3 Dec 2010

Zotac Announce two 880G AMD Mini-ITX Motherboards


http://www.anandtech.com/show/4046/zotac-announce-two-880g-amd-miniitx-motherboards

The mini-ITX market is gathering pace, and seemingly every motherboard company wants a piece of the action.  Some get it almost right, such as the Gigabyte H55N-USB which is the only motherboard this year we’ve given a highly recommended rating, whereas others can get it very, very wrong.  Mini-ITX specialists Zotac have recently announced their next two AMD offerings.

14 Nov 2010

A brief look at upcoming ASUS P67 Motherboards


http://www.anandtech.com/show/4019/a-brief-look-at-upcoming-asus-p67-motherboards

With the launch of Sandy Bridge on the horizon, the larger motherboard manufacturers are putting the final touches to their products.  ASUS, Gigabyte, EVGA, MSI, Foxconn, and others will all be vying for your hard earned cash by attempting to wow you with images of hardware, and words regarding supposed performance.  So when ASUS started handing out images of their upcoming high-end P67 range, we had to dissect and pass on the information.   Click through for the P8P67 Pro, P8P67 Deluxe and the P67 Maximum IV Extreme.

29 Sept 2010

A Quick Glimpse of the Biostar TP67XE and TH67XE


http://www.anandtech.com/show/3950/a-quick-glimpse-of-the-biostar-tp67xe-and-th67xe


With Intel’s new socket 1155 and Sandy Bridge archtecture nearly upon us, it was only a matter of time before motherboard vendors started to release promotional shots of their offerings.  We saw a few pre-production boards at Computex, enough to wet the appetite, but nothing set in stone. Now however, some high-resolution images of final production boards have fallen into our lap in the the form of their TP67XE and TH67HE offerings.

6 Aug 2010

ASUS Rampage III Formula to debut ‘soon’



ASUS’ Republic of Gamers range is soon to have a new member, in the shape of the ASUS Rampage III Formula.  Using the X58 chipset, this board is designed for looks, uncompromised performance, overclocking, and the best possible online gaming experience with the new SupremeFX X-Fi 2 audio solution.  However, based on our recent high-end X58 roundup, the X58 market is stagnating between the budget X58 and high end, where the minor features that few people end up using seem destined to create a huge markup price.  ASUS hopes to alleviate such issues with the release of the Rampage III Formula, by finding a happy medium.

5 Aug 2010

Logitech Releases a Smörgåsbord of Gaming Peripherals


http://www.anandtech.com/show/3840/logitech-releases-a-smrgsbord-of-gaming-peripherals

A competitive gamer loves being at the cutting edge.  Every piece of hardware needs to be meticulously set to his or her specifications and customisations – being hindered by substandard equipment is not an option.  For a number of years, Logitech have played a role in this field, trying to give the gamer what they want – assuming money is no object, of course.  Today they have announced a triumvirate of a new headset, new mouse and new keyboard to add to any prospective warrior’s arsenal, if your wallet stretches that far.

4 Aug 2010

Corsair to release the H70


http://www.anandtech.com/show/3837/corsair-to-release-the-h70

Water cooling is typically seen for an enthusiast, requiring pumps, reservoirs, tubing, know-how, and a cautious mind not to spill water all over your precious components.  The benefits of water cooling are obvious to many – having your system run cooler, better stability at higher overclocks, and aesthetics.  Lower down the order of the water cooling, manufacturers like CoolerMaster, Corsair and Coolit have over the years come to the market with all-in-one solutions, requiring little knowledge to reap water cooling benefits.  These early models were readily slated in reviews, for being more expensive than high-end air cooling, yet performing worse.  It wasn’t until the Corsair H50 and H50-1 models came along that these all-in-one water coolers were taken seriously, because here was a product that performed as good as a high end air cooler, in certain situations quieter, could easily fit in many cases, and only for a small premium.  So now Corsair is due to release the next model in their line – the Corsair H70.


31 Jul 2010

Gainward announces a 2GB GTX 460


http://www.anandtech.com/show/3835/gainward-announces-a-2gb-gtx-460

If you’re on the lookout for a GTX460, you had two choices – the 768MB versions, or the 1GB variants.  Fromour recent review, the 1GB versions, due to their increased memory bus width, outperformed the 768MB versions by quite a few percentage points.  This is also reflected in the price of the 1GB 460 over the 768MB 460.  So now Gainward are adding to the mix, with a 2GB GTX 460 model.

13 Jul 2010

OCZ Unveils 4GB DDR3-2133 Modules


http://www.anandtech.com/show/3815/ocz-unveil-4gb-ddr32133-modules

The amount and speed of the RAM in a system is always indicative of the user and the software.  Small home users require nothing more than enough for the operating system, word processing, web browsing and email. CAD engineers, VM users, and video/ music/graphic editors may require density over speed, to cope with a potentially large workload, while overclocking fanatics like memory that goes fast. OCZ plans to cater to both overclocking and high memory users, with the announcement of high speed, 4GB memory modules.

24 Jun 2010

Sapphire HD5670 Ultimate Announced


http://www.anandtech.com/show/3785/sapphire-hd5670-ultimate-announced


Sapphire is bringing a constant stream of passively cooled 5xxx series GPUs to the market – if you recall, we reported on the Sapphire HD5550 Ultimate only a couple of months ago.  This time, they have another iteration to introduce to the market – the HD5670.  With HDMI, Dual-Link DVI and DisplayPort connections, the card will support three monitors in an ATI Eyefinity configuration with a suitable DisplayPort monitor or active display adapter.  DirectX 11 and CrossFireX support comes as standard.

18 Jun 2010

Computex 2010: Motherboards


http://www.anandtech.com/show/3770/computex-2010-motherboards

Another year, another Computex.  Every time it comes around, vendors attempt to tease and tantalise both journalists and Joe Public alike with concept models, previews, machines running really fast, and the ubiquitous booth attendants holding motherboards upside down.  As part of our motherboard coverage here at AnandTech, rather than post separate news articles for each motherboard, we've had a look through what Computex 2010 had to offer, including current and to-be-released products, and got facts straight from the manufacturers where possible.

6 Jun 2010

ASRock X58 Extreme3: An Enthusiast X58 Motherboard at a Budget Price?


http://www.anandtech.com/show/3751/asrock-x58-extreme3an-enthusiast-x58-motherboard-at-a-budget-price

Today, we take a look at an X58 motherboard from ASRock, the Extreme3.  The Extreme3 is the next iteration up from the ASRock X58 Extreme, with the notable additions being USB3 and SATA 6Gb/s functionality. The good news is that ASRock have managed to provide the extra features whilst retaining a sub $200 price point, making it a difficult board to ignore...

News Just In: Gigabyte Announces USB3 Mini-ITX H55 Motherboard


In the race to get a USB3 capable mini-ITX motherboard to market, Gigabyte has today announced the first entry into the arena - the GA-H55N-USB3.  Measuring a tiny 17cm x 17cm, this board is a stark contrast the the Gigabyte X58A-UD9 released last week.

News Just In: A Single Slot GTX 470 from Galaxy


Power and heat output are often issues which stride the minds of graphics card enthusiasts.  Sufficient cooling and a beefy power supply are often a prerequisite if one wishes to invest in NVIDIA’s latest Fermi offering.  So what happens when we catch word of a single slot graphics card containing a Fermi GPU?

11 May 2010

AMD Releases Processor Updates


http://anandtech.com/show/3714/amd-release-processor-updates-
AMD today have launched five new processors, to replace current products, ranging from the budget Athlon II X2 260 to the Athlon II X4 610.

Hard Drives to reach 3TB in 2010?


http://anandtech.com/show/3713/hard-drives-to-reach-3tb-in-2010

Sources close to Seagate roadmaps have leaked the potential of a 3TB SAS drive being released this year.

10 May 2010

Intel announce super Westmere-EX for servers


http://anandtech.com/show/3712/intel-announce-super-westmereex-for-servers
The newest product to be thrusted into Intel's server arsenal will be called Westmere-EX, and is set to directly compete with AMD's Mangy-Cours server chip which features 12 cores, and AMD's future Bulldozer architecture.

MSI has announced the HTPC oriented 740GM-P25


http://anandtech.com/show/3708/msi-ananounce-htpc-740gm-p25
Announcing high end products and 'Halo' type hardware is relatively easy for manufacturers - slap some snazzy artwork next to a few pictures, wring a few industry related endorsements, put the major selling points in big letters, write a website page for it, and maybe run a competition to let a couple of people win one.    For entry level boards, it's a different matter - make it work well, and price it right.  This is exactly what MSI are trying to do on their new 740GM-P25.


7 May 2010

Inno3D announce triple slot GTX 470 Hawk

http://anandtech.com/show/3707/inno3d-announce-triple-slot-gtx-470-hawk-
The Fermi cards have now been out (and only just available) for the just over a month.  Like the AMD 5xxx series, the first cards used reference PCBs and reference coolers - the only way you could distinguish between the different companies was by the branded sticker on the large chunky cooler.  Given time, and knowledge of the system, custom coolers were just around the corner.  This is what we see in the new Inno3D GTX 470 Hawk.

Galaxy GTX 470 GC - The world's first non-reference Fermi

http://anandtech.com/show/3706/galaxy-gtx-470-gc-the-worlds-first-nonreference-fermi
Galaxy have pleasantly surprised us, and the folks at vr-zone.  To the table, they bring their GTX 470 GC, a 100% non-reference design graphics card utilising an NVIDIA GeForce Fermi 470 GPU.  Measuring 9 inches (compared to the reference 9.5 inches) and featuring a blue PCB, Galaxy have essentially mated a graphics card with a robot figurine.

Fastest memory race heats up - Corsair® announce blazing hot 2533Mhz DDR3

http://anandtech.com/show/3705/fastest-memory-race-heats-up-corsair-announce-blazing-hot-2533mhz-ddr3-
The whole 'fastest memory' halo product race is a bit of a farce.  In terms of DDR3, Corsair started the race back in 2007 with their first set of Dominator modules, running at 1600Mhz, 10-8-8-24.  This has been followed and bested, mainly by Corsair, but with sneak appearances by Kingston, G.Skill and Patriot (see below).  Now Corsair are marketing the next in their line of 'I've got a big cock' memory - 2533Mhz DDR3.
 

4 May 2010

Supermicro to expand their GPU servers to include Fermi-level Tesla


http://anandtech.com/show/3693/supermicro-to-expand-their-gpu-servers-to-include-fermilevel-tesla
Supermicro have launched today their second generation of GPU computing servers, using NVIDIA Tesla 20-series GPUs.  This product line is an upgrade from their first generation servers, and features a 1U server with 2x M2050 Tesla cards; a 4U tower that supports four C2050 Tesla GPUs, three other PCI-E cards, and support for eight hot-swappable 3.5" SAS/SATA drives; and a 2U twin server that supports two hot-pluggable GPU nodes and onboard QDR InfiniBand for 40GB/sec connectivity.

Corsair add 32GB and 256GB models to their Nova SSD range


http://anandtech.com/show/3692/corsair-add-32gb-and-256gb-models-to-their-nova-ssd-range
Corsair have announced today that they are expanding their Nova SSD range to include both the 32GB and 256GB models.

Biostar announce the TA890FXE and ‘BIOKING’


http://www.anandtech.com/show/3691/biostar-announce-the-ta890fxe-and-bioking
Okay, I lied a little.  Biostar announce their new tech as ‘BIO-unlocKING’, a feature on their latest 8xx series motherboard to unlock the quad core Thuban based processors (such as the Phenom II X4 960T) to their hexacore variants.  Biostar cover themselves by noting that not all quad core Thubans will unlock.  This feature will also help with unlockable dual core chips.
 

Big Bang-XPower: A new MSI motherboard announced


http://www.anandtech.com/show/3688/bigbang-xpower-msi-motherboard
Popular motherboard manufacturer MSI has announced  the next weapon in their motherboard arsenal - the MSI Big Bang-XPower. Like other second generation X58 motherboards, the XPower will feature SATA 6G and USB 3.0 teamed up with a slew of overclocking features in order to captivate the enthusiast market.
 

Sapphire announces the passive HD 5550 Ultimate


http://www.anandtech.com/show/3683/sapphire-announces-the-passive-hd-5550-ultimate

Today, Sapphire have announced the latest in their lineup of ATI 5xxx series graphics cards - the passively cooled HD 5550, dubbed the 'Ultimate'.

Back in Black

This blog is back! Though the outset will change.

I've been gain(ward)fully whisked into a world of motherboard reviews and news at http://anandtech.com.  My job there is to dissect recent news from motherboard manufacturers (and sometimes CPU, RAM and GPU news) for the public, as well as reviewing motherboards.

This blog will mainly link back to all my anandtech.com stuff, and provide some musings.  Keep your eyes peeled, dawg.

15 Feb 2010

Yet another blog

Left for dust. No really, seemingly I have better things to do with my time...

Let's just leave some BOINC stuff here. Click an adsense link if you reach this page.