Content and news by William Kelley

The allure of an SSD is one that’s difficult to ignore, but with pricing still in the realm of limited adoption, many are choosing to wait things out. But what about taking a baby step into the SSD world, with a hard drive that equips a mechanical design with some NAND flash to speed things up? We’re taking a look at Seagate’s solution.

After we published our review of Corsair’s H70 CPU cooler a couple of weeks ago, we couldn’t shake the nagging feeling that some additional testing needed to be done with different airflow configurations. We succumbed, and have the results here. Will using a config opposite to Corsair’s recommendation affect the temps? Read on.

When Corsair released its H50 CPU cooler last year, it impressed all of the critics – including us. So much so, that we even have multiple units in our lab for our test beds. It was with great interest when the H70 was released, then, as it improves on the previous design in numerous ways. But is it enough to compete with current competition?

In the market for the best CPU cooler for the buck? Cooler Master’s V6 GT is the one to look out for. It features a great design that’s both appealing to look at and efficient in doing its job, and despite it taking up less room over all compared to other mega-coolers out there, it offers exceptional cooling ability.

Looking for a mid-tower chassis that offers a big bang for a small buck? Thermaltake hopes to win us over on those claims with its Armor A90, a chassis built from the ground up with military-like design cues in mind, and also one that includes numerous convenience features, superb airflow, and a modest $90 pricetag.

Although NZXT produces a wide-range of products, its fan controllers have become one of the highlights of its line-ups. The reasons are threefold: features, performance and price. We were left quite impressed with earlier Sentry models, and we can say that NZXT has done it once again with its Sentry LXE.

When Thermaltake first unveiled its FRIO CPU cooler, the company promised that it would be one of the best-performing models it’s ever released. Now that we’ve had the opportunity to put our sample through our usual battery of tests, we can attest to that claim being true. To top it off, the FRIO even includes a fan speed control and reasonable price.

Solid-state may be the future of our storage, but for now, the prices for the latest SSD’s (even value models) is still far too high on the $/GB scale. For those looking for mass storage and still-great speeds, mechanical storage is still on top, and WD’s latest VelociRaptor’s, which utilize SATA 3.0, sit comfortably above all the rest.

A huge computer chassis deserves a huge CPU cooler, and when you need one of those, Noctua delivers. With its NH-D14, the company seems to have had the goal of delivering the largest cooler possible that could still fit on most ATX motherboards, but with that size comes extremely good performance even low noise levels.

While the rest of the world is glued to the latest and greatest SSD reviews, there are certainly a great many enthusiasts resisting the urge to splurge. With low densities and high prices, SSD technology is just not in a place that makes people comfortable with parting with their hard earned cash. Magnetic storage is still not only viable, but it is…

Want to take a “dive” into water cooling, but don’t want the hassle and/or the expense? CoolIT has got you covered. With the company’s ECO A.L.C., you get an all-in-one liquid cooler that has one of the easiest installation schemes we’ve seen to date, preforms well, and comes in at just around ~$70 US.

It’s not uncommon for a company which focuses on one thing to branch out into another, but I am not sure many people would have predicted a company such as Arctic Cooling would begin producing audio equipment. Fortunately though, the company has obviously done its research, as the audio quality is very good (with great bass!).

You might know Hades as being the God of the Underworld, but after taking a look at this chassis, you might begin to think he was the God of the “Meshworld”. Yes, there’s a lot of mesh used here, along with stark angles, creative lighting and a smart design that delivers fantastic cooling performance. But, can it unseat CM’s 690 II?

SATA 3.0 may have been available to consumers for the past couple of months, but the number of hard drive options out there are ultra-slim… just one. That drive is Seagate’s Barracuda XT. The question we’re looking to answer here is whether or not the $100 premium for SATA 3.0 is worth it, at least on a mechanical offering.

When Cooler Master released its 690 chassis over two years ago, we’re doubtful that even it could have predicted just how well-received it was going to be. It did a lot right in terms of design and function, and with the 690 II, those two factors are pushed even further. The result? The best $100 chassis we’ve ever looked at, bar none.

Crave ultimate realism in your PC games? Setting yourself up with a real simulator is a tad expensive, but for racing fans, Logitech gives us the next best thing with its G27 racing wheel. Logitech has long been known as a quality producer of racing wheels, and with the G27, the best just got better. Vroom vroom!

Kicking off our hard drive coverage begins with a look at Western Digital’s Caviar Black 1TB. As an affordable “high-end” consumer drive, this model includes all of the important features, and performs quite well throughout all of our tests. It also happens to win the contest for having the lowest overall acoustic levels, and by a fair margin.

The value in PC components today is fantastic, with the chassis being no exception. With its M59 mid-tower chassis, NZXT proves that value doesn’t have to mean cheap, as this one is packed. It features a cool design, LED lighting, features usually only seen on higher-end models, and of course, a $59.99 USD price-tag.

SilverStone’s Raven RV01 chassis might not have been the most well-received, but the company has attempted to make up for all the mistakes of the initial chassis with a follow-up, the RV02. Fortunately, the company has done just that, and except from a rather minor issue, and possibly its price, this is almost a perfect chassis.

NZXT’s previous Sentry fan controllers impressed us in our evaluations, but we wanted a bit more. To the rescue is the Sentry 2, the latest fan controller from the company that has completely floored us. At $35, it’s affordable. Add to that the touch-screen capability, support for 5 10W fans and on-the-fly temperature monitoring, and we have a new must-have product.