Review Index Page 29

  • In Win 805 Case Review

    The In Win 805 is a mid-sized tower constructed exclusively using aluminum and 3mm thick tempered glass. The front panel could be described as a work of art. The majority of the panel is covered in tempered glass but what gives it a special look is the honeycomb cutouts behind the glass. At a quick glance the 805 appears to be well equipped as well, offering plenty storage options, decent cooling out of the box, and Type-C USB on the front panel.
    By Steven Walton on
    85
  • Logitech G310 Atlas Dawn Keyboard Review

    The G310 is a slimmed down version of the G910, Logitech's previous Romer-G mechanical keyboard. Gone are the macro keys and media control functions along the side and top of the board. The number pad has also been given the boot in order to create a lightweight and compact keyboard that's better suited for travel to LAN events or to fit into smaller gaming spaces.
    By Steven Walton on
    60
  • AMD Radeon R9 Nano Review

    Based on the fully fledged Fiji XT, the Nano gets the same 4096 stream processors as the Fury X, just in a much more compact package. The Nano measures only 6in long, which is made possible by the Fiji GPU's modest power consumption and HBM technology. AMD hopes to enable 4K gaming in tiny Mini-ITX systems with the Nano.
    By Steven Walton on
    75
  • Motorola Moto G (2015) Review

    After delivering the best budget smartphone in 2013 and 2014, Motorola is going for the hat trick with this year's Moto G. It still costs $180 and it still features great hardware for the price. One of the biggest updates to the Moto G in this year's variant is that it finally comes with 4G LTE connectivity as standard, thanks to the Qualcomm Snapdragon 410's integrated LTE modem. We're also seeing decent upgrades to the front and rear cameras, MotoMaker support, plus a water resistant design.
    By Tim Schiesser on
    85
  • Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain Benchmarked

    Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain is now out for PC and consoles. Powered by the Fox Engine, you can expect to see subsurface scattering, physically-based rendering and other impressive technologies. Using the latest AMD and Nvidia drivers, we tested 26 DirectX 11 graphics cards covering most price ranges.
    By Steven Walton on
  • Samsung Galaxy S6 Active Review

    For the most part, the S6 Active is a clone of the Galaxy S6 featuring the same 5.1-inch 1440p display, Exynos 7420 SoC inside, and 16-megapixel optically stabilized camera. But where they differ is in design. The S6 Active is better suited to survive drops, harsh conditions and liquids. The Active also features a considerably larger battery, which promises to deliver far better battery life than the standard S6.
    By Tim Schiesser on
    90
  • Thermaltake Core X9 Case & DPS G PSU Review

    The Core X9 is a behemoth, boasting a bar-fridge-like 122L capacity -- large enough that Thermaltake says dual systems are on the menu, not to mention the possibilities for liquid cooling and file servers. "Super Towers" or "Ultra Towers" such as the Lian Li D8000, Cooler Master Cosmos II and Corsair Obsidian 900D typically cost upwards of $300, so we're eager to see what Thermaltake's Core X9 delivers for almost 40% less.
    By Steven Walton on
    80
  • Rocket League Review

    The thing about Rocket League that keeps me coming back to it so often, is how it's a multiplayer game, but it's not a multiplayer game. I normally avoid traditionally multiplayer titles; the last thing I want to deal with when playing video games is the grating sound and erratic behaviour of other human beings. But with Rocket League, it just doesn't matter.
    By Kotaku Staff on
  • Hands On with Nvidia's Mobile G-Sync, Origin EON-17X

    If you've ever witnessed variable refresh rate (VRR) technologies like G-Sync and FreeSync, then you likely know VRR one of the most significant gaming improvements in recent times. Now the technology has finally gone mobile.
    By Rick Burgess on
  • Nvidia GeForce GTX 950 Review

    Nvidia turned up the heat on AMD's Radeon range last year when it released its latest Maxwell GPUs, however most of them cost well over $300. Replacing the merely adequate GTX 750 Ti is the new GeForce GTX 950, stepping in as the current generation $150 GPU and promising to deliver highly playable 1080p performance.
    By Steven Walton on
    85
  • Samsung SSD 850 Evo 2TB Review

    It's hard to believe the prices many of us were paying for SSD storage just a few years ago when we can grab a 1TB Crucial MX200 SSDs for just $365 (coming in at $0.36 per gigabyte). Recently, Samsung delivered even higher capacity SSDs with 2TB versions of its famed 850 Pro and 850 Evo series, which we have on hand today. While we already know the drive is reasonably priced for the amount of storage provided, we're keen to see what its performance looks like.
    By Steven Walton on
    85
  • Windows 10 vs. Windows 8.1 vs. Windows 7 Performance

    Windows 10 is put to the test to find out how it fares compared to Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 in various aspects of the operating system including boot up and shutdown times, file copying, encoding, browsing, gaming and some synthetic benchmarks.
    By Steven Walton on
  • GeForce GTX 980 Ti SLI vs. Radeon R9 Fury X Crossfire

    Compared to reference designs by Nvidia and AMD, their partners usually come up with creations that run cooler and quieter. A perfect example of this is Gainward's GTX 980 Ti "Golden Sample", with a 15% factory overclock that provides 11% more performance on average and a "Zero RPM fan design". Not wanting to simply just revisit the GTX 980 Ti's performance, we'll be hooking up two of these in SLI and test them agains a pair of AMD's Radeon R9 Fury X cards in Crossfire.
    By Steven Walton on
  • Intel Core i7-6700K Skylake CPU Review

    Whereas Broadwell was a 'tick' in Intel's "tick-tock" manufacturing and design model, Skylake is a 'tock', which means a redesigned architecture for greater CPU and GPU performance along reduced power consumption. Chief among the changes introduced with Skylake is a new LGA1151 socket, which will require a new motherboard that supports an Intel 100 Series chipset, as well as support for DDR4 memory limited to dual-channel operation.
    By Steven Walton on
    75
  • Flagship vs. Budget: Samsung Galaxy S6 vs. Motorola Moto E

    If you're looking for the best smartphone going around, the Samsung Galaxy S6 should be close to the top of your list. On the other end of the spectrum sits the second-generation Moto E, a great entry-level handset from Motorola that can readily be found for under $100. But what does that price gap get you?
    By Tim Schiesser on
  • Lenovo ThinkPad T450s Laptop Review

    The Thinkpad T450s is Lenovo's latest addition to the legendary Thinkpad T series. This update brings Broadwell and several other refinements, but most notably a much needed trackpad redesign. An ultrabook aimed squarely at professionals, the T450s carefully balances portability, power and features in a semi-rugged 3.5 pound package.
    By Rick Burgess on
    85
  • Windows 10 Review

    Windows 10 is the best Windows you can run today. This alone should make it a big win, not to mention the fact that it's "free." However I don't think Windows 10 is there yet. Can Windows 10 bring seamless updates that one or two years from now will make it the best, most polished desktop OS available, and still be called Windows 10? Microsoft must prove itself under this new direction.
    By Julio Franco on
    85
  • Tiny NAS Battle: Synology DS414slim vs. QNAP TS-453mini

    NAS servers provide a quick, easy and secure means of backing up important data. Compared to a dedicated server, a desktop NAS is considerably more compact, especially two-bay and four-bay models like the QNAP TS-453mini and Synology DS414slim on hand today. The two aren't really direct competitors, so this isn't a straight up Synology vs. QNAP battle, but rather a look at each company's approach to developing compact NAS solutions.
    By Steven Walton on
  • LG G4 Review

    Every year, LG manages to impress me in one way or another with their new flagship Android smartphone. Whereas past models brought a near bezel-free design, great battery life, a crisp 1440p display and a laser-assisted autofocus system, this year LG has mostly focused on improving various aspects of its hardware, like the camera and display. It's an incremental update for sure but the results might prove impressive once again.
    By Tim Schiesser on
    85
  • Intel Core i7-5775C Broadwell Processor Review

    Broadwell is the 14nm die shrink of Haswell, bringing a smaller die and lower power consumption. As is often the case with Intel's 'Tick' updates, a few minor tweaks have also been applied, while remaining on the existing LGA1150 platform. Today we have the flagship model on hand, the Core i7-5775C, and its BGA version, the Core i7-5775R. Both are nearly identical save for the price and a slightly higher Turbo frequency on the BGA model.
    By Steven Walton on
    70
  • The Best Wireless Gaming Headset

    The magnitude of gaming headsets out there is bewildering. If you're in the market for a wireless headset though, the dizzying array of options dwindles to fewer than a dozen choices. I decided to chronicle my hunt for the perfect wireless gaming headset. I hope you find the resulting comparison useful.
    By Rick Burgess on
  • Asrock Beebox N3000 Mini PC Review

    The Beebox measures 0.6L and boasts a mere 4 watt TDP. This incredibly low power rating has allowed Asrock to create a tiny HTPC that is completely fanless draws less than 10 watts under typical usage. The company is heavily promoting the fact that its latest mini PC can support triple-monitors using three video outputs simultaneously, including 4K video thanks to its unique dual-channel memory, a feature other Braswell mini PCs don't support.
    By Steven Walton on
    85
  • Microsoft Surface 3 Review

    The full metal body of the Surface 3 makes it one of the best designed, most attractive Windows tablets on the market. Throw in great features like the three-position kickstand, the hidden microSD card slot, the full-sized USB port, the 3:2 display, and Microsoft has nailed the design of this tablet.
    By Tim Schiesser on
    75
  • Massive Chalice Review

    If you want to understand Massive Chalice, you need to understand XCOM. Double Fine's Massive Chalice has been hugely influenced by Julian Gallop's seminal 1994 strategy game. Like XCOM, Massive Chalice focuses on both up-close tactical gameplay and big-picture strategy. It handles the former exceptionally well, far better than it handles the latter.
    By Luke Plunkett on
  • AMD Radeon R9 Fury X Review

    On the heels of delivering its latest round of rebadges with the Radeon 300 series, AMD has launched what may be its most hyped product of 2015. The R9 Fury X employs the GCN 1.2 architecture as the R9 380 but doubles the SPU count, and touts a massive memory bandwidth of 512GB/s thanks to an exciting new memory technology known as HBM.
    By Steven Walton on
    85
  • Synology DiskStation DS1515 Review

    The DiskStation DS1515 is aimed at home users as well as small businesses. Out of the box this NAS can handle five 3.5" hard drives, giving it a maximum capacity of 40TB using the latest 8TB drives, while the addition of two DX513 expansion units boosts capacity to a whopping 120TB.
    By Steven Walton on
    90
  • Batman: Arkham Knight Benchmarked: Graphics & CPU Performance

    Batman: Arkham Knight, the fourth entry in Warner Brother's Batman: Arkham series, is based on the same Unreal Engine 3 as its predecessor and an Nvidia-sponsored title. Favoring one camp of GPUs is hardly the least contentious way to launch a new game, however it seems this release would have rattled cages regardless. Countless Nvidia and AMD users have expressed anger about Arkham Knight's performance and stuttering issues. Here's what we found in our tests.
    By Steven Walton on
  • Batman: Arkham Knight Review

    Batman: Arkham Knight is the fourth major title in the Warner Bros. series of video games that began with 2009's Arkham Asylum. Tonally, Arkham Knight is very much an Arkham game, but the decision to revolve so much of the game around the new Batmobile is an alienating move that robs Arkham Knight at the outset of the fantasy of becoming the Dark Knight. Once we're past that silliness, however, it unfurls a plot that is by far the strongest of the series.
    By Chris Suellentrop on
  • Best $70 CPU for Gaming: Athlon X4 860K vs. Pentium G3258

    At around $500 our recommended Budget Box is ideal for everyday computing with some lightweight gaming. If you're adding a dedicated GPU, however, it makes sense to swap our APU pick for a cheaper CPU, with the saving going towards graphics. We paired two $70 CPUs with the GTX 960 and R9 285 in 20 of the most popular AAA titles, to find out which one is best for gamers on a budget.
    By Steven Walton on
  • Heroes of the Storm Review

    Blizzard defines Heroes of the Storm as a "hero brawler." But really, it's a MOBA-an idiosyncratic and sparsely populated genre that mixes together bits and pieces of real-time strategy and fighting games in fiercely competitive matches. The game pits two teams of fantastical creatures against each other to see who can destroy the other's base first.
    By Yannick LeJacq on