KFA2 GeForce GTX 460 1024MB GC and SOC get tested

We test and review the KFA2 GeForce GTX 460 1024MB GC and SOC models. The 'default' GeForce GTX 460 GC editions have the GPU running at 700 MHz instead of just 675 MHz, as well as shader and memory clocks of 1,400 MHz (stock is 1350 MHz) and 3696 MHz, respectively.

The GTX 460 Super OC models, on the other hand, flexes its GPU muscle all the way up toward a blazing 810 MHz, with the shaders at 1,620 MHz and the GDDR5 at 4,000 MHz (effective).

Armed with a 2-year limited warranty, KFA2 are trying real hard to not only bring a nice custom board to the market, but also want to be the fastest of all.

Check out this Guru3D review right here.

I'm betting that each and everyone of you certainly read at least one of our GeForce GTX 460 articles, well .. there's more to be released though. A lot has been said and written on NVIDIAs GeForce GTS 450 already, thins are solidifying a little as it seems. As you guys know the GTX 460 is armed with a GT104 GPU and though many expected that GPU to be seated at the unreleased lower specced models as well, it seem that the what we assume will be called GTS 450 gets a GF106 graphics processor as Donim Habor reported.

We heard that these cards will come with large framebuffer partitions, as in 1GB of GDDR5 however that memory will be 128 bits, the good thing here is that it is gDDR5 memory, taking back half of that lost memory bandwidth (quad data rate). Currently there are no finalized numbers on stuff like clock frequency, memory frequency and shader processor cores

NVIDIA will give its board partners full control over this GPU though, as such they are allowed to design their own PCB, coolers and coolers and even put a cherry on top if they wish. We expect a 150 USD pricing level and a release end of August.

Darkspore will feature dynamic, fast-paced action as players battle across alien worlds to save the galaxy from the mutated forces of Darkspore in a four-player co-operative and full single-player campaign, as well as intense multiplayer battles. In order to defeat the malicious Darkspore, players will need to collect an arsenal of living weapons - genetic heroes with different combat abilities - and upgrade them with tens of thousands of collectible body parts and armor.

Darkspore will feature three unique classes of five different genetic hero types, with a limitless number of upgrades and customizations available through the parts players collect on each planet level. As players progress, Darkspore builds in intensity, with new planets and enemy forces requiring players to strategically select the right squad and ability combinations to succeed in their missions [via ggmania]

Corsair added three new capacities in its Force Series solid-state-drives, adding 40GB, 80GB, and 160GB models to the current lineup of 60GB, 120GB and 240GB SSDs.

Corsair Force Series solid-state drives are based on the SandForce SF-1200 SSD Processor, and includes their DuraWrite technology for great read and write speeds. Unlike most other current generation solid-state drives, the unique architecture of the SF-1200 SSD Processor allows lower capacity drives to perform with nearly the same performance as larger capacity SSDs. All three Force Series models support the TRIM command, so write performance is maintained over time.

The three new additions to the Force Series SSDs from Corsair have a Manufacturer's Suggested Retail Price in the United States of $129.99 for the 40GB, $229.99 for the 80GB, and $449.99 for the 160GB version. The new models are expected to begin shipping worldwide in August.

All Corsair SSDs are backed by a three-year warranty. Check out Guru3D's Force 120 review right here.

Let me give you guys a little progress update on our eVGA SR-2 article. Beaux is working hard on compiling data and testing. This dual socket motherboard will be tested at three stages, air, liquid-cooling and liquid nitrogen.

Currently we are at stage two, liquid cooling. And with a bit of luck stage three Liquid Nitrogen tests will be completed this week. Beaux had to wait on the H2O blocks + some extra pots where needed for the LN2 tests as the man, the legend himself, will use seven! LN2 pots, two for the CPUs, one for the chipset and four for the four GeForce GTX 480 graphics cards ;)

The results this far and the photo's we took are short from amazing. Even on air or for that matter liquid cooling this setup is pulling numbers that are ridiculous.

Take Sandra for example, the CPUs at 4.6 GHZ produce awesome numbers

• A Phenom II X6 1090T would produce 70k Gips 
• A core i7 975 would produce 88k Gips
• A Core i7 980X would produce 126k Gips
• Beaux smoking rig at this moment produces 395k Gips (!)

For this setup we now use two Xeon X5680 processors, each with 6 cores and this 12 threads. Giving this system 12 physical cores and 24 hyperthreaded. A lot of software, including the most benchmarks can't even deal with that many cores.

Here's a couple of photo's for your viewing pleasure. Click on the thumbnails to have a peek.

Thermalright has added the VRM G2 heatsink for the GeForce GTX 480 to its website. The cooler features:

• Proprietary through holes on fins for efficient ventilation Soldered fins to copper base (nickel plated) to make effective contact
• Options to install 80 x 25mm or 80 x 15mm fans.
• Supports nvidia GTX 480 only 
• Two nickel-plated heatpipes to reduce oxidation effect, maintaining top performance for long term usage.
• Features an all copper base and soldering technology that has each heatsink fin soldered to the heatpipes for a definite contact in producing high efficiency rate of heat transfer.

The cooler fits nVidia GeForce GTX 480 Only.

As usual for Scythe, all components meet Japanese standards and are designed for long life. This is supported by a variety of build-in protection circuits (OCP: Overcurrent Protection, OVP: Overvoltage Protection, OPP: Overpower (Overload) Protection, SCP: Short Circuit Protection, UVP: Undervoltage Protection, OTP: Overtemperature Protection). Scythe also grants a five-year warranty on all Chouriki 2 PSUs. The attractive brushed steel surface makes a fine impression which makes this PSU to be visually attractive and blend into your PC case without any disturbance.

For cooling, a controlled 135 mm fan from the proven Scythe Kama Flex series is used. The high-quality S-FDB (Sony Fluid Dynamic Bearing) bearing can guarantee for a long life time of up to 120,000 hours MTBF, as well as very low noise. An integrated fan control ensures that the fan speed is adjusted individually according to the load and the temperature of the power supply. At the back of the power supply, a special honeycomb structure ensures the optimum air flow.

The Scythe Chouriki power supply series is now available in stores at the suggested retail prices below.

Chouriki 2 650W - 91,50 EUR / 121.00 USD (excl. VAT)
Chouriki 2 750W - 100,00 EUR / 131.00 USD (excl. VAT)
Chouriki 2 850W - 116,00 EUR / 163.00 USD (excl. VAT)
Chouriki 2 1000W - 129,00 EUR / 175.00 USD (excl. VAT)
Chouriki 2 650W Plug-In - 99,00 EUR / 132.00 USD (excl. VAT)
Chouriki 2 750W Plug-In - 108,00 EUR / 144.00 USD(excl. VAT)
Chouriki 2 850W Plug-In - 125,00 EUR / 176.00 USD (excl. VAT)
Chouriki 2 1000W Plug-In - 135,00 EUR / 185.00 USD (excl. VAT)

EA and Spicy Horse Games announced Alice: Madness Returns, a sequel to American McGee's Alice. The game follows Alice on a journey through a wildly corrupted and shattered Wonderland to uncover the truth behind her haunted past and tortured psyche. In this journey, players will romp through highly-detailed elaborate worlds, encounter a cast of off-beat characters and engage in epic battles with deadly weapons and sinister villains. Alice: Madness Returns will be available in 2011 for the PC, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.

Alice: Madness Returns takes place 10 years after the conclusion of the original game, with Alice struggling to recover from the emotional trauma of losing her entire family in a fatal fire. After spending a decade institutionalized in an insane asylum, she is finally released to the care of a psychiatrist who just may be able to help her conquer the nightmarish hallucinations that still haunt her. Alice embarks on a mission to root out the true cause of her family

Starcraft II Wings of Liberty GPU graphics performance

We have a look at Starcraft II Wings of Liberty GPU graphics performance. With no less than 13 graphics cards we see how well this soon to be released game behaves in terms of image quality and frame rates.

We have a peek at overall performance in four common monitor resolutions. We'll grab a few current and last generation graphics cards to see if we'd run into any performance issues whatsoever.

• GeForce 9800 GTX+ 512MB
• GeForce GTX 260 SP216 896MB
• GeForce GTX 285 1792MB
• GeForce GTX 460 1024MB
• GeForce GTX 460 768MB
• GeForce GTX 470 1280MB
• GeForce GTX 480 1536MB
• Radeon HD 4770 512MB
• Radeon HD 4870 1024MB
• Radeon HD 5770 1024MB
• Radeon HD 5830 1024MB
• Radeon HD 5850 1024MB
• Radeon HD 5870 1024MB

We'll test with thirteen graphics cards from ATI and NVIDIA. Click here to read this Guru3D.com article.

In the past Point of View already had their EXO line of overclocked products. Back from the dead and molded into a new form Point of View is to release a TGT Series are hand selected high end models of individually overclocked Graphics Cards.

There will be 2 different models of POV/TGT TUNED graphics cards to start with.

The POV/TGT CHARGED version
The CHARGED version is the version that is clocked faster then the standard out of the box graphics card. This version is using clock speeds that are already pretty amazing.

The POV/TGT ULTRA CHARGED version
The ULTRA CHARGED version are carefully selected graphics cards that can reach top speeds and still using the standard cooler. This top model can reach incredible high performance speeds right out of the box. All carefully tested by the TGT team to make sure you will be fascinated.

The POV / TGT water cooled editon
The dream of every gamer is of course a water cooled edition. The POV/TGT team is of course also developing a watercooled edition. We will keep you informed as soon as we are ready to release these versions as well.

• TGT-460-A2-768-C GTX460-768MB Charged Core 780Mhz / Memory 3800Mhz
• TGT-460-A2-768-UC GTX460-768MB Ultra Charged Core 820Mhz / Memory 4000Mhz
• TGT-460-A2-1024-C GTX460-1024MB Charged Core 780Mhz / Memory 3800Mhz
• TGT-460-A2-1024-UC GTX460-1024MB Ultra Charged Core 820Mhz / Memory 4000Mhz
• TGT-470-A1-1280-C GTX470-1280MB Charged Core 650Mhz / Memory 3500Mhz
• TGT-470-A1-1280-UC GTX470-1280MB Ultra Charged Core 680Mhz / Memory 3500Mhz 
• TGT-480-A1-1536-C GTX480-1536MB Charged Core 730Mhz / Memory 3800Mhz
• TGT-480-A1-1536-UC GTX480-1536MB Ultra Charged Core 760Mhz / Memory 3800Mhz

Next to the introduction of a couple of new processors Intel also dropped prices on several products.

The new Core i7 970 is positioned at 885 USD, unfortunately that's higher then we all expected. Then if we take the Core i7 870, that processor will see a huge price drop, really 48% it drops as it will now cost 294 USD coming from 562 USD. Added will be a more energy efficient model, the 870S priced at 351 USD (82W TDP).

In the lower spectrum things do not change that much but the 2.8 GHz Core i5 760 obviously was introduced, it's price will be 205 USD.

Two Pentium processors E6600 and E5500 will each drop roughly 105 in price to 75 and 64 USD respectively.

Last but not least, good news for server admins and overclockers, the 2.93 GHz Xeon X3470 at a 95W TDP will drop a staggering 44% in price from 589 USD towards 328 USD.

There's this long and on-going mud fight inbetween Intel and NVIDIA, the result of that is the lack of new nForce motherboards that support the latest Intel processors really as Intel is blocking NVIDIA in any way possible. There are some new developments though, as Electronista reported yesterday.

Intel may settle the FTC antitrust lawsuit in a way that favors NVIDIA, sources said Monday. The strategy would follow some of the elements of the truce with AMD extend these to graphics chipsets. These could include preventing Intel from intimidating companies into avoiding NVIDIA graphics or knowingly designing code or hardware to perform poorly.

The remedy would also address an NVIDIA-specific complaint regarding unfair bundling, Reuters said. It could address accusations of Intel hampering Ion sales by forcing the CPU designer to offer fair pricing when its processors and graphics are bundled together. Intel allegedly dropped pricing on the combination of an Atom chip and the matching chipset so low that it became impractical to use Ion for all but high-end systems where cost wasn't a factor.

Unlike AMD's deal, Intel would avoid a payment to settle the case.

Neither Intel nor FTC volunteered to comment. The settlement could partially address the countering Intel and NVIDIA lawsuits over graphics licensing. Intel has claimed that NVIDIA's license for chipsets doesn't allow it to produce chipsets for processors with integrated graphics, such as the Core iX series, but NVIDIA has insisted that Intel is intentionally dishonoring its license to bar NVIDIA from fairly competing with faster, more advanced graphics.

Intel's effect on NVIDIA is believed to have forced many of the design decisions behind Apple's recent lineup. The Mac producer has a long-term deal with NVIDIA but can't use more recent Intel chips in its smaller computers; the choice led to the 13-inch MacBook and MacBook Pro models, as well as the Mac mini, using upgraded Core 2 Duos for the sake of the much faster NVIDIA components.

With the release of their VG236H Monitor ASUS now jumps in the 3D segment as well. This is  23" monitor that will be selling at arather  steep 589 USD, but the good news is that it includes a 3D Vision kit at that price.

LCD display has a refresh rate of 120 Hz allowing a smoot 60Hz per eye, and does so at a nice 1920 x 1080 resolution. We can't complain about the response time either, 2ms. As for connectivity to video output devices, the ASUS implemented DVI and HDMI inputs.

For the third quarter, Nvidia has recently launched its GeForce GTX 460 GPU and is set to launch GeForce GTS 455 and 450 GPUs in August and an entry-level GF100-based GPU in September, according to previous reports.

Although AMD is already preparing next-generation DirectX 11 products, since details are unlikely to be fully planned out until October, and AMD currently does not have plans for new product launches in the third quarter, the company is likely to offer price cuts to compete against Nvidia's new products, which should reduce its profits, the sources noted.

ADATA released the S596 Turbo. This SSD comes with the new JMicron JMF616 controller which packs 128MB DDR2 cache. The results should be a stutter free SSD with read speeds of up to 260MB/s and write speeds of up to 210MB/s.

ADATA Technology Co., Ltd., the worldwide leader in DRAM memory and Flash application products, today introduced S596 Turbo, the first Solid State Drive (SSD) using JMicron JMF616 controller on earth. Not only has the speed of S596 promoted, the stability has also strengthened. The ADATA S596 Turbo leads the SSD industry into a whole new era.

Flexible Dual Interface
In terms of the interface, the ADATA S596 Turbo equips SATA II and mini-USB dual interface, providing greater convenience and flexibility. The SSD can be used either as an external portable storage, or as an installed disk in laptop. Furthermore, with a 3.5" converter, the S596 Turbo can be installed in desktop PC. The brushed aluminum chassis of the S596 Turbo is designed for fast heat dissipation, while bringing impressive elegant demeanor.

JMicron JMF616, the Next-generation Controller Chip
In addition to the DDR2 128M cache buffer, the S596 Turbo utilizes next-generation controller, providing read speed up to 260MB per second, while write speed up to 210MB/S, which is 20 % higher than its former model S596. The firmware supports Windows 7 TRIM command, which significantly shortens the boot-up time. In addition, because of the new controller, the stability of S596 Turbo is largely raised, ridding users of sudden standstill during data transmission. The S596 Turbo supports Static wear-leveling technology, which extends the SSD's life. The S596 Turbo satisfies different needs with 32G / 64G / 128G / 256G storage capacity.

Users of ADATA SSDs are able to download Norton Internet Security 2010 (60-day trial) for free and experience enhanced mobility and security with just few mouse clicks away. All ADATA SDDs are backed by 3-year product warranty.