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Reviews Around The Web
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Choose Web Reviews from this Maker:
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Friday, August 17, 2007
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We're writing to let you know that we've just posted a new P35 chipset-based motherboard shootout at HotHardware in which we pit the Asus P5K3 Deluxe against the Gigabyte GA-P35T-DQ6. The P5K3 Deluxe is positioned as a premium product, with a price tag to match. And we put it up against another heavyweight, the Gigabyte GA-P35T-DQ6. Both boards feature elaborate cooling hardware and overclocked well past the 2GHz FSB mark. Head on over to the site and check them out?
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For years now the majority of graphics cards have required significant cooling when running intensive 3D tasks. Despite this it would be fair to say that many manufacturers place little importance in the quality of the cooling systems attached to their hardware. There are some exceptions which have mainly come from Nvidia's high end designs such as the 7800 and 8800 series however even ATI's latest 2900 series still suffer from large and loud cooling solutions. So what happens if a fan just is not cutting it? Well, in the first of a two part article we turn to two of the most well known cooling experts, Zalman and Arctic Cooling to see the alternative cooling they offer for mainstream/budget and older cards such as the Radeon X1950.
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Wednesday, August 15, 2007
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If you're on a tight budget and need to buy a graphics card for around £80 today, we'd recommend looking at the Radeon X1950 Pro as it'll offer a consistently better gaming experience than the new mid-range cards from AMD and Nvidia. If AMD and Nvidia's promises of DirectX 10 content that performs well on mid-range hardware hold true, this may change in the future. However, we?re unable to predict what might happen when in the future - at least on the performance front.
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Monday, August 6, 2007
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We have been prattling on about DDR3 and the Intel platform for some time now. It has only been a few months since DDR3 hit the shore, but its already starting to be produced in mass, especially by the enthusiast companies such as OCZ, Micron, Mushkin, Corsair, Geil and so on. Today we have three DDR3 memory kits on test; OCZ's DDR3-1333MHz, Geil's DDR3-1066MHz and Kingston's DDR3-1375MHz.
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Thursday, August 2, 2007
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Its results were better than the Zalman CNPS9700LED with both coolers running at high speed, but neither is really suited for a near-silent system. Thankfully, the BTF90 is quieter than the CNPS9700LED, but it?s still the loudest cooler at load in this selection of heatsinks.
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From the get go, its clear that the GeForce 8600 series is targeted at mainstream users. Reviews and users' experiences alike show that these cards are only fast enough for 1024 x 768 with AA and AF with current games But then again, that's what its all about it, isn't? You don't buy the GeForce 8600 series (or the lower series like the GeForce 8500 and 8400) to get performance. For the most part, you get because (1) it's cheap, (2) it's DirectX 10 and Vista compliant and probably, (3) its video decoding acceleration. The GeForce 8600GTS comes as the premium part in this series because it adds that little bit performance needed to play games. This time, we're taking four GeForce 8600GTS and three GeForce 8600GT for a test drive. We're going to take a look at the ASUS EN8600GTS/GT Silent, the Gigabyte NX8600GTS/GT with Silent Pipe, MSI NX8600GTS OC Edition and Leadtek PX8600GTS/GT TDH Extreme.
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Tuesday, July 31, 2007
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Today we have DDR2 memory modules topping out at 1200MHz DDR2 or 600MHz clock speeds, and this is using only around 2.4v which is within the safe zone. With even more time, cooling and voltage adjustments, more can be possible. We have five different memory kits for your viewing pleasure, all of them designed to run at speeds beyond DDR2 800MHz for the Athlon 64 X2s and also Intel?s P965 and P35 chipsets which have memory support for 800MHz and beyond.
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Wednesday, July 25, 2007
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In this article we test and compare 8 different VGA coolers from Zalman, Gigabyte, Vantec, Coolermaster, ZEROTherm, Arctic Cooling and Titan. The models range from completely passive no-noise solutions to multi heat pipes equipped cooling monsters. Read on to find out which one(s) offer the best performance/noise balance.
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Can the latest graphics cards to pass through our labs finally win us over to NVIDIA new mid-range family? Or will the ASUS EN8600GTS and Foxconn 8600GT-256 turn out to be over-priced and under-powered, like other 8600 cards before them?
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None of the PSUs we've looked at are perfect, even the recommended Tagan comes short by not including the 8-pin PCI-Express connectors and as stated, even the perfectly featured Enermax is "noisy", heavy and physically huge. Virtually all the tests performed extremely well with only a couple of cases dropping outside of ATX spec and the OCZ at 100 percent load falling below 80 percent efficiency.
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Monday, July 23, 2007
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We take an in-depth look at how the new ATI Radeon HD 2900 XT 512Mb stacks up to the lower price NVIDIA Geforce 8800 GTS 320Mb; comparing overclocked performance and scaling as well as Crossfire tested with multiple games. Can the new HD 2900 XT outrun the current mid/high range GTS performance champ? Let's find out.
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Monday, July 2, 2007
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The choice between stereo and 5.1 headphones can be complicated, so we are taking a look at a popular sub-$150 offering of each type to see which one will come out on top. As we find out, the choice can make quite a big difference depending on what you will use your PC for most.
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Wednesday, June 27, 2007
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In our latest CPU cooler roundup we compare 18 heatsinks on an overclocked Intel setup, testing for best performance at both high noise as well as dead silence. If you are looking for a cooling upgrade, this roundup will guide you towards the best product.
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Tuesday, June 26, 2007
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Every single one of you, prepared or not, will soon have to come to terms with the fact that the conventional cooling of the CPU needs to be replaced by a better, more efficient one, or simply stick with the default clock of your CPU, thus maybe even question the stability of the aforementioned in the upcoming hot summer days. In order to help you to find best solution, we tested 9 CPU coolers, courtesy of 5 different manufacturers. Lets cool down our CPUs!
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Friday, June 22, 2007
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The EVGA nForce 680i LT SLI Mainboard arrived Technic3D. The Mainboard with the "little" 680i LT and a small price better than a 680i? See you the the following Review against the ABIT IN9 32X MAX.
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