[H]ardNews 2nd Edition

HTPC:

SystemCooling tells you how they went about building their own Home Theater PC. I think this will be my next in-home project as well.

Home Theater PC’s have been slowly but surly gaining in popularity. As digital media is reaching the main stream more and more, the combination of computer and home entertainment is inevitable.

WaterCooling:

Ohls takes a look at watercooling kits done right. They review the Asetek Waterchill kit and find that watercooling is not rocket science nor does it require anything special to accomplish now days. Our review of the Waterchill is here for comparison.

For anyone that is interested in water cooling and wants to get started right away and do it the right way from the start, I don't know how you could go wrong with this kit. Everything you need is included to get you up and running and if a novice like myself can do it, then you can to.

9100 IGP:

TBreak takes a look at the Shuttle box that packs in the power of the ATI 9100 northbridge.

It's performance is quite comparable to Intel's 865 and 875 chipset solutions when using an AGP cards. However, when it comes to the performance of the IGP, the ST61G4 leaves the the competition in the dust. The way we look at it, if you're a demanding user that likes to overclock and will surely use an AGP card, then the Intel solutions would probably be a better buy as they overclock higher and perform a little better, however, if you're looking for more an integrated solution for your second PC or your living room, then the ST61G4 will work out much better.

9600SE:

HardAve takes a hard look at the 9600SE with VIVO.

If you need a cheap quiet videocard to play Quake3, CS and Age of Empires at a few LANs, then the HIS 9600SE may be for you. If you need a cheap and quiet solution for your HTPC and won't be playing any serious games, rather you would prefer to utilize the VIVO feature, then the HIS 9600SE will do the job nicely.