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James D.

James D.

Joined on 03/11/04

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Product Reviews
product reviews
  • 12
Most Favorable Review

Solid SDHC Card, Works well with PowerShot G9

SanDisk Extreme 4GB SDHC UHS-I Flash Card - Class 10 30MB/S
SanDisk Extreme 4GB SDHC UHS-I Flash Card - Class 10 30MB/S

Pros: Seems to work well with the Canon PowerShot G9 camera. Fast when taking pictures and accessing stored data.

Cons: Card seems a hair thicker than standard, noticed a tight fit in the SD bay of the G9. No issue with functionality, just an observation.

Overall Review: Included High-Speed reader looks nice, and is really a bonus at this price.

Most Critical Review

Older Model Seems Solid - New Revision POOR.

GIGABYTE GeForce GTX 460 (Fermi) 1GB GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 SLI Support Video Card GV-N460OC-1GI
GIGABYTE GeForce GTX 460 (Fermi) 1GB GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 SLI Support Video Card GV-N460OC-1GI

Pros: I had two of these, one I purchased right when Gigabyte put these cards out. The second, I purchased recently. The old one runs absolutely great, it's quiet at idle and it's run strong for all my casual gaming.

Cons: Newer revision (with the F10 bios) is a piece of junk. Completely died in 3 months. No real warning, just stopped running properly. BSOD's and Graphical Static.

Overall Review: Last time with Gigabyte. 50% success ratio on this card means you should probably look elsewhere. Can't possibly recommend cards contained in the current stock. I compared my two- The origina says 'Made in China' on the back, the new one says 'Made in Taiwan' -- the board revisions are both 1.0.

Projector Lottery - Beautiful when it's Working.

Acer H9500BD 2000 Lumens 1080P Full HD 3D Home Theater DLP Projector w/ HDMI & USB
Acer H9500BD 2000 Lumens 1080P Full HD 3D Home Theater DLP Projector w/ HDMI & USB

Pros: Beautiful image when projecting at 100" in my theater room. 3d Upconversion is novel and works pretty well for TV. I've found the blacks to be pretty impressive with the caveat that you need to do some additional calibration of the Dynamic Iris functionality from the Service Menu to keep it from being overly active (and thus audibly noticeable).

Cons: Buying an H9500 is like buying a lottery ticket. Poor, poor, poor QA on Acers part. I understand these are high-precision instruments and have sensitive bulbs, but there are numerous other options out there (albeit, with fewer features) which appear to be much more reliable initially. My first unit did not fire immediately out of the box, the lamplit error appeared on the screen. I assumed a fluke and replugged the unit and it fired on the third attempt. After fewer than 12 hours, I began to have trouble with the unit firing the lamp and starting up the actual display. I would get a grey pulsing screen with no Acer Logo, input display, etc. The projector was unresponsive to the remote and button presses and required a hard power-down to get it out of this state. I finally gave up on Unit 1 after about 20hrs of testing. 40 dollars to send it back which is the cost of doing buisness with newegg.

Overall Review: I'm waiting for a replacement from Newegg right now. Unfortuantely, the projector cannot be refunded according to the return policy. I'd steer clear of this unit if I could do it again. Depending on how you value the key features at this pricepoint, that will certainly influence your decision. -- Major plus sides I see to the Acer: 1) Dynamic Iris, 2) 3d Functionality, 3) Lens Shift. If you don't care for these 3 features, look elsewhere.

12/14/2012

Vibrant, But lacking Color Depth

SAMSUNG P2770FH ToC Rose Black 27" 1ms Full HD HDMI  LCD Monitor  300 cd/m2 DC 70,000:1 (1,000:1)
SAMSUNG P2770FH ToC Rose Black 27" 1ms Full HD HDMI LCD Monitor 300 cd/m2 DC 70,000:1 (1,000:1)

Pros: Came from a Dell WFP3007HighColor. This display is very vibrant and bright, but lacks the color depth that I came to expect from a premium panel.

Cons: Very apparent banding in natural color photos and digital rendering with deep gradients. Not recommended for digital photography editing, photoshop, or digital composition. Disappointed with the lack of information on panel color depth.

Overall Review: I wouldn't recommend this for a serious user, but this is would be great as a gaming panel.

12/19/2011

Great Mid-Range Cooling Solution, Might As Well forget about the rebate.

Antec Kuhler H2O 620 Liquid Cooling System
Antec Kuhler H2O 620 Liquid Cooling System

Pros: Quiet running, mid-range cooling solution. Installation was quick and easy even though the included directions are absolutely useless. If you've put a computer together, you'll have no issues getting it installed. Runs well within acceptable levels on an i7-2600k with a mild overclock to 4.4ghz on all 4 cores. Idles around 31c, load somewhere in the 55c-65c range depending on the application (IE. Prime95 tortures).

Cons: Forget about the rebate, I've still not seen mine. Same with another Antec product (psu) that I mailed in a rebate for.

Overall Review: I wouldn't pay more than 60 for the Kuhler. A compareable Air Cooling solution will produce very similar (if not better numbers) albeit at the cost of greater noise in some cases.

Good Case, Orange Trim is Cheap Looking

NZXT Phantom PHAN-002OR Newegg Exclusive Black Finish w/Orange Trim Steel / Plastic Enthusiast ATX Full Tower Computer Case
NZXT Phantom PHAN-002OR Newegg Exclusive Black Finish w/Orange Trim Steel / Plastic Enthusiast ATX Full Tower Computer Case

Pros: This case is big and allows some flexible layouts for wiring and cooling options. The included hardware kit is really quite well equipped, including all sorts of screws, thumbscrews, and other items that you'll need to get the case assembled (though you may want a few more zipties!). The fans are cheap and flexible, but they're quiet enough to be very unobtrusive when connected to the variable speed fan controllers. All of the LEDs (Power, HDD, Fan Control) on this case are also Orange! That was a nice surprise.

Cons: The orange trim looks cheap for a case at this pricepoint. The trim plastic is molded with a rough finish resembling a 5 dollar toy (not a metal strip or other nicely finished material). In the end, I removed all of the trim, resprayed it with a more attractive metallicized spray paint and reattached it, the difference is night and day. The process isn't too tough, most trim parts unscrew. The only two parts that are 'glued' are the small pieces around the power and the fan control panels, which can be pried up carefully with an xacto knife. Finally, the 200mm fan port on the side of the case will interfere with a rear-mounted radiator such as the Corsair or Antec Kuhler lines. If you decide you want to go for a side mounted fan, plan on reorganizing the upper fans to accommodate a radiator.

Overall Review: Big, Attractively Designed Case. I'm going to controversially say that the quality isn't up to the heavier Antec P180/P193 build cases, but this is a different league of case all together, so no points off for that.