Here’s to the launching of Tech ARP’s official blog site. Yup. That’s right. Prepare for more techno babbles from the team soon.
Yes, the forums helps but it’s just not enough! We simply just have too many things to say! Blah… I better stop now before Adrian throws me out for defacing this blog from the beginning. 
Until the next post.
I think I've nailed the customizations for WordPress and should be good enough for now. I love the fact that you can easily edit files within the administration page of WordPress itself, be it for the theme templates and even the CSS files. Very cool feature.
Anyways. Do comment on the site and let us know what you think about it. You can even let us know what you would like to see from this site? More news? More personal thoughts? Techno babbles? A sneak peek into Adrian's personal life? What he eats for lunch, dinner and supper?
Btw, remember to check out the latest updates to the Desktop Graphics Card Comparison Guide Rev. 11.0! This is literally the most comprehensive database of desktop graphics card comparisons.
If you still haven't check it out, you ought to. And especially so if you are looking at getting a card or just checking out the specifications of any particular card.
That's all from me for now. The rest of the team should begin to post their entries too.
Recently, Adrian and I attended the ITJourno Forums where several vendors and IT media and publications come together in an (literally) isolated place to sit down and talk and discuss on issues and trends in the Information Technology industry. This time around, the topics were more towards the business perspective. It turned out to be quite interesting for me because of my role at IBM and some of the things that were discussed pretty much revolves around the things that I do at IBM. Read the rest of this entry »
A vendor also touched on Open Source at the ITJourno forums which Ken and I attended recently. For some reason, I don't quite understand why people keep emphasizing that open source is both cheaper and better.
Don't get me wrong. I have nothing against open source software. But I do think there are still many misconceptions about it. Sometimes, I feel they are intentionally propagated by open source advocates/companies.
For example, many people actually think open source software is FREE software. Vendors can and do charge a lot of money for open source software. That's because open source has NOTHING to do with the commercial aspect of the software. Read the rest of this entry »
Intel's new VPro platform is quite interesting for SMB (Small & Medium Businesses) because it comes with Intel's Active Management Technology (AMT) which allows a PC to remotely check another PC on the network, even if that PC has been powered down!
You don't even have to boot it up to check it out. The VPro platform allows you to check the status of the remote PC without booting it up. According to Intel, you can even remotely reconfigure the hard drive, install an operating system from a CD in a local drive and boot up the remote PC without even moving your ass from your chair!
Now, that's really something… As long as it's a software issue, you need not lift your butt off that comfortable chair. With any luck, this will allow you to break in your nice leather seat, and catch up on some Zzzzz.
If you are using a notebook, you will be glad to know that this technology will not be restricted to the desktop. A new chipset for the Centrino mobile platform will be released sometime in the middle of next year, and it will come with Active Management Technology.
In my line of work which is along the line of a bit of testing software and drivers, creating patch and stuffs and also playing with registry, I had my first preview of the new Microsoft Office 2007 as an assignment recently.
First look, dang… it looks %$#! good. Everything’s spread out at your face. No more trouble and nightmares with all those menus and also toolbars. In Office 2003, you tend to have all those hidden toolbars which you tend to overlook. Or in another words, you don’t even know it’s there. Microsoft said that all the calls that they receive from their technical support department about certain functions and features, they are already supported, you just need to dive deeper into all those toolbars and menus to get what you want. ROTFL!
With the new Office 2007 Beta 2 that I had some walkthrough, it’s really something. Initially I thought it’s just another upgrade with more functions than its predecessor which was already overloaded with features but I was taken by surprise with the new interface of Office 2007. I’ll respect Microsoft for taking a risk in changing the overall how-to-do-things in the Office 2007 and the result is a very clean looking albeit space wasting interface.
Read the rest of this entry »
Now that the merger is official, almost the whole tech community is wondering what we will see in the new future. Will AMD begin to push platforms like what Intel has been doing so successfully? Will we begin to see AMD's logo and presence on ATI's line of Radeon cards immediately for all new stock of GPUs? Will AMD start to use ATI's expertise with chipset fabrication and sell chipsets to motherboard manufacturers like Intel?
On the other hand, will the Radeon line of GPUs begin to actually show up in the market on time as planned with AMD's fabrication capabilities? Will we see more creative ideas and solutions in the lineup of offerings as well?
There are so many questions that are in our minds right now as this merger develops. But I personally think that this is more good than bad. But of course, soon, we shall be able to see how much impact this merger creates for us consumers, hopefully more good than bad.
Yup. It's that time of the year again and tomorrow will be Tech ARP's BBQ get together for year 2006! This time, we will be having it at Adrian's new place! Yeah, so it will be both an the BBQ and also his house-warming party. Haha.
Btw, everyone's invited. All you need is just to bring yourself and some food along with you. Yup, it's also a pot-luck kinda thing as well with everyone chipping in for food and drinks. You can find more info on the event here in the forums.
I was glancing through some websites today and I briefly read something about in-game advertisement. This reminded me a bit about how the business of advertisement has changed over the years. In the past, it's always been on print media; Billboards, newspapers, magazines, and so on. Then there was the mass media of cable televisions, radios and movies. As I thought about it, advertisements don't really care what format or media it rides on. What it cares is where are all the people is and how effective they can deliver messages across.
Therefore, it's only natural that advertisements are beginning to show up a whole lot more than before in games. That's basically where all the people are today anyway! Read the rest of this entry »
Interesting question… Now that the AGEIA PhysX PPU (Physics Processing Unit) is out, what's the verdict? Is it really that useful? Or is it plain useless?
We have been having quite a debate here in the forums - http://forums.techarp.com/showthread.php?t=20827. Here are some choice excerpts :
Without even reading that review it's easy to conclude that just about no software products make proper use of the physics processor at the moment. Since so few processors are sold you can't write wide market software (like games) that require it's presence. A good solution would be to do multiplayer games where only the server/host is required to have it, and the clients/players just benefit from the computed results. - Olle
…keep that in mind when Havok (who has been in the business for a long time) has a physics engine that costs you nothing (except buying the game) but does the same thing but uses spare cycles from your GPU? This physX is a paperweight… - PsYkHoTiK
