Comet Lake
Throughout the majority of 2020, we saw an escalating war between AMD and Intel battling for supremacy in the desktop CPU market, which is an obvious win for the consumers. One of the side battles thus appeared in the motherboard market, with the Z490 chipset paving the way for Intel's 14 nm Comet Lake processors. One such model is the GIGABYTE Z490 Aorus Master, which is poisitioned in the mid-range segment's upper end with a premium feature set. Some of the most notable features include 2.5 GbE and Wi-Fi 6 networking, triple PCIe 3.0 x4 M.2 slots, and plenty of rear panel connectivity.
Zotac ZBOX CI662 nano Fanless mini-PC Review: Second Stab at Silencing Succeeds
Zotac is one of the major players in the SFF PC space, having marketed ultra-compact form-factor machines even before the NUCs took off. The growth in that segment has...
13 by Ganesh T S on 1/5/2021Intel Core i9-10850K Review: The Real Intel Flagship
When a company like Intel creates a CPU design, the process of manufacturing brings about variation on the quality of the product. Some cores will only reach a certain...
125 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 1/4/2021ASRock DeskMini H470 Review: A No-Frills LGA 1200 mini-PC Platform
The mini-STX form-factor was introduced by Intel in 2015 to provide additional options in the burgeoning small form-factor (SFF) PC space. Since then, vendors such as ASRock, ECS, and...
24 by Ganesh T S on 12/29/2020ECS LIVA Z3 Plus Review: Compact Comet Lake NUC Clone Cuts Corners
ECS is a well-known OEM in computing circles, known for building motherboards, computers, and industrial / embedded systems for other vendors. Some of their motherboards and small form-factor PCs...
17 by Ganesh T S on 12/22/2020Supermicro C9Z490-PGW Motherboard Review: Comet Lake with 32 CPU PCIe Lanes
More widely known for its server-grade models, Supermicro always launches a small number of consumer motherboards, sometimes with some extra flair and hardware we don't see from the regular...
27 by Gavin Bonshor on 12/21/2020The NZXT N7 Z490 Motherboard Review: From A Different Direction
It's been nearly two years to the day since NZXT last released a motherboard, which was the Z370 N7. NZXT initially used ECS as its motherboard OEM, but has...
46 by Gavin Bonshor on 10/7/2020A 15-inch Thin Laptop For The Road: No More Dongles With The XMG DJ 15
As a journalist and an editor that in any given year travels around the world to attend events, having the best device that helps me write news and generate...
46 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 10/1/2020Honor’s First Gaming Laptop: The Hunter V700
With all the political wrangling going on with Huawei and Honor, one product line that both companies seem to be able to push is the laptop and notebook business...
22 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 9/19/2020HP Updates The ZBook Lineup With Power And Fury
Today HP is launching updates to their ZBook lineup with the new HP ZBook Fury 15 and 17, and the ZBook Power G7 mobile workstations offering performance, manageability, and...
25 by Brett Howse on 9/1/2020Intel Brand Tie-ins: New Avengers Packaging Gives You a New Box To Play With
When buying a new processor, what’s the first thing to look for? Price? Performance? Frames per Second? The Box? Intel’s new brand tie-in with Marvel’s Avengers now seems official...
64 by Dr. Ian Cutress on 8/14/2020The Z490 Mini-ITX Showdown: GIGABYTE's Z490I Aorus Ultra and MSI's MEG Z490I Unify Reviewed
The mini-ITX form factor is as popular as ever, with a handful of options already available for Intel's new LGA1200 socket. Over the years motherboard vendors have been perfecting...
22 by Gavin Bonshor on 8/4/2020GIGABYTE's New Z490 Aorus Master WaterForce Combo with Bundled 360mm AIO
Up until now, GIGABYTE has reserved the monoblock clad WaterForce series for its flagship Aorus Xtreme models. In an interesting move to further enhance the performance of the Intel...
10 by Gavin Bonshor on 8/3/2020Intel Adds Core i9-10850K To Desktop Chip Lineup: 10 Cores Minus 100MHz
Intel this morning is taking the wraps off of a new Core i9 processor that it’s adding to its family of Comet Lake desktop CPUs. Taking its place as...
27 by Ryan Smith on 7/27/2020ASUS ROG Maximus XII Apex Now Available
Back in April, Intel released its Z490 chipset for its 10th generation Comet Lake processors with a choice of over 44 models for users to select from. One of...
20 by Gavin Bonshor on 7/1/2020The Intel W480 Motherboard Overview: LGA1200 For Xeon W-1200
During Intel's unveiling of the Z490 chipset and Intel Core 10th generation Comet Lake processors, Intel also announced its series of Xeon W-1200 processors. To accompany this announcement, without...
35 by Gavin Bonshor on 6/24/2020ASUS ROG Maximus XII Hero Wi-Fi Review: The Tale of Two Motherboards
Some of the recent discussions around motherboard design are whether the motherboard manufacturers are actually adhering to the CPU vendor specifications. If a motherboard manufacturer improves the base power...
31 by Dr. Ian Cutress & Gavin Bonshor on 6/11/2020GIGABYTE Announces Z490 Aorus Ultra G2 Motherboard, with G2 Esports Tie-In
Collaborations between hardware vendors and Esports teams isn't a new thing, but it is becoming an apparent and common trend within the industry. GIGABYTE and G2 Esports has announced...
9 by Gavin Bonshor on 6/5/2020The Biostar Racing Z490GTN Review: $200 for Comet Lake mini-ITX
Small form factor boards are always a key talking point for any desktop market. The usual breakdown on Mini-ITX sales for any given generation is usually around 10%, and...
39 by Dr. Ian Cutress & Gavin Bonshor on 6/5/2020MSI MPG Z490 Carbon EK X: LGA1200 Motherboard with an EKWB Monoblock
In one of the coolest collaborations of the year so far, MSI and EK Water Blocks have come together to create a new Z490 motherboard, the MSI MPG Z490...
18 by Gavin Bonshor on 6/3/2020