Your memory can play tricks on you

IF YOU'RE SHOPPING for 8800GTs this Christmas pay attention to the onboard memory – as things to come tend to shift towards the 256MB flavour of the cards, find out what you can expect performance-wise with this here review.

With game launches on the XBox360 paralleling their PC counterparts, we’re sure to see Windows based gamepad-driven games flood the market in no time. Well, OverClockersClub takes the gamepad to the PC, that’s for sure, with a black XBox-esque P3200 Rumble Gamepad. Is it just us, or is there a mutual animosity between PC gamers and console gamers when it comes down to game controllers? "A gamepad can’t come close to a keyboard+mouse combo, surely not?" Well maybe this one will change your mind.

XSReviews.co.uk got a monster case in the post, the ThermalTake Armor + VH6000. SorX is speechless, he says. Roomy, cool, good looking and feature-laden, for $150 (without a power supply) it’s a fair price for what you get thinks the author. Just make sure you’ve got the “extra-long” cabling for your components.

On a totally different note, HTC’s answer to the Iphone goes under scrutiny at GSMarena.com. The HTC Touch is apparently lacking in raw power and the whole experience falls short of the Iphone, but the price tag can turn some heads.

German site 3dchip.de does their review of the MSI Radeon RX3870 "OC" (Gurgle Engrish here). It’s a slightly OC’ed card running at 800MHz core speed, as opposed to the standard 775MHz. This time the results are tighter than what we’ve seen during our wibbling. Apparently the slight OC does well for them.

Yet another Phenom (9600) review hits the web, this one from Neoseeker. William feels a bit disappointed as he was expecting more after the hype (his words). His criticism is mostly targeted at the memory controller. In the end, the Phenom 9600 looks like a better upgrade CPU than a “new system” one, to them.

The bleus at TT-Hardware.com (Gurgled here) have their two cents worth of editorial on the HD3870 & HD3850. Same conclusions across the board except under Quake 4 where the HD38x0 perform admirably well. They just couldn’t explain those results in UT3… Value for money is – apparently - the key. High scores for both cards.

TrustedReviews got their hands on an Extremely Expensive QX9770 – a Yorkfield, none other. It’s a 3.2GHz beastie that Leo OC’d up to 4GHz and you can just see the results going up and up, just like the power consumption. If you ignore the £699 price tag, you’ve probably got a winner. µ