Joined on 03/16/10
Eggxpert Review: LG 27" 4K IPS Monitor

Pros: Excellent picure quality. Brilliant colors. Very nice stand that allows you to adjust angle on all 3 axes (It can rotate to portrait or landscape orientation), as well as height. Comes with Displayport cable so there's no excuse for you NOT to use it. Unless your video card doesn't have a display port, in which case you probably shouldn't be using it for 4K anyway.
Cons: It is a little on the small side for 4K, in my opinion. Some things are shrunken down microscopically that don't scale back up with any Windows or program settings. It is what it is though, it's not a fault of this monitor in particular, just the nature of having such a high DPI monitor.
Overall Review: I had a little trouble setting this up and getting it working at first, but it was probably user-error. I have an AMD Radeon R9 Fury video card, and at first I was trying to hook this monitor up the lazy way, by using my old 1080p monitor's HDMI connection. Well, the cable is a Displayport to HDMI adapter, and I don't think it was playing well with the monitor. As soon as I used the Displayport cable that came with the monitor, I had no issues. Once again, there's no practical reason why you shouldn't use this cable, I was just trying to do a quick-and-dirty setup at first because I was maybe a little to excited to see something in 4K. This is a very noticeable upgrade from my 27" 1080p BenQ monitor. That monitor was nice but you can clearly see a difference when watching 4K video or playing a game in 4K over 1080p. The colors are also much more saturated, making everything appear much more vibrant and it just plain looks amazing. I did have to adjust the brightness a little but other than that it looked great out of the box. I would definitely recommend this monitor to anyone looking for a 4K monitor on a budget. The price is right and it works well. It may not have a 144Hz refresh rate or anything like that but it still delivers.
EggXpert Review - Corsair RGB Laser Gaming Mouse

Pros: Excellent tracking. This is absolutely the most accurate mouse I have ever used. It is pretty light. I like light mice and it is almost perfect for me. If anything, I think it could be a little lighter, but I am still getting used to it over my old mouse that I've had for years which was even lighter than this one. The customizable lights are really aesthetically pleasing. Choosing your favorite color(s) just makes it feel that much more like your own mouse. Five fully customizable DPI settings which allow you to even set a separate DPI for the vertical and horizontal axis, which is quite possibly the most amazing about this mouse. *(almost a pro, but apparently there's also a sixth "sniper" DPI setting --- but it is unclear how to activate it which makes it more of a con)
Cons: It just doesn't feel right. Now, I have very large, clumsy hands. No, bigger than what you were just thinking after reading that. I actually haven't found a mouse that does feel right. This mouse is actually shaped very similarly to my old mouse, so i am used to the shape... but it still doesn't' fit my hand right at all. I have to hold it with my fingers curled and my palm elevated otherwise they hang way off the front of the mouse if I try to rest my palm normally. It's not comfortable at all for long periods of time. I'm still trying to find that perfect mouse for the guy with really, really big hands and little to no dexterity. I am sorry to say, but this mouse is NOT it. The left click is way too sensitive. Related to the fact that I have to hover my hand over the mouse and curl my fingers, I find myself accidentally clicking way to often just from the weight of my pointer finger resting on the button. I had a friend laughing at my stream while I was playing just a couple of nights ago because I accidentally fired on a friendly at the start of a game with hilarious consequences... well, at least it was despite the fact I was trying to play a serious game. When using the internet, I accidentally click ads or links I don't want to go to. It's just not a very enjoyable experience. The software is unclear about how to use all the settings, and has to be running in order for the mouse to remember it's DPI presets/default DPI. It takes a while to load at startup. It would be much more acceptable if that was integrated into the mouse, instead of being an application running. Additionally, the application hogs up more memory than Google Chrome at a whopping 200MB. That is the highest memory usage I have when I'm not in a game. That's more than a little ridiculous. One last thing, there are a lot of options in the application that have no real explanation on what they do or how you use them. There is nothing in the readme regarding them, nothing in the user manual... I've just been stuck wondering what they are and why they won't work. Even though you can select colors for the lighting, and it shows custom lighting being applied to even the DPI indicator, every time I try to change the color of the DPI indicator I get a message stating it cannot be performed on that light. Also, I see no option to choose a custom color hue or brightness, only about a dozen preset colors to choose from. This is still because of the completely unhelpful user manual and finicky software.
Overall Review: The cord is a little stiff. Not too much to complain about so I'm not including it as a con, but it is making a zig-zag across my desk on it's way to the computer. Hopefully it will eventually "break in" and become more flexible. Despite it's awkward feel, I still like that it's similar enough in shape layout and weight to my old mouse so it still seems familiar. This is obviously just a personal opinion, as not everybody has used the same mice, and probably don't have monstrously large hands. The fact is, the mouse itself is great. The software and lack of clear instructions on how to use it is terrible and extremely frustrating. I just want to look in the manual and learn how to use it. Is that so much to ask? Instead, looks like I'll be searching the Corsair Gaming forums (Which they actually provide a link to... in the software itself. Go figure.) Possibly having to post a thread asking how to use it so some jerks can call me a noob and it can get bumped off the first page within a day before anybody helpful actually looks at it. < / rant > I love the mouse but the software required for it to fully function is vague and too resource intensive I can only give this thing three eggs. - There's just no excuse for the software.
EggXpert Review: 2TB Crucial P3 NVMe M.2 SSD

Pros: This is a decently fast and affordable M.2 NVMe drive that can come with some pretty high capacity options. I have the 2TB version. I tested it with CrystalDiskMark and managed an average sequential read speed of 3492.6 MB/s and sequential write speed of 3197.4 MB/s. I only have a 512 GB Corsair NVMe SSD to compare it to, and while the read speeds are slightly faster than what I tested on that, the write speeds kinda blew my mind at how much faster they were. It's not exactly a fair comparison due to the differences in capacities, and the Corsair drive is maybe a couple of years old by now, but I was still amazed at how much faster writing is on this Crucial SSD.
Cons: This is really a problem with all SSDs, but the smaller capacities (especially the 500GB version) take a hit in performance. The 1TB, 2TB, and 4TB versions have much more comparable performance to each other, but the 500GB will suffer. It's not really a problem with the product as there is a technical reason for this limitation and it applies to SSDs, but it is something to keep in mind when you're shopping. The speeds I recorded while testing all fall short of the advertised speeds of "up to" 5000 MB/s sequential read, 4200 MB/s sequential write, but there are a lot of variables in other hardware to keep in mind. I am using a Ryzen 5800X CPU and Gigabyte X570 AORUS motherboard. It is also worth noting that benchmarking results, especially with sequential read / write times, are entirely synthetic and not realistic for actual usage, but rather more of a sort of view of how fast it is under more ideal and measurable circumstances.
Overall Review: While it's not the fastest SSD you can get, it does have great performance for the price and the benchmark results were still impressive enough to me. I'd definitely recommend this. Most, if not all modern PCs have at least one M.2 slot for installing SSDs such as this, and the capacities and lifespan of these drives have grown to be very practical, and the speed of even a budget NVMe SSD is definitely worth it. It can make a nice, inexpensive storage upgrade for an existing PC, or work well for a new build and is definitely worth considering for the performance you can get at this price range.
EggXpert Review - devolo Magic 2 Wifi

Pros: Setup is pretty much automatically done, besides having to push a few buttons and plug things in and out of the wall. The power passthrough plug is definitely a nice but somewhat necessary feature, as this will otherwise occupy an entire outlet. Each extender has 2 ethernet ports to attach hardwired devices, as well as acting as a Wifi extender.
Cons: The setup instructions were a little confusing, but not that hard. These are powerline adapters at their core, so they are prone to the issues you might have with any powerline adapter and your house's wiring. Depending on how your house circuits are set up, and what else may be plugged in to those circuits, these may not work, or may not work well.
Overall Review: I think this could be very useful, especially in houses a lot larger than mine. I can't really make use of more than one of the extenders. As I mentioned as a con though, there are variables at play with your houses circuitry that may make these more difficult to use, so your mileage may also vary, but whatever sorcery powerline adapters use to transfer data through your house wiring is still pretty reliable.
EggXpert review: Corsair Vengeance RGB RS 16GB 3600MHz RAM

Pros: Worked perfectly fine, plug and play basically. The XMP profile worked without having to adjust anything to get it working like I have in the past with other RAM. Even my previous Vengeance RAM took a lot of tweaking to get it working cleanly. I do like the look of the heatspreader design. It's nice and clean, rectangular, no crazy angles or shapes that I see on other designs. I like clean looking builds and this works well with that appearance. 16GB is pretty much the standard amount these days. Although I prefer my 32GB set of RAM that I totally needed in case my wife asks.
Cons: The RAM did not appear in Corsair's iCue software. My previous Corsair RAM I bought last year did without issue. I made sure the software was up to date but that made no difference. Without iCue, I can't modify the RGB and it defaults to a rainbow effect. This doesn't have the greatest timings for the speed but I have seen worse. Completely unnoticeable performance in benchmarking from my previous Vengeance RGB Pro 3200MHz 16-18-18-36, if not slightly slower on average.
Overall Review: I tested this using a Ryzen 5800X and Gigabyte X570 Aorus Elite. I like it overall. It's got decent performance, not the best. But it's not price like the best either. My only real gripe with it is that it doesn't work with iCue on my setup, but maybe that's just a software bug and not a problem with hardware.
EggXpert Review: Pallas 120 RGB

Pros: Sleek looking, very low profile cooler. Quiet, even under load. I noticed no audible difference between this cooler and the Hyper 212 Evo it replaced. Seems to be well engineered and assembled. The heatsink does not feel cheap.
Cons: After installing, the cooler is still very loose on the CPU. It is still making enough contact to work, but I can pretty freely rotate it about 45 degrees total. I double checked everything, all the screws are as tight as I'm comfortable turning them for fear of stripping them out, and all parts are assembled correctly. The provided thermal paste is basically in a tiny ketchup packet and I refuse to use that. I used a CoolerMaster paste that's in an actual syringe applicator, as it should be. I'm sure the paste is just as good as the paste I used, but it's in a very inconvenient applicator. This cooler barely fit between the VRM heatsinks of my motherboard. If they were any larger or closer to the CPU, this would not have fit at all.
Overall Review: I installed this on an i5-6600k running at 3.9GHz, replacing a CoolerMaster Hyper 212 Evo that was previously on it. While I didn't expect it to outperform the Hyper 212, it did better than I thought, especially when I was worried it wasn't making good enough contact. With ambient temperatures around 22C, the Hyper 212 would idle around 25C, and under a stress test get up to around 60C. This cooler idles around 30C, and under load got up to 80C. Not great, not terrible. At least it wasn't overheating. But this is a low profile cooler with less overall surface area to dissipate heat. I may try this on another CPU, and if it's still loose I might try bending the brackets slightly to tighten it closer to the CPU to see if it makes better contact and reduces temps. I would definitely only recommend this cooler if you absolutely have to have an inexpensive low profile cooler with decent cooling capabilities.
Recieved item as described.
Ordered a replacement laptop fan, and got an exact-fit replacement, just a different brand name on the fan. Shipping time was the only downside, but it has to come all the way from China. When I finally got it, I forgot I had ordered it.