Jeff Bouton
Recent posts
While many of us are impressed with the features and performance promised by today's top of the line graphics cards, in reality, not too many of us have the budgets to afford one of these gaming powerhouses. Often times, the common user needs to keep things in monetary perspective and consider a more practical approach to...
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With the advent of Windows XP Media Center Edition, a whole new playing field was created to help advance the relationship between multimedia and the PC. Designed solely for use in OEM systems at first, Windows XP Media Center Edition helped open the door for OEMs to create PCs with an increased emphasis on all things multimedia. ...
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Every once in a while a product comes along that really garners the attention of the enthusiast crowd. There can be a number of factors for this, including overclocking performance, easy modding potential or just an overall great value for the money. One such piece of hardware that encompasses a lot of these qualities is the Sapphire...
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The Pentium-D 900 series is the next evolution in Intel's Dual-Core plans. The Pentium-D 900 offers a total of 2MB of L2 cache per core while also adding support for Virtualization. Thanks to an improve 65nm manufacturing process, the Pentium-D 900 series also offers lower power consumption as well. Building on "Smithfields'...
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For some, a simple USB thumb drive is not enough portable storage, even at its largest capacity. Whether it's for backup purposes or there's a need to carry gobs of data around, there is no better alternative to hard drive capacities. Retail external drive kits can be pricey, which is where Vantec comes in with their NexStar3 with...
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The picoPSU-120 12V DC-DC ATX PSU isn't your typical PSU as the "120" implies. Nonetheless, this is an ingenious little device is rated at 120 Watts and can handle a max load of 140 watts to your existing setup, say for that power hunger new video card that's draining your current power source. Instead of shelling out big bucks...
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Looking back on 2005's list of hot products, dual-core CPUs and dual-graphics solutions are a couple of things that immediately come to mind. Adoption of dual-core processors continues to increase, with both Intel and AMD bringing their own renditions to the frontline. Both company's products have their own pros and cons, however. ...
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The guys at NGOHQ took some time with ATI's X1800 to see what this card could do in the overclocking arena. What they found was the X1800 was quite the little overclocker indeed. Utilizing ATITOOL, this experiment yielded impressive results, all without any physical modifications required. This is a brief write up that didn't...
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Gigabyte's i-RAM is a cool little device that utilizes 4GB of DDR RAM for data storage. The unit occupies a PCI slot for power while connecting to a standard SATA connection for data transfer. To prevent data loss, a battery backup is integrated into the design as well. Hard drive Tach and SANDRA posted impressive scores,...
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When it comes to sound cards, think Creative is the only game in town? Guess again. While Creative has name recognition cornered, there are other viable options. Take BlueGears HDA X-Mystique 7.1 Soundcard. This little gem can encode Dolby Digital 5.1 streams and has a slew of other impressive features, all for less...
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AT CES, PQI and TwinMOS showed off their latest offerings including U3 flash disks. U3 flash disk technology allows for users to take their personal programs and run them on any PC. PQI's model comes with McAfee AV preinstalled in sizes of 512MB, 1GB and 2GB. TwinMOS will offer 1 and 2 GB models with no word on preinstalled...
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The Cooler Master Stacker 830 is a modern looking case that has a stainless steel appearance. Still, the case has an elegant, modern look that gives it a personality all its own. This case seems to have a lot of things going for it, including 9 120mm fans which will keep this case cool in virtually any environment. Lastly,...
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XG's Dragon ATX case is a sharp looking enclosure that comes well equipped with a 500W Modular PSU and front LCD design. The mid-tower design offers a fair amount of room for all of your hardware goodies while the dragon design on the front makes quite a statement. Looking for a mid-tower with a little flair? If so, you may...
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Starting in March, Toshiba plans on shipping HD-DVD drives, making them the first commercial introduction of HD-DVD. Sony plans to introduce rival Blu-Ray drives in the Summer. Blu-Ray has garnered growing support in recent weeks and months, but this fight is far from over. Pricing for HD-DVD are not for the squeamish at...
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Digitimes is reporting that "sources" claim Apple will be introducing a new notebook utilizing Intel Robson Cache Technology. Basically, the system uses NAND flash memory for booting and running most commonly run programs. Along with major improvements in boot times, battery life should be...
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The TechZone.com pulled together a test comparing the performance of WiFi and WiMAX. They discuss the differences for each technology as well as analyzing and comparing their performance. This is a good read if you are entertaining a wireless upgrade and want to see if it really worth the added cost of the lastest and greatest...
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The team at Bigbruin got to thinking one day and decided to run a RAID experiment using USB thumbdrives. This is more of a proof-of-concept article as the need for RAIDed USB drives are minimal. Nonetheless, it's refreshing to see someone think outside the box from time to time, and this experiment proved to be an interesting read...
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When it comes to sound cards, the competition is a lot more "low-profile" than the video card sector. With audio cards, Creative is enjoyed the most success, being the most recognizable name in the market. ExtremeMHZ.com has a review of the Creative Soundblaster X-Fi XtremeMusic, which they feel delivers the best PC audio...
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For those looking to brush up on our VB and SQL skills, Microsoft is offering free courses. The first course covers SQL Server 2005 while the other is for Visual Studio 2005. The course range from a 90 days to a full year at no charge, covering all areas of each package. If you want to fine tune your skills, this is a good...
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It's no secret that Blu-Ray has gained major support in recent months, gaining momentum over HD-DVD. Furthering the growth, Pioneer is releasing their first Blu-Ray Disc Drive for the PC. The BDR-101A boast storage capacities of 25GB on a single disc. Look for shipments to start in the first quarter...
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While Asustek and Everlight have been tight lipped about it, Digitimes states a Chinese newspaper is reporting that Asustek will start offering a new 12.1-inch notebook that utilizes Everlight's white LED display technology. The report also states that sales of the new notebook may start as early as next month...
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Finding a good headset to work with your cell phone is key. Not only do you want to be able to hear in virtually any environment, you want to be heard as well. Futurelooks has a look at the Bluetake BT400 G5 Bluetooth Headset which shows a lot of promise. They go over the product features in detail and tested the BT400 G5...
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