Links to Reviews for March 18-19
PC Mechanic :: Friday, March 21, 2008
Crucial Ballistix DDR3-12800 Memory Kit – “Since the start of their company they have been making solid, high-quality memories that don’t let us customers down.” Zonet ZNS8021 USB 2.0 Leather SATA Enclosure – “The latest piece of technology to see a significant drop in prices has been the 2.5″ size hard drives. You can easily pick up a […]
GMC R-2 Toast Case Review
Techware Labs :: Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Joe has taken a look at the new Toast R-2 case from GMC for you and has his reactions as well as the unique pattented feature of this case. He explains why this case will fit into your love it or hate it category. For an in depth look inside and out at the R-2 read our review.
Make your Home Network go Gigabit
PC Mech :: Wednesday, March 19, 2008
“If you have ever noticed, almost all current network cards support 10/100/1000 ethernet, but very few routers actually support the /1000. The last /1000 is actually called gigabit networking, allowing you to transfer 1 gigabit per second – which is the same as 1000 megabits per second or 125 megabytes […]”
Tagan BZ 900W Power Supply
Phoronix :: Wednesday, March 19, 2008
“The last time we had looked at a Tagan power supply was last October when exploring the Tagan ITZ 1300W and comparing it to Thermaltake’s ToughPower 1200W power supply. While most enthusiasts don’t need power supplies in excess of 1,000 Watts, for those that do the ITZ 1300W did perform admirably but its voltage rails did fluctuate some, though it did have the “WOW” factor on its side thanks to the stunning paint job. Since then Tagan released a new power supply, which has a maximum power output of 900W, boasts six +12V rails, and is modular with LED indicators for each cable. This new power supply is the Tagan BZ 900W, and today we are reviewing it at Phoronix.”
Rosewill RX81-MP-SC eSATA HDD Enclosure
Tweak Town :: Wednesday, March 19, 2008
“For most folks, the name Rosewill means peripherals. Whether you are looking for enclosures, switches, keyboards, KVM devices or external enclosures, Rosewill likely has something that fits the bill. They are also generally known for offering a product for a reasonable price, something that isn’t always a common practice in today’s marketplace.
On the table this time around is one of their newer external hard drive enclosures, the RX81-MP-SC; this is an enclosure designed to fit SATA hard drives in an easy to use manner. With SATA drives becoming the standard, IDE devices are getting to a point where they are no longer needed, but an external SATA enclosure can be a true friend for those looking for a means to back up important data.”
Nvidia’s nForce 790i SLI Ultra chipset
Tech Report :: Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Barely three months have passed since Nvidia launched its high-end nForce 780i SLI chipset, and already the green team has another round in the chamber. To be fair, the 780i wasn’t so much a new design as a second-coming of the nForce 680i decked out with PCI Express 2.0 support via a custom SLI bridge chip. The 780i wasn’t the most elegant answer to the 32 second-generation PCI Express lanes lurking in Intel’s X38 Express chipset, but it was the best Nvidia could do at the time to keep up with the Joneses. Today, however, Nvidia’s real next-generation core logic arrives in the nForce 790i SLI and its spoiler-equipped Ultra variant.
Unlike its predecessor, the nForce 790i SLI has an all-new north bridge chip bristling with 32 lanes of bandwidth-rich PCIe 2.0 goodness. Within it also lies Nvidia’s first DDR3 memory controller, which has been carefully tweaked with Penryn in mind. The 790i has native support for 1600MHz front-side bus speeds, too. And, of course, everything comes neatly packaged on a fresh motherboard design tuned for overclocking and packed with ESA functionality.
This is Nvidia’s answer to the X48 Express—the very flagship of Intel’s chipset aristocracy—leading us to a heavyweight bout for high-priced bragging rights and technical superiority. Keep reading to see if Nvidia has managed to unseat the incumbent.
Asus Striker II Extreme 790i DDR3 Motherboard
Overclock 3d :: Wednesday, March 19, 2008
“Is nVidia’s latest 790i chipset an X48 killer? We put it through its paces on Asus’ latest Republic of Gamers motherboard.”
Zonet ZNS8021 USB 2.0 Leather SATA Enclosure Review
Dragonsteel Mods :: Wednesday, March 19, 2008
“The latest piece of technology to see a significant drop in prices has been the 2.5″ size hard drives. You can easily pick up a SATA 60 GB drive for around $50. If you want to use one of these drives as an external hard drive, you will need a proper enclosure. Zonet has come out with enclosure that is both utilitarian and sexy at the same time. The Zonet ZNS8021 USB 2.0 Leather SATA Enclosure provides a solidly constructed protective case that is also pretty nice to look at. In addition, it is lightweight and compact. ”
Kingston SD/2GB-U Review
ASE Labs :: Wednesday, March 19, 2008
” Kingston Technology produces all kinds of memory including RAM for a computer to flash memory. Kingston is pushing harder and harder into the consumer flash market. Kingston sent over their high speed SD flash memory for review and the SD2/2GB-U is really fast. ”
Windows Vista SP1 is here!
Tech Spot :: Wednesday, March 19, 2008
The much anticipated release of Vista SP1 is slated for release today, and while many are waiting for that to pop up as an optional download on Windows Update, the full standalone installer is now available for 32-bit and 64-bit editions of the OS.
PC Building Guide
Nodic Hardware :: Wednesday, March 19, 2008
The PC Building Guide has been adapted from an online format to book form and is even used by schools in their computer education. The PC Building Guide simply outclasses the classic teaching literature since it is always up to date and more flexible than a book can ever be.
Today we launch the PC Building Guide in English: a complete introduction to how a computer and its individual parts work, and how to assemble them into your very own computer. Complete with pictures, videos and pedagogic explanations on how to install the various hardware of a computer, its the ultimate PC Building Guide.
If you run into problems you can turn to the troubleshooting section with complete explanations of the different BIOS beep codes and the most common problems. Weve used our gathered experience from running the hardware support at the worlds largest LAN party and try to walk you through any potential problems.
This 33 page article should prove to be a good help for everyone, no matter if youre about to build your first computer, or have been doing this for years.
EVGA nForce 790i Ultra SLI Motherboard
Hardware Secrets :: Wednesday, March 19, 2008
“As its name implies, EVGA nForce 790i Ultra SLI motherboard is based on the latest high-end chipset from nVidia for the Intel platform. What is new on nForce 790i compared to its predecessor, 780i, is the support for DDR3 memories and PCI Express 2.0 support generated by the chipset itself – nForce 780i was in fact an nForce 680i with an additional nForce 200 bridge chip making the conversion between PCI Express 1.0 and PCI Express 2.0. Both chipsets support 3-way SLI mode, which allows three GeForce 8800 GTX’s or three GeForce 8800 Ultras to be connected together, and Quad SLI, allowing two GeForce 9800 GX2’s to be connected together and enjoining four GPU’s, as each GX2 is powered by two GPUs. Two of its three PCI Express x16 slots are PCI Express 2.0 and this motherboard has also two Firewire ports, optical SPDIF output and more.”
DFI LanParty UT ICFX3200-T2R/G Intel LGA775 Motherboard Review
Think Computers :: Wednesday, March 19, 2008
“Back when Socket A, and later Socket 939, were the preferred platforms for enthusiasts, one motherboard company emerged as the king of overclocking, DFI. DFI’s LanParty boards had it all: colorful UV reactive components, excellent BIOS conducive to overclocking, rock-solid stability, and excellent reliability. Today we will be looking at the DFI LanParty UT IFCX3200-T2R/G. It is an LGA775 motherboard powered by the ATI RD600 chipset, and featuring ATI CrossFire Xpress 3200 IE. This board has been around for some time but is still available, and at an excellent price, I might add. So rather than spend time comparing it to newer boards with newer chipsets that cost up to triple the price, I am going to attempt to review it on its own merits, and look at it more as an economy board rather than the upper-end board it was a year ago.”
Intel’s X48 Express chipset
Tech Report :: Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Intel’s Core 2 Extreme QX9770 is due out this quarter, bringing with it not only four Penryn cores clocked at 3.2GHz, but also a front-side bus running at 1600MHz. That faster FSB presents a bit of a problem, though, because Intel’s current P35 and X38 Express chipsets only support front-side bus speeds up to 1333MHz. So the QX9770 needs a new chipset, or at least a new north bridge, which is where the X48 Express comes in.
Based on Intel’s existing X38 Express, the X48 brings with it official support for 1600MHz front-side bus speeds. With this faster bus, the X48 looks poised to supplant its predecessor atop Intel’s chipset lineup, which means a new wave of motherboards is coming from all the usual suspects.
Gigabyte’s X48T-DQ6 is the first X48 offering to hit our labs, and in addition to packing Intel’s latest chipset, it comes with an innovative Dynamic Energy Saver mechanism designed to lower power consumption. Join us as we put this power saving scheme to the test and run the X48 Express through it paces against the rest of Intel’s chipset lineup.
Thermaltake Purepower 430W NP Power Supply Review 
Hardware Secrets :: Tuesday, March 18, 2008
“Thermaltake Purepower 430 W NP, which is also known by other names like W0070, TR2-430W and XP550 NP, is one of the simplest and cheapest power supplies from Thermaltake. In this review we completely disassembled this unit and tested to see if it can really deliver 430 W. Check it out.”
Titan RTNV TTC-HD90 Hdd Cooler
Overclock 3d :: Tuesday, March 18, 2008
“Titan release a new HDD cooler into the market promising reductions in noise and temperatue of your drive. We see if it lives up to it’s claims.”
Dissecting an eBay Scam
PC Mech :: Tuesday, March 18, 2008
“If you do any form of communication over the Internet, online frauds and scams are something you always have to be wary of. I have been fortunate enough to avoid such scams as I keep my email reasonably locked down, have a relatively good “BS detector” and am overall a tad bit on the cynical […]”
Intel Core 2 Extreme QX9770
Nordic Hardware :: Tuesday, March 18, 2008
“Intel is at it again. After the recent launch of its first 45nm and so far most extreme CPU, the QX9650, its now time for the QX9770. The logic behind the model numbering is questionable, but whats new with this model is 400MHz FSB, which thanks to Intel’s quadruple bus give us an effective transfer rate corresponding to 1600MHz. This is denoted by the third number; 9770. The frequency has also increased to 3.2GHz (8×400), which is denoted by the second number; 9770.”
x264 HD Benchmark
Tech ARP :: Tuesday, March 18, 2008
“Simply put, it is a reproducible measure of fast your machine can encode a short, HD-quality video clip into a high quality x264 video file. It’s nice because everyone running it will use the same video clip and software. The video encoder (x264.exe) reports a fairly accurate internal benchmark (in frames per second) for each pass of the video encode and it also uses multi-core processors very efficiently.”
Is .Mac Worth The Money?
PC Mech :: Tuesday, March 18, 2008
“A little over a week ago, I went out and picked up a 15″ MacBook Pro using the new Penryn processor. In a word – SWEET! I’ll have more to say about that later. But, for now, I wanted to take a look at dot-mac, or .MAC. It is the online service Apple offers with […]”
ASRock 4Core1600P35-WiFi+ Motherboard Review
Legit Reviews :: Tuesday, March 18, 2008
ASRock continues to produce products that will tempt the enthusiast and power user crowds to consider using them for their upgrade path. This time, ASRock takes a mature Intel P35 Express chipset and adds the latest features to it to make a feature rich motherboard. The ASRock 4Core1600P35-WiFi+ motherboard uses all solid state capacitors, supports 45nm 1600MHz quad-core processors and has integrated 802.11g WiFi. Read on to see what this board can do and to see just how low the price is.
Thermalright Ultra 120 eXtreme CPU Cooler Review
Dragonsteel Mods :: Tuesday, March 18, 2008
“The Thermalright Ultra 120 eXtreme CPU cooler is very popular among enthusiast circles as the reigning champion of CPU coolers and most people will quickly recommend a TRUE to someone asking. So today I’ve got the TRUE for review, and I’ve put it to the test using both C2D and C2Q processors, is it all that? Well you’ll have to read on to find out… ”
Thermaltake Xaser-VI VG400BWS (LCS) Case Review
Xtreme Computing :: Tuesday, March 18, 2008
“The model that I shall be looking at today is the VG400LBWS, or more specifically the ‘Xaser VI Super Tower Black with Transparent Side Window With Embedded Liquid Cooling’. Yeah, that’s quite a mouthful; but Thermaltake have made 8 variations of this same model case, so they have to distinguish between them properly somehow!”
Intel Core 2 Performance Comparison Guide
Tech ARP :: Tuesday, March 18, 2008
“In this article, we will be comparing the performance of several Intel Core 2 processors in five benchmarks – three game-based benchmarks and two application benchmarks. We hope to add on more and more results as we get hold of additional Core 2 processors over time. Let’s take a look at the Core 2 processors we have rounded up for this comparison.”
Ubuntu Disk Encryption Benchmarks
Phoronix :: Tuesday, March 18, 2008
“Introduced in Ubuntu 7.10 was install-time encryption support where using the alternate installer one can fully encrypt their disk in an LVM using dm-crypt. Unfortunately, the Ubiquity installer in Ubuntu 8.04 continues to lack LVM and encryption support, but using Ubuntu 8.04 Alpha 6 we have looked at the performance cost of this encrypted configuration on Ubuntu Linux. Rather than looking directly at the disk read/write overhead caused by the encryption process, we have provided some benchmarks to see how the real-world performance is impacted in both gaming and other desktop tasks.”
Cebit 2008 Coverage Part 1
Madshrimps :: Tuesday, March 18, 2008
“We explore the Halls at Cebit in Hannover 2008, in this first part of our coverage we show the latest products from Titan, Sparkle, Calibre, JetWay, Coolermaster, Biostar, Gainward, Arctic Cooling, Asrock, OCZ, Be Quiet!, Revoltec, Twintech3D, HIS, Galaxy, FSP, Xirex, Silverstone, CoolIT, Scythe and a special LN2 OC session at Mushkin.”
Xigmatek NRP-MC851 Power Supply Review 
RB Mods :: Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Today we take a look at an interesting looking product from an exciting new company. Xigmatek seems to have been on the market since 2005 but it is the first time I see one of their products. We got a sample of the NPR-MC851 PSU which seems to have some very nice features as 4x 12V rails all the wya from 18 to 30 amps. You also have modular cables and a smart silent fan which should run this product fairly quiet.
