AMD Alleges Benchmark Cheating by Nvidia

AMD and Nvidia have been engaged in a veritable pissing match over the HQV HD video benchmark, with AMD accusing its rival of cooking its Forceware drivers in order to achieve higher scores than its product deserves. Nvidia, in turn, has accused AMD of engaging in a disinformation campaign. The issue stems from beta Vista drivers (Forceware 163.11) that Nvidia provided to reviewers testing HD-video performance with videocards based on its GeForce 8600 GTS graphics processor. AMD’s Aboubakeur Nacef ran the benchmark and took photographs that he says reveal ghosting caused by overly aggressive use of noise-reduction in Nvidia’s PureVideo HD decoder. “My feeling,” Nacef told reuters, “is that Nvidia was in panic mode and needed to release something quickly.” Nvidia’s Rick Allen, countered that Nacef was “using an older driver and overly aggressive driver settings to cause the problem.” Nacef responded that Forceware 163.44 had the same problem but that he hadn’t tested version 163.69, the latest version available at press time.     

AMD to Try Tri-Core

Are there folks who want something better than dual core but less extreme than a quad solution? That’s what AMD is hoping as it prepares to release a tri-core Phenom in 2008. AMD is positioning the three-core chip as something that will help differentiate PCs that use it from their dual-core brethren. But Intel’s further slashing of its quad-core prices—already at the $200 mark—could lessen a tri-core’s appeal. More troubling is how AMD is producing these chips. The tri-core is likely to be based on the same quad-core die as Phenom, so is AMD disabling one core or is it trying to fi nd a market for its defective quad-core chips?

Spy vs. Spy— Cyber Style

A diplomatic brouhaha has coincided with a recent spate of cyber warfare, with representatives from a number of governments claiming their nations are the victims of coordinated attacks on their computer infrastructure. Systems in England, France, Germany, New Zealand, and the United States have all been attacked in recent months, and while governments in those countries have not directly accused the Chinese government of coordinating the attacks, intelligence agencies have noted that the attacks do seem to be originating from China. The Chinese government, however, denies any involvement in the incidents, and, in fact, says it has been the victim of cybersleuthing from Western governments. Lou Qinjian, vice minister of Information Industry, stated that 80 percent of the recent attacks have come from computers based in the United States, although he did not directly state that the U.S. government was coordinating the intrusions.

Fly Me to the Moon!

Google is hoping to inspire private space exploration by ponying up $30 million to fund the X Prize Foundation’s latest challenge, the Google Lunar X Prize, which tasks entrants with building and launching an unmanned lunar rover. Google will give $20 million to the first group to land a craft on the moon that can roam
500 meters and transmit a video back to Earth. It will kick in another $5 million if the team completes additional tasks such as photographing man-made objects or discovering water or ice. If your team is slow to launch, don’t worry. The second-place fi nisher will pocket $5 million, but you’d best get to work; the grand prize drops to $15 million after December 31, 2012 and the competition ends on December 31, 2014.

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Holmes is back!

A sinister cult is trying to awaken the Great Old One Cthulhu from his watery slumber, and only Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson can stop it from happening! No, it’s not a description of my high school fan fiction (well, actually, it is, but let’s not talk about that); it’s the premise behind Frogware’s latest Holmes game: Sherlock Holmes—The Awakened. Recruiting Holmes into the Cthulhu mythos of H.P. Lovecraft is a popular geek pastime that sometimes actually works. With The Awakened, the exercise gets a solid 3D presentation and narrative that reminds us of the more sedate pleasures of the puzzleadventure game. Adventure gaming never quite dies but continues to dwell in a shadow realm, on the fringe of the mainstream. Each time I play a new example of this genre, it reminds me of a time when the puzzle-adventure was the dominate PC genre, in the golden days of Sierra and LucasArts. The ascendancy of 3D action gaming signaled the decline of the narrative adventure, and it has never—and likely will never—recover its position. Yet these games still reward the person who adjusts to their slower pacing. As always, I only really understood that when seeing such a game through the eyes of another. My son sat by my side for about an hour as I played through The Awakened. Since the environments are in 3D, he assumed it was another action game. When we’d approach a character, he’d say, “Can you shoot him?” “No, I have to talk to him,” I explained. When he saw that Holmes carried a knife, he asked, “Can you use that as a weapon?” “No, but I can use it to cut this rope in order to open the trap door,” I said. At that, he began to get it. He began suggesting places to search, items to combine, ways to test and examine objects back at 221B. And slowly, he got caught up in the story, the puzzles, the process. He adjusted his expectations and took the game on its own terms. Sometimes, we need to step away from the latest 3D adrenaline rush, slow down, light a pipe, pick up a magnifying glass, and let pure story take us where it will.