ATi R600 Help Ease IC Substrate Oversupply

The upcoming R600, which is made on 80nm, is helping ease the oversupply of IC substrates, according to a Chinese-language Commercial Times report, which noted that the chip is expected to be officially announced on either March 8 or 9. The paper said that orders for IC substrates started to be released in late January and the ramp up in demand was evident in the January sales record of major substrate makers, including Nanya Printed Circuit Board (NPC), Phoenix Precision Technology (PPT) and Kinsus Interconnect Technology.

the films of frank henenlotter frankenhooker

We’ll conclude our little look back at the madcap career of semi-legendary director Frank Henenlotter with his 1990 trash masterpiece, “Frankenhooker.” I won’t beat around the bush, this is my favorite of Henenlotter’s films, and is a bona fide cult classic completely deserving of its reputation.? Hysterically funny and just-as-hysterically gruesome, “Frankenhooker” packs more punch than any multimillion-dollar Hollywood blockbuster and delivers the gore-soaked goods on a budget that directors like Zack Snyder and George Lucas probably blow on lunch.

Once again filmed in the environs of New Jersey and, most notably, New York’s former scuzzy underside in and around Times Square (and yes, there are scenes set in a sleazy 42nd Street flophouse, in case you were wondering), “Frankenhooker” is the story of aspiring mad scientist and med-school reject Jeffrey (played by James Lorinz of “Street Trash”), who builds his future father-in-law an automatic lawnmower as a birthday gift, only to have the half-assed gizmo shred his fiancee, Elizabeth (former Penthouse Pet Patty Mullen) to pieces when it goes haywire at said future father-in-law’s birthday party. Jeffrey isn’t one to meekly accept tragedy when science can fix things, though, and he absconds with her decapitated head and concocts a truly warped plan to bring the love of his life back from the grave.

On a “shopping trip” to 42nd street in an attempt to find the perfect body to attach Elizabeth’s now-cryogenically-frozen head to, Jeffrey decides his best course of action is to get as many working girls as possible assembled at one time in order to select the perfect unwitting donor for his scheme.? He hires “lead hooker” Honey (former Playboy Playmate Charlotte Helmkamp) to get a bevy of her fellow hookers together so he can literally “play doctor” with all of them, but he hits upon a problem—after taking copious measurements of all the girls, he can’t find just one perfect “specimen” to stick his former fiancee’s head on. Fortunately for Jeffrey, he doesn’t need to pick just one, as the ladies of the evening stumble upon the batch of “super crack” he has cooked up as a little side experiment and soon are getting higher than heck on Jeffrey’s killer (literally) rock. The result? The picture below says it all, I think—

That’s right, the hookers literally explode all over the room, leaving Jeffrey no end of body parts from which to select as he stitches together a new “home” for Elizabeth’s head.? Soon, with the aid of a makeshift operating theater in his mother’s garage and convenient lightning storm, Jeffrey has brought his lady-love back, with her head attached to a body assembled from exploded prostitute-parts—she’s not the same, though—she has purple hair (and nipples), shambles around like a heavy-footed beast, and says things like “Lookin’ for some action?,” “Want a date?,” and “Got any money?” Yes, homemade surgery combined with the wildly unpredictable forces of electricity have brought Elizabeth back from the grave, and turned her into—Frankenhooker!

With a wildly outlandish premise, a truly fantastic comedic performance from Ms. Mullen in the title role, strong supporting performances (especially from Ms. Helmkamp—who knew so many former centerfold models could actually act?), wonderful “old-school” effects, authentically sleazy New York locations, and a tongue-rammed-tightly-into-cheek overall tone, “Frankenhooker” is an absolute gem of a flick, as no less authorities than Bill Murray and Joe Bob Briggs have attested to.

Finally released on DVD by Unearthed Films in 2005 in a package crammed with great extras, “Frankenhooker” is an absolutely essential addition to any B-film junkie’s video library. Besides a terrifically clean 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer, the DVD includes a terrifically insightful commentary from Henenlotter and makeup/effects man Gabe Bartalos, an extensive interview with star Patty Mullen, a great set of production still photos, a featurette on the movie’s make up effects, the original theatrical trailer, and lots more goodies to keep the demented “Frankenhooker” fans out there happy.

This movie has aged especially well given the “clean-up job” Rudy Giuliani did to 42nd Street, and so unwittingly provides a slice of nostalgia for a bygone era on top of all its other sick attributes. A true one-of-a-kind movie watching experience, “Frankenhooker” marks the apex of Frank Henenlotter’s uniquely twisted filmic sensibility? and will leave you laughing out loud all the way through while reaching for the bark bag at the same time. Not to be missed under any circumstances!

Arctic Cooling unveils ARCTIC MX-3 premium thermal compound

(Pfäffikon/Switzerland, 2 July 2009) The Swiss cooling solution provider ARCTIC COOLING today unveiled the new premium thermal compound ARCTIC MX-3 (4g). Its high thermal conductivity and non-curing nature make it one of the best thermal compounds for overclockers and gamers.

Unparalleled thermal performance

As an upgraded version of the award-winning ARCTIC MX-2, the performance of the ARCTIC MX-3 outranges other well-known thermal compounds clearly. This new compound is composed of carbon microparticles which lead to an extremely high thermal conductivity – 8.2 W/mK. It guarantees that heat from the CPU or GPU can be dissipated quickly and efficiently.

Tested and proven, by using the ARCTIC MX- 3, the CPU core temperature is 7°C and 2.5°C lower than using stock compound and other branded ones respectively. It shows how significant a high performance thermal compound can be to reduce the temperature. Such excellent cooling result is surely what every overclocker and gamer is looking for.

The ARCTIC MX-3 is the easiest way to push the overclockability further!

Safer. Better.

The ARCTIC MX-3 is a metal-free, non-electrically conductive compound which does not cause any damage of the components if it is accidentally spilled out on them. It eliminates any risks of short circuit and provides more protection to the CPUs, graphic cards and other applications between power semiconductor components and heatsinks. The ARCTIC MX-3 is a truly hassle-free premium thermal compound you can rely on.

The ARCTIC MX-3 guarantees 8-year durability. It is available in July 2009. The MSRP is US$12.25 and 8.95€.

Specifications

Thermal conductivity - 8.2 W/mK
Viscosity - 875 poise
Density - 2.32g/cm3
Net weight - 4g

ASUS U46SV Launches in Europe

ASUS U46SV comes with an Intel Core i5-2410M 2.3GHz processor, up to 6GB of memory RAM, an Nvidia GeForce GT 540M graphics card, 500GB harddisk drive, DVD writer, card reader and a USB 3.0 port. Other features include a LED backlit 1366 x 768 display, 0.3-megapixel webcam and Windows 7 Home Premium operating system. The U46SV laptop is currently retailing for€799 ($1,387) in Europe.

Source: TCMagazine

ATi MOBILITY RADEON X700 For Thin-Performance Notebooks

ATI today announced a powerful new PCI Express-based graphics processor fornotebook PCs – the MOBILITY™ RADEON® X700. Driving high definition DirectX® 9performance into new territory, MOBILITY RADEON X700 delivers eye-poppingvisuals and longer battery life for the rapidly growing thin-and-light andperformance-thin notebook segments. With eight pixel pipelines, six vertexengines and high speed GDDR3 memory support, MOBILITY RADEON X700 provides thehorsepower to easily handle today’s most visually intensive games, highdefinition content and workstation applications. With the introduction ofMOBILITY RADEON X700, ATI now offers a top-to-bottom line of native PCI Expressmobile graphics processors.

MOBILITY RADEON X700 technology will be adopted by many of the industry’s topOEM and ODM designers including Acer, Arima, Asus, Alienware, BenQ, Clevo,Compal, ECS, Eurocom, Fujitsu, Fujitsu-Siemens, Gateway Inc, Inventec, Lenovo,LG, Medion, MSI, Samsung, Sony, Targa, Toshiba and Uniwill .

“Users want next generation graphics performance without sacrificing theconvenience of their thin-and-light notebooks,” said Phil Eisler, Senior VicePresident and General Manager, Mobile Business Unit, ATI technologies. “With theintroduction of MOBILITY RADEON X700, they don’t have to. It has theversatility, performance and power efficiency to address a wide range ofnotebooks from thin-and-light to mobile workstations.”

Desiged for performance thin and thin-and-light users, MOBILITY RADEON X700offers a wide range of features and benefits including:

Eight parallel pixel pipelines and six programmable vertex pipelines forlightning fast graphics performance
POWERPLAY™ 5.0 with new PCI Express based power management capabilities forlonger battery life
LRTC™ and LCD-EE™ for high-quality, crisp video playback on notebook panels
Automatic Display Configuration technology for simplified setup of externaldisplays
High performance GDDR3 memory support
A range of integrated memory options optimized for space and power efficiency

“breeders” marks a movie landmark — but so what

Reviewing Vice Squad yesterday, I got to thinking about the straight-to-VHS? boom of the mid-80s to late-90s, and the straight-to-DVD industry that of course still persists today, given that the main baddie of that film was portrayed by the one and only Wings Hauser, who absolutely made his living from that point on in direct-to-VHS B-movies, and your inquiring host simply had to find out — what was the first film to be released exclusively on VHS?

It wasn’t an easy thing to find out (and I should make it clear that I’m talking exclusively about movies shot on film here, so the early-years shot-on-video horror “classics”?don’t count in this case), and in fact when it comes to haggling over actual release dates and what have you, the jury’s still out on what came first. One thing’s for sure, though — the first movie made specifically for the direct-to-video market, as opposed to films that were made with the intention of being released theatrically only to have those hopes dashed when the DTV boom started was writer-director Tim Kincaid (Bad Girls Dormitory, Riot on 42nd Street)‘s 1986?low-rent sorta-Alien-knockoff sci-fi shlockfest Breeders. In fact, one of the advertising taglines that appeared on the original Breeders VHS box, and in related in-store promos, was “A World Premiere Right In Your Living Room!” Hope you remembered to roll out the red carpet and rent a spotlight.

All in all, Breeders isn’t too bad for what it is — it’s got that cheesy-fun sorta feel to it that so many of the movies we cover here do. And maybe it’s just the New York locations combined with the goofy-ass subject matter, but the whole thing kind of feels like a seriously under-budgeted Larry Cohen production (not that Cohen’s films ever had much of a budget themselves, but they were positively lavish spending sprees compared to this thing). There’s lots of wooden-as-a 2×4 acting, a plethora of less-than-attractive women getting totally naked, some pretty effective, all things considered, creature effects, tons of perfectly serviceable gore, and the story itself is simple yet solid. Nothing much to bitch about, then, right? Aside from the fact that it would be better if the chicks taking off their clothes were actually, you know, hot. But seasoned exploitation veterans know that can be a asking for a bit much sometimes.

We start with a couple of scenes of damsels in distress who are attacked by what appear to be perfectly normal human beings, until slimy tendrils wrap around them, and the screaming starts. Pretty standard Mars Needs Women-type stuff. Later on they start turning up at the hospital in pretty bad shape and suffering from selective amnesia when it comes to — ummm — the “events” in question themselves.

Not to worry, though, Dr. Gamble Price (Teresa Farley, the best-looking woman in the picture by far — but don’t get your hopes up, she remains fully clothed throughout — and check out her ’80s bigger-than-big hair) and police detective Dale Andriotti (Lance Lewman) are on the case. Their ace medical examinations soon discover a few interesting pieces of information —

1) The women who have been raped were all virgins prior to — you know;

2) They’ve all? had a strange black substance — ummm — deposited inside them;

and 3) They’ve all been covered in a fine reddish-brown dust that turns out to be — get this — brick dust, and not just any old brick dust at that — we’re talking about some very specific brick dust, the kind found in the bricks that were used in the construction of the city’s sewer systems over a century earlier, only they ran out of the those bricks and switched to another kind.

Now, when the movie you’re making is only an hour and 17 minutes long and at least half that run time is dedicated to various scenes of helpless young virgins being stalked and attacked in the middle of the night, your investigators are going to come to some very quick conclusions, and in this case that means that their first working hypothesis turns out to be correct — namely that alien creatures are living in the sewers and coming up to the surface to take over “host” human bodies and then attack and impregnate human females in order to propagate their species. Little questions like, you know, why they don;t just fuck the opposite-sexed members of their own kind are best not dwelled on for too long.

The trouble really starts, though, when the women who are hospitalized after being alien-raped start to wake up, and head for the old sewer tunnels themselves! Gotta keep things moving, right, and the best way to do that is to have our doctor-and-detective crack investigation team simply follow them and take on the aliens face -to-gross-face.

Since you can pretty well guess how things are going to play out here, or at least you? damn well should be able to, I’ll get back to the overall “vibe” of the film itself here for a minute : all dialogue in Breeders is essentially delivered in a flat, unemotive monotone,? it’s nearly all disarmingly matter-of-fact, and the acting ability of each and every cast member is — ummm — limited, to put it kindly. We’re pretty much firmly in “so-bad-it’s-good” territory here. The only thing Kincaid and his cohorts seem to have actively given a shit about is coming up with decently-executed creatures, and decently executed gore, given the ultra-tight budget they had to work with, and they certainly did a competent enough job with that.

What’s more than just a bit jarring, though, is to see this type of competent (I won’t go so far as to actually call it good, we’ll just leave it at good enough) effects work sandwiched into such a thoroughly incompetent-in-all-other-respects film. But hey, give them credit for laser-like focus on what really mattered, I guess.

The ultra-’80s hairstyles, clothes, computers and all that cement the “ambiance,” for lack of a better term, and as a super-cheap period piece, Breeders certainly works. It’s not terribly memorable in any respect, and some of the more direct Alien knock-offs (I’m thinking specifically here of Creature and Contamination)? were better, but it’s a solidly entertaining enough waste of barely over an hour of your life.

Still, you’d think that, given how ubiquitous the whole DTV industry became, that it would have started off with some a little bit more — I dunno — monumental, I guess, than this — wouldn’t you?

Hell, maybe not.

For whatever reason, MGM ended up with the distribution rights to Breeders here in the DVD age, and have released it in a very apropos bare-bones package. The picture is presented full-frame and I doubt it’s even been remastered, although it looks more or less just fine. The same fgoes for the sound — probably in no way touched up for DVD, but it’s perfectly serviceable enough. The only extra is the inclusion of the (non-theatrical) trailer.

While none of the actors in this flick went on to do much of anything, writer-director Tim Kincaid, who? started off his career as an actor, appearing in the blaxploitation quasi-historical flick Quadroon before quickly moving behind the camera and helming the aforementioned Bad Girls Dormitory and Riot on 42nd Street (which is awesome, by the way), also directed a couple of other straight-to-VHS sci-fi cheapies (Mutant Hunt and Robot Holocaust, if you absolutely must know).

Then his resume went strangely blank for just over a decade until he turned up again under the pseudonym of “Joe Gage,” directing a slew of gay porno flicks (and even occsionally starring in them). Rather ironic, I suppose, for a guy who made a movie called Breeders, but hey, whatever pays the rent. I guess Hollywood wasn’t exactly banging down his door in the wake of Breeders - – - even if it is a slice of movie history.