Dear community members,

We have just finished work on a brand new feature that lets registered members of TechPowerUp forums create their profile on our sister site GeneralNonsense.net in a snap.

Early last year, we decided to spin off the "General Nonsense" forum on TechPowerUp Forums to create GeneralNonsense.net, a community with a broader scope for TPU members to socialize. However, many TPU regulars complained that creating a new account there was a cumbersome process.

The new feature lets you create an account at GeneralNonsense.net using your existing TPU credentials a piece of cake:

Instructions Inside

We at Techpowerup.com want to wish all of you around the world a happy and blissful Christmas! May there be boat loads of cool gadgets, hardware and other toys under the tree this holiday season! While 2009 was quite the year with ups and downs, you all have made it a memorable one here at techPowerUp! and we hope to welcome you all next year as well - bringing you the latest in hardware and gaming!

Recently, a member of our community asked me personally to do him a big favour and publish the good cause he and his followers are trying to defend. I'm complete noob when it comes to World Community Grid (WCG) Teams, I really haven't got enough time to participate in such projects, but we know they exist for some time now and they're trying to make the world a bit better. Now techPowerUp! has its own WCG Team led by our forum member Fitseries3 and we're glad to inform you that it's doing pretty well. An averaging 113,000 points a day are being made by the team of 32 members. Full statistics of what's going on can be found here. The team is using me and this news story to become even bigger and recruit more members. To participate, please visit our forums thread here.

TechPowerUp today released Radeon BIOS Editor version 1.20, our popular ATI Radeon graphics card BIOS manipulation utility. The newest version of the software brings about some important feature-additions, along with improved stability and minor bug fixes. Changes in this version, as listed in the software's changelog is as follows:

• Added hex editor
• Added alternative BIOS extraction method
• (Hopefully) fixed the 3650 Device-ID-bug for good
• Fixed a bug concerning weird 4670 fan settings

For a complete version history, and to download the software, please visit this page.

TechPowerUp! announces the IKONIK Giveaway Contest. Up for grabs, are an IKONIK Zaria A20 PC Case, and an IKONIK Vulcan 850W modular power supply. Members of TechPowerUp! Forums for over one month, are eligible. Members need to post in the contest thread, and in a single post, answer three simple questions, to stand a chance to win the Zaria A20 or the Vulcan 850W. For a full set of eligibility details, contest rules, and other information, please refer to the contest thread. Good Luck!

A new version of GPU-Z has been released. New features include the much requested sensor logging feature and support for AMD's latest RV730 cards.

In order to improve the site and your experience we would like to know more about you. Please complete the TechPowerUp Reader Survey here. As a small reward for your time we will give away $200 to one of the submissions.

We have moved to a new host with new servers. This should result in improved page load times. If you spot any broken features please let us know. Thank you!

We have just launched our new VGA BIOS Collection. It uses a more modern interface than the old ATI BIOS Collection and also shows additional info for each BIOS.
Another new feature is that you can now download NVIDIA BIOS files as well, to improve the selection we need your help.

Please save your NVIDIA BIOS and submit it, so we can add it to the collection. Instructions can be found on the VGA BIOS collection page.

Techpowerup proudly presents the Ultra Products HWBOT Giveaway.

All techPowerUp members have to do to enter is submit benchmark data to HWBOT under Team techPowerUp.

Go here for contest details.

Giveaway includes three prizes for three lucky TPU members from Ultra Products! USB Buddy Hub, Hydra MP3 player, X-PRO 600W PSUSource: techPowerUp

Over the last weeks we have been working on a new design for techPowerUp!
The site layout is nearing its completion, in the final phase we would like to ask for your help ironing out the last bugs.
To help, go to the User CP (forum registration required) and select View New Design -> Enabled.

Please leave your comments here.

TechPowerUp! is a source for a lot of things in the computer world. You can get reviews of the latest hardware, articles telling you how to build/mod said hardware, tools to overclock that hardware, an information repository, and a close, loving community. We're proud to announce that there is an addition to what techPowerUp! brings you. Forum user Ben Clarke recently started his very own web comic, which he called "Front Side Bus". The comics are co-developed with user "PVTCaboose1337", and are shaped by the ideas of several users. You can see the development team at work here.

The official website of 'Front Side Bus' is here. All of us here at techPowerUp! Hope that this comic becomes just as popular, if not more so, than Cyanide and Happiness.

techPowerUp! proudly presents a Mushkin PSU Raffle with the winner receiving a Mushkin HP-580 AP.

by: Duonger

---

Greetings all Techpowerup loyalist... To follow up with the recent review here of our HP-580AP PSU, Mushkin would like to offer a raffle to the members of TPU. We want readers to experience the quality and performance of our PSU.

---

This is the second of the two Raffles we are having for these wonderful power supples. This one is open to only EU residents, so if you missed out on the last one because you weren't in the US, now is your chance to win! Come take a look at the contest details for your chance to win!Source: techPowerUp! Forums

How would you like the chance to win brand new 580W Mushkin HP-580 AP power supply (reviewed here by techPowerUp!) for free? Well, provided that you have been are a respectable member of the community and have been registered to techPowerUp! for 30 days or more, and are living in the North America, all you need to do is visit the Contests subforum and take a look at the Mushkin PSU Raffle. All the rules are listed there – there will be two raffles and the current one is only for North American residents. Basically, all you need to do visit that thread and post “Get More” to be in with a chance! The closing date is 28th June, but make sure you do read through the rules thoroughly.

Do you feel confident in your photo-editing skills? How about your photo-doctoring skills? If so, you'll enjoy competing in the TechPowerUp! Image Editing Contest. Sponsored by forum members, who co-operate in a club known as the "Photoshop User Clubhouse", the prizes are quite impressive. You could win the professional version of Futuremark's latest benchmarking suite, 3Dmark06. Or, if you're really good at image editing/doctoring, you could win a full legal copy of "TuneUp Utilities 2007". Please have all entries in by April 21st, 2007. You must be a registered techPowerUp! forum member to participate in this contest. There is no cost to register for techPowerUp! forums or this contest.

I know, you were probably expecting some news on the R600, or the G90, or something actually having to do with the hardware/gaming world. However, one of our forum members, Slater, is a lot closer to the gaming community than you think. Like most techPowerUp! forum members, Slater is someone who's very willing to help someone in need. If you've ever had a problem with hackers, Windows, or programming, you probably know Slater very well. I just thought it would interest some of you to know that Slater will be going into surgery, as his hand needs reconstructing. Slater is known for posting his wisdom in such helpful threads as the "sticky" Reccomended Software.

We have installed a new Chat system, it works without Java or Flash - you can also connect from behind firewalls.

Give it a try!

Guys, if you're having trouble with lag while using Mozilla Firefox, please download and install the Firefox extension "ChatZilla". Then, click here.

As most of you know we have recently launched our Reference Wiki.

Today is the first month of our Wiki Competition, which will be a monthly contest with cash prizes awarded to the most active contributors.

Five winners will be picked and awarded with $150, $100, $75, $50 and $25.

For the complete set of rules and discussion, go to this thread,

The techPowerUp! Reference Wiki is officially completed, and open for public editing. The Reference Wiki requires a fresh registration (with only alphanumeric characters and no spaces), and will not recognize a techPowerUp! Forums login.
You do not have to be registered to write or edit an article, and we look forward to having all sorts of good articles. If you have something to share, or are looking for a good read, please visit the Wiki.Source: techPowerUp!

90 minutes of downtime.. not bad .. site's back up. Please look around and let us know if you spot any errors.

We will be performing an OS upgrade today on the TPU main server. Expect downtimes between 0 and a few hours, in case something goes wrong.