Extreme Wi-Fi: Can you now get rid of your Ethernet cables?

THE BESTSELLING MAG FOR PC HARDWARE, OVERCLOCKING, GAMING & MODDING / ISSUE 128

Solid State
Showdown
Unleash your
PCs true speed
256GB OF HIGHSPEED
STORAGE FOR JUST 100
BOOT WINDOWS IN
UNDER 12 SECONDS
HOW TO

MOD AN ALLINONE
LIQUID COOLER
REVIEWED
NVIDIA GEFORCE
GTX TITAN BLACK

MAY 2014/5.99

23
SSDs TESTED


    
 
 


    

      

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Welcome
Custom PC Issue 128

Editorial
EDITOR
Ben Hardwidge
[email protected]
LABS
Matthew Lambert, Mike Jennings
MODDING EDITOR
Antony Leather

Dennis Publishing Limited

Tel: 020 7907 6000 fax 020 7907 6193
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Rick Lane

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DENNIS TECHNOLOGY
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Julie Birrell
CONTRIBUTORS
Gareth Halfacree, James Gorbold,
Jim Killock, Paul Goodhead,
Simon Treadaway, Tracy King
PHOTOGRAPHY
Antony Leather, Danny Bird,
Gareth Halfacree

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C U S TO M P C / ISSUE 128

Contents
Welcome to Issue 128
Cover story
40 Solid state showdown
We reckon every PC should be fitted
with an SSD now the difference
they make to your everyday
computing experience is massive,
from boot times to software and
game loading times, as well as
general responsiveness. Price isnt
a barrier any more either, with some
drives now dipping below 40p per
GB. Almost any modern SSD will be
a significant upgrade from a hard
disk, but that doesnt mean you
should rush out and buy the cheapest
one. NAND flash and SSD controllers
come in many flavours. Thankfully,
weve rounded up 23 of the latest
SSDs, from 240GB to a whopping
1TB, with a number of different
controllers, to help you find your
ideal solid state partner

Highlights

COVER STORY
PAGE 40

20

94

10 Online dating
Tracy King analyses press outrage
about children accessing online
dating sites.

20 Nvidia Maxwell
Nvidias new Maxwell GPU
architecture appears, in a surprisingly
cheap GPU.

88 Extreme Wi-Fi
62 PC head to head
Computer Planet and Falcon PC build
systems based on AMD Kaveri APUs.

Wi-Fi speeds have seemingly gone

through the roof, with claims of
1,300Mb/sec speeds. Can you ditch
the Ethernet cables now?

102 Hobby tech

Gareth Halfacree takes a look at the
Intel Galileo, sets up a Raspberry Pi
TOR router, and tries out a Raspberry
Pi heatsink and fan too.

78 The Elder Scrolls Online

Can a massive multiplayer game
retain the magic feel of Bethesdas
single-player epics?

94 Warcraft: The Movie

We go behind the scenes of the
worlds most ambitious Machinima
project, Death Knight Love Story.

86 Banning extremist content?

Jim Killock argues that the
governments latest censorship
scheme wont stop terrorism.

98 AMD Mantle
AMDs new API is finally out, and
weve tried it out in Battlefield 4.

110 Mod an all-in-one

liquid cooler
All-in-one liquid coolers are great, but
they lack the good looks and flexibility
of custom loops. All is not lost though.
Antony Leather shows you how to
replace an all-in-one coolers tubing
and even add a reservoir.

41

88

116

Reviewed
this month

PRODUCTS
REVIEWED

Hardware
CPU COOLERS
19 Corsair Hydro H105
24 Deepcool Gamer Storm Lucifer
GRAPHICS CARDS
20 Nvidia GeForce GTX 750 Ti
22 Nvidia GeForce GTX Titan Black

102

78

MOTHERBOARD
26 Gigabyte GA-Z87-HD3
NAS BOX
28 Zyxel NSA325 v2
MOUSE
28 Ozone Neon

Custom kit
36 Booq Boa Nerve Graphite
36 Kingston 16GB DataTraveler
Locker+ G3
36 Elgato Smart Key
37 Robocup
37 Icy Box IC-SP001-BT
37 Microlab H50BT

110

SSD Labs test

Regulars
8
10
12
14
32
36
62
66
77
86
102
107
108
110
114

From the editor

Tracy King
Letters
Incoming
How we test
Custom kit
PC head to head
CPC Elite products
Inverse look
Digital rights
Hobby tech
Retro tech
Customised PC
How to extend an all-in-one
liquid coolers tubing
How to add a reservoir to an
all-in-one liquid cooler
Readers drives
Folder of the month
Your folding milestones

116
120
121
122 James Gorbold

Cover guide
40

88

42
42
42
43
43
43
44
44
45
45
48
48
48
50
50
52
52
52
53
53
54
54
54

Crucial M500 240GB

Crucial M500 480GB
Crucial M500 960GB
OCZ Vertex 460 240GB
OCZ Vector 150 240GB
OCZ Vector 150 480GB
Intel SSD 530 Series 240GB
Transcend SSD340 256GB
PNY XLR8 SSD 240GB
PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB
Plextor M5 Pro 256GB
Plextor M5 Pro 512GB
SanDisk Extreme II 480GB
SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB
SanDisk X110 250GB
Samsung SSD 840 Evo 250GB
Samsung SSD 840 Evo 500GB
Samsung SSD 840 Evo 1TB
Samsung SSD 840 Pro 256GB
Samsung SSD 840 Pro 512GB
Toshiba Q Series 256GB
Toshiba Q Series 512GB
Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

Games

22

110

78
80
82
83
84

The Elder Scrolls Online

Nidhogg
Octodad: Dadliest Catch
Jazzpunk
Thief

OPINION

B E N H A R DW I D G E / FROM THE EDITOR

WIFIDELITY
Intels Broadwell CPUs might be coming out soon, but Ben Hardwidge
is much more excited by Asus 802.11ac wireless kit
ireless accelerators. Thats what Id call Asus latest
802.11ac Wi-Fi adaptors (see p88). Thats because
network is a word that makes you yawn before youve
even finished reading it. Home networks might be standard now,
but networking is still up there with infrastructure and
enterprise in terms of words that end up in the same line as
tedious business jargon such as solutions.
Thats a shame, because networking is now anything but
dull, as weve found out in our Extreme Wi-Fi feature this month.
Asus Wi-Fi adaptors even have large pink heatsinks attached
to them they look like proper expansion cards that are worthy
of a PCI-E slot.
The bigger deal, of course, is Wi-Fi speeds,
which have come on a long way since the
11Mb/sec days of 802.11b. As we found out,
theyre not quite in the league of beefy
bandwidth claimed by the kit manufacturers,
and they still cant match Gigabit Ethernet,
but theyre still plenty fast enough for HD
video streaming and accessing network
storage, and thats what matters in the home.
I for one will now be upgrading my home
network, which currently involves various Cat 6 cables trailing
in front of doors, ready to trip up my already clumsy other half
while shes stumbling into the bedroom with a mug of tea. If
you own your home, and you have the DIY know-how, you can
of course wire up Ethernet sockets in the appropriate rooms,
getting high-speed network access without trailing cables across
the house. But that isnt an option for most of the folks who rent
their home.
Another option is a homeplug network, which cuts out cable
clutter, but means you end up with reduced network speeds. Also,
while Ive never had any trouble with homeplug networking,
various friends have reported problems with interference from

other bits and pieces on the same circuit it largely depends on

how your house has been wired up.
So 802.11ac has come as a massive relief to me. The bandwidth
of 802.11g, and even 802.11n, might have been fine for my Nexus
7,phone and laptop for web browsing,email and watching online
video, but it isnt enough for regularly accessing large files on a
NAS box.
Thats the key for me I have a media centre PC, a laptop and
my main desktop on my network, and all of them have SSDs
and then use the same NAS for file storage, rather than using
local hard drives. Its a great setup in terms of convenience,
and I havent had to use a thumbdrive at home for years, but
it also requires high-speed bandwidth to
work properly.
What amazes me, though, is just how long
its taken manufacturers to realise theres a
niche in the market for enthusiast Wi-Fi
adaptors. Of course, weve had to wait for new
standards to get these speeds in the first place,
but its clear from our investigations that Asus
is the only company thats really taking
extreme home wireless networking seriously,
getting the right balance between high speeds and features.
Its upgrades such as these that really make a difference to your
everyday computing experience. As James points out on p122,
overclocking your CPU doesnt make a lot of difference in terms
of what you can and cant do any more, but upgrading to a new
super-fast wireless network not only changes your PC, but also
affects your home life by removing the need for cables. Likewise,
an SSD (see p40) will also make a much bigger difference to your
everyday computing life than a new CPU now.
Times may be changing in the PC business, but its great to see
new upgrades that make a significant difference to your
computing life. Wireless accelerators; you heard it here first.

Asus Wi-Fi adaptors even

have large pink heatsinks
attached they look like
proper expansion cards

Ben Hardwidge is the editor of Custom PC. He likes PCs, heavy metal, real ale and Warhammer 40,000.

[email protected]

@custompcmag

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OPINION

T R ACY K I N G / SCEPTICAL ANALYSIS

BAD DATES
Should we worry about children accessing online dating?
Tracy King analyses the outrage in the press
f youre single then you may well be a member of an
Internet dating site. If youre not single, then its
increasingly likely that you met your partner online. I
met my boyfriend in a chatroom for science enthusiasts, a fact
he hid from his friends for many years.
Despite the ever-blurring lines between the Internet and what
I lovingly call the outernet, and others call meatspace, theres
still a stigma attached to finding romantic partners online.
However, Internet dating continues to rise and is now a global
industry worth 2 billion.
One of the latest members of the dating industry is super-app
Tinder. In the UK, its added a million new users since Christmas,
apparently offering you a quick way to hook
up with like-minded people. By like-minded
I mean also want to get laid, but the app
developers in a recent Guardian interview
were at pains to insist that isnt the case.
Co-founder Justin Mateen said, We never
intended it to be a dating platform. Its a social
discovery platform,facilitating an introduction
between two people, which I find funny
because I dont know anyone who doesnt
describe it as like Grindr, but not gay.
Theres even an app for threesomes, unpronouncably called
3nder. Of course, the original heterosexual Grindr is Blendr, but
that suffered from a lack of women. Basically, whatever variation
of word-ending-with-r you prefer, theres probably a website or
app to suit your dating requirements.
But of course, with great coding comes great responsibility,
especially when it comes to the wont someone think of the
children? question.
Its certainly true that children as young as 13 are using Tinder,
and although the app claims to block over-18s from viewing
underage profiles, getting access is as simple as lying about your

age. There are definitely causes for concern, but is there cause
for outrage?
The Times thinks so. In a shouty article this month, The Times
declared Tinder a dangerous minefield; this, as someone on
Twitter pointed out, is the very worst sort of minefield.
The Times helpfully pointed out that the NSPCC recently
reported a sharp rise in calls from children distressed by
experiences of dating apps, but failed to mention that the NSPCC
admits it doesnt have any actual figures.
That isnt to say it isnt worth ensuring new technology is safe.
The recent investigation by the OFT into in-app purchases,
coupled with Apples $32.5 million refund to the parents of kids
who got happy with the premium currency
button, shows that the industry is aware
that its partly accountable for the actions of
its customers, particularly when those
customers are kids.
Clearly, if those most easily exploited are
on a platform that makes it easy to exploit
them, we need to be mindful.
Awareness among developers and
storefronts (whose primary concern is profit),
parents and kids themselves are the key to safety. But where
there are curious teens, there will be sexting and hook-ups, and
if its the very nature of human curiosity that lobby groups seek
to change, they have a long battle ahead.
We know from biased reporting of the governments net
filtering projects that the press is happy to throw out the baby
with the bathwater when it comes to online censorship, so an
attempt to demonise dating apps isnt surprising.
If The Times had its way, presumably wed all hook up the
old-fashioned way. Its a shame so many people cant see that
apps such as Tinder are just the new, convenient version of filling
in a ladys dance card.

The Times failed to

mention that the NSPCC
admits it doesnt have
any actual figures

Gamer and science enthusiast Tracy King dissects the evidence and statistics behind popular media stories surrounding tech and gaming

10

@tkingdoll

F E E D B AC K

Letters
Please send us your feedback and correspondence to
[email protected]
Overscan, underscan
An issue has been bugging me for a
few years now, and for the life of me
I cant find any definitive answers
using my Google-fu. The issue is fullscreen gaming, or more specifically,
the lack of it in certain games. Most
recently, there are two main titles
that have been doing it to me
Rome: Total war II and Saints Row IV.
I have a Core i5-2500K, an Asus
Maximus Extreme-Z motherboard,
a GTX 670 and SSDs. I also have a
32in TV for my main monitor, and a
17in screen for my second monitor,
all set up in my front room. The main
screen runs at 1,920 x 1,080, and the
second runs at 800 x 600, just so I
can read everything on it from the
sofa. The main screen is manually
set in the Nvidia Control Panel, from
1,824 x 1,026 up to full HD, because
the screen overlaps the TV edge.
I can play most DX9 and DX11
games at full resolution, full screen,
with no issues and no overlap on the
TV edge. I can run Skyrim, Crysis 1,2
and 3, Borderlands 1 and 2 and so on,
all at full screen at on my main
display, with a selection of widgets
on my second screen for my

Games that only run

in windowed mode
at 1,280 x 720 kill
them with fire!

PEDANTS PARADISE
richardnpaul In Issue 127, p95, what card costs
<150? Also, on p65, the Cyberpower Crysis 3
results are probably the wrong way around.
MadmeccAndrew Hello, just reading your mag,
and on p95 you say the R9 290X only costs
under 150 - can I have one at that price please? LOL
Ben replies: Yes, sorry, the Cyberpower Crysis 3
graphs are indeed the wrong way around and yes,
ahem, the card on p95 was obviously supposed to be
the R9 270X. Id love an R9 290X for 150 too!

12

reference. However, Rome: Total War

II and Saints Row IV will only work at
a maximum resolution of 1,280 x 720,
and usually they refuse to work in
full screen, only allowing me to play
in windowed mode, at half the size
of my screen.
Is this my fault, because Im using
a custom resolution on the TV via
the control panel? Is there any way
I can fix it? I dont think its a driver
issue, or it would occur in most, if
not all, games. The only reason I can
imagine is that the games arent
configured properly for multimonitor support, but I have friends
with multi-monitor setups that can
play these games without issue.
7HR08IK

Ben replies: There are a few reasons

why this could be happening. Firstly, I
would check to see if your TV has a

setting in its menu for adjusting

overscan and underscan (these terms
describe the picture going over the
edge of the TV, or not quite hitting the
edge of it, as you described). If you can
get your PC to output at 1,920 x 1,080,
and then get the TV to fix the position,
then that eliminates whether the
resolution is the problem.
You could also try using a different
display input I dont know what youre
using, but if its VGA, it could be worth
trying HDMI or DVI instead, if you have
the options. You could also disconnect
your second screen to eliminate
whether multi-monitor is an issue.
Secondly, Ive also had the issue of
games starting at 1,280 x 720 in
windowed mode, and refusing to run in
full-screen mode, and its always been
because the game couldnt find the
configuration file that tells it to run at
a different resolution, rather than

WHENS THE NEXT MAG COMING OUT?

Issue 129 of Custom PC will be on sale on Thursday, 17 April, with
subscribers receiving it a few days beforehand. Visit http://tinyurl.com/
CPCDates to see the release dates for the rest of the year.

As the mag sits in the

ahem, throne room, its
useful to know when I could
expect the replacement

anything to do with graphics drivers.

This could be because youve moved
your Saved Games folder, so the game
is looking for the files in a different
location, or maybe because youre
using a NAS (some games really dont
like network drives), or the installation
could be corrupt. I hope you get it
sorted it sounds immensely irritating.

Magazine price
First, Id like to say that the revamped
mag looks great. However, in your
column you mentioned all the
changes in your mag apart from
the price increase from 4.50 to a
whopping 5.99, while going from
130 pages to 122. While your reply
would probably say that its in line
with other mags, in times when
people count every penny, I really
cant see any justification for a
nearly 150 per cent increase in price.
Im sure Im not the only one who
feels this way.
Ive been a great supporter of your
magazine, as it stood out
among others for value.
Give us back our value for
money price please. As of
now, Im afraid I cant
justify paying that kind of
price, and Im sorry to say I
will no longer be buying
your magazine.
GARY MORGAN

Ben replies: Im glad you like our

revamp Gary, and Im also sorry to see
that well be losing you as a reader. If I
may put the price rise into perspective,
this is the first time weve put up the
price since Issue 66, which came out at
the beginning of 2009 believe it or

Twitter highlights
Follow us on Twitter at @CustomPCmag

not, thats five years ago, so the

increase since then is only 30p a year.
Youre right that there would be no
justification for a nearly 150 per cent
increase in price, but if that had
happened the magazine would now
cost over a tenner. The price increase
was actually around 33 per cent, which
I admit seems like a lot between just
two months, but not when you
consider how long the magazine had
been priced at 4.50, and when you
account for the price of similar
magazines on the newsstand. If you
want to save some money, though, I
recommend getting a sub (see p34).

Coming next month

I enjoyed this months magazine
and its new look, but I have a minor
issue with it. You no longer have a
notification of when next months
mag will be out. I found this useful,
and Im sure it only occupies a tiny
amount of space. As the mag sits in
the ahem, throne room, its useful to
know when I could expect
the replacement.
Apart from that small
omission, the mags still a
great read.
GLENN FAULKNER

Ben replies: Youre quite

right theres no reason we
cant tell you when the next
magazine is coming out.
From this issue onwards, well tell you
when the next mag is coming out on
the Letters page.
You can also take your web browser
to http://tinyurl.com/CPCDates to
see the release dates for the rest of
the year.

Send your feedback and correspondence to

TheImperialDude Got a feeling

my youngest is gonna be a PC
tech genius. @CustomPCMag keep
going til the end of time!
Grove_Armada What I like about Steam box is
that good games might get ported to Linux. No
more NEED for windows.
Ben: Yep, that could also be a very interesting
knock-on effect. Times for PC gamers are
potentially changing.
SoshDragon Reading through the new-look @
CustomPCMag. Looks very swish! Good
work guys c:
DbaHenderson Really enjoyed the new look @
CustomPCMag. Best issue for months.
Ben: Thank you weve had loads of positive feedback
about the redesign glad so many people like it as
much as we do!
thebuildservers You
should do things that
dont cost as much in the mag
e.g. the 24in monitor for 235
wow, I got my monitor for
100 its looks and quality
are much better.
Ben: We review cheaper kit too
we mainly reviewed that monitor,
as its one of the only displays that
supports Nvidias G-Sync tech.

Asus VG248QE
was the first monitor
weve seen to feature
Nvidias G-Sync tech

leighhaynesuk Like the new clean look, but ten

pages of buyers guide is too much. This will see
little change and so needs to be condensed.
KevHolloway I remember reading you guys had
a weekly TF2 some time back ... does that still
go on?
Ben: We dont Im afraid we stopped doing Readers
Night when we stopped having a central office.

[email protected]

13

CO M I N G S O O N / NEW KIT

Incoming
We take a look at the latest newly announced products

New Parvum cases

Essex-based indie chassis maker Parvum Systems
has just released a brand-new chassis, which retains
the firms trademark looks with matt acrylic. The new
S2.0 micro-ATX case improves over its predecessor in
a few notable ways, including the addition of case feet,
front-mounted USB 3 ports and an extra 15mm of
height above the motherboard, so you can squeeze
a thicker radiator into the case.
A number of colours are also available, with the
black or white frame equipped with orange, red, blue,
green, purple and even gold acrylic slices. The Parvum
Systems S2.0 is available now from www.overclockers.co.uk for 140 inc VAT, and will be
delivered flatpack-style to reduce shipping damage.

Gigabyte adds
Broadwell support
Intel might not have officially launched
its Broadwell CPUs yet, which will be
based on Haswell with a die-shrink to
14nm transistors, but Gigabyte has already
enabled support for the new CPUs on its full range of
LGA1150 motherboards with 8-series chipsets, via BIOS
updates. If you own a Gigabyte board with an 8-series chipset,
and want to make sure it can handle Intels next CPUs, you can
download the new BIOS versions from http://uk.gigabyte.com

Lian Li showcases
desk chassis
Weve seen a fair few mods that involved
converting a desk into a PC chassis, or
building a desk-based PC from scratch,
but now Lian Li is attempting to make
building a desk PC much easier, using
a dedicated chassis. The company has
confirmed that its new DK01 chassis will
be showcased at the CeBIT trade show in
March this year, touting the ability to show
off your internal PC handiwork via the
tempered glass lid as a big selling point.
Little else is known about the DK01 yet,
except that it will be constructed from
aluminium, and Lian Li has also shown off
some monitor mounts for attaching one
or two displays to the top.

14

AMD unveils
R9 280
AMD has just lifted the lid on a new GPU
in its R-series product stack, which
takes aim at Nvidias GeForce GTX 760.
Called the Radeon R9 280, the GPU sits
between the R9 280X and R9 270X.
Like the 280X, which was basically a
rebadged Radeon 7970 GHz Edition,
the 28nm R9 280 has very similar
specifications to the older Radeon 7950.
It has 112 texture units, 1,792 stream
processors, 32 ROPs and 3GB of 5GHz
(effective) GDDR5 RAM with a 384-bit
memory interface.
Where it differs from the Radeon
7950 is in its core clock speed, with a
frequency of 933MHz, compared to
the 7950s 850MHz frequency clock,
which boosted to 925MHz. AMD says
cards based on the new GPU will have
a maximum TDP of 250W, and will
require one 6-pin and one 8-pin PCI-E
power connector.

N E WS

WHATS GOING ON AT OCZ?

OCZ filed for bankruptcy at the end of last year, but Toshiba then acquired many of
the company assets. We catch up with OCZ to find out whats happening

e pre-emptively said farewell to

OCZ a few months ago. As it turns
out, we were wrong it happens
sometimes. Toshiba stepped in to acquire
many of OCZs assets, resulting in a stronglooking solid state drive team. So what
happened, and how is the future looking?
We caught up with OCZs VP of global
marketing, Tobias Brinkmann, and director
of marketing and PR for EMEA, Joost Van
Leeuwen, to find out.

What went wrong?

Back in 2008, recalls Van Leeuwen, we
made the strategic decision to focus on a
single product portfolio, SSDs.
This strategy had its pros and cons. Van
Leeuwen claims that this focus enabled OCZ
to produce the first affordable SSD range,
the Core Series. This move also pushed OCZ
towards focusing on innovating with SSD
technology, which included gaining many
patents and acquiring tech firms such as
Indilinx and PLX, as well as software
developer SANRAD. With all of this knowhow, OCZ could move beyond some of its
competitors from the memory business,
who simply put some third-party NAND in
a branded box with a SandForce controller
instead, OCZ had access to a controller
manufacturer, as well as the ability to make
its own firmware.
So far, so good, but there were also
problems, mainly due to the last missing
piece of the SSD puzzle access to NAND
flash memory. OCZ Technology came
across a number of challenges, says Van
Leeuwen. Due to not owning a flash fab,
supply was less consistent, and the cost
was too high to be able to really compete
in the marketplace.
Clearly, having an inconsistent and
sometimes too costly supply of NAND
is an issue for a company whose main
business is solid state drives, giving it a
disadvantage compared to firms such as

16

Samsung, which can make all the parts of

an SSD. What it needed was the ability to
produce NAND too.

Toshiba steps in
In turn, Toshiba had the ability to make its
own NAND flash memory, and had already
begun making SSDs based on Marvell
controllers. However, if Toshiba really
wanted to compete with Samsung in this
arena, it also needed a full package. Toshiba
showed interest in OCZ for a number of
reasons, says Van Leeuwen. The brand for
its well-integrated position in both the
client and enterprise markets. The IP for its
controller technology, as well as software,
R&D, engineering and OCZs patents.
Shortly after OCZ filed for bankruptcy,
Toshiba acquired most of OCZs storage
assets. The result was a new subsidiary
called OCZ Storage Solutions, a Toshiba
company. OCZ is now able to include the
missing two elements in the mix flash and
cash, says Van Leeuwen, which now has a
full mix of controller technology, including
flash and proprietary firmware, while the
financial backup will allow the company to
really compete on a global scale.

OCZs other products

However, Toshiba only bought OCZ
Technology Groups storage assets; OCZ
made other products, including power
supplies following its acquisition of PC
Power & Cooling. What will happen to those

products? Toshiba only acquired the SSD

assets from OCZ Technology, confirms
Tobias Brinkmann, and therefore a
separate buyer had to be found for the
power supply division. Im pleased that
FirePower Technology purchased the PSU
assets, plans to honour warranty
obligations and has taken over the fantastic
team we had as well.

Warranties
This brings up another question though
what happens to the warranties of OCZs
other products, including older SSDs?
According to OCZs website, while Toshiba
Corporation has acquired substantially all
the assets from OCZ
Technology Group,
most liabilities,
including outstanding
warranties, have been
excluded from that
acquisition. This
statement adds that OCZ
Storage Solutions is unable to provide
warranty support for discontinued
products including legacy SSDs, DRAM
memory and peripherals.
Thats bad news if you happen to own
one of those products, but OCZ says that
plenty of OCZ Technologys newer SSDs will
still be supported. The new organisation is
able to continue to support existing
customers with current SSD products, says
Brinkmann. This supports the vast majority
of consumers, and all enterprise customers,
as our top volume products, such as the
Vertex, Vector SATA and RevoDrive PCI-E
SSDs all continue to be supported. The
Agility Series is already on the tail end of
the lifecycle, and we are able to provide one
more year of support for this series.
The first result of Toshiba and OCZs
joint efforts is the Vertex 460, with OCZs
Barefoot 3 M10 controller and 19nm MLC
Toshiba NAND. See our review on p43.


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Reviews
Our in-depth analysis of the latest PC hardware
Nvidia GeForce GTX 750 Ti
Hold on, wheres the PCI-E power
connector? Nvidias new Maxwell card
draws all its power from the PCI-E slot / p20

Reviewed this month

Corsair Hydro H105 p19 / Nvidia GeForce GTX Titan Black p22 / Deepcool Gamer Storm Lucifer p24 /
Gigabyte GA-Z87-HD3 p26 / Zyxel NSA325 v2 p28 / Ozone Neon p30 / Custom kit p36
18

C P U CO O L E R

Corsair Hydro H105 /94

inc VAT
LGA2011

Corsairs latest closed-loop cooler oers a thick radiator and simple installation
SUPPLIER www.overclockers.co.uk / MODEL NUMBER CW-9060016-WW

he H105 adds to Corsairs expansive range of

closed-loop coolers. Like the H100i, it uses a dual
120mm radiator, but its 11mm thicker. This gives it
more surface area from which to dissipate heat, although it
requires more room to install not all tower cases will have
enough room for it, even with just a single set of fans.
The two supplied fans are Corsairs SP120L models.
These are PWM-compatible, and a Y-cable is provided so
you can control both with one header. Also bundled is a neat
set of interchangeable plastic rings for the pump unit (the
default is grey, but red and blue are supplied too), so you
can better match it to its surroundings. Meanwhile, the lowprofile pump unit requires just a 3-pin header for power.
Unlike the H80i and H100is pumps,
however, it isnt compatible with Corsairs
Link software, so it isnt as easy to customise
fan profiles.
As with the H75 (see Issue 126, p30),
installation of the H105 is joyfully simple. The
Intel mounting bracket is pre-attached, but
AMD users can easily swap it out before
screwing the cooler straight into the
standard AMD backplate. The supplied
backplate for non-LGA2011 Intel sockets has nuts attached
to slides, making it simple to line it up with the relevant
socket holes, while the LGA2011 process is, as ever, even
simpler. As with the H75, our one criticism is that the
backplate is plastic, meaning theres a risk of the nuts
turning in their sockets. Meanwhile, the tubings thick rubber
material means its flexible, yet robust and resistant to kinks
when twisted.
The H105 fared perfectly well on our LGA1155 rig, with its
delta T of 38C being 4C behind the top-performing NZXT
Kraken X60, although that cooler costs a
whopping 120. Also, dampening the H105s
fan speeds via PWM saw the delta T plateau at
/SPECIFICATIONS
just 40C, and the fans spinning at ear-friendly
Compatibility Intel: LGA115x,
noise levels.
LGA1366, LGA2011; AMD:
Socket AM3+, AM3, AM2+,
The H105 truly shines in LGA2011 systems
AM2, FM2+, FM2, FM1
though. In our LGA2011 test rig, it achieved the
Radiator size (mm) 120 x
best result weve seen so far, knocking 2C off
272.5 x 38 (W x D x H)
the result from the previous best cooler, the
Fans 2 x 120mm
SilverStone Tundra TD02, which has a similarly
Stated noise 37.7dB(A)
thick radiator.

The H105 uses

a dual 120mm
radiator, but its
11mm thicker

Conclusion
If youre using an LGA115x chip, the H105 is overkill in most
instances. However, LGA2011 users can get more cooling
power from the H105 than any other cooler weve tested,
and it only takes a few minutes to install too. Just make sure
you have enough room in your case before you buy one.
MATTHEW LAMBERT

INTEL LGA1155
38C

Corsair Hydro H105

34C

NZXT Kraken X60

37C

Corsair Hydro H100i

39C

SilverStone Tundra TD02

0

10

20

30
40
Lower is better

INTEL LGA2011
40C

Corsair Hydro H105

42C

SilverStone Tundra TD02

43C

NZXT Kraken X60

44C

Corsair Hydro H100i

0

12

24

36
48
Lower is better

LG A 1 1 5 x
COOLING

DESIGN

80%

DESIGN

OVERALL SCORE

25/30

20/30

EASY

VALUE

OVERALL SCORE

FITTING

35/40
LG A 2 0 1 1
COOLING

39/40

26/30

27/30

EASY

VALUE

VERDICT

FITTING

92%

An excellent cooler thats especially proficient when

coupled with an LGA2011 CPU. It requires a fair bit of
room in your case, however.

19

R E V I E WS / NEW KIT

GRAPHICS CARD

Nvidia GeForce GTX 750 Ti /108

inc VAT

Nvidias new Maxwell architecture makes its debut

SUPPLIER www.dabs.com

or the first time, Nvidia is launching a new GPU

architecture in a mass-market product, rather
than a top-end one. The GTX 750 Ti costs 108,
a fraction more than the Radeon R7 260X and 20-25 less
than the GTX 660 and R9 270. Along with the GTX 750, it
replaces the GTX 650 Ti and GTX 650 Ti Boost in the
GeForce product stack.
The new GPU, GM107, was designed with mobile
products in mind, and performance per watt is Maxwells big
selling point. The card has a TDP of just 60W, compared to
115W on AMDs R7 260X, which requires a 6-pin PCI-E
power connection, while the GTX 750 Ti is powered by the
PCI-E slot alone.
Maxwell is (for now) manufactured on the same 28nm
process as current Kepler cards, so other methods were
needed to boost efficiency. Fundamentally, Maxwell still
relies on Graphics Processing Clusters (GPCs) divided into
Streaming Multiprocessors (SMs),
but the SMs have been redesigned.
In Maxwell, SMs contain 128 stream
processors, compared to 192 in Kepler.
Previously, all the stream processors
were shared between a large and
complex array of schedulers and
dispatch units. Now, however, theyre
divided into four processing blocks of
32 each, and each block has its own
dedicated dispatch and scheduling
hardware. This division allows for smaller and simpler
scheduling hardware, which decreases power consumption.
These scheduling improvements, coupled with the
simpler, more parallel power-of-two layout, improves
workload balancing and core utilisation, so cores spend less
time doing nothing but drawing power. There are also more
instructions issued per clock, and fewer stalls in the pipeline,
and Nvidia claims that a Maxwell SM offers
around 90 per cent of the performance of the
Kepler one, despite consuming less power,
/SPECIFICATIONS
being significantly smaller and having a third
Graphics processor Nvidia
GeForce GTX 750 Ti,
of the stream processors.
1,020MHz (boosting to
The L2 cache size has dramatically increased
1,085MHz)
too. Even in the tiny GM107 chip, its 2MB in size,
Pipeline 640 stream
which is even larger than that of the GK110 GPU
processors, 16 ROPs
in the GTX 780 Ti. This boosts efficiency by
Memory 2GB GDDR5,
5.4GHz effective
reducing calls to the main video memory.
Bandwidth 86.4GB/sec
The GPU has two 64-bit memory controllers
Compatibility DirectX 11.2,
connected to 2GB of GDDR5 memory, which
OpenGL 4.4
is clocked at 5.4GHz (effective) for a memory
Outputs/inputs DVI-I, DVIbandwidth of 86.4GB/sec. Core clock speed,
D, mini-HDMI
meanwhile, is at 1,020MHz, and Boost 2 is
Power connections None
also supported. A boost clock of 1,085MHz is
Size 147mm long, dual-slot
quoted, but ours stayed at 1,150MHz under load.

The card has a

TDP of just 60W,
compared to 115W
on AMDs R7 260X

20

Nvidias tiny reference card has a basic cooler on the righthand side, which effectively makes it a dual-slot card, but
theres only a single-slot backplate, meaning that we could
see true single-slot third-party cards. The card doesnt
support SLI, however, so you wont find a bridge for it.
Fortunately, Nvidias G-Sync technology is supported,
provided you opt for a card with a DisplayPort output. Finally,
the on-board video encoder and decoder (which comes
with its own efficiency improvements), brings support for
ShadowPlay and streaming to Nvidia Shield.

Performance
In our standard 1080p tests, the GTX 750 Ti achieves
minimum frame rates of 22fps in Battlefield 4 and 23fps in
Crysis 3, which arent playable. However, dropping these
demanding games to their next best presets enables the
GTX 750 Ti to achieve smoother and playable minimums of
35fps and 34fps respectively, with minimal sacrifices to
visual quality. In Battlefield 4, this results in performance on
a par with the R7 260X, but in Crysis 3, its enough to be
noticeably smoother than both the R7 260X and GTX 650 Ti,
which cant maintain 30fps.
BioShock Infinite and Skyrim are easier to run, and the
GTX 750 Ti manages smooth frame rates at the best
possible settings at 1080p. Each of the four cards tested is
able to do the same, but the GTX 750 Ti excels in BioShock
Infinite, where its 25 per cent quicker than the R7 260X.
We hit the highest core clock speed possible in EVGA
Precision X when overclocking 1,155MHz. Under load, the
card consistently boosted to an incredible 1,285MHz. We
also overclocked the memory by 22 per cent to 1.65GHz
(6.6GHz effective). These are fantastic overclocks given
the reliance on PCI-E power. At these frequencies, the
card surpasses the GTX 660 in BioShock Infinite and
maintains borderline playable frame rates using Very
High settings in Crysis 3.
The power consumption figures really put everything into
perspective. The GTX 750 Ti has the lowest overall system
power consumption, and is especially strong against the R7
260X, which consumes 50W more, despite producing
slower frame rates in every benchmark. Better yet, its even

more efficient when overclocked, as performance increases

far more than power consumption. The cards efficiency
benefits it elsewhere too even with its no-thrills cooler,
it remained cool and very quiet throughout testing.

Conclusion
The GeForce GTX 750 Ti isnt the most exciting GPU in terms
of gaming performance, but you can still expect to play
modern games at 1080p with High settings, which isnt bad
for just 108 inc VAT, although of course, it limits future
proofing too. Its price/performance ratio is decent enough,
but if you can afford it, the R9 270X will perform better,
giving you enough headroom to push all your games to
their maximum settings at 1080p.
Maximum settings aside, however, the GeForce GTX 750
Ti is easily the fastest card available that doesnt require an
external PCI-E power connector, and would therefore make
a fantastic upgrade for an aging off-the-shelf PC, or an
ultra-small form factor build, without needing to worry
about power draw,. Were now eagerly waiting to see what
the rest of the Maxwell parts have in store.
MATTHEW LAMBERT

BA T T L E F I E L D 4

THE ELDER SCROLLS V : SKYRIM

1,920 x 1,080, Ultra Detail, 4x AA

1,920 x 1,080, Ultra detail, 8x AA

30 fps

GeForce GTX 660

37 fps

22 fps

Radeon R7 260X

18 fps

GeForce GTX 650 Ti

0

10

62 fps

GeForce GTX 660

22 fps 28 fps

GeForce GTX 750 Ti

27 fps

45 fps 58 fps

Radeon R7 260X

23 fps

37 fps 50 fps

GeForce GTX 650 Ti

20

30

40

1,920 x 1,080, High Detail, 0x AA

GeForce GTX 750 Ti

35fps

Radeon R7 260X

35fps
0

12

24

47fps

20
40
Minimum
Average

60

UNIGINE V ALLEY

48

1,263

GeForce GTX 660

981
GeForce GTX 750 Ti

1,093

BI O S H O C K I N F I NITE
45 fps

GeForce GTX 660

57 fps

40 fps
GeForce GTX 750 Ti

32 fps

Radeon R7 260X

30 fps
15

45

60

CRYS I S 3
1,920 x 1,080, Very High detail, 0x AA

29 fps
23 fps

GeForce GTX 750 Ti

31 fps

Radeon R7 260X

103W

GeForce GTX 660

103W
0

18

27

SPEED

36

34fps
28fps

Radeon R7 260X
0
Stock speed min

12

Stock speed avg

42fps

VERDICT

36fps

24
Overclocked min

36

48

Overclocked avg

Load

1,400

174W

VALUE

187W
222W
227W
120

180

Overclocked

FEATURES

17/20

35/40

1,920 x 1,080, High detail, 0x AA

GeForce GTX 750 Ti

60
Idle

28/40

25 fps

18 fps 23 fps

GeForce GTX 650 Ti

103W

27 fps

21 fps

Radeon R7 260X

1,050

177W

GeForce GTX 650 Ti

35 fps

27 fps

700

100W

GeForce GTX 750 Ti

37 fps

GeForce GTX 660

350

TOTA L SYSTEM POWER DRA W

36 fps

30

846

Radeon R7 260X

47 fps

46 fps 54 fps

GeForce GTX 650 Ti

848

GeForce GTX 650 Ti

1,920 x 1,080, Ultra Detail with Depth of Field

80

2,560 x 1,440, Ultra detail, 0x AA

44fps
36

79 fps

46 fps 59 fps

GeForce GTX 750 Ti

240

Lower is better

OVERALL SCORE

80%

A great little graphics card with outstanding efficiency,

making it well suited to power-limited builds.

21

R E V I E WS / NEW KIT

GRAPHICS CARD

Zotac GeForce GTX Titan Black /790

inc VAT

Nvidia makes GTX Titan even faster

SUPPLIER www.ebuyer.com

hen the GTX 780 Ti launched, it had an advantage

in games over the GTX Titan, leaving Nvidia in the
odd position of having its flagship 800 card
trumped by its own 500 model. The GTX Titan Black,
which outright replaces the GTX Titan, seeks to rectify this
issue by pairing a fully enabled GK110 GPU with 6GB of
VRAM and full-speed double-precision performance, and
some clock speed bumps too.
As a 7.1-billion transistor GK110 part, the GTX Titan Black
has five GPCs divided into 15 SMs, and this time around, all
of them are enabled, as in the GTX 780 Ti. This leaves it with
2,880 stream processors and 240 texture units, a 6.7 per
cent increase over the original Titan. It ships with a base
clock speed of 889MHz and a 980MHz boost clock,
compared to 876MHz and 928MHz in the GTX 780 Ti.
Therefore, although you can buy pre-overclocked GTX 780
Ti cards with higher frequencies, its now the
fastest card in Nvidias GeForce arsenal.
The GTX Titan Black also takes the 6GB
/SPECIFICATIONS
frame buffer from the original GTX Titan
Graphics processor Nvidia
GeForce GTX Titan Black,
(double the capacity of the GTX 780 Ti)
889MHz (boosting to 980MHz)
and pairs it with the GTX 780 Tis memory
Pipeline 2,880 stream
speed of 1.75GHz (7GHz effective). This,
processors, 48 ROPs
along with GK110s fat 384-bit memory bus,
Memory 6GB GDDR5,
gives the GTX Titan Black 336GB/sec of
7GHz effective
peak memory bandwidth 16.7 per cent
Bandwidth 336GB/sec
more than the GTX Titan. The full-speed
Compatibility DirectX 11.2,
OpenGL 4.4
double-precision units also carry over from
Outputs/inputs DVI-I, DVI-D,
the Titan.
HDMI, DisplayPort
The card has the same gorgeous design
Power connections 1 x 6-pin,
as before too, featuring a high-quality
1 x 8-pin, top-mounted
aluminium shroud. As with the GTX Titan,
Size 267mm long, dual-slot
board partners cant use custom coolers with

22

the GTX Titan Black, so Zotacs model looks the same as any
other, although it includes three free Splinter Cell games, a
DVI to VGA adaptor and some power adaptors. Meanwhile,
all of the usual Nvidia features youd expect are present,
including G-Sync and 4-way SLI support.
A vapour chamber and heatsink cool the GPU, while a
metal contact plate with strategically positioned thermal
pads draws heat away from the 6+2 phase power VRMs and
half of the memory chips (the other half are left uncovered
on the PCBs rear). The radial fan at the side provides airflow,
blasting out its hot air through the rear I/O plate.

Performance
The GTX Titan Black is the new performance king, coming
top in all but the Battlefield 4 benchmark at 4K. That said, the
GTX Titan Black doesnt offer a massive benefit over the
GTX 780 Ti in games. The difference between them never
exceeds 2fps, which youre unlikely to notice when playing.
This should come as little surprise, as they share identical
specifications where it counts, other than the GTX Titan
Blacks marginally higher clock speed. Double precision
and FP64 performance is irrelevant in games, and the 6GB
frame buffer does nothing for the new card in games either
even at 5,760 x 1,080 and 4K, 3GB isnt a bottleneck. Even
compared to the GTX Titan, meaningful differences are rare,
although technically it does achieve borderline playable
status in Battlefield 4 at 4K, unlike the GTX Titan. It
outperforms the R9 290X too, in particular being noticeably
smoother in the BioShock Infinite tests.
The Unigine Valley rankings confirm what we see
elsewhere. The Titan Black has less than a 2 per cent lead on
the GTX 780 Ti, but is 8 and 26 per cent faster than the GTX
Titan and R9 290X respectively. As expected, power

consumption is a touch higher than the GTX 780 Ti and GTX

Titan, although the cooler works well, never becoming too
noisy at stock speeds.
Weve seen good results when overclocking GK110 parts,
and the GTX Titan Black is no exception. We managed a 25
per cent core increase, reaching a base clock of 1,119MHz,
giving us a boost clock of 1,210MHz. The card sustained this
frequency without issue, even peaking occasionally at
1,262MHz. We also pushed the memory to 7.4GHz
(effective). When overclocked, power consumption is higher,

and the card becomes noisier. We saw healthy gains in each

of the benchmarks though - up to 18 per cent in Battlefield 4.

Conclusion
For games, the Titan Black offers nothing over a GTX 780 Ti.
Instead, it targets professional graphics users Nvidia says
only around half the original Titans sold were used for
games. A cheaper, pre-overclocked and custom-cooled
GTX 780 Ti will outperform the Titan Black in games too.
MATTHEW LAMBERT

BATTLE FIE LD 4

CRYSIS 3

2,560 x 1,440, Ultra Detail, 4x AA

2,560 x 1,440, Very High detail, 0x AA

44 fps 54 fps
GeForce GTX Titan Black

43 fps

GeForce GTX 780 Ti

64 fps

54 fps

40 fps
0

16

64

5,760 x 1,080, Ultra Detail, 4x AA

36 fps 43 fps
0

13.5

27

40.5

54

5,760 x 1,080, Very High detail, 0x AA

GeForce GTX Titan Black

26 fps

GeForce GTX 780 Ti

26 fps

34 fps

31 fps

18

24 fps 28 fps

GeForce GTX 780 Ti

24 fps 28 fps

Radeon R9 290X (Uber)

25 fps 30 fps

GeForce GTX Titan

23 fps 27 fps

GeForce GTX Titan

27

36

29 fps

24 fps

GeForce GTX Titan Black

33 fps

25 fps

Radeon R9 290X (Uber)

36 fps 43 fps

Radeon R9 290X (Uber)

48

53 fps

38 fps 46 fps

GeForce GTX Titan

48 fps

32

42 fps

GeForce GTX Titan Black

GeForce GTX 780 Ti

40 fps 49 fps

GeForce GTX Titan

Radeon R9 290X (Uber)

39 fps 47 fps

GeForce GTX Titan Black

52 fps

7.5

15

22.5

30

3,840 x 2,160, Ultra Detail, 0x AA

28 fps

Radeon R9 290X (Uber)

3,840 x 2,160, Very High detail, 0x AA

36 fps

GeForce GTX Titan Black

25 fps

39 fps

GeForce GTX 780 Ti

25 fps

39 fps

23 fps

GeForce GTX Titan

0

10

35 fps

20

30

22 fps

18 fps

22 fps

Radeon R9 290X (Uber)

17 fps

GeForce GTX Titan

17 fps

0
Stock speed min

2,560 x 1,440, Ultra Detail with Depth of Field

Stock speed avg

22 fps
21 fps

12

18

Overclocked min

24

Overclocked avg

69 fps 81 fps

GeForce GTX Titan Black

68 fps 79 fps

GeForce GTX 780 Ti

UNIGINE VAL L EY
2,560 x 1,440, Ultra Detail, 0xAA

61 fps 72 fps

GeForce GTX Titan

56 fps

Radeon R9 290X (Uber)

0

21

42

84

5,760 x 1,080, Ultra Detail with Depth of Field

40 fps
38 fps

GeForce GTX 780 Ti

48 fps
47 fps

28 fps

Radeon R9 290X (Uber)

0

12

36

35 fps 41 fps
34 fps 40 fps

GeForce GTX 780 Ti

30 fps 36 fps

GeForce GTX Titan

27 fps

Radeon R9 290X (Uber)

0

10.5

Stock speed avg

SPEED

21
Overclocked min

FEATURES

VALUE

19/20

15/40

30 fps

31.5

2,766
2,378
900

1,800

2,700

3,600

TOTAL SYSTEM POWER DRAW

48

3,840 x 2,160, Ultra Detail with Depth of Field, AA off

GeForce GTX Titan Black

2,947

36 fps

24

3,484

Nvidia GeForce
GTX 780 Ti
Nvidia GeForce
GTX Titan
AMD Radeon
R9 290X (Uber)

36 fps 43 fps

GeForce GTX Titan

3,000

Zotac GeForce
GTX Titan Black

62 fps

63

GeForce GTX Titan Black

39/40

18 fps

GeForce GTX 780 Ti

40

BIOSHOCK INFINITE

Stock speed min

GeForce GTX Titan Black

108W
Nvidia GeForce
GTX Titan 53 fps
Nvidia GeForce
GTX 780 Ti
Zotac GeForce
GTX Titan Black
AMD Radeon
R9 290X (Uber)

OVERALL SCORE

73%

380W

106W

384W

114W
105
Idle

Overclocked avg

410W

111W

42

378W

Load

409W
210
Overclocked

315

420

Lower is better

VERDICT
Its interesting to see Nvidia develop the Titan
brand, but for the best gaming performance,
you should save yourself 250 and get a GTX
780 Ti instead.

23

R E V I E WS / NEW KIT

C P U CO O L E R

Deepcool Gamer Storm Lucifer/29

inc VAT

Proves theres still room for giant air coolers

LGA115X AND
LGA2011

SUPPLIER www.overclockers.co.uk

espite the CPU cooler market becoming

dominated by all-in-one liquid coolers, theres still
plenty of room for large air coolers. Theyre often
quieter, and they dont need space in your fan mounts for
large radiators either. Deepcools Gamer Storm Lucifer
also has a ridiculously cheap asking price of just 29.
Measuring 168mm high, it isnt massively tall, but it also
measures 140mm wide and 136mm deep, making it as
large as many dual-fan coolers. The Lucifer is only supplied
with a single 140mm fan, but includes clips for another
spinner, and the green fan blades and nickel-coated
heatsink are quite attractive too.
It also sports an incredible tally of six
6mm heatpipes, which are squeezed
into a non-direct contact baseplate.
Meanwhile, the heatsink fins are fairly
well-spaced, so the single 140mm fan
wont struggle to push air through them;
however, as usual, dealing with the fan
clips is a tedious affair.
Theres a plethora of mounting parts,
but thankfully, they all fit together in a logical order. A large
universal backplate is held in place by pins on the CPU
socket side of the motherboard, which then allow two
mounting plates to be secured on either side of the CPU.
A single plate then straddles the huge heatsink, with
sprung screws securing to the mounting plates on the
motherboard. Installation went well until the last step, but
securing the sprung screws to the mounting plates was
enough to try anyones patience, and youll need an
extremely long screwdriver too. Installation wasnt much
easier with LGA2011 either, as you use the same brackets.
Thankfully, your efforts will be rewarded. The Lucifer
cooled our CPU to a delta T of 44C, just 4C warmer than
Corsairs H75, in our LGA1155 test system. It was remarkably
quiet too, with its 140mm fan only just audible outside the
case when running at 12V. Switching to PWM mode saw the
delta T rise 2C, but it became even quieter. In our LGA2011
test system, the delta T of 48C was also excellent for an air
cooler, proving to be just 1C warmer than Corsairs H75 and
12 cooler than the Thermalright True Spirit 120M, while the
delta T rose to 49C in PWM mode.

/SPECIFICATIONS
Compatibility Intel: LGA775, LGA115x,
LGA1366, LGA2011; AMD: Socket
AM3+, AM3, AM2+, AM2, FM2+,
FM2, FM1
Size (mm) 140 x 136 x 168 (W x D x H)
Weight 1,079g
Fans 1 x 140mm
Stated noise 17.8 31.1 dB(A)

Conclusion
Deepcools Gamer Storm Lucifer can be
tricky to fit, but it offers very competitive
cooling and quiet operation for the
money. At this price, its over 30
cheaper than Corsairs H7, and also
makes air-cooling an overclocked
LGA2011 chip for under 30 a possibility.
ANTONY LEATHER

24

INTEL LGA1155
Deepcool Gamer
Storm Lucifer
Thermalright
True Spirit 120M
Arctic Freezer i30

44C
44C
50C
40C

Corsair Hydro H75

0

13

26

39
52
Lower is better

INTEL LGA2011
Deepcool Gamer
Storm Lucifer
Thermalright
True Spirit 120M
Arctic Freezer i30

48C
60C
55C
47C

Corsair Hydro H75

0

15

30

45
60
Lower is better

LG A 1 1 5 x
COOLING

DESIGN

85%

DESIGN

OVERALL SCORE

24/30

28/30

MEDIUM

VALUE

OVERALL SCORE

FITTING

33/40
LG A 2 0 1 1
COOLING

33/40

24/30

28/30

MEDIUM

VALUE

VERDICT

FITTING

85%

The Deepcool Gamer Storm Lucifer is tricky to install, but

its quiet, affordable and can cope remarkably well with
LGA2011 cooling.

G/$1  :L)L

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R E V I E WS / NEW KIT

LG A 1 1 5 0 M OT H E R B OA R D

Gigabyte GA-Z87-HD3/80

inc VAT

Can an 80 motherboard keep up with the big guns?

SUPPLIER www.ccloline.com

ome of the best motherboards

that have been through the
Custom PC lab over the years
have been budget models with a degree
of overclocking prowess. After all,
overclocking doesnt necessarily require
spending huge amounts of money;
sometimes its about boosting your PCs
performance for as little money as possible. With many of
our current favourite LGA1150 motherboards retailing for
well over 100, Gigabyte has aimed a little lower with its
GA-Z87-HD3, which retails for just 80.
However, it certainly doesnt look like your average
budget offering; theres no stark blue PCB and the VRMs
even sport a large heatsink, rather
than being left to fend for themselves.
We have no complaints about the
layout either. The 24-pin ATX, 8-pin
EPS12V and USB 3 headers are all
located right on the edge of the PCB,
while the six SATA 6Gbps ports are
tucked away in the lower right corner.
Sadly, there are only four fan
headers, and none of them is on the
lower half of the PCB, but theyre all
3-pin or 4-pin compatible. On-board overclocking tools are
pretty much non-existent too; theres no on-board power
or reset buttons and only a CMOS clear jumper to shout
about, but at this price we cant complain. The overall
layout, therefore, is aided to some degree by the sparsely
populated PCB, but we still have to compliment Gigabyte
on a tidy arrangement. Our only criticism is that if you decide
on a CrossFire setup (SLI isnt supported), youll lose access
to the two 1x PCI-E slots, which are located between the two
16x PCI-E graphics slots.
The lower 16x PCI-E slot is also
limited
to 4x speed, so make sure
/SPECIFICATIONS
your single graphics card finds its way
Chipset Intel Z87
to the top one. However, there are a
CPU Socket Intel LGA1150
couple of PCI slots at the bottom of
Memory support 4 slots: max 32GB
DDR3 (up to 3,000MHz)
the GA-Z87-HD3, so you wont be
Expansion slots Two 16x PCI-E 3, two
entirely stuck if you need to add a
1x PCI-E, two PCI
sound card, or if you want to carry
Sound Realtek ALC892 8-channel
some kit over from an older build.
Networking 1 x Gigabit LAN
Speaking of audio, theres no lavish
Overclocking Base clock 80 266MHz,
noise-isolated sound card, such as
CPU Multiplier 8 - 80; max voltages,
the ones with Gigabytes Sniper range
CPU 1.8V, RAM 2.1V
of motherboards just a standard
Ports 6 x SATA 6Gbps, 6 x USB 2
(Z87),6 x USB 3 (Z87) 1 x LAN, 4 x
Realtek ALC892 8-channel on-board
surround audio out, line in, mic, S/PDIF
audio codec.
out, HDMI, VGA, DVI
Meanwhile, all the six SATA 6Gbps
Dimensions (mm) 305 x 225
ports are controlled by the Intel Z87

Theres no stark
blue PCB, and the
VRMs even sport
a large heatsink

26

chipset, so they should be speedy. In addition to the

on-board USB 3 header, there are also four USB 3 ports
on the rear I/O panel, along with two USB 2 ports. As far as
display outputs go, the only one missing is DisplayPort, with
VGA, DVI and HDMI all present. Theres a single Gigabit LAN
port too, and six audio ports, although the low price again
manifests itself with the lack of a digital audio output.

Performance
In our Media Benchmarks, there was little to distinguish the
GA-Z87-HD3 from more expensive motherboards. Its
image editing score of 2,072 was on par with MSIs Z87-G45
Gaming, which scored 2,081, and its video encoding score
was only a little off the pace at 3,596 compared to 3,661 for
the MSI board. However, you can also say the same for MSIs
similarly cheap Z87-G43. Thanks to an equally competitive
multi-tasking score, the overall score of 2,437 was less than
30 points behind the Z87-G45 Gaming, although the topscoring Asus Maximus VI Formula managed a lofty 2,535. It
lost little in terms of SATA 6Gbps speed either, with its read
speed of 537MB/sec and write speed of 508MB/sec being
a little slower than the top-scoring motherboards, but far
from the slowest weve seen.
The GA-Z87-HD3s EFI can be a little busy, confusing and
laggy, especially with a mouse it certainly isnt as slick as
the EFI systems found on MSI boards. However, the ability to
customise the view with settings you use most frequently is
handy, and all the tweaks youll need are well laid out, if a
little cluttered at times. We set the absolute voltage to our
usual 1.27V, but sadly, the GA-Z87-HD3 wasnt able to
handle our Intel Core i7-4770K at 4.7GHz here.
There was a little thermal headroom available, so we
bumped up the vcore to 1.272 and increased the loadline
calibration to its high setting. This still didnt get an entirely
stable system, so we had to drop down to 4.6GHz and keep
the voltage at 1.27V. This was 100MHz lower than the MSI
Z87-G45 Gamings top speed, but the same as the top

4.6GHz speed we saw with MSIs similarly priced Z87-G43.

Overclocking saw the image editing score climb from
2,072 to 2,445 and the video encoding score rocket from
3,596 to 4,341 with an overall score of 2,850. This put it just
26 points behind the MSI Z87-G45 Gaming, and 84 points
ahead of the MSI Z87-G3, despite having an identical clock
speed. There were a few frames per second lost in the
minimum frame rates in our game tests, though, with 102fps
in Skyrim being 3fps slower than the MSI Z87-G45 Gaming
and 5fps off the fastest result, although the GA-Z87-HD3
was just 1fps slower in Shogun 2.

Conclusion
Gigabytes GA-Z87-HD3 offers all the essentials, including
half-decent overclocking, a tidy layout and fast
performance. Its EFI could do with being less busy, but

once you find your way around, youll be pushing your CPU
close to its limits in no time. However, it has a very close
competitor in the form of MSIs Z87-G43, which costs a
similar amount of money. Both boards managed the
same overclock, and both also omit SLI support and an
S/PDIF output.
This makes it a close judgement call between the two
boards the MSI is slightly quicker at stock speed, while the
Gigabyte is generally quicker when overclocked. However,
the MSIs slightly superior EFI system, and its slot layout,
with one PCI-E 1x slot positioned above the top graphics
card slot so you can still use it with two graphics cards
installed, just gives it the edge. Its very close, though, and
if you cant find the MSI board, you certainly wont be
disappointed with the Gigabyte Z87-HD3 either.
ANTONY LEATHER

T HE E L DE R S C R O L L S : S K Y R I M

G IM P IM A G E E D IT I N G

1,920 x 1,080, 16x AF, 0x AA

2,072 2,445

Gigabyte GA-Z87-HD3

91 fps

2,081 2,498

MSI Z87-G45 Gaming

Gigabyte GA-Z87-HD3

2,047 2,420

MSI Z87-G43
0

700

1,400

2,100

2,800

3,596

MSI Z87-G45 Gaming

4,341

3,693 4,161

MSI Z87-G43
0

1,100

2,200

3,300

4,400

107 fps

Gigabyte GA-Z87-HD3

1,644 1,763

MSI Z87-G45 Gaming

1,647 1,763

MSI Z87-G43

1,668 1,717

450

900

1,350

1,800

2,437 2,850

MSI Z87-G45 Gaming

2,463 2,876
2,469 2,766

MSI Z87-G43
0

40

80

750
Stock speed

1,500

2,250

3,000

Overclocked

3.5GHz Intel Core i7-4770K, 16GB Corsair Vengeance Pro

DDR3 1,866MHz DDR3 memory, 128GB OCZ Vector SSD,
Corsair Pro Series Gold HX750 PSU, Windows 7 64-bit

120

160

DX9 CPU Test

28 fps

35 fps 42 fps
29 fps 35 fps

MSI Z87-G43

33 fps
0

SPEED

41/45

42 fps

28 fps 35 fps

MSI Z87-G45 Gaming

Stock speed min

33 fps
34 fps

11

Stock speed avg

22

FEATURES

17/30

It might not offer the overclocking

tools and slick EFIs of more
expensive motherboards, but it
overclocks well and costs just 80.

41 fps

33

Overclocked min

VERDICT
/TEST KIT

147 fps

T OT A L W A R : S HO G U N 2

OVE R A LL
Gigabyte GA-Z87-HD3

150 fps
141 fps

104 fps

Gigabyte GA-Z87-HD3

M U LT I- T A S K IN G

141 fps

91 fps

MSI Z87-G43

3,661 4,367

MSI Z87-G45 Gaming

147 fps

91 fps

H A N D B R AK E H . 2 6 4 V I D E O E N C O D I N G
Gigabyte GA-Z87-HD3

140 fps

102 fps

44

Overclocked avg

VALUE

24/25
OVERALL SCORE

82%
27

R E V I E WS / NEW KIT

N A S B OX

Zyxel NSA325 v2/95

inc VAT

The NSA325 v2 is relatively cheap, but is it cheerful too?

SUPPLIER www.ebuyer.com

he NSA325v2 is Zyxels effort at making a full-fat

NAS box more affordable than the QNAP and
Synology boxes. It sports 512MB of DDR3
memory, a front USB 3 port and rear USB 2 ports, although it
only has a single-core 1.6GHz Marvell Kirkwood 88F6282
CPU, while many of the latest NAS boxes offer dual-core
CPUs. It also lacks the large 92mm fans common in
Synologys models, opting instead for a 70mm fan.
However, the two tool-free hard disk
bays offer anti-vibration mounts, as
well as support for both 3.5in and
2.5in hard disks.
The front end of the operating
system is simple but snazzy, using
large icons in place of the large menu
systems of high-end NAS boxes.
Youre presented with photo, music
and video servers, which enable you
to stream content directly within a
browser window.
Theyre fairly basic tools, but the
music server does allow you to create
playlists or filter your library by artist
while the photo server supports most
file types, including large TIFF files,
although it can take a few moments to
create thumbnails.
As a testament to its ease of use,
the Zyxel NSA325 v2 automatically
creates shared folders for each server,
which makes it simple to drag your
content over to the NAS and view
it from the browser within just a
few seconds.
Of course, cloud storage is a hot topic in the
NAS world at the moment. Zyxel, though, has
/SPECIFICATIONS
come up with a hybrid cloud feature that lets
Features FTP server,
you use current cloud services such as Dropbox
webserver, photo server,
video server, audio server,
to send files to your NAS.
independent download
You can even upload torrent files, so they
(FTP, HTTP. FTPS, SFTP, NZB
automatically start downloading on your NAS
news server, BitTorrent,
RSS), iTunes and UPnP
at the other end. You cant access your NAS this
media servers, DLNA,
way, though, as it automatically deletes the files
storage server for external
once theyre uploaded. For this job, Zyxel has
USB hard disks, Time
Backup, Polkast cloud
teamed up with third-party cloud service,
support
Polkast, which pretty much does the job,
Dimensions (mm) 207 x 164
although you cant stream files you can only
x 123 (W x D x H)
download them or view thumbnails, which is
Weight 1.26kg
a little limiting.
Drive bays 2 x 3.5in/2.5in
Speed-wise, the NSA325 v2 managed read
Ports Front: USB 3, Rear: 2 x
and write speeds of 72MB/sec and 53MB/sec
USB 2, Gigabit LAN
respectively when transferring large video files,

The hybrid cloud

feature lets you
use cloud services
such as Dropbox

28

falling to 26MB/sec and 17MB/sec when dealing with our

4GB test folder of photos and documents. These compare
favourably with our current favourite NAS box Synologys
DS213j, although the latter managed a much higher 96MB/
sec read speed with large files.
Sadly, however, its main issue is the small 70mm fan,
which made a constant low-level clamour that, while not
horrendously noisy, was still quite intrusive.

Conclusion
As a basic NAS with a modicum of network media-sharing
abilities, the Zyxel NSA325 v2 does its job well, and the
Dropbox integration makes transferring files to it from other
devices easy wherever you are.
However, the whole operating system and many of the
features lack the finesse of Synologys DS213j, which is
easier to use and more flexible. You pay 60 more for the
privilege, but its worth it.
ANTONY LEATHER

SPEED

31/35
OVERALL SCORE

79%

FEATURES

26/35

VALUE

22/30

VERDICT
The NSA325 v2 has a great price,
but lacks the ease of use and slick
OS of pricier products from
Synology and QNAP.

R E V I E WS / NEW KIT

GAMING MOUSE

Ozone Neon/50

inc VAT

A small, ambidextrous gaming mouse

SUPPLIER www.overclockers.co.uk

e havent seen a new mouse from Ozone in a little

while, but those weve seen in the past have been
plump, hand-filling beasts (see Issue 88, p79).
The Neon, then, is a departure, as its slim ambidextrous
frame certainly isnt what youd call hand-filling. In fact,
its one of the smallest gaming mice weve seen. Its an
interesting tack, which could potentially make the Neon
especially attractive to any gamers with smaller hands,
who are often neglected in the
gaming mouse world, as well as
left- handed folks.
In terms of shape, the Neons sleek,
humpback lines bear an alarmingly
stark similarity to SteelSeries range
of ambidextrous mice, most notably
the 60 Sensei and the 38 Kana
(see Issue 108, p66). This isnt
necessarily bad those mice have a
good shape but its also a style that
SteelSeries already does very well,
and the Ozone doesnt appear to
iterate on the design.
Also, the Neon was marginally less pleasing to use when
we tested it side by side with the Kana, primarily due to the
difference in size the Neon just feels a little insubstantial in
the hand. This doesnt mean its poorly made or flimsy (it
isnt), but it doesnt have a comforting size that youre
holding 50 worth of gaming peripheral in your hand.
Functionally, the Neon is certainly competent. The two
primary buttons have a satisfyingly crunchy action and the
scroll wheel, while a little on the small side, has firmly
defined stages to its roll; we didnt over or under
roll when switching between weapons in our
games testing.
/SPECIFICATIONS
As an ambidextrous mouse, the Neon also
Connection Wired, USB
boasts a pair of buttons on either side of its body,
Cable Braided
and these are positioned well. We didnt find
Material Plastic
ourselves clicking the buttons on the far side of the
Extras None
mouse with our ring finer or little finger by mistake.

The two primary

buttons have a
satisfyingly
crunchy action

30

It has on-the-fly resolution switching too as youd

expect and the Neon also has the benefit of a 6,400dpi
laser sensor over the Kanas optical sensor. However, dpi
settings above 4,000dpi require high levels of smallmovement control on the users part, rendering them
largely useless for the majority of gamers only snipers
with ridiculously sized mouse pads could possibly benefit.
Theres a downloadable software suite too, which is well
designed, if unremarkable. Sadly, though, theres little more
to say about the Neon, which is frustrating given its 50
price tag. It all smacks of a lack of ambition, which is
disappointing from a company we know can do better.

Conclusion
The Ozone Neon is a solid, well-built ambidextrous mouse,
with decent buttons. However, it lacks the satisfying size in
your hand that youd expect from a 50 mouse, and its basic
physical design doesnt offer anything new or unique over
established ambidextrous mice, such as the SteelSeries
Kana. If you have smaller than average hands, and find
other ambidextrous mice too big, then the Neon is a good
gaming mouse, but its small size will limit its appeal for
anyone else.
If youre in the market for an ambidextrous mouse, and
you arent bothered about the size, the SteelSeries Kana is
cheaper, better looking and just as good for most gamers.
PAUL GOODHEAD

DESIGN

35/40
OVERALL SCORE

73%

FEATURES

20/35

VALUE

15/25

VERDICT
A good ambidextrous mouse, but
it doesnt do enough to stand out
in the extremely competitive
peripherals market.

R E V I E WS / NEW KIT

How we test
Thorough testing and research is the key to evaluating whether a product
is worth buying, and deciding whether or not theres a better alternative

PROCESSORS
We judge CPUs on whether they offer sufficient speed for the price. Part of a CPUs speed score comes from how
overclockable it is. Every type of CPU is tested in the same PC, so all results are directly comparable.

INTEL LGA2011

INTEL LGA1150

+
Intel
LGA1150
CPU

Intel
DZ87KLT-75K

16GB Corsair
Vengeance Pro Silver
1,600MHz DDR3

120GB
OCZ Vector

Intel
LGA2011
CPU

+
Asus
X79-Deluxe

16GB Corsair
Vengeance Pro
1,866MHz DDR3

250GB
Samsung SSD
840 EVO

COMMON
COMPONENTS

AMD FM2+

+
AMD FM2+
APU

+
Gigabyte G1 Sniper
A88X

16GB Corsair Dominator

Platinum 2,133MHz DDR3
(GPU testing)

+
8GB G.Skill RipjawsX
1,600MHz DDR3
(CPU testing)

+
256GB Plextor
M5 Pro

Nvidia GeForce
GTX 680 2GB

Windows 7
64-bit

TESTS: We use the Custom PC Media Benchmarks, Cinebench R11.5 and a variety of games. We also test the resultant power draw of the
test PC with the CPU installed. These tests reveal a broad range of performance characteristics for the CPU, from image editing to gaming
and video encoding to 3D rendering. We run all the tests with the CPU at stock speed and again when overclocked to its highest frequency.
*Please note: We test AMD FM2+ APUs using the on-board graphics, not the Nvidia GeForce GTX 680 2GB 3GB

GRAPHICS CARDS
Graphics cards are mainly evaluated on how fast they are for their price. However, we also consider the efficacy and
quietness of the cooler. Every graphics card is tested in the same PC, so all results are directly comparable.

4.2GHz Intel Core

i5-3570K

32

8GB Corsair Dominator

2,400MHz DDR3

Asus Maximus V
Extreme

Windows 7
64-bit SP1

= SCORES

The graphics card

were reviewing

CUSTOM PC MEDIA BENCHMARKS

+
2.66GHz Intel Core 2
Duo E6750

+
2GB of Corsair 1,066MHz
DDR2

+
250GB Samsung
SpinPoint P120S

= 1,000
Asus P5K Deluxe WiFi-AP

MOTHERBOARDS
Motherboards are evaluated on everything from layout and features to overclockability
and value for money. Every motherboard is tested with the same components, so all
results are directly comparable.

INTEL LGA1150

Motherboard
16GB Corsair
Intel
120GB
on test Vengeance Pro Silver OCZ
Core
1,600MHz DDR3
i7-4770K
Vector

INTEL LGA2011

+
Intel Core
i7-4960X

+
AMD
A10-6800K

Motherboard
16GB Corsair
on test
Vengeance Pro Silver
2,133MHz DDR3

COMMON COMPONENTS

Motherboard 16GB Corsair Vengeance

Pro 1,866MHz
on test

+
Nvidia GeForce
GTX 680 2GB*

The
Awards
EXTREME
ULTRA

AMD FM2+

Our benchmark suite

simulates how people
really use PCs, and a
higher score is better.
You can download the
suite from www.tinyurl.
com/benchies

Windows 7
64-bit

TESTS: We use the Custom PC Media Benchmarks and several games, and also test the speeds of
the boards SATA ports. We try to overclock every motherboard we review by testing for a maximum
QPI, base clock or HTT as well as overclocking the CPU to its maximum air-cooled level. We run our
tests at stock speed and with the CPU overclocked.
*Please note: We test AMD FM2 motherboards using the on-board graphics, not the Nvidia GeForce GTX 680 2GB 3GB

Some products are

gloriously over the
top. These items of
excellent overkill
earn our Extreme
Ultra award.

PREMIUM
GRADE
Premium Grade
products are
utterly desirable
wed eat nothing
but beans until we
could afford them.

PROFESSIONAL
Products worthy of
the Professional
award make you
and your business
appear even more
awesome.

APPROVED
Approved products
are those that do a
great job for the
money; theyre the
canny purchase for
a great PC.

CUSTOM KIT
TESTS: By using the fast PC detailed on the left, we can be sure that any limitations are due to the
graphics card on test. We test the four games (above) at their maximum detail settings, in their highest
DirectX mode, at several resolutions. High-end cards should be able to sustain playable frame rates at
2,560 x 1,440, while 1,920 x 1,080 is more important for mid-range cards; we also now test at 5,760 x
1,080 for three-screen setups, and 3,840 x 2,160 for 4K monitors. We also try to overclock every
graphics card we test to assess the performance impact.

For those gadgets

and gizmos that
really impress us,
or that we cant
live without,
theres the Custom
Kit award.

33

R E V I E WS / NEW KIT

Custom Kit
Paul Goodhead checks out the latest gadgets, gizmos and geek toys

U S B ST I C K

Kingston 16GB
DataTraveler
Locker+ G3 / 13

L A P TO P B AG

Booq Boa Nerve Graphite /132

inc VAT

Okay, so 132 is an eye-watering amount of money for a bag, but the Graphite is
certainly built to last; its construction oozes quality every which way you look at it.
Designed to be worn courier-style (high on the back), it can take a laptop with a 15in
screen in its strengthened, fleece-lined laptop pocket, and theres a dizzy array of extra
pockets and pouches for extra nick-nacks and gadgets. It also sports Booqs barcodebased Terrlinq system, meaning the bag can be identified, and returned to you should
you lose it. The only downside is the daft magnetic buckle on the strap, which simply
doesnt work properly, as the catch is too shallow, meaning it comes unclipped at even
the merest touch. Its a shame, as it mars an otherwise excellent (if pricey) bag.
LEAD
GRAPHITE
SUPPLIER www.colorconfidence.com

Remember when USB sticks were more than

cheap, disposable plastic objects? We do, and
thats why the Kingston G3s all-metal case
makes it a lovely item to hold and use. It actually
feels like a device youd mourn if you misplaced it.
Thankfully, the G3 features built-in passwordprotected hardware encryption, so your files are
still secure if you lose the drive. Ten unsuccessful
password attempts results in formatting the drive,
and you can handily add contact details to the
password entry screen to aid any good Samaritan
trying to return the drive.
Read and write speeds of 93MB/sec and
53MB/sec respectively are good, rather than
stellar, for a USB 3 drive, but for 13 its a well-built
and secure storage stick.
LOCK UP
LOCK IN
SUPPLIER www.dabs.com

SMART KEY FOB

Elgato Smart Key / 32

inc VAT

Approximately the size of a casino chip, the Smart Key syncs to an iOS device via Bluetooth, and alerts
you when youve strayed from the valuable item to which its attached. It worked reliably during our
testing, pinging our phone when the connection broke, although it isnt instant, as the phone checks
a couple of times to make sure the interruption is genuine.
Handily, the dedicated app provides a map of where the connection was lost. However,
without a data or GPS connection of its own, youre unable able to track your valuables if
someone else moves them. On the downside, 32 is a lot for such a
simple device, and constant use of Bluetooth will impact on
your battery life too, but it will be worth it if it prevents you
from losing your keys or bag even once.
STUPID
SMART
SUPPLIER www.morecomputers.com

36

inc VAT

MUG

Robocup /12.99

inc VAT

Half man, half mug, Robocup has three prime

directives: to uphold the law, protect the
innocent and serve the public tea.
Made from suitably hefty ceramic, Robocup
holds a larger than average brew, meaning hell
keep your thirst at bay longer than a normal,
unmodified cup. Hes sturdy too, so he can
shrug off the worst that a dishwasher or
microwave can throw at him.
At 13, we cant help thinking that youre
paying a hefty royalty to someone,
somewhere, but if youre a diehard fan of the
film this is easily overlooked. This is the future
of tea drinking youre holding in your hand, after
all. Dead or alive, youre drinking tea.
ED BALLS
ED209
SUPPLIER www.firebox.com

B LU E TO OT H S P E A K E R

Icy Box IC-SP001-BT/ 42

STEREO SPEAKERS
inc VAT

Microlab H50BT / 87

inc VAT

The SP001 is Icy Boxs first stab at a Bluetooth speaker, and it bears
an uncanny resemblance to a boules ball. The effect is enhanced by
the heavy, chrome-finished metal chassis, which lends the SP001 a
well-built feel, albeit at the cost of portability; the SP001 is better
suited to staying at home than being out and about. At the mid to
high volumes at which youre most likely to be using the speaker, it
was more than comfortable filling a medium sized room, with little
distortion and a pleasant, balanced sound profile. However,
performance tailed off at lower volumes, possibly because the
speaker needs a fair amount of volume to drive it, with the audio
losing bass. This is an easily overlooked flaw, though, especially for
the comparatively cheap price and being able to lose speaker cables.
MARBLES
BOULES

The term Bluetooth speaker is synonymous with travel audio, but

Bluetooth can be a convenient way to link home audio systems too,
as proved by the Microlab H50BT speakers. They even support NFC,
making setup childs play wave an NFC device above the speakers
and it pairs within seconds. Audio buffs may scoff at the notion of
Bluetooth audio in the home, but we enjoyed our time testing the
H50BT, which produced a nuanced, balanced output, with plenty of
satisfyingly rich bass once wed set them up correctly. Our only
criticism was the sets lack of raw volume; we expect more oomph
from a 80W set. At 87, theyre not really an impulse purchase either,
but if you want wireless audio thats easy to set up, these look
good and work well.
MUMBLERS
SPEAKERS

SUPPLIER www.scan.co.uk

SUPPLIER www.ebuyer.com

Seen something worthy of appearing in Custom Kit? Send your suggestions to

[email protected]

37

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LABS TEST

Solid state
showdown
A solid state drive is one of the best upgrades you can give your PC.
Weve tested 23 of them to discover which ones deserve your cash
irtually every PC should have a solid state drive, as they
make a huge difference to your computing experience.
With no moving parts, the data throughput of NAND is
leagues ahead of the fastest hard drives. System boot times, game
and software loading times, as well as general responsiveness, all
receive a dramatic upgrade as a result. SSDs also draw less power,
produce less heat, and are silent and much smaller too.
The downside, of course, is cost mechanical disks are cheaper
per gigabyte than SSDs, and are thus still the better choice for highcapacity storage. That said, price as a barrier to entry continues to
peel away, as some drives are now dipping below 40p per gigabyte.

How we test / p41

Crucial M500 240GB / p42
Crucial M500 480GB / p 42
Crucial M500 960GB / p42
OCZ Vertex 460 240GB / p43
OCZ Vector 150 240GB / p43
OCZ Vector 150 480GB / p43
Intel SSD 530 Series 240GB / p44
Transcend SSD340 256GB / p44

Almost any modern SSD will be a significant upgrade from a

hard disk, but that doesnt mean you should rush out and buy the
cheapest one. There are numerous other factors to consider. NAND
flash comes in different flavours, and the wide array of controller
types confuses matters further, especially if youre an early adopter
looking to upgrade to a superior model. Thankfully, weve rounded
up 23 of the latest SSDs, ranging in capacity from 240GB to a
whopping 1TB, with a number of different controllers too.
Thanks go to CCL (www.cclonline.com) and Scan (www.scan.co.
uk) for supplying us with a healthy selection of the SSDs on test.
MATTHEW LAMBERT AND MIKE JENNINGS

PNY XLR8 SSD 240GB / p45

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB / p45
Plextor M5 Pro 256GB / p48
Plextor M5 Pro 512GB / p48
SanDisk Extreme II 480GB / p48
SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB / p50
SanDisk X110 250GB / p50
Samsung SSD 840 Evo 250GB / p52
Samsung SSD 840 Evo 500GB / p52

Samsung SSD 840 Evo 1TB / p52

Samsung SSD 840 Pro 256GB / p53
Samsung SSD 840 Pro 512GB / p53
Toshiba Q Series 256GB / p54
Toshiba Q Series 512GB / p54
Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB / p54
Graphs / p56

How we test
ur battery of SSD tests comprises
synthetic benchmarks, PCMark 7s
trace-based storage benchmark, a
boot time measurement and Iometers I/O
workload generator.
Prior to testing, we issue an ATA Secure
Erase command to each drive with the
Parted Magic (www.partedmagic.com)
Linux build. This tells the controller to
release all stored electrons within every
NAND module, erasing all data and resetting
the SSD to factory performance.
For synthetic tests, we use AS SSD
(http://tinyurl.com/ASSSDCPC) and
CrystalDiskMark (http://tinyurl.com/
CPCCDM). With these free benchmarks,
you can easily compare your own PCs
storage performance with that of the drives
on test. Both benchmarks perform a
theoretical test of a drives sequential read
and write performance, as well as its 4KB
random read and write performance, both at
single and high queue-depths (64-queuedepth in AS SSD, and 32-queue-depth in
CrystalDiskMark). Queue depth refers to
the number of pending I/O operations for a
volume of storage demanding software
uses greater queue depths.
While the two tests are similar, they
use slightly different data patterns, so
performance between them can vary.
AS SSD automatically performs multiple
runs and reports the average, while with
CrystalDiskMark, we use the 1,000MB file
size set to five runs, with the average again
reported. Sadly, though, SSD performance
isnt static and can degrade as the NAND
cells are filled. Nowadays, widespread TRIM
support helps to minimise this issue, but
nevertheless, we perform a full fill of each
drive, delete the data and then retest it in AS
SSD to ensure performance is maintained.
For real-world testing, we use PCMark 7s
Secondary Storage benchmark, which
loops three times and reports an average. It
uses recorded SATA traces (the exact traffic
over the SATA bus at the time of recording)
to simulate performance under a wide
range of circumstances. Were most
interested in the application and gaming
tests, as these will have the most
pronounced impact on everyday use. We
take the raw performance results from
each, which eliminate trace idle times and

make differences between drive

performance more obvious. The AS SSD,
CrystalDiskMark and PCMark 7 tests are
performed on an Asus Maximus V
Extremes SATA 6Gbps ports, using an
Intel Core i5-3570K and 8GB of 2,400MHz
Corsair Dominator RAM.
We also test how long each drive takes to
boot a clean installation of Windows 7 64-bit
using the freely available BootRacer (www.
greatis.com/bootracer), which measures
boot times down to a thousandth of a
second. This test is conducted using a SATA
6Gbps port on an Asus Maximus V Formula
using an Intel Core i7-2600K and 4GB of
1,600MHz Crucial Ballistix DDR3 RAM. The
system also uses an AMD Radeon HD 5870
graphics card. We install the 13.12 Catalyst
drivers and reboot the system five times to

allow Windows to get its caching in order,

before taking the average of the five
subsequent boot times.
Our final test uses Iometer (http://tinyurl.
com/CPCIometer) to generate four
64-queue-depth workload patterns
(Database, File Server, Workstation and Web
Server), simulating heavy use with different
file sizes and write to read ratios. We run
each test for five minutes using fully random
data, which is easily enough to stress test a
modern SSD controller. The number
reported is the average IOPS (input/output
operations per second) of all four tests.
This test is performed on the drives as raw,
unformatted volumes, using a SATA 6Gbps
port on an Asus P9X79 Pro with an Intel
Core i7-3960X and 16GB of 1,600MHz G.
Skill RipjawsX RAM.

THE SCORES
The speed score is taken from a weighted breakdown of the performance tests. AS
SSD and CrystalDiskMark account for 25 per cent each, while 40 per cent is allocated
to the PCMark 7 and BootRacer real-world tests, which are the most relevant for
everyday use. The final 10 per cent comes from Iometer, as the sustained high
queue-depth workloads are only applicable to the most hardcore users. The cost per
gigabyte is based on the pricing at the time of writing over the accessible formatted
capacity, while the bang per buck score is a ratio of the speed and cost per gigabyte.

41

L A B S T E S T / SOLID STATE DRIVES

Crucial M500 240GB, 480GB and 960GB

Some of the lowest costs per gigabyte on test

Crucial M500 240GB/106 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.scan.co.uk

Crucial M500 480GB/195 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.amazon.co.uk

Crucial M500 960GB/337 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.amazon.co.uk

rucials M500 drives are handled by

Marvells 88SS9187 controller, for
which Crucial develops its own
firmware, while IMFT 128Gb (16GB) 20nm
MLC NAND dies are used throughout.
The controller is connected to 16 NAND
packages in each drive (one 128Gb die per
package for the 240GB, two for the 480GB
and four for the 960GB). Such high-density
NAND keeps down productions costs; the
960GB works out at an incredible 38p per
gigabyte, while the others are below the 50p
mark. Only Samsungs SSD 840 EVO 1TB and
Transcends cheap and cheerful SSD340
manage the same feat.
The M500s DDR3 cache scales with
capacity, from 256MB in the 240GB model to
512MB in the 480GB drive and 1GB for the
960GB model. Its used mainly for page
mapping, if theres a power failure, a series of
capacitors allows any user data in the cache to
be quickly flushed to permanent storage.
The M500 is also compatible with the TGC
Opal 2.0 and IEEE-1667 specs, enabling
hardware-accelerated encryption such as
that in BitLocker. This is more secure than
ATA password encryption and has a smaller
overhead than software encryption. Finally,
RAIN (Redundant Array of Independent
NAND) sets aside the extra inaccessible area
of the NAND for data redundancy, providing
some protection against NAND cell failures.
Sequential read speeds are comparatively
low, capping out at 500MB/sec and leaving
the drives at or near the bottom of the charts

CRUCIAL M500 240GB

SPEED

/GB

38/50 18/20
BANG/BUCK

23/30
42

OVERALL SCORE

79%

in both tests. Write speeds dont fare much

better, but the two larger-capacity models
have a clear advantage, hitting around
430MB/sec in AS SSD and 15MB/sec more
in CrystalDiskMark, while the 240GB drive is
limited to sub-300MB/sec speeds and
comes last in CrystalDiskMark. This limit is
due to the controller only being populated
with two NAND dies per channel.
Single-queue-depth random speeds are
essentially identical throughout the range.
With a maximum read speed of 28.7MB/sec
in CrystalDiskMark, the drives are relatively

The drives struggle in real-world tests,

although theyre bunched tightly together in
PCMark 7. In the Starting Applications test,
theyre particularly low in the charts, failing to
break the 90MB/sec bar. Booting Windows
favours smaller capacities the 240GB has a
respectable 12.03-second boot speed, but the
960GB takes 14.4 seconds to boot. Iometer
speed is also respectable. The higher
capacities are better here, but even the
240GB model averages 34,975 IOPS higher
than the Samsung SSD 840 Pro 256GB, but
not as good as the Plextor drives.

Conclusion

128Gb 20nm MLC

NAND dies are used
throughout
poor performers here, but they have excellent
write performance. The peak of 125.4MB/sec
loses only to OCZs Barefoot 3 drives.
Again, theres little separating the three
drives with high queue-depth read speeds,
although the other Marvel 9187 SSDs
outperform them. As for writes, the highercapacity drives hit around 300MB/sec in AS
SSD and 340MB/sec in CrystalDiskMark,
leaving them mid-league, while the 240GB
model comes in rather lower, with write and
read speeds of 238.9MB/sec and 276.3MB/
sec respectively.

CRUCIAL M500 480GB

SPEED

/GB

40/50 18/20
BANG/BUCK

24/30

OVERALL SCORE

82%

At under 50p per gigabyte, the M500 drives

are the best value SSDs on test (the 960GB
model is even cheaper than the OCZ Vector
150 480GB). Performance throughout could
be better, and Samsungs victory here is clear.
Still, the 240GB drive is much better than the
cheaper Transcend one and would make an
excellent primary drive for a budget SSDbased system. Meanwhile, the 480GB and
960GB models would make great laptop
upgrades by bringing both speed and capacity
to a single 2.5in slot, and the encryption,
redundancy and power loss protection
features are added bonuses too. ML

VERDICT
Some nifty features and acceptable
performance, but the low cost per gigabyte
is the real highlight of the M500 series.

CRUCIAL M500 960GB

SPEED

/GB

39/50 19/20
BANG/BUCK

25/30

OVERALL SCORE

83%

OCZ Vector 150 240GB and 480GB,

and Vertex 460 240GB
OCZ pairs the Indilinx Barefoot 3 with Toshiba NAND

OCZ Vector 150 240GB/152 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.box.co.uk

OCZ Vector 150 480GB/377 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.cclonline.com

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB/140 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.dabs.com

CZs enthusiast-aimed Vector 150

and mainstream Vertex 460 drives,
despite their different target users,
use very similar hardware. The difference is
that the Vertex 460s Barefoot 3 controller is
clocked slightly lower. This controller is an
8-channel model that uses an ARM Cortex
core and an OCZ Aragon coprocessor.
Another difference is that the Toshiba 19nm
NAND modules in the Vector 150 series are
more heavily validated. As such, those drives
are rated for higher endurance five years
of 50GB/day host writes (even more than
Samsungs SSD 840 Pro), compared to three
years of 20GB/day on the Vertex 460. All of
the drives include a copy of Acronis True
Image HD.
Sadly, though, none is compatible with the
Opal 2.0 and IEEE-1667 specifications, so
hardware-accelerated encryption, such as
that in BitLocker, is off the cards.
Of the three drives, sequential read
performance is best on the Vector 150 240GB,
which hits 519.8MB/sec in AS SSD and
537.4MB/sec in CrystalDiskMark. This latter
benchmark sees more middling performance
from the other two drives, but sequential write
performance is more convincing. In both tests,
the trio is clustered closely together, with
speeds just below 500MB/sec in AS SSD
and around 520MB/sec in CrystalDiskMark
only Samsung drives ever overtake them in
either case.

O C Z V E C TO R 1 5 0 2 4 0 G B
SPEED

/GB

43/50 16/20
BANG/BUCK

21/30

OVERALL SCORE

80%

Single-queue-depth random reads are the

weakest aspect of the Barefoot controller.
While the 480GB Vector 150 manages to
maintain mid-league status with 29.6MB/sec
(AS SSD) and 32MB/sec (CrystalDiskMark),
the two others only manage speeds of
around 25MB/sec and 27MB/sec. By
comparison, Samsungs SSD 840 Evo
drives can hit over 40MB/sec in both tests.
Thankfully, single-queue-depth random
write speeds are simply outstanding. In both
AS SSD and CrystalDiskMark, the Barefoot 3
drives top the chart in these tests.
In the higher queue-depth tests, we again
see better write performance than read
speed, although read speeds still see some
dramatic improvements, with the 480GB
Vector 150 y having the best result of
381.2MB/sec in AS SSDs 64-queue-depth
read test. Samsungs SSD 840 Evo and SSD
840 Pro drives give the OCZ drives a run for
their money with high queue-depth writes,
but in both benchmarks, a Vector 150 drive
secures the top spot.
Despite five chart-topping synthetic figures
from the Vector 150s, though, real-world
performance is fairly mediocre. The three
OCZ drives are clustered around the middle of
PCMark 7s Starting Applications test all of
the Samsung, Toshiba and Plextor drives are
ahead. The Gaming test is the biggest
letdown, however. Even the Vector 150
480GB only manages 115.9MB/sec here,

O C Z V E C TO R 1 5 0 4 8 0 G B
SPEED

/GB

45/50 14/20
BANG/BUCK

19/30

OVERALL SCORE

78%

while the Vertex 460, with 112.6MB/sec, is

in second to last place. The Vector 150 drives
are also only average at best with Windows
booting, while the Vertex 460 is much better
with its 13-second boot time.
As a saving grace, all three drives come out
on top in the Iometer tests. The Barefoot 3
controller comes into its own under this
sustained battery of high queue-depth mixed
workloads, where even the down-clocked
Vertex 460 fends off all other competition.

Conclusion
The poor to average performance observed in
PCMark, BootRacer and single-queue-depth
random shows that these drives arent the
best choice for the majority of home users
and enthusiasts. Theyre also costly the
480GB Vector 150 has the joint highest cost
per GB at 84p, while even the 63p Vertex 460
240GB is above average. Nevertheless, the
excellent high queue-depth and mixed
workload performance makes the Vector
150 drives fine candidates for heavy-use
scenarios, such as workstations or file
servers, where the high endurance rating is
also worth the extra cost. ML

VERDICT
These drives have some outstanding
performance, but theyre less impressive in
the most critical areas for home users.

OCZ VERTEX 460 240GB

SPEED

/GB

42/50 16/20
BANG/BUCK

21/30

OVERALL SCORE

79%
43

L A B S T E S T / SOLID STATE DRIVES

Intel 530 240GB and Transcend SSD 340 256GB

These two drives lock and load an older SandForce controller

Intel 530 Series 240GB/155 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.scan.co.uk

Transcend 340 256GB/100 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.cclonline.com

andForce has spent years supplying

controllers to prominent SSD
manufacturers, with its SF-2281
chip leading the way, but its more recently
come under pressure from firms such as
Samsung, Toshiba and OCZ, who have
either developed their own controllers or
switched allegiances.
Intels 530 Series relies on the SF-2281
controller, although Intel has optimised its
firmware to eke out a little more performance
from SandForces venerable silicon. The 530
also sees Intel move from 25nm to 20nm
MLC NAND. These new Micron-made
flash chips are more efficient than their
predecessors, bringing this drive into line
with the NAND used by most of its rivals.
Its a good-looking 7mm drive, finished
with brushed metal, and with a shiny Intel
logo and a neat chip graphic in one corner.
Plus, Intel is generous with its box contents;
theres a 9.5mm spacer, a 3.5in adaptor, a
SATA cable and a Molex-to-SATA power
adaptor. The five-year warranty is
good too, matching the best of
the other drives on test.
Transcends drive makes use
of the SandForce SF-2281
controller too, and it has a slimmer
7mm form factor, so it will fit inside
tiny ultrabooks as well as desktop
PCs. Meanwhile, the three-year
warranty is a standard offering
that isnt as generous as the fiveyear deal provided by several of
this months drives. It also has the
honour of being the cheapest SSD
in this months Labs, at 100 the
next cheapest SSD, from Crucial,
is 6 more expensive.
However, while Intel might have
tweaked its controller and used new 20nm
NAND chips, neither of these modifications
helped the 530 perform well in our
benchmarks. In AS SSD, the 530 was always
in the bottom half of the results tables, and in
four of the six tests, it was in the bottom five

44

in the sequential write

benchmark, that meant
a result of 322MB/sec,
which is a long way
behind the Samsung 840
Evo 250GBs 503MB/sec.
Likewise, in AS SSDs 64-queue-depth
random read test, the Intel SSD managed
210MB/sec, compared to 347.2MB/sec from
the OCZ Vector 150 240GB.
The situation was similar in
CrystalDiskMark, where the only glimmer of
hope came in the 4KB random read and write
tests the 530 was towards the top in the
former benchmark, and mid-table in the
latter. The Intel drive returned mixed results
in real-world tests too. Its mid-table scores
in the two PCMark 7 benchmarks were
bolstered by one of the best boot times in the
Labs. However, its Iometer result of 26,989
was in the bottom half of the results table,
showing that you can get better drives for
more intensive storage workloads.

Transcends drive, reliant on the same

controller, fared no better. It was in the bottom
half of the results tables in every AS SSD and
CrystalDiskMark test, and its AS SSD
sequential write pace of 259.9MB/sec was
the worst on test almost half the speed of
the top drive. The Transcends performance
was underlined in real-world tests. It propped
up both PCMark 7 tables, had an average boot
time and sat towards the bottom of the
Iometer rankings too.

Conclusion
Both these drives struggle to compete in
terms of speed, and the Intel 530 is also
hamstrung by one of the most expensive
pound-per-gigabyte figures on test. And,
while Transcends drive offers superb value
at 42p per gigabyte, that doesnt justify its
benchmark results its just too slow
compared to good-value competition.
The Samsung 840 Pro 256GB is a better
mid-sized drive than both these products in
terms of speed and bang per buck, while the
Crucial M500 240GB is a better drive if youre
on a tight budget. SandForces SF-2281
controller is clearly now past its best. MJ

VERDICT
The SandForce SF-2281 controller is
now past its best you can get better
performance and value for money.

INTEL 530 SERIES 240GB

SPEED

/GB

39/50 15/20
BANG/BUCK

18/30

OVERALL SCORE

72%

TRANSCE N D SSD 3 4 0 2 5 6 G B
SPEED

/GB

34/50 19/20
BANG/BUCK

21/30

OVERALL SCORE

74%

PNY XLR8 240GB and XLR8 PRO 240GB

How does PNYs high-end XLR8 brand translate to SSDs?

PNY XLR8 240GB/189 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.scan.co.uk

PNY XLR8 PRO 240GB/171 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.amazon.co.uk

he XLR8 brand is more often seen

on PNYs top-end, overclocked
graphics cards, but it also adorns
several of the firms mainstream and highend SSDs.
This months Labs has seen 240GB
versions of the XLR8 and XLR8 Pro drives
arrive and, like the Intel and Transcend SSDs,
they both rely on SandForce controllers. The
chip in question is the SF-2281, which has
already demonstrated its age on the opposite
page. Both PNY drives also use 25nm
Micron-made MLC synchronous NAND too.
Both PNY drives look the part, with dark
metal and a stylish logo emblazoned across
one panel, but they both also use the older
9.5mm form factor, which means they wont
fit inside some slimline ultrabooks, although
theyll be fine for use in most desktops and
standard-sized laptops.
The two drives are mainly differentiated by
the NAND used, with the Pro drives NAND
flash rated at 3,000 P/E (program / erase)
cycles. This in turn has an effect on
warranties: the standard model includes a
three-year deal, while the Pro drive serves up
five years worth of support.
On the plus side, these drives look great,
and both have reasonable warranties.
However, both will also put a sizeable dent in
your wallet. The standard XLR8 drive costs
189 inc VAT, which makes it one of the most
expensive mid-sized SSDs in the Labs. The
Pro model is a little cheaper, at 171, but its
still in the top tier when it comes to price
per gigabyte.
Both PNY drives have middling, dated
specifications too, so its no surprise that
their performance was comparatively
uncompetitive. The two drives spent much
of their time towards the bottom of our
synthetic benchmarks.
Interestingly, across most of the AS SSD
and CrystalDiskMark tests, the standard
XLR8 drive was faster than the Pro
model too. The Pro drive was particularly
disappointing in several small file reading

tests, as its 18MB/sec

and 171MB/sec results
in AS SSDs 4KB random
read and 64-queuedepth random read
benchmarks illustrate.
There was a glimmer of hope
for the standard XLR8 drive in a
handful of tests. It was one of the top drives in
AS SSDs sequential read test, thanks to its
521MB/sec result, although this behaviour
wasnt replicated in CrystalDiskMark, and the
XLR8 crept into the top half of the results
table in CrystalDiskMarks 4KB random
write run.

The Pro drives NAND

flash is rated to handle
3,000 program /
erase cycles
However, both PNY drives had good
showings in the boot time test, with the
standard XLR8 drive just outpacing the more
expensive Pro SSD its 11.54-secong boot
was the second-best in the Labs.
The PNY SSDs faltered in the rest of the
real-world benchmarks though. The
standard XLR8 was slightly faster than the
Pro model in the application boot test, with
these positions reversed in the gaming
benchmark but, in both tests, the PNY
drives sat towards the bottom of our
results tables.

PNY XLR8 240GB

SPEED

/GB

37/50 14/20
BANG/BUCK

16/30

OVERALL SCORE

67%

Our final test, Iometer, saw neither drive

impress while neither was the worst on test,
they were both in the bottom third of our
results table.

Conclusion
Like the Intel and Transcend models, these
PNY drives rely on the old SandForce SF-2281
controller, and the use of 25nm NAND also
makes them outdated compared to the 19nm
and 20nm NAND used in drives elsewhere.
This outdated hardware results in
predictably uncompetitive performance,
and neither of these drives impress at the
checkout either the slower Pro drives
76p-per-gigabyte figure is the third highest
on test, and the standard XLR8s 84p-pergigabyte price is the highest on test.
If you need a mid-sized drive, the Samsung
840 Pro 256GB is a much better option; its
consistently far quicker and its much better
value for money too, thanks to its modern,
efficient components. Meanwhile, if youre
after professional-level performance and
endurance, OCZs new Vector 150 240GB is
cheaper and faster than the XLR8 Pro. MJ

VERDICT
These XLR8 drives dont live up to their
name, with uncompetitive performance and
high prices.

PNY XLR8 PRO 240BG

SPEED

/GB

36/50 15/20
BANG/BUCK

16/30

OVERALL SCORE

67%
45

L A B S T E S T / SOLID STATE DRIVES

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB; Plextor M5 Pro

Extreme 256GB and 512GB
How does Marvells 088SS9187 controller fare?

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB/311 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.scan.co.uk

Plextor M5 Pro Extreme 256GB/161 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.scan.co.uk

Plextor M5 Pro Extreme 512GB/319 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.cclonline.com

arvells name is seen in all the

SanDisk and Plextor drives on this
page. SanDisks Extreme II moves
from a SandForce controller to the Marvell
88SS9187, although its been given a boost
with SanDisks own firmware.
The SanDisk drives 19nm MLC NAND chips
also have a twist up their sleeves. Around 14
per cent of each chip operates in a simulated
SLC mode, which SanDisk calls nCache. Its
designed to work as a write buffer to improve
small file performance, and its doubled in size
since its introduction in the SanDisk Ultra Plus
too. Its all packaged inside a good-looking
7mm enclosure, and the five-year warranty
is generous too.
Plextors M5 Pro Extreme SSDs were the
first drives to make use of the Marvell chip,
back in 2012, but the firm has now countered
the older controller by loading its 256GB and
512GB models with Toshiba 19nm Toggle
Mode NAND. That sounds potentially potent,
and both drives look good too, with bright
metal enclosures and 7mm form factors.
Like the SanDisk drive, a five-year
warranty is included too.
The SanDisk Extreme II only
slipped from mid-table in our AS
SSD results in a single test, and in
the sequential read benchmark, it
was only 4MB/sec behind the charttopping Samsung 840 Pro. The SanDisks

SA N D I S K E X T R E M E I I
480GB
SPEED

/GB

42/50 15/20
BANG/BUCK

20/30
48

OVERALL SCORE

77%

CrystalDiskMark results were similarly midtable in most tests, and its sequential read
result was, again, impressive only the two
Samsung Pro drives were quicker. However,
nCache doesnt seem to do much; the
Extreme II remained mid-table in most of
our small file write benchmarks.
In our real-world tests, the Extreme II
remained resolutely mid-table too. In
PCMarks pair of tests, it was beaten by a host
of Samsung and Toshiba drives, and its 11.99second boot time was half a second behind
the fastest drive.
Meanwhile, Plextors Marvell-based drives
returned mixed performance in AS SSD. The
two drives hit the top five when reading
sequential files, outpacing strong competition
from Samsung and Toshiba, and the 256GB
version excelled in the 64-queue-depth

random read test ,with a second-best pace of

368MB/sec. They languished when tasked
with 4KB random writes, though, and did little
to stand out elsewhere.
The 4KB random write performance
remained uncompetitive in CrystalDiskMark
but, in the rest of these tests, the two M5 Pros
didnt stray from the mid-field. The 256GB M5
Pro was also the third-fastest booting SSD on
test, and its 11.55-second start time easily
bested the 512GB models 12.47-second
result. The M5 Pros were some of the best
performers in PCMark 7s application boot
test too, but headed back to the mid-table in
PCMarks gaming benchmark.

Conclusion
Plextors M5 Pro drives are among the
quickest and most consistent drives on test,
but theyre hampered by poor pricing: the
256GB and 512GB models cost 68p and
67p per gigabyte. The SanDisk was
similarly afflicted its 70p-pergigabyte price is one of the highest
on test. Even with NAND tweaks, the
aging Marvell 88SS9187 controller cant
compete with Samsungs latest tech. MJ

VERDICT
All these Marvell-controlled drives are rapid
performers, but theyre expensive too.

P L E X TO R M 5 P R O E X T R E M E
256GB
SPEED

/GB

45/50 16/20
BANG/BUCK

22/30

OVERALL SCORE

83%

P L E X TO R M 5 P R O E X T R E M E
512GB
SPEED

/GB

44/50 16/20
BANG/BUCK

22/30

OVERALL SCORE

82%

L A B S T E S T / SOLID STATE DRIVES

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB and X110 256GB

Low cost per gigabyte, and Marvell SS889175 controllers

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB/119 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.cclonline.com

SanDisk X110 256GB/124 inc VAT

SUPPLIER: www.cclonline.com

anDisk is clearly a fan of Marvell

controllers, with the SS889187
chip used in the firms Extreme II
drive (see p48), but for its Ultra Plus and
X110 models, the firm has turned to the
Marvell SS889175.
This controller is the sequel to the 9174,
which was a big hit in older SSDs such as
the Plextor M3 and Intel 510 Series, and its
designed to improve on its predecessor
with lower power consumption, thanks to a
quartet of independent NAND channels. It
also allows to direct access to the firmware,
so SanDisk has been able to craft its own
firmware for the Ultra Plus 256GB.
Like the Extreme II, SanDisk has deployed
19nm MLC NAND inside this drive, and it also
has the nCache system that we saw in the
Extreme II. This feature is designed to
replicate SLC (single level cell) performance
across a small section of the SSDs NAND
and, in theory, improve small file write
speeds. As with other SanDisk drives, the
Ultra Plus uses the slimmer 7mm form factor,
and theres a three-year warranty too,
although plenty of other drives have five-year
deals now.
The third SanDisk drive in this Labs, the
X110, has recently made the move from the
business market to the consumer side, and
it also relies on the Marvell SS889175
controller. It uses the same 19nm NAND too,
and the same nCache system. However, the
X110 has the added benefit of read error
protection that can repair faults with no
performance overhead, as well as thermal
throttling to prevent overheating, although
admittedly, this isnt an issue weve ever
encountered with SSDs its only ever
likely to be an issue in crowded server racks.
Like the Ultra Plus, the X110 also has a threeyear warranty.
Its no surprise that two drives with similar
specifications werent too far away from
each other in benchmarks throughout our
theoretical tests they were often next to each
other in the results tables.

50

However, while nCache may be

designed to improve small file
write performance, these two
drives sat towards the bottom of our
results tables in both of AS SSDs
applicable tests; they managed
96MB/sec in the 4KB random
write test, which is almost 20MB/sec
behind the leading drive, and they were
around 125MB/sec behind the best
drives in the 64-queue-depth random
write test too. The Ultra Plus and X110
were consistently better when reading
small files, though, and were mid-table in
the sequential benchmarks.
We spotted the same pattern in
CrystalDiskMark; these drives might have a
system designed to impact small file writes,

SanDisk has been able

to craft its own
firmware for the Ultra
Plus 256GB
but in these benchmarks, both drives
performed disappointingly. In the 32-queuedepth random write benchmark, they were
bottom of the pile. Conversely, sequential and
4KB random reads were a little better.
Meanwhile, the X110 returned a boot time
of 11.85 seconds, which is one of the best on
test, but neither drive impressed in the rest of
our real-world benchmarks. They were both
in the bottom three in PCMark 7s application

SAN DISK ULTRA PLUS 256 GB

SPEED

/GB

38/50 18/20
BANG/BUCK

22/30

OVERALL SCORE

78%

boot run, and stayed in the bottom third of

this months drives in the gaming test. The
situation didnt improve in Iometer, where
these drives were bottom and scores of
around 16,400 were a long way behind the
22,621 scored by the Samsung 840 Evo
250GB, which was the next-best drive.

Conclusion
Both these drives offer reasonable value for
money, with the Ultra Plus costing 50p per
gigabyte and the X110 costing 2p more. Thats
in the top half of our results table, but thats
the only area where these drives impress.
Theres plenty of competition around the
256GB mark, and the Samsung 840 Evo is
much faster and only a few pence per
gigabyte more expensive. MJ

VERDICT
Reasonable all-rounders, but that isnt
enough to cut it in the SSD market any more.

SA N D I S K X 1 1 0 2 5 6 G B
SPEED

/GB

38/50 17/20
BANG/BUCK

21/30

OVERALL SCORE

76%


  


 
 


 

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L A B S T E S T / SOLID STATE DRIVES

Samsung SSD 840 Evo 250GB, 500GB and 1TB

Do Samsungs mainstream SSDs fare as well as its professional drives?

Samsung SSD 840 Evo 250GB/126 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.cclonline.com

Samsung SSD 840 Evo 500GB/235 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.cclonline.com

Samsung SSD 840 Evo 1TB/400 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.amazon.co.uk

he SSD 840 Evo range is the only

one on test to use TLC NAND, which
stores 3-bits per cell. Specifically,
its Samsungs 19nm Toggle 2 NAND. The
increased density compared to MLC NAND
decreases cost, hence the drives attractive
prices, but it typically lowers performance and
endurance too.
Nevertheless, Samsung has a few tricks up
its sleeve. The MEX controller, for example, is
Samsungs latest and greatest, using the
same three ARM cores used in the SSD 840
Pros MDX controller, but running at 400MHz
(100MHz faster). Its supported by Samsungs
LPDDR2-1066 cache 512MB in the lower
capacities and 1GB in the 1TB model.
To combat slow TLC write speeds, the Evo
drives use TurboWrite. This treats a portion of
the NAND as SLC memory, which is much
faster. The size of the portion used increases
with capacity 3GB, 6GB and 12GB in these
three drives. If a write process exceeds this
buffer, performance will drop to normal
TLC levels.
Another trick is RAPID Mode, enabled
through the excellent Magician software. It
utilises system RAM and resources for
caching and buffering to offer potentially
massive performance gains, although results
depend on the workload. All the drives also
ship with a typical three-year warranty,
although some drives offer five years.
The Evos sequential reads arent top of the
pack, but we saw 512-518MB/sec in AS SSD

SA M S U N G S S D 8 4 0
E VO 2 5 0 G B
SPEED

/GB

44/50 17/20
BANG/BUCK

24/30
52

OVERALL SCORE

85%

and 534-541MB/sec in CrystalDiskMark,

so theres little to be concerned about.
Sequential writes are fantastic, though, and
TurboWrites impact is obvious. The Evo
drives secure the top three spots in AS SSD,
and beat the competing similar-capacity
Vector 150 drives in CrystalDiskMark too.
For random reads, its an outstanding
victory for the Evos, with the faster controller
giving them the edge over the more
expensive Pro drives. They take first,
second and third place in both tests, and
theyre the only drives to hit over 40MB/sec.
Random writes, meanwhile, are on a par with
the 840 Pro series.
The 64-queue-depth random reads in AS
SSD arent great, especially for the 250GB
drive, but 32-queue-depth performance in
CrystalDiskMark is much better, with the 1TB
drive coming second overall with 405.9MB/
sec, and the 250GB not far behind with
401.1MB/sec.
Such queue-depths are mostly unrealistic
for the Evos intended audience, but even so,
the 1TB and 500GB drives are strong
performers for high queue-depth writes,
losing only to the Vector 150s.
The 250GB drive, meanwhile, falls down
the charts, probably suffering from having
less NAND dies per channel.
Performance is also good in PCMark 7,
although they cant match the 840 Pro
drives here. We saw 110-114MB/sec in the
application start test, with Plextor and Toshiba

SA M S U N G S S D 8 4 0
E VO 5 0 0 G B
SPEED

/GB

45/50 18/20
BANG/BUCK

26/30

OVERALL SCORE

89%

both ahead. Tasty speeds of 146-151MB/sec

in the gaming test are enough to surpass
Plextor and pull level with the Toshiba Q
Series, however.
The BootRacer results are nothing too
impressive though the 1TB drive has the
slowest boot time, but higher capacitive drives
typically suffer in this respect.
Iometer is the Evos weakest point,
although again, such workloads are irrelevant
to the vast majority of consumers. The 1TB
drive manages a respectable 32,986 IOPS,
but the 250GB achieved just 22,621 IOPS. In
this case, the relentless writes would have
quickly surpassed the drives TurboWrite
buffer and passed into the slow TLC NAND.

Conclusion
The SSD 840 Evo drives have their limits,
but for the majority of home PC users,
including hardware enthusiasts, theyre
fantastic all-rounders.
The Samsung SSD 840 Evo 250GB comes
out a little slower and more expensive than
its bigger siblings, but equally, its price of 54p
per gigabyte is still very reasonable, making
it one of the best drives available at this
popular capacity. ML

VERDICT
Fast, attractively priced and backed by great
software, the Evo range is a deserving
winner of this months Labs.

SA M S U N G S S D 8 4 0
E VO 1 T B
SPEED

/GB

44/50 19/20
BANG/BUCK

27/30

OVERALL SCORE

90%

, )AFA ,

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YYYHTCEVCNFGUKIPEQO

L A B S T E S T / SOLID STATE DRIVES

Toshiba Q Series 256GB and 512GB;

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB
Toshibas trio of contenders feature homemade hardware

Toshiba Q Series 256GB/144 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.cclonline.com

Toshiba Q Series 512GB/308 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.cclonline.com

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB/130 inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.dabs.co.uk

oshibas previous drives had

incomprehensible names, but thats
changed with the new Q and Q Pro
drives. The former range is designed for
mainstream use, and its here in its 256GB
and 521GB guises. The latter is an enthusiast
product, and weve reviewed the 256GB
version. One factor that hasnt changed,
though, is the firms reticence when it comes
to providing details about the insides. Both
ranges include Toshiba-made controllers, and
the Pro drives chip is labelled TC358790XBG,
but thats all we know about it.
Both ranges also employ 19nm MLC
Toggle Mode NAND, which is made by
Toshiba. Neither drive is especially goodlooking, though, with plain metal enclosures
and dull stickers. The standard Q Series drives
also use the portly 9.5mm form factor, while
the Pro drives are 7mm tall and include a
9.5mm spacer in the box.
Both of Toshibas 256GB drives return
238.47GB of formatted capacity and,
strangely, the Pro model is the cheaper of the
pair it costs 130 compared to the standard
drives price of 143. Meanwhile, the 512GB Q
Series drive weighs in at 308. Warranties
differ between the two drive brands, however:
standard Q Series drives have three-year
deals, and while the Pro drives are only
shipped with two years worth of support.
Theres little difference between the makeup of the Q and Q Pro series drives, which

TO S H I B A Q 2 5 6 G B
SPEED

/GB

44/50 17/20
BANG/BUCK

23/30
54

OVERALL SCORE

84%

explains why the three were often grouped

together in our benchmark tables.
The standard Q Series 256GB was the best
of the three Toshiba drives in four of the six
AS SSD benchmarks, but all three Toshiba
were inconsistent in these tests. The drives
sat in mid-table for sequential reads and
writes, with scores north of 500MB/sec not
far behind the victorious Samsungs. They
were also among the best performers in
the random 64-queue-depth tests, but fell
behind in the rest of AS SSDs small file

The Q Pro had the

fastest boot time on
test, with a rapid result
of 11.49 seconds
benchmarks in the 4KB random read test,
the three Toshibas managed around 20MB/
sec, which cant compete with the 40MB/sec
of the table-topping Samsung silicon.
We spotted the same trends in
CrystalDiskMark, with the standard 256GB Q
Series drive leading the way, and inconsistent
performance throughout. Sequential reads
and writes were reasonable, but small file
performance was uncompetitive these
drives were bottom in the 4KB random read

TO S H I B A Q 5 1 2 G B
SPEED

/GB

42/50 16/20
BANG/BUCK

21/30

OVERALL SCORE

79%

results, and occupied three out of the bottom

five positions when writing 4KB random files.
Throughout all our testing, the Q Series Pro
was fastest when dealing with 32- and
64-queue-depth tasks.
The three Toshiba drives stabilised in realworld tests, all returning good scores in
PCMark 7 only Samsung drives could beat
them in these tests, and it was Toshibas Q Pro
SSD that was the best performer out of these
three, albeit by only a handful of points. The
Q Pro was also the best drive on test when it
came to boot times, with a rapid result of 11.49
seconds, and it was the fastest Toshiba drive
in Iometer with its 44,009 IOPS result too.

Conclusion
All three Toshiba drives had mixed starts, with
good sequential performance tempered by
poor small file pace, but real-world use
proved that these SSDs still have enough pace
to rival most of the drives on test. They all
offer reasonable value for money too, with
prices between 54p and 65p per gigabyte.
The best deal is the Q Pro 256GB, though,
which just creeps ahead in performance and
has a good price too. MJ

VERDICT
All three drives impress in real-world tests,
but its the Q Pro 256GB that takes home
an award.

TO S H I B A Q P R O 2 5 6 G B
SPEED

/GB

44/50 17/20
BANG/BUCK

24/30

OVERALL SCORE

85%

L A B S T E S T / SOLID STATE DRIVES

AS SSD

AS SSD

Sequential read (MB/sec)

Sequential write (MB/sec)

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

523.9

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

503.7

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

523.8

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

503.5

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

523.5

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

503.4

PNY XLR8 240GB

521.8

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

503.1

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

520.9

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

519.8

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

519.5

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

495.8

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB

519.5

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

495.4

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

518.6

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

517.6

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

502.8
498.7

488.1
480.8

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

516.5

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

479.4

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

512.5

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB

478.9

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

511.7

SanDisk X110 256GB

460.0

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

507.9

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

459.1

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

507.4

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

SanDisk X110 256GB

507.2

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

507.1

Crucial M500 960GB

Transcend SSD 340 256GB

503.0

Crucial M500 480GB

Intel SSD 530 240GB

502.1

Intel SSD 530 240GB

459.1
446.5
431.3
429.7
322.0

Crucial M500 240GB

500.0

PNY XLR8 240GB

308.4

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB

493.3

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB

304.6

Crucial M500 480GB

491.0

Crucial M500 240GB

490.1

Crucial M500 960GB

0

135

270

405

273.0
269.6

Transcend SSD 340 256GB

0

540

130

260

AS SSD

AS SSD

4KB random read (MB/sec)

4KB random write (MB/sec)

390

520

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

40.9

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

114.9

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

40.7

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

114.0

39.2

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

34.8

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

Crucial M500 240GB

107.4
105.9

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

33.7

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

SanDisk X110 256GB

33.4

Crucial M500 960GB

105.6

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

104.3

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

33.2

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

32.7
31.7

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB

30.3

Transcend SSD 340 256GB

29.6

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

104.2

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

103.5

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

102.9

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB

102.5
102.0

Crucial M500 480GB

26.7

PNY XLR8 240GB

Crucial M500 960GB

26.6

Transcend SSD 340 256GB

99.7

Crucial M500 240GB

26.5

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB

99.6

Intel SSD 530 240GB

26.1

97.7

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

24.7

SanDisk X110 256GB

96.6

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

24.5

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

96.0

PNY XLR8 240GB

Intel SSD 530 240GB

23.5

10.5

57.6

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

18.2

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB

84.4

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

19.0

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

84.9

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

19.9

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

95.9
86.8

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

21.8

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

56

108.3

Crucial M500 480GB

34.4

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

110.9

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

21

31.5

42

30

60

90

120

AS SSD

AS SSD

64-queue-depth random read (MB/sec)

64-queue-depth random write (MB/sec)

381.2

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

332.5

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

368.7

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

330.1

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

362.8

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

329.8

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

360.3

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

329.4

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB

358.4

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

326.6

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

357.5

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

326.1
325.0

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

349.3

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

347.2

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

340.9

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

314.6

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

306.8

Crucial M500 960GB

302.8

Crucial M500 480GB

332.8

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

331.5

Crucial M500 480GB

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

331.4

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB

301.4
268.3
246.8

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

329.4

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

325.1

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

243.5

SanDisk X110 256GB

325.1

PNY XLR8 240GB

239.8

Crucial M500 240GB

322.1

Intel SSD 530 240GB

239.2

Crucial M500 960GB

321.3

Crucial M500 240GB

238.9

282.2

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

Transcend SSD 340 256GB

244.5
226.1

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

228.3

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

206.6

Transcend SSD 340 256GB

205.2

PNY XLR8 240GB

216.7

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

204.9

Intel SSD 530 240GB

210.9

SanDisk X110 256GB

203.7

171.3

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB

0

100

194.9

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

200

300

400

90

180

CRYSTALDISKMARK

CRYSTALDISKMARK

Sequential read (MB/sec)

Sequential write (MB/sec)

270

360

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

544.6

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

544.4

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

524.9
524.2

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB

542.9

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

523.5

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

541.0

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

523.3

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

539.3

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

520.1

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

538.6

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

519.6

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

537.4

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

517.0

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

534.4

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

514.5

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

534.3

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

506.0

SanDisk X110 256GB

533.6

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB

502.4

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

531.0

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

495.0

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

527.1

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

492.4

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

525.7

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

524.4

SanDisk X110 256GB

Transcend SSD 340 256GB

524.2

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

523.2

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

514.8

480.6
457.9
452.0

Crucial M500 960GB

498.0

Crucial M500 240GB

481.0

444.8
443.9

Crucial M500 480GB

339.8

Crucial M500 480GB

488.8

PNY XLR8 240GB

488.8

PNY XLR8 240GB

322.1

Crucial M500 960GB

488.3

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB

321.8

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB

480.4

Intel SSD 530 240GB

476.5
0

135

270

405

Intel SSD 530 240GB

540

Transcend SSD 340 256GB

285.2

Crucial M500 240GB

284.9
0

135

270

405

540

57

L A B S T E S T / SOLID STATE DRIVES

CRYSTALDISKMARK

CRYSTALDISKMARK

4KB random read (MB/sec)

4KB random write (MB/sec)

44.3

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

41.2

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

134.3

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

44.5

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

133.3

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

130.9

Crucial M500 480GB

125.4

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

38.1

Crucial M500 240GB

124.5

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

37.8

Crucial M500 960GB

123.8

39.6

Intel SSD 530 240GB

SanDisk X110 256GB

36.8

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB

122.2

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

36.5

PNY XLR8 240GB

121.2

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

36.0

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

121.2

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

35.7

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

120.5

35.1

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

119.5

34.2

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

119.4

34.0

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

PNY XLR8 240GB

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB
PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB
Transcend SSD 340 256GB

32.5

Intel SSD 530 240GB

32.0

119.3
116.6

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB

114.1

Crucial M500 480GB

28.7

SanDisk X110 256GB

113.5

Crucial M500 240GB

28.6

Transcend SSD 340 256GB

Crucial M500 960GB

28.5

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

26.9
26.6

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

23.1

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

98.1

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

97.4
71.8
69.3

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

20.8

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

108.2

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

21.5

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

112.1
111.4

12

24

36

48

35

70

105

CRYSTALDISKMARK

CRYSTALDISKMARK

32-queue-depth random read (MB/sec)

32-queue-depth random write (MB/sec)

140

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

406.0

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

375.5

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

405.9

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

372.7

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

405.0

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

371.6

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

403.6

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

371.4

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

403.4

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

369.7

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

402.5

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

368.9

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

401.1

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

400.7

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

365.1
353.1
348.4

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB

392.5

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

387.3

Crucial M500 960GB

339.5

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

384.8

Crucial M500 480GB

338.8

384.3

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

351.4

Transcend SSD 340 256GB

279.8

Crucial M500 480GB

351.0

Crucial M500 240GB

276.3

SanDisk X110 256GB

350.3

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB

272.7

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

345.0

PNY XLR8 240GB

264.0

Crucial M500 240GB

344.3

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

263.0

Crucial M500 960GB

Intel SSD 530 240GB

342.9
274.7

Transcend SSD 340 256GB

214.9

PNY XLR8 240GB

206.9

Intel SSD 530 240GB

169.4

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB

0

58

312.0
285.5

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB

361.3

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

105

210

315

420

260.2

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

225.0

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

224.4

SanDisk X110 256GB

222.4

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

221.6
0

100

200

300

400

PCMARK 7

PCMARK 7

Starting Applications test raw result (MB/sec)

Gaming test raw result (MB/sec)

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

137.5

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

156.7

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

156.4

132.8

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

156.7

139.2

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

150.8

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

123.1

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

150.4

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

122.0

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

127.5

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

147.7

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

146.3

120.9

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

113.4

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

112.5

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

126.6

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

104.2

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

128.2

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB

108.6

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

130.9

Intel SSD 530 240GB

110.4

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

148.4

125.8

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

121.3

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

101.0

Crucial M500 480GB

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB

99.3

Crucial M500 960GB

121.0

Crucial M500 240GB

120.9

Intel SSD 530 240GB

94.5

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

118.7

87.9

SanDisk X110 256GB

118.3

Crucial M500 480GB

87.3

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

115.9

Crucial M500 960GB

86.6

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB

114.7

89.6

PNY XLR8 240GB

Crucial M500 240GB

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB

84.3

PNY XLR8 240GB

113.7

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

83.8

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

113.6

65.2
0

35

112.6

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

83.0

SanDisk X110 256GB

Transcend SSD 340 256GB

101.5

Transcend SSD 340 256GB

70

105

140

40

80

120

BOOTRACER

IOMETER

COST/GB

Windows 7 64-bit boot time (seconds)

Mixed workloads overall score (IOPS)

Retail price over formatted capacity

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

14.81

Crucial M500 960GB

14.40

0.38

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

46,061

Crucial M500 960GB

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

45,630

Transcend SSD 340 256GB

0.42

Crucial M500 480GB

13.07

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

45,375

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

0.43

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

13.01

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

45,268

Crucial M500 480GB

0.43

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

12.80

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

12.66

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

12.47

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

12.41

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

12.39

Crucial M500 960GB

38,929

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

12.24

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

38,888

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

0.54

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

12.17

Crucial M500 480GB

38,198

Toshiba Q Series 256GB

Crucial M500 240GB

12.03

Crucial M500 240GB

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB

11.99

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

11.99

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

Transcend SSD 340 256GB

11.93

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB

31,089

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

11.89

PNY XLR8 240GB

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

11.86

SanDisk X110 256GB

11.85

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB

11.73

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB

Intel SSD 530 240GB

11.58

Transcend SSD 340 256GB

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

11.55

Crucial M500 240GB

0.48

41,705

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

0.50

41,512

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

0.50

SanDisk X110 256GB

0.52

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

0.54

44,009

41,476

0.63

33,475

Toshiba Q Series 512GB

0.65

32,986

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 256GB

0.65

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 512GB

0.67

27,747

Samsung SSD 840 PRO 512GB

0.67

Intel SSD 530 240GB

26,989

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB

0.68

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

26,859

OCZ Vector 150 240GB

0.68

26,305

Intel SSD 530 240GB

0.69

SanDisk Extreme II 480GB

0.70

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

23,728
22,621

11.54

SanDisk X110 256GB

16,456

OCZ Vector 150 480GB

11.49

SanDisk Ultra Plus 256GB

16,437

PNY XLR8 240GB

12

16

1,2000 2,4000 36,00048,000

0.76

PNY XLR8 Pro 240GB

PNY XLR8 240GB

0.60

OCZ Vertex 460 240GB

34,795

Toshiba Q Series Pro 256GB

0

160

0.84
0.84
25

50

75

100

59

R E V I E WS / PC HEAD TO HEAD

AMD Kaveri
systems
This months contenders saddle up with AMDs new Kaveri APUs.
Can these chips form the basis of decent, all-round budget machines?

Computer Planet
GX-A7700/671

inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.computerplanet.co.uk

Falcon Ghost Warrior

Kaveri Gaming
BattleRig/500
inc VAT

SUPPLIER www.falconcomputers.co.uk

MD has lost ground to Intel at the high end of the

computing market, but its accelerated processing
units (APUs) mean the firm remains the
manufacturer of choice in many budget and mainstream
builds. Its easy to see why too, thanks to the clever
combination of processing cores and Radeon-branded
graphics hardware, theres often no need for a discrete GPU.
The latest range of APUs use the Kaveri architecture (see
Issue 127, p17), which offers several improvements over its
predecessor. The new Steamroller iteration of the Bulldozer
module used as the basis for the CPU parts, for example,
has double the number of decode units to improve

62

performance in multi-threaded software. They also contain

AMDs latest GCN architecture, with the top-end chips GPU
having 512 stream processors at its disposal. Kaveri silicon is
the only restriction weve put on this months contenders.
Computer Planet and Falcon PC have responded with a pair
of affordable systems.

Case, design and build quality

Both systems have mid-sized towers, and theyre both
good-looking and very different. Falcons Zalman Z3 Plus
is white, angular and loud, with dark meshed areas and
dramatic slats along its front, which funnel air towards the

intake fan. Computer Planets Corsair Carbide 200R,

meanwhile, is more refined, with a smart matt finish and,
logo aside, no ornamentation. Both are made of metal and
plastic, and both have mixed build quality; they have sturdy
side panels, but the Zalmans plastic front is weak, and the
Corsairs base is flimsy.
The gap between the two machines widens when the
side panels are removed. Computer Planets system has
black internals that mesh well with the black sleeved PSU
cables, and its well organised too. The system looks more
cohesive than Falcons effort; while the latters black and
white colour scheme looks striking, the multi-coloured PSU
cables ruin the effect by appearing throughout the build.
That isnt the only area where the Falcon is hampered by
a lack of care. Its front 120mm fan isnt lined up with the hard
disk, and its partnered with a 120mm exhaust and two more
120mm fans in the roof. Of course, thats a decent amount of
cooling power, but its overkill for Kaveri, and Falcon hasnt
taken advantage of the fan controller. Theres room for two
fans to be attached to the two-way speed toggle on the top
of the chassis, but only the front fan is connected. Two fans
are connected to the motherboard, with another plugged in
via Molex. Falcon told us this was its preferred configuration,
but we have no idea why you wouldnt use that second
controller connector.
The faster fan mode is signified by the front fans light
burning a brighter shade of blue, the spider web pattern
illuminated in the front mesh looks great. In other areas,
though, the Zalmans aesthetics dont impress its metal
and plastic sections are slightly different shades of white,
for example, resulting in an inconsistent finish.
Meanwhile, cables are kept out of the way, but theyre
routed oddly many pointlessly dive in and out of the
motherboard tray before reaching their destination, and a
redundant 6-pin PCI-E connector flails in the middle of the
PC. Zalmans chassis includes a flimsy plastic graphics card
support that isnt necessary here but Falcon has left it in
place. Presumably, this is so that you can easily add a
discrete graphics card without having to reroute all the
cables, which makes sense, but the result is messy.
Computer Planets interior is more accomplished. Its allblack design looks slick, and we cant fault the cable-routing.
Wires at the bottom of the board are routed together, while
others are hidden behind the motherboard tray and more
dive underneath the motherboard to keep out of sight. Just
as much care has been taken at the back, where cables are
tied together in two large bundles.
Both systems provide plenty of upgrade room. Falcon
provides three vacant hard disk bays each uses tool-free
runners that are simple to use, if flimsy and theres room
for two SSDs. Six SATA connections lie vacant, and the
middle of the motherboard has a pair of 16x PCI-E slots and
single 1x PCI-E and PCI connectors, while two memory slots
are free. The Computer Planet system, meanwhile, has
room for three extra SSDs and three more hard drives, and
its motherboard has the same number of free slots and
internal connectors.
Interestingly, the Computer Planet system uses a Corsair
Hydro H80i, rather than settling for AMDs stock unit like the
Falcon machine, and theres only one other case fan a
120mm front-mounted unit. The H80i is a great all-in-one

Computer Planet

1
A Corsair H80i liquidcooler handles CPUcooling duties

The all-black interior looks

slick, and we cant fault the
cable routing either

The generous storage

bundle includes an SSD
and a 2TB hard drive

COMPUTER PLANET/SPECIFICATIONS:
CPU AMD A10-7700K

Case Corsair Carbide 200R

Motherboard Gigabyte GA-F2A88XM-D3H

Cooling CPU: Corsair H80i with 2 x 120mm

Corsair fans; front: 1 x 120mm

Memory 2 x 4GB Corsair XMS3 1,600MHz

DDR3
Graphics AMD Radeon R7 with 384 stream
processors
Sound On-board
Storage 120GB Kingston SSD; 2TB hard disk
Optical drive DVD burner

PSU Corsair VS450 450W

Ports Front: 2 x USB 3, 2 x mini-jacks; rear:
2 x USB 3, 4 x USB 2, 1 x optical S/PDIF, 1 x
Gigabit Ethernet, 1 x PS/2, 3 x mini-jacks
Operating system Windows 8.1 64-bit
Warranty Three years labour, including one
year parts and collection

liquid cooler, but wed argue that both systems get it wrong
when it comes to cooling; the Hydro is overkill for Kaveri, and
the Falcons quartet of fans are similarly overpowered. Both
cooling setups create excess noise, and the H80i needlessly
bumps up the price on what should be a budget machine.
Nevertheless, theres only one winner when it comes to
design and build quality, and thats Computer Planet; its
system is tidier, better-looking and well thought out.

The components
Falcon has opted for the top-end Kaveri part, the A107850K, in its PC, while Computer Planet has gone a step
down with the A10-7700K. Both chips have the same CPU
cores and TDP, although the latter runs at slightly reduced
base and turbo speeds (3.4GHz/3.8GHz compared to
3.7GHz/4GHz). Meanwhile, the flagships GPU is also more
powerful, as it has 512 stream processors compared to 384
in the A10-7700K.
This means the Falcon PC has more grunt available for
less money we recommend spending the extra 13 for an

63

R E V I E WS / PREBUILT PCs

Falcon PC

too, so its fan speeds can be adjusted easily directly from

your desktop.
Both builders have opted for motherboards with the topend A88X chipset. They also both use micro-ATX boards,
which left us wondering why micro-ATX cases werent also
used to save space. The gold and black Asus A88XM-Plus
in the Falcon and the all-black Gigabyte GA-F2A88X-D3H
in Computer Planets build share almost identical
specifications. With a solid bank of rear connections, support
for CrossFire and a host of internal SATA connectors and
headers on both, there are plenty of options for upgrading
these systems.
However, Falcons 1TB hard drive is definitely outstripped
by Computer Planets 128GB SSD and 2TB hard drive
combination. Computer Planets system will feel nippier in
use thanks to its SSD, and will also hold plenty more media,
such as HD video, than the Falcon PC.
A non-modular PSU is used in both builds, although this
keeps down costs, and the PSU cables are relatively well
managed in both systems. That said, the black Corsair VS
450 model in Computer Planets PC is quieter, and a better
match to its surrounding hardware than the grey metal
Cooler Master PSU in the Falcon. Finally, both systems have
a standard DVD burner.

Performance

A standard AMD stock

cooler sits on top of the
A10-7850K APU

Cables are kept out of the

way, but theyre routed in
an odd manner

A single 1TB hard drive

handles storage duties,
with no SSD

FALCON PC/SPECIFICATIONS
CPU AMD A10-7850K
Motherboard Asus A88XM-Plus
Memory 2 x 4GB Adata XPG 2,133MHz
DDR3
Graphics AMD Radeon R7 with 512 stream
processors

Cooling CPU: AMD stock cooler with 65mm

fan; front: 1 x 120mm; rear: 1 x 120mm; top:
2 x 120mm
PSU Cooler Master Elite RS-500-PSAP-J3
500W

Sound On-board

Ports Front: 1 x USB 3, 2 x USB 2, 2 x minijacks; rear: 2 x USB 3, 4 x USB 2, 1 x Gigabit

Ethernet, 2 x PS/2, 3 x mini-jacks

Storage 1TB hard disk

Operating system Windows 8.1 64-bit

Optical drive DVD burner

Warranty Three years labour with two years

parts

Case Zalman Z3 Plus

A10-7850K with Computer Planet if youre going to be

gaming with it. Both APUs run at stock speeds, which is
understandable in this market segment, but still surprising
when one of them has a liquid cooler. Falcons memory is
also faster, with its 2,133MHz kit outpacing the 1,600MHz
one in the Computer Planet PC. This is a big deal when using
Kaveris integrated graphics, as its heavily limited by
memory throughput in games.
The A10-7850K in Falcons system is cooled by the boring
AMD stock heatsink, and the lack of anything more exciting
makes the roomy interior feel wasted.
Computer Planet uses a Corsair H80i with two 120mm
fans, which may be overkill for Kaveri, but it will still happily
keep the chip cool, and it looks much better too. It has a
USB connection and supports the Corsair Link software

64

With the faster APU at its disposal, the Falcon PC comes out
on top in the full suite of our Media Benchmarks. That said, it
also has 7W higher power consumption, which goes up to a
19W difference when the systems are stressed.
However, the difference in benchmark scores comes to
just 4 per cent overall neither machine is a powerhouse,
and youll struggle to notice a real difference between them
in CPU-bound tasks.
Compared to the calibre of SSDs in our Labs (see p40),
the 120GB SSD in Computer Planets system isnt amazing,
but its still a decent inclusion in a budget machine. Its flash
memory makes Windows feel much more responsive than
the mechanical parts upon which Falcon relies.
Kaveri offers the best currently available integrated
graphics system. As the detail settings for our games test
reveal, you cant expect to play at 1080p with all the eye
candy enabled, and the most demanding games such as
Crysis 3 will struggle to run either way. However, its clear
that the Falcon PC is capable of much better frame rates
than the Computer Planet system, and it does a better job of
keeping both Battlefield 4 and BioShock Infinite in the realm
of playable frame rates too. Two factors are at play here
the extra stream processors in the Falcon PCs APU, and the
faster memory.
With an extra 0.062V, we managed to overclock Falcons
A10-7850K to 4.1GHz, and also pushed its GPU to 820MHz.
This resulted in minor improvements to the scores of our
Media Benchmarks and game tests, where it extends its
lead on the Computer Planet PC. However, we struggled to
overclock the A10-7700K in the Computer Planet PC. We
only managed to push it to 3.9GHz, and the GPU to 800MHz
whether this is the fault of the motherboard or the CPU is
hard to say, but we managed a much better overclock in our
A10-7700K review (see Issue 127, p17. Needless to say,
improvements from overclocking this PC are very marginal.

The Computer Planet machine is more expensive, and

really well built, but makes do with a lesser processor,
while the Falcon system lacks the Computer Planets
superior build quality, has no SSD and half the storage
space of the Computer Planet system. In an ideal world,
youd combine the best parts of both systems to build a
superior one.
If youre looking for an all-round budget system, the
Falcons faster APU and memory impacts on both
applications and games, its quieter and its much cheaper
too, all of which sway us, despite its odd cable routing,
lacklustre chassis and lesser storage setup.
If you can spend a little more money, though, Computer
Planets system has better build quality, uses better-quality
components, and has a much better storage setup. We
advise moving up to an A10-7850K APU, though, and you
should be able to save some money if you ask for an air
cooler, rather than a superfluous H80i liquid cooler too.

Temperatures remained low in both systems although, as

you might expect, the water-cooled Computer Planet PC
was significantly cooler under load. Annoyingly, however,
its fans did spin up to a point where they made the system
noisier than the Falcon system. Its easy to adjust the
speeds, but it still would have been better if Computer
Planet had supplied the system with the H80is fans
previously set slower speeds to keep the noise down.

Warranty
Falcons system offers two years of hardware cover and
three years of labour support, while the Computer Planet
machine has a three-year labour deal with a year of parts
and collection cover, making the Falcons deal slightly better.

Conclusion
Both of these machines offer similarly mid-sized tower
cases and mid-range specifications, and both have also
involved compromise.

MIKE JENNINGS AND MATTHEW LAMBERT

G IMP IMAG E E D IT I N G

BATTLEFIELD 4
1,920 x 1,080, Low detail

1,033 1,052

Computer Planet

1,094 1,150

Falcon PC
0

300

600

900

HA N D B R AK E H . 2 6 4 V I D E O E N C O D I N G
2,401 2,443

Falcon PC

2,480 2,645
700

1400

22 fps 26 fps
24 fps 27 fps

Falcon PC

Computer Planet

21 fps 25 fps

Computer Planet

1,200

2,100

25 fps 29 fps

2,800

7.5

15

22.5

B I OS HO C K : I N F I N I T E
1,920 x 1,080, Low detail

M U LT I- T AS K IN G
Computer Planet

911 934

Falcon PC

890 955
0

250

500

750

22 fps 27 fps

Computer Planet

1,000

22 fps 27 fps
26 fps

Falcon PC

1,448 1,476

Computer Planet

400

800

1,200

11 fps

Computer Planet

C PU T E M PE R AT U R E
26 27

10
Stock speed

20
Overclocked

20 fps

14 fps

40

17 fps

13 fps

Falcon PC

30

36

16 fps

11 fps

35 38

Falcon PC

34 fps

27

1,920 x 1,080, Low detail

1,600

Max fan-speed CPU delta T (load)

Computer Planet

18

CRYSIS 3

1,510 1,562

Falcon PC

32 fps

27 fps

O V E R ALL

30

Stock speed min

Stock speed avg

22 fps

12

18

Overclocked min

24

Overclocked avg

T O T A L SY ST E M P O W E R C ON S U M P T I O N
40 W

Computer Planet

37.5
Stock load

COM PUTE R PLAN ET

DESIGN

HARDWARE

VALUE

18/25 20/25
20/25 20/25

133W

48W

SPEED

121W

47W

Falcon PC

Stock idle

114W

43W

142W

75
Overclocked idle

112.5

150

Overclocked load

FALCON PC

OVERALL SCORE

78%

SPEED

DESIGN

HARDWARE

VALUE

19/25 18/25
18/25 22/25

OVERALL SCORE

77%

65

E L I T E / THE BEST KIT

Elite
Our choice of the best hardware available

Build a budget PC
Core components
The parts youll need to build either PC. This kit list gives you a solid PSU, a decent quality case and the full retail
version of Windows 7 Home Premium.

PRICE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

Xigmatek Midgard II

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 113, p74

60

XFX Pro Series 550W Core Edition

www.novatech.co.uk

Issue 122, p50

53

500GB Seagate Barracuda ST500DM002

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 104, p72

36

Lite-On IHAS124-04

www.cclonline.com

Issue 99, p108

12

Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit OEM

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 75, p46

70

66

(inc VAT)

All-purpose PC
The parts youll need to add to the core components to build a general-purpose PC. This machine will handle
general computing tasks with no trouble, and will also cope with basic gaming, although youll have to lower the
detail settings. It features high-speed memory to boost the performance of the AMD APUs graphics system.
PRICE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

Gigabyte GA-F2A88XM-D3H

www.dabs.com

Issue 126, p22

48

AMD A10-7850K

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 127, p17

132

8GB Corsair Vengeance 2,133MHz CAS11

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 112, p60

78

Gelid Tranquillo Rev 2

www.quietpc.com

Issue 100, p86

24

TOTAL

(inc VAT)

513

Gaming PC
The parts youll need to build a budget machine capable of playing the latest games at maximum settings on a
1080p monitor. The machine has a discrete graphics card, a dual-core CPU and slower memory than the allpurpose PC, as its GPU doesnt use system memory. Meanwhile, the Z87 motherboard gives you headroom to
upgrade to a faster CPU later, as well as an additional graphics card.
PRICE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

MSI Z87-G43

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 120, p58

78

Intel Core i3-4130

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 124, p28

83

AMD R9 270X 2GB

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 126, p50

149

8GB Corsair Vengeance 1,600MHz CAS9

www.scan.co.uk

N/A

66

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue128, p24

29

Deepcool Gamer Storm Lucifer

D
U PDATE

TOTAL

(inc VAT)

636

Recommended extra
A solid state drive will make a huge difference to the responsiveness of Windows, as well as boot-up times.
We strongly recommend adding one to any build.
NAME
Crucial M500 240GB

U PDATE

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 128, p42

PRICE
(inc VAT)

106

67

E L I T E / THE BEST KIT

Build a mid-range PC
Work PC
The parts youll need to build a solid quad-core PC with plenty of upgrade potential. This kit list gives you an allin-one liquid cooler and a K-series Core i5 CPU, meaning you can overclock it and get some serious processing
power. Weve managed to get our test Haswell CPU up to 4.7GHz using the motherboard in this list, so it has
some serious performance potential. Also included is a solid Antec PSU, a fast Samsung EVO SSD and 8GB of
high-speed memory. The core configuration assumes you wont be doing any serious gaming, however, and it
relies on Intels integrated graphics.
PRICE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

NZXT Phantom 530

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 127, p44

98

MSI Z87-G45 Gaming

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 120, p54

105

Intel Core i5-4670K

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 119, p38

168

8GB G.Skill TridentX 2,400MHz

www.novatech.co.uk

Issue 120, p98

83

Corsair H75

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 126, p30

65

Antec HCG-520M High Current Gamer 520W

www.cclonline.com

Issue 122, p43

72

Seagate Barracuda 2TB ST2000DM001

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 104, p75

60

Lite-On IHAS124-04

www.cclonline.com

Issue 99, p108

12

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

www.cclonline.com

Issue 128, p52

126

Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit OEM

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 75, p46

70

TOTAL

(inc VAT)

859

Gaming PC
The graphics card youll need to play current games at their maximum settings at 1080p and 2,560 x 1,440.

68

PRICE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

1,920 x 1,080
AMD R9 270X 2GB

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 126, p50

149

2,560 x 1,440
Nvidia GeForce GTX 770 2GB

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 126, p55

230

(inc VAT)

Build a performance PC
Work PC
The parts youll need to build a high-quality, fast PC thats ideal for multi-threaded workloads. This kit list
features a high-quality, beautifully built case, and has a Core i7-4770K CPU. This processors support for HyperThreading support effectively splits the resources of the CPUs four physical cores into a further four virtual
cores, meaning it can effectively handle eight threads at once. Theres also a solid 750W PSU, giving you plenty
of headroom for overclocking and adding multiple graphics cards, and a Corsair H80i all-in-one liquid cooler.
PRICE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

SilverStone Fortress FT02B-W USB 3.0

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 85, p88

185

Gigabyte GA-Z87-UD3H

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 120, p52

131

Intel Core i7-4770K

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 119, p38

240

8GB G.Skill TridentX 2,400MHz

www.novatech.co.uk

Issue 120, p98

83

Corsair H80i

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 116, p64

77

XFX Pro Black Edition 750W

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 122, p60

104

Seagate Barracuda 2TB ST2000DM001

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 104, p75

60

Lite-On IHAS124-04

www.cclonline.com

Issue 99, p108

12

www.cclonline.com

Issue 128, p52

235

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 75, p46

70

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 500GB

U PDATE

Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit OEM

TOTAL

(inc VAT)

1,197

Gaming PC
The graphics card youll need to play current games at their maximum settings at 2,560 x 1,440 and beyond.
PRICE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

2,560 x 1,440
Nvidia GeForce GTX 770 2GB

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 126, p55

230

2,560 x 1,440, 5,760 x 1,080 and 3,840 x 2,160

AMD Radeon R9 290 4GB

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 126, p58

322

(inc VAT)

*Note: Multiple graphics cards are required to run Crysis 3 smoothly at 5,760 x 1,080 and 3,840 x 2,160, and Battlefield 4 at 5,760 x 1,080.

Recommended
extra
A discrete sound card gives you higher-quality sound when playing back or recording music.
NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

Creative Sound Blaster Z

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 116, p42

PRICE
(inc VAT)

73

69

E L I T E / THE BEST KIT

Build an LGA2011 workstation

Multi-threaded workstation
The parts youll need to build a PC with serious power in multi-threaded workstation software, such as 3D
rendering apps and optimised distributed computing software. The kit list features a 6-core LGA2011 CPU, which
will also be overclockable using the motherboard and cooler listed. Also supplied is 16GB of RAM, a whopping
1TB of solid state storage and a 1.2KW PSU, which will give you loads of headroom for adding multiple GPUs.
PRICE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

Corsair Obsidian 750D

www.cclonline.com

Issue 123, p30

127

Asus Rampage IV Extreme Black Edition

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 124, p42

410

Intel Core i7-4930K

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 123, p51

430

AMD R9 270X 2GB

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 126, p50

149

16GB Kingston HyperX Predator 1,866MHz

KHX18C9T2K4/16X

www.dabs.com

Issue 123, p56

143

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 128, p19

94

Corsair Professional Series AX1200i

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 111, p40

250

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 1TB

www.amazon.co.uk

Issue 128, p52

400

Seagate Barracuda 2TB ST2000DM0001

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 104, p75

60

Lite-On IHAS124-04

www.cclonline.com

Issue 99, p108

12

Microsoft Windows 7 Professional OEM

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 75, p46

105

Corsair Hydro H105

U PDATE

TOTAL

(inc VAT)

2,180

4K gaming PC
This LGA2011 system has the advantage of being able to support multiple graphics cards with a decent number of
PCI-E 3 lanes, unlike many LGA1150 motherboards. As such, its also an ideal platform for building a machine for
high-resolution PC gaming, replacing the graphics card listed above with two or more high-spec cards.
NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

2 x EVGA Superclocked ACX GeForce GTX 780 3GB

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 123, p54

TOTAL

70

PRICE
(inc VAT)

786

2,966

Build a mini PC
Core components
The parts youll need to build either PC. This kit list gives you a solid PSU, 8GB of RAM, an overclockable Haswell
cooler, an all-in-one liquid cooler and Windows 7 Home Premium. Also included is a graphics card that can play
current games at their maximum settings at 1080p.
PRICE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

Intel Core i5-4670K

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 119, p38

168

8GB G.Skill TridentX 2,400MHz

www.novatech.co.uk

Issue 120, p98

83

Corsair H75

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 125, p30

65

AMD R9 270X 2GB

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 126, p50

149

Samsung SSD 840 EVO 250GB

www.cclonline.com

Issue 128, p52

126

Seagate Barracuda 2TB ST2000DM001

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 104, p75

60

Lite-On IHAS124-04

www.cclonline.com

Issue 99, p108

12

Antec HCG-520M High Current Gamer 520W

www.cclonline.com

Issue 122, p43

72

Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit OEM

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 75, p46

70

(inc VAT)

Mini-ITX PC
The parts youll need to build a pint-sized powerhouse
PRICE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

Corsair Obsidian 250D

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 127, p24

72

MSI Z87i

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 121, p48

97

See Issue 121, p92 for a full guide to building a mini-ITX PC with this case and motherboard

TOTAL

(inc VAT)

974

Micro-ATX PC
The parts youll need to build a mini PC that doesnt take up as much room as a full-sized desktop
PRICE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

Fractal Design Arc Mini R2

www.cclonline.com

Issue 127, p46

71

Asus Maximus VI Gene

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 121, p20

150

TOTAL

(inc VAT)

1,026

71

E L I T E / THE BEST KIT

Cases
PRICE

TYPE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

Budget ATX

Xigmatek Midgard II

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 113, p74

60

Sub-100
ATX quiet

Fractal Design Define R4

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 127, p42

80

Sub-100 ATX
performance

NZXT Phantom 530

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 103, p70

98

Sub-200 ATX

SilverStone Fortress FT02B-W USB 3.0

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 85, p88

185

Water-cooling ATX

SilverStone Temjin TJ07B-W

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 63, p87

260

Mini-ITX tower

Corsair Obsidian 250D

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 127, p24

72

Mini-ITX cube

Antec ISK600

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 126, p28

65

Micro-ATX

Fractal Design Arc Mini R2

www.cclonline.com

Issue 127, p46

71

(inc VAT)

Graphics cards
NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

1,920 x 1,080
gaming

AMD Radeon R9 270X 2GB

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 126, p50

149

2,560 x 1,440
gaming

Nvidia GeForce GTX 770 2GB

www.overclockers.co.uk

Issue 126, p55

230

High-end gaming*

AMD R9 290 4GB

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 126, p58

322

4K gaming

2 x EVGA Superclocked ACX GeForce

GTX 780 3GB

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 123, p54

786

* Handles all games at 2,560 x 1,440 and some at 4K and 5,760 x 1,080

72

PRICE

TYPE

(inc VAT)

Power supplies
PRICE

TYPE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

Budget 550W

XFX Pro Series 550W

Core Edition

www.novatech.co.uk

Issue 122, p50

53

Mid-range 520W

Antec HCG-520M High

Current Gamer 520W

www.cclonline.com

Issue 122, p43

72

High-end 760W

Corsair Professional Series

AX760i

www.ebuyer.com

Issue 122, p53

156

High-end 1.2kW

Corsair Professional Series

AX1200i

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 111, p40

250

Networking

(inc VAT)

D
U PDATE

PRICE

TYPE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

Router

Asus RT-AC68U

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 128, p88

180

Wi-Fi adaptor

Asus PCE-AC68

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 128, p88

70

TYPE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

Hard disk

Seagate Barracuda 2TB

ST2000DM001

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 104, p75

60

250GB SSD

Samsung SSD 840

EVO 250GB

www.cclonline.com

Issue 128, p52

126

1TB SSD

Samsung SSD 840

EVO 1TB

www.amazon.co.uk

Issue 128, p52

400

NAS box

Synology DiskStation
DS213j

www.ebuyer.com

Issue 119, p50

160

(inc VAT)

Storage
PRICE
(inc VAT)

73

E L I T E / THE BEST KIT

Monitors
PRICE

TYPE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

24in monitor

Dell U2412M

www.aria.co.uk

Issue 105, p64

210

27in budget
monitor

Digimate IPS-2701WPH

www.aria.co.uk

Issue 115, p62

330

29in monitor

Dell U2913WM

www.aria.co.uk

Issue 115, p58

348

4K monitor

Asus PQ321QE

www.scan.co.uk

Issue123, p27

2,652

TYPE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

PCI-E sound card

Creative Sound Blaster Z

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 116, p42

73

USB sound card

Asus Xonar Essence One

www.dabs.com

Issue 118, p44

340

2.1 speakers

Corsair SP2500

www.scan.co.uk

Issue118, p75

176

Headset

Qpad QH-90

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 118, p69

77

(inc VAT)

Audio

74

PRICE
(inc VAT)

Peripherals
PRICE

TYPE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

Budget mechanical
keyboard

Func KB-460

www.morecomputers.com

Issue 126, p36

65

Mechanical gaming
keyboard

Corsair Vengeance K70

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 125, p34

109

Mechanical MMO
keyboard

Corsair Vengeance K95

www.cclonline.com

Issue 123, p64

124

Mouse

Mionix Naos 8200

www.dabs.com

Issue 125, p74

60

TYPE

NAME

SUPPLIER

FEATURED

(inc VAT)

Dream PC

Scan 3XS Bear

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 125, p58

6,999

Sub-1,300
gaming PC

CCL Elite Battle Cube

7000i

www.cclonline.com

Issue 127, p62

1,230

Mini-ITX PC

Computer Planet VeeR

www.computerplanet.
co.uk

Issue 125, p48

2,786

Gaming laptop

Scan 3XS Graphite LG135

www.scan.co.uk

Issue 124, p24

999

(inc VAT)

Systems
PRICE

75

Games

Featured this month

Inverse look p77 / The Elder Scrolls Online p78 / Nidhogg p80 /
Octodad: Dadliest Catch p82 /Jazzpunk p83 / Thief p84
76

OPINION

BEN H
R IACRKDW
L AI N
DE
G E/ /INVERSE
FROM THE
LOOK
EDITOR

RESPECT
HEADING
HERE
MY
TIME
PLEASE
Standfirst here
please
Standfirst
here
Standfirst
here
Game
developers
need
toplease
think harder
about
theplease
time Standfirst
here
please
here please
commitments
they
ask Standfirst
of their players,
argues Rick Lane
his month
ow,
Id better
I spent
make
four
sure
days
I have
exploring
an Nvidia
the card
virtual
in 2014,
worldI
thought,
of
Tamriel
asin
I watched
Bethesdas
theupcoming
Witcher 3 PhysX
MMO demo
The Elder
last
proprietary
Scrolls
Online
GPU
(see
feature
p78). Well,
would
inactually
actuality,
persuade
I spent two
me
to goexploring,
days
with one companys
and two days
GPU
being
overso
anothers
bored that
since
a local
thecarpentry
3dfx days.
firm
Graphics
asked if
card
they
companies
could fashion
have been
me into
coming
a desk.
upThe
with
games
these
unique selourisown
introduction
agonisingly
judgment
protracted,
call, according
and it serves
to your
nopriorities.
purpose
What than
other
are your
to introduce
prioritiesthe
when.
player to the same mechanics that
MMOs have been using for the last 13 years.
Games are frequently accused of being too long, and theres
some truth to this charge. Many mainstream games could be
half the length, half the budget and half the
price, and would be better off for it. Even the
excellent Assassins Creed IVs campaign
dragged on for far too long. But the root of this
problem isnt a simple case of bloat, its more
that games have no yardstick for length.
With films, books and even board games,
theres a broadly accepted notion of when
they go on for too long or not long enough. Most books usually
have between 250 and 600 pages, most board games take
between 45 minutes and two hours to play, and most films run
from 90 minutes to three hours. Computer games, on the other
hand, can range from as little as a few minutes to hundreds of
hours of play time. Theres little understanding of when a game
needs editing.
Editing games is just as important as it is in any other creative
endeavour, but its a much trickier prospect than in other media.
Games arent always designed in a linear fashion that can be
neatly cut, and mechanical aspects, such as the length of time it
takes to resolve a particular action, can also affect game length,

W
T

along with cutscenes and storytelling. But I believe theres a way

to ensure even the broadest games remain sharp and compelling.
Put simply, developers simply need to ask themselves: Does
what Im asking from the player respect his or her time
commitment to my game?
For Skyrim, the answer would be yes. Although Skyrim is
potentially hundreds of hours long, theres no expectation put
upon the player to finish everything it offers, while all of that
content is unique, handmade and usually engaging. Yet for
Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance, the answer would be no
Despite only being around eight hours long,
Revengeance is bogged down with sprawling
cutscenes and exhaustive dialogue
exchanges that force the player into the back
seat, and add little to the overall experience.
Unfortunately, the situation of poorly
edited games seems unlikely to change soon,
as many game publishers (and some gamers)
still associate length with quality. Moreover, there seems to be
a fear that snappily edited games also mean fewer places to hide,
while a longer game improves its chances of having good bits
in it. Im much more likely to recommend a game with some neat
ideas that gets to the point, despite its problems, than I am to
recommend a brownish kitchen-sink-designed sludge that takes
forever to get anywhere.
As more games are published year after year, and players
find it increasingly difficult to keep up with the releases, they
will inevitably have to prioritise. Developers will have no choice
but to start seriously thinking about what their games ask from
their players.

films,
books and
CiWith
debis
vel iliquam
sam
board
games,
you
know
sam serovides doloris
whenutaque
they go
on too long
volectas

Ben Hardwidge is the editor of Custom PC. He likesRick

PCs,Lane
heavy
metal, real
ale
and Warhammer
40,000. [email protected]
is Custom
PCs
games
editor.
@Rick_Lane

@custompcmag

77

G A M E S / PREVIEW

The Elder Scrolls Online

RELEASE DATE 4 April, 2014 / DEVELOPER Zenimax Online Studios / PUBLISHER Bethesda Softworks / WEBSITE http://elderscrollsonline.com

he Elder Scrolls Online has endured a bumpy

road to launch. When it was unveiled last year, the
decision to build the MMO around the World of
Warcraft model and then drape it in Elder Scrolls lore, rather
than create a traditional Elder Scrolls game that let you
explore with your friends, came under fire from fans and
critics alike. Furthermore, the game has already been
written off by some people, due to Bethesda choosing a
subscription-based model when successful subscriptionbased MMOs are rarer than black rhinos.
Bethesdas conservative approach to MMO design is
undoubtedly (and rather ironically) a risky strategy. Yet
having played The Elder Scrolls Online (TESO) over several
days this month, its clear that not all hope is lost for
Bethesdas first MMO effort. Developer Zenimax Online
Studios has been hard at work infusing the game with a
strong Elder Scrolls vibe, and the result is a game that,
while problematic in places, has considerable potential.
Admittedly, the terrible opening doesnt do TESO any
favours. Like previous Elder Scrolls games, your player
begins in prison. In this case, Coldharbour Prison, the realm
of Molag Bal, Daedric Prince of enslavement of mortals.
Inevitably, you escape, and it turns out theres a prophecy

78

that marks you out as the most important person in Tamriel,

which makes absolutely no sense given that this is an MMO
and everyone is following the same story. There are big
lumpy dollops of exposition, some perfunctory combat,
and a few cameos from A-list actors whose vocal talents
greatly outweigh the script theyre reading.
Of course, the Elder Scrolls games have never been
strong starters, but normally, the tedium only lasts half an
hour before the game cuts you loose. In TESO, there are two
further starting areas, through which you have to suffer for
upwards of a day before the game relinquishes its grip, and
even then the necessities of traditional MMO design mean it
never fully lets go. Each area is designed around specific
levels, so while you can go to most places if you wish, youre
not going to be able to do much without getting squished.
Although the true freedom thats the trademark of prior
Elder Scrolls games is ultimately denied to you, the illusion
of freedom is preserved, simply because the world is so
vast. Tamriels landmass is divided between three factions,
and the territory of the faction we chose to play The
Ebonheart Pact encompassed the whole of Skyrim,
Morrowind and the Argonian homeland Black Marsh,
alongside having access to Cyrodiil for the PvP component.

We explored a single province of Morrowind, and the

variety of landscapes in this one area was remarkable,
including forests of giant mushrooms, arid plains dotted
with bubbling sulphur pools, and towering volcanoes
spitting ash and lava from their mouths. The Elder Scrolls
games ability to pack a world with fascinating sights was
always a strong element, and TESO lives up to that legacy.
It also feels more like an Elder Scrolls game than we
anticipated. Quests are often multi-layered, and while
theyre initially overly focused on either collecting three
things, killing three things or pressing three things, they
become more involved, with their own little twists and
turns. Furthermore, there are dungeons tunnelling deep
into the earth that exist purely to be pillaged, containing
unique loot and enemies.
Even combat has more of the Elder Scrolls feel about it
than you might expect, although its also the most MMOesque aspect of the core game. Initially, you select a specific
class for your character, but these classes are fairly broadly
defined, with most of them encompassing a mixture of
physical combat and magic, with the ability to pick whatever
weapon you prefer. A dual-wielding Dragon Knight, for
example, becomes a whirlwind of fire, rock and steel, able
to knock down an opponent by flinging a fist of stone at
them, before imbuing his weapons with molten metal and
finishing them off with a deadly flurry of stabs and slashes.
Combat for all classes is fast and furious, but currently
lacks the weight and force to make it compelling. It isnt dull,
especially once youve unlocked sufficient skills to create
tactics. Its just a little flimsy. Also, in its attempt to make
TESO feel like an Elder Scrolls game, Bethesda
hesda may have
compromised the multiplayer aspect. Forr the most part, it
plays like a solo game, with players following
wing the same
quest lines but not really adventuring together,
gether, aside
from in combat situations. It doesnt feel like a game that
youre playing with other people; more a game that
youre playing at the same time as other people.
There are exceptions though. Rifts in the
he
form of huge portals, anchored to the
ground by tree-thick chains, require
multiple players to close, and some

dungeons benefit from multiple players too. Where players

really come together, though, is in Cyrodiil, the realm
featured in Oblivion, which is now a massive PvP arena.
TESOs PvP system bears certain similarities to
Planetside, being a vast area in which the three factions
constantly wrestle territory from one another. The objects
of this war are the Elder Scrolls themselves, housed in
temples dotted around the country, each of which is
protected by a network of fortresses. To capture an Elder
Scroll, the faction must work together across the frontline
to first occupy the fortresses before attacking the Temple.
These broader campaigns are underpinned by smaller
missions and objectives, enabling you to aid your factions
cause at a variety of levels. So you could simply dive into
the thick of battle by attacking or defending a fortress.
Alternatively, you could band together a small group of
friends to raid one of the farmsteads that supply these key
structures. Or you could brave the wilds of Cyrodiil alone on
a mission to scout out a location, or assassinate another
player. Although we only spent a little time with the game,
this aspect could well turn out to be TESOs standout
feature, as it involves players working together on both the
micro and macro-scale, which the PvE aspect lacks.
Frankly, though, The Elder Scrolls Online could go either
way. The MMO framework and the Elder Scrolls mechanics
dont always sit well together, resulting in contradictions
that fail to serve either half particularly well. On the other
hand, Zenimaxs take on Tamriel is just as enticing as any of
Bethesdas prior offerings, and as the game goes on, it feels
more and more like Skyrim or Morrowind.
Being able to explore that world with other
although the game
people is wonderful, altho
that factor as
doesnt accommodate th
strangely
well as it should. Its a hulking,
hu
alluring creation with more peaks
than the
and troughs th
Himalayas, and for both
Himalayas
better and
an worse, it
does fe
feel like an Elder
Scrolls game.
Scroll
RICK LANE
LA

79

G A M E S / REVIEW

Nidhogg /11.99

inc VAT

DEVELOPER Messhoff / PUBLISHER Messhoff / WEBSITE www.nidhogggame.com

hat exactly is a Nidhogg? According to Norse

legend, its a dragon that gnaws at the root of the
World Tree. According to us, its the feeling of
unbridled joy thats generated as you throw a sword into
your best friends face.
Nidhogg is a simple swashbuckling game in which two
players try to best one another using a series of stabs,
throws, punches, jumps, rolls, dive-kicks and blocks. When
one player is killed, they respawn from behind their starting
position, allowing the other player to advance a little further
towards the edge of the screen. If one player manages to
advance through two or three screens, they win, and may
celebrate this achievement by running past an ecstatic
audience before being consumed by a dragon, the
eponymous Nidhogg.
What makes Nidhogg so compelling is the way the
combat system is finely tuned to accommodate both
a dollop of skill and a sprinkling of luck. While the
on-screen visuals may look like a child scoffed a tube of
Smarties before vomiting onto your monitor, Nidhoggs
splattering of pixels conceals slick animations and
highly responsive controls.
A fight in Nidhogg is a fast and frenzied experience
and, with the limited number of moves needed to learn,
players can become accomplished Nidhoggers in a
matter of minutes. Whats more, the fact that each
move can be dodged or countered means the fight is
never over until the fat lady gurgles through the swordhole in her windpipe. Individual duels can be epic

OVERALL SCORE

70%
/ VERDICT
Nidhogg shines
with a brilliant
radiance, but it
burns out very
quickly if youre
not playing with
a partner.

80

contests that see both combatants pushing each other back

and forth across the map, fighting both with and without
their weapons, even exchanging them as they throw them
at one another, and leaping around like monkeys covered in
itching powder.
Alongside these bitterly fought battles are moments of
absolute hilarity, where your friend runs straight onto your
sword point, or where you roll under your opponents
defence and sprint madly for the finish line, or where one
player completely mistimes a jump and plummets down a
chasm. The four different stages underpin both memorable
engagements and daft debacles. For example, one level set
in a forest features fields of head-high grass, forcing you to
fight blind.
For the most part, Nidhoggs highly streamlined structure
is a blessing, but there are a few areas where its a curse.
Four stages simply arent sufficient, especially for the
single-player mode, in which theyre repeated over and
over. In addition, the dreadful netcode makes it very difficult
to find an online opponent. At the time of writing, the
matchmaking system could only find one other person on
the entire Internet playing Nidhogg, which is difficult to
believe. Basically, it doesnt work, and thats a big problem.
This means that, unless you have a friend whos willing
to regularly come over and share a keyboard with you,
Nidhoggs appeal is rather limited. But this doesnt change
the fact that its an excellently designed duelling game. Its
just a shame there arent more ways to experience it.
RICK LANE

G A M E S / REVIEW

Octodad: Dadliest Catch/11.99

inc VAT

DEVELOPER Young Horses / PUBLISHER Young Horses / WEBSITE www.octodadgame.com

n one the strangest game premises weve

encountered in a long time, Octodad: Dadliest
catch casts you as an Octopus masquerading as
a human, trying to live a peaceful suburban life. Despite
plainly being an Octopus wearing a suit, Octodads ruse has
so far gone unnoticed, to the point where hes married and
has fathered two regular human children. Yet what starts
out as a normal day for Octodad quickly becomes anything
but, as a trip to the aquarium and an obsessive sushi chef
threaten to obliterate the life hes built for himself.
For the first couple of hours, Dadliest Catch executes its
vision superbly. You control Octodads limbs individually,
and attempt to complete everyday chores using his
wobbly tentacles, without raising suspicion, by destroying
everything in sight like a squishy wrecking ball. Simple
tasks such as making a cup of coffee and mowing the
lawn are made both challenging and amusing as
Octodad stumbles around, contorting into all manner
of strange shapes, and grunting with surprise and
frustration as he struggles to accomplish his goals.
Developer Young Horses accentuates the games
comedy in various ways. The emergent slapstick of
controlling Octodad is helped along by conveniently
placed balls and banana skins, and an extra layer of
comedy comes from the sharply written script, which
plays on the familys sheer obliviousness to Octodads
true identity. His children provide the best lines, slicing
like surgeons through social conventions with their
seemingly innocent observations.

OVERALL SCORE

72%
/ VERDICT
Weird, witty and
warm, Octodads
comical, physicsbased sandbox is
only let down by a
damp final third.

82

The challenges Octodad faces become gradually more

ridiculous, as he moves from his home to the supermarket
and then to the aquarium, which is more like a theme park,
with various rides and attractions that test Octodads coping
mechanisms and the strength of your diaphragm to the
limit. In World of Kelp he must climb the worlds largest
and most elaborate jungle gym, while in the Deep Ocean
section, Octodad has to contend with dance floors and
escalators in order to escort his daughter through the dark.
Up to this point, the games difficulty is fairly well judged.
Unfortunately, though, Young Horses then takes the
challenge one step too far, and the final third of Octodads
humour cant mitigate the frustration that creeps into play.
This concluding hour includes multiple stealth sections that
require timing, speed and delicate balancing, none of which
Octodad is any good at executing. Consequently, the game
transforms from a small but delightfully silly sandbox into
the worlds worst stealth game. The fun in Octodad
emerges from experimenting with the world around you
using Octodads unpredictable movements. When it
switches to a broadly linear structure in which its easy to
fail, the fun is greatly diminished.
Still, the witty writing and uplifting ending just about
succeed in carrying Dadliest Catch through this
disappointing third act. Its a unique, silly and endearing
game. Although it cant sustain the same level of quality
through its fairly modest length, it will nevertheless stick in
your mind like a squid to a wet window.
RICK LANE

Jazzpunk/11.99

inc VAT

DEVELOPER Necrophone Games / PUBLISHER Necrophone Games / WEBSITE http://necrophonegames.com/jazzpunk

ts difficult to pull off comedy

in games. The unpredictable
nature of the player makes
achieving comedic timing hard, while
keeping the humour consistent over
the course of even a short game
length requires a frightening amount
of content. But it isnt impossible.
Octodad uses player unpredictability
to its advantage, whereas Nidhogg is just naturally funny.
Jazzpunk, on the other hand, approaches virtual comedy
by throwing jokes at its audience with more frequency
than a Tim Vine box set on fast forward.
Jazzpunk casts you as a spy named Polyblank, who
embarks on a variety of espionage missions set in a
world best described as: If the Cold War were won not
by America, not by Russia, but by robots. Its basically
the 1960s, if that decades vision of the future had come
true, but that future was still in the 1960s. Dont worry
if none of that makes sense.
No, Jazzpunks primary aim is to make you laugh, and
its future-past cyber-cold war thematic mashup is just
a backdrop, which it readily twists, breaks and abandons
entirely for the sake of cracking a joke.
Each mission gives you a main objective, such as
stealing a technologically advanced replacement
kidney from a cowboy in a sushi restaurant (see what
we meant about making sense?). The missions are
usually straightforward to complete, but simply

OVERALL SCORE

86%
/ VERDICT
Sticks a custard pie
in James Bonds
face and puts
George Smileys
underwear on its
head this
delightfully daft
spy parody will do
anything to make
you laugh.

proceeding down that set path rather

misses the point.
These missions take place in open
levels, which are jam-packed with
side-quests, asides, Easter eggs and
other secrets, all of which deliver
punchlines in the same way Diablo
drops loot. Opening a pizza box might
transport you to a giant pizza world
where you must fight off waves of slice-zombies with a
pizza cutter and a spatula. Examining a wedding cake may
reveal it to be a secret computer with a deathmatch game
of Wedding Quake running on it, in which you must shoot
brides and grooms using a champagne bottle and a threetier Madeira chaingun.
It hammers on the funny bone with remarkable
regularity, although it isnt quite as sharp or witty as last
years comedy star, The Stanley Parable. Also, theres little
else to Jazzpunk other than walking around pressing E on
objects, so when the comedy doesnt strike the right chord,
and Jazzpunks scattergun approach makes this an
inevitability, the game suddenly feels quite empty.
These are fleeting issues though. For every joke that
misses its mark, Jazzpunk follows up with two that strike
you right in the giggle gland. Weirdly, its also the best spy
game weve seen in a while, with its playful pastiche of the
golden age of espionage proving surprisingly compelling.
Forget James Bond. The names Blank. Polyblank.
RICK LANE

83

G A M E S / REVIEW

Thief/29.99

inc VAT

DEVELOPER Eidos Montreal / PUBLISHER Square Enix / WEBSITE www.thiefgame.com

hief had us worried. The reboot by Eidos

Montreal of the classic Looking Glass series
has undergone a lengthy and, by all accounts,
troubled development, suffered a terrible marketing
campaign, and taken heavy flak from the press during
previews. As such, its a relief to be able to say that Thief is
a decent game. It isnt a classic, and it disappoints in some
areas, but as a game about creeping around in the shadows
and nicking other peoples stuff, its
s pretty darned
enjoyable when considered as a whole.
This new game marks a fresh start
tart for
the series. Garrett has a new look
ook and a
replacement voice actor, neither
her of which
are too dissimilar from Looking
ng Glass
OVERALL SCORE
original take to be jarring, and his story
has been dialled back to zero. Instead of
battling the Trickster or unravelling
elling
conspiracies in The Metal Age,
e, hes
investigating the disappearance
ce of a
/ VERDICT
fellow Thief, which leads him into a hunt
A surprisingly
for an object called the Primal;; a magic
enjoyable sneak
crystal that offers powers beyond
yond
em up that suffers
from conflicted
imagination, and makes everything
ything
design decisions
around you glow bright blue, apparently.
and a dreadful
The story is by far the weakest
kest aspect
story. Thief may not
of Thief, and its where the games
mes difficult
dazzle as well as it
development is most readily apparent.
could have done,
but give it a chance
There are at least three primary
ry antagonists,
and youll still have
all of which are written to seem
m more evil
some fun.
than Garrett in boring ways. In the previous

70%

84

games, Garrett had a selfish motivation behind his actions.

He fought the Trickster because he was outsmarted by him,
which cost him an eye, and he battled Hammerite leader
Karras in the sequel because he was a sanctimonious
hypocrite who Garrett greatly enjoyed taking down a peg.
Thiefs multiple baddies are plain shades of corruption,
psychosis and untrustworthiness. The plot is determined to
cast Garrett as a straightforward hero, completely at odds
effort elsewhere to preserve his cynical,
with the games ef
character.
greedy and egocentric
egoc
ideas and themes is obvious in other
This clash of id
opts for an aesthetic thats mostly
areas. The city o
medieval, with
wit a dash of Victorian London, but
the steampunk themes entirely. Guards
eschews th
are darker, meaner and swearier than before,
at adult humour are made at the same
attempts a
time, which
whic results in some crass and not
particularly funny jokes.
Meanwhile, certain primary missions cant
Meanwh
whether to pay homage to classic Thief
decide wh
or go their own way, and the result is
missions o
that, while good, cant live up to the
a game tha
original. It can
c never live up to our memories of
raiding Lord Baffords Manor for the first time, or
the brilliant
brillian bank heist of the second game. Yet
Thief tries to embellish and build upon the
when Thie
successes o
of those earlier games, it succeeds with
aplomb.
surprising ap
The open ccity is a bigger, more tightly packed
version of the city in Deadly Shadows, and while its

atmosphere is too dark and gloomy for its

own good, it remains a satisfying place to
explore. Its various districts are crammed
with apartments to raid, shops to pillage and
houses to ransack, and they include a bevy
of side missions that ask you to acquire
specific items.
Basso missions are brief excursions that use the city
itself, asking you to steal a ladys hand mirror from her
bedchamber, for example, or piece together the last work
of a missing poet in his dank waterside flat. Then there are
Client missions. These are larger, sequential adventures
that take place in their own specifically designed levels.
There are only six of these missions, sadly, but each one is
intelligently crafted, set around large houses and shops,
each with multiple methods of entry.
The same cant be said for the main campaign,
unfortunately. Aside from mission number six a level set
in a huge mansion, which is arguably the best moment in
the entire game the remaining seven are broadly linear in
structure; a line of smaller boxes, which you can explore to
a certain extent, but you must inevitably progress through
them in a certain direction. This isnt a problem in itself
many of the older games had similarly built levels, but they
lack the same conceptual ingenuity.
For example, theres a mission where youre asked to
break into a heavily guarded jail, which is a great idea,
but by the time you get there, an uprising has occurred,
meaning that most of the work is done for you. Its a
shame, because the same level has you skipping over
rooftops and burglarising an architects mansion
beforehand, building up to a spectacular climax that
never arrives.

Regardless of the location for your larceny, both sneaking

and stealing are pleasingly implemented. Thievery is now
a far more tactile experience, with Garrett swiping loot
greedily off tables and other surfaces, picking locks with
his nimble fingers, and caressing the frames of paintings
as he searches for hidden switches. It all feels deliciously
naughty. Meanwhile, sneaking is traditionally light-based,
but also involves evading the watchful eyes of guards,
mercenaries and servants. To aid him, Garrett has an
excellent new swoop ability, which
gives him a quick burst of speed in any
direction; handy if you need to dash
through a well-lit area.
Most importantly, stealth is a necessity,
even on Normal difficulty. Garrett has no
offensive weapon, aside from his blackjack,
and while you might be able to overcome a
single opponent in open combat, flight is
the only viable option for any more than
that. Flash-bombs and Garretts selection
box of arrows make a return, although rope arrows can
only be used in specific places now, which renders them
largely redundant.
The other major new addition is Focus mode
a supernatural power that Garrett
gains early in the story. This can be
upgraded in various ways, from
improving his defensive capabilities to
enabling him to visualise noises or
spot traps. Its useful in certain
circumstances, but it isnt essential. In
fact, for Thief purists, it can be disabled
entirely, along with many other player
aides, such as objective markers and
the mini-map. Thief caters to both
newcomers and veteran housebreakers alike.
Its easy to forget that, although regarded as a classic
today, when Thief: The Dark Project debuted in 1998, it
didnt receive unanimous praise. It was viewed as a fantastic
concept that struggled with the execution. Only in the
sequel did Thief truly live up to its potential. In a way, this
reboot repeats those initial difficulties, caught between
trying to update the game for a new audience, but without
compromising the essence of the series. It isnt wholly
successful, but it retains enough of the original magic to
make it a challenging and pleasurable pilfering experience.

The citys aesthetic

is mostly medieval,
with a dash of
Victorian London

RICK LANE

85

OPINION

J I M K I L LO C K / DIGITAL RIGHTS

Should we ban
extremist content?
Banning extremist websites at the ISP level wont
stop terrorism, argues Jim Killock
ithout public debate, the
government has started to
censor websites it believes
promote extremist views. The list of
sites isnt published, nor put before a
court. Instead, Home Office officials
have created it. The secret list is then
used in universities, schools, libraries
government offices and hospitals to
restrict access to these sites.
Now, the government wants ISPs
to block sites on this list possibly
without a court order, citing the
voluntary method of blocking child
abuse images, via a list created by the
Internet Watch Foundation (IWF), as
the preferred model. In November,
The Guardian reported that David
Cameron, is understood to favour a
similar model [to the IWF] for terrorist
content. A government-funded body,
possibly within the counter-terrorism
referral unit, will order companies
including BT, TalkTalk, BSkyB and
Virgin Media to block websites,
according to industry sources.
Meanwhile, James Brokenshire MP
told The Daily Mail in February that
Terrorist propaganda online has a
direct impact on the radicalisation of
individuals and we work closely with
internet service providers (ISPs) to
remove terrorist material hosted in

86

the UK or overseas Through

proposals from the Extremism
Taskforce announced by the Prime
Minister in November, we will look
tofurther restrict access to material
that is hosted overseas but illegal
under UK law and help identify
other harmful content to be included
in family-friendly filters.
According to The Mail, officials at
the Home Office are working with
industry to help identify harmful
extremist content to include in
family-friendly filters.
Who might make the decisions
regarding voluntary self-censorship
(using family-friendly filters), or
possibly compulsory ISP censorship?
Thats most likely the Counter
Terrorism Internet Referral Unit
(CTIRU), to which you can complain
about extremism online. It says it
works to remove anything illegal.
but what does that mean? According
to its website, examples of illegal
terrorist or extremist content include:
Speeches or essays calling for
racial or religious violence.
Videos of violence with
messages of glorification or
praise for terrorists.
Postings inciting people to

commit acts of terrorism or

violent extremism.
Messages intended to stir up
hatred against any religious or
ethnic group.
Bomb-making instructions.
It isnt clear if the CTIRU would ever
try to go to court. After all, most of the
time, it will simply be able to clear up
matters by having a word with the
private provider. Most of the time, the
provider will cooperate, of course,
and if they dont then they can be
pressurised in public. Its likely that
they will bow to public pressure.
They have brands to defend, so
theyre likely to remove controversial
material. While you and I might well
be happy to see videos of beheadings
removed, its less clear that they
should remove material where
people express sympathy or support
for political violence.
To take a couple of less recent
examples, we might ask how this
would have applied to Sinn Fein,
which gave support to the IRA, or the
activists condoning the actions of
theAnimal Liberation Front. Both
sets of people may well have been
attempting to persuade others that
violence was justified, but are we

really entitled to prevent them from

speaking? Does the ban continue to
apply once such people are elected?
The Sinn Fein example reminds us
that imposition of censorship can be
a Pyrrhic victory. Journalists in the
1980s were prevented from using
Sinn Fein spokespeoples voices,
dubbing their interviews with
actors voices, emphasising the
ridiculousness of the law. Informal
bans on extremist content could
easily have similar effects. Such
tactics tend to exaggerate the
importance of the material and its
ideas; by implication, this poses a
threat to the state. They tend to
create a victim of the organisation,
producing allies where they had
none before.
Bans and blocks are patronising
tactics. The underlying message is
that the government knows best, and
the public are too weak-minded to
distinguish truth from lies and
distortion. None of which is terribly
sympathetic, or likely to persuade
anyone to abandon extreme views.
Internet blocks live in their own
special category, mind you. As any

fule kno (to quote Molesworth),

schoolchildren learn to get around
them in order to access Facebook.
Torrent users get around government
blocks with proxies, mirror sites and
VPNs, all of which might sound
technical to MPs, but is often trivial
for interested users.
Getting around Internet blocks
doesnt have to be simple for it to
be taken up by users. Its about
incentives. If you desire to read
something, and believe its important
that you access it then you have high
incentives and will go to some
trouble. On the other hand, if youre
just casually interested, but dont
have any strong commitment, you
wont bother getting around blocks.
The result is that Internet blocks
will penalise people such as you and
I, who might be curious about the
views of extremists, and wish to
verify for ourselves that theyre as
bad as they sound, but the blocks
wont prevent people with extreme
views from getting to the websites.
In fact, they may even be more likely
to track banned material, as its
potentially more authentic.

None of the above is hard to work

out, so why does the government
continue to push for censorship? I
think it has a lot to do with the way
the government exploits the power
of the press to inflame, and generate
popularity for politicians it sees as
taking action. A common sense
reaction from a newspaper reader
will take a look at the continued
availability of extreme views, and
simply ask why such material is
allowed; cant it be stopped? Surely,
if nothing else, it must be something
we can stop? The press often seeks to
reflect these easy-to-understand
instincts, and politicians try to bend
policy to fit these instincts.
Curiously, although the idea of
Internet crackdowns has been
circulating at high levels in
government for some time now (at
least a couple of years, in fact), theres
little to no support for it among
officials, and even spooks, who
investigate extremism.
Their instinct is to use surveillance,
and censorship may make this harder,
if people resort to tools such as TOR
to hide browsing habits. Targeted
surveillance of criminal suspects
might well be appropriate, instead
of blanket surveillance of the
population. Should the Home Office
be making MI5s job more difficult?
Banning websites is the result of
a reaction to the content itself, rather
than a genuine view that websites
recruit terrorists, or persuade people
to adopt extreme views. Even if they
were a reaction to that view, bans
wouldnt prevent it from happening.
An alternative approach is needed,
which reaches out and persuades
people that violence isnt an answer.
That takes harder thought, though,
and may include controversial ideas,
such as talking to extreme groups.
Its far from clear that Internet
bans have much to offer, other than
making it seem like something is
being done. Its vital that, at the very
least, ISPs force the government to
use the courts. Otherwise, well
make bad decisions that cant be
easily challenged, and government
departments will be queuing up for
more things to ban.

Jim Killock is executive director of campaign organisation The Open Rights Group (www.openrightsgroup.org)

@jimkillock

87

F E AT U R E / ANALYSIS

EXTREME WI-FI

Time to ditch the cables?

The latest Wi-Fi standards are fast, but are they quick enough to consign
Ethernet cables to the scrapheap? Antony Leather investigates

hether your PC is in the

same room as your
router or modem, or
situated on the other side of your
house, you essentially have three
ways to get your PC online. The
preferred method has always been a
direct connection to the router using
Ethernet cables, which offer up to
1Gb/sec of bandwidth, but routing
the cabling neatly is tricky in a single
room, never mind through several
rooms or floors.

88

Powerline
networking is a
popular option

While every geeks dream home

would have an Ethernet socket in
every room, there are popular and
cheaper alternatives. Powerline
adaptors use your houses power
cables to link your PC and router,
meaning no cable routing. However,
depending on your power setup, they
can suffer from mediocre speeds and
electronic interference, which can
cause connection drop-outs.
The final option is Wi-Fi. It hasnt
always been great if you use network

storage or play games. High PING

times, and poor or non-existent
signal strength in some rooms are
familiar stories, especially if your PC
is on the other side of the house to
your router.
Thankfully, router manufacturers
have made steady progress in
recent years, but just how fast
are the latest routers and Wi-Fi
adaptors, and can they be considered
worthy replacements to wired
Gigabit connections?

802.11 and different

frequency bands
Youre probably familiar with terms
such as 802.11g and 802.11n, with the
end letter referring to a specification
used to make sure mobile devices
and PCs can connect to wireless
transmitters. For example, 802.11g
is an older but popular standard
that offers a maximum theoretical
speed of 54Mb/sec, typically over
short distances.

MAXIMUM THEORETICAL
SPEEDS
802.11a (5GHz)

54Mb/sec

802.11b (2.4GHz)

11Mb/sec

802.11g (2.4GHz)

54Mb/sec

Multiple antennas allow

for increased data transfer
speeds by using multiple
streams of data, although
you needed compatible
hardware at either end

802.11n (2.4/5GHz) 600Mb/sec

The 802.11ac standard

802.11ac (5GHz)

As a result, the 5GHz frequency band

has made a comeback, most notably
with an entirely new standard
802.11ac, although its had to include
a number of new features to
overcome its shortcomings. Firstly, as
so few devices are 5GHz-compatible,
new routers are dual-band capable;
they have two transmitters, so they
can provide separate signals for both
frequency bands simultaneously,
providing backwards compatibility.
Many high-end 802.11n routers
sport more than one aerial. In fact,
the standard supports up to four,
although three is the most popular.
The idea behind the extra aerials isnt
to simply act as one large antenna,
though, but to send multiple streams

1,300Mb/sec

The more recent 802.11n standard

added multiple-input, multipleoutput (MIMO), with additional
receivers and transmitters allowing
for increased data throughput using
spatial multiplexing in other words,
using multiple streams of data, while
also offering increased range. It also
added the option of using 40MHz
channels. When combined, these
improvements saw the maximum
theoretical speed rise to 150Mb/sec
initially, with 300Mb/sec and even
600Mb/sec possible on high-end
routers. However, these are
theoretical maximum speeds, which
youre unlikely to ever see, even if
youre sitting right next to the router.
Two frequency bands have been
introduced too 2.4GHz and 5GHz.
Both have been present in the Wi-Fi
arena since it became popular
around the turn of the century. The
2.4GHz band has been most used,
thanks to its better performance
over range and greater ability to
penetrate solid objects such as walls,
which is important when using
Wi-Fi in the home.
However, it isnt without its
problems. Many other electronic
devices, from garage door operators
to microwaves, also use the same
band, meaning its far more prone
to interference than the 5GHz
frequency band. It also has far fewer
channels from which to choose, and
some of these overlap, so tuning out
the interference can be tricky.

of data to boost throughput, which is

how some of the later 802.11n routers
reached speeds in excess of 150Mb/
sec. Of course, youd also need a
network adaptor with the same
number of aerials, which is where
the term 3x3 applies each device
having three aerials.
The 802.11ac standard
goes one step further, and
uses a featured called
beamforming to boost
throughput. With multiple
streams, theres a chance
that the phase of the output
could be affected by signals
arriving at different times, due to
reflection, also known as signal
multipath. This is an issue with all
radio technologies, and its one
reason why GPS signals can be
inaccurate in built-up areas.
Beamforming reduces this risk
by focusing the beams towards
connected devices, instead of
blanketing an area blindly. The
beams can be adjusted to greatly
reduce any phase variation, boosting
range and penetration, which is one
reason why 802.11ac routers claim to
offer much higher speeds than their
802.11n counterparts. Most 802.11ac
routers include it as standard with
their 5GHz signals too. The 802.11ac
standard also taps into wider
frequency channels, with an option
to use 80MHz, which allows for
increased bandwidth over the
40MHz available to 802.11n routers.

Just how fast is 802.11ac?

BEAMFORMING

Weve spotted manufacturers

cheating a little in their speed
ratings, by combining the speeds of
the 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands. While
its fairly common for routers to offer
both speeds concurrently in both
bands, a single device on a single
band will be slower.
For example, Asus RT-AC68U
offers 600Mb/sec on the 2.4GHz
band and 1,300Mb/sec in the 5GHz
band, and lists the product as having
1,900Mb/sec available. Clearly, you
cant connect a device to both bands
at the same time. However, the
5GHz band does have a theoretical
maximum speed thats greater than
Gigabit Ethernet speeds. Weve
tested several examples of the latest
802.11ac kit over the next few pages.

89

F E AT U R E / ANALYSIS

THE BEST 802.11AC KIT

ROUTERS

Asus RT-AC68U

At 180, Asus latest 802.11ac router is

expensive, but it means business. It
matches the top speed 802.11ac
rating of 1,300Mb/sec on the 5GHz
band and 600Mb/sec by using
TurboQAM, also known as 256-QAM,
which taps into the power of its
three-stream 802.11ac transceiver for
the 2.4GHz band too. It posted the
fastest speeds at both frequencies,
topping out at an incredible 464Mb/
sec (58MB/sec) in our file transfer
test in 5GHz mode, and 125Mb/sec
(15.6MB/sec) in 2.4GHz mode .Its

simple to set up, sports USB 3 and

USB 2 ports for external storage that
can be shared on the network, and
also features fairly extensive Quality
of Service control plus a fully
featured GUI.
This even includes an iOS and
Android-compatible cloud storage
function and its own BitTorrent
client. Its main competitors are Asus
cheaper RT-AC66U and BTs Home
Hub 5. Both managed respectable
speeds, but the RT-AC68U was
always noticeably faster,
considerably more so than the Home
Hub 5 at 2.4GHz. As an extra test for
the fastest router on test, we placed
our PC on the other side of the room
and saw the speed increase to
576Mb/sec, although this still cant
match the 928Mb/sec from using an
Ethernet cable. If you have a NAS, the
RT-AC68U offers some of the fastest
Wi-Fi money can buy.

Asus RT-AC66U

HOW WE TEST
We carried out a simple file transfer test, LAN Speed
Test read and write tests (www.totusoft.com/
lanspeed.html) and PING tests using www.speedtest.
net, comparing them to a Gigabit Ethernet connection
in a typical usage scenario, with a 5m distance and
several walls between the adaptors and routers. We
connected two SSD-equipped PCs to either end to
measure the speed tests, eliminating bottlenecking,
and used the fastest router to test the Wi-Fi adaptors,
and vice versa.

90

The RT-AC66U costs around 25 less

than the RT-AC68U, but it sports
many of its big siblings speedboosting features, such as
beamforming, and it was noticeably
faster than BTs Home Hub 5 overall,
securing second place in the speed
rankings. It outshone the rest of the
competition in our file transfer test
at 5GHz too, managing 432Mb/sec
(54MB/sec), but speeds were much
closer between the NT and TrendNET
routers in the LAN Speed Test.
The RT-AC66U sports a near
identical GUI to the RT-AC68U too,
which is slick and easy to use, with
its own BitTorrent and cloud clients,
and extensive QoS configuration,
although it lacks a USB 3 port for

external storage, instead favouring

two USB 2 ports. It isnt a bad router,
but wed definitely pay the extra for
the fantastic speeds offered by the
RT-AC68U.

BT Home Hub 5
The Home Hub 5 held up remarkably
well against the Asus routers at
5GHz. Its maximum speed of 337Mb/
sec (42.1MB/sec) in our file transfer

test wont leave you hanging around

too long, even if youre dishing out
large amounts of data to a NAS. It
even managed to pip the RT-AC66U
in the LAN Speed Test read test at
5GHz. However, at 2.4GHz, it was the
slowest router on test, although only
by a few megabytes per second. Its
GUI is basic too, and its single USB
port doesnt support printers either.
If you already own the Home Hub 5,
we recommend considering one of
Asus routers instead. The RT-AC68U
in particular was much faster in all
the data transfer tests at 5GHz, and
around twice as quick at 2.4GHz.

TrendNET TEW-812DRU
Unlike BTs Home Hub 5, the TEW812DRU sports a more elaborate
feature set, including QoS, printer
sharing via its USB 3 port
and multiple SSIDs,
although its still
basic compared to
Asus offerings.
At 5GHz, it
managed just
264Mb/sec (33MB/
sec) compared
to the Home
Hub 5s 337Mb/sec
(42.1MB/sec) in the

file transfer test. Thankfully, for

gamers, our PING test saw it match
the fastest routers on test, and it was
also the third fastest router on test at
2.4GHz too. Retailing for less than
90, if you have an aging 802.11n
router, and want to get on the
802.11ac bandwagon for as little
as possible, the TEW-812DRU is
definitely worth considering.
However, while the RT-AC68U costs
twice as much, it offers nearly double
the speeds too.

Intels mini PCI-E 802.11ac adaptor

Intels Dual Band Wireless-AC 7260 mini PCI-E adaptor
provides 802.11ac for laptops if you dont want the hassle of
using an external USB 3 adaptor. However, it only managed a
maximum speed of 176Mb/sec (22MB/sec) in our 5GHz file
transfer test, and didnt fare well in the 2.4GHz tests either,
plus it had the highest PING on test.

adaptors on test, with only Asus

USB-AC56 able to keep up. Its
maximum speed of 464Mb/sec
(58MB/sec) is incredible, although
youll need to pair it with a premium
802.11ac router, such as Asus
RT-AC68U, to see these speeds. It was
also blisteringly fast in 2.4GHz mode,
and will make a noticeable upgrade
to any current wirelessly connected
PC. Youll need a spare 1x PCI-E slot,
but if you want the fastest 802.11ac
wireless adaptor, look no further.

Zyxel NBG6503
Retailing at just 58, Zyxels NBG6503
is one of the cheapest 802.11ac
routers available. It has a fairly basic
feature set theres no USB port and
only basic software features in its
GUI, which also proved to be a little
laggy. It also doesnt offer full
802.11ac speeds, instead being
limited to 750Mb/sec, while all the
other routers on test were capable of
1,300Mb/sec. Its top speed of 100Mb/
sec (12.5MB/sec) in the 5GHz test was
pretty woeful, although it fared
better in the 2.4GHz test, being a
match for Zyxels 600Mb/sec
powerline adaptors.

Asus USB-AC56
Costing the same amount as the
PCE-AC68, you might wonder why
youd even consider the USB-AC56.
However, laptops and mini-ITX
systems may lack the ability to use
a PCI-E adaptor, and our speed tests
show the USB-AC56 is the next best
alternative to the PCE-AC68. Its
maximum speed in our 5GHz file
transfer test of 272Mb/sec (34MB/
sec) couldnt match the 464Mb/sec
(58MB/sec) of the PCE-AC68, but was
still much faster than any of the
other adaptors on test. It

ADAPTORS

Asus PCE-AC68

The Asus PCE-AC68 was twice as fast

as either of the TrendNET 802.11ac

lost its second-place slot to

TrendNETs TEW-805UB at 2.4GHz,
though, so it isnt the best option for
older networks.

USB-AC56 at 2.4GHz too. Sadly, its

setup procedure was dire, requiring
the use of TrendNETs own wireless
utility to get connected, which
proved slow and unreliable
compared to Asus adaptors. We
recommend spending more on Asus
offerings if possible.

TrendNET TEW-804UB
The TrendNET TEW-804UB is even
cheaper than the TEW-805UB, but
unlike its sibling, which is rated at
867Mb/sec, the TEW-804UB only
offers 433Mb/sec of bandwidth.
Even so, it wasnt far behind, with
a maximum speed of 199Mb/sec
(24.9MB/sec) in our 5GHz test,
although it was much slower in the
2.4GHz tests. It also suffered from the
same need for TrendNETs wireless
utility, which often made connecting
to our router a pain. It might be
cheap, but Asus adaptors are faster
and hassle-free.

TrendNET TEW-805UB
At just 22, the TrendNET
TEW-805UB delivered
respectable speeds
for a USB 3 802.11ac
wireless adaptor,
maxing out at 216Mb/
sec (27MB/sec) in our 5GHz
file transfer test, and it
bettered the more expensive Asus

91

F E AT U R E / ANALYSIS

Can you replace your cables?

The fastest Wi-Fi speeds we saw
came from combining Asus Asus
RT-AC68U router and PCE-AC68 PCI-E
802.11ac adaptor, which managed
464Mb/sec (58MB/sec) at a range
of 5m through several walls, and
576Mb/sec (72MB/sec) at close range.
This compares to 928Mb/sec (116MB/
sec) for Ethernet, so in short, the
latest Wi-Fi standard isnt going to
consign wired Gigabit Ethernet
cables to the history books just yet.
The fastest wireless routers have
the advantage of blanketing your
home with decent network speeds,
assuming your PCs and other devices
are up to the task as well, and are
very easy to set up, but the total cost
of our super-speedy setup here is
over 200; a 15m Ethernet cable costs
less than 10. However, the choice
will probably be personal do you
have the DIY skills to hide your
Ethernet cables and, if not, are you
happy to trail them around your
house? If not, the latest Wi-Fi
components are a lot faster than
their predecessors and, while not as
quick as wired Ethernet, theyre more
convenient and offer enough speed
for most peoples needs.

Zyxels powerline
adaptors

RESULTS
ADAPTOR RESULT S (5GHz)

ADAPT OR RESULTS (2.4GHz)

File transfer (MB/sec)

File transfer (MB/sec)

116

Ethernet

24.9

Intel Wireless-AC 7260

22

Asus USB-AC56 12.8

Zyxel PLA5215 12.7

Zyxel PLA5215 12.7

3.5

Intel Wireless-AC 7260

30

60

90

120

PING (ms)

30

60

90

120

PING (ms)

14

Ethernet

14

Ethernet

Asus PCE-AC68

15

Asus PCE-AC68

15

Asus USB-AC56

15

TrendNET TEW-805UB

15

TrendNET TEW-805UB

15

Asus USB-AC56

15

Zyxel PLA5215

15

Zyxel PLA5215

15

17

TrendNET TEW-804UB

18

Intel Wireless-AC 7260

0

10

16

TrendNET TEW-804UB

18

Intel Wireless-AC 7260

15
20
Lower is better

LAN Speed Test (MB/sec)

75

24.3

Asus PCE-AC68

15
20
Lower is better

15.32

Asus PCE-AC68 9.12

39.7

TrendNET TEW-805UB 6.36

17 24

Asus USB-AC56 7.4

13.18
12.51

TrendNET TEW-804UB

12.6

21.6

TrendNET TEW-804UB 4.04 6.63

Intel Wireless-AC 7260

11

15

Intel Wireless-AC 7260

10 11

2.9 3.3
11

Zyxel PLA5215 10

20
Write

Read

40

60

80

20
Write

Read

ROUTER RESULTS (5GHz)

ROUT ER RESULT S (2.4GHz)

File transfer (MB/sec)

File transfer (MB/sec)

116

Ethernet

13
10.5

TrendNET TEW-812DRU

33

Zyxel NBG6503

9.3

Zyxel NBG6503 12.5

BT Home Hub 5

8.7

Zyxel PLA5215 12.7

Zyxel PLA5215

30

60

90

120

PING (ms)

80

116

Asus RT-AC66U

42.1

BT Home Hub 5

60

15.6

Asus AC68

54

Asus RT-AC66U

40

Ethernet

58

Asus RT-AC68U

75

33

Ethernet

41

18.3

Asus USB-AC56
TrendNET TEW-805UB

Zyxel PLA5215

10

LAN Speed Test (MB/sec)

33

Ethernet

12.7

30

60

90

120

PING (ms)

14

Ethernet

14

Ethernet

Asus RT-AC68U

15

Asus AC68

15

Asus RT-AC66U

15

Asus RT-AC66U

15

BT Home Hub 5

15

TrendNET TEW-812DRU

TrendNET TEW-812DRU

15

Zyxel NBG6503

15

Zyxel NBG6503

15

BT Home Hub 5

15

Zyxel PLA5215

15

Zyxel PLA5215

12
16
Lower is better

LAN Speed Test (MB/sec)

24.28

Asus RT-AC68U

17.91

Asus RT-AC66U

15

12
16
Lower is better

Zyxel NBG6503 8.42

Asus RT-AC66U 6.21

Zyxel NBG6503 7.24 8.48

BT Home Hub 5 5.8 7.7

10 11

Read

10

Zyxel PLA5215

Write

9.63

TrendNET TEW-812DRU 7.49 8.41

29.3

20

15.32

Asus AC68 9.12

10.62

75

33

Ethernet

41

30.7

16.89

TrendNET TEW-812DRU

75

29

15.6

BT Home Hub 5

Zyxel PLA5215

16

LAN Speed Test (MB/sec)

33

Ethernet

92

6.75

TrendNET TEW-804UB

TrendNET TEW-812DRU

Zyxels PLA5215 powerline

adaptors are rated at 600Mb/
sec, but managed only 102Mb/
sec (12.7MB/sec) in our speed
tests, meaning they offered
about the same speeds as the
slowest router on test. This is
enough for the faster broadband
packages in the UK, but we
noticed a few connection
dropouts, possibly due to
interference, with Wi-Fi giving
a more consistent signal.

13.9

TrendNET TEW-805UB

27

TrendNET TEW-804UB

15.6

Asus PCE-AC68

34

Asus USB-AC56
TrendNET TEW-805UB

116

Ethernet

58

Asus PCE-AC68

40

60

80

11

20
Read

Write

40

60

80

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'%"

F E AT U R E / ANALYSIS

The first part of the worlds most ambitious Machinima project has just been released
for free online. Rick Lane goes behind the scenes with creator Hugh Hancock
to find out how it was made, and what lies in store for Part 2
here was a time in the mid2000s when Machinima,using
computer game engines to
make movies, seemed like the
next big thing. The success of shows
such as Red vs Blue, and mainstream
appearances, such as the use of the
Total War engine in the BBC TV show
Time Commanders, promised a whole
new way of utilising game tech to
make your own films and TV shows,
using nothing but your own computer.
But it hasnt really happened. The
website www.machinima.com is now
a generic host for all types of gaming
videos, and aside from that one
episode of South Park set in World of
Warcraft, when was the last time you

94

Hugh Hancock,
director of Death
Knight Love Story

saw Machinima in the mainstream?

One man hasnt given up on the
Machinima dream, however; the same
man largely responsible for our
understanding of Machinima today.
Hugh Hancock is the original founder
of www.machinima.com, from
which the entire genre took its name.
But it was movie-making that
interested Hancock, and he later
sold the website in order to
focus on creating Machinima
films. The latest, Death Knight
Love Story, is the most ambitious
Machinima project ever made.
A 40-minute romance set in
World of Warcrafts Azeroth,
Death Knight Love Story is five

years in the making, and features voice

work from multiple Hollywood actors,
including Brian Blessed and Joanna
Lumley. Its filmed using the latest
motion-capture technology, and its
fight-scene choreography is based on
authentic medieval martial-art
techniques. Its a mightily impressive
resume for a Machinima project, but
whats perhaps most intriguing about
Death Knight Love Story is that its
created using Blizzards own World of
Warcraft tech, which has no SDK or
toolsets for the player.
Hancock uses a combination of
user-developed World of Warcraftbased toolsets, such as model viewers
and file extractors, combined with

capture is applied to the models. After

that theyre exported again into 3ds
Max where the final scene it put
together, before being exported for a
final time into Mach Studio Pro for
final rendering.

several official rendering and motioncapture programs, such as 3ds Max

and MachStudio Pro, before the film is
finally cut in Adobe Premiere. In fact,
between conception and final
production, DKLS goes through a
whopping five different graphics
pipelines, with various detours
through editing software and other
programs along the way.

Motion capture

Shot on location
Before any of that, filming begins in a
surprisingly traditional manner. The
first thing we do is go into World of
Warcraft and fly around the place. We
look for suitable locations, take
p h o t o g ra p h s , t a ke i n - ga m e
photography and then screenshot
those, Hancock explains. We
screenshotted those into an animatic
[a mock-up that follows the
storyboarding phase]. That was
basically just screenshots of WoW with
characters superimposed onto them.
This is one of the major advantages
Machinima has over traditional CGI.
Theres no need to spend millions of
pounds rendering your own sets.
Instead, locations are scouted out in
the same way as any director making
a live-action film. Hancocks reason for
choosing World of Warcraft specifically
as the basis of his film, aside from
being a regular player of the game, was
because of its vast range of landscapes
and consistent art style.
Once the scenery has been found,
the next step is to find the specific minimap square for that location, and then
implement a custom script for 3ds Max
that extracts the terrain data from
those coordinates and reassembles it
as a 3ds Max render. This is a gruelling
computational task. Hancock loads an
example scene that consists of around
600,000 polygons, and if the scene

involves a landscape flyover,

Hancock might have to export 20 or
30 flyovers first. The problems, of
course, is that Warcraft has all of its
game-based LOD [level of detail]
technology, Hancock points out. Its
very carefully choosing which models
its going to render and not render, but
3ds Max says Right, well just try to
render the entire damn thing.
Just getting 3ds Max to render these
scenes can be a slow and difficult
process. Yet here World of Warcraft
once again proves it has an advantage.
The age of the tech, combined with the
fact it was initially designed to run on
low-spec machines, makes this work
far easier than it would be with an
engine that strives toward photorealism, such as Far Crys Dunia. I
would imagine getting that [type of
work with a modern engine] back into
3ds Max,and then out into MachStudio
Pro, would be a nightmare, because the
number of polygons would be way
higher, Hancock says.
Once the set is in place, Hancocks
attention moves to the characters. First
the characters are assembled in WoW
model viewer, which enables you to
assemble Warcraft characters from
their various customisable parts.
These characters are then exported
into another programme called
Motion Builder, where the motion

Arthas, the Lich

King, is voiced by
Brian Blessed,
who put in a
typically animated
performance

Despite being ten

years old, WoWs
landscapes are still
impressive

In the midst of all this work is the

task of capturing the animations
from real-life actors. This proved
to be a challenge in itself, not least
because Hancock has used two
entirely different motion-capture
methods during the filmmaking
process. Originally, he used optical
motion capture, commonly known
as the ping-pong ball setup, but it
required exhaustive amounts of postproduction clean-up. What will
generally happen is youll get a lovely
clean take until right at the end, when
suddenly your actress foot goes right
through her head, for no readily
apparent reason.
Later on in production, Hancock
switched to a pair of XN suits,
Hollywood-grade motion-capture
tech used in films such as X-Men: First
Class. Even then, though, the extreme
accuracy of these suits, combined with
a limited supply of motion-capture
actors, caused its own problems.
Despite these idiosyncrasies, from
a filmmaking perspective, Hancock
loves working with motion-capture
technology. From a direction point of
view, motion capture is brilliant,
because all I care about with the new
suits is performance, thats it. And
when Im doing the camera work, all I
care about is composition and framing;
I dont have to worry about the actors.
Motion capture proves itself especially
useful when filming the fight scenes.
The historically accurate fighting
techniques, choreographed by Martin
Page, who has spent 20 years
researching and practicing historical
sword fighting, means fight scenes are
nuanced, which would be difficult to
frame using traditional camera work.
Virtually all the scenes in DKLS are
filmed using motion capture. The only
work not conducted by Hancock
himself is rendering the characters
facial animations. Instead, this job was
outsourced to a specialist animation
company,as the face is the hardest area
of the body to motion-capture properly,
requiring pinpoint attention to detail.

95

F E AT U R E / ANALYSIS

Its also the most important, as

Hancock states:The face is the window
to the soul. Unfortunately, in World of
Warcraft, character faces are more like
mirrors than windows. The mouth of
a WoW character model is rendered
from just four polygons, meaning they
can do little other than open and close
their mouths. Its the one area in which
the age of Warcrafts tech proved to be
a weakness during filming.
Once the scene is set, and the
character animations are all in place,
its sent to a program named
MachStudio Pro for rendering, which
uses an animation technique thats
been used as far back as Quake 1. Rather
than using the models skeleton as the
basis of its animation, MachStudio Pro
instead records the positions of each
vertice at each point in each frame,
compiles this data into a single file,
then plays that back at 25fps. As
Hancock explains, this has multiple
advantages. It means it doesnt need
to worry about how skeletons are
handled in all the different pipelines,
or about how Max and Maya do their
skin weighting in slightly different
ways. It doesnt have to worry about
cloth or rope simulation either.
MachStudio Pros simplistic
approach to real-time rendering,
alongside using Warcraft as a basis for
the CG animation, means Hancock can
film at a much faster speed than most
CGI film companies, being able to
complete up to 30 seconds in a day, as
opposed to the weeks or months it

Top: Motion Builder,

where animations
Bottom: Most
characters are
constructed using
WoWs standard
customisable
parts, but the
main characters
use wholly
custom models

would take someone working at Pixar

and Dreamworks to complete a similar
segment of film. Theres only one
problem with MachStudio Pro the
company that made it went out of
business halfway through filming
DKLS, meaning the software was
never quite finished.

Ray tracing

Remember kids,
when youre
playing with
swords, always
wear protection

So, for the second part of the film,

Hancock has switched to yet another
pipeline called Octane Render, one of
the first real-time ray tracers. Octane
renders simply by simulating light,
sampling millions of light rays per
second and bouncing those samples
off realistic surface materials. This
means theres no requirement for
post-process effects such as ambient
occlusion. Hancock is enormously
excited about it.
This is what youre going to be
seeing in computer games in around
five years time, he says,GPUs are just

DKLS fight scenes

are choreographed
by Martin Page
(on the right), who
has spent 20 years
researching and
practicing historical
sword-fighting

A fight scene being rendered in 3ds Max

96

getting fast enough to do ray-tracing

in real time.
The change in rendering method
also brings a dilemma regarding the
second part of the film. The more
realistic light rendering means the
final image looks considerably better
in the second part than the first, but in
a style thats also quite different.
Hancock is currently trying to figure
out a way to preserve the improved
quality but without departing too
much from the first parts aesthetics.I
think were going to aim for an
evolution, but not one thats incredibly
jarring when you get there, he muses.
It will be a while before the second
part is released, but the responses he
has received to the first part both
good and bad have spurred him on.
Its a Marmite film; no one has just said
it was alright. People either love or
hate it. The Warcraft community has
struggled slightly with the fact that its
not fan-fiction, I think. But people who
like it love it, says Hancock.
Opinions aside, many are excited
b y H a n c o c k s a p p r o a c h t o
moviemaking.The reason he managed
to get such accomplished actors to
voice his film was because casting
agencies had never seen anything like
it, and were keen to be involved with
such a novel project.
I think whats really interesting is
that this was all done on a home PC. It
wasnt even done on a high-end PC.
Indeed, Hancock has forged a way of
making a fantasy epic on a miniscule
budget, with methods and technology
available to anyone, and gone way
beyond peoples expectations.
The first part of Death Knight Love
Story can be watched for free at
www.deathknightlovestory.com

F E AT U R E / ANALYSIS

AMD MANTLE

PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS
Matthew Lambert investigates the performance of AMDs
new graphics API in Battlefield 4 and Star Swarm

arred by delays since its announcement in September 2013,

AMDs Mantle API has finally made its debut. Its available to try
now in Battlefield 4 and a demo called Star Swarm, which is
freely available on Steam. It was due to be supported in Thief
(see p84), but that too has been delayed to a post-launch patch. Youll
need an AMD GCN GPU, the latest Catalyst beta drivers and Windows
64-bit to ensure compatibility. Mantle is in no way a final product
AMD is continuing to develop the technology, but theres enough now
to run some tests and glimpse the direction in which its heading.

Mantle explained
As a graphics API, Mantle is like Direct3D, the graphics component of
DirectX. Its essentially a series of abstraction layers that grants
developers access to the various execution units and functions within
a GPU. However, APIs such as Direct3D and OpenGL have many layers
of abstraction, allowing programs to function across numerous GPUs
architectures from different manufacturers,which operate differently
at the hardware level. Mantle, however, is only designed with the GCN
architecture in mind, meaning fewer abstraction layers are needed,
which theoretically results in fewer overheads.
CPU draw calls essentially tell the GPU what to render. Hundreds or
thousands of calls can be needed to render even a single frame, which
can be costly with current APIs,especially with lots of on-screen action.
By thinning out the layers through which draw calls pass, and by
improving the ability to queue them across multiple cores and threads,
Mantle aims to significantly reduce draw calls as a bottleneck.
Therefore, the biggest gains should be seen in CPU-limited scenarios,
rather than GPU-limited ones, which are harder to combat at the API
level, although optimisations have been made in this respect too.

98

Battlefield 4
As FRAPS is incompatible with Mantle, were reliant on Battlefield 4s
built-in frame time recorder to test this game. Sadly, were only able to
accurately calculate and compare average frame rates from this data.
We use our standard single-player benchmark to keep it consistent.
Its a fast-paced scene with plenty going on,but multiplayer is still likely
to be more CPU-bound.
With our overclocked Core-i5 3570K installed, theres little difference
between D3D and Mantle. Even at Medium settings, the scene is still
predominantly GPU-limited, although the R9 290X improved by 6 or
7 per cent in both tests when using Mantle.
We then turned to a lower-end CPU, a stock-speed Core i3-3220. With
the Ultra detail test, it was the same story a small bump for the R9
290X and effectively equal results for the other cards.
However, with Battlefield 4 at Medium settings, we finally see
Mantle come into play. The similar results under D3D for the R9 290X
and R9 280X here tell us that performance is CPU-limited, and this
disappears with Mantle. The R9 290Xs performance improves by a
whopping 46 per cent, while the R9 280X and R7 260X see 16 and 6 per
cent gains.This also puts the AMD cards ahead of the competing Nvidia
hardware at each performance point. However, the big drawback is
that the gains are all but meaningless with such high frame rates
anyway, the unlocked performance doesnt result in any visible realworld differences.
We also tested the flagship Kaveri part in this game. At 1080p with
Medium settings, the scene is hugely GPU-limited for integrated
graphics,and the results are basically the same.At 720p with Low detail,
however, we see a 10 per cent increase and a slightly smoother
experience, as 60fps is hit more frequently.

STAR SWARM RESULTS

BATTLEFIELD 4 RESULTS

1,920 x 1,080, Follow Scene, Extreme settings

Using Core i5-3570K running at 4.2GHz, 1,920 x 1,080, Ultra detail, 4x AA

12 fps

GeForce GTX Titan Black

32 fps

18

54

54 fps

AMD Radeon R9 280X (D3D)

67 fps

36

77 fps

AMD Radeon R9 290X (Mantle)

49 fps

Radeon R9 290X (Mantle)

71 fps

AMD Radeon R9 290X (D3D)

66 fps

Radeon R9 290X (D3D) 8 fps

72

52 fps

AMD Radeon R9 280X (Mantle)

27 fps

AMD Radeon R7 260X (D3D)

RTS Scene, Extreme settings

9 fps

GeForce GTX Titan Black

6 fps

Radeon R9 290X (D3D)

13 fps
25 fps

Radeon R9 290X (Mantle)

0

10

20

38 fps

30

17 fps

60

52 fps

194 fps

16
Minimum

32

140 fps
139 fps

Radeon R9 280X (Mantle)

34 fps

76 fps

Radeon R7 260X (D3D)

61 fps

48

80

184 fps

Radeon R9 290X (D3D)

Radeon R9 280X (D3D)

33 fps

Radeon R9 290X (Mantle)

0

40

Radeon R9 290X (Mantle)

12 fps

Radeon R9 290X (D3D)

20

Medium detail, 0x AA

40

SHMUP Scene, Extreme settings

GeForce GTX Titan Black

27 fps

AMD Radeon R7 260X (Mantle)

16 fps

64

79 fps

Radeon R7 260X (Mantle)

0

Average

50

100

150

200

Using Core i3-3220 running at 3.3GHz, 1,920 x 1,080, Ultra detail, 4x AA

Star Swarm
Star Swarm is an Alpha demo of Oxide Games Nitrous engine, which
was built to exploit Mantle, and renders space battles with thousands
of ships in real time.We run the four preset scenes (which survey battles
from different viewpoints) three times each for two minutes,reporting
the average results, which include minimum frame rates.
With D3D, frame rates are universally poor and unplayable, even
with the top-end parts. Although frame rates can jump to beyond
100fps in less intensive sections, the more complex parts are very hard
work. The RTS scene is the clearest example, as it maintains a wide
view of the battle scene and constantly has thousands of ships in view.
With Mantle, the difference is massive. Although two of the scenes
still dip below 30fps with the R9 290X, the experience is far smoother
in the RTS scene, its minimum frame rate effectively quadruples.,
while the average frame rate here goes up by 180 per cent.

69 fps

Radeon R9 290X (D3D)

74 fps

Radeon R9 290X (Mantle)

53 fps

Radeon R9 280X (D3D)

54 fps

Radeon R9 280X (Mantle)

26 fps

Radeon R7 260X (D3D)

26 fps

Radeon R7 260X (Mantle)

0

20

40

60

80

Medium detail, 0x AA

114 fps

Radeon R9 290X (D3D)

166 fps

Radeon R9 290X (Mantle)

115 fps

Radeon R9 280X (D3D)

132 fps

Radeon R9 280X (Mantle)

73 fps

Radeon R7 260X (D3D)

77 fps

Radeon R7 260X (Mantle)

0

45

90

135

180

Conclusion
In Battlefield 4, Mantles real-world benefits are limited, and it works
best with higher-end GPUs were unsure how many people will be
pairing such cards with low-end CPUs. Still, free performance is free
performance, and we encourage you to try it out. Star Swarm, on the
other hand, is far more revealing.
Developers are currently used to designing games around API-based
draw call limitations, but Mantle widens the potential to show more
on screen at a time. Much remains to be seen, but this nonetheless has
interesting ramifications for game development, most obviously for
RTS games and shoot em ups, but also as a whole.

1,920 x 1,080, High Detail, 0x AA

26fps

A10-7850K (D3D)

27fps

A10-7850K (Mantle)
0

7.5

15

22.5

30

1,280 x 720, Low detail, 0x AA

55fps

A10-7850K (D3D)

60fps

A10-7850K (Mantle)
0

15

30

45

60

Average

99

F E AT U R E / ANALYSIS

MAKING THE EFI

AFTER THREE DECADES, THE AGING BIOS HAS FINALLY BEEN USURPED BY EFI, BUT IT WASNT AN EASY JOURNEY.
GARETH HALFACREE CATCHES UP WITH UEFI FORUM PRESIDENT MARK DORAN, TO FIND OUT WHAT WAS INVOLVED

eplacing a widely deployed,

decades-old lump of legacy code
with a system suitable for the
modern era is no small task, but
its the mission Mark Doran, president
of the UEFI Forum, chose. A former
OS developer a poacher turned
gamekeeper, he jokes Doran heads
the group responsible for the biggest
development in the fundamental
operation of computers since the
IBM PC: the Unified Extensible
Firmware Interface.
A replacement for the Basic Input
Output System (BIOS), which has been
a mainstay of personal computers
since the 1970s, UEFI is a compatible
standard that supplants the confusing
spaghetti code [chaotic code with
many unstructured branches,
complications, threads and exceptions]
with a system that programmers can
actually understand and use.
When I first started working on
this back in the late 1990s, I had the
interesting experience of going to
IBM and talking to them about the
need to change the way firmware is
constructed for Intel Architecture
machines, based on limitations we
were running into with conventional
BIOS technology, Doran recalls. A
couple of the guys in the audience,
which is perhaps no big surprise, were
part of the original team from Boca
Raton that was building the PC AT and
the conventional BIOS with it.
They said, You know, the mission
we were handed originally was to build
code that would support a product that

100

Mark Doran,
president of the
UEFI forum

Consumer
motherboard
makers began
replacing BIOS
systems with
UEFI systems,
using its ability
to run a graphical
user interface as
a selling point for
early adopters

was meant to be used in 250,000

machines to end-of-life; we had no
idea that this code would still be kicking
around 20-25 years later.
It may have been a surprise, but the
BIOS became the de facto standard for
the PC industry. Until very recently,
even the most high-end modern
systems relied on legacy BIOS
firmware, the core of which stood
largely unchanged since its inception.
Replacing it after so many years
seemed impossible, until Intel

developed the Extensible Firmware

Interface specification, which would
grow into the vendor-agnostic
UEFI specification.
People became very creative
about how support was built into the
conventional BIOS for new
developments in the platform, and the
result was like a house-of-cards of
coding in the conventional legacy BIOS,
which mainly worked because of
ancestral knowledge in the community
that supports it, rather than precepts
that were designed to be robust in the
long haul, and in the face of the need
for extensibility, Doran explains. The
decision was taken: create an entirely
new system. Its much easier to start
again with a clean sheet designed for
extensibility and robustness in the first
place, claims Doran.
The path hasnt been entirely
smooth: the UEFI Forum simply
publishes specifications, allowing
members to develop their own
implementations although Dorans
employer, Intel, publishes an open-

BIOS TIMELINE
source reference implementation on
http://tianocore.org. Conversations
about quality of implementation
tend to be discursive, rather than
prescriptive theyre more about
information sharing, Doran admits,
which can lead to issues such as
Samsungs early implementation,
which would brick laptops if too many
variables were written to its nonvolatile memory.
There are certainly documented
instances where implementations are
not in as good shape as I would wish to
see them, Doran candidly admits.
Happily, theyre relatively isolated
this isnt widespread. Clearly, it would
be better if implementations were
sound, robust and well screwed
together, and if the policies they
implemented were well thought out
ahead of time. Were in a transition; it
will take us a while before we have the
same history and experience among
the broad set of vendors that are
participating in the ecosystem with this
quote-unquote new technology.
And, you know, bugs do happen in that
kind of environment.
Security, too, is a concern at the
forefront of Dorans mind. Some of the
downsides about demystifying some
of what was historically spaghetti
code, which was obscure by nature in
the conventional BIOS, was that we
put a lot of extra light between the
firmware and the operating system in a
way that explained how the system all
worked to pretty much anyone willing
to sit down and read the public, open
documentation.
Lots of flexibility ensued, he
explains with a mixture of pride and
a hint of regret. We recognised that
there was the potential, in creating this
relatively open environment that was
well explained and well documented,
that wed also made a playground for
malware writers front and centre on all
of these machines.
The solution was Secure Boot,
which Doran animatedly describes as
a defence against malware inserting
itself into the boot flow. Its not about
DRM; its very strictly scoped to
prevent the insertion of malware in this
pre-OS space. While there were initial

1975

Gary Kildall coins the term BIOS to

describe the portion of his CP/M
operating system thats loaded by the
ROM-resident boot loader and used to
interface with the machines hardware.

1981

IBM releases its Personal Computer,

which includes a BIOS in read-only
memory. Software developers are
instructed to write calls to the BIOS,
rather than directly to hardware, for
performance reasons.

the result of the Intel Boot Initiative

programme.

1982

The IBM BIOS is copied or clean room

reverse-engineered by competitors to
create IBM compatibles, starting with
the Compaq Portable.

2006

Apple begins shipping its first Intelpowered machines, which use EFI in
place of the non-x86 Open Firmware
used on previous models.

1988

IBM-compatible PCs based on

reverse-engineered BIOSes surpass
the originals in the personal computer
market, with Gartner estimating 1.5
clones are sold for every genuine IBM.

2007

Intel donates the EFI standard to the

newly-formed UEFI Forum for vendoragnostic development, where its
renamed to the Unified Extensible
Firmware Interface.

1993

Microsoft launches Windows NT,

which moves away from using BIOS
calls for every hardware interaction, in
favour of its own abstraction layer.

2008

Consumer motherboard makers begin

adopting UEFI, using its ability to run a
GUI even games and web browsers
as a selling point for early adopters.

1998

Intel launches the Intel Boot Initiative

to address limitations from using the
legacy BIOS with its new Itanium
architecture hardware.

TODAY

2000

Intel releases the first Extensible

Firmware Interface specification,

The majority of x86 systems

shipped use the UEFI standard,
while Microsofts requirements for
Windows RT on ARM mandate a UEFI
implementation with locked-down
Secure Boot. The legacy BIOS is all
but forgotten.

ITS MUCH EASIER TO START AGAIN WITH A

CLEAN SHEET DESIGNED FOR EXTENSIBILITY
AND ROBUSTNESS IN THE FIRST PLACE
concerns that Secure Boot, which
requires the host operating system to
be signed with keys held in the UEFIs
storage, would lock third-party
operating systems out of the market,
that thankfully hasnt happened
beyond Microsofts insistence that
ARM hardware licensed to Windows
RT is restricted to that OS.
Dorans work is far from finished.
The UEFI specification is undergoing

change, much driven by its former

critics. A number of makers of Linux
distributions are member companies
including, but not limited to, Red Hat,
SUSE and Ubuntu, Doran explains
Theyre all member companies
now, and they have reps who
participate in our interoperability
plugfest events, and oft-times theyre
sending representatives to our
workgroup meetings.
With manufacturers looking
increasingly towards the merging of
the tablet, smartphone and traditional
PC spheres, one factor is certain: Doran
and his fellow UEFI Forum members
have finally succeeded in supplanting
the BIOS.

101

C U S TO M I SAT I O N / HOBBY TECH

G A R E T H H A L FAC R E E S

Hobby tech
The latest tips, tricks and news in the world of computer hobbyism,
from Raspberry Pi, Arduino and Android to retro computing
T U TO R I A L :

Raspberry Pi TOR router

ve been playing with an interesting
toy this month from PogoPlug:
the SafePlug. Its basically the
companys low-power embedded network
device platform, with a new software loadout that turns it into a proxy for The Onion
Router (TOR) Project, protecting users privacy
in this paranoid, post-Snowden world.
Its also easy to set up on a certain other
low-cost computing platform: the Raspberry
Pi, running the recommended Raspbian
distribution. While the SafePlug is a handy
dedicated device, those who already have a Pi
or two hanging off their network can quickly
implement many of the same features with
no extra power draw.
Before we get on with the building process,
though, a warning: routing your traffic via TOR
is only one part of protecting your privacy.
Advertisers have worked out numerous
methods of tracking you across the Internet
over the years, and theres no reason to
believe the spooks arent using similar
methods. Everything from embedded
JavaScript to drive-by-downloads and
enumeration of the fonts installed on the
system helps to identify your traffic,
regardless of where it comes from. If youre
using TOR, be sure to lock down your
browsing platform as well. Now, the build!

Thanks to its integrated network port

or a USB NIC for a Model A the Pi
makes a handy-dandy proxy server

102

This symbol means the command

should all be on one line

1 Update Raspbian
I know I say this every time, but it always bears
repeating: always start each Raspberry Pi
project by updating the software catalogue
and installing any new upgrades that are
available. If you dont, you can run into
problems later. Type the following to kick
off the process:
sudo apt-get update && sudo
apt-get upgrade
2 Configure a static IP
By default, the Raspberry Pi gets a dynamic
IP address from your DHCP server like any
other client device. That isnt particularly
helpful if you want it to act as a server, though,
so set the Pi to a static address. Either set a

reservation on your router, or edit

the file /etc/network/
interfaces to remove the line
iface eth0 inet dhcp and
replace it with the following:
iface eth0 inet static
address static.ip.address
netmask 255.255.255.0
gateway router.ip.address
Change static.ip.address
to an address outside your DHCP scope but
within your network, check the network mask
is right and set router.ip.address to your
router or gateways IP. Remember to restart
networking at this point by typing:
sudo service networking restart

3 Install TOR and Lighttpd

In the early days of the Raspberry Pi, installing
TOR was a convoluted process, which
involved checking out the latest source and
compiling directly on the Pis slow ARM
processor. These days, thankfully, its a lot
easier just type the following to install TOR,
plus a lightweight webserver well use for
auto-configuration:
sudo apt-get install tor lighttpd

Any server needs to be easily found on the network, so give the Pi a static
address

These days, installing any one of thousands of different packages on the Pi is

just one command away including TOR

The TOR configuration file is well documented, but downloading my version

gives you a head start

You dont technically need an auto-configuration file, but it makes setting up

iOS and similar devices a lot easier

4 Configure TOR
To make your Pi operate as part of the TOR
network, you need to edit its configuration file.
You need to change the configuration to set
TOR to run in relay mode with a pre-set
bandwidth limit for relay traffic, and a refusal
to run as an exit node. If youre not sure what
all that means, open the configuration file at /
etc/tor/torrc and read the comments
or just download my configuration file and
change the IP addresses to match your own:
sudo wget -O /etc/tor/torrc
http://freelance.halfacree.
co.uk/downloads/torrc

5 Create an autoconfig script

Using a dedicated TOR proxy machine means
you can route traffic from devices for which no
native TOR client is available, but it doesnt
help with mobile devices that dont allow
manual assignation of a SOCKS proxy. The
solution is to create an autoconfig script for
the system to download.
Create a file with your favourite text editor
called /var/www/tor.pac with the
following content:

Each browser you want to use via TOR will need

configuring, unless you set your overall system proxy

If you see a happy onion, congratulations youre

browsing via TOR!

When youve edited the file, restart TOR:

sudo service tor restart

function FindProxyForURL(url,
host)
{
return SOCKS static.ip.
address:9100;
}

6 Configure browser and router

To start using the TOR proxy, use your
browsers configuration menu or your OS
menu, if you want to route all traffic to
configure a SOCKS proxy at static.ip.
address:9100. If your OS doesnt allow
manual SOCKS configuration (take a bow,
certain iOS versions), find the Automatic
Configuration Address option and point it at:
http://static.ip.address:9100
To test your configuration, visit https://
check.torproject.org. Finally, to act as a fully
operational TOR router, youll need to tell your
router to send traffic for port 9001 to static.
ip.address this is normally done in the Port
Forwarding or Virtual Servers menu.
TOR will help you to bypass your countrys
filtering system, but it isnt an end-to-end
setup; in particular, neer-do-wells capture
traffic on exit nodes. Ensure that you dont
type anything personal, in particular
usernames and passwords, to be transmitted
in plain text when using your TOR proxy, or
you can wave goodbye to your accounts.

103

C U S TO M I SAT I O N / HOBBY TECH

RETRO:

Turning an Amiga 1200 into a

Raspberry Pi machine
Thanks to Keyrah v2, it even uses the original keyboard
s regular readers will know, I
improved my Amiga 1200 by
replacing its badly yellowed
keyboard and housing with much whiter,
less UV-damaged versions. It makes the
Amiga look factory-fresh, but it didnt help
the insides.
The solution to my woes wasnt to throw it
away, of course, but to reuse it. The Keyrah, an
invention of Individual Computers, is exactly
what I needed to make that happen. Built
around a central microcontroller, the Keyrah
turns the keyboard from almost any
Commodore machine from the classic VIC20 right through to my Amiga 1200 into a
USB device, compatible with any modern
system. Add to that the presence of two 9-pin
ports for connecting classic joysticks, which
are then also made accessible via USB, and
you have a serious way to quickly make use of
dead, vintage computers.
The Keyrah was designed with the
Commodore 64 in mind. Its mounting holes
correspond to those of the C64, and the
positioning of its externally accessible
portions including the two joystick ports,
a USB port and a power switch that doubles
as a way to switch between two different
keyboard mapping modes mimic those of
the original C64 motherboard. Sticking it into
an Amiga, then, is a little more work, but
certainly worthwhile.
Within minutes of receiving my Keyrah from
reseller AmigaKit (www.amigakit.co.uk), I had
a fully working external keyboard that looked
like an Amiga A1200. I could have stopped
there, but wheres the fun in that?
The Raspberry Pi isnt the most powerful
computing device in the world, but its cheap,
in plentiful supply and has a credit-card sized
footprint. Perfect, in other words, for
cramming into places it was never designed
to go. Thus, the overall project was born:
inserting a Raspberry Pi into the A1200 case
and turning it into a fully functional computer.
The Keyrah is fully compatible with the Pi,
although lining up the ports with slots cut into
the A1200 casing I draw the line at mutilating
vintage computing hardware, preferring my
modifications to be reversible required the

104

Designed by Individual Computers, the

Keyrah enables you to easily reuse classic
Commodore keyboards

Although designed for a Commodore 64 casing, the

Keyrah can be convinced to fit inside an Amiga

My work here isnt done, but you

can see how you can cram a Pi
and some breakout cables into an
old Amiga A1200 case

de-soldering of the USB connector. The

power and SD connections from the Pi line
up neatly with other holes, while pigtail
connectors break out the Ethernet, HDMI,
USB and analogue audio ports.
That almost completes the build, but
wouldnt it be great if the Pi could pretend to
be an Amiga? Well, there are a couple of
options for me to investigate: versions of the
Ultimate Amiga Emulator (UAE) for the Pi
exist, with the systems relatively weedy
700MHz ARM core just about up to the task
of running games targeted at the previousgeneration Amiga 500.
Another, and possibly more interesting,
option is Aeros; an attempt at combining

Debian Linux with Aros. A modern and

mostly-compatible equivalent to AmigaOS,
Aros provides a glimpse of what AmigaOS
could have become had Commodore not run
out of cash. Sadly, the Raspberry Pi release is
only available to registered users although
the screenshots have generated enough
interest for me to consider taking the plunge
and seeing if it lives up to its promises.
For now, it just needs tidying Ill need
some removable Velcro to mount the Keyrah
and the Pi, plus a way of convincing the pigtail
connectors to stay at the rear of the case that
doesnt involve drilling holes or superglue.
After that, Ill have a lovely little addition to the
not-quite-what-it-seems pile.

REVIEW:

Intel Galileo
he Intel Galileo is the first x86
86
product to receive certification
tion from
the Arduino project, offering
ng pinfor-pin compatibility with the common
on
Arduino Uno R3, and the first
commercial implementation of Intelss
low-power Quark system-on-chip
design. The result of the companys
partnership with Arduino, the
theory is that you can take any
existing Arduino software or
hardware, stick it on the Galileo, and
run it without modification.
Unlike the microcontroller-based Arduino
Uno, the Galileo boasts a fully fledged
microprocessor in the form of a 400MHz
single-core Intel Quark X1000 chip. Sitting in
the middle of the board, the Quark powers
the Galileo and gives it capabilities out of the
reach of the Arduino Uno. In particular, it runs
a fully fledged Linux distribution, albeit a cutdown one without a graphical user interface
a feature the Galileo couldnt use anyway,
thanks to its lack of video output. Coupled
with the units on-board Ethernet connection,
an SD card slot, USB host support and even
a mini-PCI-E slot, that gives the Galileo
considerable flexibility.
Getting started with the Galileo is pretty
easy, although no quick-start instructions
are provided in the box. However, a PDF
download gives Windows, OS X and Linux
users everything they need, including a
warning that attempting to power the board
from USB without its dedicated 5V 2A PSU
will result in damage. Particularly interesting
is the use of a modified Arduino IDE package
supporting just the Galileo and no other
Arduino hardware which provides a familiar
and friendly user interface for anyone already
used to Arduino-compatible products.
Speaking of compatibility, I was expecting
plenty from the Galileo after all, its an
officially licensed Arduino board. Sadly,
though, I quickly ran into trouble: lacking an
on-board microcontroller, the Galileo
achieves compatibility largely through bridge
chips and emulation, and its slow as a result.
A Sleepduino shield I had lying around
worked with the Galileo without hardware or
software modification, but the white noise
generator portion sounded like it was dying
due to a 230Hz-ish limit on IO. In short:
speed-dependent Arduino sketches, in
particular those that rely on the

The Intel Galileo is the first outing for the companys

Quark processor

SoftwareSerial function, arent going to run

on the Galileo like they do on the Arduino Uno.
Thats a trade-off some users may be
willing to make, but sadly the first-generation
Quark chip disappoints in general-purpose
performance too. Compressing a 10MB file
with gzip took nearly 26 seconds on the
400MHz x86 Galileo, compared to just over
eight seconds on an ARM-based Raspberry
Pi running at 700MHz. Other CPU-centric
tasks, such as hashing, showed a similar
performance disparity.
The Quark does have one advantage up its
sleeve though: its x86-compatible, making
software development considerably easier
for anyone already used to the instruction
set architecture. When Intel says the Quark is
like a Pentium, it isnt kidding: according to the

A rear-mounted mini PCI-E slot could open up new

possibilities in the embedded arena

kernel logs, the chip suffers from the F00F

bug seen in early Pentium parts from the
1990s, suggesting the Quark is a literal
process shrink of the original Pentium
architecture, with all the advantages and
glitches that entails. And, like its predecessor,
it runs hot: the Quarks internal temperature
sensor easily hit 63C at idle, and no heatsink
is provided.
While Im still intrigued by the possibilities
of Intels Galileo, in particular the mini-PCI E
slot on the back, for most projects an Arduino
Uno with Ethernet Shield, or a Raspberry Pi
with a GertDuino add-on, offer better
systems for less money, and with a lower
overall power draw. The Intel Galileo is
available now from www.coolcomponents.
co.uk for 65.99 inc VAT.

NEWS IN BRIEF

Fuze gets a feature boost and a price cut

Regular readers may remember the Fuze (see Issue 124, p12), an addon accessory kit that turns a Raspberry Pi into a self-contained computer
clearly inspired by the BBC Model B. Its creator Jon Silvera got in touch to offer a
teaser of the Mark II, soon to launch in the UK. The Mark II will include an internal USB
hub with three free ports, which also powers the Pi. Theres also an 8GB SD card in place
of the 4GB card, and a dual-position mount for the Pi to either expose or hide the SD slot.
The latter feature is designed to specifically appeal to schools, preventing kids from
making off with the bundled SD card or accidentally damaging the Pis notoriously fragile
SD card slot. Jon also hinted at a token price drop for those who found the Fuze too
expensive, but warned it would be in the region of 10 or so making the top-end
bundle 169.99 inc VAT. As with its predecessor, the Mark II, which will simply replace
the Mark I and be sold under the same name, will be available in cut-down kits and caseonly versions for buyers on tight budgets.

105

C U S TO M I SAT I O N / HOBBY TECH

MODDING:

Extreme Pi cooling
received what could well be the
most expensive item Ive ever
bought in terms of pounds-persquare-inch this month: an active heatsink
and fan assembly for the Raspberry Pi.
One of the biggest advantages of
embedded CPUs against mainstream chips
is that they generate a very small amount of
heat, which is only natural considering they
also draw considerably less power. The Pis
Broadcom BCM2835 processor is no
exception here: even sandwiched between
the PCB and a memory module, the chip
requires no additional cooling.
That hasnt prevented myself and others
from fitting heatsinks, of course. A passive
aluminium heatsink, such as the type typically
sold for adhering to BGA memory modules,
can drop the internal temperature of the
chip considerably. Also, it may or may not
help to prolong its life if youre venturing
into the realms of Turbo Mode or manual
overclocking, or enjoying the benefits of living
somewhere with a climate a little warmer
than sunny Blighty.
When my friend Andrew Back found and
rightly mocked an eBay auction for an active
heatsink with integral fan, however, I knew I
had to have one. When it finally cleared
customs, Im delighted to say I wasnt
disappointed: a black aluminium tower
heatsink is joined to the smallest fan Ive ever
owned through a piece of heatshrink tubing.
The latter is available in a variety of colours,
although sadly, I wasnt given a choice about
which colour I received. The package also
includes pigtail connectors that sit on the Pis
GPIO header.
The advantage of the latter is that they
make it possible to run the fan at two speeds,
by connecting it to the 5V or 3.3V pins. The
disadvantage is that the fan doesnt fit if you
have an add-on board thats hooked up to the
GPIO header. At least, not without snipping off
the connectors and doing some soldering.
To test the efficacy of the setup, I set up
a Raspberry Pi Model B in 900MHz Turbo
Mode, and took readings from the internal
temperature sensor. The results arent
surprising: in a room with an ambient
temperature of around 18C, the bare Pi

Aww, whos a cute widdle heatsink? You are! Yes

you are! Yes you are!

Just in case the scale wasnt immediately apparent,

I dont have giant fingers its really that small

The pigtail connections for power will need

changing if you plan to use a GPIO-connected board

For real cooling performance, nothing can beat

James Phame Couzens Wet Pi project

reported a loaded temperature of 41C. With

the heatsink attached, but the fan disabled,
that dropped to just under 38C.
When connecting the fan to the 3.3V
header, the Pis internal temperature report
dropped to an impressively low 31.4C. Then,
when using the 5V header, the lowest overall
temperature of just under 30C under load
was achieved.
Success, then the gadget works! Now to,
wait, whats that noise? Oh. Small fans, even
at low speed, whine. Uncased, it isnt too bad -

roughly akin to coil whine in an old CRT

monitor, but putting the Pi in a plastic box with
a hole cut above the heatsink amplifies the
volume considerably.
As a serious venture, I cant recommend
buying or building an active heatsink for
a Pi. Youre unlikely to prolong its life by
much, it offers nothing in the way of extra
overclocking headroom I could hit 1.1GHz
on the test Pi with or without the heatsink
and a passive heatsink is cheaper and quieter.
If you want the ultimate Raspberry Pi
cooling setup, though, I can recommend
speaking to James Phame Couzens on the
bit-tech forums (http://forums.bit-tech.net):
rather than a fan, Phame designed as part of
a Pi-themed modding contest a waterblock
for the Pi that, as far as Im aware, is the
smallest self-contained water-cooling setup
in history. Dubbed the Wet Pi, its a jawdropping piece of work.

PEAK T OT A L S YS TEM POWER DRA W

33.6C

No heatsink
Heatsink,
fan disabled
Heatsink,
3.3V fan
Heatsink,
5V fan

41.2C

30.4C

37.9C

28.2C
26.6C
0
Idle

10
Load

20

31.5C
29.9C
30

40
50
Lower is better

Gareth Halfacree is the news reporter at www.bit-tech.net, and a keen computer hobbyist who likes to tinker with technology.

106

@ghalfacree

R E T R O T E C H / VINTAGE GAMING

DOOM
Ben Hardwidge reminisces about ids early 1990s action blockbuster
n February, id released a trailer for the new Wolfenstein
game. Its full of the robot Nazi alt-history nonsense youd
expect from the franchise, but theres a hint of something
else right at the end. If you pre-order Wolfenstein now, you get
access to the Doom IV Beta. I dont have a lot of hope for Doom IV.
Its been nearly ten years since Doom III, and that was a tedious slog,
but the announcement prompted a load of Doom memories.
Doom wasnt, as some people think, the original first-person
shooter, but it was the FPS that first made the genre really work.
Doom was also notable for having a free demo version that offered
a surprising amount of play time, the whole first chapter of the
game (Knee Deep In The Dead), in fact. This version came free on
various magazine cover disks, or you could buy it for a few quid.
This was a long time before hardware 3D acceleration (although
a Doom OpenGL patch came out later), so performance was wholly
dependent on the speed of your processor. I had a 20MHz 386 at the
time, which met the minimum system requirements, but the frame
rate was so bad wed say it was seriously unplayable today.
The only way to get it to run even vaguely smoothly on such a
machine was to set it to low detail, and then decrease the screen
size; a feature that gave you a mini screen of the Doom action in the
middle of your monitor, surrounded by a grey-blue wall effect
(pictured). Even this was enough for me to invite friends over to see
the game in action, enthralled by the fact you could see yourself
loading the shotgun when you ran out of ammo.
The action was barely discernible at these settings. Demons and
enemy grunts just looked like people who have been pixellated

beyond recognition on the news, and the small screen didnt show
up the scenery much either. Yet, I still loved it. Doom may have
looked primitive on my setup, but it was a whole new experience
a real-time 3D game that oozed atmosphere and blasted out a
corking soundtrack. The latter was a key facet of Doom. The MIDI
soundtrack, based on thrash riffs from the 1980s (look up Metallicas
No Remorse), even sounded good on an Ad-Lib card, but it sounded
even better on the Yamaha DB50XG I had at the time.
Doom marked the crossover between first-person shooters and
the 16-bit console era. At this time, people expected different levels,
each with a specific soundtrack, much like youd see in Sonic the
Hedgehog. This was before first-person shooters had stories or
movie-style soundtracks it was just all about the action. And thats
why I still hold a lot of affection for Doom today. Theres room for
storytelling in first-person shooters, but only if its done well.
BioShock Infinite got it right, but Doom III definitely didnt.
With its all-out action, ingenious level design and genuine scares,
Doom became a classic very quickly. It might have started out on
the PC, but it ended up being ported to almost every computer or
games system available, including the SNES and Amiga someone
has even made a ZX Spectrum version you can see on YouTube.
Doom offered a style of instant gratification that you sadly dont
see in first-person shooters now even Serious Sam didnt get the
balance of enemies right for me. Sadly, the last game to successfully
carry on the id FPS tradition was Quake II. Would people still play a
story-free, fast-paced action game with a stomping heavy metal
soundtrack today? I know I would.

YOUR DOOM MEMORIES

We asked you for your favourite Doom memories on Twitter. Here are a few of them.

charles_6835
Hmm, being terrified LOL.

being sucked in. Still got that

edition of the mag.

Donaldosaurus
Turning a corner and
being surprised by a pinkie
demon, falling off my chair in
shock and cracking my head.

NWheeler_CMP
The Doom door opening
sound, which has found its way
into every sci-fi franchise, ever.
johndavidread
Playing the 3.5in cover
disk of the Doom demo from PC
Review on a 486 in 1993 and

M_ILLSY Feb 20
I had an Escom p66 486
machine. It played okay, but
when the P120 came along it
was like HD!

ghalfacree
Prompted
by @Custom
PCMags
reminiscing, Im
having a quick
blast on the
Amiga port of
Doom.

107

MODDING

A N TO N Y L E AT H E R S

Customised PC
Case mods, tools, techniques, water-cooling gear
and everything to do with PC modding
Rigid tubing isnt for everyone
Every year, www.bit-tech.net holds
its annual modding competition
Mod of the Year. This years result
was quite interesting, especially for
anyone interested in building a
water-cooled PC. Many of the top
projects used rigid tubing, which I
spoke about last month. However,
it now seems that to get noticed,
especially at the top, rigid tubing is
a necessity. You can see this years
winning project in our Readers
Drives section this month (see p116),
and here are a few more from the
competition that put rigid tubing to
good use.
Have I used it in my PC? No for
the simple reason that I tinker with
it too much and its far more difficult
to work with rigid tubing than
standard, flexible PVC tubing.
However, for high-end system
builders, especially those that enter
future Custom PC Dream PC contests,
the use of flexible tubing will no
longer be an option if they arent
willing to lose eye-candy points.
One reason for sticking with
flexible tubing has been the fact that
the acrylic tubing most people have
been using is very brittle. That isnt
an issue if your PC is going to be
staying in one place, but if you take
it to LAN parties or modding events,
or if youre shipping a PC to a

108

The acrylic tubing most people have been

using is very brittle, so its prone to cracking
if it gets jolted, leading to catastrophic leaks

Many of the entries

in bit-techs Mod
of the Year feature
rigid tubing

customer as system builder, its

prone to cracking if it gets jolted,
which will, of course, lead to
catastrophic leaks.
Thankfully, theres a solution in
the form of PETG tubing which,
according to US-based modding
store Mnpctech, is far stronger and
even easier to bend than acrylic
tubing, as demonstrated in dramatic
style with a hammer in a video on its
Mod Zoo Facebook page (http://
tinyurl.com/petgtubing).

Mnpctech also recently added

some particularly interesting videos
to its YouTube channel, looking at the
latest fittings that are compatible
with rigid tubing, making it much
easier to work with (http://tinyurl.
com/rigidtube), as well as a handy
video guide on how to work with the
tubing yourself (http://tinyurl.com/
rigidtube2). Its definitely going to be
an area to watch, but if you tinker
with your PC regularly, like myself,
you may find it easier to stick with
flexible tubing.

New Alphacool universal

pump reservoir
Combining your pump and reservoir,
either with a bay reservoir and pump
combination, or with a pump top
reservoir, is a great way to save space
and make your system easier to
bleed and fill as well. Pump top
reservoirs especially mean that you
dont need a separate reservoir and

thats blocked off as standard, but

can be brought back into use if you
want to use the reservoir on its own.
The Lighttower all-in-one reservoir
costs 41 inc VAT from www.
aquatuning.co.uk

Neaten your cables

with cable combs

Alphacools
Lighttower is
compatible with
practically every
pump, including
Phobyas DC12
range, most Eheim
and Hydor models,
and certain D5
models too

high-performance pump top, so you

can save money and squeeze your
cooling system into a smaller space.
Pump top reservoirs attach
directly to the pump and, as a result,
theyre usually only compatible with
specific models of pump. However,
Alphacools new Lighttower is
compatible with practically every
pump on the market, including
Phobyas DC12 range, most Eheim
and Hydor models, and certain
models of the popular D5 too.
The reservoir sports a large hole
in one side, into which screws one
of several adaptors that can be
mounted on one of a range of pump

nozzles. For example, with Phobyas

DC12-220 pump, the inlet slides into
the adaptor and is sealed with two
O-rings inside.
The reservoir itself sports a
number of other useful features too.
In the base is a G1/4in port for LED
modules, which leads us to the
Lighttowers other key feature its
illuminated centre section. By adding
an LED lighting module to the base
port, the whole of the reservoirs
centre lights up. In addition, theres a
top G1/4in port too, making filling or
adding a fill port a simple task, and
theres an inlet at the front of the
reservoir too. Theres also an outlet

Cable combs look

like a little like
odd hair clips, but
theyre made to
grasp 4mm braided
cables and align
them neatly

Antony Leather is Custom PCs modding editor

Going all-out and individually

braiding your PSUs cables isnt for
the faint-hearted (or those with little
patience), but messy cabling can ruin
the look of an otherwise tidy PC.
Tying up your cables using cable ties
and making use of any cable-routing
space your case offers is one way to
beat it, but modding store www.e22.
biz has recently begun offering
another idea cable combs.
They look like a little like odd hair
clips, but theyre actually made to
grasp 4mm braided cables and align
them neatly to prevent them from
flailing around. Theyre particularly
useful for your PSUs 8-pin and 24-pin
connectors, but theyre also available
in 6-pin and 4-pin variants, and the
prices start at just 50p. The only
downside is that your cables need to
measure 4mm in diameter this
matches most braiding such as E22s
Teleious brand, as well as many prebraided sets from the likes of BitFenix
and Corsair, but its best to measure
to be sure.

@antonyleather

109

M O D D I N G / HOW TO GUIDES

How to
Replace an
all-in-one liquid
coolers tubing
1 / IDENTIFY THE BARBS

Want to use clear tubing and coloured

coolant with your all-in-one liquid
cooler? Antony Leather shows you
how its done

This tube-replacement method only works with specific all-in-one liquid

coolers, such as Corsairs H60, H70 and H100, where the tubing simply sits
over standard barbs on the pump and radiator. Check to see if your cooler
has these barbs.

TOTA L P R OJ E C T T I M E / 1 H O U R
ll-in-one liquid coolers such as Corsairs H80i are highly
desirable. offering cooling that matches or betters the best
air coolers, and theyre fairly compact and usually quiet too.
However, sometimes their tubes arent quite long enough for a
comfortable fit in certain cases.
Thankfully, many recent models use standard barbs to secure their
tubing, so its fairly easy to replace, meaning you can extend your
coolers reach as far as you like. You can even use clear tubing and a
coloured coolant, just like the more expensive custom water-cooling
kit. In the other guide this month (see p114), well go a step further and
add a reservoir, but if you just want to add some bling or extend your
tubing, follow the guide on this page.

2 / PLAN YOUR TUBING ROUTE

As with any water-cooling system, youll need to plan your tubing route
first. The tubing we used proved to be fairly stiff, and there are more flexible
types available, but in any event, youll need to take extra care to prevent it
from kinking, as its so small.

TO O L S YO U L L N E E D

6/8mm tubing
(depending on your cooler) /
www.aquatuning.co.uk

Coolant /
www.aquatuning.co.uk

Stanley knife and pliers /

Most hardware stores

110

3 / CUT DOWN STOCK TUBING

The stock tubing is very stiff, and you wont be able to pull it off by hand.
Youll need to cut it off a Stanley knife will make short work of it. Cut along
the barb so it opens up, but dont press too firmly.

4 / PULL OFF WITH PLIERS

5 / FLUSH COMPONENTS WITH DEIONISED WATER

Use pliers to pull off the tubing if necessary. Bending it in the direction of the
cut you made should force it open and enable you to prise the tubing off the
barb without making excessive cuts.

All-in-one liquid coolers use a low-maintenance coolant that needs to be

flushed out so you can use our own coolant. Allow the stock coolant to drain
out, then flush it through with deionised water. Dont be tempted to use the
pump to do this job, as running it with a low coolant level can damage it.

6 / INSPECT FOR DEBRIS OR CORROSION

7 / MOUNT HARDWARE

While youre removing the tubing, its a simple job to dismantle most pumps
to check for gunge build-ups that could hinder performance. The innards
of our pump are in good order, and the waterblock is free from detritus, so
theres no work to do here this should be the case with most coolers.

Youll need to find out the exact lengths of new tubing you need before you
fill the system with coolant again. Mount the hardware in your case and
loosely attach the tubing. This way, youll be able to find the exact lengths
youll need.

8 / CUT NEW TUBING TO LENGTH

9 / USE BOILING WATER TO FLEX TUBING

You can measure the barbs to find the right size of tubing you need, but
our Corsair H70 cooler required 6mm internal diameter (ID) tubing. This is
readily available as 6mm/8mm (the last figure being the outside diameter)
tubing. Go ahead and cut it to size.

As clamping the tubing will be difficult, its best to opt for tubing thats
slightly smaller than the barbs. Our barbs were 7mm in diameter, so using
6mm tubing allows you to heat it in boiling water first, so it shrinks back over
the barbs when it cools for a tight fit.

111

M O D D I N G / HOW TO GUIDES

10 / STRETCH BARBS OVER RADIATOR SECTION

11 / FILL SYSTEM WITH COOLANT

Use boiling water to heat up the ends of the tubing youll need to warm
it up for a few minutes. This will then enable you to push and stretch the
tubing over the barbs on the radiator as far as possible. It will then cool and
provide a seal to prevent leaks.

Its now time to start filling the radiator and CPU section with your own
coolant. Use a pourer to fill the radiator and pump sections with as much
coolant as possible you might find it best to lay the radiator flat in a sink for
this job.

12 / SUBMERGE IN COOLANT

13 / CONNECT TUBING

As theres no fill port or reservoir, the only way to completely fill the system
is to submerge both sections in coolant, fill them to the brim, then connect
the pump section to the radiator section underwater. This will bleed any air
from the system.

You may need to heat the other ends of the tubing this time so that they
stretch over the barbs on the pump section. Youll then need to quickly put
them under the coolant and fit them before they cool.

14 / CHECK FOR AIR BUBBLES

15 / LEAKTEST SYSTEM

With your cooler now linked up again, tilt the radiator from side to side to
check for air bubbles. Small amounts of air are okay, but anything larger
than 1cm in the tubes may make your pump noisy.

Power on the pump and leak-test the cooler outside the case. This gives
you time to see if air has become lodged in the radiator, which might make
the pump gurgle. If it makes the same noise as before, and there are no
leaks after 24 hours, then your work is done.

112

M O D D I N G / HOW TO GUIDES

How to
Add a reservoir
to an all-in-one
liquid cooler
1 / CHOOSE BAY OR TUBE RESERVOIR

Want to add a custom look to

your all-in-one liquid cooler?
Antony Leather shows you how
to add a reservoir to the loop

Depending on the size of your case, it may be easier to opt for either a tube
or bay reservoir. Mini-ITX systems are especially limited on space, so a bay
reservoir can be useful to tuck away in a spare 5.25in or 3.5in bay.

TOTA L P R OJ E C T T I M E / 2 H O U R S
ll-in-one liquid coolers might have brought some of the
benefits of water cooling to the masses, but they also lack
the finesse of a true custom water-cooling kit, as theyre
sealed units that dont use clear tubing or reservoirs. As such, they can
look a little bland. As we saw in the previous guide (see p110), though,
its possible to replace the tubing with clear flexible tubing so that you
can add some colour to the equation.
More importantly, you can also buy compression fittings to fit this
smaller tubing, meaning you can add a reservoir to your all-in-one
liquid cooler too. This will mean even more eye candy, while giving you
a much easier way to fill and bleed your water-cooling system too.
Youll even have the option to choose between a tube or bay reservoir,
and add a larger radiator too.

2 / BUY 6/8MM FITTINGS

Were using are 6/8mm compression fittings. These fit the tubing that
fits snuggly over the barbs of our all-in-one liquid cooler, and will allow
us to add any water-cooling gear with G1/4in threads, such as reservoirs
or radiators.

TO O L S YO U L L N E E D

6/8mm
compression fittings /
www.aquatuning.co.uk

6/8mm tubing /
www.aquatuning.co.uk

Tube or bay reservoir /

www.aquatuning.co.uk

114

Coolant /
www.aquatuning.co.uk

ATX bridging plug /

www.aquatuning.co.uk

Pliers and
Stanley knife /
Most hardware stores

3 / REMOVE ALL OTHER TUBING

To start, youll need to remove all the stock tubing from your components,
leaving just the pump and radiator sections. For more information on how
to remove the tubing, and drain and flush the old coolant, refer to the tubing
guide on p110.

4 / MOUNT HARDWARE IN CASE

5 / CONNECT FITTINGS TO RESERVOIR

Mount the reservoir pump section and radiator in the case so you can cut
the tubing to size and start fitting it. Its unlikely that youll be able to secure
it all together outside the case and then fit it internally without dismantling
it, and youll have to check for leaks first anyway.

Connect your 6/8mm compression fittings to the reservoir and tighten the
end nuts with pliers using a small amount of pressure. Youll then need to
thread the locking rings over the tubing before you fit it.

6 / CONNECT TUBING TO COMPONENTS

7 / FILL RESERVOIR WITH COOLANT

Check the flow of coolant around your loop if it isnt obvious which pump
ports are the inlet or outlet, then you may need to conduct some trial-anderror testing, but youre aiming to feed the pump from the reservoir. You
may need to heat the tubing too see the guide on p110 for more details.

Once all the tubing is connected, go ahead and fill the reservoir. Its a good
idea to use coloured coolant so that you can spot leaks. Cover every joint
with white tissue, so that leaks will be immediately evident.

8 / BLEED AIR FROM SYSTEM

9 / CHECK TEMPERATURES

As the tubing is small, the waters surface tension can make it hard to bleed
air from the system. You may need to tilt it to allow air to travel up to the
reservoir. Make sure the pump has plenty of coolant when its running, and
use an ATX jumper to switch it on without powering your other hardware.

All-in-one liquid coolers generally have much lower head pressures than
custom water-cooling pumps, so check your CPUs temperatures before
and after your changes to make sure its coping. Our bay reservoir worked
fine, but this is an essential test if youre adding a larger radiator.

115

MODDING

Readers Drives

Skyline GT-R

2013 BITTECH
MOD OF THE YEAR
WINNER!

Inspired by Nissans Skyline GT-R R34, Ronnie Hara

built this amazing case mod, based on Cooler Masters
Cosmos II chassis, and incorporating rigid tubing
and original car accessories

CPC: What inspired you to build

Skyline GT-R?
Ronnie: The design of Cooler
Masters Cosmos II case, and
Nissans Skyline GT-R R34 car. Ive
always thought the latter was both
very beautiful and powerful, and
beauty and power were the main
facets I wanted to convey with this
case mod. Ive owned two Skyline
GTS-T R32 cars in my life, but Ive
always been passionate about the
GT-R R34. Since I couldnt have one,
I thought Id instead play on the
design with a case mod.
The case that provided the
foundation for the project was given
to me by Cooler Master, a company
Ive admired very much since I
became a computer
enthusiast. This was
my first sponsorship,
which I managed to
achieve on the basis of
my previous Zeus case
mod its great to have
sponsorship and
/MEET THY MAKER
support from a
Name Ronnie Hara
manufacturer whose
products Ive been
Age 36
using for at least the
Location Japan
last six years.
Occupation Translator
My goal was to show
Main uses for PC Gaming,
how much I admire this
watching videos, Skype
manufacturers large
and general use
cases, with their fairly
elaborate designs. I
Likes Playing with my
immediately imagined
kids, sleeping, playing
joining two great
games with my friends
passions an old
and good barbecues
passion, which was
Dislikes Negative people
cars, and a current

116

passion, which is the modification

of computers. I always try to be very
thorough in my projects, calmly
considering the right way to
perform each step of the design.
This project was no different. In fact,
it required even more consideration,
as Cooler Master was also expecting
a good result from me.
Upon receipt of the case from
Cooler Master, I started working
on ideas and acquiring materials
for the mod. However, as I had
completed my Zeus case mod only a
little while beforehand, my budget
for this project was limited, so I had
to go after other sponsors. Luckily, I
received other sponsorships that
were essential for enabling the
project to stay exactly as I had
imagined. Among them are
Alphacool, Avexir, G- Vans,
Mnpctech, Phobya, X- Zone, E22 and
(again) Cooler Master, who provided
me with the power supply as well.
For this project, I also decided to
use the Intel LGA2011 platform, as
its great for games one of my
favourite activities. As such, I
bought an LGA2011 chip that was
not only in my financial reach, but
that I knew would also meet my
requirements the Core i7-3820.
CPC: How did you find working
with rigid tubing?
Ronnie: The first time Id used rigid
pipes was when I was working on
my previous Zeus project, so Id done
it successfully before. However, my
lack of knowledge at the time
resulted in me buying compression

FULL SYSTEM SPECS

CPU Intel Core i7-3820
GPU Nvidia GeForce GTX
670 SLI
Case Cooler Master Cosmos II
Storage 1TB Western Digital hard
drive, 2 x 60GB Adata SSDs
Memory 16GB Avexir Core
Series 1,600MHz
Motherboard MSI X79A-GD65
8D
PSU Cooler Master Silent Pro
1,200W
Cooling Xigmatek 6 x XAFF1256 1 x XAF-F1456 Blue,
Alphacool Phobya CPU-Cooler
UC-2, Alphacool NexXxoS NVXP
Nvidia GTX 670 waterblocks,
Phobya Balancer 150 silver
nickel reservoir, Alphacool
VPP655 pump with D5 HF Top,
Alphacool NexXxoS XT45 Full
Copper 240mm and Alphacool
NexXxoS ST30 Full Copper
360mm radiators, Bitspower
Multi Link Adaptor fittings,
Alphacool angled adaptor 90,
E22 12/10mm Ultra Clear
Disco Tubing

AT
ECT LOG
J
O
R
P
L
T
FU L
SE E TH Eyurl.com/SkylineG
n
http://ti

117

MODDING

fittings with very low profiles,

which then caused leaks when I
started the machine. I spotted this
quickly, and then bought safer
fittings for the system. Despite
this small problem with the Zeus
project, though, I liked the end result
and decided to use rigid pipes again
in Skyline GT-R.
The pipes also have a special
finish, which you can mainly see in
the inclined reservoirs. Its a lot of
work to use these tubes, as every
detail must be planned and studied,
but I recommend any case modders
to allow one day with them on a
project. Despite initial difficulties,
the end result is very rewarding. Id
also like to thank E22 for supporting
me and allowing me to use this type
of tubing again on this project.
CPC: What difficulties did you
come across?
Ronnie: The main difficulty was
finances. As I mentioned, I started
work on the GT-R soon after Id
finished Zeus. All the materials,
shipping and so on for the Zeus
project were funded by myself, as
there was no sponsorship. I spent a
lot of money buying and importing
materials from outside Japan, and
the cost of freight and transport of
materials isnt cheap. This difficulty
disappeared as soon as I got some
sponsors for the project. This time, I
invested in some tools, which made
work on this project a lot easier.
CPC: What materials did you use?
Ronnie: I often use acrylic in my
projects, and in the case of the GT-R,
I also threw in some 3M carbon

BE A WINNER
To enter your machine for possible inclusion in
Readers Drives, your mod needs to be fully working
and, ideally, finished based in the UK. Simply log on to
www.bit-tech.net and head over to the forums. Once
youre there, post a write-up of your mod, along with
some pics, in the Project Logs forum. Make sure you
read the relevant rules and advice sticky threads before
you post. The best entrant each month will be featured
here, where well print your photos of your project and
also interview you about the build process. Fame isnt
the only prize; youll also get your hands on a fabulous
selection of prizes see the opposite page for details.

118

adhesive. Because it was inspired by

a car, I also searched in car shops for
materials that would convey the
design of the original car. I used
many actual accessories for cars,
such as the temperature and
pressure displays, as well as original
emblems. I also make a point of
painting all the cases I modify. I
have a friend who works at a car
painting company, where I can use
the equipment. In this project, I
actually used the original Skyline
blue paint.
CPC: What tools did you use?
Ronnie: In my early modding work,
I just mainly used a Dremel for
making cuts nothing out of the
ordinary. However, when I started
trying different ideas for the Zeus
project, I found I needed to be better
prepared - I came across many
difficulties and began searching for
the easiest and fastest ways to
perform simple tasks. The GT-R
design was similar; during my work
on the project, I acquired a small
benchtop band saw for cutting
various metals and acrylics, some
tube benders and some other small
tools and accessories.
CPC: How long did it take you to
finish building Skyline GT-R?
Ronnie: The total time was around
four months, from receiving the
chassis to producing the final result.

CPC: What have you learned from

the build process?
Ronnie: To be patient and remain
calm when performing each step of
the project. There were a few times
when I made mistakes while
cutting, and I had to be patient
when making the cuts again. Im
only human, and we all make
mistakes. The great lesson from this
project was patience I think the
result was worth it.
CPC: Are you happy with the end
result, and is there anything youd
differently if you built it again?
Ronnie: I wouldnt change
anything, and Ive had lots of
comments praising different parts
of the project. It was all thought out
in detail, and I get requests from
other people wanting to replicate
this project; its a pleasure to answer
their questions. Skyline GT-R is
currently my main computer, which
I use to play games and watch
videos with my son. It stays in my
living room, and any friends who
visit me are delighted with the
design, and curious to know more
about it, as most of them are
unfamiliar with case mods.
This all demonstrates to me that
the final design appeals not only to
me, but also to many others. I just
have to thank my sponsors who
made this possible, and all the
people who admire my work.

Win all these prizes!

Weve teamed up with some of the worlds leading PC manufacturers and retailers to offer
this great range of prizes to each lucky Readers Drives winner. If your creation is featured in the
magazine then youll walk away with all of the prizes listed on this page, so get in your entries!

Corsair graphite Series 230t case and RM

550w Modular power supply
TOTAL VALUE 150 inc VAT / MANUFACTURER www.corsair.com
om

Corsair believes that a great PC starts with a great case.

se.
The Corsair Graphite Series 230T is a compact
expression of this core philosophy. With stylish
looks and a choice of three different colours, it
packs in a remarkable number of features to
provide builders with tonnes of room for
expansion and amazing cooling potential. Like all
Corsair cases, its built using the finest materials
and finished to the highest standards, so it will
withstand several years of upgrades. Plus, to
make sure it stand outs from the crowd, the
230T features Corsairs new Air Series LED
high-airflow fans, providing distinctive lighting
with low-noise, high-airflow cooling.
Just as a quality case is essential to building a
quality PC, a high-performance, a high-quality
power supply is also a vital ingredient. The all new
RM series has been built from the ground-up to
deliver unmatched reliability alongside 80Plus
Gold efficiency, and all with the absolute minimum of
noise. It uses specially optimised quality parts to reduce
sound at the component level, and its completely silent
below 40 per cent load, thanks to its Zero RPM fan mode. Itss
also fully modular, allowing for the maximum amount of flexibility
ibilit
during installation. With a Corsair Graphite 230T case and an RM 550W Modular power supply
at the heart of your build, youll have the foundations for a truly awesome gaming machine.

Mayhems coolant
and dyes
VALUE 50 inc VAT /
MANUFACTURER www.mayhems.co.uk

Cooling performance is only one part of the

equation when it comes to kitting out your
rig with custom water-cooling gear. The
other major bonus is that all those tubes and
gleaming fittings just make your PC look
damn sexy, and they look even better when
they're pumped full of fancy coloured
coolant. As such, we're particularly pleased
to have the folks at Mayhems now on board
with Readers' Drives; they're currently
offering two 1-litre bottles of Mayhems'
Pastel Ice White coolant, along with a
selection of five dyes, so you can choose
the colour that best complements your PC.
Check out the blue coolant in our own mini
PC mod on the cover of Issue 109 for an
example of what's possible with some
Mayhems coloured coolant.

Phobya Modding Kit

VALUE 50 inc VAT MANUFACTURER www.phobya.com, www.aqua-tuning.co.uk

The Phobya modding kit is designed with the modder in mind, offering
great value for money and quality products. The kit includes Nano-G 12
Silent Waterproof 1,500rpm multi-option fans,
which use an innovative fan-blade design.
As standard, the fans include braided black
cables to keep your case looking as neat as
possible. The fans are also supplied with a
special cable that lets you run the fan at 5V
rather than 12V, reducing the noise
emitted in order to help you to build
a silent system.
The kit also includes the
60cm Phobya 3-pin Molex to
4x 3-pin Molex Y-cable. This pre-

braided extension cable gives you extra routeing options in your case,
and it also enables you to run up to four fans from one compatible
motherboard header. Meanwhile, the Phobya SATA 3
cables included in the kit offer the same
great quality braiding as the rest of the
Phobya range, while also securing your
connection with latched connectors.
As well as this, the kit includes the
Phobya SlimGuide Controller,
which gives you the option to
whi
vary the speed of other fans in
va
your case, while the Phobya
yo
TwinLEDs let you shine a
light on your mods.

119

FOLDING

Folding@Home
Join our folding team and help medical research
Folder of the month / We catch up with: Coolamasta
CPC: So who is Coolamasta?
Coolamasta: My name is Rob,
and Im an IT manager for a
telecommunications company.
CPC: Why did you start folding?
Coolamasta: I came across the
folding section in Custom PC many
years ago, and then I read about how
protein folding was being studied
for areas such as cancer research
(among others), which appealed to
me. Plus, working in IT and having
suitable hardware was a bonus too.
CPC: What excites you most about
folding?
Coolamasta: Feeling like Im being
productive for good causes with the
technology available to me. I like
knowing I could play a part in
finding cures, especially as I know
people who have suffered from
some of the associated diseases.
Seeing large amounts of projects and
work units get completed with good
point returns makes it fun as well,
especially when we do the yearly
Chimps Challenge.
CPC: How many machines do you
have folding?

WHAT IS FOLDING?
Folding@home uses the spare processing cycles
from your PCs CPU and graphics cards for medical
research. You can download the client from http://
folding.stanford.edu and our teams ID is 35947. Once
you pass a significant milestone, youll get your name
in the mag. You can also discuss folding with us and
other readers on the www.bit-tech.net forums.

120

Coolamasta: Currently, I have five

PCs folding 24/7. All of them are
server-spec dual Xeon systems, with
between four and eight cores each.
My main rigs run Linux Ubuntu
10.04 for Bigadv/Bigbeta units, and
some of the others run Windows 7 or
Windows Server 2008 R2.
CPC: Whats your best piece of
folding kit?
Coolamasta: My custom-built dual
EP-Xeon rig, with two 8-core CPUs
with Hyper-Threading giving me 32
threads altogether.
CPC: Do you intend to keep up your
current production level?
Coolamasta: Yes, I can carry on
producing between 600,000 and
700,000 points per day, depending
on the work unit, but Ive thought
about adding a few GPUs back into
the mix too.
CPC: Any tips for fellow team
members?
Coolamasta: The dedicated folding
team section on the www.bit-tech.
net forums is a good place to start.
Theres plenty of useful information,
and were always happy to help with
any questions.
CPC: What do your friends and
family think about your folding?
Coolamasta: I dont think most of
them fully understand what its all
about, but when I explain that Im
basically helping to find causes to
diseases such as cancer, Alzheimers
and so on, with powerful computers,
they think its great that I can
contribute to that research.

CPC: Whats your worst folding

experience?
Coolamasta: In the early days I killed
at least four GeForce 8800/9800 GT
graphics cards; they just didnt like
being maxed out 24/7, even with
good cooling and no overclocks!
CPC: And the best?
Coolamasta: Being Custom PC and
bit-techs captain in the Chimps
Challenge for a few years.
CPC: Do you remember your first
folding rigs?
Coolamasta: Yes, the first one was a
Pentium 4 with Hyper-Threading,
then I added a pair of Nvidia 8800
GTs, before investing in a GeForce
9800 GX2 dual-GPU card I was
chuffed to bits with it!
CPC: How has folding changed
since we last spoke to you?
Coolamasta: Bigadv has got bigger
and better, but more cores are now
required to crunch those projects.
Also, you get impressive speed from
modern hardware (22nm) for low
power consumption, especially now
GPUs have made a big comeback.

Team rank 3
World rank 97
Score 437,547,800
Work units 150,112
Daily points average 610,882
TOP FOL DER S: This months
shout-outs go to Oatyflapjack,
ChunkyBrother, Froskoy and Roveel.
If you fold under any of these names,
email [email protected]

MILESTONES THIS MONTH

USERNAME

POINTS
MILESTONE

USERNAME

POINTS
MILESTONE

USERNAME

POINTS
MILESTONE

USERNAME

POINTS
MILESTONE

Rhddrk

20000

Techie_Taylor

400000

SLOcaliKID

1000000

maniyer

9000000

hannettuk

30000

rhyswilliams999

500000

BurnedFastfood

3000000

David_Murphy

10000000

westie84

30000

MaverickOne

600000

Origami_Tsuki

3000000

Froskoy

10000000

Calum_brown

50000

Pickles

600000

Chicken76

4000000

Sparkymatt

10000000

okjorgensen

50000

siddallj

600000

davmonk

4000000

Dr.G

30000000

SirMaximum

50000

arcitech1

700000

DrJAG

5000000

KevinWright

50000000

atpark

60000

Clotten

700000

mmorr

5000000

JEE6

70000000

Philip_King

60000

conficient

700000

ChunkyBrother

6000000

Slavcho

70000000

Baxtee

80000

Evilpaperclip

700000

CopperHead1960

7000000

PC_Rich

100000000

Grimm808

80000

NoizDaemon666

700000

ITHelpDirect

7000000

The_M2B

100000000

vacant_machine

80000

Rogerater

700000

aingram86

100000

ejhunter

800000

THE NEXT OVERTAKE

POINTS

DAILY POINTS
AVERAGE

TIME UNTIL
OVERTAKE

TSC! Russia

11,039,235,242

9,282,444

2.9 Years

Maximum PC
Magazine

9,975,594,023

9,477,120

1.5 Years

1000000

Custom PC & 9,099,648,788

bit-tech

11,107,242

1000000

Hardware.no

17,885,109

9.1 Months

NavyBlue

100000

eplison3

800000

Thawn

100000

Liam266

800000

Catflaps

200000

Forquare

900000

happysam10

200000

crazystuntman

1000000

DJcarrot

400000

Nelio_

madmatt1980

400000

rvalkass

WORLD TEAM NAME

RANK

TOP 20 OVERALL
RANK

USERNAME

POINTS

7,251,215,993

TOP 20 PRODUCERS
DAILY POINTS AVERAGE

OVERALL SCORE

DocJonz

560,943,544

160,689

WORK UNITS

RANK
1

Nelio

USERNAME

2,701,101

370,522,058

Dave_Goodchild

447,983,678

114,753

DocJonz

917,584

560,943,544

coolamasta

432,265,159

150,059

StreetSam

806,013

223,501,964

Nelio

370,522,058

60,587

Scorpuk

715,270

230,938,698

phoenicis

250,044,587

95,660

coolamasta

659,623

432,265,159

Scorpuk

230,938,698

8,868

JEE6

508,143

74,520,254

StreetSam

223,501,964

80,201

piers_newbold

464,563

154,964,667

zz9pzza

211,014,628

15,794

Slavcho

451,436

77,340,442

Wallace

182,979,135

6,088

johnim

270,373

117,450,603

10

Ben_Lamb

157,654,038

2,615

10

PC_Rich

268,534

100,247,274

11

piers_newbold

154,964,667

26,469

11

Dr.G

230,850

30,419,159

12

Christopher_N._Lewis

152,197,972

35,787

12

Ben_Lamb

226,474

157,654,038

13

Lordsoth

131,985,635

80,518

13

Wallace

204,505

182,979,135

14

Lizard

131,878,662

60,132

14

KevinWright

177,959

50,558,932

15

johnim

117,450,603

72,965

15

LordBadger

122,871

77,041,069

16

r3x

106,384,516

17,267

16

Froskoy

119,908

13,146,560

17

CustomBitChimps

103,528,316

48,000

17

Roveel

109,295

16,097,816

18

The_M2B

102,253,299

47,218

18

ChunkyBrother

105,982

6,619,977

19

PC_Rich

100,247,274

60,426

19

Oatyapjack

101,783

13,052,872

20

BennieboyUK

91,328,166

5,768

20

The_M2B

92,557

102,253,299

121

OPINION

JA M E S G O R B O L D / HARDWARE ACCELERATED

IS IT STILL WORTH
OVERCLOCKING CPUs?
James Gorbold ponders the impact of CPU overclocking on gaming,
asking if massively overclockable GPUs would be preferable
y first experience of overclocking was back in the early
1990s when I discovered that, no matter how much
I spent on hardware (I upgraded twice in one day), I
simply couldnt get Wing Commander 3 to run smoothly on my
PC. However, after trawling through a myriad of contradictory
information on the Usenet (a now largely forgotten part of the
Internet), I eventually ended up with an answer overclocking.
After a fair bit of fiddling with the DIP switches and jumpers
on the motherboard, I eventually got my shiny new 33MHz 486
running at a heady 50MHz, thereby boosting the frame rate in
Wing Commander 3 to a playable level. The
only problem was that the CPU ran so much
hotter at 50MHz that, after around 15 minutes,
it would overheat and crash barely long
enough to complete one mission and save.
Dial the clock forwards 20 years, and in that
time, overclocking has become a hell a lot
easier,safer and better documented.However,
as 2014 gets into full swing, Im no longer convinced its really
relevant or necessary any more at least as far as gamers
are concerned.
While its certainly necessary for me to have a quad-core CPU
capable of good IPC (instructions per clock) or, in product terms,
any recent Intel Core i5, to get a good gaming experience,
anything more powerful is simply wasted on the vast majority
of games. In a recent experiment, I ran my main PCs CPU at stock
speed, and found that none of the half a dozen games Im
currently playing on Steam was adversely affected. The only
effect, and its one thats beneficial, is that my PC now runs slightly
quieter than before.

There are exceptions, of course, such as Flight Sim X and the

Arma games, but these CPU-limited engines are in the minority
most games simply dont care if you have a more capable CPU.
This, of course, is also not true for many professional applications,
especially in the creative industries, such as film production,
where every iota of CPU performance is welcome, indeed craved.
On the other hand,almost every game,bar the aforementioned
examples, will eat up every nugget of GPU horsepower you can
give it, giving you a better frame rate or improved visuals. Given
the huge strides Nvidia is making in energy-efficient GPUs, as
seen in the first batch of Maxwell GPUs in the
GeForce GTX 750 and GTX 750 Ti, we might
even be able to play games at 4K without two
cards when Nvidias higher-end cards launch
later this year.
What Id really like to see,though,is graphics
cards following the same overclocking
evolutionary path as CPUs. Weve all seen
graphics cards pre-overclocked by a tiny amount, as well as
Windows-based overclocking software, but whats missing is a
GPU with really substantial overclocking headroom. There might
be a temptation for Nvidia and AMD to cash in and sell such GPUs
on expensive high-end cards, such as the GeForce GTX Titan.
However, Titan is clearly much more appropriate for the
workstation and software development market for gamers.
Instead, a far more interesting proposition would be for both
companies to sell such cards as overclocking-friendly GPUs to
gamers. If they charged a small, but not exorbitant, premium for
such GPUs, then I truly believe they would sell just look at how
many K-series CPUs Intel has sold over the last few years.

Most games simply dont

care if you have a more
capable CPU

James Gorbold has been building, tweaking and overclocking PCs ever since the 1980s. He now helps Scan Computers to develop new systems.

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