After several weeks of rumors and speculations, MSI has finally released its Z87 XPower motherboard. MSI Z87 XPower, a flagship XL-ATX model in a series of Intel Haswell-compatible boards, is differentiated by a high-quality hardware base, enhanced overclocking facilities, and total support of numerous advanced technologies. According to MSI, CPU overclocking options are considered to be among the strongest aspects ascribed to the new-comer. With this aspect in mind, the company equipped its flagship board with the most powerful 32-phase power supply system.



This motherboard is compatible with the 4th generation processors from Intel, which support Socket LGA1150 platform. Being an advanced product, XPower accommodates an increased amount of expansion slots: five PCI Express 3.0 x16 slots and a pair of PCI Express 2.0 x1 slots. Such assembly allows for operating with up to four graphics cards simultaneously in AMD CrossFireX or Nvidia SLI configurations. The board also saves …

The lineup of Asus Strix graphics cards, in addition to GeForce GTX 780 model, has been replenished with one more representative – the Radeon R9 280 Strix OC Edition (codename: Strix-R9280-OC-3GD5). The heart of the card is AMD Radeon R9 280 GPU (Tahiti PRO) with overclocked clock frequencies. Hence, the GPU index has been increased from etalon 933 MHz (overclocked) to 980 MHz. This provides for even more striking performance on gaming and overclocking cessions.



The graphics card is equipped with 3 GB of GDDR5 memory featuring 384-bit rail. Its frequency has also been increased, demonstrating 1300 MHz at the start and reaching 5200 MHz at the toughest loading. The model boasts a rich set of video interfaces, including one HDMI, one DisplayPort, and a pair of DVI ports. This ensures the creation of multi-screen configurations.


The integrated PCB employs an improved Super Alloy Power hardware base, as well as a 10-phase Digi+ VRM system. Cooling is ascribed to DirectCU II …

Evercool has been conquering the market of cooling components and wholesome systems for almost twenty years already. Its arsenal basically consists of models targeting entry-level and budgetary segment. However, the company has lately introduced a range of high-quality products which can be applied in powerful PC systems. Air-cooler Silent Shark is an atypical representative of Evercool’s product line, if viewed from price and layout respect. It enjoys at least one unique feature, as well as a bunch of standard ones, the combination of which gives durability, efficiency, and power.



Framework Peculiarities


Evercool Silent Shark features quite impressive dimensions: 165 mm (h) x 140 mm (w) x 166 mm (l). The framework itself contains a two-section aluminum heatsink, six copper heat pipes that pierce a copper base, a plastic lid, and two powerful fans. One of the fans is located between the sections, while the other – at one of the external heatsink faces. Each section …