MODDING: blogs

The World Health Organization raised the influenza epidemic level from 4 to 5 on Wednesday, signalling that a pandemic is imminent, and urged countries to implement their pandemic plans.

The annoucement came as the number of people infected with swine flu increased rapidly across the world Wednesday, and health officials scrambled to get more information about the virus — which has no vaccine. “It's a virus that we've never seen before,” said Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. “There's no background immunity in the population, and it is spreading from human to human, all of which has the potential for a pandemic.”

The Swiss low noise cooling solution provider ARCTIC COOLING today announced the launch of the Alpine 64 Pro, a new product of the acclaimed Alpine 64 series for AMD CPUs. Same as other Alpines, the Alpine 64 Pro offers outstanding price/performance ratio for mainstream users. The Alpine 64 Pro comes backed by a 6-year limited warranty. It will be available in May 2009 with an MSRP of just
$10.90 here in the United States.

The Alpine 64 Pro features a lot of high standard components. The 92mm fan comes with PWM function, which controls the fan speed, and thus, lowers the noise level to a minimum according to the CPU load. The PWM function guarantees sufficient cooling at the lowest noise level possible and saves energy simultaneously. Together with the patented fan case, low noise impeller and the vibration absorption, the Alpine 64 Pro is as quiet as 0.4 Sone at full speed (2,000 rpm).

Sharkoon unveils its SilentStorm power supply series featuring a new design with modular cable system, 135mm fan and in three different power ratings: 460, 560 and 660W. There are 4 separate 12V rails producing 72 amps with a maximum efficiency rating of 84 percent. Sharkoon SilentStorm CM will be available in mid May with prices ranging from 79.90 euro to 99.9 euro.

ARCTIC COOLING releases the Alpine 64 Pro for AMD AM3, AM2+, AM2, 939 CPUs. The 92mm fan comes with PWM function, which controls the fan speed, and thus, lowers the noise level to a minimum according to the CPU load. It will be available in May 2009 for US$10.9 and 7.60 (excl. VAT).

EVGA GeForce GTS 250 Video Card Review @ motherboards.org and other reviews from around the web can be found by visiting our forums!

EVGA offers the best support on the planet for most of their cards. A 2-year warranty may not seem like much but the fact remains that few people have video cards longer than 2 years, especially for those that want the higher end cards and need a hold me over card until the next generation of cards are released or they can afford a new card with the features and performance that the GTS 250 would offer. This card really blew me away in terms of overclocking as I was able to overclock the card to 958MHz stably without visual artifacts. The Step-Up program is a nice touch especially if NVIDIA releases a new card between now and 90 days from now or if you want to upgrade to a GTX275/285. This card is online for a price of $149.99 currently from Newegg and it performs pretty well in standard testing and game play. Its overclocking abilities are what make this card stand apart from its peers as it excels in that arena, earning it an Editor's Choice product.

BIOSTAR launched VA4775ND51 graphics card based on ATI HD4770 GPU. It comes with 128-bit 512MB of GDDR5 memory interface at a clock of 800MHz. It has 640 SPs clocked at 750MHz.

OCZ unveiled the new Silencer 910 power supply from PC Power & Cooling that has earned the 80+ Silver Certification. The Silencer delivers 910 Watts of continuous power and 1KW at its peak, and offers a temperature rating of 50C. Featuring a powerful Single Rail +12VDC (74A), and complete array of connectors including quad PCI-Express, 24-pin, dual 8-pin, and 4/8-pin motherboard connectors, this PSU can power an array of high end components.

OCZ unveiled the new Silencer 910 power supply from PC Power & Cooling that has earned the 80+ Silver Certification. The Silencer delivers 910 Watts of continuous power and 1KW at its peak, and offers a temperature rating of 50C. Featuring a powerful Single Rail +12VDC (74A), and complete array of connectors including quad PCI-Express, 24-pin, dual 8-pin, and 4/8-pin motherboard connectors, this PSU can power an array of high end components.

Nokia’s upcoming launch of the Ovi Store in the US will not, apparently, come with carrier billing – the ability to have any purchases added to your phone bill, as opposed to inputting credit card details into the system. To be fair, no other on-device store has this facility in America, so Nokia aren’t being unduly penalised in not having this feature. But it does create another step in the process for the end user, and the seamless experience Nokia were planning on isn’t quite in place in that territory. Read on for more.

LG has announced their new series of Home Theatre Systems, LCD and Plasma TVs designed to enhance user’s lifestyle. The products include LG LH50 and LH70 Full HD LCD TVs, LG HB954PB Blu-ray Home Theatre System and LG BD370 Blu-ray player.