Here a roundup of todays reviews and articles:

Alien: Isolation Benchmarked, Performance Review
ASRock X99 OC Formula Review – SSD Performance Differs Slightly With the X99
ASUS Strix GTX 970 OC Review - Silent But Deadly
Body Glove Satin Case for Lumia 520 Review
COUGAR 700M Aluminum Gaming Mouse Review
Cougar 700M Mouse and Cougar Speed Mat Review
Crucial MX100 256GB SSD: Affordable without sacrificing performance
D-Link DHP-309AV PowerLine AV 500 Network Review
Intel Xeon E5-2687W v3 and E5-2650 v3 Review: Haswell-EP with 10 Cores
MSI GeForce GTX 980 Gaming 4 GB
Nine 600 Mbps power-line kits compared: Battle against interference
OCZ ARC 100 240GB SSD Review
Razer DeathAdder Chroma Gaming Mouse Review
Tt eSPORTS Team DK Edition Gaming Peripherals Review
XFX R7 250E Core Edition

Alien: Isolation Benchmarked, Performance Review

Classified as a survival horror/stealth game instead of an action shooter, Alien: Isolation differs from last year's Alien: Colonial Marines in that there is just one Alien who can't be killed, requiring you to employ stealth tactics. The game has plenty of pants-wetting moments and sounds like a blast if you're comfortable with soiling yourself, but we're more interested in Alien: Isolation's performance when running at max quality and varying resolutions.

Read full article @ Techspot

ASRock X99 OC Formula Review – SSD Performance Differs Slightly With the X99

If you are going to introduce a new motherboard to the world, perhaps the best marketing feat one could achieve would be to set a new overclocking world record for that board close to the time of its release. Nick Shih of ASRock did that with the new ASRock X99 OC Formula recently by overclocking the latest Intel i7-5960X chip to a previously unheard of 6620.73 MHz. This is a bold statement in the world of motherboard wars and perhaps a challenge by ASRock, to Gigabyte and Asus, to match that! But then again, maybe Nick figured he had something to prove if he was going to put his signature on this board…

Read full article @ The SSD Review

ASUS Strix GTX 970 OC Review - Silent But Deadly

When nVidia announced their 10th generation Maxwell architecture it was hotly anticipated and back in February we got to see the first GPUs based on it: the GM107 based 750 and 750 Ti. While those products offered much in terms of power efficiency, they were but a taste of what was to come. After months of waiting and delays, nVidia has finally released the first of its GTX 900 series based on the GM204 GPU core. – and today we have the pleasure of reviewing the ASUS Strix GTX 970 OC (http://technologyx.us7.list-manage2.com/track/click?u=3d9b6193ffd32dd60e84fc74b&id=317ac5b544&e=312ec141fb) . We’ll start with an overview of the GPU and its cooler as well as the new features introduced with the 900 series and then it’s down to the nitty-gritty with some performance benchmarks and game tests.

Read full article @ TechnologyX

Body Glove Satin Case for Lumia 520 Review

I'll admit it right off the bat. I was wrong about the Body Glove Satin case for the Lumia 520. When I first saw the Body Glove Satin case in its packaging, I immediately thought that it would be a rubbery case that served little purpose, other than to render the sleek, pleasant-to-hold Lumia 520 bulky and difficult to use. What I found instead was an equally sleek case that compliments the form of its companion device.

Read full article @ WP Central

COUGAR 700M Aluminum Gaming Mouse Review

COUGAR 700M is an interesting futuristic mouse which features the popular ADNS-9800 sensor which allows DPI values up to 8200. Adjustments are available for the palm rest in order to fit with multiple hand shapes and also for allowing both claw and palm grips; value is added via the configuration software which allows full button remapping, adjusting the DPI steps, macros, LED lighting and so on.

Read full article @ Madshrimps

Cougar 700M Mouse and Cougar Speed Mat Review

The Cougar 700M gaming mouse features an aluminum, open frame design that looks more conceptual than a ‘gaming work horse’. Let us see if both can stand up to our rigorous testing.

Read full article @ KitGuru

Crucial MX100 256GB SSD: Affordable without sacrificing performance

If you are still using a mechanical drive in your system, it is time that you start shopping for an SSD over this holiday season. The price of SSD has dropped significantly over the last year. Where it used to be $1 to $2 per gigabyte, now the price per gigabyte for the SSD has gotten to 50 cents per gigabyte. Not only that the price of the SSDs have become rather affordable, the performance of the drive have matured where even the budget drives deliver good performance across different workloads.

Last year, Crucial kickstarted the trend of offering affordable SSD with the M500 series. Then earlier this year, the company released the M550 with improved controller that improves areas where the M500 is falling behind the competitors. As a result, the M550 is able to deliver a competitive drive in terms of performance at very affordable pricing.

Read full article @ Bjorn3D

D-Link DHP-309AV PowerLine AV 500 Network Review

When it comes to ways one can connect their computers to the Internet, most people know of two ways; one being through the standard wired LAN port, and the other wirelessly through a Wi-Fi router.

These two options are most prevalent in today's computing world, for both consumers and businesses. We know that wired connections are the best in terms of overall speed and latencies, those who play online multiplayer games can attest to this, as they need lower ping rates (which wired connections provide) to have the smoothest online gaming experience. Those also streaming HD media through their network can also attest to wired connections offering the best speed and latencies, this means less buffering and less lag.

On the flip side with Wi-Fi, it's the convenience of no wires that attracts people to use a wireless router instead, so that we can connect to the Internet virtually anywhere our home with a Wi-Fi adapter. No one wants to be running 100-FT Ethernet cables to the next room in order to have Internet, I used to do that back in the day and it was both inconvenient and downright ugly.

Read full article @ ModSynergy.com

Intel Xeon E5-2687W v3 and E5-2650 v3 Review: Haswell-EP with 10 Cores

During September we managed to get hold of some Haswell-EP samples for a quick run through our testing suite. The Xeon E5 v3 range extends beyond that of the E5 v2 with the new architecture, support for DDR4 and more SKUs with more cores. These are generally split into several markets including workstation, server, low power and high performance, with a few SKUs dedicated for communications or off-map SKUs with different levels of support. Today we are testing two 10 core models, the Xeon E5-2687W v3 and the Xeon E5-2650 v3.

Read full article @ Anandtech

MSI GeForce GTX 980 Gaming 4 GB

MSI's latest flagship is the GTX 980 Gaming. It delivers a super quiet gaming experience thanks to a powerful thermal solution and a well-crafted fan profile. In idle and light gaming, the fans will even stop completely. MSI has also overclocked their card out of the box, which yields around 10% extra performance.

Read full article @ techPowerUp

Nine 600 Mbps power-line kits compared: Battle against interference

Last year, we already wrote an article on the new HomePlug AV2 standard for power-line adapters. At this point we have tested enough of them for a modest round-up, which offered some interesting results.

Recent developments in the field of power-line adapters have been rather quick. A few years ago, everything was dedicated to the rise of the 500 Mbps models, whereas last year marked the appearance of adapters with integrated access points. Over the course of 2013, the first adapters that were based on the HomePlug AV2 standard also joined the club.

Read full article @ Hardware.Info

OCZ ARC 100 240GB SSD Review

Corporate mergers are never as random as they seem. Many thought it quite odd that Google paid a (not so) small fortune for Nest Labs. What would Google need a thermostat manufacturer for? It seemed to make no sense at the time, and to some it still may not. At the end of the day, it is just another way for Google to collect more data about your habits. That is not necessarily a bad thing, provided Google is being forthright in their intentions. For some who like their hardware predictive it's actually a nice benefit. But, for me, I will adjusting my thermostat manually, thank you.

Another acquisition that surprised some was Toshiba’s acquisition of OCZ. After all, OCZ had become a strictly enthusiast line, and Toshiba hasn’t exactly been known as an enthusiast manufacturer. So how would this fit together? One thing that is important to note is that OCZ pulled out of mainstream for wholly financial reasons, not technology reasons. They were still capable of making the best mainstream drives on the market, they simply couldn’t compete with the purchasing power of a Samsung or Sandisk in order to be price competitive. Obviously, that is not an issue for Toshiba, who also happens to manufacture NAND. From the start, it was a given this meeting of Toshiba’s stature and OCZ’s technology would somehow result in a mainstream product. About the only question left was whether it would wear an OCZ badge or Toshiba badge.

Read full article @ HiTech Legion

Razer DeathAdder Chroma Gaming Mouse Review

Razer is a company that needs little introduction, being one of, if not the most well-known names in gaming hardware. Many cite the effectiveness of Razer's aggressive marketing, but there is no denying that they were able to put themselves into that position with several key developments in their history. One of those developments was the original DeathAdder mouse released in 2006 and was quickly hailed as one of the best ergonomic mice ever made. Though the DeathAdder has seen many updates since, the ergonomic design and the use of an optical sensor have remained the same. The DeathAdder Chroma we are reviewing is the 2014 revision that updates the lights with RGB LEDs.

Read full article @ Legit Reviews

Tt eSPORTS Team DK Edition Gaming Peripherals Review

Thermaltake has consistently been a leader in delivering well made, high quality PC gamingperipherals with their Tt eSPORTS line of products. So it’s no surprise that they would partner up with one of the most well known DotA 2 teams, Team DK. The Team DK edition of these peripherals, offer the same great features and build quality we’ve come to expect from Tt eSPORTS devices, along with a unique color scheme and Team DK branding. Today we will be looking at the Knucker gaming keyboard, Saphira gaming mouse, Pyrrhus mouse pad, and the Chronos gaming headset. So let’s get started.

Read full article @ ThinkComputers.org

XFX R7 250E Core Edition

These days even a lot of the low power cards still require dual PCI slots. So if you have a setup that requires a single slot video card solution it can be a little hard to find something that performs well and will also fit in your case. I don’t think people realize it, but XFX does a great job of creating a wide selection of cards to cover special uses like this. In the past we have seen models from them for people who need half height cards and even silent models. So it wasn’t a big shock when they sent over their R7 250 Core Edition single slot card. Really, the only question is how does it compare to the dual slot cards. If it’s anything like their past cards it should perform well, but the only way to find out for sure it to run it through our benchmark suite and see how it performs.

Read full article @ LanOC Reviews