A bit of kit talk ... :-)
Samsung SH-W163
A couple of weeks ago I wrote a post about how the new Intel P965 chipset (codenamed Broadwater) is signaling the end of parallel ATA (PATA) support by only supporting serial ATA (SATA). This post caused me to get a number of emails from people worried about what this is going to mean for CD and DVD drives which almost exclusively need PATA. At the time, the only SATA DVD burner drive that seemed to be widely available was the Plextor PX-716SA/SW. Since then I've come across a drive from SATA Samsung that is both cheaper and better than the PX-716SA/SW - the Samsung SH-W163 SATA DVD +/- RW which has dual-layer support for burning 8.4GB discs.
This drive has a pretty impressive spec:
While the spec might be impressive, the drive is even more impressive in real life. Having used the drive for a few days now there are a number of things that stood out:
(If you want to see images of the Samsung SH-W163 drive, click here)
If you're looking for a SATA DVD burner, look no further!
New ATI Catalyst and NVIDIA ForceWare drivers
Just a quick note to all you ATI and NVIDIA users out there (which is probably pretty much all of you!). Both companies have released updated drivers.
The highlights are as follows:
ATI
However, read the release notes carefully as there are some new issues raised by these drivers. Also, note that the Radeon 7000, 7200, 7500, 8500, 9000, 9200 and 9250 aren't supported by Catalyst 6.6.
NVIDIA
Downloads: