ASUS First in World to Unleash Full SATA Express Performance Exclusive SRIS BIOS architecture ensures owners of future ASUS motherboards enjoy full performance, and best compatibility of the latest SATA Express hardware Taipei, Taiwan (23rd April, 2014) — ASUS today announced that research and development work supported by Intel® has led to the discovery of a BIOS structure that unleashes the true full potential of the latest SATA Express interface standard on future ASUS motherboards. Following the CES 2014 debut of the ASUS Z87-Deluxe/SATA Express concept motherboard, ASUS and Intel continued working together to ensure that users enjoy the full performance of the SATA Express interface and SATA Express components. The joint research effort means that ASUS is the first motherboard manufacturer in the world to discover and implement a technology that is critical for SATA Express to perform at its best — the Separate Reference Clock with Independent Spread Spectrum Clocking Architecture, or SRIS for short. In order to identify and validate this exciting and valuable breakthrough, ASUS developed Hyper Express, an exclusive 2.5-inch SATA Express external enclosure. This smart invention is a concept device that accommodates two mSATA devices and enabled ASUS engineers to measure extensively SATA Express interface design, allowing us to finely engineer new motherboard designs to unleash the new standard’s full speed.   Full-speed SATA Express with SRIS in the BIOS In or...

There’s a new audio product on the market from someone you just might be familiar with. ROCCAT has released the Kave XTD 5.1 headset. The XTD 5.1 model features 40mm rear and front drivers, thick padded ear cushions and an adjustable headband. The 40mm drivers are complimented by a detachable flexible microphone and the headset is compatible with PCs. ROCCAT didn't stop there though; they went beyond gamers expectations by integrating the ability of pairing your headset with your mobile device via Bluetooth Technology as well as the ability to transfer sound to a normal speaker system for media meant to be heard by everybody. Continue reading to find out if this headset is packed with all the features gamers have been waiting for.

VisionTek Announces mSATA mini Enclosure For Converting mSATA SSD Into A Bus-Powered Pocket-Sized Storage Solution Plug and Play use with PCs and Macs via USB 3 solves dilemma of what to do with “old” drive after performing an internal drive upgrade April 23, 2014, East Dundee, IL – VisionTek Products LLC, (VisionTek®) http://www.visiontekproducts.com, a leading manufacturer of award-winning, high-performance upgrades and accessories for PC and Apple® Macintosh® computers, today announced the immediately availability of the VisionTek mSATA mini Enclosure. The USB 3.0 bus-powered enclosure is a Plug and Play solution for re-tasking an existing mSATA Solid State Drive after upgrading the SSD in an ultra-slim notebook or for adding a new mSATA SSD to create a high-performance ultra-portable external drive. The Pocket-Sized Portable Storage Powerhouse Sized smaller than a business card and weighing 0.30 ounces empty, the mSATA mini Enclosure features the SuperSpeed USB 3.0/2.0 interface to offer data rates up to 600MB/s and a bus-powered design so an AC adapter is not required. To complement its performance and portability attributes, the mSATA mini’s sleek, scratch-resistant aluminum housing provides rugged durability to safeguard a drive’s data and comes complete with everything needed to start using and sharing HD movies, music, photos, and important documents wherever desired.  Three Step Easy Set-Up for Plug and Play Use with PCs and Macs The mSATA mini Encl...

Redefining large: AOC launches 28″ MVA monitors Amsterdam, 23 April 2014 – Display specialist AOC launches its first two 28″ (71.1 cm) monitors. The m2870Vhe and m2870Vq feature large 16:9 MVA panels with Full HD resolution, wide viewing angles and high luminosity. Rich colours, high contrast and fast response times make these two displays ideal for both professional needs and entertainment such as video games and movies. Both models come with an extensive array of input options and other features, with the m2870Vq even boasting an additional DisplayPort connector and stereo speakers. Perfect colours at an impressive scale With the two new models from its Value Line, the m2870Vhe and m2870Vq, AOC enters the young market segment of 28″ (71.1 cm) displays. Thanks to MVA panel technology, the 16:9 wide screen monitors offer rich, vivid colours and a super-high contrast of 3000:1. This makes them perfect for demanding professional tasks such as design programmes requiring high colour fidelity, even at wide viewing angles of up to 178°. With a fast response time of only 5 ms, the two Full HD displays are also ideal for fast-paced entertainment such as gaming and movies, which truly come to life on the large 28″ screens. Everyday office tasks such as handling large spread sheets and programmes with multiple windows profit from the huge screen real estate as well. In all of these cases, the high luminosity of 300 cd/m² allows for clear images even in environments with...

MSI R9 295X2 Now Available in stores World’s fastest graphics card MSI, the gaming force in Graphics Cards is happy to announce the availability of the new AMD Radeon R9 295X2 Graphics Card. With two R9 290X GPUs on-board with clock speeds up to 1018 MHz and 8 Gigabyte of GDDR5, the R9 295X2 delivers the most insane frame rates in todays and future games. The card is cooled with a zeo maintenance liquid cooling system so gamers can expect cool temperatures, quiet operation and consistent performance. So whether you’re looking at the best card for Gaming at 4K and higher resolutions or want to be in the driver’s seat for this year’s most stunning PC Games, the R9 295X2 is the right choice. Maximum Performance The record-shattering dual-GPU R9 295X2 is packed with two Hawaii XT GPUs featuring 5632 processors running at speeds up to 1018 MHz. The massive 8 Gigabyte of GDDR5 runs at 5 GHz and delivers enough bandwidth to drive 4K screens or 5 1080p screens in Eyefinity. Together with support for TrueAudio and Mantle technology, the R9 295X2 is ready to power the best games of 2014. Cool and Quiet Hidden under the massive aluminium housing, the MSI R9 295X2 contains a unique liquid cooling solution from Asetek that keeps the GPUs running at full speed. Heat dissipation is performed through an external 12cm fan with radiator that dissipate the heat from the dual GPU pumps. A separate fan in the middle of the card cools the rest of the on-board components making this a un...

It has been several months since AMD shook up the GPU market a bit with its R9 series of GPUs. Now that the dust has settled there has been time for AMD partners to design better cooling solutions for the Hawaii based GPUs at the top end of the R9 lineup. When the 290 and 290x first released there was a firestorm of complaints surrounding the massive amounts of heat generated and the lack of significant cooling solutions. Basically the reference design cooler was a major flop that actually caused performance loses. The 290 and 290x GPUs were known to throttle down to lower core speeds to stay within the thermal envelope. In some cases, this resulted in a 290 outperforming a 290x in benches or other counter intuitive results... OUCH! AMD partners proved to be up to the challenge though, releasing GPUs with their custom cooling solutions that offered better heat dissipation without adding to the noise penalty suffered by the reference cooler. This is all fine and dandy, but where does any of this leave the hardcore water cooling enthusiast? It leaves many researching to see which GPU from each manufacturer is and is not compatible with certain water blocks and adding additional cost to an already costly product. One of those OEMs, VisionTek, wanted to lend a hand in this process by taking away all guess work, and even the installation. They are now offering a GPU which comes ready to be incorporated into a custom waco system out of the box. I am happy to introduce the Cry...

When you look at most of the LED case fans out there, they're largely uninspired. Sure the lighting is solid on many of them, and some of them even offer up good cooling performance to match their look, but the lighting effect is ultimately the same: just a blob of light that looks like it could come from any manufacturer. While that may work for some system builders, Enermax has a solution for those of you looking for something a bit different than the rest. Enter the T.B. Vegas and T.B. Apollish fan lineup: coming in 120mm and 200mm sizes respectively, these fans feature not only some of the most unique case lighting you will ever see, but offer a degree of performance that you will be hard pressed to find in any other standalone LED fan. Let's see if these factors add up to be greater than the sum of their parts, shall we?

G.SKILL Releases Industry’s First  DDR3L SO-DIMM 2133MHz 32GB (4x8GB) 1.35V Memory Kit With validation screen on MSI GT70 2OC gaming laptop     Taipei, Taiwan – 15 April 2014 – G.SKILL International Co. Ltd., the leading high performance memory designer and manufacturer, is proud to announce the release of an even higher performance, higher capacity DDR3L SO-DIMM memory kit at 2133MHz! This time with a massive 32GB (4x8GB) capacity!   Operating at a low voltage of 1.35V and at a timing of 11-11-11-31, this new Ripjaws SO-DIMM memory kit will elevate the performance of your extreme performance gaming laptop to new heights. Desktop performance and capacity on a laptop is now a reality!   The following is a test screenshot completed on the MSI GT70 2OC gaming laptop, exhibiting stability under extreme load.     “As a world leading gaming brand, MSI Notebook’s goal is to become the most trusted name in gaming and e-sport. We stand by our principles of breakthroughs in design, the pursuit of excellence, and technological innovation as we have continued to raise the bar for ourselves and have accomplished a great deal of pioneering work in the industry,” commented Sam Chern, marketing director at MSI. “This time, G.SKILL’s F3-2133C11Q-32GRSL DDR3L memory kit clearly raises the bar for high performance gaming laptops and proves to be unbelievably stable on the MSI GT70 2OC gaming laptop, one of the best performance gaming laptops from MSI.”   About G.SKI...

QNAP Releases System Updates to Fix Heartbleed OpenSSL Vulnerability Taipei, Taiwan, April 18, 2014 – QNAP® Systems Inc. today announced firmware updates for Turbo NAS systems with vulnerability to the OpenSSL Heartbleed bug (CVE-2014-0160). The operating systems vulnerable to Heartbleed are QTS versions 4.0 and 4.1. Versions 3.8 and earlier use a different version of OpenSSL and are not affected by the OpenSSL Heartbleed bug.As described on the Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures website, the OpenSSL 1.0.1 TLS and DTLS implementation, before 1.0.1g, does not properly process Heartbeat Extension packets which allow remote attackers to obtain sensitive information by reading private keys (aka the Heartbleed bug). “We strongly urge users of vulnerable Turbo NAS systems to update their firmware,” said Jason Hsu, Product Manager of QNAP. “Users are also recommended to contact their SSL providers to regenerate their SSL CSR/keys for server protection.” To obtain the system updates (QTS 4.0.7 and QTS 4.1.0 RC2) with recompiled OpenSSL, please download from http://www.qnap.com/i/en/product_x_down/ or have your Turbo NAS perform a live update via the QTS control panel. For more information, please contact us at http://helpdesk.qnap.com/   About QNAP QNAP Systems, Inc., as its brand promise “Quality Network Appliance Provider”, aims to deliver comprehensive offerings of cutting edge network attached storage (NAS) and network video recorder (NVR) ...

Lately it seems I have been covering the smaller side of things in reviews. If you read any of them, you will know that I am not a big fan of the diminutive size of Micro and Mini anything when it comes to computing. The bigger the better has been my motto. Huge cases that could fit every feature you might ever want, plus the remains of Jimmy Hoffa, have been my focus for the last few years. Despite this, not too long ago I had the chance to experiment with some of the newer small offerings from Bitfenix and MSI in the form of the Prodigy M and the Z87I Micro ATX Gaming board. I freely admit that I had a change of heart. To my surprise the performance differences between full size and snack size has been erased during this recent resurgence of the minuscule. Bitfenix is now giving me the chance to go even smaller with a Mini-ITX based Colossus M in an effort to fully rehabilitate my aversion to pint size PCs! If it is anything like the Prodigy M, they might just succeed. Let's dig in and find out!