Thursday Reviews

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DDR3 has been out for a pretty long time already and even though a majority of enthusiasts currently run systems that utilize DDR3, the majority of systems are still running on DDR2. DDR2 is the mainstream technology and has a price point to match. The KHX8500D2T1K2/4G kit comes with brand new heat-spreaders and good performance for a 4GB DDR2 kit.

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The market for graphics cards centers around price to performance. While high-end cards capture the eye of the press, it is the job of the mainstream graphics card to capture the entire market. The 4600 series from ATI is targeted to the mainstream crowd and the Sapphire Radeon HD 4670 has just been refreshed with GDDR4 and a faster memory speed. The time to buy may be now.

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Antec is one of the most respected and well known case manufactures in the computer industry. They make a variety of cases that satisfy the OEM crowd as well as the enthusiast niche. The Skeleton is a completely unique design and the term case really doesn't describe the enclosure that well. This case is made to really show off your components.

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Kingston manufacturers a number of consumer electronic devices that have to do with memory. The main business of Kingston is memory and every enthusiast knows that Kingston makes enthusiast RAM for overclocking. That market segment is quite small compared to consumer electronics in general and the Kingston 19-in-1 USB card reader really shines with good features you don't see elsewhere.

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For those with a compatible computer, the Latosta portable laptop stand is an extremely lightweight and compact stand that can make it much more comfortable to use your laptop for extended periods of time. The typing angle created is more comfortable than a flat surface, and the elevated screen takes some of the strain off of your neck

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The Sapphire Ultimate Radeon HD4670 is a passively cooled graphics card with plenty of features other than its silent operation that should appeal to HTPC owners. With an integrated HDMI port, DirectX 10.1, and Shader Model 4.1 support, it offers some of the things you look for in a gaming graphics card, but with an obvious focus on home theater performance

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The Tuniq Potency 650W power supply is a no nonsense unit that will get the job done on a basic computer system without wasting your money on bells and whistles. It has decent features and specifications, was able to power the test configuration without issue, and it remains cool and quiet during operation

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*"One of Cooler Masters lastest offerings is the Hyper N520 CPU cooler. With the promise being able use the Hyper N520 on most recent motherboards, even the LGA1366 sockets, the Hyper N520 looks like it could be another high performance HSF from Cooler Master. However, we won't know until we toss it on our test bench and see how it compares to other coolers. Stick with us and check out the results."

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A sequel to the popular Zero case, the NZXT Zero 2 replaces it's predecessor at the top end of the pedestal. Equipped with a side panel capable of wielding no less than four 120mm fans, the NZXT Zero seemed perfect for the serious gamer or enthusiast running multi-GPU systems. Featuring a slew of changes from it's counterpart, NZXT hopes to wow the gamer and enthusiast community with a similar vivacity. Can the Zero 2 be just as strong the second time around or will it prove sequels can never compete with their predecessors? Let's jump in and find out!

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"We proceed with a series of practical articles, in which we analyze sufficiency of various CPU+GPU combinations for games, trying to keep our test conditions as close to popular realia as possible. We hope that such articles will come in handy to readers willing to reasonably distribute their budget between a graphics card and a processor."

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"AMD has updated its gaming platform codenamed Dragon with launching Phenom II processors. As all other parts we've reviewed have turned out to be more attractive than competitors in our tests and in terms of features, it's logical to assume that the new platform will merge all advantages of its constituent parts not just to make a poor part look better at the cost of other elements, but to raise platform attractiveness to a new level."

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"GeForce GTX 295 is based on two 55nm GT200b chips, which differ from their 65nm predecessors only in smaller die surface and lower power consumption. The transition to the 55nm process technology allows the card with two powerful GPUs to consume less than 300W and keep heat release at a level that its redesigned dual-slot cooling system can handle."

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Quote: "In the past, really small USB flash drives have had to make compromises on performance to fit everything in such a small form-factor. I'm pleased to say that the Super Talent Pico 16GB doesn't suffer from these drawbacks and offers great read and write performance. When you consider how small the drive is, this is even more impressive..."

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The television set has to be the most loved device in the house. After all, how many hours do you spend in front of the toaster each day? Despite all of that adoration, though, the boob tube no longer corners the market when it comes to audiovisual excitement. Thanks to advancements in online multimedia delivery, services such as YouTube, Picasa and iTunes also offer a lot of Web-based entertainment to get you through the wee hours of the morning. Still, no matter how much you can contort your body, sitting in an office chair is definitely not a

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The first of the new 2009 camcorders are finally hitting stores. Unlike the onslaught of low-priced (sub $200) video capture devices like the entry-level Flip Mino, models such as the GZ-MG670 have critical things like zoom lenses, better picture quality, bigger LCD screens and tons of others creature comforts that make them at least twice as expensive - but still much better deals in our view. Take the just released MG670 for example: It has a 35x optical zoom, a 2.7-inch widescreen LCD and 80GB storage (19 hours at best 720 x 480 pixel quality). Compare this to a Flip Mino with no zoom, a poor 1.5-inch screen and 640 x 480 clip quality. Basically, there is no comparison. However, the Flip and its brethren are extremely compact, and made for video sharing on YouTube. Both are features millions want and use every day. Until last year mainstream camcorder manufacturers didn't know sharing existed but that changed with the JVC GZ-MS100, a relatively affordable edition with YouTube uploading built into the software. Now JVC has introduced its newest models with YouTube and iTunes upload capability. As for size, it's definitely bigger than a Flip but hardly a TV station camera. Now is the MG670 worth it - and does it make sharing the breeze it's supposed to be? Let's start shootin.

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"Today we have PowerColors version of the card. To date we've only had one HD 4830 come through the door and that card managed to set the bar high for the model. You have to wonder, is PowerColor going to come within arm's reach of the bar, or hop straight over it? There's ultimately only one way to find out, so let's have a look at what the company has done with the package before we have a closer look at the card and then its performance. From there we will wrap it all up and hopefully the PowerColor card can offer us something that we didn't get from the MSI one which managed to impress."

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Trying to find a air cooling heatsink for our video cards that not only cools well but is small enough to fit into our cases and on our motherboard without taking up 3+ slots, has become a complete nightmare. As video cards get bigger and faster, most think that the cooler that cools these cards should also be massive in size. Either it adds a lot of extra unneeded weight to our video cards or these coolers take up extra valuable PCI slots that we may need.

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The rear of the box gives us a full compatibility list which takes in much of the GeForce 6, 7 and 8 series (apart from certain high-end GeForce 8800 parts), and a handful of ATI cards from the Radeon X1800 and X1900 series down to the later Radeon HD 3850 part. The cooler's specifications are all noted here, as we can see that the device is constructed from copper and aluminium (as you'd expect), while also featuring an 80mm fan, with the cooler as a whole weighing a little over 230 grams.

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* Today I will be looking at the P6T, Asus' basic mainstream X58 motherboard. As with other Asus Intel motherboard series, the P6T falls just under the Deluxe model, and is a full-featured but more affordable board. The P6T supports 3-way SLI and 3-way CrossFireX, triple-channel memory, and all of the other goodies provided by the X58 chipset. Read on to find out about the Asus P6T!"

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"Today Noctua has sent us the NH-U9B CPU cooler for testing along with a matching optional fan to allow for dual fan testing. The Noctua NH-U9B is a scaled down version of the NH-U12P that we reviewed some time ago. The major difference with these two coolers is that this is a 92mm fan cooled version for HTPC, or possibly even some SFF cases. This four heat-pipe cooler shows promise from what I have read in reviews of other products, as well as word of mouth from forum members and highly experienced people like Chris. I know, technically the NH-U9B shouldn't compete with its larger brother in temperatures, but Noctua pride themselves on quiet solutions to CPU cooling. With this in mind, I would hope this cooler is in fact quiet and can still hold its own footing battling temperatures. It is time we get to opening up Noctua's NH-U9B and see if everything I have been lead to believe is true."

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"Super Talent continues to upgraded their look, this reviewer believes the gold needs to go, I understand the reference of it, the aesthetics just aren't there. The heatspreaders are ribbed Aluminum with risers coming off the top. While we at VL have never been able to prove the addition of heatspreaders are of value, I suppose its better to have them then not, just in case you know . Super Talent, like most manufacturers today, are RoHS compliant with their chips, which basically means youcan eat them and not die from led poisoning etc... The packaging ofthe Super Talent Extreme Performance memory modules is that of simplicity with little fanfare other then a short paragraph on the back of what denotes Extreme Performance in Super Talents dictionary. "

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While pricey gaming rigs from the likes of Alienware and HP's Voodoo unit often grab headlines, these machines are well out of reach for most consumers. Thank goodness for systems like Dell's affordable and stylish XPS 625, which demonstrates that you can still get solid gaming performance for around a thousand dollars. This desktop strips away most frivolities-after all, liquid cooling systems and tool-less interiors are agreeable but expensive perks-and just sticks to the essential hardware necessary to run the latest games with aplomb. And, as an added bonus, it looks pretty slick to boot.

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You've no doubt heard the claims from electronics manufacturers stating the world's first this, the world's largest that, the world's smallest the other. Economic turmoil has only heated up this race to provide innovative products, and industry firsts. Here, we bring you 10 world's firsts that are bigger, thinner, smaller, lighter, and faster than the competition.

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QNAP is making its presence felt in the NAS industry with solutions for everyone. The QNAP TS-209 Pro II fits the bill for anyone looking for a small, flexible and powerful NAS. It provides 2 drives configurable as a bunch of disks, RAID 0 or 1 and offer a download management interface and doubles as a webserver, media & iTunes servers.

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"The past few weeks have been a pleasure to use the ASUS N10Jc-A1 Netbook as toting around a 17" screen laptop has really become a chore over the years. Never again will I need to walk out of the house with a clunky laptop when I can just grab a 3-4 pound netbook. The ability to take an inexpensive, fully functional PC on the road is only part of what is making the netbook market explode right now. The other part is the state of the economy. Given the current recession, consumers are looking for more affordable ways to get an upgrade or satisfy their electronics addiction. The performance of the ASUS N10Jc-A1 was actually a little more than I expected..."

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"As more and more people design wireless home networks, the question becomes one of what to do with your older wireless and wired systems. This has become even more prominent with the increase in the number of inexpensive 300Mbps N specification routers and access points available. Newer laptops and netbooks do come with N wireless cards, but many devices that are less than a year old do not. Well, TRENDnet has an answer for you in the form of its TEW-645UB High Power Wireless N USB adapter. The TEW-645UB boasts up to twice the range of traditional N USB adapters; with up to eight times the range of standard g adapters. Speed is also a feature of the TEW-645UB with maximum theoretical speeds of up to 300Mbps. Will the TEW-645UB be able to deliver on its promises? - It looks great on paper, but let's see if it can perform in the real world."

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Now a days video cards are pretty much follow a reference design, nothing that stands out from one to another manufacturer when it comes to actual card itself. But where manufacturers differ on their video cards is the type of cooling they use on their particular video cards. HIS has always been one of the fore runners on using an aftermarket type of GPU cooler's for their video cards. We at Bjorn3d going to look at such a video card that uses an aftermarket GPU cooler, and for its price range should provide the much needed horsepower we need to play today's most demanding games. We going to be looking at a HIS iSilence ICEQ 4+ 4670 1 gig video card.

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I hope you all had a good weekend. It's been quite a while since Auzentech's first design based around Creative's Xi-Fi chip, the X-Fi Prelude, hit the market, and today we take a look at the successor to this part, the X-Fi Forte. Boasting a low-profile, PCI Express design and a full set of driver functionality including support for Dolby Digital and DTS encoding, can it carve a niche for itself as the best discrete sound card on the market?

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Taking a look at the HD 4670, this is not the same HD 4670 we reviewed some months ago. This is a new and improved HD 4670 when has been packed with GDDR4, which is a technology jump from the GDDR3 on the older model. What we will be looking at besides the performance increase from the new memory is the new and quieter dual slot active cooler which sits atop the 750MHz GPU core. Sit back and read on as we take the new HD 4670 for a hefty round of tests.

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"Strangely, a few days later when I came back to get some screenshots of Voice Buddy, the problem seemed to have magically resolved! Voice Buddy understood every command I threw at it. I think that this could be down to a temporary system fault (or background noise, as it was much quieter in my house on the last time I tried), so I don't think it should be blamed on Voice Buddy."

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PC-based TV tuners are nothing new. For years, we've seen tuners of all kinds pass through the labs from a variety of manufacturers. ATSC tuners are a bit newer, but we've worked with those for a few years as well. An ATSC Tuner built on to a PCI Express video card, well, that is new for us. Today we'll be looking at the ATI All-In-Wonder HD. The card we'll be reviewing is an ATI/AMD reference card and when shopping around, you'll most likely find a version from one of AMD's board partners. As the name implies, the card is designed with HD in mind, and while Over-the-Air (OTA) ATSC tuners have been released by ATI before, the AIW HD is a step forward in integration.

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Quote: "In the $300 price segment, the Sapphire Radeon HD 4850x2 can't be accused of bringing a knife to a gunfight; with 1600 Stream processors, 2GB of GDDR3 memory running at 993MHz, and two GPU's clocked at 625MHz all packed on the massive 11 1/4" single PCI-Express circuit board, the HD 4850 X2 is ready to go against NVIDIA's GeForce GTX280, as well as today's most popular games. Let's take a look and see what Sapphire brings to the table in their HD 4850 X2..."

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A storm is brewing over at Cooler Master. As the turbulence stirs up, the mixture of wind, dust, and water, it mixes and molds these elements to create something magical. No, we are not talking about the physical storm that causes havoc to people's lives, but rather, we are referring to Cooler Master's latest line of products that is going to stir up the computer world. The Storm is a line of products from Coller Master that is targeted at the computer enthusiasts. One product off the Storm line-up is the Sniper case, that is the magical thing which the engineering and designing team stirs up. As you can guess, this case is going to be the start of this review.

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, Xigmatek's name is soon to make the list. They have done really well for themselves and have kept introducing more products to the market as they go. Xigmatek is keeping me busy and sends over another addition to our lab for testing. This time we are taking a look at the Xigmatek Dark Knight S1283, a variation on an already good cooling solution that is based on the S1283 series coolers. The Dark Knight stands the same as the other S1283's, but this time it is dressed in all black. Xigmatek has plated the entire cooler in a black nickel coating. And I mean everything, except for the fan of course. Speaking of the fan, with the Dark Knight Xigmatek ships the highest CFM fan on their coolers to date.

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The company that pioneered the pocket-sized flash video camera has taken it a step further with the MinoHD, a pint-sized camcorder that shoots 720p high-def video, in a case that's no bigger than the original, super-slim Mino. But can a camera that's smaller than a pack of cigarettes really deliver on the promise of HD quality? Consider us quite surprised. But at $230, it's no bargain.

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"Thermaltake have taken the design of the V1 and tweaked and enlarged it into a monster that is the V14Pro. The added bulk is not in vain though and it works well and temperatures are improved because of it. The fan on full speed is loud, and I wouldn't want to run it like that all the time, but the manual fan speed controller allows you to dial in your own compromise between noise and performance."

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* Remember the day whenever 8GB Flash Drives were highest capacity drives on the market and cost a fortune? That time is no longer as we have a chance to look at the Super Talent Luxio 64GB Luxury Flash Drive. Available in three different colors: black, silver, or wood grain, the Luxio Series drives are also available in 16GB and 32GB sizes. This flash drive is so large that it could be used as another hard drive for your system. But how much will it cost you? Read on further to find out."

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With the Xporter Magnum, Patriot has once again shown their aim at performance. Even after doubling the storage capacity of their previous Xporter they have managed to keep close to the same performance numbers with the Magnum.

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Today we see the release of the GTS 250. Now, we're not going to sugarcoat it; this card is a 9800 GTX+ which we saw come out around August of last year. The thing about the 9800 GTX+, however, is that it's nothing more than an overclocked 9800 GTX, which was a card we saw released at the end of March last year. That's all the cynical comments, though; there are pros to a rehashed card. For starters, at launch there's no reason there should be any issues with the card, since it's been around so long. There's of course also the price which should be a lot more attractive than when it launched. And finally, if it ain't broke, why fix it?!

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Quote: "M-ROCK is primarily a maker of a line of camera bags. The line extends from very small bags for things like phones and music devices to their new combination laptop and full DSLR kit backpacks, with many intermediate sized bags between. There are several styles and many sizes of bags to fit the needs of almost any photographer. All of the M-ROCK bags (beyond the very smallest sacks) are made of durable padded nylon materials with soft non-scratch interiors, have combinations of hook and loop, zippers, and buckle closures and feature multiple carrying options such as hand-held, belt attached, and shoulder straps..."

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X58 based motherboards are popping up thick and fast. And why not? - Core i7 is Intel's new cash cow and its performance is beyond anything that Core 2 could ever hope for. Thanks to the on-chip memory controller, Intel has finally abandoned the old FSB interface for this high-end CPU and move to a more data friendly bus between the Northbridge and the CPU. No longer are memory transactions between CPU and DRAM required to go across a limited bus. So far we have tested most of the major companies X58 offerings. We have already seen GIGABYTE, MSI, ASUS and DFI strut their stuff and today we have another channel partner in the fray and that is Foxconn. Foxconn has really come a long way from just producing simple OEM boards; today they have their own enthusiast lines and we have their latest one in hand, the Quantum Force X58 BloodRage.

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Quote: "The folks at OCZ have come up with a creative solution to help improve performance with their new Apex line of MLC based SSD's. Available in 60, 120 and 250GB capacities with a 2.5" form factor, the Apex drives utilize a RAID-0 configuration with a JMicron JMB390 RAID controller and dual JMF602(B) JMicron SSD controllers all enclosed in the drive itself without the need for external software or hardware to assist. In addition, the JMF602 controllers each have a 16KB on-die cache to help performance. This allows users to utilize the advantages of RAID who may not want the hassle of a traditional RAID setup. We will be specifically looking at the 120GB OCZ Apex drive which currently retails for around $350..."