News
Submitted by brandon on January 19, 2009 - 9:07am. Daily News for Jan 19
OCZ Throttle 32GB eSATA Flash Drive Review @ Legit Reviews
The removable storage benchmark in Sandra 2009 SP2 showed the OCZ Throttle eSATA drive is insanely quick when compared to USB 2.0 flash drives. The OCZ ATV 32GB USB Flash drive was one of the fastest drives we have ever benchmarked, but it looked slow when comparing it to the OCZ Throttle. With 'Write' speeds that were 4.65MB/Sec and 'Read' speeds of 25.30MB/Sec the old ATV series drive is still fast, but new technology has finally surpassed what we would once consider one of the fasted drives on the market. The new OCZ Throttle eSATA drive had an impressive 'Write' speed of 58.04MB/Sec when used with a eSATA port and 29.63MB/Sec when used with a USB 2.0 port. With a 256kb file size our testing shows that you get double the 'Read' performance by using eSATA over USB on the same device. The 'Write' performance results showed a 65% performance gain by using eSATA over USB, so hands down eSATA is the way to go if you are moving a large number of files.
Antec P1000 Computer Case Prototype @ Benchmark Reviews
Antec has been the top choice for system builders and hardware enthusiasts for almost a decade now, which is quite surprising when you consider the competition. But the good old days of beige box computer cases with plenty of fans lining the inside are long gone. To achieve market dominance in 2009, you have to manufacturer a product that features everything more would consider desirable. While visiting with Mr. Han Liu, Antec's product development director present at the 2009 International CES, Benchmark Reviews discussed the Antec P1000 gaming chassis prototype.
GIGABYTE GeForce GTX 285 Graphics Card @ TweakTown
While we would all no doubt love to own the latest top of the line dual GPU bad boy, for many it's simply not a purchase that can be swallowed by their partner, bank account or even themselves. The GTX 285, on the other hand, should offer excellent performance while not hitting the bank account as hard. The key words there, though, is "as hard", because don't think for a second that the GTX 285 is going to be cheap. The card we're looking at today comes from GIGABYTE, so with everything said and done let's have a quick look at the package before having a closer look at the card and its specifications. From there we will check out the performance and see how it compares to the older cards like the GTX 280 which is still a very capable card along with the ex performance crown holder, the HD 4870 X2. Let's stop blabbering and get a move on to the package.
Foxconn X58 Quantum Force BloodRage Overclocking Test @ Madshrimps
Foxconn has moved aggressively forward in the retail market, previously only OEM supplier they are now pushing hard to get their brand recognized by end users. Their latest motherboard is based on Intel high end X58 chipset. Their naming schemes are not a mumbo jumbo of numbers and letters, but actually really eye-catching, like their P35 MARS, X48 Blackops, and now the X58 Blood Rage.
Palit GeForce 9800 GTX+ Video Card NE/98TX+XT352 @ Benchmark Reviews
Benchmark Reviews has had the wonderful opportunity to review and critique some of the best and most powerful video cards currently available anywhere. These items are very exciting, dreams of playing your favorite video game as large as life and silky smooth abound. Wouldn't it be great if we could all afford one of these monster video cards? Today Benchmark Reviews will take a close look at what I'll call a junior monster. Currently fourth in nvidias lineup of single GPU cards, the Geforce 9800 GTX+ is a card for the mainstream gamer and offers refinements on an already proven design, specifically the wildly popular and powerful G92 core. With a die shrink to 55nm speeds are up and temps are down. We will focus specifically on the PALiT non reference design Geforce 9800 GTX+ NE/98TX+XT352. With it's nearly silent cooler and slightly overclocked core this card should put up some good numbers.
AMD Phenom II X4 940: Compared to Phenom X4 9950 BE and Intel Core 2 Q9550 @ InsideHW
In last few years it looked like AMD lost its bearings in CPU market. No one expected that company, that is in constant transition, financial problems and without complete product portfolio, can produce interesting, equivalent and concurrent product. Phenom CPUs with K10 micro architecture didn’t claim speed crown from Intel, but they were significant step forward compared to “worn out” K8 cores. We must be aware of the fact that every processor is result of compromise between investments and goals. Probably K10 would be better product if it had larger L2 and L3 cache memory, with better and larger Branch Target Buffers, with different cache policies that are favoring intensive operations with cache memory, but in that case Phenom, that was manufactured in 65nm process, wouldn’t give adequate results.
Submitted by brandon on December 16, 2008 - 11:39am. Daily News for Dec 15
DFI LP JR X58-T3H6 MicroATX Motherboard @ VR-Zone
DFI is preparing a microATX board based on Intel X58 chipset slated for release in January 2009. The PCB is black in colour and has 4 layers measuring at 245x245mm size. With 6 phase digital PWM design, it supports the LGA1366 processors from 4.8 to 6.4GT/s QPI. There are 6 DIMM slots on the board to allow up to 24GB DDR3-800/1066/1333 memories and two PCIe x16 slots for 2-way SLI and Quad Crossfire. Other features include 1 x PCIe x4, 1 PCI slot, 6 SATA ports configurable with RAID 0/1/0+1/5, one IDE port, 12 USB ports, Realtek ALC889 HD Audio, Marvell 8053 GbE LAN. There are 7 fan connectors onboard with EZ-On (Power) and EZ-Touch (Reset) switches and a Software Debug LED. The BIOS features CMOS Reloaded, Voltage Tuning for Vdimm, Vnb, Vcore, Vsb, VHT, 1MHz FSB frequency tuning and adjustable CPU multiplier, ABS technology system.
Tuniq Miniplant 950 Watt Power Supply Review @ Club Overclocker
By now, we've used every line we could think of to stress the importance of using a high quality power supply in your rig. Seriously, short of throwing your entire computer into a pool of acid, there just isn't a quicker way to damage or even destroy your hardware than to power it with a poorly built power supply. With so much riding on a single piece of equipment, we approach lesser known PSU manufacturers with caution. Today Michael has a look at a 950 watt power supply from Tuniq. Can the Tuniq PSU run with the big dogs?
Gigabyte GA-EX58-EXTREME Core i7 Motherboard @ Benchmark Reviews
The GA-EX58-EXTREME is the latest high performance X58-Express Series motherboard from GIGABYTE, designed from the ground up to unleash the awesome power of Intel's new Core i7 processors. Equipped with a host of new features including the new QPI interface, 3-channel DDR3 support, 3-Way SLI and CrossFireX support, Ultra Durable 3 technology and the industry's most extensive range of overclocking features, the EX58-EXTREME is bringing excitement back into the high performance motherboard industry. In this article, Benchmark Reviews compares the EX58-EXTREME to Intel's DX58SO Smackover and last-generations X48T-DQ6 motherboards.
AMD Athlon X2 7750 and 5050e Dual-Core Processor Reviews @ Legit Reviews
Both the AMD Athlon X2 5050e and the Athlon X2 7750 processors serve a place in today's market, but the roles for the two processors are clear as night and day. The AMD Athlon X2 5050e is perfect for those wanting to build a system that uses low power and has a quiet cooling solution. The thermal properties on the Athlon X2 5050e were amazing and the fact that the processor runs at just 41C under load on the factory heat sink was most impressive.
A closer look at the Core i7-940 Processor @ Tech Report
When we first reviewed the Core i7 processor, we had two chips on hand: the high-end Core i7-965 Extreme and the more affordable Core i7-920. Sandwiched in between them in Intel's product lineup is the Core i7-940. Since we didn't have one of those to test, we employed a trick we sometimes use and turned down the clock speed on our Core i7-965 Extreme from its native 3.2GHz to the 940's 2.93GHz frequency. Given the breadth of CPU model ranges these days, we find ourselves using this trick fairly often. In fact, in this case, Intel even recommended that reviewers use this method to test Core i7-940 performance and provided the media with instructions for setting the proper clock speeds.
Intel Core i7 920, Core i7 965 EE and Intel DX58SO @ InsideHW
Long awaited Nehalem architecture got its official name: Core i7. We have tested two CPUs based on this architecture along with one motherboard based on X58 chipset also signed by Intel. But let’s cut to the chase and go straight to testing and results. Code name for X58 chipset is “Tylersburg”. This chipset is made in 65 nm manufacturing process and it is direct descendant of X48 chipset, which means that it belongs to Intel Extreme chipset series. There will be more than one version of X58 chipset: EP, EN and WS version that will be differentiated by number of PCI Express lines and QPI (QuickPath Interconnect) connections (links, busses).
AMD Athlon X2 7750 BE 2.7GHz CPU Phenom goes Dual-Core @ Tweaktown
From the CPU-Z screenshot you can see that that design is based around a 64nm process codenamed Kuma. Kuma is actually a cut down version of the AMD Phenom processors that are currently out. First off it’s limited to a dual-core offering, which is kind of evident by the X2 part in the name. Sharing the lower clocked Phenom’s specs the 7750 uses a 1.8GHz HT link, which also limits the integrated Northbridge’s frequency to 1.8GHz. Thanks to the K10 architecture the new Athlon gets official HT3.0 specs allowing it to communicate with the external Northbridge at higher speeds and K8 based Athlon’s cache memory has also changed thanks to the K10 architecture improvements. First off the L2 cache has been dropped to 512K per core (1MB total CPU L2 cache) however a 2MB shared L3 cache has been used – it is the same size that all Phenom CPU’s share giving it extra memory storage on the CPU.
Intel i7-920 Nehalem Processor Review @ Tweaknews
The performance contained even within this US$300 i7-920 processor is extremely impressive for the money. One would really wonder why they would pay almost $250-$300 more for the i7-940 when this processor is beating even extremely fast quad cores from generations past. Sure some of the more expensive offerings will have their benefits when it comes to video and photo creation and editing, but for the mainstream or even the power user, this processor would be an excellent buy.
Submitted by brandon on November 26, 2008 - 10:49am. Daily News for Nov 26
Sapphire Radeon HD 4850 X2 @ InsideHW
ATI continuously presents new models of graphics cards, using new GPU to the maximum and filling gaps in their product lineup. ATI solves every problem with simple solution that can be summarized something like this: What is better than HD 4850? Two HD 4850! Result is logical and now after Radeon HD 4870 X2 we got in our test lab HD 4850 X2 that should position in between HD 4870 and HD 4870 X2. Graphics card that we got is signed by Sapphire.
Western Digital Caviar Green 1TB SATA HDD @ TechwareLabs
While Western Digital doesn't market the 1TB Green drive as a performance drive its actual performance might suprise you. Could this "Green" drive be your next good performance drive at a reasonable cost? We think so, and to find out why read our review.
OCZ Reaper OCZ2RPR10664GK DDR2 Memory Kit @ Benchmark Reviews
With DDR3 getting all the attention lately it's easy to overlook DDR2 performance memory. There are many very good reasons to consider DDR2 including but not limited to price and performance. Today Benchmark Reviews takes a look at at one potential price:performance hotshot; the OCZ Reaper HPC DDR2 1066 OCZ2RPR10664GK 4GB Memory Kit. Can it's unique cooling solution and high speed specs be enough to sway you?
IN WIN Commander Series 1200 watt Modular Power Supply @ Tweaktown
For many of us old timers who have been playing with computers for a while, the name IN WIN conjures up images of system enclosures. It should since the company has been around since 1985 with their primary goal being the sales and marketing of their enclosure product line. Since that time they have expanded a bit and their lineup now includes enclosures, external hard drive enclosures and power supplies. The target of today's article is the new Commander Series of power supplies. These units are rated from 650 watts to 1500 watts of power output and consist of a total of five models, so you are assured of getting the power you will need for your own custom build. The Commander we will be testing today is one of the big boys, the 1200 watt Commander. We will delve into this new power supply and let you know what kind of features are included and what kind of power you can expect to be produced. After all, this is your money we're talking about so we will want to make sure it is worth the expense.
Thermaltake Armor+ LCS @ TechwareLabs
Today we take a look at one of the most feature rich chassis to come into TechwareLabs in a long time, the Thermaltake Armor+ LCS. The Armor+ LCS weighs in just shy of FIFTY pounds but it packs an equally heavy punch in features and cooling. Take a look why this case easily won our Editors Choice award and why we think it deserves a place in your home.
Submitted by brandon on November 24, 2008 - 2:25pm. Daily News for Nov 24
QNAP TS-409U Turbo NAS @ TechwareLabs
Businesses are always in need of more storage, and those with experience know that its the data that is important and therefore redundancy is critical. We take a look today at the QNAP TS-409U Turbo NAS which combines several features to bring you a device that is not only easy to use and fast, but also provides redundancy. The TS-409U has a laundry list of features and aims to please everyone from the advanced home user to the most needy of businesses. Is the TS-409U just what the doctor ordered?
GlacialTech Altair A381 HTPC Review@ Hardware Bistro
HTPC or Home Theatre PC which is not a new stuff as it have been in the market quite some time ago. What is HTPC? Basically it is a device which combines the functions of computer and digital video recorder. Today, we are going to bring you a HTPC case from GlacialTech; Altair A381 which was just released in Sep 2008. Wonder how this A381 looks like and how it performs? Let us go through together.
SilverStone Fortress FT01 Case SST-FT01B-W @ Benchmark Reviews
SilverStone has a long history of designing and building fantastic looking products, and the Fortress Series is no exception, especially the SST-FT01B-W model. Benchmark Reviews has investigated a few SilverStone products up to now, and we've always come away impressed by their good looks, thoughtful design, and premium build quality. Things are definitely looking up; let's take it home and see what it can do with this premium computer case.
Adobe Photoshop CS4 @ InsideHW
New edition of one of the best, if not the best, application for processing raster graphics attended for photographers but also for graphic and web designers, is finally tested on InsideHW. One of most important technical novelties is that Photoshop CS4 will be delivered only as 64-bit version. Adobe made this decision after preliminary tests that showed that performances of 64-bit applications are better for 8% to 12% comparing to 32-bit version. True power and advantages of 64-bit version are hidden in fact that it can use large amounts of memory.
Silverstone NT06 Evolution Heatpipe CPU Cooler Review @ Tweaknews
In conclusion, SilverStone has a great product in the NT06 Evolution cooler. Its cooling performance is surprisingly good when coupled with a quiet, low-flow fan and very good when airflow increases. I like its compactness and relatively low mass and it looks pretty good as well. With a lower cost and an improved mounting solution, the NT06 Evolution would be a excellent value, but these issues drop it back a bit in this regard.
Intel Core i7 Memory Analysis – Can Dual Channel Cut it? @ Tweaktown
There isn't much Intel can do about the slow write speeds inherent to MLC memory. However, the company has crafted a new solid-state drive based on single-level cell (SLC) memory chips that aren't plagued by poor write rates. This latest X25-E Extreme boasts the same 250MB/s sustained read speed as the X25-M, but write speeds have been boosted from a paltry 70MB/s to a much more impressive 170MB/s. Oh my. Obviously, the X25-E Extreme is going to be faster than the X25-M. Read on to see where the X25-E's faster write speeds help the most, and in some cases, where they improve performance more than you might expect.
Intel's X25-E Extreme solid-state drive @ Tech Report
There isn't much Intel can do about the slow write speeds inherent to MLC memory. However, the company has crafted a new solid-state drive based on single-level cell (SLC) memory chips that aren't plagued by poor write rates. This latest X25-E Extreme boasts the same 250MB/s sustained read speed as the X25-M, but write speeds have been boosted from a paltry 70MB/s to a much more impressive 170MB/s. Oh my. Obviously, the X25-E Extreme is going to be faster than the X25-M. Read on to see where the X25-E's faster write speeds help the most, and in some cases, where they improve performance more than you might expect.
Intel X25-M 80GB 2.5-inch Solid State Disk @ Tweaktown
The testing for the new Intel X25-M has been completed for a couple of weeks now, but I have been putting off writing the article. Reviewers are faced with tough decisions from time to time; generally it is because we had found a fatal flaw and try to work with a company to correct the issue. This time the flaw is simply that the drive is too good. Intel is saying that their first entry into the consumer SSD market is able to read up to 250 MB/s, while other products are claiming a maximum of 175 MB/s. Honestly, who in their right mind would want to send over a consumer SSD for us to review knowing that it would be compared to the Intel X25-M? - Where do I sign up for unemployment because my job is gone? The good thing is that Intel has left us a couple of back doors and has not totally disrupted the market. The first and foremost is price. We are starting to see 128GB MLC based drives with decent performance break the 300 Dollar barrier. The new Intel X25-M just showed up at Newegg for a little over twice that amount for the 80GB version we are looking at today. I may be saved after all, but information about rapid price drops are starting to leak out. The last I heard from the rumor mill is that the X25-M will get a new price of 530 USD before the year is out; still a lot more than some of the others, but clearly not out of range for enthusiasts.
Tagan A+ Curbic Mid Tower Case Review @ Legit Reviews
Overall, the Tagan found a nice balance of budget building practice, style, and features. The Curbic looks very nice with the mesh front panel and blue LED fans. The case was surprisingly quiet for running two 180mm fans. On high they are very much in the range of what would be considered livable for a desktop; with the fans on low it was very quiet. The Tagan Aplus Curbic is not yet available in the US, and has an estimated MSRP of $59.99 and should be available in retail stores before the holiday. The Curbic would be a very good fit for the user who wants an inexpensive, yet a nice looking, case.
Submitted by brandon on November 21, 2008 - 10:23am. Daily News for Nov 21
AMD overclocks 45nm Phenoms to 4GHz and Beyond @ TechReport
The slowest system—cooled with a heatsink and fan—managed to reach just under 4GHz with a 1.55V core voltage. With liquid cooling, AMD successfully pushed a 45nm Phenom II in another machine just over the 4GHz mark. That required kicking up the CPU voltage to 1.6V, however. For the other two systems, AMD took out the big guns. One was strapped to a phase-change cooler and reached the mid-4GHz range at 1.7V, while the fastest system managed to well over 5GHz using liquid nitrogen (which kept the core temperature down to a chilly -185°C).
Acer F-22 22" LCD Monitor @ InsideHW
Formula 1 circus has a lot fanatical followers and many of them cheer for most successful team in history of Formula racing, Italian Scuderia Ferrari. This phenomenal “stable” isn’t connected only with “studs” but through numerous licenses, Ferrari is linked with some products that aren’t in any correlation with race cars. Among sundry articles from sneakers to Segway you can find even TFT monitors with Ferrari brand that are produced by Acer. We are now presenting to you 22inch model produced in limited series and each TFT has unique identification number.
ASUS Rampage II Extreme X58 Motherboard @ Tweaktown
So far we have tested GIGABYTE’s EX58-UD5 in our Core i7 CPU review and we have just recently given the P6T Deluxe the tick of approval as well, but ASUS isn’t stropping there. P6T is actually aimed at the mainstream and enthusiast sector, where today’s contender is aimed more so at the extreme and hardcore users. Running under the name of the Republic of Gamers series, the Rampage II is ASUS’ second Core i7 model to hit the market. Rampage II Extreme is the latest in the ROG series, something that ASUS really puts a lot of pride into. And with all that effort and R&D comes a price tag to match. However, if you’re one who can afford a Core i7 along with dual GPUs then you’re not going to care or skimp on the board.
MSI K9A2 Platinum AMD 790FX Motherboard Review @ PCSTATS
Retailing for about $170 CDN ($170 USD, £90 GBP), the MSI K9A2 Platinum motherboard features four PCI Express x16 slots for multiple videocards, some nice overclocker friendly BIOS options and the regular host of integrated goodies. The MSI K9A2 Platinum is built on AMDs venerable 790FX and SB600 chipsets, which incorporate Hypertransport 3.0 and bus speeds of up to 2600MHz. The board accomodates all socket AM2/AM2+ AMD Athlon64/Sempron/Phenom CPUs and inexpensive DDR2 RAM.
Wolfking Warrior Xxtreme Gaming Keyboard Review @ Tweaknews
With the Warrior XXtreme, Wolfking set out to improve on the already great Warrior game pad by including the ability to chat and execute commands, something that was missing from its predecessor. The type of gamer you are will determine whether or not the addition of this modified QWERTY keyboard is welcome or just in the way. It became obvious early on in my testing that RPG gamers would be the ones making use of the Warrior XXtreme's full potential.
NZXT Tempest Airflow King ATX Case Review @ Madshrimps
Equipped with two 140mm and four 120mm fans this case from NZXT is build to provide a maximum of airflow to the components installed inside. It is a mid-sized tower case with enough room to fit high end VGA cards and third party CPU coolers. We compare the performance of the NZXT Tempest to our multitude of competitors, read on to find out if this case is truly the Airflow King.
G.SKILL 64GB SATAII MLC SSD Review @ HardwareBistro
SSD is being widely used on notebook since last year 2007 as the capacity is getting higher and cost is cheaper. Many PC manufacturers have started to offer SSD for their notebooks as SSD has many great advantages over the traditional HDD. Today we will have a look of G.Skill 64GB SSD (MLC) which we would say is the minimum capacity required for a notebook especially for Vista OS.
Submitted by brandon on November 20, 2008 - 11:52am. Daily News for Nov 20
Kingston HyperX 3GB DDR3 2GHz Triple-Channel Memory Kit Review @ Legit Reviews
All said and done, the performance of the Kingston HyperX DDR3 2GHz 3GB triple-channel memory kit was impressive and it was great to see that it was overclocking beyond 2.1GHz with no extra voltage. Another thing that should be pointed out when it comes to performance is that no active cooling is required at 2GHz since the kit uses just 1.65V! I tested the memory inside the ThermalTake Spedo Advance chassis, which has good airflow, and when I touched the modules while playing Far Cry 2 they were just warm to the touch. Not what one would expect for some memory modules that are running at 2000MHz. It makes you wonder how fast these triple-channel kits will become in 2009 now that the Intel Core i7 platform is here.
Intel Core i7-920 Processor BX80601920 @ Benchmark Reviews
Today we are releasing the third review in our Core i7 series which focuses on the features and performance of the Intel Core i7-920. The Core i7-920 is considered to be the processor for the mainstream consumer primarily because of its price to performance ratio. The i7-920 doesn't have the unlocked multipliers that its more mature sibling does, but it is still a quite capable chip with its 2.66 GHz factory clock. We intend to share all of our findings and hope after reading this review you will have a much better understanding of the Core i7 family in general and the i7-920 in specific. We also plan to go into as complete of a discussion as possible on everything you can do to enhance capabilities this processor brings to the table. Unfortunately we don't have a QX9770, Intel's previous "King of the Hill", to compare the i7-920 to; but we should note that in all the test results we've seen the i7-920 (model BX80601920) outp! erforms the QX9770 in all processor dependant tasks. So the only true competition for the i7-920 are the other members of the Core i7 family which we will be testing for comparison purposes.
OCZ SLI Edition DDR3 2000MHz @ Pro-Clockers
But in the meantime for the enthusiast we have DDR3 that is topping 2000MHz at 1.8 volts. To me and many people that are gamers and overclockers is the way to go. Speed, power and the fun factor is just too much to not get excited about. Today we have OCZ's SLI Edition of 2000MHz DDR3. Matched with a good 790i motherboard like the EVGA Ultra and some dual Nvidia video cards has the making of being one hell of a rig.
XFX GeForce GTX 260 Black Edition Video Card Review @ Legit Reviews
Considering how the XFX GeForce GTX 260 Black Edition already has a significant overclock I wasn't expecting much in the way of overclocking headroom. That being said, the results were incredible. I was able to get the core up to 739Mhz, the shaders up to 1557MHz, and the memory up to 1285MHz. This was a 73MHz core overclock, 153MHz shader overclock, and a 286MHz memory overclock.
Asus EAH4850 HTDI/512M/A Radeon HD 4850 Videocard Review @ PCSTATS
In this review PCSTATS is going to toss a bunch of benchmarks at ASUS' EAH4850 HDTI/512/M/A videocardv and find out if it has what it takes to enter the hallowed halls of history with the likes of the Geforce 8800GT, ti4200, Radeon 9800 Pro and X1950 Pro.... the md-range videocard hall of fame. The Asus EAH4850 packs a single Radeon 4850 'RV770' GPU running at 625MHz under the hood, and 512MB of DDR3 RAM running at a smooth 1000MHz.
Coolermaster UCP Ultimate 700W @ Pro-Clockers
Well that something is power supplies. Its not like the Coolermaster is new to power supplies but the new Ultimate line from them is poised to be a big hit with the consumers due to the stability and the efficiency of the unit. But with a name like Ultimate Coolermaster has better offer more than efficiency and stability but power and looks to make the potential buyer to even consider it for their new rig. Today we will be taking a look at the smaller of the line in form of a 700 watt power house.
Xigmatek Dark Knight S1283 Heatsink Review @ Frostytech
The Xigmatek Dark Knight S1283 heatsink FrostyTech is reviewing today is equipped with vibration absorbing rubber fan posts, a 120mm internally illuminated PWM fan that scales in speed from 1000-2200RPM, and a glossy black nickel plating that case modders must love. The 600gram Dark Knight S1283 heatsink is compatible with socket 775 Intel Core 2 Duo/Quad CPUs, and all socket 754/939/940/AM2 AMD Athlon64/Phenom processors.
Intel Core i7-965 Extreme Edition Processor @ Benchmark Reviews
Fear not my enthusiast brethren, in our second publication we will be covering all that you asked for and more as we review the Intel Core i7-965 Extreme Edition (XE). We have now had sufficient time to spend with Core i7 series and our knowledge base on these processors and their supporting components has grown exponentially. In our first article, Intel Core i7 CPU & DX58SO X58 Platform we covered most of the available information regarding both the Nehalem Technology and the architecture used with the Intel Core i7 Processor family. We will therefore not repeat that discussion, instead; our goal today is to spend most of our energy concentrating on those features and performance aspects of the Intel Core i7-965XE that have led it and its other i7 kin to be dubbed "The Fastest Processor on the Planet" by Intel.
Lian Li PC-A77B Full Tower Chassis Review @ Bigbruin
I am definitely impressed with this Lian Li PC-A77B full tower chassis. Being a fan of simplistic yet useful design, this case has it all. The top mounted I/O ports are in a great location to access while using the computer. Lian Li has designed this case to allow you to install your components in many different configurations, which makes customizing your setup very convenient.
Submitted by brandon on November 12, 2008 - 1:28pm. Daily News for Nov 12
Sapphire Radeon HD 4850 X2 Dual-GPU Grapchics @ Benchmark Reviews
Sapphire is best know for taking an ATI product, and making better. It's rare that an AMD partner takes engineering into their own hands, a produces a self-made product. What's impressive is that they've decided to do so with a dual-RV770 Radeon HD 4850 X2 as their latest evolution in graphics cards. Benchmark Reviews compares performance against the GeForce 9800 GX2, CrossFireX 4850's, and the Radeon HD 4870 X2 to name a few, but add a collection of todays hottest video cards to make sure the Sapphire 11139-00-40R receives a workout.
Blu-Ray Performance - Intel X4500HD Versus Radeon 4830 Part 2 @ Legit Reviews
Many Blu-Ray movies use VC-1 and Shoot 'Em Up just happens to be one of those titles and it has DTS-HD MasterAudio 7.1 for audio. The Intel DG45ID motherboard with X4500HD integrated graphics averaged 29% CPU usage with the broken BIOS and 14% with the fixed BIOS installed on the system. The ATI Radeon HD 4830 graphics card had on average 11% CPU usage, which is 22% less than the integrated graphics.
Titan Cool Idol TTC-NK75TZ Heatsink Review @ Frostytech
Titan's Cool Idol heatsink is made from three separate aluminum fin sections joined to a copper base by six 6mm diameter copper heatpipes. The heatsink uses one 120mm PWM fan mounted on vibration absorbing rubber posts that is capable of spinning from 800-2200RPM. The use of six heatpipes and three aluminum fin sections is fairly unique, but at 850 grams in weight the Cool Idol is seriously under supported. The bulk of the heatsink hangs heavy on the fragile copper heatpipes, so right out of the box it was leaning to one side.
Silicon Power 32GB SLC SATA-II SSD @ Benchmark Reviews
Silicon Power is a rather unknown player in the North American marketplace, despite having numerous products available to the retail market. Not very long ago, Benchmark Reviews tested the first-generation Silicon Power SATA SSD. In that article we found ourselves torn between performance that left some room for improvement, and the press release announcement that Silicon Power had a new SATA-II SSD product ready to launch. As fortune would have it, we didn't have to wait very long to see if the marketing hype was true. In this article, the Silicon Power 32GB SLC SATA-II SSD SP032GBSSD750S25 receives benchmark testing and gets compared against a dozen other high-performance Solid State Drives.
Crucial Ballistix Tracer 4GB DDR3-1333 Memory Kit Review @ Bigbruin
The bottom line on the Crucial Ballistix Tracer 4GB DDR3-1333 memory kit is that it offers great performance right out of the box, and for those looking for more, they will gladly oblige. While they may not have the highest stock speed rating, even a novice overclocker should be able to get a few hundred extra MHz out of this kit.
MSI X48 Platinum Intel X48 Express Motherboard Review @ PCSTATS
The raw specs for MSI's X48 Platinum motherboard are equally impressive. The board is based on the Intel X48 Express and ICH9-R variant Southbridge, and supports DDR3-800/1066/1333 and 1600 (XMP) memory formats. It has four DDR3 memory slots which may accommodate up to 8GB of RAM in a dual channel configuration. The real beauty of MSI's X48 Platinum is broad accommodation of videocards.
Antec MicroFusion Remote 350 Mini HTPC Enclosure @ Benchmark Reviews
Home Theater Personal Computers (HTPCs) have been a steadily growing market for nearly a decade now. However, up until the past few years, if you wanted a quality HTPC case you either had to build it yourself, or modify an existing desktop case. While there is certainly some merit to building your own case, most major case manufacturers these days have their own line of cases for just this purpose. Today at Benchmark Reviews, we will look at one of the recent additions to the Antec Veris line-up: the Antec MicroFusion Remote 350 Mini HTPC Enclosure. After a thorough inspection of the exterior and interior features, we'll put it through its paces with a full range thermal performance benchmarks.
FSP Power-Mod 700w Power Supply Review @ Club Overclocker
Today we will be looking at the latest modular power supply from FSP Group, the Power-Mod 700 Watt Modular Power Supply. While the name FSP Group may be new to you, it is likely you have used one of their OEM power supplies before under the name Fortron Source. FSP is currently the number 6 power supply manufacturer in the world and has been making both OEM and aftermarket power supplies since 1993. With a history like that, lets see what the Power-Mod 700W can bring to the table!
Submitted by brandon on November 3, 2008 - 10:38am. Inte Core i7 CPU/Processor and X58 Chipset Review Edition
@ Tech Report
The Core i7-965 Extreme is, by far, the fastest processor we've ever tested, and it seems clear the Core i7 architecture brings with it a general performance increase over the 45nm Core 2 processors it succeeds. We've seen that increase in everyday desktop applications, including the WorldBench suite and several of the latest games. In part, the Core i7's performance gains come from higher clock frequencies due to the "Turbo mode" mechanism. When the Core i7-965 Extreme is operating at 3.33 or 3.46 GHz, it's going to be somewhat faster than a Core 2 at 3.2GHz. That's why I've been I've been hesitant to talk about clock-for-clock performance gains for Core i7, as you may have noticed. Yet in some cases, the Core i7 undeniably delivers clock-for-clock performance increases over Core 2, along with dramatic gains in absolute performance. We saw the biggest improvements in some specific sorts of workloads, including 3D rendering, scientific computing/HPC applications, and nearly any application that could spawn up to eight threads. More than once, a single Core i7-965 Extreme outran our dual-socket "Skulltrail" system by a considerable margin. This new system architecture pushes the performance frontiers forward in places where progress had previously been rather halting.
@ Driver Heaven
Another new feature on i7 processors is an inclusion of an integrated memory controller which supports 2 DIMMs per channel. An on CPU memory controller is nothing particularly new as even in the desktop market AMD have been using this for a while but the Intel version improves on the AMD method in a couple of major ways. Firstly the i7 version is a 24 GB maximum, triple channel design which has huge benefits with memory bandwidth. Secondly it allows for extremely uneven population of memory, for example Channel A could contain 3 GB, channel B 1.5 GB and Channel C 2 GB, though the best performance occurs when all channels are populated identically. Finally, due to the design of the overall architecture the preset memory limits are a lot more flexible. On AMD CPU's each is set with a limit such as 800MHz DDR2 on original Phenoms. With i7 the memory speed is controlled differently and this is best explained if we look at the overall design of the i7 architecture.
@ Benchmark Reviews
As you can readily see the design of the Intel Extreme Motherboard DX58SO is radically different from anything you've been used to up until this point. The primary differences are component placement. The memory sockets are moved to the top of the motherboard in a area that heretofore has been allocated for the CPU socket. The north and southbridges that we have grown used to are now essentially a thing of the past as memory management is now an on die process. The QuickPath Interconnect (QPI) assumes most of the balance of of these two components tasks.
@ Anandtech
Nehalem, as I've mentioned countless times before, is a "tock" processor in Intel's tick-tock cadence. That means it's a new microarchitecture but based on an existing manufacturing process, in this case 45nm. A quad-core Nehalem is made up of 731M transistors, down from 820M in Yorkfield, the current quad-core Core 2s based on the Penryn microarchitecture. The die size has gone up however, from 214 mm^2 to 263 mm^2. That's fewer transistors but less densely packed ones, part of this is due to a reduction in cache size and part of it is due to a fundamental rearchitecting of the microprocessor. Nehalem is Intel's first "native" quad-core design, meaning that all four cores are a part of one large, monolithic die. Each core has its own L1 and L2 caches, and all four sit behind a large 8MB L3 cache. The L1 cache remains unchanged from Penryn (the current 45nm Core 2 architecture), although it is slower at 4 cycles vs. 3. The L2 cache gets a little faster but also gets a lot smaller at 256KB per core, whereas the lowest end Penryns split 3MB of L2 among two cores. The L3 cache is a new addition and serves as a common pool that all four cores can access, which will really help in cache intensive multithreaded applications (such as those you'd encounter in a server). Nehalem also gets a three-channel, on-die DDR3 memory controller, if you haven't heard by now.
@ Legit Reviews
Together the Intel X58 Express chipset and the ICH10 Southbridge make up what is certain to be a very solid platform to use on high performance systems. The Intel ICH10/ICH10R Southbridge was launched with the Intel P45 Express chipset and has already proven itself a winner with some of the best Solid State Drive performance numbers of any chipset on the market. The X58 Express supports up to 36 lanes of PCI Express 2.0 connectivity, and since many boards using these chipsets will have both NVIDIA SLI and ATI CrossFire enabled it will mean that Triple-SLI and Quad CrossFireX will be easy to implement. This is due to the fact that NVIDIA is allowing motherboard makers to use a special sBIOS if they pay a licensing fee for SLI Technology. So, finally multi-GPU technology from both graphics card companies can be used on the same board. If that isn't enough Intel has done away with the Front Side Bus and now has the Quick Path Interconnet to handle the flow of data between the processor and the chipset. The memory now has over 25.5 GB/s of throughput since it now has a direct connection to the processor.
@ Bit-tech
Gaming performance is something key to our hearts though and we have to say the results are less than we'd hoped, but for two out of three games at least the Core i7 processors are faster - in the Source engine quite impressively so. However, given the huge advance in bandwidth - both from QPI compared to Front Side Bus and triple channel DDR3 compared to dual channel DDR2/3 previously - these architectural enhancements don't seem to benefit games as much as we would have liked. When the Core architecture was first announced with Conroe and we saw simply massive advances in gaming performance compared to AMD and the previous Netburst architecture, clearly with the same execution engine (and to some degree, a smaller L2 cache/slower larger cache) Core i7 doesn't offer the same advantage. Hyper Threading certainly doesn't make a positive impact either and the changing the QPI bandwidth doesn't hugely affect performance in Crysis and Half-Life 2: Episode Two, but it did in Far Cry 2. We'd argue a certain degree of caution in checking what the differences are in the games you play before buying, however while they're not likely to be slow by any means, the drops in Far Cry 2 were significant to say the least. Once we get the heads up as to why - we'll be sure to let you know.
@ t-Break
Codenamed Bloomfield, this well-anticipated successor in the ‘Core’ series has been officially labeled as the Core i7. Its is the first CPU to be based on Intel’s new Nehalem micro-architecture and it comes with a host of unique features. One of the most talked about feature of the Nehalem is the integrated memory controller which is something AMD’s has been doing for a while as well. However, the Core i7 supports the latest generation of DDR3 RAM in Triple channel. We say “Hello” once again to Hyper-Threading, making the quad-cores of Nehalem appear as eight logical cores with two threads per core. With the demise of the memory controller residing on the Northbridge, the Front Side Bus (FSB) is also replaced by Intel's Quick Path Interconnect (QPI)- a point to point interconnect between the CPU and the I/O hub which is, once again, somewhat similar to HyperTransport used in AMD CPUs. Adding to this is “Turbo Boost” that changes the way we’re used to overclocking with previous Intel CPUs. The first Core i7 processors launching today are the 920 @ 2.66GHz, 940 @ 2.93GHz and the 965EE @ 3.20GHz, all of which are quad core processors based on a 45nm fabrication process. They’re a bit bigger is size than previous Core 2 CPUs and the new socket packaging is LGA1366.
@ Tweaktown
Comparing all three CPUs from the back side, the Core i7 while larger, looks somewhat similar to Core 2. This is because Intel has done away with pins on the processor since the Pentium D series of CPU. I can personally vouch for killing one or two 478-pin test bed processors because of having to remove and insert them into boards for reviews. If you accidentally pull too hard on the heatsink when removing it from the board, you could easily bend or break a pin. Core i7 uses a Land Grid Array of 1366 pins, that’s 591 new pins. Intel needed to add extra pins for the QPI connector as well as extra pins for the memory module traces as the modules now connect directly to the CPU. This is a far cry from AMD who still use pinned processors in the desktop market which are prone to bending and breaking. It’s harder to ruin the pins on the board compared to the CPU. Ever since using LGA775 CPUs in test beds, we haven’t bent a single pin on any board we have had.
@ Legion Hardware
The base clock overclocking is a little trickier as it also boosts the memory frequency as well, much like FSB overclocking with a Core 2 processor. However unlike DDR3 memory that is paired with a Core 2 processor, a maximum memory voltage of just 1.6v can be used when operating with a Core i7. Increasing the memory voltage beyond 1.6v places the Core i7 processor at a high risk of being burnt out, and this is likely why Intel has gone with a triple-channel DDR3 interface, as it allows them to get away with using slower 1066MHz memory. Using a 160MHz base clock means that the memory is no longer running at 1066MHz but rather 1280MHz. It is unlikely that most current DDR3-1066 memory modules will do this at just 1.6v or less. Therefore, as we see it your options are either to try and reduce the memory timings in order to get the memory working at higher frequencies, or alternatively reduce the memory multiplier. Either option was made relatively easy to carry out in the Intel DX58SO motherboard BIOS.
@ Hot Hardware
We also did some overclocking to see how much headroom these early Core i7 processors have left untapped under their hoods. Because the Core i7 Extreme 965 has its overspeed protection removed--i.e. its multipliers are unlocked--we overclocked the processor by raising its multiplier to 25 and also experimented with an increased QPI speed. With the core voltage raised to 1.4v and the memory voltage tapped at 1.65v, we were able to take our particular processor up to a stable 4.15GHz with air-cooling. As you may have heard in the weeks leading up to today's announcement, the Core i7 processor, and in particular its integrated memory controller, are sensitive to increased voltages. Memory voltages higher than 1.65v are not recommended and could damage the CPU. In light of this, memory manufacturers have begun shipping triple-channel DDR3 memory kits capable of relatively high frequencies with voltages no higher than 1.65v.