Here a roundup of today's reviews and articles:

ASUS Maximus VIII Gene Motherboard Review
ASUS Z170I PRO GAMING (LGA 1151) Motherboard Review
Cooler Master Storm Quick Fire Rapid-i Mechanical Keyboard Review
Crucial BX200 960GB Solid State Drive Review
DBPower Hawkeye-II FPV Wifi Drone Quadcopter with Camera Review
DeepCool GamerStorm Assassin II CPU Cooler Review
EVGA GTX 950 SSC ACX 2.0, GTX 950 goes Super SuperClocked!
FSL Xylem Wood Earphones Review
GE In-Wall Z-Wave & ZigBee Dimming Smart Switch Review
Intel NUC range updated with quartet of Skylake machines
Kingston USB 3.1 HyperX Savage 128GB Review
Life-Phorm All-in-One Positioning Device By Lethal Protection
Logitech G633 Artemis Spectrum Review
Ozone Blast 4HX PC Gaming Headset Review

ASUS Maximus VIII Gene Motherboard Review

It seems like these days motherboard vendors have overly complicated lineups which cater to every conceivable niche or combination of features. For buyers, navigating these confusing waters can be frustrating but of anyone that wants to buy into a more compact form factor, things get a lot easier. While the mATX segment has been expanding as of late, there isn’t a massive amount of competition and the offerings typically fall into one of two categories: higher boards that offer a broad range of gamer / overclocker-centric features and more affordable options that offer value above all else. ASUS new Maximus VIII Gene falls into the former segment.

ASUS has been on a roll lately with their Z170 motherboard series but we have mainly been focused on their ATX offerings. Indeed, while the Z170-A and Maximus VIII Hero are both awesome boards in their own respect, they aren’t particularly unique. Meanwhile, the Gene series caters to that rather large portion of PC gaming enthusiasts who want performance and portability go walk hand in hand. ATX systems are simply too large to be comfortably carry from LAN party to LAN party, while ITX based systems lack advanced features like SLI and CrossFire.

Read full article @ Hardware Canucks

ASUS Z170I PRO GAMING (LGA 1151) Motherboard Review

The capabilities of ITX motherboards have progressed at an exponential rate and easily provides the overclocking prowess, connectivity and stability required without making too many concessions compared to their ATX counterparts. Furthermore, the huge popularity of small form-factor LAN cases like the BitFenix Prodigy have made ITX systems a more viable proposition. However. feature-laden ITX motherboards traditionally incur a significant price increase as consumers pay for the convenience of more compact PCB designs.

ASUS has bucked this market trend and launched the aesthetically pleasing Z170i PRO GAMING motherboard around the £130 mark. This is an alluring price, given the SupremeFX audio, excellent software package and intuitive UEFI BIOS. Additionally, the 1151 chipset allows for large frequency overclocks and massive DDR4 memory speeds. When the single PCIe x16 slot is populated with a premium graphics card, you should be able to create a stunning portable gaming system which ekes out every inch of performance. Size isn’t a contributing factor during synthetic benchmarks and I expect the Z170I PRO GAMING to be quite competitive when compared against its ATX-based larger brother.

Read full article @ eTeknix

Cooler Master Storm Quick Fire Rapid-i Mechanical Keyboard Review

Whenever companies develop new products, often times, they are either loaded with functionality, stripped down to the core, or -- thankfully, most of the time -- balances both parameters in moderation. For some products, it is visually quite obvious what kind of it has to offer, while others may be more subtle. Some computer cases that we have reviewed here at APH Networks show just that. A few months back, I reviewed the Phanteks Enthoo Primo. Its sheer size, abundance of space, and amount of flexibility to house a large array of components give the impression this case is designed for enthusiasts. On the flip side, my colleague Jonathan is a big fan of the subtle designs from Fractal Design. One such example is the Define R5. It looks clean and elegant, if not a bit boring to be absolutely honest. Once you turn your eyes to its internals, however, it gives you all the features you will ever want and need. What we have here at APH Networks today is the Quick Fire Rapid-i keyboard from CM Storm. As its name suggests, it is branded under the Storm series, which is Cooler Master's way of saying that this is a gaming accessory. With the picture of the product itself printed on the front of the box, the first thought that came to my mind was, "How on earth could anyone consider this a gaming accessory?" With the stereotype of "more is better" in terms of gaming products, I have to admit it looks ostensibly too simple to serve the needs of a gamer. Is the Quick Fire Rapid-i like the Fractal Design Define R5 with subtle features, or will it be just like any average barebone keyboard classified as gaming "just because I can"? We cracked open a unit here at APH Networks to find out.

Read full article @ APH Networks

Crucial BX200 960GB Solid State Drive Review

It has been almost a year since Crucial introduced the BX100 SSD and set a new standard for how much SSD you could get for your money; bringing large capacity and fast storage in the reach of more people who were dissatisfied with the slow performance of their mechanical hard disk and didn’t want to sacrifice capacity with a smaller SSD. Today I’m taking a closer look at the next step on Crucial’s goal as they just released the Crucial BX200 SSD in three capacities and at a more than good price.

The Crucial BX200 is the perfect entry-level SSD for anyone who wants to take the step away from mechanical storage, but it isn’t exclusive for those people. It could also be a great choice for people who purchase their third, fourth, or fifth SSD as you get more capacity than you are used to. The Crucial BX200 is 13 times faster than a hard drive and at the same time it is 40 times more energy-efficient. It also boots your system a lot faster and almost instantaneously on a modern operating system. Even older systems will reap the benefits of the fast boot times and it also decreases your application and game loading times significantly.

Read full article @ eTeknix

DBPower Hawkeye-II FPV Wifi Drone Quadcopter with Camera Review

Drones are the big thing now and it seems every helicopter and quadcopter is a drone and that’s wrong I think, but there’s nothing I can do about it, drones are popular and they sell. Anyway, today for review I’ve got quadcopter or drone from DBPower and it’s called the Hawkeye-II and it has a camera built-into that you can actually connect to your phone and see through so it’s like you’re in it flying along. I love remote control products, especially those that fly and this one needs some improvement. Read on to learn more…

Read full article @ Technogog

DeepCool GamerStorm Assassin II CPU Cooler Review

It may be true that the technology behind CPU air coolers hasn't changed that much over the past two decades (we've witnessed some innovations over the years but so far nothing has really taken off) but we really can't say the same about their size and design. I mean just look what's available currently in the market compared to past and even most current ISF solutions that ship with boxed CPUs. We don't just have both U-type (tower) models and C-type (top-down) models to choose from but those also come in many different sizes aimed towards pretty much every consumer out there from casual and HTPC users up to gamers, enthusiasts, overclockers and yes even professionals. So even though technology remains basically the same people have countless more choices right now offered by a much larger number of companies compared to even just 10 years ago. DeepCool may not be amongst the really old players in the market but in just a few years they've released a good number of CPU coolers (amongst others) one of which was the very good GamerStorm Assassin which has been succeeded by the new Assassin II.

Read full article @ NikKTech

EVGA GTX 950 SSC ACX 2.0, GTX 950 goes Super SuperClocked!

EVGA serves up a beautiful GTX 950 Super SuperClock ACX 2.0 sporting 768 Shader units 32 ROPs, 2940 million transistors with 2 GB od high-speed GDDR5 running across a 128-bit bus. The EVGA GTX 950 SSC ACX 2.0 gets a factory overclock to 1190 MHz which is a nice boost from 1024 the stock reference clock of GTX 950 and 166MHz higher than the reference model.

NVIDIA and their partners saw a need to cover a lower price point to be competitive with the AMD R7 370 and they did quite an impressive job of competing with the R7 370 and since having hands on a R7 370 the EVGA GTX 950 easily bests the R7 370 at the same price ($150 – $170 depending on model). Designed as a mainstream offering the EVGA GTX 950 SSC ACX 2.0 uses the same GM 206 core GTX 960 uses but the EVGA GTX 950 SSC ACX 2.0 had 256 shaders trimmed off of it and got a lower reference core speed. NVIDIA did such a good job on the GTX 950 that it borders Mainstream / Enthusiast fairly well.

Read full article @ Bjorn3D

FSL Xylem Wood Earphones Review

Up for review today I’ve got a pair of earphones from FSL or Future Sound Labs and these are called the Xylem and what makes makes these a bit special is the fact that they’re made of wood. The headphones are inexpensive and they do have an in-line remote control for controlling media and phone calls. For the price they aren’t bad, but they’re not perfect. Read on to learn more…

Read full article @ Technogog

GE In-Wall Z-Wave & ZigBee Dimming Smart Switch Review

If you are in the market for an in-the-wall smart switch then chances are that you’ve probably already got a few other smart home products in your existing home automation configuration. Most consumers that are purchasing in-wall switches or outlets already have plug-in modules, like the GE Smart Switch Plug-in module or perhaps they also have presences sensors and maybe a few window and door switches as well. Whichever existing products that you may have, you are probably looking at the in-wall switches for a couple of reasons. For one, you may be looking for a more custom and less noticeable look that you achieve with the in-wall switches instead of relying on the plug-in modules that can sometimes look a bit bulky. You may also want an in-wall switch because you don’t have another way to easily control a light or device. Examples for this would include an existing florescent light installed in your home or perhaps you have a gas fireplace that’s ignited by an existing wall switch? Why not start up that fire with your phone or perhaps a voice command to Amazon Echo/Alexa?

Regardless for your reasons behind wanting an in-wall switch, you’re probably looking for one that is easy to install, backed by a good warranty, and well one that just works! Today we’re going to look at the GE In-Wall Z-Wave Smart Switch and also the GE In-Wall ZigBee Dimmer Switch that provides us On/Off capabilities and dimmer capabilities. They also give us a wide range of possibilities since its Z-Wave and ZigBee technology and will connect up to our SmartThings hub. We’ll also show you step-by-step how we installed the switch where an existing wall switch was mounted and how we cleverly turn it on and off not only for convenience but to save electricity too!

Read full article @ Geek Inspector

Intel NUC range updated with quartet of Skylake machines

New 6th generation i5 and i3 NUCs with and without 2.5-inch drive support. Intel has quietly updated its range of NUC computers. There are four new machines on offer, all sporting Intel Skylake (6th generation) processors. The new NUCs look very similar to the Broadwell models launched earlier in the year and you will find the taller NUCs have capacity for a 2.5-inch drive, while the shorter, more compact NUCs do not.

Read full article @ Hexus

Kingston USB 3.1 HyperX Savage 128GB Review

Over the years, the small thumb drive has evolved as much as or more than any other component you can use to store and transport data. As the USB specification is updated to improve data transfer speeds, the flash NAND market has kept pace, delivering devices that take advantage of the latest specifications. The drive I am looking at today is part of Kingston's HyperX Savage line-up. This robust series of flash drives is available in capacities of 64GB, 128GB, and 256GB; delivering read/write speeds of up to 350MB/s and 250MB/s, respectively, depending on the capacity.

Pricing starts at $73 for the 64GB variant of the Savage line, with the 128GB drive I am looking at carrying a $131 price point at Kingston's web store. For your money, you get a drive that comes with a five-year warranty. If you are like me, that will be more than enough since I lose or break flash drives with alarming regularity. Kingston equips the HyperX Savage drives to work across multiple platforms, including gaming consoles from Sony and Microsoft. Let's take a look at this device and see if it lives up to the performance expectations.

Read full article @ OCC

Life-Phorm All-in-One Positioning Device By Lethal Protection

I have to lead this review with a word of caution, if you’re afraid of spiders you won’t be interested in this product for sure but this is the perfect time to post this review, just a day or two before Halloween! The product is called the Life-Phorm and it looks just like a big mean spider but it’s a stand or mount or as they call it, a positioning device, for tablets, phones and cameras and it’s certainly unique as I’ve never seen anything like it. I’ve seen and have the flexible legs tripods and stand but this one is certainly different from those. Read on to learn more..

Read full article @ Technogog

Logitech G633 Artemis Spectrum Review

Logitech have been a long standing brand in regards to quality PC and gaming peripherals and need little introduction. The G633 Artemis Spectrum comes as part of their latest gaming headsets which have set out to be the complete audio package for gamers.

As we are looking at the G633 it is worth noting that the primary difference between itself and the G933 is that the G633 is wired only, most other functions and features are identical. They are a virtual 7.1 surround headset with vibrant customisable RGB lighting. They are powered by Logitech's own Pro-G 40mm drivers and take advantage of Dolby 7.1 and DTS Headphone:X as part of a fully featured software package. These headsets are compatible with the Xbox ONE and the PS4 so console gamers don't have to miss out either. Other features include 3 programmable G-keys and a foldaway noise reducing microphone and multi source audio mixing, which allows you have your primary audio input travelling through USB and you could use the 4 pole adaptor to answer your phone while still gaming. Other features include 3 programmable G-keys and a foldaway noise reducing microphone.

Read full article @ Vortez

Ozone Blast 4HX PC Gaming Headset Review

Ozone are one of the most popular brands in PC gaming, offering a wide range of peripherals that have proven very popular with eSports gamers around the world. Ranging from mechanical keyboards to headsets, such as the Blast 4HX which we’ll be taking a look at today, they’ve got some very exciting hardware and I’m eager to see what their latest can do.

“BLAST 4HX was designed and meticulously fine tuned for both pc and console gamers. Quickly access important functions with easy and fast volume adjustments to both the headset and chat, you can even switch between pc and console mode. So whether you want to play on the PC or bust out your favorite games on the Console, all you need is BLAST 4HX.”

The Blast 4HX is certainly well equipped, offering support for PC, PlayStation and Xbox consoles, giving you excellent value for money if you own multiple gaming devices. There are two powerful 44mm drivers, a good quality microphone, extra long cables and even some nice bonuses such as LED lighting. It’s certainly ticking all the right boxes, so let’s jump right in and take a closer look at what this headset has to offer.

Read full article @ eTeknix