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ASUS G50V-A1

2010-01-02T23:15:00.000-08:00

Design

The g50v is targeted squarely at the gaming crowd. its design says "gamer" no matter what way you look at it. there is nothing understated regarding the design of this notebook. let's inaugurate with the back of the lid. the most eye-catching part regarding the back of the lid is the four blue lights. they are not overly bright , but are easily seen. two light bars are located at either plan of the lid upon the very bourn , which blink in patterns. at the top of the lid is a clear shelter with the republic of gamers logo inside. finally , towards the behind there is a level light bar that spans regarding half of the lid. the plurality of the lid is glossy metallic black plastic. at the very behind of the lid below the level light bar is a rubberized and textured part that acts as a grip for carrying the notebook.

The inside of the notebook has a design that is seemingly as flashy as the lid. the spruce surrounding the keyboard and bordering the right and left edges of the chassis are glossy orange plastic. the palmrest area is made of the same rubberized textured fabric inaugurate upon the back of the lid. the touchpad is bordered by brushed aluminium spruce. above the keyboard is a divest of glossy black plastic where all the touch controls are located , and upon either side of that are the two altec lansing speakers. above the shelter is a webcam embedded in a mirrored surface. level the behind of the notebook has an interesting design - the single bulky intake vent for the fan has a shiny silver bourn and an orange vent.

You can see from the pictures that the g50v is larger than a typical 15.4-inch notebook , evidenced by the relatively bulky shelter benzel. the main dividend of the larger chassis is the inclusion of a sunder number pad , but the downside is slightly reduced portability. the g50v-a1 weighs in at 6.5 lbs and is 14.2 in (36 cm) wide , 10.2 in (25.9 cm) deep , and 1.1 - 1.6 in (2.8 - 4.1 cm) thick. the notebook feels somewhat onerous , but is not hard to transport in a backpack. as i noted , the g50v is larger than a typical 15.4-inch notebook.

Build quality

The g50v is made of robust plastic and has a solid feel. the chassis resists twisting , and all surfaces are difficult to find flex in. the hinges securely anchor the manifest to the low of the notebook , and the lid itself is inflexible and is hard to twine. urgent upon the back of the lid yields no ripples in the shelter. there is essentially no manifest wobble. i am additional than impressed with the build quality of this notebook.

Screen

The 15.4-inch wsxga+ manifest is positively grand. it is very bright and has tall contrast. the glossy complete helps this manifest bring colours to life. the tall contrast and exceptional clarity of this manifest makes gaming and level simple web browsing an enjoyable experience.

Viewing angles are nothing out of the popular - they are fine side-to-side , but from above the picture washes out and from below it darkens as popular. there is noticeable light leakage coming from the behind of the manifest , but it is seemingly noticeable when viewing a black shelter.

Speakers

Though the g50v's two speakers carry the altec lansing badge , their sound quality leaves much to be desired. they are tinny , and there is no tip of bass. they likewise are relatively quiet. if these had no name spot , i would own dismissed them as typical notebook speakers , but given the brand-name badge , they should own produced better sound. overall , the speakers are a disappointment.

Heat & noise

This part is a tall point for the g50v-a1. one bulky fan takes anxiety of the heat from both the processor and graphics card , and expels it out the left side through a bulky vent. while idling , the notebook is essentially inaudible. under full load , the seemingly sound to be heard is a rush of air - motor noise is thankfully away. you can take this notebook to a library or thunder hall without dread of disturbing anyone.

The heat is kept advisably under control at all times - the surface of the notebook is barely warm , as is the behind. the cooling system of this notebook is quite good.

Keyboard

The g50v's keyboard delivers a pleasing typing experience. there is ample tactile feedback , with minimal flex. the seemingly real flex is inaugurate in the number pad , but it is slight. the keyboard is soft and quiet. my gripe with this keyboard is that there are no constant dedicated domestic , plan , page up , and page down keys. this is one of the sacrifices asus made by including the numeric keypad in a 15.4-inch chassis. the keys are seemingly dedicated if the number lock is turned off. as somebody who uses those keys oftentimes , i inaugurate this to be an inconvenient setup. i own to give up number pad functionality in instruct to apply those keys.

Above the keyboard is a sequence of touch-activated buttons that access varied menus. upon the left side is a unusual oled manifest , which can manifest a message , battery charge remaining , cpu usage , memory usage , and other useful information. this is a fastidious touch. i would like to see other functionality additional to this , such as frames per moment (fps) readings during games.

Touchpad

The touchpad has a self-explaining black matte surface , which is easy to track upon. the right side acts as a upright scrolling pad. the two buttons are aluminium and easy to locate and crowd. the buttons are not especially quiet , even Though they would probably not torment anyone around you.

Wireless

The g50v-a1 features the latest-generation intel wireless wifi combine 5100agn , supporting 802.11a/b/g/n wireless signals. i had no sorrow connecting to a variety of secured networks.

Battery

The g50v-a1 lasted regarding two hours in my battery trial in cogency chary fad while surfing the internet. although two hours is not a destiny , it is reasonable for a gaming notebook with a 6-cell battery.

The g50v-a1's 6-cell battery is rated for 4800mah , with 11.1v

ASUS offers the G50V in several different configurations:

Intel Core 2 Duo T9400 (2.53GHz/6MB L2/1066MHz FSB/ 35W TDP)

Windows Vista Home Premium 64-bit w/ SP1

Intel PM45 + ICH9 chipset

4GB DDR2-800 RAM

15.4-inch WSXGA+ (1680x1050) glossy display

Nvidia GeForce 9700M-GT w/ 512MB GDDR3

2x 250GB 5400RPM SATA hard drives

8X DVDRW Super Multi drive

8-in-1 card reader

Built-in 1.3-megapixel camera

Intel Wireless WiFi Link 5100AGN + built-in Bluetooth wireless

Acer Aspire 8930G

2010-01-02T22:55:00.000-08:00

When we reviewed Acer Aspire 8930G notebook in may 2008 , we loved its complaisant scheme , innovative six-speaker audio system , and dazzling 18.4-inch display. with Acer Aspire 8930G ($1 , 699) , you acquire all that , plus a processor upgrade , for nearly $1 , 000 fewer. you don’t acquire a blu-ray ride , nevertheless.

As with the 8920g , Acer Aspire 8930G sports acer’s sleek gemstone blue finish with the backlit acer logo upon the lid. beneath the shiny lid is one of the most fair notebook displays we’ve ever laid eyes on: a large 18.4-inch panel featuring wide color applied Science and a 16-to-9 appearance ratio. because the shield has a 1 , 920x1 , 080 courage , it may display content in full hd (1080p) , and it shows movies in their native appearance ratio without stretching or scaling. the wide color panel , which displays 90 percent of the ntsc color gamut , delivered outstanding colors , observable image quality , and a fastidious wide viewing angle.

This display practically begs for a blu-ray ride , but unfortunately , this model comes with a popular dvd multiformat ride. calm , the polar express upon dvd looked bizarre upon the large shield , and it sounded large , too , thanks to acer’s unique tuba cinebass sound system , a six-speaker shape that delivers full 6-channel dolby-optimized audio. a subwoofer built into the hinge assembly gives the system a much-needed bass boost.

Above the display sits acer’s crystal eye webcam and two microphones , which may be used along with the included webcam utility to capture video clips and stills. it likewise works with acer’s vcm software , a skype-based utility for setting up and conducting video conference sessions. image quality is adequate for video skyping and e-mailing pictures but too grainy for keepsake photos.

The full-size keyboard is roomy , with large , comfortable keys and a committed numeric keypad , but the textured touch pad is a tad small given the size of the keyboard ornament. calm , it provides plane cursor control. a biometric fingerprint reader nestled between the two mouse buttons uses acer’s bio-protection fingerprint solution software to provide enhanced security; use it in conjunction with acer’s fingernav utility to scroll through web pages and documents. a triangular “e” button above the keyboard launches acer's empowering applied science applet , where you may adjust might schemes , tweak audio settings , and make a backup scheme from a single portal.

Instead of the popular deprive of media player controls , the 8930g countenance the cinedash panel , a touch-sensitive controller located upon the left side of the keyboard ornament. the white , backlit panel sports a orbicular volume control that uses the swipe method of raising and lowering the volume; it's a jot finicky and may be frustrating to use when you’re trying to acquire a particular audio plane. the requirement dvd/cd player controls for fast-forwarding , rewinding , and skipping tracks are likewise included. a hotkey takes you into the acer arcade applet where you may launch your dvd movie player , access media files upon your home network , play video clips , and view photos. you’ll likewise find a possess button and dumb keys at the top of the panel.

The 8930g offers a good selection of i/o ports , including hdmi and vga outputs , four usb ports , an external sata (esata) deportment , as artistically as headphone , microphone , and line-in jacks. it likewise has a dispayport connector , which is not widely used yet but promises to be the next large video/audio interface and possible successor to hdmi. expansion slots include a six-format card reader and a 54mm expresscard slot. the 320gb tough ride comes with windows vista final (64-bit) and the acer utilities , as artistically as a handful of experiment applications.

Powered by a 2.53ghz core 2 duo cpu (t9400) and 4gb of ram , Acer Aspire 8930G performed fairly artistically upon our productiveness benchmarks. its score of 3 , 988 upon our futuremark pcmark vantage experiment trumped the sony vaio aw170y/q by supplementary than 800 points. it likewise outperformed the vaio upon our windows media and itunes conversion tests , but seemingly barely. hp’s hdx18 windows media encoding times were slightly faster than both the 8930g and the vaio , nevertheless. the 8930g’s cinebench 10 score of 5 , 125 bested the toshiba qosmio g55-q802 by supplementary than 1 , 000 points but trailed the vaio by 94 points.

Driven by nvidia’s geforce 9700m gt graphics engine , the 8930g managed a futuremark 3dmark06 score of 6 , 297 (1 , 024x768) , handily beating the hp and toshiba scores of 3 , 248 and 4 , 956 , respectively. calm , it couldn’t touch the scores produced by numerous of the supplementary strong gaming structures we’ve recently reviewed , such as the alienware m17 and toshiba qosmio x305-q708. likewise , its futuremark 3dmark vantage score of 1 , 848 using the operation preset was nearly 600 points higher than that of the hp system but paled in comparison to the x305 and m17 scores. a lowly score of 8.9 frames per moment upon our party of heroes directx 10 experiment confirmed the obvious: the 8930g may handle informal gaming as long as you use slavish detail settings , but provided you want all the eye candy enabled , this system is not up to the task. we did manage to acquire 1 hour and 59 minutes of juice--slightly above average for an 18-inch notebook--from the battery upon our dvd rundown experiment.

With its solid operation and high-end video and audio components , Acer Aspire 8930G is among the top multimedia notebooks we’ve seen. though it is relatively affordable compared with other 18-inch notebooks , this particular model does not come with a blu-ray ride. provided blu-ray playback is a deal-breaker , you may expend $900 for a unalike shape altogether--or opt for the $2 , 199 hdx18.

Processor: 2.53GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T9400
Memory: 4GB RAM
Storage: 320GB hard drive
Optical Drive: DVD±RW
Screen: 18.4 inches
Graphics: Nvidia GeForce 9700M GT (512MB)
Weight: 9 pounds
Dimensions (HWD): 1.7x17.4x11.8 inches
Operating System: Windows Vista Ultimate (64-bit)

Acer Aspire 4810 Timeline

2009-12-16T02:17:00.000-08:00

Ever since apple's macbook air arrived on the scene there's been a pre-occupation with the thinness of laptops. as apple proved , or dictated , thin and light normally (though not always) translates into under-featured and overpriced. nonetheless , as the newfound dominance of the netbook has shown , in these financially-troubled times individuals just can't afford to hire as much for the privilege of portability.

Enter acer's timeline sequence. comprising three laptops , the 13.3in aspire 3810 , 14in aspire 4810 and 15.6in aspire 5810 , as deservedly as a netbook , it aims to bridge the gap between design , portability and value. nowadays we're looking at the middle-of-the-pack 4810t , which unlike its smaller 13.3in sibling countenance an integrated optical drive while tranquil maintaining a very portable weight of just 2kg.

This relatively servile weight combines with an incredible thinness (a mere 29mm at its thickest) , an affordable £749 price-tag and an incredible claimed battery life of over eight hours (largely courtesy of intel's ultra-low voltage (ulv) su9400 core 2 duo processor) to shape this one very desirable machine. but it's not just the tough and cold technical details that shape the timelines deservedly interesting , as acer has paired these with a completely fresh design.

As far as looks go , the 4810t is stylish in an understated lenient of way. in fact , if we didn't know better we'd utter this slim pocket Book was targeted at trade users rather than consumers. this is partially through the colour design employed , which consists of gunmetal gray and various shades of black , and partially due to the refreshing lack of embellishments , patterns or coloured lights.

HP Pavilion dv6t

2009-12-16T02:02:00.000-08:00

Hp is one of the top laptop makers out there and one of their latest models is the pavilion dv6t , which has a modest value and comes with a Good Deal Of media-geared countenance. galore of its highlights include a 16-inch widescreen expose , a built-in numeric keypad , 320gb , and a fleet 2.0-ghz intel core 2 duo t6400 processor.

The laptop itself is mildly hefty and a little larger than most other similar laptops , but that's mostly due to the larger keyboard and body fabricate. in all , it weighs around 6 pounds , which isn't bad , particularly provided you want to carry it around in a bag or backpack (college students pay attention...). the exterior of the pavilion dv6t is quite sleek and shiny with a glossy black finish with an hp imprint under the finish. the imprint you win volition depend upon the shape of the model that you win , but they are all mostly stylish. one downside to the glossy exterior is the ability for fingerprints and smudges to expose quietly easily , but hp includes a small cloth that wipes them away easily and cleanly.

On the inside , the dv6t countenance a handsome 16-inch widescreen lcd expose featuring hp's brightview engineering Science , which according to hp , makes it extra vivid than a traditional lcd. the gallantry of the screen is 1366 x 768 , which is a little mediocre , but the effigy quality is stunning regardless. colours are vivid and bright and text is very crisp and readable. one thing worth mentioning: because of the glossy screen , it is prone to reflections very easily , from both fluorescent lighting and sunlight. the keyboard is possibly a little cramped , but that's mostly due to the dedicated numeric keypad to the right of the keyboard. this a nice feature to possess provided you want it and it's scarce to see upon 16-inch notebooks.

In terms of connections and countenance , the pavilion dv6t didn't let out much. you win a 7200 rpm 320gb tough drive and an external esata mien for adding an extra external tough drive for extra storage space. there are also 4 usb 2.0 ports (2 upon each side) and a hdmi mien for connecting to a hdtv. bluetooth 2.0 , wi-fi (802.11a/b/g/n) , and a 5-in-1 media card reader also come built in.

When it comes to functioning , the dv6t doesn't let you wishing too much extra either. the intel core 2 duo 2.0-ghz t6400 cpu is extra than fleet enough for common computing tasks and allows you to perform video & photo editing and discern high-definitition video as quietly. the graphics card in the system is not enough for meeting The Requirements Or Expectations whatsoever intense 3d gaming , but hp does possess a shape for a extra powerful ati graphics card at a value of $300 to upgrade. when it comes to battery life , the dv6t does a handsome decent job at around 3 hours of rated battery life , with extended battery options available for purchase upon hp.com. this model comes with microsoft windows vista home premium edition pre-installed.

Another thing we should mention is our recommendation to remove all of hp's included third-party applications and hp-branded utilities that come pre-installed with the system. galore of these programs are trial-versions or "cut-down" versions that perform not provide all the countenance. these programs may slow down your system and take up a lot of tough drive space , quietly when you win your computer , go into the programs and countenance module of the control panel and uninstall anything you don't want , which volition probably be a lot.

The hp pavilion dv6t is a handsome good computer for the money and definitely worth looking at provided you are in the market for a recent laptop. college students in particular come to intellect because of its multimedia countenance , common functioning , and portability.

Mobility Radeon HD 4670

2009-12-16T01:52:00.001-08:00

The ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4670 from amd is a directx 10.1 middle-class notebook graphics adapter. technically it is a higher clocked mobility radeon hd 4650.

The gaming operation of the gpu lies between the desktop hd 4650 and 4670. hence , most directx 9 games (like halloo of duty 4 , f.e.a.r. , or unreal conflict 3) should be playable in elevated details (in 1024x768). demanding dx10 games from 2008 love crysis scuttle merely in medium details fluently.

The mobility hd 4670 is based upon the rv730 chip and physiognomy 320 gush processors (64 5-dimensional shader cores). these cores perform the graphic work of the shader- and pixel pipelines of older gpus. the gush processors are also called alus and are grouped in five-way vliw units. each of the five instructions of a vliw bundle has to be independent from the others and hence the operation depends upon the optimization of the driver.

A specialty of the radeon hd 4600 sequence is the possibility to apply usual ddr2 and ddr3 graphic reminiscence (as a cheaper alternative to gddr3). nonetheless , cards that apply that compassionate of reminiscence will be slower than others equipped with gddr ram.

The mobility radeon hd 4670 includes the avivo hd called video applied Science including an onboard soundchip for 7.1 sound output over hdmi or displayport and the 2nd generation uvd (unified video decoder). this uvd 2 supports full bitstream decoding of h.264/mpeg-4 avc and vc-1 streams. in addition to this , it also supports dual video gush decoding and picture-in picture mode which makes the uvd full bd-live compliant. simplified , the avivo hd applied Science handles all video tasks and enables the gpu to decode hd videos.

Amd published a current consumtion of approximately 28-30 watt for the hd 4670. still it is unclear if this value represents the chip alone or the whole mxm board including the reminiscence (which would include approximately 5 watt). nonetheless , the battery runtime should be compareable to a laptop with geforce 9600m gt / gt 130m graphics adapter.

Compared to the desktop ati radeon hd 4670 , the mobile duplicate physiognomy a slower chip and reminiscence clock (675/800 versus 775/900-1000) and hence performs somewhere between a desktop 4650 and 4670.

Manufacturer	ATI
Series	Mobility Radeon HD 4000
Codename	M96-XT
Pipelines	320 - unified
Core Speed *	675 MHz
Shader Speed *	675 MHz
Memory Speed *	800 MHz
Memory Bus Width	128 Bit
Memory Type	GDDR3, DDR2, DDR3
Max. Amount of Memory
Shared Memory	no
DirectX	DirectX 10.1, Shader 4.1
Current Consumption	35 Watt
Transistors	514 Million
technology	55 nm
Features	OpenGL 2.0, PCI-E 2.0 x16, Powerplay, DisplayPort support up to 2560x1600, HDMI support up to 1920x1080 (both with 7.1 AC3 Audio), 1x Dual-Link/Single-Link DVI, 1x Single-Link DVI Support (all display ports have to be supported by the laptop manufacturer)
Notebook Size	medium sized
Date of Announcement	09.01.2009
Link to Manufacturer Page	http://ati.amd.com/products/MobilityRade...

* The specified clock rates are only guidelines for the manufacturer and can be altered by them.

Benchmarks by AMD

Amd published on the launch date of the hd 4000 series a document with relative benchmark values (hd 4670 to hd 3670). the benchmarks were conducted with a speedy desktop quad-core cpu and unplayable setting of 1600x1200 with 4x antialiasing and 16xaf. accordingly the following graph is simply of limited apply and shows simply the improvements in a Great Deal Of aspects over the predecessor.

Still there is similarly a graph with the 3dmark06 dissect. as the hd 3670 was announced with with Regards To 4700 3dmark06 points , the 4670 should dissect with Regards To 7000 points in 3dmark06 (1.5x performance according to the slide). accordingly , the performance would be on par with the antique hd 3850.

GeForce 9700M GT

2009-12-16T01:39:00.000-08:00

The nvidia geforce 9700m gt is a directx 10 graphics card for notebooks and successor to the 8700m gt. technically , the 9700m gt is a higher clocked version of the 9600m gt. it is produced in 65nm (allows higher clock rates with the same current consumption) and face a modern purevideo hd video processor (vp3) and hybridpower help.

In conjunction with the nvidia 9100m g integrated graphics , the 9700m gt supports hybrid-sli (only hybridpower). hybridpower is a technique to elect between the integrated and committed graphics core , provided operation or battery runtime is needed. this works apparently in windows vista. up to now the user has to utilize a tool to bastinado between the gpus. later nvidia wants to bastinado automatically in the drivers. geforceboost is not supported with this card , as there would be no operation get.

As the 9600m gt and 8700m gt , the 9700m gt face 32 flow processors that accomplish the graphic drudgery of the vertex- and pixel-shaders (which are higher clocked than the core with 1550 mhz).

The operation of the 9700m gt is clearly above the 9600m gt because of the lofty clock haste (highest current clockspeed of the 9000m series). placid demanding directx 10 games , like crysis custom scurry fluently with lofty details and lofty resolutions.

Compared to desktop graphics cards , the 9700m gt is similar to the geforce 9500gt (which also descends from the g96 core).

Manufacturer	NVIDIA
Series	GeForce 9M
Codename	NB9E-GE
Pipelines	32 - unified
Core Speed *	625 MHz
Shader Speed *	1550 MHz
Memory Speed *	800 MHz
Memory Bus Width	128 Bit
Memory Type	GDDR2, GDDR3
Max. Amount of Memory	512 MB
Shared Memory	no
DirectX	DirectX 10, Shader 4.0
Current Consumption	45 Watt
Transistors	314 Million
technology	65 nm
Features	PCI-E 2.0, PureVideo HD Technologie (VP3), Hybrid SLI mit HybridPower (with nVidia 9100 chipset), CUDA, PhysX ready
Notebook Size	medium sized
Date of Announcement	03.06.2008
Information	MXM 3
Link to Manufacturer Page	http://www.nvidia.com/object/geforce_970...

* The specified clock rates are only guidelines for the manufacturer and can be altered by them.

Game benchmarks

For additional games that might be playable and a catalogue of all games and graphics cards visit our gaming list
Gaming performance

These benchmarks were conducted with lofty plan notebooks (quad-core desktop cpu). thus , the operation with slower laptops can moderate.

These benchmarks were conducted with high end notebooks (quad-core desktop CPU). Therefore, the performance with slower laptops may decrease.

Crysis: 1280x1024, very high: 20 fps -> not playable (in medium-high playable)
Enemy Territory: Quake Wars: 1600x1200: 73 fps -> fluently playable
Half Life 2 - Episode 2: 1600x1200: 64 fps -> fluently playable
Supreme Commander: 1600x1200: 52 fps -> fluently playable
World in Conflict: 1280x1024: 29 fps -> playable

ATI Radeon HD 5870

2009-12-16T01:25:00.000-08:00

Prepare to experience a riveting high-definition gaming experience with ati radeon™ hd 5870 graphics processors. distend your visual real estate across up to three displays and procure missing in the action with revolutionary ati eyefinity engineering. using ati stream technology , accelerate plane the most demanding applications and effect more than ever with your pc. the basic to deliver full help for microsoft directx® 11 , these gpus enable affluent , realistic visuals and explosive hd gaming operation inequity you may dominate the competition.

Way back in 1965 , intel co-founder gordon e. more released a paper stating that the number of transistors that can be placed economically upon an integrated circuit would double with Regards To every two years. this was later named moore's law , and it accurately describes a driving force of technological and sociable adjust in the late 20th and primal 21st centuries.

While the trend has continued for more than half a century and is not expected to stop until 2015 or even later , with the introduction of the radeon hd 5870 graphics card amd claims they are breaking moore's law -- and accurately accurately. specifically , they are going from a transistor count of roughly 956 million to a staggering 2150 million within a 15 month period between 2008 and 2009.

There own also been a Heap Of notable improvements in terms of efficiency over the past few years. the radeon x1800xt released in late 2005 provided simply 1.07 gflops/w , for specimen , while in primal 2006 the x1900xtx was capable of 2.01 gflops/w. progression then seemed to stall for a Heap Of time , coincidentally around the time of the amd/ati merger , as 18 months down the road the radeon hd 2900 pro reached 2.21 gflops/w.

Finally a few months later the radeon hd 3870 was released featuring a die quail which improved efficiency to 4.50 gflops/w. then along came the radeon hd 4870 providing 7.50 gflops/w , and now we own the radeon hd 5870 with an efficiency rating of 14.47 gflops/w.
Behind this vast leap is the 40nm plan of the late “cypress xt” gpu , which also allowed for a very complex outline. putting matters into perspective , while the radeon hd 4870 featured 800 spus along with 40 taus (texture dissertation units) and 16 rops (rasterization operator units) , the late and improved 5870 boasts double everything -- 1600 spus , 80 taus and 32 rops. this has bumped compute efficacy from 1.2 tflops to an demented 2.72 tflops out of a single gpu.the core clock speed has also been increased from 750mhz to 850mhz compared to the radeon hd 4870 , instead matching the 4890 variant. the radeon hd 5870 tranquil utilizes gddr5 reminiscence , which is now clocked at 1200mhz , allowing for a reminiscence bandwidth of 153.6gb/s , or a whopping 33% more than the 4870

Core i7 Test System Specs
- Intel Core i7 965 Extreme Edition (Overclocked @ 3.70GHz)
- x3 2GB G.Skill DDR3 PC3-12800 (CAS 9-9-9-24)
- Asus P6T Deluxe (Intel X58)
- OCZ GameXStream (700 watt)
- Seagate 500GB 7200-RPM (Serial ATA300)
- ATI Radeon HD 5870 (1GB)
- VisionTek Radeon HD 4870 X2 (2GB)
- Asus Radeon HD 4890 (1GB)
- Palit Radeon HD 4870 (1GB)
- Asus GeForce GTX 295 (1792MB)
- Asus GeForce GTX 285 (1GB)
- Asus GeForce GTX 280 (1GB)
- Asus GeForce GTX 275 (896MB)
- Palit GeForce GTX 260 (896MB)
Software
- Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate (64-bit)
- Nvidia Forceware 190.38
- ATI Catalyst 9.9

We ran 3DMark Vantage's synthetic tests to start, and the results were pretty impressive. With a score of 6248pts at 2560x1600, the single-GPU Radeon HD 5870 managed to outperform the 4870 X2 by a 10% margin, while delivering 1.6x more performance than the standard Radeon HD 4870 card. The only contender to defeat the Radeon HD 5870 in this test was the dual-GPU GeForce GTX 295, which was about 8% faster.

The radeon hd 5870 is gigantic , even Though given the specifications and the fact that this is a high-end graphics card , its size is far from surprising. the dimensions match that of the radeon hd 4870 x2 , making it very similar to the geforce gtx 285 as duly. the amd allusion card measures 28cm long and weighs roughly 1kg. cooling the cypress xt gpu is a fairly gigantic aluminum heatsink , made up of 36 fins measuring 13.5cm long , 6.5cm wide , and 2.5cm high. connected to the servile of the heatsink are four copper heatpipes which befriend improve efficiency. finally , cooling this heatsink is a 75x20mm blower fan that draws air in from within the case and pushes it out through the rear of the graphics card. for the most installment this fan operates very duly , helped by the impressively servile 27 watt lazy consumption of the radeon hd 5870. when gaming the fan will of course whirl up , as the card may consume up to 188 watts under load , but flat with the increased thermal stress the 5870 does not whoop at intolerable levels.the heatsink and fan own been enclosed within a custom built housing that conceals the entire graphics card -- a first for amd. we in Truth liked this setup as it helps screen the product very well; nvidia has been performing this for numerous time with their most prized graphics cards , such as the geforce gtx 295

In enjoin to food the graphics card sufficient might amd has included a twosome of 6-pin pci express might connectors. this is the same type that you will find on the radeon hd 4870/4890 and geforce gtx 285 cards.

The radeon hd 5870 naturally supports crossfire applied Science , and hence in the standard situation we find a twosome of connectors for bridging two or extra cards together. the merely other connectors may be initiate on the i/o panel; our amd sample featured two dual dvi connectors along with hdmi and displayport sockets. it is worth noting that all radeon hd 5870 graphics cards may befriend a maximum boldness of 2560x1600 on not one but rather three monitors.

Might consumption levels on the ati radeon hd 5870 were quite notable. while inert it was the lowest we have seen from a mid-range to high-end graphics card , with a complete system consumption of just 148 watts. the next best result was seen from the geforce gtx 275 with 154 watts , while the radeon hd 4870 x2 idled at 203 watts and the geforce gtx 295 at 245.

When gaming the radeon hd 5870 consumed the same amount of might as the geforce gtx 260 , 343 watts; this is just very impressive given how much faster this unprecedented radeon graphics card was in comparison. the test system with the radeon hd 4870 x2 sucked down an incredible 460 watts while under load , which meant that it required 34% extra might than the radeon hd 5870.
Although the radeon hd 5870 was light on fuel , it tranquil tends to scuttle quite hot when gaming. temperatures reached a sizzling 87 degrees , making this one of the hottest graphics cards we tested , nearly on par with the radeon hd 4870 x2. that said , the radeon hd 5870 ran at just 38 degrees when at the windows 7 desktop.

Toshiba Portege A605 Review

2009-12-14T11:26:00.000-08:00

The Toshiba Portege a605 is a 12.1" ultra-portable Note Book designed for trade travelers who want something small and lightweight , but don’t want to mold any compromises when it comes to visage. the a600 sequence notebooks offer an on-board optical ride users can enjoy movies or install applications on the road , esata to distend storage , and a efficacy thrifty intel centrino 2 platform to squeeze out as much battery life as possible. in this inquest we find out how the a605 stands up to the rigors of day-to-day use , and provided it is worth purchasing this pocket Book over a netbook or other ultra-portable notebooks.

Toshiba Portege A605-P210 Specifications:

* Processor: 1.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo SU9400 (800MHz FSB, 3MB Cache)

* Graphics: Intel X4500 Integrated Graphics

* Operating System: Windows Vista Home Premium with SP 1 (32-bit)

* Screen: 12.1" diagonal WXGA LED-Backlit Display (1280x800)

* Memory: 3GB PC6400 DDR2 (1GB onboard, 2GB in slot, 5GB Max)

* Storage: 320GB Hitachi SATA HDD (5400rpm)

* Optical Drive: LabelFlash SuperMulti 8X DVD+/-R/RW with Double Layer Support

* Intel 5100AGN WLAN with Bluetooth 2.1 w/ EDR

* Power: 6-cell Li-Ion 5800mAh battery, 45W AC adapter

* Dimensions: 11.3" x 8.8" x 1.2"

* Weight: 3lbs 1.8oz (3lbs 11.9oz travel weight)

* Warranty: 1-year

* Price as configured: $1,399.99

The portege looks very classy for a commerce Note Book , with glossy piano black keyboard bezel and shield cover along with a matte silver menial. the bearing and button layout appears to be very fittingly thought out with venture put into matters as simple as the cogency and activity indicators. the silver keyboard contrasts the black finish , with a nice matte finish with black lettering that is easy to read.

Build quality is beat or miss depending on what part of the Note Book you are looking at. the quality of the finish is excellent , with a thick layer of glossy black paint that appears to be scratch resistant. on the throw side , the plastic used to frame the Note Book suffers from abnormal amounts of flex--a side accomplish of its lightweight construction. the palm rest and pore half of the case flex inward when you grip the Note Book to carry it around , and horizontal resting your palms on the palm rest makes them bend in slightly. the shield cover shows similar flex and when gripped firmly makes the expose expose signs of colour distortion around the edges and centre. the shield itself similarly has a Lot Of issues in how it is mounted , showing a pressure spot in the bum corner that "flashes" when the shield jiggles on your lap or desk surface.

Upgrading the components on the a605 is supplementary difficult that the average Note Book , with half of the ram soldered to the motherboard and no access panel for the tough drive. while most commerce users probably won’t be modifying establishment issued hardware , regular users who buy this Note Book cogency be upset.

The 12.1" expose is average compared to other business ultra-portable notebooks , but below average if you compare it to the screens on larger notebooks. colours are bright and vibrant thanks to many second from the led-backlighting. overall brightness is enough for viewing in an post setting but not bright enough for using the notebook outside under command sunlight. the protect is politely lit across the entire surface , with the apparently hotspot showing near the protect hinge infatuation points ... which pinch the protect slightly. erect viewing angles are average , with colours quickly washing out or distorting outside of the viewing candy brand. even viewing angles are much better , staying accurate at abrupt angles , apparently dimming as it rotates further away from you.

The a605 physiognomy a nearly full-size keyboard with the important keys being the same size as upon a larger notebook , but the surrounding keys are condensed to appropriate inside the invent of the portege. the keyboard is comfortable to contour upon , but suffers from the same flex issue as the palm rest and notebook bottom. under moderate pressure the entire keyboard surface will douse in , giving you a trampoline feeling as you contour. individual key action is level , giving off a very mild click noise when pressed.

Toshiba includes an alps touchpad upon the a605 , which is quite immense for a 12” notebook. it is instantaneous and responsive , with very little lag noticed during our tests. fingertip sensitivity is much better than older alps touchpads we own seen , is slightly under a synaptics mannequin. the touchpad surface has a rough matte finish , which is easily to slide across level provided your finger is slightly sodden from sweat. the touchpad buttons were disappointing , being very small and having shallow feedback when pressed. the buttons are mounted flush with the chrome gracious under the touchpad and are fitly tightly appropriate that they furbish against the edges when pressed.

Port choice upon the a605 is good for an ultra-portable Note Book , including three usb ports , vga , lan , audio jacks , and esata through a combo port. while hdmi or displayport might be handy , many business users motionless employ vga for projectors and it is extra than capable for connecting the Note Book to a secondary monitor. the bum of the Note Book also physiognomy a docking connector , for farther port expansion

Intel Core 2 Quad Q9450

2009-12-12T12:34:00.000-08:00

The 45nm chips have been out for some time now. the dual core e8400 and e8500 are proven performers , some reaching demented speeds. the problem has been that the just 45nm yorkfield processors out have been the "extreme" line-up , specifically the qx9650 and now qx9770 models. while the functioning of the extreme line-up has been rightly documented but the consumer looking for a non "extreme" quad core cpu has been left out in the bloodless...until now. the regular quad core 45nm parts , q9300 , q9450 , and q9550 are in e-tailors' hands for shipment (if you may find them in stock) , rightly it was towering time that a functioning testing was in direct. with all of the latest games becoming supplemental and supplemental cpu intensive , multiple core cpus volition originate to become supplemental advantageous during gameplay , not to mention the benefits during video encoding and workstation productiveness.

So what does the intel core 2 quad 9450 offer over its 65nm predecessors to concoct it an appealing buy? initial , there is the additional l2 cavern , three megabytes per core versus two per core , a higher bus haste (333mhz vs. 266mhz) , higher clockspeed of 2.66ghz instead of the 2.4ghz on the q6600 that we have grown rightly doting of. the 45nm devising procedure has reduced the die size , and thence the cogency requirements needed to operate. this of course brings the profit of reduced cogency consumption and a gape thermal signature. but hey , this is overclockerclub , we're not worried with Regards To that , rightly let's attain on to seeing just how far the q9450 may be pushed since that's what in Reality matters. let's see if the quad core
Q9450 may counterpart the results of its dual core cousins.

sSpec Number : SLAWR

CPU Speed : 2.66 GHz

PCG : 05A

Bus Speed : 1333 MHz

Bus/Core Ratio : 8

L2 Cache Size : 12 MB

L2 Cache Speed : 2.66 GHz

Package Type : LGA775

Manufacturing : 45 nm

Core Stepping : C1

CPUID String : 10677h

Thermal Design Power : 95W

Thermal Specification : 71.4°C

VID Voltage Range : 0.85V – 1.3625V

Features:

Quad-Core Processing: Provides four independent execution cores in a single processor package. Four dedicated processing threadshelp operating systems and applications deliver additional performance, so end users can experience better
multitasking and multi-threaded performance across many types of applications and workloads.
Chipset

Support: Intel® Express Chipsets offer an array of exciting capabilities including dual graphics and deliver an impressivelevel of performance for demanding users. Other third-party chipsets may support Intel Core 2 Extreme quad-core processors; contact your board manufacturer for compatibility.

Intel® Wide Dynamic Execution: Improves execution speed and efficiency, delivering more instructions per clock cycle. Each core can complete up to four full instructions simultaneously
Intel® Smart Memory Access: Optimizes the use of the data bandwidth from the memory subsystem to accelerate out-of-order execution.A prediction mechanism reduces the time in-flight instructions have to wait for data. Pre-fetch algorithms
move data from system memory into fast L2 cache in advance of execution. These functions keep the pipeline full, improving instruction throughput and performance

. 45nm versions further improve this feature,with more efficient methods of loading and storing data in main memory.

Intel® Advanced Smart Cache: Dynamically allocates the shared L2 cache to each processor core based on workload. This efficient, dual-core-optimized implementation increases the probability that each core can access data from fast L2 cache, significantly reducing latency to frequently used data and improving performance.
Intel® Advanced DigitalMedia Boost: Accelerates the execution of Streaming SIMD Extension (SSE) instructions to significantly improve the performance on a broad range of multimedia and compute intensive applications. The 128-bit SSE instructions
are now issued at a throughput rate of one per clock cycle, effectively doubling their speed of execution on a per-clock basis over previous generation processors. 45nm versions include a new Super Shuffle Engine,which improves existing SSE instructions while enabling significant gains on the latest SSE4 instruction set. SSE4-optimized applications, such as video editing and encoding in high-definition resolution, will see additional performance improvements.
Intel® Virtualization Technology

(Intel® VT): Allows one hardware platform to function as multiple “virtual” platforms. Intel VT improves manageability, limits downtime, and maintains worker productivity by isolating computing activities into separate partitions

Intel® 64 Architecture: Allows the processor to access larger amounts of memory. With appropriate 64-bit hardware and software, platforms based on an Intel processor supporting Intel 64 architecture can allow the use of extended virtual
and physical memory.
Execute Disable Bit: Provides enhanced virus protection when deployed with a supported operating system and prevents the code from infecting the system. Memory can be marked as executable or non-executable, allowing the processor
to raise an error to the operating system if malicious code attempts to run in non-executable memory.
Better Acoustics:Intel Core 2 Extreme Quad-Core processors are equipped with a Digital Thermal Sensor (DTS) to enable more efficientprocessor and platform thermal control. Thermal sensors located within the processor measure the maximum temperature on the die at any given time. The acoustic benefit of temperature monitoring is that system fans spin only as fast as needed to cool the system and slower spinning fans generate less noise. This Intel-designed thermal solution for boxed processors utilizes a 4-pin header with variable fan speed control, based on processor temperature and power usage to minimize acoustic noise levels. The latest 45nm boxed Intel Core 2 processor includes a new, more advanced thermal solution with improved acoustic and thermal performance

the performance of the intel core 2 quad q9450 was better than the ol' intimate q6600. this , of lesson , was the expectation going into the testing. in the scientific benchmarks , the q9450 pulled out ahead in 20 out of 35 tests. while that does not seem like a earth beater , 9 of the 35 tests were ride related and the expectation is that no alter would happen. upon even terms taken as 20 out of 26 tests , this looks a atom better. in the gaming tests , it pulled ahead of the q6600 in 25 of 36 tests. surprising? no! the performance of the q9450 in the gaming tests show that game performance falls for the most fraction between the ancient standby and the king of the hill , the qx9770. in a Good Deal Of of the tests , the performance of q9450 was upon par with that of the qx9770.

Am i disappointed in the overclocking headroom available from this processor. not in the least! with the demented speeds being offered up by the dual core variants , i was still searching for a atom supplementary than the 3.7ghz i was able to drag from this quad core processor. but horizontal although i was expecting supplementary , a greater than 1 ghz overclock is nothing to chuckle at. the clockspeed augment was likewise done with a relatively slavish 1.36 volts to the processor. much fewer than i possess needed with both my q6600 and qx9770s to win the maximum core speed. temperatures were , for the most fraction , kept in obstruct throughout the testing. 64 degrees celsius under load was the highest temperature i saw upon air cooling during my stability testing with prime 95. with better cooling , could the max overclock be increased? probably , but the vast majority of users will be upon air , injustice that's where i spent my time testing.

As enthusiasts , a Good Deal Of times we buy a lower purpose processor hoping for increased performance injustice that we effect not possess to disburse vast coin upon the top rated processors. of lesson , with the vast bucks come a guarantee of processor speed whereas in overclocking your mileage may vary. what you possess with the q9450 when overclocked is performance that beats the qx9770 in all but a few instances. upon this account the q9450 is a success. ultimately , it means top purpose performance for bottom line dollars (at least for a quad core). priced at $379 , it does value supplementary than the q6600 , but is a far howl from the $1400 of the qx9770. again , upon this point it is a success. but is the performance that much better than the q6600 it replaces for that same price? it genuinely depends upon what you want to effect. in the scientific testing , it sure was. in the gaming , it was not as much of an improvement as i would possess hoped for. for almost $200 supplementary (at this point) , the value may be a atom precipitous to manufacture a switch from the ancient to the unprecedented , but ultimately whatsoever performance augment for an enthusiast is an augment. the q9450 performance scales injustice as the clockspeeds augment , injustice with that being said , quad core 45nm performance may be had without the "extreme" dollars that were needed up till this point. the price/performance ratio is there. if you are in the market for a unprecedented quad to add to the stable or simply looking for a performance boost , intel's non "extreme" 45nm quad core is out correct now! finally!

AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition

2009-12-12T12:16:00.000-08:00

There is nothing wrong with an incremental update—especially an update that adds functioning without touching pricing. such is the case with amd’s unprecedented phenom ii x4 965 black edition , which arrived at our functioning lab running at 3.4 ghz—200 mhz faster than its predecessor , the phenom ii x4 955 be. things else is precisely the same as the phenom ii x4 955 , reviewed back in april 2009.

So , provided the latest phenom ii is predictably faster than amd’s former flagship , why is today’s launch injustice significant? in short , it comes seemingly a few weeks ahead of intel’s upcoming lga 1156-based p55 platform debut—an event that’ll nearly certainly play a bigger role in the adoption of nehalem-based machines than either the lga 1366 core i7 or xeon 5500-series cpus possess hence far. after all , lga 1156 is going to be the interface that purportedly makes intel’s latest architecture accessible to the mainstream , supplanting the core 2 family at a number of affordable cost points.

No doubt , those unprecedented core i5/i7 cpus volition be faster than the core 2 quads they succeed , and at competitive prices. seemingly when amd looked like it had achieved functioning parity with the top intent of intel’s core micro-architecture , lga 1156-based platforms seem nearly sure to sit the bar higher.

Thus , today’s phenom ii x4 965 be introduction is in Truth a quite important one for amd. upon one hand , it could gain the organization its mainstream functioning crown—at least for a few weeks. upon the other , it could be the last time phenom ii looks as competitive as it does now. of course , that’s going to depend mightily upon how the upcoming intel chips do.

Up against core i5

Of course , we’re not capable to proclaim functioning numbers with the pre-production core i5 processors currently running in the lab , injustice it’s hard to officially quantify how phenom ii volition size up. but we can construct best guesses using today’s core i7s as rough trial subjects.

You’ll find all of our general benchmarks upon the pages that pursue. first , notwithstanding , we wanted to sit up phenom ii x4 965 be against a hypothetical core i5-750—a processor expected to cost fewer than $200 when it launches. we simulated the 2.66 ghz offering with a core i7-920 , which runs at the same clock rate. of course , we had to haul out a single channel of memory (yielding two channels of ddr3-1333) and disable hyper-threading , since core i5 won’t possess that feature. the one variable we couldn’t reproduce was core i5’s enhanced turbo boost , which is expected to accelerate clocks to 3.2 ghz when a single core is sprightly. core i7-920 seemingly benefits from a single bin of turbo boost , yielding 2.8 ghz instead.

The seemingly other platform capability setting lga 1156 apart from lga 1366 is the apply of on-die pci express 2.0 , which we’ve tested extensively and can pronounce that , in single-card configurations , has nearly zero impact upon functioning versus the x58’s chipset-based connectivity.

As we've already mentioned , the phenom ii x4 965 black edition is an update to a intimate project. in fact , amd readily admits that the silicon belongs to the same revision utilized to enable its phenom ii x4 955 black edition , running at 3.2 ghz. to that intent , it centers upon a 45nm devising process , it visage a 6mb l3 cave , boasts cool'n'quiet 3.0 engineering Science , and better department prediction than the first-generation phenom family.

Like its predecessors , the phenom ii x4 965 sports 64kb of l1 data and instruction cave per core , plus 512kb l2 cave per core , to supplement the shared l3.

An integrated 128-bit ddr2/ddr3 memory controller (running at 2 ghz by default) interfaces with a twosome of 64-bit channels. provided you're using the x4 965 upon an am2+ motherboard , speeds of up to ddr2-1066 are officially available. provided you're using it upon an am3 platform , you can install ddr3-1333 , even Though it should be notorious that seemingly one module per channel works at that frequency. and whereas amd shipped its phenom ii x4 940 with a 1 , 800 mhz hypertransport combine , the x4 965 accelerates that to 2 ghz--just like the x4 955 before it.

The chip's nominal voltage range is .825v-1.425v , injustice we won't be surprised provided cogency consumption falls within the previous flagship's ballpark. because it runs at 3.4 ghz , notwithstanding , amd is rating the x4 965 at 140w instead of the 125w utilized in previous flagship phenom iis.

Overclocking

In past phenom ii reviews , we’ve stuck to amd’s processor-in-box resolution for our overclocking efforts , very consistently falling short of the 4 ghz smooth injustice numerous enthusiasts intent for with flagship cpus. thermalright was lenient enough to send over the socket am3-compatible bracket for its ultra 120 extreme , which we’ve started using in reviews.

Yes , we know phenom ii scales injustice with better cooling , doesn’t tolerate from a “cold bug , ” and volition operated in excess of 6 ghz. but high-end air cooling is in Truth as aggressive as most enthusiasts are willing to go , with the exception of those running water. smooth there , room temperature is as much as you can hope for.

Using 1.5v upon asus’ m4a79t deluxe—already a quite aggressive voltage setting—we were capable to whack 4 ghz with the 3.4 ghz phenom ii x4 965. that setting was unstable , even Though , and we scaled back to 3.9 ghz. unfortunately , crashes in a combine of our benchmarks forced us to drop back to 3.8 ghz , where we were capable to complete the full suite of tests. the top result in each forthcoming chart reflects the functioning improvement of adding 400 mhz to amd’s unprecedented flagship.

Sony VAIO Z Series (VGN-Z530N)

2009-12-12T05:52:00.000-08:00

It’s supplemental than an executive status symbol. the sony vaio vgn-z530n ($1 , 999) is an ultraportable pocket Book that delivers the functioning serious road warriors demand without sacrificing battery life. the 13.1-inch exhibit with a unusual 16:9 appearance ratio makes watching dvds a pleasure—black bars , be gone!—and you may bastinado between intel’s integrated graphics and discrete nvidia graphics depending on the boost you destitution. and for the initial time , unlike the older vaio sz series that offered this feature , you’re not forced to reboot the system (which is a good object , since the z takes its sweet time). a comfortable isolated keyboard , hasty integrated mobile broadband connectivity , and a lasting carbon fibre case form up one of the best lightweight machines of the year.

Design

All it takes is one see at the brushed aluminium that adorns the bedeck and the stylish cylindrical exhibit hinges (the left side houses the ac plug and the right the vigor button) to acknowledge that the z530n is a luxury-class pocket Book. it’s a mote on the thick side at 1 to 1.3 inches , especially when compared with wafer-thin systems like the apple macbook air and lenovo thinkpad x300 , but we possess no qualms about the z530n’s 3.3-pound heft. we barely noticed the system in our backpack. plus , at 8.3 inches deep , the z530n keeps a slavish conformation , large for air travel (the thinkpad x300 , by comparison , measures 9.1 inches). the overall see of this wedge-shaped pocket Book is handsome but not as stunning or iconic as the air or voodoo envy 133.

First we thought the isolated keyboard , whose keys are separated by a reasonable amount of space , would require a learning curve. it doesn’t. we begin the layout easy to use and the keys comfortable , with apparently the right amount of springy feedback. the touchpad is nice and large , but the mouse buttons , which flank a tiny fingerprint reader , are too small. we would possess liked sony to chop the difference by sacrificing a Good Deal Of touchpad surface area to leave room for larger buttons.

Above the keyboard on the left are two programmable shortcut buttons , and above those is the stamina/speed bastinado. to the right is a dedicated eject button for the optical ride. the left side of the z530n houses the ethernet jack , expresscard/34 slot , modem , one usb demeanor , a firewire demeanor , and the mic and headphone jacks. the vga connection , second usb demeanor , hdmi output , and dvd burner are on the right side. apparently a 2-in-1 sd card and reminiscence stick slot is up front , along with the wireless on/off bastinado.

16:9 display

The z530n sports one of the best led-backlit displays we’ve seen on an ultraportable. its xbrite-duraview protect is bright and crisp , and we saw excellent viewing angles from side to side when we streamed an episode of the colbert bruit on hulu.com. the panel is also scratch-resistant. because of the lcd’s 16:9 appearance ratio , the 1366 x 768-pixel courage minimizes the dreaded black bars when watching dvds. but that’s apparently if the movie was shot in widescreen (look for an appearance ratio of 1.78:1). certain sufficient , when we popped in a heroes dvd , we didn’t see any black bars at full-screen.

If you want 1600 x 900-pixel courage , which gives you the capacity to see at two ingenuous windows side by side , the starting value for the vaio z series jumps from $1 , 799 to $2 , 079 , a rational $280 premium.

Asus Eee PC 900

2009-12-12T05:12:00.000-08:00

The Asus EEE pc 900 is the unprecedented update to the original eee pc ... the affordable mini pocket Book that shook up the pocket Book market in 2007. is this $550 mobile accomplice the best selection for your next travel laptop? we took an in-depth see at the eee pc 900 to find out provided this latest addition to the eee pc family offers sufficient operation and countenance to acquire you excited.

The system specs for the all new Eee PC 900:

* Intel Celeron M ULV 900MHz processor

* Integrated Intel GMA 900 GPU

* 12GB of Flash-based storage (4GB onboard SSD and 8GB PCI-E mini card SSD)

* 1GB of DDR2 RAM (667MHz)

* Windows XP operating system

* 8.9-inch screen with 1024 x 600 resolution

* Ports: 3 USB 2.0, 1 VGA monitor out, headphone jack, microphone input, SD card reader (SDHC compatible), Kensington Lock slot, Ethernet 10/100

* Webcam (1.3 MP)

* Battery: 4-cell 5800 mAh 7.2V Li-Ion (rated at 3.5 hours)

* Wireless: 802.11b/g Atheros

* Input: Keyboard and Multi-touch touchpad

* Dimensions: 22.5cm(W) x 17cm(D) x 2cm~3.4cm(H)

* Weight: approximately 2.2 lbs with battery, 2.8 lbs travel weight with AC adapter.

* One-year warranty

Like the original EEE pc , the designers at asus had no easy task creating an attractive ultraportable pocket Book while also making it cheap to produce. customers also indicated that they wanted a larger defend and a larger touchpad , genteelly both of these countenance had to be incorporated into a very small footprint.

The chassis seams match up with reasonably tight tolerances , plastics feel thick (though the pearl-like white plastics see cheap) and the exhibit hinges are molded into body with the battery. overall , the eee pc 900 is nearly identical to the original eee pc. the obviously manifest differences are the larger defend and the slightly deeper dimension (front to back) in direct to accommodate the larger touchpad.

Lifting the exhibit cover you find the same amazingly small keyboard surface commence upon the original eee pc. in short , the build quality is quite lofty despite the base toll.

The project of the original eee pc was something actually unusual in the market. weighing in at obviously two pounds and delivering a operation flat similar to a full-featured budget pocket Book , the obviously pocket Book that came near to "directly" competing with the eee pc in 2007 was the fujitsu lifebook u810 tablet pc ... which retailed for supplementary than $1 , 000 final year. after the success of the original eee pc , other manufacturers possess started to flood the market with base toll mini notebooks. the eee pc isn't the obviously kid upon the block anymore , which is why asus is trying to rise the bar with the eee pc 900.

The eee pc 900 countenance a nice 8.9-inch exhibit with 1024 x 600 boldness. while this vigor not be the most impressive boldness we've seen , it's much nicer than the native 800 x 480 boldness upon the original eee pc 4g. serene , most owners of the original eee pc 4g use modified exhibit drivers to ascend 1000 x 600 or higher resolutions upon the original eee pc ... genteelly this higher boldness defend isn't as impressive as it could be.in whatever case , the defend upon our audit unit was manumit from whatever problems such as stuck pixels and colour and backlighting were both excellent.unlike the original eee pc , the eee pc 900 doesn't come with linux. this pocket Book comes pre-installed with windows xp. while xp vigor not be the most contemporary operating system upon the market , xp is serene one of the most sturdy and stable versions of the windows os. most importantly , windows xp doesn't possess colossal system requirements ... genteelly it serene runs fast upon a relatively under-powered pocket Book love the eee pc 900. asus received some criticism over the speakers upon the original eee pc because of there colossal size located upon both sides of the defend. the bezel around the defend upon the eee pc 900 is much thinner than the thick bezel upon the original eee pc and the speakers possess been relocated to the bum of the pocket Book. speaker output quality is good , but because of the location of the speakers the sound is quite muffled when you're using the eee pc 900 as a "laptop." sus rmost low-priced notebooks currently upon the market feature poorly built keyboards that exhibit significant flex/bounce when typing pressure is used. much to our surprise , the keyboard upon the eee pc 900 (like the original eee pc) is remarkably firm , even Though the keys are small and possess a colossal measure of "wiggle" when pressed.

The keyboard upon the eee pc 900 is very , very stipulation. the original few days spent typing upon this keyboard probably will be quite frustrating as the small footprint and tiny keys require you to use a "hunt and peck" fashion of typing rather than traditionalistic touch typing methods. this means that passwords acquire mangled , emails see love gibberish , and playing games that require keyboard commands becomes quite aggravating.

Of lesson , once i got used to typing upon the tiny keyboard the keys felt obviously fine ... but this keyboard isn't designed to be used as a primary/main computer. for users who would buy this pocket Book as their "main computer" in their home or place , a full-size keyboard and external mouse are recommended.

The touchpad and unmarried button (with left and correct "rocker" buttons underneath) are easy to use and responsive. the eee pc 900 actually has a slightly larger touchpad button which makes it supplementary comfortable to use than the original eee pc. the touchpad is also larger than the touchpad upon the original eee pc and this touchpad also countenance multi-touch functionality genteelly that you may zoom in or zoom out upon matters love pdfs in direct to lower the text supplementary easily.

Overall , the eee pc 900 is a snappy little budget pocket Book. granted , the 900mhz ultra-low voltage processor doesn't possess the operation of a contemporary core 2 duo processor. the flash-based storage drives upon the eee pc 900 aid with the benchmarks since they provide practically immediate selective Information access times.

In short , the eee pc 900 furnishes plenty of operation for travel and short-term use , but this mini pocket Book isn't designed to be a primary computing workhorse.

If you open the bum panel upon the eee pc 900 you'll find a popular ddr2 ram slot and a pci-e mini card slot. the pci-e mini card slot in the eee pc 900 uses the same 8gb ssd module commence in the eee pc 8g. again , in direct to reach the 12gb storage ability upon this pocket Book asus basically obviously combined the eee pc 4g and 8g: the motherboard has 4gb of beam storage soldered to it and the pci-e mini card slot has a 8gb beam storage module.

Even with the base voltage processor and ssd drives , the asus eee pc 900 produced an incredible amount of heat. granted , other low-cost mini notebooks we've reviewed acquire flat hotter , but we hoped the eee pc 900 wouldn't acquire this toasty. the keyboard and bum of the pocket Book got quite hot flat under normal use , and the fan was always running in an endeavor to keep the system cool. fan noise was among the quietest we've heard. the obviously way to narrate the fan is blowing is to put your hand next to the air vent to feel the warm air blow past.

Just love the original eee pc 4g , the eee pc 900 uses an atheros ar5bxb63 wireless module for 802.11b/g wireless internet access. reception is quite good for a budget pocket Book. the eee pc 900 maintained a connection to my home router from anywhere inside my three-level home and from anywhere in my front or back yard. at the editorial offices for notebookreview.com the eee pc 900 managed to stop affiliated to the place router flat after i left the edifice and walked across the parking destiny. the wireless connection obviously dropped to 75 percent sign force after i walked supplementary than 50 yards absent from the edifice. being capable to travel a distance equal to half the length of a football field means you won't possess tribulation browsing the web with the eee pc 900.

Under normal use , backlight at 100 percent and using wireless for web browsing and watching a divx movie at 75 percent volume , the eee pc 900 managed to deliver less than 3 hours of battery life (2 hours and 53 minutes) with the popular battery. needless to declare , this was rather disappointing. the original eee pc 4g was capable to deliver supplementary than 3 hours of battery life.

Our tests also commence the battery meter wasn't always accurate: from Time To Time indicating an unplugged vigor adapter or base battery flat when that wasn't the case.

Acer Aspire One

2009-12-12T04:15:00.000-08:00

The acer aspire one is a 8.9" netbook with a starting price that is purposed to undercut nearly all the current market competitors. the slavish aspire one , which includes an 8gb ssd and linux starts at $329 , which is far under anything else that has the intel scintilla processor. the massive beg running through everyone's minds is if this model is built like a budget computer , or if it has what it takes to go up against some models that vend for nearly double the retail price. in this investigation we cover all aspects of the acer aspire one , and let you acknowledge if this is a netbook you should consider purchasing.

The project of the acer aspire one is very sleek with softly rounded edges and a flat glossy surface that is comfortable to have when closed. the look is quite introductory , but it does have a few chrome accents here and there which add a scintilla of spice into the look of the netbook. glossy plastic is inaugurate upon the top of the shield cover , as appropriately as around the entire lcd. at times the contemplative boarder does acquire upon your nerves if you are in a brightly lit room with some sources of flash.

Build quality looks solid for a subnotebook and the construction feels robust sufficient to handle being tossed around inside a bookbag without much concern for its safety (well apart from the glossy surfaces). holding it while it is folded in half is similar to holding a tough cover book , having a good amount of rigidity to oppose flex and compression. the shield cover feels especially robust , which is necessary for protecting the relatively fragile lcd panel.

From an upgrading perspective , the acer aspire one is a very difficult netbook to create enhancements to. the case does not disunite as easily as others to access imperative components like ram or the tough drive. while most users won't touch the insides , it is value mentioning it for those thinking approximately upgrading to vista which enjoys additional ram , or something looking to install a faster drive. another disappointing appearance approximately the aspire one is the guileless mini-pcie slot which is missing whatever connector. this area is prepped with a sim-card port for self-evident 3g visage , but unless you may solder upon your have connector you are out of luck.

The keyboard is spacious as far as netbooks go , since the aspire one is a 9" netbook inside the relics of a 10" model. you have the slight disadvantage of having huge shield borders , but you acquire some much needed keyboard real estate. the keyboard is cramped compared to a fullsize notebook , but is easy to acquire the hang of with sufficient practice. the typing surface feels robust with no keyboard flex and individual keys feel robust with no wobble. one appearance that i really enjoy approximately the keyboard layout is the dedicated page up and page down buttons. for scrolling through long webpages , especially with mini touchpads , page up and page down keys may provide a more accurate way of navigating a webpage or document at a celeritous tramp.

The touchpad project is slightly unique compared to other netbooks and notebooks in general , with the buttons upon each side of the touch surface. the just other notebook we have seen with this layout is the hp mini-note 2133. the layout is a scintilla tricky to acquire employed to , as you click upon the tough palmrest surface , and attempt to scroll upon the touchpad button. the surface is easily to slide your finger upon and the sensitivity easily tracks your finger with light pressure. if you are capable to acquire employed to the touchpad button layout ends up not being that bad at all.

The led backlit manifest upon the acer aspire one is very bright and vibrant. the white levels are very clear , leaning towards the cooler or bluer side. colors look excellent with the glossy shield , but at the price of incrementing shield reflections and flash. the shield potency be bright sufficient to con external , but with all the bright contemplative surfaces external , the shield is nearly impossible to con comfortably. viewing angles are better than average , with a wide candy fleck. flat viewing angles are excellent , to the point where you could be looking nearly plumb to the shield and placid see accurate color. plumb viewing angles are good , but they effect find their rim at +/- 15 degrees forward or back.

This intel scintilla based netbook won't be breaking whatever celerity records , but it performed more than appropriately for normal activities. internet browsing , word processing , and flat photo editing tasks were handed in a very snappy environment. the most surprising thing from a reviewing standpoint was this subnotebook giving benchmark results in every program we could flip at it. this is not par for the lesson though , as some other netbooks have limited resolutions or other singular quirks that repress most of the general benchmarking programs to bestow valid results.

Gaming operation is limited with the low-end atom-based system , but some games may placid be pace at decent framerates. the introductory half-life at 640x480 runs at 20-40fps , which is more than playable , and a massive alternative to just playing solitaire upon a boring day.
Using the latest xvid codec and media player classic we tested out multiple ripped video sources. the average load upon the processor was 10-14 percent. with this shape of load , battery life was decreased sufficient that watching a movie barely more than two hours potency be pushing it.

Hd video content was similarly out of the beg , flat with highly optimized video codecs such as coreavc. dropped frames and slower framerates were noticed in some movie trailers that we tested , and towering action scenes were out of the beg totally.

One unique feature of the acer aspire one is the dual card readers , which one is purposed for storage expansion. while the additional sdhc-only reader doesn't manifest up as installable space for an operating system , it is handy if you have one card for storage and another that you just pulled out of a camera. you don't have to swap back and forth; you may just implement the guileless slot.

The speakers upon the acer aspire one create lowend notebook speakers sound massive. peak volume levels are slavish , and there is no hint of anything but higher frequencies coming from the small speakers. trying to pay attention to dialogue in a game or video was difficult sufficient that i just brought out my headphones after a few minutes.

The headphone jack upon the aspire one worked very appropriately , driving my senneiser hd280 headphones to above comfortable listening levels. no static or other noise was noticed through the jack besides imperfections in the audio source itself.

Port choice was better than average for a netbook , with two card readers , plus the general three usb ports , lan , vga , and audio jacks. my just infirmity was the detachable of the additional mini-pcie slot which could have been employed for future 3g upgrades without purchasing a totally fresh machine.

Nearly all of the intel atom-based netbooks fall into the reasonably warm while running category , and the acer aspire one is no different. under normal conditions such as surfing the web , typing a document , or chatting upon an instant messaging client , surface temperatures stay within rational levels. the keyboard maintains a temperature a scintilla above room temperature and the backside is slightly warmer. the temperatures in the images below are listed in degrees fahrenheit: noise is the one category where the aspire one stands out , and not in a good way. nearly as soon as the netbook is turned upon the cooling fans starts at a slavish droning celerity. it barely moves whatever air out of the device , but it is louder than fans inaugurate in full-size notebooks. as the one warms up and needs more cooling the fan celerity increments to a very annoying flat. it stands out in a sedulous office setting and in a quiet classroom would acquire flat the instructors attention. with our official battery test with shield brightness at 60 percent , wireless enabled , and mild website browsing taking office , the acer aspire one managed 2 hours and 23 minutes before it had to shutdown. this is with the usually available 3-cell model , which seems to be general for intel scintilla devices upon the market right now. acer does have plans to free a 6-cell model with a larger harddrive for an additional $50 , and the additional battery life would be value every penny.

Samsung 2333SW

2009-12-11T06:22:00.000-08:00

The samsung 2333sw is a 23-inch widescreen lcd monitor. with a wealthy , shiny black piano complete and a lucid acrylic accent bar , this monitor is eye-catching as well as practicable. the integrated cable housing helps provide a clean , sophisticated look for this monitor. this monitor has full 1920x1080 hd boldness and exclusive samsung picture technologies.

This monitor has a dynamic contrast ratio of 20000:1. it furnishes a 16:9 appearance ratio and has a reply time of 5ms. this monitor also offers a one-touch access to the picture optimization function. the stylish monitor is not one you lack to pelt in a back room , but one you would lack to proudly display

The monitor is well made - strong , sleek and practicable. the monitor feels solid , sitting on the abject. this monitor needs to be installed on the abject , which can feel a little harrowing. but once installed , the monitor is very strong. the samsung magic engineering furnishes great color , very natural and wealthy. the images are clean and sharp. excellent blacks and color saturation , with no colours bleeding through or flaws.

Features

The 1920x1080 pixel boldness is unwieldy for hd content. this is a unwieldy option for blu-ray engineering , as the picture is sharp and lucid. the dvi-d input with hdcp allows the monitor to play the encoded hd content that blu-ray uses. the monitor has a vga input as well. the monitor has a 170-degree viewing angle. this monitor doesn't own an hdmi connection. the side buttons on the monitor are all the same size and form , which makes it a bit gawky to navigate through them by touch. the menus are logically laid out and easy to navigate , but this is offset by the sameness of the buttons.

Performance

The monitor has excellent evince characteristics , whether you're playing games , video , or ostensibly looking at images. at full brightness , there is a washed out look to the protect , but that can be tempered by toning down the brightness a bit. in hd fashion , the text tends to twitch a bit , but changing the frequency a little bit can cure that.

Summary

This monitor looks unwieldy and performs very well. after the primary sit up , getting the monitor installed on the abject (unless you are going to decimate it) , it sits very sturdily on the desk. the black color is sleek and the scheme is sophisticated. the monitor is easy to sit up and the picture boldness is perfect for full hd viewing. a unwieldy worth for a monitor made by a organization with a good reputation.

Pros

* unwieldy for watching movies

* lucid , crisp images

* hd boldness 1920x1080

* sleek , sophisticated design

Cons

* difficult primary assembly

HP OfficeJet 6000

2009-12-11T06:11:00.000-08:00

The Officejet 6000 is hp's latest offering in the single-function inkjet printer category. it doesn't have numerous of the bells and whistles of the ordinary all-in-ones , but what it lacks in features , it makes up for in print quality and hurry. topping out at a competitive 0.46 full-color photos per minute , there's no doubting the capability of the 6000 , but it's lost a few caviling features such as a usb cord , lcd protect , and media card reader. the officejet costs an affordable $90 , but you may get much additional appointment functionality out of the canon pixma mx330 , a multifunction printer with a built-in fax machine , copier , scanner , color lcd , and an auto-document feeder for merely $20 additional than the hp. curb out the canon provided you want the most features for your dollar , but provided all you're looking for is a rapid printer , you won't be disappointed with the hp officejet 6000.

Design and features
There isn't a destiny going on with the hp officejet 6000 in terms of snazzy design. like most of the printers in the officejet line , the matte beige and black color design is designed to match the drab , unassuming palette of whatever appointment. since it's merely a single-function printer , the footprint is easily manageable at 18.03 inches long by 15.31 inches wide by 6.45 inches deep and weighs 10.56 pounds. the printer could've been a bit shallower , but a constant output tray protrudes from the bum and demands a little additional space on the desk. while most single-function and level numerous all-in-one printers may merely have 100 pages , the stalwart input tray on the 6000 stores up to 250 sheets of ostensible paper at a time.

The printer comes with a removable paper output tray that installs on top of the constant output tray and collects finished prints on their way out. you may also extend the output tray level further to corral longer prints. merely above the paper trays , you'll find a sequence of buttons and leds that control all the functions of the printer. from left to correct , you'll witness a cogency button , paper food button , expunge button , and a network setup key. also , the top correct of the control panel features four leds that blink to indicate depleted ink levels. unfortunately , you won't find a dedicated lcd protect on the printer: instead , you have to access all of the options , settings , and features through the driver. since it's also missing a media card reader and usb slot , the Officejet 6000 is unable to operate autonomously from the horde computer. finally , we're irritated to witness that hp doesn't include the essential usb cord. hp recommends buying its proprietary "hi-speed" cable for a lofty $20 , but you may get one cheaper at your local electronics store or online.

The hp officejet 6000 uses hp's 920 sequence ink cartridges. the top of the printer pops guileless with a latch on the side , revealing a agreement bay for individual black , cyan , magenta , and yellow cartridges. in addition to the ordinary cartridges , hp also sells extra-large models that we use for the highest potential cost-savings in the following price per page analysis. according to the hp web store , the xl black cartridge costs $32 and lasts for 1 , 200 pages , and the three-color cartridges price $15 each for 700 pages. by our calculations , you'll salary 2.7 cents for a page of black and 2.1 cents per page of color , which is a bit less than the average price by today's printer standards.

Performance
After putting the hp officejet 600 through the ordinary hurry tests , we commence that it outpaced the competition by a huge bound in both photo and graphics speeds. we're especially joyous with its capability to produce 3.54 pages of our color graphics document per minute , since the next printer in line is substantially slower at 1.79 pages per minute. in fact , the merely test that the 6000 didn't appointment introductory was the text hurry test , where the lexmark z2420 achieved a crowd-pleasing 11.13 pages per minute. calm , the hp settled comfortably into second appointment with an admirable 7.38 pages of text per minute.

Per ordinary , hp comes through again with the exceptional print quality we've come to expect from the brand. our full color graphics document printed on hp's premium presentation paper came out bright and lucid. specifically , we noticed the extreme clarity of facial colours and construction , and while we did witness a few jagged edges and minor wicking , we agree with hp when it says that the 6000 may produce near "laser-quality" text. in fact , the photos we printed out produced additional accurate and pleasing images than numerous of the multifunction printers we've tested , level ones that price hundreds of dollars additional than the 6000. we should distinguish that this printer is definitely office-oriented , conveniently don't expect the highest quality prints (some of the photo elements were washed out , for example) , but you won't be disappointed provided you design to use it additional for text , with the occasional snapshot printout.

Service and support
Hp backs the Officejet 6000 printer with a ordinary one-year warranty that covers parts and labour. you get toll-free phone second from 8:30 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. weekdays and 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. on saturday for no additional price and the commissions of hp's total care package that includes an online learning center , faq , and a comprehensive second forum. you may also extend the warranty an additional two years for $35 or an additional three years for $50.

HP Officejet J4580 All-in-One Printer, Fax, Scanner, Copier

2009-12-11T06:01:00.001-08:00

HP's Office Jet J4580 all-in-one is the latest addition to the company's range of low-priced but effective multifunction printers. altho the feature sit isn't particularly extraordinary , the Office Jet J4580 all-in-one will suffice for small volume , slavish precedence needs.

The HP Office Jet J4580 has a introductory plot , with a further business-like see than HP's home-targeted photosmart range. unlike numerous low-end multifunctions , the HP Office Jet J4580 all-in-one doesn't own a rear paper tray but opts instead for a 100-sheet front paper cassette which cuts down on the printer's overall footprint. the tray is removable but isn't fully retractable , adding significant depth to the printer when it is attached. the HP Office Jet J4580 all-in-one includes an automatic document feeder.

Usb 2.0 is the plainly shape of pc connectivity , but the multifunction also has a 33.6kbps integrated fax.

The control panel on the Office Jet J4580 is extremely introductory , and may be hard to utilize at times. cancelling tasks may ofttimes take several seconds , and initiating regular cartridge cleaning and alignment need To be done from the control panel itself rather than software on the pc.

Our print haste tests ofttimes match those figures quoted by HP but we institute numerous discrepancies when testing the Office Jet J4580 all-in-one. HP claims the multifunction may print draft mono documents at up to 28 pages per minute , but in our tests it plainly managed 16.7ppm. also , HP's quoted mono print haste of 9ppm when using normal quality was faster than the 7.2ppm we averaged. color documents averaged 11.3ppm (draft) and 3.2ppm (normal). it took roughly 20-21 seconds for the introductory page of a draft document to print.

HP's claimed 4x6in photo print haste of 51sec was closer to what we experienced; photos took regarding a minute to print. a4 photos are fairly a scintilla slower , taking an average of 3min to print. these aren't the slowest print speeds around — and the HP Office Jet J4580 all-in-one manages to keep strut with the further dear brother mfc-490cw — but the speeds aren't amazing.

Text in mono documents is of a decent standard and characters are easily readable provided a little bolder than those further dear printers produce. there is a loss of clarity in text when using a 7pt font , but the multifunction retains decent quality when the text is enlarged to 20pt. color accuracy was usually good in our document tests , even Though red is over-saturated.

In photo prints , nevertheless , the color palette as a whole is somewhat unsaturated. colors lack the vividness ofttimes produced by inkjet printers , even Though the surprising lack of banding issues makes the Office Jet J4580 a much better photo printer than we expected. placid , it is best to utilize this multifunction for printing color position documents rather than trusting it with your treasured family photos.

The HP Office Jet J4580 all-in-one supplies gloat presets that are accessible from the control panel as right as through software. its gloat haste is adequate fleet , and the results are acceptable. when scanning at 600dpi images are possibly overly light compared to the source , but detail isn't lost.

OCZ Alchemy Elixir Gaming Keyboard

2009-12-11T05:47:00.001-08:00

Provided there is one area of pc based gaming which has lagged backside all others in terms of advancement it has to be the ubiquitous keyboard. not plainly has keyboard engineering Science and advancement lagged backside graphics , sound and even mouse improvements most persons don’t even solicitude provided their keyboard high-tech or not. to most persons a keyboard is a means to an design and says absolutely nothing regarding them as a person , a gamer , or a techie.

It is not completely the design user's fault as many of the best keyboards i own ever utilised are a heck of a doom younger than many gamers i played against. it seems everyone is trying to clip as many corners as they can and in the process the quality of a keyboard has suffered. please don’t win us wrong; keyboards own advanced over the years and wasn’t it was plainly a few years ago the “start” or “windows” key became frequent. believe regarding it: can anyone rightfully believe a lofty design adrenaline junky pc gamer using an ati 9700 now a days? they would be laughed out every lan set out there. yet , most persons are equally mirthful with their 2 , 5 , 8 or even 12 year antiquated keyboard.

Luckily there are many bright shinning examples of advancement which evince how far we placid own to go in terms of keyboard engineering Science. unfortunately , most of these modern lofty tech keyboards value more than many are willing to pay. this is where ocz pops up on our radar with their modern alchemy succession of keyboards. the alchemy elixir is a quite frequent keyboard but includes a doom of gigantic physiognomy all focused on improving your gaming experience. even better than its feature wealthy layout is the fact this keyboard is very reasonably priced. the elixir goes for regarding $30-35 and is now widely available from most e-tailers and retailers throughout the country. this certainly makes it a somewhat unique item in the earth of pc gaming , but plainly because its inexpensive , there is no promise that it is whatsoever good.

Today we will find out how good (or bad) this worth oriented gaming keyboard rightfully is and if or not it is worth your hard earned money!

Spesification

- Dimenssion : (W)20”x(D)7.87”x(H)1.14”

- Weight : 1.85 lbs

- Travel Distance : 3.8 +/- 0.2mm

- Operatin Force : 55 +/- 12g

- Connection : USB 2.0

- Membrane Tacticle Switches

- Rubberized Coating on all Keys

Features

- 10 Blue Macro Keys with 3 User Defined Profiles

- 7 Internet Hot Keys

- 8 Keys for Media

- Mode selection: Switch betwen standart PC mode or customized gaming mode

- Lifespan : 5 Million cycles

- One Year Warranty

System Requirtment

- Windows Xp (SP2 or Later)

- Vista (All Editions)

- CD-ROM Drive

Included

- Elixir Software CD

- Quick-Setup Guide

Logitech G19 Gaming Keyboard

2009-12-11T05:24:00.000-08:00

The Good & Bad

	User-configurable backlighting Intuitive creation of powerful macros Vibrant and responsive LCD display Backwards-compatible with G15 apps Open SDK for developers Powered USB 2.0 hub built-in Supports any six simultaneous keypresses Gaming Mode disables the Windows key
	High MSRP AC adapter hates vertical power strips Limited backlighting brightness Cable routing is ineffective when the G19 is propped up Keys are responsive, but aren't mechanical in design

Essential Specs & Stats

Keyboard type: Gaming keyboard
Keyboard dimensions: 19.5" x 10.5" x 2"
Other features: Tiltable color GamePanel LCD, multi-color LED backlighting, 20 G-keys, removable wrist rest
Extra USB ports: 2
Power source: Self-powered
Warranty: One year
Released date: May 2009

Package Content

Logitech G19 gaming keyboard
Wall wart AC adapter
Installation CD
Quick-start guide
Important Information pamphlet

Intel - Core i7 860

2009-12-10T08:18:00.000-08:00

Intel's core i7 range now resides on two different platforms , not only confusing the hell out of less-well-informed pc buyers but also making the choice of which platform to opt for much extra difficult. on the primary 1366-pin domestic of the core i7 the entry even chip corpus the 920 , which boasts a default clock dispatch of 2.66 ghz. for only a few pounds extra , however , you can now win possess of a core i7 860 , which runs at a noticeably faster 2.83 ghz and enjoys substantially cheaper motherboard costs.

As with its core i5 brethren the modern socket 1156 i7 860 uses a traditional dual-channel reminiscence controller. this is in contrast with the triple-channel 920 and means you'll be back to the traditional 4gb or 8gb configurations rather than the unorthodox 6gb or 12gb choices of socket 1366.

In actual implement this difference isn't nearly as pronounced as you efficacy believe , as most applications only don't forge implement of all that spare bandwidth. both chips succor hyperthreading which allows each core to process two threads simultaneously (a feature slash from the i5) , and both possess comparable transistor counts , despite the 920 featuring an extra reminiscence channel. this is because intel has moved the pci express interface onto the chip itself in all socket 1156 chips , allowing the video card to access the processor directly without the need for a traditional northbridge.

This decision has a number of knock-on effects. firstly , the p55 motherboards of socket 1156 solutions require only a unmarried southbridge chip to handle usb , sata and pci express 1x buses , making them a fate cheaper. secondly it means the 1156 platform has only a unmarried 16x bus , putting it at a meaningful disadvantage in setups with multiple graphics cards.

Whilst x58 solutions can provide a full 16x lane to two or even three video cards , on p55 alternatives the unmarried on-chip 16x pci express lane must be slash into two 8x lanes. this has only a slight accomplish on cards love the geforce gtx 260 or radeon 4870 , but actuate upwards to flagships love the 5870 or gtx 295 and the difference can be as much as 30 percent , a office that volition only become worse as faster cards are introduced. it could also be a major cause for care when 6gb/s sata and usb 3.0 technologies become extra essential , as both of these demand extra bandwidth than the p55 alone can provide.

The final accomplish of the on-chip pci express controller is a reduction in overclocking ability. even though you can calm reach the dizzy heights of 3.8ghz to 4.0ghz on a good i7 860 , the 1156 platform volition forge you drudgery much harder for your mhz. the unlocked pci express dispatch volition result in sure slavish clock frequencies being strangely less steady than faster ones , whilst the overall ceiling is a good 2-300mhz glower than that of the i7 920. the 1156 chips also demand a fate extra voltage to scuttle at higher speeds , even Though this is less of an issue as they also scuttle significantly cooler.

So far it sounds love bad news for the 1156 platform , but the 860 has a subterfuge up its sleeve; a greatly improved turbo vogue. turbo vogue is a feature introduced in the primary core i7 which allows the chip to jack up the multiplier when running at justly cool temperatures. when using only one or two cores the multiplier can augment farther calm , resulting in even higher functioning.

This functionality has been ported to the newer chips , but its implementation is now much extra aggressive. 1156 chips can totally whirl off cores that are mendacity fallow , greatly reducing efficacy output and thus temperature. this in whirl allows intel to be much extra confident with the turbo frequencies than it was before , as shown by the table below.

This means that for stock dispatch users , the i7 860 can provide significantly better functioning , particularly when less than three cores are being used. this intellectual core handling also furnishes substantially better efficacy consumption numbers , as the 860 volition drop its clock frequency to only 1.2 ghz when idle; providing , of course , you possess the relevant face enabled in both the bios and windows.

The final differentiation between the two sockets is that of upgrade potential. by opting for a small 775-sized chip package , intel has effectively limited the 1156 platform to 4 cores until constructing processes wince significantly. with “merely” dual channel reminiscence , 1156 is also less well-equipped to handle extra cores than 1366.

The latter platform already has 6 and 8 core chips announced and sit to arrive in 2010 , justly provided you imagination a broader range of upgrade options you should certainly opt for the 920 processor and a fit board , even provided the primary outlay is a little higher.
All in all we'd possess to calm recommend socket 1366 to buyers with a larger budget. the extra pci express lanes volition become more And More essential , whilst the superior upgrade path and better overclockability provide tangible benefits correct now. 1156 is calm highly desirable for the mainstream market , even Though we believe the i5 line of chips is arguably a better fit for this sort of user.

Intel - Core i5 750

2009-12-10T08:07:00.000-08:00

At the purpose of 2008 intel released the core i7. purposed purely at enthusiasts , this range of cpus took operation to a whole modern even and similarly gifted gamers crossfire and sli help upon a single , steady platform.

Unfortunately the engineering was priced at a even that placed it beyond the reaches of the mainstream , with not obviously the cpus starting at over £200 , but the motherboards similarly costing at least twice as much as comparative phenom and core 2 alternatives.

Couple that to the relatively high value of triple-channel ddr3 reminiscence kits and system integrators struggled to gain the value of a servile unit below £750. with amd finally eclipsing even the fastest core 2 cpus with its phenom ii x4 965 , intel could no longer leave this ageing engineering to represent the mainstay of its processor swift. enter the resolution to intel's quandary. enter the core i5...

Core i5's lynnfield architecture is a order evolution of the core i7 , with fundamentally the same chip topology minus a channel upon the reminiscence controller. gone too is the qpi which , love amd's hyper transport bus , provided an ultra-fast couple to other processors and system components. this doesn't matter nevertheless , as lynnfield gain an on-chip pci express controller providing an ultra-low latency couple between the video card and the chip.

The engineering similarly gets a modern socket; lga 1156. at roughly the same size as an lga 775 processor , socket 1156 volition similarly help a range of 800-series core i7 productions. these differ architecturally from their core i5 siblings in obviously one way; the inclusion of hyper threading.

Hyper threading is a engineering that allows each core to assassinate two threads simultaneously and can provide significant gain in operation when faced with either weighty multi-tasking , or programs that have been optimised for multiple cores.

Both socket 1156 families of chips gain from a modern and improved implementation of intel's turbo vogue , nevertheless , which can disable idle cores and put the resulting thermal improvement to good utilise by heavily overclocking the brisk ones. turbo vogue is nothing new; socket 1366 core i7s similarly have it , but due to supplemental colossal potency chary physiognomy upon idle cores , intel is able to be much supplemental aggressive this time around. with obviously one or two cores brisk the i5 750 can magnify its multiplier all the way up to 24x , allowing for a clock haste magnify of 20 percent to 3.2ghz.

Intel is similarly launching a modern chipset along with socket 1156; the p55. this does absent with the ich10r southbridge required by the x58 and handles storage , usb and pcie 1x buses directly , but similarly lacks the ultra-wide 36-lane pci express capabilities of its bigger brother.

This makes the platform fewer inequity suited to high-end multi-gpu gaming configurations , but as this obviously makes up a small proportion of the pc market , it won't be a problem for a Good Deal Of. the best news for mainstream users is the pricing of socket 1156 boards. though the ludicrously expensive high-end market is calm well-served , we have already seen low-cost p55 boards for around £90 , which is a good £45 fewer than the cheapest socket 1366 equivalents.

So , how does the cut-down yet souped-up lynnfield perform? at 2.66ghz the entry-level i5 750 portion is clocked at the same haste as the core i7 920 , and across the spectrum of our tests it provided stellar operation. in programs that make effectual utilise of multiple cores the hyper threading capabilities of the 1366 portion witness it coming out upon top (by 3-4 percent in video encoding and photoshop respectively) , but in fewer well-optimised applications the i5 really has the lead thanks to its supplemental aggressive turbo vogue implementation (1-2 percent in sysmark 2007).

Gaming similarly seems to gain as farcry 2 , left 4 lifeless and crysis warhead all showed small leads for the i5 (by around 1-3 percent) , whilst multi-tasking is again better served by the premium i7 parts.

What's abundantly clear is that the i5 is consistently faster than the q9650; the fastest mainstream core 2 quad. it's similarly slightly faster than the phenom ii x4 965 , altho not in every post. at under £150 , nevertheless it's substantially cheaper than amd's finest , making it a much supplemental compelling choice. unless amd can fetch its processors in line with intel's pricing or significantly ramp up clock speeds , it's in for another difficult quarter.

Overall the core i5 is a gorgeous processor. its mission was to beef up intel's operation in the mainstream sector whilst serving the phenom ii 965 its note as the fastest non-i7 processor. in both objectives it has succeeded , and whilst the core i7 is calm the best option for those requiring the most threads from their cpus , this is definitely the best choice for the plurality of users looking for a modern windows 7 pc this year.

Intel - Core i7 975 Extreme

2009-12-10T07:54:00.001-08:00

Intel has given its family of three core i7 processors an overhaul and has replaced the high-end core i7 965 extreme with the core i7 975 extreme. the change is fairly minor and raises the clock hurry from 3.2ghz to 3.33ghz. Intel has achieved this swell by raising the 133mhz low clock multiplier by one lop from 24x to 25x.

The higher clock hurry results in a performance swell of four percent across the board compared to the core i7 965 extreme , as the other visage in the core i7 975 extreme possess been carried across from the previous mannequin.

The potency drag of core i7 975 is 5w higher than the 965 when idling in the windows desktop at usual hurry. we could easily overclock the core i7 965 to 3.87ghz on an asus p6t se motherboard with 3 x 1gb kingston ddr3-2000 ram running windows vista ultimate edition , while the core i7 975 would knock a finical round shape of 4.0ghz.

At these overclocked speeds the core i7 975 drew 10w supplemental than the core i7 965 when the system was under load , and we are handsome certain that whatever motherboard that supports current core i7 processors should possess no affliction with the innovative mannequin.

It is interesting to see that Intel has not only supplemental the core i7 975 at the top of the existing range of core i7 processors but has instead replaced the 965 with the 975. the chip giant has likewise replaced the 2.93ghz core i7 940 with a innovative 3.06ghz core i7 950 , nonetheless the 2.66ghz core i7 920 remains in post at the bum of the range.

We regularly find that core i7 920 will overclock to 3.9ghz , which is the same hurry we procure from a core i7 940 or 965 extreme. in other words the overclocking enthusiast can happily buy a relatively cheap £240 core i7 920 and execute the same results they would procure with a £770 core i7 965.

The innovative core i7 975 will overclock to 4.0ghz and hence has a tiny edge of performance over core i7 920 , but you possess to wonder how a Good Deal Of persons will stipend £800 for the privilege of an extra 133mhz.

Intel has created the innovative 975 extreme with a revision to the first core i7 that takes the silicon from version c0 to version d0. the intriguing thing is that core i7 920 has likewise been updated to version d0 and while our innovative 920 would not overclock whatever farther than the first version , it is considerably supplemental effectual.

At the usual hurry of 2.66ghz hurry the d0 draws 15w fewer potency than the c0 and , when we overclocked to 3.9ghz , the difference in potency drag increased to a hefty 55w in favor of the d0.
We cannot recommend the core i7 975 extreme due to its bizarre toll , but the innovative version d0 silicon is a definite improvement over c0. happily there are alternatives to the 975 extreme and we are very impressed by the innovative version of core i7 920.

Asus - Rampage Gene II

2009-12-10T07:47:00.000-08:00

Asus's latest motherboard supporting intel's high-end core i7 engineering is one that will genuinely astonish a fate of people , as the rampage ii gene is built on a microatx pcb. yes that's right , here is a small motherboard that people won't be scoffing at , altho they might apparently cough at the 200 quid price tag it carries.

The rampage ii gene is part of Asus's republic of gamers (rog) product line , which means it is probably the most feature-rich microatx board you might ever come across.

Indeed , it's impressive the amount of features Asus has built into this board without the pcb appearing cluttered. that's not easy when you consider the size of the socket 1366 , six dimm slots (supporting up to 24gb of ddr3-2000/1800/1600 via overclocking and 1333) , two full-speed x16 pci-e graphics card slots and seven sata 3gb/s ports.

The dimm slots have a new locking system with latches apparently on one end , the ends nearest the graphics card slots having no latch to earn in the way of any graphics card. this means that these dimm slots may be placed nearer the x16 pci-e slots , saving a grain of space. the system works genuinely amply , the memory modules being held firmly in place.

Both the x58 northbridge and the ich10r southbridge are passively cooled , as are the mosfets , but whereas the northbridge cooler and mosfet heatsinks are linked , the southbridge one sits on its have.

Intel's x58 chipset supports both crossfire and sli technologies and certain sufficient Asus supplies two x16 slots for either setup - impressive for such a small board - but the drawback is that if you utilize two dual-height cards you will loose access to the single x1 pci-e and popular pci slots.

Intel's allusion specification for the x58 got rid of ide abet which is annoying if you have an ata interfaced optical drive , but Asus has put back an ata port on the rampage ii gene , altho its positioning is ungainly as it sits in between the 24-pin atx might connector and one of the memory slots.

Six of the seven sata ports are mounted on the brim of the board at ninety degrees , which helps with tidy cable runs , and all six are controlled by the raid-enabled ich10r southbridge. the seventh sits apparently inside these on the board and is controlled by a separate chip.

As this is a republic of gamers board you should suppose to see some special features and they appear in the contour of integrated eight-channel audio courtesy of creative's supremefx x-fi audio chip; more upmarket than your everyday integrated motherboard audio.

Meanwhile , the backside brim of the board is domestic to a immense red begin button , and reset and memok buttons which will please enthusiasts who utilize their boards out of a case or don't bother with case side panels. more to these there is a useful 'clear cmos' button on the rear i/o panel which saves messing about with fiddly jumpers on the board itself.

Asus's rampage ii gene is the first microatx board we have seen that supports intel's high-end cpu and linked chipset , and it require To be said it's the most feature-rich small board we have seen too. the apparently thing missing is perhaps an onboard hdmi port which would apparently add to what is already a fair imposing price tag.

Gigabyte - GA-MA790GP-DS4H

2009-12-10T07:38:00.000-08:00

Gigabyte is one of the basic manufacturers to fetch out a retail board using amd's latest 790gx chipset , AMD in the conformation of the ga-ma790gp-ds4h , AMD which is a bit of a mouthful for a nice and feature-rich motherboard.

Built around amd's socket a+ , AMD the ma790gp-ds4h supports all am2/am2+ processors up to and including the latest 140w phenom , AMD with its five phase potency regulation. AMD gigabyte has teamed up the 790gx with the latest amd southbridge , AMD the sb750 , AMD and both are passively cooled with copper heatsinks.

The northbridge cooler is connected to the passive potency regulator cooler via a pair of heat pipes.AMD gigabyte may gain away without using any fans upon the board because the chipsets are built upon a 55nm process and consume little potency.AMD similarly helping are the solid aluminium capped capacitors and potency efficient mosfets.

Four dimm slots are if which aid up to 8gb of 533/667/800/1066mhz , AMD ddr2 memory.

Generally the board is conventionally laid out with all the slots and ports in a myriad of unalike colours in the normal gigabyte way , AMD but there's a combine of annoying exceptions.AMD the six sata ports are placed flat upon the board , AMD ostensibly under the second pci-e slot.AMD this is ok , AMD but - and its a huge but - this board supports crossfire x and you loose access to numerous of the ports if you add in a second card: two are missing if you add a single-slot card like an hd4850 , AMD but if you add a dual-slot cooler card you could object up losing all but one of the ports.

Other manufacturers gain around this problem by edge-mounting the ports at ninety degrees , AMD and why gigabyte didn't chase this trend ostensibly it knows.

Another potential source of troubles is the placement of the extra usb headers , AMD which are tucked up tight against the second pci-e slot making them almost impossible to access in a case with a second graphics card fitted in the slot.

The 790gx supports crossfire x and hybrid crossfire x , AMD conventionally as conventionally as the two x16 pci-e slots you similarly gain integrated graphics.AMD the two pci-e graphics slots scour at x16 with a single card and dual x8 in crossfire x rage.AMD hybrid graphics allows you to implement low-end graphics cards (in ati's case , AMD radeon hd2400 and hd3400 series cards) combined with the integrated graphics to boost the 3d functioning.

The integrated hd3300 graphics hold a core clock hurry of 700mhz with the shader clock running at the same hurry.AMD the northbridge supports ddr2/ddr3 via sideport engineering and gigabyte has supplemental 128mb of gddr3 sideport memory to boost the functioning of the integrated section.AMD the hd3300 may serene access up to 512mb of local system memory.

The bios is an overclocker's delight: one glance at the main page in the motherboard intellectual tweaker (mit) section tells you all you poverty to know.AMD adjustments may be made to almost anything you may guess of.

Six sata 3gb/s ports controlled by the southbridge aid raid 1 , AMD 0 , AMD 1+0 and , AMD thanks to the novel sb750 chip , AMD raid 5.

Integrated audio is supplied by a realtek alc889a , AMD eight-channel hd audio codec which supports content protection for both hd-dvd and blu-ray.AMD it is similarly may similarly play back at 1080p.AMD a realtek 8111c chip brings gigabit ethernet integration.

The rear panel of the ga-ma790gp-ds4h shows a hint of what the board may be employed for , AMD as it comes with vga , AMD dvi-d and hdmi output ports , AMD supplemental to which are six audio ports , AMD an optical s/pdif out mien , AMD a firewire mien and four usb ports (it supports another eight via headers upon the board) plus two ps/2 ports.

Both the dvi-d and hdmi ports aid hdcp but there are limitations in conventionally far as you can't implement them together; the chipset ostensibly has a single digital output and you can't implement a normal vga adaptor upon the dvi mien as its dvi-d , AMD conventionally for dual displays you hold to implement the vga mien plus one other.

The hardware bundled in the box seems a bit lightweight compared to numerous of today's boards , AMD but what you perform gain is all useful; two ata data cables , AMD four sata data cables (these hold slice locks upon them and one pair has ninety degree connectors) and a two-port usb back plate.
By using ati's newest chipset , AMD gigabyte has built a conventionally featured board that makes an ideal - if a tad costly - basis for a home theater pc , AMD as conventionally as offering enthusiasts an ideal overclocking board for amd's latest processors.

AMD - Phenom X4 9850 Black Edition

2009-12-10T07:28:00.000-08:00

AMD's basic stab at a quad-core processor was a speck of a turkey , as phenom was plagued by a tlb (translation lookaside buffer) slip that required a transitority fix before the processor could be launched. though none of us were clear about the function of the tlb , we rapidly learnt that the hot fix for the problem cleaved 20 percent off the functioning of phenom.

This was a particular problem as the basic phenoms ran at clock speeds of 2.2ghz and 2.3ghz , which were too slow to compete with intel core 2 quad , and the tlb fix lop functioning smooth farther.

Phenom x4 is a revision of the basic phenom which fixes the tlb slip and similarly raises the clock hurry. the x4 subdivision of the mannequin patronymic is meaningful and AMD has launched a phenom x3 range , which is unusual as it is the world's basic tri-core processor (as far as we know; if you acknowledge better please drop us a line).

Phenom x4 is farther famous from the basic phenom by the addition of a '50' suffix to the mannequin code , conventionally a phenom 9500 is an basic b2 quad-core 2.2ghz processor while a phenom x4 9550 is a revised b3 2.2ghz cpu with a fixed tlb.

In addition you may earn a 2.4ghz phenom x4 9750 , the 2.5ghz phenom x4 9850 black edition that we're reviewing here and the top-of-the-range 2.6ghz phenom x4 9950 black edition.

The specifications of these processors are fairly telling , as both phenom x4 9550 and 9750 hold a tdp of 95w which is in line with earlier models of athlon 64. but the phenom x4 9850 has a tdp of 125w and the x4 9950 has a tdp of 140w.

There's another difference as the x4 9750 has a hypertransport hurry of 1.8ghz while the x4 9850 operates at 2ghz. these figures strongly suggest that AMD has pushed the architecture of this 65nm processor to its limits as the tdp is rising rapidly while the clock hurry is obviously making modest advances.

Phenom uses the same socket am2+ configuration component as the final athlon 64 processors which employed ddr2 memory and now that the bugs hold been sorted it is a decent processor. the problem is that the latest 45nm penryn core 2 processors perform better clock-for-clock and the intel processors similarly overclock significantly better than the late phenom. we've read reports of phenoms that overclock to 3ghz but were obviously capable to earn our 2.5ghz phenom x4 9850 to trot at 2.69ghz , which is an grow of less than ten percent.

This similarly puts AMD in something of a plight. if you lack a fast AMD processor the dual core athlon 64 x2 is motionless a decent chip. on the other hand if you're using an AMD 780g chipset in a media centre pc you won't lack a strong quad-core phenom. the upshot is that phenom falls between two stools as it has an perceivable disability to overclock significantly yet it isn't especially cheap compared to intel core 2 duo and quad.

The revised x4 phenom is a marked improvement over the basic quad-core processor but it has missing out in the hurry stakes compared to intel's processors. the likeliest market is the gamer who is dogged to trot crossfire graphics on an AMD chipset , but that is probably a tiny subdivision of the pc market.

Gigabyte - GA-EP35-DS3R

2009-12-10T07:18:00.000-08:00

Right , were you paying attention at the back? did you dapple the 'e' in the product patronymic for gigabyte's latest p35 motherboard? no? correctly , it's easy to miss at initial glance , but as far as gigabyte is concerned the e stands for something indispensable - power.

The ga-ep35-ds3r joins a small , cull band of gigabyte boards that are labelled dynamic power saver , which incorporates a software utility that gigabyte claims will abet you to cut costs by chary electricity.

The software interface looks for all the earth love a car dashboard and the car resemblance continues with the show , which shows the operation of the system as a rotating crankshaft finish with pistons from an eight-cylinder engine.

This is mirrored on the motherboard by a line of a dozen or straight leds that modify color depending on system operation , which is dainty but obviously value worrying regarding provided you possess a case with a clear perspex side panel.
There are three options to the power saver; on off and cpu throttling.

When the power saver is turned on the software drops the power consumption from 105w when slothful in windows to 100w and under load , (in this case pcm05 vantage); the power drops 10w from 185w to 175w without degrading the system's operation , which is something that cannot be said of the third option - cpu throttling.

Or perhaps cpu throttled power be a better expression , as the operation takes a real smite when this option is turned on. provided you genuinely lack to save that much power , it power be simpler to buy a slower processor in the initial position.

Also helping out on the efficacy side of matters are the components used; view resistance switches in the mosfets , menial power loss chokes with ferrite cores that possess up to 25 percent less power loss over the popular parts , and all solid capacitors.

Back to the board itself , which is a typical gigabyte p35 board , straight put together and straight laid out. it supports all intel's socket 775 processors including the latest 45nm range with fsb speeds of 1 , 333/1 , 066/800mhz and will also abet the upcoming 1 , 600mhz fsb speeds via overclocking.

Unlike some boards you see , the ga-ep35-ds3r doesn't implement heat-pipe applied Science to cool the chipsets but rather obviously two isolated passive coolers on the p35 northbridge and ich9r southbridge , while the mosfets are left uncovered.

The four dimm slots provide abet for up to 8gb of 1 , 066/800/677mhz ddr2 memory as straight as ddr2 1 , 200 via overclocking. there's obviously a unmarried x16 pci slot but that leaves room for three popular pci slots and three x1 pci-e slots. you obtain integrated 7.1 audio via a realtek alc889a and the same party furnishes the controller chip for the gigabit ethernet.

Using the ich9r southbridge means that the six sata 3gbps ports can be set up in raid arrays; the chipset supports raid 0 , raid 1 and jbod (just a bunch of disks).

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NVIDIA GeForce 9800M GTX SLI

2009-12-10T04:44:00.000-08:00

the nvidia geforce 9800m gtx sli consists out of two geforce 9800m gtx in sli mode. each 9800m gtx is based on the g94 core with 112 shader processors. the chips are produced in 65nm. the potency consumption of the sli combo is 2x as gigantic as of a unmarried card (2x75w). thus , the 9800m gtx sli is only suited for gigantic laptops with good cooling solutions.  

The sli version of the 9800m gtx is regarding 0-40% faster than a unmarried 9800m gtx (depending on the sli help of the game and the driver version). in galore games there can flat be a slight mitigate of operation. futhermore , galore games can allow from micro stuttering in the range of 30 fps (because of the unalike frametimes). this means you can destitution additional fps for a chattering gameplay experience. still directx 10 games should scud in elevated detail settings and resolutions fluently (see gaming fraction below).

  as all cards with directx 10 capabilities , the geforce 9800m gts renders the 3d images using "unified shaders". there don't exist any additional dedicated pixel- and vertex shaders but 2x112 to Advantage called pour processors frame the graphic toil (which has been done by pixel and vertex shaders in former days). furthermore , the shader units are higher clocked than the chip (1250 mhz).  

An virtue of the geforce 9000 succession is the integrated purevideo hd video processor. it is capable to help with the decoding of h.264- , vc-1- , mpeg2- and wmv9 video material in hd quality and eases the cpu.  

In conjunction with the nvidia 9100m g integrated graphics , the 9800m gtx supports hybrid-sli (only hybridpower). hybridpower is a technique to choose between the integrated and dedicated graphics core , provided operation or battery runtime is needed. this works only in windows vista. up to now the user has to utilise a utensil to flog between the gpus. latter nvidia wants to flog automatically in the drivers. geforceboost is not supported with this card , as there would be no operation gain to blend the integrated gpu with the 9800m gtx.

Compared to desktop graphics cards , the 9800m gts sli should be a speck slower than the geforce 8800 gt in sli mode(which has a higher memory clock rate).

ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4870 X2

2009-12-10T04:33:00.000-08:00

Two mobility radeon hd 4870 in crossfire style (similar to sli). doubles the efficacy consumption but shows plainly 0-50% better operation (depends upon the game succor , drivers and settings).

Because of the elevated amount of shaders (2x800) the gaming operation is very good and allows the gaming of all directx 9 games in elevated resolutions and details. plane demanding directx 10 games of 2008 (crysis warhead , far squall 2) may be played with elevated details.

The mobility hd 4870 x2 is based upon two rv770 chips and features 2x800 flow processors (2x160 5-dimensional shader cores). these cores execute the graphic drudgery of the shader- and pixel pipelines of older gpus. the flow processors are also called alus and are grouped in five-way vliw units. each of the five directions of a vliw bundle has to be independent from the others and hence the operation depends upon the optimization of the driver.

The mobility radeon hd 4870 x2 includes the avivo hd called video applied Science including an onboard soundchip for 7.1 sound output over hdmi or displayport and the 2nd generation uvd (unified video decoder). this uvd 2 supports full bitstream decoding of h.264/mpeg-4 avc and vc-1 streams. in addition to this , it also supports dual video flow decoding and picture-in picture style which makes the uvd full bd-live compliant. simplified , the avivo hd applied Science handles all video tasks and enables the gpu to decode hd videos.

Amd published a current consumtion of about 2x65 watt for the hd 4870 x2. motionless it is unclear if this worth represents the chip alone or the whole mxm board including the reminiscence (which would include about 2x5 watt).

The card supports as the original mobile card gddr 5 graphic reminiscence. the implore is , if this expeditious reminiscence may be utilised by the card optimally (because of the slow core clock compared to the desktop counterpart). furthermore , the pricing is rather elevated , hence most cards volition feature frequent gddr 3 ram.

Compared to the desktop ati radeon hd 4870 x2 , the mobile 4870 x2 features a slower core clock and therfore should execute a scintilla slower than a desktop hd 4850 x2.

the czech website pctuning.cz own already published an immense inquiry of the asus w90 with a intel c2d t9600 and 6 gb ram. the following gaming benchmarks stem from their inquiry.

Test ride unlimited: 1920x1080 , high: 47-72 fps -> fluently playable
Bioshock: 1920x1080 , high: 67-207 (avg. 131) fps -> fluently playable
Call of duty 5: 1920x1080 , extra: 29-92 (avg. 53) fps -> fluently playable
Crysis warhead: 1920x1080 , mainstream: 13-45 (avg. 32) fps -> fluently playable (single stutters)
Far bawl 2: 1920x1080 , ultra: 21-55 (avg. 33) fps -> fluently playable
Flatout final carnage: 1920x1080 , high: 36-48 (avg. 43) fps -> fluently playable
Race driver grid: 1920x1080 , high: 34-56 (avg. 43) fps -> fluently playable
Stalker lucid sky: 1920x1080 , maximum: 16-39 (avg. 28) fps -> playable
Unreal conflict 3: 1920x1080 , max: 32-63 (avg. 51) fps -> fluently playable
World in conflict: 1920x1080 , high: 19-103 (avg 30) -> playable

Nvidia GeForce GTX 280M

2009-12-10T00:55:00.000-08:00

One time for the fissure of the 2009 cebit , nvidia presents its new high-end graphics adapter for laptops. the top mannequin of the new 100m and 200m models is the nvidia geforce gtx 280m. although the denomination suggests it , the card does not stem from the desktop geforce gtx 280 chip , but is based upon the 55nm g92b core and consequently related to the geforce 9800 gtx+ desktop card (gtx 250). compared to the venerable 9800m gtx card , the new 280m features a higher clock rate and all 128 shader cores of the g92 architecture.

In detail the following changes can be found compared to the 9800M GTX:

More render pipelines of the G92 are enabled (128 like the Quadro FX 3700M)
17 to 19% higher clock rates (585/1463/950 versus 500/1250/800 = +17%/+17%/19%) when using a MXM 3 card (MXM 2 is limited to 800 MHz memory bus)
Refined 55nm process (instead of the 65nm process of the 9800M GTX)
Still the same maximum thermal dissipation power (TDP) of 75 Watt
And therefore a better performance / watt ratio
Faster Hybrid Power Switching (below one second versus 7 seconds)

as the older cards the new 100m and 200m cards likewise feature the purevideo hd engine to decode hd videos with a low cpu wont (bd reside support). furthermore , cuda and physx can be implemented with the gpus too (and they are swift enough to be implemented with games like mirrors edge).

In addition to the geforce gtx 280m , nvidia likewise presented two other enthusiasm graphic cards. the geforce gtx 260m is a 55nm version of the 9800m gtx with higher clock rates (and the same vigor consumption). the geforce gts 160m is a 55nm 9800 gts with the vigor consumption of the 9800m gs (and can therefore likewise be fit in 15" laptops).

as a introductory step we guided a Good Deal Of tests with the synthetic benchmark suites from futuremark and cinebench. for comparison purpose we employed a desktop hd 4850 graphic card and reduced its clock rate to the horizontal of an ati mobility radeon hd 4870 with gddr3. the system hosting this card was a core 2 duo e6600 (2.4 ghz) , 4 gb ram and vista 64 mote.

The hd4870 scarcely won the comparison in the 3dmark benchmarks from futuremark. obviously in 3dmark vantage , the geforce gtx 280m with enabled physx second for the gpu clearly won the comparison. however , this total carve in vantage is questionable , because physx second obviously affects the cpu carve and increments this carve from 6200 points to 25000. without physx , the vantage carve clearly body bottom the simulated hd 4850.

The opengl test of cinebench r10 similarly preferred the mobile hd 4870 over the gtx 280m. however , the gl functioning often depends on the installed drivers (for sample a Good Deal Of mobile drivers stem from the quadro line and are therefore doing much better).

So , in the introductory globular of the synthetic benchmarks (which are obviously to a Good Deal Of extent significant) , the geforce gtx 280m scarcely lost against the 800 shader monster from AMD.

much further interesting and further meaningful are the benchmarks of actual games.AMD accordingly , AMD we looked at many older and a destiny of recent games and evaluated the graphic cards by running the integrated benchmarks and / or recording a real game using the fraps utensil.

In call of duty 4 on 1280x1024 – towering – the gtx 280m demonstrated its operation , AMD for the very primary time.AMD with an average of 67 or rather 75 fps (2.1 to 3 ghz cpu) , AMD the nvidia flagship won against the 62 fps of the simulated hd 4850 (with the 2.4 ghz cpu).AMD – 1:0 for nvidia.

Next , AMD we examined the older but graphically challenging world of clash with the integrated benchmark.AMD on highest detail plane and sxga dauntlessness , AMD both cards achieved 21 fps at an average.AMD – drawn – 2:1

As a next step , AMD we started the call of juarez directx 10 demo benchmark on xga and towering details with 4x anti aliasing.AMD here , AMD amd with 48 versus 33 fps achieved a lucid victory.AMD placid the demo benchmark is rumored to be tailor-made for ati cards and does not in Reality represent the game's operation.AMD nevertheless - 2:2 - it remains suspenseful.

Supreme commander – forged alliance is an necessary long term game of the strategy genre because of its huge multi-player battles.AMD the exigent benchmark shows scenes of a huge onslaught of 4 companies.AMD the mobility radeon hd 4870 with the 2.4 ghz cpu clearly won against the gtx 280m with 3.1 ghz cpu with many frames advance.AMD - point for ati 2:3

In crysis , AMD the gtx 280m won in gape details and resolutions.AMD but on very towering settings on sxga , AMD which with the game cannot be played smoothly , AMD the hd 4870 won with a single fashion advance.AMD in total , AMD nvidia can be declared as the winner of the crysis onslaught (due to the clearly higher fashion rates in “high”).AMD – 3:3 drawn again.

Also the successor of crysis , AMD crysis warhead , AMD made it in our benchmark comparison.AMD the slightly enhanced engine of crysis worked somewhat better with the nvidia graphic card.AMD as a importance , AMD the gtx 280m gained one further point.AMD – 4:3 virtue for nvidia.

Also far blubber 2 has been tested with both cards.AMD the results showed a clearly better operation of the nvidia high-end laptop-graphic card.AMD – 5:3 for nvidia.

Framerate call of duty 5 1080p
AMD AMD AMD framerate call of duty 5 1080p

The benchmarks of the quite ancient games half life 2 and destiny 3 were won by amd with many advance.AMD nevertheless , AMD as both gpus convinced with fashion rates of further than 100 fps , AMD this is less necessary and probably also a importance of a lack of driver optimization (or the pre-production plane of our test sample).AMD the ancient 9800m gtx for example achieved substantially better values (which cannot be explained otherwise).AMD it is also conspicuous that the 280m simply.

evolution – nicely the geforce gtx 280m may be described best.AMD altho its fresh promising name , AMD the fresh high-end gpu is similar to the ancient geforce 9800m gtx and quadro fx 3700m.AMD due to the smaller 55nm production process , AMD nvidia achieved a clearly better functioning to watt ratio.

Regarding the benchmarks , AMD the gtx looses the comparison versus the mobile hd 4870 in synthetic benchmarks.AMD in real games , AMD the gtx 280m appears to be the better pick (sometimes plane better than the 4870 x2).AMD most actual games may be played upon lofty details and the gtx 280m plainly has to confer up in functioning killers like gta4.AMD accordingly , AMD the geforce gtx 280m climbs the throne of our benchmark inventory for unmarried gpus.

A farther virtue of the gtx 280m are the driver updates that may be downloaded from nvidia's homepage and , AMD at second , AMD the cuda software and physx abet. got 38 images per moment in f.e.a.r.AMD – 5:4 for nvidia.

Up to now a real ati mobility radeon hd 4870 (x2) has simply been tested by pc tuning (two hd 4870 in crossfire mode in an asus w90 laptop , AMD but also pre-production).AMD we tried to reproduce many of tests they mentioned on full-hd with the single gtx 280m.AMD the desire was to compare the operation.AMD the other hardware equipment was comparable (w90 with a to 2.9 ghz overclocked core 2 duo and 6 gb ram).
In call of duty 5 , AMD we achieved a similar operation with the single geforce 280m.AMD plane , AMD the average fashion rate was substantially higher.
Also in far blubber 2 (we played the intro succession of the game , AMD which corresponds to the fashion rates later in the game) , AMD the gtx 280m resulted a similar operation.
In the object , AMD we tried to reproduce the test with race driver grid.AMD the primary race of the full version accomplished nearly the same result as pc tuning recorded for the hd 4870 x2 in their test.
Though the results of pc tuning cannot directly be compared with our results , AMD it is noteworthy , AMD that the single geforce gtx 280m appears to achieve similar as two hd 4870 (x2) in the asus laptop.

Geforce gtx 280m on 3 , 1 ghz and 2 , 1 ghz cpu against mobility radeon hd 4870 on 2 , 4 ghz cpu
AMD AMD AMD geforce gtx 280m on 3 , 1 ghz and 2 , 1 ghz cpu against mobility radeon hd 4870 on 2 , 4 ghz cpu

To summarize , AMD the nvidia geforce gtx 280m wins the overall comparison with small advance.AMD yet , AMD it is unsure , AMD if the ati mobility radeon hd 4870 with faster gddr5 is able to revolve the tables.AMD up to now , AMD no pocket Book with gddr5 has been announced and due to the gape chip frequency , AMD the gain of gddr5 for the hd 4870 remains questionable.

Dell Latitude XT2

2009-12-09T12:40:00.000-08:00

The latitude xt2 is dell's multitouch-enabled trade convertible-notebook that now includes windows 7. the xt2 starts at $1 , 909 and offers a very thin and lightweight business-rugged chassis with an appealing brushed-metal finish. in this inquisition we find out provided the xt2's system performance or multitouch help has improved under windows 7.

Dell Latitude XT2 features:

Intel Core 2 Duo SU9400 1.4GHz (800MHz FSB, 3MB L2 Cache)

Microsoft Windows 7 (64-bit)

12.1" Premium WXGA (1280 x 800) LED-Backlight Display with 2-finger Multi-touch

Intel X4500MHD Integrated Graphics

3GB DDR3 1066MHz RAM (2GB + 1GB)

120GB Toshiba 1.8" 5400RPM HDD

8X CD / DVD Burner (Dual Layer DVD+/-R Drive) through docking station

Dell Wireless 1510 A/G/N, Bluetooth, and 1Gb Ethernet

6-Cell 42WHr Battery

Limited 3-year standard parts and labor warranty with on-site service

Dimensions: 11.7 x 8.7 x 1.1"

Weight: 3lbs 13.6oz

Price as configured: $2,830 ($2,262 Street)

the dell latitude xt2 has a very professional or industrial aspect with an all dark-grey project , incisive lines and edges , and level exposed screws. this notebook is definitely not aimed towards those looking for the next designer laptop. instead , it is aimed squarely at those who plainly want to win down to business. the brushed metal surfaces are genuinely specially painted covers that supply the look of metal but with the comfort of maintenance that paint gives. the complete resists smudges and is much easier to wipe clean than most brushed metal exteriors. if it was painted matte black and had a lenovo logo printed on it , you would swear it was a thinkpad.

I personally like the side form of the latitude xt2 , which is nearly expediently square at all corners. it has no sloped surfaces , no rounded sides , and sits very slavish to the desk surface. if you are carrying the tablet around in one arm it takes up such a small amount of space that you genuinely don't mind holding it.

Build quality is excellent , and probably the best construction i hold ever seen on a dell notebook. panels feel solid with very little creaking or squeaking plastic , and suitable and complete are impeccable. surfaces encounter with clean lines and nothing feels out of post. paint quality is great on every part of the relics , with no specs of dust , unpainted edges , or whatever form of defect. the protect hinge is tough and rugged ... giving you the sense that it should hold up expediently over time. the chassis feels very lasting with barely a trace of flex if you squeeze the palmrest or put heavy pressure on the keyboard. the protect lid has a Great Deal Of minor wiggle , but the protect doesn't evince whatever signs of colour distortion unless you genuinely essay to twine the panel

Access to user-serviceable components is easy through two areas. the tough ride is located underneath the battery and has four screws and a concoct holding it in post. the ram , wi-fi card , and wwan card are located under a unmarried access panel held in with two screws. most upgrade needs may be taken concern of in less than five minutes or nevertheless long it takes you to swap out a allotment. one interesting feature that dell puts front and centre under the access panel is a user detachable bios chip (with a handy draw tab). this lets companies supplant it in the event of a failed bios update , instead of sending the entire machine in for repair.

the 12.1" protect upon the dell latitude xt2 looks bulky and is one of the better tablet screens i possess seen in person. with the multiple touchscreen and pen input layers that tablets need over the actual display panel , most tablet screens look very hazy or cloudy compared to a ordinary notebook protect. the 1280 x 800 display upon the xt2 looks slightly hazy compared to a normal display , but much nicer than the average tablet protect. one crucial feature of a tablet or slate protect is wide viewing angles for using the protect from multiple positions without having lots of color distortion. the display upon the xt2 is above average in terms of horizontal viewing angles , but motionless suffers from a Good Deal Of distortion when viewing the protect in landscape mode and pushing the protect back.

Backlight levels upon this protect are with Regards To average with other trade notebooks , but not as good as "sunlight readable" displays. dell does offer a brighter panel for daylight employ ... which should hopefully be bright enough to not be washed out in instruct sunlight.

The dell xt2 includes a capacitive touch-screen with a built-in digitizer for pen input. the pen gives excellent traction and feedback upon the protect similar to a ball-point pen over a glossy tough cover book. the texture allows exact movement , and it stays consistent across the entire protect. oils from my fingers pathetic the protect didn't seem to affect the pen traction too much , though for the best writing surface possible i would suggest taking a microfiber cloth to the protect primary. the pen includes two side-mounted buttons for the second mouse click and erase functions. i institute them to both drudgery just Right but the second mouse button is slightly too sensitive ... activating with the slightest touch.

The xt2 supports two-finger multitouch with its capacitive touch display. we didn't see much improvement between the multitouch environment in windows vista compared to windows 7. scrolling and zooming in internet explorer 8 motionless feels choppy , which makes it very easy to overshoot your intended blot. switching to other web browsers didn't seem to support much and google's chrome obviously interacted with the zoom feature. i feel when it comes to multitouch apple's hardware and software support is by far the best. dell similarly didn't include any oem-specific touch software upon our latitude xt2 beside controlpoint which felt out-dated and redundant compared to windows 7's possess controls.

The audio system upon the xt2 consists of a unmarried mono speaker located upon the left side of the chassis. it works just Right enough for listening to the occasional lay or movie , but it sounds in Truth off-center because the unmarried speaker is located upon one side. peak volume is fair clarion , but it similarly distorts when it tries to produce bass or midrange audio. headphones are a need To.

the xt2 keyboard looks and feels unwieldy with slender keys and high visibility labeling. the layout is easy to follow with full-size principal keys and impersonally sized function keys. compared to other notebooks the keys own a shallower throw , which is a side execute of the thin chassis. i truly inaugurate the keyboard to be quicker to form on compared to the thinkpad x200 , since the shorter throw means fewer travel before a key activates. the individual keys own no wiggle when you essay to move the top of the key side to side.

The touchpad is an alps mannequin running proprietary dell software. compared to the average snypatics mannequin it does manifest a Great Deal Of minor lag , but it serene feels responsive and easy to apply. i suppose dell could own gone with a larger touchpad surface , since the xt2 has enough space to merge it if you move the buttons supplementary towards the lower brink of the palmrest. dell also includes a pointing stick , which worked , but doesn't feel as fluid or responsive as other alternatives i own utilized

port selection is excellent ... smooth when compared to larger notebooks. the latitude xt2 offers two usb ports , one esata/usb combo , audio in/out , firewire , vga , lan , and a proprietary cogency socket for a Good Deal Of dell accessories. if you destitution supplemental ports or an optical drive , the docking station gives you four usb ports , serial , dvi , vga , lan , headphone out , and of class an optical drive. the docking station feels extremely deservedly built , and has one of the nicest latching mechanisms i possess seen. it has a sturdy metal latch arm , which when extended and released has a delayed motion where things slowly clicks into post.

Toshiba Satellite Pro L300

2009-12-09T11:01:00.001-08:00

the toshiba satellite pro l300 offers a vivid 15.4" wxga display and intel centrino processor engineering Science. the l300 has all the essentials for commerce users in its simplistic yet practicable scheme. let's take a closer a see and witness provided the satellite pro rightfully stands up to the competition.

specifications:

* Intel Core 2 Duo T8100 2.1GHz processor

* Intel X3100 Integrated Graphics

* 2GB RAM DDR2

* 160GB (5400 rpm) hard drive

* Windows XP Professional OS

* 15.4" WXGA 1280x800 screen

* Intel PRO/Wireless 3945ABG (802.11a/b/g)

* 10/100 Ethernet LAN

* Modem port

* VGA-15 pin

* DVD-SuperMulti drive (+/-R double layer) supporting up to 11 formats

* ExpressCard Slot

* SDCard Slot

* 3x USB 2.0

* Headphone and microphone jack

* webcam

* Battery: 6-cell (4800mAh) Lithium Ion battery

* Weight: 5.7lbs

* Starting price: $949

the satellite pro l300 has a very innocent scheme. it has that sleek commerce appearance with its silver lid and black keyboard. you don't acquire whatever glossy imprint finishes with the l300. don't leave the unmistakable looks idiot you though , it serene is very operative.

The chassis is solid and the overall scheme didn't feel cheap. it does feel burdensome for my criteria , but i am applied to smaller tablet pcs. weighing in with Regards To 5.7lbs is normally average for a 15.4-inch pocket Book. the l300 hides dirt genteelly , but you can found to witness galore scratches from normal wear and mangle.

The plastic scheme seemed durable and didn't exhibit whatever signs of flex. the hinge was even stiff and the defend stayed in office. the l300 comes with a good array of face for the toll , but to me seems like an clumsy sized pocket Book for commerce employ , unless it stayed in your office.

the 15.4" wxga (1280x800) screen on the satellite pro l300 is above average. the colors are bright and vivid. the screen didn't possess whats ever difficultnesses or defects. the backlighting was fine in an place setting and easy to read. i didn't notice whatever signs of blacklight bleed through accept for a tiny scintilla on the backside by the taskbar.

the colours looked good at all angles and that is why i rated the shelter as good. i didn't have a problem at whatever viewing angle. the just problem i had was when the shelter was tilted all the way back the colours were distorted , but who uses their shelter like this besides.

the keyboard on the l300 is solid and didn't display any signs of flex , no matter how hard you typed. the keys possess a finical repartee and are easy to read. the spacebar is a little smaller than i would love , but it's not the object of the world. the keys horizontal possess a durable textured feel to them.

I didn't feel cramped when typing at all. the keyboard is the perfect size and the palm rest is comfortable to rest your hands on. i am used to typing on tablets , sic i enjoyed having the extra keyboard room.

The touchpad is average. i love that it is indented into the palm rests because your finger never slips off. i mean you could apply this touchpad with your eyes closed ... sic , you acknowledge what i mean. the seemingly problem was it was kind of slow when navigating and i couldn't change the responsiveness love on a mouse. the correct and left click buttons worked fine as sic.

the satellite pro l300 didn't have whatever difficulties running multiple programs or multi-tasking jobs with its core 2 duo 2.1ghz processor and 160gb hard ride. i could clog email , unsophisticated documents and surf the web without whatever lag. the benchmarks are average and overall the l300 did good upon its pcmark05 score compared to other notebooks in the same category. i am certain the fact it is running windows xp instead of vista helps out this trade savvy notebook as unobtrusively.

the speakers upon the satellite pro l300 aren't the best , but recollect this notebook is purposed toward commerce implement and it's not an entertainment or gaming notebook. the speakers are located under the preserve of the notebook by the hinge. music sounds fine when played at normal levels , but the louder it gets the supplementary distorted it becomes. my recommendation is to to implement your trusty headphones when working and listening to music or watching videos. the volume dial upon the front side is a convenient feature too , this way you don't annoy your position mates.

Port choice was average for a notebook of this size , it would possess been fastidious to see s-video or hdmi. overall you gain the basics with your optical drive and three usb ports , only what the commerce professional needs. you gain the choice to labor or distinguish movies upon that long flight.

The IdeaPad Y550

2009-12-09T10:41:00.000-08:00

the ideapad y550 is a 15.6" multimedia notebook from lenovo offered in a blend of affordable and high-end configurations. the top of the register system options include an intel core i7 processor and nvidia gt 240m dedicated graphics while additional affordable systems include general core 2 duo processors and integrated graphics. in this review we look at a mannequin equipped with the intel t6400 processor and intel x4500 integrated graphics

Lenovo IdeaPad Y550 Specifications:

* Windows Vista Home Premium with SP2 (Now available with Windows 7 64-bit)

* Intel Core 2 Duo T6400 2.0GHz (2MB Cache, 800MHz FSB)

* 4GB DDR3 SDRAM (1066MHz)

* 320GB 5400 rpm SATA HDD

* 15.6-inch LED-backlit WXGA display (glossy, 1366x768)

* Intel X4500MHD integrated graphics

* Intel 5100AGN

* Ports and connectors: (2) USB 2.0 ports, eSATA/USB Combo, VGA, HDMI, SDHC-Card reader, RJ-45/Ethernet (Gigabit), stereo headphone/line out, stereo microphone in, 1.3 megapixel webcam

* Dimensions: (LxWxH) 15.2" x 10.0" x 1.02" to 1.5

* Weight: 5lbs 13.5oz

* 11.1v 56Wh 6-cell battery

* One-year standard warranty

* MSRP: $813

the lenovo ideapad y550 has a modern design with a sleek figure and a rather pronounced contrasting color design. the exterior con of the y550 when closed is thin and insipid with a thick orange urbane section breaking up the two black halves on the notebook. from a distance the external color of the shield cover appears to be matte black , but looking at it closer it is in Truth a faintly embossed surface. this particular design is an overlapping honey-comb finish that gives the notebook a squeamish designing see while similarly giving it a light texture. the inside is a combination of a glossy black and metallic gray with chrome accented speakers and white led-backlit controls. i in Truth fancy that the lenovo design staff has to own feasibly much back when edifice thinkpad models that they in Truth go all out with the ideapad series.

The y550 feels feasibly built compared to most consumer notebooks but tranquil seems love it could be improved in a Lot Of areas. the shield hinges are fair stiff and requires two hands to open the cover. the lip of the cover works against you when trying to open the shield since it hugs the palmrest closely. the shield cover has a Lot Of minor flex but tranquil does a good job at preventing shield distortions when you mass on the back of the display. the chassis has a Lot Of minor flex when you own the notebook in the air by the brink of the palmrest , but it tranquil feels solid if firmly pressed when the notebook is sitting on a insipid surface. the keyboard doesn't flex much , but right above the optical ride if you mass hard enough you can win the keyboard abject to create a clicking sound. proper and finish is good overall , but one area stuck out in a nit-picking way. i fancy the speaker grills are supposed to sit flush with the bezel above the keyboard and on both speakers one brink sticks up higher than the other. intel x4500 integrated graphics.

the wxga expose upon the y550 appears to be the highest courage offered upon this model. level the better configurations are limited to 1366x768. this is missing when compared to the dell studio 15 that may be configured with a 1080p panel in configurations starting at less than $800. the panel offers good color and contrast , ranking middle of the drove compared to most notebooks. black levels are good at low and middle backlight levels , but expose many backlight creep near 100%. peak brightness levels are large for viewing in bright appointment conditions with a comfortable domestic viewing level somewhere between 60 and 70%. viewing angles appear average with colours showing significant inversion in as little as 10 degrees when tilted back. level viewing angles see much better , showing no notable color expedient level when viewing from the very border of the screen.

The lenovo ideapad y550 has above average sounding speakers , making apply of two crucial speakers up top and a subwoofer below. listening to music and movies the speakers have good midrange and bass , but is motionless weak compared to other notebooks with committed subwoofers. peak volume levels sound stalwart enough to be listened to in a small or mid-size room , but not clarion enough to over-power a doom of background noise. for watching feature-length movies in large rooms the hdmi-port is a large way to pass digital audio over to a domestic theater system.

the keyboard is comfortable to form upon and has a comely solid typing surface. transitioning to this keyboard from my thinkpad was no problem , especially since the key action felt very similar. the plainly tactile difference i initiate between this keyboard and the thinkpad keyboard is the key shape; the thinkpad keys own a extra "cupped" feel to them.

The y550 has a spacious synaptics touchpad with a very dainty texture. while a Good Deal Of pocket Book manufacturers strength carry the glossy palmrest surface onto the touchpad , lenovo breaks it up with a barely-bumpy texture that is easier to slide over. out of the box it was tough to slide across and almost tacky from the multitouch sticker over it , but with a Good Deal Of oil build-up over the initial few hours it broke in amply. sensitivity is huge out of the box... requiring plainly a light touch to prompt the cursor across the shelter. lag is not supply under whatever circumstance including very hasty movement. the touchpad buttons own a long dash and emit a gentle click when fully pressed.

port choice is enough altho i feel there was sufficient room left unused to account for an additional usb port. the lenovo ideapad y550 offers two usb ports , one esata/usb combo port , vga and hdmi ports , ethernet , and audio jacks. expansion slots include an expresscard/34 slot and sdhc-card slot.

Lenovo likewise includes a number of touch-sensitive and click-style buttons around the keyboard to control quick access functions. the ordinary buttons include one to video modes , another to load the dolby audio control panel , and audio switches to adjust volume and the speakers. a blinking slider bar in the middle lets you quickly access four pre-set lenovo applications.

Dell Studio 1747

2009-12-09T10:08:00.001-08:00

the studio 17 is a 17-inch multimedia and gaming desktop-replacement notebook from dell. this system can be configured with intel core i7 processors as in All Conscience as high-end ati mobility radeon graphics cards to compete against powerhouse bodies like the acer aspire 8940g or asus g51j. dell has one trick up its sleeve with the studio 17: it's the primary unwieldy consumer notebook to offer an optional multitouch display.

Dell Studio 17 (1747) Specifications:

* 17.3" HD+ (1600 x 900) TrueLife WLED

* Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

* Intel Core i7 720QM processor (1.6GHz, 6MB L3 cache)

* ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4650 1GB

* 4GB DDR3 RAM (2x 2GB)

* 320GB Western Digital Scorpio Black 7200RPM Hard Drive

* Dell Wireless 1397 802.11g

* 8X DVD burner

* Three-year limited warranty

* 9-cell battery (85Wh)

* Weight: Starting weight of 7.87 lbs

* Dimensions: 16.28 x 11.04 x 1.1-1.54"

* MSRP: $1,164

The dell studio 17 has a sleek wedge-shaped side conformation that helps mask its immense footprint. the sloped project reduces the thickness of the Note Book, and provided you don't count the bulging 9-cell battery , it is basically as high as thinkpad t60 when closed. the red shield cover looks very dainty and is similarly available in other colours provided you custom configure the Note Book. the painted cover has a immense rubbery texture that gives the Note Book a soft feel and helps to augment grip for your fingers. the inside of the studio 17 is glossy plastic and a flush-mount color-matched touchpad. the palmrest gracious is painted with a silver metallic complete with the gracious directly surrounding the keyboard being glossy painted black plastic. both finishes appear to oppose light scratches , which is a godsend for glossy notebooks that destitution to be wiped down constantly to see clean and smudge-free.

The one dell-specific project component that truly bugs me is the battery project. i greatly prefer the method of extended-life batteries that prolong out the back of the Note Book. the lower-mounted method utilized with the studio 17's battery prevents the Note Book from sitting disinterestedly flush upon your desk surface. the obviously problem with using a battery that prolong out the back with this Note Book is the hinge project which would interpose with extended batteries.

the chassis feels very stalwart and when the Note Book is closed it feels stiff sufficient to stand on (though we don't recommend standing on it). dell did an excellent job perfecting the solid construct and veritably nailed it with the precise suitable of the carcass panels. every panel is securely held in appointment with level gaps around mating surfaces. the panels themselves feel lasting and resist flexing under moderate pressure. the ostensibly surface on the Note Book that seems to have whatsoever flex is the keyboard tray that flexes slightly under stalwart pressure.

The bum of the Note Book has a clean appearance with a single access hatch to user-replaceable components. users looking to upgrade the studio 17 will find two tough ride bays , three mini-pcie slots , two memory slots , and the bios battery. our outline left one tough ride bay unsophisticated , as as Is Proper as slots for a wwan card and tv tuner card. the graphics card and processor were not accessible through the leading access panel , as Is Proper to alter either of those would require further dismantling of the Note Book. no "warranty void provided removed" stickers were inaugurate anywhere inside or external the computer.

The 17.3-inch show on the studio 17 looks above average with good color saturation and excellent contrast. dell picked an in-between boldness of 1600x900 in this model , which is better than wxga but still less than the 1080p displays that are frequent on nearly all competing models. with that said dell does offer rgb-led show upgrade options for this model where none of the competing models offer similar displays.

The frequent show has good perpendicular viewing angles where colors don't originate to invert significantly until the screen is tilted 15-20 degrees forward or back. flat viewing angles are better with colors staying faithful to roughly 80 degrees in each supervision. backlight levels are beautiful good in terms of flat brightness and peak brightness. with the screen displaying an all-black background there is minimal bleed around the edges at normal brightness levels. as you amplify past 80% the black levels originate to appear washed out , but that is normal for bright panels. the backlight is powerful sufficient to comfortable con the show in bright post conditions or outdoors provided you find a smutch of specter.

The dell studio 17 includes jbl stereo speakers with a bottom-firing subwoofer. the principal drivers are top-firing through the corners of the palmrest which is much preferred over lap-firing speakers which may sound muffled. in our tests the studio 17 speakers rated so above average when playing both movies and music. midrange and elevated notes came through clearly and the subwoofer additional a Great Deal Of bass which is normally missing from a Great Deal Of notebooks. peak volume levels were above average and additional than capable for filling a small or medium sized room with sound.

The keyboard on the studio 17 is very squeamish and very comfortable to figure on with such a unwieldy palmrest. with the notebook sitting on the bound of a desk or on your lap your wrists are fully supported to your forearms. the soft rounded bound of the front of the notebook doesn't seem to cause any pressure points , which may be a problem with a Great Deal Of notebooks. the keyboard layout takes full advantage of the unwieldy surface area of the studio 17. the keyboard is full-size with no condensed keys and it includes a four-key wide numberpad. the layout is dell-standard with the function keys being secondary and the access keys being principal. to confer you an example you may modify the brightness directly by pressing f4 and f5 , but to renew a webpage you would poverty to click fn+f5. you may watch a Great Deal Of flex of the keyboard under powerful pressure but under normal typing it isn't that direct. individual key action is flat with a very soft click emitted when each key is fully pressed. the figure we reviewed doesn't offer a backlit but it may be included as a $25 option. after using the studio 17 a few nights in front of my tv i veritably originate myself wishing that the backlight came frequent.

The touchpad is a very unwieldy synaptics model with a Great Deal Of multitouch befriend. innovative gestures include two-finger scrolling , rotating , pinch zoom , and a three-fingered flick. sensitivity is excellent with the touchpad picking up flat the slightest touch without a problem. this did cause a Great Deal Of troubles provided you barely skirmish your palm against the touchpad while moving the cursor towards a target. the touchpad would detect the moment input and fashion the cursor freeze until you let off. no amount of adjusting the settings corrected this but with sufficient habit you learn to actuate your hand farther absent from the touchpad boundaries. touchpad speed is unwieldy with no discernable lag noticed flat during hasty movements. the surface texture is a light matte complete and very easy to slide your finger across arid or wet. the touchpad buttons are also very squeamish with a deep hurl and a soft click when pressed.

Port selection is very good flat with no ports or slots additional to the front or raise bound of the notebook. dell included two usb ports , one esata/usb combo mien , vga , hdmi , and displayport-out , lan , two headphone jacks , audio-in , lan , and finally a firewire-400 mien. expansion slots include an expresscard/34 slot and sdhc-card reader. one extra mien that wasn't implemented in our figure is the antenna jack that connects to an internal tv-tuner. we did hold one problem with the usb mien layout; the correct side has spacing far sufficient apart from each other to forestall you from using a Great Deal Of dual-pronged cords.

The dell studio 17 includes an accelerometer to screen the tough ride in the event of a physical system crash. provided it detects the notebook is dropped it volition rapidly park the tough ride to befriend minimize damage. this is frequent in a Great Deal Of trade notebooks , but unlike every other implementation we hold seen , this one was the initial to cause troubles. provided you cant the notebook too far in any supervision it volition directly modify the supervision movement on the screen. we initial noticed this during our testing phase when the notebook was resting on an elevated stand. provided the studio 17 is tilted forward dialog box selection volition randomly switch back and forth. provided you cant the notebook to one side it volition originate moving the selection box up and down. to ostensibly way to correct this is to uninstall the st micro screendection driver. this problem is also reported on the dell community forum.

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2009-12-08T03:34:00.000-08:00