Alpha Hits 1GHz Pictured: Alpha's 750MHz CPU with Slot B cartridge exposed. Alpha Computing showed off a 1GHz Alpha CPU running at room temperature at PC Expo this week. The technology demo by Alpha Processor, Inc., a subsidiary of Samsung, was designed to showcase the high-performance Alpha CPU which API is pitting against Intel's Pentium III Xeon line. Xeon has yet to come close to hitting 1GHz in clock speeds and the Alpha dwarfs it in L2 cache size. Besides the 1GHz Alpha, API unveiled its top 750MHz Alpha 21264 in the new "Slot-B" form. Using a cartridge-type system akin to Intel's Slot 1 and Slot 2, Slot-B will share some technology with AMD. Theoretically, users will be able start with AMD's code-named K7 CPU and move up to an Alpha. To show off the power of the 750MHz Alpha, API compared it to a 550MHz Pentium III Xeon with 1MB of L2 cache. Rendering a single Lightwave frame on the Xeon took 191 seconds. On the 750MHz Alpha with 8MB of L2, the same frame took only 96 seconds. Alpha also announced two new Slot-B motherboards to coincide with the 750 launch. The single-CPU UP1000 motherboard uses AMD's Northgate Irongate 751 chipset, and three 168-unbuffered DIMM slots for up to 768MB of RAM. The Southbridge of the chipset will be provided by ALI and control two unshared ISA slots, PS/2, USB, and Ultra DMA controllers. The total number of 32-bit PCI slots is four. The UP2000 supports dual Apha CPUs, up to 2GB of ECC RAM, and includes onboard Ultra2 LVD SCSI, USB, and six PCI slots. The UP2000 will use Compaq's 21272 chipset. A CPU roadmap shown by API shows the Alpha hitting 1GHz by the second quarter of 2000 with the 21264. By Q4 of this year, the Alpha will clock at 833MHz. By the first quarter of 2000, the Alpha will click in at 933MHz. Interestingly, API projects Xeon won't hit 1GHz well past the second quarter of 2000. The Alpha doesn't come cheap however. The price of the new 750MHz Slot B with 8MB of L2 costs $4,368 when purchased in quantities of 100. The 2MB L2 version will cost $2,296 and the 4MB version $2,754 in the same quantities.  Rats Control Robots Using Brain Power A team of neurobiologists have discovered that rats can control machines using only their brains. The rats in question--six in all--had tiny electrodes, no thicker than a hair, implanted into their brains, reported medical journal Nature Neuroscience in its July issue. "It doesn't hurt the animal,'' said John Chapin, of Hahnemann Medical College in Philadelphia. ''All there is is a little plug coming out of the animal's head. He runs around the cage and everything." At first, the rats were taught to control a robotic arm in order to get a drink of water. "We trained the rat initially to put his paw on a lever and to press the lever down. When the lever got pressed down there was a robot arm that moved over to a water dropper and then brought the water back to the animal's mouth," Chapin said. When the lever was pressed down all the way, the research team recorded the accompanying brain activity, which was then converted into a single electronic signal that could move the robot arm. However, when the research team connected the lever to the converter directly, they discovered that the brain activity controlling the movement came before the actual movement did. Hence, the rats could get a drink just by "thinking" about it, without actually having to touch the lever at all. "When control of the robot arm was switched to the brain, the robot arm went over and brought water to the animal's mouth before the animal even started to move," Chapin said. "After a couple of days, the animals began to recognize that and they stopped actually pressing the lever." The neurobiologists think the technology may someday help paralyzed people.     AMD Announces K7... Er, Athlon After months of pre-hype hoo-hah, Advanced Micro Devices has officially announced its 7th-generation x86 processor. Clocking in at 500, 550, and 600MHz at launch, the CPU formerly known as K7 will henceforth be known as Athlon. Athlon is a true 7th-gen x86 processor that breaks away from the mold set by the 6th-gen Intel P6 core found in Pentium Pro, Pentium II, Pentium III, Xeon, and Celeron CPUs. Athlon is defined by the following highlights: * Super-pipelined, 9-issue superscalar microarchitecture--super for scaling to faster and faster clock speeds. The nine issues are defined by six integer calls and three floating-point calls. * 200MHz system bus based on Alpha's EV6 protocol--awesome for efficient multiprocessing. * Three pipelined, out-of-order floating-point units--ready to roar for 3D gaming and other math-intensive calculations. * 128K of on-die L1 cache. * Up to 8MB L2 cache granted by the CPU and chipset design. The 22 million transistor processor will launch at a 0.25-micron process. Production begins at Fab 25 in Austin, Texas, and will pick up speed as Fab 30, in Dresden, Germany, begins cooking in early 2000. The processor requires an entirely new chipset/motherboard design. Systems will launch with AMD-produced chipsets. Soon thereafter, chipset perennials VIA, SiS, and ALi will pick up the slack. Announced motherboard partners include Asus, Biostar, FIC, Microstar, and Gigabyte. Systems will launch with just 512K of L2 cache. Though the memory bus runs at 200MHz, expect 100/133MHz SDRAM support early on due to RAMBUS yield problems. The 600MHz AMD Athlon processor is priced at $699, the 550MHz Athlon is available for $479, and the 500MHz Athlon can be yours for $324. Prices are based on 1,000-unit quantities. Cell Phone Users Beware An industry-sponsored study says that there are hazards connected to cell phone usage. Some feel that cellular phones are most dangerous when used by drivers who should be paying more attention to the road. But a new study shows the dangers could possibly be much worse. A $27 million study released over the weekend by Washington-based think-tank Wireless Technology Research suggests a correlation between cell phone emissions and a slightly higher incidence of human brain tumors, cell growth in human blood micronuclei, and DNA breakage in rats. WTR chairman Dr. George Carlo describes the results as "the first data that are directly relevant to the human-exposure situation," noting that results from previous studies were "largely speculative." "You would come to the [possible] conclusion that RF [radio frequencies] causes genetic damage," Carlo continued. "That is a huge surprise." Some conclusions drawn by the study are roughly parallel to studies that have found DNA breakage caused by microwave emissions, which are near cell phones' emissions on the radio frequency spectrum. Dr. Carlo is using the findings to issue a call for greater public health support while the true implications of cell phone use are fleshed out. Some, however, maintain that it's still too early to reach definitive conclusions. "We saw both effects and no effects, and we need to replicate [the studies] to assess the results," said Paul Joseph Morrissey, the head of Motorola's biological research program. Cocaine Up For Bid on Ebay Everything is available on Ebay - even 8-balls of cocaine. An anonymous seller offered 200 pounds of cocaine up for bid on Ebay, though Ebay yanked the page before the auction closed. The seller, whose location was listed only as Hollywood, CA, opened the bidding at $2,000,000 and received one bid of $2,000,100. The item description stated, "That's right! 200 Pounds of everyone's favorite white drug! Only available for a short time, get your 8-balls today!" Below the description was an image showing a mound of cocaine. The page was reportedly up for 18 hours before Ebay officials removed it.    Americans Prefer Internet Explorer Yet another study shows Internet Explorer pulling away from Netscape Navigator in the browser war. Internet Explorer now claims more than 33.8 million users - about 1.8 million more those who use Netscape Navigator, according to a study by InfoBead. A study released last month by Zona Research showed IE winning on corporate desktops as well. InfoBead queried some 11,000 U.S. households and found more preferred IE to Netscape Navigator. "Internet experience does seem to play a limited role in browser choice," said InfoBead analyst Miran Chun. "Almost 60% of those with five or more years of Internet experience use a Netscape browser, while only 42% of those with one year and 51% of those with two years of experience use Netscape. In contrast, IE's use is unaffected by the user's experience. Its share remains between 50% and 52% among all groups, regardless of years of experience." Chun said more experienced users running both Navigator and Internet Explorer may be playing with the numbers as well.   IBM Hard Drives Get A Storage Boost IBM is upping the storage capacity of hard drives. Again. Today, the company announced two new very large capacity desktop hard drives: the 37GB 5,400RPM Deskstar and the 34GB 7,200RPM 34GXP. Both are based on IBM’s third-generation giant magnetoresistive (GMR) technology, which offers areal densities up to 5.3 billion bits per square inch--the largest densities currently shipping from any drive manufacturer. The reason for such large-capacity drives? IBM sites the large space requirements of digital music, specifically of the MP3 format variety; the ever-expanding installation requirements of popular games; and the large capacities and drive speeds required by digital video and audio-editing aficionados. The new drives are also the first to incorporate IBM’s Drive Fitness Technology (DFT)--a diagnostic solution that works in conjunction with S.M.A.R.T. technology (Self Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology) and the latest error-logging technology. DFT tests your drive so you'll know whether it's in perfect working order, or whether or not you'll need to ship it back for a replacement unit. IBM expects to make both hard drives available almost immediately. For the skivvies on IBM’s current 22GB 7,200RPM 22GXP hard drives, and other UltraATA 66 drives.   Hackers Trash Senate Site--Again For the second time in several weeks, hackers broke into the official U.S. Senate website over the weekend and wreaked havoc with the site's links, main banner, and various portions of text. The group taking credit for the infiltration, the Varna Hacking Group, replaced the “United States Senate” banner with their own, and changed many links, pointing users to such sites as Yahoo and Playboy. Several of the links sent web surfers to “Free Kevin Mitnick” sites, a pattern that has become a hallmark of recent government website break-ins. In a further display of their support for the captured hacker, the group posted a message at the top of the site proclaiming, “You CAN stop ONE, but you can NOT stop ALL.” Mitnick has been idolized by hackers since his 1995 imprisonment for a variety of hacking-related crimes, and the ongoing string of government website break-ins are retribution for his arrest, according to groups of hackers who have taken credit for them. The government issued a stern warning to the hacker community earlier this month after several sites, including the FBI home page, were hacked. "For those who think that this is some sort of sport, I think [it will be] less fun when the authorities do catch up with them... and these people are prosecuted,” said White House Press Secretary Joe Lockhart. Apparently the hacker community is failing to heed the government’s stern warning. Americans Luke Warm To Robot Dog Aibo the robot dog may have sold out in Japan, but Americans are having a more tepid reaction. It's taken more than four days to sell just a thousand of the robotic dogs in the U.S. Compare that with the 3,000 dogs that sold in just 20 minutes in Japan. Sony believes cultural differences may be to blame. "The difference in the sales should correspond to the difference of culture between Japan and the United States," Sony One other factor may be the price Americans are willing to pay for dog that's more robot than dog. Aibo, sold only through the Internet in the U.S., costs $2,500, about $400 more than in Japan.   Hackers Add Senate To Victims Hackers have added the U.S. Senate's main page to their list of owned web sites in an escalating war between the FBI and "crackers" around the globe. Hackers defaced the main page for the Senate late Thursday leaving the message: "The FBI may be all over the other groupz, like those gH and tK queerz, cl00bagz gal0re. M0D make th0se m0ronz l00k like a gr0up of special-ed st00dentz!@# FBI vs. M0D in '99, BR1NG IT 0N FUQRZ! (BTW NIPC IZ ALS0 0WNED)." Members of the MOD group told security site, Antionline, that they gained access to another computer on the Senate's network, installed a sniffer, and swiped the administrators passwords. On Friday, the Senate's page was still down but a mirror of the hacked site was kept on Antionline. On Wednesday, an attack on the FBI's main page spooked the agency enough to take down its main page. The FBI's page also remained down Friday morning.     Net Brokers Benchmarked How much money can you lose in a plunging stock deal if your sell order is delayed by 30 seconds or doesn't go through? Only the people with the ducats know, but a study released Tuesday shows that Dreyfus is the fastest brokerage on the Net, with the popular e*trade bringing up the rear. Keynote Systems conducted the study June 1 to 4 of the top 15 Internet brokerages, measuring the success rate and how long transactions took to execute. While Dreyfus provided traders with the fastest transactions, Brown & Company delivered the highest success rate, with 99.7 percent of trades going through. Keynote performed trades every 15 minutes from sites in 10 major metropolitan cities in the United States. Keynote's automated measurement systems were hooked up to the Net via a T-1. Transactions were counted as unsuccessful when a brokerage's web page failed to fully download or when a transaction didn't complete within a set time limit. Complete Results for June 1 to 4 Online Broker Transaction Performance in Seconds Transaction Success Rate [Rank] Dreyfus 7.47 94.6 % [6] Scottrade 7.68 97.9 % [2] Brown & Company 11.63 99.3 % [1] Discover 19.11 89.9 % [8] Suretrade 21.87 46.7 % [15] Fidelity 25.04 96.8 % [4] Keynote Web Broker Trading Index 25.24 88.4 % Quick & Reilly 26.95 88.4 % [10] American Express 27.20 88.1 % [11] Charles Schwab 30.03 94.4 % [7] Mr. Stock 30.07 88.4 % [9] Bull & Bear 30.69 85.2 % [12 National Discount Brokers 32.16 95.2 % [5] Firstrade 32.89 83.5 % [13] Ameritrade 37.44 97.2 % [3] e*trade 38.35 80.5 % [14]   Intel Releases IA-64 Details Following months of rumors that its next-gen CPU project was derailing, Intel released the specifics of its IA-64 processor instruction set. The move should encourage otherwise-wary software developers to anticipate the processor's release, and build ports accordingly. Co-developed by HP and code-named Merced, IA-64 chews on 64-bit instructions, employs sweeping advancements in processing techniques, and is intended for upper-echelon workstations and servers. At the last Developer Forum, Intel said that IA-64 will first sample in 1999 at a 0.18-micron process, with L2 cache running at full clock speed on the same daughtercard as the processor. Full-scale production is slated for 2000. Core CPU clock speeds weren't part of today's announcement, but manufacturing process technology logic tells us to expect the dreaded 666MHz and faster. The IA-64 architecture employs a new technology called EPIC, or Explicitly Parallel Instruction Computing. EPIC is intended to better RISC-style instructions with high-falutin techniques such as instruction grouping, pre-fetching, predication, and speculative execution. It's all about moving as many bits through the pipeline as quickly as possible, cueing up workloads for immediate execution, and keeping all instruction units busy with a steady stream of fodder. The last thing an IA-64 processor wants to do is wait for something to do; nary a clock cycle should be spent idling. To accommodate its heady aspirations, the IA-64 comes complete with 128 integer registers, 128 floating- point registers, 64 predicate registers, and a flurry of "special-purpose" registers. "Instructions will be bundled in groups for parallel execution by the various functional units. The instruction set has been optimized to address the needs of cryptography, video encoding and other functions that will be increasingly needed by the next generation of servers and workstations.   Get your own Rent-A-Page website NOW! Phantom Menance Dubs Hot On Usenet Copies of the new Star Wars movie are hot items on the Internet with people offering to trade pirate dubs of the movie for other 'warez. Earlier this month, Lucasfilm raised eyebrows when it put hundreds of ISPs on notice that they could be subject to lawsuits if pirated copies of Stars Wars: The Phantom Menace were found on their servers. Lucas' fears may have been well founded. Within hours of Star Wars being released, badly dubbed copies of the movies with cheering audiences heard in the audio track were distributed on the Internet. A run through the Usenet Friday showed numerous people offering to trade a copy of Phantom Menace for other software. Star Wars isn't the only movie popular on the net. Copies of The Mummy, The Matrix, and almost every major box office hit have hit the Internet soon after being released in the theater. Windows 98 Special Edition Now Available Windows 98 Second Edition officially went on sale at stores around the country as of Thursday. Win98 SE integrates a bug fix pack for 98 and adds a raft of new features including Internet sharing and more robust support for USB and IEEE 1394 "Firewire." SE also includes IE5, support for Pentium IIIs, and faster application loading and shutdowns. New PCs purchased from quality PC companies should now automatically include SE. Owners of Win95 and 3.1 machines can purchase SE for the retail price of $109. Win98 users can buy it directly from Microsoft for $19.95. Those who don't want to pony up for the CD can expect access to a downloadable Service Pack 1 in a few weeks. However, the SP1 won't include other improvements that Microsoft is building into the SE version.

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