2.4 GHz Phenom Available in December

The Phenom family has taken AMD through a lot of pain since the official unveiling. We have talked about the TLB errata that affect any Phenom running at more than 2.3 GHz to cause serious
faults in the L3 cache allocation. Finally, this makes the whole system freeze, and of course, users tear the hairs off their heads.

The Phenom 9700 series could not make it to the market because of this issue and has been postponed until further orders. However, a leaked AMD internal note revealed that AMD Phenom 9700, 2.4 GHz processor is to become available starting mid-December. The Phenom 9600 series to run at 2.3GHz has been slated for general availability starting the first quarter of the next year.

AMD's desktop product marketing manager Michael Saucier confirmed that all the Phenoms are subject to the same TLB issue and that AMD is currently working on a microcode fix. This patch would decrease the 9700's performance with up to 10 percent, to maintain the maximum CPU clock under 2.4 GHz.

The chip maker has launched the Spider platform back in November. It included the Phenom processor, the RD790 chipset and the RV670 graphics processor, and shortly after, MSI announced the first Phenom-Ready motherboard built around the RD790 chipset, the MSI K9A2 Platinum. Asus and Gigabyte motherboards to support Phenom quad-core processors (as well as the "defective" tri-cores) have been announced since early October.

The Phenom 9700 is about to land, which should be a reason to celebrate. Nevertheless, it seems that the MSI K9A2 Platinum, which is the favorite Phenom-Ready motherboard at AMD, is not to be found at all on the market. Moreover, rumors had it that there was a design error and the motherboard manufacturing had been ceased. MSI however denied the allegations and made it clear that the board was in high demand and had sold out. The manufacturer will start shipping again next week, just in time for the arrival of the 9700 Phenom.

Santa Offers Support for Your Holiday Gift via Microsoft

Do you need support for your holiday gift? Well, the Redmond company is quite in a jolly mood, seeing as the holiday spirit will manage to drive up the adoption of its products. And with a healthy line-up of offerings available this Christmas, Microsoft is not just going to let consumers out hanging. So, the inauguration of the Holiday Support Center comes as an extra bonus for your holiday shopping, provided that your gift has the Microsoft logo on it. The support center is nothing more than a collection of resources aimed at offering online assistance, or how the company has put it - helping consumers get the most from their gifts.

"We want to do all that we can over the holiday season to help customers maximize their
time," says Denise Rundle, general manager of Microsoft consumer support. "With the Holiday Support Center, we’ve brought together helpful resources in one easy-to-find place. We want customers to have access to the right resources so they can enjoy their holiday gifts as quickly as possible", she continued.

The Microsoft Holiday Support Center is centered on a range of products, of course, with Windows Vista at the top. Having missed the previous holiday season, because of repeated delays of the operating system, the Redmond company is now prepared to make the best out of Vista's first Christmas on the shelves. And accompanying Vista this Christmas, there are Windows Home Server, the office 2007 System, a variety of hardware offerings, games for Windows, the Xbox console and Zune. At the same time, Microsoft's support center will give users out of the bag resources on Internet Explorer 7, Windows Media Player and a variety of downloads designed to integrated with products, from Vista to Windows Live Messenger.

"’Tis the season for holiday traditions: trimming the tree, lighting candles, hanging mistletoe, baking cookies and catching a performance of The Nutcracker - not to mention countless hours of holiday shopping and gift wrapping. In keeping with the spirit of the season, Microsoft is upholding one of its own traditions — the Microsoft Holiday Support Center. Provided to customers for the ninth year, this online support resource offers assistance at no charge to consumers with issues related to Microsoft consumer products and technologies. A convenient, one-stop portal, the site condenses the top questions likely to come up over the holidays for popular products, and provides relevant solutions and resources," Microsoft added.

COWON Q5W Wireless PMPs Deployed In the US!

COWON has just announced its intentions to ship its next-generation Q5W portable media player in the U.S. The more important is the fact that this PMP is actually the first one ever to combine Wi-Fi and Bluetooth wireless technologies with a cool 5-inch wide screen color TFT LCD. Not to mention it was given a classy touch sensitive interface to go with the smooth polished design line.

Based on a AMD Alchemy Au1250 600 Mhz internal processor, the PMP is said to be fully compatible with Microsoft Windows CE 5.0 Professional operating system.

Why is it so important for COWON? It seems like: "The COWON Q5W is the first three-in-one portable device that delivers premium multimedia player, mobile PC and GPS navigation capabilities to holiday gadget shoppers and digital media enthusiasts nationwide.

COWON Q5W PMP

"Discriminating consumers can now do it all in one definitive PMP package: watch movies on a large wide-screen, use Wi-Fi to browse the Internet and check e-mails, wirelessly connect to Bluetooth-enabled stereo headphones and even plot their journey home with an optional GPS navigation package. To top it off, the Q5W offers 40GB or 60GB of storage capacity, an advanced photo and document viewer, built-in stereo speakers, an FM tuner and the industry’s best audio/video format support," explains Francis Choi, senior marketing manager, COWON America.

Juiced up for about 13 hours via a single lithium polymer rechargeable battery, the COWON Q5W can deal with lots of file formats such as MP3, WMA, ASF, OGG, WAV, FLAC, APE and MPC file formats for audio content, as well as AVI, ASF, WMV, MPEG and OGM file formats. The sound performance can be customized with JetEffect BBE, Mach3 Bass, MP Enhance, 3D Surround or with one of the 5 equalizer modes. The PMP also features an integrated Wi-Fi (802.11 b/g) feature and enables users to wirelessly connect to the Internet to surf the Web, use e-mail and MSN voice-enabled Messenger service.

COWON Q5W PMP

The pre-installed Adobe Embedded Flash Player 7 allows users to create and experience interactive content, applications and video on the Web. Additionally, the COWON Q5W includes the latest Bluetooth 2.0 technology to wirelessly connect to Bluetooth-enabled stereo headphones.

Interested in getting yourself one of those, then you should know the prices of the Cowon Q5W 40 GB and 60GB are 549.99 bucks and 599.99 bucks, respectively. What's more? An optional COWON Q5W GPS navigation package is available for $199.99.