Mourning the PowerPC, Modern CPUs, Gigabyte's Silent Pipe & More

Good morning folks. There's lots of news flowing in today, some of it due in part to yesterday's announcement that Apple will be using Intel processors in the not so distant future. There's also a full compliment of hardware news in the HH in-box, so we've got plenty of good stuff to keep you busy this morning.  In fact, let me get right to it - I've got to pack a bag and catch a plane to San Fran to meet up with the crew at NVIDIA...

 Picking up the pieces: John Siracusa mourns the Power PC @ ARS:

"A lot of people are excited about the prospect of a future Apple without the dark cloud of CPU uncertainty over its head. I like that idea too, but I only wish it had come to fruition through IBM. After the G5 introduction, I thought it had. I was actually encouraged by IBM's game console contract wins. It seemed like the PowerPC ISA had a bright future. Maybe it does, but apparently not with Apple."

 How Modern CPUs Work @ ASE Labs:

"A Central Processing Unit is one of the major components of a computer. The CPU controls logic flow and other control type operations. There are many different things inside a modern CPU. How it works is what we are after today."

 Gigabyte Silent-Pipe Radeon X800 XL (GV-RX80L256V) PCIe Review @ Bjorn3D:

"Completely silent and fragtastic gaming? Oh yeah, baby, and it comes in the form of Gigabyte's Silent-Pipe Radeon X800 XL. By now, we all know that the X800 XL offers a lot of bang for the buck, and if you read my last couple of X800 XL reviews, you would know that ATI's stock cooler on the X800 XL is quite noisy. While some companies are releasing 'quiet' or 'nearly silent' X800 XL solutions, Gigabyte completely eliminated the noise problem by extending its Silent-Pipe technology to this excellent VPU."

 DVD Burner round-up: Top 16x drives tested @ TechSpot:

"DVD Burners have had a long way growing towards maturity, and after reviewing these three heavy hitters, I have to say the technology has almost been perfected. Not only these will support both kinds of media and burn them at 16x speeds, but also support dual layer media, which means you can store up to 8 gigabytes of information in one disk."

 Intel Readying Dual-Core Desktop Dothan @ CoolTechZone:

"It's a known fact that Intel has failed to deliver a viable desktop solution since it launched its Prescott microprocessor. In addition to delivering a poor and expensive solution, the abundance of technologies with its 915/925 chipsets left the platform at an almost destructive state with memory and motherboard manufacturers frustrated at the lack of sub-par sales."

 AMD Opteron 275 Dual Core Processor @ GamePC Labs:

"Today at GamePC, we've taken a look at AMD's new top of the line dual-core processor, the Opteron 275. We've grabbed a paid of these processors, effectively allowing for quad core operation in a dual-processor motherboard. Not only have we run performance tests against other high-end Opteron and Xeon processors, but we've also thrown in some power consumption and thermal tests as well."

Well, that's all we've got for now brothers and sisters.  Check back later though, there's more to come...