hardware

AMD brings turbo boost to Radeon HD7970

Adam Oxford at

Should you happen to be in the market for a $500/£420 graphics card, AMD has launched a new contender for your cash today. I say new, but it's more a makeover: the Radeon HD7970 Gigahertz Edition is physically identical to the current AMD flagship, the HD7970, with a couple of minor tweaks to earn it that big sounding suffix.

The first is, as the name suggests, an increase to the core clockspeed from 925MHz to 1000MHz. To go with that the 3GB of memory has been accelerated to a full six gigahertz equivalent speed, putting it on a par with NVIDIA's top end GTX 680. More interesting, however, is the fact that AMD has also caught up with NVIDIA by introducing a feature for accelerating the HD7970 depending on the processing load and chip temperature, something which the latest GeForce cards were well praised for.

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The best mice for Diablo 3

Tyler Wilde at

We joke about all the clicking in Diablo III, but broken mice and swollen wrists are no joke. They're bad things which make us sad. A good mouse is an important part of a balanced click-fest, so we've tested a selection of mice we think are best suited for Hell, as well as a few we don't recommend.

Note: If you're tired of Diablo III coverage, simply mentally replace any mention of it with "Torchlight II."

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Intel, Plextor launch new SSDs: end days for hard drives in sight?

Adam Oxford at

Intel and Plextor have both announced new additions to their SSD line up this week, hitting low price points for fast solid state drives. While they're timed to arrive at the peak of current generation SSD technology, though, it's what comes next that's really interesting.

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Plantronics reveals GameCom 780 7.1 headsets/GameCom 380 headsets

Chris Comiskey at

Plantronics met with PC Gamer today to talk about their new headsets, the USB 7.1 Dolby Pro Logic II GameCom 780 (and their lower-priced stereo GameCom 380, with analog jacks rather than USB). The 780 and 380 are both set for US release on January 15th. At launch, they’ll be available at retail in Best Buy stores nationwide, or—if you prefer shopping via mouse and keyboard—you can snag ‘em online through Plantronics.com/us or Amazon.com. The 780 will set you back 80 clams, while the 380 will cost you $50. Read on for more details!

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Hard Stuff: Origin EON15-S review

Chris Comiskey at

You know those folks that dress for utility instead of style? The ones that wear flak jackets and ammo belts to dinner parties? The Origin EON15-S is their laptop equivalent.

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Geek toys review: Nanodots

Chris Comiskey at

When the carrying pouch is more entertaining than its contents, there’s something amiss. Inside an admittedly awesome yellow drawstring bag—complete with atomic logo emblazoned across the front—lies a handful of magnetic BBs called nanodots. That stick to each other. Awkwardly. That’s all they do. This is sort of like tearing open the wrapping paper off a massive box on Christmas morning only to discover a mouth-guard and a jockstrap within.

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Geek toys review: Skitterbot!

Chris Comiskey at

The Skitterbot is one of those toys you buy for your kids, but end up hoarding for yourself. It’s that awesome. The stylish body of this six-legged mecha-insect is small enough to fit in the palm of your hand, and when activated, it scurries around the floor at a speedy one foot-per-second. You can choose from four different colors—red, blue, green, and white—and all of them look fantastic covering the Skitterbot’s armored shell. You control the Skitterbot via an oval remote that also doubles as a USB-powered recharger (via a retractable data port on the remote and a cord that plugs into the Skitterbot’s mouth).

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Hard Stuff: Black Ops|Enix PC review

Chris Comiskey at

Ever seen a honey badger? They hunt cobras twice their size and stick their tongues into bee hives. This is much the same with the Black Ops|Enix: it’s short but mighty, and it attacks gaming resolutions of 2560x1600 without fear. Tucked within the rugged metal case (that takes up about as much floor space as a full backpack) are two blazing-fast GTX 580s in SLI, a brand-new Core i7 2600K (overclocked from 3.4GHz to 4.7GHz), 8GB of DDR3 Corsair Dominator RAM, and USB 3.0 support. Digital Storm played it smart by including a Corsair H70 liquid cooler to keep the processor overclock stable. It’s pretty damn impressive how much high-end hardware they’ve packed into such a teensy area.

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Nvidia announce wireless graphics card

Tom Senior at

Nvidia have announced the launch of the KFA2 GeForce GTX460, the world's first wireless graphics card. Read on for details.

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The best of the PC at CES 2011

Tom Senior at

The Consumer Electronics Show 2011 has just wrapped up, showing off hundreds of hot new gadgets to the world. CES always provides a great insight into the technology of the future, and that includes the chips, processors and controllers we can expect to be using with our PCs later this year. Below you'll find an overview of five of the most interesting bits of new tech shown at this year's convention.

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VisionTek unveil new hybrid GFX card with LAN socket

Tom Senior at

Vision Tek have announced the release of their next combi-card, a dual purpose card aimed at improving your PC's graphics capability while improving network speeds. It'll be hitting the market soon for just under $200. Read on for details.

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