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Tristan H.

Tristan H.

Joined on 03/01/10

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Product Reviews
product reviews
  • 5
Most Favorable Review

AM3 Super Ram?

G.SKILL PIS Series 4GB (2 x 2GB) DDR3 2000 (PC3 16000) Desktop Memory Model F3-16000CL6D-4GBPIS
G.SKILL PIS Series 4GB (2 x 2GB) DDR3 2000 (PC3 16000) Desktop Memory Model F3-16000CL6D-4GBPIS

Pros: They work at advertised timings and speed. They work at advertised timings and speed in all 4 dimms. I want to point out, that those Pros (are exactly what you expect from all RAM), but they worked without tweaking. That is a first for me. It didn't even break a sweat on my motherboard or CPU IMC. I feel they have a huge overclock potential. Dual Channel Kit that is on par with the lower ended Triple Channel Kit (which is very very good.)

Cons: Required a nominal voltage increase to pass POST. Heatsinks/spreaders too tall, and WILL be problematic for large CPU heatsink owners (stop pushing WATER COOLING already!!!! I get it, I am behind!)

Overall Review: Voltage: Quick Benchmarks: Latency @ stock speeds, 41.3 ns (avg) Latency @ 3000 NB, 32.9 ns (avg) Latency @ 1090T @ 4.2 GHz + 3000 NB, 32.3 ns (avg) Read @ 12,700 MB/s (avg and rounded down) Write @ 10,300 MB/s (avg and rounded down) Took 1.7125v instead of 1.65v. Not a complaint really, but it is above advertised. Considering I am using a Crosshair IV which they were specifically catered too, I feel it should be mentioned.

11/10/2010

One of the better gaming headphones.

Razer Tiamat 7.1 Surround Sound Over Ear PC Gaming Headset
Razer Tiamat 7.1 Surround Sound Over Ear PC Gaming Headset

Pros: Physical sound drivers make 3D sound locating better than virtual / simulated 3D sound. Excellent for earlier COD games such as Modern Warfare 4. Black Ops muffles positional sound to prevent users from taking advantage of players without headphones. BF3 / BF4 / Hardline's positional audio also works great for these headphones. Games with high ambient sounds or scripted "scare" sounds come through with greater realism and direction. Dead Space, Resident Evil, Silent Hill etc...

Cons: Buzzing when using USB ports built into the Motherboard. Buzzing is removed when using a powered USB wall wart as they are called (phone charger). Often on sale / Black Friday, that's when I would pounce on these. Have to use the 7.1 for full effect, otherwise it's a waste of money, so invest in a soundcard if your motherboard does not have a built-in 7.1 audio chipset. I.e. if you don't have Green, Pink, Grey, Black, and Orange inputs for Audio (blue is line-in), get a sound card. Heavy, so you should position yourself with good posture to avoid cramping / stiff necks.

Overall Review: Great product even though Razer's taking hits on release quality products.

Overclocks well, but a little warm.

AMD FX-8370 4.0 GHz (4.3 GHz Turbo) Socket AM3+ FD8370FRHKBOX Desktop Processor
AMD FX-8370 4.0 GHz (4.3 GHz Turbo) Socket AM3+ FD8370FRHKBOX Desktop Processor

Pros: * Matches 90% of the performance of an i7 4770K, when overclocked 20%. * Can overclock 10~30% over stock frequencies. * Processor /w high-end motherboard about 50% cheaper than an i7 4770K w/ matching high-end motherboard. * Performs better in newer console ported titles due to the eight threads being fully utilized.

Cons: * Still not as fast as last gen Intel quad cores with Hyper Threading. * Runs warm and power hungry, invest in a good motherboard, PSU, and cooler. * Does not perform as well in video games that depend one one or two strong threads. * Should not be paired with systems using more than 2 GPUs, they will be inherently bottle necked in terms of performance and GPU usgae.

Overall Review: It's great price/performance ratio when compared to what you get from an Intel Motherboard combo, but will nearly always be slower in benchmarks/gaming compared to Intel's current gen. Still happy with my purchase.

Medium-end Gaming Audio Card

Creative 70SB088000004 7.1 Channels 24-bit 96KHz PCI Express 1x Interface PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium
Creative 70SB088000004 7.1 Channels 24-bit 96KHz PCI Express 1x Interface PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium

Pros: Price No Problems Installing on Windows 7 (x64) (For me.) Reliable for me in a 2.1 Setup and a pair of Sennheiser HD650s. EAX 5.0 (Good for gamers) Outputs at 96KHz/192KHz PCI-Express - Pro - Faster transmission of data, lower latency, higher bandwidth and lower CPU utilization. Dolby-Digital-EX / DTS

Cons: Occasional crackling in higher pitched sounds. (Usually hear it after starting computer and thats it.) Creative's support is somewhat lacking. Only inputs at 96KHz PCI-Express - Con - A tiny bit flimsy connection, no anchor, and does not sit well on my motherboard. These Sound Cards are not for audiophiles or an audio-aficionado. Lacks high-end features.

Overall Review: No notification in specs/manual/website about this 64MB of onboard memory for this particular model. Windows does indeed register around 58MB (which may as well be 64MB) of Memory Resources allocated locally on card, and a few of the memory modules on the card display Hynix (which is a memory module maker.) logo.

Good CPU

Intel Core 2 Duo T9600 2.8 GHz 6MB L2 Cache Socket P 35W Dual-Core BX80576T9600 Processor
Intel Core 2 Duo T9600 2.8 GHz 6MB L2 Cache Socket P 35W Dual-Core BX80576T9600 Processor

Pros: 35W Power Usage Less Power Used / Less Heat Smaller Form Factor 45 nm = Less Heat Higher L2 Cache of 6MB vs. the lower 2MB This pumps a great deal of data more through each clock cycle. FSB 1066 MHz Allows for a decent upgrade in the future when Laptop DDR2 1066 MHz is more affordable, you can greatly extend the life of the laptop with either a 4GB 800MHz to 8GB 1066 MHz. With good memory the CPU it is easily clockable to 3.2GHz. Runs fairly decent on BOINC for Seti/Einstein/Milkway, about 2 hours/4 hours/6 hours turn around on non GPU WUs. Windows Index Score for T9600: CPU: 6.4 - 6.6 with an OC. MEM: 6.4 - 6.5 with the same OC above. Idle Temps: 35c - 39c Load Temps: 48c - 50c *Note that I have a shared cooling system between chipset, CPU, and GPU, so this greatly affects even my idle temps. A laptop with a really good cooling system will get better results.

Cons: The price, unbelievable that these things have not dropped in price in over 12 months.

Overall Review: As of March, 2010, I see that the T9400 and the T9600, are the exact same price. Only the T9600 is faster? Currently in a ASUS G60Vx, previously in my ASUS G50Vxm. It actually runs cooler than my T5750 which was a lower end budget Intel 2/2 Ghz processor. It has the higher FSB of 1066 MHz, so if I choose to later on upgrade my DDR2 from 4 to 8, I will definitely take advantage of the speed shift. In my Laptop, its still considered a 15.4" form factor, despite having a 16" screen so there is heat generated in this laptop from the gaming GPU Geforce GTX 260M. Also a downside is the shared cooling system for chipset, gpu, and cpu, so any extra heat from one, will add to the others. This CPU runs much cooler than the budget processors as the lower required wattage of 35 watts. There is also another silent yet extremely powerful bottleneck reduction, the L2 cache of 6MB vs. 2MB in the lower end models.