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Nathan K.

Nathan K.

Joined on 10/05/05

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Product Reviews
product reviews
  • 5
Most Favorable Review

Nice card, great price!

XFX GeForce 8800 GS 384MB GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 SLI Support Graphics Card PVT88SFDF4
XFX GeForce 8800 GS 384MB GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 SLI Support Graphics Card PVT88SFDF4

Pros: Installed perfectly and easily. My Vista 3d performance score jumped from 3.0 (with integrated graphics) to 5.8. I've not messed with overclocking but even without, games that were non-playable before are now smooth and beautiful. Card seems nicely designed and of good construction. Size is reasonable (considering the mammoth sizes of cards these days) and I didn't have any difficulty fitting it in my case. Takes only one slot. Finally, price was great! Maybe the best bang for the buck out there. XFX claims "real life performance near that of a 8800 GTS 640 MB card." I can't confirm that but performance seems pretty darn good.

Cons: I saw a few reviews on other sites stating the fan was noisy. It does add a bit of noise (kind of has a low shhhhhhh... sound" but I really can't hear it over my case and power supply fans. Like any higher end card, especially with a high end processor, make sure you have a good power supply. XFX states you need at least 500 watts with a Core2 Extreme. I haven't had any problem with AMD X2 and 350 watts.

Overall Review: Great value. I'd recommend the card to anyone. Consider what you like to play. Bragging rights is nice but most people really don't need the best or most expensive card out there to enjoy gameing.

Most Critical Review

Good value, some problems and limits.

Iomega StorCenter ix2 Network Storage Server 1TB
Iomega StorCenter ix2 Network Storage Server 1TB

Pros: Good value, two drive system. RAID. USB expansion ports can act as print server or you can add additional external usb drives. Small footprint. Fairly quiet, but drives are "clicky." Decent performance. Runs cool. Low power consumption. American based technical support. Friendly user interface. Multimedia potential.

Cons: Have had some software problems (bugs) and problems with back-ups. The lower end Seagate drives are not user replaceable. No drive access over the internet. E-mail notification not working (drive problems are supposed to be automatically sent to your e-mail account), but I haven't been able to get this to work. Short warranty period.

Overall Review: Purchased this NAS to safeguard personal photos etc. Setup to Raid 1. Nice user friendly interface for persons less technically inclined. Installed easy. Retrospect 2.0 back-up software didn't work and kept giving errors. American based tech support was helpful and upgraded me to Retrospect 7.0 which works but sometimes doesn't fully complete the back-up. Also, I can't get the e-mail notification to work. Drives are not user replaceable which may limit business use. No drive access over the internet, this is uncommon for NAS. Considering such limitations the cost is about one half what you would pay for a similar setup. The drive has a lot of potential but Iomega needs to clean up some software bugs, and add internet drive access. I can live without being able to swap drives but I'm sure this is a deterrent to many. Performance is good, on most benchmarks about mid-pack for NAS. Reading performance is better than writing.

Click of death.

Hitachi GST Deskstar 7K1000.D HDS721010DLE630 (0F13180) 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive Bare Drive
Hitachi GST Deskstar 7K1000.D HDS721010DLE630 (0F13180) 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive Bare Drive

Pros: Had to RMA the first drive. I installed it in a security system DVR. Very loud repetative clicking sound. The DVR was working terrible. Almost RMA'd the DVR, but tried an older spare drive. Worked good after that. New drive seems to be working well at this point. Quiet and seems fast. Lighter weight than most others.

Cons: Concerned about the number of drive failures reported in these reviews. Seems unusually high for a typically reliable device. It does concern me about the durability of this drive. Time will tell.

Overall Review: It looks like this drive is of a fairly new design. I think Hitachi has some quality control issues to solve. Kind of like a first year model car, not all the bugs worked out yet. When working the drive is quiet and seems fast. Just hope it lasts.

Impressed

Zonet ZFS3016B 16Port Ethernet Switch
Zonet ZFS3016B 16Port Ethernet Switch

Pros: Good, solid construction. Very fast, no problems handeling my busy network. Plug and play, worked perfect. Never installed an easier piece of network equipment. Doesn't seem to generate any heat.

Cons: None

Overall Review: Don't spend your hard earned money on "name brand" when this thing works great!

No problems

Advantek AWN-AP-54MR Wireless AP
Advantek AWN-AP-54MR Wireless AP

Pros: Does everything its supposed to do. Fast. Good setup interface. The connection seems reliable and range is good; I haven't had problems with disconnects as stated in a previous review. Great value for the price, as long as it keeps working as it is now.

Cons: Nothing thus far.

Overall Review: No need to spend a lot to get a decent performing AP.

11/19/2007