VerdinaNET

Used to use steel series 4H but since there was no bass at all i changed to roccat kave with surround sound but not happy with them either. Right not i plug 5.1 surround speakers into receiver with DTS Neo from the motherboard and it's absolutely outstanding Recommending this setup:)

How do you enjoy gaming guys ? Headphones, 5.1, 7.1 system ?

Even better than the first one. I like well optimized games so that my gtx 780 can handle it well. Good puzzles, very fascinating gameplay and outstanding graphics.

Hi guys, i am a fan of the game Crysis since the first one. There is being a while since third part is out and meybe fourth coming in 2017 ? What do you think ?

Very good and optimized game. I like it very much. Quite intensive and hardcore gameplay.

For fps improvement easiest way is better video card or meybe lower the details and filters:) Defragmenting and ccleaner activities are fine for general optimization. Nice one.

As the iphone 7 came do you think there is point upgrading from last generation ?

Gears of war is one of the best.

I used to play Quake 2 ))

Linux-operated botnet Distributed Denial of Service attacks surged in this year's second quarter, due to growing interest in targeting Chinese servers, according to a Kaspersky Lab report released this week. South Korea kept its top ranking for having the most command-and-control servers. Brazil, Italy and Israel ranked among the leaders behind South Korea for hosting C&C servers, according to Kaspersky Lab. DDoS attacks affected resources in 70 countries, with targets in China absorbing 77 percent of all attacks. Germany and Canada dropped out of the top 10 most-targeted countries, replaced by France and the Netherlands. The Linux server is the go-to platform for orchestrating DDoS attacks because of its latent vulnerabilities, said Charles King, principal analyst at Pund-IT. A common problem is that they are not protected by reliable security solutions. "That makes them prime targets for hackers, especially those that leverage C&C servers to centrally manage and carry out DDoS attacks," he told LinuxInsider. "Deploying leading security solutions, as well as utilizing and updating established Linux distros, can go a long way to protecting against these issues." Hardware to Protect All devices are vulnerable -- servers and desktops running any flavor of Linux, along with switches, routers, ADSL modems, wireless devices and cars. Internet of Things devices running embedded Linux also are vulnerable, said Oleg Kupreev, lead malware analyst at Kaspersky Lab. "The main reason is in most cases it is hard to update or reconfigure vulnerable software ASAP -- especially on highly loaded, critical servers -- or to update outdated software that is not supported by manufacturer devices," he told LinuxInsider. Companies that rely on Linux servers must protect them against this growing threat. For Linux servers, it is very important to harden, or tweak, the security of the system, Kupreev said. It's important to understand and implement SELinux, keep the software and the kernel up to date, and adopt a strong password policy, he explained. Attack Vectors It appears that nothing much is new about the methods hackers used in their recently stepped-up activities. "We don't see any changes in tactics. Brute-forcing passwords, exploiting common vulnerabilities in Web applications, hijacking or sniffing wireless communications -- these are old and well-known threats, said Kupreev. "Of course, each year we see some new threats, like remote-controlled cars -- but it's not a trend, it's just a reality." SYN DDoS, TCP DDoS and HTTP DDoS remained the most common attack scenarios in the second quarter, according to Kasperky's report. The share of attacks from Linux botnets almost doubled, to 70 percent. The proportion of attacks using the SYN DDoS method increased 1.4 times, compared with the previous quarter, accounting for 76 percent. For the first time, there was an imbalance between the activities of Linux-based and Windows-based DDoS bots, based on the report's findings. Linux bots are the most effective tool for SYN-DDoS. "Linux is becoming more commonplace and is used in most embedded systems," noted John McCarty, CISSP and senior security consultant at AsTech Consulting. "These implementations often are not hardened or patched and upgraded regularly, which has led to these systems being compromised and becoming a part of a botnet," he told LinuxInsider. Time Matters Too The duration of the DDoS attacks has increased, Kaspersky's report shows. For instance, the proportion of attacks that lasted for up to four hours fell from 68 percent in the first quarter of this year to 60 percent in the second quarter. The proportion of longer attacks grew considerably. Those lasting 20-49 hours accounted for 9 percent (4 percent in Q1) and those lasting 50-99 hours accounted for 4 percent (1 percent in Q1). The longest DDoS attack in Q2 2016 lasted 291 hours (12 days), a significant increase from Q1's longest attack, which was eight days. Contributing Factors Linux can be an extremely secure operating system, according to AsTech's McCarty. When it is properly configured and locked down, Linux can be hardened to withstand many of the current exploits and attacks. "However, this reputation can lead to some administrators feeling that these systems are inherently secure and do not need the level of configuration and attention necessary to protect the systems from attack," he said. Another factor that encourages hackers to exploit Linux loopholes is the lack of security professionals and security software to maintain systems properly, said Dodi Glenn, vice president of cybersecurity at PC Pitstop. "These systems usually host services, which can be used to reflect malicious activities," he told LinuxInsider. Linux is not inherently insecure, and it has become ubiquitous, observed Weston Henry, website security research analyst at SiteLock. "The number of cloud servers and devices running Linux/BusyBox online with security as an afterthought may lead to insecure devices and services," he told LinuxInsider. Treating the Cause Companies must ensure they are hiring the right people to maintain the Linux systems, said PC Pitstop's Glenn, and proactive security is key. "When securing these systems, create a baseline of the system or a profile of the system, noting its usage of resources in normal operation modes," he advised. Organizations using Linux should ensure the systems are patched, securely configured and hardened, so that unnecessary services and applications are not running or even installed on them. It would help to toss in an intrusion prevention system and next-generation firewall as well. "This will help minimize the overall attack surface of these systems, limiting the ability of a hacker to take over the system and use it within a botnet or for any other purpose," said McCarty. DDoS attacks still seem to be about quashing competition -- from online gaming and gold farming sites in the past to bitcoin sites now, noted SiteLock's Henry. The uptick in Linux botnets stems partly from the stated router and set-top box compromises. "A decreased barrier to entry into cloud servers and services may also add to the vulnerable pool," he said. "Consider security during system design. That is, design security into the system instead of adding it on after deployment." Other steps to take prior to launch, according to Henry, include assessing network and hosting services for DDoS robustness; beginning a relationship with a DDoS mitigation service; having a DDoS mitigation plan in place; and using a robust content delivery network to take any initial brunt. Source:http://www.technewsworld.com/

When developing business I believe every enterpreneur need to do his best. Do you think webinars are important part of development and do you personally often participate in webinars? According to you free or paid webinars is better.

Today I'm listening some Michael Jackson's songs

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Graphics card maker EVGA isn't a company that lets anopportunity go to waste, and it seized advantage of a doozy after TechPowerUp and other sites outed Asus and MSI over GeForce GTX 1080 review sample shenanigans. On Tuesday, EVGA sent out a graphic to press stating that it does not deliver graphics cards with tweaked clockspeeds to reviewers. “With EVGA,” the company said. “What you see is what you get.” What it’s all about The whole controversy started on Thursday of last week. TechPowerUp reported that both Asus and MSI sent the hardware-focused site graphics cards set to run slightly faster than what you’d get from a retail store. The hope, obviously, was that Asus and MSI would see better reviews for their products and get an edge over the competition. The companies also had an excuse for the tweaked clock speeds, since customers could easily get the same speeds the reviewers were seeing. All they had to do was flip a setting in the special software that comes with each new graphics card. MSI has a software package called MSI Gaming, while Asus offers GPU Tweak II. These graphics cards come with three basic clock settings that users can easily manipulate: gaming mode, OC (“overclock”) mode, and silent mode. The first is the standard retail setting that most of us see when we open those glorious boxes housing a new gateway to gaming joy. Silent mode runs the slowest of the three since it puts the card at reference clock speeds. OC mode, meanwhile, squeezes a little more performance out of the card. TechPowerUp said it received cards set to OC mode, meaning they given review samples set to a profile that offers more performance than what buyers actually receive in stores. Soon after that initial report, PC Perspective agreed this was a bad practice on the part of the companies. But PC Perspective also pointed out that the difference in speeds might result in about a one percent performance improvement overall. (What did you expect for a quick, one-click tweak?) Nevertheless, TechPowerUp argues that even a small performance gain provides an unfair advantage. That small boost could, in fact, be the deciding factor for gamers looking to squeeze every ounce of performance they can from a specific graphics card. Asus confirmed to PC Perspective that it does send its cards to reviewers in OC Mode in order to showcase the card’s maximum performance. Why this matters: Technically, both companies can say the cards sent to reviewers and to retail stores are the same since they only tweak a factory setting. The marginal improvement in clock speed is also easily obtained by consumers if they enable the right profile for their card. Nevertheless, companies shouldn’t send reviewers a product that doesn’t match what consumers get, right down to the factory settings. That’s especially important for graphics cards reviews where many readers skip right to the benchmarks to compare numbers. Source: http://www.itnews.com/article/3086303/hardware/

I want to download some more wordpress social media plugins, but I'm still wondering what to choose . According to you what are the best ones?

Microsoft this week released the second upgrade for Office 365 commercial subscribers on the slow train, and warned those still running the original Office 2016 applications that they have four more months before they will be required to update. Alongside a large number of Windows security updates issued Tuesday, Microsoft also released build 1602 of the Office apps to corporate Office 365 subscribers who hew to the "Deferred Channel" track. Deferred Channel is the slower of the two main release tracks Microsoft established for Office 365. (Until February, it was called "Current Branch for Business" to match the name of a slow release track for Windows 10.) Unlike the faster "Current Channel" (CC), which boasts monthly updates to the Office 2016 applications -- Word, Outlook, Excel and the like -- Deferred Channel (DC) only provides updates every four months. Consumers who subscribe to Office 365 Personal or Office 365 Home are on the CC track; they don't get a choice. IT administrators managing commercial Office 365 plans, such as Business Premium, E3 and E5, may select either CC or DC for some or all users. The slower pace of DC is designed to give organizations time to test the updates before deployment, and essentially sets those on the CC track as testers for DC customers. Microsoft follows the same practice with Windows 10, using consumers as a large test group to identify, and fix, flaws or compatibility issues, before the operating system's major upgrades reach the more important corporate customers. So far, Microsoft has issued two DC updates: One in February 2016, the second this month. The two were labeled 1509 and 1602, respectively. Build 1509 was the original release of the Office 2016 client applications, which, as its nomenclature indicated, was the original launch code shipped in September 2015 to consumers and companies on the Current Channel track. Office 365's applications are on an every-four-months schedule for DC, with updates slated to release in February, June and October of each year. The cadence is important for customers to remember because Microsoft has set rules for Office 365 subscribers who adopt DC. They may skip an update, but no more than one, sticking with an individual Office 2016 feature set for no longer than eight months. For example, those running 1509 -- again, the original versions of the Office 365 apps -- since February must apply 1602 or later by October. If they do not, the apps will no longer receive security patches and other fixes. "The existing Office 365 ProPlus version (1509) within the Deferred Channel will continue to be serviced for an additional four months," Amesh Mansukhani, a senior program manager on the Office engineering team, said in a post to a company blogTuesday. In October, the DC will receive the 1605 update, the same one issued to CC customers this week. The rolling release tempo for Office 365's Deferred Channel allows corporate customers to pass on one update. In this opening scenario, where DC users have been on 1509 since February, they will be allowed to skip 1602, but not both 1602and 1605. In October, they may upgrade to either 1602 or 1605. The former falls off the support list in February 2017, while the latter will be "serviced" -- to use Mansukhani's term -- until June 2017. Yes, it can be confusing. This story, "Microsoft starts clock ticking on Office 2016's first upgrade" was originally published by Computerworld. Source: http://www.infoworld.com/

Apple on Monday kicked off its Worldwide Developers Conference with the biggest-ever release of its iOS mobile operating system. CEO Tim Cook called iOS 10, coming this fall, "gigantic" and "the mother of all releases." Among the new offerings in the upcoming version of iOS are more features in Messaging, all new designs for News, Music and Photos, and increased opportunities for developers to integrate their apps with Siri, Maps and Messages. "Long term, the most interesting thing is the fact that Apple opened up Siri and Messaging and Maps to developers to add to those services," said conference attendee Bob O'Donnell, chief analyst at Technalysis Research. "It reflects the way the world is moving. It's moving away from standalone apps and into integration with services," he told TechNewsWorld. "Apple is acknowledging that by opening these things up for other developers to provide add-on functionality for these services." Smarter QuickType The new iOS enhances the user experience at the lock screen and home screen with rich notifications, as well as interaction with apps through the expanded use of 3D touch. QuickType received an upgrade in the new iOS. "We're bringing Siri intelligence to the keyboard," Craig Federighi, Apple's senior vice president for software engineering, told the audience at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco. QuickType has incorporated deep learning to produce more intelligent results and to react proactively to information on a screen, he explained. If someone sends you a message asking where you are, for instance, you may be prompted to send a map. The photo app in the new iOS is more robust with the addition of facial recognition, as well as scene and object identification. Advanced search techniques support a "memories" feature that automatically will scan your photos to create a montage and video of a past event. The Maps app in the new iOS, which Apple has opened to developers, will be more proactive. It not only will allow you to see traffic patterns ahead, but also will suggest alternative routes if it sees you're heading into a traffic jam. New Messaging Features Both the News and Music apps are redesigned in the new iOS, and a new Home app is included in the portfolio of native apps. Home acts as a hub for controlling all home accessories -- garage door, security camera, light dimmers and such. The new iOS adds voice mail transcription to its Phone app and numerous new features to Apple's messaging app, including rich links, easier insertion of photos and video into messages, and larger emojis. Messages also will display highlighted text that can be clicked for quick insertion of emojis. "Apple has added a ton of features for people who like to live in their messaging platforms, said conference attendee Patrick Moorhead. principal analyst at Moor Insights and Strategy. "That's particularly true in China, where they get into WeChat and they never want to leave," he told TechNewsWorld. Better Watch In addition to previewing the new iOS, Apple revealed changes in WatchOS, tvOS and its desktop operating system, renamed "MacOS." The new WatchOS improves the Apple Watch's performance and makes navigation and access to apps easier. "If the experience is as good as they showed on stage today, Apple could start selling a lot more watches," Moorhead said. Apple announced a number of channel additions to the new tvOS and a new single sign-on feature that eliminates the need to enter user credentials every time you access a service through Apple TV. It also announced an app that allows an iPhone to be used like an Apple TV remote, including access to Siri. The new MacOS Sierra provides access to both Siri and Apple Pay. It includes picture-in-picture video, a desktop everywhere feature for accessing a Mac's desktop across devices, and a universal clipboard that allows items to be cut and pasted across devices. "One of Apple's main goals in this year's WWDC keynote was to open developers' eyes to opportunities beyond the iPhone," said conference attendee Charles King, principal analyst at Pund-IT. "That's a critical issue, since faltering sales for smartphones -- including Apple's -- have got to be a prime concern among Apple developers," he told TechNewsWorld. "So we saw the company announce the integration of key phone technologies, like Siri and Apple Pay, in Mac desktops and laptops. That could spark new opportunities for developers," King noted. "Many of the other announcements -- the iOS updates, design fixes for Apple Music and Apple TV, and promises of software fixes that will make the Apple Watch more responsive -- were more in the line of necessary and often badly needed housekeeping," he said. "The main takeaway from the keynote is that Apple recognizes the value developers bring to the company's business, and will do all it can to keep them happy and profitable." Source: http://www.technewsworld.com/

While I was reading some articles in the net I was wondering what OS do you prefer for your computer. According to you Mac, Linux or Windows is the best?

Just decided to say hello to all of you even I'm a member from some months ago. I found very usefull threads here and I look forward to communicating with everyone in the gamers talk & reviews community.

What type of game is your favourite and do you prefer playing games alone or with friends?

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Back in the '90s, when you couldn't traverse through a college campus without the violent echoes of heavy metal accompanied by the anxious clicks of a Doom death match, Microsoft reigned king over PC gaming. At the time, using an operating system other than MS-DOS was today's equivalent of using a controller to play a twitch shooter on a luxurious custom rig. Times have changed since 1993. We no longer have to worry about JNCOs coming back in style or John Romero making anyone his bitch. Instead, we're welcomed with myriad options through which to play our games. With Linux finally emerging viable in the market, thanks in part to Valve's Steam Machine initiative, no longer is Windows, or MS-DOS for that matter, the indisputable king of PC gaming. Taking on the king With Valve's Steam client having gained traction as the most popular pick for digital PC game marketplaces, it's worth noting that the company co-founder, Gabe Newell, boldly claimed as far back as 2013 that "Linux and open source are the future of gaming." In fact, the lord and savior himself called Windows 8 "a catastrophe for PC gaming" little more than a year earlier. But why? As of September 2015, only 1,500 Steam games were compatible natively with the entire range of Linux distributions. Meanwhile, Windows thrives on a 6,464 title count, more than four times as much as Linux, according toPhoronix. That number doesn't even include the number of games exclusive to the Universal Windows Platform. Many of the most-played Steam games, such as Dark Souls III, Grand Theft Auto V, and Rocket League still aren't available on Linux, and some may never be. It's obvious then why PC World reported earlier this year that not only did Linux users account for less than 1 percent of Steam users at 0.91% in February 2016, but that was actually a dismal 0.04% decrease from the month prior. Newell said all the way back in 2012 that Valve wanted to make 2,500 games available on Steam for Linux. Even after launching its own Linux kernel specifically geared towards gaming, the company has still failed to deliver on that promise nearly four years later. SteamOS: holding Linux gaming back There are undoubtedly perks to using Linux. Unlike Microsoft's Windows and Apple's Mac OS X, the open-source operating system is available in a number of distributions, or distros, each marked with a unique set of benefits. Among these distros is Valve's own SteamOS, a proposition that would ostensibly bring PC gaming to the living room. And, had it been more than an Ubuntu port stripped of everything but Steam's Big Picture Mode, maybe, just maybe, it would have stood a chance at normalizing PC gaming in your family's home entertainment center. But, alas, there was nothing new to see there. Truth be told, SteamOS wasn't only limited in its functionality. Some hardware makers didn't even release their Steam Machines because of the sheer performance issues they were running into with Valve's custom operating system. Falcon Northwest, for example, told Digital Trends last year that SteamOS "doesn't support some common functions that you'd expect from an operating system." These issues simply wouldn't persist in a Windows environment. What's more, you can easily get the superior performance of Windows paired with the accessibility of SteamOS in as few steps as configuring Steam to launch at system startup while simultaneously getting the service to open in Big Picture Mode by default. Linux is out of control While there are some redeeming qualities about Linux, advanced customization and affordability aren't really factors when you're playing video games on what is most likely a $1,000+ hardware setup. What is important to take into consideration is your control input. With Windows, you're faced with a plethora of choices when it comes to controls – and that's exactly what PC gamers like, right? Options. You can get a mechanical keyboard with Cherry MX Red switches or Cherry MX Brown; you can get you mouse wired or wireless, and you can even choose between a PS4 orXbox One controller. With Linux, though, many of these options aren't natively supported. Sure, you can find a complicated workaround to use an Xbox One controller with your Ubuntu-equipped PC, or you could shell out a hundred bucks or so for Windows 10, where using an Xbox controller requires nothing more than plugging it into an open USB port. Of course, with Valve's proprietary Steam controller having arrived by the tail-end of last year, you can be confident in Linux compatibility from a company trying to push its own kernel. But, at the same time, the Steam controller is an impressively designed compromise – an attempt to shift controller users as well as mouse and keyboard fanatics toward a middle ground. Unfortunately, the result is a niche appeal, if any at all. A catastrophe that's here to stay Evidently, Windows isn't going anywhere, with a Steam market share of nearly 96% as of March 2016. In fact, Epic Games even recently called Microsoft out ontrying to "monopolize" PC gaming with its Universal Windows Platform initiatives. Although Microsoft has lost sight of what PC gamers want in recent years (see:Games for Windows Live), there's no doubt that the current Xbox head Phil Spencer wants to bring the company back to its roots, namely by integrating features (and games) from the Xbox One into Windows 10. In contrast, Valve's attempts at making Linux not only the best place to play games from your Steam library, but actually the heart of your living room are tough to jive with. Despite making an effort with SteamOS, it doesn't help that a number of companies still haven't released their November 2015-bound Steam Machines after neglecting to comply with the operating system's handicaps. There's a clear winner here, and unless Linux rectifies its performance disparity, lack of natively supported control options and impoverished game library, the OS to beat for PC gaming will remain Windows 10. Source: http://www.techradar.com/news/

SecureWorks is the first initial public stock offering of the technology industry this year. That may be the extent of the victory lap for the tech I.P.O. market, at least for now. In its first day of trading on Friday, shares of SecureWorks, a digital security company, have been hovering near the $14 price it set the night before. The stock opened on the Nasdaq market at $13.89. SecureWorks raised $112 million, selling eight million shares. It had been marketing nine million shares within the range of $15.50 to $17.50, indicating that demand was weaker than expected. The lackluster demand is not that surprising. For one thing, SecureWorks has little in common with so-called unicorns — those private, venture-backed start-ups with valuations above $1 billion that have been avoiding the public markets. SecureWorks is 17 years old, based in Georgia and owned by Dell. And the ways in which SecureWorks does resemble some unicorns — top-line revenue growth, a history of losses and an enterprise-software business model — are not the most encouraging for investors. Recent trading among already public security stocks did not help SecureWorks’ deal. Shares of FireEye and Rapid7 declined in recent weeks as SecureWorks was meeting with potential buyers of its stock. Investors look to companies similar to the one going public when trying to determine what price they might be willing to pay for the I.P.O. When the so-called comparables slip, it can be a bad sign for the debutant. For Dell, pricing below the range was not necessarily bad news. The computer maker, which has agreed to acquire EMC in the largest technology deal ever, is not selling shares in the offering. Dell will own 86 percent of SecureWorks after the offering, and it is hoping the share price will rise in the public market. Dell will also control more than 98 percent of the voting power through a separate class of shares. The I.P.O. price yields a valuation of $1.1 billion, which is almost double the roughly $600 million Dell paid for the company in 2011, according to Triton Research, which provides information on private companies. SecureWorks said it might use the proceeds from the offering to develop new solutions or enhance current ones, and fund capital expenditures. Those funds may be necessary as competition in the security world increases. The company said in the filing that it expected “pricing pressures within the information security market to intensify as a result of action by our larger competitors to reduce the prices of their security monitoring, detection and prevention products and managed security services.” Still, the company has drawn quite a bit of revenue from its 4,200 customers. SecureWorks reported $339.5 million in total revenue for the year through Jan. 29, a 30 percent increase from the same period last year. SecureWorks had $72.4 million in losses for the year, almost twice as much as the same period in 2015. Bank of America, Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase are managing the offering. Source: http://www.nytimes.com/

For the first time, scientists at IBM Research have demonstrated reliably storing 3 bits of data per cell using a relatively new memory technology known as phase-change memory (PCM). The current memory landscape spans from venerable DRAM to hard disk drives to ubiquitous flash. But in the last several years PCM has attracted the industry's attention as a potential universal memory technology based on its combination of read/write speed, endurance, non-volatility and density. For example, PCM doesn't lose data when powered off, unlike DRAM, and the technology can endure at least 10 million write cycles, compared to an average flash USB stick, which tops out at 3,000 write cycles. This research breakthrough provides fast and easy storage to capture the exponential growth of data from mobile devices and the Internet of Things. Applications IBM scientists envision standalone PCM as well as hybrid applications, which combine PCM and flash storage together, with PCM as an extremely fast cache. For example, a mobile phone's operating system could be stored in PCM, enabling the phone to launch in a few seconds. In the enterprise space, entire databases could be stored in PCM for blazing fast query processing for time-critical online applications, such as financial transactions. Machine learning algorithms using large datasets will also see a speed boost by reducing the latency overhead when reading the data between iterations. How PCM Works PCM materials exhibit two stable states, the amorphous (without a clearly defined structure) and crystalline (with structure) phases, of low and high electrical conductivity, respectively. To store a '0' or a '1', known as bits, on a PCM cell, a high or medium electrical current is applied to the material. A '0' can be programmed to be written in the amorphous phase or a '1' in the crystalline phase, or vice versa. Then to read the bit back, a low voltage is applied. This is how re-writable Blue-ray Discs store videos. Previously scientists at IBM and other institutes have successfully demonstrated the ability to store 1 bit per cell in PCM, but today at the IEEE International Memory Workshop in Paris, IBM scientists are presenting, for the first time, successfully storing 3 bits per cell in a 64k-cell array at elevated temperatures and after 1 million endurance cycles. "Phase change memory is the first instantiation of a universal memory with properties of both DRAM and flash, thus answering one of the grand challenges of our industry," said Dr. Haris Pozidis, an author of the paper and the manager of non-volatile memory research at IBM Research - Zurich. "Reaching three bits per cell is a significant milestone because at this density the cost of PCM will be significantly less than DRAM and closer to flash." To achieve multi-bit storage IBM scientists have developed two innovative enabling technologies: a set of drift-immune cell-state metrics and drift-tolerant coding and detection schemes. More specifically, the new cell-state metrics measure a physical property of the PCM cell that remains stable over time, and are thus insensitive to drift, which affects the stability of the cell's electrical conductivity with time. To provide additional robustness of the stored data in a cell over ambient temperature fluctuations a novel coding and detection scheme is employed. This scheme adaptively modifies the level thresholds that are used to detect the cell's stored data so that they follow variations due to temperature change. As a result, the cell state can be read reliably over long time periods after the memory is programmed, thus offering non-volatility. "Combined these advancements address the key challenges of multi-bit PCM, including drift, variability, temperature sensitivity and endurance cycling," said Dr. Evangelos Eleftheriou, IBM Fellow. The experimental multi-bit PCM chip used by IBM scientists is connected to a standard integrated circuit board. The chip consists of a 2 × 2 Mcell array with a 4- bank interleaved architecture. The memory array size is 2 × 1000 μm × 800 μm. The PCM cells are based on doped-chalcogenide alloy and were integrated into the prototype chip serving as a characterization vehicle in 90 nm CMOS baseline technology. Source: http://phys.org/technology-news/

An operating system is only useful as it is customizable. After all -- if you can't make an OS look and act the way you want it to, then who cares if it's objectively better (faster, more powerful) than any other OS? Good news, Windows 10 users: You can easily customize both the look and feel of Microsoft's new OS, and make it work for you. Here's our guide on how to make Windows 10 pretty andeasy to use. Windows 10 Settings menu: The Personalization tab: A look at Windows 10's new Personalization settings -- the bedrock of all your visual customization needs. How to customize the Windows 10 Start menu: We were all excited about the return of the Start menu -- even though it's more like a hybrid of the Windows 8 Start screen and the Windows 7 Start menu rather than a traditional Start menu. Here's how to make it yours. Pin links to the Start menu from any browser: Put your favorite links on the Start menu, no matter what web browser you favor. 10 ways to customize the taskbar in Windows 10: If you're like me, the taskbar -- not the Start menu -- is the real workhorse in Windows 10. How to disable the Windows 10 lock screen: Windows 10 is designed for every device, including mobile devices, which is why it has a lock screen and a log-in screen. But for many of us desktop and laptop users, the lock screen is redundant and inconvenient. Here's how to get rid of it. Make people jealous of your lock screen with Windows Spotlight: If you must have a lock screen, it might as well look awesome with pretty, high-res photos from Windows Spotlight feature. How to uninstall default apps in Windows 10: Windows 10's default apps don't take up a lot of space, but do visually clutter up your Start menu (especially if you don't use them). Here's how to uninstall them (and how to reinstall them). 3 ways to customize Microsoft Edge: Microsoft's new Edge browser is a work-in-progress, but here's what you can do right now to make it look pretty. How to get the home button back in Edge: Edge has decided to take a leaf out of Google Chrome's book and be too cool for a home button. But some of us like home buttons, so here's how to get it back. Here's how to get rid of Internet Explorer: Edge is such a work in progress that Windows 10 also ships with Internet Explorer 11. You can't really uninstall IE11, but you can hide it so you don't have to look at it. Force Cortana to use Google instead of Bing: Make Microsoft's virtual assistant use the Web search engine of your choice. Get rid of default cloud service icons in File Explorer: Cloud storage service icons show up in the left menu of your File Explorer, whether you want them to or not. But you can remove them with a relatively simple Registry hack. How to change your computer's name in Windows 10: What's customization if you can't customize your PC's name? Source : http://www.cnet.com/