JDRucker - Slashdot User

Submission + - Self-Contained PC Liquid Coolers Explored (hothardware.com)

Submitted by

MojoKid

on Thursday December 15, 2011 @02:18PM

MojoKid writes: "Over the last few years an increasing number of liquid coolers have been positioned as high-end alternatives to traditional heatsink and fan combinations. This has been particularly true in the boutique and high-end PC market, where a number of manufacturers now offer liquid coolers in one form or another. These kits are a far cry from the water coolers enthusiasts have been building for years. DIY water coolers typically involve separate reservoirs and external pumps. The systems tested here, including Intel's OEM cooler that was released with their Sandy Bridge-E CPU, contain significantly less fluid and use small pumps directly integrated into the cooling block as a self-contained solution. Integrated all-in-one kits may not offer the theoretical performance of a high-end home-built system, but they're vastly easier to install and require virtually no maintenance. The tradeoffs are more than fair, provided that the coolers perform as advertised."

Submission + - World of Warcraft Finally Loses Subscribers (ign.com)

Submitted by bonch on Tuesday August 16, 2011 @07:06PM

bonch writes: After seven years and a highpoint of 12 million subscribers, World of Warcraft has seen a loss of nearly one million subscribers in the last six months for the first time in its history, according to Blizzard CEO Mike Morhaime during an Activision earnings call. However, the game remains the most popular MMO, and Morhaime said Blizzard plans to reverse the trend with fresh content. Some believe that the loss in subscriber interest is a sign of the game's inevitable twilight years. Blizzard also recently received the trademark Mists of Pandaria, fueling speculation for the next expansion pack.

Submission + - Rage and The Tech Behind Id Tech 5 (hothardware.com)

Submitted by

MojoKid

on Tuesday August 16, 2011 @05:05PM

MojoKid writes: "id Software's long-awaited FPS, Rage, is set to ship in October. When it launches, Rage will be the first game to feature id's newest graphics engine, dubbed id Tech 5. id Tech 5 has evolved considerably since the company started talking about it four years ago, however. While it contains a number of additional features, MegaTexturing remains one of the game's most visible advances. MegaTexturing uses a single large texture to map the terrain of an entire area. Data from that texture is streamed in depending on where the player is standing and what's visible. Effects that would normally be blended in traditional tiled texturing can be baked into the megatexture and streamed off disc when needed. The advantage of megatexturing is that it allows artists to create unique environments rather than resorting to a variety of tricks to hide repetitive texture tiles."

Submission + - Six-Drive SATA III SSD Round-up Shows Big Gains (hothardware.com)

Submitted by

MojoKid

on Tuesday July 12, 2011 @07:12PM

MojoKid writes: "Solid State Drives have gone from essentially non-existent on the desktop to the preferred storage medium of enthusiasts and workstation professionals in less than three years. Three of the drives featured in this six-drive SATA III SSD round-up consistently offered "best-of-class" performance throughout testing, with speeds in excess of 500MB/s for read and write througput. OCZ's Vertex 3 Max IOPS, Corsair's Force GT, and the Patriot Wildfire all feature the same SandForce SF-2281 controller and synchronous NAND flash memory. These drives offered the highest transfer rates in the majority of tests, though performance does drop off as the data gets more incompressible."

Comment Re:Begging (Score 3, Funny) 255

by JDRucker on Monday January 03, 2011 @11:06AM (#34743616) Attached to: Wikipedia Meets $16M Budget Goal

But NPR doesn't have a creepy stare hovering over you as you watch all of their content.

Submission + - With World Watching, Wikileaks Falls Into Disrepai (wired.com)

Submitted by JDRucker on Thursday July 01, 2010 @03:47AM

JDRucker writes: Supporters are concerned. Very concerned. Would-be whistle-blowers hoping to leak documents to Wikileaks face a potentially frustrating surprise. Wikileaks’ submission process, which had been degraded for months, completely collapsed more than two weeks ago and remains offline, in a little-noted breakdown at the world’s most prominent secret-spilling website.

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