ToC Gaming News Blog : All The Latest PC Gaming News

We know you have a ton of questions about the upcoming CoD: WW Beta, so we put together a quick FAQ on the Xbox 360 Beta. Stay tuned, we’re in the process of developing a much more in-depth FAQ on the PC and Xbox 360 Betas.

QUESTION: What is the CoD: WW Xbox 360 Beta?
ANSWER: Treyarch is recruiting dedicated Call of Duty fans of to help test Call of Duty: World at War’s performance from a gameplay and backend standpoint. Feedback and performance data from this Beta will be instrumental in ensuring CoD: WW’s success from Day One! This Beta will have a limited space so make sure you get your name in the hat to get a token!

QUESTION: Who gets to be in the CoD: WW Xbox 360 Beta?
ANSWER: For U.S. consumers, read on to find out more. For our international comrades, many more countries will have access to the Beta program, so stay tuned! People interested in joining the beta in the U.S. can join one of two ways:

1. Guarantee a spot by pre-ordering the game through GameStop or
2. Getting first-crack at a token by heading to CallOfDuty.com and signing on as a new community member. Remember, space is limited so the earlier you register, the more likely you’ll get a token.

QUESTION: If I already have an account on Callofduty.com, should I create a new one?
ANSWER: No! See below for how the handout of tokens will work, but if you already have an account with us there is no need to sign up anywhere, you’re already in line!

QUESTION: How does token distribution work for members of CallofDuty.com?
ANSWER: To reward the most dedicated CoD fans, the order of distribution on CallofDuty.com is as follows:

1. Charlie Oscar Delta members who migrated their accounts over to CallOfDuty.com
2. CallofDuty.com members
   (CallofDuty.com members will be prioritized by they date in which they joined CallofDuty.com. The longer they’ve been a member, the better chance they have of getting a Beta Token.)

QUESTION: How will we get the keys?
ANSWER: Beta keys will be emailed to the address you have associated with your membership on CallofDuty.com. We will be announcing the start of the Beta on CallofDuty.com as well as emailing everyone selected to participate.

QUESTION: When will the beta start and how long will it last?
ANSWER: The beta is tentatively slated for October and will conclude prior to the game’s November 11th launch. As soon as we approach the launch of the Beta, we will notify everyone who is eligible to participate.

QUESTION: Will I have the opportunity to provide feedback?
ANSWER: Absolutely. When the beta launches, we’ll provide information about how you can communicate back to Treyarch.

QUESTION: Will there be a PS3 beta? If not, why?
ANSWER: No, there won’t be a PS3 beta. The Xbox 360 and PC environments will provide the feedback that we need to make any back-end technical modifications to the co-op and multiplayer features, which means an optimized experience for everyone, independent of the console they own.

QUESTION: When will more information be released on the PC beta?
ANSWER: More information on the PC beta will be posted soon, please stay tuned. The PC beta is also planned for October.

Call of Duty Headquarters

Electronic Arts (EA) will mark the tenth anniversary of its Medal Of Honour series with a new promotional package for the PC.
The Medal Of Honour Tenth Anniversary Edition will contain five PC games from the series alongside some added extras.
Games included are Medal Of Honour: Allied Assault with its two expansion packs, Spearhead and Breakthrough, alongside Medal Of Honour: Pacific Assault Director's Edition and the most recent Medal Of Honour Airborne.
The pack also contains a 14-track compilation of music from the series by composer Michael Giacchino, as well as exclusive weapons for use in the games and a strategy guide covering all instalments of Allied Assault.
Gamers can also learn more about the real-life history of World War II with footage from the conflict alongside interviews with war veterans.
The first Medal of Honour game was released on the PlayStation in November 1999.

Gaming - News - EA marks ten years of 'Medal Of Honour' - Digital Spy

The world of high demanding games widens every day. While the level of realism of games rises at a constant rate, graphics card manufacturers have to keep up with providing the powerful hardware support which can enable users to fully enjoy the game play. Both game developers and graphics solution makers have difficult tasks to fulfill in order to raise the performance bar with each and every new release. 

N4G.com : Running Crysis WarHead on 14 Graphics Cards - A GeForce GTX 280 delivered more performance than a Radeon HD 4870 X2

Well, it looks like the good times that are the Ubuntu alpha testing process hit a bit of a snag recently, as one of the latest kernels apparently had the nasty side effect of irreparably damaging some users' hardware -- specifically, certain Intel network cards. So far, it seems that only laptops have been affected by the bug, which corrupts the NVRAM used to store data like MAC addresses, but folks don't seem to be ruling out the possibility that it could affect desktops as well. What's more, while a warning has been added to the ISO download, it hasn't been pulled altogether, with the only explanation given being that it would delay the 8.10 release schedule too much. Not entirely surprisingly, that has prompted at least a few folks to give up on testing alpha versions of the OS, at least until this whole thing gets sorted out.

Ubuntu alpha apparently breaking hardware, shattering dreams - Engadget

Treyarch has revealed details about the Call of Duty: World at War Limited Collector’s Edition, due to ship alongside the game when it launches on November 14th.

The Limited Collector’s Edition comes packaged in a metal storage tin big enough to store multiple games. So if you were ever looking for a solution to transporting all of your Call of Duty’s together, here it is.

The only other physical item included with the limited edition is a branded steel canteen. The other bonuses are all digital items to use in game, including the powerful FG 42 Machine Gun being unlocked from day one, a VIP status tag for use in the online multiplayer modes, and an exclusive double experience week.

So far we’ve only seen shots of the Xbox 360 and PC Limited Collector’s Editions, so it’s unclear as to whether it’ll be available on other platforms. Check out the first pics below.

D+PAD » CoD: World at War Limited Edition Revealed

And you thought the Spore DRM Issue was finally at an end, eh? Hardly, since a bunch of Spore owners have banded together and have filed a class-action lawsuit against the game’s publisher, Electronic Arts.

The lawsuit claims that the DRM program, SecuROM, actually interferes with the standard operation of the computer’s operating system. For those of you who don’t know what an OS is, I’ll translate: It breaks Windows (or OS X, whatever). The suit claims that the program is installed without the permission of the user, and that once the program is installed it cannot be removed — even if the user uninstalls Spore.

From the Courthouse News Service:

Consumers are not warned about the program, which is installed without notice and cannot be uninstalled, even if the uninstall Spore, the complaint states. The secret SecuROM program is “secretly installed to the command and control center of the computer (Ring 0, or the Kernel), and surreptitiously operated, overseeing function and operation on the computer, preventing the computer from operating under certain circumstances and/or disrupting hardware operations,” the complaint states.

I usually have an opinion about these kinds of things. But then I remember that I refused to buy Spore until the DRM complaints have been dealt with, so rock on with the lawsuit.

EA Sued Over Spore DRM

ThermalTake introduced Xpressar - world's first computer case with a DC inverter type micro refrigeration cooling system! According to ThermalTake, the Xpressar RCS100 case keeps your components 20°C cooler than a liquid cooling system.
The Xpressar RCS100 is a quite big supertower case, it measures 605 x 250 x 660mm and weighs 22.2kg. There's support for micro ATX and ATX motherboards, seven 5.25" devices, five 3.5" devices and 10 expansion cards. The case is made out of 1.0mm SECC steel and features an aluminum front door, the design of the case looks a bit like the Xaser VI and it has several nice features such as a removable motherboard tray, cable management, a sliding hood and an adjustable PSU bridge. Furthermore, the front also features a compartment with I/O ports, this includes 2x e-SATA, 4x USB 2.0, 1x FireWire IEEE 1394 and HD audio.
The most interesting thing about this case is the phase-change cooling system, the Xpressar features a micro vapor-compression refrigeration system, which is a method similar to the one used for air-conditioning. It has a compressor, condenser, expansion valve, evaporator and intelligent IC controller. The cooling system uses a circulating liquid refrigerant as the medium which absorbs and removes heat from the space to be cooled and subsequently rejects that heat elsewhere. The refrigeration cooling system is compatible with Intel LGA775 and LGA1366 (Nehalem) sockets and the compressor uses a max of 50W.

The scheme below explains how it works and more info can be read over here.

ThermalTake claims the Xpressar cooling solution performs significantly better than air cooling and liquid cooling. The firm ran tests on a Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 processor and found the Xpressar kept the processor at a relatively chilly 35°C at full load with a noise level of only 20dBA. According to ThermalTake, that's 20°C better than liquid cooling and more than 40°C better than air cooling but I have some serious doubts about these results. It strikes me odd that a non-overclocked Core 2 Duo E8400 with a decent air cooler would reach over 75°C and shut down.

Phase-change cooling for computers isn't exactly new, but AFAIK this is one of the first cases that integrates it nicely. Besides the refrigeration cooling, the Xpressar also supports a 140mm front intake fan, 140mm top exhaust fan, two 140mm bottom intake fans and a 140mm VGA intake fan but those are all optional.

In short, XPRESSAR, this world first DC inverter type micro refrigeration cooling system customized for PC chassis, has minimized the compressor widely applied in air conditioners and refrigerators commonly seen in our everyday lives, and placed it inside the computer case to cool the extreme heating sources of your systems. The built-in intelligent IC controller, the part making this news valuable, will then be keeping the temperatures constant and stable to preventing condensations at the same time.

More details and photos can be found at the Xpressar website.
Unfortunately the case isn't compatible with all motherboards. Here's a list of compatible motherboards from ASUS, Gigabyte and MSI:

MSI: P45 Diamond / P45 Platinum / P45D3 Platinum / P7N Diamond (Only for one VGA card plug in 4th slot) / P7N2 Diamond (Only for one VGA card plug in 4th slot) / X48C Platinum (Only for one VGA card plug in 4th slot)

Gigabyte: EP45-DQ6 / EP45T Extreme (DDR3) / EP45 Extreme (DDR2) / X48T-DQ6 (DDR3) / X48-DQ6 (DDR2)

Asus: Blitz Formula / P5Q / P5QC / P5Q Pro / P5Q Deluxe / P5E Deluxe

ThermalTake Xpressar is the first micro refrigerated case

Yahoo!: Playstation 3 is in trouble