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Latest Madshrimps Articles and Latest Webnews |
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A couple of motherboard manufacturers are now including SATA 6Gbps and USB 3.0 chips on their motherboards. In this to the point article, we take look at the performance for SATA 6Gbps and USB 3.0 compared with their predecessors. ... |
by Terw_Dan @ 2010-02-07 |
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The new model from MSI is a special edition based on Intel´s latest Pinetrail platform to celebrate the sale of one million 10-inch U100 Wind netbooks.The special edition is available in either blue or red. ... |
by windwithme @ 2010-02-04 |
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Since the launch of the new CPUs from Intel, nicknamed Clarkdale, we have seen a fair share of overclocking attempts; some people even breaking world records, pushing the a Clarkdale over 7Ghz. We have read reports from overclockers who had issues with pushing the BCLK higher when the IGP was enabled. In this article we will explore possible solutions to help circumvent this limit, so you can enjo... |
by massman @ 2010-02-02 |
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In this overclocking test three AMD 785G Chipset based motherboards are put through a series of tests in combination with a Phenom II X2 545,DFI LANPARTY BI 785G-M35, GIGABYTE GA-MA785GPMT-UD2H and BIOSTAR TA785G3 HD are used to overclock and unlock the X2 to X4 at 3.75Ghz... |
by windwithme @ 2010-01-27 |
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To start off this is a totally new experience to me. Yes even at my age I am still in for some learning action. Being used to review motherboards, CPUs and GPUs and cooling equipment, I had no idea how to approach a review about a keyboard. Being an avid gamer, in a past far away, I always avoided wireless input. Even though technology has come a long way since the dark ages, I am still sceptical ... |
by leeghoofd @ 2010-01-22 |
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The fastest memory stick on the face of the earth? OCZ is definitely gunning for the title with their Throttle eSATA 32Gb unit, we measured read speeds up to 85.9Mb/s, almost three times as fast compared to your standard USB variation. More performance numbers and stress testing inside.... |
by jmke @ 2010-01-21 |
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With a Big Bang we Maximus test a few SuperComputer motherboards based around the P55 chipset for our next LanParty rig. Compared to the previous 3 models this roundup provides you with in-depth test results of 7 Intel P55 mainboards from MSI, Asus, Gigabyte and DFI.... |
by massman @ 2010-01-17 |
More Recent Content: # # # # # # # # # # # # # # #
Upcoming Content, Review Requests, Work In Progress Reports:
Msi N240gt-md512-oc/d5 Another P55 round-up: Asus/Asus/DFI Dimastech Benchtable (chrome finish) Hard model ...request a product (p)review More...
Hardware or Gadget/Multimedia News
(hit read more to go straight to the full story)
Hard drive head manufacturer TDK has recently made available a little chart that provides new info regarding the hard drive capacity updates coming throughout this year. In the 3.5-inch zone, the next step up is a 640GB platter, which is expected to start being used as of next month and adopted by all major HDD manufacturers by November.
The move from 500GB to 640GB will enable companies to make and sell 3.5-inch drives with a 2.5TB capacity (using 4 platters) or even 3TB (5 platters).

This scratch build case is inspired by the Art Deco stylings of 1920s and 1930s Zenith radios, but despite looking back so far in time for inspiration, it still has modern features such as integrated watercooling. Gary has hand cut, sanded and altogether modded a complete build using inspiration of the classic design as ground work. Without a bit of clever handy work (and without looking around the back) you probably couldn't tell this was a post-Millennium product.

We asked Gary to put us together a project log and he provided us with over 8,600 words of detail to go with the several hundred build pictures: for those of you who have a desire for detail: you've got it here! We'll pass it over to Gary now, so he can lead you through this feast of a magnificent mod.

Samsung announced its plans to release an S2 Portable hard drive that is pre-loaded with Michael Jackson's THIS IS IT, the latest movie about the King of Pop. The 2.5-inch external HDD with the special bundle has a 500GB capacity, a USB 2.0 interface, a Power Saving Mode, auto backup, and SecretZone, a feature that acts as a virtual drive and secures files and folders with AES-128bit or AES-256bit encryption.

This week Koolance will start shipping the CPU-360, its newest CPU waterblock which is compatible with LGA 775/1156/1366 and AM2/AM2+/AM3 chips. The nickel-plated CPU-360 measures 12.5 x 12.5 x 1.5 cm, weights 411 grams and features a copper cold plate with a brass top, an o-ring sealed impingement plate, and G 1/4" threading.


Month after its unveiling, the first consumer motherboard equipped with the Lucid Hydra 200 SoC, MSI's Big Bang Fuzion, has finally been officially introduced. This new board is based on the P55 chipset and features support for LGA 1156 processors, nothing but Hi-c Caps, SFCs (Super Ferrite Chokes), DrMos (8-phase power for the CPU), a SuperPipe-boasting cooling system, and the OC Genie one-button overclocking function.
The Bog Bang Fuzion also packs four DDR3-2133 memory slots, three PCI-Express slots enabling Nvidia, AMD, or Nvidia+AMD multi-GPU configurations, V-check points, APS (Active Phase Switching), ten SATA 3.0 Gbps and two eSATA ports, dual Gigabit Ethernet, and FireWire connectors.

A high-ranking executive from Nvidia Corp. said that it considers external graphics adapters for notebooks a big opportunity even though the company does not offer such products at the moment.
“I think it is a big opportunity. We have two strategies at Nvidia: one is to put graphics everywhere, the other one is to [find more ways to] integrate discrete chips into the box. I think there is definitely a place for [external graphics cards for notebooks], no question. We continue to look at whether this is a GPU [docking stations] or external devices,” said Rene Haas, general manager of the notebook GPU business at Nvidia, in a brief interview with X-bit labs.
There are a lot of notebooks featuring high-performance microprocessors, but there are much less notebooks with high-performance graphics processors since discrete graphics chips increase the size and weight of mobile computers rather tangibly and are not needed crucially. A way to add high-performance graphics to laptops was introduced by ATI in 2008: external graphics cards and external graphics port (XGP) technology. Unfortunately, so far such graphics cards have hardly become widespread; in fact, there is only one XGP solution available: Mobility Radeon HD 3870 box available only from Fujitsu Siemens. One of the issues, believes Nvidia, is the price of such graphics solutions.

Intel Corp. is the world’s largest maker of central processing units (CPUs), core-logic sets, graphics adapters and is also a leading supplier of Wi-Fi controllers and some other chips. The company believes that in the coming years, as popularity of solid-state drives (SSDs) will continue to grow, it will also become the leading supplier of SSDs.
“We want to be a leader in SSDs. We want to bring SSDs out of the niche markets and into the mainstream,” said Tom Rampone, the general manager of Intel's NAND solutions group, reports EETimes.
At present Intel claims to be the top player in the U.S. retail SSD market and the second largest supplier worldwide. Intel and Micron form IM Technologies manufacturer of NAND flash memory and at present IM produces flash using the most advanced process technology possible. Intel believes that this is an indisputable advantage that will not only help to boost shipments of SSDs, but will also allow to make a profit.

AMD and Nvidia partner Club 3D is currently putting the finishing touches on a new Cypress-powered graphics card, the Radeon HD 5850 Overclocked Edition. Seen below, the DirectX 11-ready card features a custom, dual-slot quad-heatpipe cooling solution, 1440 Stream Processors, a 256-bit memory interface CrossFireX support, and dual DVI, HDMI and DisplayPort outputs.
Club 3D's creation has a core clock of 760 MHz (725 MHz stock), 1GB of GDDR5 memory @ 4200 MHz (4000 MHz) and is bundled with a Dirt 2 voucher. Unfortunately, there's no confirmation as to the Radeon's pricing or release date.

It should be noted that the type of computations required to process physical effects in video games is an ideal match for the architecture of modern GPUs from both ATI and Nvidia. There is only one problem. If one and the same computing core is used for both 3D graphics and physics computations, these tasks will conflict, competing for the GPU’s resources and the GPU may prove to be unable to deliver a high enough frame rate in a 3D scene that is graphically complex and also features advanced physical effects. This problem can be solved by installing a second graphics card into the computer and using it as a PhysX accelerator; Nvidia’s drivers offer this opportunity. But it is not always possible or desirable to install a second card whereas the dual-processor GeForce GTX 295, besides its low availability, has such shortcomings as a high price and a high level of power consumption. And what if an advanced and complex GPU is accompanied with a simple and cheap one, serving as a PPU? That must be the reasoning behind EVGA’s decision to develop and market a unique graphics card that comes with a dedicated PhysX accelerator core. We will test the EVGA GeForce GTX 275 CO-OP PhysX Edition in this review and tell you all about all its highs and lows.

Ultra, the company who’s claim to fame is inventing the modular power supply, brings us another one of their X4 creations. Their last power supply got good marks in the lab, lets see if their more powerful version can pull off the same.

Team Group made a solid name for themselves a couple of years ago when they started offering some of the fastest memory on the market at a price that made other memory makers red in the face. Since then Team has been a part of the enthusiast community worldwide and even expanded their product offerings to include among other things flash memory drives and even solid state drives.
Today we are testing the new Team Group Xtreem-G1 solid state drive. The G1 is based on the Indilinx Barefoot controller and has a rated read speed of 260MB/s and a write speed of 180MB/s. The Barefoot controller is capable of using up to 64MB of high speed DRAM cache and Team stuffed the drive to the max with very fast cache memory.

As the worlds patiently awaits NVIDIA Fermi which is aimed to challenge the ATI Radeon HD 5870, the graphics giant is not sitting idling. In fact, NVIDIA has been busying updating their existing lineup. NVIDIA has revamped the entire graphics line up to the 200 series.
Although many people may think that NVIDIA simply “recycles” their old cards and rebrand the name, the reality is that the latest line of the 200 series graphic cards actually packs some feature upgrades. The latest GT 240 from NVIDIA is manufactured with the 40nm processing technology that will ensure the card runs cooler than previous generation of cards. Not only that the card runs cooler, it also consumes less power. As a result, the GT 240 draws power directly from the PCI Express slot and does not need any auxiliary power. This is good news for those who wish to upgrade their system without spending extra money on a power supply.


We have reviewed quite a few Foxconn motherboards over the years and the high end boards tend to have a lasting impression on us. In most cases performance is exceptional; design and style are outstanding. All of these features can be found in the latest Quantum Force motherboard, the Inferno Katana.

In the family of Antec Performance One, a Micro ATX box is available, the Mini P180. Available in black or white, less bulky model is closely derived from its big brother the P183. Revenues from Antec will they still work miracles, or the weight of ages will he the detriment of the latter? We will try to find out in this article.

Power supplies are important and often overlooked components. Ultra Products understands that case-proud PC enthusiasts do not overlook the PSU. In fact, hard-core hardware geeks demand not just performance, but style to complement not just their *** kicking hardware, but their beautifully lit cases. Thus, Ultra has released the new X4 Series in a range of wattages starting at 500 watts. The model we are taking to task in this review is the totally modular 1600-watt version.
This block of power weighs a respectable 15 pounds, measures 240mm x 150mm X 87mm and features a 135mm fan. And, it is 80 Plus Certified. One note about the 1600-watt rating; this PSU is rated at 1600 watts when connected to a 20-amp plug using the special 120 volt 20 AMP cable (included). When you use the included 120 volt 15 AMP cord to connect to a typical outlet, the PSU operates at 1200 watts.

For 2010, Intel has introduced a new line of processors code named “Clarkdale”, and will be known as the Core i5 600 series. At this point there are four processors in this series, the 650, the 660, the 670, and the 661. Today I will be looking at the Intel Core i5 661, a dual core LGA 1156 processor built in the 32nm process, with on-die video processing. This should make it a natural for HTPC and non-gaming rigs. How will the i5 661 fare with this geek who has had the honor of reviewing some of the most powerful video cards in the world? Read on to see!

NVIDIA and ATI dominate the market for gaming-oriented video cards. But neither company sells video cards directly to the consumer; rather, they produce "reference designs" that are manufactured by a number of "partners". Most partners simply produce the reference design and slap an identifying sticker on the card's cooler; although some might replace the reference design cooler with a quieter or more powerful solution, with few exceptions there's little to distinguish one partner's version of a specific card from another partner's version of the same card. EVGA breaks out of this rut with their EVGA GTX 275 CO-OP PhysX Edition, model 012-P3-1178-TR, which combines NVIDIA GTS250 and GTX275 GPUs on the same card, and Benchmark Reviews takes it around the block to see what it's got.

The cooling solution that was on the ASUS ENGT240 did its job quite well - the highest that I saw the card get was 64°C during all the testing, which is not very high for a video card operating at 630MHz on the GPU and running through all these benchmarks back-to-back. I do like the fact that the ENGT240 does get all the power that it needs from the motherboard's PCI-E slot - there are no extra power adapters that need to be plugged into the video card.

How does a full-featured Phenom II X4 CPU for $99 sound? AMD's new dual core hotrod, the X2 555 BE, is actually an X4 in disguise and just needs a bit of help to unlock those two extra cores for all the performance goodness you can dream about at bargain prices. We successfully unlocked the X2 555 BE and we'll tell you how today and show the resulting performance increase.

Today, we'll be taking a look at the DH55TC "Tom Cove" motherboard. This board offers a wealth of features, but with a market price in the $99 range, is it a better solution than competing boards? We'll take a look at the performance of three processors on the DH55TC platform, and examine other market options to find out.

The card with the best performance from AMD from the previous generation, the ATI RADEON 4870X2 has a very noisy stock cooling cooling system. Surprisingly, not a lot of custom VGA coolers appeared for it. Arctic Cooling thought a lot of us, the 4870X2 users and released the Accelero XTREME 4870X2 after a very big delay. Will this custom cooling be as great as it says on the package? We will see later in this review.

Just found this thread over at the Xtremesystems.org forums where Japanese overclocker Gyrock showcased the first sub-10s 1M using AMD ever. For that, he needed an AMD Phenom II X4 965BE C3 clocked at 6.8GHz. Screenshot and more information inside ...

A couple of motherboard manufacturers are now including SATA 6Gbps and USB 3.0 chips on their motherboards. In this to the point article, we take look at the performance for SATA 6Gbps and USB 3.0 compared with their predecessors.

Performance is the exact same as the TRUE Revision C but for more money. The other oddity is that they still do not include a fan with their heat sink. Someone needs to let Thermalright know we are clawing our way out of a recession and offering value to your customers is a great way to earn loyalty. The Venemous X is a good cooler for what it is but since the TRUE Revision C offers the same performance for less money I just can’t recommend the Venemous X. The Thermalright TRUE Rev C is still closest to our hearts.

People laughed when I said that Socket 1160 would lose 4 pins, but here we sit just over a year later and Socket 1156 is old news. The next one, called Socket R in some circles, has 2011 pins. It was going to be released in late 2010, but that got some of the more numerologically inclined managers at Intel to sound the alarm. Still shaken by seeing the movie 2012 and reading arcane charts found in bubble-gum packets, a 2010 release was moved out to appease certain powers that are not known to those uninitiated in the ways of real product planning.

If you’ve been considering buying a new computer, or at least building your own, you might’ve noticed two features that pretty much every motherboard manufacturer out there is touting at the moment - USB 3.0 and SATA3 6Gbps. Currently both of these features are being implemented by third-party chipsets from NEC and Marvell. However, AMD is getting ready to add full SATA3 6Gbps support to all six SATA ports on its upcoming SB850 southbridge.
Intel has no plans on adding any of these features to its chipset line-up this year and although SATA3 6Gbps is penciled in on the roadmap for 2011 we’re hearing that Intel isn’t exactly planning on going down the same route as AMD. We’re not sure if the implementation we’ve been told about is limited to only some chipsets or not, but according to our source, Intel will be offering only a single native SATA3 6Gbps port.

The NH-U9B SE2 continues the legacy of Noctua's classic NH-U9 series of compact premium coolers, which have received more than 100 awards and recommendations from the international press. The new SE2 version lends itself to use in quiet HTPCs or smaller cases and adds support for LGA1156 as well as LGA1366 via the latest SecuFirm2 multi-socket mounting system. We have tested the cooler with a Core i7 860 system…

Many people out there simply do not have $200 laying around to go out and buy a new graphics card. You may be someone who fits into this category, and are looking for some performance and features while still retaining the lower price point. Today we have the Sapphire HD 5670 which falls into this category. Sapphire understands that many users just want to have higher performance without paying a huge price, so they have opted to include an aftermarket cooler with thier take on the 5670. This means that you will not only have a cool running card, but you'll also be able to easily overclock to the max.
The ability to overclock is great, but what about the features? Well you'll be happy to note that this card has all of the features of the more expensive cards. This includes DirectX 11 and Eyefinity. While this card won't play games as well on Eyefinity as the more expensive cards, it has the ability. Like many other more recent graphics cards, this card decodes video. Combine that with the aftermarket cooling solution, and you have a great card for a high end HTPC

NZXT has manufactured a good case and after some modification, Hades
has found a place to call home with this reviewer. Beautifully sculpted and
outrageous airflow for $89.99 US is astounding. I'd recommend this case to
anyone looking for cutting edge styling, great airflow and nice cable
management features as long as you don't use liquid cooling and/or a large
heat sink as the case will not close.

Based on the mainstream Intel H55 chipset, the Asus P7H55D-M EVO has premium features like eSATA, FireWire, and USB 3.0 powered by NEC controller. It also has a tweak-friendly BIOS, making it a more versatile platform for Clarkdale than Intel's DH55TC.

Today we have two sets of memory from G.Skill on our test bench, the high performane Pi series DDR3-2200 and a 1.35v set from the Eco series running at DDR3-1600.

The board is definitely original, but at the same time practical enough for a home theater. It has a complete set of peripheral interfaces, high-quality integrated audio, up-to-date graphics core, and, finally, a universal remote.

Today we will take a look at AMD:s newest consumer class quadcore processor, the AMD Athlon II X4 635. With Athlon II X4 series you get quadcore cpu for around 100$. Let's see how this performs against a little more expensive AMD Phenom series.

Ah, the heartbeat of the machine. The driving force that sends every pulse of electricity and every turn of the fan. The most important part of the computer and the most dangerous part are one. I�m talking about the power supply. Without it, every other part of your computer is just a bunch of silicon, wire, and metal sitting in a box. It must be reliable, it must be powerful, and it must look good. Well, that�s the consensus these days, isn�t it?
Thermaltake has tossed us another bone with the TR2 RX 750-Watt power supply. It looks great, its 750 watts strong, and today I�ll find out how reliable it is. Thermaltake doesn�t disappoint very often, and I have high hopes for this particular piece of hardware. I�m going to be testing it on my usual testing rig, a 2.9Ghz Athlon 64 X2 dual core with 2GB of 800Mhz RAM. I also have six 120mm case fans all running at once, two DVD-RW drives, two SATA HDDs
, and an ATI 4870 video card. Normally, this setup would warrant at least a 500W power supply, so the TR2 should have no trouble keeping up.

Kingston one of the premier names in memory business has released the HyperX 1600MHz 12GB Triple Channel Kit (KHX1600C9D3K6/12G). This set is designed for those using an X58 LGA 1366 motherboard in conjunction with the Core i7 series. The kit is composed of six 2GB sticks of DDR3 memory designed to operate at 1600 MHz.

Many of the computer cases these days include an array of features that typically make it a bit more difficult to pick the "better" of the bunch from the very large choice. The choice for many comes down to the external aesthetics because the bigger and better cases tend to all have superb cooling, removable motherboard trays and tool less designs. If you like a classic looking brushed aluminum design and three whopping 230mm fans sounds like a good combination of the two, then you should have a look at Cooler Master's ATCS 840.

he time has come, Once again, one radiator Roundup has found the way to our home page. With twelve test candidates, we have received kindly by our board partners, we have done some work in order to present you an overview of the currently most often used radiators. Although the trend is now tending towards the slightly larger radiators for 140mm fan, we opted for the 360mm radiators, for here was hard rectified by the manufacturers and also some new developments we could keep our Roundup.

From 30mm to 63mm, we have covered the full range of currently available for radiators and thus create the comparison of high-end of the space-saving heat exchanger that takes place in small enclosures. In our test we laid down three fan speeds, they have been with 600 rpm, and 900u/min close 1200u/min leaning against the practice. With 600 rpm to classify for the user as a fan is silent, however, usually classify 1200u/min are already at the threshold of pain and no more than quiet. A radiator testing at high speed made no sense for us, and finally to a water cooling system so not only improve the cooling efficiency dramatically, but also provide for much more calm at home workspace. Of course, we keep an eye on the flow of our test candidates.

If you're gaming at 1920 x 1200, the HD 5770 is the card I would recommend in a heartbeat, especially if you want to protect yourself a little bit for future titles. It offers us consistent performance at 1920 x 1200 with the detail level set high.
As always, though, we appreciate some extra performance. Last year we saw MSI attach the GT 240 from NVIDIA with its Afterburner software. Outside of just giving us normal abilities like overclocking the core and memory, it also gave us a chance to increase the voltage on the core. What this ultimately meant was that we could achieve an ever higher core clock.

If you're looking to build a truly compact, no nonsense mini-ITX system, the Mini-Box.com M350 universal mini-ITX enclosure is an excellent case to consider. Just slightly larger than a mini-ITX board itself, and only 62mm tall, you can't get much smaller in this form factor. And depending on the components you use inside, you may be able to build a completely silent system.

Zalman. The first thing that comes to mind for most people when they hear that name is 'CPU heatsinks'. Since 1999, Zalman has been providing great products designed to keep PC components cool, especially CPUs. The Zalman CNPS10X Extreme and CNPS10X Flex continue the Zalman tradition of providing great cooling components for CPUs. While the Flex allows you the flexibility to choose your fan setup, the Extreme provides a controllable PWM fan for immediate installation.
It seems the days of bland CPU coolers are gone. They have all been replaced with engineering masterpieces designed to pull as much heat away from the CPU as possible. From installation to benchmarking, we put the Zalman CNPS10X Flex and Extreme to the test.

Sapphire Radeon HD 5670 review also featuring Inno3D GeForce GT 240. Sapphire Radeon HD 5670 has 30% higher clock speed, 15% higher memory speed and 304 extra Shader Processors compared to the Inno3D GeForce GT 240.

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