Content and news by Rob Williams

NEC have kindly allowed us to review their latest dual-layer DVD writer drive, the ND3540A. This internal drive is capable of writing to most kinds of media available, at speeds of up to 16x for DVD’s and up to 48x for CD’s.
This excellent writer offers top burning performance and is available at budget prices!

Check out the full review at Cache-Community.

This simple looking external DVD writer from Freecom is a top performer. It offers dual layer recording as well as regular + and – format DVD and CD writing, and is also plug and play compatible via a fast, hot-swappable USB2.0 connection.

Check out the full review at Cache-Community.

This is the FINAL week of the giveaway contest! At stake is a 1GB Mushkin PC3200 222 Level II V2 Dual Pack Memory Kit! This is your chance to get this amazing memory kit for free! So, hurry up before it’s too late!

Check out all the details at the Rojak Pot.

7800GTX works on 24 Pixel Pipeline and 8 Vertex Shader units while the 7800GT works on 20 Pixel Pipeline and 7 Vertex Shader Units. Obviously the card is inferior to 7800GTX but the price difference is worth considering. The 7800GTX currently costs around $542.00 and the 7800GT around $449.99, $100 difference between their prices. The 7800GTX is truly a beast but 7800GT provides great performance/price ratio to those who are neck to neck with their budget.

Head over to Gamer God for the full review!

It’s the summer and it’s HOT! To cool down our precious systems, Overclockers Online has teamed up with Thermaltake for this latest contest. We’re going to give away the Big Typhoon and Golden Orb II. Both of these bad boys can take the heat!

Check out all the details at Overclockers Online!

With SLI capable video cards, performance levels as high as the 7800GTX, one must wonder why Overclockers Online would have any interested in something like the 6600. Silence is what makes the difference with this card. No longer will we have to listen to any fans with AOpen’s silent solution.

Head over to read the full review at Overclockers Online.

The stock coolers on most graphics cards barely do the job. If you are into overclocking, you would most certainly opt for a third-party cooler from the likes of Zalman or Arctic Cooling. But for a select group of extreme overclockers who enjoy voltage-modding their cards for the extra edge, even third-party coolers just won’t hack it.

Today, Max_87 shows us just how easy it is to mod a Thermalright SI-97 CPU cooler into an awesome GPU cooler capable of handling even voltage-modded cards!

Check out the full guide over at Rojak Pot.

I have to say I was quite impressed with the size of the activity LED’s as I have never been a fan of the bling, bling ram because of the size and height of it, now here we have a set that hasn’t broke the standard heat spreader size and that makes these already more appealing to me. You have to understand the point, with other brands, they activity part is like a separate module on top and can lead to problems with installations of some of the best performance air coolers on the market.

Head over to Xtreme Computing for the full review!

ThermalRock, a division of Thermaltake, has diverted away from the design of traditional ATX cases in favor of offering a new level of innovation with such things as CD storage on the front bezel. However, will their latest creation, the Eclipse ATX chassis, be anything more than a re-designed Thermaltake Soprano?

Head over to Phoronix for the full review!

Two months ago we reviewed the ATI All-in-Wonder X800 XT AGP which features the ATI Theater 200 Analog video decoder. After reviewing the Theater 200’s performance we were quite happy with the quality of the video that was captured. Today, thanks to VisionTek, we have the opportunity to try out ATI’s latest Theater band chip. The 550 Pro, found on the VisionTek Xtasy Theater 550 Pro add-in card, claims the title of the first PCI Express (x1) compatible chip making it an excellent candidate for ATI’s next round of All-in-Wonder cards.

Check out the full review at Bona Fide Reviews.

Two important requirements for a headset are quality sound & a great mic. This product satisfies plus it has a USB sound card. It has soft padded ear cups & headband which is ideal for extended use. This headset even comes apart in three pieces for easy & safe transportation. Another unique feature is the flexible retractable mic. It’s time to upgrade! Watch the Video to find out more…

Check out the full video review over at 3D Gameman!

Foxconn, once primarily an OEM supplier, has turned towards the vastness of the retail market with a core offering of entry level to high end motherboards that are surprisingly hot for their complex alpha-numeric names. Looking at the specs of its flagship Intel 955X chipset based solution, the 955X7AA-8EKRS2, we’re left quite impressed. The board supports up to 8GB of PC5300 DDR2 memory as well as 800/1066MHz FSB Intel Pentium 4, Pentium D and Pentium Extreme Edition processors.

Check out the full review over at PC Stats!

We have a star-studded House of Commons line-up for the rest of August. Note your schedules and join us at IRC Stratics for the following Developer Chats: August 15th 5pm pst / 8pm est – Planetside August 16th 5pm pst / 8pm est – Lineage 2 August 17th 5pm pst / 8pm…..

ECS has built the RS400-A motherboard around ATI’s RADEON XPRESS200 chipset for the Intel LGA Socket 775 platform. Keeping cost down was a driving factor during development of this board. It can be used with DDR1 or DDR2 memory modules. Also available are slots for PCI-Express x16 and AGP. This board looks like an upgrader’s dream, but does it offer the performance enthusiasts want?

Head over to techPowerUp! for the full review!

In the first salvo we find the ECS KN1 Extreme nForce 4 Ultra motherboard, a concise example of how far ECS is willing to go to win over consumers. Hardware features on the socket 939 AMD Athlon64 ECS KN1 Extreme include an additional Serial ATA/IDE RAID controller, IEEE 1394a, a 5.1 channel audio codec and two network cards (one Gigabit, one 10/100). To top things off, ECS also throws in a decent software bundle and a little I/O slot exhaust fan. The board itself is based on the nVidia nForce 4 Ultra chipset, which means that one PCI Express x16 videocard is supported, but not SLI. Expansion comes care of the three PCI slots, and two PCI Express x1 sockets.

Check out the full review over at PC Stats!

The Transmissions from the Central Wastelands section has been updated with comments from the beta testing community! You can check it out here! Gamespot takes a look at the Hazard Mode and has even included a video. You can check that out here. Finally, Gamespy has an article on Races and Classes…..

Well, there are many articles circling on the internet now about the topic of video game violence, and I am sure if you are reading this then you are probably saying “Another One?” Well let me assure you that THIS article will not be the same as the others. Why? Because I am pissed off at all of it, and I’m not going to be Politically Correct about it either.

This is a great article, definitely worth a read. Check it out at Think Computers.

ATI’s X800 GT SKU offers, finally, real-world performance that, on balance, overcomes NVIDIA’s GeForce 6600 GT. Users looking to upgrade to a £100-£110 PCI-Express GPU would do well to seriously consider SAPPHIRE’s X800 GT Hybrid 256MB card. AGP users will need to wait, though, and the very nature of the how the X800 GT came into being indicates that it won’t be around forever, so snap it up while you still can.

Head over to Hexus for the full review. I love this cards color!

Sunbeamtech has released a flood of new computer products this year including items such as cases, coolers, mod items, and input devices. The one thing all of these different items seem to have in common is a bit of flair provided by some sort of lighting. The Pro Series Illuminated Keyboard is one of the latest releases from Sunbeamtech, and helps the end user to get one step closer to having everything in their system glow.

Check out the full review at Big Bruin.

Modular power supplies are getting extremely popular and Thermaltake certainly isn’t going to hesitate any longer. Their offering comes with some nice accessories like the wattage display.

Check out the full review at InsaneTek.