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Here a roundup of today's reviews and articles:

AMD CPUs Immune to SPOILER Vulnerability: Company Statement
ASUS ROG STRIX RTX 2070 O8G GAMING Review
ASUS Zenith Extreme Alpha (AMD X399) Motherboard Review
Atari VCS Gets a Spec Boost
Cooler Master SK630 Low Profile Keyboard Review
Enermax LIQTECH II 360 White CPU Cooler Review
FiiO M6 Portable High Resolution Music Player Review
ID-Cooling Auraflow X 240 Review
MSI GeForce GTX 1660 GAMING X & VENTUS XS Review
OneDrive shortcut in Windows 10 explore won't go away
Patriot Viper Steel DDR4-3866 Review
Patriot Viper VPN100 M.2 PCIe NVMe SSD Review
Plugable USBC-NVMe SSD Enclosure Review
Thermaltake Water 3.0 360 ARGB Sync Review
Tom Clancy The Division 2 Performance Preview
Tom Clancy’s The Division 2: PC Review
Zowie Divina S Series Review



AMD CPUs Immune to SPOILER Vulnerability: Company Statement

SPOILER, short for Speculative Load Hazards Boost Rowhammer and Cache Attacks (not sure how that abbreviates), is the latest in the long line of security vulnerabilities preying on imperfections in speculative-execution capabilities of modern processors, which surfaced early March, and affects all Intel processors. The vulnerability exploits the speculative nature of loading data from main memory to a CPU register. Intel has yet to assign a CVE to SPOILER, and hasn't yet released its own documentation on possible mitigation.

Meanwhile, rival AMD put out a statement that its processors are inherently immune to SPOILER due to a fundamentally different memory management design. "We are aware of the report of a new security exploit called SPOILER which can gain access to partial address information during load operations. We believe that our products are not susceptible to this issue because of our unique processor architecture. The SPOILER exploit can gain access to partial address information above address bit 11 during load operations. We believe that our products are not susceptible to this issue because AMD processors do not use partial address matches above address bit 11 when resolving load conflicts," the company writes in its statement.

Read full article @ techPowerUp

ASUS ROG STRIX RTX 2070 O8G GAMING Review

The ASUS ROG STRIX RTX 2070 O8G GAMING offers up a good balance of performance and features. The question is, at the $600 price point, does it actually provide the best gameplay experience when you compare it with an AMD Radeon RX Vega 64 We put these two video cards head to head in this evaluation.

Read full article @ HardOCP

ASUS Zenith Extreme Alpha (AMD X399) Motherboard Review

Today we take a look at ASUS's new Flagship for the AMD X399 chipset, the Zenith Extreme Alpha. You might have seen our review of the Zenith Extreme before, but this new motherboard is designed to go above and beyond in regards to its VRMs and features.

You might have seen our review of the Zenith Extreme before, but this new motherboard is designed to go above and beyond in regards to its VRMs and features. Let's see how this new motherboard delivers.

Read full article @ TweakTown

Atari VCS Gets a Spec Boost

The nostalgic Atari VCS console has been delayed yet again, but at least this time you’re getting more for your money. The creators have pushed backthe system’s launch to the end of 2019 in return for an upgrade to an as yet unannounced embedded AMD Ryzen chip, complete with Vega-based graphics. It’ll offer more power for games, of course, but it’ll also pull off feats you might not expect in a retro box, like native 4K video playback and support for protected streaming video services like Netflix.

Read full article @ FunkyKit

Cooler Master SK630 Low Profile Keyboard Review

I’ve always been a fan of low-profile keyboards, especially when it comes to looking amazing on my desk. The problem with low-profile keyboards has always been that they were not made all that great and that they lacked mechanical key switches. Enter the Cooler Master SK630, which is a tenkeyless low-profile keyboard that takes the classic slim, minimal design of popular chiclet keyboards and injects it with premium components and style we know Cooler Master for. This includes Cherry MX low-profile key switches, a beautiful aluminum top plate, a floating key design, and of course RGB lighting. Could this be the quality low-profile keyboard you’ve been searching for? Read on as we find out!

Read full article @ ThinkComputers.org

Enermax LIQTECH II 360 White CPU Cooler Review

Today we will present one of the latest Enermax liquid cooling solutions – LIQTECH II 360 which is in the special, white edition.The LIQTECH II is already a well-known series but we had no chance to review this cooler with a 360mm radiator so it’s time to take a closer look at this version.

I’m sure that the LIQTECH II will perform well as other Enermax coolers so the only question is how well does it perform and if it’s worth to pay more for a version with 360mm radiator over 240 or 280mm models. I hope this review will answer this question.

Let’s not make this introduction any longer as there are more interesting things to see in this article. After some technical details, you will be able to see how the cooler looks in a white themed PC case.

Read full article @ FunkyKit

FiiO M6 Portable High Resolution Music Player Review

Although not quite on par in audio performance with the M7 the brand new M6 Portable Hi-Res Music Player by FiiO comes very close, is more compact, features WiFi connectivity and is priced rather aggressively.

Read full article @ NikKTech

ID-Cooling Auraflow X 240 Review

ID-Cooling seeks to dominate the competition with their latest and greatest all-in-one liquid cooler, the Auraflow X 240. This RGB LED-equipped offering not only delivers solid performance, but also manages to deliver best in class value when looking at RGB-equipped liquid coolers.

Read full article @ TechPowerUp

MSI GeForce GTX 1660 GAMING X & VENTUS XS Review

NVIDIA has been on a GeForce graphics card release spree, where this year we've already been introduced to the GeForce RTX 2060 and then weeks later the GeForce GTX 1660 Ti was released. Fast forward another few weeks and we have the GeForce GTX 1660, which is a cut down version of the GTX 1660 Ti and has some interesting changes to get its price point down to sub $250.

I normally have day one reviews of major graphics card releases but my sample turned up at around 4PM my time and the review was due a few hours after that. Today is a new day, filled with writing and benchmarking the MSI GeForce GTX 1660 in both GAMING X and VENTUS XS variants, in a few different resolutions.

Read full article @ TweakTown

OneDrive shortcut in Windows 10 explore won't go away

One love, one drive. OneDrive? Yup, here's a tutorial showing how to remove the OneDrive shortcut from Windows Explorer in Windows 10, with several methods covering registry change, export, deletion and merge of necessary keys. All your files are belong to us. Take a look.

Read full article @ Dedoimedo

Patriot Viper Steel DDR4-3866 Review

Looking at the hardware industry over the last few years, it?s fair to say we've become a bit RGB obsessed. What really matters for a gaming PC isn't fancy lights, however, it's performance. Pure, unbridled speed. Today, we're looking at a new memory kit from Patriot, one of the longest standing companies in the business, that aims to provide exactly that. This is our review of the Patriot Viper Steel DDR4-3866 Extreme Performance Memory kit.

Read full article @ MMORPG

Patriot Viper VPN100 M.2 PCIe NVMe SSD Review

Patriot Viper VPN100 M.2 PCIe NVMe SSD Review SSDs arent all equal and Patriot surely proves that with their VPN100 M.2 NVMe SSD. Today Im taking exactly this drive with a 1TB capacity and put it under the microscope to check how well it performs.

Read full article @ eTeknix

Plugable USBC-NVMe SSD Enclosure Review

Plugable's USBC-NVMe enclosure lets you slap in a M.2 SSD for fast, portable storage.

Read full article @ Tom's Hardware

Thermaltake Water 3.0 360 ARGB Sync Review

It's a tricked out 360mm AIO with impressive ARGB lighting, but is it worth the £158.99 asking price? There’s a lot to unpack from the name of the Thermaltake Water 3.0 360 ARGB Sync. The ‘360’ obviously refers to its 360mm radiator, and we know ARGB = Addressable RGB lighting. The ‘Sync’ aspect references software compatibility for the Water 3.0 360 with current motherboards, and it’s great to see that the cooler supports ASUS Aura Sync, GIGABYTE RGB Fusion, MSI Mystic Light Sync, and AsRock Polychrome software.

Priced at £158.99, this is not the cheapest liquid cooler we’ve ever seen – there are a few 360mm AIO coolers on the market for a little less, with some closer to the £110 mark. That being said, it will be interesting to see how the additional £50 is justified, whether it is with features or sheer performance.

Read full article @ KitGuru

Tom Clancy The Division 2 Performance Preview

Tom Clancy’s The Division 2 launched over the weekend and weve been testing it out over the past couple of days with a collection of currently-available graphics cards. Of interest to AMD fans, this game joins the ranks of those well optimized for Radeon graphics, and with a new driver (Radeon Software Adrenalin 2019 Edition 19.3.2) released over the weekend it was a good time to run some benchmarks and see how some AMD and NVIDIA hardware stack up.

The Division 2 offers DirectX 11 and 12 support, and uses Ubisofts Snowdrop engine to provide some impressive visuals, particularly at the highest detail settings. We found the "ultra" preset to be quite attainable with very playable frame rates from most midrange-and-above hardware even at 2560x1440, though bear in mind that this game uses quite a bit of video memory. We hit a performance ceiling at 4GB with the "ultra" preset even at 1080p, so we opted for 6GB+ graphics cards for our final testing. And while most of our testing was done at 1440p we did test a selection of cards at 1080p and 4K, just to provide a look at how the GPUs on test scaled when facing different workloads.

Read full article @ PC Perspective

Tom Clancy’s The Division 2: PC Review

Ubisoft may have learned from it’s past mistakes. It is sad to see developers ignoring past failures when they have so many reference points to look back on. The original Division launched in a broken state, Destiny has taken years to find itself, and most recently Anthem’s failures at launch meant its sales figures have been abysmal. My expectations for these so-called live games-as-a-service franchises have been set so low that I went into this review expecting the worst. It bodes well that the developers of this franchise have been updating The Division 1 since launch, and in its current state it is quite impressive. The Division 2 also has some of the same bugs and issues that the original game had, but this time, the developer actually listened and took feedback from the Beta players.

Developed by Massive and Ubisoft, Tom Clancy’s The Division 2 is one of the most technically sound and fun experiences at launch that I have experienced in a long time. I feel thankful for receiving a complete game instead of yet another broken “it will be fixed” type of game. A developer who has obviously listened to the fans and learned from its past mistakes has created a great world to be in, but it’s not without its hiccups – and lootboxes.

Read full article @ BabelTechReviews

Zowie Divina S Series Review

Zowie is often considered one of the best peripheral makers across the globe. They certainly know how to create fantastic shapes, so pretty much everyone can find a comfortable Zowie mouse. The Divina S series mice feature a symmetrical design, PMW3360 top optical sensor, and a lightweight shell optimized for eSports-level performance.

Read full article @ TechPowerUp