Joined on 12/05/07
Awesome looking case
Pros: The cable management capabilities of this case are out of this world. I love how both sides can be removed and cables can be routed behind and back through the panel where the MoBo is attached, makes for a super clean looking interior. One reason I bought this case was for the red LED's, since I'm sick of the standard blues on most custom cases. They certainly did not disappoint, they look amazing. Fan controls work great, and look awesome too. TONS of room inside. Love that there is so much space for additional fans, which I installed new glowing-red fans into all the places (after some working around for one of them...) and it looks sweet and performs super cool. The power button has some nice solid action and none of the fan controls or the power button feel flimsy. The case itself feels very well put together and is really heavy, which I think is a pro, and its large size and multitude of fans give it excellent ventilation.
Cons: Some weird compatibility/space issues. For one thing, the two 120 mm fans on the side of the case interfered with installing a hard drive in the furthest right drive bay. The fan pushed against the cables and the case couldn't close. I worked around this by installing the HDD with the power and SATA inputs facing the back of the case. In addition, the rails for the HDD bays are super weird. When installing my Western Digital HDD, the little peg things that come with the case don't completely fit the HDD (don't line up with the holes on the side 100%), and they don't hold the HDD in well since they are pretty short. I ended up having to completely jury rig this thing using other screws that came with the case and screwing the HDD into the slide-out tray from the bottom. Also, and this could be an issue with OCZ too but the "adapter" that came with my OCZ SSD also didn't match up with the tray in the case and also had to be jury-rigged to work. There is a secondary drive bay to the left of the main drive bay, and it's in a ridiculous spot. I had to remove it completely in order to install the PSU and plug in any of its rails. Nice that the case comes with so many HDD spaces but kind of silly placement. It wasn't hard to remove but it had me wondering why the designers placed it THERE. The case comes with some fans, and there are spaces to install other fans if desired. I bought a 200 mm Cooler Master fan to place in the blank spot in the main case door. The space is 200 mm per the case specs and the little "grate" in the spot matches up perfectly with the size of the fan I bought, so I know it's the right size, but the holes for the fan in the case and the holes in the fan itself do not match up at all. Very frustrating. One corner matches up and the other three don't. Not sure if this is a flaw with the NZXT case or with the Cooler Master fan, but either way it was obnoxious. Ended up taking a power drill to the fan and drilling my own custom holes in order to make it compatible with the case. Not ideal but hey I really wanted to use this fan (:
Overall Review: All in all the problems I had with the case are easily worked around with some creative troubleshooting, so it's not worth dropping an egg for them. Just some frustrating silly things. But the case itself is solid and I love how it looks, I love the "pros" about it much more than I dislike the "cons".
Sooooooo disappointed.
Pros: It plugged into the MoBo just fine? Three antennae are kinda cool?
Cons: I installed the drivers from the CD that this card came with, and I still couldn't get it to work for more than a minute. When it did work, it would (for example) load Google, and if I searched for, say, "puppies" it would populate a page of results. But then if I went to follow any of the links from that page, it would sit there and sit there thinking and not load anything. I couldn't connect to Windows Update to get any updates, it would start the download and sit at like 15% not doing anything after that. Couldn't download Chrome or anything else. If I reset the adapter through Windows it would work briefly but then nothing.
Overall Review: I ended up playing "computer doctor" and performing a transplant with my old rig I built about five years ago. The wireless card in that is a Gigabyte model. It's so old that there is no Windows 7 x64 driver for it on their site, but my first PC runs Win 7 x64 as well as the new one so I figured I must have got it working somehow. After popping that card in and installing the Vista x64 drivers from a flash drive, I have the old card working in my new rig better than this card did. So I feel like I've confirmed that it isn't my OS or the MoBo causing issues with networking, it's this card. Pretty bummed out. Gotta find a new one I suppose, since the old Gigabyte one is now discontinued. ):
Good basic mouse
Pros: I bought this mostly because it's not too expensive and I need a mouse with the forward/back controls on the side. I use this without a mouse pad and it works great on all surfaces I've used it (wooden desk, fabric, leg, etc). The mouse is ergonomic and comfortable, and the grips feel nice. I'm not a hardcore gamer so I can't really speak to the DPI settings or anything like that, but it really is a nice reliable mouse and you can't beat the quality for the price.
Cons: None, it's a great mouse.
Awesome and colorful!
Pros: It's a sleek and sturdy keyboard; the keys feel like they're in there tight they are very responsive when typing. Each color is bright and vibrant and the board looks great on every setting. I like that it has a matte/non glossy finish, my current keyboard and laptop keys are both glossy and they feel slippery which can be obnoxious but this board's keys don't have that problem. Personally I bought this because it can glow red which matches my new case, but I'm having a hard time sticking with one color because they're all so great. For the price it's a really good option for an illuminated board. Pretty basic, but great construction, and I'm confident that it will last a long time.
Cons: It doesn't make me breakfast in the morning.
Overall Review: As a previous reviewer stated, the keys are indeed very hard to read when the backlight is off... but my thought on the matter is, you're buying an illuminated keyboard for a reason, and it's not battery powered so why would you need or want to turn it off? You could also learn to type without looking at the keyboard. (;
Excellent PSU.
Pros: I bought this in mid February of '09 towards the end of my build... Since then I've used my tower almost every day and have had NO issues with this PSU. Standard PSU stuff - it powers my PC and has an easy to access off/on toggle in the back. The removable rails are awesome for cable management. Multi-colored LED's around the rails are a nice feature. It really adds a cool touch to my tower. I get a lot of compliments (:
Cons: None. Seriously, this thing is a rockstar.
Overall Review: I'm looking to build a new rig for gaming and professional graphic design/video editing. This PSU is pretty much the only thing I'm keeping out of my 3-yr-old setup: Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3R OCZ Reaper HPC 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 RAM Intel Core 2 Duo E7300 Wolfdale Sapphire 100245L Radeon HD 4850 GPU Assorted WD HDD's Raidmax Aura steel case (pink)
Don't know what all the fuss is about.
Pros: I got this to use with my 40" TV in a home theatre set up. I was skeptical at first when buying because of some reviews, but I figured I'd give 'er a go. And I'm glad I did! I'm not having any of the issues mentioned in some reviews: "has a range of 1-2 feet/five feet/two inches" - No. I have a small apartment so the usual setup is about 6' from the receiver, and it works great. For the lols, I brought my mouse into the kitchen (about 8 feet & behind a wall), put it on the wall, and it still moved and clicked on the screen. "doesn't work if the receiver is higher than the pieces" -Also no. I don't have a couch so the pieces either go on the coffee table or the floor, both are lower then the receiver and they work just fine. "the keyboard lags when typing" - Again, nope. I typed up a long message this morning with the keyboard and it kept up with me. And I'm no two-finger typer! "mouse doesn't work on shiny surfaces" - my coffee table is pretty dang glossy and it still works!
Cons: The mouse left-click button is squeaky. You have to hold your hand just right to get it to not squeak when you click. It drives me nuts! Wish I could turn the mouse off. I think it goes into a sort of sleep mode when not in use. We'll see how long the batteries last. Can always take the batteries out, I s'pose. I also wish I didn't have to deal with the transmitter. Why no mini USB receiver, Logitec? :(
Overall Review: 4 eggs because of the few cons. Mainly the mouse squeak. I wish it had the forward/back mouse buttons... All in all a good buy. I'm happy with it.