Week of January 10, 2010

The Tuff N Tiny is designed to be portable, rugged and resistant to dust, water and static discharge. It includes a key ring lanyard allowing it to attach to one’s mobile phone or keychain. This miniature USB Flash Drive is composed of a durable light plastic and is perfect for carrying around on one’s keys meaning your data is always nearby and readily accessible.

CLICK HERE FOR Verbatim Flash Drive PRICING & SHOPPING

Although all-in-one printers that can copy, scan and print have become the most popular segment of printers, there are many other types of printers currently available. One of these specialty types of printers, called wide-format, has the often useful ability to print on large sizes of paper. Epson's WorkForce 1100 is a new wide-format printer. This specialty type of printer has to be especially heavy duty. So we set out to find out if this WorkForce is a workhorse or a wimp.

CLICK HERE FOR Epson WorkForce 1100 Printer PRICING & SHOPPING

If you want a video card today there really isn’t any other choice than an ATI card as they have the highest performance and features that NVIDIA cards cannot match. The XFX Radeon HD 5870 XXX Edition is a really powerful card with high clock speeds out of the box. You get Dirt2 as part of the bundle, showing off the power of your new card with the power of DirectX 11. This card is available online for a retail price of $426 making it a good upgrade from the $406 that the reference HD 5870 from XFX at the same online store. You get XFX’s 5-Star Support and monthly driver updates. A total Editors Choice for the high-end gamer!!!

CLICK HERE FOR XFX Radeon HD 5870 Video Card PRICING & SHOPPING

If however you are like me and enjoy overclocking every bit of kit you can ever lay your grubby paws on then the Mushkin kit is definitely a good buy. I don't often get to play with mid-range memory kits, in fact it has been a while since my boards have seen under DDR3-2000C7, but I was impressed by these Mushkin Blackline modules. It was especially a lot of fun when I loosened up tRCD and the kit really began to scale, each notch up was a blast and I enjoyed the sensation of exploring what I felt was uncharted territory. Lately it has felt like all I do when overclocking is plug in pre-tested values for memory speeds and timings, this was a breath of fresh air for me.

Zalman's CNPS10X Extreme fulfills both roles pretty well care of a cleverly integrated PWM fan speed controller in the top part of the fan shroud. Do nothing and the CNPS10X Extreme's 120mm fan will fall under BIOS control, automatically scaling fan speed from 1000RPM to 2150RPM as needed. Set the fan speed controller and the heatsink operates in one of three fan-duty modes, or responds to the turn of a dial to the exact fan velocity you want.

CLICK HERE FOR Zalman CNPS10X Extreme Heatsink PRICING & SHOPPING

CLICK HERE FOR TWEAKNEWS.NET'S REVIEW ON THIS PRODUCT

Start 2010 off right with the Best 20 PCSTATS Beginners Guides of all time. These Beginners Guides are some of the clearest and easiest to follow how-to articles available on the internet. From hardware upgrades to home networking to data backups, massive collections of PC tips, tweaks and tuning advice for Vista and Windows XP, you'll find it here on PCSTATS.com!

We all know that two is better than one, we have dual core CPUs, dual GPU video cards, and if you really want to get the most out of your storage, a set of SSDs in RAID will boost your performance noticeably. We tested 6 different RAID stripe sizes and 3 different RAID configs in 4 different storage benchmarks, some synthetic, others real world operations. More than 1200 benchmarks results summed up in a few charts.

CLICK HERE FOR OCZ SSD Drive PRICING & SHOPPING

With the GA-P55-UD6 Gigabyte presents its flagship out of their P55 chipset series. It especially awaits gamers and PC-enthusiasts which are looking for a lot of connectors and features.

For many of you 500 watts is plenty enough. Instead of investing more money for a higher wattage PSU, you can spend less, and still get the power you need, but spend more money in other places. In the current economic times this can be the difference between a low end graphics card and a mid range one. Thus your gaming experience will be much more enjoyable. If you fall into this category then you can finally breath easy, for Ultra has your back.

CLICK HERE FOR Ultra X4 PRICING & SHOPPING

AMD has delivered a couple of firsts over the past few months, and it's keeping the tradition going with its release of the market's first $100 DirectX 11-capable graphics card. Despite its budget status, the HD 5670 retains the HD 5000-series' impressive power consumption and low idle temperatures, along with AMD's multi-monitor Eyefinity support.

Bookworms, this is your year. In case Amazon's Kindle, Sony's Readers and Barnes & Noble's Nook didn't quite catch your fancy this past holiday season, CES 2010 brought an onslaught of new e-book products to fill, well, a small library. From ultra-thin, large-screen readers meant to replace magazines and newspapers, to those tagged with full color LCDs for browsing blogs when Jane Austen gets a little dull (that's five pages into Emma, by the way), the category marches forward with more content, features and flexibility than ever before. Here are five of the hottest e-readers that will define the portable reading space in 2010.

Noctua is a company that I have really come to love over the past year. Chris Ram tried explaining it to me when I started here, but at that time I couldn’t fully wrap my head around what he was trying to tell me. Time progressed and I got some firsthand experience with the company and as time passed by I was starting to get what Chris was trying to tell me for so long ago. After reviewing a couple of coolers, especially the NH-D14 that arrived at the end of last month, I was sold.

"TR2 is a cost-effective power supply series from Thermaltake, which is comprised of two sub-series: TR2 standard (430 W, 500 W, 600 W, 700 W and 1,000 W) and TR2 RX (450 W, 550 W, 650 W, 750 W, 850 W, 1,000 W, 1,200 W). Models from TR2 RX series have modular cabling system. Being targeted to users on budget, several model from this series don't even have the standard 80 Plus certification. Today we are going to test the 750 W from TR2 RX series. Is it a good buy? Let's see."

CLICK HERE FOR Thermaltake Power Supply PRICING & SHOPPING

ATI has released their sub-$100 DX11 offering to solidify their DX11 domination of the market. Check out these links to find out more information on this new card.

Hothardware
Hardwareheaven
Hardwarecanucks
benchmarkreviews
tweaktown
techreport
modders-inc
bjorn3d
legitreviews
rbmods
ninjalane
elitebastards
overclockersclub
techpowerup
chw.net

"The NVIDIA ION platform and Intel Atom processors are getting increasingly popular. Vendors are launching new motherboards, nettops, and netbooks based on the "Ionized Atom". The reason for such popularity is simple: ION is presently the only option for a supercompact, relatively inexpensive, and potentially noiseless HTPC or an entry-level gaming computer."

CLICK HERE FOR ASUS AT3N7A-I Motherboard PRICING & SHOPPING

Powercolor Radeon HD 4770 is compared to HIS Radeon HD 3870. Powercolor Radeon HD 4770 has 4% Lower Clock Speed, 30% Faster GDDR5 Memory and 320 Extra Shader Processors compared to HIS Radeon HD 3870.

CLICK HERE FOR Radeon HD 4770 PRICING & SHOPPING

The LED TV Series 6 is not a true LED TV but only a backlit one with a standard LCD display, as opposed to CCFL backlit LCD TVs. While not a true LED TV, it is still very stunning. For the most part, colors are more vivid and the picture is more uniform, especially in black scenes. Even though the UN46B6000 doesn't have the best viewing angle and costs much more than a CCFL backlit LCD TV, you're spending money on a power conscious TV that delivers a phenomenal picture you can brag about.

CLICK HERE FOR Samsung 46B6000 46inch LED TV PRICING & SHOPPING

SilverStone changed the case industry when they released their Raven series, where the motherboard is installed rotated 90º, making the rear panel from the computer to be on top of the case, improving thermal dissipation. Now they are bringing this concept to their Fortress series, with the release of FT02. Let's take an in-depth look on this new case.

When computer technology takes a step forward, it is sometimes better to stick with the status quo and let someone else help the industry recoup their R&D investment. When video cards first jumped from the AGP slot to PCI Express, for instance: PCI Express videocards didn't deliver enough of a performance boost to justify buying a whole new motherboard. We could be seeing the same scenario unfold with the next generation of hard drive interface, known as SATA 6Gb/s - but since Seagate's 2TB Barracuda XT currently is the only hard drive you can buy today that uses the new standard, it's impossible to know. Theoretically, the SATA 6Gbps delivers twice the throughput of the previous standard, SATA 3Gb/s (as you've no doubt guessed, six gigabits per second compared to three gigabits per second); in the real world, it didn't matter much which interface we connected the Barracuda XT to.

CLICK HERE FOR Seagate Barracuda XT PRICING & SHOPPING

There is no shortage of DDR3 memory in the marketplace these days, and it's priced lower than DDR2 in many cases. As always though, the choices to be made when selecting RAM for a system can be confusing. There are a lot of kits currently available that are "optimized" for Intel i5 and i7 systems, and now OCZ has released two new low voltage kits that are designed to complement the AMD Black Edition series of CPUs. Both sets of DIMMs are specified at 1600 MHz; one at CL7 timings, and the other at CL8. They are both rated to run these speeds at 1.65v. In this article Benchmark Reviews will examine how a dual-channel kit of CL8 modules, optimized for an AMD 790FX platform, performs at a variety of speeds and timings.

In more basic terms, Tuniq is in the business of providing an attractive product that makes a statement. While an appealing cooler is good to have, it is only as good as the fan equipped with the cooler in most instances. Tuniq claims that the included fan is indeed a silent fan, and still boasts quite a bit of CFM to handle the job. In principle this is fine on paper, but to make it work in reality is another thing we have yet to see for ourselves.

The Tritton AX 180 headset has excellent sound reproduction considering that they're analog stereo. The microphone is easy to adjust and works great. It is also easy to remove if you don't need it for a while. The headphones feel sturdy and are light and comfortable. While their audio performance doesn't keep up with their big brother the Tritton AX720, that is compensated by their lower price ($69 at Best Buy) and their solid performance...

CLICK HERE FOR Tritton AX 180 Universal Gaming Headset PRICING & SHOPPING

We have seen many factory-overclocked cards from different vendors, but most of these cards just push the GPU/MEM clocks using reference design hardware. Once in a while, a cards pop up like this Gigabyte SOC card which deviates from the group and packs a whole lot more punch then what other vendors can offer.

Today we are going to look at the Kinzu optical gaming mouse which is a budget model with some interesting features that we often see on higher-end gaming mice.

XFX, a traditional video card manufacturer, has recently decided to enter the power supply business. They first offering, an 850 W model called Black Edition proved to be an outstanding product. Now they are launching a more mainstream model rated at 650 W, called XXX Edition, featuring modular cabling system, single-rail design and 80 Plus Bronze certification. Will this model live up to the expectation? Let's see.

"Frostytech is testing CoolIT's Domino ALC liquid cooling system. The unit consists of a thin 122gram nickel plated copper waterblock, a 17cm length of Fluorinated ethylene propylene (FEP) plastic tubing and pump integrated into a 115x115mm aluminum heat exchanger with a 120mm fan. The Domino ALC is ready to go out of the box, the user need only install it onto the CPU and mount the radiator near by."

CLICK HERE FOR CoolIT Domino ALC Liquid Cooling System PRICING & SHOPPING

CLICK HERE FOR TWEAKNEWS.NET'S REVIEW ON THIS PRODUCT

"So today for review I’ve got a power supply, but not just any, it’s the new X4 750Watt from Ultra. The X4 is a fully modular power supply that makes things much easier when it comes to keeping your case nice and tidy. The X4 also features many cables with enough connections for most any type of setup you’ve got. One of the great features about this PSU is that despite the rather large voltage it’s still a physically small power supply that should fit in most any case."

"This time we'd like show you a cheaper Socket 1156 motherboard. It has a reasonable expansion capacity, an unexpectedly complex and high-quality power supply system, and a basic cooling system which is sufficient though. Still, it's a full-size ATX motherboard with S/PDIF outputs and eSATA ports on the rear panel, meaning you won't have to buy additional accessories."

CLICK HERE FOR ASUS P7P55D LE Motherboard PRICING & SHOPPING

Today for review I've got another PC case from our friends at Xclio, this one is called the Nighthawk. This case features modular hard drive bays that can be moved, or removed and can support up to eight of them. The Nighthawk also features fans that can be controlled so you can adjust their speeds, and those fans have plenty of LEDs to brighten up your day.

"If you don't like certain GPS navigational devices because of their small, unflattering screens, then the Magellan RoadMate 1700 is your solution. It offers a 7-inch screen that looks extremely beautiful and is completely touch-enabled, meaning you won't have any issues "touching" the right button if you have large fingers. This is a great choice for consumers that want the largest screened GPS possible without getting an in-dash navigation system."

CLICK HERE FOR Magellan RoadMate 1700 PRICING & SHOPPING

With the launch of Clarkdale by Intel, they have finally released a Nehalem for the masses, the Core i3 and i5 variations with integrated graphics are a direct competitor to the market segment currently held by AMD Phenom and Athlon CPUs. In this article we compare the performance of the IGP on the Intel Core i5 661 to and AMD system with 785G chipset.

CLICK HERE FOR INTEL PROCESSOR PRICING & SHOPPING

CLICK HERE FOR AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition PRICING & SHOPPING

Crucial Memory, has always been the one memory manufacturer that not only produces fast, reliable memory, Crucial Memory offers users the ability to add that extra little touch to our builds for that perfect theme. The memory type we are referring to is th Ballistx Tracer memory. Crucial has also out done themselves by offering 4 different colors of Ballistx Tracer memory.

We can use a Blue LED Tracer, Green LED Tracer, Red LED Tracer, or even a multi-colored Tracer memory. Today at Bjorn3D, we are going to look at a set of Blue Ballistx Tracer memory. This memory should definetly add the extra eye candy to a build while also providing my smallest computer 'Minor Me' the performance from the memory it requires to keep this little computer of mine in top shape.

CLICK HERE FOR Crucial Ballistx Tracers PRICING & SHOPPING

"The Cogage Arrow Heatsink arrived Technic3D. It is compatibility with Intel Core i5 (LGA 1156), Core i7 (LGA 1366) and LGA775 (AMD optional). We have check the Cogage with two 120mm Fans and one 140mm Fan. See you in the following Review the Arrow compared with many other Cooler on a Intel Core i7 920."

"All the computers in my house are either Dells or HPs except for one. This one is a special computer that I built about two years ago and have been thinking about upgrading only recently. Since I don't have money to run out and purchase all the parts at once, I decided to build it one piece at a time, starting with the case. The chosen case for my project is the AZZA Helios 910R. With an ultra-efficient cooling system, an awesome black on red color scheme, lots of room for drive expansion and a price starting at $79.99, this case has promising future for any PC enthusiast..."

CLICK HERE FOR AZZA Case PRICING & SHOPPING