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techPowerUp take on the HIS Radeon HD 5450
No comments · Posted by James Thorburn in General
techPowerUp have taken a look at the HIS Radeon HD 5450, younger brother to the Radeon HD 5570 we reviewed recently.
While the 5450 may be lacking in gaming performance in some cases less is more.
“Power consumption is about as low as it can get. Not much to say here, other than that it’s amazing and shows how much AMD’s GPU design team has done to achieve low power. HIS has done their part with the PCB design, too, which seems to be highly efficient as well.”
AMD · ATI · Radeon · Review · techPowerUp
We have updated the device switching tool from our Xonar article, renaming it to Auto Output Device Switcher and adding a configuration tool.
You can find it in our article.
ASUS · Auto Output Device Switcher · Update · Updates · Xonar
The Tech Report have taken a look at four small H55 motherboards, including the Zotac H55 ITX.
Some interesting information in it, particularly in terms of power consumption.
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Asus Xonar DX and the Dolby Digital dilemma…. Our solution
No comments · Posted by James Thorburn in General
When we took a look at the Sapphire Radeon HD 5570 recently we also mulled over the usage of the Home Theatre as a gaming platform in general. One area which we didn’t touch upon in that piece which has proved a weakness for some – audio.
For most gamers this isn’t a big issue, surround sound devices are connected by multiple stereo audio jacks or in the case of some headphones, USB. But with a Home Theatre set up there’s a good chance you’ll want to connect your system to a separate receiver over TOSLINK or Coaxial S/PDIF – this is where problems can arise.
So today we’ve taken a look at the ASUS Xonar DX, how it deals with surround sound gaming over S/PDIF connections, the problems its approach cause, and our very own makeshift solution. Read on to find out more…..
ASUS · Dolby Digital · Dolby Digital Live · DTS · Gaming · MCE · Xonar DX
Aria have a couple interesting offers today.
First up is the Compro VideoMate S350 PCI Digital Satellite TV Tuner, a DVB-S Freesat tuner, for £23.49. Perfect for the Windows 7 Media Center user with a satellite dish but no Sky subscription.
Next is the XFX ATI Radeon HD 4550, the predecessor to the Radeon HD 5570 we looked at recently. Again this is just £23.49.
Kylo, a 10ft UI web browser launched a couple days ago, so we’ve taken a look at it and produced a quick video walk-through.
You can find it here, we hope you enjoy it.
Browser · Guide · Hillcrest Labs · Home Theatre PC · HTPC · Kylo · Software · Twitter · Video · YouTube · YouTube XL
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Sapphire Radeon HD 5570 – Turning the HTPC into a viable gaming device?
No comments · Posted by James Thorburn in Hardware
Apologies for the lack of updates over the last week, work and life took priority for a few days.
We have however used the time to get another article ready, a review of the Sapphire Radeon HD 5570 and a look into whether it can turn the HTPC into a competitive gaming system.
Please check it out and we’d love to hear your thoughts.
5570 · Articles · ATI · Gaming · HD 5570 · Home Theatre PC · HTPC · Radeon · Review
MSI have released a new microATX board based on the 890GX chipset, the 890GXM-G65.
The 890GXM-G65 supports processors based around AMD’s AM3 socket, with the Radeon HD 4290 graphics core and support for both USB 3.0 and SATA 6Gbps. It’s not cheap mind, with sites currently listing it around £130, twice the price of the H55 based ASRock H55M we reviewed yesterday.
890GX · 890GXM0-G65 · AM3 · AMD · mATX · microATX · Motherboard · MSI
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ASRock’s H55M reviewed here at MCE-Pro – H55 on a budget
No comments · Posted by James Thorburn in General
Our latest article is now online, taking a look at the ASRock H55M, a low price microATX motherboard. But what does it offer for the HTPC builder?
Read our review to find out…
ASRock · Core i3 · Core i5 · Core i7 · H55 · H55M · HTPC · mATX · microATX · Motherboard · Review
OCZ have announced a new addition to their ever expanding range of SSD drives, the OCZ Onyx.
Read and write speeds come in at a mediocre 125MB/sec and 70MB/sec respectively, and with just 32GB of space its you aren’t going to be recording hours of high-definition TV to it, but with support for TRIM under Windows 7, SSD’s characteristically rapid seek times, and zero noise this drive has the potential to make a great operating system drive for a HTPC when backed up with some mechanical mass storage.
Prices are expected to be under the $100 mark in the US which should see it competing with OCZ’s own Solid 2 series drives and Intel’s 40GB X25-V.
