ATI chipset goes entry level

EVEN THOUGH 7800GT card manufacturers are few, the coverage - other would say Halo effect - is much more amplified. BFG has yet another review of its 7800GT, this time from hardocp. Kyle and Brent combine two of those. In a step that many vendors are probably going to follow, BFG has overclocked its card out of the box, slapped a lifetime warranty and a 24/7 free tech support. On top of that you get HDTV, VIVO, Dual DVI but not games. Performance is SLI is what sets it apart from the 7800GTX it seems.

BFG has yet another review, this time from Beyond3D which is as impressed with this piece of hardware as was HardOCP. The board is compared to the reference version and its performance shows how within a few month, a mid range card can signifantly outperform yesteryear's top of the range.

Chilean website Overclockers.cl has a review of the Hitachi Deskstar 7K80, which is a SATA II drive. It is compared to two Western Digital drive: one WD800JB and one Raptor model. If there is one conclusion to this review, it should be that RPM still rule. The Raptor, even with a SATA 1 and no NQC does a wonderful job. Now, if only WD could come forward witha 16MB cache, 10KRpm SATA 2 NQCed Raptor.

Technomods has a review of the ECS RS480-M motherboard which comes with a ATI 200 Xpress chipset. To find an ATI chipset in an Elitegroup motherboard is a tribute to the Canadian's efforts to get its product down to the entry level. The ATI 200 XPress includes a DirectX 9.0 IGP - X300SE in this case - and a list of features long enough to fill a dictionary. Performance is OK for the price. Not a good overclocker but very stable. So says the reviewer.

PC Magazine reviews what it calls "cheap PCs". At $1000 though, they are not cheap. Five PCs are compared and most of them. They all come with a 512MB memory, huge hard disk drive and a LCD screen. Only one though comes with a separate graphics card. Dell gets the top points but you might be better off building that $1K computer yourself.

The moditory checks Func F-series mousepads which are somewhat better than your £1 mousepad. You get some more features like a no-slip backing and a mouse cord clip which comes handy for gaming mousepads. Those mousepads, competition mousing surfaces, may determine whether you stay alive or get shot within a few minutes. I mean, sheesh kebab.