Corsair has introduced a new member to their VOID gaming headset lineup. Selling at under $100 USD, the VOID RGB Elite Wireless not only eliminates the wire, but also adds 7.1 surround sound support and RGB lighting. Let’s go check it out in the review.
Unboxing
The packaging design remains similar to other gaming products from Corsair, with the black and yellow color scheme. Apart from the photo of the VOID RGB Elite Wireless, there is not much to see in the front, except for the logos of iCUE software and Discord-certified.
A series of features and specification lists are shown on the back in four different languages. The headset is claimed to have a 16-hour battery life, low-latency 2.4 GHz wireless connection and support 7.1 virtual surround sound.
You can see the Corsair’s motto “NEVER MISS A BEAT” for their audio products printed on the sides.
A user manual, warranty guide and safety/regulatory information can be found inside the box. There are also the USB wireless receiver, a USB Type-A to Micro-USB cable and a foam microphone pop filter.
Corsair VOID RGB Elite Wireless Gaming Headset
The VOID RGB Elite Wireless shares the identical design with the older VOID gaming headsets. The polygon-shaped ear cups is paired with the mostly plastic casing and headband. Both ear cups can be rotated by 90 degrees for users to lay the headset flat around the neck or on the table. Our sample provided by Corsair is in the white color variant. There is another variant with carbon/black color.
All controls are located on the left ear cup. Right next to the RGB-enabled “Corsair” logo are the power button and microphone mute button. The micro-USB charging port and the volume wheel are fitted at the bottom. There is no 3.5 mm audio jack for wired connection on the VOID RGB Elite Wireless.
Instead of leatherette-covered ear pads, Corsair chooses to use microfiber mesh material for a more breathable experience. The cushion is made from memory foam, which is thick and supportive.
The VOID RGB Elite Wireless’s headband frame is made from steel, which feels sturdy and should have no problem using for years. It offers up to 9 distinct steps on each side for size adjustments. There is also foam cushioning on top to remove unwanted stress points on your head.
The omni-directional microphone is not removable and the arm can be bent closer to/further away from your mouth. It can also be swung up to mute the microphone quickly. A LED ring around the mic will light up red when being muted.
The only way to connect the VOID RGB Elite Wireless to the PC or PS4 is using the included USB receiver. It operates through 2.4 GHz wireless radio to deliver low-latency audio for about 40 feet/12 meters. The receiver is as big as a normal USB flash drive. The headset is compatible with Windows PC, PS4 and PS4 Pro.
Review
Design
Despite the VOID RGB Elite Wireless’s mostly plastic construction, it weighs in at around 385 grams, which is on the heavier side (even for wireless gaming headsets). Ear pad cushion is soft and thick enough to wear comfortably in long gaming sessions. The breathable fabric ear pads should be able to prevent sweating during hot summer days. However, the clamping force is way too loose for me, which may be an issue for smaller-sized heads. The headset will move out of the correct position, when I shake my head slightly.
Features
The VOID RGB Elite Wireless not only outputs stereo sound, but also supports virtual 7.1 surround sound. The audio effects are pretty immersive and have more depth inside. Directional sound is produced with accuracy in most movies/videos and games.
With Corsair’s iCUE software, users can adjust their desired EQ settings for more customization. The physical buttons and volume wheel are easy to reach, while the swivel-to-mute microphone is nice to have. The wheel also doubles as the button to switch EQ profiles. It would be great, if the headset has a wired mode connected via a standard 3.5 mm headphone jack. Although you can still use the headset when it is charging, the USB receiver is required to remain plugged into the computer.
Sound Quality
Inside the large ear cups are two 50 mm neodymium drivers, which provides reasonable sound for a gaming headset. It offers a warmer sound, making gun shots and explosion in games more enjoyable with more bass. Mids and highs are acceptable with less clarity. With or without the virtual 7.1 surround sound enabled, audio cues in games can still be heard with ease.
Sound isolation is nothing spectacular, but may improve a bit if I could get a tighter fit with the headset.
Microphone Quality
The integrated microphone does decently well, which is perfectly fine for voice calls and game chats. Compression is less aggressive than the HyperX Cloud Flight (its review here), which leads to cleaner, less distorted sound. The real-time sidetone is a great feature to have, that allows you to hear back your voice in the headset.
You can listen and compare to the various microphone samples here, from the gaming headsets we tested previously.
Wireless Range and Battery Life
The claimed range of the VOID RGB Elite Wireless is about 40 feet/12 meters. I do not experience any noticeable lags and dropouts, with the USB receiver plugged into the back I/O of my PC. Signal remains stable when I walked around the apartment, which should have no problems in normal use cases.
With the RGB LED turned off, the headset can last for about 17 hours with the volume set to about 70%, which is in line with the advertised 16-hour battery life. However, the battery level may drop dramatically faster with the RGB lighting effect switched on. Moreover, it is not acceptable for large companies, like Corsair, to still use micro-USB for the charging port in 2019/2020. Please move everything to USB Type-C.
Software and RGB Lighting
You can use the VOID RGB Elite Wireless as a pair of generic headset without the iCUE software. But important features, such as voice prompt, sidetone volume and 7.1 virtual surround sound, will need to be activated from the software.
The iCUE software takes 990 MB of free disk space to install. You can see the headset battery status, update firmware and adjust brightness in the settings menu. There are two major tabs for the VOID RGB Elite Wireless, Lighting Effects and EQ Presets. As the names implies, you can control the RGB lighting effects’ colors, modes and speeds, as well as adjusting the equalization of the sound.
Conclusion
Overall, the Corsair VOID RGB Elite Wireless is an awesome refresh to the existing VOID gaming headsets lineup. Both the sound and microphone quality are great for gaming and casual music listening. The 7.1 virtual surround sound is accurate and immersive. Wireless performance is strong with no observable lags and disruptions. The RGB lighting is bright and vivid, but it will decrease the battery life noticeably.
The VOID RGB Elite Wireless costs $99.99 USD (MSRP) with a 2-year warranty, and it is on sale for $79.99 USD at the time of this review. It is priced very competitively in the market, where most wireless gaming headsets with surround sound support are around $100 USD to $150 USD. With the solid build quality and features, the VOID RGB Elite Wireless can be a more budget-friendly option. I would recommend trying it out to see if it fits well for your head size, due to the clamping force issue.
You can purchase the headset from your local/online resellers or the links below from Amazon and Newegg.
Thanks Corsair for providing us the VOID RGB Elite Wireless for review. (Review Sample)
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The Argon Series AR11 CPU cooler from SilverStone is designed for small form factor (SFF) computer builds. In this review, we will compare the AR11 with a few other compact coolers to see how it performs.
Unboxing
The AR11 cooler comes in a tiny black cardboard box with photos of the cooling fan and heatpipes on both the front and the back. There is a specification list with information like dimensions and weight. Short descriptions of features can be found in 11 different languages on the sides of the box.
The accessories included are sparse, with only four mounting screws, a user manual and a bag of single-use thermal compound. Unlike most CPU coolers, the AR11 is only compatible with Intel LGA 115x CPU sockets, from LGA 1156 to LGA 1151.
SilverStone AR11 CPU Cooler
The AR11 is 32 mm in height, 97 mm in width and 94 mm in depth without the cooling fan. It should have no problem with RAM and PCIe slots compatibility. However, the cooler will sit extremely close against the VRMs and chokes of the motherboard, but should not interfere with the installation, unless they are particularly tall.
Don’t be fool by the small size of the cooler though. It is packed with four 6 mm copper heatpipes, which route through the aluminum heatsink to transfer heat away from the CPU. It is rated to work with processors under 95W of TDP.
The AR11 uses the HDC technology, which the heatpipes will directly contact the integrated heat spreader (IHS) of the CPU. No nickel plating and polish has been done to the base.
The AR11 cooler is equipped with a 92 mm slim fan, named PLA09215B12H, with a thickness of 15 mm. The 9-blade fan is advertised to produce a maximum of 4.53 mmH2O of static pressure and 55.76 CFM of airflow. It can spin from 1200 RPM to 3000 RPM, and controlled via a 4-pin PWM header. There is no anti-vibration rubber pad on each corner, which may introduce some rattling noises at high speed.
Review
We have updated our CPU cooler tests to more reflect real-world cooling performance of coolers.
Testing Methodology
To find out how the cooler performs, a total of three benchmarks are included. AIDA64 is used to run a CPU stress test. CPU, FPU and system cache are all stressed to create as much heat output as possible. Also, Cinebench R15 and Cinebench R20 are used to simulate real-world CPU load (like video-editing or rendering). It will be run continuously for three times. The highest CPU package temperatures are recorded. Ambient temperature is around 26°C.
Results will be taken at a 50% fan speed and 100% speed, controlled via the motherboard CPU PWM fan header. Both single-fan and dual-fan configuration of the cooler will be tested.
The CPU’s idle temperature hovered about 35°C, while the ambient temp at 26°C. The AR11 cooler was capable of maintaining the CPU package at around 72°C with 50% fan speed (~1700 RPM) in AIDA64 stress test. Increasing to full fan speed (~2900 RPM), the temperature dropped down to 66°C, which is a 8.33% improvement.
The AR11 could not further decrease the load temperature at maximum RPM in Cinebench R15, at 66°C. Though, the temperature was reduced to 70°C at lower fan speed.
In Cinebench R20, we saw the same picture with the load temperature stayed at 66°C, when the fan was spinning at its maximum. The CPU temperature gained an extra 1°C, than in Cinebench R15.
Comparison
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Compared to other similar slim CPU coolers, the AR11 performed on par with the Noctua NH-L9i, which is an even smaller 37 mm thick cooler. Both had temperature delta of around 40°C. The larger Noctua NH-L9x65 (its review here) did about 5°C to 8°C better among the three benchmarks.
Conclusion
The SilverStone Argon Series AR11 does what a 47 mm compact CPU cooler is expect to do. It will be able to sufficiently cool a non-overclocked processor without major issue, under 95W TDP. The small-sized heatsink provides awesome RAM and PCIe slots compatibility. However, the LGA 115x-only mounting system will limit your options for CPU platforms to Intel.
The included 92 mm fan did an acceptable job in pushing enough airflow to through the heatsink. Spinning at 3000 RPM, the fan noise is noticeable. The OEM fan seems to be reasonably reliable with a rated MTBF of about 70,000 hours.
The AR11 CPU cooler is priced at $37.99 USD (MSRP), and comes with a 1-year warranty. It costs about $2 USD less than the similarly-performed Noctua NH-L9i, which is currently on sale for $39.95 USD at the time of this review. If you have a slightly more space to work with, you can pay more to get the bigger Noctua NH-L9x65 for better cooling. Overall, the AR11 is a decent and affordable compact cooler with solid build quality.
You can purchase the cooler from your local/online resellers or the links below from Amazon and Newegg.
Thanks SilverStone for providing us the AR11 for review. (Review Sample)
Feel free to leave comments below, if you have any opinion about this website. Share the website around if you enjoy reading it. Subscribe to our Newsletter or follow our Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
Support this website simply by shopping in Amazon and Newegg. It will give us small kickbacks, if you use the above affiliate links to make any purchases, which will help us grow.
Consumer network speed has been stayed at “only” 1 Gbps for quite some time. Although 10 Gbps network interface cards (NIC) are becoming more affordable, it may still be too expensive for most people to completely switch over. Now, slower but cheaper 2.5 Gbps NICs are now available at half the cost. In this review, we will check out the new TEG-25GECTX 2.5G NIC from TRENDnet.
Unboxing
The TEG-25GECTX ships in a cardboard box, with a feature list printed on the top/side in various languages. The card is compatible with both Microsoft Windows, Windows Server and Linux. It also supports a wide range of networking standard, such as 802.1Q for VLAN and 802.3ab/802.3bz for Ethernet.
The TEG-25GECTX card is packed inside a anti-static bag. You can swap the standard PCI bracket with a low-profile one, if you tend to install the card in a small form-factor (SFF) build. Inside the box, there are a quick start guide, safety note and a driver CD. Driver can be downloaded directly from TRENDnet’s product page.
TRENDnet TEG-25GECTX 2.5G Network Interface Card
The TEG-25GECTX has a blue printed circuit board (PCB) with the full length PCI bracket installed by default. The primary Realtek RTL8125 controller is hidden beneath the tiny black aluminum heatsink. The overall size of the NIC is relatively compact, which should have no problem fitting into smaller PC cases and server chassis.
The TEG-25GECTX is equipped with a PCIe 2.0×1 interface to transfer all its network traffic, which has a theoretical bandwidth of about 4 Gbps (~500 MB/s). It is upward compatible with PCIe 3.0 or PCIe 4.0 slots in newer motherboards.
The RJ-45 Ethernet port supports from 100 Mbps, 1 Gbps up to 2.5 Gbps. Two LED lights are integrated in the port, which are used to show connectivity and activity status.
Review
Testing Methodology
To minimize the number of variables that will affect the benchmark results, all of our tests will be performed by two computers directly connected via Ethernet. We use the iperf3 to measure the total bandwidth between the two NICs. A Windows 10 shared folder is created on RAM disks to prevent HDD’s bottlenecks. The peer-to-peer file transfer times of the three files, sized in 10 GB, 500 MB and 250 MB, will be recorded.
Performance
In iperf3, we tested the available bandwidth in the TEG-25GECTX’s link in a 60-second period (iperf3.exe -c 192.168.100.1 -t 60). The upload speed was quicker at 2.34 Gb/s, which is about 292.5 MB/s. The download speed was 15% slower at 1.99 Gb/s, around 248.75 MB/s. The total bandwidth was about 2 times larger than a normal 1 Gbps connection (125 MB/s).
In real world peer-to-peer file transfers, the read and write speeds were similar at 285 MB/s and 284 MB/s respectively. Both took around 37 seconds to complete transferring the three files, sized at 10 GB, 500 MB and 250 MB.
In task manager, we saw the network utilization was high and capped at 2.5 Gbps. The CPU usage was hovering around 10% to 13%, which the TEG-25GECTX card was able to offload most work from the CPU.
Conclusion
The TRENDnet TEG-25GECTX 2.5G Network Interface Card can provide slightly faster performance than normal 1 Gbps connection in both synthetic bandwidth test and real-world file transfers. The Realtek RTL8125 controller allows the NIC to be more budget-friendly than high-end 10G NIC.
The TEG-25GECTX performed great in our benchmarks. It can transfer large-sized files to shared folders in the local network at around 285 MB/s, which is about two times faster than 1 Gbps.
The TEG-25GECTX is priced at $54.99 USD (MSRP), but is on sale for $49.99 USD at the time of this review. The card is perfect for file transfers, which can maxed out most of the hard drives’ performance at 2.5 Gbps. The PCIe 2.0×1 interface is simple to install and integrate into existing systems. You can upgrade your home local network to 2.5 Gbps easily with a few of these NICs.
Update (January 2021): The price of the TEG-25GECTX is dropped to $34.99 USD.
You can purchase the NIC from your local/online resellers or the links below from Amazon and Newegg.
Thanks TRENDnet for providing us the NIC for review. (Review Sample)
Feel free to leave comments below, if you have any opinion about this website. Share the website around if you enjoy reading it. Subscribe to our Newsletter or follow our Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
Support this website simply by shopping in Amazon and Newegg. It will give us small kickbacks, if you use the above affiliate links to make any purchases, which will help us grow.
The P34A80 from Silicon Power is the top-end PCIe 3.0 NVMe SSD in their lineup. The company has long been a reputable brand for making incredible storage devices, but it is relatively new in the NVMe SSD market. The P34A80 is the second NVMe SSD they have ever released. Let’s see how well it performed in our tests.
Specifications
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The Silicon Power P34A80 is only available in M.2 2280 form factor with four capacities, from 256 GB to 2 TB. It uses a PCIe 3.0×4 interface and NVMe 1.3 protocol to transfer the data.
It is advertised to reach sequential read/write speeds of up to 3400 MB/s and 3000 MB/s. Smaller-sized drives will have slightly slower write speed at around 1100 MB/s to 2300 MB/s. All models have a rated MTBF of about 2 million hours, with endurance of 380 TBW to 3115 TBW. A 5-year warranty is also provided.
Unboxing
The packaging for the P34A80 is extremely simple. There is a plastic window on the top, showing the actual drive underneath. You get information like capacity, warranty and a bunch of regulatory labels.
Silicon Power P34A80 PCIe NVMe SSD
The P34A80 SSD is not equipped with any heatsink or LEDs. Our test sample is the 1 TB model, which is packed with components on both sides of the printed circuit board (PCB). The top is covered with the usual sticker, containing the part number, serial number and model name.
Identical to most high-end PCIe 3.0 SSDs, the P34A80 also features the Phison PS5012-E12 memory controller and the Toshiba 64-Layer 3D TLC NAND flash (BiCS3). The four NAND flash packages (TABBG55AIV) are spread evenly on both sides. The two 4 Gb (512 MB) DDR4 RAM cache chips are manufactured by SK hynix (H5AN4G8NBJR), with total capacity of 1 GB.
The P34A80 connects to the motherboard via a M.2 connector (M key). It routes all the data through the PCIe 3.0×4 interface, which has a theoretical bandwidth of 32 GT/s or 3.94 GB/s.
Review
Testing Methodology
To test the performance of the solid-state drive, we use four well-established storage benchmarking software. They are CrystalDiskMark, ATTO Disk Benchmark, AS SSD Benchmark, as well as HD Tune Pro.
CrystalDiskMark can measure both sequential and random 4KB read/write speeds with a queue depth of 32. ATTO Disk Benchmark can test how the drive performs across different transfer block sizes, mostly in a sequential environment. AS SSD Benchmark can provide both normal read/write speed and the IOPS performance of the drive. HD Tune Pro can be used to simulate a large file transfer of up to 100 GB.
We also recorded the time to copy three files of 10 GB, 500 MB and 250 MB from a RAM disk to the SSD, to simulate a real-world situation.
The P34A80 SSD performed as claimed in CrystalDiskMark, with sequential read/write speeds at 3464 MB/s and 3042 MB/s. They dropped down to around 490 MB/s and 430 MB/s when tested with random 4K operations at queue depth 32. Most SATA-based SSDs will stay below 300 MB/s in similar scenario.
Overall numbers decreased slightly in AS SSD Benchmark. The maximum sequential speeds hovered around 2500 MB/s. At higher queue depth of 64, performances climbed up to around 1800 MB/s in random read and 1600 MB/s in write.
IOPS number represents how well a drive handles random input and output operations. The P34A80 scored 5228 in the benchmark. It reached 466076 IOPS and 410336 IOPS respectively in random 4K read/write.
At ATTO Disk Benchmark, the drive achieved speeds over 1000 MB/s when the file sizes increased to 32 KB. It then plateaued at about 3300 MB/s in read and 3000 MB/s in write.
A 100 GB file transfer was simulated in HD Tune Pro. For the first 25 GB of data, the P34A80 managed to sustain a higher write speed at around 2500 MB/s. It lowered significantly to 1000 MB/s afterwards, due to the saturation of internal DRAM and SLC cache. Read performance was a bit weird with quite a lot of fluctuations, averaging about 1500 MB/s.
Three files, total sized at about 15 GB, were transferred from a RAM Disk to the P34A80. It took approximately 5.28 seconds to complete, with speed of around 2 GB/s. As observed in the HD Tune Pro test, the cache will still functioning as designed, if the file sizes are under 25 GB.
Comparison
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Similar to the Asura Genesis Xtreme (its review here), the Silicon Power P34A80 SSD’s performance was in line with what we would expect from a SSD in the same configuration (Phision PS5012-E12 controller + Toshiba 64-Layer 3D TLC NAND). However, the P34A80 did have slightly slower sequential speeds in AS SSD Benchmark and HD Tune Pro.
Conclusion
The Silicon Power P34A80 performed similar to the other identically-equipped PS5012-E12 NVMe SSD we tested. It could achieve very respectable speeds in both sequential read and write, above 3000 MB/s. Despite it dropping to around 1200 MB/s when writing large files, there is still a noticeable advantage over standard SATA-based or DRAM-less SSDs.
The P34A80 is provided with a 5-year warranty, and costs $114.99 USD (MSRP) for the 1 TB model. Other high-end NVMe SSDs are priced at over $120 USD. For roughly the same price at about $100 USD, you can either get a slower SATA SSD or less durable QLC NVMe SSD, such as the Samsung 860 EVO or Crucial P1. Paying an extra $15 USD, you can have much better performance and the same capacity with the P34A80. If you want to upgrade your storage with limited budget, I would definitely recommend the P34A80.
You can purchase the SSD from your local/online resellers or the links below from Amazon and Newegg.
Thanks Silicon Power for providing us the SSD for review. (Review Sample)
Feel free to leave comments below, if you have any opinion about this website. Share the website around if you enjoy reading it. Subscribe to our Newsletter or follow our Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
Support this website simply by shopping in Amazon and Newegg. It will give us small kickbacks, if you use the above affiliate links to make any purchases, which will help us grow.
Computer hardware in the commercial/enterprise sector is always a couple generations ahead than those in the consumer market. Technologies, like multi-channel memory, higher core-count processors and 10 Gigabit Ethernet, have been adopted in server environment for years.
From time to time, companies will have to swap their servers with newer, more powerful and energy efficient components. Older parts will then enter the used market at a fraction of the original costs. This is why we can build a 12-core, 24-thread machine under $300 USD.
Processor
In this build, we decided to use the Intel Xeon E5-2630 v2 processor, which has 6 cores and 12 threads. We were able to find two of them (refurbished) in ServerMonkey for $15 USD each, to make a 12-core, 24-thread system.
A Xeon E5-2630 v2 costs around $600 USD, when it is brand new in 2013. It uses the Ivy Bridge micro-architecture with a 22 nm manufacturing process. It has a base clock of 2.6 GHz and can turbo up to 3.1 GHz.
Motherboard
Based on which processors you choose, the selected motherboard will be slightly different. Extensive research is a must to ensure the compatibility between the parts. There are a few crucial things to check. For instance, the CPU socket, motherboard chipset, memory type and number of PCIe lanes.
For our Intel Xeon E5-2630 v2, a C602 motherboard is required with dual LGA 2011 sockets. Typically, you can find the suitable motherboard on eBay and Craiglist. Luckily, we found a used Supermicro X9DRi-LN4F+ on TaoBao for $680 RMB (around $97 USD), which was pulled from a decommissioned server. FYI, listings for the same motherboard on eBay often sell for above $150 USD.
The X9DRi-LN4F+ is an enhanced extended ATX (EE-ATX) board, with a length of 34.7 cm and width of 33 cm. It supports both E5-2600 v1 and v2 processors through BIOS update. Please ask the sellers for more information about the BIOS version of the board.
There are two identical LGA 2011 sockets on the X9DRi-LN4F+. Each CPU can have up to 12 sticks of memory in quad-channel. Both ECC and non-ECC DDR3 memory modules are supported. The maximum capacities will vary, depends on which type of DIMM is used. You can get up to 1.5 TB of RAM with LDIMM and 768 GB with RDIMM.
One of the good things about this board is its standard square ILM socket. The mounting holes are aligned in a square pattern, instead of a rectangle for the narrow ILM. This makes finding a compatible CPU cooler is relatively easier and cheaper. Most consumer CPU coolers, like the Noctua NH-U12S (its review here) and Cooler Master Hyper 212, will support square ILM by default.
Apart from the normal 24-pin power cable, you will need two extra 8-pin EPS cables for the two CPUs.
The I/O ports of the X9DRi-LN4F+ are rather decent with four Gigabit Ethernet ports, four USB 2.0 ports, one VGA port and one serial UART 16550 port. Common in server-grade motherboard, the X9DRi-LN4F+ also features an additional IPMI port for remote management.
There are plenty of PCI Express expansion slots on the X9DRi-LN4F+. Four of them are in PCIe 3.0×16, one in PCIe 3.0×8 and one in PCIe 3.0×4. You should be fine to install multiple GPUs, network interface cards (NIC) and other add-in cards.
The six onboard SATA ports are slightly different than one another. The white-colored ports are powered by the storage control unit (SCU), but are limited to only 3 Gbps (~375 MB/s). The other four black-colored ports are wired to the AHCI controller, and can reach up to 6 Gbps (~750 MB/s).
RAM
To fully utilize the quad-channel ability of the CPU and motherboard, you will need at least four memory sticks per processor. You can check the memory compatibility in the motherboard manufacturer’s website. For us, we bought a 64 GB (8 x 8 GB) DDR3 Registered ECC RAM kit from ServerMonkey for $120 USD. If you are in a stricter budget, lowering the amount of RAM to 32 GB may be a good idea.
Our DDR3 ECC Registered RAM are produced by Hynix and run at frequency of 1333 MHz. Each memory stick has an aluminium heat spreader on top for cooling.
CPU Cooler
As we said previously, most modern consumer CPU cooler will be supported by the motherboard, because of its square ILM sockets. You can choose whatever existing coolers, from your older systems or purchase some used one cheaply. You will not be able to overclock the Xeon CPUs, therefore, as long as the coolers fit, you are good to go.
In our particular build, we used two Noctua NH-U9S coolers, which are kindly provided by Noctua. We requested the NH-U9S (its review here), due to its compact footprint and decent cooling performance.
Power Supply and Case
As we are working on a dual-CPU system, a power supply with dual 8-pin EPS power connectors is recommended. If you have a decently-built PSU from reputable brands and high enough wattage, you should be fine using a EPS power splitter. It would allow you to power both CPUs with a single EPS cable from the PSU. Generally, you can reuse the power supply from existing computers at home.
Depends on what motherboard you get, the size of the board will be different from each other. They may be in E-ATX, EE-ATX and SSI-CEB form factor. If you want to save some money, you can modify old PC chassis by drilling extra mounting holes. Or buying used server chassis online can also be another simpler option.
Total Costs
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Our 12-core, 24-thread system cost us around $246.99 USD with the CPUs, motherboard and 64 GB of RAM. You can definitely modify the lists with different components for your specific lists, like adding more memory and more CPU cores.
Feel free to leave comments below, if you have any opinion about this website. Share the website around if you enjoy reading it. Subscribe to our Newsletter or follow our Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
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After the major redesign with the new Radeon Software Adrenalin 2020 Edition, AMD released the 19.12.3 update to iron out most bugs and problems. This latest update mainly focuses on improving the software stability.
A total of 24 fixed issues are mentioned, with another 15 known issues. For example, the game and boost clocks of the RX 5500 XT graphics cards will now report correctly in the software.
We have attached the official release notes for the software below:
Fixed Issues
Game and boost clocks may be incorrectly reported for Radeon™ RX 5500 XT graphics products in Radeon Software.
Radeon Software Install may experience an error and fail to detect AMD graphics hardware when a certain WiFi adapter is enabled in the system.
Rocket League™ may crash or experience an application hang after performing a task switch.
A black screen may occur when Performance Metrics Overlay is open and changing game resolution.
After disabling Radeon Software Overlay users may still see the toast messages for the overlay shortcut while in fullscreen games.
Audio from custom scenes may continue to play after recording or streaming has been stopped.
Installer audio has been reduced as it was too loud on some system configurations.
Some users may be unable to select drop downs in graphics settings for Tessellation Mode.
Radeon ReLive may appear to be missing or not available to install on some system configurations with Hyper-V enabled.
Newly added game profiles may fail to enable the currently selected global graphics settings options in their profile.
Performing an auto update from web to Adrenalin 2020 Edition from Adrenalin 2019 Edition may fail with an error code.
Improved Radeon Chill experience when using a gaming mouse.
Switching between borderless and fullscreen in some games when Performance Overlay is enabled and Radeon FreeSync is enabled may cause stuttering.
MechWarrior 5: Mercenaries™ may experience black corruption near the bottom of the screen close to the player model.
Radeon Anti-Lag may fail to enable for DirectX® 9 applications when enabled in the global graphics settings options.
Radeon Anti-Lag may fail to enable for Counter-Strike: Global Offensive™.
The custom stream option may fail to present users with a url box to choose their endpoint.
DirectML Media Filters may fail to apply Upscale and Denoise when attempting to do both at the same time on one image.
Some Radeon FreeSync enabled displays may experience LFC intermittently enabling mid game causing poor performance or stutter.
A grey box may prevent users from setting custom hotkeys in the scene editor.
Performing Auto Tuning for graphics clocks on Radeon RX 5700 XT may result in an extremely high OC or unstable OC.
Some games may experience instability and screen loss or control loss when performing a task switch when the Gaming profile is set in Radeon Software which enables Radeon Enhanced Sync.
Radeon Image Sharpening may fail to enable in Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order™.
HDCP 2.2 enabled content may fail to play on some Radeon RX 500 series graphics products.
Known Issues
Some Radeon R9 200, Radeon R9 300 and Radeon R9 Fury series graphics products may experience instability with a limited number of DirectX®9 or DirectX®11 games when using a high refresh rate 120hz+ display. A workaround if you are experiencing this issue is to lower your displays refresh rate.
Trials Rising™ may experience excessive fog/smoke in some areas of the game.CPU usage may remain sometimes remain high once Radeon Game Advisor has been invoked during a game.
Factory Reset install may keep previously configured Radeon Software game profiles. This can cause mismatch between global graphics settings and per profile settings.
Text overflow in some UI boxes or toast messages may be experienced in some language localizations.
Controls for vertical sync may be hidden or disappear when Radeon Enhanced Sync is enabled.
Radeon Software may open with an inconsistent size or may not keep it’s previously set size when opened.
Some Vulkan® gaming applications may crash when performing a task switch with Radeon Image Sharpening enabled.
Integer Scaling may cause some video content to show flicker when the display resolution is set to less than native resolution.
Performance Metrics Overlay may appear to lock frame rate at 60 fps when performing a task switch in or out of a game.
Battlefield™ V may experience an application hang when changing settings in game with Radeon Boost enabled on Radeon RX 5700 series graphics products.
Performing a resolution change while Radeon Software overlay is open may cause an application hang or TDR.
Enabling Radeon Image Sharpening on HDR enabled displays may cause colors to become washed out.
Mortal Kombat 11™ may experience an application crash after the splash screen on Radeon RX 5700 series graphics products.
SETI@Home may be provided incorrect results from Radeon RX 5700 series graphics products.
You can download the Radeon Software Adrenalin 2019 Edition 19.12.3 Drivers at AMD’s website.
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