Joined on 04/20/05
Just a guy who been building PCs for fun for over 30 years....so yes im old.
Great Processor
Pros: 32nm Low Power Draw Con sidering the CPU and GPU architecture. Overall Performance of this little chip is great. Price. Form factor. Not having to install a video card one less thing to do on a budget gaming build.
Cons: Since this is still a new product drivers are still in their infancy for the A-Series APUs. This is evident by the current 11.6b hotfix amd issued to address some bugs in drivers. But I will say this intial performance is good despite early driver support. Overclocking can very greatly. But I had a hard time holding above 3.3 OC on stock HS with a minor bump in voltage. GPU really neeeds High speed, low latency ram to give it as much bandwidth as possible. IMO DDR3 1600 or higher. I won't go with ddr3-1333.
Overall Review: I have a 12 year old Nephew who is big into PC gaming. Unfortunately his home rig is a very aged Athlon 64 3200+ with 1 gig of ram, and a radeon 700 series. So CPU and pre Direct X 9.0b support put most recent games out of his reach. This system is very responsive. Being used to what old integrated graphics from both AMD/Intel could do I still getting a little use to watching 3d Games being played and medium/high detail with no hiccups even after 8 hours+ of use (he is still playing as i type this). To give people an idea of the system compared in CS:Source stress test. At base speed with no overclocking this system scored 165FPS at 1280x1024 with all detail on high. The PC i built for my father Athlon II x4 640 2.8 ghz with Geforce 8800 GT gets 240 fps. With new drivers the APU improve. A8-3850 APU ASUS F1A75-V PRO FM1 AMD A75 CORSAIR Vengeance 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 1600 Western Digital Caviar Black WD1002FAEX 1TB 7200 RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb Antec Earthwatts 43
Nice Case Bad PSU
Pros: Nice case, looks sharp. Is sturdy, and has plenty of room. Alot of fans keeps temps low.
Cons: After under 4 months. The PSU unit died. All i had in the PC was CPU+Fan, 1 optical drive, and 1 SATA HD. So i wasn't stressing it. 2 weeks before PSU unit died had problems powering up, lights would power up but not enough to power system up.
Great Value
Overall Review: Cant believe how inexpensive these have become. Great addition for anyone needing some m.2 storage.
Great Value Drive (Size/price)
Pros: The drive has been rock solid for last 2 months, the price and performance is great. I have the drive over 90% full of games and the performance has been great m.2 so no Data cables, no power cables just click it in, 1 screw and you are done.
Cons: With PCIE 4x being the new standard for high end drives, this drive along with all other m.2 PCIE gen 3 drive lose in the speed category regardless of maker. But a Gen 3 drive is still insanely fast, and in most applications IE (games) your cant tell the real world difference between Gen 3 to Gen 4. I play PUBG, Red Dead Online, Apex, and way too many more to list.....and in 95% of games the difference in game load times in under 1/2 a second. if you do professional work (video editing etc) then spend extra and get the Gen4 version. But for the vast majority of use (Web browsing, gaming, etc) you will never be able to tell Difference between Gen 3 and 4.
Overall Review: I received the crucial P3 PCIE Gen 3.0 m.2 2280 drive for review model #CT2000P3SSD8. I have 3 PCs in my house at the time of the review 5700x, 5900x, and 5950x....all with various ram configurations from 16GB to 128gb. So this review is from the x470/x570 motherboard point of view. I tried the drive in all 3 systems, just to make sure it wasn't held different chipsets/bios versions, or by core count/ram sizes. It performed great in all systems. Like all m.2 drives installation is easy fast and clean. Click the SSD in and 1 screw to hold it into place, no SATA data or power cables required which help keeps builds clutter and cable free. While I have used Crucial for a variety of products over the years (a lot memory kits, 2.5 inch SSDs -easy compatibility with wide array of OEM laptops) this was my first chance to use a Crucial M.2 drive in a 2TB capacity. The drive didn't disappoint at 2TB of storage the capacity is great. The drive ran at advertised speeds even when it was very full the drive still ran extremely fast. (Some SSDs the fuller they get can run much much slower, while good drives have very little performance drop off ) My biggest concern when I first got the drive was it is PCIE Gen 3 version (they also offer a Gen 4 Version (model CT2000P3PSSD8 one extra P in model name) , I was curious how much speed I would lose compared to my Gen 4 drives and other Gen 3 in my systems. Surprised and shocking is the REAL WORLD differences in the vast majority of use cases (games, web browsing, general use etc) despite on paper having such huge speed differences between and Gen 4 was not noticeable. For a few days id have games like Red Dead Online, PUBG, Wow, and many others....and i just sit there clicking load on 2 of my PCS side by side for a hours. I REPEAT FOR GAMING Gen 3 vs Gen 4 offers EXTREMELY EXTREMLY Little REAL WORLD difference save money go Gen 3 for a gaming drive. So far the drive has giving me Zero issues, it performance has been great. Its a nice plus When Crucial a brand of Micron a company that been making Memory components since the 1980's they continued to evolve and offer a wide selection of products that have great compatibility. These drives offer a great combination of performance to price, and stability. If you want fast storage for games this is Gen 3 drive is great. If video editing, 3d rendering, file compression decompression etc....spend the extra for the Gen 4 version. But in REAL world side by side games/application loading if you blinked that was different between PCIE Gen 3 and a Gen 4 m.2 2280 Drive. If you are building a new PC or just want to add storage the CT2000P3SSD8 is a great option, prices that don't break the bank and offer fast reliable storage.
Great Ram, Beautiful RGB.
Pros: Fast, Cool, ICUE support
Cons: None its Ram.
Overall Review: Been using the Corsair Vengeance RGB in my main rig now for over a month. Ram works great. The Ram works at advertised speeds, the heatspeader is nice and well built and very effective at keeping the Ram cool. The main reason you buy this Ram is because of the Corsair ICUE support. The LED like all Corsair ARGB lighting has a nice soft glow (IE not overtly bright) which I love you can enjoy all the colors without turning your rig/room into a disco ball. Loading the ICUE software allows for some of the easiest way to coordinate all your RGB in you build. So if you own a Corsair AIO water cooler, or a Corsair case you can adjust all lighting with a few clicks. This type of all around integration and ease of access is what makes the Corsair Vengeance RGB attractive to anyone who already own other Corsair products, or just want nice looking Ram. You dont need other Corsair products to enjoy it. So you get great Ram that works at advertised speeds, backed by a great warranty, but you get access to the whole Corsair ICUE software suite. So as you add more products you can continue adjust lighting throughout your build. Buy, install, open bios and enable the memory profile and you are good to go. Beautiful lighting to compliment you build. Great build quality, great warranty, all by a brand thats been winning consumers over for decades.
Great mid range GPU
Overall Review: With the GPU shortages was very happy to score this on NEWEGG Shuffle on launch day. Used this GPU to upgrade my wifes rig. So far the GPU runs great. The 6600xt give you equal to or better then a 5700xt depending on resolution. At 1080p its faster by 8-11% on average. At 1440p it trade blows vs the 5700xt wins some loses some or ties but does it at way way less power consumption. The SAPPHIRE nitro+ offers great cooling, cool LED that can match case lighting if setup, it offers very high clocks for a 6600xt while still only needing the 1-8pin power plug. Cooling is great (the 6600xt is an easy GPU to cool). Like most of you trying to get a GPU, let alone close to MSRP in these times is tricky. Im very fortunate. Over this card preforms extremely well. Me and my wife both game at 1440p on 165hz. So we go from PUBG, Fortnite, Apex, POE, D3, fall guys, valheim, Minecraft we bounce around. Her GPU was lacking before but trying to get any GPU near MSRP has been tough. This GPU gave her a huge uplift, and combined w Newegg shuffle got it a a great price. Overall long short. Great GPU if you focus on rasterization performance. Very power efficient, and runs extremely cool. Give you better than 5700xt at 1080p and trades blows at 1440p. So my wife rig going from 1060 3gb to this have a huge boost. Like all you out there good luck scoring a GPU at reasonable price/markup in these times its a battle out there If you are gaming at 1080/1440p this is a great GPU. Great clocks, cooling and LED on the Nitro+.