Joined on 06/25/05
Great card for 1440 performance
Overall Review: Purchased this card to replace a 3070. It is quite a bit more powerful than the Nvidia card, especially without Ray Tracing or any of the upscale tech on. With RT on it seems to pretty much be around the same ballpark of performance. I was rather surprised to find that CP77 takes this card to task on the RT Ultra setting. In spite of that aspect my monitor supports the Free Sync (Premium) and plays seamlessly well down to ~50 FPS. CP is the only game in my collection that works this card that hard. I am seeing well into 100+ FPS on almost every other title I have played on it @1440 with highest settings in most cases. The card looks good both front and back so it would be a good choice for standard mounting or vertical mounting. I don't notice it being any louder than the previous card, and not notable over the case/cooler fans. Temps stay in line quite well. So far I have not seen it go over ~76 degrees with a roughly 21* ambient. Overall am pleased so far, and would recommend at the price point.
it's big
Pros: The size and response time. Price
Cons: Overly bright with low contrast.
Overall Review: To rate the monitor at three stars for the price is probably being too critical. I needed a new screen and probably went too big, too low spec due to the price, got "stars in my eyes". It's got a really good gaming mode and allows you to increase the response time up to 1ms. The issue is that the color is too bright to watch at that mode continuously and begins to tire the eyes. In response to this issue, there is an eye saver mode that subdues the brightness and color considerably. It also slows the response time to a point that causes mouse trails and text shadows when scrolling. Overall, I would say if you are looking for a large size monitor to use for viewing streaming movies, etc, or only for gaming at this price it would be worth considering. Otherwise, for full time office I would consider looking elsewhere in hindsight. Not worth going to the trouble to ship back over, but I wouldn't purchase again.
Best current price, quick delivery
Overall Review: Not a whole lot to say. Best current price outside of a sale. Delivery was quick. Genuine product key that isn't going magically de-activate.
Decent budget case
Overall Review: Of note, this is the second time I have posted this review. I do not understand why my reviews are constantly not being posted, particularly when they are positive?!? I have used DIYPC cases in a variety of 'cheap' builds over the years. The aspect that always stuck with me was how cheaply made and cheesy those cases on the low low budget price were as far as sturdiness, and especially with the sides off. This case not only comes in at a nice budget price but is seemingly very sturdy and well built. It is, by far, the nicest DIYPC case I have ever used. The finish of the case is very good. No sharp edges on the inside, everything is painted nicely. There is plenty of wire pass, and with a basement a good place to tuck unused cabling when using a non-modular power supply (which many would looking at this price point). The case comes with (4) static blue LED fans which are connected to power via a SATA plug. They are one speed only but run at a low and slow speed and are quiet. The LED are quite bright and will turn the entire room blue at night. The PSU area isn't very deep, and in particular is only going to allow up to a certain height to insert into its area in the basement. If you have pre-run cables for such as front header audio or USB down there, you may have to pull those back to get the PSU in. The cabling will be up against the drive caddy. I opted not to use the lower space there for a 3.5" drive and tucked a good bit of the unused cabling there. The case is well ventilated with a mesh front, exhaust fan on the back in standard placement, and also room up top for more fans. I haven't double checked but would also imagine that radiators could be front mounted or top mounted. There is room up top even for ATX motherboards with large heat sinks. There is also placement along the top of the basement area for fans. There is not a really clear area for those to be pulling fresh air from so more of an ergo thing such as if you wished to put LED fans there for looks. Of note, there is an intake for down facing PSU fan with a screen filter. As far as detractors go, there are a couple of things that are somewhat odd/off. There is a spot on the "shelf" front side of the case where you can mount a 2.5" drive in the upper right. This is all good and fine, but the wire pass does not line up well with what will be the power and SATA cabling to support that drive. Basically, would end up with the cabling for that just running up the shelf from the basement. Another is the hole in the front part of the basement behind the lowest fan. Invariably there main 24 pin cable for your power supply can easily be seen here, as well as the cables for the two lowest fans. You can get around that aspect if you are mindful. The case also does not have the newer USB 3 "oval" connector for the front panel. The use case for this build was an inexpensive system build with a mix of leftover, used/NOS, and new parts to utilize some things left in the parts closet and hopefully what will be a quick flip. The case presents really well, is nice looking with the real glass side panel, and as mentioned above is well ventilated. System spec include an i7 3770 on the stock fan and a blower style 970. Even when running AAA titles the temps for the hardware never exceeded the mid 70's. Overall, very happy about this case and is a nice direction for DIY to be going in the improvement of build quality and functionality with a variety of options. This has been the best ~$50 priced case I have purchased in a long time and easy to recommend.
Seems to be a good budget option
Pros: Nice looking Nice touchscreen Good touchpad Decent Bluetooth capability
Cons: Limited I/O unless you get a USB C dock or the like Terrible keyboard Afterthought level of speakers A little heavy for this size
Overall Review: The unit came well packaged with a bubble wrap bag around the laptop itself. The power brick is in a small, folded bit of cardboard and can move around some. Would love to see the shipper put a small bit of bubble wrap in there with that. Otherwise, the unit arrived quickly, and the laptop doesn't have a mark on it. It powered on as expected. I took the time to power the laptop up and check it over since the return period and Christmas are too close together. The single most glaring fault is there is very little to visibly tell you the machine is on, and the power button it the top right keyboard button. There are two little lights on the right side that indicate charging hooked up and power being on. The keyboard is pretty terrible. The screen is nice, vivid and bright enough, and is Touchscreen. The touchpad is really nice as it reacts to touch and gestures very well. With the 15W TDP processor the chassis doesn't get hot even when the temp monitor, and the fan you can clearly hear, lets you know. The refurbisher just did a clean install of the factory bloatware OS. Out of the box the laptop is missing most of its drivers. It is highly recommended to get through the setup process, get it on the internet and then basically just stand by and supervise for a couple of hours as it updates and gets all the drivers installed. I do recommend checking operation before doing a clean install, which is the best option. Overall, for the price and along with a little patience this is not a bad value option for under three bills. Should be really decent for surfing, watching videos, and general productivity. It does not have a lot of grunt under the hood and isn't for gaming unless it was something light.
Nice 'freebie' alongside an AMD graphics card
Overall Review: Not really my cup of tea so far, but it was included with the graphics card. I would not have purchased the game separately.
Purchased a refurbished laptop and it was great
The laptop came looking brand new, not a scratch on it, just none of the peeling film. It arrived a solid week before the estimated delivery date. although I may have gotten lucky only coming from a few states over. The laptop itself was packed in a bubble bag that was very nice. The charger was in the little folded bit of cardboard on one end and rattled around a fair amount. Might be a good idea to put a small strip of bubble wrap or air pillow in there.
Picked up a refurb Dell laptop that was marked as B grade. I can't find a mark on it, everything is whole and undamaged by a quick look. Shipping was faster than estimated. I would buy from them again.