AMD Phenom X3 Range

The office was abuzz when I walked in the door carrying the latest AMD X3 chips.

We have at our disposal the AMD Phenom X3 8750, 8650, and 8450. Just to let you know what to expect we will let you in on our test rig’s spec; we have a MSI K9N2 Diamond which features the Nvidia Nforce 780a SLI chipset, we threw in some OCZ Reaper HPC DDR2 1066 (our poor fingers), in went the two BFG 9800GX2 cards in SLI, and to power this beast we used our trusty OCZ Mod Xstream 900W Modular PSU.

This of course won’t be a stock review; we plan to see how high we can OC these chips using our air cooler, we’ll see if we can get the baby chip up to dizzying heights and maybe we might find an OCing gem.

Look out for the August Issue – oh and we are the first to get our hands on these chips... we smell and exclusive.

Microsoft Wireless Laser Desktop 5000

Keyboard and mouse combo’s are usually reserved for the family. They get bought for the purpose of an all-in-one package that will do the job. They usually disappoint on more than one front and then get replaced with yet another disappointing package. Microsoft has decided to give the public a desktop package that has features and doesn’t disappoint.

The Microsoft Wireless Laser Desktop 5000 is an impressive package. Microsoft happily announces on the box that estimated battery life is 6 months, and from our previous experience with Microsoft Wireless products we can firmly believe that claim. The keyboard is a dream to type on, and course comes with Microsoft’s standard Enhanced F Keys, and to help with the usual chores such as Cut, Copy, and Paste, Microsoft has labelled the shortcut keys and clearly indicates that Ctrl needs to be pushed. The keyboard features the best palm rest that we have ever used.

The mouse is a dream to move around. The 1000dpi laser is precise and the buttons are responsive, the four axis tilt smooth scroll wheel is a pleasure to use. This mouse even proved to be a very capable gaming mouse, although more hard-core gamers will laugh at this idea.

Rating:
79%

Price: R890
www.microsoft.co.za
“Check out PCFormat August 2008 for the full review.”
Michael Reed

Steelseries Ikari Laser Mouse

The Steelseries Ikari Lazer mouse’s buttons are precise and respond well, and thanks to the bundled software you can programme in macros. The laser is extremely accurate and works on every surface we tested it on. As with the latest gaming mouse, the Steelseries Ikari Laser mouse has on-the-fly adjustable sensitivity but Steelseries have taken this one step further.

On the bottom of the Steelseries Ikari Laser mouse is a LCD which displays the CPI, and can be used to adjust the CPI on-the-fly down to the single digit which we were really impressed with.

This helps when you need to use your mouse on another PC; you are able to adjust your sensitivity without the need to install drivers - this tops the charts for convenience in our books. Steelseries have designed this mouse to be used without the need for interpolation.

Rating:
95%

Michael Reed
Price: R1000
www.dynax.co.za
“Check out PCFormat August 2008 for the full review.”

Thermaltake BigTyp 120 VX

Modern processors produce heat, and at high load levels they produce lots of heat. Thermaltake have decided to help with that problem and have introduced the BigTyp 120 VX.

This large cooler is very easy to install and has its own 120mm fan (with attached fan speed controller). At high speed the sound levels are pretty audible but at low speeds it is almost whisper quiet.

The cooler performs well with the heat produced by AMD’s latest stove-like chip Phenom X4 9850. The cooler features six copper heat pipes which transfer the heat to the 142 aluminium fins which are cooled by the 120mm fan. Not a bad cooler especially for the price.

Rating:

79%

Michael Reed

Steelseries Gaming Glove

The steelseries is a big gaming brand. PCF was excited to find out that this amazing brand is now available in South Africa. We pulled some strings and managed to get a whole bunch of Steelseries goodies. Take a look at our July issue for more Steelseries reviews.

This week we decided to review the Steelseries Gaming Glove. The glove is designed to be worn on your mouse hand and can be used by either left- or right-handed players. While the glove provides no serious wrist support it does help movement over gaming surfaces and removes the worry of sweat interrupting your gaming session.Whether you really feel the need to spend R209 on a gaming glove is up to you, but we honestly wouldn’t mind it for a serious gaming session, but for everyday use it is uncomfortable and annoying.

Rating:
70%

Michael Reed