Week of January 20, 2008

"While it's always exciting to receive review samples from the big boys in the hardware world, it's also nice to take a look at something a little different and this almost always comes from the little guys. Now, Vvikoo are manufacturers of some top end nVidia and ATI based GPU solutions, so using the word "little" is probably a little harsh, but they are definitely the new kid on the block and have a lot to prove. What I have with me today is an 8800GT, but not just any GT... oh no. This one has 1gb of DDR3, a huge aftermarket Zalman cooler, and it's purple."

In a world where multi-tasking is a necessity, multi-display configurations are becoming ever more popular. DisplayLink is a new kind of technology that promises to take the hassle out of adding additional displays to your PC - even six is possible. Best of all, you don't need a second GPU.

"Having recently reviewed the creative Zen Stone Plus a few months back, which I highly recommended, I couldn't wait to get my hands on Creative's new flash-based ZEN. This highly featured digital media player allows the user to play MP3, WMA, Audible and WAVE file types, plus WMV support Movies and Photos on the move, bringing you a whole world of entertainment at the touch of a button. The model we have today is the 4GB version, but the ZEN is available in three other sizes to choose from, and that's not all the ZEN is hiding under its belt..."

CLICK HERE FOR Creative ZEN - 4GB SHOPPING & PRICING

"This will be my third Apevia/Aspire case. Besides the X-Dreamer II, which I used for the better part of a year, I had an X-Plorer that I used for at least a year, a long time for someone who gets as many cases as I do. So I am familiar with Apevia cases, and expect the X-Telstar to be a mid-priced, fairly well built and finished, pre-modded case with a few interesting features. Read on to see if it meets my expectations."

CLICK HERE FOR Apevia X-Telstar Steel Mid-tower Case SHOPPING & PRICING

It's hard not to love this card; awesome speed, silent and cool operation that comes complete with a three year warranty. In a world of reference designs and vanilla products, Inno3D sets itself head and shoulders over the rest of the field with THE fastest factory overclocked 8800 GT on the market. Coupling this with their efficient iChill cooling package was almost destiny.

"The co-op gameplay (2 player online or split-screen) felt quite similar: it was nice to have a really useful soldier next to you, providing covering fire and so on, but it didn't feel particularly necessary. This is almost certainly down to the difficulty setting, for which C:DO has a dynamic version, affecting later levels; by not progressing far enough into the game, there's good chance that we didn't experience enough scenarios that truly require the unique capabilities of each person (one is a sniper, the other a heavy machine gunner). The opening level provides a spot of tank action, though, so one should expect various vehicles and new tactics to appear throughout the game, as the tank was more effective with both players in it, compared to being handled by just one."

CLICK HERE FOR Denied Ops SHOPPING & PRICING

We’ve just posted a new article at HotHardware in which we evaluate a pair of somewhat unique Radeons, the Sapphire Ultimate HD 3850 and Atomic HD 3870. Unlike most reference 3850s, the Ultimate HD 3850 has a 512MB frame buffer and is outfitted with a passive heat-pipe cooling system for completely silent operation. The Atomic HD 3870 differs from ATI’s reference design as well and features higher GPU and memory speeds, a fancy single-slot cooling solution that leverages Microloops’ Vapor-X technology, and it has one of the best bundles we have seen in quite a while.

"Centaur is a small company of less than 100 folks stuck away in Central Texas happily designing, building, and testing their processors. No matter what lies ahead for the CN processor, you have to admire the hands on, no nonsense, low budget approach that Centaur is employing in the development of their products. Centaur has taken semiconductor design down off its pedestal and placed it where we can all admire it in all its complexity. Which doesn't seem all that complex after you have Elizabeth build you a CPU to take home with you."

"The Gateway FX7020 is the company's budget gaming system that has a lot to offer for the price."

CLICK HERE FOR Gateway FX7020 SHOPPING & PRICING

"After testing five different sets of DDR3 memory, I must say that the highest clockspeeds that I have attained were with the Patriot Viper Fin PC3 12800, 962FSB (1924MHz) 8-7-7-20. 162FSB worth of overclocking headroom means that with a 1:2 memory divider you will be hard pressed to find a CPU that can outscale this memory. Did I mention that this was done at a 1t command rate? With higher speed rated memory, the expectation is that it will go a little faster and further up the clock speed scale. This does hold true in many instances, though not all. With the voltage requirements for performance DDR3 creeping up and away from the 1.5 volts DDR3 spec, cooling the memory modules needs to be addressed. Patriot designed a special Aluminum-Copper composite (ACC) heatspreader that effectively cooled the modules down. Even with 2.0+ volts running through them they never got warm to the touch. One surprise was the ability to run tighter than stock timings at 1333MHz. I was able to run the modules at 6-5-5-16 with only 1.76 volts. Sweet!"

CLICK HERE FOR Patriot Viper Fin DDR3 PC3 12800 2 x 1 GB SHOPPING & PRICING

“The Raidmax Sagitta 2, the new second edition of the original Sagitta, offers a number of aesthetical as well as design improvements. This stylish case will certainly stick out at the LAN party scene. Gamers alike will be asking you where you got this pimpin' case. This isn't one of those cases that are great on the outside, but not so great on the inside. The Sagitta 2 has a number of features that help separate it from the pack. This really isn't your every day gaming case. Let's take a look to see why it isn't your typical gaming case.”

Kingwin has recently decided to join the ranks of other companies which have branched their product line into the power supply unit industry. More know for their very effective HDT Heatpipe Direct Touch coolers, Kingwin is also insistent that their PSU line be just as beneficial to the hardware enthusiast. Overclockers and gamers will most likely enjoy the impressive nickel-finished appearance, while system builders and casual users will appreciate the quality build into this power supply. Benchmark Review load tests the Kingwin Mach 1 ABT-800MA1S 800W Modular PSU for AC power ripple and DC voltage regulation.

CLICK HERE FOR Kingwin Mach 1 ABT-800MA1S 800W Modular PSU SHOPPING & PRICING

Anyone who knows anything about computer history should be aware of the Kingston brand as for the last twenty years they have been producing memory products. Since their inception in 1987 Kingston have continued to expand and develop their product catalogue from including network and storage devices in 1993 to becoming the first memory manufacturer to co-market memory upgrades with a PC-OEM in 1996. In recent years they have launched Value RAM and HyperX. Excellent business decisions mixed with a quality product range have seen Kingston become a very successful manufacturer. Today we have one of their latest products in our test labs, the Media Reader.

CLICK HERE FOR Kingston 19 in 1 Card Reader SHOPPING & PRICING

"The Fujitsu Lifebook S6510 lets you have all the features of a regular notebook, while offering the size an ultra-portable."

CLICK HERE FOR Fujitsu LifeBook S6510 Laptop SHOPPING & PRICING

The Samsung SyncMaster 275T is a 27-inch wide TFT-LCD monitor delivering an ultra-fast response time of 6ms (GTG), DC 3000:1 contrast ratio, 0.303mm pixel pitch, 1920 x 1200 maximum resolution, scanning frequency of 30-81 kHz horizontal and 56-75 Hz vertical, and horizontal/vertical viewing angle of 178°/178°. The SyncMaster 275T has USB 2.0 (1 up x 4 down), MagicColor, MagicBright3, and an Optional speaker.

CLICK HERE FOR Samsung SyncMaster 275T TFT LCD SHOPPING & PRICING

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

"The ATI Radeon HD 3650 is the direct replacement for the ATI Radeon HD 2600 Pro as you can tell from the chart above. The ATI Radeon HD 3650 is active cooled with a core clock of 725MHz and a memory clock of 800MHz and will be available with two kinds of memory ICs - GDDR3 and GDDR2. The slower and older GDDR2 memory chips will be used on the $79 price point cards, while the $99 cards will feature faster GDDR3 memory ICs..."

"The Thermaltake Max 4 hard drive enclosure aims to provide cooling and good looks for your hard drive at an affordable price. We find out how easy this enclosure is to use as well as taking a look at it from the inside out. "

CLICK HERE FOR Thermaltake Max 4 Hard Drive Enclosure SHOPPING & PRICING

Enthusiasts and gamers usually don't have the luxury of a quiet PC. But thanks to Zalman ... MSI have come up with the NX8800GT Zilent. It utilises the an overclocked G92 GPU from Nvidia, and has 512Mb of DDR3 ram. It also features a special silent copper heat pipe cooler especially made by Zalman. Our CPU3D review team tests it with some DX10 games.

" With the demise of analog signals in America coming soon, there are many ways to get into the digital age. You can buy a set top box or rent one from your TV provider. The digital TV signals also promise more channels and improved clarity over the air. AutumnWave steps in to provide mobile HDTV with their OnAir HDTV GT. It turns your laptop into a HDTV. "

CLICK HERE FOR OnAir Solutions GT USB HDTV Receiver SHOPPING & PRICING

"Logitech has recently announced a new product in its line of gaming mice. According to the odd numbering tradition, it has been named G9. The well-balanced design is coupled with several engineering, technical, and design innovations. Let's review them one by one."

CLICK HERE FOR Logitech G9 Mouse SHOPPING & PRICING

"We’ve seen high-end mice for a while now, with most gamers either opting for a Razer or Logitech branded mouse to do their fragging. SteelSeries have recently added a third vendor to the list with their Ikari Laser mouse, which I have here ready to be put through its paces.

Featuring the usual on-the-fly sensitivity and multiple buttons, it’ll have to shine to beat away the already well know competition."

"So it’s easy; we have the HD 3870 X2 in our hands, it’s tested and that’s probably all that really matters. We’re going to have a quick look at the package that MSI have put together, a look over the specifications and then we’ll get straight into the benchmarks.

As far as features go we’ve got a pretty good line-up; HDMI support, PCI Express 2.0 (but backwards compatible), Dual GPU with Quad GPU support coming and a pre-overclock."

If you don't have enough room to support their Ultra-120, Thermalright has introduce a new cooler for the space challenged called the Ultima-90. The Ultima-90 looks a lot like the Ultra-120 Extreme but in a smaller package. And that is just what it is. Some may be quick to rush to the conclusion that a smaller heatsink would lead to a large decrease in cooling performance. But the guys at Thermalright say different. We are going to take it around the block to see for ourselves.

We're still not ready to proclaim Vista a must-have upgrade, but as DirectX 10 titles continue to hit the market, the days of XP could be numbered among the gaming community. Factor in DDR2's rock bottom pricing, and 4GB kits have suddenly become a viable option, helping to negate the concerns over jumping onto Microsoft's resource hungry OS.

CLICK HERE FOR Patriot Viper 4GB DDR2-800 (PVS24G6400LLK) SHOPPING & PRICING

"The OnAir GT has multiple input connections to maximize its ability to bring you the best programming available. The first is the coaxial connector which allows you to scan for digital/analog over-the-air broadcasts from your local area using the included antenna, or you can connect the cable from your cable TV provider to view that programming. The second is the A/V in connector, which allows you to input not only S-video devices but virtually anything that has RCA outputs, such as DVD players, gaming consoles, and even that camcorder you just got for Christmas."

CLICK HERE FOR OnAir Solutions GT USB HDTV Receiver SHOPPING & PRICING

New architecture provides substantial increases in performance and functionality with leading power efficiency to enable next generation "Small is Beautiful" computing devices.

During CoolIT's CES-presence this month, the Freezone Elite was unveiled. In addition to offering stellar performance comparable to the original, the new MTEC control center is thrown in as well. This self-regulating module proved to do a fantastic job, making the Elite a superb cooling solution.

I set out at the beginning of this article to replace my 14 month old gaming mouse. It seemed to me a bit of a risk to go with Microsoft over someone like Logitech or Razor, who arguably have more experience when it comes to gaming mice. In fact he mouse I was replacing was from one of the above mentioned companies (I'm not going to say who). at the end of the day the Sidewinder mouse really comes across as a solid mouse with an excellent feature set. Couple that with Microsoft support and you have a product that you can rely on for years to come. The ability to customize so much about the mouse means that it's practically guaranteed to work for you. Whether you like a feather light mouse or one that takes a bit of effort to move you're covered. If you want to be able to chain in game commands together with a single button your set. If you're basically looking for a quality gaming mouse, look no further the SideWinder is it.

CLICK HERE FOR Microsoft Sidewinder Gaming Mouse SHOPPING & PRICING

On the test bench today are two power supplies, Antec's EarthWatts (EA-500) 500w and Seasonic's M12II 500w (SS-500GM). They're both 500w power supplies, and in many ways they're the same, but also quite different. With one marketed for users who want a value priced energy efficient unit, and the other for gamers, I'll take a look at what sets them apart.

CLICK HERE FOR Antec EarthWatts SHOPPING & PRICING

CLICK HERE FOR Seasonic M12II SHOPPING & PRICING

“Are you running out of power? I am taking a look at the ToughPower 1500Watt power supply from Thermaltake. My first thoughts before testing this huge PSU was to find second job to pay the electric bill, but it seems that the ToughPower 1500Watt PSU is very power effecient. The cables are all modular (apart from the main atx power cable) which is great seeing you would only have to connect those needed to run your system instead of having to tie down all the access cables which you dont use. Some say size does matter, well in this case it's true. A normal PSU has a length of about 16cm, the ToughPower 1500Watt takes up 20cm. Will it fit in a case? “

If you want unbeatable cooling performance from an active cooler ... then the Enzotech Ultra-X is what you're looking for. It features four extra thick copper heat pipes and a huge array of aluminum fins, cooled by a big 120mm fan. This cooler looks mighty impressive to say the least. And thanks to Specialtech, we'll be tesing this cooler on our toasty Q6600 processor.

Just as we predicted some time ago that the Radeon HD 2600XT Dual is going to open the portal to the multi-GPU development, it is coming true. The very next step ATI has made shows a huge advancement compared to the one-month old newborn. Ladies and gentlemen, we present you with ATI Radeon HD 3870X2 graphics card. For now, this is the best graphics card in the entire market and the most complete choice one can get for his/her money. As the author of these lines would gladly carry this baby home, the award we will give this card is fully deserved."

" Although typing on a keyboard is inherent to the computing experience, sometimes you may want to push the keyboard away and pick up a pen to write or draw using your computer. Genius has a slew of new Pen/Tablets available and today we will look at the G-Pen F610. This tablet features a 6"x10" working area and includes twenty nine programmable Hot Key buttons."

"These three video cards came to us from three of the biggest brands in computer gaming hardware: EVGA, XFX, and ASUS. At the end of the day, if we had to pick one of these video cards, we would choose the EVGA e-GeForce 8800 GTS 512 MB because it is the least expensive, comes with Crysis, and it provides the exact same gameplay experience as its more expensive competitors."

CLICK HERE FOR GeForce 8800 GTS SHOPPING & PRICING

Xigmatek's new NRP-HC1201 power supply offers 1200W of power with support for up to six VGA power connectors. Juice is delivered over four 12V rails with up to 36A per rail. Of course the usual features like long and fully sleeved cables and 80+ high efficiency are present as well.

"Just a quick message to let you know that the official PC requirements for Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed are now online - they're up and running on our Game-o-Meter, so you can check to see if your PC is up to scratch. Be warned though: the minimum reqs are very steep!"

There have been a plethora of 1kw power supplies released recently from many of the leading power supply manufacturers. Today we will take a look at a unit from a company not so well known among technology enthusiasts, Sirtec. They are not a new company, they have been designing and manufacturing PSUs for quite some time now although you might not have heard of them because their units can be commonly found in OEM systems and pre-installed in cases of many system and chassis manufacturers.

“Every year, North America hosts the largest Consumer Electronics Show (CES) which is where any and everyone can go to debut their newest or best products. If you can think of any technical gizmo or gadget, chances are that it's already there. This year's event didn't quite have the amount of computer components as last year, but there was still plenty and High Definition was all the rave. Of course, there were still endless rows of iPod and music player stations. As a matter of fact, there were more of those than High Definition Televisions. I'm not sure we need more docking stations, but HD TVs advancements are always a good thing. The more new products that come out, the quicker prices drop on the current products.”

"As standard, P35 offers sixteen lanes of PCI Express 1.1 bandwidth (meaning no PCI Express 2.0 support in this chipset) as a single PCI Express 16x slot for a discrete graphics board. However, this bandwidth can be split across two electrical PCI Express 16x slots to offer CrossFire support, and indeed this is exactly what ASUS has done with the subject of today's review - Insert and enable two ATI CrossFire capable boards into the P5K Pro and multi-GPU rendering is possible, with the PCI Express bandwidth split between the two slots, giving eight lanes of bandwidth to the primary slot and just four to the secondary slot. While this will impact performance in some bus bandwidth intensive scenarios (with ATI's Super AA mode being the primary culprit for such situations), in many cases performance should be broadly comparable to using two 'true' sixteen lane PCI Express slots."

Today we intend to not only review the ASUS® Maximus Formula but perform the review using a somewhat different approach that we hope is a precursor to something really unique and exciting for our readers. We'll detail the changes we've made when we get to the 'Testing Methodology' section of the review where the change actually are implemented. Up until then the format of our review of the Maximus formula will remain essentially the same. Please join us in our pursuit of presenting the Maximus Formula from a much broader and complete perspective.

CLICK HERE FOR ASUS Maximus Formula SHOPPING & PRICING

"There are two key gaming mice manufactures that have been doing just that for years, Razer and Logitech. However, these high-spec mice come at a cost, and are often over the top for the average gamer, who wants accuracy and comfort, but still some money left in the bank.

So today I have Speedlink’s Styx which features a laser diode to pick up your movements, and spitting out 2200 DPI accuracy. Let’s see how it performs."

“Thermaltake is known for their cool cases and their latest editions will only enforce that fact. The Xaser VI series include aircooled cases with clear side panels and mesh panels as well as watercooled editions. I will be looking at the VG4000BNS, which has red mesh on both sides, although I like the color red it kinda hurt my eyes when looking at it 24/7 so I decided to change the case by giving it a paint job. But let's not get to far ahead, read on to check out the full review of the original Xaser VI. “

CLICK HERE FOR Thermaltake Xaser VI VG4000BNS Case SHOPPING & PRICING

"Diamond Multimedia doubled the on-board GDDR3 memory from 256MB to 512MB on the Diamond Radeon HD 3850 512MB Ruby Edition Video Card, which should significantly help frame buffer performance in gaming, but that isn't all they did. They also tossed the old single slot cooler and went with a larger and improved cooling system that lowered temperatures across the board. To top it all off they designed their own PCB! As you can see, Diamond went back to the drawing board and came up with a video card that should impress most of the ATI fans out there..."

CLICK HERE FOR Diamond Radeon HD 3850 512MB SHOPPING & PRICING

"The Foxconn X38A is interesting because it combines two contradictions: being a top motherboard and being fit for memory upgrades. Both types of products have been manufactured for a long time already. But we cannot recall somebody trying to combine them."

CLICK HERE FOR Foxconn X38A - a Motherboard SHOPPING & PRICING

The Kingwin RVT 12025D is an entirely different cooler from its sibling with the exception of its utilizing the Direct Touch Heatpipes. The RVT 12025D lays the convection fin/fan assembly parallel to the mainboard. Many folks with hot running mainboards really appreciate these, myself for one. While the RVT 12025D is nowhere near as tall as the RVT 12025, it makes up for it with a large 145 x 150mm footprint.

CLICK HERE FOR Kingwin RVT 12025 SHOPPING & PRICING

CLICK HERE FOR Kingwin RVT 12025D SHOPPING & PRICING

"The Xigmatek HDT-S1283 heatsink features three heatpipes in direct contact with the top of the processor, resulting in one very potent CPU cooler. The technique is called Heatpipe Direct Touch, and for today's class of heatspreader capped processors it's the only way to go. The Xigmatek HDT-S1283 heatsink FrostyTech is reviewing today is equipped with vibration absorbing rubber fan posts, a 120mm PWM fan that scales in speed from 1000-2200RPM, and a little spoiler to direct exhaust airflow down towards adjacent motherboard components."

Original cooler design will undoubtedly catch your eye if you come across it in a store. Let’s find out from our new article how good this solution actually is and if it will become an overclocker’s choice.

We’ve been given the opportunity to orchestrate a direct comparison of two of the most exciting graphics cards shipping today, AMD’s ATI FireGL V8650 and NVIDIA’s QuadroFX 5600. The V8650 is a monstrous version of ATI’s R600 graphics processor with 2GB of memory attached, whereas the FX 5600 is the 1.5GB heavy workstation cousin of the GeForce 8800 Ultra, both of which use NVIDIA’s G80 processor. Both cards are phenomenally large, as well.

CLICK HERE FOR ATI FireGL V8650 SHOPPING & PRICING

"The Geeks 7" digital picture frame is an unbranded OEM model, unusually though it is packaged in a colorful high gloss retail box with lots of padding. Looking inside, we find a 7" LCD Digital Photo Frame & MP3 Player, Power adapter, Remote control, AV Cable, and User's manual. All of this was pretty standard fare except for the welcome addition of a media player. Extra credit needs to be awarded, though, to the manufacturer for including a well-written paper manual--something of a rarity these days."

"We have already tested the X48 chipset in its DDR2 variant (that’s right, because it’s a direct descendant of the X38 it keeps the dual mode memory controller); the DDR2 version has already managed to produce some better scores than the X38 DDR2 thanks to its increased FSB support. Today we are moving onto X48 in DDR3 form.

MSI has graciously provided us with their new X48 Platinum motherboard which is designed to be an ultra overclockable and feature-rich model. How it stacks up is the subject of today’s review."

"I've been reviewing for quite some time now and I can tell you, I have never seen a product completely blow its competition out of the water like the A-DATA PD7 8GB flash drive. I thought that the Lexar 8GB drive would be able to keep up with the A-DATA PD7 but I was sorely mistaken. The A-DATA PD7 8GB almost doubled what its competitors scored in all of the tests! I am extremely amazed at the speed, ease of use, and the fact that this flash drive is Windows ReadyBoost ready. Originally, I thought that my generic 2GB flash drive was pretty darn good but this A-DATA flash drive dropped my jaw when I saw the results."

CLICK HERE FOR A-DATA PD7 8GB Flash Drive SHOPPING & PRICING

"although it didn't operate as fast as the USB drive, the power consumption is where the benefits were and for people on the move that is important. I also used the drive under vista, via vista boost and there was a slight increase in performance when opening and shutting files I was working with, so a performance boost without a huge power hit."

CLICK HERE FOR Lexar 8GB ExpressCard SSD SHOPPING & PRICING

At first glance the new b-Envi from BGear looks to be just your plain and average SFF case. But once this puppy is lit up the controls are out of this world. The touch sensitive control are something that no other case had before, but after the introduction of the b-Envi that could change. Besides touch sensitive controls, the b-Envi also has a removable motherboard tray that will aid greatly in the building process. Yeah, there are a few more things the b-Envi has to offer but you have to read the rest of the article.

"Despite being named the Silencer Quad, this PSU uses just a single beefy 12V rail, running 60 amps! Seeing specs like those just makes you want to drool. High efficiency, just one silent fan, and single rail design, all of this is amazing… but is it too good to be true? Continue on as we find out."

CLICK HERE FOR PC Power & Cooling Silencer Quad 750w PSU SHOPPING & PRICING

"After months of hype and anticipation, INTEL and AMD have unleashed their next generation processors on the market. While AMD's Phenom line has received luke warm reviews to this point, INTEL's Penryn line has been the toast of the town. Why?

Today, HardwareLogic breaks down the quad core QX9650. While a casual glance might leave the impression there's little difference between the QX9650 and its predecessors (the QX6800 and QX6850), looks can be, and in this case, are deceiving. There's much more here than meets the eye..."

CLICK HERE FOR Intel QX9650 Core 2 Extreme SHOPPING & PRICING

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

"Take your office with you thanks to the Seagate FreeAgent Pro hard drive, available in a number of sizes."

CLICK HERE FOR Seagate FreeAgent Pro 160GB SHOPPING & PRICING

"I never thought I would be able to pull more performance out of my existing hardware. My CPU has hit walls from 440 to 470 FSB on other boards but usually I could coax another 5 FSB from it with extreme voltages. As it turns out, the old Quad had a little more life left in it after all. 490 x 7 was stable in Memtest 1.70 but would crash upon loading Windows. Lowering the clocks a little further resulted in a boot into Windows at 484 x 7. Not only did this clock speed boot into Windows, but was Prime 95 stable for over 24 hours as well. Voltages on the northbridge, CPU and CPU PLL were increased to gain stability at this clockspeed. A nice little feature in the BIOS is the color coding of the miscellaneous voltages. Green, of course, for normal, Yellow for high and Red for crazy. This gives you an indication of what levels Asus thinks are "safe" and which are not. Overclocking the memory did not require a whole lot of tweaking to get the memory to perform. By focusing on the CPU clocks I ran the memory slower than it is capable of. This memory does indeed push to 940MHz on this board with timings of 8-7-6-20 at 1.96volts. Pushing the limits on the Asus Blitz Extreme was not a problem. The crash recovery requires just a shutdown and reboot. This takes you back to the default settings, so the next boot is trouble free. Kind of refreshing if you ask me. If it does get to the point where the simple reboot does not work, there is always the clear CMOS button on the I/O panel just in case. The final clock speed of 484 x 7 is the most "Extreme" clockspeed that my Q6600 has ever been able to achieve."

CLICK HERE FOR Asus Blitz Extreme SHOPPING & PRICING

Of all the RAM kits we have reviewed thus far in our High-Speed DDR3 Overclocking and Review Series, practically every set has been aimed towards performance enthusiasts and overclockers. But Benchmark Reviews isn't going to ignore our roots within the system builder and reseller community. SimpleTech offers OEM system builders and GSA suppliers with a solid PC3-10600 DDR3 1333MHz S1024R5NP2QA RAM kit for the Intel P35/X38/P45/X48 chipsets.

Today we are examining the B-Gear/B-Tarantula 550 Watt Power Supply. This particular power supply has a number of nice features ranging from its modular design down to the beautifully wrapped modular connectors. We will be testing this black beauty to see if it is as dangerous as it looks or perhaps it may turn out to be an "itsy bitsy spider".

CLICK HERE FOR B-Gear/B-Tarantula 550 watt Power Supply SHOPPING & PRICING

The Westone UM1 in-ear-monitors are aimed at people wanting good sound quality on the move without having to spend several hundreds of dollars. With a price of $109 they are Westone's contribution to a highly competitive price segment.

CLICK HERE FOR Westone UM1 Earphones SHOPPING & PRICING

“Now why would AMD release an AMD Athlon X2 5000+ Black Edition Processor? Try affordability and performance on for size. At a reasonable $115.00 for 2.6GHz of power running through two cores, this processor should be very capable of providing more than enough power for today's most graphic intensive games. Of course as with any of the newest processors, it should be teamed up with a good graphics card like the NVidia 8800 or ATI's newest series. This more affordable processor is basically AMD's way of thanking all of the people who have chosen and continue to choose AMD processors.”

CLICK HERE FOR AMD Athlon 64 X2 5000+ Black Edition CPU SHOPPING & PRICING

VIZO specialises in PC accessories. In this review we'll be taking a look at the VIZO Luxon Advanced ED - USB/eSATA enclosure. It features USB2.0 and eSATA 3.0G connectors, and you can install any 3.5" SATA hard drive of any size. We look at the build quailty, ease of installation and package contents.

“Cooler Master makes some the most solid, attractive cases on the market. It also makes some top quality power supplies and cooling products, too. The company's focus on green power supplies and a new hardware monitoring architecture garnered it a lot of attention, and we at ThinkComputers believe that Cooler Master is doing a lot of cool and good things. Read on for coverage.”

"Thermaltake has sent me their Max 4 hard drive enclosure that features active cooling in the form of a silent 80mm fan that is only 15mm thick, so it really only adds about 15mm to the overall thickness of the enclosure and keeps your hard drive cool. The Max 4 also features dual interfaces in the form of USB and eSATA allowing you to utilize the higher transfer rates of an eSATA connection if there's one available. So continue on to check out this enclosure... "

CLICK HERE FOR Thermaltake Max 4 Active Cooling HDD Enclosure SHOPPING & PRICING

TTGamer have today posted a review of The Witcher for the PC. CD Projekt conjure up a spell and cast a solid RPG with their first in-house title ever.

CLICK HERE FOR The Witcher PC SHOPPING & PRICING