Intel Not Going to Wait for Software to Catch Up

Intel wants to always be ahead of what software demands.

Just this year alone (and we've only cleared three months of it), Intel has unleashed an entirely new generation of desktop and mobile mainstream processors, as well as bumped up its enthusiast desktop offering to a hexacore, 12 thread Gulftown CPU. Earlier this week Intel bumped the core count for Nehalem-EX server chips to eight with the ability to process 16 threads.

With this rapid pace of rollout, is there any worry that Intel's hardware performance growth is outpacing the speed of software progression? Intel says it's not worried at all. In fact, it prefers staying ahead of the software demand curve.

"We learned our lesson in waiting for software. We did this 64-bit thing that was perceived to be a little bit late relative to the market. So we will get the hardware out there as soon as it's ready," Kirk Skaugen of Intel's Architecture Group said at the Nehalem-EX launch, according to the Register.

"What drives things mainstream," Skaugen said, "is this 'software spiral' that's been talked about since the early days of Andy Grove. The fact that when we announce new hardware, it creates a software set of innovations that put more pressure on the hardware to create new hardware innovations - and the cycle goes on and on."

Basically, if you build it, they will come.

FIFA 10 PC Case Mod Merges Grilling, Gaming

A case mod that may force you to cook some meat in the back yard.

At first the FIFA 10 PC case mod looked like an April Fool's joke, sporting what seemed to be a backyard BBQ grill somehow housing an Intel-based PC. But after close inspection of the images, this PC-in-a-grill seemed genuine on the surface, and apparently was featured at the German Case Modding Championship. Still, don't let this mod fool you: it doesn't really cook meat.

According to the German FIFA Online website, the PC aspect features an Asus Socket 775 motherboard, Intel's Core 2 Duo processor, 4GB of Corsair TwinX RAM, and AMD's ATI Radeon HD 4870. The PC also contains a possible 1TB HDD (the site said 1GB but that seemed too small), a DVD burner, and a wireless mouse and keyboard that's jazzed up to fit the overall FIFA 10 theme. Microsoft's new Windows 7 Home Edition rounds out this highly unusual package.

As for USB ports, HDMI, and the rig's power connection, the images didn't provide any real detail. But in appearance alone, the case mod lights up with red neon rods as if there's an actual flame within the cooker's "pit." The modders even threw on a few fake pieces of meat just to give it that extra, authentic backyard grill feeling. Hopefully they didn't incorporate any kind of burnt meat smell... that would just be maddening after a few hours.

If your PC looked like a BBQ grill, would you be more inclined to eat throughout the day?

Telenor Deploys Massive Indoor Solution in Lahor

Telenor has recently completed one of biggest indoor active solutions in Asia. Deployed for Lahore Shah-Alam (Azam Cloth Market), this indoor coverage solution is considered as Pakistan’s largest metro site at this point of time.

This is what business community of Azam Cloth Market was dreaming for, where more than 10,000 shops are situated. This huge wholesale and retail market serves the entire country; hundreds and thousands of visitors, buyers and sellers flock to the market every day.

With total of 7 Remote Units and 206 Active Solution Omni Antennas make up whole market, spanning 80 0m radius, covered.

Wii Game Powered by What You Search on Google

A new game for the Nintendo Wii soon to be available in Japan incorporates Google search queries.

The Wii is a great console for playing party games like Wii Sports and Think Fast. Soon Japanese gamers will be playing a new kind of game with the Wii, one that involves the popularity of certain Google search terms.

Siliconera reports that the quiz-like game, dubbed 'And Kensaku,' pulls 10,000 search terms using data from Google. Players then have to guess which terms are more popular in a variety of different games. In one game, whoever picks the phrase with the least amount of hits loses. In another, it's a race and your character runs faster when you pick trendier topics.

And Kensaku hits Japanese stores on April 29 for 4,800 yen ($52). No word on whether or not Nintendo is planning an international release.

Microsoft Releases Out-Of-Band Patch for IE

Microsoft has fixed an emergency drive-by download vulnerability in Internet Explorer 6 and 7

Tuesday Microsoft said that it released MS10-018 "out-of-band" due to an increase in attacks against its two older browsers, Internet Explorer 6 and Internet Explorer 7. Normally Microsoft releases updates via its customary "Patch Tuesday" roundup. However, this rare move served an urgent response to a zero-day, drive-by download vulnerability that has been heavily exploited by attackers over the last several weeks.

According to Microsoft, the patch will address the publicly disclosed vulnerability first revealed on March 9. The problem is caused by an invalid pointer reference located within the two older browsers that can be accessed after an object is deleted-- this can allow attackers to swoop in and initialize remote code execution attacks. At the time, Microsoft claimed that the problem was limited to "targeted" attacks, however that has since changed.

"The most severe vulnerabilities could allow remote code execution if a user views a specially crafted Web page using Internet Explorer," Microsoft said weeks ago. "Users whose accounts are configured to have fewer user rights on the system could be less impacted than users who operate with administrative user rights."

In addition to the zero-day exploit, the latest patch also addresses nine other vulnerabilities that even effect Internet Explorer 8. Microsoft's Jerry Bryan said that many have asked Microsoft if Tuesday's patch addresses the vulnerability that was used in the Pwn2Own contest at the CanSecWest security conference last week. Apparently that's a negative.

"We are still investigating that issue at this time so we do not have an update available," he said. "In accordance with the contest rules, the vulnerabilities used are responsibly disclosed so that the respective vendors can produce updates to protect their customers before the vulnerabilities can be used by criminals. Microsoft continues to encourage responsible disclosure and we are a sponsor of the CanSecWest conference because we believe in working closely with security researchers to protect customers and the entire computing ecosystem."