One of the best!!

Very competitive against high end heatsink/coolers

As I was researching heatsinks for my new i7 setup, I cam across a few all-in-one water cooling kits. After a short time looking at reviews, it was clear that this was the best of the bunch as far as all-in-one water cooling kits are concerned. What really drew me towards this unit, is the size and weight. After using a TRUE Ultra 120 Extreme in my last setup, I was weary of buying another due to the size and weight. You can actually see the heatsink slightly bending the motherboard when the case is stood up. Not only that, the heatsinks are huge! So big in fact, I had to remove a 120mm fan just to get it to fit in an 830 stacker case. Also, there is much less room to work with when installing one of these huge heatsinks.

So after using the Corsair H50 for a month now, here are my thoughts:

Pros: Very easy to install, light compared to heatsinks, easy to work with in the case since it is smaller than a heastsink, radiator is small enough to work with as well, and great temps(see below for specs & temps)

Cons: Liquid in the case has always scared me, but Corsair gives you a two year warranty and I have read on their forums that the pump in these things will last for many years past the warranty. Possible leaks, but again, Corsair says this thing will not leak and after looking at how the thing is put together, I believe them. At least it won’t leak in the lifetime you have it in the system.

Other thoughts: The directions tell you to pull air in from the case by mounting the fan/radiator to the inside back of the exhaust port. I actually did it different. I had it in a push/pull configuration. I push air from the inside, through the radiator and then pull the air through with a second fan on the outside of the back exhaust port.

Temps: I have an i7 920 overclocked to 3.2GHz and my idle temps are 37/35/37/33c. Load temps are 59/57/58/55c with an ambient room temperature of 73F.

Specs:
Case – CM HAF 932
CPU – i7 920
Corsair 6GB Dominator
BFG GTX 275 OC
BFG 1200W PS
2 x WD Velociraptors

Works great. Even better with a few additions.

Pros: Rivals the some of the best air coolers out there, no maintenance like traditional water coolers, SUPER easy installation, seems to be good quality.

Cons: Instructions are lacking (see my installation tips below), must buy additional fans to unlock its full potential (I didn’t ding it for this in my rating because I knew this when I decided to purchase it), no screws for a second fan, an intake setup will screw up the airflow in your case so expect to play with the case fans a little to get it right. Ideally, I would like to knock off half a star for the instructions.

General comments: The build quality is excellent however I did notice that a couple of the fins were slightly bent right out of the box. The threads on female thumb screws and the male thumb screws did not match up very well, so I still had to use a screwdriver after tightening them as much as possible with my hands. No big deal. The included fan has an annoying whining noise at full speed but I had planned on replacing it anyways. As with any high speed fan, I think the noise level would be reduced significantly by an anti-vibration gasket which can be purchased for about $5. At the time of writing this review, they are not on Amazon but Frozencpu has them (Feser 120mm Xvibe Noise Absorber).

I didn’t keep the stock fan. I ended up doing a push/pull setup using two XIGMATEK 120MM XSF-F1252 Case Fans which are rated at 75 CFM and seem to have pretty decent static pressure. They also make a whining noise but its more tolerable than the stock fan. If you want to run a two fan setup, you will need to run to your local hardware store and pick up four 6-32×1-1/4″ screws and four #6 washers.

The performance seems very good. With my OVERCLOCKED setup below, I am getting about 26C idle and 65C load with an ambient temperature around 22C. With the stock fan setup, you can expect a 4-6 degree increase in temperature. Pretty sweet if you ask me.

CPU: 2600K OC to 4.7 GHZ at 1.365v
Cooler: H60 with a push/pull intake
Mobo: Asus P8P67 Delux
RAM: Corsair Vengance 8gb 1866
Graphics: 2 x SLI MSI GTX 560Ti
SSD: OCZ Vertex 3 120gb
HDD: Samsung Spinpoint 72 1tb
PSU: Cooler Master Silent Pro M 1000w
Case: Cooler Master CM 690 Advance

Wonderful

ASUS Fast

Works fine.

so i have had this headset since august 7th. i order it on amazon before they put it to pre-order which i didn’t understand. anyway, i have had it for over a week and let me say, this is the best headset i have ever owned. for 160$ you can go wrong considering its wireless and has 40mm drivers. My brother owns the astro a40′s and to me these are better, but the astro’s do have more metal on them.

PROS

Sound, bass response is amazing and they never distort

wireless, i have gone about 35ft through 2-3walls without it cutting out.

quality, logitech is none for their amazing mic and keyboards, now they can add wireless gaming headsets to the list.

CONS

wish it was less plastic, i feel that if i drop them or put them in my backpack that if i bang into something it has the potential to break.
Also with this plastic they creek when you put them on or move them around, not always tho.

CONCLUSION

Buy them, you can go wrong. if you have the logtiech g35 don’t bother but if your in need of an awesome brand new headset in the 150$ rang, but them.

Read More @ Amazon

Fantastic Gaming Headset

This headset is way better than any other I have ever used, and I cannot reccomend it enough. It was very easy to set up, and the wired connection for charging is very clever in how it was designed. Its very easy to keep the cables nice and neat while still being able to charge it when you need it to.

The wireless range is great – it will work just fine all over my entire 2 bedroom apartment, which is particularly nice given that the buttons on the side of the headset are programmed to control the pause/play for music even when I am far away from my PC

Yes, there is a bit of plastic near the ears that make a bit of a creaking sound, which may possibly annoy some people. But don’t let that dissuade you! It provides a very nice, clear, crisp sound. The microphone is excellent as well.

7.1 surround doesn’t seem “perfect,” as it is a software surround sound solution, but it sure gives a nice effect and makes the games I play (World of Warcraft, Starcraft 2, Modern Warfare 2) feel very immersive. Voice chat over Ventrilo and Teamspeak works very nicely as well.

All in all, if you are in the market for a very nice, wireless PC headset, this is a great choice.

Review on YouTube

Being a medical transcriptionist, I’m always looking for the “ultimate keyboard,” (with, at last count, 37 keyboards stacked up in my office) and this does come close. I’ve had it now for just over one month and have typed approximately 9 million keystrokes.
Pros:
Very nice touch to the keys.
Definitely like the wrist pad.
Best backlit keyboard I’ve used.
Always like the large DEL key
It looks good.
Cons:
The price.
The F keys and enter key could light up better.
I personally would like the back legs to be a bit more substantial and a bit higher (Logitech “ergonomic” keyboard has two choices 4 or 8 degree legs.

All in all, though, I still give it a 5. I really do like
it.  Read More @ Amazon

I’ve been looking for this for SOOOO long…

Here is my story:
*** Okay…I have wasted so much money in my quest to find even just a ‘good’ illuminated keyboard. Usually you cannot find an illuminated keyboard that contains the normal keyboard setup…you get a scrunched version where the delete key is combined with the number pad….or in some wild location elsewhere….home, page up, page down, end…..gone.

*** I resolved myself to the fact that I would have to settle for an illuminated keyboard that just would not have the normal keyboard layout. Okay…I accept it. Now…let’s start looking. Seven keyboards and 4 years later, I decide to give it one more shot. I have been so disgusted by the performance of the only decent illuminated keyboards…sticky keys…loud, obnoxious keys…poor etching in the keys so that they letters and numbers are so poorly illuminated that it makes it worse than if they were just black.

I have tried them all. I have read reviews, bought them first-hand, second hand, well-known brands, obscure brands. Gaming keyboards to professional boards created for IT. None made it past a low-level of mediocrity.

NOW, FINALLY! HERE IT IS!

This is by far, hands-down, thumbs-up, smile-not-a-frown….ABSOLUTE BEST illuminated keyboard out there.

* The keys are fantastic! They are silent, well-padded, and the KEYBOARD LAYOUT IS STANDARD! WHOOOOOOOOOPEEEEEEEE!
* The illumination is by far the clearest and best on the market. The laser-etched letters on the keys glow well at every angle. Whether you type directly over the keys…whether you lean back and type…whether you have the keyboard set low or elevated…the illumination is PERFECT!

This is everything you want in an illuminated keyboard. If you are a game-freak, then maybe you will be less than perfectly satisfied because it utilizes a standard layout…but it does have the new bells and whistles of the ‘system’ hotkeys. Audio control, illumination control, Email and Home page shortcut keys, etc etc.

Look no further if you want a fantastic illuminated keyboard. Look no further if you are looking for a slim, lightweight, fits-in-your-backpack laptop-style keyboard for your laptop.

Four years I have looked. Many keyboards sold on Ebay or handed to friends or family because they just did not cut it.

This is it, folks. You won’t get any better than this. This is the Alpha and the Omega of the illuminated keyboards. Forget your ‘Fangs.’ Nevermind your ‘Saiteks I, II, or III.’ Toss them all.

This one puts em all to SHAME…Shame I tell you.

Get one.

Review on Youtube

Review on YouTube

I have had an Acer 22″ monitor for 3 years and it has been excellent. This monitor is even better in its picture quality which is tops. I love this monitor. I would have given it 5* except for its poor manual which is on the CD you receive and the fact that the picture controls are under the front of the monitor where they cannot be seen and are therefore difficult to use.
The monitor came out of the box in full working condition. I used the DVI connection and had to set the resultion to the 1920×1080 native resolution. There were no bad pixels. The monitor automatically sized the screen and all other parameters. However, the brightness was much too high. I had to chat online with Acer to find out where the picture controls were since the poor manual did not show it. There are five push buttons under the right front end of the monitor which are not easy to use. The manual again was not specific in how and in what sequence to use the buttons to make the changes I wished. I had to fiddle with the controls for almost 20 minutes until I finally was able to determine how to manuever to get what I wanted. I turned the brightness down from 72 to 50 and the monitor is still plenty bright. One of the adjustments is the time the on screen display stays on. The default is 10 seconds which is much too short when you are struggling to figure out how to make changes. I strongly suggest the first thing you do when you bring up the onscreen display is to change the time to 20 seconds to give you the time you require to make the changes. There is no HDMI input, but it comes with both the DVI-D cable and the VGA cable.
You will not go wrong buying this monitor provided you have the patience to fiddle with the picture controls. This is only a one time setup so it is not a major reason not to buy it. Read More @ Amazon

another high quality product from Acer!

Review on YouTube

This is my first personal PC build, I wanted to dabble into PC gaming but didn’t want to break the bank for an endeavor I may not heavily invest time on. At the same time, it is always smart to leave yourself with options and with an AM3+ socket to support the next generation of CPUs, a 900 series chipset to use these new processors to their fullest, and native SLI support this motherboard is perfect! I can find myself using this board comfortably for years to come.

Support for USB 3.0 ports along with two USB 3.0 ports on the rear panel, Dolby Digital Audio for home theaters, and plenty of expansion slots. As I said before, the 900 series chipset has support for SLI now and the 990x chipset can support up to two graphic cards for Crossfire or SLI, with the second PCI-E x16 slot running at x8 speed. Since the first PCI-E x16 slot and the second uses the same bandwidth using both slots lowers the speed of the first slot to x8 as well, but that is only like a 5% decrease in performance compared to the 990FX chipset which can support more slots and at x16 speeds.

I digress, if you’re an entry level or budget gamer this isn’t a concern, the point of SLI and Crossfire is to allow you to increase performance on the cheap, by purchasing one card and later on getting another when the price is even lower. Yes you could get by w/ a 970 chipset, but you might as well shell out the couple extra bucks to have the option to support SLI or Crossfire.

Another case for future proofing is that the 900 series chipset can use the upcoming Bulldozer CPUs to their fullest, you don’t want to get an 800 series mobo with an AM3+ socket because while Bulldozer will work, you just won’t be able to get all of its performance. Currently I’m using a Phenom II x4 955 BE, two years from now when I feel like my CPU is bottlenecking I can easily switch the CPU without also having to purchase a new motherboard. Once again, another way to save money for those on the budget AND keeping yourself open to options for the future.

Here is my build:
CPU – Phenom II x4 955 BE
Heatsink – Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus
Mobo – Gigabyte GA-990XA-UD3
RAM – G. Skill Ripjaws 4GB DDR3 1600
HDD – WD Black 1TB 7200 SATA 3 & Samsung Eco 1TB 5400
Optical Drive – LG CD/DVD burner OEM
Case – Antec Three Hundred Illusion
PSU – Antec High Current Gamer 520
GPU – EVGA Nvidia GTS 450   Read More @ Amazon

Great Board

Review on YouTube