Thermaltake is constantly innovating to get its message across to its gamer fan base. One of the steps it has taken recently is to introduce videos onto the Youtube platform so that the ever demanding gaming audience can get glimpses of the latest technology before it hits the shelves, or even before the products are reviewed. This unique and forward thinking strategy is making the already steep competition between the big chassis and cooler manufacturers a one horse race.

Undoubtedly Thermaltake is almost the only brand name "in the game" with stalwarts like Zalman and Cooler Master having to re-invent themselves just to keep up. It used to be that Zalman would not budge from its predefined strategy, since its name is already synonymous with solid, reliable, quiet systems. Cooler Master on the other hand are more aligned with mainstream offerings, catering for businesses, System integrators and such like, with only a few of their products geared for gaming. Thermaltake is the only company that has consistently targeted the mainstream and high-end gamer, they consistently focus on lots of flash and plenty of features that keep the gamers coming back for more.

Equivalent to two 24" monitors stuck together side by side, the new DLP prototype monitor from Alienware displayed recently at CES is bound to take gaming and design to new heights. With bigger and better graphics cards going into high-end computers, it seems only natural that the hardware that graphics cards display on should also stretch to new heights.

What makes this monitor special is firstly the response times which are 0.02ms, definitely a major step up from normal LCD monitors. In addition the light source is LED, and the gamma is supposedly 170% greater than anything else available on the market right now.

CES organizers have banned at least one staff member of the Gizmondo website from being able to attend future CES events and they're also considering taking action against the website and its owner as well.

During several press conferences and exhibits at least one staff member would use a universal infrared device to shut off flat screen TVs at random, sometimes several times over during the same conference to really baffle the presenters.

Some would be quick to agree on the actions CES are taking against this sort of disruptive behaviour, others may argue that it's all in good humour and they simply need to lighten up.

Though we're not entirely certain about its authenticity, chinese website PCINLIFE has come into contact with a supposed "8800GS" graphics card with 768MB GDDR3 memory onboard. The brand of the card is by a mob most of us wouldn't have heard of before, "Yeston".

There's stacks of images looking at all angles of the card at this link. Unfortunately any more specifics about the card haven't yet been disclosed.

General Motors, the automotive manufacturing giant attended the largest US Consumer Electronics Show for the first time ever in CES 41 year history. The keynote speaker, General Motors CEO Rick Wagoner was holding no punches and delivered a somewhat atypical promotion of greener pastures where man and machine combine to improve the world we live in. The GM thrust was as a result of several key technologies that enable their new series of luxury cars to guzzle absolutely no petroleum. The line between what is and isn't a consumer electronics gadget is getting thinner and thinner, as in this instance, car technology incorporates many of the conveniences that we consumers love.

The new range of Vue Green line cars work off a lithium ion battery which can plug into a wall socket for a charge, furthermore the electronic motors are amplified with hydrogen fuel cell technology creating water vapor as the only emission. The new technology is said to be affordable too, since GM plans to introduce 16 new hybrid models over the next four years. The cheapest of which is only about $2K more than similar luxury sedans.

A new set of "GigaWorks" series speakers has entered Creative's lineup this week, which at first may seem a little underwhelming and perhaps unworthy of being a part of the GigaWorks range due to the fact that they're just a stereo setup comprising two rather small satellites.

However, not unlike the usual approach Bose takes, the HD50's are all about quality and power packed into a small unit; though that's not to say these would be in any way shape or form comparable given the market and price point they're set at.

The tweeter Creative has chosen to use on these speakers is a 'Titanium Super Tweeter' which promises a complete audio experience whilst the system also sports BasXPort™ which is designed to produce a more powerful bass output without the use of a subwoofer.

Deliberately timed with CES, AMD has revealed details of their new Mobility Radeon HD 3000 series graphics chipset for notebooks. In similar fashion to the HD 3000 line for desktops, this new mobile series of GPU brings a similar array of new features never seen before in the portable market.

AMD says it is already shipping a low-end HD 3400 chipset with 40 stream (shader) processors and a mid-range HD 3600 sibling (120 stream processors) in notebooks as of today, beginning with ASUS' M50 gaming notebook [link to be active soon]. Future versions, such as a likely HD 3800 version, are also expected in the first half of 2008. Operating system support is not mentioned but may include Mac OS X as well as Windows XP and Vista.

You can find out more details about the latest Mobility series at electronista and also at AMD's website.

Hitachi have pushed the barrier of mechanical notebook storage today with the introduction of the world's first 500GB 2.5" HDD, this raising the capacity limit by a whopping 180GB over previous drives.

Dubbed the Travelstar 5K500, this HDD operates at 5400RPM with a seek time of 12ms. Hitachi were able to squeeze 500GB into the drive by using three platters with a 260Gb/in² areal density.

There is a downside however; the drive's thickness has been increased from the standard 9.5mm to 12.5mm to fit all three platters inside the casing, this making the unit too large to fit inside the majority of notebooks currently on the market, not to mention external enclosures too.

CoolIT Systems have lined up a new range of products to be showcased during CES next week; these comprise the new "Freezone Elite" liquid/TEC cooler which include's the firm's MTEC Control Center, a dual TEC graphics card cooler which they simply call the "Dual Drive Bay VGA Cooler", a sealed/closed loop radiator and pump module dubbed "PURE" for efficient CPU cooling, and also the Boreas MTEC Chassis which combines a powerful liquid cooling solution implemented into Silverston'e TJ-07 full-size aluminum tower chassis.

The lads over at Techpowerup have some more images and details on the new products, as does Engadget and also this section of CoolIT's website.

Some supposed exclusive screenshots have surfaced on the web which are apparently a taste of what's to come from FutureMark with their next installment of the 3DMark series, 3DMark08.