Channel 10’s Sarah Perez has compiled a list of ten plugins for Microsoft’s Windows Live Writer which she found at the Windows Live Gallery. Of course, the developers who have taken the time to extend the application via the SDK are the ones who really deserve the majority of the credit. For those who don’t know, WLWriter is a free desktop application that allows a user to write blog entries and then post them to their blog. The program seems to be one of the more successful applications of the Windows Live array, but nevertheless some features are not built-in. Enjoy!

View: 10 Useful Plugins for WLWriter @ Channel 10

Microsoft has released several new updates and hotfixes via Windows Update since the public availability of Windows Vista SP1 Beta and RC (Service Pack 1 Beta and Release Candidate), such as KB943899 (fixes to improve the performance, responsiveness, and reliability of Windows Vista) and KB943302 (Vista Application Compatibility Update). However, for system that has installed with a version of Vista SP1 Beta or RC, these newer updates that released after SP1 Beta or RC versions and not included in the service pack, will fail to install the these latest updates with message saying updates cannot be applied.

But there is a workaround. Read the guide HERE

We all know DX10 and DX10 supported video cards have been out for a while now, but only few of them are good enough to actually playing DX10 content. Most people still argue that DX10 is a waste of time, saying that it offers only a slight quality improvement (if at all any), but for that slight performance improvement, it takes away half of your frames per second. Suffice to say only the best cards from either of the two high-end VGA manufactures: nVidia and ATI, are capable of handling (not taming) DX10 based games.

But…only a few of us can afford them. Those video cards go way past USD350 range, and that is not all; you need a heavy duty power supply unit, very good cooling inside your case and good luck paying that electricity bill!

As with every video card family, we get a “refresh” product line towards the end of a family. Remember we got the 7900 series for the Geforce 7 series and Radeon X1900 series for the X1000 series? Likewise, we have now got the refresh lineup from nVidia and ATI for the Geforce 8 and Radeon HD2000 series. (However, as crazy as it may sound, ATI have named it HD3000)

So, the new kids are,

• Geforce 8800GT (256MB/512MB/1GB)
• Geforce 8800GTS G92 (512MB)
• Geforce 8800GS (Aimed at OEM market, and still not available in retail)
• Radeon HD3850
• Radeon HD3870 (A higher clocked HD3850)

* Click on the above links to see a review of each card.

The Geforce cards are faster and go on sale for around USD250-300 and the Radeon cards go on sale for around USD200-230.

Even though Internet Explorer (IE) is the most compatible browser with websites, it is not very compliant with web standards. Acid2 is one test of how modern browsers work with some specific features across several different web standards. IE7 does not show the Acid2 face properly…show doesn’t Firefox 2.0. Weird ha? However Firefox 3.0 (beta) does, and Opera 9 also does. The upcoming IE8 browser will also render the face properly.

This is how the rendered image looks like on IE8.

ACID2 face on IE8

Read more about this here.

Wonder what’s up at the 2-5% region :S

And that drive temperature is just awesome!!!

So it had to happen! I wasn’t really running out of space…I mean, I could have managed. I just needed a second drive, because for some reason, Windows Vista’s I/O priority crap was driving me crazy! There is NO such “intelligent” prioritizing that I could see! When copying a large file, the system will stall, even with 4GB RAM installed and no pagefile being used! wtf!

Anyway, ideally I wanted a very fast drive for Windows and Programs (Games included), and the Western Digital Raptor series is the number one choice. But…you don’t get them in Sri Lanka. Period! So, I had to look for another drive, that would at least come closer.

I could have bought a small 160GB drive to go along with the 320GB I was already having. But…160GB drive would be the slower drive and it would not be ideal for my situation. I could have gone with a RAID-0 setup, but then a friend showed me it is not worth it…so I was now in a spot of bother. There is no smaller & faster drive that I can buy as the system drive. *sigh*

Then I thought, “what the hell, I’m gonna buy a 500GB drive and make the 320GB one the system drive!” And that’s what exactly happened in the end.

Only three HDD brands were easily available in the SL market. Samsung Spinpoint-T series, Hitachi Deskstar and Maxtor DiamondMax11. All of them are OK, but the Samsung drive stood out…in terms of price, performance and reliability. Besides, the resellers for the Samsung drives were better than the others.

So this is what I bought: Samsung Spinpoint T-166 HD501LJ.

With the introduction of the Perpendicular Recording technology, the hard drive capacities are moving to the terabyte level. But is that all this new recording technology can offer? On the paper, no. But in reality, we didn’t see any “tangible” performance gains in the new 1TB drives from Seagate, Western Digital and Hitachi. I was quite disappointed, to be honest. Sure, they are faster than the previous generation models, but as far as I can tell, it is just the electronics and fine tuning – not a result of the new recording technology.

But there is a new kid on the block. The Samsung Spinpoint F1…It’s the all new performance desktop drives from Samsung, where for the first time they have incorporated Perpendicular Recording Technology. They are quite new, and I feel so bad that they were not available in Sri Lanka when I bought my 500GB Spinpoint T166 500GB last Thursday.

Wanna know about this new kid? Head over to Tom’s Hardware Guide, for the review.