$18 (after $20 rebate) NVIDIA 8600GT graphics card

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 09:09:00 GMT

$18 (after $20 rebate) NVIDIA 8600GT graphics card with dual DVI
http://www.newegg.com/Special/ShellShocker.aspx

I don't think this blog entry requires much explanation. Even without the rebate, it's a great deal. You can order up to 3 of these and get a maximum of $60 rebate. For anyone with an older graphics card, this will breath new life into the computer with a reasonably fast, quiet, and cool temperature graphics card.

Weird resolutions for 23" LCDs popping up

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 10:51:00 GMT

23" LCDs are getting real cheap, but holding weird resolutions. I thought it was odd when they started doing 1920x1080 rather than 1920x1200, but take this Samsung 23" for $200 with an odd ball 16:9 resolution of 2048x1152.

While that extra resolution may be welcome for productivity work, it is suboptimal for 1080p video content. A lot of games won't support that resolution either.

Google makes it easy to snag a copy of every YouTube video with local cache

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 06:20:00 GMT

Update 6-22-2009 - Looks like Google stopped hard drive caching on their 720P content. Ironically, that's the content that needs the caching the most but I guess they want to keep people from snagging the 720P clips.

With skyrocketing bandwidth costs due to 640 Kbps "HQ" video and 2.25 Mbps 720P "HD" video, Google is getting a massive bandwidth bill every day to deliver all those YouTube videos. To alleviate their bandwidth load (and your's), they now cache all the video content on your hard drive. Not only does this perform better, but it also makes it easier to snag c

First quick impressions on the Asus Eee PC 1008HA clamshell

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 01:06:00 GMT

Just got my hands on an Asus Eee PC 1008HA clamshell yesterday afternoon. So far, this thing is very much impressing me with its form factor. The 1008HA looks like a miniature MacBook Air at 1.1 kilogram (2.4 pounds) and no more than 1 inch thick. There are no breaks in the contour of the chassis and the unit looks very nice. I put the unit in my wife's purse and it barely feels like there's a netbook inside. The ladies will definitely care for the pink, red, blue, or white 1008HA.

How to get a nice Home Theater PC for $595

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Wed, 13 May 2009 14:43:00 GMT

As I've previously explained, an Intel G45 motherboard and Intel Conroe-L "Celeron" processor makes the ideal computer system as oppose to an NVIDIA Ion system. Now I'll give you the full configuration list of parts for building a great HTPC system for under $600.

At $179, NVIDIA Ion solution loses all of its appeal

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Wed, 13 May 2009 14:40:00 GMT

TechReport just reviewed one of the first mini-ITX NVIDIA Ion platform solutions from Zotac which involves an NVIDIA 9300 graphics adapter and Intel Atom 330 1.6 GHz dual-core CPU. The problem is that its MSRP is priced at $179 and at that price, one can buy a far better integrated graphics Intel G45 motherboard and Intel Conroe-L 1.8 GHz CPU for less money.

F-Secure is mistaken regarding Windows 7 RC security "fail"

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Wed, 06 May 2009 07:05:00 GMT

F-Secure is getting some news coverage because one of their bloggers claim that they have identified a security failure in Windows 7 Release Candidate. Their blogger Mikko writes that Windows 7 still hides file extensions which allows virus writers to easily trick users in to launching executable files that were disguised as ordinary

Download Office 2007 SP2, don't use Windows Update

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 12:30:00 GMT

For anyone who has more than one computer running Office 2007 or if you may need to run the update on a future reinstall, I would suggest that you download the Office 2007 SP2 update here rather than use Windows Update. That's because the file is just shy of 300 MB and it's a big hassle to have to download the file more than once.

Sun gets its knight in shining armor after all

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 12:14:00 GMT

It appears to be a happy ending for Sun Microsystems after all. Not only did they get avoid being abandoned and ravaged by the market like Yahoo, they even got a slightly higher bid with a better matching company. Oracle and Sun were always joined at the hip when it came to Java and Middleware and Oracle database and SPARC/Solaris. The vast majority of Oracle database administrator I knew consider SPARC/Solaris the only serious Oracle platform in the world (though I don't personally agree with this viewpoint).

Maureen, don't spoil the act

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 11:57:00 GMT

Ms. Maureen Callahan at the New York post seems to have struck a nerve and become somewhat of a villainess for her article "Fairytale Ending: Why is no one suspicious of Simon Cowell's latest creation?" criticizing the Suzan Boyle YouTube phenomenon. Someone should have pulled Maureen aside and whispered to her that writing this article is tantamount to standing up in a WWE wrestling event and shouting "IT'S FAKE!"

Asus Eee PC 1000HE netbook review

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 06:34:00 GMT

I've previously called the Asus 1000HE netbook one of the best values in the netbook market in terms of bang per buck but I had to try it out myself to see if it actually lives up to my expectations. I've now had the opportunity to live with the Asus 1000HE for about a month and I've performed a good deal of testing on it to see how it performs in common tasks that one would expect a netbook to perform.

A good bonus service from AT&T DSL, free nationwide hotspot access

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 11:54:00 GMT

I travel quite a bit these days because of my job, and I have been noticing more and more than I can get AT&T hotspot service at places like Starbucks or many airports and some hotels. In the past, one would have to pay $20 per month for T-Mobile hotspot services or cough up $10 or more per day for Wi-Fi access. Now if you're an AT&T DSL customer, you get this service for free which is really convenient. Even if you have 2G or 3G data service, you will still want to use the much lower latency Wi-Fi access when it is available.

YouTube using Silverlight instead of Flash for March Madness

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 07:30:00 GMT

It appears that YouTube is using Silverlight instead of Flash video for March Madness. That's awesome news for netbook owners and lower end computers because Silverlight is so much more CPU friendly than Flash video. Now if YouTube will convert the rest of the site over, at least for all of the 720P content, that would make the site so much more friendly because flash 720P simply chokes on lower end computers such as netbooks.

Alleged Netflix "deliberate throttling" conspiracy is normal congestion

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 10:56:00 GMT

The folks at breakitdownblog.com have accused Netflix of deliberately throttling their users to 480 Kbps (60 KB/sec). Their proof? Downloading a video stream using 10 TCP flows is 10 times faster than downloading videos using the normal single flow. The blogger at breakitdownblog.com concludes that this must mean Netflix is intentionally throttling their users because they assume that there must be extra available bandwidth that Netflix is keeping from their customers. Well I hate to break the news to breakitdownblog.com, but this is normal congestion behavior.

Here is why Microsoft Silverlight is superior to Adobe Flash

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 04:54:00 GMT

This is a good test for a netbook to run to show that 720P Silverlight works on a slow netbook while flash 720p will not.

Blending creativity and technology

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 17:07:00 GMT

This is definitely one of the most creative short movies I've seen in some time

HTTPS web hijacking goes from theory to practice

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 04:40:00 GMT

I've been privately talking about the theoretical dangers of HTTPS hacking with the developers of a major web browser since 2006 and earlier last month, I published my warnings about HTTPS web hacking along with a proposed solution.

Silverlight version of Photosynth working in Chrome

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 07:31:00 GMT

I was surprised to see that Microsoft Photosynth Silverlight edition was working in Google's Chrome browser today. It looks like Silverlight is shaping up to be an awesome universal application platform especially when it comes to video playback.

Half-life short film blends creativity and affordable technology

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 01:02:00 GMT

We are now in an era of cheap high definition video cameras, cheap data center Internet bandwidth, free Internet HD broadcasting, and cheap computing power. The only thing artists need is creativity, talent, and a little time on their hands.

Asus 1000HE is now one of the best netbooks on the market

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 06:21:00 GMT

There's a new candidate for the best netbook on the market as far as I'm concerned and it is the Asus Eee 1000HE. Had it come with the GN40 chipset like many of us thought, it would have taken the top spot but it now shares the honors with the Dell Mini 12. $375, it sets a new bar in features per dollar. I've posted a guest article

One of the better superbowl ads this year

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 11:48:00 GMT

Nothing really caught my eye this year but this one was funny.

Does Verizon really deserve criticism for deploying the most fiber

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 22:13:00 GMT

Five months ago, Saul Hansell of the New York Times questioned Verizon's sanity by giving consumers a Maserati for the price of a Volkswagen by deploying fiber. Yesterday, Mr. Hansell questioned whether it was right that Verizon might benefit the most from tax credits

Broadband Populism or Broadband Pragmatism

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 02:28:00 GMT

In his recent OPEC 2.0 op-ed, Columbia University law professor Tim Wu offered his vision of a broadband policy by declaring the broadband market a “bandwidth cartel” that has gouged the public like the energy market. While this bash-the-corporation rhetoric may have some populist appeal, Wu’s analysis is both factually and logically flawed. See rest of post here

Fairness is the ultimate end-game in network management

george_ou@lanarchitect.net — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 16:11:00 GMT

Update 8/12/2008 - Robb Topolski has graciously apologized for the personal attacks.

I have to admit that I was surprised at the speed at which I've been attacked on my latest FCC filing "Guide to protocol agnostic network management schemes". Within hours of my filing, Robb Topolski who now works for Public Knowledge wrote an attack blog "George Ou: Protocol Agnostic doesn't mean Protocol Agnostic" which,

George Ou's technology blog