Charles T. asked: I saw an article online about USB 3.0-capable motherboards and hard drives and have a few questions. I read somewhere that USB 3.0 is about 10 times as fast as USB 2.0, but the USB 3.0 hard drive benchmarks I saw only showed a performance increase of about 5 or 6x depending on the file size. Is this one of those cases where a new technology will never be able to hit its advertised speeds? You know, like AGP 4X vs. AGP 8X, or PCI-E 1.0 vs. 2.0. I ask because I’m in need of some really fast, cheap, removable storage that’ll be compatible with new and old PCs and have been hoping USB 3.0 would be the solution I’ve been waiting for.

My other question is that I heard that Intel is delaying USB 3.0 until around 2011. Is that true?

A: You read correctly that when using its fastest mode, USB 3.0 will offer about 10 times the bandwidth of USB 2.0 (4,800Mbps vs. 480Mbps), Charles. But there are a number of other things that will ultimately have an effect on performance, especially with regard to USB 3.0 hard drive transfer speeds. Remember, no matter how much bandwidth an interface such as USB 3.0 offers, the performance of the actual drive(s) will still limit your transfer speeds. For example, if a USB 3.0 hard drive is connected to a USB 3.0 port that fully supports the fastest 4,800Mbps SuperSpeed mode but the hard drive is only capable of 100Mbps transfer speeds, that 100MBps will be the maximum bandwidth the drive will consume. With that said, it’s not likely that future devices will exploit and expose 100% of the bandwidth afforded by USB 3.0, but rest assured devices will be significantly faster than USB 2.0.

To answer your second question, Intel isn’t delaying USB 3.0 until 2011, per se, but the company’s chipsets won’t offer native support for the technology until then. That may delay mainstream adoption of USB 3.0, but third parties are at the ready today with discrete controllers and bridges that will be available on motherboards and in peripherals, such as external hard drive enclosures. This hardware should be available by the time you read this.

Jimmy D. asked: I’ve heard the buzz surrounding the Core i7 Mobile processor from Intel and think it sounds like complete overkill. I’m in the market for a midrange multimedia notebook but don’t want a boat anchor of a machine. I need decent graphics capabilities for some casual real gaming (not just Sims) and the ability to run full 1080p video without having to tether to the wall 15 minutes into the movie. While the Core i7 probably offers a nice performance kicker, I don’t need a desktop replacement notebook but certainly can’t stand a tiny, emaciated netbook either. I need something in between. Any suggestions?

A: Jim, there’s no question that a notebook processor that is capable of 8-thread multiprocessing (a quad-core with Hyper-Threading) is definitely targeted more toward the power user looking to get more horsepower in a notebook footprint, battery life be damned. However, Intel’s new Core i7 Mobile processors have some really nice dynamic clock gating features, on a per-core level, that can save power and preserve battery life when processing workloads don’t require much juice. The new chip can completely power down cores if an app is coded only to take advantage of a single- or dual-core processor.

So, in reality, although the onboard processing engines that make up a Core i7 processor offer more performance and collectively will draw more power under a full multithreaded load, these chips have more granular and intelligent power management; they’re actually much more power-efficient compared to previous high-end mobile processors.

That said, we agree—a full Core i7 for your intended usage may indeed be overkill. The good news is Intel’s new Arrandale Core i5 Mobile processor architecture is coming out in January and will have on-chip Intel graphics capable of full HD video decode processing. This Core i5 mobile chip will also be a native quad-core but will be built on Intel’s 32nm process for significantly lower power consumption.

Although the chip won’t support Hyper-Threading, it will support Intel Turbo Boost clock gating functionality at the core level for additional power savings. And to appeal to your gamer side, the chip will also support an adaptable switching capability that will let the system toggle between integrated graphics and a discrete GPU that might be configured in a number of notebooks from various vendors. Look for notebook product offerings from the usual suspects to start rolling out over the next few weeks and throughout the first quarter of 2010.

Brent J. asked: I built a new system for myself just under a year ago and I’ve been having one nagging problem: It periodically hangs, which drives me crazy. It’s an Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 on a Gigabyte EP45-UD3P with 4GB DDR2 memory, 1TB HDD, and Gigabyte Radeon HD 4670 512MB. Other installed hardware includes a Hauppauge PVR-150, LG DVD-RW and a D-Link 802.11g PCI card. I’m running Windows Vista 32-bit Home Premium SP2, though the problem also occurs on the beta and RC versions of Win7 that I’ve installed on the same machine.

Every once in awhile the system will freeze for about three to four seconds and then return to normal. For example, if a song is playing on iTunes when it happens, the song will skip for the three to four seconds it takes for the system to become usable again. It doesn’t appear to be HDD-related, as the HDD doesn’t thrash when this happens. I do notice that, for a split second after the system resumes, my CPU meter in the Windows Sidebar shows two of the four cores (always Core 1 and Core 3) show full usage and then return to a more typical load. I’ve tried having the Performance Monitor open and setting the Task Manager to sort processes based on CPU usage but I can never see which process, if any, is causing the problem. Any suggestions on narrowing this down or on solving it altogether would be greatly appreciated.

Also, how do I determine the revision of my motherboard? It doesn’t appear in CPU-Z, and I need it to determine what version of BIOS updates will work with my board.

A: This sounds to us like one of two things. The first thing to consider is the number of peripherals and add-in cards in your machine that are looking to occupy a system resource, such as an interrupt or memory address. It’s possible you have some sort of hardware-level conflict that causes your system to hang briefly while it arbitrates between the devices calling upon that specific resource. However, with your OS and hardware selection, issues like this are a bit rare these days.

Let’s take a closer look at what you’re doing at the time you see the hang occur. Are you browsing the Web? Checking email? Are you accessing a large database or using a resource-intensive app, such as a database program, higher-end office software, or content-creation app? You could be seeing the result of a script—malicious or otherwise—running amok and chewing up memory bandwidth and processor resources such that your system becomes temporarily unavailable until that script completes and/or times out.

You were on the right track checking Performance Monitor. We’d also suggest checking your System Tray to determine what actual applications you’re running at the time the hangs occur. Go through a process of elimination troubleshooting approach.

Finally, as you hinted, updating the BIOS of your motherboard is always a great idea to minimize the possibility of resource conflicts. One of the easiest ways to identify your motherboard’s revision is to fire up the manufacturer’s BIOS update tool for Windows. First pull down the latest version of the Gigabyte BIOS update utility from Gigabyte’s site and grab the latest BIOS for your board while you’re there. It should be listed by model number. When you fire up the utility, it will show you the version you’re running and offer an option to upgrade if need be. Good luck!

Derek B. asked: I have a unique problem with my work PC. I’m employed by a small company that has only 14 computers, so we sometimes have to share each other’s systems when we need to access a certain program. For example, we have an invoicing program on only one PC because it’s too expensive to have multiple licenses in the office. And on my PC, we have a custom reservation database program that’s used to track customers who are on a waiting list for a slip-on private dock in my city.

My problem is that because I have the reservation program on my PC, I have to let three other employees use my system on occasion. That means they have my username and password, etc. In and of itself that isn’t a problem, but when these people use my PC, they also have access to my emails in Outlook, and I have some emails that are of a private nature with salary information, performance reviews, and the like. We don’t have an IT staff, and I’m not terribly tech savvy; I thought I’d ask you guys for help. Is there an easy way to give users access to my PC and programs but block them from being able to open Outlook and see my emails?

A: You’re in luck, Derek. There are a couple of really easy ways to prevent users from accessing your Outlook emails, even if they have access to your PC. If you do a quick search online, you’ll find a couple of third-party applications that’ll let you password-protect Outlook and prevent it from launching, but for someone in your situation, we think it would be easiest (and cheapest) to password-protect your PST file.

Outlook saves emails, contacts, and some other information in one specialized file, which has the extension .PST (typically “outlook.pst”). If you open Outlook, right-click your Personal Folders heading at the very top of your folders list, choose Properties, and then click Advanced. In the resulting Personal Folders window, you’ll see the path to your .PST file. Make a backup of that file and stash it somewhere for safekeeping.

Although Outlook doesn’t currently have a built-in mechanism to password-protect the program itself, it does give users the ability to add a password to their .PST file(s). With the .PST password option configured properly, Outlook will prompt you to enter a password when it launches; if the password entered is incorrect, Outlook will close.

To set your .PST password, right-click the Personal Folders heading again and select Properties from the context menu. On the General tab, click the Advanced button. A new window will open labeled Personal Folders. In that window, click the Change Password button. Another window will open that will ask you to enter the existing password (leave this blank, as you don’t have a password currently), a new password, and verify the new password. Enter a new password (obviously, make it something different from your login password), but do not check the box underneath labeled “Save This Password In Your Password List.” Click OK to save the password and OK again to close the Personal Folders and Properties windows. Finally, close Outlook altogether. When you launch Outlook again, you should be prompted for the .PST password.

by Dave Altavilla and Marco Chiappetta,
the experts over at HotHardware.com.