Tech News
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Sandy Bridge Processor Reviews - 2600K and 2500K
Published: Sunday, January 2, 2011 | By: DennisIt would seem that the Intel NDA lifed early? or maybe this was just the NDA for names and details. Cannot be certain, but the first wave of Sandy Bridge processor reviews has been posted.
- Intel Core i5-2500K Sandy Bridge GPU Performance @ techPowerUp
- Intel Core i5 2500K & Core i7 2600K processor review @ Guru3D
- GIGABYTE P67A-UD7 (Intel P67 Express) Motherboard
- Intel Core i7-2600K and i5-2500K Processors Debut @ HotHardware
- Intel's 'Sandy Bridge' Core processors reviewed at TR
- Intel Sandy Bridge Launch - i7-2600K - i5-2500K CPUs - P67 / H67 Motherboards @ HardwareHeaven
- Intel Unveils Sandy Bridge: Core i7 2600K i5 2500K i5 2400 i3 2100 CPUs @ Legit Reviews
- Intel Core i7 2600K and Core i5 2500K review @ KitGuru
- Funky Kit Review: Sandy Bridge Processors - Core i7-2600K plus Core i5-2500K
- Intel Sandy Bridge: Core i5 2500K and Intel 6 Series Chipset @ Bjorn3D
- Intel Sandy Bridge Core i5-2500K & i7-2600K Review @ t-break
- Intel Sandy Bridge: Core i5-2500K and DH67BL Motherboard Review @MissingRemote
- Intel i5-2500K Sandy Bridge @ LanOC Reviews
- Intel's Sandy Bridge Revealed: Core i5-2500K & i7-2600K Reviewed @ Techgage
- OC3D: i7 2600k, i5 2500k & 2300 1155 Sandy Bridge Review
And the award for the longest article title in hopes of getting a higher SEO ranking goes to Hardware Heaven and Legit Reviews.
Btw we'll have our Sandy Bridge review posted in the next couple of days, not as a processor (since we don't do that) but as a motherboard launch.
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NL: Review Block - Motherboards
Published: Sunday, January 2, 2011 | By: DennisWe don't normally group motherboard reviews into a single review block but we have several "pre" views of the upcoming P67 in the inbox and figured, why not?
- Gigabyte P67A-UD4 Preview @ PureOverclock
- Gigabyte P67A-UD7 & P67A-UD4 Sandy Bridge Motherboards Preview @ Hardware Canucks
- MSI P67A-GD65 Sandy Bridge Motherboard Preview @ Hardware Canucks
- ECS P67H2-A2 Socket 1155 Motherboard Preview @ OCIA
These massive enthusiast level motherboards have always intrigued me, of course they are all designed for one purpose and by buying one you are pretty much saying it will never see the inside of a case, but that's not to say it wouldn't happen.
MSI Big Bang XPower X58 Review @ ocaholicThe Big Bang XPower is MSIs recent flagship model regarding the socket 1366. Especially overclockers as well as PC-enthusiasts should be able to enjoy this thing. Therefore, not only its looks are amazing hopefully the performance is on a high level too.
Well that does it for the motherboards this time around, stay tuned for more,
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Happy New Year!
Published: Friday, December 31, 2010 | By: DennisHappy new year everyone!,
May all of your 2010 failures be forgotten and hopes for your 2011 wishes to come true.
Things here will be a little quiet until CES time. I have quite a few things to wrap up before the big trip including a fresh new review complete with new benchmarks
Take care, and stay safe
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Inno3D Geforce GTX580 Overclock Review @ XtremeComputing
Published: Thursday, December 30, 2010 | By: DennisAt one point I was a huge fan of Inno3D stuff, mostly because they were the only ones who offered a PCI version of the popular GeForce2. Something like that isn't considered fashionable with Eyefinity and 3DVision Surround being the hot ticket. However, back then it was the only way to enable a dual screen desktop.
Since then Inno3D has retreated back to the APAC market and is rarely heard of in the States.
Today I’ve got the Inno3D GTX580 Overclock to review. The latest and (hopefully) greatest single-gpu graphics card on the market. Seen to be a tweaked and perfected version of the GTX480, this card should be top boss. However, we’ll see how it does in our benchmarks
Seems like a good card, complete with OEM cooler.
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Octomom meets Motherboard - Kinda
Published: Wednesday, December 29, 2010 | By: DennisIt would seem the big news of the day is a crazy "me too" motherboard from MSI called the Marshal. The board comes with eight full length PCI Express slots, four of them are designed to run at full bandwidth while the remaining run at half bandwidth.
We have seen several motherboards using a similar configuration, Gigabyte, and EVGA seem to be the popular choice and since their release other companies have been doing their best to play "catch-up".MSI shows off its Big Bang Marshal board
@ Semiaccurate (the name strikes phjear in malware detectors world wide)
@ DailyTechIn other news we have a couple twin fan extra tall MSI video cards being shown by MSI.
R6970 Lightning and N580GTX Lightning Sneak Peek
Lastly, we have a fancy device from EVGA that reminds me of some stuff DFI used to do back in the day on their LAN Party motherboards, yep molex power piped directly into the PCI Express slot for greater video card stability. EVGA calls this device "Power Boost".
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Media Players Media Remotes and the HTPC
Published: Tuesday, December 28, 2010 | By: DennisThe HTPC offers a great deal of flexibility when it comes to expanding your Home Theater video library, of course to get the most from your HTPC experience you first need a computer to hook up to your big screen television.
Missing Remote has a beginners Guide to Home Theater PC (HTPC) to get you started.
Of course if you would rather not hassle building a computer for the living room you can purchase a AIO unit like the QNAP NMP-1000P Media Player. We had the opportunity to review the NMP-1000P and aside from a few "gotchas" it worked perfectly.
Lastly once you get your HTPC up and running you'll need a way to control what the computer does. A wireless keyboard and mouse seem like a logical choice; however a special built remote might be better. GlideTV has you covered with their Navigator HTPC Remote and Legit has a review posted.
If you want to see another HTPC build be sure to check out the Ninjalane Project "Building a HTPC" -
Gigabyte Aivia K8100 Gaming Keyboard Review @ Hardware Canucks
Published: Tuesday, December 28, 2010 | By: DennisGaming keyboards are a love and hate relationship. People that know how to use them, tend to side on the love side, while productive folks often look for a comfortable "ergo" design and rely on their fast fingers to get that first frag.
Which user are you?Let's preface things by saying that we have a special place in our hearts for all things red. With that being said, red peripherals do take a bit of getting used to but Gigabyte does offer the Aivia in a number of different colours from a standard black finish to screaming yellow. This is definitely a safe move on their part since the K8100 is a near-perfect keyboard which would have been ruined in some eyes if Gigabyte stuck to Lego-like primary colours.
Don't get me wrong, I am a total fan of "red" however there is something about this keyboard that just seems excessive.
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NL: Review Round-Up - Cards, Boards and Sandy Bridge
Published: Tuesday, December 28, 2010 | By: DennisRadeon HD69XX Series Round-Up
- AMD Radeon HD 6950 & HD 6970 CrossFireX @ Techgage
- Sapphire Radeon HD 6950 2GB Video Card Review @ ThinkComputers
- Sapphire HD 6850 1GB Review @ XSReviews (1GB ??)
nV Video Card(s)
- Gainward GeForce GTX 570 GLH Golden Sample Graphics Card Review @ HardwareHeaven (Maybe one of these days Gainward will start selling in the US, I do miss the sexy red PCB, on anything for that matter)
Motherboard Round-Up
- Gigabyte GA-H55N-USB3 Mini-ITX Motherboard Review @ OCIA (Our review of the GA-H55N here)
- Foxconn P67A-S Intel P67 Preview @ techPowerUp (W00t for Sandy!!)
- MSI P67A-GD65 Sandy bridge mobo preview
Sandy Bridge is the news big Intel release and it would seem Intel is really pushing it, at least from the standpoint of getting "all" of the mobo makers on board with product for launch. -
NL: Review Block - Cases and Cooling
Published: Tuesday, December 28, 2010 | By: DennisSome review links from around the web.
Cases
- Silverstone SG07B-W Gaming SFF Case @ Pro-Clockers
- SilverStone Grandia GD05 Case Review at Overclockers Online
- IcyDock MB973SP-B Tray-less 3-Bay SATA Hard Drive Bay Module
- SilverStone SG05-450 SFF Chassis Review @ OCIA
Cooling
- Scythe Setsugen 2 meets GTX 570 @ Hardwareoverclock
- Thermalright Silver Arrow Heatsink Review @ Frostytech
- Vantage Advanced Liquid Cooling by CoolIT Systems @ Bjorn3D
- Swiftech H2O-320 Edge Water Cooling Kit @ PureOverclock -
AMD Radeon HD 6950 to HD 6970 Mod @ TechpowerUp
Published: Monday, December 27, 2010 | By: DennisIt usually takes a few weeks but eventually hardware enthusiasts will find ways to get around the limitations mfgs add to their hardware. In this case a simple BIOS flash will turn your HD 6950 into a fully capable HD 6970.
Just like on all other similar products, AMD's two Cayman variants, called Cayman Pro and Cayman XT, are based on the exact same GPU silicon. The model variant a GPU chip becomes is decided after the die is produced, at some point before it is put on the card. Creating new SKUs from the same silicon by locking features has been common practice in the industry since at least the Radeon 9500 in 2002.
This article is to unlock the Radeon HD 6950. The HD 6970 has nothing that can be unlocked.While the card will accept the BIOS there is no guarantee that the card will accept higher clocks, and in some cases may actually cause more issues than it solves.
I'll give this mod a try when I have a spare moment, given how well the HD 6950 clocked in the review I'd expect things to go extremely well.
