2002 and February 2004), there’s still
a lot of uncertainty surrounding
many issues where technology and
the law collide. To make matters
worse, overly broad wording of new
legislation (like that of the Digital
Millennium Copyright Act) tends to
inadvertently snare lots of dolphin
with all the tuna, creating even more
legal chaos. If you feel that your right
to access, use, and create technolo-
gy has been violated, you can contact
the Electronic Frontier Foundation
at http://www.eff.org. As stated on its web
site, the purpose of the EFF is to
“...identify threats to our basic rights
online and to advocate on behalf of
free expression in the digital age.”If you don’t feel like your rights
have been violated and don’t need
their help, then consider making a
donation to the EFF instead, as the
non-profit group is entirely donor-
supported and works tirelessly to
promote digital freedom and neu-
tralize bad legislation. But we have
some personal advice for you, Rick.
Maybe you ought to let this one go.
Universities take on a lot of risk to
provide Internet access for students,
so it’s not surprising to us that they
might be, uh, a little overly cautious
at times. Intentionally or not, you
soaked up tons of bandwidth and
got busted for it, possibly jeopardiz-
ing everyone’s access.
Besides, remember how you said
they had no way of knowing what you
were up to? Well, now they know.DREAMING OF DDR
I was thinking of getting 2 gigs
of DDR RAM for my PC, and I
recently read in your magazine
that DDR2 is coming out this
summer. I have an Asus P4C800-
E Deluxe mobo—will it be
compatible with DDR2?
—JOE CENSOPLANOSENIOR EDITOR GORDON MAH
UNG RESPONDS: No go, Joe. When
DDR2 is released, it will run at lower
voltages and require a different con-
nector. This means that the upcoming
RAM, which will scale to speeds
that today’s DDR can only dream of,
will require you to buy a new moth-
erboard. However, this doesn’t mean
you should cancel your plans to
buy more RAM, which is affordable
these days. And whether DDR2 will
become lingua franca this year or be
about as easy to find as a hen’s teeth
has yet to be seen.WHO’S RIGHT ABOUT
OVERCLOCKING AND BOOTVIS?
Recently, two programs you
suggested didn’t pan out for
me. First, I wanted to overclock
my videocard, for which you
suggest Powerstrip. I downloaded
it, but the web page’s FAQ
not only strongly discourages
overclocking, but says it will “not
really” improve performance.
Also, having a new PC with a
two-minute boot time, I went to
get BootVis (at your suggestion)
from Microsoft. The web page
says, “Bootvis.exe is not a tool
that will improve boot/resumeperformance.” I was a little
disappointed; you made these
programs seem like the answer to
my problems. Who do I trust?
—JOE AIRAUDITECHNICAL EDITOR WILL SMITH
RESPONDS: We’ve tested both apps
extensively. Despite what the folks
at Entech say, using a utility—like
Powerstrip —to overclock your
videocard can net you significant
performance gains, especially if
you’re blessed with a videocard that
overclocks well. We’ve clocked some
midrange boards well beyond 500MHz
for a frame rate boost of up to 10 per-
cent in some benchmarks.
Running Bootvis on a fresh install
of Windows XP can shave whole
minutes off your boot time. After
pimping it as a hardcore hardware
hacker feature prior to the launch of
Windows XP, Microsoft is mysteri-
ously disassociating itself from the
utility. Our guess is it was causing
some costly calls to tech support
hotlines intended for important OEM
customers. You can still find Bootvis
these days by searching for it on
Google. (Be sure to use the SP1 ver-
sion if you have that installed.)WHY DO FAST
PCs BOOT SLOWLY?
Why is it that unimaginably
fast computers boot so slowly?
For example: On page 68 of
your January issue, you give a
positive review to the Hypersonic
SonicBoom. Granted, it’s fast, with
a P4 3.2EE, 1G DDR, and Western
Digital 10,000rpm hard drive. But
it has a very slow boot speed. I
cannot fathom why such a god-
like and cool looking computer
takes 65 seconds to boot! I can get
my P4 2.6 (HT) and 7200rpm ATA
HDD to boot in about 23 seconds,
including login, with no services
disabled. Making matters worse,
just as I got over the shock of that
65-second travesty, I was floored
to see that on the next page, HP’s
fast Pavilion ZD7000 notebook
has an 82 second boot!
—CURTIS SCHEIRERSENIOR EDITOR GORDON MAH UNG
RESPONDS: Blame it on the RAID. For
many high-end systems, including
Hypersonic’s SonicBoom, slow boot
times can usually be blamed on the
RAID array. Anyone who runs RAID,
SCSI, or a PCI add-in card for storage
knows it takes these cards 15 to 20
seconds to look for the hard drives.
While we list the boot times for read-
ers, we acknowledge (and hopefully
most advanced readers know) that
boot times are flexible. They change
as applications and hardware are
added or removed. In the case of HP’s
notebook, Windows XP was likely
waiting for some poor-acting driver
to settle down.YOUR WISH HAS BEEN
GRANTED
I recently read an article about
how LCD displays are now up to
par with (and even better than)
CRTs. I’m curious if LCDs are now
a viable option for gamers and
ask if you can do an article on
whether or not they are.
—ERIC KAERCHEREDITOR IN CHIEF GEORGE JONES
RESPONDS: Your wish is our com-
mand, Eric. We’ve received a num-
ber of e-mails requesting that we
resolve this issue; as LCD technology
becomes more and more sophis-
ticated, its potential for gaming
becomes more promising. In next
month’s issue, we’ll be comparing
several top LCD displays to the trusty
CRT. Stay tuned! nin the No-Bull
Peace Prize winning
May issue of
Maximum PC
THE FUTURE
OF 3D IS HERE
ATI and nVidia are on the verge
of delivering a whole new set of
3D technologies, and we have
the scoop! What’s the upshot for
you, gentle reader? Unbelievable
frame rates in the next-generation
of games!PROJECT:
BUDGET PC
Is it possible to build a $500 PC that
zooms? How fast can you make a
$1,000 rig? Our staff is furiously testing
components and gear. We’ll have the
answers for you next month.MAXIMUM PC
CHALLENGE: LCDS
Can the latest, greatest LCDs
compete with traditional CRTs in
displaying the newest games? Find
out next month!PLUS
A feature on the latest mother-
boards, Voodoo’s cool-looking silent
PC, and more!COMING
NEXT MONTH
CUT, COPY, PASTE
In the March RAM: All
Questions Answered feature
we goofed in the chart titled
“How We Test RAM” (page 55).
We ran the wrong clock speeds
for DDR SDRAM. The correct
clock speeds are:
PC2100 = 133MHz
PC2700 = 166MHz
PC3200 = 200MHz
PC3700 = 233 MHzLETTERS POLICY: MAXIMUM PC invites
your thoughts and comments. Send them to
[email protected]. Please include your
full name, town, and telephone number, and limit
your letter to 300 words. Letters may be edited for space
and clarity. Due to the vast amount of e-mail we receive, we cannot
personally respond to each letter.8 MAXIMUMPC APRIL 2004