Here a roundup of the latest reviews and articles:

AMD Claims Zen Processor Cores Will Compete With Intel, Announces Next Gen Graphics With HBM Stacked Memory
AMD: Zen chips headed to desktops, servers in 2016
AMD’s 2016-2017 x86 Roadmap: Zen Is In, Skybridge Is Out
CRYORIG H5 Universal CPU Cooler Review
Fluance Fi30 Bluetooth Speaker System Review
G.Skill Ripjaws 4 16GB 2666MHz (F4-2666C15Q-16GRR), Overclocking Ambrosia!
GIGABYTE GA-X99-UD4P LGA 2011-v3 Motherboard Review
Grand Theft Auto V Review
Noctua NH-L9x65 Low Profile CPU Cooler Review
QNAP TS-451 Review
QNAP TurboNAS TS-453S Pro NAS Server Review
Samsung Galaxy S6 & S6 Edge Review: Samsung finally delivers on design
WD My Cloud EX2100 Dual Bay 8TB NAS Review

AMD Claims Zen Processor Cores Will Compete With Intel, Announces Next Gen Graphics With HBM Stacked Memory

AMD this afternoon kicked off its first Financial Analyst Day in three years. During the hiatus, AMD has had a change of leadership and the company has seen its market share erode in the processor and GPU markets. However, on the x86 side, AMD is pushing forward with the 2016 launch of processors based on its new Zen core. For starters, Zen-based processors will bring with them a significant boost in overall performance and a roughly 40% IPC improvement. Although AMD didn't offer specifics, it touts Zen as having a “high-bandwidth, low-latency cache system” and that it will be built on an “energy-efficient” 14nm FinFET process.

In addition, AMD will be launching a next generation Radeon graphics architecture in Q2. Perhaps the biggest enhancement comes from what AMD claims is the world’s first implementation of High Bandwidth Memory (HBM). AMD’s 3D-stacked HBM greatly improves memory bandwidth while at the same time reducing power consumption...

Read full article @ HotHardware

AMD: Zen chips headed to desktops, servers in 2016

The roadmap for upcoming AMD products has been pretty murky lately, but the company revealed some of its key plans for the next few years at its Financial Analyst Day today.

Read full article @ The Tech Report

AMD’s 2016-2017 x86 Roadmap: Zen Is In, Skybridge Is Out

AMD’s CTO Mark Papermaster just left the stage at AMD’s 2015 Financial Analyst Day, and one of the first things he covered was AMD’s CPU technology roadmap for the next couple of years.

The big question on everyone’s mind over the last year has been AMD’s forthcoming x86 Zen CPU, developed by Jim Keller’s group, and Papermaster did not disappoint, opting to address the future of AMD’s x86 plans first and foremost. AMD is not releasing the complete details on Zen until closer to its launch in 2016, but today they are providing some basic details on the CPU’s abilities and their schedule for it.

Read full article @ Anandtech

CRYORIG H5 Universal CPU Cooler Review

Today I be will reviewing the H5 Universal CPU Cooler brought to us by Cryorig. When I received the H5 from Cryorig I had to do a little research because I had not heard much about the company. Cryorig is fairly new to the masses launching the Cryorig brand in 2013. I started to gain excitement after reading a couple of reviews of some of their other products. All I kept reading was how fantastic the companies products performed. If you are new or old to DIY computer world I encourage you to look into Cryorig. I can not wait any longer to see the results of the Cryorig H5 Universal so lets began this review already!
 
The CRYORIG H Series coolers feature our proprietary Hive Fin structure. This design allows for a combination of Jet Fin Acceleration and Turbulence Reduction, as well as strengthening structural strength of the fin stacks. Combined together, the Hive Fin design brings cool innovation. I find the Hive Fin design intriguing. When you delve deeper into the theory behind the physics and jet fin acceleration technology, you ask yourself does this stuff really play that big of a role in keeping my CPU cool? Well those questions are answered later in this review and trust me you will want to know and you may never be the same after you find out what I did!

Read full article @ FunkyKit

Fluance Fi30 Bluetooth Speaker System Review

Bluetooth speakers are all but common now. We have reviewed quite a few of these speakers over the past few months. Most of these speakers have been smaller, made for portability and can really only fill a small room with sound. Enter the Fluance Fi30, a larger Bluetooth speaker that boasts impressive sound and is made to be stationary as it plugs into the wall does not rely on a rechargeable battery. This is the Bluetooth speaker you are going to want to get if you want something that has much more impressive sound than the smaller units and don’t need something that is portable. Did I mention the Fi30 is quite sexy as well? Read on as we take a look…

Read full article @ ThinkComputers.org

G.Skill Ripjaws 4 16GB 2666MHz (F4-2666C15Q-16GRR), Overclocking Ambrosia!

Skill has been churning out enthusiast memory that overclocks like nothing else weve ever seen. Pop a set of Ripjaws 4 into your dream machine and settle into the BIOS for an overclocking experience like youve never had

Read full article @ Bjorn3D

GIGABYTE GA-X99-UD4P LGA 2011-v3 Motherboard Review

Today I am fortunate enough to have one of the GIGABYTE Intel X99 motherboards on hand to test and put through the paces. The GIGABYTE GA-X99-UD4P is a part of the GIGABYTE Ultra-Durable product stack, so it should be an ultra stable motherboard. If you hadn’t figured it out from the name, the GIGABYTE X99-UD4P is using the latest Intel X99 chipset for the latest Intel Extreme processors. The X99-UD4P is a reasonably priced Intel X99 motherboard that’s currently available for only $249.99 plus shipping at Newegg.com.

The GIGABYTE X99-UD4P Intel X99 motherboard has all the latest goodies that are tagging along with the X99 chipset. First and foremost is the socket, the GIGABYTE X99-UD4P utilizes the Intel LGA2011-3 socket. The LGA2011-3 socket fits the latest Intel Core i7 Extreme processors like the Intel Core i7-5960X. In addition to the latest processors, the GIGABYTE X99-UD4P utilizes the latest memory technology and is the first chipset to use DDR4 memory. Much like the previous Intel X79 chipset, the X99 chipset and the GIGABYTE X99-UD4P are still taking advantage of the quad-channel memory architecture.

The GIGABYTE X99-UD4P certainly isn’t lacking in features. Outside of the goodies like quad channel memory and support for the latest and greatest Intel Haswell-E processor mentioned above, there’s no shortage. At first glance it’s easy to notice that there are four PCIe x16 slots. The four PCIe X16 slots give the X99-UD4P the ability to run up to four graphics cards in either NVIDIA SLI or AMD CrossFireX.

Read full article @ Legit Reviews

Grand Theft Auto V Review

The graphics are very good and what blemishes that do exist are easily forgiven. Performance could be better, but as I suspect that comes down to my specific hardware and how I go for highest playable settings, I would consider this a concern rather than an issue. The story is both fun to experience and very well done. I really would have expected weaknesses due to its complexity, but none existed that I noticed. Gameplay is strong and solid, and really the only weaknesses here are more to do with the Rockstar Editor feature. I did have fun playing GTA Online alone, so I am sure it can add a great deal to the experience when played with friends.

Read full article @ OCC

Noctua NH-L9x65 Low Profile CPU Cooler Review

In today's review we will look at the Noctua NH-L9x65 Low Profile CPU cooler, with 65 as in 65mm. These small and petit CPU coolers can be used with any form factor motherboard and CPU but focus on Micro ATX and Mini ITX. They are small, deadly silent but do pack enough punch to even cool a Core i7 4790K. And yes, you can even overclock a bit as well. Yup, that would be Noctua for ya.

You know, there really aren't bad performing coolers produced anymore. For every segment and budget you can find something you need. The market stabilized and within the entire range and scope of heatpipe based coolers there's a certain comfort zone with a corresponding product available. As a result, most of these coolers available on the market are all adequate at the very least. There are always exceptions to this, there's a handful of manufacturers out there that offer the really interesting stuff, the kit and gear that really stand out from the cooling crowd, the hardware you and me crave and need so badly... that is in the enthusiast domain of gaming hardware. And that's where we need to make a stop at Noctua as they tick all those boxes.

In their long line of CPU coolers, Noctua recently introduced the L9-type coolers, especially made for the small form factor range The cooler has recently been introduced into the channel to offer OK performance but its main focus is to be silent in respect to small form factor PCs. The Noctua NH-L9x65 Low Profile CPU cooler is bound to keep any CPU released to date cooled including even the most high-end Haswell SKUs.

Read full article @ Guru3D

QNAP TS-451 Review

Tumbling prices add to the appeal of this four-bay SOHO NAS. Qnap's four-bay TS-451 NAS was launched to much acclaim back in July 2014, and with good reason: the SOHO server was one of the first to feature an Intel 'Bay Trail' processor and could rightly claim to offer cutting-edge technology in a user-friendly package.

The processor in question, an Intel Celeron J1800, is a dual-core 64-bit SoC that can be considered a step up from the usual Intel Atom, bringing increased performance to mid-range NAS solutions. Making the most of Intel's varied portfolio, Qnap's choice of processor includes Quick Sync Video for real-time hardware transcoding, as well as support for virtual machines courtesy of Intel VT-x.

Read full article @ Hexus

QNAP TurboNAS TS-453S Pro NAS Server Review

If everyone here had to choose one specific type of product where we've seen the biggest changes/advancements over the past 3-4 years or so the most popular answer would definitely be network attached storage devices (NAS) since from very basic single-core SoC CPUs and 256/512MB of RAM in just three years we've moved to Dual and Quad core Intel Celeron and i3 CPUs with up to 8GB of RAM pre-installed. Granted such hardware specifications may sound as a bit over the top to some people and if NAS devices were only aimed for home use I’d tend to agree with them but what many fail to realize is that the largest percentage of NAS sales belongs to small businesses and enterprises so both performance and reliability are of the utmost importance to those users. Now as many of you know the most "popular" NAS models in the market can accommodate both 3.5" and 2.5" drives but for people who want something even smaller manufacturers also make models that can only be outfitted with 2.5" drives and the latest TurboNAS TS-453S Pro by QNAP is one such model.

QNAP Systems, Inc., as its brand promise "Quality Network Appliance Provider", aims to deliver comprehensive offerings of cutting edge network attached storage (NAS) and network video recorder (NVR) solutions featured with ease-of-use, robust operation, large storage capacity, and trustworthy reliability. QNAP integrates technologies and designs to bring forth quality products that effectively improve business efficiency on file sharing, virtualization applications, storage management and surveillance in the business environments, as well as enrich entertainment life for home users with the offering of a fun multimedia center experience. Headquartered in Taipei, QNAP delivers its solutions to the global market with nonstop innovation and passion.

The TurboNAS TS-453S Pro may be the very first NAS model to arrive at our doorstep that only takes 2.5" drives (4 of them actually) but that doesn't mean anything especially since it also has some of the best hardware specifications we've seen to date. So under the hood this time over QNAP has placed a quad-core Intel Celeron CPU (J1900) running at 2GHz which in turn they have paired with 4GB DDR3L-1600 RAM (expandable to 8GB) and a 512MB flash DOM (the OpenGL 3.0 compatible Intel(R) MESA DRI Bay Trail version 10.0 is responsible for the graphics end). Other features include RAID 0/1/5/6/10/5 + hot spare support for the 4 SATA III hot-swap bays, two Gigabit RJ45 LAN ports, three USB 3.0 ports and an HDMI video output (probably v1.4a). The TurboNAS TS-453S Pro really has nothing to be jealous of from its larger brothers but we are interested to see how well it does in terms of read/write speeds especially since 2.5" HDDs are not as fast as 3.5" models (SSDs excluded) so let's move forward with our review and find out.

Read full article @ NikKTech

Samsung Galaxy S6 & S6 Edge Review: Samsung finally delivers on design

The launch of the Galaxy S6 is one of the most important for Samsung in a long time, and this time around there’s not just one flagship, but two: the company has released a curved-display Edge variant. Both come with a 5.1-inch Super AMOLED display with a top-end 1440p resolution, a brand new Exynos 7 Octa 7420 SoC, and a 16-megapixel optically stabilized camera. Unlike with the past three generations of Galaxy flagships, there’s no Qualcomm model in sight.

Read full article @ Techspot

WD My Cloud EX2100 Dual Bay 8TB NAS Review

The WD My Cloud EX2100 is a new prosumer-oriented NAS system from WD that continues the company's adventures in the realm of "personal cloud" storage.

Over the years WD has expanded its My Cloud offerings from simple one-drive units like the original My Cloud to the updated two-drive EX2 unit that straddled the line between professional NAS drive and home user box. The all-new EX2100 model we are looking at here is an upgrade from the EX2 in that it sits at the very top of its home user product stack, along with the four-drive version named the EX4100.

It is an upgrade from the EX2 in that it offers improved performance, a few more features such as dual Ethernet and a quick-copy USB 3.0 button, and a more business-oriented design.

Read full article @ HotHardware