The Zone

Intel's performance notebook processor, the Centrino 2 has hit the streets, with plenty notebook makers already beginning the churn out for notebooks with the Centrino 2 processor. We were quite surprised by its performance because it not only tries its best to beat out equal desktop systems, it is also quite successful. Check out the PCMark05 score below. For the full-blown analysis check it out in our September issue of HWM.

After AMD-ATI put out the HD 4870 and HD 4850 it seemed as if it was directly challenging NVIDIA with the HD 4870 against NVIDIA's own GTX 260. NVIDIA has never been one to take this lying down and has fired back a salvo of its own with the 9800 GT, which according to our tests should be nicely positioned against the previously unchallenged HD 4850. Check out our 3DMark06 test below. For a full review and analysis of some of the 9800 GT cards out there, check out our latest issue of HWM (HWM September 2008).

Phew! What a tiring weekend it was at the second PIKOM PC Fair of the year! With more bargains ranging from USB flashdrives to monitors, printers, and even notebooks now, it really is a place to go to if you're needing new tech toys. Here's a photo compilation of what we saw over the weekend! Hit the jump for more images. 

Howdy folks. HWM was recently invited to a regional product launch in Beijing courtesy of HP Malaysia and we sure liked what we saw

Times are hard on me

There is nothing but a mess

Of TVs and DVDs

LOL

Look out for the review of the Pioneer DVR DVD recorder in next month's HWM!

zerotau posted a picture of his workplace the other day, so I thought I'd do the same myself. :D It's not as messy but what's not pictured are the 10 or so product boxes aptly "boxing" me in my cubicle. I'll spare you the utter cluttersome of my workplace surroundings and just quickly describe what's on my desk.

Last month I had to review 5 AMD motherboards and I thought I wouldn't have to write so many reviews of the same type of product for a while.

I thought wrong. OTL

This month seems to be the month of notebooks, as those are mostly what have been given to me to review for the October issue of HWM - 2 normal size notebooks, 3 ultra portable notebooks. In addition, I've 3 graphic cards, 2 motherboards, and a SFF PC sitting idly on my desk, all waiting to be tested. Yikes. There goes my weekend.

Out of all 5 notebooks, only one of them sports the latest AMD Turion 64X2 processor. Can you guess which one is it? ;)

Nothing so sinister about that, actually as the "G" in question is Logitech's first gaming keyboard; the G15! Oh yeah, baby, typing on this super soft keyboard is a charm, but as for gaming, this one is uncapable of creating macros, let alone spare some time for fragging undead zombies on his ancient PC, so this one will just let you drool over some pics for now....

The cool LCD and multimedia buttons......don't ask about the ram; my machine is on XP yet has lesser than 512MB of physical memory LOL

Hullo, missed me? :D I didn't update the blog last week since I was in Singapore (courtesy of Sendi Mutiara Multimedia) to check out the debut of Hellgate: London and Granado Espada at the IAH Game Conference.

I got to try out both games and they're sweet, especially Hellgate: London. It was really fun hacking and slashing hordes of demon, and the first-person view when using ranged weapons really felt like an FPS even though I was shooting all over the place.

Developers Bill Roper and Kim Hakkyu were like superstars at the event; dozens of people were asking them to autograph their Hellgate/Granado T-shirts and posters (I, too, also asked for their autographs). With so many game journalists circling them constantly, I was lucky enough to get one-on-one interviews with both Bill Roper and Kim Hakkyu, so look forward to their interviews in the upcoming GameAxis issues.

It wasn't all fun and games as upon returning home to Malaysia, a few sample products came in the mail for me to review. Here're a couple of stuff that you can look forward to next month's issue of HWM:

Surprise, surprise! When we thought that were were one of the last countries to recieve cool gadgets, Samsung relieves us of our gadget thirst and launched the K5 just about a week ago. Undoubtedly one of the cooler MP3 players to own, it sports touch-sensitive keys, an OLED display, sizes in 2GB and 4GB, super sound quality, and built-in speakers to boot!

More after the jump

Last week, we attended Logitech's launch of their latest lineup of desktop and gaming peripherals. Lots of drool-worthy stuff for gamers and PC users were on-display for the media to try out. Check out the pics! (More)

We're back at the last PC Fair for this year, and we'll reward you with even more great stuff than before! Subscription gifts include Lexmark printers, USB TV boxes, and high quality photo paper for HWM subscribers, and for GameAxis peeps, you'll recieve a Bagman bag worth RM119 with every subscription of GameAxis. That's a real sweet deal! We will be at booths 504 and 505 @ Hall 5, at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre from the 1st to 3rd December!

*Terms and conditions after the jump

For those who were wondering where we went for last couple of days, we were actually quite drunk and pretty much wasted, and got stuck in a nudist camp near Dover after waking up. This small misadventure is primarily thanks to our smashing 4th Brand Survey Awards cum Anniversary night last Thursday. Held at one of the ballrooms at the Sheraton Subang, it was a fun filled night, especially with our invited seamstress, who put stitches in every one present! More pictures after the jump!

Does this animal look cute to you? With its beady eyes and slightly snickering smile, it looks a bit scary to me, in fact. Truth is, it (or rather, he) is the new Toshiba mascot for their IT product line, and yes, he's a seal. Like what you have been reading on other technorati blogs, Toshiba has finally launched the new Pala-chan MP3 player in Malaysia, along with their latest notebook range and branding strategy. More after the jump!

• Asus Striker Extreme motherboard: RM1700
• x2 Asus Graphic Card 8800 GTX: RM4600
• Corsair Dominator 2GB 800MHz RAM: RM1500 
• Intel Core 2 Extreme QX6700 2.66GHz Quad Core processor: RM3500+

Total cost: RM11300+

System being devoured by the power tentacles of a CoolerMaster 850W PSU? Priceless

XD