| NZXT Kraken X60 - The Best Liquid Cooling System (Part 2) |
| The NZXT Kraken X60 stands out with its impressive results. The performance of Corsair H100i Extreme at its maximum fan speed is just as good as the minimum speed rate of the Kraken X60’s fans. The same thing happens in the comparison with the Swiftech H220. It is just 1°C worse than its predecessor at 1870 RPM. |
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| NZXT Kraken X60 - The Best Liquid Cooling System (Part 1) |
| In our review about the NZXT Kraken X40, we have been so pleased with the unique features and performances of that brand new liquid cooling system. Therefore, we wish to introduce to you this senior model of this range, which is more costly and named Kraken X60. |
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| What’s So Great About Fusion Drive? (Part 2) |
| If you run into a software problem on your Mac while running a homemade Fusion Drive, support might be refused at a Genius Bar or a service provider until your Mac is restored to a regular configuration. |
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| What’s So Great About Fusion Drive? (Part 1) |
| When Apple updated the iMac and Mac mini in late 2012, it introduced a new storage option called Fusion Drive. Despite the name, it’s actually two drives working in a special arrangement. It pairs 128GB of flash storage with either a 1TB or 3TB hard drive. Apple bills it as providing the high capacity of a hard drive with the performance of flash storage, in a way that has no impact on how you work and store things. |
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| Fuze Powered by Raspberry Pi |
| A robust case that turns the Raspberry Pi into a comprehensive educational workstation; the keyboard is poor and the price high, but you do get a lot for your money |
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| Nvidia GeForce GTX 650 Ti Boost Graphics Card |
| Developing new GPUs is expensive, so it’s no surprise to see firms making the most of what they’ve got. Nvidia’s GeForce GTX 650 Ti Boost does just that, building on last year’s non-“Boost” Ti card and improving it across the board. |
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| Sapphire HD 7790 2GB GDDR5 OC Edition |
| MD has been making a big noise about its monster HD 7990 card recently, despite the number of people who can afford one being tiny. A far more realistic option for most of us, though, is the HD 7790, which has now been improved. |
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| Seagate ST500LM00 Laptop Thin SSHD 500GB |
| As the 'Thin' title suggests, the other major advance is that this unit is just 7mm thick, enabling it to fit into most ultra-thin laptops designs providing they allow you to change the hard drive. The larger 1TB laptop version has two platters, making it a slightly chunkier 9.5mm, and Seagate promises 1TB and 2TB desktop drives soon. |
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| Nvidia Geforce GTX 650 Ti Boost 2GB - A Good Option |
| The launch of the GTX 650 Ti Boost 2GB is something of a response to the debut of AMD's Radeon HD 7790 1GB, as it targets gamers playing at 1080p and sits in the mid-range of graphics hardware, with prices floating around $211.4 for stock models. However, it actually picks its fight with the model above this in AMD's range, the HD 7850 2GB, which can also be found for about $211.4. |
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| Component Watch: Five Of The Best Gaming Mouse |
| A bad workman always blames his tools, apparently. While that may well have more than a whiff of truth, you can bet that Michelangelo’s David would’ve looked a bit less polished if all he’d had to work with was a sledgehammer. Sometimes, to bring out your true skills, you need the tools capable of channeling them – and that, at least for us, is enough justification to warrant buying a high precision, fully customizable gaming mouse. |
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| The Summary Of Six Mini-ITX Mainboard Based On Intel Z77 Chipset (Part 10) |
| All Mini-ITX mainboards based on the Intel Z77 chip set offer a few overclocking setting and we have focused on them in the description above. And while the basic functions (CPU multiplier and memory frequency adjustments) is available in all of the mainboard BIOS, their voltage regulation capabilities may vary. That is why we summarize them in the following table. |
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| The Summary Of Six Mini-ITX Mainboard Based On Intel Z77 Chipset (Part 9) |
| The exterior design of the Zotac Z77-ITX WiFi suggests that it can. It looks most impressive with its huge heatsink on the chipset and the VRM, which are fixed with screws and connected to each other with a heatpipe. The cooling system works well, the temperature of the voltage regulator being the lowest among all the mainboards in this review. Eight-phase VRM provides solid capacitors, ferrite-core chokes and integrated DrMOS components. |
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| The Summary Of Six Mini-ITX Mainboard Based On Intel Z77 Chipset (Part 8) |
| There are more and more Mini-ITX mainboards allow building high-performance PC configurations. This market is becoming highly competitive and manufacturers have to try hard and put out original and attractive solutions. Products from MSI based on the Z77 features a free combined mini-PCIe/mSATA slot which can accommodate SSDs as well as expansion cards. |
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| The Summary Of Six Mini-ITX Mainboard Based On Intel Z77 Chipset (Part 6) |
| ASRock, Asus and Gigabyte are leading mainboard manufacturers, who currently offer the most successful and interesting platforms. Therefore, many mainboards from these manufacturers can be very similar and sometimes hard to choose. That is why we have predicted that Mini-ITX Gigabyte GA-Z77N-WIFI would similar to the compact mainboards from its competitors, but it manages to make us really surprised. |
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| Sapphire Radeon HD 7790 1GB Dual-X - An Effective And Quiet Cooler |
| The GPU itself consists of 14 of AMD’s Compute Units, leaving it with a total of 56 texture units and 896 stream processors. The front end is more powerful than the other 7700-series cards, and in this area it joins the ranks of the 7800 and 7900-series with a pair each of geometry engines and rasterizers. Sapphire has overclocked the card to 1,075MHz from its stock speed of 1GHz |
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| The Rapoo E9080 Wireless Touchpad Keyboard - Shine Bright Like A Star |
| The only thing going against the E9080 is the price - which I felt was a bit too steep, but the overall build quality and feel certainly justifies it to an extent. The weight is another thing to keep in mind, but nothing that will prove to be a deal-breaker. This Rapoo wireless keyboard is certainly meant with the user in mind and you won't be disappointed with it in any case. |
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| The Summary Of Six Mini-ITX Mainboard Based On Intel Z77 Chipset (Part 5) |
| As usual, an EVGA mainboard seems perfect at first sight. The Z77 Stinger features an almost perfect component layout. Although it's often difficult to arrange all the parts properly on a compact PCB, this mainboard is a good illustration that miniaturization doesn’t have to be inconvenient. |
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| The Summary Of Six Mini-ITX Mainboard Based On Intel Z77 Chipset (Part 4) |
| Another hardware button can be found on the mainboard's PCB. It enables the MemOK! feature to re-boot your system in case of memory-related problems. The P8Z77-I DELUXE also carries traditional Asus TPU switch for automatic CPU overclocking but lacks Power and Reset buttons typical of DELUXE products. |
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| The Summary Of Six Mini-ITX Mainboard Based On Intel Z77 Chipset (Part 3) |
| As there remain fewer players on the mainboard market, the ones that are left expand their product line-ups as if trying to make up for the limited choice of brands No doubt then that Asus offers plenty of Mini-ITX LGA 1155 mainboards. Even if we narrow down the Z77-based mainboards, we still can find 3 products. |
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| The Summary Of Six Mini-ITX Mainboard Based On Intel Z77 Chipset (Part 2) |
| As mSATA slot is placed on the opposite sides of the PCB, it becomes quite clear that the front of the PCB is really stuffed with components. And we must also recognize that the layout of the components are not particularly convenient in this case. LGA 1155 socket has been moved too close to the PCI Express x16 slot, which means we can never use any of the powerful processor air-coolers. |
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| The Summary Of Six Mini-ITX Mainboard Based On Intel Z77 Chipset (Part 1) |
| After the Intel Z77 chip was released, it is likely to provide the function of a large computer system in Mini-ITX form-factor. We plan to talk about six mainboards that could be used as a platform for an overclocking or gaming system. These will be the products from ASRock, Asus, EVGA, Gigabyte and MSI Zotac. |
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| Kyocera Torque - An Ultra-Durable Phone Providing Prominent Sound (Part 1) |
| If you’ve used an OtterBox Defender cover, you will find it familiar to Torque. It’s wrapped in a rubber cover, and being a little thinner than the iPhone 4 wrapped in Otterbox case, with the dimensions of 5.06x2.69x0.5 inch. While it’s built to be overused, the hardware is not heavy – in fact, it feels slightly lightweight with 5.94 ounce (168.5g), depending on the kind of punishment it’s designed to bear. |
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| The Review Of Three Seasonic Power Supply Suits (Part 3) |
| Although Seasonic’s XM sub-models appeared earlier than the KM3 model discussed above, it is still being produced, so we will go on following our traditional way of assessment to consider PSUs from lower to higher wattages. |
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| The Review Of Three Seasonic Power Supply Suits (Part 2) |
| The SS-650KM3 (X-650) and SS-850KM3 (X-850) are the same as their predecessors in the specifications and meet the requirements of these present days by being able to provide most of their power output through the voltage range +12 V. The load capacity of the less important +5 V and +3.3 V voltage range is quite low at 125 watts. |
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| The Review Of Three Seasonic Power Supply Suits (Part 1) |
| We have already been familiar with two generations of Seasonic X Series power supply units; these products are 80 PLUS Gold certified. But the manufacturers do not stop there, and today we are going to mention about the most powerful products in this this series as well as two power supply suits that are recharged with a slightly lower capacity. |
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| 10 Essential Hardware Accessories (Part 2) |
| While a great many of us choose to share images online, it’s also a great idea to have a printer at hand so you can produce tangible pictures that can be hung on your wall. More importantly, being able to print out vital documents is also hugely convenient, which is just where the HP Photosmart 5520 e-All-in-One wireless printer comes into play. |
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| 10 Essential Hardware Accessories (Part 1) |
| Having a mobile device such as the Apple iPad, or perhaps, an iPad mini, allows you to do so much more with your computing activities. It offers oodles of features and functionality, so you can carry on with daily chores, no matter where you’re based. However, it’s possible to squeeze even more productivity out of your mobile gadget thanks to the wealth of available hardware accessories. |
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| GeForce GTX TITAN Gaming Supercomputer Graphics Card |
| Titan is Nvidia’s Kepler GPU at its most potent, with 2688 CUDA cores and 288GB/s memory bandwidth driving 6GB of GDDR5. In contrast, the already excellent GeForce GTX 680 GPU has 1536 CUDA cores and 193GB/s memory bandwidth, and comes with only 2GB of GDDR5 as standard. |
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| USB DACs Super Test: PC + DAC = HI-FI (Part 6) |
| If you were ever in any doubt about whether or not computer audio could attain the heights of hi-fi, worry no more. As computer-based music grows in strength and popularity, DACs (and especially DACs with a USB connection) are increasingly coming out of their niche market and enticing music lovers everywhere with their talents. |
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| USB DACs Super Test: PC + DAC = HI-FI (Part 5) |
| The penultimate DAC on our Super test list comes from French manufacturer Micromega. The Micromega MyDAC is part of the company’s new ‘My’ range of compact and affordable audio components – a line-up which will also include an MM/MC phonon amplifier, a headphone amplifier and a wireless streamer, among others. |
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| USB DACs Super Test: PC + DAC = HI-FI (Part 4) |
| If there were a prize for the most connections and features on a DAC, this LDAC-Pro from German cable and connectivity specialists Lindy would win easily. Perhaps that’s what’s spawned the eyebrow-raising price – it’s the most expensive DAC in this |
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| USB DACs Super Test: PC + DAC = HI-FI (Part 3) |
| The rPAC weighs just 300g, making it light and portable enough to carry around in your bag if you’re using your laptop on the move. Connections are minimal but practical: a type-B USB input a pair of line-level RCA outputs and a headphone output. |
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| USB DACs Super Test: PC + DAC = HI-FI (Part 2) |
| Part of Furutech’s entry-level line of products, the Stride supports native playback of up to 24-bit/96kHz music files, which is plenty of scope to boost the music playing from your iTunes collection. Any higher-resolution 192 kHz files will have to be down sampled to 96 kHz. |
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| USB DACs Super Test: PC + DAC = HI-FI (Part 1) |
| Adding a digital-to-analogue converter to your computer or laptop produces a very satisfying musical equation. The choice is now wide and the quality high, and there’s one to suit your taste |
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| Getting Started with the Beaglebone |
| Over the next couple of issues, this series aims to make a novice well-versed with the Beaglebone. It will cover various topics such as porting different OSs to the Beaglebone, a few tinkering projects, etc. This first article gives a brief overview of the Beaglebone and how to toggle a user LED on it. |
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