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Posts Tagged ‘light’

Hexa-core system has its way with our benchmarks

When we introduced our new system benchmarks last month, we thought it might be at least six months before review machines began stomping the holy crap out of them. Unfortunately for us, Digital Storm couldn’t wait to pile it on. The company has unleashed a rig so damned powerful that we’re wondering if our new benchmarks and zero-point system aren’t already obsolete.

But what would you expect of a rig named HailStorm Black Ops Edition that’s equipped with Intel’s new hexa-core Core i7-980X CPU? The Core i7-980X normally clocks in at 3.33GHz, … [Read More...]

This morning, Western Digital officially announced (and started shipping) the next generation of its VelociRaptor hard drives, and we’ve got tasty benchmark numbers for you. 

The new VelociRaptor with its top off.

The new Velociraptors are SATA 6Gb/s-enabled and come in 450GB and 600GB flavors (a 300GB bump from the previous-gen’s 150GB and 300GB). Like their predecessors, the Velociraptors spin at 10,000rpm and desktop versions are mounted on IcePack heatsinks that let them fit in standard 3.5-inch SATA hard drive bays. IcePack-less 2.5-inch models are available for enterprise servers, but at 15mm high , they won’t fit in your laptop. 

The much-needed … [Read More...]

Built Fortress tough, with a Silverstone price tag

Going on name alone, one would expect the Silverstone Fortress FT02 to be an updated version of our Best of the Best mid-tower case, last year’s Fortress FT01. And while it shares a few of the FT01’s traits (like a unibody aluminum frame, acoustic padding, and some stylistic cues like black metal mesh), the vast majority of its DNA comes from the Raven RV02. In fact, it’s the homo sapiens to the RV02’s chimpanzee.

The rotated motherboard placement and right-panel window mean the Fortress FT02, like the Raven RV02, looks strange at … [Read More...]

Powermat Wireless Charging

by Legitreviews.com

The holiday season is in full effect and Christmas is right around the corner. If you haven’t gotten a gift yet, you already know that you are in a bad position. That Barnes & Noble Nook eBook reader sold out last month and the arrival date for one is February 1st! Most vacation packages aren’t nearly as discounted as they were a few months ago and gift cards have gotten a bad reputation as being insincere. Time is running out to top off all that bad news, as this past weekend was the last shopping … [Read More...]

BD write speeds reach the double digits

Once Blu-ray burners reached 8x writes, enabling them to fill a 25GB disc with data in less than 15 minutes, speed stopped being a major argument against the technology—now it’s just price and consumer need that stand in the way of widespread adoption. Still, for what it’s worth, Blu-ray write speeds continue to improve at a steady pace, and now, a mere six months after reviewing our first 8x drive, we’ve been presented with Plextor’s 12x B940SA.

But, you’ll probably wonder, what good is a 12x drive when today’s BD-R media has a … [Read More...]

Why Wipe Data Securely?

Whether you are preparing to reuse a hard disk for another operating system, clear off your junk shelves by passing along outdated drives to a friend or relative, donate an old PC to a charity or school, discard a too-small USB drive or flash memory card, or repurpose an SSD, you don’t want to leave any information on the storage device. With stories abounding of identity theft aided by information lifted from discarded storage devices, you want devices you no longer plan to use to have no usable information when they head out the door. … [Read More...]

Why

There are a gazillion apps to turn your iPhone into a remote control, and let you operate your computer, your Sonos home music system or even your DirecTV DVR. The problem is, they work over Wi-Fi, whereas your TV, stereo and DVD-players all swallow up infra-red light in order to follow your distant commands.

That changes with the little $50 L5 iPhone Remote, a dongle that plugs into the dock connector and allows you iPhone to become a proper universal remote, spitting invisible light at all manner of home electronics. It comes with a free companion application that lets you … [Read More...]