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Constantine Z.

Constantine Z.

Joined on 02/02/02

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Product Reviews
product reviews
  • 20
Most Favorable Review

Update to previous review, all good now

SYBA 2-Port SATA 6G Card, Mini PCI-Express Form Factor, non-RAID, ASM1061 Chipset Model SD-MPE40056
SYBA 2-Port SATA 6G Card, Mini PCI-Express Form Factor, non-RAID, ASM1061 Chipset Model SD-MPE40056

Pros: Fits in mini pci express slot. SATA 3. Port multiplier. Price. Tech Support replied immediately to my emails.

Cons: First one was DOA.

Overall Review: Very impressed with the working card. Visible and usable both under windows and Linux. Very fast.

10/11/2013
Most Critical Review

Bought 2 - Need to revise review

Foxconn D70S-P Intel Celeron 1037U 1.80GHz Intel NM70 Mini ITX Motherboard / CPU / VGA Combo
Foxconn D70S-P Intel Celeron 1037U 1.80GHz Intel NM70 Mini ITX Motherboard / CPU / VGA Combo

Pros: Small, affordable, low power consumption, quite powerful for what it is. Responsive and Competent Tech Support.

Cons: Poor workmanship on the heatsink attachment, bios needed a revision.

Overall Review: I bought 2 of these. One is running as a NAS in a rather large mini Itx server case with plenty of cooling. Fan ran at over 6000 rpm. Turning on smart-fan made it quiet. All was ok with this build. Second one was going to be an HTPC so I put it in a smallish itx case. Immediately, the temps went too high and the PC kept shutting down. Realized that smart fan function was broken, fan speed did not increase with temps. Contacted support and withing a couple of days they provided new bios with fixed smart fan functionality. Kudos for that. It turns out that now smart fan would slowly increase fan speed and eventually it would become too loud. Support suggested that I check the thermal paste. I had to remove the heatsink. The paste looked hard & brittle and it did not look like it was making contact. I replaced it with arctic silver and again the temps rose rapidly. Something was not right. The heatsink had 2 rubber posts that I thought were too tall. I removed those and now the heatsink is making perfect contact. Temps are 20 degrees lower than before. Still a bit high for my taste but at least the HTPC is not crashing anymore. I think FoxConn would do well to put a slightly bigger/better heatsink on this baby and it will be a great embedded solution. p.s. this htpc is powerfull enough to play 1080p mkv in foreground using xbmc while in the background wmc is recording 3 tv shows off an hdhomerun prime. Very impressive for the little celeron...

12/18/2013

Bought two, one flaked after a month or so

Enermax Marathon 80mm Silent PC Case Fan UC-8EB
Enermax Marathon 80mm Silent PC Case Fan UC-8EB

Pros: Just the right amount of quiet and air flow

Cons: One started making a fluttering noise after 5 weeks. The 2nd one is still silent.

Overall Review: I expected longer longevity from this.

Really nice and it works inside the PS3

Seagate 1.5TB Portable External Hard Drive USB 3.0 Model STBX1500401 Black
Seagate 1.5TB Portable External Hard Drive USB 3.0 Model STBX1500401 Black

Pros: Inside it's a Samsung Spinpoint M9T ST1500LM006 Works inside the PS3

Cons: None

Worked great

SYBA USB 3.0 19pin Header Card with Dual Type-A Femal Ports Cable, Mini PCI-Express Form Factor Model SD-MPE20142
SYBA USB 3.0 19pin Header Card with Dual Type-A Femal Ports Cable, Mini PCI-Express Form Factor Model SD-MPE20142

Pros: Worked great. Very useful. Price was right

Cons: None

Overall Review: Put this in a mini-itx board that had mini pci express slot. Shows up as a Renesas chipset under Windows.

10/10/2013

Works well, looks nice

Ineo I-NA321U PLUS USB 3.0 to SATA III Hard Drive Docking Station for 2.5-inch & 3.5-inch SSD & HDD [Supports 4TB+]
Ineo I-NA321U PLUS USB 3.0 to SATA III Hard Drive Docking Station for 2.5-inch & 3.5-inch SSD & HDD [Supports 4TB+]

Pros: Very fast when 1 drive is used. Looks good, got a great price.

Cons: When copying from 1 drive to another transfers are about 50% less than when copying from or to it from another USB 3.0 dock

Overall Review: It seems that I am hitting some kind of usb 3.0 limit on a single port. When I copy from this or to this from another usb 3.0 dock I get 140-160MB/s. When I put two drives in this and copy from one to another I get 70MB/s or so.