It’s been over seven years since Tom’s Hardware first published a comparative test of CPU coolers. At that time, there was a distinct lack of awareness regarding the importance of this component, and a pronounced dearth of critical tests containing knowledgeable analysis. In December 2000, we published the first CPU cooler comparison worldwide, comparing 17 different models. Compared to today’s technology, the coolers of that time seem like amateurish and provisional designs - many of the companies that are well-established brand names in cooling today only became aware of this very profitable field through the tests. And while some companies have since exited stage left, others have evolved into real heavyweights. (Full article ‘CPU Cooler Charts 2008, Part 1′)

Only a few days ago we looked at the performance of Intel’s new Core 2 dual core processors, the Core 2 Duo E8000 series, aka Wolfdale. While a 45 nm quad core Extreme edition processor (Yorkfield) has been available since early winter, the dual-core processors for the mainstream had not been released until recently. As the first Wolfdale review made clear, the new dual core processors provide a nice performance boost when compared to the 65 nm Core 2 Duo E6000 generation. This time we want to look at the overclocking potential and the power requirements of the new Wolfdale-based 45 nm Core 2 E8000 processors, as the enthusiast crowd has very high expectations since 65 nm Core 2 Duo Conroe already is an amazing overclocker. Core 2 processors have served the overclocking community well since their debut. (Full article ‘Overclocking Intel’s Wolfdale E8000′)

Secure online banking, password protected documents, secure remote access to your work PC - they all rely on encryption at some point. But running that whole security process in software is like leaving a spare front door key somewhere in your yard - you’re relying on being able to think of a key-sized hiding place that a burglar won’t find. Random numbers, traditionally stored on disk or in standard memory, are used to encrypt the private keys, also stored on disk or in memory, that secure documents and connections. Back in 2000, encryption specialist nCipher showed that a Trojan like Back Orifice could easily find those random numbers and the private keys they protect. (Full article ‘How Hardware-Based Security Protects PCs’)

Intel Skulltrail Article Overview Article Topics Part 1 Intel Skulltrail Part 1: The Power of 8 Cores Part 2 Intel Skulltrail Part 2: Overclocking and Power Consumption Part 3 Intel Skulltrail 3: 8 vs 4 Core Performance We compared the performance of the dual-socket Skulltrail system to that of a Core 2 Extreme QX9770 at the same speed and a Core 2 Extreme QX9650, which runs 200 MHz slower. All three CPUs are Penryns with completely identical features and functionality. (Full article ‘Intel Skulltrail 3: 8 vs 4 Core Performance’)

We published an interesting article last month: “Intel Power Consumption Then and Now” compared performance, power requirements and performance per watt of four different Intel processors. We started with an old Pentium 4 and went all the way up to a Core 2 Quad, and we ran all tests and benchmark at the same 3.0 GHz clock speed. The results were amazing, finding that current processors not only offer significantly more performance, but also much better energy efficiency than the old Pentium 4/D generation. Of course we also wondered: shouldn’t this also apply to AMD? Typically, we start any comparison alphabetically, which would have led us to analyze the performance per watt development of AMD first. (Full article ‘AMD CPU Efficiency Compared’)