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Unlike the iPhone 14 Pro models, the standard iPhone 14 doesn’t feature any major design changes. However, new in the lineup is the iPhone 14 Plus – a new standard model with a larger 6.7-inch display, which Apple will offer alongside the standard 6.1-inch screen as last year’s model. The iPhone 14 series no longer offers a mini variant, but getting a phablet-sized screen and improved battery life no longer requires upgrading to a Pro....

Apple is reportedly considering alternative suppliers of NAND memory for the iPhone to diversify its supply chain and create more resilience when confronted with unexpected disruptions. Bloomberg notes that the Cupertino giant is exploring partnerships with Micron Technology, Samsung Electronics, and Yangtze Memory Technology Co. (YMTC). The hunt for additional suppliers seems to be motivated by lessons learned during the pandemic and a recent incident affecting Western Digital and Kioxia NAND fabs in Japan....

Apple’s smallest MacBook Pro is also its most popular because of its excellent portability. It weighs less than a third of a pound more than the MacBook Air, with a footprint only slightly larger. So users get the portability of an Air with the performance of a Pro. By the way, Apple did not get rid of the TouchBar as some have predicted. The M2 chip makes the MacBook Pro 13 more powerful than ever....

Apple has announced the Mac Studio, a new desktop system that can only be described as a Mac mini on steroids. The newest member of the Mac family is aimed at professionals who are looking for something more compact than a Mac Pro, but also more powerful than the Mac mini. The base model Mac Studio is powered by Apple’s M1 Max chip that debuted in the MacBook Pro 14 and MacBook Pro 16 last year, but it can also be configured with a new chipset called the M1 Ultra....

Although the hardware is largely unchanged, the Vision 3D has a few crucial upgrades, namely the higher clocked Core i3 processor and the Nvidia GeForce GT 425M graphics card – the latter of which made a world of difference in our testing. The GeForce GT 425M provides a significant boost in gaming performance over the Core 100HT-BD as well as other HTPC systems with integrated graphics. For those seeking even more performance, Asrock has made it very easy to overclock the CPU and GPU within Windows....

Something we noticed right away when dismantling the Asrock Vision HT 420D is that it was fitted with just a single DDR3 memory module. While this provided a 4GB capacity, it didn’t allow the Core i5-4200M processor to take advantage of its dual-channel memory controller. By only including one memory module, Asrock has limited the processor to single-channel mode. We suspected this would have a major negative impact on performance so we tested the Vision HT 420D in both single and dual-channel modes....

Regardless, the Asus E35M1-M Pro impressed us with an idle consumption of 28 watts and a load consumption of 36 watts when stressed with Prime95. That’s 3.4x less power than the Phenom II X2 560 desktop system under load.

Looking at brightness support we have 1000 nits of peak brightness and 600 nits of sustained brightness, which is well above what is required. I measured full white sustained brightness of 634 nits which is absolutely eye scorching in regular viewing conditions, and that gradually increases to nearly 700 nits for a 25% window, and 900 nits for 10% windows or smaller. I achieved an impressive sustained brightness of 933 nits for a 2% window, with flashes pushing well over 1,100 nits, meeting Asus’ specification claims....

Some of these devices are great choices, others are extremely mediocre, but there’s always one thing in common: they’re all cut from the same stone. At this price point, it’s hard to find a smartphone that differs from the standard low-cost mould that includes weak specifications, a small display, and a bland design. Enter the Asus Zenfone 5. Asus is no stranger to making Android devices, having produced numerous tablets since the launch of Android 3....

The front-facing camera is a 2-megapixel 4:3 CMOS paired with an f/2.4 lens. This camera can’t record at 1080p because it doesn’t have a large enough active pixel area, however the rear facing camera does support 1080p, and also comes with an LED flash. Like the vast majority of entry-level handsets, the camera is the main weakness, usually being a ‘you get what you pay for’ situation. Sony’s IMX219PQ sensor is actually quite capable in good conditions, capturing vibrant colors with decent accuracy, but there are many areas where the Zenfone 5’s camera falls below average....

As it is to be expected, the Radeon HD 5570 struggled with Crysis Warhead delivering just 22fps at 1440x900. The card matched the Radeon HD 4670 in terms of performance, while it was noticeably slower than the Radeon HD 3850 and the GeForce 9600 GT.

Power consumption levels on the ATI Radeon HD 5870 were quite notable. While idle it was the lowest we have seen from a mid-range to high-end graphics card, with a total system consumption of just 148 watts. The next best result was seen from the GeForce GTX 275 with 154 watts, while the Radeon HD 4870 X2 idled at 203 watts and the GeForce GTX 295 at 245. When gaming the Radeon HD 5870 consumed the same amount of power as the GeForce GTX 260, 343 watts; this is obviously very impressive given how much faster this new Radeon graphics card was in comparison....

While the Avant is on the thicker and heavier side of the gaming laptop spectrum, weighing more than 10 pounds with battery installed, it’s not packing a full-sized GTX 980 like the ones proudly displaying their names behind the tranparent side panels of gaming desktops. In September of last year Nvidia introduced a special laptop form-factor version of the card, featuring the same components and overclocking ability in something a bit slimmer....

The Bowers & Wilkins Px8 are over-ear wireless cans that come in your choice of black or tan color schemes. They feature 40mm dynamic full range carbon cone drive units that B&W claims reduce distortion, resulting in improved clarity. “Coupled to a fully optimized drive unit ‘motor system’, with revised magnet, voice coil and surround, the result is unparalleled accuracy and realism,” the company notes on the product page....

This is similar to the situation we faced when testing StarCraft II, which gave us very different results in 1v1, 2v2, 3v3 and 4v4 scenarios. Adding AI opponents also affected performance. We eventually decided to test with four human players and four AI players on a large map, but we also had a difficult time determining when to start the benchmark. There’s not much happening at the beginning of a StarCraft II game (very few units are present etc....

Naturally, this was bound to happen sooner or later and we expect that most Titan owners welcomed the challenge. You’d think the solution would be to add a second Titan, but that won’t get you out of trouble with Relic’s latest WWII RTS. Although we didn’t show SLI performance in this review, we did try it and the scaling was very poor. It was much the same when testing Crossfire, and with no profiles for either technology we did a little digging into the subject....

Obviously, looks are subjective, but for a gaming-oriented case I think the Spec-Alpha looks great. It’s a bit crazy, a bit out there, but Corsair is able to pull it off with a high level of build quality and what appears to be a highly refined design. As hard as I have tried, the photos simply don’t do it justice - the white semi-gloss on the panels look amazing in person, for instance....

That momentum carried into HD Tune’s 1MB test as the m4 edged ahead of the Vertex 3 by nearly 24MB/s when measuring reads. That said, the Vertex 3 reclaimed its lead during the write test – and in a big way. The m4 vastly outperformed the RealSSD C300 and 510 Series in both benches. Again, the m4 proved to be considerably faster than its predecessor in the random read/write, random file size test....

The difference between quality settings is quite apparent. Shadows are considerably more realistic when using the extreme settings over very high – they’re not only smoother but also softer in certain places where objects are not casting such a harsh shadow. Extreme settings also offer more realistic lighting effects and objects such as rubbish bags have more definition. We see the same variations between the very high and high quality presets as well....