- Details
-
Category: Cooling Hardware
-
Published: Wednesday, 02 July 2014 23:24
It is easy to get carried away with size and bulk in the air cooler market. Many tower coolers have moved on to incorporate 140mm fans into their designs and push the limits on available board real estate around the CPU socket. Still there is a market for value market air-cooling that doesn’t take up space and still gives you competitive performance for your dollar. Recently we took a look at the NH-U12S and today we are back with a smaller cooler offering by Evercool. This four heat pipe 120mm air cooler promises to offer you a cooler processor without the need to hand over your wallet. Join me as we take a look at the Venti and see if this budget cooler is worth your time and money.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: Editorials
-
Published: Monday, 30 June 2014 19:05
Although PC maintenance is always important, especially with the higher end PCs that we run to play today’s games, it is especially important come summer time. Not only are we in the middle of the LAN season but also most importantly with temperatures getting warmer outside the possibility of you overheating your PC becomes more likely. Because of that, I wanted to post up a reminder to everyone to take a little time and do a little PC maintenance. To go with that I decided to put together a small write-up on a few things you should work on when doing your maintenance.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: Other
-
Published: Friday, 27 June 2014 13:58
Although my wife would most likely argue against this, we as gamers don’t always spend all of our time at our PCs. The market for console gaming is huge and DXRacer recognized that and has jumped into the market with chair designed specifically for it. Their new TV Lounge Chair shares a few features with their office chairs but the overall design is drastically different and focused specifically on living room gaming. I took the opportunity to bust out the PlayStation again and put in a little game time in the living room.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: Video Cards
-
Published: Monday, 23 June 2014 16:42
Just as soon as I thought all of the video card introductions from the Nvidia 700 series cards were over Asus tossed out another one. This time it was something a little special, the Striker. The Striker is a GTX 760 but they went a little above and beyond from their standard cards. This is actually a little bit of an unusual launch, typically special cards are limited to the highest end GPUs (like this Mars and Poseidon models), but they did something special with that GPU that more people can afford. Now lets dig in and see how the Striker holds up against the competition.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: Mobile
-
Published: Monday, 16 June 2014 11:39
When I picked up a new laptop this year, I had a strict set of requirements for a new laptop bag. I wanted something that matched the portability of my new Yoga 2 Pro, something that was different from the standard run of the mill bags, and something that fit the laptop perfectly. Surprisingly trying to find a laptop bag that fit an ultrabook was a lot harder than I thought, most manufactures ignore the laptop thickness and just size by the screen size. I did run across a company called WaterField that makes a wide variety of bags, including bags to fit my laptop. Today I’m going to take a look at their VertiGo Travel Bag and a Sleevecase to keep my Yoga 2 Pro nice and safe.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: Video Cards
-
Published: Friday, 13 June 2014 12:23
With all of the Sapphire cards that launched this year the one model that I didn’t get a chance to check out was their Vapor-X cards. They share a lot of the styling of their other cards but Sapphire changed up the cooling design with a vapor chamber sitting between the heatsink and the GPU and PCB to spread out the heat for better cooling. I had to see how it compares to the standard Tri-X cooling as well as the competition, so I got in touch with Sapphire and put their Vapor-X 290 to the test.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: CPU's
-
Published: Tuesday, 10 June 2014 18:59
When it comes to CPUs there are only a few options available when you are looking for the fastest performance. Up until now you could go with a Haswell CPU or if you wanted more cores The Ivy Bridge-E CPUs. AMDs has done well on the integrated GPU side of things but for pure CPU power Intel has been the only way to go. Recently Intel announced their latest refresh with their Devil’s Canyon CPUs. Today I finally have the chance to put the i7-4790k to the test and see what kind of improvement it is over the i7-4770k.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: Input Devices
-
Published: Friday, 06 June 2014 17:07
In the world of keyboards, there is a huge price range depending on what you are looking to get out of the keyboard and the overall quality. With mechanical keyboards, Cooler Master has done a great job of bridging the gap between lower end keyboards and the enthusiast grade keyboards. They have been able to provide options that are priced well, but still have most of the quality and features of the most expensive models. One of the glaring holes in their lineup though has been in the tenkeyless market. Their Quickfire Rapid lineup has been extremely popular, but they haven’t had a model with backlighting. They have finally introduced a model to fill that gap and today I have the chance to take a look at it and see how it performs. Considering the Quickfire Rapid has been in our LAN bag and on our test bench for years now, I have extremely high expectations for the Quickfire Rapid-I.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: PC Cases
-
Published: Wednesday, 04 June 2014 17:36
It’s fairly rare these days that a new company jumps into the case market. We have seen it in recent years from Corsair for example, but for the most part, it is a rare occurrence. Recently XFX announced that they would be joining the case market. On top of their video cards, XFX has sold power supplies, a mouse pad, and even a monitor stand. I’m excited to check out what they put together as their first case.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: Games
-
Published: Monday, 02 June 2014 17:42
Ever since the fantastic teaser trailer Ubisoft dropped in our laps from seemingly out of nowhere at E3 2012, the world has been waiting to get our collective hands on Watch_Dogs. Seven months removed from the financial and critical success of GTA5, (PC owners are still waiting) Ubisoft has seen fit to finally let us dive into the networked world of Chicago. The time for anticipation is over, join us as we take a look at Ubisoft’s new open world IP and see if all this hype was worth the wait or if we will be found wanting.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: Photography
-
Published: Friday, 30 May 2014 18:59
With the prevalence of Skype and the rise of personal YouTube and TwitchTV channels, the webcam is becoming as necessary as the keyboard and mouse and much like other accessories there is a wide array of options for the user to choose. Today we take a look at the Widecam F100 from Genius which boasts to be the world’s first full HD 1080p ultra wide angle webcam. Boasting many useful features for video conferencing as well as personal use, will the F100 prove itself or simply be just another webcam with just another gimmick? Join me to find out.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: Input Devices
-
Published: Friday, 23 May 2014 19:27
Recently with both my headsets and mice I have been all about the wireless devices. Living wireless is great, the reason a lot of companies hadn’t pushed it in the past was because the technology was costly and had too much lag for gaming. Things have changed and almost everyone has introduced their wireless gaming models, everyone except SteelSeries. Well today, I finally have the chance to take a look at the Sensei Wireless. Their Sensei models have been popular and have even been my go to wireless mouse, I can’t wait to see if the Sensei Wireless lives up to the high expectations that the wired models set.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: Input Devices
-
Published: Wednesday, 21 May 2014 20:47
A good portion of Logitech’s most recent product introductions have really just been refreshes of old products. The G602 wireless mouse was really the only fully new design to come from Logitech in a few years up until very recently. Not too long before I went on vacation Logitech introduced their newest mouse the G502 Proteus Core. Not only is the G502 a completely new product, but it is also the only Logitech Gaming product to also include a name beyond their standard G naming scheme. That must mean that the G502 is something special to them and they really wanted it to stand out. Today I am going to take a look at the G502 Proteus Core to see what it’s all about and find out if it is worth getting excited about, let’s dig in.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: Mobile
-
Published: Monday, 19 May 2014 20:15
Both my wife and I have been putting our Nexus 7’s to a lot of use for a few years now. They have been used for reading, gaming, redditing, facebooking, finding dinner while traveling, as a GPS, countless other things, and most importantly they have both been used to end debates about who is right or wrong almost daily. Of all of the devices that we have they rarely get left behind when traveling or when we are out and about. We opted to wait when we saw the Nexus 7 2013 simply because replacing both devices can add up a little when you add in new cases, screen covers, ect. Just before heading out for our vacation this summer Verizon Wireless offered to send a new 2013 Nexus 7 with LTE over for us to toy with. Today I will talk a little about how it compares to our older Nexus 7 and how well it worked out while on vacation.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: PC Cases
-
Published: Friday, 16 May 2014 18:32
Not every case fits every person’s needs, Cooler Master recognized that and set out to make a case that people can adjust to what they need. Say for example that you want to pack your PC full of water cooling gear or an absolute ton of hard drives. The HAF Stacker can handle that and nearly anything else you might want to do. For CES this year a case modder even turned multiple stackers into a life sized monster. Today I’m going to take a look at the HAF Stacker 935 and 915F, the 935 comes with two models giving us a total of three pieces to try out different options.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: Audio
-
Published: Wednesday, 14 May 2014 23:57
As phones, laptops, and other mobile devices continue to get smaller and smaller we have to compromise in some areas. A great example of this is overall sound quality. When was the last time you were shopping for an ultrabook and even considered what sound card was installed in it. I know when I picked up mine I didn’t give it any thought. Creative Labs recognized this and today is introducing two new mobile Sound Blaster products called the E1 and the E3. Today I have the chance to take a closer look at the E1 and see what it is all about.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: Motherboards
-
Published: Monday, 12 May 2014 15:36
With the Z87 launch, Asus made a few big changes with their mainstream motherboard line, the biggest being the change to the gold color scheme. That change came with a mixed response but the high quality and big feature set that Asus includes on all of their boards they were still very popular. With the Z97 launch, they have stuck with the gold theme but they have softened the color slightly to make it a little less polarizing. Today I will be taking a deeper look at the Z97-A, one of Asus’s mid ranged mainstream boards. I can’t wait to see what they changed for the Z97 launch and to see how the softer gold looks as well.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: Motherboards
-
Published: Sunday, 11 May 2014 17:08
Typically, Intel keeps their chipset launches timed with new CPUs but todays (official) launch of the Z997 chipset does not come with shiny new silicon from Intel. There are rumors of launch days for a Haswell refresh but as of now, there isn’t anything official. Even without new CPUs we can still take a look at the latest in motherboards. To start things off, today I will be taking a look at MSI’s Z97 Gaming 5. With their new naming scheme we can tell right away that this is a gaming motherboard (of course) and the 5 is their entry level full ATX board with a 7 and a 9 that will round out the line. I’m excited to see what has changed and what remained the same!
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: PC Cases
-
Published: Tuesday, 06 May 2014 09:54
Silverstone has been involved in the Mini-ITX gaming market for a long time now. Not only have they had a wide variety of case options, but they have also provided short cabled power supplies and more recently they have been the only manufacture with a good SFX power supply for small form factor gaming. On top of all of this, they have been known to really change things up with unique case designs. Their most recent Raven design would have to be considered unique as well. With a look that reminds me of modern day consoles, I suspect that the Raven RVZ01 could be the perfect case for a Steambox build. Let’s see if that is the case.
Read more ...
- Details
-
Category: PC Cases
-
Published: Friday, 02 May 2014 16:25
Once Fractal designs a case they normally go back through and make sure to design similar models that fit the needs of people who need small, medium, and large sized builds. There isn’t anything worse than finding the perfect case for you then finding out that it’s not going to fit your build. We already have taken a good look at the Arc XL from Fractal, so when the Arc Mini R2 came in the similarities were too hard to ignore. If it’s anything like its much larger brother we will most likely love the Arc Mini R2, but of course we have to take a much closer look to find out more about it.
Read more ...
