Daily Reviews Summary 12/16/07

The last few months were very uncomfortable and stressing for AMD. It seems the $5.4 billion dollar merger with ATI did not do any good for now. Even worse, the current products are inferior to the competition in terms of performance. Because we can't do a damn thing about it we have to watch and monitor what happens next. This particular transaction made a lot of strategical and operational changes to the company. Many wonderfully performing engineers were let go or simply moved elsewhere which in my opinion created chaos and distraction in the departments. Whatever positive things AMD says about the merger and the wonderful products they are just trying not to scare away the investors and potential OEM customers.

Pardon the above prologue, but it's necessary to explain why AMD products fall behind NVIDIA and Intel -- and that's across all levels. Price wise however, AMD gets the kudos and that's certainly an important factor for a lot of customers. Again, AMD needs to calm down, take a few chill pills and let ATI do what they do best -- Graphics Processing Units. The coordination between both companies is as important as their isolated actions.

Before we proceed, check out what Björn cooked for you while being in Warsaw.

Going back to reality, I have another graphic card for you to check out. It's AMD's second attempt to convince you to their high-end Radeon HD models. The ever wonderful PowerColor aka Tul, shipped a surprise package to my doorstep with the PowerColor HD 3850 512MB Xtreme inside. I would like to apologize to Raymen and you guys for not releasing the article as planned, but Leadtek WinFast PX8600 GT SLI article had been in the works.

Perhaps the best addition is the GPS, which allows you to have turn by turn navigation. This is a wonderful improvement over using Google Maps, and is a much more portable and cheaper alternative to an in-car satellite navigation system. Although, you will have to spring for the $9.99 monthly subscription to use this service.

Not everyone needs a monstrous 750W+ power supply unit for their everyday home or office PC, but most people would pay for a little extra in order to own a low power, high quality unit. Silverstone hope to address this with the release of the ST35F. The ST35F has a maximum power output of only 350W, more than enough for an average home or office PC which is not designed for heavy gaming or overclocking. Let us have a closer look at it and see if it's worthy of the extra money over an OEM unit.

The new Logitech G15 features black keys, a gunmetal border around the keys, and a black border around the rest of the keyboard. What I noticed right off the bat about this new G15 is that the LCD screen isn't a flip-up - it's always visible. I also noted how the media controls are on the side of the LCD display. This new G15, like the older G15, features a full number pad, something I find myself using frequently. You'll also find USB connectors for other peripherals you may have, such as an iPod. There is a mute button and a brightness button that allows you to have your backlight and LCD screen brightness level at either dim, bright, or off. I also noticed that the backspace, enter, and shift keys do not have the letters for their name on them - only arrows depicting their actions.

I've tested Super Talent memory in the past and been pleased. Their latest ProjectX DDR3 PC3-14400 Memory product is really fast with a decent timing of 7-7-7-21. Although this memory timing is still a slow when compared to DDR2, it's great considering the speed. This memory is reliable, stable, compatible and performs well.

Sapphire don't mess with the green camp; they're ATI through and through. This means that they don't just deal with the high end cards though, it also means they cover mid-range and budget cards, even old technologies like AGP. Today we have the 2600 Pro 512mb from Sapphire on an AGP platform. How does it compare to our P4's old favourite, the x1950 Pro? Let's see.

As two different platforms do not treat memory in the same way, let's swap motherboards and user a new test system. In this second part of our DDR2 roundup we continue our stress test with a DFI 680i based board. Find out how different nVidia's 680i chipset clocks your ram in the following review, and see if the latest memory kits can threaten our previous champions.

With new processors and video cards being released in what seems like a weekly cycle, it's easy to forget the other important parts of a computer, namely the peripherals. I've been guilty of using a 5 year old keyboard with a PC that would have been cutting edge just a few months back. Of course there's nothing wrong with that, but there comes a point where an upgrade wouldn't hurt. Today we'll be looking at Microsoft's Wireless Optical Desktop 5000, a keyboard mouse combo that aims to please.

The Logitech V470 is a slick Bluetooth mouse for notebooks, so you can enjoy your wireless freedom on the road. It utilizes two AA batteries as a power source and can be had in either blue or white. The V470 is intended for notebooks with built-in Bluetooth and also comes with a pouch for easy transportation.

Hiper made a name for themselves among modders through the flashy modular “Type R” line of Hiper power supplies (they say the “R” stands for “Racing”). Oh they are pretty, but as Dale Earnhardt Jr. might tell you, pretty paint jobs don’t get you around the track. It’s time to take Hiper’s 680 watt Type R Mk. II for a few laps.

Massive external storage is no longer a dream. You can now retain all your favorite shows, movies, games, music, and whatever else on a single hard drive (in most cases) and you can do so without resorting to ramen noodles. Just as important as the hard drive is the external enclosure. What interface to choose? How should it look? How loud is it? What kind of cooling does it provide? Is it portable? Today we'll be taking a look at Eagle Tech's W Series external USB enclosure and attempt to answer all these questions.

During the last few months of using this monitor, it has truly been a luxury - 22 inches of viewing area, brilliantly vibrant color and ultra crisp images, what is there not to love? Answer, not much besides the limited tilt capabilities, the SyncMaster 2232GW is a solid monitor. Overall, the SyncMaster 2232GW is a beautifully designed monitor which is capable of delivering top notch graphics and all at a reasonable price.

I mean, what is a power supply? A rectangular box with electrical stuff in it and wires coming from it (I do understand what the stuff inside does, but I know that most don't). The box may be steel or aluminum; painted, plated, or anodized. The wires may be sleeved or not, modular or not. There will be a fan or two, they may have LEDs, or not. I guess that's why I found it rather refreshing to review the Sigma Shark. No, it isn't some kind of radical departure from the basic power supply, but it is a little different.

Card readers are pretty handy these days. With everything that requir es or uses memory sticks, flash drives, and SD cards now-a-days, toting around a card reader can be helpful for getting tasks accomplished in our busy lives.

If you want the audio fidelity of the Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Elite Pro but with a price tag below $200, then you absolutely must take a look at the Auzen X-Fi Prelude 7.1 sound card.

Designed and built by Auzentech around the Creative X-Fi audio processor, the Auzen X-Fi Prelude 7.1 is chock-full of quality opamps and even 64MB of onboard X-RAM. This is definitely a sound card made for audiophiles who want to game as well.

OCZ Technology has become the worldwide leader as a maker of performance ram, or any ram for that matter. If you want your system running at peak performance and the best that it can be then you have to have OCZ ram in there.

They've sent me over their 2gig kit of PC2-6400 SLI-Ready ram, not only does it look really cool with the black heatspreaders and the Nvidia SLI logo in the center, it out performs top quality ram running at PC2-8500 speeds easily. This ram from OCZ also features an EPP mode that allows you to run at timings of 4-4-4-15 @ 1T, and I also found that it easily hits the 1100Mhz mark while overclocking. So read on to check it out, I've got tons of tests and benchmarks running under Windows Vista and XP...

Today we'll be looking at our second external HDD enclosure from Eagle Tech. The M Series differs from the W series in two ways. First, it only supports SATA drives. Second, it offers both a USB2.0 and an eSATA interface. It also features a very innovative method of installation, the first we've seen of its kind. How does it perform? Let's find out.