Thermaltake is well known for its innovative and creative Chassis, Cooler, and Power Supply among enthusiasts worldwide; the products are not only preferred by gamers and enthusiasts, they are often being imitated by industry competitors. With such popularity among end-users and prestigious reputation in the industry, Thermaltake announces today its endorsement of the new Enthusiast System Architecture (ESA) industry with plans to introduce ESA-certified components in the near future.

“ESA is an open standard that enables components such as chassis, power supplies, and water cooling systems to communicate status and control in real-time.” said Waleed Zamel, Technical Marketing Manager at NVIDIA. “ESA-compliant applications provide enthusiasts with unprecedented software control to achieve better performance, optimal thermal and acoustic operating environments. By providing ESA-compliant Chassis, Liquid Cooler, and Power Supplies, our partner Thermaltake is enabling users to exploit the full potential of the hardware. This kind of engineering cooperation is targeted to enable our mutual enthusiast customers to push the technology to new heights.

”Peter Pan, General Manager of Thermaltake comments, “Thermaltake has spent the past 7 years in developing enthusiast-related chassis, coolers, and power supplies. We are excited about the development of ESA, and believe it will create a synergy within the PC component industry to stimulate the growth of gaming and DIY market and bring it to a whole new level.”

Thermaltake offers wide range of ESA-compliant products to enthusiasts who want to be the trendsetter in PC industry; Xaser VI, Armor+, and Armor of chassis, BigWater 780e of liquid cooler, plus Toughpower series of power supply all supports ESA technology and will be available in Q1 of 2008 for users to purchase in retail channels. Xaser VI, Armor+ and Toughpower series also are all honored to be designated as WCG 2007 Official Product. With endorsement from the largest e-Sport even worldwide, Thermaltake’s ESA-compliant products will offer enthusiasts the highest performance, the quietest and most reliable PC platform

SANTA CLARA, Calif., Aug. 30, 2007 – Intel Corporation today announced it has received a request for additional information from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in connection with the agency’s regulatory review of the proposed transaction with STMicroelectronics and certain affiliates of Francisco Partners to form a private, independent semiconductor company that will design, develop and manufacture non-volatile memory products.

While no estimate is being provided for a specific transaction closure date, Intel intends to respond promptly to the information request by the FTC (also known as a “second request”). The company will also continue to work closely with the agency as it conducts its review under the Hart-Scott-Rodino (HSR) Act. Once the FTC determines that the company has substantially complied with the second request, the HSR Act requires a waiting period of 30 days before the transaction may be closed.

From the pretty lengthy amount of time I had spent with Saitek’s audio products, I had grown to respect everything they were coming out with. I was thrilled with the iFreedom and the iVenture and I figured anything they had for gaming, like headsets, would be beautiful. Saitek’s GH50 LOOKS pretty, but when I took them from the package, they were a bit light - which I wasn’t expecting. Usually headsets with earcups are pretty hefty, making your head feel like you have one of those World War II helmets on. I wasn’t pleased by that. Then, when I had placed the batteries into the small volume and surround sound control that was clinging to the dual microphone and earphone cords, I noticed that the switch was superflous. It did nothing. When you turned it on, the light didn’t turn on at all. When you turned it off, still no light. What did this light DO!?

I booted up my favorite online game with voice and noticed that the Mic Boost in the Windows settings was constantly turning itself on whenever I plugged in the microphone. Why was it doing that? I plugged it into a different computer and it did it there too, was this something that it did because it was compensating for low volumes? The sound coming through the mic was like talking into a tin-can, which became more and more irritating as I continued playing. I then got so frustrated with people asking, “Why is your mic doing that!?”, that I just stopped and plugged in my normal desktop microphone. The mic was horrific and many times, I wanted to call up Saitek and ask why they even bothered with the damn thing in the first place. Old school monitors came with better embedded microphones than this piece of crap, let me assure you.

Now, the headset’s audio was beautiful but not enough to have to deal with how large the headset was. True, it sounded fantastic and I loved listening to the harmonies and bass that came through the headset, but why does it make mention of vibration? Nothing vibrated, hell - the light didn’t even work, so where was the vibration feature? Not that I need it, I have other toys for that - but it would’ve been nice if it did just a little of what it said it would do.

Honestly, the Saitek GH50 Gaming Headset would be a poor investment for the gamers out there that require something solid to listen and speak with. For the amount you pay, you barely get a third of that back in performance and what’s the point? Move on. I hear Logitech is going to dazzle us soon and maybe before that, Saitek’s Cyborg headset will make better on the promises this model was supposed to give us.