Your CPU is Rocket Lake or older? Write us for a 400W cooler

Giveaway, News | | Editors

We’d be happy to give someone, whom it will help, an unconventional Zalman liquid cooler. The Reserator 3 Max Dual will definitely have a nice collector’s value someday, but it will have to wait for retirement. It may not support the latest platforms anymore, but it is still well equipped to run in many PCs with relevant performance for today. And it has the cooling performance to handle very high power Core i9-class processors as well. Read more “Your CPU is Rocket Lake or older? Write us for a 400W cooler” »

Beware: counterfeit Samsung SSD 980 Pro are selling in China

News, SSDs | | Jan Olšan

When you shop on auction servers or Chinese internet “marketplaces”, you are at risk of counterfeit hardware. There have been and still keep being sold counterfeit graphics cards (that usually contain old and worthless GPUs), but also processors. And now, apparently, we are getting counterfeit NVMe SSDs. They also appeared in China and are while they are quite sophisticated, you won’t get the desired features and performance. Read more “Beware: counterfeit Samsung SSD 980 Pro are selling in China” »

When E cores are disabled: Core i5-13400F vs. Core i5-12400(F)

Extra tests, Processors | | Ľubomír Samák

With the little (E) cores turned off, the Core i5-13400(F) becomes a 6-core processor with 12 threads in the same way that the older Core i5-12400(F) is. This intergenerational comparison is also a side product of tests main goal of which is to show the impact of E cores not only on computational and gaming performance, but also on operational characteristics. The biggest differences occur in the situations that mainstream PCs run into most often. Read more “When E cores are disabled: Core i5-13400F vs. Core i5-12400(F)” »

RTX 4080 Noctua Edition is out. Great cooler, what about the coils?

Graphics, News | | Ľubomír Samák

You already know the non-reference graphics cards with Noctua coolers from the Nvidia Ampere generation (GeForce RTX 3000), but now comes the first design with an Ada Lovelace GPU, on the RTX 4080. The main improvement of the cooler lies in the use of the Vapor Chamber and the cooling efficiency seems to be really top-notch. But we know less about the coils – nobody was really concerned with them in tests, but we did get some information from Noctua. Read more “RTX 4080 Noctua Edition is out. Great cooler, what about the coils?” »

Prisma AL-14 PWM: The best 140mm fan by Fractal Design?

Cooling, Extra tests, Fans | | Ľubomír Samák

Fractal Design claims the Prisma models as its most efficient 140mm fans. According to the specs, they are supposed to achieve the highest airflow at a lower noise level than the Aspect 14s. However, this is physically impossible due to the constructional differences of the two fans. The title of the article has a bit of a pejorative tone and while the Prisma AL-14 PWM is a decent fan, it already has a superior from its own ranks. Read more “Prisma AL-14 PWM: The best 140mm fan by Fractal Design?” »

Not every Core i5-13400F is the same: Raptor (B0) vs. Alder (C0) lake

Extra tests, Processors | | Ľubomír Samák

In the vast majority of Intel Core i5-13400F processor tests (including ours), you’ve studied the results of the variant built on the Golden Cove cores from the Alder Lake generation. But there is also an iteration from Raptor Lake (with Raptor Cove cores). However, this processor is harder to get hold of, its availability is considerably weaker, but it is obtainable. You’ll find out if it’s worth the extra effort from the comparative analysis. Read more “Not every Core i5-13400F is the same: Raptor (B0) vs. Alder (C0) lake” »

Radeon RX 6300 spotted in China. Modern GT 1030 replacement?

Graphics, News | | Jan Olšan

Basic low-cost dedicated GPUs became a dying breed over the last decade. Faster integrated GPUs leave less and less room for them and it doesn’t pay off to develop new chips of this sort anymore. Nvidia has been selling the GeForce GT 1030 with a 16nm Pascal architecture chip for almost six years now, and it’s only now, it seems. that a more modern replacement could appear: the Radeon RX 6300 with a 6nm GPU based on a current architecture. Read more “Radeon RX 6300 spotted in China. Modern GT 1030 replacement?” »

Gigabyte Aorus 140 ARGB: Short/quiet and lighted (blades)

Cooling, Extra tests, Fans | | Ľubomír Samák

Blade length is always the “topic”, but will be more common with 140mm fans than smaller variants. Some bet on long blades for preference of selected features, the other manufacturer on short ones. And such (short) and overall more robust blades are also used by the 140mm Aorus fan. From certain points of view this is quite a big advantage, but for which something had to be sacrificed. It’s a quid pro quo. Read more “Gigabyte Aorus 140 ARGB: Short/quiet and lighted (blades)” »

24GB/48GB DDR5 modules don’t work with Ryzen CPUs, fix coming?

Memory, News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

In the past, Intel processors could not run newer higher-capacity DDR2 and DDR3 modules, while AMD processors worked. That’s why we were sort of assuming that the currently appearing DDR5 modules with unusual “non-binary” capacities would just automatically work on AMD platforms. But that’s not true, it seems that they only work with Intel processors for now and Ryzen 7000s will only be able to use them after a future update. Read more “24GB/48GB DDR5 modules don’t work with Ryzen CPUs, fix coming?” »

Enermax Aquafusion ADV 240 – Pretty liquid cooler with big noise

Cooling, CPU coolers, Extra tests | | Pavel Sekerka

The Aquafusion ADV 240 is the first AIO cooler from Enermax that I have the pleasure to test. The subject of today’s review is also the interesting white design variant, which in combination with the RGB backlighting of the fans and the infinity mirror effect on the cooler block looks really premium. The price of this cooler comes out to an affordable 105 EUR, which could provide a solid price-performance ratio if it performs well in tests. Read more “Enermax Aquafusion ADV 240 – Pretty liquid cooler with big noise” »

Ryzen 7000X3D: technical details and asymmetric CCX handling

News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

Last day of February, AMD started selling the Ryzen 7000 processors with 3D V-Cache, the chiplet technology increasing L3 cache capacity. Prior generation (Ryzen 7 5800X3D) proved that this benefited gaming, and it looks like the same is true now. Ryzen 7000s are aimed specifically at gaming PCs, and according to reviews, they seem to have surpassed Intel’s Raptor Lake processors in that and are now holding the gaming performance crown. Read more “Ryzen 7000X3D: technical details and asymmetric CCX handling” »

BeQuiet! Light Wings (140 mm): Different size, different geometry

Cooling, Extra tests, Fans | | Ľubomír Samák

We analyzed the “Light Wings” fan fairly recently, but that was in the 120 mm format. BeQuiet! approached the 140mm model a little differently. Although the frame is only proportionally enlarged, the shape of the rotor is already significantly different. It relies on long, curved blades, which look great in this cross-section, but there are some design caveats. Still, in some applications, this fan excels. Read more “BeQuiet! Light Wings (140 mm): Different size, different geometry” »

Radeon driver problem breaks Windows, avoid factory reset option

Graphics, News | | Jan Olšan

AMD released a new version of Radeon Software drivers 23.2.1 last month, which was significant in that after a hiatus where new versions were only for Radeon RX 7900s for a while, it merged the two branches and now the same driver supports all GPUs again. But it looks like there is a bug in the installer that may lead to a broken Windows installation. It’s said to happen only rarely, but there are certain situations to watch out for. Read more “Radeon driver problem breaks Windows, avoid factory reset option” »

Axagon CLR-M2FAN: Active SSD cooler for closed off spaces

Cooling, Extra tests, SSD coolers | | Ľubomír Samák

Many people look down on SSD coolers with fans, saying that “a proper heatsink must be enough in this power class”. But it’s a bit more complicated than that. Direct fan cooling of the fins makes sense for SSD coolers as well. However, this is only sometimes the case, it depends on the environment in which the SSD is operating. And when it fits yours, you can’t overlook Axagon’s cooler (CLR-M2FAN) when deciding. Read more “Axagon CLR-M2FAN: Active SSD cooler for closed off spaces” »

Nvidia RTX Video Super Resolution out. What you need to know

Graphics, News | | Jan Olšan

In January, Nvidia announced a new feature for its graphics cards: the RTX Video Super Resolution, upscaling and post-processing videos played in Chrome-based web browsers. Nvidia uses AI upscaling with temporal stabilization in games under the DLSS name, so applying AI to web video is a logical extension. This feature has now been enabled by the current GeForce graphics drivers and the first comparisons and feedback are coming in. Read more “Nvidia RTX Video Super Resolution out. What you need to know” »

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