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.6800GT Videocard
.EQ3401M QBIC
.MSI K8N Neo2
.Gigabyte USB Drive
.Guide to BSOD
.Albatron PX915G Pro
.Guide to File Synch'n
.Geil Ultra-X DDR
.PCstats Weekly Tips
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Albatron's GeForce 6800GT NV40 Videocard
Hello,
Up
until now, I've only heard secondhand stories of processors
and other computer hardware getting fried in a power supply
failure, or through some manner of electrical short in the PC. That
was until I inserted an innocent little USB key into the back
of my computer this weekend. The USB key didn't go in straight,
and perhaps some of the electrical contacts shorted out... It's hard to
say for certain what really happened, but I will admit to the end result;
it killed my Pentium 4 processor. I now have a nice paper weight, and
a rather embarrassing tale to tell since this kind of thing isn't
supposed to happen to the
'experts.'
One
possible reason for this fatality may reside with the resettable PTC
(Polymeric Temperature Coefficient) fuses, but it is too soon to say.
We're looking into the matter, and hope to have some answers soon. In the
mean time, I pose this question; "have you ever fried hardware in
your PC, and how did it happen?" Use the PCStats Feedback page to let us know your story!
Starting from the top,
the PCstats Newsletter covers the awesome little Albatron
6800GT videocard as it runs through a series of Doom3 benchmarks,
and a couple dozen other tests. Following that is an i865PE based Small
Form Factor PC from Soltek called the QBIC.
MSI's K8N
Neo2 (socket 939) motherboard bats its way through the benchmarks and
the Albatron PX915G
Pro does the same for the Intel Pentium 4 socket 775 platform.
PCstats handy Guide to
Crash Recovery and the Blue Screen
of Death is a must read, as is our Guide to File
Synchronization; an excellent data backup utility. GeIL submitted a
pair of its Ultra-X
DDR this week, which Colin took to task in this
review. As we round things off, please don't forget to check out
PCstats Weekly Tech Tips!
 The nVidia GeForce 6800 GPU is a
powerful chip, as are videocards based on it like the Albatron Geforce
6800GT. The 'NV40'
GPU is the backbone of the 6800-series, and comes in a couple
flavours, and with so many differently clocked 6800 models to choose from,
consumers have a couple of routes to follow. They can shop on price points
alone, or shop smart and overclock for a little after-the-fact performance
upgrade. For example, it's safe to assume that the 6800GT is
overclockable to Geforce 6800 Ultra levels (400MHz core), and in fact
in our own round of testing we were able to push this card as fast as
433MHz! Continue
Here>>
In this review, PCstats is investigating what
the Soltek QBIC miniPC has to offer. This is a bare
bones Small Form Factor (SFF) PC, based on the Intel i865G chipset and
Pentium 4 800MHz FSB processor architecture. Soltek's EM340IM QBiC
model supports any current Pentium 4 Northwood CPU, so if you don't
need a lot of power simply get yourself an inexpensive chip and you're all
set. The Soltek QBiC is as well equipped as any SFF PC on the market; with
an 8X AGP and PCI slot for peripheral expansion, integrated 5.1-channel
audio, IEEE 1394 firewire, 10/100 LAN and onboard video
care of the i865G. Its two DDR DIMM slots support up to
2 GB of RAM. Continue
Here>>
 Over the next few pages PCstats will be sussing out
the MSI
K8N Neo2 Platinum motherboard to see just how it performs, and the
features it offers up. Built upon the nVidia nForce3 Ultra chipset, the
MSI K8N Neo2 supports the socket 939
AMD Athlon64 or AthlonFX processor, and will support up to 4GB of
PC3200 DDR memory. With respect to its onboard components, users of the
MSi K8N Neo2 Platinum will find two onboard Gigabit NICs, IEEE1394
Firewire, 7.1-channel audio, four Serial ATA
ports with NVRAID (RAID 0, 1,
0+1), and MSI's own CoreCell technology. That might not sound like a lot,
but remember the four Serial ATA channels are integrated, as is Serial
ATA/IDE RAID, and all this runs us about $140USD.Continue
Here>>
Gigabyte's entry into the world of Hi-Speed USB flash
drives is the aptly named GO-U0128B, and it has to be one of the most compact
flash drives we have ever tested. The whole device measures 45 x 20 x
9mm when the USB jack is retracted into its protective case. To indicate
data transfer activity, the GO-U0128B uses a bright blue
LED that illuminates the clear plastic behind the aluminum shell.Continue
Here>>
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| Beginners Guides: Crash Recovery: The Blue Screen of
Death |
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| If you've ever used Windows, chances are
you've experienced the lovely shade of blue associated with the famous
Windows Stop Error or 'Blue Screen
of Death.' This frequent, although
less so in newer operating systems, error occurs whenever Windows senses a
software, hardware or driver error which will not allow it to continue
operating properly. In other words, it happens all the
time, for all sorts of
reasons. In this article we'll provide you with a set of
tools for troubleshooting that you can use to get around
any Blue Screen Of Death.Continue
Here>> |
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| Albatron Mars PX915G Pro Motherboard
Review |
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The small blue PCI
Express x1 slots on the Albatron PX915G Pro on the review bench today offer more
bandwidth than the entire PCI bus. That's 500MB/s at full duplex mode
folks! To remedy the shared bandwidth issue, each PCI Express slot has its
own direct pipeline to the ICH6 southbridge. Individual PCI Express
devices can no longer steal bandwidth away from other
peripherals. Of course there's
more to the Albatron Mars PX915G Pro than PCI Express, and we'll be
getting to those other features in a bit.Continue
Here>> | | |
|
 This guide is
for all the road warriors who use a PC at work, notebook on
the road, and two or three other
computers throughout the day. With this guide, you can synchronize your
files between your PCs, so you always have the latest files at hand. Sexy topic
huh? Well if you have a laptop or a work computer as well as your home
desktop, you should know about file
synchronization. It can make your life a heck of a lot easier if you do
work on more than one system during the week. In this article we will explain the process of file synchronization and show you the two major
methods of synchronization within
Windows XP. New files created on one system are replicated to the other, as are changes made to
existing documents. Continue
Here>>
GeIL make it their
business to offer enthusiast calibre DDR, and this particular pair of GeIL's
Ultra-X PC3200 512MB DDR RAM DIMM's certainly have a lot to offer.
Each DDR memory module has a liquid crystal thermal monitoring sticker
attached, which shows the temperature in both Celsius and Farenheit. The
Ultra-X
PC3200 DDR is rated to run at 200
MHz, while keeping memory timings of 2-2-2-5 at a voltage of
just 2.55V. To help protect the memory from physical damage, tin coated
copper heatspreaders are utilized. Continue
Here>>
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PCstats Weekly Tech Tips: Admin Controls |
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Are
you tired of continually fixing someone else's PC because they keep screwing with the registry settings? We can save you some time by disabling that ability all together. ;-)
First log into the person's account and load up regedit (Start -> Run then type regedit and press the ok button), from there follow this path: HKEY_CURRENT_USER -> Software -> Microsoft -> Windows -> CurrentVersion -> Policies. Right click on the Policies folder, create a new key and label it System. Right click on the window on the right and then create a new DWORD value, name it DisableRegistryTools and give it the value 1. Once that's done save, exit and reboot.
Now in the future when the
troublemaker tries to open up the registry editor they'll be prompted that the feature has been disabled by the system administrator! This tweak even works on users who have administrative access (but who are not the administrator).
If you're a deals hunter, check out the PCStats Web Deals Forum. Fellow forum members have found quite a few gems, and I'm sure it'll save you money on your next upgrade.
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| | Join the PCstats Forums Today @ Forum.PCstats.com! |
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PCstats Issue
No.154
Circulation: 239,480
| This
Issue By |
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Editor-in-Chief
. M. Page
Weekly Tips
. C. Sun
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