From DailyTech: The MPEG LA organization, owners of the h.26x video codecs have announced that licensing of the h.264 video codec will remain permanently royalty free for those who provide free internet video to end users. Previously the moratorium on licensing fees was set to expire in 2015, at which point the plan was to begin charging sites like YouTube fees.

The announcement adds an interesting twist to the contentious recent issue of video codecs and HTML5. Currently the prevailing codec appears to be the proprietary lossy H.264 (MPEG AVC) codec. It is used in the HTML 5 video implementations for Internet Explorer 9, Safari, and Google Chrome. Google Chrome also supports Ogg Theora, along with Firefox and Opera. Opera, Firefox, and Chrome's Developer version all support Google's open-source royalty-free WebM video as well.

The issue is that using three formats -- Ogg Theora, WebM, and h.264 makes coding a bit of a headache as you need to upload all three formats and include source tags for all three formats if you want to be sure to support all users.

Now that h.264 licensing is free forever for free internet video, that should help Apple (whose CEO Steve Jobs is a major MPEG LA shareholder) and Microsoft push the format. However, it must be remembered that unlike Ogg Theora and WebM, MPEG LA does still plan to charge for paid video. This means that if sites like Hulu implement subscription services, they will likely have to pay for license. As will companies that deploy h.264 on their internal websites or use the format for offline purposes.

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From X-bit Labs: The latest ATI Catalyst drivers released on Wednesday apparently contain a list of future graphics processing units' code-names. Unfortunately, the list brings more questions than reveals any particular answers.

There is a mess with the code-names of graphics processors families and graphics processors themselves at AMD. The Northern Islands (NI) desktop graphics processors were supposed to be made using 32nm bulk process technology, according to AMD’s official slides demonstrated in late October, 2009, in Japan. Most likely, the Northern Island chips were meant to be made at TSMC, which scrapped the process technology, automatically postponing the NI family. As a result, many unofficial sources reported that the next desktop ATI Radeon HD-series of products will be based on code-named Southern Islands (SI) chips that will feature elements of both Evergreen (Radeon HD 5000) as well as NI and will be made using 40nm fabrication process at Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company.

Based on the previously reported information, it is logical to assume that the SI lineup comes earlier than the NI, but the latest Catalyst 10.8 drivers list graphics processors that belong to the Northern Islands family. Either AMD's graphics business unit is indeed working on the NI family of GPUs and the product release is nearing; or some of the engineers have forgotten to remove mentions of chips that may exist in silicon, but will not be launched in a while; or the company intentionally listed the chips along with PCIe IDs to misinform competitors and market observers.

Even though it is unclear whether Northern Islands is the next-generation of desktop ATI Radeon graphics processors, or will power a later breed of graphics processing units (GPUs), the list discovered by ATI-oriented Rage3D web-site looks curious. It should be noted that the next-generation of mobile graphics chips by ATI is called Vancouver, which means that the NI family does not include notebook parts.

Apparently, the NI family of GPUs will include seven chips: Barts, Blackcomb, Caicos, Cayman, Seymour, Turks, Whistler; in addition, the list contains loads of code-names of graphics boards. Seven chips with different code-names for a graphics cards family is very unusual quantity. For example, ATI Radeon HD 5000-series consists of four chips, just like the Radeon HD 4000. Nonetheless, the history knows examples of more than four chips per desktop GPU family, but the only difference between those products were their manufacturers: TSMC or UMC.

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From X-bit Labs: Advanced Micro Devices plans to add dynamic overclocking technology to its server processors code-named Interlagos that are based on the Bulldozer micro-architecture next year. This will be the first time when an AMD server chip will get ability to dynamically boost itself. However, the server TurboCore technology will naturally have some specifics and will most likely receive a new name.

"There will be a TurboCore feature for Bulldozer, but there will be some improvements from what you see in “Thuban”. There are some enhancements to give it more “turbo”. This will be the first introduction of the TurboCore technology in the server processors. We expect that this will translate into a big boost in performance when using single threaded applications, and there should be some interesting capabilities for heavier workloads as well," said John Fruehe, the director of product marketing for server/workstation products at AMD.

AMD's previous-generation and current generation Opteron microprocessors support CoolCore and/or CoolSpeed technologies that optimize power consumption and performance. The former can disable parts of the chip that are not used to trim power usage, whereas the latter can allow reducing p-states of microprocessors for certain periods of time so that to keep CPU operating even when thermal limits are reached.

Many of Intel Xeon processors for dual-processor and multi-processor machines are equipped with Intel TurboBoost technology, which allows to disable some cores that are not necessary under present workload and increase clock-speeds of remaining cores.

AMD's latest desktop processors with six-cores code-named Thuban and officially known as AMD Phenom II X6 also feature TurboCore technology that dynamically disables unused cores and raises the clock-speed of the remaining, which greatly helps to speed up applications that cannot take advantage of multiple cores.

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NZXT Tempest EVO Computer Case @ Tweaknews
Nvidia GeForce GTX 460 SLI Performance Review @ Techspot
Coolermaster HAF 912 Gaming Case @ XSReviews
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Mafia II PC Game Review @ Techgage
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Samsung Flight II SGH-a927 Cell Phone @ TestFreaks
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DeepCool GamerStorm CPU Cooler @ Tweaknews
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From InfoWorld: Some of the world's most popular Windows programs are vulnerable to a major bug in how they load critical code libraries, according to sites tracking attack code.

Among the Windows applications that can be exploited using a systemic bug that many have dubbed "DLL load hijacking," are the Firefox, Chrome, Safari and Opera browsers; Microsoft's Word 2007; Adobe's Photoshop; Skype; and the uTorrent BitTorrent client.

"Fast and furious, incredibly fast," said Andrew Storms, director of security operations for nCircle Security, referring to the pace of exploit postings for the vulnerability in Windows software called "DLL load hijacking" by some, "binary planting" by others.

On Monday, Microsoft confirmed reports of unpatched vulnerabilities in a large number of Windows programs, then published a tool it said would block known attacks. The flaws stem from the way many Windows applications call code libraries -- dubbed "dynamic-link library," or "DLL" -- that give hackers wiggle room they can exploit by tricking an application into loading a malicious file with the same name as a required DLL.

If attackers can dupe users into visiting malicious websites or remote shares, or get them to plug in a USB drive -- and in some cases con them into opening a file -- they can hijack a PC and plant malware on it.

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From DailyTech: With its browser market share at a decade-low, Microsoft has a tall task awaiting it with the release of Internet Explorer 9. The good news is that Microsoft appears to be rising to the occasion. It's currently four developer previews in, and our early testing indicates that it's in a dead heat speedwise with Mozilla's Firefox 4 betas (thanks to its new Javascript engine "Chakra").

In a month where Apple looks to release new iPods and potentially other products, Microsoft's Internet Explorer event on September 15 will likely go largely overlooked. But that event should prove a critical step for the company, as it is anticipated to formerly unveil the first beta of IE 9.

What no one knew -- until now – was what that beta would look like. Mary-Jo Foley of ZDNet was cleverly poking around on Microsoft's foreign webpages and came across screenshots of what may be the new IE 9 beta, accidentally leaked by Microsoft Russia.

If this is indeed the look of the beta, Microsoft is going for an even more aggressively minimalist look than Mozilla's Firefox 4. The URL bar, forward/backward buttons, and tabs have all been merged into a single row (this occupies two rows in Firefox 4) and multiple page elements have "been consolidated into one" (according to the translated Russian text corresponding to the image).

"Favorites", "Suggested Sites", and "Get More Add-ons" – features found in IE 8 -- have all been presumably moved to subtler locations. All this reorganization is geared at providing "more room for the (Web) site itself", according to Microsoft.

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From DailyTech: Amazon.com announced that the new-generation Kindles are both the fastest-selling and best-selling devices on the website, selling more in the first four weeks of availability than any other previous Kindle launch.

The new-generation Kindles shipped today, which is two days earlier than expected. Customers ordered more new-generation Kindles on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk combined than any other device during the first four weeks of its availability. In fact, customers from 125 countries on six continents have placed orders for the new Kindle.

"Kindle is the best-selling product on Amazon.com for two years running and our new generation Kindles are continuing that momentum," said Steven Kessel, senior vice president of Amazon Kindle. "Readers are excited about all that the new Kindle has to offer - 50 percent better contrast, 20 percent faster page turns, 15 percent lighter, up to one month of battery life - and a new price of only $139."

The new Kindles certainly do have a lot of updated features. The body is 21 percent smaller, giving it a sleek, clean look. It also weighs 15 percent less than older models at 8.5 ounces, has built-in Wi-Fi and double the storage at 3,500 books. Some features have stayed the same though, such as the 6-inch screen for reading.

The Kindle Store has more than 670,000 books now, with 235,000 of those being added just in the last seven months. Over 550,000 of these are under $9.99, and over 1.8 million out-of-copyright, pre-1923, free books can be read on Kindle devices as well.

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From PC World: Google has overtaken Microsoft to secure the top spot in a major Japanese survey of corporate brand perception.

The company has been growing in Japan and easily attracts more traffic each month than competing Microsoft Web sites, but Microsoft's long history in Japan and deep ties with Japanese IT vendors had given it an advantage until this year.

Google scored 782 points in the survey, a single point ahead of Microsoft, which was ranked in second place. The latest ranking reverses last year's top spots and puts the two U.S. tech giants almost equal. Last year Google was 25 points behind Microsoft.

The annual survey is carried out online by Nikkei Research and this year received responses from 33,033 consumers and 14,184 business people. It asks respondents how they perceive major brands and the experiences they gain from using a company's products or services.

Yahoo Japan, Google's biggest competitor in Japan and operator of the country's most popular Web portal, managed to climb a couple of positions to fourth place. That put it behind Sony, which kept hold of its number-three position.

Other IT companies in the top 20 were Canon, ranked sixth, Panasonic at position eight, Casio at nine, and Sharp at position 18.

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