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Domenick D.

Domenick D.

Joined on 05/15/02

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Product Reviews
product reviews
  • 7
Most Favorable Review

Very impressed

SAPPHIRE Radeon HD 4870 512MB GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 CrossFireX Support Graphics Card 100259L
SAPPHIRE Radeon HD 4870 512MB GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 CrossFireX Support Graphics Card 100259L

Pros: Great card at a great price. Quiet, effective stock cooling solution. Runs L4D at full detail @ 1440x900 at around 60 fps with my Phenom 9850. Room for upgrade with crossfire.

Cons: A little long, but that's par for the course nowadays.

Most Critical Review

Do not buy this

SteelSeries 61050 7H Headset
SteelSeries 61050 7H Headset

Pros: None

Cons: It broke after less than an hour of use. I put it on, played 1 game of starcraft 2. My phone rang. I got up to answer it, and came back to my desk, put the headset on, and the left ear was dead. I took it off, made sure all the connections were made, and put it back on, and the right ear was now also dead. I didn't drop it. I didn't even have it long enough to get it dirty. It's a brand new piece of junk.

Great board, with one caveat

ZOTAC IONITX-F-E Intel Atom 330 (1.6GHz, dual-core) MCP7A-ION Mini ITX Motherboard / CPU Combo
ZOTAC IONITX-F-E Intel Atom 330 (1.6GHz, dual-core) MCP7A-ION Mini ITX Motherboard / CPU Combo

Pros: Tiny, easy to put together. Uses desktop DIMMs rather than Laptop SoDIMMs.

Cons: Despite what a few others have said, this simply didn't play Netflix streams well, at least on Windows 7 x64. Netflix streams on PC unfortunately don't use the GPU at all, and this Atom, although it's the best Atom, really can't keep up. I ended up using this as a WHS and putting the Athlon X2 to HTPC duty.

Arrived DOA

ECS Geforce6100PM-M2 AM2+/AM2 NVIDIA GeForce 6100 Micro ATX AMD Motherboard
ECS Geforce6100PM-M2 AM2+/AM2 NVIDIA GeForce 6100 Micro ATX AMD Motherboard

Pros: It ummm.... is cheap I guess.

Cons: It came dead. RMA time...

Best HTPC case bang for your buck

APEVIA X-QPACK-NW-BK/420 Black Aluminum 1.0 w/ ABS plastic front panel Micro ATX Desktop Computer Case 420W Power Supply
APEVIA X-QPACK-NW-BK/420 Black Aluminum 1.0 w/ ABS plastic front panel Micro ATX Desktop Computer Case 420W Power Supply

Pros: Looks great, fantastic price, clever internal layout. There are no other non-Apevia HTPC cases out there that don't either look ridiculous or carry massively bloated pricetags. I guess the case manufacturers think HTPC owners are millionaires that don't mind 300 percent markup on their cases. This one is half the price of it's aesthetic equal, casewise, and none of those pricier options include a power supply.

Cons: The hard drive led is a blue led (everyone has become obsessed with blue leds it seems), and like many blue leds, it is overly bright. I dimmed it nicely with a piece of scotch tape and a black sharpie. After a year and a half of being constantly on, the power supply died. It works, but under load it cannot maintain a steady flow of juice, and the machine just shuts down.

Overall Review: Get it!

Great product

APEVIA Black / Blue SECC Steel / Aluminum X-MASTER-BL/500 ATX Media Center / HTPC Case
APEVIA Black / Blue SECC Steel / Aluminum X-MASTER-BL/500 ATX Media Center / HTPC Case

Pros: Aesthetically pleasing as an HTPC or just a small full ATX case. Slick drive rails. Inexpensive. Light. Included fans and PS are relatively quiet.

Cons: A bit thin-metalled. The buttons have somewhat of a cheap feel to them.

Overall Review: If you're looking for the smallest case which you can pack a full sized PCI express video card (I'm using a 4870), or even two of them, this is it.