Tech News December 2002

by NewsDecember 31, 2002June 29, 201400

Vantec Nexus Fan Speed Controller reivew
ViperLair :: Monday, December 23, 2002
“What separates the Nexus Fan Controller from other baybuses is ease of installation. An issue many baybuses face is having only 3-pin fan connections. This is an issue because only 60mm and 70mm fans (unless I forgot a larger fan) use these connections.”

VIA Epia M9000 Mini-ITX Motherboard review
Tweaknews :: Monday, December 23, 2002

“The VIA EPIA M-Series Mini-ITX Mainboard is a revolutionary, ultra-compact x86 platform optimized for today’s killer digital applications. At just 17cm x 17cm, Mini-ITX is the world’s smallest native x86 mainboard platform, and is fully compatible with Microsoftand Linux Operating Systems. Available with an embedded VIA Eden ESP processor core for fanless systems with ultra low-power requirements, or an embedded VIA C3 E-Series processor for more demanding digital multimedia applications, the EPIA M-Series is the perfect platform for a whole range of small form factor, low-power digital media devices and home entertainment centers.”

Akasa Silver Mountain 2Q HSF Cooler Review
MODTHEBOX! :: Monday, December 23, 2002

“Out of the box, my initial impressions of the Silver Mountain 2Q were very positive, the entirely silver plated heatsink coupled with a black fan guard boasts a nice amount of aesthetics. Bearing a striking resemblance to its predecessor; the original Silver Mountain, the Silver Mountain 2Q features Silver plated copper construction along with a slightly increased base from 60mm to a 72mm footprint. The Silver Mountain 2Q is Akasa’s prestige offering and is rated to handle up to AMD Athlon XP 2800+ speeds.”

CoolerMaster’s XDream HSF review
Voided Warranty :: Monday, December 23, 2002

“No more taking the panel off of your case just to change the speed settings of your HSF. I would like to give some props to Cooler Master for this new design. Good work guys… Even if I did think of it first.”

Soltek SL-85ERV review
3dXtreme :: Monday, December 23, 2002
“That’s right, unofficial support for DDR400!! Not only that but Soltek also had a bios update that makes this board Hyper-Threading capable…..”

A RabidHardware Weekend 1.0: Shopping Carts
Rabid Hardware :: Monday, December 23, 2002

“This article started with 4 particular people (Doc (Ben), Brother McNasty (Adam), Pigvomit (Tom), and me (Niels) being in a mildly Jackass ™ mood, and completely and utterly bored as well. Upon driving past the local school playground one evening (which has a fair size hill) a nice high performance Walmart shopping cart was detected, and somehow the idea was brought up to take said shopping cart for a run down said hill. Our objective was to gather various shopping carts and to pit them against one another and pick our favorite based on speed, durability, comfort, and stability.”

SystemCooling has a look at Vantec’s USB 2.0 Solution
SystemCooling :: Monday, December 23, 2002

With Firewire not quite meeting the expectations hoped for, due in a large part to the high retail pricing of compatible devices, the door was left wide open for USB 2.0 with it’s moderately priced compatible peripherals such as most modern printers and scanners, digital cameras, hard drives, and the list seems to be getting longer each day. The only problem is that unless you have a rather new motherboard, or have purchased a USB 2.0 PCI card, the new device’s will not work in general, while some devices will work, but at reduced speed with USB 1.1 ports.

Laser Goodness! (Review)
SystemCooling :: Monday, December 23, 2002

Have you ever followed a link while surfing, a friend had given you in search of a particular product and getting so excited about a whole range of products being offered that you almost forgot why you were there in the first place? Well, that is exactly what happened to us. We found KoolPCMods and their fantastic collection of laser cut mods. In this article we will show you just a few of the ones that caught our attention, otherwise we could go on for days!!

Vantec Nexus Fan Controller NXP-201 Review
PimpRig :: Monday, December 23, 2002

“The Vantec Nexus Fan Controller is not a run of the mill rheobus like you see on other mod supply websites, as a matter of fact, it isn’t a rheobus at all.”

FrozenCPU Rounded Electro Luminescent Cable Review
Virtual-Hideout :: Monday, December 23, 2002

“I think there’s certain things that “if they aren’t broke, don’t fix them” and this is one of them. Like we don’t have enough stuff in our cases that need power and/or molex plugs, now the damn IDE cables too?!…. HELL NO, WE WON’T GO!!…LOL! I’m a huge supporter of LED fans myself. Why? Because they not only serve their cooling purpose, but they add the great colors and glow to the product WITHOUT adding any additional wiring. It’s totally an invisible feature. That to me, is the perfect kinda product. This EL IDE Cable, is the exact opposite of an led fan. Instead of taking a messy product and either adding features or making it neater, this product takes a perfectly fine item and turns it into a pricey mess. Remember guys, even if you like the spiral glow of these, think x 3. Three inverters to hide, Three wires to hide, Three molex plugs you’ll need …..just for your ide cables!””

Vantec Nexus Multifunction Panel review
Nexus Hardware :: Monday, December 23, 2002

“The Nexus Multifunction panel is the best looking fan control and temperature monitoring device I’ve seen on the market. It comes with three interchangeable faceplates to properly fit your “style”. The knob in the middle controls fan speed (as well as noise). The unit is equipped with an lcd display for temperatures as well as fan RPM:”

Asus A7N8X nForce 2 motherboard review
Overclockers New Zealand :: Monday, December 23, 2002
“A7N8X is without doubt THE fastest AMD platform (single CPU) on the market now. It blitzes through the benchmarks like a thunder, surpassing all other VIA boards. It is amazing what Nvidia has achieved in a years time.”

Vantec Nexus NXP101 MultiFunction Controller Review
Frosty Tech :: Monday, December 23, 2002
“There was a time when only a few cases had USB or Firewire ports on the front bezel. That meant when you wanted to hook up a USB device you had bend down behind the desk to try an find a free port. USB hubs solved a lot of those problems, and gradually case manufacturers began creating bezels with integrated USB and Firewire ports to solve access issues. Those cases which don’t support front mounted USB/Firewire ports can be upgraded pretty easily with a USB/Firewire bay in either the 3.5″ or 5.25″ slots. With the abundance of bay devices being installed in modern systems, we are gradually running out of space. So when Vantec introduced their Nexus NXP101 Mutifunction Panel with two USB headers, a Firewire header, a fan controller and a digital LCD readout of three temperature sensors and fan RPM things were looking good. The LCD screen is backlit green, so even in darker areas it will be readable, and the entire unit is powered by just one floppy drive power connector (or molex).”

PC Toys DDR Maxx Heat Spreaders Review
OCIA :: Monday, December 23, 2002

“RAM heat spreaders… everyone has their own opinion on this subject. Some feel they are a waste of money; only adding to the aesthetics of your system and doing absolutely nothing at all in the cooling department. Others swear by these heat spreaders, reporting an increase in stability and often times an increase in overclocking ability. Today we look at two DDR heat spreaders from PC Toys in hopes of finding out once and for all the truth behind RAM heat spreaders.”

Tt Aquarius II Water Cooler Kit Review
Overclocker Café :: Monday, December 23, 2002
“This is by far the smallest water pump I have seen used in PC water-cooling kits. Moving 23.8 GPH, which is roughly the equivalent amount of water moved by flushing the average American toilet fifteen times. Superficially, this seems like a lot but most water cooler systems use either the Eheim pump or something very close to it. The Eheim pump moves roughly 158 GPH; which is six times that of the Tt pump.”

Soltek SL-KT400-A4 KT333CF motherboard Review
Overclockers New Zealand :: Monday, December 23, 2002
“It is pretty evident that the FRV and KT-400-A4 are essentially the same board, except for AGP 8X function. The performance is nearly identical for both of them under various applications and games.”

Sky Hawk Galaxy-LX Review
XtReMoDs :: Monday, December 23, 2002

“Everyone wants a computer case that will catch people’s attention. Everyone also wants a case that will keep your high end machine cool. Sky Hawk has done a very nice job in bringing style and performance together into one case; Sky Hawk USA’s Galaxy-LX case with Q-window.”

Beantech’s BT-68AEA Alu Mobile Rack review
Tech-Dreams :: Monday, December 23, 2002
“A couple of days ago, when I received the BT-80 Clear Acrylic case from BeanTech, they also sent me their BT-68 AEA Aluminum Mobile HDD Rack to review. Now, I was never into mobile racks because I never really saw the need for them, but I must say — I really put myself at a disadvantage before by not having a mobile rack! You see, I have five computers networked here at home – one computer is mainly used to download, surf the web, play games, and do other things of this nature while another computer is used for just multimedia – playing music and movies. My multimedia computer feeds off my main computer, which eats up its resources. So, when I thought about what I would do with the mobile rack, I immediately thought about using it for my multimedia. This way, I can easily swap it between the other three computers to make my life, well, just a bit easier. Easy is good, don’t let anyone ever tell you differently.”

Zalman ZM300A-APF PSU Review
myWORLD :: Monday, December 23, 2002

“Power supply, I can say is one of the most important part for a particular computer system when it comes in powering the motherboard, drives, fans, and so on. Without them, how are we supposed to do the daily computing? Choosing a good and suitable power supply is crucial too. If you chose a bad and low quality power supply, you may run into some power supply breakdown or your system won’t work as stable as you’ve expected.”

BeanTech’s BT84 Clear Acrylic Case Review
Think Computers :: Monday, December 23, 2002

“With case modding growing, just about everyone is modding their cases. The thing we see most is people putting windows on their case. They do this to show off their components and cooling systems. Many hardware companies are making their products more visually appealing, so a window is almost standard on cases now. What if you wanted to take it futher? Have an all windowed case? Or a clear case? Well few companies have come out with clear acrylic cases. BeanTech is one of them and today we will be taking a look out their BT84 Clear Acrylic Case.”

ABIT KX7-333 RAID v ABIT KD7-RAID Comparative Review
Hexus :: Monday, December 23, 2002
“For now though, the winner of this shootout is the ABIT KX7-333 for its no hassle speed and stability – a simply outstanding board. It isn’t packed with features I won’t use, it just has everything you need, where you need it, fast.”

Cooler Master Alloy Front Bezel review
ViperLair :: Monday, December 23, 2002
“So first things first you open the packet and measure up the bezel to make sure everything fits. Those of you with curved tray fronts need not worry as the tray front replacement has 2 lips either end for a standard tray or for a curved tray you can stick the 3M tape onto the back of the replacement tray front itself, insuring a proper fit.”

MobileMaxx Removable Hard Drive Rack Review
OCIA :: Monday, December 23, 2002

“The rack has programmable alarms so that you can set your computer to alert you whenever your drive is getting too hot. The rack also has a fan alert alarm that lets you know if the fan stops working. I find both of these features to be quite useful. Some might consider it overkill but if you have ever had a drive crash and burn while full of data, anything that might help your current drives not to crash gains value quite rapidly.”

Cooler Master HAC-V81 X-Dream CPU Cooler Review
MODTHEBOX! :: Monday, December 23, 2002

“The design of the 80mm fan and fan guard is more than just an aesthetic decision. Fabricating a plastic guard instead of a metal one eliminates some of the noise caused by vibration. As well, the design of the guard allows for less turbulence from air being drawn in, and reduces the amount of back pressure the fan generates. The fan itself can run anywhere from 2500 to 4800 RPM, while pushing up to 62.8 CFM of air. Even at it’s lowest setting, the benefits of a 80mm fan become obvious; over 31 CFM, better than some moderate level cooling solutions. Cooler Master doesn’t provide a decibel rating for the fan. At full speed, however, it is slightly quieter than a Delta Screamer, and the 80mm fan generates a pitch much lower than a smaller 60mm fan.”

Design Comp’s Custom ATC-210 Case review
ReviewNation :: Monday, December 23, 2002

“Design Comp is a company that makes custom computer cases, for the high end PC user. When they send us their custom Cooler Master ATC-210 case, my jaw dropped all the way to the floor when first looking at it. We’ve reviewed Cooler Master cases in the past, but none quite like this… Design Comp went out of their way to mod this case to the utmost extreme, and obviously with that comes quite a hefty price tag of $441.50 total. Lets see if this case is really worth the near 450 bones you’ll be throwin on the table, or if its just a dud in a hot body…”

XP 2400 OverClocking Article
OCIA :: Saturday, December 14, 2002

“Pinto, Palomino, and Phen Phen… What do these three have in common? They all once where the cream of the crop until they got the ax. Remember the Pinto? Wasn’t that a nice little car? To bad it exploded whenever it got rear ended. What about Phen Phen? Great stuff for weight loss if you don’t mind heart failure. Then there is the Palomino. A fast little devil that required a new fire extinguisher mod on the side of your case. Now we have the new Thoroughbred “B” chip that helps one of AMD’s biggest weaknesses: heat. But just having a cooler running chip wasn’t enough for the guys at AMD.”

Vantec AeroCool VP4-C7040 and CA4-C7040 review
Think Computers :: Saturday, December 14, 2002

“If you’re reading a heatsink article, then you no doubt know that CPU heat is increasing steadily with each new clock increase. The need for greater heat dissipation has advanced to the point that aluminum heatsinks can no longer cut the mustard, as we are now seeing copper coolers and aluminum/copper hybrids.”

Crystalfontz USB 20×4 LCD (Model: CFA634-TMC-KU) Video Review
3dgameman :: Saturday, December 14, 2002

“The Crystalfontz USB 20×4 LCD is the USB interface version of their 634 model which means only one cable and allows for easy installation. Also, with 20 characters per line and 4 lines it translates into a lot of data being shown at once. Their CrystalControl software is easy to configure and easy to use. Watch the Video to find out more…”

BeanTech’s BT-80 Clear Acrylic Case Review
Tech-Dreams :: Saturday, December 14, 2002
The front of BeanTech’s acrylic case provides you with the standard power on/off button, reset switch, power on/off LED, and HDD activity LED. A little below that holds a place for two USB 2.0 ports, and a Firewire 1394 port connected to a small PCB board visible inside the case to the side of the 3 1/4″ drive bays. There are a total of four 5 1/4″ drive bays and two 3 1/2″ bays centered in front of the case. Below the drive bays is a 80mm clear blowhole fan. Incidentally, take a look at the cuts on the grills for the fans. Very nice!

Zalman ZM-NB32J North Bridge Heatsink RevieW
myWORLD :: Saturday, December 14, 2002

“In this era of IT age, computer system nowadays tends to run faster and better with the help of the ever improving technology, such as an advancement of the chipset design, CPU, video card, and much more. However, the problem in designing these fast computer components is they generate a lot of heat. But, with the help of the heatsink, this temperature can be lowered thus controlled at the satisfactory level.”

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