SLI on a Budget

MadShrimps has a very interesting take on a budget SLI setup for those of you who just like the idea of doing it. The guys grab a couple Asus N6600GT Extremes and run them through the ringers.

Asus has been around for 20-years, this success is most likely based on their steadfast loyalty to the PC-Enthusiast in all of us. Today we built a "budget" SLI rig running two Asus N6600GT Extremes based on the NV43 GPU which fully supports their 256MB GDDR3 memory compliment. Mated with an Asus P5ND2-SLI the system can handle any 3D-title and definitely put the fun back in performance.

Weekend Mods & Ends

Cooling

Jetart Storm 2 VC1000 @ XSReviews – Scythe Shogun CPU Cooling Review @ Technic3D* – Thermaltake Mini Typhoon @ techPowerUp

ETC.

Crucial Gizmo Overdrive @ Byte Sized Reviews – NorthQ 4001EXT and 4775-400 @ DriverHeaven – TG3 Deck Legend Keyboard @ Maximum CPU – Vizo Luxon External Drive Enclosure @ DreamWare Computers

Cases & Modding

CableMart csmf425 @ Monster-Hardware

Free Stuff

HSPC Tech Station Giveaway @ Virtual-Hideout – Razer Diamondback and Copperhead Giveaway @ Modders-Inc

*Requires translation.

PowerColor X1800 GTO

If you are looking are for a video card and are on the fence, why not take a look at Technic3D’s rundown of the PowerColor X1800 GTO. This one is in German, so run it through a translator and get to reading.

As god the Midrange Gamer Graphic Card X1800 GTO from PowerColor really. Technic3D will see that with Overclocking (non Flash).

Corsair 2GB XMS-4400PRO DDR

ARP has their impressions of this 2GB memory kit up for your morning reading. You guys should know by now I simply do not use any other ram but Corsair, so check out the review and find out why.

This 2GB XMS-4400PRO TwinX memory kit is Corsair's fastest dual-channel DDR memory kit. Although its SPD is programmed for DDR400 operation at 3-3-3-8, it is certified to run at 550MHz DDR at 3-4-4-8.

Scientists make water run uphill

This one is a bit more science than tech, however imagine the implications of a system that would be able to make water run uphill using nothing more than its own steam. I wonder how long before someone is using the system to cool their rig?

"We were interested in whether it would be possible to use this phenomenon to move liquids around," said Dr Heiner Linke, the intellectual power behind the self-propelled droplets.

Blame [H] addict, Tom.

Pentium XE 965 and 955 Processors

HardwareZone has a very in depth look at the new processor solutions from Intel. This is a great article with a good bit of information, so if you were curious, look no further.

Succeeding their lackluster predecessors, the new Pentium XE processors based on the Presler core sport some serious specs. With clock speeds of up to 3.73GHz, loaded with 4MB of L2 cache and taking advantage of a 1066MHz FSB, they seem to instill fear into AMD's A64 FX series; but are they that extreme?

DHzer0point 0.64

The folks over at DriverHeaven have the latest Zero Point drivers up for download. Versions are available in both red and green.

Increased amount of screen resolutions Powerplay support returned, after exiting a 3d application your card will revert to a lower power state. All mobility cards supported through the x1k series cards, if you have trouble installing on your notebook let us know.Increased pixel shader and vertex shader efficiency, with increased clipping optimizations. General performance enhancements. DHzer0point Color optimizations. Support for and increased performance noted with Crossfire configurations. We have removed the CP from this release due to the lack of configuration options. We are working on an alternative CP option other than CCC.

Geek Horoscopes

The boys over at BBSpot have once again taken the realm of astrology and spiced it up to the obscene level of geekdom for your viewing pleasure.

Taurus - Apr 20 - May 20 - Running your webserver on Windows ME does not make you a daredevil. It makes you an idiot.

NGO NVIDIA Optimized Driver v1.8456

Those of you who enjoy squeezing every single frame you can out your GeForce can rejoice, the latest NGO Optimized Driver has been released. There are new versions in both 32 and 64 bit.

The NGO NVIDIA Optimized Driver is a tweaked version of the NVIDIA ForceWare driver. The main purpose is to satisfy the users with better performance and image quality. The Driver has support for all GeForce cards.

OCZ EL 2GB DDR500 Gold GX XTC

For those of you who are big fans of overclocking and OCZ ram, you might want to take a look at 3DXtreme and and their review of this package before you buy.

OCZ continues to deliver some of the highest quality and best performing memory on the market. Today 3DXtreme is taking a look at the latest 2GB kit of memory from OCZ the DDR500 XTC kit. This kit features timings of 3-3-3-8, so while it’s not quite as tight as the EB kit we reviewed a few months ago, this memory is cheaper and features the new XTC heatspreaders.

I realize that not every single piece of hardware is going to be a good overclocker, but it never hurts to research a little.

Dual Core Pentium D 930

Neoseeker managed to get some overclocking in during their Dual Core Pentium D 930 review today. The results, a 1GHz overclock on air cooling, is impressive no matter how you slice it.

We've had no problem at all running it at 4.125GHz, at stock Vcore, with the stock heatsing/fan. Yes, stock everything yielded an excellent near 1GHz overclock and was stable throughout all of our benchmarks. To me, that's an amazing overclock for a dual core Intel part.

Patriot Memory PDC22G8000+XBLK Rev.2

Wasn’t it like yesterday that we were all using PC100? PC133 was a big deal and no one had even done the daring PC150? Now we are at DDR2-1000 with this Patriot Memory PDC22G8000+XBLK Rev.2. PCStats says that this memory from Patriot is “truly remarkable”, read the full review to see why.

The Patriot PDC22G8000+XBLK Rev.2 memory is a "jack of all trades" DDR-2 module. This pair of dual channel DDR-2 RAM is capable of running with timings as tight as 3-3-3 under DDR2-667 (PC2-5300) speeds, and with timings as tight as 4-4-4 under DDR2-1000 (PC2-8000) speeds... Yes you've read that right, the PDC22G8000+XBLK memory isn't married to those all too familiar 5-5-5 CAS Latency settings.