The Guru of 3D posted NVIDIA 8600 GT and GTS shootout

Hello everybody, moments ago NVIDIA released their GeForce 8500 and 8600 mid-range DX10 graphics cards. Guru of 3D has a shootout ready for you with six of these new graphics cards. The products serve the $129-$229 price range. The new cards introduces technology previously exclusive to the high-end GeForce 8800-series to more affordable levels.

Guru3D tested the XFX 8600 GT (XXX) and GTS (XXX) boards, the BFG 8600 GTS (OC) board, the Point of View 8600 GTS (EXO) board and from Galaxy Technology both a customized GeForce 8600 GT and GTS.

NVIDIA 8600 GT and GTS Shootout

Bjorn3D posted XFX 680i LT SLI Motherboard Review

Several months ago the first 680i SLI motherboard first appeared on the US market. On paper this board appeared to be solution that the enthusiast community had been long awaiting to take their Core 2 Duo processors to the next level of performance. After several BIOS revisions and a less than auspicious beginning what was initially seen on paper transcended by most accounts into a fully functional, kick-ass motherboard. The vast majority of these motherboards were manufactured by NVIDIA following a reference standard design targeting 'Hardcore Enthusiasts' and sold by a select group of partners. By now you probably know that in most cases these partners were the same partners that NVIDIA used to market their graphics solutions. Brilliant marketing strategy if you ask me! There were, however, a few dissenters, namely: ASUS, Abit, and Gigabyte. These companies chose to follow the less traveled path and bring to market their own design using the same 680i SLI chipset.

Okay enough history! Let's fast-forward a couple of months which puts us about two to three weeks ago. NVIDIA and the same group of partners brought to market the 680i LT SLI motherboard. This product contained much of the heart and all of the soul of its big brother but was aimed more at the 'Extreme Gamer' and cost approximately $50 less. We'll expound in detail on the differences other than cost later in this review.

Today it is our extreme pleasure to share with you our findings on a 680i LT SLI motherboard that is being marketed by an NVIDIA partner that certainly needs no introduction, XFX. From our rather extensive experience reviewing XFX Graphics solutions we've seen their corporate philosophy transcend from merely words into a series of excellent, highly polished digital wonders that go a step beyond in not only performance but quality as well. We highly anticipate that our review sample, the XFX nForce; 680i LT SLI will continue to follow this same lofty tradition.

XFX 680i LT SLI Motherboard Review



Dragonsteel Mods takes a look at the CoolIt PCI Cooling Booster

A little bit ago I took a look at a ram cooler from CoolIt systems, today for review I have something that looks similar but is made to cool your PCI cards. The CoolIt PCI Cooling Booster as it is called mounts to your PCI slots holes and directs an 80mm fan onto all your cards and motherboard components to help keep them cool and stable.

CoolIt PCI Cooling Booster Review

Fastsilicon posted a review on the Enermax Uber Chakra Case

Overall we have to say this is a very impressive case. This is one sturdy, heavy, and well built chassis. Everything from the overall weight to the general construction, and the subtle attention to details just screams quality. It's also quite an attractive case, and one of the first we've ever seen to implement an eSATA port in its design.

Enermax Uber Chakra Case Review

BCC Hardware checked out the Ultra X-Pro 600W Energy Efficient PSU

I have to admit that I was skeptical of reviewing more of Ultras' products. I am glad to see that Ultra has done a great job in improving their product quality and been able to prove that they do make products that are worth owning. The X-Pro is no exception to that rule. The quality of the power supply is excellent, all the way from the paint finish to the ability of being able to power the most power-hungry of computer components.

Ultra X-Pro 600W Energy Efficient PSU Review

Dragonsteel Mods takes a look at the Ideazon Fragmat Gaming Mousepad

Today on the review block I have another product from Ideazon, the Fragmat Gaming Mousepad. The Fragmat has a polymer surface on it that allows it to be used with all types of mice, and this surfaces helps reduce friction allowing your mouse to just glide across it.

Ideazon Fragmat Gaming Mousepad Review

Bjorn3D posted a review on the GeIL PC2-6400 DDR2 Ultra 2GB kit

It's been a while (Q2, 2004) since first DDR2 modules landed in customers' motherboards. Today, most if not all modern platforms come equipped with these chips. Note that all memory standards have to be first approved by JEDEC. First company to propagate the use of DDR2 memory was Intel with their Prescott CPUs, AMD followed later on with AM2. As of now, every major IC company seems to be holding on to DDR2 bandwagon.

While DDR2 modules come in different speeds (533, 667, 800 and 1066 MHz) most of us -- especially enthusiasts, want to grab the fastest ones available on the market. There are still a lot of chipsets supporting memory up to 667 MHz DDR2. The newer ones cope with speeds of 800 MHz and beyond -- that's why the varation in speed.

Today I will be looking at what seems the best price/performance compromise. The product I'm talking about is GeIL PC2-6400 2GB Ultra Dual Channel kit rated at 800 MHz and pretty tight 4-4-4-12-2T timings. Everyone knows GeIL right? Well you should since they've been in memory business since 1997. If not, give the below text a glance and continue reading on the next page.

GeIL PC2-6400 DDR2 Ultra 2GB kit Review

Legit Reviews posted a review on the XFX 8600GT and 8600 GTS XXX Edition Video Cards

The XFX GeForce 8600 GT is a single slot design that requires no additional power connector for operation. This makes the board very energy efficient as it has a maximum power draw of just 43 watts. The XFX GeForce 7600 GT has a is maximum power draw of 65 watts while the GeForce 6600 GT is 70 watts. For the third generation in a row NVIDIA has been able to decrease the power consumption on their mainstream video cards while adding features and improving performance, which is amazing and something for them to brag about.

XFX 8600GT and 8600 GTS XXX Edition Video Cards

Elite Bastards posted a review on the Foxconn GeForce 8600 GTS video card

The most notable change here is in the number of 'Stream Processors' (what you would previously have termed 'Shader Units') available within the architecture - Compared to 128 Stream Processors in NVIDIA's flagship GeForce 8800 GTX part, G84 features just 32 processors, giving it (in its simplest terms, and of course things never are that simple with GPUs) a quarter of the fragment, vertex or geometry shading capabilities of its big brother. However, to offset this slashing in the number of Stream Processors, NVIDIA have made changes to the texturing capabilities of G84 - While each texturing unit in G80 can calculate just four texture addresses and eight filtering operations per clock, an equivalent unit in G84 can calculate twice as many addresses, leaving it capable of processing eight texture addresses and eight filtering operations per clock.

Foxconn GeForce 8600 GTS video card Review

HEXUS posted a review on the MSI GeForce 8600GTS

Today the GeForce 8600GT and 8600GTS arrive and bring with them DirectX 10 support for people on a relative budget. But how much of that G80 magic remains, and what other changes has NVIDIA made to ensure it succeeds in this most crucial of market segments - the sector?

MSI GeForce 8600GTS - the new midrange champion

NVNews posted EVGA and MSI GeForce 8600 GTS Preview

Today NVIDIA unleashes its mainstream Graphics Processing Units (GPU) based on the GeForce 8 architecture by announcing the GeForce 8600 GTS, GeForce 8600 GT and GeForce 8500 GT. The GPUs are Windows Vista and DirectX 10-ready and will be featured on graphics cards at price points ranging from $89-$229.

EVGA and MSI GeForce 8600 GTS Preview

techPowerUp posted NVIDIA GeForce 8600 & 8500 Preview

Today NVIDIA announced their latest new graphics processors of the GeForce 8 Series. The new cards are called GeForce 8500 GT, 8600 GT and 8600 GTS. In our preview we examine the differences between the products and how they stack up against the last generation GeForce 7 products.

NVIDIA GeForce 8600 & 8500 Preview

XSReviews has reviewed the MSI 8600GT

Nvidia has dominated the high end of the GPU market for the last 5 months with their 8800GTX and GTS offerings. However up to now ATI/AMD has managed to hold their own in the mid range market with their X1950 series, specifically the great "bang for buck" x1950 Pro. Now though, Nvidia are bringing in their mid-range muscle; it's time for the 8600GT.

MSI 8600GT Review

Modders-Inc has a new review online on the Sytrin KuFormula VF1 Plus GPU Cooler

Everyone would like their graphics card to run cooler for different reasons and the stock GPU coolers do a decent job, but we always want something better. Sytrin's newest cooler, the KuFormula VF1 Plus, cools extremely well. The KuFormula VF1 Plus might take up a little more space than most coolers, but the cooling difference more than makes up for the additional space.

Sytrin KuFormula VF1 Plus GPU Cooler Review

HotHardware.com posted NVIDIA GeForce 8600 GTS & GT Review

Today is the day NVIDIA chose to officially announce the new DX10-class GeForce 8600 GTS, 8600 GT, and the rest of the mainstream GeForce 8 family of products. We pulled together a few GeForce 8600 GTS and GT cards, tested them with some popular games and benchmark tools, and have posted our thoughts for all too see. Head on over to the site and take look.

NVIDIA GeForce 8600 GTS & GT Review

Tech ARP posted Sparkle GeForce 8600 GTS Graphics Card Review

If you have been waiting for NVIDIA to release a cheap, mid-range DirectX 10 graphics card, you need wait no longer. The new NVIDIA GeForce 8600 GTS offers not only the same unified shader technology and DirectX 10 support, it also comes with a spanking new video processor that can completely take over H.264 decoding.

Join us as we take a look at one of the first GeForce 8600 GTS cards to hit the market - the Sparkle GeForce 8600 GTS. Based entirely on the reference card, this card is representative of the other GeForce 8600 GTS cards in the market.

Sparkle GeForce 8600 GTS Graphics Card Review

Neoseeker has published a review of XFX's 8600 GTS XXX edition, and overclocked 8600 GTS that sports a 730MHz core clock and 2.26GHz memory clock, about a 10% overclock over stock settings.

One of the most exciting feature of the new 8600 and 8500 is a completely new video processing engine (VP2 + BSP + AES128 Engine) which offloads 100% of Blu-Ray and HD-DVD processing from the CPU. While the previous G80 core did come equipped with PureVideo HD functionality, the new core architecture has changed the way it works. Before the GeForce 8800 cards would off-load some of the cycles from CPU to GPU when decoding HD-DVD or BLU-RAY movies. Now with the 8600 and 8500 cards, the video processing load will be completely handled by the GPU, allowing the CPU to handle other computations and avoid framerate drops during video playback.

XFX 8600 GTS XXX Review

Bit-Tech posted their Nvidia GeForce 8600 GTS review

Today, Nvidia has announced five new mid-range DirectX 10 graphics cards based around its G84 and G86 graphics processing units. We have a look at GeForce 8600 GTS to find out if it is this year's must-have mainstream graphics card.

Nvidia GeForce 8600 GTS Review

Beyond3D takes a look at the NVIDIA G84 architecture and video performance

NVIDIA unveil G84 today, and we've spent good time with a pair of boards from XFX to see what the architecture brings to the table. For the intro piece we've looked at video decoding, since arguably the most exciting bit about GeForce 8600 products is the new set of tech blocks for that purpose. We put XFX's XXX GTS through its paces with HD-DVD testing and more.

NVIDIA G84: Architecture and Video Performance

Hardware Analysis posted an article on Nvidia’s 8600 series

Nvidia's new DirectX 10 8600 series of graphic cards was introduced yesterday, but from what we've seen thusfar we're a bit underwhelmed, here's why.

Nvidias 8600 series, a bit underwhelming?

ThinkComputers.org posted In Win Alpha 360 mATX Case Review

The last time I took a look at a case from In Win it was the F430 and I was really impressed with it, especially because In Win is not that known of a brand. Well today we will be taking a look at one of their mATX cases the Alpha 360. We got a sneak peek of the Alpha 360 at CES so we were excited to test it out. If you are looking for a nice mATX case this one might be for you. Read on to check out the review.

In Win Alpha 360 mATX Case Review

CoolTechZone.com takes another look at the RIM BlackBerry 8800 Keyboard

Back when we first reviewed the RIM BlackBerry 8800, one of the issues we noted was the clear distinction between its keyboard in comparison to the 8700 series. The 8700, if you remember, have much more tactile keys than the 8800, although the 8800 does well on the looks front. After completely switching to the 8800 and using it exclusively for the past few weeks, we feel we are ready to make the ultimate decision.

RIM BlackBerry 8800 Keyboard Revisited

OCIA.net takes a look at the Logitech SilentSound Noise Canceling Headphones in their latest review

As the description suggests, there is actually some active science/technology behind how the headphones function. Using Logitech's SilentSound technology, the headphones dynamically adjust to and filter out surrounding noise, leaving you with a quieter environment in which to enjoy your music. Logitech claims their headphones cancel out up to 22 decibels of noise - pretty impressive. This is my first time trying any type of noise canceling headphones so it will be interesting to see if this technology actually works or is just a clever marketing ploy.

Logitech SilentSound Noise Canceling Headphones Review

CoolTechZone.com posted Nokia N800 Internet Tablet Review

Nokia’s latest device, the N800 Internet Tablet, is unique, to say the least. It’s not a smartphone, yet it can send and receive e-mail messages; it’s not a phone, yet it can make phone calls; it’s not a portable multimedia player; yet it can playback audio/video files; and it’s not a notebook, yet it can browser the web. Are you confused yet? Alright, let’s see if we can define the Nokia N800 Internet Tablet. The N800 does a lot of things, but it can’t be placed in any one of the multitude of portable categories. Nope, it’s in a category all by itself.

Nokia N800 Internet Tablet Review

Tweaknews.net posted a review on the Flexiglow Cyber Snipa Tracer Mousepad

Anyone who is serious about gaming should take a closer look at the Tracer mouse pad. The ultra-slick surface is just the right size and performed great with both a laser and optical mouse. Movements were fast and precise without the mouse overly sliding around and because it's so thin I didn't experience wrist soreness like I have in the past with thicker pads.

Flexiglow Cyber Snipa Tracer Mousepad Review