The spider has been squashed by a dragon

Subject: Processors | January 8, 2009 - 12:29 PM | Jeremy Hellstrom
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Phenom II is here and it lays the smack down on the original Phenom.  Unfortunately it is not stomping Intel's Core i7 line, it's main competitor, nor does it beat out similarly clocked Core2 CPUs.  However, at an estimated price of $275, about $900 cheaper than the similarly clock Intel 965 and it will work happily in existing AM2 systems; no new RAM required.  It doesn't look like AMD will be taking the performance crown away from Intel, though it's ability to take higher voltages and the ease of upgrading will likely sell a lot of chips to AMD fans. 

What's Zii to ya?

Subject: General Tech | January 8, 2009 - 11:54 AM | Jeremy Hellstrom
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Creative is branching out into the system on a chip market with their soon to be announced Zii.  The Zen is their current MP3 player, with support for video and even wireless on some models, not exactly a full system but certainly a good media player.  From what VR-Zone has figured out that you will be seeing this chip in an iPhone competitor and possibly a teraflop computer with the footprint of an piece of A4 paper.  Could this help Creative expand fr

ASUS at CES 2009: a video run through

Subject: Shows and Expos | January 7, 2009 - 03:45 PM | Ryan Shrout
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ASUS definitely isn't sitting on its hands with this whole "Eee" branding thing.  While we have in the past poked fun at the company's desire to put the Eee moniker on just about ANYTHING they could paint white, at CES yesterday ASUS showed off quite a few interesting new products in various stages of development.  The most exciting was probably the Eee Keyboard PC - a fully functioning computer in a stylized keyboard that has an iPhone-sized touch pad on the right hand side where the number pad would usually be located.  The back of the unit has connections like Ethernet, DVI/V

A horse drawn PC

Subject: Cases and Cooling | January 7, 2009 - 03:12 PM | Jeremy Hellstrom
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If you are looking for an inexpensive way to power a mid ranged system, the AeroCool Horsepower 650W is a possibility.  The modular cabling is a nice feature to add, as is the pair of 6+2 PCI-E connectors, which will allow a modest SLI/CrossFireX setup to run happily.  The 12V rail is split into 4, all sporting 18A which should keep most PCs running happily.  Dr

Hitachi's enterprising high density storage

Subject: Storage | January 7, 2009 - 01:30 PM | Jeremy Hellstrom
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Hitachi's Deskstar E7K1000 is a terabyte drive with a full 32MB cache and three 334GB platters.  The large size of the platters should, in theory, offer quieter running as well as drawing less power, especially when partnered with the "Hitachi Voltage Efficiency Regulator Technology".  The Tech Report ran this HDD through their testing suites and proved that not only does this new Deskstar offer both of benefits mentioned, it also offers greater speed.  This update was certainly worth the wait.

Year of the Sequel Part 3 : Revenge of the bean counters

Subject: General Tech | January 7, 2009 - 12:04 PM | Jeremy Hellstrom
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bit-tech has posted a collection of the games to look out for in 2009 for both consoles and the PC.  On first glance, there is quite a bit to be excited about, with a totally reinvented Dawn of War II, Halo 3 ODST and FEAR 2 : Origins just to name a few.  If you look at it in a different way, most of the big franchises 'must have' games are sequels or add-ons to existing series, which can be disappointing to those looking for a new gaming experience.  For the accountants, it is excit

What happens in Vegas ... gets posted to our front page

Subject: Shows and Expos | January 7, 2009 - 11:43 AM | Jeremy Hellstrom
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CES 2009 is in full swing, but instead of heading to the tech displays, the first thing Legit Reviews did was try out the massage chairs.  Luckily, someone managed to pry them out of the chair and forced them to take some pictures.  Corsair is showing off 64GB thumb drives and some really impressive triple channel kits.  They played with the Novint Falcon , and recorded it so you can get an idea how exactly the new controller works.  AMD and LogiTech also had some interesting booths set up, so head ove

ASUS Chairman Unveils the Latest Innovation and Computing Concepts at CES 2009 in Las Vegas

Subject: Shows and Expos | January 7, 2009 - 11:11 AM | Jeremy Hellstrom
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LAS VEGAS, NV (January 6th, 2009) - ASUS Chairman Jonney Shih unveils the company's latest innovations and introduces its futuristic computing concepts at a keynote speech two days before the official opening of the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas.

In a 40-minute presentation, Shih talks about the speedy growth of ASUS' branded notebooks and the revolutionary Eee PC (Easy to Learn, Easy to Work and Easy to Play) line, which set the industry trend for netbooks.

ASUS' Showcases Exciting New Technology, Innovations and Products in Las Vegas

Subject: Shows and Expos | January 7, 2009 - 11:09 AM | Jeremy Hellstrom
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CONSUMER ELECTRONICS SHOW, LAS VEGAS, NV (January 6, 2009) - ASUS, worldwide leader in component and notebook design and manufacturing, will unveil its extensive lineup of products showcasing at CES 2009. Focusing on the main theme of "Access Life with ASUS", the rich assortment of products that will be exhibited at CES 2009 aim to simplify users' lives and help them realize their full potentials in the new digital era.

A mouthful of a motherboard

Subject: Motherboards | January 6, 2009 - 05:29 PM | Jeremy Hellstrom
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The EVGA X58 3X SLI motherboard takes a while to say but it does tell you exactly what to expect; an X58 chipset capable of handling 3 video cards in SLI/CrossfireX.  They do not use the nFORCE 200 MCP, which didn't seem to have had any appreciable effect on the performance during [H]ard|OCP's testing.  Perhaps more interesting were two new featur

BFG TECHNOLOGIES UNVEILS PHOBOS

Subject: Systems | January 6, 2009 - 03:40 PM | Jeremy Hellstrom
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Lake Forest, IL - January 5, 2009 - BFG Technologies, known as a leading supplier of premium power supplies and 3D graphics cards, is excited to announce its first line of complete gaming and multimedia PCs, called Phobos. These sleek hand-built, high performance machines were designed with the "Graduated Gamer" in mind. This audience is looking for all the performance associated with a high-end gaming system, but none of the hassle related to building and servicing such a system.

A good thing that just keeps on getting better

Subject: Graphics Cards | January 6, 2009 - 02:48 PM | Jeremy Hellstrom
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The HIS Radeon 4870 ICEQ4+ TURBO is a full 1GB model sporting a fancy third party cooler that drops the temperatures as well as the noise at full.  As the running temperatures and fan noise were the two biggest faults of the original 4870, this really is a great step forward.  Add into that equation the coming price drop as well as the ~10% o

Samsung's take on the Atom

Subject: Mobile | January 6, 2009 - 02:35 PM | Jeremy Hellstrom
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Samsung has placed a Intel Atom N270, 1GB of DDR2-800 and a 160GB 5400RPM HDD into a shell with a 10.2" WSVGA 1024 x 600 display and called it the NC10 Netbook.  Even with it's diminutive size, Samsung has managed to fit an almost full sized keyboard, as well as a 6 cell battery that will keep you going for a long while.  Phoronix being who they are, quickly installed Linux to see how compatible the netbook was.  See the results here.

Conspicuously wealthy

Subject: Cases and Cooling | January 6, 2009 - 01:18 PM | Jeremy Hellstrom
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If there is one place on this planet that absolutely screams wealth, it is Dubai and it's architecture.  Why not show off your own style with the Lian Li PC-888 which looks almost exactly like one of the most famous hotels in Dubai.  It will even hold a full sized system and cool it as well.  You can see the pictures of this case at bit-tech.

AMD is thinking bigger that just an atom

Subject: General Tech | January 6, 2009 - 12:17 PM | Jeremy Hellstrom
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AMD isn't interested in competing directly with the Atom, instead they seem to want to marginalize it.  Atom has taken a bit of a beating due to it's lack of support for high quality video, though on tiny screens it could be argued that high definition is not a real possibility.  Their new low power processor will be the Neo and according to the specs you can see on The Inquirer, an HDMI output handling 1080p is within the Neo's power.  It should also be significantly faster

NVIDIA GT212 details hint at 384 SPs

Subject: Graphics Cards | January 5, 2009 - 03:51 PM | Ryan Shrout
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A post over at Expreview is indicating they have source spilling some proverbial beans about the upcoming NVIDIA GT212 GPU update due in mid-2009.  Here's the table of interest:

XFX cards with ATI Radeon inside start to show up

Subject: Graphics Cards | January 5, 2009 - 03:40 PM | Ryan Shrout
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XFX sent out a PR email blast letting the whole world know that the XFX Radeon HD 4000 series of graphics are official and should be available any day now.  The company has its Radeon products website up and running at has quite a few new cards on the table including:

New Verbatim drives will offer four connection options

Subject: Storage | January 4, 2009 - 01:58 PM | Ryan Shrout
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I have always been a fan of options, especially when it comes to computers and computing in general.  We were big fans of the X58 chipset because it now allows us to CHOOSE between SLI and CrossFire on the same motherboard.  I really liked some OCZ SSD hard drives as they had both SATA connections and USB connections allowing you to use them internally or as external drives.  This new Verbatim hard drive takes it another step further by offering FOUR connectio