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Here today's reviews and articles:

AMD FX-8320E AM3+ Processor Performance Review
ASRock Q2900M Motherboard
CES 2015 Day 1 roundup
Cooler Master Nepton 240M Liquid Cooling System Review
COUGAR 700K Mechanical Gaming Keyboard Review
Create your own Firefox Theme
CyberPowerPC Shows off Radical Fang Trinity System
DeepCool Gamer Storm Lucifer Heatsink Review
Intel Reveals HDMI Compute Stick
Lian Li PC-O5S
Noctua redux and industrialPPC Fan Round-Up
NZXT S340 Review
Phanteks Enthoo Mini XL Review
Plextor M7e M.2 PCIe SSD Performance Numbers From CES 2015
SuperSpeed USB 3.1 Performance
Zotac ZBOX CI320 nano Review: A Fanless Bay Trail-M mini-PC



AMD FX-8320E AM3+ Processor Performance Review

AMD released a slew of new FX-series CPUs in September, 2014, including the FX-8370, FX-8370E, and the subject of our review, the FX-8320E. This is the low end of AMD’s eight-core FX series of enthusiast CPUs, and the “E” suffix marks it as a low-power variant; nonetheless, AMD touts it as a viable CPU for a gaming system. Benchmark Reviews will run this CPU through our gauntlet of tests to see how true this is.
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Read full article @ Benchmark Reviews

ASRock Q2900M Motherboard

The ASRock Q2900M is a microATX motherboard that comes with a Pentium J2900 "Bay Trail-D" quad-core CPU soldered on it. It has one USB 3.0 and two SATA-300 ports, but its highlights are actually its low power consumption and low cost.

Read full article @ Hardware Secrets

CES 2015 Day 1 roundup

CES 2015 has officially begun! That's right, the biggest tech-stravaganza of the year is under way, and if you thought all the big announcements happened yesterday… well, you're wrong. There was more today, and there'll be more tomorrow. This is how CES goes.

Read full article @ Windows Central

Cooler Master Nepton 240M Liquid Cooling System Review

Coolermaster's Nepton 240M self-contained liquid cooling solution closely follows in the footsteps of the impressive Cooler Master Nepton 280L. The Nepton 240M utilizes a 277x120mm aluminum heat exchanger that measures 28mm thick. Attached to the Nepton 240M's radiator are two 120mm PWM 'Silencio FP 120' fans placed side by side. The 'Silencio' is a novel high-pressure fan that spins at 2400RPM-800RPM to drive up to 76CFM at 4.8mmH2O air pressure..

Read full article @ Frostytech.com

COUGAR 700K Mechanical Gaming Keyboard Review

Back in the day the only thing a keyboard manufacturer really had to do in order to have a best-selling model in its hands was to offer one with high durability and in some cases an ergonomic design as its two main selling points (take for example the very successful Natural Keyboard by Microsoft released back in the mid 90's). Today however things have changed a lot and so mainly because of the large increase in competition manufacturers have to offer much more than just good quality with their keyboards in order to attract buyers. The result we all know since the market is currently filled with keyboards featuring strange designs, slim designs, mechanical switches, new generation membrane switches, RGB key lightning, several macro keys, aluminum frames, detachable frames, LCD screens and in some cases even attached fans. Today on our test bench we have the latest flagship mechanical gaming keyboard by our friends over at COUGAR, the 700K.

Read full article @ NikKTech

Create your own Firefox Theme

The Firefox web browser supports two different theme types: so-called Personas or light themes, and complete themes. The main difference between the two is that Personas modify only colors and backgrounds, much like Chrome themes do, while complete themes can modify nearly every element in the interface.

Read full article @ gHacks

CyberPowerPC Shows off Radical Fang Trinity System

CyberPowerPC was showing off one of the coolest systems we have seen in a very long time at CES 2015 this week. They are calling it their Fang Trinity and as you can see from the photos and video below it has quite a radical design, something that we have not seen before! So the Fang Trinity is based off new case design by Deepcool. The case has a compartment type design where different components are stored in different compartments on the case. This design is extremely unique and makes for a very cool looking system. This case is not cheap either the compartments are made of steel had each have a very thick metal cover.
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Read full article @ ThinkComputers.org

DeepCool Gamer Storm Lucifer Heatsink Review

The DeepCool Gamer Storm Lucifer heatsink is a fairly large CPU cooler, very much resembling a passive thermal solution on quick glance due to its boxy footprint and widely spaced aluminum fins. The heatsink isn't a passive cooler though, its single fan is very much required to keep the Lucifer from becoming like its name-sake. The 140mm PWM fan is made by Deepcool with a rubberized frame so it sits comfortably against the aluminum fin stack without any rattling noises.

Read full article @ Frostytech.com

Intel Reveals HDMI Compute Stick

While visiting with Intel at CES 2015 they showed us something that really caught our attention. We all have seen HDMI sticks for streaming content etc, but what about an entire working PC in the form factor of an HDMI stick? Well Intel had a prototype of what they are calling their Intel Compute Stick and it looks very promising. Again only a prototype at this point the Intel Compute Stick will have a quad-core Atom processor, 2GB of RAM and 32GB of storage.
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Read full article @ ThinkComputers.org

Lian Li PC-O5S

Roughly 3 months ago now Lian Li teased fans with an upcoming open air chassis series. The images they provided of the three models showed what looked to be very complete cases. Still Lian Li stressed that this wasn’t the final design and was calling on their supporters to offer any ideas or criticisms they might have.

Now a few months later we have the culmination of all that feedback, with finished versions of the PC-O5(S), PC-06 and PC-07. All three models are based on the same design, what differentiates them is their size.

Read full article @ Legion Hardware

Noctua redux and industrialPPC Fan Round-Up

We have reviewed a large selection of Noctua products over the years, and we have become very familiar with their distinctive design for cooling fans. The color scheme used can not be confused with any other brand, and in action the performance is hard to match, too. Things changed over at Noctua recently, and with the launch of two new lines of fans, comes two new color schemes and a bunch of feature changes.

The promotional image above shows off a pair of Noctua's industrialPPC fans, wher the PPC stands for Protected Performance Cooling. These fans offer a black fan body and feature-wise among other things they offer dust/water resistance, and 3-phase motors for reduced power consumption and smoother/quieter operation. The other line up is named redux, and these grey colored fans offer a more entry level, budget friendly take on the Noctua fan that still offers all of the high end features people have come to expect from Noctua.
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Read full article @ Bigbruin.com

NZXT S340 Review

Building on a budget? NZXT's Source 340 should be on your radar. We saw our fair share of intriguing PC chassis in 2014, and when we think of those that stood out from the crowd, NZXT's H440 comes to mind. Soundproofed and forward-thinking, said chassis continues to be a go-to solution for high-end builds and is available today in a choice of colours for under £100.

The H440 remains a solid option, but for anyone wanting to spend less, it's well worth diverting your attention to NZXT's lower-cost alternative, the Source 340 (S340), which is under the spotlight today.

As part of NZXT's keep-it-simple range, the S340 carries an affordable £55 price tag and should offer a lot of what's good about the H440 without breaking the bank.

Read full article @ Hexus

Phanteks Enthoo Mini XL Review

Phanteks has moved to the top of our list as one of the premium manufacturers. Phanteks has been on the forefront as leader in the manufacturing of thermal solutions like high performance fans and air coolers. Phanteks this past year took the industry by surprise, when the company ventured into computer case manufacturing, by introducing for the very first time their award winning Phanteks Enthoo Primo full tower chassis. A chassis that was specifically designed for the computer enthusiast, and water-cooling aficionado.

Today what better way than to start our New Year but to have the pleasure of reviewing the Phanteks Enthoo Mini XL and what looks to be a scaled down and smaller version of the acclaimed Enthoo Primo. The Phanteks Enthoo Mini XL sports many of its distinct features and designs, which includes multiple radiator support, modular HD cages, separate PSU area, and all aluminum look. The Phanteks Enthoo Mini XL is available in a satin black windowed version. Try imagining Primo, as it is anything but Mini, in a scaled down version, at a lower price.
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Read full article @ PureOverclock

Plextor M7e M.2 PCIe SSD Performance Numbers From CES 2015

One most anticipated products of CES 2015 are the next round of PCI Express Solid-State Drives (SSDs) that so many have been waiting for. When we learned that Plextor would be showing off the upcoming M7e PCIe SSD at CES 2015 we couldn't wait to see what Plextor had in store for enthusiasts. The Plextor M7e doesn't have a solid release date just yet, but it is coming in Q2 2015 and this next generation solid-state drive uses the PCIe Gen 2 x 4 interface. Read on to see what performance numbers we got in CrystalDiskMark!

Read full article @ Legit Reviews

SuperSpeed USB 3.1 Performance

While Digital Experience in Las Vegas has plenty to see, one of the first things that caught my eye was the USB booth. Here they happened to be showing off the latest and greatest iteration of SuperSpeed USB, USB 3.1!

Read full article @ Legit Reviews

Zotac ZBOX CI320 nano Review: A Fanless Bay Trail-M mini-PC

Over the last couple of years, mini-PCs in the ultra-compact form factor (UCFF) have emerged as one of the bright spots in the troubled PC market. Zotac is no stranger to this segment. In fact, their nano xs units came to the market before the Intel NUC, even though the NUC is credited with kickstarting the UCFF trend. Intels Bay Trail family of SoCs has proved to be an affordable and low-power candidate for UCFF PC units. We have already evaluated a couple - an actively cooled GIGABYTE BXBT-1900 and and the fanless ECS LIVA. This review provides some insights into what the passively cooled Zotac ZBOX CI320 nano brings to the market.

Read full article @ Anandtech