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Boyse W.

Boyse W.

Joined on 09/15/11

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Product Reviews
product reviews
  • 10
Most Favorable Review

Absolutely beautiful

NEW NZXT H440 STEEL Mid Tower Case. Next Generation 5.25-less Design. Include 4 x 2nd Gen FNv2 Fans, High-End WC support, USB3.0, Matte BLK/Red
NEW NZXT H440 STEEL Mid Tower Case. Next Generation 5.25-less Design. Include 4 x 2nd Gen FNv2 Fans, High-End WC support, USB3.0, Matte BLK/Red

Pros: +Probably the best looking case you'll ever see. No matter what color you get it will look fantastic. Great for those people who like to go all out with color and fancy cabling. +Decent airflow considering the covered front panel. +Nice shroud for PSU to make cable management cleaner (but not always easier, see cons). +Large side panel to show off your work. +Decently low price. +It's just... so gorgeous. I can't overstate how beautiful it is.

Cons: -If you plan to use water cooling, make sure your radiator isn't too big. If it is, you'll have to mount it on the top with the fans covering your RAM! -It IS a mid-tower, so I'm not subtracting a point here, but it is fairly cramped, especially with a large water cooler (obviously) or a large heatsink or a larger GPU. -Horrible 2.5" SSD mount location. Located on top of the shroud, it's in such a horrible place because it's so hard to plug in a sata power cable. -If you need to do anything with your PSU, you have to dismantle your whole rig as accessing the PSU is a nightmare.

Overall Review: So, I'm really on the fence about this one. It's so clean and simple and beautiful looking, but all that is also kind of a downfall for me. Every design element that looks nice somehow hinders the way the case works. The cable management on the back panel is sort of tight leading to you having to force the panel on, which is never fun. The solid front panel means that even with the 3 included front fans it still just doesn't move air well over components. The only way the airflow would be ok would be if you spend some real money on high quality fans that push more air than a typhoon. Despite its' issues, it's still a solid case if you aren't worried about the airflow and just want a nice looking case that does function well. And I feel it's worth mentioning that while there is no 5.25" drive bay for a CD drive, you won't miss it. I bought an external one for if I need it and I used it once to install Windows, which I could've done with a USB, and haven't used it since. So don't let that deter you too much from this case.

Phenomenal

Razer Goliathus Gaming Mouse Mat - Fragged Control Edition - Standard M
Razer Goliathus Gaming Mouse Mat - Fragged Control Edition - Standard M

Pros: -Does not move during use -Comfortable feel -Very accurate -Looks cool -Not too big for me

Cons: -Could be a bit large for some desks -After 5 months it's starting to wear out a bit

Overall Review: This mousepad is awesome. Absolutely worth every penny. I purchased the medium size and it fits my desk perfect but for some people it will probably be too big. Luckily though a smaller size is available. The only "problem" i've had so far is that the mousepad has started to wear down a little in one place. I have my sensitivity fairly high however so I don't move my mouse much from one area so I'm not too surprised or upset about it. Overall this is an amazing product and I highly recommend it for everyone

Solid memory

CORSAIR Vengeance 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin PC RAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model CMZ8GX3M2A1600C9B
CORSAIR Vengeance 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin PC RAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model CMZ8GX3M2A1600C9B

Pros: -Good heat spreaders -Stable -Quick -Comes in different colors

Cons: -Heat spreaders a bit big

Overall Review: It's memory. Does what you need it to and can be overclocked easily. The heat spreaders do their job well and add a nice flair to the inner workings. If that's not your thing, it comes in a nice neutral black as well. There's only one issue and that is the size. If you're using a bigger heatsink on your CPU that goes over your RAM slot (i.e. Hyper 212), they will not fit under it. At all. Unless you want to remove the heat spreaders from one stick, go for the Corsair Vengeance low profile which has the same specs as this, just smaller heat spreaders.

Good budget motherboard

GIGABYTE GA-970A-UD3 AM3+ AMD 970 + SB950 USB 3.0 ATX AMD Motherboard
GIGABYTE GA-970A-UD3 AM3+ AMD 970 + SB950 USB 3.0 ATX AMD Motherboard

Pros: -Worked out of the box -Good amount of SATA ports -Lot of USB 2.0/3.0 ports

Cons: -Supports CrossFire but not SLI -North bridge heat sink not very secure -UEFI bios is clunky -SATA placement bad for mid towers

Overall Review: If you're looking for a motherboard to support one nVidia or two AMD GPUs while being able to use AMD's Vishera CPUs then this motherboard is for you. If you're looking to a bit higher, do some overclocking or SLI some new GTX 7xx cards, look somewhere else. I bought this mobo on a budget and it has worked well since January with no issue. The issues aren't major really, just small things. It supports CrossFire but not SLI, which makes sense since it's a budget AMD board. If you're even considering SLI at any point in the future but are within a budget, the Gigabyte UA-990FXA-UD3 mobo is only about $35 more than this and supports SLI. The UEFI bios is very basic and unappealing and somewhat scattered. Not difficult to use if you've been through a bios, but still somewhat aggravating at times. If you have a mid-tower, you'll most likely have an issue plugging in your SATA devices. The ports are placed along the right side and with my old Antec 900-2 mid case, there was only about 3/4" worth of space between the ports and my drive bays. Took some doing to get them in properly. And be careful putting this in, the NB heat sink is secured by plastic pushpins, so if you hold onto it it will come off a bit. The thermal paste will reset it, but just be aware. For just over $100 this is a great motherboard but it may not be right for everybody. After owning it for just under 7 months I'm already looking to upgrade to a 990FX motherboard that has the features I need. If not having SLI isn't an issue for you, then this motherboard is a good fit for a tight budget.

One of the best air cooling units available

Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus - CPU Cooler with 4 Direct Contact Heatpipes
Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus - CPU Cooler with 4 Direct Contact Heatpipes

Pros: -Keeps CPU cool -Good, solid design -Cheap but great quality

Cons: -Install is somewhat confusing -Very very big

Overall Review: This cooler is amazing. Keeps my FX-8320 @3.774 GHz at around 52°C in Prime95. I have two fans connected to it right now for push/pull; the included fan and one of the 120mm NZXT fans that came with my Phantom case, and the stock fan is extremely quiet, even at 100%. The cooler is built really well but you wouldn't expect it to be at such a low price. The only 2 "cons" I listed aren't really cons exactly. The instructions that come with this cooler aren't the best, so I recommend going to YouTube and looking at one of the million installation videos. After watching a video, it's not that hard to install really. Before I bought this unit, I was nervous that people I watched install this had done it a lot so it looked easy, but when I finally got it and started the install I realized it really is that easy. The other "con" is that it's large. You really shouldn't be surprised at this though. It comes with a 120mm fan, that should give you a good idea as to how big it is. Just make sure you have room and consider the possibility that, depending on your mobo, it will cover a memory slot. My build: Gigabye 970A-UD3 Motherboard AMD FX-8320 8 core CPU @ 3.774 GHz EVGA GeForce GTX 550 Ti (Fermi) 2 x 4 GB Corsair Vengeance @ 1600 MHz NZXT Black/Green crafted Phantom Full case

Wonderful case with minor issues

NZXT Phantom PHAN-002GR Black with Green Stripes Steel / Plastic ATX Full Tower Computer Case
NZXT Phantom PHAN-002GR Black with Green Stripes Steel / Plastic ATX Full Tower Computer Case

Pros: -Extremely big and roomy -Solid construction -Absolutely beautiful -Relatively easy set up -Good airflow -Quality fans included -Quiet as all get out

Cons: -Bad 3.5" and 2.5" drive placement -Bad side fan placement -Only 4 fans included (3 120mm and a 200mm)

Overall Review: This case is absolutely massive. Very tall and allows for lots of room for expansion with good airflow all around it. Considering how big it is, I was mildly surprised that it really didn't weigh much more than my old Antec 900-2 case with everything inside. The construction on the case is very solid as well. There's two detachable plastic pieces on the front and top of the case that come off with no tools. You simply pull and it comes off. Considering it takes a bit of force to get it off, I never felt like it would break when I pulled the front or side off. The only issue I've had is that the drives go in a bad way. If you look at the pictures, you'll see that the drives go in with the ports facing the side of the case. Usually not an issue, but this case isn't as deep as others, so the the back of your hard drives will be pretty close to the side panel. Couple that with the fact that the two side 120mm fans are right over the drive bays, cables will more than likely be touching the fans. It's easily remedied by using an angled SATA cable which I wish I had used when I first built this... Unfortunately, since I didn't, I inadvertently broke the SATA port on one of my hard drives. It still functions, but the port is busted. I don't knock any eggs off or really count that specifically as a con considering it was my fault for pushing on the side panel. The door wasn't sitting right and I couldn't figure out why... Until I broke the SATA port. Again, it's not really a con, just a word of warning to use angled SATA cables and maybe remove the fan. Overall it's a well built and beautiful looking case that's worth the money. My build: Gigabyte 970A-UD3 mobo AMD FX-8320 3.5 GHz CPU @ 4.0 GHz (4.1 GHz turbo) EVGA GTX 550 Ti Fermi 2GB @ 1000 MHz NZXT Phantom Black/Green Full ATX case 2 x 4 GB Corsair Vengeance @ 1600 MHz 2 x Seagate Barracuda 1TB 7200 HDDs Dual 23" Acer Monitors