Pros: Like I said in my prior review down below, it is very fast. I discovered it is a 7200RPM drive, and it copies files very quickly. And the software is excellent. I did not mention in my prior review that the software includes some great utilities that allow you to see space on your drive, a log of various activities on the drive, such as your backup programs, and various options for the three programs, and controls for power management, the lights on the drive, and even a test to see if the drive is working correctly. You also get access to cloud storage. Pretty good stuff actually, all very easy to use.

Cons: It does not have a manual power switch. I like the option of manually turning an external drive on and off completely. Also, it does heat up, as others have noted. In my original review, I did not think it was that bad, but I've discovered that it heats up to 55C and above. But there is a solution. I found that IF I set the Power management to five minutes (if no hdd activity, the Backup Plus will spin down) AND have the backup software not set at continuous backup (as that appears to activate the Backup Plus), THEN the Backup Plus will spin down automatically after five minutes and will remain spun down, and therefore cool down. The temperature drops to 40C or below, which is very tolerable. Perhaps Seagate meant to use the Power Saving features as a way of managing heat. If that was their intention, it works.

Overall Review: Keep in mind that this is an external drive. It is not intended to be running and spinning continuously in an external enclosure, as it will get hot. That's my beef about not being able to manually turn it off when I am not using it (you can still manually power down via Windows). Hence my 4 eggs. But having learned to manage the temperatures, I am very happy with this drive and it will remain my primary backup drive and I will have plenty of room.

Pros: This is a fast drive, all the specs are matched by write and copy speeds that are fast. I copies from the drive and wrote to the drive separate 9Gb folders of mixed files, and it went quickly. I also copied to and from another mechanical drive and a SSD drive, and in both instances, this drive worked very well. I have no complaints about the speed of the drive. Also, it is very quiet and runs cool. So what is not to love? It turns out about 1Tb.

Cons: This drive came with a 2Tb partition and then 700+G of unformatted space. And no matter what I do, I cannot get that space to format or to merge with the 2Tb partition. In essence. 700Gb of wasted space.

Overall Review: That's really about it. A good drive, but something seriously wrong with this drive. I see no one else reporting this, so it must have just been the drive I got. But this is not acceptable.

Pros: This is my first AMD CPU since the days of the Athlon 64 X 2. I had really liked the AMD chips (I still have a working K6-III 450 that OCs to 600MHz on an old Compaq Presario), and my first builds in the early 2000s were all AMD. But I shifted to Intel with the introduction of the Core2Duo line of CPUs which were amazingly cool-running and OCable and never went back to AMD until now. My last Intel build which I still use was an i5-13600k build from 2023, a great cpu. But Intel seems kind of stalled right now, so I opted for AMD Ryzen. I have never spent such a large sum on a cpu (and adjusting for inflation), but I'm old and decided to go for it. Using this cpu has been a learning curve to say the least, with CCDs, 3d cache, core parking, and other features of these chips with which I was unfamiliar. But wow, this 9950X3D is jaw-dropping. Currently, I am not OCing but I am undervolting. And at stock, some of the CCD1 cores run at 5750+ stable, and all the CCD0 at 5500+. None of my temps (package, CCD or individual cores) exceed mid-70s (peak bursts) and average in the mid-60s under gaming (FS 2024, Cyberpunk 2077) or benchmark (OCCT, Cinebench) demands. And this is using only a 240mm AIO. The AMD chipset drivers work great, and when paired with Win 11 Game Bar and a Win 11 Balanced power option, the non-3D cached cores idle at 4.3GHz when gaming just as they are supposed to do. This is all new to me, but I've learned, and it's just magic. I'm using a 5070 Ti and 64G of Corsair Vengeance (I bought in early 2025 when it was cheap). My gaming is smooth, apps the same (it blows through Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop), and everything snaps. Hats off to AMD.

Cons: None. I do wish it was cheaper and made lattes.

Overall Review: An amazing chip that has a premium price but performs at a premium level. The best CPU I have ever had the pleasure to buy, install, tweak, use, and enjoy. Its price has remained stable, even down a bit from its original price, and if you can swing it, but it. You probably will not regret it.

Pros: I am using MSI Afterburner and it allows me to OC this card very nicely, getting core clock speeds at 3100+ with power slightly lowed (below 300W under load) using the curve tweak feature. So far, it has been very stable. Now I initially used GPU Tweaker III and it completely botched up my system, my overall system, with instability and boot problems at the bios level. I could not really explore this card until I removed GPU Tweaker III via Revo Uninstall and installed Afterburner. Now I am still exploring the limits of this card, but once I eliminated GPU Tweaker III, it has been working beautifully.

Cons: None once I got rid of GPU Tweaker III.

Overall Review: A great card, I got it cheaper than the current price, I was pushing my budget when it was cheaper, and I'm not sure I would have bought it at the current price. That said, though, I can definitely recommend this card, as it really overclocks nicely with great stability with excellent temperatures. .

Pros: I am using it with a 9950x3d and this mobo and its chipset drivers work perfectly. I just installed and ran FS 2024, and the CCD0 cores all functioned while all the CCD1 cores parked with 0 utilization. So the mobo, its drivers, the cpu and Windows 11 all did their job and worked in harmony. The game ran so smoothly. In addition, the PCI-e 5.0 x 16 slot runs at that speed per GPU-Z, and the first NVmE slot (M,2_1, the one above the PCI-E x 16 slot with its own heat spreader) runs at PCI-e 5.0 x 4 without affecting the PCI-E x 16 speed, with a Samsung 9100 Pro running at 14k sequential read and write per Crystalmark and Samsung Magician. I have a 990 Evo PCI-e x 4 drive in Slot 3 and it runs at 7K sequential read and write. The on-board sound is quite good. Quickly and in no order: bios update was easy, manual is very good. With the installed bios that came with the board, it immediately recognized and allowed me to boot up my 9950x3ed and some corsair ram that was on their DRAM approved list. I updated the bios, and the system read some Corsair Dram NOT on the list, and runs it at full advertised DRAM 6000HT speeds. SATA channels work fine and independent of the NVME slots; there are no conflicts or speed degradation. Finally, BE SURE to insert the little rubber pads included with the mobo into the M2 slots, for single-sided M2s. The pad fits below the M2, helps to push the M2 snug against the heat sink on top, and drops temps quite significantly (5C at idle, more so under load).

Cons: This is not a con per se, but a warning. I managed to bend pins in the cpu socket such that I bricked the board, but was so impressed with this mobo that I replaced it with another. I don't know exactly what I did to bend those pins (and one was horribly bent) though the cpu was okay (first time I messed up a cpu install in 20+ years of building systems), but just beware and be careful when inserting your cpu. One genuine con, but readily sorted out: Asus posts Realtek drivers for Wifi and Bluetooth in their download site, and these are listed first. As you expand the list, you will notice Mediatek drivers also listed, and these are what you need, or at least what I needed, as the Wifi and BT chips are MediaTek, not Realtek. Asus must have switched at some point, so maybe some boards have Realltek. But be aware.

Overall Review: While the number of connections are somewhat limited, there are enough connections for my needs. This board runs very well so far, after a couple of weeks. I am running a 9950x3d and it runs very well and does all its voodoo magic. Drives run well, my GPU runs well. I am running 6000HT ram at advertised speeds and timings (CL 30 et al). Temps are good. All in all, a solid motherboard that I can recommend to others.

Pros: I am using it on a 9950x3d on a X870-Plus mobo and running a 5070Ti. I use one of the enclosed PSU cables for the 12V connection to the GPU, and have detected no heat issues or any other problems. My system is running very well and stable with this PSU. While listed as an ATX 3.0, it seems pretty consistent with 3.1 standards.

Cons: None

Overall Review: A solid PSU and I can recommend it to others. I have used Seasonic power supplies in the past and always have been impressed by their workmanship, quality, and value.