One Card Reader":http://www.koutech.com/proddisp.asp?page=2&Category=Card+Readers%2FWriters. You can also get a generic six-in-one card reader. * "2 USB 2.0 plus Firewire":http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=17-111-603&catalog=26&manufactory=BROWSE&depa=1. $12.50 from newegg. You have to have firewire or USB headers on your motherboard though.

"CPU Temperatures":http://www.pantherproducts.co.uk/Articles/CPU/CPU%20Temperatures.shtml. Now with Superfan,, I can see CPU temperatures, but what's a good temperature to run? Well, they vary by processor, but according to pantherproducts.co.uk, you should say 20 degrees C below the critical (e.g, above this I burn out) temperatures: | Processor Family | Critical | Stay Below... | | AMD Athlon "Barton" | 85C | 65C | | Pentium III Slot 1 500-866MHz | 80C | 60C | | Pentium II 450 MHz | 70C | 50C | | Pentium IV | 80C | 60C | For Pentium IVs, they feature a slow down function, so if temperature rises, the CPU actually slows down. But "Tech Republic":http://techrepublic.com.com/5100-6270-5053843.html reports that developer data shows 80C. As a point of interest, my current machines are: | Motherboard | Processor | Idle Temp | Max Temp | | ASUS p4v4x | Pentium III Slot 1 550MHz | 40C | 50C | | Shuttle SS51G | Pentium IV 533FSB 2.4GHz | 39C | 50C | | ASUS a7n8x-x | Athlon 2500+ | 41C | 47C |

"SpeedFan":http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php. This is an amazing utility. I'm going to donate to the guy who wrote it. It knows about the SM (system management) bus and the many different chipsets used. It can actually detect the temperature sensors used and the fan control. It can even dig down into late generation hard drives and tell you their temperatures. The best feature is that it will automatically change the fan speed based on the temperature of the CPU, so that you get the lowest noise given the performance. Motherboard Monitor does similar things, but there seems to be a bug where it can't detect the temperature correctly or wattage correctly on my ASUS a7n8x.

Arrgghh. I removed two disk drives from my hurting ASUS A7N8X-X machine, but I'm stil getting random reboots. Next suspect is memory problems. There are actually quite a few memory testers around: * "Memtest86":http://www.memtest86.com/. The grand daddy. Now has bootable CD version. Requires 8KB and tests like crazy. Hasn't been updated since 2002 though, so won't detect my Athlon XP 2500+ (Barton) * "Memtest86+":http://www.memtest.org/. Updated by the folks at x86-secret, this updates memtest86 * "Memtest":http://hcidesign.com/memtest/. Windows-based, so most of Windows actually has to work for this to work, but still useful for the big machines. Like Prime95 or SuperPi, its a way to see if your machine is Ok at the top level. First time I ran the machine hard hung. No BSOD, but seems fine now. Strange errors.

"CD Freaks":http://www.cdfreaks.com/article/134/. A super comprehensive review of the new NEC ND-2500A. It is the first drive that can write DVD-Rs at 8x. (Most drives can now write 8x DVD+Rs). But, the most impressive thing is that it has very low write error rates for CDs and DVDs. The same piece does some great recommendations for media type, the overall reco is that Verbatim Data Life seems like a great brand across CD=R, DVD=R and DVD+R * CD-Rs. They like Verbatim Data Life (Mitsubishi Chemicals 97m34s23f). they like Sony as made by Taiyo Yuden (97m24s01f) but not the Sony (Acer Media 97m22s67f), but there is no way to tell at retail who made the underlying disks. * DVD-Rs, they like Verbatim Data Life Plus (either Taiyo Yuden TYG01 or Mitsubishi Chemicals MCC01RG20). Note that the Data Life Plus is $10 each compared with $1 fo general use, but its really good quality. * DVD+Rs, Also Arita (Ricoh RICOHJPNR01) write at 6x. Verbatim Data Life Plus (Mitsubishi Chemicals MCC002) and BeALL (BeAll000P40) but only write at 4x. Finally, they like Plextor made by Taiyo Yuden (MIC YUDEN000T01), These are also expensive at $10 each compared with $1.00 typically for say Memorex brand (the best sellers on pricegrabber) but they do write at 8x, so super high quality As an aside, which DVD format to use? I've used DVD+RW and DVD+R with good success and only buy combo drives that support both. Basically DVD-Rs are more compatibille but slower to write. They require a final step called finalization that can take a long time. On balance, DVD+Rs seem like the right long term format as long as you use only newer drives.

"DVD Copy Basics":http://www.cdfreaks.com/article/114For those of you with kids who love peanut butter or have seen a DVD blown by a 4-year old sliding it across the table, here's a pretty good intro into how to have a backup until they learn to treat DVDs like Chihuly glassworks. They recommend DVDXcopy Express for beginners. For power users, they liked InstantCopy.. And of course for freeware geeks, there is DVD Shrink to putz with. DVD Shrink is actually pretty easy, but if you just want to copy the main movie, so kids can watch it, its even simpler. Then there are no menus to confuse people either. Just go to reauthor and drag the main movie and select only English AC5.1 and AC2.0 and voila. "Doom9.org":http://www.doom9.org/index.html?/mpg/dvdshrink31-main.htm. This is a great overview of how to get things done. Check out the DVD-9 to 1 DVD+/-R

"CD Freaks":http://www.cdfreaks.com/article/134/. A super comprehensive review of the new NEC ND-2500A. It is the first drive that can write DVD-Rs at 8x. (Most drives can now write 8x DVD+Rs). But, the most impressive thing is that it has very low write error rates for CDs and DVDs. Most interesting though is that they go through various recordable media and recommend them. Its actually hard to figure out who the underlying manufacturers are, but there apparently is a media code somewhere that tells all. The net is that media made by Taiyo Yuden (they are sold as Sony CD-Rs, but Sony has resells other brands), the code is 97m24s01f for these. More later on how to actually figure this code out. For DVD-Rs, Taiyo Yuden is resold as Verbatim Data Life Plus DVD-R certified at 4x, but writable by the NEC at 8x. Their code is TYG01. Verbatim Data Life Plus is also made by Mitsubishi Chemicals with code MCC01RG20. Fortunately, both of these are very good, so getting Verbatim Data Life Plus seems like a good bet. For DVD+Rs, Taiyo Yuden is sold as Plextor with code YUDEN000T01 and again have great quality.

OK, so I just used the "Power Calculator":http://www.jscustompcs.com/power_supply/ to see how close I am to the limits for the machines I've built: | Machine | JS Power Estimate | Power Supply | Random Crashes | | ASUS A7N8X-X | 448 watts | 350 watts | 1/10 minutes | | Shuttle SB61G2 | 281 | 200 | 1/day | | Shuttle SS51G | 238 | 200 | 1/week | | Shuttle SK41G2 | 250 | 200 | 1/week | | Shuttle SN84G4 | 294 | 250 | 1/week | So its interesting to see that machines that are farther away from their recommendations are in fact carshing more. The one exception is the SK41G2 that I built. I think this is because

Most reviews really like the Antec (Tom's Hardware love the True 480). These power supplies are big BTW, for the traditional AT or PS/2 size cabinets, so they won't work in mini-PCs like the shuttle. The big bruiser is the True550. Guess which one I want :-) Here's a good review that covers most of the line at "Gruntville.com":http://www.gruntville.com/reviews/PSUs/Antec_TruePower_550/. They have everything from Ture330 to True550.

Hmmm. Connie's machine is now in a strange state. Seems to randomly reboot and now it hangs on IDE detection. I've turned off all the overclocking, but basically, it gets blown back to the power up. As if the reset button were pushed. I noticed that if I have the reset jumper in, the machine now won't start, so I disabled that. And now it boots, but will hang all the time. Why? Well, here's a good guess... "Whimpy Power Supply":http://www.nforcershq.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=266234. Hmm a big source of problems, I have a 350 watt one, but is it enough, check out "JS Calculator":http://www.jscustompcs.com/power_supply/ to see. My math shows I need 448 watts and I have a 350 watt supply. Found it! Main reason is that I've got 4 disks spinning which each require an additional 50 watts plus a brand new video card, so no wonder I have problems. Plus a Promise controller card. And, you have to have a supply with 17% more or so I need a 520 watt supply so I'm off to shop at "Tom's Hardware":http://www6.tomshardware.com/howto/20030609/ and also get rid of some hard drives ASAP. I can get rid of the 60GB system drive soon enough and one of the 120GB hard drives, this mean no Promise controller (net savings, 75watts!). "nForcesHQ.com":http://www.nforcershq.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=13. apparently, this is the main site for all the nForce based cards. This is the site for the ASUS. 'They have an amazing list of open "issues":http://www.nforcershq.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=11763 with: * "Standby":http://www.nforcershq.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=14905&highlight=standby issues * "More than 4 seconds":http://www.nforcershq.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=11763&start=30 will reset you to 100MHz so you can restart if you are overclocking * "AGP drive low":http://www.nforcershq.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=11763&postdays=0&postorder=desc&start=45 resulting in random reboots because the video card draws too much * RAID controller has lots of bugs with XP. The S-ATA is working though, but with much pain. * "Uber BIOS":http://homepage.ntlworld.com/michael.mcclay/. Michacel McClay has taken each ASUS BIOS and tweaked it for better stability and bug fixes. So these are the ones to download. Will try and see if this helps. BTW, he uses the RAR archive format. "ALZIP":http://www.alzip.com/ has a freeware version for home users to decompress that format. * "Ben Pope FAQ":http://www.ben.pope.name/a7n8x_faq.html. Ben's FAQ. Hmmm. Makes me wonder if I bought the right board ;-( It got great reviews. Lesson here is look at the reviews *and* then go to the support forums. Also did random google trolling to find many users who don't know what is going on: I'm trolling the web and amazingly, someone at "hardware analysis":http://www.hardwareanalysis.com/content/topic/17590/ is having the exact same problem. No answers though. Seems like a very low level problem somewhere. "OCworkbench":http://www.ocworkbench.com/ocwb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=30;t=000846. Some of the folks their have had similar experiences. On this board, when you overclock, you can actually have all the fans come on and everything works, but there is no BIOS that takes over. They make a point that for this motherboard, it is very particular about clearing, you have to a) remove AC power, b) remove battery, c) flip the reset jumper for 5 seconds, d) put the jumper back, e) put the battery back and f) restore power whew. Oh BTW. "Pro Cooling":http://www.procooling.com/reviews/html/asus_a7n8x-x.php had a good review of the board and mentioned there is a utility speedfan that lets you control fan speed very directly. This thing is quite noisy, so maybe I can get both the power supply fan and the cpu fan to work with that utility. "Motherboard-Forum":http://www.motherboard-forum.com/asus/A7N8X_Deluxe__Spontaneous_Reboot_556851.html. these folks suggest a bad power supply (I have a nice Enermac 350, so that's not the problem I don't thnk, although it was better when I had a good UpS on it, but that didn't work since the draw was too high hmmm.). also suggests bad ram is a cuase. Maybe I'll take a stick out and see if it does better. Last suggestion was. Also suggests unchecking System Properties/Advanced/Startup and Recovery/Automatically Restart so at least you can see what happened.' "ABXZone.com":http://www.abxzone.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=670652#post670652 has another puzzled user with the same problem. seems to reboot without warning.

IMHO, the next big change is coming. A couple of clips from wifiplanet: * "Wifi Phones and Dual-mode":http://www.wi-fiplanet.com/voip/article.php/3287901. Atmel's AT76C901 is a single chip wifi phone. Several manufacturers, including Cisco (Quote, Chart), have developed handsets using the chip. The Cisco phone, which the networking giant announced in April, is shipping now. The first dual-mode phones are expected to ship next year. Nokia, the world's largest handset maker, is rumored to have a dual-mode phone in the works that could hit the market in the first quarter of 2004. Rival Motorola plans to offer one next year using a chip from Texas Instruments. In addition, Japanese wireless operator NTT DoCoMo said last week that it will introduce a dual-mode phone in the spring * "TI TNETW1230":http://www.wi-fiplanet.com/voip/article.php/3079071. Volume pricing will be under $20. Supports the 802.11a, b and g. * "Broadcom Wifi trip":http://www.wi-fiplanet.com/news/article.php/3073961. AirForce One Chip line (model BCM4317 for 802.11b) is literally that -- a postage-stamp-sized single chip that incorporates the baseband processor, Medium Access Controller (MAC), the radio, and the power amplifier. The key to wireless power management with a handheld is the power use when the unit is in a sleep or standby model. * "Hotspots with VOIP":http://www.wi-fiplanet.com/voip/article.php/3290301. The service is $16.95 (CDN) per month, which includes unlimited worldwide calling to other mobitus users, as well as voicemail with e-mail notification, call display, call waiting and three-way calling.

Hey I'm begging someone to be the wifi test results center. I'm amazed at how few standard test results there are. In contrast to the many sites doing PC testing. I've only found one C|net test ever done that does range testing. And, the folks at wifi-planet.com do a great job, but it isn't indexed in any meaningful way. If some one die (are you reading this Tim? Mark? Steve?), then I'm sure they'd become the number one site for home networking and wifi networking in general. Anyway, here's my list, I'll keep up to date of wireless range testing I've seen. BTW, if I were to do this, I would have two sets of tests, one is raw performance, the other is with a standard 11b client attached to see how compatibility works. These results were culled from individual reports on wi-fiplanet.com | Product | Mode | Chipset | 10ft (Mbps) | 25 ft | 50 ft | 75ft | 100 ft | 125 ft | Encyption penalty | | D-Link DI-624 | Super G strict | Atheros 5002 | 47.03 | 38.84 | 29.83 | 39.75 | 29.63 | 25.8 | -10% WPA | | Netgear WFT-624 | 108 Mode | Atheros 5002 | 40.49 | 40.06 | 32.18 | 33.11 | 32.69 | 23.56 | -20% WPA | | Microsoft MN-700 | 11-g only | Broadcom | 20.66 | n/a | n/a | n/a | n/a | 11.13 | -50% WPA | | US Robotics | 11g packet bursting | TI TNETW1130 | 26.52 | n/a | n/a | na | na | 9+ | na | | Sony PCWA-AR300 | 11g | Atheros AR5100X | 20 | 12 | 12 | 12 | 12 | 0 |

Well, I have an old laptop. a Compaq Evo400n, running an 850 MHz Pentium III, I'm really curious why it takes 2 minutes for the thing to boot up. First I defragged the hard disk. (Using O&O Defrag), then I started removing startup junk. It's amazing what people are throwing into the startup system these days. Here are things that you can do. Its painful though to have to do this. I wish app writers would stop doing this kind of stuff: # Defrag your hard disk. One problem here is most defragmenters don't seem to be very smart about disk layout. At least there is not much you configure. The builtin Windows one and the Executive Diskkeeper upon which it is based, don't help much. I've tried a bunch of others including freeware ones and O&O seems to be Ok fast and give you the option to sort in a bunch of different ways. Too bad there isn't a defrag optimizer that lays everything Windows needs in one flat file, so that all thre should be an analyzer that lets Windows in effect start from sector 0 and move out without needing to seek all over the place. Maybe if I'm laid up more, I'll look into how to write out (or ask loup about it). # Start your machine. Choose Start//Run and run the file taskmon.exe, choose the process tab and marvel at all the many things that are running when you haven't done anything yet :-) The job now is to get rid of as much as you can stand. # Now to to Start/All Programs/Startup and look at the junk here. I for instance had Blackberry Desktop Manager and the Office Startup thing where Office preloads junk which makes Office seem fast, but makes *every* Windows load slower # Next look down at the lower right, you should see an amazing array of icons that are things that have started up. Most I'm sure you don't really need. They are marketing things in truth. For instance, Quicktime has an icon, so does Real, etc. They all differ, but if you right click, you need to find where they have an option that lets you get rid of startup when Windows does. The only one I'd leave is the anti-virus one. The harder ones are things like IM applications, these are usually really big and hog. Consider using Trillian or some other multi IM applications to cut down on having to have AOL, Yahoo, Microsoft all running # Now get download from Lavasoft, Ad Aware, this will get rid of spyware, another source of junk that slows you down (and also spys on you). Run it hope you don't have too much of these behind the scenes apps. I didn't since I normally run this to get rid of tracking cookies, etc. But most folks have boatloads of it. # OK, now Windows has this other list of services that boot at run time, you have to troll though. Hard to get to, but first you have to right click on the My Computer icon and click on Manage. Then click on Services and Applications/Services. You will see a huge list of background services. Troll through this and start disabling things. Here's a list of what I did. The Compaq machine I'm on has all of these DMI services which we don't use. So, disabled Compaq DMI Web Agent, Compaq Local Alerter, cpqdmi, win32sl. # Now restart your machine and see how you are doing. # Choose Start/Run and type in msconfig.exe and press enter. This utilty (which really should be on a Start menu somewhere) in its Startup tab will tell you all the things that start automatically when you run the machine. You will now see a boatload of inexplicable stuff. On to the hard bits. OK, here's a list of strange stuff that I found and how to get rid of it. This is very applications specific, but in general, if you don't understand, google is an amazing too for you to figure out what it is: * iTunesHelpers. iTunes has a bunch of processes that run in the background. Go to the itunes program and disable that stuff. * "ctfmon":http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=282599. A strange one. This is an Office XP helper that runs waiting for y ou to type in Chines or some other strange character. The uninstall is unbelievably complicated. But for XP, you have to go to the Control Panel, choose Microsoft Office XP and Add/Remove Featrues. Then click Next, click plu on Office Shared Features, then Alternative User INput and then select Not Available and then Update. Then you go to the Control Panel and click on Text Services/Date, Time, Language, Region Option and then Details tab and remove everything but the US keyboard. Finally go to a command windows and run regsvr32.exe /u msimtf.dll and then msctf.dll. Whew! * "Ltmon":http://www.modemsite.com/56k/ltwin.asp. This is a utility that is for the internal Lucent (now Agere Windows modem). Left it since it is 96KB and should make things too slow. * "Wcmdmgr":http://www.liutilities.com/products/wintaskspro/processlibrary/wcmdmgr/. This is the web update from Wildtangent. Reports back on hardware. I took it out again to speed things up. So now I'm at 30 seconds until I see the logon screen, but still 2:30 until the disk stops spinning on logon, so there is more happening. Removing the Compaq management drivers took out a full minute, so I'm at 27 seconds to logon, then 1:30 for logon. "Tweaking XP Services":http://www.techspot.com/tweaks/winxp_services/index.shtml. The main thing to look at now are in depth at the various Windows services that are started. let's see if we can get rid of some of those: Go back My Computers, right click and select Manage. Choose Services and Applications/Services and look through the list. for some things to get rid of: * distributed link tracking. Sounds cool if I had an NTFS 5.0 domain at home. Here are things in my system I left on: * "Defwatch.exe":http://www.liutilities.com/products/wintakspro/processlibrary/defwatch. this watches for Nortan Anti-vius updates. Sigh, another reason, Windows should have cron jobs, so you don't have whole services waiting around just to look for virus updates. * "Gearsec.exe":http://www.reger24.de/prozesse/gearsec.exe.php. This is a CD burning library that some application or another loaded in. Can't tell which. I'm guessing this is the itunes stuff. * "ATIEVxx.exe":http://www.answersthatwork.com/Tasklist_pages/tasklist_a.htm. This utility is installed with ATI drivers. Looks for hot keys, but its not known how to us. Definitely disable according to answersthatwork.com

AGainst my better judgement, I'm going to try one of these out. D-link has actually been OK for me, but Adrian has had terrible experiences. OTOH, I have a 24-port D-link switch at home and it seems fine. It does have nasty interference problems because of Super-G, but what the heck, give it a try. Supposed to have better range characteristics. Here are some reviews that basically tell me nothing except the hint that even with identical chipsets (both the Netgear and D-link use the Atheros 5002), you can get incredible range differences. * "PC Mag UK":http://reviews.zdnet.co.uk/hardware/networking/0,39023965,39118932,00.htm. LIked it. Has a 3-year warranty too. * Pyroport.com":http://www.pyroport.com/reviews/1.shtml. NOt a deep review, more like a feature check. * "ZD Net":http://reviews-zdnet.com.com/D_Link_DI_624_AirPlus_Xtreme_G_router/4505-3319_16-20817312.html. Duplicate of PC Mag reviews, but the user comments don't seem pollute unlike CNet's. For the equivalent card, called the DWL-G650 there don't seem to be many reviews: * "Cnet Asia":http://reviews-zdnet.com.com/D_Link_DWL_G650_AirPlus_Xtreme_G_Wireless_CardBus_Adapter/4505-3251_16-20817314.html. * "Dev Hardware":http://forums.devhardware.com/showthread.php?threadid=16056&s=ea25b63548cadd67d5b6e64a556d096d folks are pulling their hair out trying to get it to work at all. Now for the Netgear equivalents. First, they are much more expensive. Effective price of D-link is just $50 for the router and $35 for the card! But, here are the reviews WG511T was much faster over the range than the D-link "ZDNet":http://reviews-zdnet.com.com/Netgear_WG511T_108Mbps_wireless_PC_Card/4505-3251_16-30535788.html. Their CNet performance test found: | Router | Mixed B/G (5ft) | G or Super G (5ft) | G/Super G (100 ft) | | Netgear WG511T | 12.5Mbps | 47.1Mbps | 25Mbps | | US Robotics USR5410g | 17Mbps | 28.6Mpbs | 8Mbps | | Sony PCWA-C300S | 13.9 | 24.2 | 7 | | Actiontec | 11 | 23.5 | 7 | | Buffalo Airstation Adapter-G | 7.9 | 19.6 | 7 | | Linksys WPC54G | 6.7 | 15.6 | 1 | THe equivalent router is the Netgear WGT624 which "ZDNet loves":http://reviews.zdnet.co.uk/hardware/networking/0,39023965,39118460,00.htm but users rating don't like it much. "Wi-Fi Plane on D-link":http://www.wi-fiplanet.com/reviews/AP/article.php/3109311 and "Netgear":http://www.wi-fiplanet.com/reviews/AP/article.php/3109311. These results BTW differ sharply from the only other site I could find which does Wifi range testing. Here is what they found running the Chariot benchmark when using the link compression. | Product | Mode | 10ft (Mbps) | 25 ft | 50 ft | 75ft | 100 ft | 125 ft | | D-Link DI-624 | Super G strict | 47.03 | 38.84 | 29.83 | 39.75 | 29.63 | 25.8 | | Netgear WFT-624 | Super G dynamic | 40.49 | 40.06 | 32.18 | 33.11 | 32.69 | 23.56 | Other Dlnk modes tests: | D-Link DI-624 Mode | 10 ft Mpbs | | Super G dynamic (allos b and g clients) | 36.33 | | Super G dynamic 11b client associated | 17.19 | | Super G dynamic 11b client running | 8.23 for 11g, 2.83 11b | | Super G no turbo (disables bonding) | 23.11 | | Super G with WPA on | 41.83 | Other Netgear tests: | Mode | 10ft (Mbps) | | WPA encryption | 32.13 | | Standard 11g | 21.67 | | 108 Mode with 11b associated | 14.38 | | 108 Mode 11b running | 5.54 for 11g, 3.31 for 11b |

Well, we're getting closer to a big architectural shift. In 2H04, there will be a new pinout for processors from Intel (over 700 pins), a move to a new bus (called PCI Express). Intel's Prescott has shipped, so their costs have gone way down (going from 130nm process to 90nm means its much cheaper), so you can expect they'll have room to just hammer AMD. AMD on the other hand is rolling out their 64-bit line.

In the mean time, what to buy right now. Well, if I were getting a good price-performance system. Here is what I'd get. My buddy Jeff was asking what a good system would be that would last a while:

* Athlon 64 3000+. These are very modestly priced at $200 or so.
* Shuttle SN85G4. A nice box with decent performance.
* Kingston HyperX 1GB PC3200 RAM. More than enough.
* Western Digital 200GB WD2000PB. This is the fluid bearing model. Moderate price, lots of disk..
* Optorite DD0401. An 8x DVD Writer.
* Logitech Wireless keyboard and mouse. Keeps the computer clean.
* Benq FP991. A great flat screen.
* GeForce 5900 SE. A great value card if you ever want to play a game.