Our Most Recent Reviews
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.
Plainview, NY--March 17, 2010 -- This IT services company has expanded its core business and upgraded its online presence to pump up revenues, according to Bruce Malyon and his team.
About 15 years ago, Alan Cook called a meeting at his home to talk to some colleagues about starting a new managed IT services company called Computer Network Solutions, or CNS, for the New York area. Instead of the two or three friends he expected, 70 interested people showed up. Bruce Malyon, current chief operations officer of CNS and long-time friend of Cook, attributed the turnout to Cook's vision.
"Cook had a very specific plan for CNS, but he also has never limited what it could become, which established a strong foundation for us from the beginning," said Malyon.
CNS primarily provides IT management services, which Malyon said include everything from networking to general technical maintenance, for New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, and Pennsylvania. In the beginning, CNS developed strong relationships with key partners, like SUN Microsystems, for which the company maintained and repaired server mainframes and hardware. CNS still does between $2 million and $3 million of business with SUN annually, and Malyon said the company would not be where it is today without that relationship.
And for the last five years, CNS has been one of the few firms of its size to be a Cisco Gold Partner, maintaining at least 12 staff members trained on various Cisco applications and four CCIEs.
For the past three years, the company had started to move toward a more product-focused business model to take advantage of high demand in a growing economy. But when the market fell, CNS found itself losing product sales and its recurring revenue.
"From the beginning, CNS's business model was based on the much more reliable recurring revenue model through the sale of our services for longterm contracts," Malyon explained. "If we hadn't reacted quickly to the market decline and adjusted our focus back to our core managed services, we would have been in a very vulnerable position."
Strengthening the base, building a brand
So since early 2008, CNS has been emphasizing the sale of complete IT solutions that include maintenance, professional services, and product solution sales. This refocusing demanded that the company expand instead of retract in this recession, but Malyon said there has been no better time to strengthen the company and gain marketshare.
CNS added more than 20 new positions in the last year. Most of them were field engineers but three were marketing professionals, the first the company had ever hired. That small staff orchestrated the launch of a new Web site, the development of new brochures and sales pitches, and an e-newsletter campaign. Malyon said just putting those pieces in place have helped the company gain access to bigger opportunities: In 2009, its average deal size jumped from around $40,000 to between $78,000 and $90,000 and it closed on three major accounts all worth $900,000 or more.
The flexibility of so many offerings has been crucial recently, with businesses of all types cutting back their IT budgets. Malyon added that the beauty of this model is that CNS can save the client money, no matter what the economy is doing. "Either we replace a client's existing IT support system with our experienced, professional, 24-hour support staff, or we free up that system to work on more strategic projects while our team takes care of malfunctioning equipment or networks," he explained.
Records management: the natural next step
But all of that work was just the beginning. In the meantime, CNS was also building up its development staff, picking up talented people who had lost their jobs in the recession and putting them to work on a new service offering for the company: a document management software platform called MaxxVault. After 15 months of work, the system launched last November, and Malyon said sales in December hit $450,000.
MaxxVault is designed for scanning in paper documents, managing traveling electronic documents through a workflow, and maintaining electronic records. It can integrate with the Microsoft document management platform Sharepoint, and it can also be used as an e-mail archiving system. Malyon, who has experience working in software development, said this venture meshes seamlessly with CNS business strategy.
"We already manage our clients' networks and equipment, now we can help them manage their data," he explained. "This fits into our recurring revenue model as clients pay for upgrades and maintenance over the life of the product, but has the added benefit of an upfront sales margin."
MaxxVault will be key to Cook's long-term vision for CNS: moving to the national stage. Already, the company has secured 10 resellers across the country for the platform, and Malyon expects to reach 50 by the end of 2010. And that is in addition to the three resellers of CNS network monitoring service also in place; he said he aims to reach 25 over the next 12 months.
He explained that the company's strategic vision has three parts. In the first part, CNS will receive as much as 90% of its revenue from recurring sources through a combination of resellers and sister companies nationwide. In the second part, which Malyon said will fall between 2012 and 2015, the company will grow from MaxxVault to producing other software solutions available nationwide. He said unlike most entrepreneurial ventures approaching 15 years in business that are looking an impending exit strategy, CNS benefits from a forward-thinking founder and an eager management staff ready to execute a third phase of development for the company.
"Beyond five years out, I hope that we'll have built a highly profitable business with a strong recurring revenue base and a national reputation for excellent service offerings," he concluded.
About 15 years ago, Alan Cook called a meeting at his home to talk to some colleagues about starting a new managed IT services company called Computer Network Solutions, or CNS, for the New York area. Instead of the two or three friends he expected, 70 interested people showed up. Bruce Malyon, current chief operations officer of CNS and long-time friend of Cook, attributed the turnout to Cook's vision.
"Cook had a very specific plan for CNS, but he also has never limited what it could become, which established a strong foundation for us from the beginning," said Malyon.
CNS primarily provides IT management services, which Malyon said include everything from networking to general technical maintenance, for New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, and Pennsylvania. In the beginning, CNS developed strong relationships with key partners, like SUN Microsystems, for which the company maintained and repaired server mainframes and hardware. CNS still does between $2 million and $3 million of business with SUN annually, and Malyon said the company would not be where it is today without that relationship.
And for the last five years, CNS has been one of the few firms of its size to be a Cisco Gold Partner, maintaining at least 12 staff members trained on various Cisco applications and four CCIEs.
For the past three years, the company had started to move toward a more product-focused business model to take advantage of high demand in a growing economy. But when the market fell, CNS found itself losing product sales and its recurring revenue.
"From the beginning, CNS's business model was based on the much more reliable recurring revenue model through the sale of our services for longterm contracts," Malyon explained. "If we hadn't reacted quickly to the market decline and adjusted our focus back to our core managed services, we would have been in a very vulnerable position."
Strengthening the base, building a brand
So since early 2008, CNS has been emphasizing the sale of complete IT solutions that include maintenance, professional services, and product solution sales. This refocusing demanded that the company expand instead of retract in this recession, but Malyon said there has been no better time to strengthen the company and gain marketshare.
CNS added more than 20 new positions in the last year. Most of them were field engineers but three were marketing professionals, the first the company had ever hired. That small staff orchestrated the launch of a new Web site, the development of new brochures and sales pitches, and an e-newsletter campaign. Malyon said just putting those pieces in place have helped the company gain access to bigger opportunities: In 2009, its average deal size jumped from around $40,000 to between $78,000 and $90,000 and it closed on three major accounts all worth $900,000 or more.
The flexibility of so many offerings has been crucial recently, with businesses of all types cutting back their IT budgets. Malyon added that the beauty of this model is that CNS can save the client money, no matter what the economy is doing. "Either we replace a client's existing IT support system with our experienced, professional, 24-hour support staff, or we free up that system to work on more strategic projects while our team takes care of malfunctioning equipment or networks," he explained.
Records management: the natural next step
But all of that work was just the beginning. In the meantime, CNS was also building up its development staff, picking up talented people who had lost their jobs in the recession and putting them to work on a new service offering for the company: a document management software platform called MaxxVault. After 15 months of work, the system launched last November, and Malyon said sales in December hit $450,000.
MaxxVault is designed for scanning in paper documents, managing traveling electronic documents through a workflow, and maintaining electronic records. It can integrate with the Microsoft document management platform Sharepoint, and it can also be used as an e-mail archiving system. Malyon, who has experience working in software development, said this venture meshes seamlessly with CNS business strategy.
"We already manage our clients' networks and equipment, now we can help them manage their data," he explained. "This fits into our recurring revenue model as clients pay for upgrades and maintenance over the life of the product, but has the added benefit of an upfront sales margin."
MaxxVault will be key to Cook's long-term vision for CNS: moving to the national stage. Already, the company has secured 10 resellers across the country for the platform, and Malyon expects to reach 50 by the end of 2010. And that is in addition to the three resellers of CNS network monitoring service also in place; he said he aims to reach 25 over the next 12 months.
He explained that the company's strategic vision has three parts. In the first part, CNS will receive as much as 90% of its revenue from recurring sources through a combination of resellers and sister companies nationwide. In the second part, which Malyon said will fall between 2012 and 2015, the company will grow from MaxxVault to producing other software solutions available nationwide. He said unlike most entrepreneurial ventures approaching 15 years in business that are looking an impending exit strategy, CNS benefits from a forward-thinking founder and an eager management staff ready to execute a third phase of development for the company.
"Beyond five years out, I hope that we'll have built a highly profitable business with a strong recurring revenue base and a national reputation for excellent service offerings," he concluded.
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