cover
Edward R.

Edward R.

Joined on 10/07/02

0
0

Product Reviews
product reviews
  • 11
Most Favorable Review

Wonderful bang for the buck.

AMD A10-5800K - A-Series APU Trinity Quad-Core 3.8 GHz Socket FM2 100W AMD Radeon HD 7660D Desktop APU (CPU + GPU) with DirectX 11 Graphic - AD580KWOHJBOX
AMD A10-5800K - A-Series APU Trinity Quad-Core 3.8 GHz Socket FM2 100W AMD Radeon HD 7660D Desktop APU (CPU + GPU) with DirectX 11 Graphic - AD580KWOHJBOX

Pros: With a gentle overclock of the GPU to 950MHz and pairing of fast RAM, this thing is phenomenal for everyday gaming. My most played game is StarCraft II, which I run at 1600x1200 (nearly the same number of pixels as 1920x1080) and every conceivable graphics setting turned all the way up... beautiful. And the CPU cores are more than able to keep up with all of the destruction on screen. Most people buy this with the intention of overclocking, but upon finding out how horrible the stock HSF is I decided to actually go the other way; at stock 3.8/4.2-turbo, I found total stability in dropping the stock vcore all the way down to 1.275v from 1.425. Things run even cooler now, it's still solid as a rock and I still have more CPU power than I can figure out what to do with.

Cons: The HSF. It's loud and rinkydinky. But that's to be expected.

Overall Review: Paired with 2133MHz RAM to feed the bandwidth hungry APU, a gentle GPU overclock and a decrease in the CPU core voltage allows for an amazingly capable system with a very small thermal footprint.

10/31/2012
Most Critical Review

Working wonderfully if your rig idles all day

Thermaltake TR2 TR-500 500 W ATX12V v2.3 SLI Ready CrossFire Ready SLI CrossFire Power Supply
Thermaltake TR2 TR-500 500 W ATX12V v2.3 SLI Ready CrossFire Ready SLI CrossFire Power Supply

Pros: Easy to install, looks nice, plenty of connection options and an ample amount of cabling.

Cons: At system load, which only uses around 1/3 of the PSU's capacity, I get a high pitched whine from the PSU that I can hear throughout the entire house. Makes it kinda hard to fun the system for Folding, as was one of my original intentions for it.

Another excellent condition i5

HP 14.0" Intel Core i3-2310M 4GB Memory Windows 10 Home 64-Bit NE5-0682
HP 14.0" Intel Core i3-2310M 4GB Memory Windows 10 Home 64-Bit NE5-0682

Pros: Not much to say aside from that. Screen, keyboard and general surface area of the machine is an A with the sides being an A- or B+ Mine arrived with an i5 2540M

Cons: None

Feature packed and well priced. Another awesome MSI mATX AMD board

MSI B350M MORTAR AM4 AMD B350 USB 3.1 HDMI Micro ATX AMD Motherboard
MSI B350M MORTAR AM4 AMD B350 USB 3.1 HDMI Micro ATX AMD Motherboard

Pros: BIOS 1.1 was already out by the time I got this board so I didn't have to deal with any teething. It's been great since day 1. And all I needed to do to get my Ryzen 7 1700 to 3.8GHz was jump into the BIOS and set it up with a nice low voltage of 1.325. Additionally, I knew enough to buy good RAM so I've never had any problems. I'm running Trident Z 3600 at 3200 with 14-14-14-34 timings and have been since day one. I'm sure 3600 will happen someday but I'm fine with 3200 @ 14 in the meantime.

Cons: As has been pointed out, the board lacks Dual BIOS.

Overall Review: Awesome board for the price. Literally the only reason to get a Full ATX board over this is that you need the expansion slots.

Easyily setup, very well made

G.SKILL TridentZ Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4 3600 (PC4 28800) Desktop Memory Model F4-3600C16D-16GTZ
G.SKILL TridentZ Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4 3600 (PC4 28800) Desktop Memory Model F4-3600C16D-16GTZ

Pros: Not yet able to get 3600MHz with my Ryzen setup but 3200 @ 14-14-14-34 was as simple as typing it into the BIOS. Running an MSI B350M Mortar with BIOS 1.2 but 1.1 worked as well.

Cons: No cons. Got them on sale and knew enough to not expect a full 3600MHz... yet. But 3200 at CAS 14 is more than fine in the meantime.

Excellent i3/5 alternative

AMD Athlon X4 860k with AMD Quiet Cooler Quad-Core Socket FM2+ 95W AD860KXBJASBX Desktop Processor
AMD Athlon X4 860k with AMD Quiet Cooler Quad-Core Socket FM2+ 95W AD860KXBJASBX Desktop Processor

Pros: It's cheap, relatively cool running and OCs like a beast. I've been running at 4.5GHz with stock voltage on an MSI A88XM Gaming for a year. And my Corsair Hydro keeps Prime95 temps below 50 degrees. I ran around 59 with a Hyper 212.

Cons: None. It's a more capable CPU than anything Intel offers in the price class.

10/24/2016