Featured Stories
Gigabyte GeForce GTX 650 Ti Boost OC WindForce 2X tested
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 05/21/2013 07:50 AM | 5 comment(s) ]
We have a review on the Gigabyte GeForce GTX 650 Ti Boost OC WindForce 2X, the OC indicates a factory tweak and the Windforce is hinting at a silent yet powerful two fan cooling solution. The product is customized with a new PCB, cooling and a few tweaks, it has 2GB of memory with both that memory and the core base-clock slightly overclocked. An tasty product at an interesting price in the lower segment of the mainstream market.
Read the full article right here.
Current Stories 
Acer launches F-22 Bid Limited Edition Ferrari-Branded monitor
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/03/2008 08:31 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
Acer has teamed up with car manufacturer Ferrari to bring you a limited edition LCD monitor known as F-22Bid- A natively 1680
AMD Phenom X4 9950 BE (Black Edition) processor review [Guru3D]
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/03/2008 08:21 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
A review on the Phenom X4 9950 BE processor. The BE editions in essence are the 'regular' processor, yet they passed quality and analysis for better overclocking performance and have their multiplier unlocked. This obviously is the product we'll be testing today. We'll conduct our test in two ways though, first off we'll check baseline performance just like the regular Phenom X4 9950 and then start an overclocking session. Throughout our benchmarks we'll show you the results on both that baseline and overclocked performance with all benchmarks.
This is AMDs is the cream of the crop processor of the quad-core product line, it runs at 2600 MHz on all four cores with a multiplier of 13. But really, it doesn't mind clocks over 3000 MHz either. And that's what we'll show you in today's article.
You can read this Guru3D article here.
Download: Realtek HD Audio 2.05 driver
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/03/2008 07:47 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
The new Realtek HD Audio 2.05 driver is available for download.
Realtek HD Audio Driver supports all of Realtek HD Audio Codec in Vista/WinXP/Win2000/Win2003 .
- Vista WHQL Supporting: ALC882, ALC883, ALC885, ALC888, ALC889, ALC861VD, ALC660, ALC662, ALC663, ALC260, ALC262,ALC267, ALC268, ALC269, ALC272, ALC273, ALC887
- Windows 2000/XP WHQL Supporting: ALC880, ALC882, ALC883, ALC885, ALC888, ALC889, ALC861VC, ALC861VD, ALC660, ALC662, ALC663, ALC260, ALC262, ALC267,ALC268, ALC269, ALC272, ALC273, ALC887
- HDMI Device WHQL Support: ATI HDMI Devices
- OS Supporting: Microsoft WindowsXP, Widnows2000, Vista x86/x64
- Pack with Microsoft High Definition Audio UAAV1.0a(5013)
Add/Fix
- Driver:
- Customizations.
- Meet Microsoft OEM Ready program requirements.
- Package: Meet Microsoft OEM Ready program requirements.
Due to the UBER slow servers from Realtek we made a package containg both the XP and Vista drivers, recompressed for a real small download size.
Download - Click here.
Download: SmartFPS v1.9 benchmark
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/03/2008 05:59 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
SmartFPS.com is a free software to benchmark latest videocards and processors by real world games like Crysis, Crysis Warhead, Unreal Tournament 3, Call Of Duty 2, Battlefield 2, Serious Sam 2, Call Of Juarez, Quake 4, Prey, The Chronicles of Riddick: EFBB and Enemy Territory: Quake Wars.
Just download demo versions of these games for free and click one general button in SmartFPS.com. After benchmark process you are receiving quality performance results in AvgFPS (average number of frames per second) for your PC components like GPU, CPU, RAM and Mainboard.
Download - click here
Download: GeForce ForceWare 178.15 Vista 32|64-bit
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/03/2008 02:47 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
This driver originates from NVIDIA's developer zone. There's not much info on it other than it's a small update over the recently released WHQL driver.
We have a discussion/feedback thread open on these drivers right here.
A bucket load of GeForce graphics cards are supported though.
Download:
GeForce ForceWare 178.15 Vista 64-bit
GeForce ForceWare 178.15 Vista 32-bit
AMD to release 45nm Shanghai this year
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/02/2008 10:20 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
Word on the street is saying that AMD is on schedule with its release schedule of their new 45nm processors. In fact the first samples of their 45nm Shanghai based server processors already have been shipped to OEM customers. Servers based on this CPU will be available this year as originally planned.
The AMD processor under codename Shanghai is designed to compete against the Intel Nehalem processor, especially in the volume two-socket server market.
AMD is not afraid of a new mistake like we've seen with the Barcelona TBL bug and assured that after mess, the validation process was heavily increased to prevent something like that from happening again. The 45nm Shanghai processor has as stated a very small 45nm fab processes. As a result there should be a 35% performance advantage over the last gen 65nm Barcelona processors. AMD will not yet release info on clock-frequencies but claims the chip has 6Mb cache on board and a very friendly TDP of 75 Watt. AMd slipped that they'll also make a low TDP 55W version, yet also 105W SKUs for the brute real force.
Since this is the groundwork for their upcoming desktop 45nm processors, we'll follow it closely.
AMD shows Mobility Radeon HD 4000 chip
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/02/2008 10:07 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
AMD is hinting at new technology show by showing a pre-production version of a Mobility Radeon HD 4000 chipset. Although AMD has yet to publicly discuss the hardware, the company's booth at the Japanese expo contains a clearly identified test bed with the notebook-oriented chipset demonstrating its full hardware Blu-ray video decoding.
The demo unit has a large expansion card and a desktop-class cooler but is believed to be using these only for simplicity's sake in the development phase. Most production notebooks often use custom-designed cooling and embedded graphics that are impractical outside of complete systems.
AMD is believed to be launching the first Mobility Radeon HD 4000 chipsets later this year with basic, mid-range and high-end versions that mirror their equivalents in the current 3000 series.


WD ships next-gen GreenPower Caviar HDD
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/02/2008 10:02 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
Western Digital has new GreenPower Caviar hard drives with higher-density platters and larger caches. The upgrades use a smarter seek algorithm and aggressive caching to drop power use by about 20 percent versus the company's regular hard disks. This next update is also about 10 percent faster than earlier Green drives, according to the company's claims, and uses new storage that carries as much as 333GB per platter on the drive as well as 32MB of cache for every model. The new HDDs are more power efficient and faster as well. The 1TB second-gen Caviar Green retails for around $219 but you can also get it in 500GB, 640GB and 750GB capacities.
WD says its new Caviar Green 1TB hard drive has 333GB platters and 32MB of cache, compared to a respective 250GB and 16MB for the old model. Those tweaks reportedly reduce power draw by up to 20% and increase performance by up to 10%. Considering the original remains the most power-efficient 3.5" terabyte hard drive, a 20% drop in power consumption sounds like a big achievement.
With that said, we should point out several caveats. The Caviar Green series uses lower spindle speeds than typical 7,200-RPM drives, which reduces performance. Also, the company's 300GB, 10,000-RPM VelociRaptor actually draws significantly less power than the current terabyte Caviar Green, probably because it's a 2.5" drive in a 3.5" sled.

Acer Predator Gaming PC now available
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/02/2008 10:00 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
Hot, Futuristic Design
A powerful showcase of Acer
Transcend debuts new SSDs
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/02/2008 09:58 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
DigiTimes reports Transcend unveiled new 2.5" solid state disks with a read speed of 159MB/s and write speed of 136MB/s.
Transcend's new notebook form-factor 2.5-inch SATA-II and IDE interface SSDs are both equipped with a tough but lightweight case, capacity up to 64GB, high reliability, low power consumption and resistance to shock and vibration.
Featuring a powerful new controller, Transcend's SSDs far outpace standard 2.5" hard drives, delivering exceptional sustained read/write speeds of up to 159MB/136MB combined with latencies below 1ms. In addition, Transcend's SSDs have built-in ECC (Error Correction Code) that ensures highly reliable data transfer and increases overall system integrity. No word on prices just yet.
EA cancels Tiberium
Contributed by: Sash on: 10/02/2008 01:43 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
Kotaku obtained a copy of the internal memo sent to staff earlier today outlining the reasons why the game was axed. In the memo Mike Verdu, of EA LA, says that the game would not be able to get up to snuff given the amount of time and resources left in the production cycle.
The memo goes on to state that several people on the team had to be released.
" We will make every effort to place affected individuals on projects within the studio
EA cancels Tiberium
Pete Hines on Fallout 3 PC DRM protection
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/01/2008 01:27 PM | 0 comment(s) ]
It's the most controversial topic of this gaming year as far as Guru3D is concerned, and I'm glad it receives so much attention as game-developers really do need get more aware of how we (the gamers and people that actually spend money on purchasing that product) look at this forcefully installation or root-kit viral like software.
Here's a much better example of developer awareness. Over at ShackNews they conducted an interview with Bethesda's Pete Hines as he talks about a big title to be released soon, Fallout 3 PC. What kind of DRM will be included on the Fallout 3 disc? Will the PC version suffer from console interface holdovers a la Oblivion? Is the company optimistic about supporting the PC platform in the future? Here's an excerpt:
Similar question in the sense that it's an issue that can be overblown. What kind of copy protection will be included on the PC version of Fallout 3?
Pete Hines: Pretty similar to what we did for Oblivion, which was--we basically don't do any--we do the mildest form possible. I actually don't know if I even want to get into what it is that we exactly do, but we try to be really noninvasive when it comes to that stuff. [ed- Oblivion employed a simple DVD check.] And it is a pain in the ass--it is a pain in the ass that we have to do it at all in the first place. But when you spend tens of millions of dollars, we don't think it's right to just put something out there and let everybody do whatever they want and pass it around. And to have to support all of that--which is often the unspoken thing that nobody really wants to point to. You can argue all day whether or not somebody would have bought a copy of a game they pirated, but you can't argue, and you will never win the argument that I'm not having to provide tech support for those folks. Because I know for a fact that we are. We catch those folks all the time, where we're providing support for somebody who turns out didn't actually pay for the game and just downloaded a copy.
Did you put a lot of work into optimizing the PC version, and accounting for people with older machines?
Pete Hines: Yeah, we've been working with folks like Nvidia and having them do compat testing and optimization stuff, and looking at how the game plays on Nvidia cards. We've been doing some stuff with Alienware, specifically testing on different configurations of their machines. So we are trying to do our due diligence on the PC and make sure it runs as advertising. But the problem on the PC, it's just not--you have a 360, you have the same thing that everyone else has. When you talk about a PC, how much RAM you have, do you have the right video card driver, the right sound card drivers, are you running all kinds of applications in the background that are eating up memory or trying to interrupt the process of the game and makes the game crash--you don't have any of those problems on the 360 or PS3. So we try as much as we can for account for everything that we can account for, but the killer is all the variables you have no control over. I don't even know if I have the right drivers for anything on my home PC. It's something that you have to spend a bit more effort as a consumer.

ECS Elitegroup A790GXM-A mainboard review [Guru3D]
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/01/2008 11:28 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
Today we test a new AMD 790GX based mainboard from ECS Elitegroup. ECS is trying get a little more reach in the enthusiast market, I wasn't surprised to see them release the product as shown today.
A mainboard in the sub 140 USD range, yet ECS style - with a bucket load of features like integrated graphics, HDMI connector, passive cooling, 8-channel sound, dual GigE Ethernet, Crossfire ready ... and decent tweakability.
Overall for the money these motherboards is just very interesting, and the performance and power-consumption, really amazing.
Click here to read this review.
EVGA released nForce 790i SLI FTW Digital PWM
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/01/2008 10:42 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
EVGA took the original overclockers dream; The EVGA 790i SLI FTW; and made it even more extreme with the addition of Digital Power Management (Digital PWM - Pulse Width Modulation), improving upon the voltage stability and efficiency. I
n addition, the EVGA 790i SLI FTW Digital PWM includes solid state capacitors, an 8-Phase Power design, on-board all ferrite core chokes, an enhanced enthusiast BIOS, Vdroop control and much more.
According to EVGA this boils down to:
- Improved voltage stability.
- Improved voltage efficiency.
- And most importantly, improved overclockability!
- Innovative chipset fan design directs airflow away from the graphics card.
- Reach extreme overclocking speeds supporting 1600MHz FSB and beyond.
- 8 phase power design for superb stability and performance.
- Solid state capacitors and ferrite core chokes allow for better overclocking and stability.
- Convenient layout with on-board Clear CMOS, Power, and Reset buttons.
- Friendly system BIOS features with easy to use overclock and voltage settings.
- Extreme DDR3 speeds of 2000MHz and beyond
- NVIDIA SLI certified
- Intel socket 775
- 45nm CPU ready (Yorkfield & Wolfdale)
- 8 Phase power design
- PCI Express 2.0 support
- 2-Way and 3-Way SLI support
- 9 SATA-2 ports with support for RAID 0, 1, 0+1, 5, JBOD
- On-board buttons for CMOS/Power/Reset
- HD Audio - 7.1 Channel
Super Talent 128GB SSD breaks Sub $300 barrier
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/01/2008 10:35 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
What $300 can get you these days for a dazzling fast hard drive? A 10k RPM 300GB VelociRaptor or you prefer a Solid State Drive with lesser capacity? Super Talent has introduced its most cost-effective pair of SATA-II SSD at affordable prices. The new MasterDrive LX series come in 64 and 128GB sizes and offer 3Gbps interfaces in a 2.5″ drive format.
Both NAND multi-level cell flash based memories are capable of read/write speed up to 100/40 MB/s. It also features Integrated ECC, wear leveling and bad bit management functions to improve the reliability and lifespan of these SSDs. Each unit has an expected MTBF of over 1 million hours. Shipping this week, the 64GB and 128GB model will be offered at $179 and $299 respectively.

Dell intros entry-level monitors, S1901WX and S1709W LCD
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/01/2008 10:32 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
Dell has silently introduced two low end yet very affordable monitors at its online store. Both models feature a new rounded edge design with detachable stand, and 16:10 widescreen resolution of 1440
Panasonic 150-inch plasma TV prototype is HUGE
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/01/2008 10:25 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
You know when you go to the local electronics store and see the biggest TV they offer and think,
TDK claims HDD recording density record
Posted by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 10/01/2008 10:21 AM | 0 comment(s) ]
TDK decided to 'capture the flag' and announced it has achieved a new milestone in surface recording density for hard disk drives thanks to its prototype TMR head. The company achieved the world
