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JEFF C.

JEFF C.

Joined on 02/23/04

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Product Reviews
product reviews
  • 8
Most Favorable Review

Still running, 24/7

MSI K8NGM2-L 939 NVIDIA GeForce 6100 Micro ATX AMD Motherboard
MSI K8NGM2-L 939 NVIDIA GeForce 6100 Micro ATX AMD Motherboard

Pros: Thing just keeps running and running....

Cons: Thing just keeps running and running.... Can't justify upgrading until it dies.

Overall Review: Built this years back as my primary desktop, then relinquished it as a Windows Home Server when I upgraded. That was back in 2008. This thing has been running 24 hrs a day, 7 days a week, for the past 7 years, without a hitch. I'll eventually build a WHS 2011 machine with newer parts, but until that day comes, this will keep serving its purpose. While this review really isn't pertinent any more, I just had to brag.

Most Critical Review

Add me to the list of one star buyers

Manufacturer Recertified Corsair Force Series 3 CSSD-F120GB3/RF2 2.5" 120GB SATA III Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) Manufactured Recertified Factory Refurbished
Manufacturer Recertified Corsair Force Series 3 CSSD-F120GB3/RF2 2.5" 120GB SATA III Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) Manufactured Recertified Factory Refurbished

Pros: Arrived fairly quick.

Cons: DOA. Guess whatever savings I expected going with a refurb will be eaten up by shipping.

Overall Review: Installed in an ECS KBN-I/2100 motherboard as a replacement for a standard disk drive. Does not recognize the drive. Even when connected as a slave drive, it does not show up under "Disk Management". All the reviews since April are DOA. Has ANYONE received a working drive since then?

Tested fine

Team Group 32GB Color microSDHC UHS-I/U1 Class 10 Memory Card with Adapter, Speed Up to 80MB/s (TCUSDH32GUHS40)
Team Group 32GB Color microSDHC UHS-I/U1 Class 10 Memory Card with Adapter, Speed Up to 80MB/s (TCUSDH32GUHS40)

Pros: Ran through Flash Drive/Card Tester V1.14, using "write, read, & compare", and had no bad segments. We'll have to wait and see how reliable it is, but so far, so good.

Cons: None so far.

10/24/2018

Junk board, worse support.

ASRock 970M Pro3 AM3+/AM3 AMD 970 + AMD SB950 6 x SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 Micro ATX AMD Motherboard
ASRock 970M Pro3 AM3+/AM3 AMD 970 + AMD SB950 6 x SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 Micro ATX AMD Motherboard

Pros: Cheap

Cons: Appears to have a 1.5 year lifespan from the reviews I've read. The lifespan of mine supports that (born 8/20/15 - died 3/5/17). Guess that explains the 1 year warranty.

Overall Review: Figured I'd try ASRock to see if there was any recourse for what appears to be an obviously poorly designed board. ASRock graciously offered to RMA the board.... For a $50 service fee. Well golly gee, that's a mighty fine offer. Let me pay you $50 to repair the board that was junk to begin with, especially when I can buy the same board brand new for $55. I recently had an issue with a 2 year old MSI board. MSI quickly shipped out a replacement board, free of charge. Guess which company I'm going to replace this with...

No effect in strength

Asus Certified WL-ANT191 Omni High Gain Antenna
Asus Certified WL-ANT191 Omni High Gain Antenna

Pros: Base allows me to keep router under desk, while antenna is out in the open.

Cons: Made no difference in signal strength.

Overall Review: I have a large house, with 2 above ground floors and a finished basement. Unfortunately, my Linksys WRTU54G-TM router is located on the far end, ground level. Reception in the basement is poor. Using the "Wifi Analyzer" android app, I measured the signal strength in several different spots throughout the house (ground floor -75, basement -85, upstairs -70). I then connected the Asus antenna both directly to the router and with the extender. Signal strength remained the same at each location. Also have an N-router configured as a bridge, so I was able to confirm my position was the same for each reading using it's signal strength. Wouldn't need this if it wasn't for my piece of S Chromecast, with it's lousy reception and refusal to connect to the bridge, that I'm trying to use in the basement. Don't know if I got a defective refurb or if this is normal for this antenna. One star for the antenna and one for the rebate.

Waste of time & money

ECS KBN-I/2100 (V1.1) AMD E1-2100 Dual Core processor AMD Kabini (SOC) Mini ITX Motherboard / CPU / VGA Combo
ECS KBN-I/2100 (V1.1) AMD E1-2100 Dual Core processor AMD Kabini (SOC) Mini ITX Motherboard / CPU / VGA Combo

Pros: fanless small profile

Cons: Network adapter shuts off too early to use outside of OS Slower than expected

Overall Review: Have built several systems, so I know my way around. Build this to use on the living room entertainment system, but utilize my SiliconeDust HDHomerun Prime tuner. Didn`t expect a high end gaming system, but did expect something that would run as a HTPC for a basic setup. Had a hard time steaming videos over the network and was slow as hell to load programs. Figured I`d try to help it by upgrading the HD from the standard 250gb HD to an SSD drive. That`s where the poor design really falls flat. While trying to reinstall the system onto the new SSD from my home server, I discovered that the Realtek drivers don`t function properly, requiring you to DL the drivers from Realtek and load them on a thumb drive. But don`t bother, because the ethernet jack shuts down after a couple minutes, while the WHS Restore software is installing. No ethernet, no finding the server, no restore. Going to have to order a USB/ethernet adapter to even get it up running. Too much work for too little reward. Going to keep an eye out for an alternative setup.