Dipping PC parts into a vat of oil sounds scary at first, but it's actually a great way to cool components, and surprisingly safe to boot. You may recall that back in 2008, we played with an oil immersed system from Hardcore PC, and while the idea hasn't quite gone mainstream, it's making headway. Puget Systems sells a DIY oil kit (which we highlighted in 2010), and now Intel is experimenting with the idea, albeit on the server side.

Another pioneer in the field of PCs has passed away, adding to what seems like an unusually large number of deaths in the technology sector during the past year or so. This time it's Victor Poor, a mostly self-taught engineer who began working at Intel in 1969 and helped develop the chip maker's first single chip microprocessor later known as the 4004. A marvelous piece of silicon at the time, the 4004 was a 4-bit CPU that made use of new silicon gate technology.

Intel and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) these days are all about combining CPU and GPU functions onto single slices of silicon, but is there still a market for GPU-less processors? Sure there is. After all, peanut butter without jelly is still a tasty snack, as any canine will attest, and if you're rocking discrete graphics or have an IGP motherboard, all you're really interested in is the CPU portion of a processor anyway. To serve those customers, Intel is said to be readying the release of its Core i5 3350P processor, which is an Ivy Bridge chip without graphics.