Joined on 01/18/05
Worth every penny
Comments: My first choice would've been Zalman, but that thing is huge itself, and would have conflicts with RAM slots placed on the mother board (depending of the motherboard of course). This thing was designed for Ahtlon's Dual Core and/or FX series, but I decided to put it on my OC'd 64 3000+ 2.2GHz. Here's the results. Note that fan was set to 4800RPM. Stock Heatsink IDLE LOAD: 32.4 C FULL LOAD: 40.1 C ASUS X-MARS IDLE LOAD: 29.7 C FULL LOAD 37.6 C Very impressive performance results. The best part is something I don't understand. I assume because of its fan design, it would've been whiney, but @ 4800 RPM, it's nearly dead silent. Also, the description says max speed is 5400RPM, but I measured this thing at full load and it reads 5780RPM max. This thing is worth very penny from the first day it came out =P
Still running, but worried about QC on fan.
Pros: -Nice looking light show for those have a white or blue setup. -Stable rails -Ran as it should for 800w PSU -Cheaper than other similar high-end units, but better quality than mid-level units.
Cons: -After 2 weeks, the fan is making this weird high pitch bearing sound, kinda like a cross between a whistle and wheels of those old shopping cars squeaking. It's not loud, but seemed somewhat out of the ordinary.
Overall Review: I do not have a backup PSU to send this one for RMA. I think this is the last Kingwin PSU I'll buy, going back to Corsair.
Decent on speeds, but very reliable.
Pros: I've purchased both the Samsung Evo and this Toshiba Q series from another vendor during my build a week ago. I was just curious to see which is more reliable between the two hard drives. With HDTune (I know, not exactly the best software to test), I was getting the following: Samsung - 378MB/sec average Toshiba - 303MB/sec average While not as fast as the samsung, I'm more willing to sacrifice some speed for price than other brands where they sacrifice reliability.
Cons: the case looks extremely generic, like it wasn't really for general consumers. Something you would find in an oem laptop. Can't really complained because those mechnical hard drives didn't look great either except for WD Raptors.
Overall Review: Originally I wanted to purchase two Toshiba's. My Qosmio laptop had an 80gb older Toshiba SSD and that one lasted 2 years without any hiccups or much changes in speed since then. I was thinking of Kingston and Sandisk, but SSD failures after 1 year scared me away from the brands.
Pretty noise comparison.
Pros: It works like it should.
Cons: Bought a Samsung DVDR at the same time, Samsung ran extremely quiet compared to this Asus.
Overall Review: Disappointed that a Samsung I bought as a backup ran more quiet than this DVD drive.
Good motherboard for price.
Pros: -BIOS LCD -2 CMOS reset buttons and a motherboard power button -Good quality design, was able to fit 2 5850.
Cons: -5 SATA inputs. Is it difficult to add another >_> -You really have to plan ahead of what would fit and connect to this motherboard. Wish it had built in WIFI.
Overall Review: You can't really complain about the layout or features for a $100 motherboard. I remembered motherboards with less features for $150.
Good cable.
Pros: @Magoo: Works well with my motherboards. Maybe your motherboard does not like this design.
Cons: None
Overall Review: Pretty difficult to review a cable in which you wouldn't be handling more than several times in the course of its lifetime.