Cover HolidayM.indd

LAB NOTES

A PC Dunk Tank

LAB NOTES

A PC Dunk Tank

LAB NOTES

A new computer bets big that enthusiasts are ready to ditch

conventional cooling

S

ubmersible computing is nothing

new; people have been sinking whole

systems in mineral oil for at least a

decade, but you’ve never before been able to

buy a prebuilt submerged system. At the very

least, the oil-submerged Reactor that arrived

in our Lab this month (page 58) promises

top-tier performance at far reduced acoustics,

and taken to its logical conclusion, it may

off er cooling above and beyond anything else

available today. But what if you don’t have

$4,500 or more to spend on a Reactor? Puget Systems has been experi-

menting with sinking a PC in a fi sh tank, and the results are quite interest-

ing. Puget has posted the results of its long-term testing on its website at

http://www.pugetsystems.com/submerged.php.

GORDON MAH UNG

SENIOR EDITOR

TOM EDWARDS

MANAGING EDITOR

Do you regularly carry

around nuclear-missile

launch codes, the

Chinese Democracy

demos, or the Colonel’s

secret recipe? If so,

Kingston’s BlackBox

8GB fl ash drive is

the product for you.

The drive utilizes the

Federal Information

Processing Standard,

ensuring your data

is safe. Check out my

full review at http://

tinyurl.com/6fnpkk.

KATHERINE STEVENSON

DEPUTY EDITOR

My PC was experiencing

an intermittent booting

problem. I would think

I had discovered the

cause and a month or

so later the issue would

pop up again. This led

to the discovery of a

handy app: Windows

Reboot Utility (http://

tinyurl.com/4okxkh). By

running this continuous

loop of reboots I was

able to quickly isolate

the culprit—a persnick-

ety soundcard.

WILL SMITH

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

This month, Norm

and I got to take a

backstage tour of the

amazing Morrison

Planetarium at the

California Academy

of Arts & Sciences.

Once there, we got

a behind the scenes

look at the hardware

used to power the

most advanced

digital planetarium

in the world. You can

fi nd the full story at

http://tinyurl.com/

planetarium-tech.

NATHAN EDWARDS

ASSOCIATE EDITOR

Whew, my fi rst edit

cycle as a real live

magazine editor!

Most of my Lab

time this month was

spent reviewing the

Lenovo IdeaPad S10

(page 90)—my fourth

netbook—and Veloc-

ity Micro’s new Core

i7 machine (page 82).

And I started learning

the ropes on my new

beats: cases, cooling,

and hard drives.

NORMAN CHAN

ONLINE EDITOR

In Left 4 Dead (page

50), surviving the

zombie apocalypse

requires cooperation

and watching your

teammates’ backs. But

if that disaster were to

happen in real life, I’m

pretty sure distrust

and self-preservation

would eventually

undermine any

teamwork eff orts. In

other words, I would

leave everyone at the

magazine for dead.

http://www.maximumpc.com | HOLIDAY 08 |MAMAMAXIMXIMXIMXIMUUUUMMPPPCC| 107

IN THE LAB^

HANDS ON WITH THE LATEST HARDWARE AND SOFTWARE