Microsoft Longhorn Alpha outed

AN ALPHA RELEASE OF MICROSOFT'S LONGHORN gets a going-over at the German-language site Chip.de. Here it is.

Ok. Ok! Here's a translation thanks to the Googlers.

With this OS, Microsoft will attempt four big changes, says Chip. The user interface - Avalon - gets a revamp, copying, as usual the Mac OS, in this case OSX's Aqua. The Palladium "security" system will get an outing, too as will a new file system, WinFS. And .NET sneaks in there somewhere too. The Alpha is too early to evaluate properly they say, but they ask at least a couple of good questions, like: Who actually gave Intel, Microsoft & Co the idea that they have to have to "protect" the computers of this world? And, "above all," they ask, "who protects us against them?"

Another a hot topic for the future is Nvidia's upcoming GeForce FX graphics chip. Paper launched already, promised early next year but unlikely to appear in volume before April, Nvidia has been showing off the technology dahn under. The inhabitants of Tweaktown tipped up to check it out. Their show report is here.

Sticking with today's tech, Tech-Report has a three-way Radeon round-up, comparing three distinct flavours of ATi's Radeon 9700 Pro. They have cards from Crucial and Tyan, plus ATI's own All-in-Wonder version of the Radeon 9700 Pro. Somwhat surpisingly, each of the cards brings something unique to the table. Find out what over here.

While UK Gamer has published a review of MSI's Ti4200-TD8X64 VGA card which is based on NVIDIA's NV28 GPU and has support for AGP 8x. The Gamers compare it to Asus' V9280s which is also based on the same GPU, and a regular Geforce 4 Ti4200. It's all here.

Back to the future and Digit-Life has some gen on the upcoming DEC/Compaq/HP/Intel? Alpha EV7 that they expect to see in January. That's over here.

Wibbling through moboland, Hexus.net has a look at DFI's NB78-HL motherboard over here. They put this board through the normal rigorous tests and it never flinched, they say.

3DVelocity decided to home in on Albatron's KT333 board, the KX400+ Pro. This board brings on board the 8235 South Bridge and adds USB 2.0 and ATA-133 to the mix, they say, over here.

HotHardware.com has a fiddle with an MSI GNB Max-FISR mobo, driven by Intel's new Granite Bay chipset for the Pentium 4. They're impressed, over here.

Married to a Geek? Monster Hardware has a survival guide in five easy steps over here. Probably the funniest thing they've ever published, they reckon.

And down in Overclocker's corner, ForumOC.com has a review of the Sunbeam Rheobus Easy Fan Controller over here. A well thought-out solution, they reckon.

Aselabs check out a $20 Red Cold Cathode from CompUSA over here.

And 8ballshardware have a review of a Coolermaster ATC 4000 case, here.

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