Thin is in, as it pertains to the tech world, and the current trend is towards increasingly skinny devices. Just take one look at the Ultrabook frenzy, including similar devices that don't carry Intel's official Ultrabook label, but are just as flat and portable nonetheless. Catering to this crowd of thin and light machine owners is OCZ, which is rolling out a line of low profile Vertex 3 solid state drives.

The world's population of fan controllers grew by two this week, courtesy of BitFenix, including one model the company claims is the world's first Internet-connected fan controller (Recon) and another that sports low profile sliders (Hydra Pro) for compatibility with just about any case, even ones with doors. The Hydra Pro features 30W per channel performance (with five channels), offers push-button LED on/off functionality when combined with BitFenix's Spectre and Spectre Pro LED fans, and boasts BitFenix's SofTouch surface treatment similar to what you find on many rubberized smartphones.

Probably of more interest to most folks is the Recon, an Internet-connected fan controller that also boasts five channels, but offers fan monitoring and control via mobile devices. The mobile interface is browser-based, so you can control it with just about any operating system, including iOS, Android, and Windows.

"Users have been clamoring for these two devices for a while now, and I'm proud to report that the wait is finally over," says BitFenix Product Manager David Jarlestedt. "With Recon and Hydra Pro, BitFenix once again takes our disruptive ideas and brings them into a new design space – fan controllers. Offering never-before-seen functionality at competitive price points, Recon and

Last year, Hewlett-Packard briefly toyed with the idea of quitting the PC business. While that didn’t pan out as the powers that be at the company eventually decided against it, HP did launch a major restructuring effort by announcing the merger of its printing and PC divisions in March, 2012. According to recent reports, that restructuring effort also includes job cuts. Hit the jump for more.

Acer this week rolled out its TravelMate P243 laptop, a notebook designed to meet the needs of SMB and SOHO with a "pleasant yet practical design." On the practicality side, the TravelMate P243 wields third generation Intel Core processor options with Turbo Boost and, according to model, discrete level Nvidia GeForce GT 630M graphics to tear through those multimedia chores (or some gaming in between hammering out TPS reports).

The TravelMate P243 sports a 14-inch display with a 1366x768 screen resolution. Specs will vary by model, though all will come with a USB 3.0 port for high-speed data transfers (provided you're rocking a USB 3.0-friendly storage device), HD webcam, up to 8GB of system memory, at least 750GB of storage space, stereo speakers, 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi, GbE LAN, Bluetooth 4.0, and various security features, including Acer's ProShield Security lineup, which is a suite of security and manageability tools integrated in a unified user interface (file shredder, pre-boot authentication, and other odds and ends).

Pricing starts at £339 when it launches in the U.K. Acer didn't say when that will be, nor did the company mention whether or not its latest TravelMatewill make a trip to U.S. shores any time soon.

One of the complaints some people have with Amazon's Kindle Fire device is that it's only 7 inches. Sure, it's relatively affordable in the land of tablets (or glorified eBook readers, if you prefer to call it that), but certainly a larger screen size would put additional competitive heat on Apple's iPad, the only tablet line that sells better than the Fire. Well, it looks as though a 10.1-inch Kindle Fire is nearing release.

Ruh-roh! Being an early adopter of technology often means putting up with headaches while a product's kinks get worked out, and it seems that's holding true for at least some early GTX 670 buyers. EVGA apparently forgot to quality test a small batch of GTX 670 Superclock cards and is recalling them as a result.

HardOCP's Kyle Bennett heard the first whispers and asked EVGA what was going on. Here's what the company told him:

EVGA has isolated this problem to an early batch of GTX 670 Superclock cards (P/N: 02G-P3-2672-KR) that were not properly screened during QA/QC procedure. We have already been working with our partners to retest this particular batch. In the meantime, our R&D has also done numerous tests, burn in and component quality verification to confirm that the EVGA GTX 670 Superclock is a well designed product.

The rep didn't mention whether there were specific defect concerns or a way to identify potentially untested cards. Several threads in EVGA's GTX 600-series subforummention GTX 670s crashing shortly after installation; maybe the cause is related? In any case, those forum users report that the RMA process is painless, and EVGA told Bennett that they'd be

If your trigger finger starts itching for a new FPS frag fest while you're out-and-about and away from your PC, Steam now offers the gaming equivalent of calamine lotion: remote game management. Yup, Valve's made it possible to install new games on your PC while you're "busy" at work. Yay instant gratification!

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MSI's 'Gamer's Choice Edition GTX 680 Norris Edition' is a high-end gaming PC, but it's not an official Chuck Norris system, because a gaming PC implies eventual obsolescence and Chuck Norris would never allow that to happen. There are millions of PC gamers in the wild, because Chuck Norris allows there to be, and as far as we know, there's only one Norris Edition system, an obvious reference to the martial arts master and Internet sensation.

So we've established that MSI's latest system is missing Chuck, but otherwise the recipe includes plenty of promising ingredients. It starts with a liquid cooled (Corsair Hydro Series H100) Intel Core i7 3770K processor (Ivy Bridge) overclocked to 4.4GHz. There's also an MSI brand GeForce 680 GTX graphics card (N680GTX Twn Frozr 2GD5/OC), an MSI Z77A-GD65 motherboard, 16GB of DDR3-1866 memory, 120GB Corsair Force GT solid state drive, 2TB Seagate hard drive spinning at 7,200 RPM, and Corsair TX650 power supply. All this comes wrapped in Corsair's Graphite Series 600T mid-tower chassis.

According to overseas reports, like this one at Golem.de, MSI's Gamer's Choice Edition GTX 680 Norris Edition PC launches on May 20, 2012 for an introductory price of 1,899 euros

RunCore's latest solid state drive offering is an oxymoron in the tech world, or perhaps the company was being ironic when naming its new SSD line 'InVincible' when 'Impenetrable' might have been a better choice. Naming scheme aside, the neat thing about RunCore's InVincible line is that the drives feature a pair of self-destruction modes, including one that wipes out data by overwriting the entire disk -- otherwise known as zeroing out -- and one that's, um, a bit more permanent.

"A less subtle method is the physical destruction of your SSD by applying an over-current to the NAND flash memory and thereby physically destroying these," RunCore explains. "The RunCore InVincible product series is catering to embedded computer systems requiring high-speed serial switched fabric interconnects for rugged design implementation and more flexible power ranges. Delivering optimized storage options particularly in mission-critical fields such aerospace, military and general industrial applications."

RunCore uploaded a video of the self-destruct feature to YouTube (see below), and these folks aren't fooling around. Within seconds of activating the physical self-destruct mode, the InVincible SSD starts to smoke. The chips inside end up burned and cracked.

No word on how much these suicidal drives cost or

Whenever a new Windows OS rears its head, Microsoft alleviates the concerns of wary would-be PC buyers who may be tempted to put off purchasing a new computer for couple of months by offering them a free upgrade to the soon-to-be-released Windows flavor. That may grind to a halt with Windows 8; several sources say Microsoft will still give recent Windows 7 PC buyers a chance to upgrade, but only if buyers shell out another $14.99.

However, that $14.99 bucks will net users full access to Windows 8 Pro rather than the everyday Windows 8 OS, CNET's Mary Jo Folley and Microsoft-focused reporter Paul Thurrott report. Windows 8 Pro includes geek-friendly features like file encryption and virtualization support. It may seem a bit like double dipping, but according to Foley and Thurrott's sources, the offer will be available to anybody who buys a PC running at least Windows 7 Home Basic after June 2nd -- giving Home Basic buyers very low-cost access to Pro-level features.

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Well, that didn't take long. Just a couple of days after Buffalo beat Netgear to market with the first commercially available 802.11ac router, Netgear's responded by launching not only the R6300 Wi-Fi router it's been teasing us with, but also announcing a second, slightly cheaper 802.11ac-enabled router and a 802.11ac Wi-Fi USB adapter.

The $70 USB adapter's a big point of interest, as widespread 802.11ac support in consumer devices isn't expected any time soon and Buffalo only released an 802.11ac media bridge. Netgear's adapter gives you the ability those vaunted 802.11ac speeds -- that's a theoretical max of 1.3Gbps, by the way -- wirelessly, as a Wi-Fi standard should be. Too bad it won't be available until the third quarter.

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When we think of Ivy Bridge, we conjure up images of decked out gaming rigs with high-end graphics cards and other burly hardware. And that's all well and good, but Intel's 3rd Generation Core processors are equally suited for IT and business end users, so it was inevitable that the Santa Clara chip maker would strengthen its vPro platforms with its latest and greatest processor technology.

"With the 3rd generation Intel Core vPro processor platform, Intel is leading the way into a new era, delivering the comprehensive and manageable computing solutions to business that enable them to deal with security threats, while providing the flexibility and form factors users demand," said Rick Echevarria, vice president, Intel Architecture Group and general manager, Business Client Platform Division.

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It’s raining Ivy Bridge laptops these days. Not a day goes by without a PC vendor announcing the launch of a bunch of laptops featuring 3rd generation Intel Core i processors. The latest to do so is Sony, which has announced updates to both its VAIO S and Z laptop families.

The company seems especially proud of the new VAIO Z, which it touted as the “fastest ever notebook from Sony” in a press release. According to the company, the 2.6-pound VAIO Z owes that reputation to the fact that it combines 3rd generation Intel quad-core processors (select models) with third-generation SSD Flash RAID drives. Some models of this 17 mm-thick ultraportable laptop will come with a LightPeak-enabled Power Media Dock, featuring AMD Radeon HD 7670M, Blu-ray drive and extra USB 3.0 ports. Sony has also announced full HD displays and 3G/LTE connectivity, but they too will be restricted to certain models.

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Roccat's marketing mavens may have drank a gallon of Red Bull when typing up the press release for the company's new 'Savu' mid-size hybrid gaming mouse, a rodent "built to reign supreme as the new titan of optical sensor mice." Those are just some of the mighty big statements Roccat uses to describe the Savu, which wields a hefty 4,000 DPI optical sensor and supports the company's Easy-Shift[+] technology.

"The Savu is the planet’s premiere mid-size gaming mouse – period," says René Korte, Roccat Founder and CEO. "We packed it with not only world-beating speed and comfort, but with a slew of innovations designed to thrill. The Savu represents our continued dedication to giving gamers the exact gear to fit their every desire."

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ViewSonic this week rolled outits new VX2460h-LED monitor, a 24-inch LED-backlit display with what the company claims is the thinnest profile available for its size and class category. Whether or not there's a 24-inch monitor out there that's skinnier, no one's going to call ViewSonic's newest panel chunky, as the widescreen display measures a scant quarter-of-an-inch thick at the bezel (full dimensions are 22.87 inches (W) by 17.60 inches (H) by 7.64 inches (D) with stand).

We're not big on monitor specs because they're so easily manipulated and/or misrepresented, but for what it's worth, ViewSonic rates the VX2460h-LED as having a 2ms response time (GTG), 40,000,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio (1,000:1 typical), 250 cd/m2 brightness (typical), and 170-degree (H) by 160-degree (V) viewing angles.

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Bad definitions pop up every now and again in the antivirus world, as evidenced by that boondoggle a few months back when Microsoft's AV started banning Google's Chrome browser as a malicious app. A new set of bad definitions may be the worst whoops! we've ever seen, though; a ProActiv definition update pushed to premium Avira subscribers brought Windows PCs around the world to a halt after incorrectly labeling a bevy of critical processes as malware. Ruh-roh Raggie! 

The issue was limited to premium subscribers only, as Avira free doesn't receive ProActiv updates. Avira forum moderators rushed to offer workarounds to the problem, and fortunately, the problem has already been fixed via an emergency update. The bad patch was active for less than 12 hours in total.

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Enhanced energy efficiency, a decent CPU gain and big improvement on the graphics front: no, we're not talking about Ivy Bridge, we're talking about AMD's second-generation A-Series Fusion APU, Trinity. And why are we talking about Trinity APUs, you ask? Because they officially launched today, that's why. Well, kinda -- only laptop and "ultrathin notebook" Trinity APUs are hitting the streets any time soon.

Trinity APUs are still based on a 32nm manufacturing process, shoving roughly 10 percent more transistors on a die that's slightly larger than Llano's. The CPU uses AMD's new "power-optimized" Piledriver core -- the follow-up to Bulldozer -- and beats Llano's CPU performance by up to 29 percent, by AMD's numbers, while the integrated Radeon 7000 series GPUs offer "an increase in graphics performance of up to 56% over the previous generation."  Trinity also brings native Eyefinity support.

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The much anticipated third installment of the popular hack-and-slash Diablo series launched earlier today at one minute past the stroke of midnight, which means some of you reading this (or not reading this, at it were) have been giving your mouse a workout for around eight hours straight. Those who didn't download a pre-ordered digital copy ahead of time faced potentially long lines at retail stores, such as the one seen here at a Fry's Home Electronics store in Las Vegas.

"Twenty years have passed since the Prime Evils were defeated and banished from the world of Sanctuary," Blizzard explainson its Battle.net site. "Now you must return to Tristram and investigate rumors of a fallen star, an omen that the End Times have begun."

Diablo III, a PC exclusive, carries a console price tag at $60, and you can tack on another $22 or $37 if you plan to purchase the Diablo III Signature Series Strategy Guide or thet Limited Edition hardcover version. There's also a Collector's Edition of Diablo III that sells for $100 and comes with a handful of extras, like a Diablo skull base and 4GB USB soulstone with full versions of Diablo II and Diablo II: Lord of Destruction, as well as an art book, soundtrack, and behind-the-scenes DVD/Blu-ray set.

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With all the attention focused on the pixel-pumping prowess of the brand-spankin' new video cards being released by AMD and Nvidia these days, an important part of the equation may be getting glossed over: keeping the hardware running cool. Deep down in our inbox, barely visible through the flood of GTX 670-related press releases, we noticed a nugget of information that may be able to help hardcore system builders with their heating problems. Today, Fractal Design announced a new six-fan controller, the Adjust 108.

Adjust 108 sports a brushed aluminum design with six sliders that use LED lights to convey fan speed information at a glance; low speed fans glow white while high RPMs turn the light blue.

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Are all the stories about seamless Wi-Fi switchingand Google Street View wardrivinggetting you down? Is your WPA2 password, well, "password"? Fear not, worried Wi-Fi lovers; researchers from Institut Polytechnique Grenoble and the Centre Technique du Papier have you covered -- literally -- with their spiffy Wi-Fi blocking wallpaper, charmingly called "Metapaper."

The silver triangle snowflake-esque design may or may not be your cup of tea, but the French publications L'Informaticienand The Connexionreport that it's actually the wallpaper's secret sauce. The geometric shapes are coated in conductive ink made with silver particles that block three separate Wi-Fi frequencies. If you don't like it, the creators say slapping a layer of more eye-friendly wallpaper over it won't damage its signal-blocking capabilities. Tin-foil hat types may even want to coat the walls in Wi-Fi-blocking paintbefore applying the Wi-Fi blocking wallpaper to get twice the protection, or, er, something.

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