Computer Hardware

Intel Motherboard list

2010-03-23T07:35:00.000-07:00

Intel® Desktop Board D101GGC
Intel® Desktop Board D102GGC2
Intel® Desktop Board D201GLY
Intel® Desktop Board D201GLY2
Intel® Desktop Board D410PT
Intel® Desktop Board D510MO
Intel® Desktop Board D5400XS
Intel® Desktop Board D865GBF
Intel® Desktop Board D865GLC
Intel® Desktop Board D865GRH
Intel® Desktop Board D865GSA
Intel® Desktop Board D865GVHZ
Intel® Desktop Board D865PCD
Intel® Desktop Board D865PCK
Intel® Desktop Board D865PERL
Intel® Desktop Board D875PBZ
Intel® Desktop Board D910GLDW
Intel® Desktop Board D915GAG
Intel® Desktop Board D915GAV
Intel® Desktop Board D915GEV
Intel® Desktop Board D915GLVG
Intel® Desktop Board D915GMH
Intel® Desktop Board D915GUX
Intel® Desktop Board D915GVWB
Intel® Desktop Board D915PBL
Intel® Desktop Board D915PCM
Intel® Desktop Board D915PCY
Intel® Desktop Board D915PDT
Intel® Desktop Board D915PGN
Intel® Desktop Board D915PLWD
Intel® Desktop Board D915PSY
Intel® Desktop Board D925XBC
Intel® Desktop Board D925XCV
Intel® Desktop Board D925XEBC2
Intel® Desktop Board D925XECV2
Intel® Desktop Board D925XHY
Intel® Desktop Board D945GBO
Intel® Desktop Board D945GCCR
Intel® Desktop Board D945GCL
Intel® Desktop Board D945GCLF
Intel® Desktop Board D945GCLF2
Intel® Desktop Board D945GCNL
Intel® Desktop Board D945GCPE
Intel® Desktop Board D945GCZ
Intel® Desktop Board D945GNT
Intel® Desktop Board D945GPM
Intel® Desktop Board D945GRW
Intel® Desktop Board D945GSEJT
Intel® Desktop Board D945GTP
Intel® Desktop Board D945GZCC2
Intel® Desktop Board D945PAW
Intel® Desktop Board D945PDK
Intel® Desktop Board D945PLNM
Intel® Desktop Board D945PLRN
Intel® Desktop Board D945PSN
Intel® Desktop Board D945PVS
Intel® Desktop Board D945PWM
Intel® Desktop Board D946GZAB
Intel® Desktop Board D946GZIS
Intel® Desktop Board D946GZTS
Intel® Desktop Board D955XBK
Intel® Desktop Board D955XCS
Intel® Desktop Board D975XBX
Intel® Desktop Board D975XBX2
Intel® Desktop Board DB43LD
Intel® Desktop Board DG31GL
Intel® Desktop Board DG31PR
Intel® Desktop Board DG33BU
Intel® Desktop Board DG33FB
Intel® Desktop Board DG33TL
Intel® Desktop Board DG35EC
Intel® Desktop Board DG41BI
Intel® Desktop Board DG41CN
Intel® Desktop Board DG41KR
Intel® Desktop Board DG41MJ
Intel® Desktop Board DG41RQ
Intel® Desktop Board DG41TX
Intel® Desktop Board DG41TY
Intel® Desktop Board DG41WV
Intel® Desktop Board DG43GT
Intel® Desktop Board DG43NB
Intel® Desktop Board DG43RK
Intel® Desktop Board DG45FC
Intel® Desktop Board DG45ID
Intel® Desktop Board DG965MQ
Intel® Desktop Board DG965MS
Intel® Desktop Board DG965OT
Intel® Desktop Board DG965PZ
Intel® Desktop Board DG965RY
Intel® Desktop Board DG965SS
Intel® Desktop Board DG965WH
Intel® Desktop Board DH55HC
Intel® Desktop Board DH55TC
Intel® Desktop Board DH57DD
Intel® Desktop Board DH57JG
Intel® Desktop Board DP35DP
Intel® Desktop Board DP43BF
Intel® Desktop Board DP43TF
Intel® Desktop Board DP45SG
Intel® Desktop Board DP55KG
Intel® Desktop Board DP55SB
Intel® Desktop Board DP55WB
Intel® Desktop Board DP55WG
Intel® Desktop Board DP965LT
Intel® Desktop Board DQ35JO
Intel® Desktop Board DQ35MP
Intel® Desktop Board DQ43AP
Intel® Desktop Board DQ45CB
Intel® Desktop Board DQ45EK
Intel® Desktop Board DQ57TM
Intel® Desktop Board DQ963FX
Intel® Desktop Board DQ965CO
Intel® Desktop Board DQ965GF
Intel® Desktop Board DQ965WC
Intel® Desktop Board DX38BT
Intel® Desktop Board DX48BT2
Intel® Desktop Board DX58SO

Intel DG33TL Motherboard

2010-03-23T07:30:00.000-07:00

Intel DG33TL Socket 775 ATX Motherboard
Integrated Intel GMA 3100 Graphics
1333 MHz FSB
4 * 800-667 DDR2 (Supports Upto 8GB)
6 * SATA II Ports
10/100/1000 LAN
IEEE 1394a
8 Channel Audio
Supports * Intel® Core™2 Quad processor * Intel® Core™2 Duo processor * Intel® Pentium® dual-core processor * Intel® Celeron® processor 400 Series
3 Years Limited Warranty

Indian Price: 3,800/-

Processors

OS X seems to work with all processors that Intel recommends as compatible with this board. If you are using a newer processor, such as the "Wolfdale" 8000 series, you may need to update the BIOS in order for it to be recognized properly and run at full speed.
Onboard Audio

The DG33TL has a SigmaTel STAC9271D Audio Chipset. Audio will not work out of the box with current distributions of OSX.

Kext for onboard soundcard can be found here .

The mute function did not work for some users with the kexts previously linked, however onboard audio is fully functional with the above kexts. .

However Mute and Mic In works with the latest VoodooHDA kext.
Onboard LAN

The DG33TL has an Intel 82566DC LAN Controller. Onboard LAN currently works with iDeneb 10.5.6 if Intel 82566DC LAN controller is selected at install. If you do not have the iDeneb 10.5.6 distro you can download the kext from here Users have also reported success with PCI and USB solutions. Please review the hardware compatibility lists for your version of OSX. . . .
Onboard Video

The DG33TL has an Intel GMA 3100 Graphics Controller. Onboard video does not currently work. Users have reported success with various PCI-E video cards, including nVidia 6, 7, 8 and 9 series cards. .

nVidia cards may need the appropriate nvinject kext, which are included in the Kalyway installation DVD.
IDE Controller

During installation, users have reported failures when attempting to use IDE drives, in particular IDE Optical Drives. Some users have reported success by selecting VIA
SATA Controller

It is recommended to use SATA0 for your hard disk, and SATA1 for your optical drive during installation. Additional drives can be added post installation. . .
Hard Drives

It is recommended that you format your hard disk as a Master Boot Record for Leopard & GUID for Snow Leopard. This can be done in Disk Utility, under the partition tab. Choose the partition you are going to install the system on and click options. If you do not format the disk correctly, you will not be able to boot without the install DVD in the DVD drive. .
Recommended BIOS settings

It is recommended to change your hard drives to AHCI (as opposed to RAID or Legacy). If you intend to dual boot your computer, the IDE setting works in Kalaway 10.5.2 and MBR.
OSX Compatibility

Board has been reported to be compatible with the following images:

Kalyway 10.5.1

Kalyway 10.5.2

iDeneb 10.5.6

iAtkos5i 10.5.5

iAtkosV7

Retail Snow Leopard 10.6.0 via USB Install Method

USB Image based Snow Leopard 10.6.2
Kernels
Kabyl

Supports Sleep and Shutdown

Final Cut Pro works

64-bit enabled .
Vanilla

Supports restart and shutdown with OpenHaltRestart

Supports all updates from System Update including iLife '09

No Sleep support

64-bit enabled

Patriot Viper II Sector 5 2000MHz 4GB Memory Kit Review

2010-03-23T07:23:00.000-07:00

The Patriot Viper II Sector 5 Series

Patriot Viper II Sector 5 PVV34G2000LLK Review With the release of CPU's that have great overclocking potential comes the need to have ram that has lots of headroom so as not to limit overclocking potential. On more than one occasion, I have found myself wondering what the full potential of a system would have been if I had just had some DDR that was not holding me back or causing me to lower the frequency. Several manufacturers have released products that address this issue. Today, d we look at one of those companies, Patriot Memory, and their Viper II Sector 5 4GB 2000MHz kit, to see what kind of room we find it gives us in our overclocking adventures. Patriot advertises this model with the following on their website: "The PatriotViper II 'Sector 5' Series, part of the Extreme Performance (EP) line, is the ultimate performance memory solution for the Intel P55 system platform. The Viper II 'Sector 5' series are built using only the highest quality pre-sorted IC's available and are subjected to rigorous testing and validation on the P55 platform to achieve optimized performance and maximum quality. These modules are engineered to reach 2000MHz at 8-8-8-24 timings and are available in 4GB kit capacity. This kit includes Futuremark's 3DMark Vantage benchmarking software for enthusiasts to fine tune their system for optimal performance." Patriot has also decided to market this kit with a license for Futuremark's 3DMark Vantage, which is a $20 value.
VIPER SERIES SPECS AND FEATURES:
* Extreme Performance PC3-16000 (2000MHz)
* Low Latency (8-8-8-24)
* XMP Ready
* Equipped with advance aluminum heat-dispersing shields
* 100% Tested and Verified
* Lifetime Warranty * RoHS Compliant
* Tested on Intel P55 chipset As we can see from the specs, this kit is rated to run at a frequency of 2000MHz, and is able to do it at timings of 8-8-8-24. It also carries a lifetime warranty, and has the XMP profile built right into it. Let's take a closer look at the build.

Thermaltake Element V Full ATX Tower Case Review

2010-03-23T07:20:00.000-07:00

The Thermaltake Element V

Today I have Thermaltake's Element V full-sized ATX case up for review. The case combines a mixture of aesthetic and functional components to form a rather expansive home in which your computer can safely live. Thermaltake has a variety of cases in their product line but the Element series consists of a lineup of cases from the $49 Element Q to the $159.99 Element V. All of these cases follow a simple black aesthetic with red color accents and Colorshift fans.

Thermaltake Element V

The Thermaltake Element V is a full-sized ATX case measuring in at a hefty 31.15 lb of steel and plastic. Due to the weight the case is quite hefty but all this weight is a compromise in price and chassis rigidity. Besides being heavy the case is also quite large at 20.9 inches high, 8.7 inches wide and 21.1 inches long. This results in a lot of internal volume meaning the case can support Mini-ATX, ATX, and Extended ATX motherboards. Keep in mind the case has only 7 expansion slots, so some of the larger flagship motherboards like the EVGA X58 4-Way SLI Classified will not fit. Outside of these few oversized boards, though, you should be set. Thermaltake mentions that the longest graphic card you can fit in the case is 13.2 inches while the tallest cooler you can fit is 6.1 inches, which gives you enough room for most options on the market. For those individuals planning builds around NVIDIA's upcoming GTX480, this case is "Fermi Certified". The case can fit up to 5 5.25" drives with external access and up to 6 3.5" hard-drives in the two internal hard-drive caddies. Now let's go on a photo tour of the Thermaltake Element V.

Thermaltake Element V Build

Plantronics Audio 476 --DSP Foldable Headset Review

2010-03-23T07:15:00.001-07:00

Plantronics .Audio 476 DSP Introduction

Plantronics is no stranger to LR given that we have reviewed many of their Bluetooth headsets over the years. This time around, we are taking a look at the Plantronics .Audio 476 DSP which is a USB 2.0 powered headset. The Plantronics .Audio 476 DSP headset is a foldable stereo headset just announced in January 2010 during CES, that offers digital signal processing to enhance the sound quality. The noise cancelling microphone uses a wideband acoustic echo cancellation to get natural sounding voice audio.

Plantronics .Audio 476 DSP

With Plantronics' DSP and acoustic tuning features, the .Audio 476 DSP promises to deliver and capture top-quality and crisp voice audio. Besides the use for Skype or other Voice over IP communications for online phone calls, the Plantronics .Audio 476 DSP is expected to work well with online game voice communication as well as exceptional voice track playback from your favorite musical artists. The Audio 476 DSP is especially certified for Skype 4.0 Super Wideband calls, however it should perform well with many of the VoIP clients.

Plantronics .Audio 476 DSP Box

The Plantronics .Audio 476 DSP is packaged in the folded position so customers know exactly how it folds right out of the box. We also know it is compatible with PC or Mac systems allowing either market to take advantage of this product. As we like to see with any corded product, there are inline controls for volume and a microphone mute button so users can have easy access to the functions that are used the most.

Plantronics .Audio 476 DSP Bundle

Included in the package is a series of instructional pamphlets for safety, Warranty and the User Guide. While the User Guide has useful information, it was definitely not required to use the .Audio 476 DSP to its fullest potential. Being a plug and play device, we were able to plug it in and go right out of the box. The only warning we will give though is some VoIP applications may need to you configure which audio device it should use for the mic and sound if your system has these devices already integrated.
Specifications

* Speaker Driver Size: 32mm diameter
* Speaker Frequency Response: 20Hz-20kHz
* Microphone Frequency Response: 100Hz-10kHz
* High Fidelity 24-bit stereo: 48kHz sampling rate
* Acoustically tuned EQ
* Wideband Acoustic Echo Cancellation
* Cable Length: 6.5 feet (2 meters)
* Compatibility: Mac, Windows - USB Plug and Play
* Standard 1 Year Plantronics Limited Warranty

Now that we see the specifications, let's move on to a closer look at the headset.

nVidia GeForce 8800 GTX Grapics card

2009-11-01T17:10:00.000-08:00

nVidia GeForce 8800 GTX Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: November 2006

As you'd expect from the high-end entry in a new generation of graphics cards, the GeForce 8800 GTX delivers a significant performance boost over its predecessors. In most tests, a single 8800 GTX card comes close to matching the performance of a pair of GeForce 7900 GTX boards in a Scalable Link Interface (SLI) configuration. That would be plenty of enticement for most serious gamers to upgrade, but the 8800 GTX has another ace in the hole: It's the first graphics card to support DirectX 10 (DX10), Microsoft's new 3D programming interface that will debut with Windows Vista.

In our tests of an nVidia reference board, the 8800 GTX blew away all the single-card records in our performance benchmark tests, scoring 165 frames per second (fps) in our Half-Life 2: Lost Coast test, compared with 105fps for a GeForce 7900 GTX card, and approaching the 173fps scored by a pair of 7900 GTX cards in an SLI setup. Its Futuremark 3DMark06 score of 12,144 nearly doubled the score of the single 7900 GTX card, and even bested the dual-card 7900 GTX SLI score of 11,888. Plus, the 8800 GTX enjoys a significant performance lead over ATI's competing high-end card, the Radeon X1950 XTX. ATI doesn't plan to release its next-generation card until early 2007, leaving nVidia the undisputed performance leader for now.

These performance tests all reflect DirectX 9 games running under Windows XP. Under DX10, which ships with Windows Vista (and which won't be available to XP users), the 8800 GTX hardware supports advanced features such as geometry shader processing, Shader Model 4, and the DX10 unified shader instruction set. With these technologies in play, you'll see more-elaborate graphics effects and yet another level of realism compared with DX9 graphics. You're not likely to find many games that take advantage of DX10 until at least mid-2007, however, and it'll be even longer before games actually require it.

The 8800 GTX's image quality is excellent. Improved anti-aliasing (AA) performance lets you crank up the settings to 16x quality with the frame-rate impact you'd typically see with 4x AA. Like ATI's newest Radeons, the 8800 series supports high-dynamic-range (HDR) lighting while using AA and filtering; earlier GeForce cards didn't support using HDR and AA together. PureVideoHD support promises high-quality Blu-ray and HD DVD playback (we weren't able to test this, though WMV HD clips looked great), and the card's High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP) support will allow it to play protected HD content.

With its large cooler that blocks a second slot, this PCI Express (PCIe) card resembles a 7900 GTX, though it's about 1.5 inches longer. The 8800 GTX requires lots of juice for operation: You'll need to plug in two PCIe power connectors to power the card, and nVidia recommends a 450-watt or greater power supply with a 12-volt rating of 30 amps. (To run two of these cards in an SLI configuration, you're almost certain to need a new power supply, due to the need for four PCIe power connectors.) The card features a 575MHz GPU, 768MB of memory running at 900MHz, dual DVI outputs, and a component high-definition TV output.

Though the DX10 support is mostly potential, at least for the next few months, the DX9 speedup is here now. Full-bore gamers who demand top frame rates and full visual effects at extremely high resolutions will find lots to like here. Just remember that you may have to factor the price of a new power supply into the final cost.

nVidia

www.nvidia.com

Mfr. Est. Price: $650

Benchmark Results± GeForce 7900 GTX GeForce 8800 GTX GeForce 7900 GTX SLI
Half-Life 2: Lost Coast* (fps) 105 165 173
Quake 4 (fps) 112 135 148
FEAR (average fps) 47 81 95
Futuremark 3DMark06 6,870 12,144 11,888

See all of our NVidia GeForce 8800 GTX coverage

Computer Shopper does not currently have pricing information for this product. It may be available directly from the manufacturer's Web site.

nVidia GeForce 8800 GTS Grapics card

2009-11-01T17:09:00.000-08:00

nVidia GeForce 8800 GTS Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: December 2006

The nVidia GeForce 8800 GTX earned the 3D-graphics crown by decimating both its 7900 GTX predecessor and the ATI Radeon X1950 XTX in all our benchmark tests. Its $600 to $650 price, however, is more than some are willing to pay just for the bragging rights to the fastest PC on the block. If you feel the need for speed, or want to prepare for Windows Vista's DirectX 10 (DX10) technology even before games using it are available, you have a less expensive solution: The nVidia GeForce 8800 GTS. A slightly pared-down version of the 8800 GTX, the 8800 GTS offers much of the same performance for about $150 less.

In our tests, the 8800 GTS fell between the 7900 GTX and the 8800 GTX, scoring 144 frames per second (fps) in our Half Life 2: Lost Coast test, compared with 105 fps for the 7900 GTX and 165 fps for the 8800 GTX. Likewise, the chip's Futuremark 3DMark06 score of 9,770 was centered between the 7900 GTX's 6,870 and the 8800 GTX's 12,144.

ATI's high-end card, the Radeon X1950 XTX, manages to approach the 8800 GTS's performance in a few tests at very high resolutions, but the 8800 GTS still trumps it with its full support for Windows Vista's DX10 technology and Shader Model 4, which promise more-elaborate graphics effects and an additional level of realism compared with DX9 graphics (that is, when DX10-enhanced games start shipping in mid-2007). ATI won't have a DX10 card available until early 2007.

The 8800 GTS's cost savings and slightly slower performance come from architectural differences from its GTX big brother, such as 96 shader cores instead of 128, and a 320-bit path to memory instead of a 384-bit one. The 8800 GTS clocks its GPU at 500MHz, compared with 575MHz on the GTX; its memory speed of 800MHz is also slower than the GTX's 900MHz. And 8800 GTS boards are currently shipping with 640MB of memory, compared with 768MB on the 8800 GTX.

The 8800 GTS is somewhat smaller than the GTX, but it still blocks the slot adjacent to its PCI Express (PCIe) slot. Make sure you have a good power supply because the card requires a single PCIe power connector (compared with two for the GTX). Also, nVidia recommends a 400-watt or greater power supply with a 12-volt rating of 26 amperes. The card also features dual DVI outputs and a component-high-definition-television (HDTV) output.

The 8800 GTS offers plenty of power to run today's most-demanding games at extremely high resolutions, and its DX10 support means it's primed for 2007's top titles, as well. Sure, the 8800 GTX is somewhat faster, but the 8800 GTS is still plenty fast for the vast majority of gaming junkies.
Benchmark Results± GeForce 7900GTX GeForce 8800GTS GeForce 8800GTX
Half-Life 2: Lost Coast 4xAA 16X AF 1600x1200 105 144 165
Company of Heroes 1600x1200 56 77 108
F.E.A.R. all setting max 1600x1200 soft shadows 29/47/101 30/58/134 40/81/192
3DMark06 6870 9770 12144

See all of our NVidia GeForce 8800 GTS coverage

PNY Verto GeForce 8600 GTS Grapics card

2009-11-01T17:08:00.003-08:00

PNY Verto GeForce 8600 GTS Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: May 2007

Graphics cards that support the latest 3D features keep getting cheaper. The $199.99 PNY Verto GeForce 8600 GTS features the same 3D eye-candy support of the more-expensive GeForce 8800 series, but it costs $100 less than the least-expensive 8800 card. Of course, with the lower price comes reduced performance, at least compared with high-end cards (most notably at higher resolutions), but the 8600 GTS still offers plenty of power for gaming, particularly on midsize or smaller monitors.

The GeForce 8600 GTS is a single-slot PCI Express (PCIe) card that requires a direct connection to your PC's power supply. (An adapter is supplied for systems without a PCIe power connector.) Requiring only a 350-watt power supply, it's not as power-hungry as 8800-series cards are. Outputs include a pair of dual-link DVI ports (along with VGA adapters), component video for use with a high-definition television (HDTV), and S-Video. The board includes 256MB of memory; its 128-bit communication channel to the GPU is narrower than the 8800 GTS's 320-bit bus, accounting for the performance decline at higher resolutions.

In our F.E.A.R tests, the 8600 GTS delivered a smooth 47 frames per second (fps) at 1,280x1,024 resolution with antialiasing (AA) disabled. Cranking the resolution up to 1,600x1,200 (and turning on AA) lowered the average frame rate to 27fps—still very playable. Moving up to 1,920x1,200 lowered the average to a sluggish 22fps, with some sequences in the game getting very jerky. Results with the game Company of Heroes were better, with very good frame rates up to a resolution of 1,600x1,200, but a poor minimum frame rate at 1,920x1,200. If you have a midsize monitor (say, 17 or 19 inches), the 8600 GTS delivers plenty of horsepower for jacking up the graphics of today's games.

That said, the card is sometimes outpaced by the older, less-expensive GeForce 7900 GS and by similarly priced ATI cards. Compared with those cards, however, the 8600 GTS is better-prepared for tomorrow's games, because of its support for the enhanced visual effects of DirectX 10 (DX10) under Windows Vista. DX10 games such as Age of Conan, Crysis, and Lost Planet still remain on the horizon, though, so DX10 is insurance for the future rather than something to meet an immediate need.

nVidia has improved its PureVideo HD support in the 8600 series, adding full hardware support for h.264 video playback, as well as for HD DVD and Blu-ray decoding. Add this to support for High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP) copy protection over a dual-link DVI connection (allowing for playback of protected HD content on monitors with very high resolutions), and you have an excellent card for home theater use—if you happen to be running Windows Vista, that is. At press time, nVidia's Windows XP drivers for the 8600 don't support PureVideo HD. XP users can still play back HD video, but the CPU will do all the grunt work until nVidia delivers the promised XP driver update sometime this spring. Vista users aren't completely in the clear—while Vista-driver game compatibility has improved with each update, early adopters will still encounter some trouble.

Falling into the low end of the GeForce 8600's $199 to $229 price range, PNY's card lacks a software bundle or any other frills, and it isn't overclocked like some of its competitors. You get a one-year warranty, or three years if you register the card.

Though it doesn't set any speed records, the GeForce 8600 GTS is a fine choice for budget-conscious gamers using 19-inch or smaller monitors. DX10 support promises tomorrow's games will look their best, and Vista-using home theater buffs will find the video playback quality among the best currently available.

PNY Technologies, 800-769-7079

www.pny.com

ATI Radeon HD 2900 XT Graphics Card

2009-11-01T17:08:00.001-08:00

ATI Radeon HD 2900 XT Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: May 2007

ATI may be late to the DirectX 10 (DX10) party, but it turns out that the party hasn't really gotten going yet, anyway. After months of allowing nVidia to own the DX10 market with its GeForce 8000-series cards, ATI has launched its own DX10 card, the Radeon HD 2900 XT. With the first DX10 games close to shipping as of this writing, ATI is still ahead of the game.

The 512MB HD 2900 XT is priced at $399, the same as the 640MB version of the GeForce 8800 GTS. The HD 2900 XT's performance is noticeably better than that of the 8800 GTS in some games, however. While its score of 62 frames per second (fps) in our F.E.A.R. test (at 1,600x1,200 resolution) was almost identical to the 8800 GTS's 60fps, in Company of Heroes the ATI entry scored 92fps to the nVidia offering's 81fps. In Futuremark's 3DMark06 benchmark test, the HD 2900 XT beat the 8800 GTS's 8,892 with a score of 10,992. (Because of the lack of appropriate games or benchmark tests, it's still up in the air as to which card will be faster in DX10, however.) Just as important, 3D-rendering quality is excellent, with performance headroom to turn up filtering and anti-aliasing in today's most-demanding games. Plus, ATI's Avivo HD technology makes for smooth, detailed video playback without the need to buy an additional decoder.

At 9.5 inches in length, the HD 2900 XT is a tight fit in some smaller cases (though we had no trouble fitting it in a somewhat cramped Antec Sonata 2). You can install a pair of HD 2900 XT cards in CrossFire mode for an extra speed boost in most games. Gone is the need for a clumsy external cable and a special master card—CrossFire now works just like nVidia's Scalable Link Interface (SLI) technology, allowing you to connect two standard HD 2900 XT cards using an included ribbon cable between the cards.

You'll need a monster power supply, though. A 750-watt power supply is necessary to run two cards; even a single card needs 550 watts. In comparison, the GeForce 8800 GTS requires just a 400-watt supply. The card requires two leads from your power supply. It will work with two standard six-pin cables, but you'll need to connect it to a new power supply with both an eight-pin connector and a six-pin one to enable the card's overclocking features. In addition to the higher electric bill versus the GeForce card, you'll also have to put up with a little more noise: The internal fan goes from a noticeable whir to, when running 3D applications, a sound similar in tone and volume to a fast-spinning CD-ROM drive.

The card has outputs galore, with a pair of dual-link DVI connectors, cables for component-video and S-Video, and an adapter that adds a High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) port supporting High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP). The card even has built-in six-channel surround audio when used with the HDMI connector.

Faster than nVidia's card of the same price, the Radeon HD 2900 XT is an attractive choice for serious gaming. But while its HDMI output may be attractive to home theater users, its loud fan will keep it out of most media rooms.

Advanced Micro Devices, 866-824-3215

ati.amd.com

XFX GeForce 8800 GTS 320MB XXX Version Grapics card

2009-11-01T17:07:00.001-08:00

XFX GeForce 8800 GTS 320MB XXX Version Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: May 2007

Fast with today's games and ready for tomorrow's titles using Windows Vista's DirectX 10 (DX10) technology, the nVidia GeForce 8800 graphics-processing unit (GPU) is the logical choice for serious gamers. But with board prices starting at $399, even a low-end 640MB 8800 GTS card can be too rich for many gamers' wallets. nVidia and its board-maker partners have responded with a 320MB version of the GeForce 8800 GTS, which halves the memory on the card, while dropping the price to a more affordable $299.

To see the trade-offs that come with half the memory, we tested the GeForce 8800 GTS 320MB XXX bundle, from nVidia partner XFX. This XXX version of the 320MB 8800 GTS boosts the GPU clock from 500MHz to 580MHz, and the memory clock from 1,600MHz to 1,800MHz. The card costs $339, and the extra $40 over a $299 base model gets you 7 to 12 percent better performance, as well as a bundled copy of Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter.

Comparing this card with a more expensive 640MB version, we found that the performance drop from halving the available onboard memory varies dramatically by program and resolution. When playing Half-Life 2: Lost Coast, performance from the 320MB card was nearly identical to that of the 640MB. Running Quake 4 set to Ultra detail, which calls for 512MB of texture memory, resulted in a dramatic drop, from 96 frames per second (fps) to 62fps. While overall performance didn't vary much between the 320MB and 640MB cards when running the graphically demanding Supreme Commander, only the 640MB card could run the game in dual-display mode at high resolutions.

Even though the card's GPU sits at the low end of nVidia's 8800 series, it still managed to beat ATI's high-end Radeon X1950 XTX in all but a few tests at very high resolutions. Plus, ATI still doesn't have a DX10-compatible offering. That said, DX10 games (which promise more-elaborate graphic effects) won't hit the market until mid-2007.

The 8800 GTS 320MB blocks the slot adjacent to its PCI Express (PCIe) slot, and nVidia recommends a 400-watt-or-greater power supply with a 12-volt rating of 26 amperes for this class of card. The card also features dual DVI outputs and a component high-definition-television (HDTV) output. The card supports High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection, allowing full resolution with Blu-ray and HD DVD videos. In a market crowded with look-alike graphics cards, XFX stands out with its double-lifetime warranty, which not only offers full lifetime coverage for the card, but also covers the second owner should you resell it.

Opting for the 320MB 8800 GTS and saving a C-note results in little performance sacrifice compared with the 640MB version; the frame-rate differences are most evident at extremely high resolutions on large wide-screen monitors. Note, however, that the extra memory might be more beneficial to upcoming DX10 games.

XFX, 800-880-3225

www.xfxforce.com

ATI Radeon HD 2400 XT Graphics Card

2009-11-01T17:06:00.000-08:00

ATI Radeon HD 2400 XT Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: July 2007

AMD's entry-level ATI Radeon HD 2400 XT graphics card supports high resolutions, DirectX 10 (DX10) 3D features, and first-rate video playback, all at a price well under $100. Gamers and users with multiple wide-screen monitors will want to spend a bit more on a midrange card such as the ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT. For less demanding tasks, however, the HD 2400 XT delivers a full feature set and surprisingly good performance.

This 256MB card, half-size and L-shaped, is small enough to fit inside the most cramped of small-form-factor PCs. It draws all of its power from the PCI Express (PCIe) x16 slot it plugs into—no direct power-supply connection is needed. The back of the card features a dual-link DVI port that supports resolutions up to 2,560x1,600, as well as a VGA port (single-link DVI on some third-party models) that supports analog monitors at resolutions up to 2,048x1,536. The card also includes a DVI-to-High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) adapter—complete with support for six-channel audio over the HDMI cable—and a component-video/S-Video connector.

The HD 2400 XT turned in fairly dismal results on our standard 3D tests, clocking just 15 frames per second (fps) at 1,280x1,024 in F.E.A.R. Though our average frame rate in Company of Heroes was a decent 32fps, at times the game dropped to a stuttering 10fps. That's not to say the gaming features are wasted, however. If you're willing to turn down some details or drop to a fairly low resolution, the HD 2400 XT can manage current games at a playable clip. For instance, F.E.A.R. ran at 37fps at 800x600, even with the game's details set to high.

Probably more important to this graphics card's audience, the ATI Radeon HD 2400 XT has the oomph to take advantage of Windows Vista's 3D features. With a Windows Experience Index rating of 4.5, the card is fast enough to enable Vista's special effects. For comparison, the Intel GMA3000 graphics core found on many motherboards supports Aero Glass transparent windows, but when you run Vista's slide show, most of the transitions are disabled due to the chip's 3.0 rating. With the HD 2400 XT, you get full support for smooth, animated slide-show transitions, as well as features such as Flip 3D task switching.

Video playback is top-notch, even with 1080p high-definition (HD) content on a 1,900x1,200-pixel 24-inch monitor. The Radeon HD 2400 XT supports ATI Avivo HD video, with hardware decoding for MPEG and DivX, as well as the H.256/AVC and VC-1 video codecs used by HD DVD and Blu-ray discs. This decoding capability makes for a sharp, clear picture with smooth frame rates, even at high resolutions, without requiring a PC with a high-end CPU to decode the video. The card's small fan is relatively quiet, but owners of home theater PCs may want to consider a third-party card that's based on the HD 2400 XT chipset, but with silent passive cooling.

The HD 2400 XT can be paired with an identical card in CrossFire mode on compatible motherboards, which will boost 3D performance a bit, but that function will likely be of interest mainly to users looking to drive three or four monitors on a single PC.

If you're looking for a faster alternative to integrated motherboard graphics, and you're not planning on running a pair of 24-inch-plus monitors or doing much gaming, the HD 2400 XT delivers excellent performance at a bargain price.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

Mfr. Est. Price: $75

Advanced Micro Devices, 866-824-3215

ati.amd.com
Price (at time of review): $75

ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT Graphics Card

2009-11-01T17:05:00.001-08:00

ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: July 2007

The ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT is AMD's new midrange graphics card, competing with nVidia's GeForce 8600 GT for potential buyers who are looking for good 3D and video performance that won't cost upwards of $300. Priced at around $150, the HD 2600 XT is an attractive choice for gamers looking for a DirectX 10 (DX10) card to use with smaller monitors, as well as for home theater PC users.

Unlike its hot, dual-slot, wattage-hungry big brother, the Radeon HD 2900 XT, the Radeon HD 2600 XT is a single-slot solution that draws all of its power directly from the PCI Express (PCIe) slot, without requiring a cable from the power supply. The card has 256MB of GDDR4 memory and features a pair of dual-link DVI ports, along with a component-video connector. To upgrade your performance, or drive up to four monitors simultaneously, you can pair it with a second HD 2600 XT on CrossFire-compatible motherboards.

Under Windows Vista, the Radeon HD 2600 XT includes full support for DX10, the enhanced-graphics system that's finally starting to see support in games such as Company of Heroes and Call of Juarez. The card's 3D performance at 1,280x1,024 resolution was good, with F.E.A.R. scoring a playable 34 frames per second (fps) and Company of Heroes clocking in at a smooth 57.6fps. With a second card in CrossFire mode, our Company of Heroes score didn't improve until we tried higher resolutions. It was dramatically faster in our F.E.A.R. test, however, clocking in at 59fps at a resolution of 1,280x1,024. Higher resolutions definitely benefit from CrossFire: At a resolution of 1,920x1,280, Company of Heroes slowed to 16.7fps with one card, but ran at 22.4fps with two. Drivers are mature under both XP and Vista, providing nearly identical performance under both operating systems.

We should point out that we tested the Radeon HD 2600 XT in CrossFire mode on a P35 chipset motherboard (we used the Asus P5K3 Deluxe) with one PCIe x16 and one PCIe x4 slot. AMD says that motherboards with two PCIe x16 slots will see more-dramatic boosts in speed from CrossFire, with frame-rate increases of 60 percent or more.

The Radeon HD 2600 XT includes ATI's Unified Video Decoder (UVD), a portion of the chip dedicated specifically to decoding VC-1 and H.264/AVC video content, in addition to the MPEG and DivX encoding found on earlier cards. Other video enhancements include hardware up- and downscaling; support for High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP), even on dual-link displays and 30-inch monitors; and a DVI-to-High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) adapter. The Radeon HD 2600 XT has support for 5.1-channel audio over HDMI when playing Blu-ray or HD DVD discs. Both upscaled DVD and 1080p HD content looked sharp and clear on a 24-inch Gateway FPD2485W monitor. Video quality was on par with that of a dedicated HD DVD player.

Home theater PC owners should note that, while it's quieter than the Radeon HD 2900 XT's cooler fan, the Radeon HD 2600 XT's small fan is loud enough to be noticeable. Some third-party manufacturers such as Sapphire, however, are releasing silent, fanless versions of the card.

Providing very good performance in the latest games at low to medium resolutions, excellent video quality, and the option for a performance boost later via a second CrossFire card, the Radeon 2600 XT is a welcome entry in the midrange market. (Bargain hunters can find the slower GDDR3 version of the card for $129, and the DDR2 RAM-based Radeon HD 2600 Pro for just $99.)

Discuss this product in our components forum.

Mfr. Est. Price: $150

Advanced Micro Devices, 866-824-3215

ati.amd.com

Gigabyte GV-NX84G256H Graphics Card

2009-11-01T17:04:00.000-08:00

Gigabyte GV-NX84G256H Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: July 2007

With a street price of around $60, the Gigabyte GV-NX84G256H is one of the least-expensive entries into the DirectX 10 (DX10) graphics club. But although this Gigabyte graphics card (based on nVidia's GeForce 8400 GS engine) is full-featured, its slow 3D performance means it's of interest only to those looking for a performance boost on a Windows Vista desktop, or for high-definition (HD) video playback.

The GV-NX84G256H is an attractive choice if you're building a compact, quiet PC. This 256MB card is relatively small (7 inches long by 4 inches tall) and lacks a fan, relying instead on a tall, finned heat sink for cooling. The result is a video card that's absolutely silent. Shorter GeForce 8400 GS cards are available from other manufacturers, but these include fans.

On the back of the card, you'll find a single DVI port, a VGA port, and a connector for a small breakout box that includes both component-video and S-Video outputs. Unlike ATI's Radeon 2400 series, no High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) adapter is included. The DVI connector features dual-link output, supporting resolutions up to 2,560x1,600 pixels. It also supports High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP), allowing you to play HD DVD and Blu-ray content with the appropriate software and an HDCP-compliant monitor.

Despite sitting squarely at the low end of the performance spectrum, the GV-NX84G256H's PureVideo HD support did a great job with HD video content. Playback was smooth in our video tests, and the image quality with both HD and DVD content was superb. The card's performance is also decent with Windows Vista. Its Windows Experience Index score of 3.5 in Aero desktop performance is fast enough to enable the special effects in slide shows, as well as the other desktop enhancements that are often disabled when using integrated motherboard graphics chipsets.

The Gigabyte card falls flat in gaming performance, however. On the upside, it supports the full suite of DX10 graphics features, allowing you to see all the details in DX10-capable games. The downside: You'll have plenty of time to view those details, since the screen updates so slowly. Our 3D tests turned in unplayably slow results, particularly at higher resolutions. For instance, F.E.A.R. clocked in at a jerky 13 frames per second (fps) at 1,280x1,024 resolution, and a slide-show-like 4fps at 1,600x1,200. We had to lower the resolution to just 800x600 to get a playable 31fps in the game. You can get a 3D-performance boost by installing a second 8400 GS card on a system that supports Scalable Link Interface (SLI), but that's like trying to speed up a Geo Metro by adding a second three-cylinder engine.

Gamers should look elsewhere, but for Vista usage and HD video playback, the Gigabyte GV-NX84G256H delivers good performance at a rock-bottom price.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

Mfr. Est. Price: $59.99

ATI Radeon HD 3850 Graphics Card

2009-11-01T16:59:00.000-08:00

ATI Radeon HD 3850 Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: November 2007

ATI's Radeon HD 3850 won't win any benchmarking contests, but that doesn't mean it's not one of the most exciting video cards we've seen so far this year. While it's far from the fastest card on the block, it offers incredibly good performance for its $179 price. The HD 3850 runs the latest games at a good pace on a midsize monitor, offers superb video quality for movie playback, and supports the latest PCI Express (PCIe) 2.0, DirectX 10.1 (DX10.1), and CrossFireX specifications.

The previous generation of ATI cards was plagued by a power-hungry design that generated lots of heat and fan noise. The chip at the heart of the HD 3850 is built on a smaller 55-nanometer (nm) process (compared to 80nm for the Radeon HD 2900XT), which enables it to run cooler while using less power. It's an excellent choice for a quiet home-theater system, with its whisper-quiet fan and power-saving profiles that kick in when idling. Along with S-Video and a pair of DVI ports, the card includes adapters for High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) and component-video output.

The HD 3850 fits in a single PCIe x16 slot and uses a six-pin power connector. The card supports PCIe 2.0, which can double communications bandwidth with the motherboard, but it works in PCIe 1.1 slots, as well. Installing two HD 3850s lets you drive up to four monitors, or accelerate 3D by activating CrossFire mode, which limits you to a single display. Upcoming drivers will support CrossFireX, allowing you to install up to four cards, offering even better 3D performance or driving a whopping eight monitors (Flight Simulator X fans, take note).

The Radeon HD 3800 series (in addition to the 3850, there's also a pricier Radeon HD 3870 card) is the first to support DX10.1. With games only now starting to ship with DX10 support, we can't see DX10.1 ever being a requirement, but its support for Shader Model 4.1 and higher-precision math might make for some graphical improvements over DX10 in the distant future.

Image quality on the HD 3850 is superb, with top-quality anti-aliasing and filtering. ATI's Avivo HD technology includes hardware decoding of the H.264 and VC-1 compression schemes used by HD DVD and Blu-ray. DVDs and our HD samples looked great, with smooth playback. The HD 3850 supports playback of protected high-definition content at up to 2,560x1,600 pixels.

For a card in this price range, 3D performance is excellent, leaving the previous midrange ATI cards (like the Radeon 2600 XT)—and nVidia's competing GeForce 8600 series—in the rear-view mirror. At medium resolutions, the HD 3850 runs even the latest DX10 games at a playable frame rate. At 1,280x1,024 resolution and using DX10, World in Conflict managed 25 frames per second (fps) with details set to High, while Company of Heroes averaged 42fps. F.E.A.R., a DX9 game, attained a silky-smooth 81fps. Adding a second card in CrossFire mode significantly sped up our DX9 tests, but DX10 tests were only marginally faster. We saw graphical glitches in the Crysis DX10-based demo that weren't evident with CrossFire disabled.

At higher resolutions, such as 1,920x1,200, performance dropped significantly on newer games—even in CrossFire mode. Company of Heroes averaged just 11.5fps at high resolution with all the details at maximum settings, while World in Conflict turned in just 9fps. This can likely be attributed to lack of memory: The HD 3850 features just 256MB of GDDR3. If you want to run games at high resolutions, particularly with anti-aliasing enabled, wait for the upcoming 512MB model, or consider stepping up to the 512MB HD 3870.

You can easily find faster 3D cards, but not at the HD 3850's under-$200 price. With enough oomph to run DX9 titles with the details cranked up and DX10 games at medium resolutions, the HD 3850 brings to low-cost cards the kind of performance that used to cost over $300 to obtain.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

Advanced Micro Devices, 866-824-3215

ati.amd.com

EVGA e-GeForce 8800 GTX Superclocked Graphics Card

2009-11-01T16:58:00.001-08:00

EVGA e-GeForce 8800 GTX Superclocked Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: July 2007

The EVGA e-GeForce 8800 GTX Superclocked takes nVidia's GeForce 8800 GTX graphics engine and ramps up its speed to make its performance approach that of the even pricier GeForce 8800 Ultra. Though it's not the fastest video card on the market, this premium-price DirectX 10-capable board offers stellar performance on the most-demanding games.

The Superclocked version of the EVGA graphics card runs its GPU core bus at 621MHz and its memory at 1,000MHz, compared with the 575MHz GPU and 900MHz memory on a stock GeForce 8800 GTX card. The EVGA's GPU speed is actually slightly faster than that of the top-end GeForce 8800 Ultra, and the memory is only a mere 80MHz slower. (The Superclocked board costs about $50 more than the EVGA's stock 8800 GTX card.)

The 8800 GTX is blazingly fast, outmatched only by the 8800 Ultra. At lower resolutions, the board is practically overkill. Sure, it's 30 to 50 percent faster than the GeForce 8800 GTS (with 640MB of graphics memory) and the ATI Radeon HD 2900 XT in most of our tests, but do you really need 133 frames per second (fps) in F.E.A.R., instead of 85fps (8800 GTS) or 98fps (Radeon HD 2900 XT)? Once you crank up the resolution and special effects, however, the performance seems more useful. At 1,900x1,200 resolution, with all the details maxed out, Company of Heroes turns in a whopping 91.9fps, compared with 62.5fps on the 8800 GTS and 67.2fps on the HD 2900 XT. Though few games push the card to the limit now, when next-generation games start nudging midrange cards under 60fps, you'll appreciate the 8800 GTX's performance boost.

Like all GeForce 8800 GTX cards, EVGA's Superclocked version features a large but quiet cooler that blocks a second slot. The card is a whopping 10.5 inches long, which may present problems for smaller cases; we had to remove the case's front fan to fit the card in an Antec Sonata II. Also, the 8800 GTX needs lots of juice for operation—you'll need two PCI Express (PCIe) power connectors, and nVidia recommends a 450-watt-or-greater power supply with a 12-volt rating of 30 amperes. To run two e-GeForce cards in a Scalable Link Interface (SLI) configuration, you'll need 750 watts and four PCIe power connectors, likely necessitating the purchase of a new power supply.

The 8800 GTX Superclocked has a pair of dual-link DVI ports, each supporting a resolution of 2,560x1,600, as well as component and S-Video outputs. The card supports High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP), but you don't get an option for High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) output. The 8800 GTX's PureVideo video playback uses fewer hardware-acceleration features than the lower-end GeForce 8600 cards do, but given the fast processor that a card this expensive is likely to be paired with, that shouldn't be an issue. Both standard- and high-definition video content looked great and played back smoothly in our tests.

The EVGA e-GeForce 8800 GTX Superclocked costs hundreds of dollars more than the GeForce 8800 GTS and Radeon HD 2900 XT, both of which play today's most sophisticated games smoothly at high resolutions. It's most appealing to owners of very large monitors who demand smooth gaming performance with all the details cranked to 11, as well as users who want the performance headroom to skip the next upgrade cycle. And it's at least a little cheaper than the GeForce 8800 Ultra.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

EVGA, 888-881-3842

www.evga.com

Asus EN8500GT Silent Graphics Card

2009-11-01T16:55:00.001-08:00

Asus EN8500GT Silent Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: August 2007

Based on the nVidia GeForce 8500 GT graphics engine, the Asus EN8500GT Silent is an inexpensive DirectX 10 (DX10) video card that offers excellent video playback and good desktop performance. Its slow 3D performance, however, has us wondering if the niche between the GeForce 8400 GS and GeForce 8600 GTS really needed to be filled.

This sleek blue PCI Express (PCIe) card features a large black heat sink that covers both the GPU and the 256MB of DDR2 memory—the “Silent” in the name refers to the lack of a fan. Like all GeForce cards, you can get a 3D-speed increase by pairing the EN8500GT with another GeForce 8500 GT card on a motherboard that supports Scalable Link Interface (SLI). On the back of the card, you'll find a dual-link DVI port that supports High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HCDP), a VGA port, and an S-Video port that can accommodate the included component-video adapter. Dual-link DVI allows the EN8500GT to support resolutions up to 2,048x1,536. The card doesn't, however, include a High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) adapter, unlike the ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT.

Desktop performance was very good, with the card turning in a Windows Experience Index score of 4.8, enabling it to run Windows Vista's Aero interface with all its features enabled. The card supports PureVideo HD; both DVD and high-definition content played back smoothly with top-notch visuals during our tests.

The GeForce 8500 GT supports the full suite of DX10 special effects found in games such as Company of Heroes. The EN8500GT was a poor performer in our 3D tests, however, delivering a jerky 17 frames per second (fps) in F.E.A.R. and 18.3fps in Company of Heroes at 1,280x1,024 resolution. It maintained frame rates much better at higher resolutions than its GeForce 8400 GS little brother did, managing 12fps in F.E.A.R. at a resolution of 1,600x1,200, compared with just 4fps for the 8400 GS. Still, none of these frame rates was fast enough to be playable, and we had to drop to a grainy 800x600 resolution or turn down the details to get an average frame rate higher than 30fps in these games. Older games will fare better at higher resolutions, though.

The overall poor 3D numbers leave GeForce 8500 GT cards in an odd place in nVidia's lineup. If 3D performance doesn't matter at all, then a less-expensive 8400 GS card will likely suffice. If performance is a concern, however, spending the extra cash on an 8600 GTS card will deliver playable frame rates at higher resolutions. The EN8500GT should interest people who value a noise-free environment enough that they're willing to turn down game visuals to achieve it.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

Mfr. Est. Price: $96.99

Asus EN8600GT OC Gear Grapics card

2009-11-01T16:54:00.001-08:00

Asus EN8600GT OC Gear Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: August 2007

The $169 Asus EN8600GT OC Gear is a DirectX 10 (DX10) graphics card that includes what Asus claims is the world's first hardware-based real-time graphics overclocking device. This drive-bay module lets you adjust the system volume, graphics-card speed, and fan speed without exiting the game you're playing. While it works well, we have to wonder why Asus paired the OC Gear hardware with a middling graphics card based on the nVidia GeForce 8600 GT graphics engine.

The OC Gear module fits into an empty 5.25-inch bay and connects to an internal USB header on your motherboard, which provides both power and communication with the graphics card's drivers. If you're looking to add a bit of bling to your case, the OC Gear module delivers: It includes a large, stereo-style control dial, a three-digit frame-rate display, a fan-speed indicator, and bar graphs to indicate volume, GPU clock speed, and GPU temperature. Pressing the knob switches among controlling system volume, GPU clock speed, and fan speed. (You must use software to adjust memory speed, however.)

The EN8600GT video card included with the package fits in a PCI Express (PCIe) slot, includes 256MB of DDR3 memory, and doesn't require a power connector. It has a pair of DVI outputs, as well as an S-Video/component-video connector. One thing that sets the graphics card apart is its large heat sink, which blocks an adjacent slot and includes a much quieter fan than the stock model. Its GeForce 8600 GT chip supports DX10, as well nVidia's PureVideo playback features for high-definition video content.

The decision by Asus to couple the OC Gear module with a barely midrange graphics card is odd, since you'd expect anyone interested in overclocking to be a performance hound. At stock clock speeds, the 8600 GT is 15 to 20 percent slower than the GeForce 8600 GTS, which is itself a step down from nVidia's top-flight GeForce 8800 series. When we cranked up the card to the fastest possible stable speed (700MHz GPU, 1,550MHz memory), the card came close to stock 8600 GTS speeds, though it did lock up once during our extensive tests. In our F.E.A.R. test, the EN8600GT scored 37 frames per second (fps) at 1,280x1,024 resolution, but bumping up the speeds pushed performance to 45fps, just 2fps slower than the 8600 GTS. The addition of the OC Gear module, however, pushes the price into 8600 GTS territory, where you can get slightly better performance without overclocking.

Overall, the OC Gear module is an appealing add-on for gamers looking for a flashy way to crank up performance temporarily in demanding games. But it would make a lot more sense paired with a more performance-oriented card, such as the GeForce 8600 GTS, or better yet, the GeForce 8800 GTS.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

Direct Price: $169

AsusTek Computer, 502-995-0883

usa.asus.com

ATI TV Wonder 650 Combo PCI Express grapics card

2009-11-01T16:52:00.000-08:00

ATI TV Wonder 650 Combo PCI Express Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: November 2007

The ATI TV Wonder 650 Combo PCI Express is one of the most flexible TV-tuner cards you can install yourself. With both high-definition (HD) and standard-definition (SD) support, Windows Media Center compatibility, and a compact design, it's a great choice for those building an entertainment PC or upgrading an existing PC to add TV capability. However, encrypted channels and other issues limit the flexibility of any TV-tuner card you install yourself, and the TV Wonder 650 is no exception.

The card can record HD digital-cable channels transmitted using the QAM standard when using Windows Vista, but don't expect you'll be watching reruns of The Sopranos in full HD. The ClearQAM support only lets you record unencrypted channels—the ones that don't require a cable box or CableCard. On many cable systems, QAM signals are limited to local channels, shopping channels, and perhaps a few basic-cable channels such as The Discovery Channel or The Hallmark Channel. To get full access to the entire suite of cable channels, you need a CableCard-equipped tuner—and those are only available built into approved Vista Media Center PCs. With the TV Wonder 650 Combo, you can also record broadcast HD channels using a standard antenna.

The "Combo" in the name indicates that this card has two separate tuners, so it's capable of tuning both HD and SD signals simultaneously, allowing you to record a show on each tuner. (Some non-"Combo" TV Wonder cards can tune both SD and HD, but only one at a time. We also tested the TV Wonder 600 PCI, and we had to choose between SD and HD signals with that card.) When using both tuners under Vista's Media Center, we found both recordings to be flawless.

This half-height card is small enough to fit in the most cramped of cases. It plugs into one of your rarely used PCI Express (PCIe) x1 slots; an external USB version is also available for $20 more. There are connectors for an over-the-air antenna, coaxial cable TV, S-Video, and FM radio. The FM-radio antenna connects to the same connector as would digital cable, however, so you can use an FM antenna only if you're using one of the other connectors for video input.

Hardware MPEG-2 support lets you record SD programming with very little CPU usage, and the Theater 650 chip sports a 3D comb filter, hardware noise reduction, edge enhancement, and automatic gain and color control, all of which result in a much better-looking SD image that you'll get with budget tuners. HD images look great as well.

You can record using Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 or Vista Home Premium or Ultimate, though Vista is needed for QAM tuning. ATI also bundles its own Catalyst Media Center recording/playback application, but its limitations and primitive user interface will drive you towards either Media Center or a third-party recording application.

Compact and offering above-average video quality, the TV Wonder 650 is an excellent choice, particularly for Vista users. Offering dual tuners on one card makes it a great solution for small, slot-starved entertainment PCs.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

Advanced Micro Devices, 866-824-3215

ati.amd.com

ATI Radeon HD 3850 Graphics Card

2009-11-01T16:51:00.000-08:00

XFX GeForce 8800 GT Alpha Dog Edition Graphics Card

2009-11-01T16:50:00.002-08:00

XFX GeForce 8800 GT Alpha Dog Edition Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: November 2007

Given how nVidia has named its graphics cards in the past, you'd think that the GeForce 8800 GT would be a slower, less-expensive version of the $400 8800 GTS. Well, it is less expensive, with cards arriving on the shelves at $250 to $300, but it's not slower. In fact, the 8800 GT outperformed the 8800 GTS in most of our tests, effectively bringing the cost of buying a high-performance graphics card down by about $100.

The XFX GeForce 8800 GT Alpha Dog Edition (PV-T88P-YDD4) we tested boosts performance even more over the stock 8800 GT by running its graphics processing unit (GPU) at 670MHz (versus 600MHz for a stock GPU) and its memory at 1.95GHz (versus 1.8GHz stock). That adds about $30 to the price (you can find it for around $300 on the street), but it buys you a few additional frames per second (fps) over a stock-speed 8800 GT.

The Alpha Dog is a single-slot card, with a thin heat sink that will allow it to fit in cramped cases. Unfortunately, the smaller fan is somewhat more audible than the one included on the 8800 GTS, though it remains relatively quiet except when the GPU is really cranking. The card requires a single six-pin PCI Express (PCIe) power connector. It boasts a pair of DVI connectors, a component-video adapter, and S-Video. Though it supports High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP) over DVI, there's no HDMI connector.

nVidia's 8800 GT chip is based on a 65-nanometer (nm) manufacturing process (versus the 80nm and 90nm processes used in earlier cards), resulting in a cooler, smaller chip. The 65nm process also allows some additional capabilities to fit on the chip, such as extra texturing units and hardware PureVideo 2 support for enhanced video processing. The 8800 GT Alpha Dog has 512MB of RAM. Though the memory bus is just 256 bits wide, compared to 320 bits on the 8800 GTS, the other improvements more than compensate in final performance.

The 8800 GT supports DirectX 10 (DX10); note that ATI's competing Radeon 3800 series supports the new DX10.1. DX10.1 will ship as part of the upcoming Windows Vista Service Pack 1, adding support for Shader Model 4.1 and mandating improved anti-aliasing support and some other new features. But while DX10.1 may result in slightly better visuals in the distant future, we don't expect to see titles supporting it for some time—and we'd be surprised to ever see a game require it. The 8800 GT does add support for PCI Express (PCIe) 2.0, which can double the memory bandwidth between the motherboard and card.

The 8800 GT's performance in our benchmark tests would have been impressive for a $400 card; it's spectacular for a $300 model. Our Alpha Dog card scored 123fps in our DX9 1,280x1,024 F.E.A.R. test, compared to 88fps for a 640MB 8800 GTS card. Upping the resolution to 1,920x1,200 brought the range closer, but the 8800 GT's 65fps still smoked the more-expensive 8800 GTS's 53fps. Moving to the demanding World in Conflict DX10 benchmark test (run at 1,280x1,024), the 8800 GT scored 47fps, compared to 39fps for the 8800 GTS.

Upping the resolution to 1,920x1,200 finally put the 8800 GTS back in the lead in a couple of our tests, with the 8800 GT scoring 20fps in World in Conflict and 21.8fps in Company of Heroes, compared to 22fps and 23.4fps respectively for the 8800 GTS. This slight edge for the older card at higher resolutions is likely due to its higher memory bandwidth, as a ton of data is being moved around when using anti-aliased graphics at the highest resolutions. Still, the 8800 GT had the fastest results in the Crysis demo test even at the higher resolution, turning in 36.3fps at 1,280x1,024 and 9.7fps at 1,920x1,200, compared to just 25.6fps and 8.2fps for the 8800 GTS.

On the video-playback front, the 8800 GT has the same hardware PureVideo 2 playback support that the 8600-and-earlier series cards have included, but which until now has been lacking from the 8800 series. With hardware decoding of H.264 video, you'll see less CPU usage when watching HD video compared with earlier 8800 cards.

It's a great time to be a gamer, because ATI's new Radeon HD 3850 brings good graphics performance to the under-$200 market, and nVidia's 8800 GT brings performance approaching top-end $600 cards to the under-$300 crowd. The XFX GeForce 8800 GT Alpha Dog Edition stands out among other 8800 GT cards not just for its faster clock speeds, but also for its double-lifetime warranty, which covers not just the original purchaser, but also anyone to whom you later sell or give the card. Plus, it comes complete with the full version of the excellent Company of Heroes, as well as a disc containing the game's DX10 patch.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

XFX, 800-880-3225

www.xfxforce.com

Related Graphics-Card Reviews on ComputerShopper.com

ATI Radeon HD 3850

nVidia GeForce 8800 GTS

EVGA e-GeForce 8800 GTS 512MB Graphics Card

2009-11-01T16:50:00.001-08:00

EVGA e-GeForce 8800 GTS 512MB Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: December 2007

When nVidia recently released its GeForce 8800 GT design, it left the 8800 GTS in a weird place: The GTS was more expensive than the GT, but slower in most tests. With the advent of the new, faster 512MB 8800 GTS cards like EVGA's e-GeForce 8800 GTS, the model makes a better show at earning its GTS designation.

Though it shares the same name as and a similar look to earlier 8800 GTS cards, the 512MB version is actually a whole new design. It uses the same 65-nanometer GPU chip as the 8800 GT, which adds additional texturing units and hardware PureVideo 2 support for improved video playback, while running cooler than the earlier chip. The memory bus on this new chip is 256 bits wide, versus 320 on the earlier models of the card, but the other improvements result in it performing faster in most tests than the older 640MB 8800 GTS.

The e-GeForce 8800 GTS is a double-wide card that blocks the adjacent slot to make room for a large heat sink and cooling fan, as with the earlier 8800 GTS models. The cooler is larger than the one included on the 8800 GT, and it's significantly quieter. The e-GeForce 8800 GTS requires a single six-pin power connector and sports a pair of dual-link DVI outputs, as well as an additional connector for S-Video or component-video output. Though it supports High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP), the card lacks a High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) output.

Like the earlier GTS models, the 512MB 8800 GTS supports DirectX 10 (DX10), but not the new DX10.1, which will ship as part of the upcoming Windows Vista Service Pack 1. DX10.1 adds support for Shader Model 4.1, as well as mandating improved anti-aliasing support and some other new features, but we don't expect to see games use it for a while, and we'd be shocked to see a game ever require it. The new 8800 GTS adds support for PCI Express 2.0, which can double the memory bandwidth between the motherboard and card.

On the video-playback front, the 512MB 8800 GTS has the same hardware-based PureVideo 2 playback support that the 8600-and-lower series have included, but which wasn't present in the 320MB and 640MB models of the 8800 GTS. With hardware decoding of H.264 video, you'll see less CPU usage when watching HD video compared with earlier 8800 cards.

Despite having 128MB less memory, EVGA's 512MB e-GeForce 8800 GTS left an original-model 640MB 8800 GTS in the dust in most of our tests. At 1,280x1,024 resolution, the 512MB model delivered 132 frames per second (fps) in F.E.A.R., versus 88fps for the 640MB version. World in Conflict saw a score of 47fps, compared with 39fps on the earlier card. The ultra-demanding Crysis achieved 37fps at high detail, as opposed to to 25.6fps for the older card.

Boosting the resolution to 1,920x1,200 and turning on anti-aliasing kept the new GTS from stealing the older model's crown. Aided by the additional memory and wider bandwidth, the older 640MB 8800 GTS was the victor in our World in Conflict and Company of Heroes DX10 tests, with the 640MB model turning in 22fps and 23.4fps respectively, compared with 19fps and 20.4fps for the new 512MB model. But the 512MB card won the race in F.E.A.R, clocking 64fps, compared to 53fps for the 640MB card.

Interestingly, the overclocked XFX GeForce 8800 GT Alpha Dog Edition almost matches the stock-speed EVGA e-Force 8800 GTS in many tests. Expect an overclocked 8800 GTS to show more-significant speed jumps over the GT. But even at stock speed, the 8800 GTS has the advantages of quieter operation and a cooler that vents heat outside the computer.

The EVGA E-GeForce 8800 GTS 512MB comes bundled with a copy of Crysis, a just-released sci-fi 3D shooter that's not only fun to play, but also is demanding enough on the hardware that you'll feel justified in purchasing a fast 3D card. EVGA backs the card with a limited lifetime warranty.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

Direct Price: $359.99

Asus EAH3870 TOP Graphics Card

2009-11-01T16:49:00.002-08:00

Asus EAH3870 TOP Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: January 2008

ATI's new top-of-the-line HD 3870 chipset is actually aimed at capturing the mainstream market, offering very good performance at a reasonable price. The Asus EAH3870 TOP soups up the HD 3870 by overclocking the GPU and memory, and bundling a good DirectX 10 (DX10) game.

The EAH3870 TOP is based on ATI's reference design for the HD 3870 card, the only visual difference being a slick Company of Heroes: Opposing Fronts decal affixed to the heat sink to highlight the bundled game. Though based on the same 55-nanometer (nm) chip design as the less-expensive, single-slot HD 3850, this 512MB card sports a thick heat sink that blocks the adjacent slot. Asus overclocks the card's GPU significantly, running it at 851MHz instead of the stock 775MHz. The GDDR4 memory overclock is minimal, running at 2,286MHz instead of 2,250MHz.

Installing two EAH3870 TOP cards lets you drive up to four monitors, or increase 3D performance by enabling CrossFire mode. Upcoming drivers will support CrossFireX, allowing you to install up to four cards for even better 3D performance (or to drive eight monitors simultaneously). Each card requires a single six-pin power connector. Along with S-Video and a pair of DVI ports, the card includes adapters for High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) and component output.

In addition to supporting PCI Express 2.0, which can double communications bandwidth with the motherboard, the EAH3870 TOP is also one of the first cards to support DX10.1. This enables support for Shader Model 4.1 and better anti-aliasing, which might make for visual and performance improvements in the future. Still, we don't foresee DX10.1 support being a requirement for high-quality 3D results.

Image quality is excellent, with superb anti-aliasing and filtering. ATI's Avivo HD technology enables hardware decoding of the H.264 and VC-1 compression used by HD DVD and Blu-ray. DVDs and our HD samples played back smoothly and clearly. The HD 3870 upscales protected HD content playback up to 2,560x1,600 pixels, and supports HD audio over the HDMI cable.

The faster GPU and 512MB of GDDR4 memory allowed the EAH3870 TOP to turn in significantly faster benchmark results than the HD 3850, though it still fell behind the slightly more expensive GeForce 8800 GT. At 1,280x1,024 resolution, the EAH3870 TOP clocked 99 frames per second (fps) in F.E.A.R., topping the 81fps recorded by the HD 3850 but falling behind the 123fps of the XFX GeForce 8800 GT Alpha Dog Edition. In our DX10 tests, the card achieved 27.6fps in Crysis, versus 20.8fps for the HD 3850 and 36.3fps for the 8800 GT. World in Conflict showed a significant boost over the HD 3850, with the EAH3870 TOP averaging 34fps, compared with the HD 3850's 25fps and the 8800 GT's 47fps.

Test results were mixed at 1,920x1,200. In F.E.A.R., the card's 56fps was admirable, and its Company of Heroes average of 20.9fps nearly matched the 8800 GT's 21.8fps—and nearly doubled the HD 3850's 11.5fps. Most impressive was the Crysis test, which averaged 10.8fps. That's a low number, but it beats the 6.5fps of the HD 3850 and the 9.7fps turned in by the 8800 GT. But our World in Conflict test clocked just 11fps, just over half the 20fps achieved by the 8800 GT.

One important note: Though the card is whisper-quiet when idling, during 3D gaming the fan noise became very noticeable, more so than the HD 3850 or nVidia 8800 GT or 8800 GTS cards.

The $20 premium you pay for the factory-overclocked EAH3870 TOP puts it very close in price to the faster GeForce 8800 GT. The EAH3870 TOP, however, has the advantage of HDMI output and an excellent $40-value bundled game.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

Direct Price: $249

ATI Radeon HD 3650 Graphics Card

2009-11-01T16:49:00.001-08:00

ATI Radeon HD 3650 Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: January 2008

AMD's new ATI Radeon HD 3650 is a solid choice for those looking for an inexpensive graphics card that offers good all-around performance. Though its 3D performance is relatively slow, its excellent video-playback quality, support for multiple monitors, and flexible output options make it a good option for those who don't want to spend over $100 on a video card.

The Radeon HD 3650 is a single-slot card that draws all of its power from the PCI Express (PCIe) slot. It boasts a pair of dual-link DVI ports for dual-monitor output, a component-video/S-Video connector, and a High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) adapter for one of the DVI ports. The card is small, and should fit in most full-height home-theater-PC cases, though its cooling fan is loud enough that you might want to consider a third-party model with passive cooling if noise is a factor. The HD 3650 gets a slight performance boost from the additional bandwidth of PCIe 2.0, but it also supports older PCIe 1.1 slots.

The HD 3650 has full support for DirectX 10.1 (DX10.1) under Windows Vista. Gaming performance was reasonable with older games, but it didn't hold up with the latest titles at high detail. The 34 frames per second (fps) we got from our F.E.A.R. test at a resolution of 1,280x1,024 were smooth enough to make the game playable and enjoyable. In our DX10 tests, however, World in Conflict turned in a jerky 9fps at 1,280x1,024, while Company of Heroes was at the low end of playability at 17.6fps. Dropping the detail and resolution in both games resulted in significant frame-rate boosts, however. If you play games often, you should invest in the under-$200 ATI Radeon HD 3850 instead. But for occasional gaming at low-to-medium resolutions, and for playing older titles, the HD 3650's performance is acceptable. The card supports ATI's CrossFireX scaling, allowing you to install two or even four HD 3650s in your system to boost performance or drive additional monitors.

We ran into a problem during our game testing: consistent driver crashes when testing Company of Heroes and Crysis at 1,920x1,200. Whether this was due to the newness of the driver software or the card overheating is unknown, but realistically this isn't a card you'd use to run cutting-edge games at those resolutions. At lower resolutions, we encountered no issues.

Performance in Windows is excellent, with the HD 3450 providing snappy response with all the Vista desktop effects enabled, and full support of advanced features such as slide-show effects. ATI's Avivo HD technology enables hardware decoding of the H.264 and VC-1 compression used by HD DVD and Blu-ray discs. DVDs and our high-definition samples played back smoothly with terrific image quality. The card is fully compliant with High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP), supporting protected video, and it supports HD audio over the HDMI cable.

Though nVidia's GeForce series has grabbed the overall performance crown for now, ATI's 3000 series now has something for just about everyone shopping in the low to middle range. The Radeon HD 3650 is a fine choice if you want good desktop performance, excellent video-playback quality, and reasonable 3D performance. The cheaper HD 3450 is there for those who don't care about 3D, while the HD 3850 and 3870 cards deliver enough 3D horsepower to satisfy many gamers.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

Direct Price: $99

ATI Radeon HD 3450 Graphics Card

2009-11-01T16:48:00.001-08:00

ATI Radeon HD 3450 Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: January 2008

AMD's entry-level ATI Radeon HD 3450 graphics card is an amazing deal for those looking to juice up their PC's video-playback performance and quality. For just $49, you get support for HD video playback, high desktop resolutions, power enough to display all the bells and whistles of Windows Vista's Aero interface, and the ability to add additional cards to support more monitors. But while it supports the latest DirectX 10.1 (DX10.1) 3D features, the Radeon HD 3450 is decidedly not the card for you if you play games.

Our sample card was a half-height, fanless PCI Express model with 256MB of DDR2 memory, intended for low-profile home theater cases. The card has only a single DVI port, as well as a component-video/S-Video connector and a High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) adapter for the DVI port. ATI also has a model available with both DVI and VGA ports, as well as one with a VGA port and the new DisplayPort connector.

Though this is an inexpensive, entry-level card, the HD 3450 has the power to handle all of Vista's graphics effects, including desktop transparency, Flip 3D task switching, and the full suite of slide-show effects. That makes it a good replacement for entry-level PC graphics, such as the integrated graphics chips found on many motherboards, which are fast enough to enable basic effects such as transparency but disable more-sophisticated effects such as slide-show transitions.

While its desktop performance was excellent, the HD 3450's gaming performance was dismal. It delivered slide-show-like frame rates of 11 frames per second (fps) in F.E.A.R. and 4.6fps in Company of Heroes (both at a resolution of 1,280x1,024). If you have a nostalgic bent, the card has enough power to handle 3D games from early in the decade at low resolutions, but its support of the DX10.1 standard used by the newest games is mostly there as a checkbox item for the promotional text on the card's box. Casual gamers should consider the Radeon HD 3650 as the bare minimum, with the HD 3850 a more suitable entry-level card for serious gamers.

For the card's home-theater-PC target audience, though, the HD 3450 delivers. Its lack of a fan offers silent operation, and its video-playback performance and visual quality are top-notch. Despite its low price, the card offered flawless playback of 1080p HD content on a 1,900x1,200 24-inch monitor. It supports ATI Avivo HD video, with hardware decoding of MPEG and DivX, as well as the H.264 and VC-1 video codecs used on HD DVD and Blu-ray discs. This makes for a sharp, clear picture with smooth frame rates, even at high resolutions, without requiring a PC with a high-end CPU to decode the video. The HD 3000 series cards improve on the hardware decoder introduced in the HD 2000 series by reducing CPU utilization and increasing memory bandwidth to smooth playback at the highest resolutions. With the HDMI adapter and High-Bandwith Digital Content Protection (HDCP) support, the HD 3450 will handle even copyright-protected HD video.

If you're looking for better 3D-gaming performance, plan on spending more than the Radeon HD 3450's bargain price. But if you just want a graphics card that delivers good performance on the Windows desktop and excellent video-playback performance and quality, this card is hard to beat.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

Direct Price: $49

ATI Radeon HD 3870 X2 Graphics Card

2009-11-01T16:47:00.001-08:00

ATI Radeon HD 3870 X2 Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: February 2008

The ATI Radeon HD 3870 X2 is exactly what the “X2” name implies: two Radeon HD 3870s on a single board. Doubling up the graphics processing units (GPUs) and memory allows AMD to offer the kind of dual-card performance you get from a CrossFire or Scalable Link Interface (SLI) system, without dealing with motherboard-compatibility issues or installing multiple cards. The end result is the fastest single graphics card you can buy—in most tests. Since the underlying technology is still dual-card-based, performance may drop a notch in games that don't take good advantage of CrossFire or SLI.

This is a big piece of hardware. The HD 3870 X2's thick heat sink and fan block the adjacent expansion slot, and its 10.5-inch length (identical to nVidia's GeForce 8800 GTX board) means this PCI Express (PCIe) 2.0 card will be a tight fit in smaller cases. The card needs a pair of PCIe connectors from your power supply; six-pin cables will work, but you'll need one eight-pin connector if you want to enable the Overdrive overclocking feature. Outputs include a pair of dual-link DVI monitor connectors, S-Video, and adapters for component and HDMI output.

Though it's billed as a 1GB card, memory is actually equivalent to a 512MB card, since the GDDR3 RAM is split evenly between the two GPUs. The HD 3870 X2 appears to your computer as a single DirectX 10.1-compatible (DX10.1) card, supporting the use of two monitors simultaneously, so you don't have to worry about enabling or disabling CrossFireX mode. In fact, you're not even presented with that option. You don't need a CrossFire-compatible motherboard, but if you have one, you'll eventually be able to pair two HD 3870 X2 cards for a four-GPU solution. Unfortunately, drivers to accomplish this task aren't available yet.

As with the standard HD 3870 card, image quality is excellent, with top-notch anti-aliasing and filtering. ATI's Avivo HD technology enables hardware decoding of the H.264 and VC-1 compression used by HD DVD and Blu-ray. DVDs and our HD samples played back smoothly with top-notch image quality. The HD 3870 X2 upscales protected-HD content to resolutions up to 2,560x1,600 pixels, and it supports HD audio over the HDMI cable.

In terms of speed, the HD 3870 X2's GPU runs at 825MHz, versus 775MHz for the single card. Memory is a bit slower, at 1.8GHz, compared with 2.25GHz for the single card. Compared to actually running a pair of single HD 3870s in CrossFire mode on an Intel X38-based motherboard, the HD 3870 X2 was very close in performance overall. In most tests, the X2 card was slightly slower than the CrossFire configuration. However, in Crysis, the CrossFire solution was significantly faster, turning in 46 frames per second (fps) at 1,280x1,024 and 24.2fps at 1,920x1,200, compared with 37.6fps and 16.8fps respectively for the X2 card. And while World in Conflict performance was nearly identical at 1,280x1,024, the X2 was only 1fps faster than a single HD 3870 card at 1,920x1,200, coming in at 12fps compared to the 24fps result from the CrossFire pair of HD 3870 cards.

That said, the card's performance was superb, breaking single-card records in most of our tests. In F.E.A.R., for instance, the HD 3870 X2 turned in 100fps at 1,920x1,200 resolution, compared with 56fps for a single HD 3870 and 64fps for nVidia's EVGA e-GeForce 8800 GTS 512MB, our previous single-card champ (and faster than the 8800 GTX in many tests). In Company of Heroes at the same resolution, the HD 3870 X2 turned in a 26.9fps score in DX10 mode, compared with 20.9fps for a single HD 3870 card and 20.4fps for the 8800 GTS 512MB. The HD 3870 X2's Crysis score of 16.77fps at 1,920x1,200 and high detail blew away the 10.75fps of a single HD 3870 and the 8.69fps of the 8800 GTS 512MB.

We did notice, however, a few instances where the card's lead was less evident—or missing altogether. Its World in Conflict score of 12fps at 1,920x1,200 was bested by the 8800 GTS 512MB's score of 19fps. Still, we've found that World in Conflict doesn't scale well in CrossFire mode at high resolutions. The same problem was evident in Flight Simulator X, a game that doesn't benefit noticeably from either CrossFire or SLI; in a test at 1,900x1,200, the 8800 GTS 512MB scored 11.2fps, compared with 8fps for the HD 3870 X2.

The HD 3870 X2 also ran into trouble at lower resolutions: At 1,280x1,024 resolution, meanwhile, the HD 3870 X2 was nearly matched by the less-expensive 8800 GTS 512MB. In Crysis, the HD 3870 X2 racked up 37.6fps, compared with 37fps for the 8800 GTS 512MB; in World in Conflict, the HD 3870 X2 tallied 50fps, versus 47fps for the nVidia card. In one test, the 8800 GTS 512MB soundly beat the HD 3870 X2, turning in 71.3fps in the Company of Heroes 1,280x1,024 benchmark, compared with the HD 3870 X2's 49.4fps.

Still, you probably don't buy a card like this to run at lower resolutions, and the HD 3870 X2 has a commanding performance lead in most games. Overall, the Radeon HD 3870 X2 is indeed the fastest graphics card you can buy, but if you already have an HD 3870 and a CrossFire-capable motherboard, adding a second graphics card will give you better performance than a single X2.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

Direct Price: $450

Advanced Micro Devices, 877-284-1564

ati.amd.com

Related Graphics-Card Reviews on ComputerShopper.com

Asus EAH3870 TOP

EVGA e-GeForce 8800 GTS 512MB

XFX GeForce 8800 GT Alpha Dog Edition
Price (at time of review): $450

Asus EN9600GT Graphics Card

2009-11-01T16:46:00.001-08:00

Asus EN9600GT Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: February 2008

The Asus EN9600GT is one of the first graphics cards to use nVidia's new GeForce 9600 GT chipset. In previous generations, midrange GeForce cards like the 7600 GT and 8600 GT series were best suited for gamers who didn't mind turning down the details or resolution in a game to get a smooth frame rate. The 9600 GT series resets those expectations, offering very good gaming performance with the details cranked up, even at moderate-to-high resolutions.

The EN9600GT's GPU runs at 650MHz, with 512MB of GDDR3 memory running at 900MHz. Interestingly, the GeForce 9600 GT still lacks support for DirectX 10.1 (DX10.1), supporting the original DX10 instead. This omission isn't likely to ever be a critical issue, as the changes from DX10 to 10.1 are very minor, but it's surprising nevertheless. The EN9600GT supports High-Definition Content Protection (HDCP), ensuring full-resolution output of Blu-ray, HD DVD, and other protected high-definition formats.

This single-slot PCI Express (PCIe) x16 card uses a six-pin PCIe power connector and takes advantage of (but doesn't require) PCIe 2.0. It has a pair of dual-link DVI outputs as well as a component-video/S-Video connector. The card also includes a DVI-to-HDMI converter for connection to an HDTV, until now a rarity on GeForce cards. A small cable is included to connect the card to the digital audio connector on your motherboard, allowing the card to pass sound through the HDMI cable. The cooling fan is relatively quiet, making the EN9600GT suitable for use in a living-room PC.

The 9600 GT offers a serious performance boost over its 8600 GT predecessor, particularly at higher resolutions. Its F.E.A.R. scores of 89 frames per second (fps) at 1,280x1,024 and 54fps at 1,920x1,200 are more than double the 45fps and 20fps that the 8600 GT turned in at those resolutions. The 9600 GT even manages a playable 33fps in F.E.A.R. on a 30-inch monitor running at 2,560x1,600.

In our DX10 tests, the EN9600GT tops the similarly priced ATI Radeon HD 3850, clocking 38fps in World in Conflict and 52fps in Company of Heroes, compared to 25fps and 42fps for the HD 3850. Upping the resolution to 1,920x1,200 makes the difference even more dramatic, with the EN9600GT turning in 16fps at Very High settings in World in Conflict and 25.6fps in Company of Heroes, compared to 9fps and 11.5fps for the HD 3850.

The EN9600GT supports dual-card Scalable Link Interface (SLI) on compatible motherboards; nowadays, that's typically motherboards using the nVidia 680i or 780i chipset. The card lacks the additional connector needed to support three-card 3-Way SLI, a feature that nVidia seems to be reserving for its highest-end cards. Adding a second 9600 GT card provides a significant frame-rate boost, pushing our 1,280x1,024 Company of Heroes frame rate to 92.4fps and our World in Conflict results to 50fps.

The EN9600GT features nVidia's PureVideo HD, which lightens load on the CPU during DVD and Blu-ray playback by offering full hardware decoding of MPEG2 and H.264, and partial acceleration of VC-1 video. The 9-series cards add support for faster dual-stream decode acceleration, dynamic contrast enhancement, and automatic enhancement of green, blue, and skin tone colors. Video playback was smooth with both standard- and high-definition content, with excellent color reproduction.

Offering a level of 3D performance that until recently cost $100 more, this first entry in the 9 series is a welcome addition to the GeForce family.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

Mfr. Est. Price: $189

Asus EN9800GX2 Graphics Card

2009-11-01T16:15:00.000-08:00

Asus EN9800GX2 Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: March 2008

NVidia bills its new GeForce 9800 GX2 as the fastest single graphics card yet. And it does easily earn that title, turning in record-breaking performance in our 3D tests and letting you play the latest games at high detail on the largest monitors. It pulls this off by recreating a dual-card Scalable Link Interface (SLI) setup in one slot, pairing two GPUs, each backed by 512MB of memory, in a single package. You'll pay plenty for all this, however: nearly $600 for Asus' version of the card, the EN9800GX2, that we tested.

Asus customizes its jet-black EN9800GX2 with a silkscreened Asian beauty against an alien landscape on one side. It (along with other 9800 GX2 cards) has bright LEDs near the back and power connectors to enhance its appearance in windowed cases. The card comes bundled with Company of Heroes: Opposing Fronts, as well as the Asus Gamer OSD overclocking/screen-capture software.

This PCI Express 2.0 x16 card is lengthy at 10.5 inches, and it blocks an adjacent slot. Not surprisingly, 9800 GX2 cards require lots of power: You'll need both six- and eight-pin connectors on your power supply (the card won't work with a pair of six-pin connectors), and nVidia recommends a minimum 580-watt power supply for a single card, or 850 watts for two 9800 GX2s. The EN9800GX2 manages to cool the setup with a fan that's whisper-quiet when the system is idling.

The card has a pair of dual-link DVI ports, as well as an HDMI connector with digital audio pass-through. The card supports High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP), ensuring full-resolution output of Blu-ray and other copyright-protected HD formats. The EN9800GX2 supports DirectX 10 (DX10), but nVidia continues to forego DX10.1 support.

Across the board, the EN9800GX2 outperformed every 3D card we've tested. Though its performance in Futuremark's 3DMark06 was similar to ATI's dual-GPU Radeon HD 3870 X2, it left that card in the dust in actual game benchmarks. The 9800 X2 clocked 50.5 frames per second (fps) in our Company of Heroes DX10 test at 1,920x1,200 resolution, compared to 26.9fps for the HD 3870 X2. At the same resolution, the 9800 X2 clocked 37fps in Very High detail in World in Conflict; the HD 3870 X2 turned in just 12fps. DX9 tests were similarly fast: F.E.A.R. turned in a silky-smooth 62fps at 2,560x1,600 resolution.

Unlike ATI's HD 3870 X2 card, which appears to the PC as if it's a single card, 9800 GX2 cards suffer from the same restrictions as a two-card SLI setup. When using multiple displays, you must open the nVidia Control Panel and change to Multiple Display Mode, which disables SLI and only utilizes a single GPU for 3D. Depending on what programs you're using, you may have to shut down some applications, or even reboot, to switch between single and multiple GPU modes. This is really inconvenient for gamers who use dual monitors, and nVidia says it plans to address this limitation in a future driver revision.

Each of the 9800 GX2 GPUs is similar in performance to a GeForce 8800 GT card. In fact, overall performance was very similar to a pair of factory-overclocked XFX GeForce 8800 GT cards running in SLI mode on the same system. That's not to say that dropping a pair of 8800 GT cards into an SLI-capable system is equivalent to a single 9800 GX2. (For one thing, you can use a 9800 GX2 card on a motherboard that doesn't support SLI.) The EN9800GX2 also supports nVidia's HybridPower technology. Used with nVidia's upcoming integrated-graphics motherboards, the EN9800GX2 can shut down completely and transfer responsibility to the motherboard's graphics chipset when you're not running 3D applications, significantly reducing power consumption.

Also, if you have an SLI-capable motherboard and a strong-enough power supply, you can pair two 9800 GX2 cards to get Quad SLI performance. Quad SLI for 9800 GX2 cards isn't yet available for testing, but nVidia promises improvements over the first generation of the technology, including better scaling performance when adding a second 9800 GX2. Of course, you'll likely need to crank every setting to maximum on a 30-inch monitor to truly benefit from Quad SLI. (Or play Crysis.)

The EN9800GX2 supports the latest version of nVidia's PureVideo HD, which offers significant hardware decoding improvements over the GPU used in the GeForce 8800 GTX and GeForce 8800 Ultra. It lightens the load on the CPU during DVD and Blu-ray playback by offering full hardware decoding of MPEG-2 and H.264, and partial acceleration of VC-1 video. The 9-series cards add support for faster dual-stream decode acceleration, dynamic contrast enhancement, and automatic enhancement of green, blue, and skin tone colors. Video playback was smooth with both standard-def and HD content, even at 2,560x1,600 resolution, and color reproduction was excellent.

The Asus EN9800GX2 is blazingly fast, and it's the clear winner if you're looking for a single graphics card with the highest performance for use on a single-monitor system. If your system supports SLI, the choice isn't as clear, as you can pair a couple of GeForce 8800 GT cards and match or slightly exceed the EN9800GX2's performance. You'll save about $100 in the process, though you'll forego the chance to upgrade to Quad SLI.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

Mfr. Est. Price: $599

EVGA e-GeForce 9800 GTX Graphics Card

2009-11-01T16:14:00.001-08:00

EVGA e-GeForce 9800 GTX Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: April 2008

The EVGA e-GeForce 9800 GTX represents nVidia's new high-end, single-GPU video card. Though it outperforms and replaces the GeForce 8800 GTX, the 9800 GTX comes in at a much lower price, around $350, leaving the dual-GPU GeForce 9800 GX2 to take over the $500 category. Though the 9800 GTX doesn't match the 9800 GX2's performance, it's less expensive and easier to use in a multiple-monitor setup, has lower power requirements, and outperforms all the other single-GPU cards out there.

The 9800 GTX is a 10.5-inch long card that blocks an adjacent slot to make room for its large cooler. If you have a window on the side of your PC, you'll be glad to know that this time, nVidia has paid extra attention to style—the cooler isn't a big box, but has a wave shape around the fan. EVGA brands the black cooler with a slick bright-green energy motif, classier than the soldiers or hot girls adorning some competitors' graphics cards. Even though it only needs to cool a single GPU, the fan is somewhat louder than that of the 9800 GX2, but it's still relatively quiet.

The 9800 GTX doesn't introduce any major new features, or even offer a staggering performance jump over earlier cards. It's essentially a souped-up version of the design used in the GeForce 8800 GT and the new GeForce 8800 GTS 512MB. But the main thing it brings to the table is increased speed, and it does that very well. In our tests, the 512MB 9800 GTX consistently beat every other single-GPU card we've tested. In fact, it even matched or outperformed the dual-GPU ATI Radeon HD 3870 X2 card in our DirectX 10 (DX10) tests, though that card outpaced it in the DX9 3DMark06 and F.E.A.R. tests.

In our Company of Heroes DX10 tests at 1,920x1,280 resolution, the 9800 GTX turned in a smooth 40.5 frames per second (fps), compared to 26.9fps for the HD 3870 X2 and 20.4fps for the 512MB 8800 GTS. In the demanding World in Conflict DX10 test at the same resolution, the 9800 GTX clocked 23fps, compared to 19fps for the 8800 GTS and 12fps for the HD 3870 X2. In comparison, the 9800 GX2 managed 37fps, leaving the single-GPU cards in the dust. You can enhance 3D performance by adding more 9800 GTX cards to enable dual- or triple-card Scalable Link Interface (SLI) configurations on nForce-chipset motherboards; nVidia says, in fact, that the 9800 GTX may be faster in a 3-Way SLI configuration than a pair of 9800 GX2s in Quad SLI in some situations.

The e-GeForce 9800 GTX sports a pair of dual-link DVI outputs, as well as a component-video/S-Video connector. Like other GeForce 9000-series cards, the 9800 GTX supports HDMI output and can pass digital audio through an HDMI connection. The EVGA card doesn't include the necessary conversion dongle for HDMI output, however, so you'll need to purchase a certified DVI-to-HDMI adapter to connect to a TV or monitor via an HDMI cable.

The 9800 GTX uses two six-pin PCI Express power connectors and requires a 450-watt power supply. On upcoming motherboards supporting nVidia's HybridPower technology, the 9800 GTX card will be able to shut down entirely and transfer responsibility to the lower-power motherboard GPU when you're not using 3D applications.

The earlier 8800 GTX didn't have the extensive support for hardware video acceleration of the lower-end 8000-series cards. The 9800 GTX, on the other hand, has full PureVideo HD support, which lowers CPU load during DVD and Blu-ray playback, offering full hardware decoding of MPEG2 and H.264, and partial acceleration of VC-1 video. Like other 9000-series cards, it supports faster dual-stream decode acceleration, dynamic contrast enhancement, and automatic enhancement of green, blue, and skin-tone colors. Video playback was smooth with both standard-def and HD content, with excellent color reproduction and artifact-free playback on both a 30-inch LCD monitor and a 56-inch DLP TV.

Also, if you have an SLI-capable motherboard and a strong-enough power supply, you can pair two 9800 GX2 cards to get Quad SLI performance. Quad SLI for 9800 GX2 cards isn't yet available for testing, but nVidia promises improvements over the first generation of the technology, including better scaling performance when adding a second 9800 GX2. Of course, you'll likely need to crank every setting to maximum on a 30-inch monitor to truly benefit from Quad SLI. (Or play Crysis.)

While the 9800 GTX is eclipsed by the 9800 GX2 in the performance department, it has more reasonable power requirements, avoids the need to shut down additional monitors when gaming (unless you use it in an SLI configuration), and is much less expensive. It offers excellent performance in the most demanding games and accelerated video playback, all at a price about $200 less than the introductory price of nVidia's previous-generation GTX card.

EVGA backs the card with a limited lifetime warranty, as well as its 90-day Step Up program, which lets you upgrade to a faster card within 3 months for the difference in price between the cards.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

Mfr. Est. Price: $349.99

Asus ENGTX280 Graphics Card

2009-11-01T16:11:00.001-08:00

Asus ENGTX280 Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: June 2008

nVidia's new flagship card, the GeForce GTX 280, isn't going to suffer the same criticisms as the recent GeForce 9800-series cards. While those are somewhat faster than the preceding 8800 generation, their biggest achievement was offering more performance per dollar. After testing Asus' new model, the ENGTX280, we can confidently state that the GeForce GTX 280 is all about the fast.

Just how fast? A single ENGTX280 nearly doubled the performance of the EVGA e-GeForce 9800 GTX in many of our tests, and even beat a pair of dual-GPU GeForce 9800 GX2 cards running in Quad SLI mode on others. Our game tests left the ENGTX280's predecessors in the dust. At 2,560x1,600 resolution, the ENGTX280 averaged 46.5 frames per second (fps) in our Company of Heroes DirectX 10 (DX10) tests, compared to 19.7fps for the 9800 GTX, 24.7fps for the 9800 GX2, and 38.2fps for the pair of 9800 GX2 cards in Quad SLI mode. At the same resolution, World in Conflict scores 30fps, compared to 10fps for the 9800 GTX and 16fps for 9800 GX2. This card finally makes DX10 games playable at full resolution and detail on 30-inch monitors.

In testing with the new 3DMark Vantage benchmark, the ENGTX280 was the first card that made the 2,560x1,600-resolution Extreme test mode look like gameplay instead of a slide show. The card scored 4,899 at the Extreme preset, compared to just 2,134 for the 9800 GTX card. Its results of 7,267, 10,592, and 26,071 at the High, Performance, and Entry presets, respectively, were similarly breathtaking.

If that's not fast enough, dropping a second GTX 280 card into an SLI-capable system yields results of 9,108, 12,630, 16,128, and 30,670, respectively, at Extreme, High, Performance, and Entry settings in 3DMark Vantage. Our F.E.A.R. DX9 test at 2,560x1,600 yielded an amazing 143fps, compared to 116fps for a pair of 9800 GX2 cards in Quad SLI mode. With a pair of GTX 280s in SLI mode, even demanding DX10 games like World in Conflict and Company of Heroes manage silky smooth 50fps and 88.9fps results, respectively, at 2,560x1,600 with all the details maxed out. A pair of these cards in SLI is a dream combo if you own a 30-inch monitor. You can install a third card in a 3-Way SLI system for an even greater performance boost, but given these results we can't foresee the need to do so for quite a while. Note that, as with earlier cards, nVidia's drivers disable multiple monitor support when running in SLI mode; you'll have to disable the second card to use more than one display. The company says it hopes to address this limitation in a future driver update.

Such performance comes at a price—quite a price. The ENGTX280 sells for $649. (nVidia will release a slower $399 GTX 260 card in the coming weeks.) That price buys you a double-width board boasting nVidia's new 1.4-billion-transistor GTX 280 Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) and 1GB of memory running at 2,200MHz. The board features a pair of High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP)-enabled, dual-link DVI ports; a digital audio input for use with an HDMI adapter (not included); and a component-video/S-Video output. The card's quiet cooling fan vents warm air out the back of your PC. Asus bundles its Gamer OSD software with the card, which supports GPU overclocking, video capture, and screenshot grabbing.

You'll need a 550-watt or greater power supply unit (PSU) and both an eight-pin and six-pin power connector to run a single card. Each card can draw up to 236 watts, so count on an 800-watt PSU for a pair of cards in SLI mode. While you can install three ENGTX280 cards in 3-Way SLI mode, you'll need six PCI Express power connectors to manage that. The board won't necessarily send your electric bill into the stratosphere, as it uses only 25 watts of power in idle (2D) mode, and can shut off completely for 2D use on an nForce motherboard that supports HybridPower.

nVidia has once again chosen not to support DX10.1, sticking with the original DX10 for this card. (There's almost no use of DX10.1 in any currently available games, so this isn't likely to be a big concern for most users.) Visual quality is superb, as the ENGTX280 lets you crank up texture detail, anti-aliasing, and filtering at high resolutions while still maintaining playable frame rates. The board supports nVidia's PureVideo HD, which lowers CPU load during DVD and Blu-ray playback, offering full hardware decoding of MPEG2 and H.264 video, and partial acceleration of VC-1 video. DVDs and HD WMV files both looked stellar, with rich color and smooth playback even on a 30-inch screen.

With the release of the GTX 280, nVidia is making a big splash about its GPU computing technologies, which let the card's GPU do operations that it can process much faster than your computer's CPU. nVidia claims that the GTX 280's GPU, with 240 cores running at 1.3GHz, is the fastest floating point processor yet for the PC.

We tested the GPU processing by converting a video for the iPhone first with the Sony Vegas 8.0, and then with the BadaBOOM GPU-based converter supplied by nVidia. On a quad-core, 3.2GHz Core 2 Extreme QX9770, our sample MPEG2 video took 42 seconds to convert to iPhone H.264 format using the CPU and Vegas 8.0. Using a preliminary version of BadaBOOM to convert the file using the GPU, the same file converted in just 27 seconds. The difference will be even more dramatic on slower CPUs or processors with fewer cores, where the CPU conversion will take much longer—but the GPU version should remain around 27 seconds. (BadaBOOM should be commercially available in August.)

The nVidia version of the Folding@Home application, a distributed computing project that aids in medical protein-folding research, can simulate 590 nanoseconds of a protein's existence over the course of a day. Compare this to the PlayStation 3's Cell processor, which can compute about 100 nanoseconds in a day. You can find add-ons for Adobe Premiere that support GPU-assisted rendering, and the next version of PhotoShop should support it as well.

Of course, the nascent GPU computing capability is just gravy at this point. There's plenty of reason to buy the ENGTX280 now (if you can afford it) for its stellar gaming performance, which is dramatically faster than its predecessors, and, for now at least, the competition. Be careful, though, as the card is so speedy that you might find yourself budgeting for a 30-inch monitor as well.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

AsusTek Computer, 502-995-0883

usa.asus.com

Asus EAH4850 Graphics Card

2009-11-01T16:10:00.001-08:00

Asus EAH4850 Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: June 2008

While nVidia was touting its price-is-no-object performance crown with the new GeForce GTX 280, ATI was quietly shipping the first of its new Radeon HD 4850 cards, which cost a third as much and can run today's most demanding games on typical systems. Unlike the GTX 280, the HD 4850 won't let you crank all the settings to full on the latest games on a 30-inch monitor. But for the typical 3D user, it provides plenty of oomph, with performance rivaling cards that until very recently cost $350.

One testament to this card's excellent performance: nVidia dropped the price of its previous top-end single-GPU card, the GeForce 9800 GTX, to match that of the HD 4850. Our review card, an Asus EAH4850, offers performance comparable to the formerly $350 9800 GTX but bests it by supporting DirectX 10.1 (DX10.1); by not blocking an adjacent slot; by requiring just one power connector instead of two; and by including a DVI-to-HDMI adapter.

The Asus EAH4850 is a single-slot PCI Express (PCIe) 2.0 card that uses one six-pin power connector and a 450-watt power supply. It features two dual-link DVI ports ready for High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP), the aforementioned HDMI converter, and an analog video port that supports S-Video and component output. The card is based on the new RV770 GPU, which boasts 800 shader units and 956 million transistors, compared with 320 shaders and 666 million transistors for the last-generation HD 3850. The EAH4850 includes 512MB of GDDR3 memory and is bundled with the Asus overclocking and screen- and video-capture utilities.

Image quality is excellent; both ATI and nVidia now have anti-aliasing and filtering down to an art. ATI's Avivo HD technology enables hardware decoding of the H.264 and VC-1 compression used by HD-DVD and Blu-ray video discs. The card supports HD audio over the HDMI cable.

Performance, meanwhile, is stellar for a card in the EAH4850's price range. Overall, the card runs neck and neck with nVidia's GeForce 9800 GTX in our benchmark tests, with the cards trading places for the lead depending on the game and the resolution. In our Company of Heroes DX10 tests, the EAH4850 clocked 54.7 frames per second (fps) at 1,280x1,024; 35.6fps at 1,920x1,200; and 23.8fps at 2,560x1,600. Granted, the 9800 GTX's 98.3fps at 1,280x1,024 blows the EAH4850 out of the water, but the Asus entry nearly matched the 9800 GTX's score of 40.5fps at 1,920x1,200 and bested its 19.7fps at 2,560x1,600. In our World in Conflict test, the EAH4850 slightly edged out the nVidia card, scoring 51fps, 27fps, and 14fps at the aforementioned resolutions, compared with 49fps, 23fps, and 10fps, respectively, for the 9800 GTX. The EAH4850's scores in Futuremark's 3DMark06 fell below those of the 9800 GTX, but the EAH4850 beat the 9800 GTX at both Entry and Extreme settings in the new 3DMark Vantage DX10 benchmark suite.

To boost performance even further, you can drop up to three additional EAH4850 cards into a system that has a CrossFireX-compatible motherboard and additional PCIe slots.

We had one big complaint: Though the EAH4850's fan is nearly silent at idle, the single-slot cooler doesn't seem to do a great job of cooling the card. We saw an idle temperature of 78 degrees Celsius in a roomy, well-ventilated case, rising to 85 degrees under load. Not only will those high temps increase system heat, they also mean the HD4850 isn't likely to tolerate much overclocking.

Still, the EAH4850 is a great performer for the price. Not long ago, comparably performing cards fell into the $350 to $400 price range. The EAH4850 is fast enough to run newer games at playable frame rates at resolutions up to 1,920x1,200 with all the details cranked, and that's plenty fast for many gamers. ATI may not compete at the high end nowadays, but at mainstream prices, it gives nVidia a serious run for the money.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

AsusTek Computer, 502-995-0883

usa.asus.com

Sapphire Radeon HD 4870 Grapics card

2009-11-01T16:07:00.000-08:00

Sapphire Radeon HD 4870 Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: July 2008

AMD must be causing some headaches in the halls of its chief competitor, nVidia. First, AMD ships the ATI Radeon HD 4850, a $199 card that ran neck-and-neck with the nVidia GeForce 9800 GTX, resulting in nVidia significantly dropping the price of its own card. Now, AMD's $299 Radeon HD 4870 offers even greater performance, putting the card in competition with nVidia's new GeForce GTX 260—which sells for $100 more.

Our review card came in the form of Sapphire's Radeon HD 4870. Along with the usual accessories, Sapphire bundles Cyberlink's PowerDVD 7.0 and DVD Suite, a registered copy of Futuremark's 3DMark06, AMD's Ruby sampler DVD, and a 2GB USB flash drive containing a number of videos and wallpapers.

Although its HD 4850 little brother is a single-slot, single-power-connector card, the bigger HD 4870 has a thicker cooler-and-heat-sink combo that blocks an adjacent slot, and it requires a pair of six-pin PCI Express (PCIe) power connectors. Like the HD 4850, the HD 4870's RV770 GPU chip runs hot, idling at about 78 degrees Celsius. Its larger cooler vents air out the back of the case, however, so the hot GPU shouldn't have as much effect on overall system temperature. The fan is very quiet while idling, but noticeably louder than the HD 4850 when it gets up to speed at high loads. It seems to cool things down quickly, however, and doesn't stay loud for long periods.

The card has a pair of dual-link DVI outputs, an analog output that supports S-Video and component, and it ships with HDMI and VGA adapters. The HDMI connector has its own integrated digital audio device, so you don't need to connect a pass-through cable to your motherboard sound card like you do with HDMI-capable nVidia cards. The card uses a faster version of the DirectX 10.1-capable RV770 GPU introduced on the HD 4850, and gets some of its increased performance from its use of 512MB of cutting-edge GDDR5 memory.

The card's performance is groundbreaking for its price. With 3D effects and details maxed, the Sapphire HD 4870 turned in playable frame rates at 1,920x1,200 pixels in all our tests, clocking 35 frames per second (fps) in Call of Juarez, 36fps in World in Conflict, 39.9fps in Company of Heroes, and a whopping 100fps in F.E.A.R. This is something none of the previous-generation ATI cards could manage—not even the dual-GPU HD 3870 X2, which turned in a pokey 12fps at that resolution in World in Conflict and 26.9fps in Company of Heroes. The HD 4870 significantly outpaced nVidia's 9800 GTX in all our tests except the two lower-resolution Company of Heroes tests; though admittedly, at its new price, the 9800 GTX now competes with the less-expensive HD 4850.

The HD 4870's performance doesn't match that of nVidia's high-end GTX 280 card, of course, but for the price of that model, you can buy two HD 4870 cards. You can drop up to three additional HD 4870 cards into a system that has a CrossFireX-compatible motherboard and additional PCIe slots, boosting performance even further.

Image quality is excellent, and ATI's Avivo HD technology enables hardware decoding of the H.264 and VC-1 compression used by HD DVD and Blu-ray discs. New in the HD 4800 series is the ability to hardware-decode two streams at a time, allowing the card to accelerate the picture-in-picture mode present in Blu-ray 2.0. The card supports HD audio over the HDMI cable.

Its bundle of useful PowerDVD applications might make Sapphire's version sound like a better pick than something you already own, but although the company offers a two-year warranty on its video cards, all service requests must be handled through your place of purchase—not with Sapphire. (The company offers support via e-mail or a toll call.)

Given the Radeon HD 4850's already impressive performance, the $100 more you'll spend on an HD 4870 will net you about a 30 percent speed increase at higher resolutions. That additional speed might be overkill unless you're using a 24-inch or larger monitor; at lower resolutions, the HD 4870's additional performance is more of an investment in the future—something that used to be the domain of more expensive cards.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

Sapphire Technology Limited

www.sapphiretech.com/us

Direct Price: $299

Asus EAH4870X2 Graphics Card

2009-11-01T16:06:00.000-08:00

Asus EAH4870X2 Graphics Card Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: August 2008

The Asus EAH4870X2 is a powerhouse video card that uses ATI's new Radeon HD 4870 X2 design, which places two top-of-the line 4870 GPU chips on a single board and is backed by a whopping 2GB of video memory. The 4870 X2 puts ATI back in competition at the top end of the 3D-gaming market in terms of both performance and price.

The EAH4870X2 is the functional equivalent of a pair of HD 4870 cards running in CrossFireX mode, but on a single card. Each GPU is backed by 1GB of dedicated GDDR5 memory, and an onboard PCI 2.0 bridge chip allows the two subsystems to talk to each other. Both the GPU and memory run at the frequency of a single HD 4870 card, which is an improvement over the HD 3870 X2, which ran chips slightly slower than single 3870 cards did.

Because everything's on one card, you don't need a CrossFireX-compatible motherboard to use the EAH4870X2. (If you have one, though, you can team the card with additional Radeon 4870 X2 cards for even better performance.)

You do need a beefy power supply and plenty of room, however. Asus recommends a 600-watt power supply, and the card requires both a six-pin and an eight-pin PCI Express (PCIe) power cable, as well as room for a 10.5-inch long board that blocks an adjacent slot. In smaller cases, such as the Antec P190, you won't have room to mount a hard drive behind the long video card. ATI didn't position the power connectors at the back of the card as it did on the single-GPU HD 4870, so you won't need additional clearance for those. The card runs quite hot—around 90 degrees Celsius at load—and though the dual-slot heat sink vents the hot air out the back of the case, the fan gets noticeably audible when the GPUs start getting a workout. It's much louder than the single GPU HD 4870, so if noise is a concern, you might be better off with a pair of HD 4870 cards in a CrossFireX configuration.

The board includes a pair of dual-link DVI connectors, an HDMI adapter with onboard audio, and an analog component-video/S-Video output. Unlike Nvidia's dual-GPU GeForce cards, you can use dual monitors with the EAH4870X2 without having to disable the second GPU. The card supports DirectX (DX) 10.1 even though most games require only DX10—a status quo that isn't likely to change until the in-development DX11 is released.

In almost all of our tests, the EAH4870X2 was the fastest single video card we've tested to date. At 2,560x1,600 resolution, the EAH4870X2 turned in 41 frames per second (fps) in World in Conflict, 54.7fps in Company of Heroes, and 116fps in F.E.A.R., compared with 30fps, 46.5fps, and 77fps for the GeForce GTX 280. In fact, the GTX 280 beat the EAH4870X2 only in our lower-resolution World in Conflict tests, and the results indicated that the issue was probably due to World in Conflict capping its performance at 60fps on the EAH4870X2, even after we disabled the Vsync limiter. (The single-GPU HD 4870 card encountered the same issue with this game.)

Keep in mind that dual-GPU solutions like the EAH4870X2 require the drivers to support the game you're playing with a CrossFireX profile. Though the vast majority of commercial games are supported, a few titles, such as Microsoft Flight Simulator X or games running on the Windows desktop, don't benefit from the second GPU, and newer titles might not get a profile until weeks after launch.

Meanwhile, image quality is excellent. ATI's Avivo HD technology is able to decode the H.264 and VC-1 compression used by HD DVD and Blu-ray. New in the HD 4800 series is the ability to decode two streams at a time, allowing the card to accelerate the picture-in-picture mode present in Blu-ray 2.0. The EAH4870X2 supports HD audio over the HDMI cable.

Asus includes a bundle of exclusive software with the EAH4870X2, such as Splendid, a video-enhancement technology that lets you alter color or contrast so that the images look best in your viewing setup. You also get a GamerOSD package that lets you overclock the card, as well as capture video and screenshots.

The EAH4870X2 offers such phenomenal 3D speed that you'll need to crank the latest games up to their highest detail levels on a 24-inch-or-larger monitor to take full advantage of its performance. You can also break out your older games, max out the resolution, anti-aliasing, and filtering, and see them with unprecedented image quality. If you want unmatched graphics performance—and you play with the sound turned up loud enough that fan noise won't bother you—it's hard to go wrong with this card.

Discuss this product in our components forum.

AsusTek Computer, 502-995-0883

usa.asus.com

Direct Price: $549

ATI Radeon HD 4670 Grapics card

2009-11-01T16:05:00.002-08:00

ATI Radeon HD 4670 Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: September 2008

ATI’s Radeon HD 4670 is a full-featured, compact graphics card that offers last year’s midrange performance at a very low-end price. For around $80, you can play even the latest games at medium resolutions, watch DVD and HD video, and run multiple monitors.

The HD 4670 is available with 512MB of 1,000MHz GDDR3 memory or 1GB of slower 900MHz standard DDR3 RAM; we tested the 512MB version. The faster memory will offer better performance in the resolutions at which you’re likely to play games when using this card. Interestingly, our sample card sported one dual-link DVI connector (which can be used with an HDMI adapter) and two cutting-edge DisplayPort connectors. Some card makers will ship versions with dual DVI connectors and an analog port instead.

The card draws all of its power from the PCI Express (PCIe) x16 slot and doesn’t require a separate power cable. Along with its short, 7.6-inch length, this makes it a good choice for use with compact PCs that don’t have PCIe power leads. AMD says the HD 4670 consumes less than 75 watts under full load, and it features dynamic power management to minimize power consumption when the card is idle. The single fan is almost inaudible, and the card runs much cooler than its 4800-series big brothers, idling at 43 degrees Celsius. When the GPU is stressed, though, temperatures reach 83 degrees, which might raise overall temperatures in cases with limited airflow.

The HD 4670 supports DirectX 10.1 (DX10.1), though virtually all existing games only take advantage of DX10. For a card in its price range, the HD 4670’s 3D performance is excellent; even demanding DX10 games were playable with details cranked up at 1,280x1,024 resolution. The HD 4670 scored 32 frames per second (fps) in our World in Conflict test and 40.1fps in Company of Heroes. Compare those numbers to results from the HD 3850 board released about nine months ago at about the same price, which turned in virtually unplayable scores of 9fps and 17.6fps respectively in our World in Conflict and Company of Heroes tests.

In DX9 tests, we not only got a silky-smooth 66fps in our F.E.A.R. test at 1,280x1,024, but also a very responsive 40fps at 1,920x1,200, compared to just 34fps and 15fps in the same F.E.A.R. test with the older HD 3850. The HD 4670 doubles, and in some cases more than triples, the performance of its predecessor, letting you play even the newest games in high detail at medium resolutions—not bad at all for a sub-$100 card.

You can drop up to two additional HD 4670 cards into a system that has a CrossFireX-compatible motherboard, boosting performance even further. Image quality is excellent; ATI has had 3D anti-aliasing and filtering down to an art for a couple of generations now, and the card does a great job of upscaling DVD content to your monitor’s native resolution. ATI’s Avivo HD technology enables hardware decoding of the H.264 and VC-1 compression used by HD DVD and Blu-ray. The HD 4670 has onboard 7.1-channel audio, supporting surround sound output over the HDMI or DisplayPort cable.

The ATI Radeon HD 4670 brings an unprecedented level of performance for such a low price. It’s an excellent card both for video playback and for playing even the latest games on small to midsize monitors.
Price (at time of review): $79

ATI Radeon HD 4550 Grapics card

2009-11-01T16:05:00.001-08:00

Key Specs
Graphics Processor: ATI Radeon HD 4550
Core Clock: 600MHz
Graphics Memory: 512MB DDR3
Interface: PCI Express x16
Onboard Ports: DisplayPort, DVI, HDMI
Bundled Adapters: None
DirectX Support: 10.1

ATI Radeon HD 4550 Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: September 2008

The ATI Radeon HD 4550 offers superb video-playback quality, multiple monitor support, and usable if unimpressive 3D performance at an entry-level price. This compact card is a perfect addition to a home theater PC, particularly if you want to play back HD video, but gamers should consider the next card up in ATI’s lineup.

The compact HD 4550 draws all of its power from the PCI Express (PCIe) x16 slot it plugs into, making it a good choice for PCs with smaller power supplies that don’t offer a six-pin PCIe power cable. AMD says the card uses just 20 watts of power in operation. The card is passively cooled and completely silent, using a large metal heat sink instead of a fan.

The card we tested featured a dual-link DVI connector, as well as both HDMI and DisplayPort outputs. The HD 4550 can drive any two of these outputs simultaneously. There’s onboard eight-channel sound when using the HDMI output, which is more convenient than Nvidia’s HDMI-equipped cards that require you to run an audio cable to your motherboard. Cards from some OEM manufacturers may include a combination of DVI, VGA, and analog output, and/or a cooling fan in place of the setup of our reference card.

Along with 512MB of DDR3 RAM, the card has all the features of the other Radeon 4000-series cards, including DirectX 10.1 (DX10.1) 3D support and the excellent Unified Video Decoder (UVD) 2, which accelerates decoding of both DVD and high-definition or Blu-ray content. This takes the decoding load off the computer’s processor, allowing smooth playback of video content on inexpensive, midrange computers, even at 1080p resolution. Both HD video and upscaled DVD content played back flawlessly, with vibrant color and no visual artifacts, on a 1.8GHz Core 2 Duo test system.

The card’s 3D performance is nothing to get excited about, but the HD 4550 at least makes recent games playable if you turn down the details and resolution a bit. It manages 24 frames per second (fps) in our 1,280x1,024 F.E.A.R. test with the details cranked to maximum, and dropping the details or resolution a bit gets the score to 30fps or more. Last year’s Radeon HD 3450 card, by comparison, only scored a slide-show-like 11fps in the same test. However, the Radeon HD 4670, which costs just $24 more, more than doubles the HD 4550’s performance, turning in 66fps on the same test. And the HD 4670 makes DX10 games playable without turning down the details, unlike the HD 4550. The HD 4550 scored just 18.2fps in our 1,280x1,024 Company of Heroes test; the HD 4670 clocked in at 40.1fps. World in Conflict was even slower at 11fps on the HD 4550, while the HD 4670 managed a playable 32fps. With a CrossFireX-capable motherboard, you can pair the card with another HD 4550 to get a performance boost.

The Radeon HD 4550’s excellent video-playback support and silent operation make it an excellent choice for home theater PC usage, general productivity, and the occasional casual game. But if you spend much time at all playing 3D games, you’d be far better served by the Radeon HD 4670, which offers more than double the 3D performance, with a price difference that’s half the cost of a single game.
Price (at time of review): $55

ATI Radeon HD 4830 Grapics card

2009-11-01T16:04:00.000-08:00

Key Specs
Graphics Processor: ATI Radeon HD 4830
Core Clock: 575MHz
Graphics Memory: 512MB
Interface: PCIe x16
Onboard Ports: Two DVI, Component/S-Video, CrossFireX
Bundled Adapters: DVI-to-VGA, DVI-to-HDMI
DirectX Support: DirectX 10.1

ATI Radeon HD 4830 Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: November 2008

With the release of the $129 ATI Radeon HD 4830, AMD has closed the one gap in the company’s graphics-card lineup, offering performance good enough to play the latest games at decent resolutions and high detail at a price under $150.

This single-slot PCI Express (PCIe) x16 card includes 512MB of GDDR3 memory, and runs at a clock speed of 575MHz, compared with 625MHz for the HD 4850. It requires a six-pin connector from the power supply. Our test board included a pair of dual-link DVI connectors, a component/S-Video analog output, and an HDMI adapter.

In typical operation, the single fan is barely audible and the card idles at 45 degrees Celsius, cooler than its HD 4850 and 4870 big brothers. When the GPU is stressed after prolonged gaming, though, temperatures in our tests reached 84 degrees, which might raise overall temperatures in cases with limited airflow. You can manually crank up the fan using the ATI Catalyst Control Center software to bring temps down, but noise will increase significantly.

The HD 4830 supports DirectX 10.1 (DX10.1), though virtually all games use only DX10 features. The 3D performance is very good, falling just a few frames per second (fps) behind the more expensive HD 4850 in most of our tests. The DX9 F.E.A.R., for instance, clocked in at a playable 43fps at a massive 2,560x1,600 resolution, compared with 46fps for the HD 4850. The DX10 version of Company of Heroes was a speedy 53.7fps at 1,280x1,024 and a quite playable 32.5fps at 1,920x1,200, only slightly slower than the 54.1fps and 35.6fps results, respectively, for the HD 4850.

You can drop up to three additional HD 4830 cards into a system that has a CrossFireX-compatible motherboard and available PCIe x16 slots, boosting performance even further.

Image quality is excellent. In games, the superb 3D anti-aliasing and filtering we’ve come to expect from ATI is present, and the card is fast enough to run the latest games at medium wide-screen resolutions (such as 1,680x1,050) with detail settings set to max. The HD 4830 also does a great job upscaling DVD content to your monitor’s native resolution. ATI’s Avivo HD technology enables hardware decoding of the H.264 and VC-1 compression used by HD-DVD and Blu-ray. The card also has onboard eight-channel audio, supporting surround-sound output when using the HDMI adapter.

Note that a few hundred HIS-brand HD 4830 cards shipped with the incorrect BIOS software. Our test card was one of those, and updating to the latest BIOS gave us a small but noticeable speed increase over our first round of test results. If you purchased an HIS HD 4830 card, check out the company’s support site for information on how to check and update the BIOS version.

Given the street-price difference of about $50 between the Radeon HD 4830 and the HD 4850, this card is as much a competitor to ATI’s HD 4850 as it is to Nvidia’s 9800GT. If you’re using a 22-inch or smaller monitor, it delivers everything you need for full-resolution, full-detail gaming and for HD video as well.
Price (at time of review): $129

www.amd.com

Nvidia GeForce GTX 295 grapics card

2009-11-01T16:03:00.001-08:00

Key Specs
Graphics Processor: GTX 200
Core Clock: 576MHz
Graphics Memory: 1,792MB
Interface: PCIe 2.0 x16
Onboard Ports: 2 DVI ports, HDMI
Bundled Adapters: DVI-to-VGA
DirectX Support: DirectX 10

Nvidia GeForce GTX 295 Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: January 2009

In the back-and-forth competition for the title of fastest single graphics card, the GeForce GTX 295 puts Nvidia back on top, bouncing ATI's Radeon HD 4870 X2 down to second place. Like ATI's former champ, the GTX 295 actually packs the equivalent of two 3D cards into a single package, offering dual-GPU performance without the motherboard-compatibility and power-supply hassles of separate cards.

The GTX 295 bears a strong resemblance to Nvidia's previous dual-circuit-board monster, the GeForce 9800 GX2. Like that card, it is 10.5 inches long and double the width of a standard card, so it blocks an adjacent slot. The back of one circuit board is now exposed, and the new card has a slick flat-black finish that doesn't pick up fingerprints like its glossy predecessor did.

Each of the GTX 295's 55-nanometer (nm) GPUs has 896MB of memory as well as the same 240 the same processing cores and 80 texture-filtering units as the GTX 280, making for a total of 1,792MB of video RAM. The stock clock speeds are slightly slower than the GTX 280's GPU, with a 576MHz core clock, 1,242MHz shader clock, and 999MHz memory speed, compared to 602MHz, 1,296MHz, and 1,107MHz respectively on the GTX 280. As you'd expect, some OEMs will offer GTX 295 cards with higher-clocked parts, though we imagine cooling issues with the sandwiched parts will keep speeds below those of the fastest single-GPU cards. The fan, which sits between the two circuit boards, is quieter than the stock 4870 X2 cooler but noticeably more audible than the fan on the GTX 280.

Assuming your PC case has the clearance for a double-width card, you'll only need one PCI Express (PCIe) x16 slot for the GTX 295. But it requires both an eight-pin and a six-pin power connector as well as at least a 680-watt supply that can support the board's 289-watt peak power demand. Used with a Scalable Link Interface (SLI)-capable motherboard (and an even larger power supply), you can install a second GTX 295 to enable four-GPU, Quad SLI support.

The GTX 295 features a pair of dual-link DVI connectors as well as an HDMI port. Nvidia has finally added SLI Multi-Mon capability to its drivers, so you no longer have to disable the second GPU when using two monitors. Alternately, you can dedicate one of the GPUs to graphics and the second (or an additional GeForce card) to PhysX physics acceleration, though only a few games take full advantage of PhysX so far.

In nearly all of our tests, the GTX 295 handily beat the competition. Its score of 9,074 on the Extreme setting of Futuremark's 3DMark Vantage clearly was far ahead of the 4870 X2's 7,289, and it nearly matched the 9,108 achieved by a pair of GTX 280 cards running in SLI mode. In our DirectX 9 (DX9) F.E.A.R. test, the GTX 295 turned in 127 frames per second (fps) at 2,560x1,600 resolution, beating the 116fps achieved by the 4870 X2 —and more than doubling the 62fps of Nvidia's previous-generation dual-GPU card, the 9800 GX2. In our World in Conflict DX10 test, the GTX 295 scored 49 fps to the 4870 X2's 41fps.

The one exception was our Call of Juarez test, where the 4870 X2's 62.6 fps at 1,920x1,200 resolution beat the GTX 295's 52.6 fps score. Call of Juarez seems better-optimized for ATI's cards, as the Radeon series almost always trumps comparable GeForce cards with that game. Also, note that a few games, such as Microsoft Flight Simulator X, don't take advantage of a second GPU, and frame rates end up very close to those you get from a single-GPU card. That's the exception, though, and the majority of games will see a significant speedup on the GTX 295 compared to the GTX 280.

As with other Nvidia cards, the GTX 295 supports DX10 rather than DX10.1. With only a couple of games offering DX10.1 support and DX11 arriving with Windows 7, this isn’t likely to be a big concern for most users. Visual quality is superb, with the raw horsepower of the GTX 295 letting you max out texture detail, anti-aliasing, and filtering at high resolutions while still maintaining playable frame rates. The board supports Nvidia’s PureVideo HD, which lowers CPU load during DVD and Blu-ray playback.

At $499, the GTX 295 isn't cheap, but consider that the single-GPU GTX 280 sold for $649 when it was introduced in mid-2008. And—certainly not coincidentally—that pricetag matches the street price of ATI's 4870 X2 at the time of the GTX 295's introduction. It's probably overkill for smaller monitors, but if you're looking to push graphics to the limit on a 30-inch monitor, a 1080p TV, or on dual displays, the GTX 295 delivers the best performance you can currently buy in a single card.
Price (at time of review): $499

XFX GeForce GTX 285 Black Edition grapics card

2009-11-01T16:02:00.000-08:00

Key Specs
Graphics Processor: Nvidia GeForce GTX 285
Core Clock: 690MHz
Graphics Memory: 1GB GDDR3
Interface: PCI Express x16
Onboard Ports: Two DVI, one S-Video/component
Bundled Adapters: VGA, HDMI
DirectX Support: 10.0

XFX GeForce GTX 285 Black Edition Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: February 2009

Nvidia's GeForce GTX 285 is a minor update to the GTX 280, which was already the fastest single-GPU graphics card available. With a graphics processor built on a smaller 55nm manufacturing process, it offers cooler operation while using less power, and a speed bump that gives a surprising performance boost. The XFX GeForce GTX 285 Black Edition that we tested overclocks both the GPU and the 1GB of GDDR3 memory over stock speed, pushing the card even faster.

The XFX GeForce GTX 285 Black Edition is a double-width PCI Express (PCIe) x16 card. Its relatively quiet fan channels air across a massive heat sink to vents on the back of the card. Because its 55nm GPU chip uses less power than the 65nm chip on the virtually identical GTX 280, the GTX 285 doesn't require an eight-pin connector from the power supply; it uses a pair of six-pin PCIe power connectors. XFX includes an adapter that converts two four-pin hard drive power connectors to a six-pin connector, in case your power supply only has one PCIe lead.

The board sports a pair of dual-link DVI connectors, as well as an analog S-Video/component port. VGA and HDMI adapters are also included. To move audio over the HDMI connection, you'll need to connect an included cable to the audio connector on your motherboard.

The GPU on the GTX 285 is built on a smaller process than the GTX 280, which helps the 285 run faster and use less power; otherwise, their feature sets are identical—which is why we were pleasantly surprised by the performance boost we saw. The GTX 285's Futuremark 3DMark Vantage Extreme score of 6,341 was unmatched by any single-GPU card; the GTX 280 scored just 4,899, while the less-expensive ATI Radeon HD 4870 scored 3,637. In comparison, the dual-GPU HD 4870 X2, which costs about $100 more than the GTX 285, scored 7,289.

Game scores were very impressive. In our Company of Heroes DirectX 10 test, the board scored a smooth 66.3 frames per second (fps) even at 2,560x1,600 resolution, compared to 46.5fps for the GTX 280 and 26.5fps for the Radeon HD 4870. World in Conflict scored 79fps at 1,280x1,024 and 35fps at 2,560x1,600, compared to 71fps and 30fps, respectively, for the GTX 280. Our DirectX 9 F.E.A.R. results were so fast—a record 159fps at 2,560x1,600 resolution—that we ran them multiple times to confirm the results.

The GTX 285 Black Edition boosts GPU speed to 690MHz, compared with 648MHz for a stock GTX 285, and clocks memory at 2,600MHz, compared to the 2,480MHz stock speed. The faster clock rates had more effect in some games than others. World in Conflict, a CPU-intensive game, didn't see any speedup over stock GTX 285 speeds, while the Company of Heroes DX10 test saw an increase of 3fps to 7fps, depending on resolution. Our F.E.A.R. DX9 test saw the greatest increase: only 6fps at 2,560x1,600, but a whopping 33fps at 1,280x1,024. (Of course, that was a jump from 207fps to 240fps, scores that are both already so fast that the difference is imperceptible.)

Though it takes real effort to push this card to the limit, if you do need more speed down the road (and if you have a motherboard that supports Nvidia's SLI multi-GPU technology), you can add up to two additional GTX 285 cards. Image quality is identical to that of the GTX 280; that is, it's excellent. There's enough power in the card to run the most demanding games with antialiasing and filtering active, and the PureVideoHD video playback was smooth and clear. Like all recent GeForce cards, the GTX 285 can devote some of its processing power to running PhysX physics (used in only a few games so far, such as Mirror's Edge) or running GPU-powered encoding applications such as Badaboom.

XFX bundles the excellent shooter Far Cry 2 with the card, as well as an amusing "Do not disturb: I'm gaming" door hanger. Not only does the company offer a lifetime warranty on the card if you register it within 30 days, but it also allows that warranty to be transferred to a new owner if you sell the card and upgrade.

The XFX GeForce GTX 285 Black Edition is an excellent choice for the performance-minded. Unless you own a 30-inch monitor and are looking to push games to extreme settings (or you need additional headroom for PhysX or GPU-driven applications), don't even consider a dual-GPU card like the GTX 295—the GTX 285 is plenty fast.
Price (at time of review): $399 (mfr. est.)

Asus EAH4890 grapics card

2009-11-01T16:01:00.001-08:00

Key Specs
Graphics Processor: ATI Radeon HD 4890
Core Clock: 850MHz
Graphics Memory: 1GB GDDR5
Interface: PCI Express x16 2.0
Onboard Ports: Two dual-link DVI; analog video
Bundled Adapters: DVI-to-HDMI, VGA
DirectX Support: 10.1

Asus EAH4890 Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: April 2009

The Asus EAH4890 is the company's tweaked, highly overclockable graphics card based on the new ATI Radeon HD 4890 design. This isn't a big leap—it's essentially just an enhanced, speed-boosted version of the HD 4870—but it does offer a noticeable performance boost over the earlier card, particularly if you're willing to experiment with overclocking.

The board's RV790 graphics processing unit (GPU) is a slightly updated version of the RV770 chip found on the earlier HD 4870. The feature set hasn't changed: The chip sports a 256-bit memory bus, a whopping 800 stream processors, and 40 texture units, and supports DirectX 10.1. ATI has boosted performance by upping the clock speed of the GPU (850MHz, compared with 750MHz on the HD 4870) and the 1GB of GDDR5 memory (975MHz, up from 900MHz on the HD 4870), and by optimizing the GPU's internal design. There's no technological leap here, such as a smaller chip process—the HD 4890 is basically a faster HD 4870.

The speed increase doesn't push the HD 4890, now ATI's fastest single-GPU design, to the performance level of Nvidia's high-end single-GPU card, the GTX 285. However, at release time the HD 4890's street price is some $80 to $100 less than various GTX 285 models. Nvidia just announced a new GTX 275 model to compete directly with the HD 4890; it should be widely available by the middle of April.

The card features a pair of dual-link DVI ports, a component/S-Video port, and HDMI and VGA adapters.

The HD 4890 may not quite catch the GTX 285, but it does provide a good speed boost over its HD 4870 predecessor, and it definitely has enough oomph to crank games up to their highest details on midsize monitors. In our World in Conflict test at 1,920x1,200 resolution, the EAH4890 achieved 41 frames per second (fps), up from 36fps on the HD 4870. In contrast, the Asus ENGTX280 scored 43fps, and the XFX GTX 285 achieved 49fps. On the 3DMark Vantage benchmark test, the EAH4890 scored 4,625 at Extreme settings, compared to 3,637 on the HD 4870 and 4,899 on the ENGTX280.

With a CrossFireX-compatible motherboard, you can team the EAH4890 with other ATI-based video cards for an additional performance boost. We dropped in a second EAH4870 and saw very smooth performance even at 2,560x1,600 resolution. At that resolution, our World in Conflict score jumped from 28fps to 48fps; this compares to 49fps on the dual-GPU Nvidia GTX 295. Our F.E.A.R. score with two cards was 139fps at 2,560x1,600, compared to 72fps with a single card and 127fps on the GTX 295. As with all of the current-generation cards from both ATI and Nvidia, both SD and HD video playback on the EAH4890 is smooth, vibrant, and free of stutters and artifacts.

Two EAH4890 cards installed in CrossFire mode in our Antec Skeleton testbed case.

While many graphics-card manufacturers merely slap a new label on a factory-stock reference-card design, Asus has tweaked the EAH4890 design to allow for better overclocking, with its VoltageTweak feature. Using the bundled SmartDoctor utility, you can increase the GPU voltage to allow for better overclocking potential.

Using SmartDoctor to boost the card's voltage from 1.3 volts to 1.4 volts and running ATI's automatic Overdrive settings, we were able to boost the GPU clock from 850MHz to 990MHz, and the memory from 975MHz to 1,190MHz memory. This gave us a noticeable performance boost. The biggest jump was our World in Conflict test at 2,560x1,600 resolution, which jumped from 28fps to 35fps. Our F.E.A.R. test at that resolution went from 72fps to 75fps. At 1,920x1,200, the Call of Juarez results were boosted from 39.4fps to 42.5fps.

The EAH4890 uses two six-pin PCI Express power connectors, and it has a thick heat sink that blocks an adjacent slot.

The EAH4890 requires two six-pin PCI Express power connectors, and it has a large cooler that blocks the adjacent slot. At idle, the fan is much quieter than the one on the HD 4870 we tested; it only becomes noticeably audible when the GPU is hard at work. (The fan gets louder during heavy 3D work if you're overclocking.) The card has a pair of dual-link DVI outputs, as well as an analog component/S-Video connector. The package includes adapters for HDMI and VGA output. Asus also bundles its GamerOSD overclocking and video-capture tool, SmartDoctor monitoring application, and VedioSecurity Webcam security utility.

The EAH4890 offers high-end performance at a very reasonable price. It's not enough of a boost over the Radeon HD 4870 to warrant an upgrade from that card, but if you're upgrading from a previous-generation card, the EAH4890 boasts smooth frame rates on the most demanding games on medium-to-large monitors, at a price well under $300.
Price (at time of review): $269

ATI Radeon HD 4770 grapics card

2009-11-01T16:00:00.000-08:00

Key Specs
Graphics Processor: ATI Radeon HD 4770
Core Clock: 750MHz
Graphics Memory: 512MB GDDR5
Interface: PCI Express x16
Onboard Ports: Two dual-link DVI
DirectX Support: 10.1

ATI Radeon HD 4770 Review
Reviewed by: Matt Safford
Review Date: April 2009

There’s no doubt that Quad SLI setups and $500 cards like the Nvidia GeForce GTX 295 make for impressive frame rates and butter-smooth performance even at insanely high resolutions. But in the budget-conscious world where the majority of us live, the graphics-card sweet spot for most gamers is closer to $100. And for a card at that price point, the ATI Radeon HD 4770 is pretty impressive. (The 4770 will sell initially for around $109, before a $10 rebate.) It approaches the performance level of its more expensive sibling, the Radeon HD 4850, with the help of 512MB of GDDR5 memory, while sipping almost a third less power under full load, thanks in part to its smaller 40nm manufacturing process. There are certainly more powerful graphics boards available, but for gaming on a budget, it’s hard to beat this card.

Unlike ATI’s recent high-end addition, the Radeon HD 4890, the Radeon HD 4770 is more revolution than evolution. Aside from the addition of GDDR5 memory, this is also the first desktop graphics-processing unit (GPU) to feature ATI’s new 40nm manufacturing process, which ATI touts as the world’s most advanced. Though rival Nvidia is certainly working on 40nm boards of its own, the Radeon HD 4770, along with ATI’s recently announced laptop GPUs (the Mobility Radeon HD 4860 and 4830), is first to the market.

One of the primary benefits of the smaller manufacturing process is less power draw. We see that plainly with the Radeon HD 4770, which pulls just 80 watts maximum, compared to the 110-watt maximum draw of the beefier Radeon HD 4850. Unfortunately, the Radeon HD 4770 still requires a six-pin PCI Express power connector, so if your power supply doesn’t have one, you’ll have to upgrade or get an adapter.

We weren’t surprised that the Radeon HD 4770 beat ATI’s previous budget champ, the Radeon HD 4830, in nearly all of our benchmark tests. In fact, on the 3DMark Vantage High and Extreme tests, the Radeon HD 4770 trounced the Radeon HD 4830, scoring 4,430 (High) and 3,023 (Extreme), compared with the Radeon HD 4830’s scores of 3,764 and 2,430 on the same tests, respectively. What was surprising, though: On the Extreme test, the Radeon HD 4770's score of 3,023 actually beat the more expensive Radeon HD 4850, which scored just 2,797 on that test. We chalk that up to the Radeon HD 4770’s faster GDDR5 memory; the Radeon HD 4850 runs the older, slower GDDR3 memory.

Unlike the Radeon HD 4830, the Radeon HD 4770 occupies two expansion slots, like its more-powerful 4800-series siblings do. Make sure there's space in your case before upgrading.

In games testing, the Radeon HD 4770 continued to surprise, leaving the Radeon HD 4830 far behind, and, in some cases, even trouncing the Radeon HD 4850. In our DirectX 10 Company of Heroes test, the Radeon HD 4770 turned in average frame rates of 59.2 frames per second (1,280x1,024), 58.5fps (1,900x1,200), and 54.2fps (2,560x1,600), while the more expensive Radeon HD 4850 card scored 54.1fps, 35.6fps, and 23.8fps on the same tests, respectively. The results were mixed between the two cards, however, as the Radeon HD 4850’s F.E.A.R. and World in Conflict scores were nearly all noticeably (though not tremendously) higher than those of the Radeon HD 4770. Impressively, though, at the maximum resolution of 2,560x1,600 in F.E.A.R., the Radeon HD 4770 ran just barely behind, at an average of 43fps, versus the Radeon HD 4850’s average of 46fps. And in World in Conflict, running at 2,560x1,600, the cards were tied—albeit at a poky average frame rate of just 14fps.

The only real complaint we have about this card is that the fan was quite loud when it kicked into full-speed operation, noticeably out-droning anything else in our test machine. That said, even during intense testing, the card didn’t get hot enough for the fan to stay at full blast for more than a few seconds, and at a slower speed, the fan was very quiet. Also, unlike the Radeon HD 4830, this card occupies two expansion slots, so make sure you save space in your system.

Clearly, if you’re using a 30-inch monitor or want to run today’s games at 1,920x1,200 with all the eye candy maxed out, you’ll need a more capable card. But for gaming at medium resolutions, the Radeon HD 4770 does surprisingly well considering its budget-friendly price. In our testing, it fared nearly as well as (and even sometimes better than) the more expensive Radeon HD 4850, for a fair bit less. Another way to look at the value of the Radeon HD 4770 is to consider that, in most tests, this card even defeated the EVGA E-GeForce 9800 GTX, which, about a year ago, was the fastest single-GPU card available and sold for $350. Until the laws of competition force Nvidia to release a new card to compete (or to lower the price on an existing product with more muscle), the ATI Radeon HD 4770 is the best-performing graphics card for around $100.
Price (at time of review): $109 (mfr. est., before $10 mail-in rebate)

ATI Radeon HD 5870 grapics card

2009-11-01T15:59:00.000-08:00

Key Specs
Graphics Processor: ATI Radeon HD 5870
Core Clock: 850MHz
Graphics Memory: 1GB DDR5
Interface: PCI Express x16
Onboard Ports: Two dual-link DVI, DisplayPort, HDMI
DirectX Support: DirectX 11

ATI Radeon HD 5870 Review
Reviewed by: Denny Atkin
Review Date: October 2009

In the back-and-forth battle to claim the graphics card "king of the hill," ATI has sent Nvidia tumbling down and reclaimed the crown with the new Radeon HD 5870 card. We tested Sapphire's Radeon HD 5870 card and found it the fastest single-GPU graphics card we've tested yet. Though Nvidia's dual-GPU GeForce GTX 295 card still holds the speed records for a single card, the Radeon HD 5870 has the advantages of a significantly lower price, support for DirectX 11, and none of hassles that dual-GPU cards sometimes pose.

Thanks to ATI’s new Eyefinity technology, you’ll be able to connect up to three monitors to this card for productivity, or some super-high-resolution gaming.

The new 5000-series Radeon cards are the first to support DirectX 11, which was introduced in Windows 7and will be available for Windows Vista as well. While DirectX 10 didn't make a huge splash in the gaming and graphics world, DX11 promises to be more successful. Along with the usual under-the-hood 3D programming improvements such as the new Shader Model 5.0, DX11 features DirectCompute support, allowing developers to create games and applications that use the graphics processor to speed computations and program new effects. This capability exists now for DX9 and DX10 cards through Nvidia's CUDA and ATI's Stream, but it's seen little support since different manufacturers have their own programming interfaces. DirectCompute, on the other hand, will work on any DX11 card. So we're hopeful this will help GPU-based computing finally get some traction.

Unfortunately, we weren't able to test the DX11 support. The only currently available DX11-enhanced game, BattleForge, uses the new API to enhance its performance but doesn't really take full advantage of it. Later this year, S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat and DiRT 2 will be available with more thorough DX11 support.

The Sapphire HD 5870 card we tested uses ATI's curvy, restyled stock red-and-black cooler, but emblazons a futuristic warrior girl on the side. It fits in a PCI-E x16 expansion slot, and blocks the adjacent slot to the left. The card boasts an 850MHz GPU, 1GB of 1,200MHz DDR5 memory, and 1,600 stream processors--double that of the Radeon HD 4870.

You'll need a pair of 6-pin PCI-E power connectors to power the card. If your power supply doesn't have these available, Sapphire includes a pair of adapters that will convert hard-drive Molex power connectors to the correct connector. But you'll also need at least a 500W power supply to power a single HD 5870 card. The card draws up to 188W when loaded, but idles at a mere 27W at the desktop. A pair of CrossFireX connectors let you team the HD 5870 with additional ATI cards to further boost performance.

With a pair of dual-link DVI ports, HDMI, and a DisplayPort, there’s no shortage of connection options. Sapphire even includes an adapter for VGA.

On the back of the card, you'll find a wealth of connectors: two dual-link DVI, DisplayPort, and HDMI. Multi-monitor support gets even better with this generation: The card can drive three displays simultaneously, at resolutions up to 2,560x1,600, as long as one of the three is a DisplayPort monitor. (ATI announced that an upcoming version of the card will support up to six simultaneous DisplayPort monitors.) There's also a VGA adapter bundled in the box that can be used on one of the DVI ports.

We weren't able to test DX11 yet, but the HD 5870's performance was stellar even on older DX10 titles. Its 3DMark Vantage Extreme score of 8,253 is nearly double that of the previous-generation Radeon HD 4890, which scored 4,625, and is significantly faster than the 6,341 achieved by XFX's overclocked version of Nvidia''s fastest single-GPU card, the GeForce GTX 285. The HD 5870 managed an impressive 60 fps in our demanding Far Cry 2 benchmark at 2,560x1,600 resolution; running at a lower 1,680x1,050 resolution the frame rate jumped to 101.54. In our World in Conflict test, the results were much closer to the GeForce GTX 285: The HD 5870 scored 73 fps at 1,280x1,024, 55 fps at 1,920x1,200, and 39 fps at 2,560x1,600. The GTX 285's scores were 79, 49, and 35 fps respectively. By comparison, the dual-GPU GTX 295 scored 91, 60, and 49 fps.

Needless to say, video playback of both DVD and Blu-ray discs was smooth and vivid even at HD resolutions.

During our testing, the card was stable, and we didn't encounter any driver glitches. At idle, the fan is relatively quiet, but when the card is working hard, it quickly becomes the loudest component in the computer. It's not shop-vac-level distracting, but it's clearly noticeable even in a low-noise PC case.

The HD 5870 is an easy choice for performance fiends with huge monitors, and those who crank all of a game's graphics settings to 11 and want to be able to continue to do so a year in the future. For now, the Sapphire Radeon HD 5870 card and its siblings from other manufacturers own the single-GPU performance market, as Nvidia's next-generation, DX11-capable GeForce cards won't be available until sometime in 2010. If you're running at 1,920x1,200 resolution or lower, however, ATI may just be competing with itself with its lower-end HD 5770, which offers very playable performance in today's games at those resolutions at a price less than half that of the HD 5870.

ATI Radeon HD 5750 grapics card

2009-11-01T15:58:00.000-08:00

Key Specs
Graphics Processor: ATI Radeon HD 5750
Core Clock: 700MHz
Graphics Memory: 1GB
Interface: PCI Express x16
Onboard Ports: Two DVI, DisplayPort, HDMI
DirectX Support: DirectX 11

ATI Radeon HD 5750 Review
Reviewed by: Matt Safford
Review Date: October 2009

Okay, it's video-card-upgrade time, and your bank account is currently too strapped to handle the $159 asking price of the ATI Radeon HD 5770, and the beefier $379 Radeon HD 5870 is way out of the question. Understood. But you still want your system to support the fancy new visual flourishes that soon-to-arrive DirectX 11 (DX11) games will offer, as well as multiple monitor support. That's not an uncommon wish list today, and the $129 Radeon HD 5750 is an enticing option to fulfill it. Its price isn’t drastically less than the 5770, but its performance isn’t far behind that card, either. Considering the asking price and the minimal number of DX11 games being released before the end of 2009, the 5750 might also be a good stopgap if your current card just doesn’t cut it any more, but you’d rather wait and see how quickly DX11 takes off, and what kind of DX11 performance will be offered from rival graphics-card maker Nvidia.

DirectX 11, the new gaming-centric application programming language that will be launching with Windows 7 (and also to be available to Vista users as well), promises a fair bit of visual improvements for gamers. Users upgrading to a DX11-compatible card (and running games that support DX11, some due out by the end of 2009) will experience graphical goodies like an improved Shader Model 5.0, and hardware tessellation, which should lead to more visually complex characters in games. DX11 also features DirectCompute support, designed to let developers offload computations normally handled by the CPU onto the graphics card. This ability has been available through Nvidia’s CUDA and ATI’s Stream technologies, but DirectCompute promises to gain more traction, as it’s a singular technology that will work with any DX11 card.

Thanks to ATI’s new Eyefinity technology, you’ll be able to connect up to three monitors to this card for productivity, or some super-high-resolution gaming.

The 5700 series of cards, also including the 5770, are the second round of DX11 cards from ATI. And while the 5750 falls on the budget-end of the DX11 bunch, it still packs some impressive architecture for a graphics card that should sell for around $130. The 5770 has 1GB of graphics memory (a 512MB version for around $109 should also be available shortly), and its core clock speed of 700MHz is just 150Hz behind the 5870. It also has 720 Stream Processors (80 fewer than the more expensive 5770). Power efficiency is even more impressive than the 5770, as this card draws just 86 watts at full load, 22 watts less than the 5850. And when idle, it sips just 16 watts. So if you’re looking for a practical excuse to upgrade, this card, over time, will save you money on your electric bill versus an older, more power-hungry card from a year or two ago.

The 5750 also features the same Eyefinity multimonitor support as the 5800 series cards. A pair of dual-link DVI ports, an HDMI port, and a DisplayPort connector on the back of the card will let you connect up to three monitors simultaneously for impressive desktop productivity, or gaming at extreme resolutions above and beyond the typical maximum of 2,560x1,600. If gaming at such high resolutions is your plan, though, one of the more powerful DX11 cards is probably a better choice. Productivity apps on a triple-monitor setup with this card should run smoothly, however.

We weren’t able to truly test the 5770’s DX11 capabilities, as the only game currently available with any DX11 support is EA’s BattleForge, and that game isn’t fully optimized for DX11. Games like DiRT 2 and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. are due to be released this year with full DX11 support, but the flood of DX11 games won’t happen until 2010.

We did, however, put the Radeon HD 5750 through our usual round of DirectX 10 (DX10) gaming tests in our labs with a newly updated testing rig running Windows 7. We came away quite impressed with this card’s playable performance in games up to 1,920x1,200. The more expensive Radeon HD 5770 did slightly better, but for those willing to turn the detail levels down a bit at times, this card should handle today’s DX10 games on 24-inch monitors. Those with smaller screens should experience butter-smooth performance without having to sacrifice detail settings.

In our DX10 World in Conflict test, the 5750 scored average frame rates of 37, 30, and 19 frames per second (fps), at resolutions of 1,280x1,024, 1,920x1,200, and 2,560x1,600, respectively. The 5770 scored 42fps, 32fps, and 22fps on the same tests, respectively, or just a few frames ahead.

With a pair of DVI ports, HDMI, and a DisplayPort, there’s no shortage of connection options with this card.

In our Far Cry 2 DX10 test, the 5770 was still ahead, but again, not by much. The 5770 scored average frame rates of 56.8fps at 1,680x1,060, 49.8fps at 1,920x1,200, and 33.3fps at 2,560x1,600. The 5750’s scores of 49fps, 43.2fps, and 28.7fps on the same tests, respectively, again weren’t far behind. Those willing to dial down the detail levels just slightly should be able to achieve playable frame rates here even at the demanding resolutions of a 30-inch screen. That’s quite impressive for a card at this price and power-consumption point.

The synthetic 3DMark Vantage test might be the best indicator at this point of the performance gap between these two cards, however. Here, the 5770’s score of 9,888 on the Performance setting, and 4,272 on the Extreme setting, are a bit further ahead of the 5750’s scores: 8,136 and 3,386, respectively. Still, considering the previous-generation ATI single-GPU champ, the Radeon HD 4890 (which still sells for around $200) scored 4,625 on the Extreme test, this indicates that ATI's lowest-price DX11 card isn’t far behind its previous-generation high-end GPU. The $379 5870, however, is unsurprisingly in another league, scoring 17,027 on the Performance test and 8,253 in Extreme. So while while the 5750 is impressive for its $129 asking price, those expecting playable performance at high resolutions under DX11 will likely have to shell out for a more expensive card.

Still, for those who don’t consider themselves more than casual 3D gamers, and those looking to upgrade a media PC that only has space for a short (though full-height and dual-width) graphics card that won’t be obsolete with the launch of DirectX 11, the 5750 is a good choice. Likewise, if you need a new card now but would still like to wait and see what rival Nvidia has to offer on the DX11 front in the coming months, the 5750 is a smart stopgap that will keep you playing smoothly today. It won’t do too much damage to your savings scheme if you plan on opting for a serious-performance DirectX 11 card in the coming months.

ATI Radeon HD 5770 grapics card

2009-11-01T15:48:00.000-08:00

Key Specs
Graphics Processor: ATI Radeon HD 5770
Core Clock: 850MHz
Graphics Memory: 1GB
Interface: PCI Express x16
Onboard Ports: Two DVI, HDMI, DisplayPort
DirectX Support: DirectX 11

ATI Radeon HD 5770 Review
Reviewed by: Matt Safford
Review Date: October 2009

ATI beat rival Nvidia to the DirectX 11 (DX11) punch with the recent release of its Radeon HD 5800 series graphics cards, and they're already following it up with a more budget-minded pair of cards that are still quite impressive. We recently tested the Radeon HD 5870 and found that, while the lack of current DX11 games makes testing performance in that area difficult, its DirectX 10 (DX10) support places it firmly atop the single-GPU graphics-card heap, at least for the moment. And with support for up to three monitors on a single card, it’s capable of gaming at impressively high resolutions. But at about $379, it’s out of the price range of many gamers, particularly in today’s cash-crunched economy.

Thankfully, just a few weeks after announcing high-end DX11 cards that most gamers can’t afford, ATI is back with the 5700 series, bringing many of the 5800 series’ features to a price point less than half that of the 5870. At a suggested price of $159, the Radeon HD 5770 brings DX11 support into the mainstream. And while DX11 games haven’t exactly arrived yet, impatient gamers who buy now will have plenty of DX10 eye candy to tide them over, as this card’s DX10 performance is stunningly impressive for the price.

DirectX 11, the new gaming-centric application programming language that will launch with Windows 7 (and be available to Vista users as well), promises a fair bit of visual improvements for gamers. Users upgrading to a DX11-compatible card (and running games that support DX11, some of which are due out by the end of 2009) will experience an improved Shader Model 5.0, as well as hardware tessellation, which should lead to more visually complex characters in games. DX11 also features DirectCompute support, designed to let developers offload computations normally handled by the CPU onto the graphics card. This ability has been available through Nvidia’s CUDA and ATI’s Stream technologies, but DirectCompute promises to gain more traction, as it’s a singular technology that will work with any DX11 card.

Thanks to ATI’s new Eyefinity technology, you’ll be able to connect up to three monitors to this card for productivity, or some super-high-resolution gaming.

The 5700 series of cards, also including the smaller, somewhat slower $129 5750, are the second round of DirectX 11 cards from ATI. And while they don’t quite have the same graphical oomph as their more-expensive cousins, the 5770 packs some impressive architecture for a graphics card that isn’t aimed squarely at enthusiasts with deep pockets. The 5770 has 1GB of GDDR5 memory, and its core clock speed of 850MHz is the same as that of the 5870, although its 800 Stream Processors are only half as many as those found on the more expensive 5870. Power efficiency is also important to note, as this card draws just 108 watts at full load, 80 watts less than the 5870. Plus, when idle, it sips just 18 watts; the 5870 sucks down 27 watts when idle. So if you’re looking for a practical excuse to upgrade, this card, over time, will save you money on your electric bill versus a card from a year or two ago, as well.

Physically, the 5770 is less than 9 inches long, which means it will fit in some cases that just can't handle the larger 11-inch 5870. And requiring just a single six-pin power connector, it will be less demanding on a system's power supply than more powerful cards.

But if size, money, and power consumption aren't as much of a concern as extreme gaming, consider that the 5770 also features the same Eyefinity multimonitor support as the 5800 series cards. A pair of dual-link DVI ports, an HDMI port, and a DisplayPort connector on the back of the card will let you connect up to three monitors simultaneously for impressive desktop productivity, or gaming at extreme resolutions above and beyond the typical maximum of 2,560x1,600. If gaming at such high resolutions is your plan, however, opting for the more powerful 5870 card (or a pair of 5770 cards running in tandem using CrossFire) is probably a better choice, especially if you want to do so with future DirectX 11 games, which will no doubt be more demanding.

As previously noted, we weren’t able to truly test the 5770’s DX11 capabilities, as the only game currently available with any DX11 support is EA’s BattleForge, and that game isn’t fully optimized for DX11. Games such as DiRT 2 and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. are due to be released this year with full DX11 support, but the flood of DX11 games won’t happen until 2010.

That being said, we put the Radeon HD 5770 through our usual spate of DX10 gaming tests in our labs with a newly updated testing rig running Windows 7. We came away quite impressed with this card’s playable performance in games up to and sometimes above resolutions of 1,920x1,200. The ATI Radeon HD 5870, which sells for well more than twice as much, does notably better—but, in DX10 at least, it's overkill unless you plan to game with a trio of LCDs or a 30-inch monitor.

Port selection on this card is impressive, including twin dual-link DVD ports, HDMI, and a DisplayPort.

In our DX10 World in Conflict test, the 5770 scored average frame rates of 42, 32, and 22 frames per second (fps), at resolutions of 1,280x1,024, 1,920x1,200, and 2,560x1,600, respectively. The 5870 scored 73fps, 55fps, and 39fps on the same tests, respectively, illustrating its dominance, most notably at screen resolutions you're only likely to see on 30-inch monitors.

In Far Cry 2’s DX10 test, the 5770 put up noticeably better numbers, returning a playable frame rate even at the highest resolutions we test. The 5770 scored average frame rates of 56.8fps at 1,680x1,060, 49.8fps at 1,920x1,200, and 33.3fps at 2,560x1,600. The 5870’s scores of 101.5fps, 87.8fps, and 60.6fps on the same tests, respectively, solidify the more-expensive card’s dominance, but for users more interested in playability than bragging rights, the 5770 handles this game with relative ease, even at extremely high resolutions.

Until DX11 games appear en masse, the synthetic 3DMark Vantage test might be the best indicator of the performance gap between these two cards, however. And here, the 5770’s score of 9,888 on Vantage's Performance setting, and 4,272 on its Extreme setting, are still impressive, considering the previous-generation ATI single-GPU champ, the Radeon HD 4890 (which still sells for around $200) scored just a bit better on the latter test (4,625). The $379 5870, however, is unsurprisingly in another league, scoring almost twice as high, or 17,027 on the Performance test, and 8,253 in Extreme. What these scores indicate to us is that while the 5770 is indeed impressive for its $159 asking price, the 5870 will likely perform much better on DX11 games when they become available. But considering the 5870 costs more than twice as much, that’s probably the way it should be.

If you’re happy with your current DX10 performance on an older card, and aren’t extremely excited about the DX11 games that will be first out of the gate, there isn’t an extremely compelling reason to upgrade yet, at least until ATI’s rival Nvidia launches its first DX11 cards sometime in the coming months. But if your old card isn’t keeping up with today’s games and you’re excited about slapping a triple-monitor setup on your desk for gaming and productivity (and are short on cash after shelling out for those couple of extra LCDs), the ATI Radeon HD 5770 is a great value. It handles today’s games at high resolutions with ease, and it offers DX11 support that will make tomorrow’s games even more impressive. Those looking to game at 2,560x1,600 resolutions without compromising on any of the eye candy should look to more-expensive cards with more-powerful graphics performance. But if mainstream gaming is good enough for you, the $159 ATI Radeon HD 5770 is the new card to beat.

Canon Selphy ES40 review

2009-10-21T18:57:00.000-07:00

Price (at time of review): $149.99 (mfr. est.)

Key Specs
Print Technology: Dye sublimation Interface: USB 2.0; PictBridge/USB; memory-card slot; optional Bluetooth Supported Paper Sizes: Card (2.1x 3.4 inches); postcard (3.9x5.8 inches) Maximum Resolution: 300x300dpi LCD Size (Diagonal): 3.5 inches Dimensions (HWD): 9x9x5.4 inches Weight: 4.8 pounds

Canon Selphy ES40 Review

Reviewed by: Susan Glinert
Review Date: October 2009

There’s a scene in Woody Allen’s futuristic sci-fi movie, Sleeper, where the hero comes home and finds his appliances in the middle of a furious argument. When we saw the Voice button on the front of the Selphy ES40, we had a bad feeling that the printer was going to wake up and announce, “Hi! I’m Phil, and I’ll be your printer today!” Then we would have to immediately consult the manual to disable this feature. (We like our appliances quiet and docile.) Fortunately, the voice feature isn’t obnoxious—the perky-sounding female voice merely announces that printing is finished and walks you through certain menus.

If you enjoy listening to appliances (or even if you don’t), this $149 photo printer is a good investment. It’s a competent, compact photo printer that’s easy to set up and use, and the print quality is terrific. On the down side, the cost per photo is high, like with the Canon Selphy CP790 we reviewed just before this model, especially compared with printers from Epson and Kodak. So you'll pay for the companionship.

The Selphy ES40 looks and feels just like a boxy 1950s radio, complete with a handle for lugging to the beach. The front panel sports a 3.5-inch LCD panel and an assortment of buttons for accessing the menu, setting the number of copies, toggling voice guidance on and off, and setting trim. The Creative button lets you add a variety of special effects, such as soft focus, vignette, pinhole camera, nostalgic (sort of faded), smooth skin (great for wrinkle removal), and starlight. Here is also where you’ll find a variety of built-in layouts, such as calendar, plus the ability to add frames, clip art, and speech bubbles. One notable omission—the software cannot shrink a picture to fit the paper.

The memory card slots are located underneath a sliding panel at the top of the printer.

Despite what you might think at first glance, the wheel on the front doesn’t tune a radio—it’s used to cycle through menu options or photos on a memory card. Memory-card slots are located underneath a sliding panel at the top of the unit, which keeps dust and coffee from finding its way into the printer. The connection ports are on the left side of the printer. Best of all, there’s no power-brick transformer, just a slender power cable that plugs into the back of the unit. Once you’ve inserted the paper/cartridge pack and attached the power cord (there’s no battery option), you’re ready to print.

This Selphy might look like a radio, but the manual states that it may not be placed within three feet of one, nor a TV set or other device that generates strong magnetic fields. The printer requires about six inches of extra space on the back side for its air vent. You also need to leave some clearance in front of the unit. The photo paper is stored inside the printer in a vertical orientation; when you make a print, the sheet emerges from a slot in the front, parallel to your desk. The Selphy ES40 then rotates the paper 90 degrees and draws it back into the printer. (Strangely, it's cool to watch.)

While you don’t need to use a computer with the Selphy ES40 to print photographs, you do need one to read the instruction manual. A 20-page printed beginner’s guide covers the main features, but for complete feature coverage, you’ll need to read the PDF manual supplied on the CD. Here you’ll find directions for the extra features the printer offers: automatic red-eye correction, image trimming, color adjustments, layout variation, and special effects. You can also make calendar pages and sets of ID photos, both conveniently built into the software.

The Selphy ES40 is especially easy to load up with consumables, because the 50-sheet paper pack and dye-sublimation cartridge are a single unit. Installing the combo is as simple as removing the orange plastic tab and sliding the unit into a slot on the right side of the printer. We like this arrangement, because the packs make the printer especially portable—no need to stash both cartridges and paper and then fumble around with a feed tray. (The printer doesn’t need one, because the paper is stored inside the unit.) The convenience trade-off means that the printer itself is a bit bulkier than competing models—9x9x5.4 inches—and weighs almost 5 pounds.

The paper/cartridge pack is inserted in the top of the printer.

You can use the printer independently with memory cards, or you can connect it via USB to your computer or camera. (Cables are not included, and unfortunately, you can’t print directly from a USB key.) The driver and the Selphy Photo Print utility installed without any problems, although the software required that we reboot the computer.

Selphy Photo Print is a very basic app for printing photos and adding simple clip art, speech bubbles, text, or frames to your photo. This underpowered app can only use TrueType fonts, and it only sees photos that reside in the My Pictures folder, a malady that also affected the Selphy CP790. Once you’ve selected a picture, you can magnify an area, apply rotation, or let the program auto-adjust the image. There’s no way to save preferences or settings; selecting another photo means starting all over again. And if you plug a memory card into the printer, you’ll have to exit Photo Print, because the app won’t be able to find the printer again until you do so.

Because the Selphy uses dye-sublimation technology to print (as opposed to inkjet), it features the 300x300dpi resolution and 256 levels of color typical of snapshot printers that use the technology. The four-color cartridge also includes a protective coating for each photograph, making the prints reasonably resistant to water and scratches. We carefully positioned a drippy glass on top of a print and left it there for about 20 minutes with no harm to the photo. We also placed the photo face down on a wood floor and rolled a chair over it with no perceptible damage. Canon claims a 100-year life for the photos if they are stored in the dark; constant exposure to light reduces the lifetime to 10 years (or 30 years, if kept under glass).

All of the Selphy's editing tools and controls are located on the front of the printer.

Each photo took exactly 80 seconds to print, both when printed from the computer and in stand-alone mode using an SD card. That time compares favorably with Canon’s less-expensive Selphy CP780 (59 seconds for PC-based printing, and 1 minute and 13 seconds in stand-alone mode), because the timing includes paper rotation as well as printing. But it’s almost twice as long as the pricier Sony DPP-FP97 Digital Photo Printer (which printed in 42.6 seconds and 44.8 seconds, respectively).

It was worth the wait, though, since we were impressed with the quality of the photos. We saw clear color without either washed-out highlights or muddy low-lights. Printing directly from a Canon PictBridge camera, the computer, or memory card made no difference to the image quality. In all cases, the photographs were virtually perfect and equal to or better than drugstore prints.

You'll recognize that you're paying for convenience here, however, if you compare the cost per print to the prices at your local pharmacy's one-hour photo service. You can purchase Canon's 50-photo cartridge/paper combo pack for $19.99 (40 cents a photo) or buy a more economical 100-photo pack for $31.99 (32 cents a photo). These prices are fairly high compared with the Epson PictureMate Dash PM260 (25 cents a photo), but about the same as the Canon Selphy CP790 we recently reviewed. If you are feeling particularly flush, you can add glitzy gold or silver frames (or clip-art highlights) to your photos via special cartridges offered by Canon; you load these specifically when you want to do print an image with gold or silver highlights, and they're usable only when printing from a computer. Expect to pay about $1 each for these prints; the gold and silver cartridges cost $19.99 each.

Indeed, the running costs for this machine are fairly high. On the upside, Canon does offer a one-year warranty for parts and labor, in a world dominated by 90-day warranties. If your printer breaks during this time and Canon’s tech service can’t solve the problem via phone, you’ll get a replacement and a prepaid label to return the defective unit. Despite the parsimonious software bundle, this printer is a very able choice—if you can afford the media.

Lite-On iHOS104 BD-ROM review

2009-10-21T18:55:00.000-07:00

Lite-On iHOS104 BD-ROM Review

Reviewed by: Matt Safford
Review Date: June 2009

Over the last few years, the prices of 1080p-capable LCD monitors have fallen dramatically, to the point where solidly performing displays like the Asus VH222H can be found for not much more than $150. And 25.5-inch and larger LCDs are becoming increasingly common—and increasingly affordable. HDTV prices, too, are taking a similar tumble, making them appealing alternatives to PC monitors when connected via HDMI. All of these trends are making the idea of watching stunning 1080p Blu-ray movies from your PC ever-more enticing. If you've just blown your budget on that new LCD TV or monitor, we know of no cheaper way to watch Blu-ray (on a PC or otherwise) than the $70 Lite-On iHOS104 BD-ROM. It won't burn Blu-ray discs (or any other type of recordable media), but if you're looking to watch Blu-ray on a budget, this is the new drive to beat.

Of course, you'll want to make sure your PC's hardware can handle Blu-ray playback before buying the iHOS104, or any Blu-ray drive. CyberLink, the company that makes the playback software bundled with this drive, has a free BD Advisor application available that will scan your system and tell you if you're Blu-ray ready, or what you may need to upgrade.

The iHOS104 is an internal drive, so you'll have to make space for it in your case. And because it won't burn CDs or DVDs, you'll have to keep your old DVD burner installed to keep that functionality at hand. (That may make the iHOS104 a poor fit for small-form-factor cases that can accommodate only one optical drive.) But both novice and veteran PC users should find installation straightforward, so long as their PC's power supply has a free Serial ATA power connector and the motherboard a spare SATA port.

Hooking up this Blu-ray drive isn't any different than hooking up any standard Serial ATA optical drive. Once you mount the drive in a free 5.25-inch bay, connection is a matter of plugging in two cables to the back of the drive: Run the included SATA data cable from a SATA port on your motherboard, and connect a SATA power lead from your power supply. The whole installation process took us less than 10 minutes. If your case doesn't match the black bezel that comes pre-installed on the front of the drive, there's a silver replacement included in the box. (For more on installing a Blu-ray optical drive, check out our Weekend Project feature story "How to Install a Blu-ray Burner.")

CyberLink's PowerDVD is bundled with the drive. It does a good job of handling Blu-ray playback, as well as playing several other disc/file formats.

After closing up your case and powering on the PC, Windows should find and install the iHOS104's driver automatically. You'll then need to install the included CyberLink PowerDVD BD Edition software. (Installation went smoothly for us, even on our recently built Windows 7 system.) After entering a license key upon starting PowerDVD for the first time, we popped in a Blu-ray copy of Pan's Labyrinth. The image quality looked great on a ViewSonic VX2260wm test monitor, and it was even more impressive when we connected the PC to a larger HDTV via HDMI. We found CyberLink's PowerDVD software to be as simple and capable as most other DVD software we've used.

Those with a desire to burn Blu-ray data disks will have to look elsewhere (and spend more than twice as much) for a Blu-ray burner, as the Lite-On iHOS104 can't record discs. But if all you're looking to do is watch 1080p Blu-ray movies on your PC (or a TV connected to it), this drive is the cheapest option we've seen, and it gets the job done admirably.

Price (at time of review): $69.99 (mfr. est.)

AMD Athlon II X2 240e review

2009-10-21T18:51:00.000-07:00

Price (at time of review): $77 (mfr. est.)

Key Specs
Socket Type: AM3; AM2+ Number of Cores: Two Operating Frequency: 2.8GHz Front-Side Bus: HyperTransport 3.0 L2 Cache: 1MB (512K per core)

AMD Athlon II X2 240e Review

Reviewed by: Matt Safford
Review Date: October 2009

Intel may have cornered the market on high-end desktop processors for the time being with its über-expensive Core i7-97 5 and its somewhat less expensive quad-core variants. But AMD, ever-cognizant that the mainstream and budget arenas are where most CPUs are sold, continues to innovate in this area. At the time of this writing (late October 2009), the company announced no less than eight new Athlon II processors, ranging from the dual-core Athlon II X2 235e (running at 2.7GHz and priced at $69), up to the quad-core Athlon II X4 605e, clocked at 2.3GHz and priced at an estimated $143.

Six of these new processors have an "e" appended to their names, indicating that they are rated for low power consumption. The "e" chips have a maximum power rating of 45 watts, compared with the typical 95-watt draw of today's standard Athlon CPUs. We looked at the Athlon II X2 240e, which has a clock speed of 2.8GHz and 1MB of total L2 cache; it should sell for around $77. Like all current AMD Phenom and Athlon processors, this CPU can be placed in an AM3-socket motherboard (and paired with DDR3 memory), or in an older, less-costly AM2+ motherboard, which uses less-expensive DDR2 memory.

Apart from the low-power rating for many of the new chips, what's the difference between AMD's new Athlons and its more-expensive Phenom II CPUs? Mainly, the Athlon II lacks the Phenom II's 6MB of Level 3 (L3) cache. How much this affects performance depends on the application. In our tests of AMD's recent $99 quad-core Athlon II X4 620, we found that the Athlon II X4 was nearly able to match midrange Phenom II chips in some applications, but it fell far behind in multicore-aware applications such as the Sony Vegas video editor. As the Athlon II X2 240e chip doesn't have four cores, that level of performance with apps like Vegas will drop off accordingly. But unless you're using professional-level content-creation software or other fully multi-threaded programs, you aren't likely to see a major performance difference between Athlon II and Phenom II processors that have similar clock speeds and the same number of cores.

Power users concerned only with maximum performance likely won't be interested in these energy-sipping CPUs, but those looking to build or upgrade a mainstream PC should take note. These low-power processors pull just a bit more than half the power that their standard counterparts do, making them a great choice for machines that aren't often powered down. And if you're considering upgrading an older AM2+ system with a new CPU, grabbing one of these lower-power processors for your new system could end up saving you money on your electric bill over time. That's because, unless you're running a large, power-hungry 3D-graphics card, the CPU is generally the component in your PC with the biggest power draw.

In our tests, the dual-core Athlon II X2 240e couldn't quite keep up with AMD's recent $99 quad-core Athlon II X4 620, again particularly with Sony Vegas, which is optimized to take full advantage of multiple CPU cores. However, with software that isn't as optimized for multiple CPU cores (and most software today still falls into that category), the Athlon II X2 240e did surprisingly well, especially considering that it costs about 25 percent less than the 620 and uses just a little over half the power of its quad-core counterpart.

On our 64-bit Cinebench 10 test, which taxes the CPU to render a large, photo-realistic image, the Athlon II X2 240e's score of 6,103 was noticeably below the Athlon II X4 620's score of 9,840. And in our Windows Media 9 Encoder test, the 240e took 5 minutes and 21 seconds to covert our test file, a minute and a half longer than the quad-core 620. But in our iTunes 7 conversion test, which isn't fully optimized to use multiple cores, the 240e benefited from its faster clock speed (2.8GHz), converting our 11 test files in just 3 minutes and 23 seconds, which is 26 seconds faster than the 620 CPU. (It runs at 2.6GHz.)

As noted, though, on our Sony Vegas 8 test, designed to drive every core a CPU has to the max, the dual-core Athlon II X2 240e can't really compete with the quad-core Athlon II X4 620. In our Vegas MPEG-2 rendering test, the 240e took 7 minutes and 49 seconds, while the 620 slipped in nearly three minutes faster (5 minutes and 7 seconds). Clearly, if you frequently use video-editing or professional graphics programs like Adobe's CS4 (which is also fully optimized for multi-core CPUs), a quad-core CPU is well worth the extra money. And if you still want to save some money on your electric bill, AMD's new Athlon II X4 605e features four cores, plus a power-friendly 45-watt maximum power draw. Of course, if you're editing massive numbers of large media files, particularly HD images or video, much more powerful (and power-hungry) CPUs like AMD's Phenom II 965 and Intel's Core-i5 and Core-i7 processors will save you loads of time waiting for your projects to render. Whether that saved time is worth spending a lot more money on a CPU and compatible components depends on how often you edit, and how much you can tolerate waiting around for your PC to finish rendering your projects.

While more-powerful CPUs are available for just a little more money, the $77 Athlon II X2 240e is still speedy enough for common PC tasks, and it never felt sluggish in our Windows 7 testbed PC. Its 45-watt maximum power rating is just over half that of many other mainstream CPUs, and it's even more power-efficient when compared with high-end performance CPUs, so it should save you some measurable money in the long run. And those looking to save money now will appreciate this CPU's compatibility with less-expensive AM2+ motherboards and DDR2 memory. This is a safe pick for budget-conscious upgraders and builders, and well suited to efficient, everyday productivity tasks should you see it in a prebuilt PC.

How To Upgrade Your Laptop Hard Drive

2009-10-21T18:34:00.000-07:00

These days, a lot of laptops come with pretty big hard drives, all things considered. It's not hard to find 320GB or 500GB drives in even the relatively affordable models. That wasn't always the case, though. If your laptop is a year or two old, you might find yourself running out of space.

Or perhaps, you just feel that your drive access is too slow. Your drive may be large enough, but it's an older 4500 RPM or 5400 RPM model and you want to move up to a newer 7200 RPM drive, perhaps with more cache.

The good news is, unlike many parts on modern notebooks, the hard drive is usually something you can swap out. The bad news is, it takes a little bit of work. In this article we'll show you how to copy the contents of your notebook's drive to a new one, then install it.

We'll be using a Dell XPS M1330 (Buy Now) here, along with a brand-new 500GB Seagate Momentus 7200.4 drive (Buy Now). But our advice will be as generic as possible, so you can easily apply it to your own system.

Stuff You'll Need

Before we get started, let's talk about the parts you'll need. Obviously you'll need your laptop and your new hard drive—typically a 2.5-inch SATA laptop hard drive (unless your laptop is really old).

click on image for full view

To get into your laptop, you'll need some small screwdrivers. This can vary a bit depending on your laptop, but it's a good idea to have micro flathead and Phillips head screwdrivers. You may also need a Torx screwdriver (the little six-pointed star shape). These are cheap and available at any hardware store.

We'd advise against trying to use tools that don't quite fit, as tempting as that may be—it's easy to strip the screws, and you probably don't have extras lying around that are the right size and length to replace them. For most laptops, the little screwdrivers are the only tools you'll need to get inside.

click on image for full view

If you're going to re-install your operating system from scratch, that hardware is all you'll need. We're going to copy the contents of our current drive to the new one, though, so we're going to need an extra piece of hardware and some software to do that. We'll talk about the software in a bit, but the hardware we'll need is a USB-to-SATA adaptor. We're using a Sabrent USB-DSC5 adaptor kit that sells for around $20, and can hook up either SATA or IDE laptop drives. Continued...

click on image for full view

Copying Your Drive

If you're going to reinstall your operating system from scratch, you can skip all this. We want to show you how to preserve your data, though, so we'll walk you through it all.

First, make sure your laptop is plugged in. The drive copy can take a long time, and you don't want to run out of power in the middle of it. That would be, well, bad.

Note that we're using a Dell laptop, and nearly every Dell computer these days ships with a recovery partition and a hidden partition of diagnostic tools. If you don't have a laptop with these sort of hidden partitions, this will be a little easier. Given the popularity of Dell computers (and others with hidden recovery/diagnostic partitions) we figured we'd make things a little harder on purpose.

First, you need to hook up your new hard drive to your USB port with the SATA-to-USB adaptor. It's really rather self-explanatory. Then boot into Windows.

click on image for full view

Now it's time to install the drive cloning software. If you're using a Seagate drive like we are, you can use Seagate's free DiscWizard application to copy your drive. MaxBlast 5 is the similar app for Maxtor drives. This is basically a free, vendor-specific version of the disk copying tools from Acronis.

We want to keep this as vendor-neutral as possible, in case your new replacement drive isn't made by Seagate/Maxtor. We generally like Acronis' products, so we'll use their Migrate Easy 7.0 tool. This is a $40 application, but it's got a free, fully-functional 15-day trial. If you're only going to clone one drive one time, that's all you really need. Miray's free HDClone software gets rave reviews as well.

You'll have to reboot your computer after installing Migrate Easy, then launch the app. Make sure your new drive is hooked up with your USB-to-SATA adaptor before booting up. Once in the software, click on the Disk Clone option to launch the cloning wizard. After it scans the drives, you'll be presented with a choice between "Automatic" and "Manual." For many drives, Automatic will work fine. Because we want to copy the hidden partition over, we're going to choose Manual.

click on image for full view

We're prompted for the source hard disk. With the internal hard drive selected, we can see how the 150GB drive is carved up into several partitions. This is the one we want. We're then asked for the destination drive, which is obviously our "USB" 500GB drive.

click on image for full view

We're given three options for the old drive—Create a new partition layout, Keep data, or Destroy data. We want to keep data, the default option, in case anything goes wrong and we need to replace the old drive.

click on image for full view

Now a crucial step in our Dell drive cloning. We're asked what moving method we'd like to use, and given options between: As Is, Proportional, and Manual. Proportional is usually fine, and will attempt to grow each partition by the same relative amount.

However, with drives that have recovery partitions, this is a problem. Proportional sizing can play havoc with the recovery partition, which we really need to remain the same size.

So we'll choose As Is. This will make all the partitions on our new drive the exact same size as the old drive. This is a tremendous waste of space! We have a 500GB drive, and it will look like less than 150GB, just like the current drive. That's okay. The plan is to copy all the partitions over at the exact same size, preserving the functionality of the recovery and diagnostic sections, then manually adjust the size of the primary OS partition after we have the drive cloned.

click on image for full view

Now we're shown the final drive structure, and you can see all that unallocated space we're wasting. Again, if your laptop has no hidden partitions, you don't have to go through all this mess. Just choose an Automatic copy and you should be good to go.

click on image for full view

After clicking Proceed, the computer reboots and begins its byte-by-byte copy of the drive.

After the Copy

After the computer reboots, locks partitions, and clones the drives, we still have a little work to do. The cloning operation can take a very long time, especially if you're doing a byte-by-byte copy like we are (ours took several hours), so don't be alarmed if it's not exactly speedy.

Once the copy is complete, it's time to do a little surgery on the laptop. If you're going to install the OS from scratch on your new drive, this is where you rejoin our How-To in progress.

First, unplug your laptop and remove the battery (there's usually a battery latch on the bottom). Wait a minute to make sure all the power has dissipated from the system—you never want to take a screwdriver to your computer if there's any current in there at all.

How you remove and replace the hard drive in your laptop will vary wildly by manufacturer and model type. Some you'll access through the empty battery compartment. Some you may have to take the entire shell off, or remove the keyboard from the top side.

Some, like our Dell XPS M1330, have a set of screws you remove on the bottom specifically to access the hard drive, which then slides out of the side (in our case) or is revealed by lifting a cover. If you have no idea where to begin, do a search for "[notebook model] disassembled" and see what comes up. There are lots of photo guides and videos to taking apart most popular notebook models.

click on image for full view

Once you remove your old hard drive and replace it with your new one, then screw everything back together, you're ready to go.

If you didn't have any hidden partitions and were able to use an automatic or file-by-file clone of the drive, or if you're going to install your OS from scratch on the new blank drive, you're basically done!

Fixing Partition Sizes

We did a sector-by-sector copy of our drive to preserve functionality of the hidden partitions, so we still have a little work to do. We need to resize our primary partition (the C: drive) to fill up all that unused space in our new larger drive.

In Vista, you can do this pretty easily with the built-in disk management tool. In the Start menu, type "manage" to filter search results that will include "Computer Management." Click on that. In the computer management tool, on the left side under "Storage" you'll see the "Disk Management" option. Click on that, and you'll see all your drives and volumes listed in the center pane.

click on image for full view

From there, we just right-click the primary C: partition and select Extend. A window pops up asking us how big to make the partition, and it already defaults to the maximum available size. All we have to do is hit Next and it's done.

click on image for full view

That's really all there is to it. Of course, depending on the type of hidden/utility/recovery partitions you may have and their location on the drives, you may not be able to use the Disk Management utility to extend the partition.

Also, this Disk Management doesn't offer this functionality in Windows XP. For that, you can use the annoying command-line utility from Microsoft called diskpart.exe. Using diskpart.exe can be confusing and obtuse, but Microsoft has instructions that may help. Finally, if none of that will work, you can rely on a third-party app like Partition Magic or Partition Master, though those tools aren't always free.

Final Thoughts

Replacing the hard drive in your laptop is actually a pretty easy process for most people. Most laptops make it fairly easy to access the hard drive, even if it's not immediately obvious. Most laptops don't have special hidden partitions that won't work properly if they're resized.

So for most users, you can do an easy file-by-file type ("Automatic") copy that is pretty fast and you don't have to worry about any sort of partition resizing or anything of that sort.

Even if you have those sorts of partitions, you can make life easy by doing a fast clone of the primary partition only, skipping all the recovery/diagnostics/whatever partitions altogether. You won't have use of them once you upgrade your hard drive, but if you're okay with that, it makes life a lot easier.

Of course, some would argue that a better alternative is to simply re-install your OS from scratch on the blank drive. This requires backing up all your data, re-installing all your applications, and copying all your data back. All of which is a pain, but it results in a nice clean installation that isn't gunked-up with stuff you don't use anymore, and besides, you back up your data regularly anyway, right?

If that's the case, you simply remove the old drive, slap in the new one, put your OS install disc in the optical drive, and start from scratch. It's simple and effective, if time-consuming.

The only time things get a little hairy is if you have a laptop with special partitions that need to remain the same size, and you want to make sure they still function when you get over to the new drive. This requires making a very slow byte-by-byte copy first, which leaves a lot of unformatted space on the drive, then adjusting the size of your main partition later to use that empty space.

If you update the hard drive on your laptop, or have done it in the past, head to the comments for this article and share your experiences and tips.

10 Tips for Turbocharging Windows 7 Gaming

2009-10-21T18:30:00.000-07:00

Windows Games Explorer Tips
The Games Explorer in Windows 7 is much more useful. In Vista, it was almost as if Microsoft was ashamed of the idea of people playing games on their PC. The Explorer lived in the right side start menu, not show up in the programs listing and, if you had a lot of games, it would take forever to load.

The Games Explorer in Win7 is much more flexible. It actually shows up as a group in the "All Programs" now. And there's other nifty stuff you can do with it. It's still not the release version of Windows 7, so some features (like finding updates) don't work. But you can still get a lot of benefit out of the Games Explorer.

click on image for full view

Drag the Games Explorer to Your Desktop
Those of you who are neatniks about their desktops can ignore this, but you can now drag the Games Explorer from the Start Menu to the Windows 7 desktop. It's just another shortcut, and a double click will open it.

Drag Your Game to the Games Explorer
If you've ever had to scroll down a lengthy list of applications to find the publisher of your game, then launch it, the Games Explorer is your friend.

In the old days, some users would create a kind of virtual Games Explorer by force-installing all games to a common directory, like D:\Games. The Games Explorer now effectively virtualizes this.

Even Steam and Stardock Impulse games can now be dragged from their Start Menu entries into the Games Explorer.

Pin Frequently Used Games to the Task Bar
If you find yourself playing a hot new often—something we all do on occasion—even the chore of opening the Games Explorer takes too long. If you right click on one of the game icons in Games Explorer, it will give you the option of pinning it to the Task Bar. Now your game is just a single click away. You can right click on the icon in the task bar any time to unpin it.

Use Parental Controls
If you're using a shared family PC, and you want to avoid exposing small children to violent games, use Parental Controls. Note that Parental Controls only work if all accounts are password protected, and the account you allow your kids to log into is a standard user account (not an administrator account).

Other Windows 7 Gaming Tips

Calibrate your display—Windows 7 includes a nifty display calibration setup. In the control panel click "Hardware and Sound", then "Display", and then the "Calibrate color" link in the left column. This will create a profile for gamma and color adjustments, and optionally even TrueType settings.

If you already have a profile installed for your display, particularly if it's a wide color gamut display, then you may not want to use the Windows 7 calibration tool. This is particularly true if you're a digital photographer or videographer who wants to have a wide gamut display calibrated for Adobe RGB or other wide gamut color space.

On the other hand, if you have a wide gamut display, and you want to calibrate it for gaming and normal desktop use, you might want to set it for sRGB. Once set up for sRGB, you can use the Windows 7 calibration tool to get the color output that's most accurate.

While we're on the topic of displays, screen resolution has its own context (right click) menu. This will bring up the screen resolution menu. On it, you'll find a link to "Advanced Settings." Click on that, and you'll get the classic display property sheet. See the tab labeled "Color Management?" That takes to a screen with a single button labeled, oddly enough, "Color Management."

click on image for full view

From that button, you can get to a very detailed screen that helps you manage the color for your display devices, and also includes another route to the Windows 7 display calibration tool. Tread carefully, though, as you could end up making all your images and games look either very dull or quite garish.

click on image for full view

If there's a profile for your specific display, you can choose either ICC or sRGB viewing conditions. This way, you can have the best of both worlds: ICC profiles for photo and image editing and sRGB for normal desktop use and gaming.

DOS Games? On Windows 7?
Play old DOS games with DOSBox—Windows 7, like Vista, doesn't play nice with a whole lot of old DOS games. If you want to get your nostalgia fix on, we suggest trying DOSBox, a great, free, open source DOS emulator. Get it at DOSBox.

The Return of MSConfig.exe
Disable unwanted startup programs with msconfig.exe. In Vista, the easy way to do this was through Windows Defender. Just go to the Tools menu and choose Software Explorer.

That option is gone from Windows 7, at least in the RC. Instead, open the Start menu and type "msconfig" then press Enter. Our good old friend the System Configuration menu will pop up, and the Startup tab can be of great help in preventing unwanted applications, background services, and tools from running every time you boot up. (I'm looking at you, QTTask.exe.)

Upgrading a Graphics Card: 20 Must-Know Tips

2009-10-21T18:22:00.000-07:00

Maybe there are statistics, maybe there aren't, but we're willing to bet that in the computer enthusiast space, the most-upgraded part of any self-respecting system is the graphics card. That's probably doubly-true when it comes to geeks like the ExtremeTech staff that have at least one computer built especially for gaming—which means we upgrade graphics cards religiously.

The graphics market is ever-evolving, and our computers evolve right along with it. There are few feelings worse than that sense of desolate jealousy you get when you drop a brand-new video card into your system only to read—usually the very next day—an announcement of a newer, better card.

Not long ago, we presented you with a big batch of hints for when the inevitable time comes that you have to swap out your computer's motherboard. Now it's time for a similar piece, but this time we're focusing on upgrading the graphics card for your system.

The rules are the same: This is not a tutorial, a how-to, or a here's-exactly-what-you-do. The Internet is chock full of such articles. Rather, this is a collection of handy tips that to compliment such tutorials and make them that much easier.

Choosing the Right Card

Before you even begin to upgrade your computer's graphics card, you have to procure its replacement. Thus, our first set of tips is about choosing the perfect card for your impending upgrade. Remember, this isn't a step-by-step, so here, in no particular order, are our tips.

Depending on the age of your current system, be prepared for the worst. If your computer hasn't been upgraded in several years, you might need to upgrade lots of other parts simply to facilitate a graphics card upgrade. While there are a few AGP cards still available on the market, you'll likely want to upgrade to a PCI Express graphics card. If your motherboard doesn't have a PCI Express X16 expansion slot, you'll have to upgrade the motherboard—and therefore, the CPU and very likely the memory as well.
Set a budget before you pick out a graphics card. That way, you won't get carried away and spend more money than you actually have. The budget should take into account the current state of your finances, and also what level of graphics prowess constitutes an upgrade for you. If your last video card cost $100, you might be able to spend a similar amount for a performance boost; if your last one cost $600, get ready to spend a bundle.
With a budget set, get the most powerful GPU, with the largest amount of onboard memory, you possibly can. The more muscle you get now, the longer you can wait before your next upgrade.
Factory overclocked cards can be nice, but are sometimes overrated. They're generally more expensive than cards that run at performance specifications. Do lots of research to ensure that any cost difference is worth it in terms of a performance boost.
Brand should be your last consideration, in most cases. Unless you've had terrible luck with a particular brand and wish to avoid it, go with the brand that offers the best price for the particular GPU you wish to add to your system

Preparing to Remove the Old Graphics Card

The tips that follow assume you have a graphics card on that you're planning to insert into your system, after removing the currently-installed card. There are always some steps you should take before you actually perform the physical upgrade, and doing so will make the whole process go more smoothly.

Download the latest drivers for your new graphics card's GPU. Save the file somewhere to which it's easy to navigate (the desktop, or the Downloads folder in your user directory).
If you're interested in before and after performance scores, run a few benchmarks before you pop the old card out. While the proof is in the pudding and the biggest indicator of your new card's performance will be how fast it runs current games with detail settings cranked up, it's still nice to be able to quantify the boost in performance.
Uninstall the current drivers before you power down the system to remove the old card. Purging the system of old drivers will help keep bloat to a minimum.
Remove any overclocks before you remove the old card. Set the CPU, FSB, RAM and graphics subsystems to run at spec. If you wish to overclock your system, do it after you've installed the fresh hardware.

Performing the Physical Swap

Now it's time to actually open up the computer and swap out the old hardware for the new. Here are some hints to make your efforts more successful.

Power down the computer and unplug the power cord before you proceed. That way, if you accidentally brush up against the power button while you're working inside the case, you won't turn on the computer. That would be a bad thing—you don't want to be digging around inside the computer on a live motherboard.
Get the cables out of the way before you remove the old card. Lots of current PC cases feature the power supply mounts on the bottom of the enclosure, and the CPU power cable might run right atop the graphics card. Unplug it and tuck it in somewhere. Unplug the PCI Express power cables from the old card and get them out of the way, too.
Don't forget: Lots of motherboards have locking clips on their PCI Express X16 slots. There's a release lever somewhere along the slot (usually on the side opposite the expansion bracket). Don't force the old card out of the computer or you can break the locking clip; trip the release and remove the old card gently.
Store the old card in a safe place, preferably in an antistatic bag. Save it as an emergency backup card in case the new one arrived broken or dies before its time.
Sometimes it's easier to connect PCI Express power cable(s) to the new card before you actually insert the new card into its expansion slot.
Dress any cables safely away so that they don't block the new card's fan from spinning. If you're installing multiple cards, check all the fans to ensure all cables are clear.
Power up the computer and observe the new card's fan before you close the case. Make sure it runs freely.

Completing the Process

You're almost done, but there are still a few steps left in the process and, therefore, we have a few more tips to give.

After you power the system on and the OS loads, cease any automated driver installation routines. Launch the driver installation file you downloaded before you made the physical swap.
After you've installed the drivers, go into the driver applet and make any settings you wish. For example, be sure to enable CrossFireX/SLI, if applicable, and tweak any performance settings you wish.
We tend to leave most of the settings such as antialiasing and anisotripic filtering up to application settings, but that's up to you. Force any settings you feel like forcing, but remember any tweaks you make so that you can reverse them if something goes awry.

click on image for full view
Check the GPU temperature within the driver applet's appropriate page. Ideal temperatures vary from one GPU to the next, so do your research and see what the GPU should read at idle and make sure it's not overheating.

click on image for full view
Finally, burn in the new graphics card before you start playing games. Grab 3DMark Vantage (or 3DMark06 if you're running a pre-Vista Windows OS) and set it to loop a demo. Observe it periodically, allowing it to run for at least an hour, and watch for any unwanted graphics artifacts. Another good burn-in program is Furmark

If all seems well, launch your favorite games and blast away! See how high you can set their detail levels and still achieve a playable experience. You'll enjoy playing your old games with new graphical splendor—have at it!

8 Tips for the Beginning PC Builder

2009-10-21T18:16:00.000-07:00

You never forget your first time—building a PC, that is. You usually spend way too much time getting too little done, and though you end up with a system that probably works, you're not really sure because your hands are too scratched up to use the computer right away. Most first-timers aren't immediately sure they want to be lifers.

But that's natural. PC building, like anything else, is a skill that requires time, patience, and above all practice to perfect. But the results are almost always worth it, even when the process isn't ideal on your initial go-rounds.

We're assuming you already have a basic idea of what to do to build a PC—this isn't a step-by-step guide. But if you're a newbie, the following tips should save you some time and frustration.

1. Research, research, research. The most important part of your build happens long before you even pick up a screwdriver, and that's making sure you buy all the right parts. Spend as much time as you can on sites like Newegg.com, which have advanced search systems, verifying that all the components you're looking at work together today and will continue to do so tomorrow. Some specific questions you'll want to keep in mind:

If you're buying an Intel processor, is it of the right series (Core i7, Core i5, etc.) to fit in the motherboard you're considering?
Do the motherboard's RAM slots and the DIMMs themselves have comparable speeds to reduce the possibility of performance bottlenecks?
Does the motherboard have all the ports you need or want for your peripherals?
If you think you may want to upgrade later, are you leaving plenty of room for expansion in terms of drive bays, card slots, and so on?
Does your power supply have sufficient wattage to, uh, power all your other hardware? (Warning: Arithmetic may be required!)

2. Ground yourself. It's easy to charge yourself up with static electricity, especially if you're working in a carpeted room (or if you have to walk across one to get to where you're building). But what's just an annoying shock to you can be devastating to computer hardware. To be sure you're safe, discharge yourself before touching anything with sensitive circuits. Many PC toolkits come with antistatic wrist straps, and you can go that route if you want, but they can be inconvenient. A less restrictive way: just touch some of your case's bare metal. It'll be a moment of discomfort, but you'll get over it—a lot of PC hardware isn't as resilient.

3. Watch your bags. While we're on the subject of static: It's tempting to throw away potential garbage when you're unpacking prior to starting a build, but antistatic bags (such as the one the motherboard comes in) are worth hanging onto. Whether they're for holding components temporarily while you install something else, or for longer-term storage, the bags will help you preserve your tech investment.

4. Allow more time than you think you'll need. Things always seem simple when you're looking at parts in boxes or reading their manuals. But they can suddenly get a lot more complex when you're actually trying to install something. Leave time for dropping screws inside the case (and fishing them out again—see tip 5), struggling with DIMMs that don't lock down the way you think they should, and especially figuring out the front-panel wiring scheme. These snags can trip up even experts, so don't expect instant magic from start to finish.

5. Get grabby. You already know your most important PC-building tool is a Phillips-head screwdriver. But just behind it should be a three-pronged grabber. If your screwdriver's head isn't magnetized—or, heck, even if it is—you're all but guaranteed to have to fish out screws from uncomfortable nooks and crannies in your case at least once during a build. The grabber, which has extendable wire prongs, is thinner than your fingers, giving it the ability to grab screws when your fingers can't. One comes standard in almost every PC toolkit—get to know it well.

6. Put power first. Install your power supply unit (PSU) into your case before you do pretty much anything else. It'll be disappointing to find that there's not enough room to squeeze it in once you've added your motherboard, fans, drives, and other hardware. Put it into place first, then drape the cables somewhere out of the way while you work on everything else. Organizing the cables will be a pain, but it's a lot better than finding out you can't weave the PSU past the heat sink on the CPU.

7. Think outside the case. Do as much work as you can before inserting your components into the case—that will give you a lot more room to maneuver when doing tricky things like installing the processor and heat sink. Depending on the layout of your specific motherboard and the design of your hardware, this may not be possible, but it will automatically lower your blood pressure if it is. If you have removable cages or brackets for your hard drives or SSDs and optical drives, chances are you'll find things a lot less bruising if you can do most of the assembly outside the case first and then integrate everything later.

8. Don't get discouraged. Building your own PC is pretty simple once you set your mind to it, but there are lots of little places you can go wrong. Even pros sometimes screw up the brackets on the DVD drive, forget to connect a power cable, or confuse a couple of the front-panel wires. And even if you know exactly what to do, you can find yourself getting tripped up more easily than you might think. (Properly seating that Intel heat sink on the processor is maddening for everyone.) But be patient and stick with it—the results are almost always worth the trouble. No one's perfect the first time at bat, but the first time you hit the power switch and watch a computer you built from scratch boot up, you'll feel like you hit a grand slam.

Cooler Master CM Storm Sniper Black Edition Review

2009-10-19T21:23:00.000-07:00

Today I am going to check out the latest chassis from Cooler Master called the CM Storm Sniper Black Edition. This is one of the first cases for gamers in the new CM series of cases. If you are a PC enthusiast looking to get a new chassis for a buildup of your latest gaming PC, the CM Storm Sniper Black Edition may be just what you need.

Features & Specifications
The CM Storm Sniper Black Edition is made from steel, ABS Plastic, and mesh. The entire chassis is colored black inside and out for sinister looks. The case measures 22.3" D x 10" W x 21.7" H and weighs a whopping 26.4 pounds. The case supports micro-ATX and ATX mainboards. There are five exposed 5.25" drive bays and a single 3.5" exposed bay that uses an insert inside one of the 5.25" bays. Inside the chasses are five 3.5" bays for hard drives.

The cooling system of the case has a 200mm fan with blue LED lights, the top has the same fan, and the side has a 200mm fan as well. An additional 200mm fan is in the rear of the case as well. The chassis can be fitted with a liquid cooling system. Seven expansion slots are on the rear and the font panel has four USB ports, a FireWire port, eSATA, mic, and headphone jack. There are grommets on the rear of the case to pass water-cooling tubing and the font panel has a built in fan controller.

In Use
I am a big fan of Cooler Master PC cases, they have always had top-notch build quality, and the CM Storm Sniper Black Edition is no different. The chassis is well built and can with stand rough use. Inside the case, the black color makes for a dark and sinister home for your gaming gear and the edges are rounded and smooth. That means that you aren’t likely to cut yourself during an install. The roomy chassis can hold the largest video cards around today and has plenty of expansion.

The chassis also uses a tool-free design so you can install optical drives and hard drives without needing your screwdriver handy. The case also has feet that can be pivoted out to provide more stability if needed. The inside of the case is roomy enough to support a dual 120mm radiator. You can adjust the speed of the fans inside the case using the rotary knob on the font panel and you can turn the LED lights on and off with a switch so you can have lights on if you want and go dark if you don’t.

The case also has a unique StormGuard system that allows you to protect your peripherals from theft at the LAN party. The security system is basically a special expansion cover and you just pass the USB cables through slots in the port cover to tie them to your PC. The side panel of the case is made from mesh and has no window. As cool looking as the case is on the inside, you might expect a windowed side panel to be an option.

Pros

Good build quality
Lots of space
Fan controller

Cons

Heavy
No windowed side panel

Verdict
The CM Storm Sniper Black Edition is a fantastic chassis to choose for your next PC build up. It has plenty of room, looks good, and is very well built. It would be hard to go wrong with the CM Storm Sniper Black Edition as the home for your gaming rig.

Central processing unit

2009-10-10T23:51:00.000-07:00

The Central Processing Unit (CPU) or processor is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, and is the primary element carrying out the computer's functions. This term has been in use in the computer industry at least since the early 1960s (Weik 2007). The form, design and implementation of CPUs have changed dramatically since the earliest examples, but their fundamental operation remains much the same.

Early CPUs were custom-designed as a part of a larger, sometimes one-of-a-kind, computer. However, this costly method of designing custom CPUs for a particular application has largely given way to the development of mass-produced processors that are made for one or many purposes. This standardization trend generally began in the era of discrete transistor mainframes and minicomputers and has rapidly accelerated with the popularization of the integrated circuit (IC). The IC has allowed increasingly complex CPUs to be designed and manufactured to tolerances on the order of nanometers. Both the miniaturization and standardization of CPUs have increased the presence of these digital devices in modern life far beyond the limited application of dedicated computing machines. Modern microprocessors appear in everything from automobiles to cell phones and children's toys.

History of Central Processing Unit

Main article: History of general purpose CPUs

EDVAC, one of the first electronic stored program computers.

Computers such as the ENIAC had to be physically rewir ed in order to perform different tasks. These machines are often referred to as "fixed-program computers," since they had to be physically reconfigured in order to run a different program. Since the term "CPU" is generally defined as a software (computer program) execution device, the earliest devices that could rightly be called CPUs came with the advent of the stored-program computer.

The idea of a stored program computer was already present in the design of J. Presper Eckert and John William Mauchly's ENIAC, but was init ially omitted so the machine could be finished sooner. On June 30, 1945, before ENIAC was even completed, mathematician John von Neumann distributed the paper entitled "First Draft of a Re port on the EDVAC ." It outlined the design of a stored-program computer that would eventually be completed in August 1949 (von Neumann 1945). EDVAC was designed to perform a certa in number of instructions (or operations) of various types. These instructi ons could be combined to create useful programs for the EDVAC to run. Significantly, the programs written for EDVAC were stored in high-speed computer memory rather than specified by the physical wiring of the computer. This overcame a severe limitation of ENIAC, which was the considerable time and effort required to reconfigure the computer to perform a new task. With vo n Neumann's design, the program, or software, that EDVAC ran could be changed simply by changing the contents of the computer's memory.

While von Neumann is most often credited with the design of the stored-program c omputer because of his design of EDVAC, others before him, such as Konra d Zuse, had suggested and implemented similar ideas. The so-called Ha rvard architecture of the Harvard Mark I, which was completed before EDVAC, also utilized a stored-program design using punched paper tape rather than electronic memory. The key difference between the von Neumann and Harvard architectures is that the latter separates th e storage and treatment of CPU instructions and data, while the former uses the same memory space for both. Most moder n CPUs are primarily von Neumann in design, but elements of the Harvard architecture are commonly seen as well.

As a digital device, a CPU is limited to a set of discrete states, and requires some kind of switching elements to differentiate between and change states. Prior to com mercial development of the transistor, electrical relays and vacuum tubes (thermionic valves) were commonly used as switching elements. Although these had distinct sp ee d advantages over earlier, purely mechanical designs, they were unreliable for various reaso ns. For example, building direct current sequential logic circuits out of relays requires additional hardware to cope with the problem of contact bounce. While vacuum tubes do not suffer from contact bounce, they must heat up before becoming fully operational, and they eventually cease to f unction due to slow contamination of their cathodes that occurs in the course of normal operation. If a tube's vacuum seal leaks, as sometimes happens, ca thode contamination is accelerated. See vacuum tube. Usually, when a tub e failed, the CPU would have to be diagnosed to locate the failed component so it could be replaced. Theref ore, early electronic (vacuum tube based) computers were generally faster but less reliable than electromechanical (relay based) computers.

Tube computers like EDVAC tended to average eight hours betw een failures, whereas relay computers like the (slower, but earlier) Harv ar d Mark I failed very rarely (Weik 1961:238). In the end, tube based CPUs became dominant because the significa nt speed advantages afforded generally outweighed the reliability problems. Most of these early synchronous CPUs ran at low clock rates compared to modern microelectronic designs (see below for a discussion of clock rate). Clock signal frequencies ranging from 100 kHz to 4 MHz were very common at this time, limited largely by the speed of the switching devices they were buil t with.

Discrete transi

stor and Integrated Circuit CPUs

CPU, core memory, and external bus interface of a DEC PDP-8/I. made of medium-scale integrated circuits

The design complexity of CPUs increased as various technologies facilitated building smaller and more reliable electronic devices. The first such improvement came wi th the advent of the transistor. Transistorized CPUs during the 1950s and 1960s no longer had to be built out of bulky, unreliable, and fragile switching elements like vacuum tubes and electrical relays. With this improvement more complex and reliable CPUs were b uilt onto one or several printed circuit boards containing discrete (individual) compone nts.

During this period, a method of manufacturing many transistors in a compact space gained popularity. The integrated circuit (IC) allowed a large number of tran sistors to be manufactured on a single semiconductor-based die, or "chip." At first only very basic non-specialized digital circuits such as NOR gates were miniaturized into ICs. CPUs based up on these "building block" ICs are generally referred to as "small-scale integration" (SSI) devices. SSI ICs, such as the ones used in the Apollo guidance computer, usually contained transistor counts numbering in multiples of ten. To build an entire CPU out of SSI ICs required thousands of individual chips, but still consumed much less space and power th an earlier discrete transistor designs. As microelectronic technology advanced, an increasing number of transistors were placed on ICs, thus decreasing the quantity of individual ICs needed for a complete CPU. MSI and LSI (medium- and large-scale integration) I Cs increased transistor counts to hundreds, and then thousands.

In 1964 IBM introduced its System/360 computer architecture which was used in a series of computers that could run the same programs with different speed and per formance. This was significant at a time when most electronic computers were incompatible with one another, even those made by the same manufacturer. To facilitate this improvement, IBM utilized the concept of a microprogram (often called "microcode"), which still s ees widespread usage in modern CPUs (Amdahl et al. 1964). The System/360 architecture was so p opular that it dominated the mainframe computer market for the decades and left a legacy that is still continued by similar modern computers like the IBM zSeries. In the same year (1964), Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) introduced another influential co mputer aimed at the scientific and research markets, the PDP-8. DEC would later introduce the extremely popular PDP-11 line that originally was built with SSI ICs but was eventually implemented with LSI components once these became practical. In stark contrast with its SSI and MSI predeces sors, the first LSI implementation of the PDP-11 contained a CPU composed of only four LSI integrated circuits (Digital Equipment Corporation 1975).

Transistor-based computers had several distinct advantages over their predecessors. Aside from facilitating increased reliability and lower power consumption, transistors also allowed CPUs to operate at much higher speeds because of the short switchin g time of a transistor in comparison to a tube or relay. Thanks to both the increased reliability as well as the dramatically increased speed of the switching elements (which were almost exclusively transistors by this time), CPU clock rates in the tens of megahertz were obtained during this period . Additionally while discrete transistor and IC CPUs were in heavy usage, new high-performance designs like SIMD (Single Instruction Multiple Data) vector processors began to appear. These early experimental designs later gave rise to the era of specialized supercomputers like those made by Cray Inc.

Microprocessors

Main article: Microprocessor

The integrated circuit from an Intel 8742, an 8-bit microcontroller that includes a CPU running at 12 MHz, 128 bytes of RAM, 2048 bytes of EPROM, and I/O in the same chip.

Intel 80486DX2 microprocessor in a ceramic PGA package.

The introduction of the microprocessor in the 1970s significantly affected the design and implementation of CPUs. Since the introduction of the first microprocessor (the Intel 4004) in 1970 and the first widely used microprocessor (the Intel 8080) in 1 974, this class of CPUs has almost completely overtaken all other central processing unit implementation methods. Mainframe and minicomputer manufacturers of the time launched proprietary IC development programs to upgrade their older computer architectures, and eventually produced instruction set compatible microprocessors that were backward-compatible with their older hardware and software. Combined with the advent and eventual vas t success of the now ubiquitous personal computer, the term "CPU" is now applied almost exclusively to microprocessors.

Previous generations of CPUs were implemented as discrete components and numerous small integrated circuits (ICs) on one or more circuit boards. Microproces sors, on the other hand, are CPUs manufactured on a very small number of ICs; usually just one. The overall smaller CPU size as a result of being implemented on a single die means faster switching time because of physical factors like decreased gate parasitic capacitance . This has allowed synchronous microprocessors to have clock rates rangin g from tens of megahertz to several gigahertz. Additionally, as the ability to construct exceedingly small transistors on an IC has increased, the complexity and number of transistors in a single CPU has increased dramatically. This widely observed trend is described by Moore's law, which has proven to be a fairly accurate predictor of the growth of CPU (and other IC) complexity to date.

While the complexity, size, construction, and general form of CPUs have changed drastically over the past sixty years, it is notable that the basic design and function ha s not changed much at all. Almost all common CPUs today can be very accurately described as von Neumann stored-program machines. As the aforementioned Moore's law continues to hold true, concerns have arisen about the limits of integrated circuit transistor technology. Extreme miniaturization of electronic gates is causing the effects of phenomena like electromigration and subthreshold leakage to become muc h more significant. These newer concerns are among the many factors causing researchers to investigate new methods of computing such as the quantum computer, as well as to expand the usage of parallelism and other methods that extend the usefulness of the classical von Neumann model.

CPU operation

The fundamental operation of most CPUs, regardless of the physical form they take, is to execute a sequence of stored instructions called a program. The program is represented by a series of numbers that are kept in some kind o f computer memory . There are four steps that nearly all CPUs use in their operation: fetch, decode, execute, and writeback.

The first step, fetch, involves retrieving an instruction (w hich is represented by a number or sequence of numbers) from program memory. The location in program memory is determined by a program counter (PC), which stores a number that identifies the current position in the program. In other words, the program counter keeps track of the CPU's place in the current program. After an instruction is fetched, th e PC is incremented by the length of the instruction word in terms of memory units.Often the instruction to be fetched must be retrieved from relatively slow memor y, causing the CPU to stall while waiting for the instruction to be returned. This issue is largely addressed in modern processors by caches and pipeline architectures (see below).

The instruction that the CPU fetches from memory is used to determine what the CPU is to do. In the decode step, the instruction is broken up into parts that have significance to other portions of the CPU. The way in which the numerical instruction value is interpreted is defined by the CPU's instruction set architecture (ISA). Often, one group of numbers in the instruction, called the opcode, indicates which operation to perfor m. The remaining parts of the number usually provide information required for that instruction, such as operands for an addition operation. Such operands may be given as a constant value (called an immediate v alue), or as a place to locate a value: a register or a memory address, as determined by some addressing mode. In older designs the portions of the CPU responsible for instruction decoding were unchangeable hardware devices. However, in more abstract and complicated CPUs and ISAs, a microprogram is often used to assist in translating instructions into various configuration signals for the CPU. This mic roprogram is sometimes rewritable so that it can be modified to change the way the CPU decodes instructions even after it has been manufactured.

After the fetch and decode steps, the exe cute step is performed. During this step, various portions of the CPU are connected so they can perform the desired operation. If, for instance, an addition operation was requested, an arithmetic logic unit (ALU) will be connected to a set of inputs and a set of outputs. The inputs provide the numbers to be added, and the outputs will contain the final sum. The ALU contains the circuitry to pe rform simple arithmetic and logical operations on the inputs (like addition and bitwise operations). If the addition operation produces a result too large for the CPU to handle, an arithmetic overflow flag in a flags re gister may also be set.

The final step, writeback, simply "writes back" the results of the execute step to some form of memory. Very often the results are written to some internal CPU register for quick access by subsequent instructions. In other cases results may b e written to slower, but cheaper and larger, main memory. Some types of instruction s manipulate the program counter rather than directly produce result data. These are generally called "jumps" and facilitate behavior like loops, conditional program ex ecution (through the use of a conditional jump), and functions in programs. Many instructions will also change the state of digits in a "flags" register. These flags can be used to influence how a program behaves, since they often indicate the outcome of various operations. For example, one type of "compare" in struction considers two values and sets a number in the flags register according to which one is greater. This flag could then be used by a later jump instruction to determine program flow.

After the execution of the instruction and writeback of the resulting data, the entire process repeats, with the next instruction cycle normally fetching the next-in-sequence instruction because of the incremented value in the program counter. If the completed instruction was a jump, the program counter will be modified to contain the address of the instruction that was jumped to, and program execution continues normally. In more complex CPUs than the one described here, multiple instructions can be fetched, decoded, and executed simultaneously. This section describes what is generally referred to as the "Classic RISC pipeline," which in fact is quite common among the simple CPUs used in many e lectronic devices (often called microcontroller). It largely ignores the important role of CPU cache, and therefore the access stage of the pipeline.

Design and implementation

Main article: CPU design

Integer range

The way a CPU represents numbers is a design choice that affects the most basic ways in which the device functions. Some early digital computers used an electrical model of the common decimal (base ten) numeral system to represent numbers internally. A few other computers have used more exotic numeral systems like ternary (base three). Nearly all modern CPUs represent numbers in binary form, with each digit being represented by some two-valued physical quantity such as a "high" or "low" voltage.

MOS 6502 microprocessor in a dual in-line package, an extremely popular 8-bit design.

Related to number representation is the size and precision of numbers that a CPU can represent. In the case of a binary CPU, a bit refers to one significant place in the numbers a CPU deals with. The number of bits (or numeral places) a CPU uses to represe nt numbers is often called "word size", "bit width", "data path width", or "integer precision" when dealing with strictly integer numbers (as opposed to floating point). This number differs between architectures, and often within different parts of the very same CPU. For example, an 8-bit CPU deals with a range of numbers that can be represented by eight binary digits (each digit having two possible values), that is, 28 or 256 discrete numbers. In effect, integer size sets a hardware limit on the range of integers the software run by the CPU can utilize.

Integer range can also affect the number of locations in memory the CPU can address (locate). For example, if a binary CPU uses 32 bits to represent a memory address, and each memory address represents one octet (8 bits), the maximum quantity of memory that CPU can address is 232 octets, or 4 GiB. This is a very simple view of CPU address space, and many designs use more complex addressing methods like paging in order to locate more memory than their integer range would allow with a flat address space.

Higher levels of integer range require more structures to deal with the additional digits, and therefore more complexity, size, power usage, and general expense. It is not at all uncommon, therefore, to see 4- or 8-bit microcontrollers used in modern applications, even though CPUs with much higher range (such as 16, 32, 64, even 128-bit) are available. The simpler microcontrollers are usually cheaper, use less powe r, and therefore dissipate less heat, all of which can be major design considerations for electronic devices. However, in higher-end applications, the b enefits afforded by the extra range (most often the additional address space) are more significant and often affect design choices. To gain some of the advantages afforded by both lower and higher bit lengths, many CPUs are designed with different bit widths for different portions of the dev ice. For example, the IBM System/370 used a CPU that was primarily 32 bit, but it used 128-bit precision inside its floating point units to facilitate greater accuracy and range in floating point numbers (Amdahl et al. 1964). Many later CPU designs use similar mixed bit width, especially when the processor is meant for general-purpose usage where a reasonable balance of integer and floating point capability is required.

Clock rate

Main article: Clock rate

Most CPUs, and indeed most sequential logic devices, are synchronous in nature.[7] That is, they are designed and operate on assumptions about a synchronization signal. This signal, known as a clock signal, usually takes the form of a periodic square wave. By calculating the maximum time that electrical signals can move in various branches of a CPU's many circuits, the designers can select an appropriate period for the clock signal.

This period must be longer than the amount of time it takes for a signal to move, or propagate, in the worst-case scenario. In setting the clock period to a value well above the worst-case propagation delay, it is possible to design the entire CPU and the way it moves data around the "edges" of the rising and falling clock signal. This has the advantage of simplifying the CPU significantly, both from a d esign perspective and a component-count perspective. However, it also carries the disadvantage that the entire CPU must wait on its slowest elements, even though some portions of it are much faster. This limitation has largely been compensated for by various methods of increasing CPU parallelism. (see below)

However, architectural improvements alone do not solve all of the drawbacks of globally synchronous CPUs. For example, a clock signal is subject to the delays of any other electrical signal. Higher clock rates in increasingly complex CPUs make it more difficult to keep the clock signal in phase (synchr onized) throughout the entire unit. This has led many modern CPUs to require multiple identical clock signals to be provided in order to avoid delaying a single signal significantly enough to cause the CPU to malfunction. Another major issue as clock rates increase dramatically is the amount of heat that is dissipated by the CPU. The constantly changing clock causes many components to switch regardless of whether th ey are being used at that time. In general, a component that is switching uses more energy than an element in a static state. Therefore, as clock rate increases, so does heat dissipation, causing the CPU to require more effective cooling solutions.

One method of dealing with the switching off unneeded components is called clock gating, which involves turning off the clock signal to unneeded components (effectively disabling them). However, this is often regarded as difficult to implement and therefore does not see common usage outside of very lo w-power designs.[8] Another m ethod of addressing some of the problems with a global clock signal is the removal of the clock signal altogether. While removing the global clock signal makes the design process considerably more complex in many ways, asynchronous (or clockless) designs carry mark ed advantages in power consumption and heat dissipation in comparison with similar synchronous designs. While somewhat uncommon, entire asynchronous CPUs have been built without utilizing a global clock signal. Two notable examples of this are the ARM compliant AMULET and the MIPS R3000 compatible MiniMIPS. Rather than totally removing the clock signal, some CPU designs allow certain portions of the device to be asynchronous, such as using asynchronous ALUs in conjunction with superscalar pipelining to achieve some a rithmetic performance gains. While it is not altogether clear whether totally asynchronous designs can perform at a comparable or better level than their synchronous counterparts, it is evident that they do at least excel in simpler math operations. This, combined with their excellent power consumption and hea t dissipation properties, makes them very suitable for embedded computers (Garside et al. 1999).

Parallelism

Main article: Parallel computing

Model of a subscalar CPU. Notice that it takes fifteen cycles to complete three instructions.

The description of the basic operation of a CPU offered in the previous section describes the simplest form that a CPU can take. This type of CPU, usually referred to as subscalar, operates on and executes one instruction on one or two pieces of data at a time.

This process gives rise to an inherent inefficiency in subscalar CPUs. Since only one instruction is executed at a time, the entire CPU must wait for that instruction to complete before proceeding to the next instruction. As a result the subscalar CPU gets "hung up" on instructions which take more than one clock cycle to complete execution. Even ad ding a second execution unit (see below) does not improve performance much; rather than one pathway being hung up, now two pathways are hung up and the number of unused transistors is increased. This design, wherein the CPU's execution resources can operate on only one instruction at a time, can only possibly reach scalar performance (one instruction per clock). However, the performance is nearly always subscalar (less than one instruction per cycle).

Attempts to achieve scalar and better performance have resulted in a variety of design methodologies that cause the CPU to behave less linearly a nd more in parallel. When referring to parallelism in CPUs, two terms are generally used to classify these design techniques. Instruction level parallelism (ILP) seeks to increase the rate at which instructions are executed within a CPU (that is, to increase the utilization of on-die execution resources), and thread level parallelism (TLP) purposes to increase the number of threads (effectively individual programs) that a CPU can execute simultaneously. Each methodology differs both in the ways in which they are implemented, as well as the relative effectiveness they afford in increasing the CPU's performance for an application.

Instruction level parallelism

Main articles: Instruction pipelining and Superscalar

Basic five-stage pipeline. In the best case scenario, this pipeline can sustain a completion rate of one instruction per cycle.

One of the simplest methods used to accomplish increased parallelism is to begin the first steps of instruction fetching and decoding before the prior instruction finishes executing. This is the simplest form of a technique known as instruction pipelining, and is utilized in almost all modern general-purpose CPUs. Pipelining allows more than one instruction to be executed at any given time by breaking down the execution pathway into discrete stages. This separation can be compared to an assembly line, in which an instruction is made more complete at each stage until it exits the execution pipeline and is retired.

Pipelining does, however, introduce the possibility for a situation where the result of the previous operation is needed to complete the next operation; a condition often termed data dependency conflict. To cope with this, additional care must be taken to check for these sorts of conditions and delay a portion of the instruction pipeline if this occurs. Naturally, accomplishing this requires additional circuitry, so pipelined processors are more complex than subscalar ones (though not very significantly so). A pipelined processor can become very nearly scalar, inhibited only by pipeline stalls (an instruction spending more than one clock cycle in a stage).

Simple superscalar pipeline. By fetching and dispatching two instructions at a time, a maximum of two instructions per cycle can be completed.

Further improvement upon the idea of instruction pipelining led to the development of a method that decreases the idle time of CPU components even further. Designs that are said to be superscalar include a long instruction pipeline and multiple identical execution units. [Huynh 2003] In a superscalar pipeline, multiple instructions are read and passed to a dispatcher, which decides whether or not the instructions can be executed in parallel (simultaneously). If so they are dispatched to available execution units, resulting in the ability for several instructions to be executed simultaneously. In general, the more instructions a superscalar CPU is able to dispatch simultaneously to waiting execution units, the more instructions will be completed in a given cycle.

Most of the difficulty in the design of a superscalar CPU architecture lies in creating an effective dispatcher. The dispatcher needs to be able to quickly and correctly determine whether instructions can be executed in parallel, as well as dispatch them in such a way as to keep as many execution units busy as possible. This requires that the instruction pipeline is filled as often as possible and gives rise to the need in superscalar architectures for significant amounts of CPU cache. It also makes hazard-avoiding techniques like branch prediction, speculative execution, and out-of-order execution crucial to maintaining high levels of performance. By attempting to predict which branch (or path) a conditional instruction will take, the CPU can minimize the number of times that the entire pipeline must wait until a conditional instruction is completed. Speculative execution often provides modest performance increases by executing portions of code that may or may not be needed after a conditional operation completes. Out-of-order execution somewhat rearranges the order in which instructions are executed to reduce delays due to data dependencies.

In the case where a portion of the CPU is superscalar and part is not, the part which is not suffers a performance penalty due to scheduling stalls. The original Intel Pentium (P5) had two superscalar ALUs which could accept one instruction per clock each, but its FPU could not accept one instruction per clock. Thus the P5 was integer superscalar but not floating point superscalar. Intel's successor to the Pentium architecture, P6, added superscalar capabilities to its floating point features, and therefore afforded a significant increase in floating point instruction performance.

Both simple pipelining and superscalar design increase a CPU's ILP by allowing a single processor to complete execution of instructions at rates surpassing one instruction per cycle (IPC).[10] Most modern CPU designs are at least somewhat superscalar, and nearly all general purpose CPUs designed in the last decade are superscalar. In later years some of the emphasis in designing high-ILP computers has been moved out of the CPU's hardware and into its software interface, or ISA. The strategy of the very long instruction word (VLIW) causes some ILP to become implied directly by the software, reducing the amount of work the CPU must perform to boost ILP and thereby reducing the design's complexity.

Thread level parallelism

Another strategy of achieving performance is to execute multiple programs or threads in parallel. This area of research is known as parallel computing. In Flynn's taxonomy, this strategy is known as Multiple Instructions-Multiple Data or MIMD.

One technology used for this purpose was multiprocessing (MP). The initial flavor of this technology is known as symmetric multiprocessing (SMP), where a small number of CPUs share a coherent view of their memory system. In this scheme, each CPU has additional hardware to maintain a constantly up-to-date view of memory. By avoiding stale views of memory, the CPUs can cooperate on the same program and programs can migrate from one CPU to another. To increase the number of cooperating CPUs beyond a handful, schemes such as non-uniform memory access (NUMA) and directory-based coherence protocols were introduced in the 1990s. SMP systems are limited to a small number of CPUs while NUMA systems have been built with thousands of processors. Initially, multiprocessing was built using multiple discrete CPUs and boards to implement the interconnect between the processors. When the processors and their interconnect are all implemented on a single silicon chip, the technology is known as a multi-core microprocessor.

It was later recognized that finer-grain parallelism existed with a single program. A single program might have several threads (or functions) that could be executed separately or in parallel. Some of earliest examples of this technology implemented input/output processing such as direct memory access as a separate thread from the computation thread. A more general approach to this technology was introduced in the 1970s when systems were designed to run multiple computation threads in parallel. This technology is known as multi-threading (MT). This approach is considered more cost-effective than multiprocessing, as only a small number of components within a CPU is replicated in order to support MT as opposed to the entire CPU in the case of MP. In MT, the execution units and the memory system including the caches are shared among multiple threads. The downside of MT is that the hardware support for multithreading is more visible to software than that of MP and thus supervisor software like operating systems have to undergo larger changes to support MT. One type of MT that was implemented is known as block multithreading, where one thread is executed until it is stalled waiting for data to return from external memory. In this scheme, the CPU would then quickly switch to another thread which is ready to run, the switch often done in one CPU clock cycle, such as the UltraSPARC Technology. Another type of MT is known as simultaneous multithreading, where instructions of multiple threads are executed in parallel within one CPU clock cycle.

For several decades from the 1970s to early 2000s, the focus in designing high performance general purpose CPUs was largely on achieving high ILP through technologies such as pipelining, caches, superscalar execution, out-of-order execution, etc. This trend culminated in large, power-hungry CPUs such as the Intel Pentium 4. By the early 2000s, CPU designers were thwarted from achieving higher performance from ILP techniques due to the growing disparity between CPU operating frequencies and main memory operating frequencies as well as escalating CPU power dissipation owing to more esoteric ILP techniques.

CPU designers then borrowed ideas from commercial computing markets such as transaction processing, where the aggregate performance of multiple programs, also known as throughput computing, was more important than the performance of a single thread or program.

This reversal of emphasis is evidenced by the proliferation of dual and multiple core CMP (chip-level multiprocessing) designs and notably, Intel's newer designs resembling its less superscalar P6 architecture. Late designs in several processor families exhibit CMP, including the x86-64 Opteron and Athlon 64 X2, the SPARC UltraSPARC T1, IBM POWER4 and POWER5, as well as several video game console CPUs like the Xbox 360's triple-core PowerPC design, and the PS3's 7-core Cell microprocessor.

Data parallelism

Main articles: Vector processor and SIMD

A less common but increasingly important paradigm of CPUs (and indeed, computing in general) deals with data parallelism. The processors discussed earlier are all referred to as some type of scalar device.[11] As the name implies, vector processors deal with multiple pieces of data in the context of one instruction. This contrasts with scalar processors, which deal with one piece of data for every instruction. Using Flynn's taxonomy, these two schemes of dealing with data are generally referred to as SISD (single instruction, single data) and SIMD (single instruction, multiple data), respectively. The great utility in creating CPUs that deal with vectors of data lies in optimizing tasks that tend to require the same operation (for example, a sum or a dot product) to be performed on a large set of data. Some classic examples of these types of tasks are multimedia applications (images, video, and sound), as well as many types of scientific and engineering tasks. Whereas a scalar CPU must complete the entire process of fetching, decoding, and executing each instruction and value in a set of data, a vector CPU can perform a single operation on a comparatively large set of data with one instruction. Of course, this is only possible when the application tends to require many steps which apply one operation to a large set of data.

Most early vector CPUs, such as the Cray-1, were associated almost exclusively with scientific research and cryptography applications. However, as multimedia has largely shifted to digital media, the need for some form of SIMD in general-purpose CPUs has become significant. Shortly after floating point execution units started to become commonplace to include in general-purpose processors, specifications for and implementations of SIMD execution units also began to appear for general-purpose CPUs. Some of these early SIMD specifications like HP's Multimedia Acceleration eXtensions (MAX) and Intel's MMX were integer-only. This proved to be a significant impediment for some software developers, since many of the applications that benefit from SIMD primarily deal with floating point numbers. Progressively, these early designs were refined and remade into some of the common, modern SIMD specifications, which are usually associated with one ISA. Some notable modern examples are Intel's SSE and the PowerPC-related AltiVec (also known as VMX).

Personal Computer Hardwares(computer parts)

2009-10-10T23:31:00.000-07:00

Typical PC hardware

Hardware of Personal Computer.
1. Monitor
2. Motherboard
3. CPU
4. RAM Memory
5. Expansion card
6. Power supply
7. CD-ROM Drive
8. Hard Disk
9. Keyboard
10. Mouse

Inside a custom computer.

Though a PC comes in many different form factors, a typical personal computer consists of a case or chassis in a tower shape (desktop) and the following parts:

Motherboard

The motherboard is the main component inside the case. It is a large rectangular board with integrated circuitry that connects the rest of the parts of the computer including the CPU, the RAM, the disk drives (CD, DVD, hard disk, or any others) as well as any peripherals connected via the ports or the expansion slots.

Components directly attached to the motherboard include:

* The central processing unit (CPU) performs most of the calculations which enable a computer to function, and is sometimes referred to as the "brain" of the computer. It is usually cooled by a heat sink and fan.
* The chipset mediates communication between the CPU and the other components of the system, including main memory.
* RAM Stores all running processes (applications) and the current running OS. RAM Stands for Random Access Memory
* The BIOS includes boot firmware and power management. The Basic Input Output System tasks are handled by operating system drivers.
* Internal Buses connect the CPU to various internal componen ts and to expansion cards for graphics and sound.
o Current
+ The northbridge memory controller, for RAM and PCI Express
# PCI Express, for expansion cards such as graphics and physics p rocessors, and high-end network interfaces
+ PCI, for other expansion cards
+ SATA, for disk drives
o Obsolete
+ ATA (superseded by SATA)
+ AGP (superseded by PCI Express)
+ VLB VESA Local Bus (superseded by AGP)
+ ISA (expansion card slot format obsolete in PCs, but still used in industrial computers)
* External Bus Controllers support ports for external peripherals. These ports may be controlled directly by the southbridge I/O controller or based on expansion cards attached to the motherboard through the PCI bus.
o USB
o FireWire
o eSATA
o SCSI

Power supply

Main article: Power supply unit (computer)

Includes power cords, switch, and cooling fan. Supplies power at appropriate voltages to the motherboard and internal disk drives. It also converts alternating current to direct current and provides different voltages to different parts of the computer.

Video display controller

Main article: Graphics card

Produces the output for the computer monitor. This will either be built into the motherboard or attached in its own separate slot (PCI, PCI-E, PCI-E 2.0, or AGP), in the form of a graphics card.

Most video cards support the most basic requirements, and video card manufacturing companies are doing a good job of keeping up with the requirements the games need. However the games are still evolving faster than the video because of manufacturing companies.

Removable media devices

Main article: Computer storage

* CD (compact disc) - the most common type of removable media, suitable for music and data.
o CD-ROM Drive - a device used for reading data from a CD.
o C D Writer - a device used for both reading and writing data to and from a CD.
* DVD (digital versatile disc) - a popular type of removable media that is the same dimensions as a C D but stores up to 12 times as much information. It is the most common way of transferring digital video, and is popular for data storage.
o DVD-ROM Drive - a device used for reading data from a D VD.
o DVD Writer - a device used for both reading and writing data to and from a DVD.
o D VD-RAM Drive - a device used for rapid writing and reading of data from a special type of DVD.
* Blu -ray Disc - a high-density optical disc format for data and high-definition video. Can store 70 times as much information as a CD.
o BD-ROM Drive - a device used for reading data from a Blu-ray disc.
o BD Writer - a device used for both reading and writing data to and from a Blu-ray disc.
* HD DVD - a discontinued competitor to the Blu-ray form at.
* Fl oppy disk - an outdated storage device consisting of a thin disk of a flexible magnetic storage medium. Used today mainly for loading RAID drivers.
* Iomega Zip drive - an outdated medium-capacity removable disk storage system, first introduced by Iomega in 1994.
* USB flash drive - a flash memory data storage device integrated with a USB interface, typically small, lightweight, removable, and rewritable. Capacities vary, from hundreds of megabytes (in the same bal lpark as CDs) to tens of gigabytes (surpassing, at great expense, Blu-ray discs).
* Tape drive - a device that reads and writes data on a magnetic tape, used for long term storage and backups.

Internal storage

Hardware that keeps data inside the computer for later use and remains persistent even when the com puter has no power.

* Har d disk - for medium-term storage of data.
* Solid-state drive - a device similar to hard disk, but contain ing no moving parts and stores data in a digital format.
* RAID array controller - a device to manage several internal or external hard disks and optionally some peripherals in order to achieve performance or reliability improvement in what is called a RAID array.

Sound card

Main article: Sound card

Enables the computer to outpu t sound to audio devices, as w ell as accept input from a microphone. Most modern computers have sound cards built-in to the motherboard, though it is common for a user to install a separate sound card as an upgrade. Most sound cards, either built-in or added, have surround sound capabilities.

Other peripherals

Main article: Peripheral

In addition, hardw are devices can include external components of a computer system. The following are either standard or very common.

Wheel Mouse

Includes various input and output devices, usually external to the computer system.

Input

Main article: Input

* Text input devices
o Keyboard - a device to input text and charact ers by depressing buttons (referred to as keys), similar to a typewriter. The most common En glish-langua ge key layout is the QWERTY layout. The QWERTY layout always starts with QWERTY.
* Pointing devices
o Mouse - a pointing device that detects two dimensional motion relative to its supporting surface.
o Optical Mouse - a newer technology that us e s lasers, or more commonly LEDs to track the surface under the mouse to determine motion of the mouse, to be translated into mouse movements on the screen.
o Trackball - a pointing device consisting of an exposed protruding ball housed in a socket that detects rotation about two axes.

* Gaming devices
o Joystick - a general control device that consists of a handheld stick that pivots around one end, to detect angles in two or three dimensions.
o Gamepad - a general handheld game controller that relies on the digits (especially thumbs) to provide input.
o Game controller - a specific type of controller specialized for certain gaming purposes.
* Image, Video input devices
o Image scanner - a device that provides input by analyzing images, printed text, handwriting, or an object.
o Webcam - a low resolution video camera used to provide visual input that can be easily transferred over the internet.
* Audio input devices
o Microphone - an acoustic sensor that provides input by converting sound into electrical signals.

2009-10-10T21:58:00.001-07:00

For those that haven't been keeping up with all the new processor launches the Intel Core 2 Quad Q9300 processor is the newest 45nm quad-core 'Yorkfield' processor. It is also the entry level 45nm quad-core processor, which means it has the lowest price tag! At $285.99 plus shipping on PriceGrabber the Intel Core 2 Quad Q9300 is still fairly pricey, but you get what you pay for and it should run circles around the $235 AMD Phenom 9850 quad-core processor. The Intel Core 2 Quad Q9300 Processor has been getting a ton of attention these days as retailers are offering it in some pretty killer bundles. Microcenter for example has the Intel Core 2 Quad Processor Q9300 (OEM) processor and a 2GB (2x1GB) OCZ Gold DDR2-800 memory kit being offered together for $250. If these deals are looking tempting, but you are unsure about the processor and how it stacks up against others on the market you are in luck as we are going to run the Intel Core 2 Quad Q9300 against seven other processors to see how it does.With the latest version of CPU-Z 1.44.2, we can see our quad-core 'Yorkfield' processor is correctly identified at 2.50 GHz with a 1333MHz FSB and 6MB L2 cache.Our processor is an M1 stepping and has a TDP of 95W, which is the same as the Q6600 that it replaces. The Intel Core 2 Quad Q9300 should be a pretty good overclocker, but it only has a 7.5 multiplier (333MHz FSB x 7.5 multiplier = 2.5GHz). With a somewhat low multiplier the FSB will have to be increased beyond 450MHz to break the 3.5GHz mark. This eliminates the use of many low end motherboards as to hit FSB speeds above 450MHz it will really tax the platform. If you increase the FSB to 400MHz that will make the CPU 3.0GHz, which should be easy to reach! We will try to reach these higher clock frequencies in our overclocking section as many enthusiasts will be buying this processor just to overclock it.

Intel E8600 Core 2 Duo Processor

2009-10-10T21:57:00.001-07:00

Processors come in various revisions as the manufacturers test and modify the circuits that comprise the finished product. The previous Wolfdale stepping, C0, was introduced with all previous versions of the E8xxx, E7xxx, and Q9xxx series processors. If you need a quick refresher on what was introduced with the original 45nm processors, check out Nate's Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 Processor Review.The differences between the C0 and E0 steppings aren't much on paper. There is a new function called the Power Status Indicator that will let motherboards drop their VRM down from a multi-phase circuit to a single-phase circuit to save power when at idle. There were also two additional instructions added to the instruction set, XSAVE and XRSTOR, neither of which are world changing. This stepping also features a step towards being green with the introduction of a halide-free package, just another step towards being cleaner like the move to lead-free processors. So, since the processors are electrically, mechanically, and thermally identical to the C0 stepping, why do they deserve a brief review? Simply, it's all about that need for speed and the E8600 delivers.I won't be using my X48 test-bed today as this review will predominately focus on overclocking and frankly X48 isn't the ideal platform for Wolfdale overclocking. Today I'll be using the Gigabyte GA-EP45T-Extreme which includes Intel's P45 chipset with DDR3 support. I just received the new F3I BIOS from Gigabyte earlier this morning so that was loaded onto the board. The memory was run at 7-7-7-21-2T timings through all the stock speeds and varying times are noted in the overclocked results. The Gigabyte HD 4850 card that was used in the review has been volt modded and BIOS flashed to 850MHz on the core and 1125MHz on the memory, up from 625MHz on the core and 993MHz on the memory. Windows XP SP2 was used for the tests as this quick review was performed on my 3D Benchmarking operating system that was currently installed on the test hard drive.

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 280 Graphics Cards by EVGA and PNYhey are two very different cards.

2009-10-10T21:56:00.001-07:00

When the NVIDIA GeForce 9 series of graphics cards launched back February 2008 with the GeForce 9600 GT leading the way, many enthusaists didn't see the performance jump they were used to seeing and saw the series as a polished GeForce 8 GPU with a new name. The GeForce 9800 GX2 was launched in March 2008 and was the fastest card on the market, but wasn't really innovative as it was again just a couple GeForce 8 series cores on a new board. By the time April 2008 came around the GeForce 9800 GTX it was yet another G92 based product and many enthusiasts were not impressed. Those that bought the GeForce 8800 GTX back in November 2006 had a card that was still faster in many applications and had no real reason to upgrade unless they wanted the new video processor or better power consumption numbers. Anyone that bought a GeForce 8800 GTX back in 2006 and paid an arm and a leg for it should pat themselves on the back as they bought a video card that lasted well into 2008. With that said, it is time for GeForce 8800 GTX owners to think about upgrading because after you read this you will be wanting to. Since most consumers are not GPU experts lets compare the main features of the GeForce 8800 GTX from 2006 to the just released GeForce GTX 280. As you can see from the chart above the GeForce GTX 280 has 87.5% more cores (stream processors), double precision and huge increases in floating point bandwidth

This morning, NVIDA has announced the GeForce GTX 280 and GeForce GTX 260 graphics boards, which are part of the just announced GeForce GTX 200 GPU family and powered by the new GT200 GPU. These cards use NVIDIA’s second-generation unified visual computing architecture and are more than just a polish of existing products. NVIDIA claims the GeForce GTX 280 will deliver an impressive 1.5x performance improvement on average over high-end GeForce 8 and GeForce 9 series single-GPU graphics boards, which makes it the fastest single-gpu board on they have ever produced. It has 240 processing cores and 1GB of GDDR3 frame buffer memory running on a wider 512-bit memory bus. The MSRP of one of these monseters is $649 for the stock-clocked GeForce GTX 280 video card.
If that is a bit too pricey, the crew over at NVIDIA have the $449 GeForce GTX 260. This card still has good price versus performance , but has a reduced number of processing cores (192 instead of 240) and lower frame buffer size (896MB instead of 1024MB). Today, we have a couple GeForce GTX 280's to show you and they are two very different cards.

NVIDIA Launches GeForce 8800M SLI Notebook Graphics

2009-10-10T21:50:00.000-07:00

NVIDIA has launched their new flagship video processor for mobile computers, the GeForce 8800M GTX and 8800M GTX. NVIDIA wants to power your DX10 notebook and took a huge leap forward in technology by introducing this new hardware architecture. Already, Dell, Alienware, and Sager are offering the new 8800M in one of their many notebook configurations. Let's take a closer look what NVIDIA is serving up.Along with bringing DX10 to the notebook world, NVIDIA has made several other improvements over the previous generation chips resulting in a dramatic leap forward in terms of raw performance with more than double the memory bandwidth and texture fill rate of the "old" GeForce 8700M GT. This translates into blistering framerates and a more immersive overall gaming experience. As most of our readers should know by now, NVIDIA's SLI Technology allows users to combine the horsepower of two GPUs resulting in a stunning increase in graphics performance. Notebook users powered by NVIDIA can now experience high frame rates at widescreen XHD (Extreme High Definition) resolutions such as 1680x1050 or 1920x1200, depending on which manufacturer you go with
GeForce 8M series GPUs feature NVIDIA’s PureVideo HD video processing solution. Building on the GeForce 7 solution that combines video decode acceleration and advanced postprocessing, GeForce 8M series GPUs drastically reduce CPU utilization for H.264 movies, empowering even low end PCs to play back high definition Blu-ray and HD DVD movies.
The GeForce 8M series GPUs is the world’s first mobile PC video solution to offload 100% of H.264 decoding. GeForce 8M series GPUs accelerate all four key blocks of the H.264 decode process, which is a major improvement over the CPU only and the previous?generation GeForce 7 series implementation which addressed only two of the four key processing blocks

Getting To Know DDR3 Memory Modules

2009-10-08T08:33:00.001-07:00

DDR3 Memory Modules Ready To Launch This Month

Later this month Intel Bearlake P35 based desktop motherboards will be released for the very first time. While these motherboards will feature the latest and greatest Intel P35 chipsets they also happen to be the first desktop platform that utilizes DDR3 memory modules. For those that don't know DDR3 is the next generation of Double Data Rate (DDR) Synchronous Dynamic Random Access Memory (SDRAM). DDR3 memory modules are an improvement of DDR and DDR2 memory technology and will deliver higher clock frequencies, lower power consumption and as a result lower heat dissipation. When DDR3 is launched the frequencies will be at 1066Mhz and 1333Mhz, with 1600MHz and beyond out in the distance.

For those that recall the transition from DDR1 to DDR2, the move from DDR2 to DDR3 will be much the same. It will take years for DDR3 to become main stream with many predicting that it will take the industry till 2009 to fully moved over to the new memory form factor. Those with DDR2 motherboard have nothing to worry about as DDR2 production will continue with improved parts still on the drawing boards.

Pictured above are the three generations of Kingston HyperX DDR memory modules. At the very top is a Kingston HyperX DDR1 modules with a DDR2 module directly below it and the upcoming DDR3 module at the very bottom. While all of the modules are the same length notice that the 'module key' that is located near the center of each module is in a different location making each generation physically incompatible. It should be noted that DDR3 DIMMS have 240 pins, which the same number as DDR2.

To better show that the 240-pin DDR3 module can not and will not fit in a 240-pin DDR2 socket we took a picture of the Kingston HyperX DDR3 module in a DDR2 socket. As it can be seen in the above picture using the eVGA 680i SLI motherboard as the test bed, the socket key does not line up with the DDR3 memory module key. Even if the modules would fit the power requirements vary between each series. The upcoming DDR3 modules use just 1.5V, compared to DDR2's 1.8V and DDR's 2.5V. It seems that many of the 1066MHz and 1333MHz DDR3 modules will need 1.7V to operate at those frequencies, which is still much lower than what we are seeing DDR2 using at the same frequencies. With enthusiast and gamer oriented DDR3 modules starting off at 1333MHz and reaching above 2000MHz in the months ahead voltages will continue to increase from 1.7V.

With upcoming 333MHz FSB processors running DDR3 memory modules at 1333MHz will be a standard setting in the BIOS. To hit 1600MHz a FSB of 400MHz needs to be reached, but that is not tough to do as it would be a mild overclock. DDR2 memory modules on the market right now have been topping off around ~1320MHz, so DDR3 is starting off at the upper limits of where DDR2 starts to become unstable.

When it comes to performance for enthusiasts and gamers it seems the DDR3 kit that you should hold out for is the DDR3 1333MHz memory kits. It seems that DDR3 memory kits start to strut their stuff at speeds above this, so don't expect to see impressive performance numbers beyond till modules reach this frequency and beyond. From what we can tell not too many modules can even hit 1500MHz with good yields. It seems that the memory companies are still sorting all the memory IC's and are in the mist of figuring out if Micron, Eplida or Qimonda IC's are the best to use. It seems that Samsung IC's aren't doing too hot, so don't expect to see those on many of the first enthusiast modules.

When it comes to memory timings the initial 2GB kits of DDR3 1066MHz memory modules are mainly using 6-5-5-15 timings and the 1333MHz modules are running 7-7-7-20 timings. Once again it seems 'aggressive' timings is a thing for the past as when DDR2 first came out CL5 and CL6 parts were seen out at about in the early days. While many will baulk at the high timings keep in mind that DDR3 has 8-bit pre-fetch architecture (compared to 4-bit pre-fetch buffer with DDR2 and 2-bit on DDR1), on-die termination (ODT), power-saving modes known as PASR (partial array self refresh) and ASR (auto self refresh) and other capabilities. With the improved pre-fetch architecture alone it makes it hard to compare DDR3 to DDR2 when it comes to timings as the modules do more per cycle.

Love it or hate it, numerous brands of DDR3 memory and Intel Bearlake (P35) chipsets are built, packaged and ready to be placed for sale in the weeks ahead. The question now is who will have the first dual channel 2GHz memory module?

Kingmax 256mb DDR-400 Memory

2009-10-08T08:32:00.001-07:00

Introduction:

We all know there are many different types/brands of memory modules to choose from. Kingmax is a brand name that I personally have not heard of until we received a few sticks of Kingmax 256mb DDR-400 Memory from Intel in our "Canterwood" package. So today we are going to give you a quick look at Kingmax's MPXB62D-68KX3 256mb DDR-400 Memory Module. We will be comparing it to our Corsair 256mb PC3200C2 Memory Module.

Kingmax Semiconductor Inc. was founded in 1989 and is listed among Taiwan's Top 150 manufacturers according to the May 2001 Commonwealth Magazine. Kingmax is considered a leading manufacturer of memory modules. Kingmax is based in Taiwan and has over 400 more employees working in sales offices in America, China, Australia, and Europe. Kingmax is also ISO-9001 certified, so we should be able to expect quality products from Kingmax since their R&D department's process follows a strict set of guidelines.

Next I will give you a list of Kingmax's 256mb DDR-400 memory features and our benchmark results

OCZ EL DDR PC-3700 Dual Channel Gold Rev. 2 Memory

2009-10-08T08:28:00.000-07:00

Introduction:

It has been some time since we last looked at an unbuffered module from OCZ, but today we are looking at OCZ's Dual Channel Gold Edition PC-3700 Revision 2 memory modules. This kit has been praised by many in the enthusiast community as being the memory kit that does tight timings at both mid and high range speeds. We have had the memory for a number of months now and have tried it out on many platforms and at different speeds.

Features:

Our models came as a kit and look pretty darn nice with the gold mirrored finish on top of the copper heat spreaders. OCZ Dual Channel Gold Edition PC-3700 Revision 2 memory is specifically designed for use on Intel i865 and i875 chipset based motherboards, but can also be used by AMD fans on their boards also. The OCZ modules came in the standard clear kit packaging, but also included a case badge. It should also be noted that OCZ warranties these modules for life. Overclockers will be happy to find that these modules include EVP® (Extended Voltage Protection), which is a feature that allows the consumer to use a VDIMM of 3.0V ± 5% without invalidating their lifetime warranty.

OCZ Dual Channel Gold Edition PC-3700 Revision 2 memory is speed rated for 466MHZ (PC-3700) speeds at relatively tight timings of CL 2.5-3-3-7, 1T. With CL2.5 ratings at PC-3700 speeds it is likely that this module will be able to run a wide variety of timings and speeds, but only testing will tell if the IC's used can handle different CAS Latencies.

What is under the heat spreader?

Once I removed the heat spreaders I found some clean looking IC's that have been labeled via OCZ's laser etcher. It is common knowledge that OCZ removes the original markings and relabels the memory for internal warranty purposes, so these numbers don't mean much. After taking out the trusty flashlight and holding the memory at some extreme angles I was able to see the original markings from the packager that were present before OCZ placed their own markings on top of them. The markings underneath turned out to be: V58C2256804SAT5B. After looking them up we found them to be ProMOS IC's rated for DDR400 performance levels. If you have not heard of ProMOS don't worry as they are a large Taiwanese memory chip manufacturer and the parent company of Mosel Vitelic.

Decoding The IC:

For those of you that want to know the inside scoop on everything we broke down what the codes on the IC mean below.

ProMOS V58C2256804SAT5B
Specification	Feature
V5	ProMOS
58	DDR I SDRAM
C	CMOS
2	2.5 Voltage
25680	Organization = 8x32 & 8K Refresh
4	4 Banks
2	Interface = SSTL_2
A	Revision Level #1
T	TSOP Package
5B	200MHz @ CL2.5

Key Features:

Memory amount: 2x 512MB
Access time: 5.0ns ProMOS IC's
466MHz (PC-3700) Unbuffered DDR Modules
CAS latency: 2.5 clock cycles
RAS precharge: 3 cycles
RAS active to precharge: 7 cycles
Command rate: 1T (1 cycle)
Copper heat spreader for thermal diffusion (Gold Layered)
Latency: 2.5-3-3-7-1T
2.7V
Lifetime Warranty

Now that we know what the memory is rated for by OCZ and what exact IC's are being used on the OCZ Dual Channel Gold Edition PC-3700 Revision 2 memory kit we can look at our testing to see how it really performs.

Intel Pentium Processor 965 Extreme Edition Review

2009-08-15T02:39:00.000-07:00

The Extreme Edition Gets A Speed Bump

Like its predecessor, the Intel Pentium Processor Extreme Edition 965 with Hyper-Threading technology boasts 1066 FSB, 4 MB total L2 cache configured as 2 x 2MB per core, Intel Virtualization Technology, Execute Disable Bit, and Intel Extended Memory 64 Technology. The Extreme Edition platform provides the horsepower and new capabilities that allow PC enthusiasts the flexibility to address the robust content creation and multitasking expectations of the high-end desktop market segment. Below is a chart comparing the latest Extreme Edition processor to the previous two flagship processors that it has replaced.

According to the above chart the only difference is the clock speed, but Intel has changed more than just the final frequency on the Extreme Edition.

Intel Pentium Processor Extreme Edition 965

3.73 GHz dual core processor with Hyper-Threading Technology
1066 FSB
4 MB total L2 cache configured as 2 x 2MB per core
Intel Virtualization Technology
Execute Disable Bit
Intel Extended Memory 64 Technology (EM64T)

The 965 comes clocked at 3.73GHz (14.0 x 267MHz) with a 1066MHz front side bus. If this clock frequency rings a bell it should as it is the same core speed as Intel's fastest single core Extreme Edition processor, the Prescott-based chip Intel 3.73GHz EE that was launched in Feburary 2005. There are two separate 'Cedar Mill' cores on the same package that make up the Presler core. Many call the Presler the first true dual-core Intel processor.

If you are thinking of getting one of these processors Intel recommends using the Delta EPS12V 600W ? DPS-600MB M power supply or equivalent with a 2x4 (instead of a 2x2) 12V2 connector to provide headroom and allow for more current and power to be delivered to the processor. The processor Vcc, Icc, and power specifications provided with the Intel Pentium Processor Extreme Edition 955 still apply to the new Intel Pentium Processor Extreme Edition 965. Now that we know what the Intel 965 is all about let's take a look at the new stepping.

Intel Pentium Processor Extreme Edition 955

2009-08-15T02:37:00.000-07:00

Intel Unleashes the Presler Processor

Usually around this time of the year we show you dozens of benchmarks with the next generation Intel Processor with the whole AMD versus Intel mentality. Reviews is still going to do that, but just not today. This morning at 10am Intel announced its new Pentium Processor 955 Extreme Edition CPU, formerly code-named Presler. This chip, which goes on sale to the public on January 16 for $999, is the second generation of dual-core consumer desktop CPU's from the chip giant. Intel has made a number of changes to it's dual core processor series and many will call this Intel's first true dual core processor. This processor features two separate cores with 2MB L2 cache each for a total of 4MB, a 266MHz Quad Pumped Front Side Bus for a solid 1066MHz system bus, Intel Virtualization Technology, and it was all done on the 65nm process over the previous 90nm package found on the previous Prescott and Extreme Edition processors.

After getting the Intel Pentium Processor 955 Extreme Edition "Presler", holy cow that is a mouthful, we quickly found out that a couple rumors going around the internet were not true. One was about the temperatures and the other being the overclockability of the processor in general. Without further ado let's look at the new gem in Intel's Enthusiast portfolio. Taking a look at the Presler (Shown above in the middle) we can easily notice that it looks different from the Intel 5xx, 6xx, and 8xx processors that surround the new kid on the block. Let's see if CPU-Z can read the processor correctly.

It looks like CPU-Z is showing everything okay except for the voltage that the Vcore is running at. Our unlocked processor is running at a multiplier of 13 with a front side bus (FSB) of 266MHz for a total core frequency of 3.46GHz. Not a bad core speed for a CPU having doubled the cache than the previous Extreme Edition, which was the Intel 840 with a total cache of 2MB.

The Intel Pentium D 820..... Dual Core for the masses

2009-08-15T02:34:00.000-07:00

Two months ago, after almost a year of hype, dual core processors made their general public debut. With the release of Intel's Pentium D 840, those who could afford the best of the best finally saw the benefits that dual core processors bring to the table. Today, with Intel's release of the Pentium D 820, Intel brings the benefits of dual core processors to the rest of us. What benefits can you expect from Intel's newest, much hyped processor? Is upgrading from a 5XX or 6XX series processor worth it right now?

Today, Legit Reviews will answer these questions, and give you our impression of Intel's budget dual core processor, the Intel Pentium D 820. Featuring a 2.8GHz core speed and 1 MB of L2 cache, the 820 not only promises vast improvement over hyper-threading when multitasking, but also a "smoother" performance in single thread applications

A few notable features, or lack of features, are the absence of hyper threading and the lack of EIST (Which makes sense as the Pentium D 820 is already throttled back to 2.8 GHz). Will the lack of Hyper Threading show much difference in overall performance? We'll see later on as we test the Pentium D 820 against its bigger brother the Pentium D 840, as well as the Pentium 4 620.

With the release of the Pentium D 840, users realized a major drawback to dual core processors, the lack of support with the 915 and 925 chipsets, so those of us who shelled out upwards of $200 a few months ago for a high end 925XE board are basically SOL. As of right now, only the 945 and 955 chipsets will support dual core processors. Which brings me to the next portion of this review.....the 945 chipset. As it did with the Pentium D 840 and 955 chipset, Intel released the Pentium D 820 with its optimized partner, the 945 chipset. Like the 865 and 915 chipsets before it, the 945 is a watered down version of Intel's current flagship chipset. Released in two versions, the "G", which has integrated graphics, and the "P", which does not, the 945 chipset incorporates almost all of the features found on its expensive big brother, the main exception being Intel's patented Memory Pipeline Technology (As Intel states, "Enhanced memory pipelining that enables a higher utilization of each memory channel, accelerating data transfers between the processor and system memory and resulting in higher system performance.").

Intel Dual Core: Multi-Tasking Benchmarking

2009-08-15T02:32:00.000-07:00

Last week when the dual core embargo was lifted LR brought you the usual processor article on the Intel 840. Today, we are going to focus on the multi-tasking abilities of the new dual core Smithfield processor versus that of the single core Prescott. For benchmarking we wanted identical clock speeds, so an Intel 840 was run versus an Intel 640. Both processors are very similar having EIST, EMT64, 2MB Cache, 800MHz FSB's, and 90nm cores. The only major things that these two processors don't have in common are price points ($285ish on the 640 and around $1000 for the 840) and the fact that one is dual core. The following benchmarks should show the advantages of dual core over single core if one is to be seen.

Over the past week we have had hundreds of e-mails on what to test for multi-tasking and to be honest 99% revolved around gaming and virus scanning. The other e-mails dealt with watching DVD's, downloading files from the internet, running Folding @ Home, Encoding DVD's, and other multi-tasking situations.

Software Used:

Microsoft Media Player 10
Power DVD 6
DVD Shrink 3.2.0.15
EZ CD Ripper 2.30
Folding @ Home Console 5.02
Symantec Norton 2004
DOOM 3

Test System:

Intel P4 640 & 840 -- Intel D955XBK (Intel 955X), 1GB (2x512MB) Corsair PC5400 @ DDR2 667 (3-2-2-8), Geforce 6800GT 256mb (Forceware 71.84), 120GB Seagate SATA150 HDD, Windows XP w/SP2 and DX9C.

Testing Procedure:

All testing was done on a fresh install of Windows XP Professional build 2600 with Service Pack 2 and DirectX 9.0c. All benchmarks were completed on the desktop with multiple applications open. No overclocking was done on the video card during any of this review.

Time to see how dual core works in a multi-tasking environment.

Intel Dual Core: Pentium EE 840 Arrives

2009-08-14T10:54:00.000-07:00

Intel Pentium Processor Extreme Edition 840

Dual Core Today:

For more than a year now the enthusiast community has been hearing the benefits of dual core processors. AMD was the first to announce their move to a dual core solution, and much was made of them beating Intel to tape, only one problem... On April 4th, 2005 Intel made it clear to the whole industry that they have dual core ready and will be launching parts this quarter. While in recent months it was clear AMD was not going to be the first to launch a desktop dual core part, Intel shocked even me when they told us to be ready to sample dual core in March! While Intel isn't officially launching dual core today, it is giving us a chance to "preview" these new processors now and share our thoughts with our readers. In the following weeks expect Intel to start shipping desktop dual core processors to the retail market. Pricing is not even set yet, but we expect them to be approximately the same price as any other Extreme Edition released from Intel.

Today, for the very first time, Intel is letting the media show off the Intel Pentium Processor Extreme Edition 840. Legit Reviews has the pleasure of being among the first to use the Intel 955X Express chipset, the I/O Controller Hub (ICH7/R), and the Pentium Extreme Edition 840 processor. Like getting the keys to a rare sports car, I took the new platform for a test drive and found it to be everything I expected. I found amazing performance gains, pitfalls, and many interesting quirks that come with any advance in technology.

The Intel 840 EE is the first desktop processor featuring a dual core design to be given to the mercy of reviewers. Dual core means that the processor has two full execution cores, both running at the same clock, in one physical processor. In the case of the Extreme Edition 840, the two cores are each running at a modest 3.2GHz. The Extreme Edition 840 also features Intel's patented Hyper Threading, which means each processor core has two logical processors for a grand total of 4 threads to be used!

After waiting more than a year for dual core to arrive, lets get right to the details and take a look at what Intel is up to with the new Smithfield Core.

The Old Intel Pentium 4 Prescott Processor Core:

The New Intel Pentium D Smithfield Core:

Intel will produce a number of different multi-core processors. Initial silicon will feature a "monolithic" design where both cores are on a single die as seen below. The first Intel Pentium D "Smithfield" dual-core processors will use the single-die design. But in the case of 65nm Presler (a CPU slated for production in 2006), the two physical cores will be separate pieces of silicon placed side by side on the same processor in a "multi-chip" design.

As you can clearly see the Intel Pentium D Smithfield core is basically two Prescott processors that have been "bolted" together. Since the release of the Prescott, Intel has put a significant amount of time and money into the design, and has improved it greatly from the original problematic core that it once was. The first move toward taming the Prescott was the 5XXJ series (E0 steppings), which added XD-Bit and new technologies to lower temperatures (C1E & TM2). Intel was not done updating the Prescott core, and in February 2005 launched the 6XX series, which added EIST (Enhanced Intel Speed Step) technology for even better thermal properties as well as EMT64 support for next generation 64-bit applications. With the Prescott now fully mature, Intel was able to bring out Smithfield, which is more or less two Intel 6XX series cores attached together. (as seen in the above image)

With the Extreme Edition 840, each of the processing units will have an independent 1MB L2 cache, and Hyper-Threading will be enabled on both cores, which gives the system a total of four processing threads visible to the OS. Hyper-Threading is of course the technology Intel originally introduced in the Pentium 4 that allow a single processor core to handle two processing threads. As it was when Hyper-Threading first came out not all dual core processors will be offering it. For those not interested in the Extreme Edition series, Intel will have the Pentium D processor. The Pentium D will have two processing cores and 2MB of L2 cache, but the processor will not have Hyper-Threading support. As a result, the Pentium D will only have the ability to handle two threads, but reach retail shelves at a much lower price point.

Multi-core processors will be compatible with the just announced Intel 955X and 945 Express Chipset families (internally referred to as Lakeport and Glenwood).

Intel 6xx Series Processors Arrive

2009-08-14T10:53:00.000-07:00

Over the holiday weekend Intel officially announced the new Pentium 4 Extreme Edition 3.73GHz processor and four processors in their Pentium 4 6XX series (rated as 660 to 630). Today we have the Intel Pentium 4 Extreme Edition at 3.73GHz and the Intel Pentium 4 660 in house for testing. Both of these processors use a new Prescott core that features 2MB of L2 cache and are EMT64 enabled!

When the Prescott first came out the longer pipelines and the increased temperatures from the new 90nm core shocked even the most die hard Intel fans. With the Intel P4 6XX series Intel strived to add performance while at the same time lowering power consumption and temperatures. The new improved core is still manufactured using the 90nm strained silicon production technology just like the original Prescott, which has been in use on the Pentium 4 5XX processors for almost a year now. Since the Prescott core is by no means new or unknown let's jump right into the new features.

The New Features:

More L2 Cache - Enthusiasts know that more cache means more performance and that is exactly what Intel did on these updated Prescott cores. They doubled the L2 cache in hopes of adding performance. The extra cache means more transistors, and in this case, over 40 million more! This increase in cache also increases the size of the die from 112mm² to 135mm². This is the only true "performance" upgrade made to the core this time around.
EMT64 Enabled - Other than the extra L2 cache the newly launched Pentium 4 6XX processor family offers support for Enhanced Memory 64 Technology or EM64T as many know it by. Since this is nothing more than 64-bit extensions of x86 architecture they are identical to the AMD64 extensions, thus giving us the first AMD vs. Intel battle on the 64-bit Operating System. Now that both Intel and AMD have their 64-bit CPU's out the door and both are fully functional, with the latest public release of Windows XP Professional x64 expect to see this OS completed in the near future!
Enhanced Power Management - Combination of EIST (Enhanced Intel Speedstep Technology), C1E (Enhanced Halt State), and TM2 (Thermal Monitor 2). In an appropriately designed system, these features can deliver average power savings with little impact to performance by adjusting frequency & voltage. To go a little more in depth, all three technologies offer similar functionality initiated in three different ways. C1E is activated via Halt (idle) instruction execution. EIST operates via OS request based upon CPU load. TM2 operates via processor request based upon the thermal load on the processor.
Execute Diable Bit Enabled - Intel Execute Disable Bit offers Improved Security when used with Windows XP SP2. With the Execute Disable Bit feature you can be protected from certain types of viruses and buffer overflow exploits. This is similar to AMD's NX technology and Intel has used Execute Disable Bit on the 5XXJ series processors.

The die increase that we talked about above can be seen below via the images of the old Prescott core and the Prescott 2MB with extra cache:As you can see the new core is very similar to the old core. From just looking at the die pictures it seems as if they just added more cache and made some other minor changes. Below are CPU-Z version 1.27 screen shots of our two processors that we are showing you today.

Both of our processors have 2048 KBytes of L2 Cache and are based on 90nm core technology. Both CPU's also feature a stepping code of 3 and a revision number of N0. The biggest difference between these two processors is the Bus Speed that they run at. The 660 is running at 800MHz, while the 3.73GHz EE is at 1066MHz. One more difference that can't be seen here, but can easily be spotted when you try to pay for these is the price difference. The Intel 3.73GHz Extreme Edition is priced at $999 in 1,000 unit quantities while the Intel 660 rings in at $605.

Many of our readers are enthusiasts that love overclocking so I know what you are thinking by this point -- An extra $400 for 66MHz FSB? I'm sure every overclocker out there just got a big smile on their face and so did we when we noted that the Intel Pentium 4 630 runs at 15 x 200 = 3.0GHz and costs only $224! With a multiplier of 15 and a sub $250 price this processor may easily hit close to a 1066MHz Bus Speed for less than a quarter of the price of the 3.73GHz Extreme Edition. As always you have to have the right hardware to overclock and don't forget it may void your warranty, increase temperatures, and overclocking is not endorsed by Intel. (Who themselves allow for overclocking up to 10% in their own boards BIOS options.)

Intel's 925XE Chipset & 1066FSB Processors Arrive

2009-08-14T10:52:00.001-07:00

Intel's 925XE Chipset & 1066FSB Processors Arrive

Finally... 1066FSB Arrives

The move from the Intel 865/875 chipsets to the more recent 915/925 chipsets brought noted improvements across the board that no one could ignore. Today (Halloween by chance) is the day that Intel makes public the updated 925X chipset and the new processor that can capitalize on it. Enter the 925XE Express Chipset and Pentium 4 Processor Extreme Edition with HT Technology at 3. 46GHz (13x266MHz). For those of you who don't know the Intel Pentium 4 processor has been running at a Front Side Bus (FSB) of 800MHz for some time now. To achieve this speed Intel was running the FSB quad pumped at 200MHz. Since the FSB dictates how much data can travel between the CPU and chipset, an increase is logical to gain overall system performance. Today Intel raises the bar on FSB performance and for the first time breaks the 1GHz barrier by running the FSB quad pumped at 266MHz, thus arriving at a FSB of 1066MHz.

The increase to a 1066MHz FSB will be the first time DDR2 memory will officially run in sync at DDR2 533MHz. Plus, now that DDR2 memory has matured seeing 3-3-3-8 timings with PC2-4200 memory is common. It is no shocker that Enthusiasts have been waiting months for this chipset, but we found it interesting that many companies have also been waiting on the 925XE chipset. The most noticeable is ABIT, who is going to launch the first ABIT-Fatal1ty gamer motherboard based on the 925XE chipset, thus gambling the success of their new product line off this chipset. The long-awaited FSB speed increase has arrived! Was it worth the wait?

If you look at what Intel has said about their Socket 775 it is their long term solution platform. They have made public comments at the Intel Developer Forum and other events that the 915/925 chipset family will more than likely power Intel's next generation dual core processors. These new processors are expected to come out in mid 2005 -- best guess would be late Q2 or early Q3. Between now and then the Intel 925XE looks to be the Intel enthusiasts' chipset of choice for their next system build.

The New Intel 3.46GHz EE 1066FSB Processor:

The new Intel 3.46EE processor is based on the old 130nm Northwood core (also known as P4 "C"). It comes with 2mb of L3 Cache and does not have SSE3 or XD-BIT instructions. The 3.46GHz processor only differs from the previous generation Extreme Editions by being able to run at 266MHz on the FSB. We actually tried to run our "old" 3.4EE at 13x266MHz and it failed to successfully load Windows at such speeds. The new Intel 3.46EE is basically a cream of the crop Extreme Edition processor that can run at a high front side bus frequency.

Let's take a look at pricing for 1,000-Unit quantities and also compare the new 3.46GHz EE to some other socket 775 prices.

Pentium 4 3.46EE 1066FSB - 3.46GHz -- $999
Pentium 4 3.40EE 800FSB - 3.40GHz -- $925
Pentium 4 560 - 3.60GHz -- $417
Pentium 4 550 - 3.40GHz -- $278

As you can tell the new Pentium 4 3.46EE is not close to the price range for any college student (wouldn't it be nice if Intel offered student discounts like Microsoft??), but is priced just like the original P4 3.4EE when it came out several months ago at $999. That happens to be more than double the Intel 560 processor, which is the flagship of the "mainstream" Intel socket 775 processors.

Below are some shots of our Intel 3.46GHz EE processor running on our test bed.

While the Pentium 4 Extreme Edition will be the first and currently only processor to work with the new quad-pumped system bus at 266 MHz there are more processors coming. Intel also affirmed that its Pentium 4 Extreme Edition (EE) 3.73GHz and 600-series desktop CPUs, which should be launched in the first quarter of next year, will feature Intel's Extended Memory 64 Technology, or Intel EM64T. We asked about XD-BIT (Execute Disable bit) and were told not to expect any of the current P4 EE's to come with it, just the Prescott processors with a 'J'-suffix will have XD-Bit enabled. All the enthusiasts looking for a "mainstream" cost efficient 1066FSB processor will have to wait till the 600 series is launched!

Let's move on and see what the new Intel reference board offers.

Intel Pentium 4 2.8E

2009-08-14T10:46:00.000-07:00

Early this month we posted our original Prescott review and then followed it up with an article taking a closer look at Prescott temperatures. This is the third article we have written on the Prescott, but it's also the first using a Retail Prescott purchased by ourselves. While Intel has admitted that the first generation of Prescotts will not offer a "huge" performance increase over equally clocked Nothwood processor they did hint that once clock speeds get above 3.6GHz the processor would be impressive. So, we wanted to see how well the Prescott overclocks and the results are in. This was a tricky adventure, since we still have no idea what a higher Vcore can do to this chip (default on our retail Prescott was 1.35). With some motherboard manufacturers purposely limiting the Vcore options (as in, "giving none") we can see that we are not the only ones concerned with the new power requirements.

Our Test System:

Intel Pentium 4 2.8E (Prescott)
Asus p4c800e deluxe (Bios version 1014)
ATI Radeon 9800 Pro
Thermalright SP-94 / Panaflo 92mm Medium speed fan (Air Cooled)
2 x Western Digital Raptor 74GB, 10,000rpm, 8mb cache hard drive
Antec True Control 550W Power Supply
1gb (2 x 512mb) OCZ 3700 Gold Rev2 Memory (for 5:4 mem ratio) testing, 1gb (2 x 512mb) OCZ 4000EL (for 1:1)
Timings used: at 5:4 on the OCZ 3700 Gold Rev2 we used timings of 2-3-3-6, the OCZ 4000EL was run at 3-4-4-8

Testing Method:

To get some idea of stability, we ran our overclocking stability tests using Futuremark's 3dMark 2001, Super pi, and cpu burn all running at the same time. We also did DVD encoding and burning at the selected speeds while running the UT 2003 demo.

Performance:

First off, we decided to test the 2.8E at its default vcore and see what she could do. We were very happy to see that we were able to run at a stable speed of 252fsb, which equaled a speed on the cpu of 3528mhz. This was a nice overclock for default Vcore.Here is a CPU-Z screen of our default Vcore efforts.

We were obviously never planning on keeping it at default Vcore, so we moved on to see how far we could push this chip. We decided we would go to a max of 1.55 on this retail 2.8E, so we slammed the vcore to that and re-ran our stability tests. Our results were quite pleasing, though no where near what we have seen some of the ES chips attain. Something else that we noticed is that the Asus P4C800E - Deluxe motherboard that we use has a tendency to overvolt. At our default vcore settings, it did just that as you can see from the screen shot, but once we set the vcore to 1.55 in the bios, the Asus no longer over-volted. Though it was a nice surprise to us, it was somewhat unexpected, since the Asus has over-volted every chip we have had in this board.

Anyways, with our Vcore set at 1.55, we were able to get an overclock of 270MHz FSB, which gave us a cpu speed of 3,780MHz. We did this speed at both 1:1 overclocking with our OCZ 4000EL and at a divider of 5:4 with our OCZ 3700 Gold Rev2. We would have to say that this chip absolutely screamed at these speeds. As far as temps go, we expected and got much higher temps as the Vcore was raised. At. 3.8GHz our cpu idled at 42°C and at load it reached 53°C. The temperatures did not seem to hinder our overclocking by any means.

Let's look at some of our screen shots from this overclock compared to default settings of the chip. Default pics are first, then pics at 270MHz FSB

Testing:

Let's look at some of our screen shots from this overclock compared to default settings of the chip. Default (200MHz FSB) pics are on the left, then pics at 270MHz FSB on the right.

Memory:

We were very surprised to see the read results, especially on the overclocked result -- over 7600MB/Sec! We re-ran the test several times, and this was a repeatable result! Look at the writes now:

This was a pretty good increase as well, but nothing out of the ordinary here. Sandra unbuffered is next.

The overclocking faired good results on Sandra Memory Bandwidth testing also. We noted an 800MB/sec increase in unbuffered bandwidth. This represents a 31% increase in bandwidth from default clock speeds. Pretty impressive!!

3d Mark 2001 SE:

Here we see a very nice 16% increase from 200MHz FSB to 270MHz FSB. Pretty nice scores here, especially considering there is no overclocking on the video card.

Super PI:

Our default test of Super Pi to 2 million places came in at 1 minute 49 seconds, so there was a dramatic improvement with the overclocking.

Conclusion:

Jason's thoughts:

Going into this review we had high hopes of our retail processor. We reached 3.75GHz, which is just shy of a 1GHz overclock. Not only is this a very nice overclock on an early production core, but it was also done with air cooling. This Means that all you enthusiasts at home on a budget have something that can be reached without dumping your wallet out. We did take it easy on the Vcore, as 1.55 would not be extreme for the Northwood. From what we have found during overclocking this looks like a promising beginning of the Prescott core! We should see it scale quite well with the socket change.

While many have pointed out the downfalls of the new core, it is in all reality just the first step in the process of moving forward to higher clock speeds and a new socket design in the near future. Right now the Prescott is a tad slower than the Northwood at equal clock speeds, but Intel has told us that the Prescott will get better as Intel comes out with higher clock speeds. The sweet spot for the Prescott is rumored to be around 3.6 - 4.0GHz, which are speeds that we are able to get with the retail 2.8E processor with good air cooling. Most benchmarks we have seen seem to place it slightly behind the Northwoods, but when ours was overclocked to the 3.8GHZ, we can certainly tell you this was one fast chip!

Lastly, keep in mind that Intel is making some slight modifications to the Prescott core right now. These changes should help address the heat issues that we noted on in the past. Once we get the newly modified core from Intel we will be sure to let you know the differences in temperatures and if any performance differences can be noted.