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Func is probably a bit less well known computer accessory manufacturer. After a few years of silence Func published the MS-3 high-end mouse and the Surface 1030 XL mouse mat. Now we are going to take a look at these new products.
RC model airplanes and single rotor copter are so yesterday. Multicopters are taking the world by storm and this series of articles will clarify all the needed terminology, technology and skills needed to make one for yourself!
azer's newest gaming mouse, Ouroboros, is a wireless mouse with customizable ambidextrous ergonomics and excellent adjustment possibilities. Let's see if the newcomer is as good as Razer claims!
In last spring Silverstone published two HTPC cases to Grandia series. The cases' model names are GD07 and GD08 and their most important features are extensibility, cooling perfonrmance and silence. This time we are about to take a closer look at the GD07 model.
Lian Li is considered as a company that produces high-end and very well finished cases. Let's see if PC-7H can face the presumptions.
Classic hand-held gaming devices near to your heart? Take a look at this project where I combine one of the real classics with another arcade icon.
Competition open for Finnish readers.
Need something to shock your friends? Levetron Mech 5 gaming keyboard gets the looks for sure but how well it will fair in real work usage? Read and find out!
Updated: 28.10.2012
Radio controlled cars are nice but why not take the play to the air?! Multirotor copters are the latest hit and this new model from UDIRC is the cheapest way to experience it!
SilverStone has recently published an improved version of its TJ04 case, which was introduced in 2004. The new model is called Temjin TJ04-E, which has some nice new improvements. Knowing SilverStone's products' quality, the expectations are high for this newcomer.
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- Seagate Desktop HDD .15 (ST4000DM000) 4000GB HDD Review - TweakTown
Introduction It's no secret that Solid State Drives have taken over and cornered the desktop market as far as OS drives are concerned. With this transition, platter based drives have been relegated to mass storage, whether it be as a secondary drive in a desktop system, or in a home server or NAS. Seagate recently upped the ante in terms of raw storage capacity releasing the next generation of desktop 3.5" drives. This latest drive out of the Seagate camp packs four terabytes into a single 3.5" form factor, and with pricing sitting around $190 or just over four cents per GB, it's also one of the most affordable drives in existence. To accomplish this high capacity low-cost drive, Seagate shipped the Desktop HDD .15 with a slower 5900RPM spindle speed, which isn't too surprising, as we typically see new platter technologies released at slower speeds before they are ramped up at a later date. Don't think that this slow spindle speed is going to hold back the performance of the .15 though, as its areal density sits at the top of the market at 625GB/sq. in. This means that the same amount of data is passed through the head in one revolution at 5900RPM compared to what goes through the head of the WD Black at 7200RPM with its 400GB/sq. in areal density. Specifications, Pricing and Availability Taking a look over the specifications for the Desktop HDD .15, we find that Seagate has supplied the drive with a generous 64MB cache. SATA compatibility extends from generation one at 1.5GB/s to the latest Gen 3 at 6GB/s with NCQ. Seagate has spec'd out the drive for an average seek of 8.5ms read and 9.5ms write, followed closely by an average read/write data rate of 146MB/s. Moving further down you will find that the mechanics of this drive are controlled by 8 heads with 4 platters using native advanced format 4K sectors. Power consumption figures for the .15 list a two amp startup draw with 7.5 watts used during normal operation. At idle the drive drops to 5 watts with standby consuming just 0.75 watts. Newegg at the time of writing has the Desktop HDD .15 in the 4TB capacity listed and in stock at $189.99 or 0.475 cents per GB. The Desktop HDD .15 comes in both retail and bare drive forms and is covered under Seagate's two year warranty. ... Read the rest in your browser!Related ContentPQI Air Card 4GB Wi-Fi SDHC ReviewWestern Digital My Passport Edge for Mac 500GB External HDD ReviewADATA M.2 SSDs Performance Preview and the NGFF StoryIntel DC S3500 480GB Enterprise SSD ReviewSeagate Enterprise Performance 10K HDD V.6 (Savvio 10K.6) SAS Enterprise HDD Review
- Top 10 TweakTown Content from the past week [17 June 2013] - TweakTown
Here are our top 10 articles, reviews and guides from the past week!A look at SanDisk's Extreme II SSD ArchitectureASUS Z87-Expert (Intel Z87) Motherboard ReviewIronside Cyclone Desktop Gaming PC (with custom TweakTown airbrushing) ReviewSony brutally destructs Microsoft's Xbox One plan with its PlayStation 4 console at E3NVIDIA GeForce GTX 770 2GB Video Card OverclockedSeagate Enterprise Performance 10K HDD V.6 (Savvio 10K.6) SAS Enterprise HDD ReviewIntel DC S3500 480GB Enterprise SSD ReviewMan of Steel (2013) Cinema Review from the perspective of a Superman fanboy
- The Great Gatsby (2013) Cinema Review - TweakTown
Nothing polarizes the worlds critics more than the release of a Baz Luhrman film, and despite the consensus of his last film, the well intentioned, but nonetheless disappointing Australia, it seems that you either get them or you don't. With The Great Gatsby, Luhrman finally has a project that plays to the best of his strengths and signature touches; a perfect confluence of music, spectacular production design and for the first time, 3D technology. Through his doctor, as a form of treatment for his malaise and depression, Nick Carraway (Tobey Maguire) recounts the story of his introduction and time spent with Gatsby (Leonardo DiCaprio), describing him as "the most hopeful man I had ever met". Carraway lives next door to the imposing Gatsby mansion, the epicenter of New York's social life with the hundreds that flock to his home, oblivious to who he really is, or what he does to fund it. When Gatsby calls on Nick for a favor of extending the invitation to his cousin Daisy (Carey Mulligan) to one of the shindigs, an unstoppable chain of events is set in motion that juxtaposes Gatsby's unrelenting desires, with events that are entirely out of his control. Director Baz Luhrman first cast a young, pre superstardom DiCaprio in 1996's Romeo + Juliet, and the intervening years have made him a markedly more accomplished performer, imbuing Gatsby with the qualities of naked ambition, fractured emotion and the necessary air of mystery. Matched by his performance is Carey Mulligan as Daisy, a carefully measured role which portrays fragility and ambition in equal measure. All in all, the entire cast is very, very good, including Joel Edgerton as Tom Buchanan, Daisy's partner and Jason Clarke as the jilted husband of Tom's lover. While many critics have expressed their disdain at the film, I've no doubt that it's Luhrman's strongest picture to date. Whatever criticisms leveled at his previous projects, most notably glitzy extravagance and technical brilliance at the cost of coherence, don't necessarily apply here - the excesses belong to the larger than life Gatsby's, not to the Director. Whilst Luhrman normally has a penchant for slightly over-long cuts, in this respect Gatsby is nearly perfectly balanced. It wouldn't be a Luhrman film without great music and in this regard the film doesn't disappoint. It may be entirely anachronistic, but the merging of 1920's jazz with bass infused modern beats is strangely appealing, but I would have to single out Lana Del Rey's hauntingly touching track "Young and Beautiful" for particular mention, which acts as a quasi-theme to be echoed throughout. With expectations in check, I thoroughly enjoyed The Great Gatsby, a visually stunning tour de force with solid performances from a well developed adaptation of an American classic. ... Read the rest in your browser!Related ContentThe Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012) Blu-ray Movie ReviewStar Trek: The Next Generation - Season Three (1989) Blu-ray ReviewThe Hangover Part III (2013) Cinema ReviewStar Trek: Enterprise - Season One (2001) Blu-ray ReviewMan of Steel (2013) Cinema Review from the perspective of a Superman fanboy
- ASRock Z87 OC FORMULA (Intel Z87) Motherboard Review - TweakTown
Introduction The ASRock Z77 OC Formula was shown off at Computex 2012 last year and we found ourselves impressed with what ASRock was doing with its new golden boy Nick Shih. Once shown off, though, it was still a few months before we finally got a chance to check out the motherboard in person. Once we got the board in our hands, we were not disappointed with what ASRock was offering. They brought to the table a board that performed exceptionally well, offered strong overclocking capabilities, massive amount of features, a great bundle, and all at just a simply fantastic price point. It quickly became one of our favorite Z77 motherboards to use and became the center of all our RAM testing for a couple of reasons. The first was the overclocking potential on the board was great. The second, though, was the fact that Nick Shih, the man behind the creation, is so on top of the BIOS. Working constantly to provide the best BIOS to overclockers, Nick made sure that the latest and greatest memory was always compatible on it and working well. For all these reasons we found ourselves extremely excited to check out what the team over at ASRock had done with the latest Z87 chipset from Intel. Initial showings of the board looked fantastic and seeing it Computex 2013 made our mouth water even more. So much so that when we talked to the friendly folk at ASRock and told them we'd happily take the board only for now, as we knew that the full package setups weren't being sampled yet. So, with that said, today we'll be moving straight from here into the motherboard itself, since we don't have the box or the bundle to discuss. This is definitely one board we're excited to test, so let's just get stuck into it and see what exactly is being offered from ASRock on the new Z87 OC FORMULA. ... Read the rest in your browser!Related ContentMSI Z77A-GD65 Gaming Series (Intel Z77) Motherboard ReviewASUS Z87-Expert (Intel Z87) Motherboard Review
- Lian Li PC-Q27 Black Mini-ITX Chassis Review - TweakTown
Introduction Lian Li is well known for their designs based off purely aluminum built cases. On top of the sleek and sexy look of brushed aluminum, another thing I give credit to Lian Li for is that they have always tried to make life easy with their cases by using screws to compile all the parts into a full chassis. Anyone who has wanted to remove a drive bay system, or even had ideas of grandeur prancing through your mind about an awesome case mod, you can simply remove most of the components in any Lian Li chassis. On top of all that aluminum, on top of the customizability of their cases, and from what I had seen at CES, the new ideas were nothing Lian Li was falling short of. We are going in the direction of a SFF chassis with the latest case from Lian Li. This chassis is based with a Mini-ITX motherboard in mind, and only Mini-ITX. With the idea to stay as compact as possible, Lian Li brings forth some new tricks that are firsts for me, along with some ingenuity coming forth in older systems, just now incorporated in places you may not have thought of before. In all honesty, this design does remind me of the Silverstone FT-03, but done completely different, and in a way that screams Lian Li throughout the entire chassis. The chassis that we are going to have the pleasure of gazing at today is the PC-Q27 B from Lian Li. In the most basic sense of the chassis, you are given a cube style case that is slightly taller than it is wide or deep. It is of course glad in brushed aluminum and offers USB 3.0 with reverse compatibility for older systems. I really don't want to get too deep at this stage about what Lian Li has packed inside of the PC-Q27 chassis. So, at this point we should just cut to the chase, and you can see and read for yourself to see if this is the next SFF chassis you want to buy over the next few pages. ... Read the rest in your browser!Related ContentNZXT Grid 10 Port Fan Hub ReviewScythe Mugen 4 Tower CPU Cooler ReviewDEEPCOOL GAMMAX S40 CPU Cooler ReviewScythe Ashura CPU Cooler ReviewCooler Master N200 Chassis Review
- Ironside Cyclone Desktop Gaming PC (with custom TweakTown airbrushing) Review - TweakTown
Introduction We're getting to take a look at our first PC from Ironside Computers today. Ironside is a system integrator and builds highly customizable gaming desktops. We've got a fairly well-spec'd Cyclone PC from Ironside in our lab to check out. It's worth noting that because of the high degree of customization, your Cyclone system could look radically different than the one pictured above and throughout this review. Ironside allows you to select a platform-in this case, Ivy Bridge-and then select a case and components that make use of that platform. Please note that PCMark 7 has been updated to the latest version, causing previous benchmark results to not be comparable. We have archived these results. Unfortunately, this means there are fewer systems to compare to. Without further ado, let's dive into the meat of this review and see what the Cyclone is made of. Specifications, Configurations and Pricing Ironside Computers equipped our Cyclone gaming desktop review sample system with Intel's Ivy Bridge-powered i5-3570K. One of the main differences between the 3570K and the 3770K is the inclusion of HyperThreading. For gaming, HyperThreading is a mostly useless technology. The 3570K retains Turbo Boost, which allows it to jump from 3.4GHz to 3.8GHz when one or two cores are loaded. Cooling is provided by Ironside's Level 2 Iron Tundra liquid cooling set up. It makes use of a 240mm radiator combined with an XSPC 5.25-inch reservoir and pump combo and an XSPC waterblock for the CPU. This should ideally perform better than an integrated all-in-one water cooler that seems to be in fashion. The 3570K is slotted into an ASRock Z77 Extreme 4. This motherboard features support for CrossFire and SLI, making it the perfect base for a gaming PC. It features on-board USB 3.0 and SATA 3 6Gbps. There are definitely better motherboards out there, but this one is no slouch. Two 8GB DDR3 DIMMs are slotted into the motherboard's RAM slots, leaving two slots open for easy expansion to 32GB in the future. They are clocked at 1600MHz, which should provide good performance for gaming. Graphics are provided by an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 670 video card. The NVIDIA GTX 670 is quite a capable video card, though the Cyclone can be configured with SLI'd GTX Titans, one of the fastest video card configurations currently on the market. All of these components are housed inside a Corsair Vengeance Series C70 Gunmetal mid-tower case. Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit is the operating system pre-installed on a Corsair Neutron GTX 120GB SSD. Users can customize the Cyclone to come with various 64-bit versions of Windows 7 or Windows 8 Pro 64-bit. Storage is provided by a 7,200RPM 1TB drive. The cost for a system like this is $1,948.37, give or take a few dollars for sales and other discounts. Configuration is endless, thanks in part to the case. Ironside Computers offers a high degree of customization. Individual components can be selected from different manufacturers for most of the major components in the system. ... Read the rest in your browser!Related ContentDigital Storm ODE Haswell-powered Desktop Gaming PC ReviewTweakTown Blue Prodigy PC breaks PCMark Storage World Record at Computex 2013
- Seagate Enterprise Performance 10K HDD V.6 (Savvio 10K.6) SAS Enterprise HDD Review - TweakTown
Introduction The Seagate Enterprise Performance 10K HDD V.6 (formerly branded as the Savvio 10K.6) provides a new enterprise-class SAS 6Gb/s 10K HDD in a svelte 2.5" form factor with a 15mm Z-height. These slim HDD's pack a generous helping of capacity, with models weighing in at 300, 450, 600 and 900GB. The small form factor HDD segment is booming as decreases in size create a high performance tier deployable into dense applications. High performance tiers of HDD's continue to serve a vital role in the datacenter, with the speedy SSD competition only accounting for 3% of datacenter storage in 2012. While the percentage of SSD's is forecasted to expand to 9.9% by 2016, this still leaves the HDD as the storage backbone of the datacenter with a whopping 90.1% share. The high capacity HDD market also continues its rapid expansion, with the HDD industry shipping 53% more TB of capacity in 2012 compared to 2011. Creating a fast front-end for these vast arrays of HDD's requires a nimble high-performance tier that can also provide a robust amount of storage capacity. The SAS Enterprise Performance V.6 delivers enhancements in speed, power consumption and encryption capabilities over the previous 10K.5 generation. The jump from a 168MB/s sustained transfer rate with the 10K.5 to 204MB/s for the Enterprise Performance V.6 equates to a 21% jump in performance. This places the sustained sequential transfer rates for the V.6 on equal footing with 2.5" 15K HDD's. Another key selling point of the V.6 is its energy efficiency. The V.6 features a 14% decrease in power requirements in comparison to the Savvio 10K.5 HDD's. Even more impressive is the power consumption reduction of up to 71% in comparison to 15K-RPM 3.5" HDD's. The performance and power consumption gains are impressive, but the Seagate Enterprise Performance 10K HDD V.6 also brings other enterprise-class features to the table. One ongoing concern for large HDD deployments is excessively long RAID rebuilds. The V.6 is the first mission-critical HDD to offer the Seagate RAID Rebuild technology option. The RAID Rebuild feature enables faster recovery from a failed drive in a RAID configuration. RAID Rebuild improves performance by extracting easily readable data from a failing drive by identifying blocks that would take longer to recover from the failed drive than to rebuild from parity data in the RAID array. This minimizes the likelihood of a second drive failure in the array during rebuild and allows host control of error recovery. The V.6 drives also include self-encryption at no extra cost for all capacity points. For those with more intense requirements for data security, there is a 900GB V.6 that also provides the FIPS Self-Encrypting Drive option. A shocking 50,000 drives leave datacenters daily with terabytes of data intact. According to IBM, more than 90% of drives returned for warranty contain readable data. By providing FIPS 140-2 Level 2 compliance, Seagate gives customers an easy means of protecting data at rest. Seagate's Instant Secure Erase reduces the time required to overwrite the drive from hours to less than a minute, speeding the process of repurposing or retirement of the drive. Protection Information (PI) technology provides an end-to-end data protection scheme that prevents data corruption from the application level down to the drive. The V.6 is backed up by a five year warranty. Today we will compare the performance of the 10K V.6 against a leading 15K HDD, and the energy efficiency to a lower RPM 7,200 RPM model. ... Read the rest in your browser!Related ContentSanDisk Extreme II 480GB SSD ReviewPQI Air Card 4GB Wi-Fi SDHC ReviewWestern Digital My Passport Edge for Mac 500GB External HDD ReviewADATA M.2 SSDs Performance Preview and the NGFF StoryIntel DC S3500 480GB Enterprise SSD Review
- NVIDIA GeForce GTX 770 2GB Video Card Overclocked - TweakTown
Introduction Just before Computex 2013 last week we saw the new NVIDIA GeForce GTX 770 2GB launch and found ourselves impressed with what NVIDIA was offering. As always we move from our review of a reference card into the overclocking side of things to see just what kind of performance we're able to get out of new models. While we had hoped to do it much closer to launch, due to the craziness that surrounds Computex, we just didn't get a chance to do so. With that all died down now and with things returning to normal, we're able to step back into our office, sit in front of our computers and testbeds and get everything up and running again. While we've had a few GTX 770 video cards start to pile up around us over the last week, the first thing we really want to do before we get into them is check out the overclocking capabilities on the reference design model. With companies offering us some new coolers at launch, we're looking forward to seeing those load temperature numbers drop down like we saw on the EVGA GTX 780 SC a few weeks ago. As always, because we've already looked at the reference card, which we linked just above, we'll get straight into our testbed and the overclocking before we check out the performance. If you want to take a closer look at the card we recommend you check out our launch review in the event you missed it. ... Read the rest in your browser!Related ContentNVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 3GB Video Card ReviewNVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 3GB Overclocked - Closing the gap on the GTX TITANEVGA GeForce GTX 780 3GB SuperClocked Video Cards in SLIEVGA GeForce GTX 780 3GB SuperClocked Video Cards in SLI OverclockedNVIDIA GeForce GTX 770 2GB Video Card Review
- Intel DC S3500 480GB Enterprise SSD Review - TweakTown
Introduction Intel's launch of the 6Gb/s DC S3500 bolsters their existing SSD product stack with an MLC mainstream enterprise SSD. Featuring Intel's third-generation PC29AS21CA0 (an 8-Channel ASIC) in concert with 20nm MLC NAND provides the DC S3500 with up to 75,000/11,500 random read/write IOPS and 500/450 MB/s of sustained sequential read/write speed. The mainstream SSD market is booming and many administrators are choosing to deploy mainstream SSDs to address performance challenges in read-centric and mixed workload environments. The high performance envelope of enterprise SSDs boosts system performance up front, and the long-term advantages of radically lower power consumption, space reduction, and cooling costs drive TCO down even further. One of the most pressing needs in today's datacenters is optimization of the compute layer. Performance is often hamstrung by I/O bound systems, leading to servers that operate with much lower CPU utilization than possible. The explosion of virtualization and the resulting 'I/O Blender' of sporadic highly random workloads require storage solutions with consistently high performance and low latency. Boosting the efficiency of the storage subsystem feeds the CPU with enough data to operate efficiently, creating more production and density per server. The Intel DC S3500 (codename Wolfsville) is designed to provide a more cost-friendly alternative for those in need of acceleration with enterprise-class features at a lower price point. The DC S3500 (DC for Datacenter and S for SATA) provides a mainstream alternative to the Intel DC S3700, yet retains many similar characteristics. The DC S3500 aligns itself to replace the Intel 320 customer base, offering seven times the endurance and 85% improved random read performance over the 320 Series. The 320 arrived in early 2011 and a replacement for the 3Gb/s 320 series is overdue. Intel's goal is to replace the 320 with an SSD with similar characteristics to the DC S3700. The primary differentiator between the S3500 and the S3700 is the NAND employed. The DC S3500 utilizes 20nm MLC NAND in contrast to the 25nm HET-MLC NAND onboard the DC S3700. This provides a lower endurance threshold that is more suitable to read-centric and mixed workloads. The DC S3500 features a maximum of 450 TB Written for an 800GB capacity drive, and we expect endurance to scale with the various capacity points. The DC S3700, in contrast, offers up to 14.6PB of endurance for the 800GB model. The DC S3500, with the same controller as the DC S3700, also focuses on performance consistency. Performance variability can rob applications of performance. Individual 'hangs' and lags from outlying I/O can significantly affect application performance simply because applications are forced into waiting for the next I/O to complete. The DC S3500 does not have quite the robust write latency specifications of the DC S3700, focusing more on read latency performance. The DC S3500 guarantees a maximum read latency of 500ms 99.9% of the time during a 4k random workload, and 50/65uS typical read/write latency. Many administrators have experimented with utilizing standard client SSDs in enterprise environments and have suffered the consequences of inconsistent performance. The DC S3500 will rival client-side offerings with a price of roughly $1.22 per GB at launch. Delivering performance consistency and reliable performance at this price range will provide Intel a solid entrant into the booming value/mainstream SSD market. Providing solid performance with a host of enterprise features such as end-to-end data path protection, 256-bit AES encryption, ECC protected memory, power loss protection, and a five year limited warranty rounds out the impressive feature set of the DC S3500. ... Read the rest in your browser!Related ContentSanDisk Extreme II 120GB SSD ReviewSanDisk Extreme II 480GB SSD ReviewPQI Air Card 4GB Wi-Fi SDHC ReviewWestern Digital My Passport Edge for Mac 500GB External HDD ReviewADATA M.2 SSDs Performance Preview and the NGFF Story
- Top 10 TweakTown Content from the past week [10 June 2013] - TweakTown
Here are our top 10 articles, reviews and guides from the past week!A look at SanDisk's Extreme II SSD ArchitectureNZXT Grid 10 Port Fan Hub ReviewSanDisk Extreme II 240GB SSD ReviewTweakTown's Guide to 3D Printing: Part 2 - 3D Printer Kit SelectionSanDisk Extreme II 120GB SSD ReviewSanDisk Extreme II 480GB SSD ReviewTweakTown's "Best of Computex 2013" Awards and WinnersTweakTown Blue Prodigy PC breaks PCMark Storage World Record at Computex 2013PQI Air Card 4GB Wi-Fi SDHC Review
- ASUS Z87-Expert (Intel Z87) Motherboard Review - TweakTown
Introduction Having had a chance to take a look at the new Haswell Intel i7 4770K processor just the other day and finding ourselves impressed with what the CPU is capable of, we get a chance to start going through the mountain of Z87 motherboards that have started building up around us. Now that Computex is over, we can back on track and start to plough through the samples that sit around us, especially those that are related to everything Haswell. Today we're starting off with a motherboard and it's the original one that you saw in our launch review of the 4770K CPU. Package Checking out the box you can see we've got a fairly standard setup on the front of the box which gives us the model number and some of the main features that are offered. Turning over you can see we've got an absolute wealth of information. The left hand side of the box gives us a picture of the board and covers some of the main highlights. The right hand side of the box expands on some of the main features which include the Dual Intelligent Processors 4 with 4-Way optimization covering performance, efficiency, digital power and system cooling. You can also see a run down on Thunderbolt and below that you can see information on the Wi-Fi GO! feature that is included. Moving inside the box you can see the standard paperwork line up and a driver CD. We've also got four SATA cables, SLI bridge, EZ-Connectors and the standard rear I/O panel. Along with all that you can see we've also got a 2T2R Dual-Band 2.4/5GHz Antenna included. ... Read the rest in your browser!Related ContentMSI Z77A-GD65 Gaming Series (Intel Z77) Motherboard Review
- ENERMAX HOPLITE ST ECA3261-W ATX Case - Modders-Inc
The Hoplites were the heavily armed infantry soldiers of the Greeks.They were named after the shield they used which was a Hoplon that protected them in battle from fierce competitors that used anything they could to get past the shield. Enermax knows that you want your harware battle ready. Can this HOPLITE defend off everything [...]This post ENERMAX HOPLITE ST ECA3261-W ATX Case appeared first on | Modders-Inc.
- Cooler Master N200 Chassis Review - TweakTown
Introduction I will give one thing to Cooler Master; they aren't afraid to try new things. The way the chassis market is going, there are a few things that have become "must-have" options when it comes to what a customer expects to see. Water cooling support is big these days, and so are fan filters built into the chassis. Native USB 3.0 is something that should be included, and there should be no need these days for a rainbow colored assortment of cabling. There should be room for an average sized tower cooler for the CPU, and there needs to be room for some serious graphics power to be bolted in as well. Another thing that is being offered I find very handy are hidden 2.5" drive mounting locations as well as possibly a removable hard drive cage for more room and better ventilation inside the chassis. On the outside you can do just about anything, but as many companies will tell you, once you get too far outside the box, less and less people are interested in your designs. What I look for externally is a unique looking bezel that is well ventilated, but looks will supersede airflow for some. As for the door panels, well I prefer flat panels with a window, but my second choice is panels with bumps for extra room, and without a window, I do like the option to have a fan in the left side to blow directly on the video cards to help keep them cool when in SLI or X-fire. As for the back of the chassis, I don't expect much, maybe some removable expansion slot covers that I can replace later. No cheap tool-free mechanisms in the back, maybe some holes for water cooling, but most definitely it needs an exhaust fan. As far as the PSU is concerned, it can be at the top or the bottom as long as the cables reach, but if it is on the bottom a dust filter is a must. The newest chassis to hit the desk for testing is the Cooler Master N200. What many will be surprised to see is that most of the things I listed above are in some way included in this new chassis. While this is a much smaller chassis than most are used to dealing with, Cooler Master did not let that stop them from helping to redefine what buyers want to see in any chassis, even if released in the sub-$50 category as this one is. What you are about to see may be compact, but it is attractively stylish, offers all sorts of things we don't see in some towers much larger and more expensively priced, and is a chassis that I can see many buyers warming up to once they see everything the N200 has to offer. ... Read the rest in your browser!Related ContentThermaltake EVO Blue 2.0 850-Watt 80 PLUS Gold Power Supply ReviewNZXT Grid 10 Port Fan Hub ReviewScythe Mugen 4 Tower CPU Cooler ReviewDEEPCOOL GAMMAX S40 CPU Cooler ReviewScythe Ashura CPU Cooler Review
- Scythe Ashura CPU Cooler Review - TweakTown
Introduction Scythe has been around for what seems like forever in the PC cooling game. They have been trying along the way to come up with innovations and new designs that mesh with the current hardware and in my opinion, have been really successful with some of their designs. Names like the Mugen, Ninja, Katana, Big Shuriken, these are all coolers that have done really well for Scythe over the years. So when Scythe asks me to review a newly designed cooler, I am eager to see what they came up with this time. The idea behind this latest addition to their CPU cooler lineup was to offer more room for the memory. With that in mind, they didn't want to shrink the tower any, or have to rely on a super thin fan to make the room, so they were left with the idea to simply offset the cooler slightly. Essentially once the pipes leave the base, they make a roughly ten degree bend to the left. This alone will allow this full sized tower cooler to now offer room for all the DIMM slots to be populated. Take into account that this new cooler looks very appealing, and should match any system with the black anodized aluminum top plate of the cooler that you will be looking at when this cooler is in use, and the fact that they claim they did not sacrifice performance in doing any of this, there is potential for this design yet. Today we will be looking at the Ashura from Scythe. As I said, it is offset, it ships with a strong 140mm fan for cooling, and with the new hardware, it should give a secure and high pressure mount to the CPU, and with all the minor features added into the design, it should give the Ashura a leg up on the competition. I plan to test exactly that with the Ashura, as we work through the next few pages keep an eye out for all the finer details along with the obvious ones as we see just how well the Scythe Ashura keeps up with the competition in single fan tower cooling. ... Read the rest in your browser!Related Contentbe quiet! Dark Power Pro 10 1200-Watt 80 PLUS Gold Power Supply ReviewThermaltake EVO Blue 2.0 850-Watt 80 PLUS Gold Power Supply ReviewNZXT Grid 10 Port Fan Hub ReviewScythe Mugen 4 Tower CPU Cooler ReviewDEEPCOOL GAMMAX S40 CPU Cooler Review
- Genius X-G510 Optical Gaming Mouse Review - TweakTown
Introduction I have seen only one other mouse from Genius thus far, when we looked at the DeathTaker, not too long ago. It was small, compact, was stylish, had plenty of buttons, and even offered a weighting system. While this mouse was designed with RTS and Role Playing games in mind, aside from the fact that it was just a little too small for my hand, it was a mouse that really made me take a second look at Genius and what they were bringing to the table in the peripherals market. The mouse we will be looking at in-depth shortly is a different take on the design and layout all together. When Genius built the DeathTaker, they limited the market some to people who love a bunch of buttons, and of course for those who have small hands. This time around the coin was flipped and the new mouse is more about simplicity, while showing off just a little. In this latest entry, not only is the functionality simplified, this is also ambidextrous, and so it gives those "lefties" out there another option. I do wish I had a broader sampling of Genius mice, but with a laser sensor example out of the way with the DeathTaker, I am glad to see an optical offering for the second time around. So, let's get down to it and explain why we are here today and why you should keep reading. For one, the looks of the mouse you are about to see is very well thought out, and does make for a great fit to both right and left handed users. This mouse also offers rubberized coatings, a unique LED lighting scheme and software that will allow you to do anything you wish with the mouse. All of this is contained inside of the new Genius X-G510 gaming mouse, and I really think it is well worth a look, more specifically once you catch wind of the great pricing. ... Read the rest in your browser!Related ContentLogitech G700s Rechargeable Gaming Mouse ReviewCM Storm Quick Fire Stealth Mechanical Keyboard Review
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