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Gregory B.

Gregory B.

Joined on 05/01/05

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Product Reviews
product reviews
  • 20
Most Favorable Review

Great solution

SNT SNT-125B Black 3.5" SATA Hard drive to 5.25" Bay SATA Mobile Rack Removable Hard drive kit
SNT SNT-125B Black 3.5" SATA Hard drive to 5.25" Bay SATA Mobile Rack Removable Hard drive kit

Pros: Inexpensive, but not cheaply made. Power switch allows drive to be powered off. The manufacturer's web site states this is SATA III compatible. I don't have a SATA III drive so I can't confirm.

Cons: None

Overall Review: I am going to purchase more of these for my other systems. Make sure you change the BIOS setting for the Sata drive to make it eSata (External sata). That way when you power it off, it won't hang Windows explorer.

11/12/2011
Most Critical Review

Major BIOS problems

ASUS Crosshair V Formula AM3+ AMD 990FX SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX AMD Gaming Motherboard with 3-Way SLI/CrossFireX Support and UEFI BIOS
ASUS Crosshair V Formula AM3+ AMD 990FX SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX AMD Gaming Motherboard with 3-Way SLI/CrossFireX Support and UEFI BIOS

Pros: Lots of nice leds and switches. However, they don't do a lot of good if the board doesn't go into BIOS mode.

Cons: My ASUS Crosshair IV motherboard died, so I purchased a new ASUS CrossHair V motherboard from NewEgg. The self-test passed. However, there was no video. The BIOS did not display. I RMAed the motherboard and installed the second CrossHair V. I also purchased a new 1100T CPU and Corsair 850 power supply from NewEgg which I also installed. Still no video. I installed the same model of Corsair DDR3 memory and a different ATI video card from another computer. Still no video. I found that if I pressed the internal memory check GO button, the memory would test fine and BIOS screen would display. However, after saving BIOS setting and rebooting, no video. It looks like a serious BIOS problem.

Overall Review: My computer hasn't worked for 2 weeks while waiting for parts and I've spent hundreds of dollars on new computer components which weren't bad and had hours of frustration. After all of this hassle, I will be replacing this with a NON-ASUS motherboard.

Wireless connections don't work

NETGEAR Nighthawk X6 AC3200 Tri-Band WiFi Router, Gigabit Ethernet, Compatible with Amazon Echo/Alexa (R8000)
NETGEAR Nighthawk X6 AC3200 Tri-Band WiFi Router, Gigabit Ethernet, Compatible with Amazon Echo/Alexa (R8000)

Pros: Has a few new features

Cons: Wireless networking doesn't work

Overall Review: For $299, the router should work out of the box. I upgraded to the latest firmware - V1.0.0.100_1.0.44. I could get wireless devices to connect, but they couldn't communicate with the Internet. I am switching back to my reliable R6300.

Bad cable design

AFT XM-37U USB 3.0 3.5” Kiosk Card Reader
AFT XM-37U USB 3.0 3.5” Kiosk Card Reader

Pros: Reader reads all types of cards. Compact flash pins cannot be bent

Cons: The cable was not compatible with a ASUS Sabertooth 990FX motherboard. After bending one of the USB 3.0 header pins and breaking it, I cut off the side molding on the cable and got it to fit. However, now the USB 3.0 port on the card reader doesn't work because of the missing pin.

Speedy drive

Corsair 64GB Voyager Slider USB 3.0 Flash Drive (CMFSL3B-64GB)
Corsair 64GB Voyager Slider USB 3.0 Flash Drive (CMFSL3B-64GB)

Pros: Faster than previous Corsair USB thumb drives High capacity

Cons: None

Overall Review: On sale, this is a great price for such a high capacity drive.

10/29/2013

Solid motherboard

ASUS TUF SABERTOOTH 990FX/GEN3 R2.0 AM3+ AMD 990FX SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX AMD Motherboard
ASUS TUF SABERTOOTH 990FX/GEN3 R2.0 AM3+ AMD 990FX SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX AMD Motherboard

Pros: Running a FX-8350 at 4.4 Ghz with no problems. Windows 8 Fast Boot makes the system restart or boot very quick. I am running dual EVGA GTX670 FTW cards and games work great. ASUS provides the SLI connector with the motherboard and instructions on how to configure the Nvidia driver. This is my first experience using SLI and it has been good.

Cons: None

Overall Review: Upgraded from a Sabertooth 990FX version 1 to this board. Windows 8 had a problem coming out of hibernate mode. I installed the AMD chipset driver on the CD and it fixed the problem. I haven't had any other problems with the motherboard.