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Asus Z77 Roundup
When doing all of our Ivy Bridge launch prep we spent a LOT of time benchmarking and testing a whole collection of boards. You guys have seen our reviews of the Intel and Gigabyte boards. When it came time to write about the four different Asus Z77 boards I realized that most of you are not going to want to read through a lot of information that we would cover over and over on each review. We decided to roundup all four of the boards and cover them together. This way we can get to the point a little quicker, saving you time, as well as giving us a chance to talk more about the differences between the variety of boards that we tested.
ASUS P8 Z68-V/GEN3
Perhaps one of the most daunting tasks after making the decision that you do not wish to purchase an off-the-shelf computer is attempting to figure out which components go in the machine. There are fun aspects, like the graphics card and processor, and then there are the not-so-fun aspects, like the motherboard (at least in my opinion). Why do I think it is a whole lot of not fun? There are so many out there to choose from, with all sorts of features. When shopping you will likely come across the ASUS board that I am going to review today. Arguably, it is one of the better all-around boards out there, with features like good integrated graphics and killer sound. But to a gamer that generally does not mean squat. Does the ASUS P8 Z68-V/GEN3 board have what it takes to function as a serious gaming component? Read on to find out!
XFX R7750 Black Edition DD
Not everyone is looking to spend $500 on their video card, in some cases that is the total budget for a build. When you are up against a wall trying to pack the best performance you can get into a budget build you still want to get the most performance you can out of your video card. That’s where cards like the XFX R7750 Black Edition Double Dissipation come into play. XFX has taken the styling and cooling from their high end cards and combined it with the price of budget cards like the HD 7750. Today we are going to take a look at how those two things do combined in XFX’s R7750 Black Edition Double Dissipation.
Sapphire HD 7770 Vapor-X
Earlier this year when AMD introduced the HD 7770 we took a look at cards from both Sapphire and XFX. Although we were impressed with the cards performance it was a little ill-timed due to AMD still clearing out discounted back stock. Three months later we are able to revisit the situation with today’s release of Sapphires new HD 7770 Vapor-X. With Sapphires Vapor chamber cooling technology along with a nice overclock over the reference design, the Sapphire HD 7770 Vapor-X could be a great option for a gamer on a limited budget. Let’s take a look.
Motherboard Sizing
When we got in a few oddly sized dual CPU motherboards from EVGA and Asus I posted up a few pictures on our forums and on Facebook. The problem was that even though they looked large there wasn’t any prospective. So we tossed in a couple other boards to give everyone a little perspective. This lead us to digging out even more motherboards to put together all of the standard motherboard sizes all together for everyone to be able to see the differences. Along with the picture we also have a breakdown on the dimensions of each size standard; I hope this helps everyone as some point. Sometimes it can be hard to understand all of the different motherboard sizes and how they all relate.
Android to the Maxx, DROID Razr Maxx
The list of different Android based phones available at any time is both overwhelming and frustrating. It’s almost impossible to get good feedback from friends who have the same phone because of this. So it’s rare than you have any one phone that manages to stand out. Doing something different is the only way to do this normally, but most times this ends off coming off as gimmicky or just lame. When Motorola introduced the Droid Razr Maxx it caught my attention right away. This was just before our trip out to San Francisco for the GTX 680 Editors day, what a better way to put the Maxx’s proposed batter life to the test!
Lian Li PC 100 “The Hammer”
We have had a few different Lian Li chassis come through the LanOC Offices and there hasn’t been a time that we haven’t been impressed with the new and interesting features Lian Li always seems to slip in. When they wanted to ship over their new case “The Hammer” PC 100, we signed up right away. We had seen the case previewed from a few shows prior and this time around Lian Li took a new perspective with its design, I was very interested to see how their changes worked out. Let’s jump in and see what it’s all about!
Nvidia GTX 670
When Nvidia launched Kepler with the GTX 680 I was impressed with the launch price of the card but even at such a great value it is still out of reach for some people. Just because you can’t afford the top card doesn’t mean you don’t want to experience Kepler’s performance. Of course it was only a matter of time before we saw Nvidia filling in the gaps in their product line, starting first with the GTX 690 then going to the next step down from the GTX 680, the GTX 670. Today we get to have a look to see how the performance compares to both the GTX 680 as well as AMD’s offerings. We are also very curious how it compares to the GTX 580, a card that has found its way into most of our office PC’s.
ioSafe Rugged Portable
So you do the smart thing, you backup your data from your laptop and your home PC to an external or network drive and go on with life feeling confident that you have gone well and above what most people do. For the most part, you did. What about when you’re traveling, have you seen how much abuse a device can take when on the go? For some people, and I know I’m one of them, some of the data you carry with you while traveling is more important than the laptop or device that you actually carry it on. In that situation you need a way to not have to worry about your data, no matter the situation, and to have a guarantee to back it up as well. The folks over at ioSafe focus specifically on this crowd. Not only do they offer products that are according to them build to handle almost anything, but they back it up with data recovery if something does happen. Today we are going to take a look at that Rugged Portable hard drive to see what all of the fuss is about, without any more buildup, let’s dig in.
Cooler Master Storm Trigger
Just two years ago the only mechanical keyboards you would find were from companies like DAS keyboard trying to create a nitch market. Over the past two years things have really exploded with every manufacture you can think of introducing their own mechanical keyboards. Cooler Master has been especially aggressive with multiple unique designs like their Quickfire series. What they did lack was a full featured mechanical keyboard with full backlighting, until now. Today they officially introduce their Storm Trigger, although it you look around the board was available Globally before now. With full backlighting it falls into a small category of Mechanical Keyboards with very little competition. I am excited to see how it performs.
Cooler Master HAF XM
The topic of cleaning your computer out came up last week on our forums and it got me thinking about how often I really need to clean out my computer. As it turns out it’s not very often anymore. All because of improvements in case design like fan filters. You don’t really see them on low end cases yet but they have been slowly trickling down. At CES this year we had a chance to get our hands on one of Cooler Master’s upcoming chassis, the HAF XM. A mid-range case packed with the features we have come to love from their high end HAF line. Today we are going to dig into the final product and see how it came out.
Gigabyte Z77X-UD3H
Z77 boards come in all shapes, sizes, colors, and prices. Just about every manufacture has a whole lineup of boards covering the whole range to make sure you can find what you are looking for. Gigabyte is no different; they have a whole selection of boards that will fit your needs. Today we are taking a look at their Z77X-UD3H, one of their budget boards. It may not be a high end board but it is still packed with features. I am curious how it will perform now that the cat is out of the bag with Ivy Bridge. Let’s jump in and see what it’s all about.
Another edition of your favorite gaming news roundup is here. Wednesday is upon us and Apple just had their big iPhone announcement, RAGE is out today, we have new Portal 2 DLC, Midweek Madness sale is Portal 2 and big ol’ stack of news at the end. Decrypt your files cause it’s go time!
RAGE:
RAGE is out today on PC and from what I have been reading people are not taking to kindly to it. I played for about two hours last night and was having fun with it. As I posted on Google+ earlier. Don’t go off the deep end when a game first comes out. Finish the game and then speak your mind. Hasn’t anybody ever learned to hold judgement till the end? Reading around the net you can find all kinds of idiots out there. People calling the game shit, asking for Carmack’s head, it’s all just nonsense really. It’s a freaking game people, not your life. Hell, Duke Nukem Forever got slammed in the ratings and I felt that it was a pretty fun game. Also, if you read around and get your mind set on the game then yes, you are going to look at every little detail and come out frustrated. The best ways to play games is go in with an open mindset and take it for what it's worth. After reading some of the comments left by trolls around the intertubes, they have pretty much said that the reviews are misleading or in fact trying to cash in on making the game look better than it is. I in fact take reviews with a grain of salt. Does the game run? Will it crash every five seconds? That is the type of stuff that I am looking for. Id has said that they are looking into the pop in that people are experiecing but I can tell you that it isn't bad at all on Nvidia cards. I can't tell you about AMD cards as I don't own one.
RAGE will always be compared to Borderlands no matter what anyone says. It looks a lot like it but better in many ways. There is way more detail as you progress through the story and towns that you are sent to. The vehicle sections are much better than in Borderlands. The cars drive much better and you can really blast through towns without running into stuff. The game isn’t perfect by any means but it is far from the worst that I have played. The game ran fine for me while I was playing it on the LanBox. Sure, it has a Nvidia 580 but it’s not like you couldn’t use a lower end card to play and have a great experience.
I need to finish the game before I let people know how good it is and how well it ran on my machine but so far I haven’t had anywhere near as many problems as people are elating to.
As of this writing I have played 4 hours into the game and I am having a load of fun. I try and stay out of the troll infested RAGE bashing threads that are prevalent around the net and just keep playing. Sure, there is stuff to work on but the game runs fine for me and hasn't crashed my machine. Is all the other stuff worth getting all pissed off about and calling PC gaming dead? No.
Here are some screenshots of the game early on.
Many of you may not know Cory, but I can tell you he is one of the biggest Portal 2 fans that I have ever seen. Well Cory, this is your week my friend. I know that you are going to be playing Portal 2 again and there is a good reason for that. Valve has just released the Portal 2 DLC Peer Review for free on Steam. While this add’s more co-op levels to the game it also expands both the single and multiplayer challenge modes. They have also introduced leaderboards so you can compare what and where you need to improve you gameplay while battling your friends for that all important self indulgence.
Midweek Madness:
If you haven’t picked up Portal 2 now would be a great time to do so. With a savings of 50% for grand total price of $14.99 you can jump in now, save some cash and get the DLC that I mentioned above for free. It’s a great game with a great story and as all Valve games are it will run on just about any PC out there. If you need any more encouragement it has a Metacritic rating of 95.
Left Field:
Anyone else dissapointed in the Apple iPhone announcement? Man, what a let down the iPhone 4S is. I will say this up front. I do own stock in a couple of companies, mostly one’s that I like and support. Google would be one, Apple would be another along with IMAX and Ford. No, I don’t own any stock in gaming companies, that would just be wrong, plus they don’t pay that well anyways. Regardless I am an Android user and I like to see competition and with the iPhone 4S I saw Apple copying as many things as they needed to compete with Android. I will say that more competition is better for consumers and that is what we want. Better phones with more features for less money.
I just picked up a Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9 for some extra fun around the house and I must say that I like this way more than the XOOM that I bought awhile back and returned. These are not laptop replacements, so get that out of your head right away. This is something else that you can play around with when you are out and about. I went with the smaller screen because the 10.1 just seemed to big to lug around and the 8.9 does weigh less. I will elaborate on this more in a future Gaming News but as of right now I am really enjoying it.
Have you seen how many Free To Play games are on Steam now? Gesh, there must be 10 or more. Nothing like playing an MMO and not having to pay a monthly fee!
Star Wars Old Republic is dropping on December 20th. That seems a tad bit close to Christmas but with a $15 a month fee to play the game after the 30 days free that comes with the game I can’t see this taking off. There are so many MMO’s that have gone free to play that EA must think that they have a winner on their hands to charge people a monthly fee. I know that with the game requiring Origin to play it is a no sale for me.
Reading around the net I have found out something interesting. The server files for the Battlefield 3 Beta have leaked and people are hosting 100 Rush maps now. Here comes the bad news. If you accidently end up in one of these maps through the Quick Match and have your account compromised aka rank hacking you can have your Origin account banned. So that new Star Wars game that you just purchased and all of you Origin games will be unavailable! And to think that people ask why I am not a fan of Origin. It’s not a bad service but there is absolutely no reason for Battlefield 3 to have it. You do everything through Battlelog and that runs in your browser. So to run Battlefield you need to have the game open, Origin and your default browser open.
How about some League of Legends news. The new mode with the new map Old Dominion has been released. This is more news than anything else. I am not a huge LoL player but I know a couple LanOC’ers play it all the time and enjoy it. I love these types of games because they are free. It’s kinda like crack, give people something for free, get them hooked and they will pay for more, that is a good thing by the way, lol. Starkiller has even been live streaming some of his matches. If you would like to watch him play here is the link.
Thats it for this week everyone. Gaming time is going to become longer and longer in the next few months as it gets colder in Indy and the sun starts setting earlier. Have a great rest of the week and make sure to check out our Daily Deals/Weekend Deals thread that we have going on. It has a over 11,000 views and we are updating it everyday.
Until next week,
Wingless is out!
Apple 4S, didn't realize it was an incremental update when Android has completely updated in the past year. Windows Phone all the way for me anyway.
Origin doesn't put customers first, and that's why it will fail.
If you aren't keen on the traditional don't-die aspect in MOBA games, Dominion is worth trying. Faster-paced, no lane issues, missions and goals, and a shorter time to win.
Origin doesn't put customers first, and that's why it will fail.
If you aren't keen on the traditional don't-die aspect in MOBA games, Dominion is worth trying. Faster-paced, no lane issues, missions and goals, and a shorter time to win.
At this time Star Wars does not require Origin to play in the beta. Not sure if they will change that down the line or not. Star Wars has its own log in and you just use your EA account name. I have been playing the beta with out origin even installed.
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