Eric Lempel, Director of PSN Operations, just posted a 2.4 “XMB” walkthrough on the PS Blog. The Trophies one, just posted, is below.

Drooling commence.

Diablo III is official finally and also for the MAC (Jeanne Marie just confirmed)!!! We’re very excited.

We’re at the 1st row, center and seated at the Blizzard Entertainment Worldwide Invitational at the Porte de Versailles Exposition Centre in Paris. Transition to the Diablo III Press Conference.

• We’re hungry. Time for a snack.
• Loads of other PR stuff
• Expect one “hell” of a game. Har har.
• Not only is community being improved, but so are voice commands.
• Co-op is the key to all of it. “We really see the single-player and co-operative play as the same thing,” says Jay.
• “The biggest thing we have to help us protect against piracy is the community.”
• “Diablo isn’t a mod-friendly game because of random nature,” says Jay. Mods haven’t been a big focus. It’s difficult with this title.”
• ___________Diablo III Conference Commencing____________________
• Fire Dancers Approach Stage And Conclude
• Fighting with a huge lizard (looks intense for the graphics engine)
• Shows vast land, and a bunch of battles with zombies
• “Diablo III is a first and foremost co-operative gaming experience.”
• Going out into the wild with a witch doctor to show very improved gameplay.

• “More quests and stories than in any other Diablo games. “
• Greater technology increases mass power of AI on screen. Shows a ton of zombies.
• Each class is unique as usual, and “more complex than ever.”
• Next up, they release footage to journalists regarding combat in their central dungeon, one main level in Diablo III.
• They show the characters and the primary focus on the details as they demo the game.
• Lead designer’s come out on stage to a huge applause.
• Diablo III’s storyline will start 20 years after the events of Lord of Destruction and that the length of the 3rd iteration will be about the same as the 2nd to make a whole “package.”
• Diablo III “is finally here. No more crying about it.”
• Candle is burning under the dark.
• People are yelling.
• Diablo I music plays

Note: We didn’t bother taking photos. They are being released to us, and we’ll spam you with them later. I can already see some have it up. Savor them

Crucial is known for their line of Ballistix enthusiast memory in which hard work is put for lower latencies, maximum performance, and great reliability. The Crucial 4GB DDR3 PC3-8500 (CT2KIT25672BA1067) is not an exception. This kit, even without the signature of golden shaded aluminum heat spreaders, performs equally admirably, and should be in the direct eye fire of hardware, performance, and gaming enthusiasts alike.

The Radeon 4800 series has many people excited since we published our review on the 4850 to our in-depth exclusive reveal first on the 4870. Now, today we bring a review on the 4870 with dual goodness. That’s right. We have 2 of these powerhouses from AMD, which reveals the introduction of the highly desirable and now most successful GDDR5 memory architecture. A complete power machine, the ATI Radeon 4870 is the most valuable card to date in terms of the Radeon evolution and Ruby keeps looking sexier by the minute. Stable temperatures, amazing performance on all DX 10.1 games with many XGA resolutions, make not only a very formidable card series in general, but a great contender as the 4870 and one that is set out to win against the competition this time around.

EA announced today that Chicago Bulls forward, Luol Deng, will be the cover athlete and spokesman for NBA LIVE 09 in the UK. Deng, raised in the UK from 1993, has played in the NBA for three years and is a vital part of the Great Britain national team. This is the first time the UK has worked with a local athlete and highlights the continued growth of the NBA in Europe.
more»

For the ultimate Spore fan, Maxis, an Electronic Arts Inc (NASDAQ: ERTS) studio today announced the limited Galactic Edition of the highly-anticipated game from the creators of The Sims. This special box will contain the ‘Making of Spore’ DVD, ‘The Art of Spore’ hardback mini-book, a fold-out Spore poster, and a premium 100-page Galactic Handbook. The Galactic Edition will also feature a DVD documentary from the National Geographic Channel called “How to Build a Better Being”.

The Spore Galactic Edition is the ultimate backstage pass for the Spore universe. The Spore Galactic Edition is an incredible collection of art, video and behind-the-scenes access to the development team for fans, along with some of the coolest, most collectable packaging in years. - Patrick Buechner, vice president of marketing, Maxis.

Spore gives players their own personal universe in a box. Create and evolve life, establish tribes, build civilizations, sculpt entire worlds and explore a universe filled with creations made by other gamers. Spore gives players a wealth of creative tools to customize nearly every aspect of their universe: creatures, vehicles, buildings, and even UFOs.

In the UK the Galactic Edition of Spore will be available for £44.99 while the regular edition will retail at £39.99. Versions of Spore will ship for the PC, Mac, Nintendo DS™ and mobile phones on the 5th September 2008.

So, on with it. What’s the latest ATI Radeon 4800 series all about? What is the texel stream rate and all of that? WhatIfGaming is here to go over the ATI Radeon 4800 Series in depth. The ATI Radeon HD 4800 Series of GPUs in short brings the power of supercomputing to gamers, setting a new standard for visual computing and redefining the way gamers play and take HD gaming to a whole new level. The new TeraScale graphics engine delivers an immersing gaming experience. Add this GPU to your PC and watch Blu-ray movies and play HD content with great visual fidelity (HD Monitor capable of a resolution of 1920×1080 or greater). Best of all– it’s all break-through efficiency that doesn’t compromise performance for power.

The powerful new TeraScale graphics will propel you deep into your game play with seamless frame rates and high resolutions. With it, enhanced anti-aliasing (AA) and anisotropic filtering allow unparalleled realism to max out the settings of the most demanding next-generation games. Below are the key 4800 series summary highlights we put together:

Enhanced Anti-Aliasing & Anisotropic Filtering
High performance anisotropic filtering and 24x custom filter anti-aliasing (CFAA) smooth jagged edges and create true-to-life graphics, for everything from grass to facial features.
DirectX 10.1
Play today while preparing for tomorrow with state-of-the-art DirectX 10.1 graphics capabilities.
ATI CrossFireX Technology
ATI CrossFireX technology with up to quad GPU support offers superior scalability so your system is ready to level up when you are.
PCI Express 2.0
Support for PCI Express 2.0 will prepare you for bandwidth-hungry games and 3D applications.

Unified Video Decoder 2
Unified Video Decoder 2 frees up your CPU for other tasks so you get The Ultimate Visual Experience™ for even the most processing-intensive content, including VC-1, H.264 and now MPEG-2. Also, take full advantage of Blu-ray functionality with dual-stream, picture in picture (PIP) capabilities (done in order to adhere to Blu-Ray standards).

Upscale Beyond 1080p
Watch the hottest Blu-ray movies or other HD content at full 1080p display resolution and beyond.
On-chip HDCP
On-chip HDCP (High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection) makes life easier by allowing you to playback HDCP protected content.
HDMI
HDMI with 7.1 digital surround sound support. Also, xvYCC support allows the user to enjoy a wider range of color when connected to a capable HDTV.

Best of all? DX 10.1 support. That’s right. Unlike the newer GTX 280 line, the entire 4800 series supports DX 10.1 fully with tessellation and Gather4 texture fetching.

Let’s go into the 4800 Series features now in detail through a summary.

Antec is known for making great power supplies that last a very long time. In the new addition to the long line of NeoPower pure performance series, Antec heralds the NeoPower 650W high efficiency power supply. The NeoPower features three 12V rails, a high efficiency design, and aims for a better tomorrow for performance. NeoPower’s highly efficient design produces less heat, allowing the use of a smaller fan running quieter at slower speeds. Built to support dual GPUs and the top of the line core CPUs, the NeoPower 650W aims to improve on heat generation, affordability, and performance without compromise for hardware enthusiasts that love both a single and dual powered GPU solution. Continue on to see how it fares as we place it under our severely rigorous power supply analyzation process.

Ever since the Nine Hundred Gaming Case, Antec has been looking for many more ways to increase the stability of the overall experience for gamers and hardware enthusiasts at the end of their computer’s life cycle. Hopeless and needy with their venture, gamers are setting out for a new PC upgrade with the latest line of GPU’s recently hitting the DIMM regions all the way to the mountains of the PCI-E slots. Successor to the Nine Hundred, The Twelve Hundred is Antec’s current best hardcore case for gamers looking to build a crazy setup with the wildest cooling system. Building off the Hundred heritage, the Twelve Hundred ushers features such as: enhanced case cooling through more performable air solutions with air filters, capacity for more fans, and extraordinary space, all of which resuscitate the raw case urge everywhere.

AMD is proudly bringing PC gamers 1.0 TeraFLOP Graphics Performance, with a single GPU that consumes only 110W of power in the HD 4850. Going head to head with the 8800GTX, 8800GTS & GT, and 9600GT series of cards. Developing a new TeraScale graphics engine, AMD is excited to deliver an impassive experience for gaming. With enhanced anti-aliasing 24X (AA) and AF, gamers will find a new realism more improved than previous versions of cards that all had AA and AF flickering sporadic problems. You’ve read our Cinema 2.0 coverage and are waiting for our detailed article on the latest 4800 series line, including ATI Radeon HD 4870 details. Now, we want to reveal one part with the ATI Radeon HD 4850 that should provide a glimpse into the new series line. With power that supports DX 10.1 fully unlike the GTX 200’s, the ATI Radeon HD 4850 brings efficiency together against the competition through features such as ATI Powerplay and ATI Avivo HD to give gamers a more enhanced experience all around.

more»

Everyone wants a good flight so they can remember a great experience later on. Airports have that smell to them. It’s known, but we abnegate from our area of stance anyways and let our nose be the guide. Flight 1171 from LAX to SFO. Close, just have to wait in the long line. That’s when you aggregate all the flights into one spot: “Stand there,” or “wait there’s” aside. Regardless, you always have the smell of those aviator gases. It’s going to be a delightful trip to AMD’s Cinema 2.0 premiere.

The walk to boarding 70A is simple enough, a wonder of lights to the event so we can all reflect on the beginning. Last year launch, AMD sought to break their traditional graphical mark and break into the immeasurable society of mainstream consum..”Hi, checking in,” I say with a penchant smile. OK, so it wasn’t really a smile as it was a smirk. Boarding through, the air hostess is standing frigid with coffee. No one is giving the way. Like a gentleman, I step aside and everything carries on. It’s that time again. When I do the penguin march to the seat. Placing gently in to the center, I am greeted by the decor of two businessmen. One is clearly a health specialist, AMCA pen and everything. The other is a company manager with an air of fatigue, window closed, purple strand tie whizzing about. Stepping away, AMD was making a push fast to mainstream consumers. With the launch of the extensive 3000 series, things are looking up to the eager public. Now, after an entire year, WhatIfGaming is anxious to see what they have up their sleeve this time. The CG poly comparison to real time graphics back in January had us on our creative pens throes. As the aircraft lifts, the city slowly fades. The clouds slowly engulf the pier, and there’s nothing else to do but focus ahead on the so called revolution in graphics: Cinema 2.0. And of course, the bobble heads (people) in the other seats.