Here a roundup of the latest reviews and articles:

Blackview Omega Smartphone Review
Crysis 2 4-Years Later Review
Gigabyte G1.Sniper B6 Review
Intel 750 PCIe SSD Review (1.2TB) – 1st Consumer 2.4GB/s NVMe SSD Set To Change The Industry
Intel Broadwell, Skylake and Air versus Water Cooling
Intel NUC Kit NUC5i5RYH Review
Intel SSD 750 (1.2TB) Review
Intel SSD 750 Series 1.2TB PCIe NVMe Review
Intel SSD 750 Series 1.2TB PCIe X4 Card Review
Intel SSD 750 Series 1.2TB Review
Intel SSD 750 Series PCIe SSD
Intel SSD 750 SSD Review: PCIe storage for the consumer market
Intel's 750 Series solid-state drive reviewed
Netgear Nighthawk X4 AC2350 WiFi Router Review
Seagate Seven Steel External USB 3.0 Drive Review
The Intel SSD 750 Series Performance Review

Blackview Omega Smartphone Review

Omega is one of the latest smartphones of Blackview, featuring the established MT6592 SoC at 1.7GHz from Mediatek and is paired with 2GB of RAM, 16GB of internal storage. The selfie camera is 5MP, while the shooter from the back is powered by the Sony IMX135 13MP sensor and it does have a battery of 2100mAh.

Read full article @ Madshrimps

Crysis 2 4-Years Later Review

Should we fight the Ceph and put the Nanosuit on once again? In general, I am going to say no, but on sale, I say 'why not.' I prefer not to bring price into reviews, but I think it helps qualify my recommendation for Crysis 2. It is a fun game that, as far as the gameplay is concerned, is just too short for my liking, and its very linear design does not help much. If you have it and want to play an enjoyable FPS, go ahead and get into the game, but if you are thinking about purchasing it, I recommend you watch for a sale. While the gameplay is fun, the story is not as solid as I would prefer, contains plot-holes, and definitely teases future games. On its own that is not bad, but generally I would like to see a sequel answer more questions than present more. The graphics do look good, but these are not the generation-defying looks you may expect given the title. It looks like a more modern game built for the previous generation of consoles, which just means it looks like so much more could have been done.

Read full article @ OCC

Gigabyte G1.Sniper B6 Review

Let's review the budget yet enthusiast board G1.Sniper B6 from Gigabyte, it is based on the lower cost B85 chipset from Intel for Socket 1150 processors. B85 based motherboards typically end up in business desktops and normally are limited from overclocking. Well, that is just different with the Gigabyte G1.Sniper B6! The G1.Sniper B6 is based on the Intel B85 Express chipset, and comes with out of the box support for "Haswell" and "Devil's Canyon" CPUs. A small price, nice features and tweakability? Though a little more limited you'll get USB 3.0 ports and of course an improved and enhanced audio solution (albeit that is really a software layer sitting on top of the Realtek ALC898 codec).

The Gigabyte G1.Sniper B6 uses a modest 8 phase CPU VRM (voltage regulation) design, has 24-pin ATX and 8-pin EPS connectors, four SATA 6 Gbps ports and two SATA 3 Gbps ports. It also features a Realtek ALC1150 Audio CODEC (110 dBA SNR) and Nichicon audiophile-grade electrolytic capacitors on the AMP stage. Yup, again this is supposed to be a budget series chipset. Gigabyte also fits the board with a pair of PCI Express 3.0 slots - one is connected straight to the CPU and supports x16 graphics cards. The other slot however can only work in x4 mode as this is a limiting factor of the B85 chipset. But with one graphics card, you'll have full x16 PCIe 3.0 bandwidth. Other features are AMI UEFI Dual-BIOS, USB 3.0 ports at the back, audio outputs and PS/2 mouse/keyboard ports. In addition to Gigabit LAN support. Lets have a peek at this fairly feature rich value motherboard and then let's fire up this review.

The best news, you can find this great looking puppy for as little as 89 EUR...

Read full article @ Guru3D

Intel 750 PCIe SSD Review (1.2TB) – 1st Consumer 2.4GB/s NVMe SSD Set To Change The Industry

You know how we said in previous reviews that the enthusiast market hasn’t had much action and is just starting to take off? Well, right when we thought we were starting to see some fast PCIe SSDs, Intel decides to step in and release a beast. “A beast you say?” Yes, a fast, high capacity, NVMe, PCIe lane destroying beast! A beast of which those stories about things that go bump in the night could not have prepared you for. Let us introduce you to Intel’s latest disruptive monstrosity, the 1.2TB Intel 750 PCIe SSD.

Read full article @ The SSD Review

Intel Broadwell, Skylake and Air versus Water Cooling

Where is Intel Broadwell? Hardware Editors Leo Waldock and Luke Hill discuss Broadwell which is due to be replaced by Skylake in a few months' time. The snag is that Intel hasn't yet released the laptop and desktop versions of Broadwell so the clock is ticking. Or is it tocking?

Read full article @ KitGuru

Intel NUC Kit NUC5i5RYH Review

Fifth-generation Broadwell makes its way to the Next Unit of Computing. Still awaiting a fifth-generation Intel Core processor for your next self-built PC? The new range of chips, codenamed 'Broadwell,' are said to be just around the corner, but technology enthusiasts needn't wait as a desktop interpretation of Intel's latest architecture is already available as part of a new-and-improved Next Unit of Computing (NUC).

High-performance advocates will be turning their backs as we speak, but in many ways, you could argue that the NUC is the best interpretation of a modern Intel PC. The drive for efficiency and on-chip consolidation has led to single processors that are more capable than ever before, making today's mini PCs a match for the desktop towers of years gone by.

Read full article @ Hexus

Intel SSD 750 (1.2TB) Review

NVMe comes to the consumer platform. Solid-state drives (SSDs) are one of the best PC innovations of the last decade. Near-instant access, noiseless operation and low energy consumption drive a better user experience in various form factors.

Concentrating on the home PC for a moment, most SSDs are presented in a 2.5in form factor and connect to the system via the SATA 6Gbps interface. Other formats are available, including mSATA and nascent M.2, but regular SATA continues to hold sway for the majority of drives.

But there are two problems with using SATA for the long term. The first is a lack of bandwidth imposed by the interface, topping out at a usable 550MB/s or so. The second is the transfer protocol used to communicate between drive and system host controller, which is predominantly Advanced Host Controller Interface (AHCI).

Read full article @ Hexus

Intel SSD 750 Series 1.2TB PCIe NVMe Review

The push for greater performance from storage devices is seeing enthusiast drives transition towards PCIe-linked connections for increased bandwidth. While faster hardware is great, on paper, it is of limited use if the surrounding ecosystem is unable to put the performance increases to effective use.

That’s where the SSD-optimised Non-Volatile Memory Express (NVMe) specification comes into the picture. Today we will be looking at one of the first storage devices to make NVMe accessible for enthusiast consumers – Intel’s SSD 750 Series PCIe drive.

Read full article @ KitGuru

Intel SSD 750 Series 1.2TB PCIe X4 Card Review

There are three main SSD form factors available today. The first is the standard 2.5 inch SSD, the second is the stick-of-gum sized M.2 PCIe SSD, and finally we have PCIe SSD cards, which are more commonly found in servers in enterprise. 3.5 inch SSDs are most popular, offering great performance and value, and the new M.2 PCIe SSDs have homes in both new motherboards with the new slot, and even come with adapters, allowing you to reinvigorate an older system. Finally, we have the PCIe NVMe SSD cards that fill a large void for pro users willing to spend more for top performance for desktop use.

The recently announced Intel SSD 750 Series fills that void, and comes in two flavors: A PCIe 3.0 X4 card for top performance, and a 2.5 inch version. Today we'll looking at the PCIe version that goes up to 1.2TB, and offers high performance without the enterprise cost. Just how high a performance and cost? Let's get some answers!

Read full article @ Futurelooks

Intel SSD 750 Series 1.2TB Review

Wipe the slate clean. That's the thinking behind the Intel SSD 750 Series 1.2TB. Forget the SATA interface, forget the AHCI protocol. This is high bandwidth, NAND Flash-specific storage of the highest order. This is solid state all grown up and with Non-Volatile Media Express (NVMe), and it's forging its own path free of the past. Since the first consumer SSDs started hitting our PCs they've all been piggy-backing old school, high-latency mechanical drive technology in terms of their interfaces and protocols. In the beginning of the SSD revolution running across the 600MB/s limit of the SATA 6Gbps interface wasn't much of a problem. Quickly our SSDs became more trustworthy and more capable, and suddenly they were bumping their heads against the limits of the suddenly geriatric-looking connection.

Read full article @ Techradar

Intel SSD 750 Series PCIe SSD

You may not know it, but over the past few years we as gamers and enthusiasts have been smack dab in the middle of a bit of a revolution. Sure games don’t seem to push hardware as much as they used too and the focus has been on higher resolutions. But on the storage front performance has been improving with leaps and bounds. Here at LanOC our first hard drive review came about around the same time that the first consumer SSDs were hitting the market. When tested that hard drive saw an average read speed of about 75MB/s. Our first SSD review a few months later put down an impressive 214.6 MB/s. After that we saw speeds increase to 300 and then recently to around 550 MB/s. PCIe drives have performed better than that but none of them promise to put down numbers like todays review. Today I’m going to check out Intel’s first consumer focused PCIe drive that happens to also use NVMe.

Read full article @ LanOC Reviews

Intel SSD 750 SSD Review: PCIe storage for the consumer market

Designed for enthusiasts and workstations, the key feature of Intel's SSD 750 Series is its adoption of Non-Volatile Memory Express or NVMe, a new performance controller interface set to replace the aging AHCI standard, bringing things like multiple queues, higher queue depths and lower latency with a direct path from the storage to the CPU. The drive is rated to deliver sequential read performance of up to 2.4GB/s with sequential writes hitting 1.2GB/s.

Read full article @ Techspot

Intel's 750 Series solid-state drive reviewed

Intel's latest datacenter drives combine a quad-lane PCIe Gen3 interface with the new NVMe protocol to deliver incredible performance with sequential and random I/O. Today, that tag team taps in on the desktop with the high-end 750 Series SSD. We've taken a closer look at Intel's new desktop flagship to see how well the next-generation of PCI Express storage translates to enthusiast PCs.

Read full article @ The Tech Report

Netgear Nighthawk X4 AC2350 WiFi Router Review

Today we are evaluating the newest Netgear 802.11ac router, the Nighthawk X4 R7500 that is the first high-end Netgear router to feature Quantenna's QSR1000 4x4 chipset for MU-MIMO support to help boost performance for multiple users of the same router. The R7500 is an Dual-Band AC2350 which means it can produce speed up to 600 Mbps on the 2.4 GHz channel and 1733 Mbps on the 5.0 GHz channel. Read on to see how it performs!

Read full article @ Legit Reviews

Seagate Seven Steel External USB 3.0 Drive Review

No matter how many portable hard drives I've used to date I've yet to find one which i can carry easily inside my rear pocket and without worrying about breaking it. There have been some exceptions to that in the past like a 1.8" drive manufactured by Plextor which i had the chance to review roughly 6 years ago and the brand new T1 portable SSD by Samsung (review coming soon) but unfortunately although i have to admit that both solutions look very nice they simply can't compete with regular 2.5" models, at least not in terms of capacity and enclosure durability. Seagate has been around for almost 4 decades now so I've always hoped that they'd step forward to create something unique in this segment of the market and with the recent release of the Seagate Seven (STDZ500400) steel external USB 3.0 drive i think that my quest for the ideal portable hard drive for use on the go is finally over (or almost over).

Read full article @ NikKTech

The Intel SSD 750 Series Performance Review

Intel has a historically stellar track record in the SSD market with their full stable of consumer, enterprise and datacenter drives continually receiving top grades on our pages. One of the highlights has been the 730-series which combined –at the time- class leading performance, great endurance ratings and Intel’s iron-clad warranty structure. It also sparked a great deal of discussion when, just before the holiday season, Intel reduced its price by a good 30% across all capacity levels. While many snapped up the drives, others were left wondering if the fire-sale signaled a replacement was just around the corner and now we have the answer. Say hello to the new Intel 750-series SSDs.

The 750-series may be the spiritual successor to the 730 but it does things a bit differently. Gone is the standard SATA interface, focus on power consumption and compatibility with notebooks. In their place is a raw, unadulterated enthusiast drive architecture that utilizes an NVMe backbone and been built from the ground up to provide massive performance regardless of such niceties like efficiency or adherence to smaller form factors. We’ve already seen what NVMe can do when tied at the hip to Intel’s current enterprise-centric architectures so there’s potential for many of the benefits to now trickle down from the enterprise market into enthusiasts’ hands.

Read full article @ Hardware Canucks