Want to win a $25 gift card to the ultimate nerd paradise, ThinkGeek.com?  It's easy with Intel Software Network!

Just Ask us anything about software running on Intel Architecture and you'll automatically be entered in our drawing.  That's it!  No strings; we just want to know what you're curious about and how we can help answer your questions.

Questions will be accepted through July 16 and you can enter multiple times - so what are you waiting for!  Start asking today!

The objective of the Idea Zone is to harness the wealth of community knowledge for product innovation. I am hoping that Idea Zone will establish an ongoing conversation where you have an opportunity to share your new ideas on existing products (new features, improvements), provide product suggestions as well as provide feedback on Intel Software Network. You now have the ability to influence the products/tools features.

The products included in the initial launch are Intel Graphic Performance Analyzers, Intel Parallel Studio, Visual Adrenaline Program and Intel vPro Technology. The most important thing to note is that all the ideas will be passed to the product groups/owners for them to consider in their roadmap/ product requirements. 

Through the Idea Zone, developers will be able to share their own ideas, vote for their favorite ideas, discuss ideas posted by you and those posted by others, and get feedback on your ideas. The ideas with the highest scores will bubble up to the top. A team of experts will review every idea and ideas will be rolled up based on novelty, clarity and number of votes & comments it receives from the community. So, here is your chance to influence what you want Intel to do.

Ideas will then be classified as ‘Active’ OR ‘Under consideration’ OR ‘Future consideration’ in order to close the loop with you and  provide transparent updates on how we plan to use your ideas. We want to successfully put your ideas into use.

We are here to listen and make the changes you need.  So, whether it is a small change request or a completely new feature, we are excited to hear from you! 

Check out the Intel Software Network Idea Zone. I am really looking forward to your participation. Thank you!

Ps* We require that you have to register to the IdeaZone site separately and we are working on integrating the registration/login on ISN and the ideazone site in the near future. Thanks for your patience as we work through this process.

Several links for POVRay
Please visit http://icl.intel.com/wikis/cts/PovrayTesting for PovrayTesting information;
Plesae visit http://www.povray.org/ for Povray project details.

For Window installation
Please download the window version from http://www.povray.org/download/

For old version source code
Current POVRay version is called 3.6.1c. Please If you are looking for older versions of POV-Ray or for versions of platforms for which official support has been discontinued, check out our FTP server: ftp://ftp.povray.org/pub/povray/Old-Versions/

Key Notes
For Window version
1. For window version, current POVRay only support VC.NET 2003 or later version
2. How to compile and build POVRay using VC.NET environment
a. Select 'povray' as the start-up project. Do NOT try to compile the default project (cmedit). It won't do anything (and is not meant to). It's a utility project there for the convenience of our developers.
b. All you need to do to get a working POV-Ray for Windows binary is to edit the file source\optout.h to define your name and email address in the distribution message (search for DISTRIBUTION_MESSAGE). Then, activate the OVRAY project and hit F7 and wait. You should end up with the file windows\vc.net\bin\pvengine.exe. Note that if you do not do the above first you will get compile errors.
3. If it complains about missing DLL's when you run it, it's probably because you weren't paying attention when we told you that you needed to install POV-Ray v3.6 first :-). (If you have in fact installed it ensure it is the same version as the source code you have compiled, as the DLL names will change between v3.60 and v3.61).
4. If you are using VC.NET 2005 or later to compile windows\vc.net\povray.sln, the vc.net will ask you convert project file into current version.
5. Please run windows\vc.net\bin\pvengine.exe and you can run this benchmark from menu / render/ run benchmark ( can select one cpu or all cpu if it is multiprocessor System)

For Linux Environment
Here I build and make POVRay using as non-privileged user.
After you untar package, you can follow below steps to make and build POVRay:
1. mkdir
2. ./configure –prefix=/install/path CC=”icc” CXX=”icpc” COMPILED_BY=”your name ”
3. time make check install
4. go to install path and run and $./povray –benchmark

Through above steps, you can setup POVRay environment and run basically benchmarks. In next blog, I will report some benchmark results and how to optimize POVRay performance with Intel Compiler.

I had the pleasure of being involved in the development of this training.  As with books, and face-to-face course material, you, the end user, see only the finished product.  But behind it is a lot of work, by many people.  In this case, we had four people from the SDK group (two engineers including me, our manager, and our documentation specialist) working together with a very talented lady whose specialty is producing e-learning courses.

I have written books, and developed course material, but doing an e-learning was a new experience for me.  I particularly enjoyed working with the people on our team here – they are top notch, even if I do say so myself!

We started by simply “story boarding” the training in PowerPoint, using bulleted lists of what we wanted to cover.  Over time we filled the material in, reorganized it, reworded it, argued over it, and sat in (many) meetings weighing the phrasing of practically each and every sentence that went into the final material.  Once the basic coverage and outline were settled, our training specialist went to work producing the animations used in the training.  These too underwent evolution; the final version is much different (and better!) than the initial animations.

The last stage of producing the learning is to add professional narration; we got someone really good.  Although I had been through the material many times during its development, I was surprised at how much of an additional dimension the material acquired simply by adding good narration.

All in all, this training represents a lot of work; we think it is a worthwhile investment of our time, and we hope you will too.

We are very excited about this WBT, and we hope that all you folks out there trying to learn about Intel AMT and the SDK will try it out.  Even more important: WE WANT YOUR FEEDBACK!  Tell us what you liked and what you didn’t like, and what other kinds of WBTs you would like to see!  We are listening, really!

Solution
There are 2 ways to resolve this issue:
1. let our customer upgrade the license by themselves
2. Help our customer to upgrade the license

The Intel Software Development Products Registration Center website is at https://registrationcenter.intel.com/regcenter/register.aspx, customers should provide their email address and old serial number SN and then click ‘Register Product’ button to upgrade their new license for 11.0.XX Intel Compiler products.

We also promised that we will be reporting back to you on our findings, so here is the  summary presentation  reportout from the focused group discussions submitted  to us by OnSurvey Inc.  

You should already be noticing  some changes we are making on various commuity home pages based on your input.  I, along with other ISN team members, will continue to highlight what we are doing with your feedback. Please don't wait for the next focused group discussion to give us your suggestions. All of us at Intel Software Network really believe in continous improvement and this can only happen by listening to you "the users of the commnity".  Any and all your opinions/suggestions/rants are most welcome.

I am really looking forward to meeting all the attendees at our Intel events next year; the most major of which will be the Game Developers Conference in March (San Francisco), SIGGRAPH in August (New Orleans, LA), the Game Developers Conference in September (Austin, TX), and our own Intel Developer Forum, also in September (San Francisco).

A few questions for all of you out there that think you might attend one (or all!) of these shows:

• How would you like to interact with Intel?
• What would you like to see at our Intel booth?
• What sort of information will you be looking for if you visit the Intel booth?
  Be specific:  Will you be looking to speak with engineering experts?  Will you be looking for developer guides or white papers?  Will you be looking to drop off your resume?
• If you visited one of these booths last year, what would you like to see again (or not see again)?

If you have ANY suggestions or ideas for our shows, use the comments area below to let me know!  We are starting the conference planning stages now and really would like feedback from you, the attendees!  :)

-Gina

Here at ISN Customer Support we've been getting general inquiries about the new interface from users with questions like:

- How do I change my Intel Software Network display name?
- How do I create a new account?
- How do I subscribe to a forum to receive emails when a new post is made?

If you have any questions not listed here, don't be afraid to ask us for help if you get stuck looking for a way to do something or need the answer to a question.

That's what ISN Customer Support is here for! :)

Imagine Intel engineers having their own blogs!!
Imagine letting you have direct conversations on our community!!
Imagine letting you have your own blog!!
Imagine publishing articles written by you!!
Oh well .. Imagine actually listening to you!!

In the past, nothing was said on the external website without going through multiple reviews including a legal review, let alone publishing something written by a external user without much scrutiny.We have changed that and we continue to break other barriers.

We really like to increase your participation on the community and make you feel that you own this community as much as we do. To build communities, we put "web 2.0" capabilities such as blogs/ videos / RSS / exciting contests, etc. on ISN. We also continue to push for transparency, giving up control, and getting you to participate on the community.

Are we successful at it? Our metrics says that we are consistently growing , and you continue to participate through your comments and discussions. But, honestly we really don't know if we are successful. And, we know for sure that we have a lot of work to do.

To help us better understand your needs, we’ve engaged OnSurvey, Inc., a third-party, independent market research firm. Our intention is to be completely transparent with this process so that you will be able to express your thoughts/opinions freely. We will also be reporting back to you on our findings later this summer.

OnSurvey will be conducting 2 online virtual focus groups in a few weeks. They will be tentatively held on Wednesday, July 30 (7 to 8 p.m. EST) and Wednesday, August 6 (7 to 8 p.m.).

As a token of our appreciation, each participant will receive a $75 gift certificate from Amazon.com. We will be selecting the focused participants based on the comments on this blog post answering ANY ONE of the following questions:

1. Why do you visit ISN? What ISN features you like/dislike?
2. Do you feel your voice is being heard by Intel? Yes/No & How/Why?
3. What other online communities you are actively participating in and why?

OnSurvey will be contacting individuals later in July with details. Space is limited so I encourage you to volunteer by leaving a comment on this post as soon as possible. Thank you and appreciate your continued participation on ISN.

For those of you still wondering what I'm talking about, I'll let you in on a little secret. We're showing the old design to about half of you, and the new design to the other half. Yes, this is intentional. We're collecting metrics to guage the effectiveness of the new design.

Would you like to do me a favor? Let me know what you think about it.  Does it work better than the old design?  How would you improve it?

Do you have a burning question you've always wondered about and wanted to ask someone at Intel? 
Well now is your chance! 

I'm opening up this blog to gather customer questions about the Intel Software Network, Intel Software Products, or general Intel questions that I will try and answer for you.  No technical questions please - these can be answered in our ISN forums or through our Intel Software Products customer support pages or at our Intel Hardware Support form.  I'm looking for your questions about Intel that might be hard to find or that are general questions you found yourself wondering about. 

Just imagine that I'm your next door neighbor who works for Intel that you just ran into on the sidewalk for a casual chat - what would you ask me?  What are you curious about?

Post your questions in the 'What do you think?' comments section below and I will edit the post to add the questions that I've received.

________________________________________________

ISN Customer Support Q&A:

What was your first experience with an Intel processor?

My first experience with Intel was with the Intel 386™ processor when I was 9 years old in my IBM PS/1 model 2121.  It had a 20MB hard drive and ran Windows 3.11 for Workgroups.  :)  It is a fond memory!  Prior to that, I had an Atari 800XL, which was super cool in it's day.

________________________________________________
 
Why doesn't Intel allow software developers access to its processor BIOS Writer's Guides
 
BIOS Writer's Guides (BWG) are Intel restricted access documents.  They are available for approved BIOS vendors and OEMs developing BIOS under NDA (non-disclosure agreements) through Intel.  Publicly available documents that may help you are our Software Developer's Guides and our processor documentation guides (choose a processor, then click its 'Technical Documents' tab).

________________________________________________
 
Why does Intel charge money for software development products?

This answer comes from James Reinders, Intel Software Products Director of Business Development and Marketing:
"Intel produces software in many forms, some are sold for a price, some are free and/or open source, some are available to non-commercial users for free and to commercial users for a price.  While it is very important to support our processors, it is also not our desire to destroy the market for independent innovations.  In cases where we charge a price, we are asking a fair payment for our work at a competitive price. We battle to earn our business, and this makes us a better supplier.  Most important of all - this helps create an opportunity for others to compete with our tools and make a fair price. It would be unfortunate if we extinguished competition for supporting our processors by giving away all our software. Intel is fortunate to have the richest array of support for our processors of any processor vendor – we are not interested in destroying that."

________________________________________________
 
How can I find more information about the Intel-powered Classmate PC?

Please see our Classmate PC site at http://www.classmatepc.com for more information.

________________________________________________
 
Does Intel make a CPU that fits an AM2 socket?
Date answered:  June 24, 2008
 
This is an interesting question for those of you 'stuck' with AM2 motherboards.  I'm sorry to say that the answer is no, and there are no socket adapters available for this type of configuration - the number of pins are different and so is the entire architecture of the motherboard.  No fear, though - you can still go Intel!  The easiest thing to do would be to upgrade your motherboard to an Intel Socket 775 (or Socket T) configuration - you can get some as cheap as $50 these days!  See this Amazon.com search page for examples.
________________________________________________
 

HOW DO I FIND CUSTOMER SUPPORT AT INTEL?

INTEL SOFTWARE NETWORK  If you have questions about any Intel Software Network product or service, feel free to drop us a line by using our support contact form.  Before you send us a message though, we encourage customers browse our ISN Forums at http://software.intel.com/en-us/forums/ to see if the question has already been asked & answered.  Want to become a forum member and post your question?  Click the JOIN link at the top and fill out the form for your free account.

HARDWARE PRODUCTS  If you have questions about an Intel Hardware product (such as motherboards, processors, chipsets, and wireless devices), use this form and choose your product from the drop-down boxes.

SOFTWARE PRODUCTS  If you have questions about the Intel Registration Center or our Intel Software Products (that are not answered by our ISN forums), see the Intel Software Help Center.  You can also find specific Intel Software Product Support pages here.  For more in-depth questions, Intel product owners can sign up for our free Intel Premier Support for Intel Software Products (but make sure you register your product at the Intel Registration Center first!). 

DRIVERS  & DOWNLOADS  If you need to download drivers or software for your Intel product (chipsets, motherboards, wireless products, Intel utilities), please see our Intel Download Center at http://downloadcenter.intel.com/. 

EVALUATION VERSIONS  If you want to download trial versions of our Intel Software Products, visit our Intel Software Evaluation Center at http://www.intel.com/cd/software/products/asmo-na/eng/219690.htm
.  You can also find information about our discounts through the Intel Academic Developer Program.  Additionally, you can download certain Intel Software Products for non-commercial use. 

INTEL HISTORY  Curious about Intel Microprocessor History?  Visit our Intel Museum 'Microprocessor Hall of Fame' at http://www.intel.com/museum/online/hist_micro/hof/index.htm. 

INTEL SUBSCRIPTIONS  If you'd like to sign up for the Intel Software Network Newsletter or the Intel Insight magazine, please visit http://softwaredispatch.intel.com.  Want to unsubscribe?  Visit http://remove.intelmktg.com/isn/ for the ISN Newsletter and visit http://remove.intelmktg.com/isd/ for the Intel Insight magazine.

SOFTWARE MANUALS  Are you looking for Intel Software Architecture manuals?  You can find those in PDF format at http://www.intel.com/products/processor/manuals/. 

WEBINARS  Find links to our Intel Software Network Webinars here. 

WHERE TO BUY  If you'd like to find out where to buy Intel products, visit http://www.intel.com/buy.  They have a cool PC Buying Guide (linked in the right column) that walks you through finding a PC that meets your needs and lets you know where to buy it.

Feel free to comment on this blog and let us know if you found these links useful and tell us how we're doing with our ISN Customer Support!