Manufacturer:Cooler Master
UK Price (as reviewed): £185 RRP (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed): $250 RRP (ex. Tax)
Just like with buses, we wait six months for a new Cooler Master case, and then two show up in the space of a few weeks! Not that we’re complaining though, as the Cooler Master HAF 932 we looked at a few weeks ago delivered excellent performance and the new ATCS 840 we’re looking at today set to build on this already strong showing.
Manufacturer:AMD
UK Price (as reviewed):£89.98 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed):$129.99 (ex. Tax) (plus $15.00 mail-in rebate)
It's always great to see competition and that's exactly what returned when AMD introduced the Radeon HD 4800 series in July. The refined RV770 architecture went a long way to fixing the problems with the previous R600 and RV670 designs and it resulted in a massive performance leap that clearly caught Nvidia off guard.
Manufacturer:Cooler Master
UK Price (as reviewed):£33.71 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed):$48.48 (ex. Tax)
Weight: 1045g
Size (with fan): 127.28mm (W) x 127.28mm (D) x 160mm (H)
Fan Speed: N/A
Noise Level: N/A
Warranty: Two year limited hardware warranty
Supported Sockets: Intel LGA775, AMD 754, 939, 940, AM2, Intel LGA1366 support available soon.
Manufacturer:G.Skill
UK Price (as reviewed):£56.17 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed):$69.99 (ex. Tax)
Manufacturer:Asus
UK Price (as reviewed):£449.99 (inc. Delivery)
US Price (as reviewed): TBA
Things are always a bit schizophrenic with me, so it’s no surprise that when I was first presented with the new Eee PC from Asus that I was in two minds about it all.
On the one hand, the Asus Eee PC S101 is the exactly what everyone should want from a netbook. It’s sleek, smooth, lightweight and well-made and this new model has a very executive feel to it. This is the type of thing we’re all secretly hoping our new owners might buy us all for working on.
Researchers at King's College London and Royal Philips Electronics are to collaborate todevelop new ways to improve the diagnosis and treatment of cardiovascular disease.
Under the multi-million Euro five-year agreement, Philips and King’s College London’s Division of Imaging Sciences will work together to develop new medical-imaging technologies with a particular focus on cardiology and cardiac electrophysiology.
One of the key areas they will focus on will be how to combine different imaging technologies such as X-ray, MRI, ultrasound and CT, to help doctors navigate their way through a patient’s heart during minimal-invasive procedures.
Researchers at King's College London and Royal Philips Electronics are to collaborate todevelop new ways to improve the diagnosis and treatment of cardiovascular disease.
Under the multi-million Euro five-year agreement, Philips and King’s College London’s Division of Imaging Sciences will work together to develop new medical-imaging technologies with a particular focus on cardiology and cardiac electrophysiology.
One of the key areas they will focus on will be how to combine different imaging technologies such as X-ray, MRI, ultrasound and CT, to help doctors navigate their way through a patient’s heart during minimal-invasive procedures.
Researchers at King's College London and Royal Philips Electronics are to collaborate todevelop new ways to improve the diagnosis and treatment of cardiovascular disease.
Under the multi-million Euro five-year agreement, Philips and King’s College London’s Division of Imaging Sciences will work together to develop new medical-imaging technologies with a particular focus on cardiology and cardiac electrophysiology.
One of the key areas they will focus on will be how to combine different imaging technologies such as X-ray, MRI, ultrasound and CT, to help doctors navigate their way through a patient’s heart during minimal-invasive procedures.
Manufacturer:NEC
UK Price (as reviewed):£621.58 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed): TBC
The bottom end of the monitor market has long been using sub-par panels in order to keep costs down, so it came as almost no surprise when monitor manufacturers started looking at cheaper panels in bigger displays. You can, after all, buy a 24-inch widescreen monitor with a 1,920 x 1,200 native resolution for around £200 these days if you're not concerned about quality and just want lots of desktop real-estate.
Manufacturer:NEC
UK Price (as reviewed):£621.58 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed): TBC
The bottom end of the monitor market has long been using sub-par panels in order to keep costs down, so it came as almost no surprise when monitor manufacturers started looking at cheaper panels in bigger displays. You can, after all, buy a 24-inch widescreen monitor with a 1,920 x 1,200 native resolution for around £200 these days if you're not concerned about quality and just want lots of desktop real-estate.
Manufacturer:Zotac
UK Price (as reviewed):£233.82 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed):$299.99 (ex. Tax)
Core Clock: 650MHz
Shader Clock: 1,400MHz
Memory Clock: 2,100MHz
Memory: 896MB GDDR3
Warranty: Five years (parts and labour)
With the excellent ATI Radeon HD 4800 series stealing a lot of Nvidia's thunder at many of the key price points this summer, many of the company's partners have been pretty quiet of late. Nvidia has been uncharacteristically quiet during this period as well, with an exception made for Nvision in August, with only one new graphics card launch since the original GeForce GTX 280 and 260 – the GeForce GTX 260+, as we've coined it.
Manufacturer:Silverstone
UK Price (as reviewed):£152.69 (inc. VAT) With windowed side panel
US Price (as reviewed):$199.98 (exc. Tax)
Silverstone, and its TJ07 premium aluminium chassis especially, has achieved something of a cult status within our community over the last few years thanks to the TJ07’s elegant design and excellent build quality. It used a unique uni-body construction where the majority of the case's chassis is made from a single piece of curved aluminium.
Manufacturer:Zotac
UK Price (as reviewed): ~£80 (inc. VAT) - estimated
US Price (as reviewed): ~$120 (ex. Tax) - estimated
It's not often, actually, not ever we review a Zotac board, however this time around it has come out ahead of its rivals and is first out the gate with a working product based on Nvidia's MCP7a chipset. While the MCP7a release was put back a few weeks, we've still yet to see parts from Asus and MSI that were promised to us more than a few weeks ago. Not that we're complaining about this new little micro ATX board though, it's always good to look at a board from someone new, as it broadens our horizons and keep the usual suspects on their toes.
Manufacturer:Nvidia
Nvidia will tell us that its latest integrated graphics chipset is on time but it's actually quite late. We're into October now and it was meant to be here sometime back in Q2. Back at the start of this year at CES, Tim was briefed about how all future Nvidia chipsets would include integrated graphics and how the entire Nvidia platform will be the one of choice for consumers.
Despite our twitchy dislike of "platforms" and their possible limitations to consumer choice, I have to admit having read the Hybrid Power features it was actually a chipset I was genuinely planning an upgrade around and I'm
Manufacturer:Asus
UK Price (as reviewed):£174.78 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed):$219.09 (ex. Tax)
Sometimes it’s hard to believe that Asus makes more than just Eee PCs and Republic of Gamer motherboards, but there are many more products that come out of the Taiwanese giant’s factories these days. One such range often left in the frankly huge shadow left by the Eee PC and RoG lines is the company’s monitor line up.
Manufacturer: Cooler Master
UK Price (as reviewed): £119.99 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed):$145.00 (exc. Tax)
It’s certainly been quite a while since we’ve looked at a new Cooler Master case – April in fact, if you can believe it, which is surprising considering the popularity of their cases in the modding community.
Iconic Cooler Master designs like the Cosmos or 832 Stacker have been the basis for some of the most impressive mods of the last year, providing a huge and customisable blank canvas into which we’ve seen everything from impressive watercooling set ups to full blown Battlestars installed.
Manufacturer:Palit
UK Price (as reviewed):£120.87 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed):$189.99 (ex. Tax)
Core Clock: 685MHz
Memory Clock: 2,000MHz (effective)
Memory: 512MB GDDR3
Warranty: Two years (parts and labour)
Another day, another custom Radeon HD 4850 is probably what you're thinking right now. And that's exactly what we were thinking when Palit's latest Radeon HD 4850 turned up on our doorstep; at least, until we opened the box and started looking a little closer.
Manufacturer:Gigabyte
We've seen X58 boards from Asus and MSI already, but now Gigabyte has sent us its X58 to scrutinise. The 0.2 revision we received in the post was minus final heatpipes though, and for the Extreme model we have here we expect them to be... well, Extreme, in typical Gigabyte fashion.
Instead of pursuing the idea of fancy looks and very niche overclocking features, Gigabyte is maintaining the status quo once again, even if this is the "Extreme" model. We've got to be honest though - since the Extreme has become the new DQ6, what significance does the DQ6 have? Or then the 5 for that matter? It's difficult to ascertain what market each is designed for because the differences are so slight.
Manufacturer: Thermaltake
UK Price (as reviewed): N/A
US Price (as reviewed) N/A
Weight (with fan): 840g
Size (with fan): 161mm(H) x 171mm(W) x 100mm(H) D
Fan Size: 139mm
Fan Speed: 1000-1600RPM
Noise Level: 16-24dBa
Warranty: One year standard warranty via retailer
Supported Motherboards: Intel LGA 775,AMD 754, 939, 940, AM2
Manufacturer:ECS
UK Price (as reviewed): N/A
US Price (as reviewed): N/A
Core Clock: 740MHz
Memory Clock: 2,200MHz (effective)
Memory: 512MB GDDR3 per card
The 9800 GTX+ is something of a forgotten commodity in the current generation of graphics cards – a hanger on from the heady days of G92, when Nvidia ruled the roost and 8800 GTs roamed LAN parties in great graphics rendering herds.
Manufacturer:ECS
UK Price (as reviewed): N/A
US Price (as reviewed): N/A
Core Clock: 740MHz
Memory Clock: 2,200MHz (effective)
Memory: 512MB GDDR3 per card
The 9800 GTX+ is something of a forgotten commodity in the current generation of graphics cards – a hanger on from the heady days of G92, when Nvidia ruled the roost and 8800 GTs roamed LAN parties in great graphics rendering herds.
Manufacturer:Asus
You may come here to read bit-tech during your lunch break, drop into our community to make a few comments after school or work, and while most of us have rooms littered with computer hardware, with soldering iron burn marks in the carpet and desks that are public health hazards, only a few have the time, patience and well... money to pursue some extreme overclocking.
We've covered Extreme Overclocking events before, we overclock in almost every article and on many occasions in our hardware forum we've seen readers hitting GHz overclocks on their CPUs. This is tame by some people's standards, though.
Manufacturer:Asus
We managed to get some very early hands-on time with Asus’ next addition to its Eee PC line up, which is due to be announced some time today. We've also managed to garner enough information on the new Eee to put together some early thoughts on this exciting new device.
The new unit, which will be known as the Eee PC S101, excites us because it is such a massive departure from previous Eee PCs. The major change is the sub-notebook’s aesthetics – the Eee PC has grown up and it no longer looks, or feels like Your First Notebook, never mind a cost-cut device.
Manufacturer:AMD
UK Price (as reviewed):£187.87 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed):$295.00 (ex. Tax)
Core Clock: 750MHz
Memory Clock: 3,600MHz (effective)
Memory: 1GB GDDR5
When AMD launched the ATI Radeon HD 4870 and 4850 graphics cards back in June, the company was back in the game in a big way. Nvidia had been sitting tight at the top of the market, announcing products that some would argue shouldn’t have been released and when it unveiled the GeForce GTX 200 series, it’s fair to say the company had underestimated AMD’s resolve and aggression.
Manufacturer:HIS
UK Price (as reviewed):£135.00 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed):$189.99 (ex. Tax)
Core Clock: 685MHz
Memory Clock: 2,200MHz (effective)
Memory: 512MB GDDR3
Warranty: Three years (parts and labour)
The Radeon HD 4850 is arguably the best bang for buck graphics card on the market at the moment and it has been a favourite in the bit-tech
Manufacturer:HIS
UK Price (as reviewed):£135.00 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed):$189.99 (ex. Tax)
Core Clock: 685MHz
Memory Clock: 2,200MHz (effective)
Memory: 512MB GDDR3
Warranty: Three years (parts and labour)
The Radeon HD 4850 is arguably the best bang for buck graphics card on the market at the moment and it has been a favourite in the bit-tech
Manufacturer:HIS
UK Price (as reviewed):£135.00 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed):$189.99 (ex. Tax)
Core Clock: 685MHz
Memory Clock: 2,200MHz (effective)
Memory: 512MB GDDR3
Warranty: Three years (parts and labour)
The Radeon HD 4850 is arguably the best bang for buck graphics card on the market at the moment and it has been a favourite in the bit-tech
Manufacturer:HIS
UK Price (as reviewed):£135.00 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed):$189.99 (ex. Tax)
Core Clock: 685MHz
Memory Clock: 2,200MHz (effective)
Memory: 512MB GDDR3
Warranty: Three years (parts and labour)
The Radeon HD 4850 is arguably the best bang for buck graphics card on the market at the moment and it has been a favourite in the bit-tech
Manufacturer:OCZ
UK Price (as reviewed):£97.43 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed):$154.00 (ex. Tax)
OCZ's EliteXStream range offers new 800W and the 1,000W power supplies - OCZ has finally made a product that crosses the boundary and bears fruit from its recent PC Power and Cooling acquisition. Yes while on the outside it says "OCZ", inside it has a heart of PC Power, which is partly the reason why it dons the Elite branding too. OCZ are intending to leverage the popularity and engineering prowess of the ever capable people at PC Power, but getting those plug things right to make a modular PSU still seems to elude them.
Manufacturer:OCZ
UK Price (as reviewed):£97.43 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed):$154.00 (ex. Tax)
OCZ's EliteXStream range offers new 800W and the 1,000W power supplies - OCZ has finally made a product that crosses the boundary and bears fruit from its recent PC Power and Cooling acquisition. Yes while on the outside it says "OCZ", inside it has a heart of PC Power, which is partly the reason why it dons the Elite branding too. OCZ are intending to leverage the popularity and engineering prowess of the ever capable people at PC Power, but getting those plug things right to make a modular PSU still seems to elude them.
Manufacturer:Samsung
UK Price (as reviewed):£319.00 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed):$479.99 (ex. Tax)
When it comes to PC monitors, size matters. But that doesn't necessarily mean bigger is always better. The key issue is the trade off between screen diagonal and native resolution. Bump up the screen size without increasing the resolution and the result is bigger, coarser pixels.
Unfortunately, that's an all too common ruse in the monitor market at the moment. Just about every widescreen display in the 23- to 28-inch range, for instance, currently sports a 1,920 x 1,200 pixel native resolution (though we should note that PC monitors with HDTV-esque 16:9 aspects and 1,920 x 1,080 pixel grids are expected to become increasingly common over the next 12 months). Needless to say, at the top end of that range you're looking at some fairly fat pixels.
