Here a roundup of today's reviews and articles, including Philips Brilliance 298P4QJEB 29” UltraWide Monitor Review, AMD Richland A10-6800K Review, Seagate Constellation ES 1TB Enterprise Hard Drive Review, AverMedia Live Gamer Portable Review, and Patriot Extreme Performance (PV38G240C0K x2) 2400MHz Viper 3 Series Memory Kit Review



Philips Brilliance 298P4QJEB 29” UltraWide Monitor Review @ Hardware Canucks

How wide is too wide for a monitor? That’s the question the new Philips Brilliance 298P4 dares you to ask. Like many IPS-based monitors it has been designed with professional consumers in mind but in this instance, does so with a unique, controversial design.

Usually monitors come in 16:9 or occasionally 16:10 aspect ratios which blend vertical with horizontal space for an optimal viewing experience. While these ratios work very well for a wide variety of scenarios and tasks, there’s a small but vocal segment that wants a huge amount of horizontal real estate. Previously, they needed to look at higher priced, 27” and 30” monitors which routinely sell for $700 and more. That’s not exactly an economical solution since it’s being hampered by the higher manufacturing costs associated with substrate loss when producing LCD / LED panels.

Read more: Philips Brilliance 298P4QJEB 29” UltraWide Monitor Review @ Hardware Canucks

Gelid Black Edition Heatsink Review @ Frostytech

For adventurous computer enthusiasts seeking new and innovative heatsinks, Gelid's 'the Black Edition' heatsink offers pretty good cooling performance with a modest noise output at stock fan speeds. Gelid's 'the Black Edition' heatsink is compatible with Intel socket LGA2011/1366/1155/1156/775 processors and AMD socket AM2/AM3/FM1/FM2 CPUs/APUs.

Read more: Gelid Black Edition Heatsink Review @ Frostytech

AMD Richland A10-6800K Review @ Vortez

AMD have taken the gaming world more seriously of late, evident with the 'Gaming Evolved' campaign being ever present in many recent PC titles as well as now having their APU technology being utilised in the coming next generation gaming consoles from Sony and Microsoft. Though these are earmarks for the success of the APU, the continually increasing demand in desktop performance gives rise to the latest 6000 series refresh for the FM2 platform. Though the names (or numbers) have changed as well as the new 'Elite' branding for their top tier products, the A10-6800K is essentially a higher clocked, cherry picked, 'Trinity' chip. The core speed is up to 4.1GHz/ 4.4GHz compared to the 3.8GHz - 4.1GHz of the A10-5800K and the GPU core clock has been increased to 844MHz from 800MHz. Another noticeable change is that 2133MHz memory is now 'officially' supported.

Read more: AMD Richland A10-6800K Review @ Vortez

Kingston MobileLite Wireless Reader @ LanOC Reviews

With the sheer amount of media we consume on a daily basis, the mobile market is constantly evolving with newer and newer ways for us to store and transfer all this data. A while back I reviewed Carry Technology’s Wi-Reader Pro and was impressed by the functionality and usefulness of a portable, wireless cloud device and today I am back again with another similar device. Join me as I take a look at Kingston’s MobileLite Wireless Reader and put it to the test to see if it can bring anything new to this budding market.

Read more: Kingston MobileLite Wireless Reader @ LanOC Reviews

Sandia Cooler: Air Bearing Heatsink Prototype Update @ Frostytech

What makes the prototype Sandia Cooler special is the design, its aluminum cooling fins serve double duty as the rotating fan and fan blades of the cooler . Unlike traditional CPU coolers, heat energy in the Sandia Cooler is conducted across a very thin air gap bearing from the stationary base of the cooler to the upper rotating aluminum fin/fan component.

Read more: Sandia Cooler: Air Bearing Heatsink Prototype Update @ Frostytech

Seagate Constellation ES 1TB Enterprise Hard Drive Review @ PC Stats

All Constellation ES drives are rated to 6Gb/s SATA III speeds, incorporate 64MB of cache, utilize 7200RPM spindle speeds and offer Native Command Queing. The drives are covered by an impressive 5 year warranty and rated to1.2 million hours MTBF.

Read more: Seagate Constellation ES 1TB Enterprise Hard Drive Review @ PC Stats

Apotop Travel Wi-Router, Wi-Reader & Wi-Reader Pro Review @ ThinkComputers.org

The mobile accessory market is a flurry of good, bad, decent, and fantastic products. Apotop has managed to break into the crowded market and stand out among the rest. They were kind enough to send us three of their products, Travel Wi-Router, Wi-Reader, and Wi-Reader Pro. Each product shares similar feature sets, Wi-Fi hotspot, sharing an SD Card or USB device with a mobile device, and built-in battery ready for travel use. It all sounds promising, continue reading to see if Apotop delivers.

Read more: Apotop Travel Wi-Router, Wi-Reader & Wi-Reader Pro Review @ ThinkComputers.org

Rosewill Hercules 1600 W @ techPowerUp

Rosewill craves to establish themselves as a top name in the PSU market, so they keep on releasing high-end models. Their top of the line PSU is the Hercules-1600, which we will have the chance to test today. With 1600 W of max power, things are going to be very interesting.

Read more: Rosewill Hercules 1600 W @ techPowerUp

Apple iMac 27-inch (Late 2013) Review @ TechReviewSource.com

With a memory bump, the Apple iMac 27-inch (Nvidia GeForce GTX 675M) shows that it is still capable of running with the big dogs. It's the highest performance Mac we've seen, for now.

Read more: Apple iMac 27-inch (Late 2013) Review @ TechReviewSource.com

AverMedia Live Gamer Portable Review @ KitGuru

Today we'll be taking a look at the AverMedia Live Gamer Portable. Equipped with an on-board H.264 hardware encoder to reduce CPU usage, streaming compatibility and the option to record directly onto an SD card, AverMedia claims the Live Gamer Portable is Smart & Sharp, Your All-Purpose Sharing Weapon. Compatible with PC, PS3 and the Xbox 360, it is currently available for £159.90 (http://www.amazon.co.uk/AVerMedia-C875-Portable-Capture-Xbox360/dp/B00C1EO536) .

Read more: AverMedia Live Gamer Portable Review @ KitGuru

MSI GTX 780 N780 Lightning Video Card Review @ HiTech Legion

The MSI GTX 780 Lightning graphics card is MSI's newest offering, targeted at achieving the highest overclocks possible. The MSI GTX 780 Lightning offers a graphics card with the GK110 GPU at its core, with MSI’s TriFrozr Thermal design. The TriFrozr design offers a cooling solution with three PWM fans that can be independently controlled. The architecture also includes an all-digital PWM control and triple level signals to show load using different colors. The overclocking features don’t stop there. Two separate BIOS chips are present on the 10 layer PCB. One is tuned for gaming performance out of the box, while the other is specifically tuned and unlocked for LN2 overclocking. In addition the card has 16 GPU phases of power and three memory phases, and the ability to add a “GPU Reactor” behind the GPU for more overclocking stability. The GPU reactor is designed to offer up to 300% more power capacity and to stabilize power noise. The Lightning card doesn’t skimp on quality either utilizing MSI’s Military class 4 components, consisting of DrMOS 4, CopperMOS, Hi-c CAP, Super Ferrite Core, and Dark Solid Caps.

Read more: MSI GTX 780 N780 Lightning Video Card Review @ HiTech Legion

ECS L337 GANK Machine Z87H3-A2X Extreme Review @ OCC

The second BIOS I used fixed the override voltage setting problem and allowed my to finally tune the voltage to get to the 4.7GHz clock speed my chip is capable of. Setting the memory timings manually would result in a failed post attempt across both of the BIOS I have tested so far. Using the XMP profile for my memory proved to be the best option for me with this board from ECS. Although it sounds bad out of the gate, it's still a good start for the board and the next BIOS update should iron out any other issues. When using the BIOS it is a step forward from last year's UEFI BIOS implementations with the interface working as intended.

Read more: ECS L337 GANK Machine Z87H3-A2X Extreme Review @ OCC

Patriot Extreme Performance (PV38G240C0K x2) 2400MHz Viper 3 Series Memory Kit Review @ HiTech Legion

Never afraid of a fight, the vipers of the Arizona desert have fiercely defended their home and remained encamped there for hundreds and thousands of years against any predator that might come their way. Vipers are much more territorial than any other creature and want to live in the same den their entire 35 year life span which their parents and grandparents most likely spent as well before them. Over the last few years however, housing development and rising human populations have dislodged many snakes from their desert dwellings and have periodically clashed with the townsfolk, eventually dwindling the reptile population down to near extinction levels.

Read more: Patriot Extreme Performance (PV38G240C0K x2) 2400MHz Viper 3 Series Memory Kit Review @ HiTech Legion