| Thursday News Edition |
| ASUS Radeon HD 3850 X2 1GB - Mainstream Dual-GPU Option @ pcper.com |
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Posted by newsbot
on May 15th 2008
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The ASUS Radeon HD 3850 X2 1GB turned out to be a surprisinglycompetent graphics card that augments the gaping hole between the HD 3870 X2and the HD 3870 in the product stack. ASUS is the only card vendorcurrently selling this product design and its likely they will remain so asthe life span of the RV670 creeps along. But with the aggressive pricingASUS has put on the product (that hopefully becomes MORE aggressive) the9800 GTX from NVIDIA has a new, and very competent, competitor. If ASUS andAMD can get the word about this custom ASUS-built Radeon HD 3850 X2 it mightbreathe new life into AMD's GPUs this spring.
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| Lian-Li PC V1010 Case @ thinkcomputers.org |
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Posted by newsbot
on May 15th 2008
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I liken Lian-Li to the Mercedes-Benz of the chassis design world.The Taiwan-based company designs its chassis with sleek, conservative styleand hand-builds cases out of lightweight, yet durable aluminum. The chassisare generally not flashy, but are very, very conducive for high-performancecooling while overclocking. Lian-Li recently renewed its V series line-upwith five new cases:PC-V2110, PC-V2010, PC-V1110, PC-V1000Z, and the focusof this review, the PC-V1010. ThinkComputers goes inside the Lian-LiPC-V1010 chassis in this review.
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| Vizo Mini Ninja at Modders-Inc @ modders-inc.com |
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Posted by newsbot
on May 15th 2008
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Overall, the Vizo Mini Ninja is a well made little notebookcooler. It is fairly compact, light weight, and sturdy. Being made of a nicegrade of aluminum, it is going to be structurally durable for an extendedtime.
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| Is Microsoft's Dominance in Jeopardy? @ forum.ecoustics.com |
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Posted by newsbot
on May 15th 2008
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Nearly 16 months after Microsoft launched Vista, the company is still trying to convince some consumers of the operating system's merit. Vista
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| BFG Tech GeForce 9800 GTX OCX 512MB graphics card @ bit-tech.net |
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Posted by newsbot
on May 15th 2008
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To be fair, I’m still in two minds about the GeForce 9800 GTX.And eventhough BFG Tech has gone above and beyond the call of duty here, Istill don’t think it’s enough for me to change my mind about thisparticular card in Nvidia’s line-up. You see, the standard cards are still on the expensive side compared tothe GeForce 8800 GTX and GeForce 8800 GTS 512, while BFG Tech’s GeForce9800 GTX OCX is priced at such a point that it’s no longer competingagainst only products in Nvidia’s line-up, but also against the RadeonHD 3870 X2. And over time, it seems like the 3870 X2’s drivers haveimproved a bit and it’s now becoming a more rounded purchase when youcompare it to something like the card we’ve looked at here today.When the 3870 X2 drags its feet in games that don’t scale so well, theBFG Tech GeForce 9800 GTX OCX is a faster card, but when you get intoscenarios where scaling is there, the Radeon HD 3870 X2 is generally asignificantly faster proposition. And because of that, I think it’s thebetter purchase right now in the £250 price bracket.That’s not to say that BFG Tech’s card is one that you shouldn’tconsider at all – the company has worked to correct the omissions fromits earlier bundles and you can now use the audio over HDMIfunctionality thanks to the included S/PDIF cable. It’s also one of thehighest-clocked GeForce 9800 GTX cards out there—and it’s backed by animpressive warranty term—which makes it one of the best G92-based cardson the market today. It’s also the first G92-based card we’ve seen thatbests the GeForce 8800 GTX in a convincing enough manner for it to beconsidered a replacement.
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| CoolIT Freezone Elite watercooling kit @ bit-tech.net |
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Posted by newsbot
on May 15th 2008
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The Freezone Elite will definitely beat anything you can likelybuild to fit in anywhere nearthe same space by a mile - let alone any pre-built kits. But its priceclass puts it in a whole different realm, which is why I built such abig system to compare it to. An enthusiast is going to look at what heor she can build for a similar cost, not just what fits in the samespace.The watercooling system I compared to costs around £200 in the UK (and$320 in the US) – that's about £50 less, and it's quieter and cooler.However, every time I need to make a change, I invest twenty minutes inundoing everything, draining the loop, etc. And that's in a case that'sdesigned for it.It took me all of two minutes to disconnect the Freezone Elite. Ofcourse, then it took another five to get all the pre-applied thermalpaste off, then a hunt for the manual to hook it back up again when Icouldn't remember which unmarked cable goes where. They may seem likeminor niggles, and they are – but for almost £250 of yours or my money,you can damn well bet that I don't want to be talking about littleniggles.With the Freezone Elite, I think CoolIT has a good product...but it hasa better foundation for a great product. There's a lot of potentialhere, but I think it's not yet realised in this particular model. Withthe brilliant MTEC software and controller, the great TEC performanceand the incredible ease of use, it's off to a great start – but it willonly ever get rid of as much heat as that CPU block can absorb.
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| Sunbeam SATA/IDE to USB 2.0 Adapter @ techpowerup.com |
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Posted by newsbot
on May 15th 2008
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Sunbeam has come out with a nice tool that solves the mystery of how to handle multiple formats of hard drives. The SATA/IDE to USB 2.0 Adapter can use 2.5
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| Lexar Gaming Edition 2GB SD Card and 4GB Memory Stick PRO Duo @ rbmods.com |
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Posted by newsbot
on May 15th 2008
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With flash memory getting cheaper and capacity getting larger, itmakes more sense than ever to purchase a new card for your gaming system orfor any other device that takes it. What makes these cards special is thatthey feature free downloadable Xploder Lite software, meaning that theyessentially, and I quote, give
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| ATI Radeon HD 3850 256MB Crossfire ed @ thetechlounge.com |
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Posted by newsbot
on May 15th 2008
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We know it'd make more sense to just spend more money on a really fast card, but--two video cards! Given that you can definitely get two 3850s for $300, it seems like a reasonable upgrade option, even though I normally rail pretty hard against mid-range multi-GPU configurations. The main weakness of the 3850 is its clean performance drop when anti-aliasing is enabled. Without that, it really does scream. Will an extra $150 give it that 4xAA shine?
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| PC Power & Cooling Silencer 750 Quad Power Supply @ hardwaresecrets.com |
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Posted by newsbot
on May 15th 2008
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Our review of PC Power & Cooling Silencer 750 Quad, a 750 W power supply featuring four auxiliary power cables for video cards, labeled at 40º C and promising to deliver up to 825 W during peaks. Let’s see if it survives to our tests.
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| ThermoLab Nano Silencer CPU Cooler @ tweaktown.com |
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Posted by newsbot
on May 15th 2008
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recently looked at the ThermoLab Micro and found it to be an energy efficient processor-only cooler that was designed for small enclosures. Today we are going to look at the ThermoLab Nano, an even smaller cooler made for the same type of application; extremely small enclosures and cases. Before you start to yawn I will go ahead and say upfront that the Nano performed better than the Micro, even though it is a smaller cooler and fan. What is really attention getting is the size of the cooler and the custom applications that modders will be able to use with it.
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| RIM BlackBerry Bold (9000) Smartphone @ cooltechzone.com |
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Posted by newsbot
on May 15th 2008
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RIM just announced a new smartphone for its portfolio of existing BlackBerry devices boldly called the Bold. The name is quite bold (pun intended) and obviously so. It?s a complete rehash on UI and hardware sides that make for a powerful device that?s surely to quell iPhone?s market takeover intentions. It?s not that we particular think of the iPhone as the BlackBerry Killer, but it?s the next best alternative, and with Apple moving in swiftly behind RIM, it could?ve happened. However, RIM is taking care of itself and very well so.
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| Battleforge Interview:Volker Wertich @ bit-tech.net |
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Posted by newsbot
on May 14th 2008
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BT:You said“the Battleforge series” just then – does that mean you haveBattleforge 2 planned already?VW:Heh, well since Battleforge is an online game we havea longer life than other games and we’ll continue to work on the gameafter release. We will continuously release new maps, new cardadditions. Depending on the success of the game we may have a very longlifetime or a shorter life time, obviously.That said, we have sequels in mind and our game-plan goes over intoyears. BT:Now, Battleforge is a card-based RTS, but from what I sawearlier it looked very similar to a traditional RTS in that you’recreating units in a normal way and putting them down. How exactly doesBattleforge differ from a standard RTS game then?VW:Ok, so the thing is that the cards can be anything. Avehicle, a room – anything. What it is though is a collectible itemthat you own, ok? A virtual collectible item that you personally own.Having a card lets you then produce those units in a match.You then take twenty of those cards and form a deck that you take intobattle. The deck directly defines any unit, spell or item you take intoa game.Of course, this is a real-time game too. So, as soon as you produce aunit or play a card you have access to these new units which you cancontrol like you’re used to in a normal RTS game. In other words, the cards define your tech tree.
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| Technic3D/Xigmatek HDT-SD964 @ technic3d.com |
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Posted by newsbot
on May 14th 2008
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The Xigmatek HDT-SD964 CPU Heatsink arrived Technic3D. The CPU Cooler with 92mm PWM Fan, H.D.T. technology and easy installation. Se e you in the following Review the SD964 with one and two fan compared with Standard Boxed Cooling and more.
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| ATI Radeon HD 3850 256MB Video Card ed @ thetechlounge.com |
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Posted by newsbot
on May 14th 2008
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With it's release during the massive hardware holliday last year, the HD 3850, the least of four major cards, is easily overlooked. That's really a shame, since it's really a top-notch gaming card. Obviously, it's not the first choice for enthusiasts, but from a value perspective, it's without a doubt the best choice.
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