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Here a roundup of today's reviews and articles:

11 Things To Do After Installing Ubuntu 15.04
ASUS ROG Sica gaming mouse w/ Whetsone mouse mat
ASUSTOR AS5102T 2-Bay Enthusiast NAS Review
Corsair H110i GT vs NZXT Kraken X61 Review
Dell Venue 11 Pro 7140 Convertible Review
Fractal Design Core 2500 Case Review
G.SKILL Announces Ripjaws 4 Series DDR4 Memory Kits
G.SKILL Ripjaws 4 DDR4 128GB kit is the world's fastest at 2,800MHz
Hands-on review: Acer Switch 10 E
Intel SSD 750 NVMe PCIe SSD Review
Nox Xtreme lanbx
NVIDIA Quadro M6000 Review: Maxwell Goes Workstation
OPPO R5 Smartphone Review
Patriot Supersonic Rage 2 USB 3.0 256GB Flash Drive Capsule Review
REVIEW: AMD FX 8320E Processor
Seagate Enterprise NAS HDD 6TB SATA III HDD Review
Skullcandy Grind Review
Sound Blaster X7 Review
SteelSeries Siberia v3 Prism Gaming Headset Review
Tt eSPORTS Challenger Prime Gaming Keyboard Review
Windows 10 on Lenovo G50



11 Things To Do After Installing Ubuntu 15.04

While you wait for your freshly minted ISO download to complete, check out our bi-annual rundown of things to do after installing Ubuntu 15.04.

Read full article @ OMG! Ubuntu!

ASUS ROG Sica gaming mouse w/ Whetsone mouse mat

ASUS bread and butter might be its award-winning motherboards, but that does not mean it cannot make a splash in the peripheral sector too. Last year in-fact it released its ASUS Gladius mouse (http://www.kitguru.net/site-news/highlights/andrzej/kitguru-annual-awards-2014/11/) , which was awarded as a KitGuru ‘Product of the Year 2014′. How then, will ASUS new SICA mouse stack up?

It is an optical sensor equipped, ambidextrous mouse with a slight Mayan theme, making it a stylistic compliment to the Whetstone mouse mat, which also features that same sort of patterning.

Let us find out whether they can play nice and live up to the rest of the ROG range’s pedigree.

Read full article @ KitGuru

ASUSTOR AS5102T 2-Bay Enthusiast NAS Review

ASUSTOR has one more amazing function that I’d like to tell a bit about before we move on and take a closer look at the device itself. The MyArchive function allows you to use hard disks as removable storage archives. Plug in an archive when you need it and swap it out for another one when it isn’t needed anymore, or just to cut on the power consumption. It’s as easy as plug and play and works by keeping any OS related files off the drives.

There is a limited amount of drive bays reserved for this function and in the case of the AS5102T it is one. Larger models allow for two bays to be used for the MyArchieve function. The lazy person can even buy additional disk trays to eliminate the need for screwing when replacing drives this way. This is also a very cost effective way of storing a lot of data, especially when we look at the Seagate Archive HDDs. The 8TB variant costs less than a 6TB WD NAS drive as we use in our tests, and that is an offer that is hard to resist. But keep in mind that these drives are heavily optimized for reading and will have bad writing performance compared to NAS drives.

Read full article @ eTeknix

Corsair H110i GT vs NZXT Kraken X61 Review

ALCs (All-contained Liquid Coolers) are now regarded as a mainstay in the cooling market, bridging the gap between air cooling and custom water-cooling. There are two brands which have recently produced flagship products in this arena and today we are to carefully observe the two in a head-to-head battle.

Corsair’s Hydro Series has been the go-to product line for enthusiasts wanting to indulge and take full advantage of a closed loop cooling solution. Today we’ll be looking at their latest creation in the H110i GT. This cooler uses a 280mm radiator with dual 140mm cooling fans and as the “i” indicates, GT is digital and can be paired up with Corsair Link software for advanced control and customisation.

In the other corner is NZXT with their Kraken X61. Although this cooler has been on the market for a longer period of time, many cooling advocates have vouched for this solution and its backed by many an accolade. Similarly, Kraken X61 also has a large 280mm radiator which also has dual 140mm cooling fans and can be combined with NZXT’s CAM software for progressive modification.

Read full article @ Vortez

Dell Venue 11 Pro 7140 Convertible Review

If you are looking for a professional looking convertible with the latest available low power consumption Intel Core M processor which is paired with 8GB of RAM, 256GB SSD and comes with a fully-fledged Windows 8.1 Pro operating system, then look no further, your answer is here!

Read full article @ Madshrimps

Fractal Design Core 2500 Case Review

QUOTE: The Fractal Design Core 2500 is in the sub-100 dollar category, which has some really heated competition at the moment. Computer cases are becoming less expensive, while adding more features. I’m going to put the Fractal Design Core 2500 through it’s paces in this article for Benchmark Reviews, and see how it stacks up to the competition.

Read full article @ Benchmark Reviews

G.SKILL Announces Ripjaws 4 Series DDR4 Memory Kits

Memory overclocking titan G.Skill has announced their latest DDR4 memory kit—the Ripjaws 4 with speeds of up to 3200MHz. These memory kits are available in red, blue or black updated Ripjaws heatspreader design that is only 40mm tall for high-compatibility with most CPU heatsinks. For more information, check out the official press release below: G.SKILL Announces Ripjaws 4 Series DDR4 Memory … Read more.

Read full article @ Modders-Inc

G.SKILL Ripjaws 4 DDR4 128GB kit is the world's fastest at 2,800MHz

Modules are based upon new 8Gb high density ICs from Samsung. G.SKILL has written to HEXUS today to inform us of its new 'world's fastest' Ripjaws 4 DDR4 128GB (16GBx8) memory kit. The headline speed rating that the new G.SKILL DDR4 128GB memory kit can attain is 2,800MHz, CL16-16-16-36. This new 1.35V memory kit benefits from the use of high capacity 20nm Samsung memory ICs.

Read full article @ Hexus

Hands-on review: Acer Switch 10 E

If you're looking for a laptop that can double as a tablet, the market is saturated with quality devices. Both the Lenovo Yoga Pro 3 ($1,099, £1,099, AUS$1,254) and Asus Transformer Book T300 Chi ($899, £601, AU$1,156) compete in a market led by the Microsoft Surface Pro 3 (starting at $799, £639, AU$979). For those consumers who want the flexibility of a hybrid without the bells and whistles (and price tag) that come with the top-of-the-line, the Acer Aspire Switch 10 E ($279, £185, AU$358) might be in your wheelhouse. Like the HP Pavilion x360 ($409, £273, AU$530), the Aspire Switch 10 E combines affordability and style, but little else. This puts it in line with a solid group of mid-range convertibles that are ideal for students and consumers with basic performance needs.

Read full article @ Techradar

Intel SSD 750 NVMe PCIe SSD Review

Intel recently launched the SSD 750 series, which is first set of SSDs that support NVM Express (NVMe) or Non-Volatile Memory Host Controller Interface Specification (NVMHCI) technology. NVMe is set to replace the AHCI (Advanced Host Controller Interface) technology that came out in 2004 when the PC market was still dominated by hard drives. AHCI has served us all well over the past decade, but the NVMe specification was build specifically for Solid-State Drives (SSDs) that are attached through the PCI Express (PCIe) bus. The enterprise space has enjoyed NVMe technology for over a year, but sadly no consumer oriented PCIe SSDs with support for NVMe has made it to the market. Intel changed all that this month by releasing the Intel Solid-State Drive (SSD) 750 Series, its highest performing SSD for use in client PC storage devices and workstations.

Read full article @ Legit Reviews

Nox Xtreme lanbx

The Nox Xtreme lanbx aims to combine portability with the ability to pack potent hardware. The result is a small system you can easily take with you. The lanbx looks bulky and quite menacing, like those nuclear launch-suite cases in modern action movies, and we give it a go to see whether it is more than just a movie prop.

Read full article @ techPowerUp

NVIDIA Quadro M6000 Review: Maxwell Goes Workstation

NVIDIA's Maxwell architecture has already torn up the gaming world thanks to cards like the GeForce GTX Titan X and the GeForce GTX 980. NVIDIA recently took time to bring that same Maxwell goodness over the workstation market as well and the result is the new Quadro M6000, NVIDIA's new highest-end workstation platform. Like the Titan X, the M6000 is based on the full-fat version of the Maxwell GPU, the G200. Also, like the GeForce GTX Titan X, the Quadro M6000 has 12GB of GDDR5, 3072 GPU cores, 192 texture units (TMUs), and 96 render outputs (ROPs).

Sometimes, however, paper specs don't really tell the whole story. Just as Maxwell delivered substantially better gaming performance than Kepler, NVIDIA has said that the M6000 will beat out the previous generation Quadro K6000 in a significant way in pro workstation applications as well as GPGPU or rendering and encoding applications that can be GPU-accelerated. Will those claims prove true?

That's what we're going to look at in-depth here...

Read full article @ HotHardware

OPPO R5 Smartphone Review

The OPPO R5 was, until very recently, the slimmest smartphone in the world. Measuring just 4.85mm thick – it makes the iPhone 6 look chunky by comparison. That said, does the R5 sacrifice performance and usability for its sleek style? Today we see if the smartphone – priced at under £315 – is worth a look.

Read full article @ KitGuru

Patriot Supersonic Rage 2 USB 3.0 256GB Flash Drive Capsule Review

The rise of USB 3.0 as a high speed interface for PCs and the increasing affordability of flash memory has led to some very interesting products. USB flash drives are a dime a dozen, but there is scope for manufacturers to differentiate themselves. High-performance flash drives have traditionally employed a SATA SSD controller behind a USB 3.0 - SATA bridge. However, this increases the drive cost in what is essentially a price-sensitive market. Controller vendors have recently started to introduce native high-performance USB 3.0 flash controllers. Today, we will be looking at the performance of the Patriot Supersonic Rage 2 256GB, a high-end USB 3.0 flash drive sporting a recently introduced native USB 3.0 flash controller.

Read full article @ Anandtech

REVIEW: AMD FX 8320E Processor

The AMD FX Series processors are a few years old now and we haven’t seen any really big changes with AMD’s road map for these aging chips. Going back down memory lane a bit, during AMD’s original launch of the Bulldozer FX 8150, many of us had high expectations for AMD’s Piledriver architecture. Unfortunately, the 8 core 32nm processor didn’t match up to the marketing hype, and many folks saw it as a huge failure.

Despite that, the engineering behind the architecture was actually a good idea, but the “ecosystem,” as some have put it, just wasn’t ready for AMD’s leap into this territory. Many of today’s applications and software just weren’t designed to adapt to the architecture’s full potential.

AMD quickly re-positioned themselves and focused on competing with Intel’s mid-range line up based on price to performance. Shortly after the FX 8150, AMD pushed out their “slightly” revised processor, the FX 8320/8350, which was intended for its flagship AMD line up based on the Vishera platform. The FX 8350 was a little better received and took a strong market hold with solid price to performance, and held its ground for some time. Unfortunately, the platform was not what we would call “new,” and with Intel’s Tick Tock pushing ever forward, AMD again was left behind again.

Read full article @ PureOverclock

Seagate Enterprise NAS HDD 6TB SATA III HDD Review

It's no secret that there are several storage choices out there for use with a desktop PC (or even a laptop) from the all-time classic regular mechanical drives up to the new solid state hybrid drives (HDD+SSD combo) and solid state drives. Things however become quite more complicated when looking for a NAS (Network Attached Storage) oriented model since there are many things one has to pay attention at aside performance and reliability such as power consumption, temperatures and even noise levels. Of course that's also why all the players in the market have launched their very own "solutions" for NAS users but much like everything else in the PC industry not all are created equal. With us today we have what is perhaps the most promising mechanical hard drive in the market today developed primarily for use with NAS servers, the Enterprise NAS HDD 6TB by Seagate.

Read full article @ NikKTech

Skullcandy Grind Review

To craft the Grind on-ear headphones to be affordable for all, Skullcandy carved away flashy design flourishes that cost music-listeners a fortune, sparing only the most crucial components. Then, the Park City, Utah-based audio company packed in some capable sound drivers. The result of this scrupulous molding of design, performance and value is a set of headphones that are an absolute steal for $60 (£40, AU$77).DesignSport is at the heart of Skullcandy's company-wide design ID, and the Grind are no exception. But don't let that shy you away: these on-ear cans come in a variety of colors to meet the needs of listeners regardless of their style preferences.Our review sample offers up something in between sporty and casual. The headband offers the first impression, one made up of a faux white leather that feels enough like the real thing. On its underside, soft black foam is stitched into place with a breathable mesh layer, which rests comfortably on your head. The Grind are reinforced with a brushed metal frame that gives them a premium look and feel. Branding on these headphones is subtle, with a small logo stamped onto each of the sidearms.

Read full article @ Techradar

Sound Blaster X7 Review

Creative take their Sound Blaster range to new levels...

Read full article @ HardwareHeaven

SteelSeries Siberia v3 Prism Gaming Headset Review

Today I will be reviewing the SteelSeries Siberia v3 Prism Gaming Headset. I recently reviewed the v3 from SteelSeries and the v3 Prism is just a little higher on the scale of options and luxuries. The main noticiable differences are the USB cable rather than 3.5mm input, 16.8 million illumination and color differences of the frame. Great audio can make any visual experience that much better. For many of us, out of courtesy, we are unable to unleash the full surround sound system. This is why a great headset is necessary. When you find a headset that delivers rich deep sounding bass, excellent highs, and no distortion; you will disappear into an ideal audiophile world. One of the biggest complaints about headsets can be that after wearing them for a while, they begin to make your ears ache, compresses your head to much, or being too heavy. I will test these areas in detail while I put the Siberia v3 Prism Gaming Headset by SteelSeries through the gauntlet.

Read full article @ FunkyKit

Tt eSPORTS Challenger Prime Gaming Keyboard Review

When you think of a gaming keyboard do the ultra high-end expensive keyboards come to mind? Many people think that gaming keyboards are simply too expensive and not worth it. Well what if I was to tell you we are reviewing a gaming keyboard today that has a MSRP of only $29.99! Tt eSPORTS has sent us over their Challenger Prime gaming keyboard that features a membrane design, full illumination, six dedicated macro keys and much more. Let’s get to gaming on the Challenger Prime and see what it can do!

Read full article @ ThinkComputers.org

Windows 10 on Lenovo G50

I've written a review covering mostly the hardware compatibility piece of Windows 10 Technical Preview Build 9926 and Build 10041 on Lenovo IdeaPad G50-70 laptop, including major problems with SD card and touchpad functionality. You think this is a Windows article only? Then, if you're a Linux user, you should also take a look. There's a hidden message in there. Well, not really hidden. But still. Enjoy.

Read full article @ Dedoimedo