I found this out over a year ago when I stumbled across a website explaining the function of a small, innocent looking black box. No, this device wasn't designed to compromise a remote host, to break a bank combination, or to get free cable. This black box is simply designed to make your life a little bit easier and fun when it comes to using your computer. What am I talking about? I'm referring to the IRman, an incredibly affordable device that allows you to totally control your computer by infrared remote control.

The guys over @ NeoWin.net have their first review online. They reviewed the Hercules Game Theater XP soundcard and here's a blurb:
The Hercules Game Theater XP is a real sound station including both a PCI sound card and a powerful external rack, the Game Theater XP is the most powerful, innovative and easy-to-use solution ever offered to gamers Multiple USB and game port accessible on the front panel, lets players plug in several game peripherals simultaneously for multi player gaming Connect joysticks, wheels or gamepads. We took a look at this Hardcore Gamers dream. Read the complete review
Well done guys!

Dean B. Nottis Jr. over @ 3DXtreme.org let me know that he has a review about the ATI All-In-Wonder 8500DV online.
Here's a blurb:
"If you want a card that has top notch graphics and great gaming coupled with a TV tuner and further expandability you can't beat it. With the ATI All-In-Wonder 8500DV ATI has delivered as promised." Head over and read the review by using the above link.

Abbas Jaffarali from Tbreak used our Newssubmit to let me know that they have finished a review of an Asus V8460 GeForce4 Ti4600 sales sample card. Here is the reviews intro to tease you: One card to rule them all. Like the ring- this card is evil. Once its in your hands, it's almost impossible to let go of it. It turns your friends into foes with greed- there is just way too much power in this card to resist. Ok, Skipping right through the drama, indeed, we do have the most powerful graphics card available for your home PC in our hands. It's the top-of-the-line GeForce4 Ti4600 provided to us by ASUS who like to call it V8460 and they sent us a sales sample version of the card which we're giving away to one lucky person. Yes, you read it right- someone is going to win this card, but more on that at the end of the review.

3dspotlight.com: Dimension Technologies has been working for years in flat panel displays that can simulate 3D environments without the need of using glasses, head trackers or helmets. Even though its applications can go from Medical to Business use, DTI 3D LCDs are also aimed to hardcore gamers looking for a complete new experience... so, here we bring you our complete review of this $1700 piece of art, so how did it perform?

ReactorCritical.com present their new article: The Battle of Titans 2, where they have tested Geometry pipeline, Transformation and lighting speed, Vertex shading speed and have done several game benchmarks on both RADEON 8500 and GeForce3.

All stakes are done, now, it is time to choose your card.

As it becomes clear that the GeForce 4 MX series is a controversial piece of hardware regarding the performance - capabilities context one should consider buying something else than Nvidia in the lower price segments. Anyway here is a snip of it which makes my statement clear: While testing this board, I was rather concerned when I discovered that it had no hardware support for DirectX 8. While this isn?t a huge issue right now, there are some games getting ready to hit the streets that will require this feature to get the best performance in the game (can you say Doom III?). It also doesn?t support per-pixel shading either, so again, some of the newer games getting ready to come to market won?t play at their best on this board. Read the review @ TweakTown

We looked at the midi server case CS-601 'blue' of Frozen Silicon. Frozen Silicon is a german PC peripherals manufacturer and this is one of their most sold PC cases. Compared to products from Lian Li or Coolermaster this case has a much lower price tag to carry so it might be an interesting shot for those who don't want to spent a fortune on such a high-end case. Nonetheless the CS-601 offers various features that it can keep up with Lian Li or Coolermaster products. Check out the Antec SX-10XX / CS-601 case review here For our german readers we have a translation over here. Update: It seems the case is only sold as a CS-601 here in Germany. It is in fact originally manufactured by Antec INC.. Just thought to let you know.

t-break has published a review for the ASUS GeForce4 MX440 card and compared it against the MSI Ti200. Here's a bit from it: Now there are quite a few versions of the Detonators floating around, however, we've used the official 23.11 as well as the 27.20 for the GF3 Ti200 and the 27.00 (WHQL Certified) and 27.20 for the GF4 MX440. The older 23.11 drivers don't recognize the newer GeForce4 cards and the 27.00 drivers don't recognize the older GF3 cards, which is why we've used 27.20 for both the cards along as well.

CNET took two interesting image editing tools to the ring and let them battle it out in terms of features, usability and performance.
Photoshop is the professional standard application used by journalists, photographers, artists and companies selling @ an estimated price after rebates of $559.99.
Photo Impact instead is targeted @ the ambitious home user or hobbyist. This value priced software ($89.95) handles digital photo processing, Web graphic design, and general graphics like pro software. It also offers pretty decent features like post-scanning editing or simply displaying the image size in the title bar of the current pic. I for myself am going with PhotoImpact. Users can check out the full article on image editors @ CNET.

Just got word from Matt@OverclockersClub.com that they have completed a review on the Antec "Blue" harddrive cooler.
Here's byte from their review: The aluminum alloy harddrive cooler from Vantec, a great way to cool those hot 7200RPM drives. The package includes an aluminum alloy heatsink type structure with two 5000RPM fans mounted on it, four screws and a pass-through molex connector for power.

I am a new contributor to AMDZone.com. For my first contribution I have worked up a review of H.Oda's newest version, ver3.0f, of the WCPUID program. Rancho*: Welcome to the scene...

Just got word from 3DSpotlight.com that they have just finished their review of FIC's latest motherboard the AN11:

Motherboards giant, FIC has released their latest AMD motherboard based on the VIA KT266a chipset, which has been seeing a lot of action recently. However, motherboards based on this chipset are not particularly similar, and results can vary considerably between manufacturers offerings.

plugnpray.co.uk have posted a review of CTX's 19" professional series monitor PR960F.The ability to set backgrounds which are designed to highlight certain effects, make the monitor much easier to configure. Purity controls and the current input type are the only setting which cannot be controlled from the operating system.

Anonymous Writes: Competition in the optical drive market keeps getting hotter and each manufacturer must keep pace with the others to survive. In the past, drive speeds roughly took a year or more to increase, however, during the last couple of years, we?ve seen speeds increase much faster. Last year we saw the advent of 16x and 24x write speeds and the 10x re-write speed. With 2002 we expect to see at least 3 new speed grades introduced- if not more. So far we already have 32/12/40 units entering the market and both Plextor & LiteOn have already announced 40x units which could be shipping in less than two months Click on Read More for link to the complete review.

Just got word that Tweakers Australia have just finished their review of MadOnion's 3DMark2001 SE benchmark utility. Here's a byte from their review I though I would give my impressions of 3DMark2001 SE before the larger majority of testers/benchmarkers go ahead with a 40MB download. For those of you on a broadband connection you probably already have it, but for those still stuck on dialup - I suggest you have a read before you make the giant leap!

As usual when you first open 3DMark you are greeted by a cool fading logo. This has not ceased to exist on SE, although the words 'Special Edition' have now been added. I was curious to what the actual difference was in SE, hoping for some new scenes and demos. However, I do know for a fact that these changes have been made in the SE version...

Just got an email from Udo@3DNow Galaxy that he's just finshed his Radeon Drivers Comparision!!

Here's what he's saying

i have tested the performance from the 4.13.9005 to the 4.13.9012 for the ATI Radeon 8500 (Win9x/ME) - (9005/9008/9009/9012). and I have tested them width 16 Games and synthetic Benchmarks, like Undying, Max Payne, AquaNox, Star Trek Elite Force, Serious Sam II Demo, Counter-Strike 1.3 .....so get out your translators coz the site is in Germany or just look @ the pic's.

The last few days it was D(etonator)-Days, 27.23/27.30/27.42 were leaked. So I've tested these drivers against 27.20. (That driver was the best driver for my system)
The drivers were tested with 3DMark2001 under Windows XP. And there is a NEW King ;) Click Read More... if you wanna see the results!

Just got an email from Daniel@PC-Extreme that they have tested the performance of all the new Detonator Drivers from the 21.81 to the current 27.42 on 3DMark 2001 / Aquanox / Q3 / Unreal Tournament.

The review is in German, but the benchmarks speak their own language.

Envynews review the new Swiftech heatsink: Swiftech sent me their latest design marvel, the MCXC370. When I took the heatsink out of its box and looked at it in the light, it was a beautiful sight; form and function meeting in cold metal, and a reputation for getting the job done like no other. Staring at me from under the fan were 188 shiny helicoid aluminum pins set into a thick block of copper with the smoothest base I have ever seen.