Quiet and Beautiful

AVADirect wasn’t really a systems builder on our radar until late last year when we reviewed their Avant Mini Cube Gaming PC. After extensive testing, we found that the system was well configured, well built, and well priced, quickly propelling AVADirect to the top as one of our favorite custom PC builders.

Recently, AVADirect sent us another one of the systems in their lineup, the AVADirect X370 Quiet Gaming PC, which as its name implies is AVADirect’s quiet gaming PC offering based on AMD’s X370 Ryzen platform.

AVADirect Quiet Gaming PC Specs Desktop AVADirect X370 Quiet Gaming PC Case Phanteks Eclipse P400S CPU AMD [...]

Aorus, Gigabyte’s gaming-centric laptop branch, has released the world’s thinnest gaming laptop that packs two Nvidia GTX 1070 GPUs in SLI.

The Aorus X9 is designed for gamers looking to play at QHD/UHD resolutions and is more than VR ready. Complimenting the dual GTX 1070s is an Intel Core i7-7820HK quad-core CPU. The CPU is unlocked, meaning users can overclock it on their own.

Two display options are available: a 17.3″ UHD 3840x2160p IPS display with 100% Adobe RGB color gamut, or a 17.3″ QHD 2560x1440p 120Hz WVA high-refresh rate display. All displays are factory calibrated for the best color accuracy.

To handle [...]

MSI recently announced the Vortex G25, a small yet powerful gaming PC.

The MSI Vortex G25 is absolutely tiny. It’s slim build is almost reminiscent of a blade server. When stood up vertically, it takes up less space than a gaming console. It’s so compact, in fact, that it can be mounted on a VESA monitor mount. At just 5.51lbs, it won’t rip your monitor apart, either.

The Vortex G25 is outfitted with Intel’s 10th generation “Coffee Lake” CPUs. Users can choose from the Core i7-8700 or the Core i5-8400. Graphics options include either an Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 or a GeForce GTX 1060. All [...]

As device makers strive to continue to make their devices thinner and more compact, USB-C ports have become commonplace on today’s latest mobile devices. Despite this however, the availability of quality USB-C docks are still difficult to come by.

OWC, the popular maker of Mac accessories, is attempting to change that with their most recent release, the OWC USB-C Travel Dock. The OWC USB-C Travel Dock is a portable USB-C powered device that offers users five additional I/O ports to greatly expand the versatility of a single USB-C port.

Ports on the OWC USB-C Travel Dock include:

USB-C Power 2x USB 3.1 Gen 1 Type-A HDMI (Up to one 4K [...]

If you’ve been holding out for a new massive gaming monitor, AOC may have the perfect monitor for you.

According to a recent announcement, AOC is unveiling their Agon AG322QCX, a new 32-inch curved gaming monitor. The new monitor features a 2560×1440 QHD resolution, VA panel technology, 144Hz refresh rate with AMD FreeSync support, 4ms response time, and an 1800R curvature.

As far as I/O, the AG322QCX features two DisplayPort 1.2 ports, one HDMI 2.0 port, one HDMI 1.4 port, one VGA port, and two USB 3.0 ports.

The AOC Agon AG322QCX is now available at Microcenter for $429.99.

EPI, the brand licensing partner for Philips monitors, recent announced the new 27-inch Philips 276E8FJAB IPS monitor.

The new monitor, which is designed for both entertainment and professional applications features a 2560×1440 resolution, IPS technology, a response time of 4ms, and onboard speakers. As expected of IPS display technology, the monitor also provides ultra-wide viewing angles of 178º/178º. Connectors on the monitor include VGA, DisplayPort 1.2 and HDMI 1.4.

Those interested can now purchase the Philips 276E8FJAB for $349.99.

Introduction

Several months ago, we reviewed the Thinkware X550 and walked away quite impressed. While some of the driver safety features were a bit more gimmicky than Thinkware would have you believe and the pricetag is relatively higher than competing dashcams on the market, the Thinkware X550 still proved to be an excellent dashcam with great picture quality and more importantly the ability to record well at night which is an issue for many of the cheaper dashcams on the market.

New for the company this time around is the Thinkware F800, which is the new flagship in the Thinkware F-series dashcams. Unlike the Thinkware X-series dashcams, the F-series are more [...]

At SIGGRAPH 2017, PNY announced that they’ll soon be jumping into the mobile workstation market with their latest PNY Prevail Pro P3000 and Prevail Pro P4000 mobile workstations.

The new mobile workstations which are just 0.78-inches thin and weigh in at just 4.8Lbs, feature up to a 15.6-inch 4K UHD(3840×2160) display, an Intel Core i7-7700HQ processor, up to 32GB of DDR4 2400MHz RAM, and Nvidia’s Quadro Mobile P3000 for the Prevail Pro P3000 and the Quadro Mobile P4000 (Max-Q) for the Prevail Pro P4000. Storage options include up to 512GB M.2 NVMe PCIe SSDs and up to a 2TB HDD.

I/O options include a Kensington [...]

Microsoft’s Surface Studio is pretty cool. The 28-inch all-in-one desktop that instantly turns into a large canvas for drawing certainly drew a lot of attention when it was revealed last year, but there’s a couple major problems with it. First, you’ll have to fork out at least $3,000 for just the base model and second, you’re locked into the existing hardware with little to no upgrade path within just a few years.

To solve this issue, Dell revealed the Canvas 27, which is a solution that provides all the benefits the Surface Studio provides, but removes all the limitations. The Dell Canvas 27 is a massive pen display sporting a 27-inch Adobe RGB [...]

At a special event at SIGGRAPH 2017, Dell revealed the Precision 5520 mobile workstation, commemorating 20 years of Dell Precision workstations.

Crafted in a beautiful brushed aluminum finish, the Dell Precision 5520 mobile workstation is according to Dell the thinnest and lightest 15-inch mobile workstation on the market. The laptop features a thickness of just 0.66-inches at its thickest point and a weight of just under 4lbs for the fully loaded unit.

What do you get in such a compact package? Well, you get a choice between the Intel Core i7-7820HQ or the Intel Xeon E3-1505M v6, up to 32GB of DDR4, Nvidia Quadro M1200 graphics and up to 1TB M.2 PCIe [...]