More GeForce GTX 285 Details Emerge

As we are approaching the now inevitable release of the 55nm GeForce GTX 285, more details regarding said card surface on the Internet. NVIDIA's new GeForce flagship graphics card is expected to come as an overclocked version of the company's current GeForce GTX 280.

Also, unlike the current card, the GPU of the upcoming GTX 285 takes advantage of a 55nm process technology, which basically allows for better performance and overclocking capability, while it should also provide a better power consumption level.

According to a recent post on the Chinese language Expreview, the upcoming single-core GTX 285 is expected to boast frequency levels a bit over those available for NVIDIA's current GeForce GTX 280. The core speed of the GTX 285 should settle at 648 MHz, compared with the 602 MHz available with the GeForce GTX280. The Shader and Memory frequencies have also been brought up to 1476MHz and 1242MHz, respectively.

Given that the 65nm-based GTX 280 has Shader and Memory clock speeds of 1296MHz and 1107MHz, the performance boost might not be all that impressive. Still, the performance of the GTX 285 is expected to surpass that of ATI's HD 4870 and to come close to what the HD 4870 X2 can now provide. We are yet to see a comparative review between any pair of aforementioned cards, but we should keep our peeled for one such piece as it would give us a general idea of what we should expect from NVIDIA's next-generation GeForce graphics card.

After the release of the GTX 280 and the dual-GPU GTX 295, the Sunnyvale, California-based AMD is also expected to unveil a new range of cards as well. The rumored Radeons are to compete directly with NVIDIA's upcoming 55nm range of products. What is yet unclear is whether said cards are to remain at 55nm, or whether AMD plans to jump straight to 40nm.

Source: http://akupunyasitus.blogspot.com

Broken Webpages IE8 Beta Add-On on Vista SP1 and XP SP3

While building Internet Explorer 8, Microsoft is joggling the evolution of IE and its commitment not to break the web, namely content that is tailored to IE6 and IE7. Internet Explorer 8 is not only capable of rendering websites developed with modern standards, but also content that was designed with the shortcomings of its precursors in mind. In addition to building three rendering modes into the browser and ensuring the evolution of Compatibility View, the software giant is also taking the necessary measures to identify the specific websites that fail to play nice with Internet Explorer 8. In this context, the Report a Webpage Problem Internet Explorer 8.0 Beta Add-On is now available for download.

“The Report a Webpage Problem Internet Explorer Add-on appears as a toolbar button and a 'Report a Webpage Problem...' item on the Tools menu,” an excerpt from the tool's description reads. “When the toolbar button is clicked or the menu item is chosen, the control takes a screenshot of the web page currently being viewed. A new tab is then opened containing a report submission form. A scaled down version of the screenshot will be visible at the bottom, and the user has a choice of whether or not to include the full-sized screenshot (choosing No to the 'Include Screenshot' question means no screenshot will be sent).”

The add-on is designed to catalyze feedback for Microsoft when it comes down to webpages with rendering problems, which could contain scripting errors or any additional issues. According to the Redmond company, the add-on is set up to integrate exclusively with the Beta versions of Internet Explorer 8, and will not be available for the final version of the browser. The software giant revealed that the add-on's availability would be discontinued in the Internet Explorer 8 pre-RTM timeframe. The Report a Webpage Problem Internet Explorer 8.0 Beta Add-On would work with copies of the browser run on top of Windows Vista SP1, Windows XP SP3, Windows Server 2003, and Windows Server 2008.

“On the report submission page, the user also has the option to select a category best representing their observed problem. This category selection will be part of the report information returned to Microsoft. A 1000 character limit comment field is provided, if the user chooses to include some description of the problem. Additional data included in the report: the protocol type (http, res, file, etc.) of the URL being reported; the complete URL; a numerical value representing the Document mode,” Microsoft adds.

The Report a Webpage Problem Internet Explorer 8.0 Beta Add-On is available for download here.

New MSNBot (msnbot/2.0b) from Live Search

Microsoft is getting ready to introduce its latest move against Google, an overhauled boot for its search engine. While the Redmond company is laboring to reportedly scrap the Live Search brand in favor of Kumo, with a transition of leadership as Qi Lu takes on the new role of president of the Online Services Group, the organic evolution of Live Search moves forward. In this regard, the latest product on the Live Search front is a new MSNBot.

“Live Search is committed to continuing to improve how we discover and crawl your content. In the coming weeks, we will be testing an update to MSNBot, which may show up as a new crawler name in your referrer logs. The new crawler user agent string will appear as: msnbot/2.0b (+http://search.msn.com/msnbot.htm). You’ll still see the current version msnbot/1.1 (+http://search.msn.com/msnbot.htm) as Live Search’s primary user agent,” Jeremiah Andrick, program manager, Live Search Webmaster Center, revealed.

Webmasters and web content owners will be the ones directly affected by Microsoft testing the new MSNBot. The new Live Search crawler will generate extra traffic as far as bots are concerned, but the software giant is promising that MSNBot/2.0b will tiptoe on websites and that it will not take a heavy tole on the resources available.

Qi Lu, the new president of the Online Services Group, indicated that one of the pitches that convinced him to join Microsoft was CEO Steve Ballmer's promise that the Redmond company had a strong focus on driving product quality.

“We intend to ensure that any robots exclusion protocol you are using is respected. As such, you don’t need to update your Robots.txt file. We plan on crawling at a slow speed during the tests with the updated version. When the new crawler replaces our current crawler, we will keep you up-to-date,” Andrick added.

Microsoft Is Cooking a Kumo Live Search Rebrand - Kumo.com now on Live Search servers

It remains to be seen whether rechristening Live Search will deliver a positive impact in terms of gathering and keeping fresh eyeballs, if it will just be a strategy with little repercussions in terms of market share, or if it will have just the opposite effect, and drive users away from Microsoft's search engine. However, the fact of the matter is that the software giant is indeed cooking a Live Search rebranding, with Kumo (Kumo.com) as one of the candidate brands.

The fact that Microsoft was considering a brand evolution for Live Search was initially reported by Mary Jo Foley. In this regard, LiveSide has indicated that Kumo is now under Microsoft's control, but accessible only to employees.

Meaning both “cloud” and “spider” in Japanese, Kumo is, without a doubt, intimately connected with Live Search, considering the domain servers the company is using, namely NS.USWEST.SEARCH.LIVE.COM; NS.USEAST.SEARCH.LIVE.COM and NS.ANYCAST.SEARCH.LIVE.COM. However, until this point in time, Microsoft has steered right clear of confirming any future plans related to a Live Search rebranding. As far as Kumo is concerned, mum's the word from Microsoft.

Still, one thing is clear, the Redmond company has nothing short of big plans for Kumo.com. The domain has been registered for no less than 10 years, and is scheduled for expiration on July 19, 2018. The registration of Live.com, the home of Live Search, is set to expire in 2017.

In the race with Google, Microsoft is not fighting just a search engine, but the technology behind it. Google is a brand that is now virtually synonymous with search, and the Redmond company has nothing to counter this aspect. Windows Live Search, Live Search, and Live.com simply do not have sufficient brand potential to go against Google, in the context in which users are no longer searching the web, they are googling it. The question is will anybody be kumoing it?

Microsoft: We're Here to Win Against Google

At the start of December Microsoft confirmed that the former executive vice president of Engineering for the Search and Advertising Technology Group at Yahoo had switched sides and was going to take the lead of its Online Services Group. Scheduled to take on his new position come January 5, 2009.

Dr. Qi Lu revealed that he was gearing up to hit the ground running, while Microsoft's target in term of online search could not be clearer. Lu admitted Google's superiority in the search space, and acknowledged the challenges that Microsoft would face in its attempt to catch up with the Mountain View-based search giant, stating that “we've got our work cut out for us.”

“We're here to win, and my view on this is that to win in the search space, fundamentally you build on the strengths of your product. And we know what it takes to build a compelling user experience and winning product, which is to have a powerful infrastructure, great talent, and put great processes in place so that we can out-develop, out-market, out-innovate our competitors,” Lu stated.

Dr. Qi Lu was recruited at Microsoft by none other than the Chief Executive Office Steve Ballmer. According to Lu, Ballmer promised that Microsoft had a strong commitment on continuing its investments in research and development, while at the same time focusing on delivering high-quality products in order to increase competitive chances on the market. In this context, Lu pointed out that there were a couple of major occasions for Microsoft to compete against Google.

“First, I think there is a genuine opportunity to take our search products to the next level. I see that Microsoft's search product quality is improving at a very, very fast rate, that there are great foundations there,” Lu added. “The second opportunity is to continue building a very powerful advertising platform. Microsoft has made a series of strategic acquisitions, and also built a bunch of internal technologies and products.”

Microsoft to Kill Windows XP 'Blue Edition' - In the fight against pirated software

Microsoft is attempting to kill the “Blue Edition” of Windows XP. In mid-2008 the Redmond company discontinued the availability of retail and OEM licenses of Windows XP, with the exception of copies of the operating system going onto ultra-low-cost laptops and desktops. However, XP “Blue Edition” is by no means a part of Microsoft's efforts to focus consumers and partners on Windows Vista and beyond. Killing XP “Blue Edition” is an illustrative example of the company's actions to stop the software counterfeiting phenomenon affecting its products.

According to Microsoft, “Blue Edition” is nothing more than a fabricated marketing program used to market and sell pirated copies of Windows XP. In this regard, the software giant informed that it had debuted legal actions against multiple online auctioneers worldwide, which were allegedly responsible for selling pirated copies of XP “Blue Edition” and not only via various global marketing schemes.

“Dishonest auctioneers are too often using these online auction sites to sell counterfeit and illegal copies of Microsoft software, taking advantage of unsuspecting customers around the world,” revealed David Finn, associate general counsel for Worldwide Anti-Piracy and Anti-Counterfeiting at Microsoft. “These dealers are peddling bogus products that can put customers and their personal information at serious risk.”

Microsoft has indicated that auctioneers in 12 countries around the world are now facing lawsuits for selling counterfeit software on online auction sites. A total of 63 legal actions involve lawsuits in the US (16), in Germany (12), in France (12), and in the UK (7). In addition, the software giant is also going after software counterfeiters in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Japan, Mexico and New Zealand.

“By taking legal action against these and other alleged counterfeiters, Microsoft is helping ensure that consumers around the world are protected from those who sell counterfeit software over the Internet,” Finn added. “We are also continuing to arm our customers with the information they need to keep from falling victim to counterfeit software. Consumers should be aware that the so-called ‘Blue Edition’ software is nothing more than low-quality counterfeit software burned onto a CD.”
By: Marius Oiaga

Opera 10.0 Alpha 1 Available for Download - Get it here

Having released Opera 9.5 and Opera 9.6 in 2008, the Norwegian browser maker is now offering the first taste of Opera 10.0. While Microsoft and Mozilla are laboring to hit the Release Candidate stages of Internet Explorer 8 (now at Beta 2) and Firefox 3.1, respectively (now still at Beta 1, and on the verge of Beta 2), Opera is also cooking the next iteration of its browser. The first Alpha development milestone for Opera 10.0 is now available for download.

“It seems like yesterday we released Opera 9.6 and now you can all get your hands on Opera 10.0. Rather than ramble on, here's a quick list of what's new: Presto 2.2 Engine; performance boost; 100/100 and pixel-perfect on the Acid3 test; auto-update; inline spelling checker; Opera Mail improvements, including rich text composition and delete after X days; Widget Improvements on Linux,” revealed Adam Minchinton, Opera Mac developer.

Opera has tweaked and optimized the core of the browser, and has taken Presto up to version 2.2 from 2.1 in Kestrel. In this context, now Opera 10.0 Alpha 1 passes the Acid3 Test for web standard support to perfection, the browser maker claims. At the same time, the evolution of the engine has delivered a new level of performance, not only in terms of speed, but also in regard to how the broser handles CSS, XML printing, and RGBA and HSLA support.

“The long awaited auto-update functionality is here! That's right, Opera will now update itself as new versions are released. And for those of you who want every single snapshot release just enable the 'Download All Snapshots' setting (opera:config#AutoUpdate). Please be aware that if you do so, you will be upgrading to all snapshots - and, as you know: snapshots contain the latest changes, but may also have severe known issues, including crashes and data loss situations. In fact, they may not work at all,” Minchinton added.

Opera 10.0 Alpha 1 for Windows is available for download here (Link 1), here (Link 2), here (Link 3), here (Link 4), here (Link 5).

Opera 10.0 Alpha 1 for Linux is available for download here (Link 1), here (Link 2), here (Link 3), here (Link 4), here (Link 5), here (Link 6).

Opera 10.0 Alpha 1 for Mac OS X is available for download here (Link 1), here (Link 2), here (Link 3), here (Link 4), here (Link 5), here (Link 6).

MySQL Administrator for Windows 5.0 r10

MySQL Administrator is a powerful visual administration console that enables you to easily administer your MySQL environment and gain significantly better visibility into how your databases are operating.

MySQL Administrator now integrates database management and maintenance into a seamless, single environment, with an intuitive and clear graphical user interface.

By using MySQL Administrator you will be able to:
- Achieve higher database availability through improved management
- Reduce errors through visual database administration
- Lower database administration costs through improved productivity
- Deliver a more secure environment through easier privilege management

MySQL Administrator enables developers and DBAs to easily perform all the command line operations visually including configuring servers, administering users, and dynamically monitoring database health.

Other common administrative tasks such as monitoring replication status, backup and restore, and viewing logs can also be performed through the MySQL Administrator graphical console.

User Administration in Minutes
Administering users, granting privileges and viewing user privilege information has never been easier! Now you can leverage the full power of MySQL's user management and privilege capabilities to fully protect your MySQL server host using an integrated graphical user administration console.

For example, a form-based interface provides a simple method for adding users, assigning passwords and including user profile information. Plus, assigning and revoking global, database, and table/column privileges is as easy as adding and removing privilege items from an available list. Finally, an explorer interface provides a hierarchical view allowing you to easily view user privileges by privilege type.

Single View Dynamic Health Monitoring
Dynamic health monitoring gives you an immediate view into the key indicators of the health of your MySQL environment. Dynamic graphs enable you to easily view percentage of memory usage, connection usage, hit rates, as well as the number of SQL queries on an ongoing basis, as your system runs.

The Disk Health tab gives you an overview of the amount of hard disk space, tablespace, and log files being used. You can also use the visual health monitoring feature to get a hierarchical view into status and server variables such as the number of outstanding connections, number of bytes sent and received by clients, buffer allocations size and more.

Quickly Optimize MySQL
MySQL Administrator now allows you to easily view and setup key parameters so you can quickly optimize the performance of MySQL. Using a graphical forms-based environment, you quickly fine tune general and advanced parameters. For example you can set memory usage parameters and configure server start-up parameters related to the MyISAM and InnoDB table types.

Rapid Disaster Prevention and Recovery
Now you can rapidly create consistent backups and restore data by simply visually selecting the schemas and tables you want to back/restore from your hierarchical data directory. The graphical environment gives you additional visibility into Tabletype, Rows, Data Length, and Update time.

Server Information At-a-Glance
The server information section of MySQL Administrator allows you to quickly view basic information about the server and client. This view gives you immediate visibility into items such as server status, client and server version numbers and IP address, as well as connection information.

View Replication Status
Now you can quickly set up replication to increase the robustness and speed of your MySQL environment. The replication features within MySQL Administrator allow you to easily view the network topology of your replication master and slaves. Plus, the graphical environment provides additional visibility into IP addresses and logfiles.

View Server Logs from a Centralized Administration Environment
Now you can view all the MySQL log files including error logs, binary logs, and InnoDB logs from a single, centralized administration environment so you can diagnose server problems quicker and track database changes.

Service Control
Gain complete control of service creation and overcome the time consuming task of installing and setting up services. Plus, start and stop MySQL servers and view corresponding log messages.

Browse Catalog
Browse your catalog and view corresponding tables with columns, all indices and users with privileges to access selected databases. From here you can monitor and optimize tables.

Cross Platform
MySQL Administrator will initially be available for Microsoft Windows and Linux, and be compatible with MySQL version 4.0 or later.

MySQL Administrator for Windows 5.0 r10 is available for download here (Link 1)
MySQL Administrator for Windows 5.0 r10 is available for download here (Link 2)

The Windows 7 Troubleshooting Platform

The Windows 7 Troubleshooting Platform - Windows Vista could have used this level of advanced troubleshooting. Microsoft has kicked the troubleshooting capabilities of Windows to the next level with the introduction of Windows 7. And as early as Windows 7 pre-Beta Milestone 3 Build 6801, the Redmond company is offering a taste of the full capabilities of the operating system, capabilities that could have been life savers for Windows Vista users when the RTM build initially hit the shelves. According to the software giant, Windows 7 comes to the table with a comprehensive and extensible Troubleshooting Platform capable of identifying and resolving a wide array of problems on its own.

This mainly because the platform has a PowerShell-based mechanism at its core. Microsoft indicated that the platform was in fact a collection of components. The troubleshooting package, engine, and wizard all combine in order to deal with potential problems that the end users might come across.

"The troubleshooting pack is a collection of PowerShell scripts and relevant metadata. The troubleshooting engine launches a PowerShell runtime to execute a troubleshooting pack, and exposes a set of interfaces to control troubleshooting pack execution," Microsoft revealed. "The troubleshooting wizard provides a consistent experience across troubleshooting packs, communicating with the troubleshooting engine to troubleshoot and resolve problems that are specified in a troubleshooting pack."

As you can very well see from the image on the left, the Troubleshooting Platform is designed to deal with a range of issues spanning from the programs running on top of Windows 7 to those affecting devices, networking, printing, display, sound, performance and the Windows operating system itself.

"The Troubleshooting Platform seamlessly integrates with the Windows 7 PC Solution Center, enabling other applications to execute diagnostics in a similar manner as part of their PC management regimen. The Troubleshooting Platform is configurable by IT professionals through Group Policy for use within the enterprise, and a Windows Troubleshooting Toolkit that allows developers to author troubleshooting packs is also available," Microsoft added.
Source: http://akupunyasitus.blogspot.com/

Windows 7 Pre-Beta Build 6801 Leaked and Available for Download

Windows 7 Pre-Beta Build 6801 Leaked and Available for Download - Via torrent websites. The past week, Microsoft delivered the first consistent taste of Windows 7, offering the pre-beta bits of the operating system at the Professional Developers Conference. On October 28, developers attending the event got their hands on a 160 GB drive pre-loaded with various goodies including Windows 7 Build 6801 in both 32-bit and 64-bit flavors. Subsequently, as it was the case with previous beta or final releases of Windows, the pre-beta bits for Windows 7 Build 6801 were leaked and made available for download via torrent websites.

Steven Sinofsky, Senior Vice President, Windows and Windows Live Engineering Group, managed to keep Windows 7 under a translucent veil throughout the development process ahead of PDC2008. However, the conference focused on Windows 7 made the successor of Windows Vista as transparent as possible, as well as “free for all” users with a BitTorrent client. All major torrent hotspots are currently offering downloads of Windows 7 pre-beta build 6801, advertised as untouched.

The pair of Windows 7 pre-beta releases on the original 160 GB drive are: Windows 7 32-bit - 6801.0.080913-2030_Client_en-us_ULTIMATE-ULTIMATE_GB1CFRE_EN_DVD.iso and Windows 7 64-bit - 6801.0.080913-2030_Client_en-us_ULTIMATE-ULTIMATE_GB1CXFRE_EN_DVD.iso. With the pre-beta bits of the next iteration of Windows available outside of Redmond, the software giant promised that the fully fledged Beta of Windows 7 would be delivered early in 2009.

“Windows 7 will offer improved navigation, a new taskbar and a streamlined UI so that common tasks done in Windows are done easier and more quickly. You will be able to share data to all your PCs and devices in your home network or at work. With Windows 7 + Windows Live, you will be able to stay connected to the people that matter to you, and with Internet Explorer 8 you will get a faster, safer, more productive Web experience,” revealed Mike Nash, Corporate Vice President, Windows Product Management.
Source: http://akupunyasitus.blogspot.com/

Windows Home Server Build 6.0.1800.24 - November 2008 update

Starting on November 25, Microsoft made available an update to its home server operating system. The November 2008 refresh to Windows Home Server will be served automatically to all users via Windows Update. Microsoft is describing the release designed to take Windows Home Server to version 6.0.1800.24 as a minor update, delivering only a small evolution compared to Power Pack 1. The enhancements range from storage issues being fixed, to CPU consumption, to backup and even to remote access.

“This update improves the interaction between home computers running Windows Vista and a Windows Home Server-based system, when copying files or folders that are larger in size than the free space available on the first (or primary) hard drive to a Shared Folder.”

“Additionally, this update resolves certain issues, which can happen when restoring files and folders from Windows Home Server, such as the opening of a Home Computer Backup sometimes stalling at 79% complete. The update also improves the search functionality, when using remote access,” revealed Todd Headrick, the product planner for the Microsoft Windows Home Server.

In addition, the update is designed to resolve backup issues affecting Windows Home Server directly. Microsoft informed that restoring items from a Home Server Backup to an external hard disk would no longer replace the latest version of the Windows Home Server Connector software with older releases.

The new version of the home server platform can be accessed via the Windows Home Server Console - Settings - Resources page.

“After installing the Windows Home Server Connector software with Power Pack 1, you were given the choice to automatically install new updates of the Connector software from your home server to your home computers. The November 2008 update requires an update to the Connector software, but it is more or less automatic (assuming you took the option for 'automatic updates' during the initial installation of the Connector software),” Headrick added, informing that a restart would be required.
By: Marius Oiaga

Download Windows Home Server Toolkit 1.1 - A collection of diagnostic tools

Microsoft is streamlining the troubleshooting process of issues associated with the user of its home server operating system. In this context, the Redmond company has made available for download version 1.1 of the Windows Home Server Toolkit. Essentially a collection of tools, the toolkit is set up to troubleshoot problems not only on Windows Home Server, but also on the Windows PCs connected to the home server.

“The Windows Home Server team released version 1.1 of the Windows Home Server Toolkit, a collection of diagnostic tools that run on your home computers and home server.”

“This version provides a Windows Home Server Connector Troubleshooter that works on home computers running Windows XP and Windows Vista (32-bit) and Windows Vista (x64) operating systems,” revealed Todd Headrick, the product planner for the Microsoft Windows Home Server.

There are three main aspects of Windows Home Server Toolkit v1.1. First off, the toolkit is able to communicate with Microsoft. In this context, the company has automated the error reporting process, by permitting that users collect and send the log files from Windows Home Server via the toolkit.

In addition, the Windows Home Server Connector Troubleshooter ensures that Windows PCs are tested for eventual Connector software problems, and that users receive guidance in resolving them. Last but not least, the Windows Home Server Toolkit Add-in installed on the home server platform allows for the execution of troubleshooting tasks straight from the Windows Home Server Console Settings page.

“The Toolkit Add-in for Windows Home Server has been simplified to make it easier for people to access relevant information when troubleshooting any issues that they may encounter with their home servers. After installing the toolkit on a home computer, you can easily copy the Toolkit Add-in to your home server. Click Start, All Programs, Windows Home Server Toolkit, Publish Server Add-in, to copy the Toolkit Add-In file to your home server,” Headrick added, indicating that the toolkit would have to be installed via the Console.

In addition to the 32-bit and 64-bit flavors of Windows Home Server Toolkit version 1.1, Microsoft is also offering for download the Windows Home Server Toolkit User Manual v 1.1.

Home Server Toolkit User 1.1 is available for download here.
By: Marius Oiaga

Windows 7 Direct3D 11 Features

Windows 7 Direct3D 11 Features - A taste of DirectX 11 is already available for download. As of November 2008, Microsoft is delivering the first taste of DirectX 11 for Windows 7 for download. A release aimed at developers, The November 2008 DirectX Software Development Kit, brings to the table the successor of Direct3D 10.1, namely Direct3D 11. In the SDK package, the Redmond company is offering a technical preview of Direct3D 11, but also the adjacent components and tools. Backwards compatible, content developed for Direct3D 11 hardware will also be compatible with earlier products supporting Direct3D 10 and 10.1 (in Vista SP1). Via the Windows 7 Developer Guide, Microsoft provides an insight into the new features made available by Direct3D 11.

“Geometry and high-order surfaces can now be tessellated to support scalable, dynamic content in patch and subdivision surface representations. To make good use of the parallel processing power available from multiple CPU cores, multithreading increases the number of potential rendering calls per frame by distributing the application, runtime, and driver calls across multiple cores. In addition, resource creation and management has been optimized for multithreaded use, enabling more efficient dynamic texture management for streaming,” Microsoft revealed.

According to the Redmond company, version 11 is designed to deliver an evolution of the functionality of the Direct3D 10 pipeline for Windows 7. In this regard, Microsoft has positioned Windows 7 to take advantage of the next generation of GPUs and multi-core processors when it comes down to the way the operating system will handle games and 3D applications. The software giant has indicated that Direct3D 11 in Windows 7 will support: Tessellation; Compute Shaders; Multithreaded Rendering; Dynamic Shader Linkage; Windows Advanced Rasterizer (WARP); Direct3D 10 and Direct3D 11 on Direct3D 9 Hardware (D3D10 Level 9); Runtime Binaries; D3DX11; Completely Updated HLSL and Direct3D Compiler; D3D11 Reference Rasterizer and D3D11 SDK Layers.

“New general-purpose compute shaders have been created for Direct3D 11. Unlike existing shaders, these are extensions to the programmable pipeline that enable your application to do more work completely on the GPU, independent of the CPU. DrawAuto, which was introduced in Direct3D 10, has been extended to interact with a compute shader. Several improvements have been made to the high-level shading language (HLSL), such as a limited form of dynamic linkage in shaders to improve specialization complexity, and object-oriented programming constructs like classes and interfaces,” the company added.

The November 2008 DirectX Software Development Kit is available for download here.
The November 2008 DirectX End-User Runtime Web Installer can be downloaded via this link.
DirectX End-User Runtimes (November 2008) is up for grabs here.
Source: http://akupunyasitus.blogspot.com/

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Crysis: Warhead - Play as Psycho in this expansion of the first game

Warhead, the sequel to the critically acclaimed first person shooter Crysis, delivers a parallel side story to the first game. Based on a very tweaked and optimized version of the CryEngine 2, it delivers the same stunning beauty from the first game without the absurdly high system requirements. It offers a pretty entertaining gaming experience and some interesting surprises which I won't spoil for you. The vehicles and enemies will keep you hooked on the game, but the stereotype missions will bore you.

Story
As I said, the game is based on a parallel side story to the first one. You play as the British Sergeant Psycho Sykes who, after parting with the first game's main character, Nomad, follows the North Korean General Lee and his mysterious cargo. Presumed to be a nuclear warhead, hence the title of the game, Psycho is tasked with tracking down and apprehending the cargo for the United States. On his pursuit of the general, he saves his old friend, Sean O'Neill, who in return acts like a guardian angel through most of the game helping Psycho out with his VTOL aerial craft. On his journey, he takes part in a lot of cliché missions and reaches a harbor where the cargo is shipped to a submarine. After climbing aboard, he is knocked out and awakens being tortured by the general, but in a different environment, as all of the things are frozen by the same aliens from the first game.

After chasing the general with the help of a hovercraft, one of the most exciting aspects of the game, he joins up with another team of marines. After defeating one of the large exo-suit aliens, he travels through the elaborate mine system of the mountain. Combined with the lack of a functioning map and the claustrophobic environment, it really is a recipe for the player to get lost, as I did.

After escaping the mining system, he is tasked with escorting a train the cargo is on through the jungle riddled with North Korean soldiers and later on, aliens. After another encounter with the general, he has to invade a Korean airstrip filled with hostile soldiers and vehicles. Against all odds, he defeats all of the humans but is faced with the arrival of an upgraded exo-suit type alien.

Quite an intro for Psycho

The Nano Suit is always good

Concept
The concept of the game is pretty simple, although Nomad, the lead character in the first game had the most important job, help rescue the American scientists and then defeat the aliens, Psycho's job is also very important. But you can't really help the fact that it is the lesser story of the happenings from the island. It isn't as grand as Nomad's adventure, or as exciting as his. The missions are all pretty cliché, with escorts or defensive missions making up for quite a decent part of the game. I have to admit that the fights with the big aliens are pretty entertaining, but they don't really make up for all the downsides of the game.

It is definitely good for all the Crysis fans who want another nano suit dressed adventure battling North Koreans and aliens, but for the average shooter player, it isn't much to look at. All of the boring missions really take the fun out of a pretty smart and entertaining shooter (in the end). As I discussed with my colleagues here at Softpedia, it's like Crytek wanted to make two games using the same universe. One filled with innovation and a compelling story, which is Crysis, and the other molded after classic shooter clichés, with the stereotype missions and characters, which is Warhead.

Gameplay
In terms of actual gameplay the title, aside from various small modifications, is pretty much the same as in the first game, which in actual playing terms isn't that bad. The same nano suit is present with its familiar controls and very useful options. In terms of the weapons available, very few innovations were made, like the pulse rifle. In terms of equipment, the anti vehicle mines or claymores are noticeable new items, with a special EMP grenade designed to disrupt the power of nano suits also making an appearance.

Concerning vehicles, you will be experimenting with quite a few new ones. From regular military jeeps to armored personnel carriers (equipped with big guns) or tanks, you will definitely have an alternative to just walking around the island. Noticeable vehicles in this version are the hovercraft, on which you will be engaging the general on the frozen sea, or a train, which you will be tasked with guarding.

Another nice feature is the fact that, at some point in the game, you will be helped by other people, be it O'Neill, with his VTOL or other nano suit teams from the Special Forces. Considering that the amount of enemies is quite large, this is really a good thing. A downside is the fact that the actual game lasts only about eight hours.

General Lee

The bigger they are, the harder they fall

Visual and Audio
In terms of the graphics aspects, you can't ask for anything else. Once again, the CryEngine 2 proves its power, recreating a gorgeous tropical island, and its frozen counterpart extremely well with the minutest details in place. The surroundings are very beautiful and can sometimes really distract you from the mission. The special effects, like explosions, are marvelously well done, I myself trying to blow stuff up just to watch the effects which portray it so well. As a special feature, the part of the game where the island is frozen is very realistically rendered, with the likes of North Korean soldiers frozen in a wide variety of positions.

The audio part of the game is also well done. The sounds associated to the vehicles are very realistic, with the engines sounding very different as the vehicle is taking damage. The sounds of the jungle are also very well done. Although its peace is almost always disturbed by the gun fire and battles going on there.

Multiplayer
The multiplayer aspect of the game, entitled Crysis Wars, is a very interesting part. Although it came on a separate disk, it was incorporated in the Crysis: Warhead pack. Aside from the Instant Action and Power Struggle modes, the new mode entitled Team Action is very entertaining. The wide range of maps offers a very good experience, without the player being (too) bored.

Conclusion
All in all, it's a pretty decent game. All shooter fans will have a reasonable experience, although, at times, a bit annoying. Crysis fans are sure to enjoy this title, bringing their favorite universe back to life in this new adventure. Psycho is a more enjoyable character than the enigmatic Nomad from the first game. If you enjoy shooters and want to wear the nano suit again, then you definitely should buy it.



















Source: softpedia.com

The Windows 7 Operating Systems – Better Together

Ever since Windows Vista Service Pack 1 and Windows Server 2008 RTM/SP1, Microsoft's Windows client and server operating systems have been virtually joined at the hip. As a future product development strategy, the two platforms will evolve together, an aspect valid not only for Vista SP2 and Windows Server 2008 SP2, but also for the forthcoming Windows 7 operating systems. Microsoft confirmed at the Windows hardware Engineering Conference in Los Angeles this week that Windows 7 and Windows Server 7 (Windows Server 2008 R2) would advance in lockstep. During his keynote address, Bill Laing, Corporate Vice President, Windows Server and Solutions Division, exemplified several instances in which Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 would work better together.

Not only is Microsoft developing Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 in tandem, but the company is also attempting to convince customers that the two operating systems must be used as a pair. “Because Windows Server 2008 R2 is being developed in tandem with the Windows 7 code, Windows Server 2008 R2 has several features that are designed to work better with computers running Windows 7,” Laing explained.

Just as Windows 7 hit M3 stage, Windows Server 2008 is also at Milestone 3, with Microsoft providing a taste of both platforms to testers. Windows 7 pre-Beta Build 6801 was delivered to both WinHEC 2008 and PDC 2008 participants, with the pre-Beta bits of Windows Server 2008 R2 M3 having been made available at the WinHEC event. Microsoft has already offered Windows Vista SP2 and Windows Server 2008 SP2 to Technology Adoption Program (TAP) customers for evaluation.

Laing indicated a few examples of technologies which make Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 play nice together, including Branch Cache. “Any time a document is retrieved by a client in a company’s branch office, Branch Cache keeps a copy in the branch, so if another client in the same office wants to retrieve that document, it can be served up locally instead of across the WAN. The result is a significant reduction in bandwidth use between corporate offices and branch sites, and a huge potential cost saving because most organizations pay for bandwidth by the byte. It also gives branch offices a degree of autonomy in case the link to headquarters is severed for any reason,” Laing said.

In addition to Branch Cache, Laing also praised the impact that the future iteration Hyper-v is bound to deliver. In this context, Microsoft plans to offer Live Migration support with Hyper-V, as a continuation of its efforts to democratize virtualization. But there are additional features that have made Microsoft present Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 as an item.

“Remote Desktop Services (RDS), the new name for Terminal Services, is another example. We expanded RDS in Windows Server 2008 R2 so that you can run the desktop or applications in the datacenter while your users can be anywhere,” Laing stated. “Another feature, DirectAccess, allows remote Windows users to securely connect to their work environment as if they were on the corporate LAN, and also lets IT administrators fully manage remote PCs securely, as if they were on-premises, but without using a VPN.”
By: By Marius Oiaga

Sapphire Adds New GeForce 9400GT Cards

Although NVIDIA's new low-profile GeForce 9400 graphics card has been officially announced for quite some time now, one of its add-in-board partners decided to keep its customers waiting for a while. However, the company has officially launched its version of the new GeForce graphics card earlier today, offering four new models, based on the same GPU.

As we mentioned in our previous articles, NVIDIA's new GeForce 9400 card has been designed to accommodate the graphics requirements of entry-level users who don't spend their entire budget on just one video card. In addition, the GeForce 9400 GT features several NVIDIA technologies and supports Microsoft's DirectX 10 API. Furthermore, this is also one of the few NVIDIA cards that have been developed using a 55nm process technology, which AMD has been adopting for quite some time now.

Back to Sapphire's latest GeForce cards, the four new models have been designed to deliver a maximum of 1GB of DDR2 memory. However, two of them will be equipped with only 512MB DDR2 memory on a 128-bit memory interface. There is another way you can differentiate the four models from one another, as the two 1GB DDR2-enabled cards are equipped with a passive cooling solution. All four of them are based on PCI-Express 2.0 interface and have the same clock settings as the reference model, with 550MHz for the GPU and 800MHz for the memory.

In addition to the new GeForce 9400GT models, Sparkle can also offer four GDDR3-equipped cards, all of which have only 512MB of memory. In total, Sparkle has 12 graphics cards, based on the same 9400GT GPU. So we could say that if you are an entry-level user and you are searching for a new low-profile graphics card, you should find what you are searching for in Sapphire's product lineup.

Source: news.softpedia.com

NVIDIA Unveils New Quadro FX GPUs for Professional Workstation Graphics

With NVIDIA having lost the number one spot in the high-performance consumer graphics card market, the Santa Clara, California-based chip maker is now concentrating its efforts on its professional business segment, with the Quadro lineup of graphic processors. The green company has just introduced two new products, specifically designed to meet the requirements of workstation desktop platforms, the Quadro FX 470, the first integrated professional motherboard GPU, and the Quadro FX 370 Low Profile (FX 370 LP), an entry-level graphics card part of NVIDIA's Quadro family of GPUs, designed for small form factor systems.

"In today's competitive global marketplace, engineers, traders, designers and power office users demand more functionality and reliability from their desktop computing solutions," said Jeff Brown, general manager, Professional Services, NVIDIA. "The Quadro FX 470 and the Quadro FX 370 LP are precisely tested, certified and designed to maximize productivity and deliver the cost-effective, professional-quality solution these users require on a daily basis."

Both products released by NVIDIA have been featured with a 128-bit precision graphics pipeline, 32-bit floating point precision, filtering and blending, advanced color compression and early z-culling for improved bandwidth and rendering efficiency, and full-scene antialiasing. Also, the company's latest Quadro products include features such as Unified GPU Architecture, CUDA and Shader Model 4.0 Support, I/O scalability and performance, and NVIDIA's nView advanced display software.

The new Quadro FX motherboard GPU comes to support Intel's latest processors, including Pentium D, Pentium 4, Core 2 Quad, Core 2 Duo, Celeron D and Celeron. It provides 1 dual-link DVI, while the 4 memory DIMMs can support a maximum of 4GB of memory. The Quadro FX 370 Low Profile graphics card is featured with a total memory of 256MB, 8 CUDA Parallel processor cores and 8 GB/s.

Coming with a manufacturer's suggested retail price of US$149, the new low-profile Quadro FX 370 GPU appears to be the best high-performance graphics solution for low-cost professional workstation solutions. The Quadro 470 GPU motherboard has been set to come at an MSRP of US$700.

Source: news.softpedia.com

.NET Framework 4.0 and Dublin

At the end of September 2008, Microsoft unveiled that the next versions of Visual Studio and .NET Framework would span across not only the client and server operating systems but also across services and devices. Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 are expected to drop either in late 2009 or by the first half of 2010, even though Microsoft failed to confirm a delivery deadline. As far as the next iteration of its runtime environment is concerned, Microsoft is cooking .NET Framework 4.0 while planning a synchronization with the evolution of Windows Server, namely Windows Server Dublin.

“Updates to the next versions of Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) and Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) are focused on reducing complexity for developers by providing better support for Web 2.0 technologies like REST, POX and ATOM, and increasing performance and scalability in the process. In fact, early tests show these improvements to WCF and WF are, at a minimum, enabling 10X the perf and scalability - and to think we’re still fine tuning here! Second, 'Dublin' makes it easier to deploy, manage and scale these next-generation applications,” explained Steven Martin, Director, CSD Product Management Microsoft.

Windows Server "Dublin" is a collection of enhanced capabilities added to the Windows server platform which will expand to also take Internet Information Services (IIS) to the next level. The end purpose of the improvements planned for the Windows Application Server is to permit developers to handle composite applications in a much simpler way than they can today. Microsoft is in fact looking to streamline processes including installation and management as well as the scalability of composite solutions.

“We will deliver a Community Technology Preview (CTP) of Windows Workflow Foundation, Windows Communication Foundation, and 'Dublin' technologies at the Professional Developers Conference in October 2008; this will allow us to begin receiving broader feedback from customers and partners. We are committed to driving and prioritizing our development efforts based upon customer and partner feedback; the feedback from this CTP and other customer programs will help inform us as to the exact timing of our beta and RTM,” Microsoft indicated via the Dublin NET 4 Overview whitepaper.

.NET Framework 3.5 Service Pack 1 (SP1) is available for download here.

Source: news.softpedia.com

Call of Duty: World At War Xbox 360 Beta Is Now Open

Call of Duty: World at War is definitely shaping up to be a great title. Although the developer of the game, Treyarch, was severely disapproved when it announced that it would have the shooter franchise back to World War II, after the huge success of the latest title which took place in contemporary times, CoD 4: Modern Warfare, the game does look pretty good.

We have already posted our impressions of the PC multiplayer beta stage, and now it seems that the team at Treyarch decided to make the Xbox 360 version of the beta stage open to everyone. Everyone who has an Xbox Live Gold membership, of course, but Silver subscribers might get the chance to play it after a few days. Before this, a special token was required to download the multiplayer client and join in on the battles of CoD., token which you received if you were a registered user on the official CoD website.

“The Xbox 360 Multiplayer Beta went public this morning on Xbox Live Marketplace. Now all your friends and neighbors can join in the online mayhem and see how deadly you've become during your time fighting during the exclusive Beta period,” read the official announcement on the CoD website.

This is definitely great news for the people who wanted to see if the game was worth buying this very busy holiday season. One of the key features for the previous title was the very well built multiplayer mode and the fact that it was very balanced, offering players a great experience. This new title promises to bring an even greater online experience, mainly because it will feature more modes of play and that the factions involved will be very individualized.

For those of you who don't know, CoD: World at War is the fifth title in the franchise, and the first one not to be developed by Infinity Ward, the creators of the series. Its action will follow the events in the Pacific Ocean during the Second World War and the battles in Berlin. It promises to give players a unique look on the battles of WWII and hopes that it will clear the name for all war based shooters which have really been saturating the market for a while now.

Considering the multiplayer mode and the fact that Treyarch tried really hard to offer an even more motivating single player story, this game looks very promising in the eyes of gamers.

Source: news.softpedia.com

Registry Tweaks to Enhance Your Windows XPerience

Registry Tweaks to Enhance Your Windows XPerience Registry workarounds for tedious, but useful XP optimizations. You may ask yourselves, why should this article be any different from all those tweaking tutorials around the Internet or, better yet, why should you read this when you can install a program that does it all for you? Here's why: this article will help you make important changes to your system with just two windows opened: this one and a notepad. That's all! No need to click your way through dozens of windows, no need to go through the risk of pushing the wrong button and crashing your operating system.

Furthermore, you don't have to pay a single cent! Why pay for a program to do what you yourselves can do in just a few seconds? And last but not least, you will be able to choose from a list only the tweaks that you're interested in and then apply them on any computer, at any time with just a double-click. Tweaking can hardly get any easier than that! Think how cool that would be, especially after reinstalling Windows.

Let's start by creating the file that will do all the magic. Right-click on your desktop, create a new text document and name it tweaks.reg. Windows will ask if you're sure that you want to change the file extension – click Yes. Right-click the file and choose Edit: a blank notepad window will appear. There are two things you must keep in mind: first of all, for the magic to work your text document must start with 'Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00'. Secondly, later on, be very patient when copying something to paste it in your document. If you copy an incomplete text, the tweak will not work and you might alter other system settings.

As for the pieces of advice that will make your work easier when creating the tweaking file, just keep in mind two things: remember the purpose of each line (you can use comment lines in which you can write whatever you like as long as they start with a semicolon) and, of course, know that there's no problem in leaving a few lines empty between each tweak, to help you differentiate them.

Now here's a list of system tweaks for you to choose from. The idea is quite simple: I'll provide a few lines (the tweak) and a short explanation for what they do. If you're interested in seeing the tweak applied to your computer, all you have to do is paste the lines at the bottom (no, you can't paste them anywhere you like) of your tweaks.reg file.

To make sure I've got your attention, in this article I’ll post optimizations that are either impossible to apply in a conventional way (from Windows Explorer or Control Panel, for example) or possible, but pretty tedious, so getting your hands dirty in less known parts of Windows would normally be necessary in order to apply them.

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/Policies/Explorer]
"NoLowDiskSpaceChecks"=dword:00000001

It will deactivate the annoying "Low Disk Space" message that appears in your system tray each time one of your drives is almost full.

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/SOFTWARE/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/policies/system]
"NoInternetOpenWith"=dword:00000001

This baby will remove the window that always pops up when you try opening a file that is not assigned to a program, asking you if you wish to go online and find out which program you should use to open that type of file. After applying this patch, you’ll see just the Open With window.

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/Explorer/CabinetState]
"Use Search Asst"="no"

I don't know about you, but I'm a big fan of the old, classic search, without any "assistants." So if you don't like the Windows XP default search interface and prefer the classic from its predecessors, just add these lines to your tweaks.reg file.

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Control Panel/Sound]
"Beep"="no"
"ExtendedSounds"="no"

If you haven't got the chance to install a sound driver, you've surely noticed the annoying beeps made by your motherboard each time an alert window pops up. After applying this tweak, you won't need to worry about these beeps anymore.

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT/lnkfile]
"IsShortcut"=-
[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT/piffile]
"IsShortCut"=-

Add this tweak to your list if you don't want your Windows XP to constantly add the shortcut arrow each time you create a shortcut.

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/Windows/Current/Version/Explorer/Advanced]
"ShowInfoTip"=dword:00000000

If you find the tool tips containing information displayed by Windows when hovering a file with your mouse rather bothersome, adding this optimization to your tweaks.reg file will help you get rid of them.

I'll stop here and be back soon to continue my list with a lot more interesting tweaks in a future article. So all you have to do now is save the contents of the tweaks.reg window, close it and then double-click it. Windows will ask if you wish to add the information stored in tweaks.reg to your registry. If you're sure you've followed each step correctly, go right ahead and press Yes.

In the meantime, if you know any other cool tweaks or had problems creating the tweaks file, just post a comment to this article and have your say.

Source: news.softpedia.com

Sysinternals Update: Process Monitor 2.01 for Vista and XP

Sysinternals Update: Process Monitor 2.01 for Vista and XP But also DebugView 4.76, AccessChk 4.21, Autoruns 9.35. Microsoft Technical Fellow Mark Russinovich and Bryce Cogswell, software architects in the Core Operating Systems Division, introduced the 2.0 major update to Process Monitor at the end of September 2008. Now, the tool has been taken one step further to version 2.01, this time just a minor refresh designed mainly to deal with a few issues associated with v2.0. The Process Monitor 2.01 release is an integral part of a larger update of the Sysinternals suite involving other three applications: Autoruns 9.35, DebugView 4.76, and AccessChk 4.21.

“Process Monitor v2.01 - this release fixes several bugs, including compatibility with Windows 2000, excessive exit delays, and adds the new networking events to the filter dialog's operations list,” explained Curtis Metz, Program Manager, Microsoft Sysinternals. Back in September, version 2.0 of Process Monitor brought real-time TCP and UDP monitoring.

Delivering network tracing capabilities to Process Monitor was Russinovich's next step in the evolution of the utility. Taking Process Monitor from version 1.0 to 2.0 involved adding new low-level capabilities, such as a stronger focus on system memory usage in addition to network tracing.

“Autoruns 9.35 - this Autoruns update adds additional autostart locations, including lsastart, s0initialization, savedumpstart, and servicecontrollerstart, and fixes several bugs,” Metz added. “DebugView 4.76 - debugview no longer truncates the last character of each line of a log file when it loads one back into the display. AccessChk 4.21 - this fixes a bug in the code that checks for malformed security descriptors that could cause spurious warnings.”

The new versions of the four updated utilities have also caused the entire Sysinternals Suite to be refreshed. As of October 16, Microsoft is serving a new release of the Sysinternals Suite now complete with all the touched-up utilities: Process Monitor 2.01, DebugView 4.76, AccessChk 4.21, Autoruns 9.35.

Process Monitor 2.01 is available for download here.
The Sysinternals Suite is available for download here.

Source: news.softpedia.com

Download Process Monitor 2.0 for Vista and XP

At the start of September 2008, Microsoft Technical Fellow Mark Russinovich revealed that he was cooking a major update for Process Monitor, one of the components of the Sysinternals suite. As of September 30, version 2.0 of Process Monitor became available for download. The description of the tool authored by Mark Russinovich and Bryce Cogswell reveals that Process Monitor 2.0 is designed to integrate seamlessly with both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows 2000 SP4 with Update Rollup 1, Windows XP SP2, Windows Server 2003 SP1, and Windows Vista.

“Process Monitor v2.0: this major update to Process Monitor adds real-time TCP and UDP monitoring to its existing process, thread, DLL, file system and registry monitoring. You can now see the TCP and UDP activity processes performed, including the operation (e.g. connect, send, receive), local and remote IP addresses and DNS names, and operation transfer lengths. On Windows Vista, Process Monitor also collects thread stacks for network operations,” revealed Curtis Metz, Program Manager, Microsoft Sysinternals.

Concomitantly with the new release of Process Monitor 2.0, the entire Sysinternals suite was update and is also available for download. Russinovich refreshed two additional utilitoes on top of Process Monitor 2.0, namely Sigcheck and Contig. “Sigcheck v1.54: this Sigcheck release fixes a bug in CSV output formatting. Contig v1.55: Contig now supports the -accepteula command-line switch,” Metz added.

Via Process Monitor 2.0, users will be able to monitor in real time the file system of the Windows operating system along with the platform's registry and process/thread activity. Back in early September, Russinovich promised that Process Monitor would indeed evolve with the addition of new low-level capabilities, including a more intimate focus on memory usage, while at the same time delivering network tracing to the utility.

Process Monitor 2.0 is available for download here.
The Sysinternals Suite is available for download here.

Source: news.softpedia.com

Insight on Network Monitor 3.2 RTM

Version 3.2 of Network Monitor is being offered as an update to v3.1, but in this regard, the utility is also nothing like the 2.x releases. Tawanda Sibanda, the lead program manager for Network Monitor indicated that Network Monitor 3.2 was produced through a consistent effort of the Netmon team that worked to integrate into the product all the feedback it had received from customers. At the same time, Netmon 3.2 delivers the inherent bug fixes as well as a necessary boost in stability. Network Monitor 3.2 is designed to support Windows Vista, Windows XP, Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2008.

“So What’s New in Network Monitor 3.2? Process Tracking: Now you can identify rogue applications sending network data! View all the processes on your machine generating network traffic (process name and PID). Use the conversation tree to view frames associated with each process. Capture engine re-architecture to improve capture rate in high-speed networks. Network Monitor 3.2 drops significantly fewer frames that Network Monitor 3.1,” revealed Sibanda.

At the explicit request of its users, Microsoft implemented the “Find conversations” capabilities. With version 3.2, frames can be easily isolated in the same network conversation, Sibanda explained. The new iteration of Netmon is capable of parsing over 300 protocols, with Microsoft ensuring a high degree of customization when it comes down to the parsers. In this context, Networtk Monitor 3.2 also offers improved parser management, as users are permitted to expand the default parsers to the full set.

In addition, “in the upcoming months, we plan to place all our Windows parsers on the Microsoft open-source CodePlex site and allow the community to modify and contribute parsers. This version of Network Monitor seamlessly integrates new parser packages. [Network Monitor 3.2 also delivers] Network Monitor API: Create your own applications that capture, parse and analyze network traffic! More extensive documentation of the API and NPL. Access the documentation from Help > NPL and API Documentation. IA64 builds. PCAP capture file support. ContainsBin Plug-in: Search frames for arbitrary byte sequences or strings,” Sibanda added.

Microsoft Network Monitor 3.2 RTM is available for download here.
By: Marius Oiaga

New Windows 7 Tools and Features - Announced for TechEd EMEA 2008 and PDC2008

Microsoft is not only “raising the volume” on the references related to the upcoming Windows 7 Beta development milestone, but it is also no longer drastically limiting the amount of shared information on the next iteration of the Windows client. With Windows 7 specifics planned to be fully detailed in under two months, the Redmond giant has offered another taste of what is in store for the operating system. The successor of Windows Vista will sport an evolved User Account Control, complete with Software Restriction Policies version 2, a new Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit as well as a fresh Windows 7-based Surface software development kit.

According to what the company has already revealed, Windows 7 will come to the table with next-generation graphics infrastructure, touch computing capabilities, energy consumption optimizations and a new networking application programming interface designed to permit developers to build web services in native code. But the evolution of Windows 7 will span across all areas of the operating system including virtualization, security, search, networking, management, deployment etc. A sneak peek at what will be available in Windows 7 is offered through the agendas of the TechEd 2008 EMEA and PDC 2008 conferences.

At the beginning of this week the Redmond company has announced new Windows 7 tools and features, with the promise to deliver additional details at the upcoming TechEd EMEA 2008 and the Professional Developer Conference 2008. For PDC2008, the number of Windows 7 sessions has grown to 5 with the addition of the Developing for Microsoft Surface presentation (Presenter: Brad Carpenter).

“This session introduces the newly available Surface SDK that forms the basis of the Windows 7 multi-touch programming model. In addition, learn about the unique attributes of Surface computing and then dive into the core controls like ScatterView and vision-system tagging. Learn how you can become a part of the expanding partner ecosystem for Surface computing and leverage your existing investments in Windows Presentation Foundation and Microsoft Visual Studio,” reads the abstract of the session.

But while Microsoft has promised that PDC2008 will offer a comprehensive insight into Windows 7, for the time being it is TechEd 2008 EMEA that has all the “juicy details.” For TechEd EMEA 2008 there are no less than 11 sessions announced, recently adding four to the original 7, namely Windows 7 Security, User Account Control (UAC) and Software Restriction Policies v2 (SRP); Windows 7 Fundamentals; Windows 7 Networking: Branch Offices and Get Involved - Building the Next-Generation Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit for Virtualization, Windows 7, and more.

“Windows 7 networking features support distributed enterprises. In this session we will discuss the networking features of Windows 7, explore their usage scenarios and understand how to manage them in an enterprise environment. Interactive Sessions are designed as an opportunity for dialogue between presenter(s) and audience. Please come prepared with questions on the session's topic to discuss with the presenter(s). Interactive Sessions will have less use of PowerPoint push out to the audience and more discussion,” reads the abstract for the Windows 7 Networking: Branch Offices session presented by Devrim Iyigun (Okurgan), Sandeep Singhal.

Microsoft's Steve Hiskey will focus on the new User Account Control in Windows 7, as well as the version 2 of Software Restriction Policies and their respective evolution from what is available today in Windows Vista SP1. Baldwin Ng, senior product manager, Microsoft Solution Accelerators, will present the next-gen Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit which will be tailored to Windows 7.

“Windows 7 Fundamentals - This session will define Windows Fundamentals, discussing Microsoft's focus on Fundamentals for Windows 7 and provide an overview of the Platform, Tools, Telemetry investments and broader ecosystem outreach efforts designed to ensure Windows 7 ships with the highest level of quality,” indicates the abstract of the Windows 7 Fundamentals session presented by Erik Lustig.
By: Marius Oiaga

Gunbound 606

Gunbound is a game that like Worms - only this time played with tanks. GunBound is about an endless war fought with one-person-driven vehicles called Mobiles. In Lond, 16 special Mobiles are tested carefully depending on the region they will be used in.

With the many unique types of armour, we open the game to you, so you can develop crafty (and even sneaky!) new strategies. the Moondisk also chandes the gravity on each map, making it necessary to estimate how the atmosphere will alter how you fire. It's important to use your weapons well and adapt quickly, or you wil surely lose quickly!

Each turn, you have a lot of different options available. You can shoot, or you can hide by burying yourself in the ground, like a bunker.

All of these things make the game dynamic, and help the game come alive for players! Players can choose any mobile they want, dress their avatar in any fashion they choose, and enter battle! And if you win, you even bonus points, allowing you to dress in better clothes.

Remember, winning is important, but you must also please the crowds, so dressing well also helps you earn more money -"bad" players can win, but this does not mean they will get a lot of points!

NETWORK: GunBound gives you fast, easy access using its special network system. This turn-based game is so fast paced, you will actualy think it's real time!
Gunbound is available for download here.

Counter-Strike 1.6

Counter-Strike 1.6 is a MOD for Half-Life that is set in a teamplay mode. Play the world's number 1 online action game. Engage in an incredibly realistic brand of terrorist warfare in this wildly popular team-based game. Ally with teammates to complete strategic missions.

Take out enemy sites. Rescue hostages. Your role affects your team's success. Your team's success affects your role.

There is only one outcome in each scenario and you will have to prove your allegiance every time you pull the trigger.

Requirements:
Minimum
· 500 mhz processor
· 96mb ram
· 16mb video card
· Windows 2000/XP
· Mouse
· Keyboard
· Internet Connection

Recommended
· 800 mhz processor
· 128mb ram
· 32mb+ video card
· Windows 2000/XP
· Mouse
· Keyboard
· Internet Connection

Note: This is a Steam installer, which means you need to have Steam on your computer and a valid copy of Half-Life
Counter-Strike 1.6 is available for download here.