News archives from September, 2004

Gaming has been getting more popular over the past few years and should continue to do so into the future. With games looking better and needing more computing power to run high end hardware is normally needed. To accompany all of this expensive hardware peripheral companies have been putting a lot of time and effort into R&D to design better keyboards, mice, and other input devices. With these precision mice that use advanced optical engines comes the need for better mousepads.

Some people have claimed that once you get the bios flashing, the 6800 can open up the extra pipelines. These claims, it turns out, are true but the results are certainly not optimal. At best, when the process is successful you ll achieve 16 pipelines, but the driver would still be indicated as a mere 6800. Here, however, I will show you a much superior method. I will demonstrate that even a 6800LE, which has only eight pipelines, can be readily transformed into a full-fledged 6800Ultra.

Heatpipes have been the recent trend among heatsinks and Thermalright is no exception. The popular SP-94 and SP-97 both use heatpipe technology and have been top performers in their respective classes for a while now. Thermalright seems to have hit a size/weight limit with their copper heatsinks and have introduced a few aluminum products. They started with the ALX-800, which is like an aluminum version of the SLK-800. Then they released their first northbridge heatsink fan, the NB-1, which was also aluminum. Their latest releases, the XP-120 and XP-90, use heatpipe technology and the advantages of aluminum to differentiate themselves from the rest of the crowd.

If you re searching for the best mouse surface out there you won t be disappointed with the Razer eXact Mat. It s a large area to move your mouse on, it s constructed of anodized aluminum, it has very good rubber grips to anchor it down to your desk, and it s much easier to change sides than the fUnc 1030 because you just flip the whole mat. The mouse glides over both sides exceptionally, especially if your mouse has Teflon feet. The pad feels solid and natural, and the aluminum trim does not bother your hand or wrist at all...

After finishing all of the testing and looking back on everything I am quite impressed with this memory. Though I was able to run the memory at the specified speed with little to no problems I wouldn''t say that everything went according to plan. I was not able to get Comanche 4 to successfully complete even with my DDR voltage maxed out. I do feel that part of the problem in the overall equation was the motherboard being maxed out. I don''t think that my processor had anything to do with the problems since I was using an engineering sample and was able to lower the multiplier. So with all of these things being taken into consideration I would say this memory stands up pretty well. It would have been nice to be able to run the memory with latencies of 2-2-2-5 at DDR400 however since their specifications say nothing about this I won''t knock it too much. So I guess my one sentence summary of the memory would be as follows: If you have an overclockable Intel motherboard and processor and want to get your memory to 250MHz or faster this PC4000 from GeIL should do the job.

The concept of water cooling had always been regarded as hardcore in the overclocking scene. The installation of a radiator, water block, reservoir and a pump was never an easy task to do. This leaves many overclocking enthusiasts having to be content with air cooling. The product that we took a look at in this review will definitely change the way you perceive water cooling. Introducing the Poseidon (model WCL-03 120Cu) Liquid Cooler series made by a new company named 3R Systems. Without further ado, let us take a look at the water cooling unit that might (who knows?) eventually up in your rig.

From DDR400 to DDR530, OCZ s EL rev2 pc3200 displayed consistent speeds, which is astounding for memory that claims to be a humble DDR400. In other words, the ram is truly a Jack of all trades. With a superior overclocking rate, OCZ s EL PC-3200 has truly impressed me. It is not often that you ll see a ram that can run at Cas2, 3-3-5, moreover at high frequencies such as PC4400.

This motherboard has a lot of connections on the back of it. Aside from the PS/2, serial, parallel ports which are common to most motherboards there is also onboard video, 7.1 audio, gigabit NIC, 10/100 NIC, and four USB 2.0. Onboard video is nice for lower end systems which will save some people money on buying a separate video card. The socket is one of the biggest changes that comes with the new LGA775 standard. There are now shorter capacitors around the socket and four holes for mounting the heatsink.

TwistedMods has the honor of introducing Dremel s NEWEST Product to the world and making three lucky winners some of the first to own one (before it even hits the shelves)! Dremel s newest tool in the corded rotary tool lineup is the Dremel 400 series XPR. We have exclusive information here at TwistedMods that Dremel has let us share with you as the modding community.

These days, there are various makes of power supplies in the market but most of them have better looks than performance. Moreover if you are planning to get the latest 925x motherboard, you ll certainly need a good PSU that supports ATX 12 V2.0 that has a 24-pin ATX power connector. With the birth of the Blue Storm, FSP Group defines the norm by combining both performance and looks with their new power supply unit (PSU). We took a look at their latest flagship, the Blue Storm 400W PSU in this review.

But what impresses me most was how much he spent to produce this masterpiece. Jun claims the cost for making this mod was a mere $50 dollars. Ok, just to clarify how cheap that is You can t get decent seats at a Vanilla Ice concert for $50!!! Best of all, it was his first attempt ever at modding a system!!! Isn''t that nice? This mod is an illustration of how modding can be such a surprise. Regardless of experience, you could come out with something that is attractive, affordable, and even professional.

Overall, the S&S mouse pad looks very simple because the pad is entirely black and the only other visual attraction is the tiny logo of Steelpad at the bottom left corner. The mouse pad is made of plastic with a rubberized base that is compatible with all type of mice including optical and ball mice. The bottom of the S&S mouse pad is shiny with some randomly spread rubber on it. The function of the randomly spread rubber is to secure the pad firmly on the desk surface which I might add, it did very nicely. The purpose of the design is to improve the mouse pad surface area for higher accuracy and responsiveness to your mouse movements.

Installing a number of case fans and exhaust fans in a rig is a common method to bring in cool air and exhaust out warm air. But the cool air that fans bring into the case is influenced by and dependent on the ambient temperature outside the case. If your ambient temperature is high, the air that gets into your rig will be hot. You certainly do not want hot air getting into your rig as the air also affects the temperature of your hardware, including your processor. Well there''s good news for everyone without an air-conditioned room to locate your rig, a company called Waffer Technology tries to cool the situation by introducing the concept of PC Air Conditioning.

This is one heavy hunk o metal! This is basically an SLK800 with more flexible mounting hardware, which include additional clips, standoffs and screws. Previous models depended on fastening the product to the plastic ZIF socket, putting a tremendous amount of stress on plastic pieces that sometimes would break off. The new mounting method is much more involved but is also much more secure and stable.

Although you cannot see much here by way of a comparison with other water cooled systems the cooling performance has improved and it shows that the Titan TWC-A04 is capable of driving this additional 120cm radiator from the Thermaltake BigWater system.

No.1 in lots of Xbox charts, win this game for your very one Xbox.

TwistedMods has the honor of introducing Dremel s NEWEST Product to the world and making three lucky winners some of the first to own one (before it even hits the shelves)! Dremel s newest tool in the corded rotary tool lineup is the Dremel 400 series XPR. We have exclusive information here at TwistedMods that Dremel has let us share with you as the modding community.

From the Coolermaster website: "The Musketeer clearly displays the fan voltage, the audio sound pressure and the temperature of the thermal sensor. The two front sliders allow users to adjust the fan speed and the dynamics of the sound pressure with no further hassles. Plus, the Musketeer''s Audio Sound Pressure device will simply swing along with sound, just like legacy amplifiers, perfectly corresponding with the spirit of One for All and All for One. Let s find out.

If you''ve ever installed a PC Component in your computer, spent hours sleeving the cables, gotten your PC entirely reassembled, only to find out when you turn on your PC that the part you spent hours working on doesn''t work, then you know what i''m talking about when I say that a tester PSU is a must for anyone who is constantly doing something to the innards of their PC.

Recently Cooler Master has found that one of our competitors has been falsely claiming that their designer was the one originated the design of our renowned Wave Master. Therefore, it is vital for us to clarify such rumor with declaration letter written by Cooler Master Head Quarter. Please visit below link for a closer look at the declaration. Please help us to straighten out the misleading information by posting this news on your sites.

One of the features of the board that is immediately noticeable is that it has a dual DVI. The overall layout is similar to a normal 6800GT but Gainward s 6800GT offers Dual DVI that resembles what you d find with a 6800Ultra card. It is a delightful feature that only Gainward s 6800GT possesses, and it will help users achieve phenomenally high image quality by using two digital TFT-LCD monitors. Note that the reference video GeForce 6800 GT does not comes with dual DVI. This alone makes Gainwards 6800GT very unique. The card also comes with an S-Video port for video and television.

I just want to say in this first sentence of my conclusion that these are the best 2.1 speakers I have ever heard. These speakers performed exceptionally in every testing environment and were more than loud enough for a large living room. The satellites have very good range of highs and mids even without a tweeter built in. The subwoofer is extremely powerful and has a huge punch for a 2.1 setup. I really like the THX-certification, it is great to have this feature to have if you intend on using these speakers for DVD playback. I am very impressed with these speakers and would highly recommend them to anyone searching for a 2.1 setup with a good amount of power...

The most noticeable feature on the silencer cooler is that it expels the heat completely outside the case, which not only helps the graphic card cool but also helps maintain the system s overall low temperature. This review will be short and simple, but it contains all the vital aspects regarding the performance of the new silencer. I have compared it with Gainward s stock cooler as well as the Geforce 6800 cooler. These will be used when trying to compare the performance of the Silencer. I know that some of you are waiting desperately so why wait any longer to discover its secrets?.

Whether you are overclocking, looking for a cool case accessory, or searching for a way to dampen the sound of your case fans, the Digital Doc 5+ will offer a solution to many of your needs. Stay informed with an advanced, eight-channel, temperature sensor system displayed on a blue LCD screen. The Digital Doc 5+ also gives you the ability to control case fan speeds based on a desired set temperature, an alarm to warn you of dangerously high temperatures, and front panel USB 2.0 and firewire connections. If this doesn t sound cool to you, get up off your chair you shouldn t be on a computer. You can see the Digital Doc in a nice plastic package with a slide-out cardboard backing. Not much support for shipping, but the unit mainly contains cables and a light 5.25 drive-bay unit; nothing that can easily be damaged during shipping. Inside was an instruction manual, the display/control unit, a set of eight 3 to 4 pin fan adaptors, eight temperature sensor wires, adhesive strips to attach thermal sensors to hardware, and screws to mount the unit in your drive bay. The versatile Digital Doc 5+ is easily comparable with other top temperature sensor and fan controller units. The Digital Doc 5+ we will be looking at today is black with the blue backlight. Some improvements from the older Digital Doc that I noticed right away includes the new blue LCD display backlight color (instead of the original orange) and the absence of the 40mm HDD cooler fan (now replaced with two USB 2.0 slots and one firewire connection).