Psyko 5.1 Gaming headset now available in USA and Canadee-i-o [Surround]

The Psyko 5.1 gaming headset has fascinated us for nigh on a year now but it is finally reaching the masses. The headset is available today on NewEgg and a number of other exciting online retailers.



The headphones cost We did a hands-on at CES.


[CrunchGear]

The Sapphire Radeon HD 5970 Is Faster Than Every Other Graphics Card [Graphics]

The new Sapphire Radeon HD 5970—based upon the acclaimed ATI HD 5970 chipset—is the new world's fastest graphics card. Its 3DMark Vantage score is an insane 22,000.
The overclocked ATI GPU runs at 850MHz, which is supported by 4GB of DDR3 RAM (itself, clocked at 1,200MHz). And all this hardware necessitates three fans an a massive heatsink, making it thicker than your average video card. Outputs include two dual-link DVIs and one mini DisplayPort. Weird that there's no HDMI on here, like the 5870 has.

AMD expects that we'll see the HD 5970 from a variety of different manufactures, which is good because while we have no idea what the thing costs, it won't be cheap.
[Gizmodo via Fudzilla via SlashGear]

Dell Alienware M11X Is Their First Ultraportable Gaming Netbook [Laptops]

Alienware no longer means 'bulky gaming PC.' Dell's new Alienware has an 11 inch display and looks like a netbook!

• 6 1/2 hours of battery life (battery mode)
• 2 hours of "intense gaming"
• that gaming mode will come courtesy of a faster NVIDIA GPU, which you can switch to in seconds and which does not require a restart or logging out
• Video out via DisplayPort, HDMI, and VGA
• 3D mark scores in 6-7k range
• 50FPS Crysis, 30FPS Call of Duty on High Settings
• Under $1000 (later this year, we believe)
[Gizmodo]

PS3 May Get Cross-Game Chat With Next Firmware Update [Rumor]

Bedlam in the official Playstation forums: Someone slipped up and accidentally confirmed that cross-game chat may be coming in the next Playstation 3 firmware update. The post was quickly deleted, which forumgoers are taking as evidence of the slip's truth.
Cross-game text chat has been around since April, but voice chat has so far been a no-show. Kotaku writes that they tried to contact Sony for a truly official response, but only received a curt reply:

As you know, we haven't made any announcements on upcoming firmware and don't comment on rumor or speculation.

It's quite possible that the next firmware update will in fact bring cross-game chat, but I think we're getting a bit too excited over a forum post.
[Gizmodo via Playstation Forums via Kotaku]

Zune HD Promo Video Offers Quick Peek at Hardware's 3D Gaming Capabilities [Zune Hd]

As the Zune HD launch looms ever closer, a smorgasbord of purported launch videos have offered up what appears to be the best demonstration yet of the sleek, sexy portable's 3D gaming capabilities.
The 3D gaming example, Forza 3, debuts at about the 30 second mark in the video above. It's a fleeting glimpse, but it's solid evidence nevertheless.
For authenticity's sake, we tell you that Microsoft PR reportedly asked the leak's originator, Buy TV, to take the videos down, but not before brigands at sites like Neowin were able to upload them to YouTube, where they spread like a New York Times homepage virus.
Zune HD drops in two days. [Neowin, Buy TV via ars technica]