Table of contents for March 2016 in Custom PC UK

Ironically, K-series CPUs are the chips that need to be overclocked the least I’ll let you into a little secret. Most of the time, my Core i7 CPU isn’t overclocked. I bought a K-series chip, of course – I want the option to push my CPU to its limits for benchmarking, or if I’m running software that really needs it. However, it runs at stock speed for over 90 per cent of the time. It’s not so much that there’s no longer any need for overclocking, but that the top-end K-series CPUs are ironically the chips that need to be overclocked the least. They’re already powerful enough for most people. The chips that really benefit from overclocking are the cheap ones. When I first got into overclocking, back in the…

The entire group of buttons sits on an adjustable slider SUPPLIER www.scan.co.uk / MODEL NUMBER CH-9000091-EU /SPECIFICATIONS Sensor 12,000dpi optical Connection Wired, USB Cable 1.8m, braided Materials Plastic Extras Adjustable thumb buttons Multi-button thumb pads on mice can be hit or miss affairs; they can be uncomfortable to use and it can be tricky to get used to them as well. However, Corsair has employed a couple of nifty features with its new Scimitar RGB mouse that really make it stand out. Firstly, the 12 thumb buttons grouped together on the side are clearly numbered and backlit, and while they’re positioned at slightly differing angles, they’re all roughly the same size and have an alternating textured finish. The most useful feature, though, is that the entire group of buttons…

It still sports the great-looking steel expansion slot shrouds SUPPLIER www.ebuyer.com /SPECIFICATIONS Chipset Intel Z170 CPU socket Intel LGA1151 Memory support 4 slots: max 64GB DDR3 (up to 3466MHz) Expansion slots Three 16x PCI-E 0, one 1x PCI-E Sound Realtek ALC1150 Networking Killer E2201 Overclocking Base clock 80–500MHz, CPU multiplier 8-500x; max voltages, CPU 1.8V, RAM 2V Ports 6 x SATA 6Gbps (Z170), 1 x M.2, 1 x USB 3.1 Type-A, 1 x USB 3.1 Type-C, 3 x USB 3, 2 x USB 2, 1 x LAN, 8-channel surround audio out, line in, mic, optical S/PDIF out, 1 x HDMI 1.4, 1 x DVI-D, 1 x VGA, 1 x PS2 Dimensions (mm) 244 x 244 While mini-ITX might be grabbing the headlines recently, there’s a slightly less drastic way…

Few fantasy worlds seem as well matched to the family-breaking, argument machine that is Monopoly than the brutal, politically mercenary world of Game of Thrones. We can’t help think it would be Lilttlefinger’s game of choice, were he ever introduced to it. As with all Monopoly special editions, the board looks great. A full map of Westeros graces its centre, with beautiful artwork for each of the purchasable locations around the edge. The playing pieces are unique too, with iconic items such as dragon eggs replacing the usual pieces. We can’t help feeling a little disappointed that Hasbro hasn’t reworked some of the other artwork, however – it would be even better to see custom images or ideas for the Go To Jail or Free Parking spaces, but either way,…

It may have taken an age for Creative to produce a Bluetooth speaker, but the Roar is a quality piece of kit, with more features than you can shake a fretboard at. Audio can be supplied via Bluetooth, 3.5mm jack, USB or from a microSD card. It can even record audio, and it also supports NFC and doubles as a battery to charge an ailing phone. Three drivers and two passive radiators combine to create a deliciously full sound, with plenty of high-end punch and satisfying bass. If we were being picky, we’d say the bass can sometimes dominate a little, with mid-range detail losing out as a result, but it’s a blemish that’s easy to overlook on an otherwise great speaker. SUPPLIER www.creative.com Seen something worthy of appearing…

You don’t lose much in the way of performance over a full-sized card SUPPLIER www.cclonline.com The most powerful and capable card for a mini-ITX PC is currently the AMD R9 Fury Nano, which squeezes a beefy GPU and HBM memory onto a tiny PCB. However, it can also throttle at high temperatures and, with Nano prices currently hovering around £500, you currently get a better balance of performance and value from a cheaper short-PCB card. One option is Sapphire’s R9 380 ITX Compact OC (see p50), but for an extra £100 you can also get the Asus GTX 970 DirectCU Mini. It’s a dual-slot card that measures 171mm long and 121mm high, making it small enough to mount in a compact case, and with a bit of breathing space…

SUPPLIER www.overclockers.co.uk Being the cheapest full-sized card on test, you might expect the KFA² Infin8 to be the slowest performer, but the exact opposite is true. We were most impressed to see this card topping the performance charts in all three of our tests, despite its comparatively low price. It sports a great-looking all-black design, which extends to the included backplate. There’s no dual BIOS feature, but you do get a few adaptors in the box, including a pair of Molex to 6-pin PCI-E converters, plus two Molex to 8-pin PCI-E converters, along with a DVI-to-VGA adaptor. The cooler is set to the highest default fan profile of any GTX 970 on test, though, at 2,200rpm, making it the noisiest full-sized card on test, although the noise from the…

AMD has recently retired its Catalyst Control Center (CCC) driver software, replacing it with a richer graphics application called Radeon Software, aiming to add features and refine the interface. Speed improvements are one of AMD’s biggest claims, promising quicker installation and launch times with the new software, although the scale of the speed boost depends on your CPU and graphics card. AMD quotes a rough improvement in installation time and load times of between 2x and 4.84x when using an Intel CPU, and 24x when using an AMD CPU. In use, one area where we immediately noticed a speed-up is the number of clicks required to install it. The process feels more streamlined, with less messing about to get the software onto your system. Also, launching Radeon Settings with a…

SUPPLIER www.ebuyer.com Sapphire’s R9 380 Nitro Backplate 4GB is the only 4GB card on test, and thus the priciest, so it will be interesting to see how much difference the extra memory makes. It’s a sizeable card too, measuring 237mm long and 125mm high, so it isn’t built for compact cases. There are quite a few additional features as well, including a backplate (as the name suggests), as well as DVI to VGA adaptor and a dual BIOS setup. On the back, you’ll find the standard video outputs, including dual-link DVI-I and DVI-D, HDMI and DisplayPort. Meanwhile, the Nitro’s clock speeds aren’t quite as high as those on the XFX Radeon R9 380 DD Black Edition, but there’s still an impressive 40MHz overclock (4.1 per cent), applied to the…

You can’t honestly criticise a work you’ve been paid to examine by its creators At lunchtime I like to watch short, informative videos on YouTube. My current favourite series is a fast-paced science show called Crash Course Astronomy, recommended to me by our very own Tracy King. It was before watching the latest episode of CCA that an advert played that almost caused me to fall out of my chair. The advert was for Ubisoft’s tactical multiplayer shooter Rainbow Six: Siege. In it, several gaming YouTubers – video producers who specialise in game coverage that straddles the line between entertainment and criticism – were taken on a Rainbow Six-themed paintballing assault course, led by writer ex-SAS specialist Ryan. Many gaming video producers are paid by developers and publishers to cover…

JANUARY The Witness The year of 2016 kicks off with the release of Jonathan Blow’s long-anticipated follow-up to 2008 platformer Braid. The Witness is a puzzle game inspired by the 1990s adventure Myst. It drops the player onto a picturesque island divided into ten sections that surround a mountain, and the ultimate goal of the game is to reach this mountain’s summit. Each section contains a wide variety of maze-type puzzles. However, the rules for completing each maze differ each time and are communicated with varying degrees of clarity. Any given section will have a theme that acts as a clue to solving every maze in that section. Some mazes simply require you to find a route through them, while others require you to trace a specific path. Some mazes…

MILESTONES THIS MONTH TOP 20 OVERALL TOP 20 PRODUCERS WHAT IS FOLDING? Folding@home uses the spare processing cycles from your PC’s CPU and graphics cards for medical research. You can download the client from http://folding.stanford.edu and our team’s ID is 35947. Once you pass a significant milestone, you’ll get your name in the mag. You can also discuss folding with us and other readers online at the www.bit-tech.net forums.…

Gaming and enthusiast credibility is really difficult to establish Lenovo and Razer recently announced a plan to build gaming PCs together. On the surface, this new relationship looks good. Razer is a long-time specialist in this field, and this popular PC gaming brand sponsors numerous eSports teams and stars. Razer has even dabbled in building swanky gaming laptops with its Blade range. However, while the Blade systems have generally been well received by the press, they’re expensive, only available in a few select regions and as a result, they’ve sold in limited numbers. This partnership with Lenovo brings huge buying power for components, resulting in cheaper costs, and it also brings more manufacturing capacity and global sales reach. Razer’s gaming credibility and Lenovo’s large-scale manufacturing abilities makes it look like…

Beware of anything that claims to be ‘quantum’ unless it’s from CERN I read tonnes of customer reviews while compiling my Christmas wish list this year. This sort of consumer feedback, made possible by the Internet, theoretically democratises retail in a way that previously wasn’t really possible. Beforehand, we’d mostly choose a blender by which brand we trusted. Brands still play a part (the Amazon bestsellers in most categories are household names), but increasingly, customers are prepared to take a punt on lesser-known names. Kickstarter is a fine example. Although larger brands such as Double Fine or MST3K attract the most investment, when it comes to tech, there’s a Wild West of new and occasionally shady names at which we can throw our money. Take Shield Apparel, a company I…

AMD’s new GPU beats the GeForce GTX 960 by 17 per cent at 1080p SUPPLIER www.scan.co.uk /SPECIFICATIONS Graphics processor AMD Radeon R9 380X, 970MHz Pipeline 2,048 stream processors, 32 ROPs Memory 4GB GDDR5, 5.7GHz effective Bandwidth 182.4GB/sec Compatibility DirectX 12, OpenGL 4.5, Mantle, Vulcan Outputs/inputs Dual-link DVI-D, Dual-link DVI-I, HDMI, DisplayPort Power connections 2 x 6-pin Size 238mm long, dual-slot Through all the renames and rebrands it can be hard to keep track of AMD GPUs. Two GPUs that once sat at the top – the Radeon HD 7970 and HD 7950 – were later rebranded as the R9 280X and R9 280 respectively. These GPUs were then redesigned using AMD’s third-generation Graphics Core Next architecture (GCN 1.2) and the result was the Tonga GPU, which was used in…

The black PCB and MSI’s steel PCI-E slot covers look great SUPPLIER www.cclonline.com /SPECIFICATIONS Chipset Intel Z170 CPU socket Intel LGA1151 Memory support 4 slots: max 64GB DDR3 (up to 3733MHz) Expansion slots Three 16x PCI-E 3, three 1x PCI-E 3 Sound Realtek ALC1150 Networking Intel Gigabit LAN Overclocking Base clock 98–341MHz, CPU multiplier 8-83x; max voltages, CPU 2.155V, RAM 2.2V Ports 6 x SATA 6Gbps (Z170), 1 x M.2, 2 x USB 3, 1 x USB 3.1 Type-C, 2 x USB 2, 1 x LAN, 8-channel surround audio out, line in, mic, 1 x HDMI 1.4, 1 x DVI-D, 1 x VGA, 2 x PS2 Dimensions (mm) 305 x 244 While Intel’s top end Core i7-6700K is currently retailing for silly prices that even make a decent X99-based…

Being thin, long and wide, the Jumpr Slate is physically similar to the modern smartphones it’s likely to charge – if your bag or coat has a phone pocket, the Slate will fit neatly into that pocket too. Available in micro-USB and Lightning variants, the sturdy, bright orange captive cable removes the need to remember a separate charging lead. Thoughtfully, there’s also still a standard USB socket, should you need to charge a gadget that’s incompatible with the built-in cable. The Slate charged a Nexus 5X phone fully once, then to 23 per cent a second time around – a solid result for a 5,000mAh unit. Combine this performance with the stylish and practical design, and the £40 asking price is clearly reasonable too. SUPPLIER www.maplin.com…

In our most recent graphics card labs test (see Issue 148, p40), Custom PC cast its watchful eye over the entire GPU market. We found that Nvidia’s GeForce GTX 970 hit the sweet spot in terms of bang per buck, especially for 2,560 x 1,440 gaming, while AMD’s Radeon R9 380 offered the best balance of performance and value in the sub-£200 category, offering great speed at 1080p and even some 2,560 x,1,440 gaming abilities. There are loads of cards available with these GPUs, though, with various manufacturers offering different clock speeds, coolers, display outputs, accessories and pricing, and even different PCB sizes. For this reason, we’re going to examine the differences between various third-party GTX 970 and R9 380 cards, so you can find the best GTX 970 or…

SUPPLIER www.amazon.co.uk As with the Asus R9 380 Strix (see p48), the Asus GTX 970 Strix’s dimensions are slightly longer and taller than standard GTX 970 cards, measuring 280mm long and 141mm high. Asus has made good use of this space, though, fitting a beefy semi-passive cooler, and applying a decent overclock to the card. As with the other Asus cards on test, there are no adaptors or extra cables in the box, but there are some goodies on the card itself. There’s a backplate, and there’s also an LED next to the PCI-E power connector to tell you when you’ve made a secure connection. The only notable feature lacking, when compared to the competition, is a dual BIOS. Like the Asus R9 380 Strix, Asus has taken advantage…

SUPPLIER www.ebuyer.com The modern PC hardware market is wonderfully diverse, thanks to firms catering for any segment they can imagine, making slight modifications to configurations to better suit different people’s needs. For example, MSI has nine different versions of the GeForce GTX 970, each differing in slight ways, adjusting the cooler, clock speeds and PCB size to fit the needs and price points of different users. The GTX 970 Gaming 4G is one of the more high-performance models, behind cards such as the Golden Edition version, which has higher clock speeds. Decked out in the trademark red and black MSI colours, it’s a very big card, measuring 279mm long and 139mm high, making it almost the same length as the biggest card on test, the Asus GTX 970 Strix.…

SUPPLIER www.dabs.com Asus’ Radeon R9 380 Strix 2GB is both the longest and tallest AMD card on test, with its 272 x 138mm dimensions throwing out any notion of squeezing it into a small case. The upside of this size, though, is that you get enough space for good heat dissipation, along with a quiet, efficient and semi-passive cooler. Asus hasn’t gone wild with its out-of-the-box overclock either. In fact, it isn’t much faster than the smallest R9 380 card on test. The GPU core sits at 990MHz, just 20MHz over the stock speeds, which is the equivalent of a 2 per cent boost. Meanwhile, its memory frequency is the same as the reference R9 380 spec, 5.5GHz (effective). But the overclock isn’t the focus of this card, which…

SUPPLIER www.ebuyer.com The DD in the name of the XFX R9 380 DD Black Edition stands for ‘double dissipation’, an obvious reference to the enhanced performance from the dual-fan cooler that sits on top the card. In theory, this extra airflow means greater headroom for higher clock speeds, and XFX has taken full advantage of this situation, with this card offering the highest stock speeds of any of the R9 380 cards on test. The core clock is 1030MHz, representing a 60MHz increase from the R9 380 stock speed, or 6.2 per cent, while the 5.8GHz (effective) memory frequency is 5.4 per cent higher than the stock clock frequency. However, the cooler is fully active, unlike the semi-passive coolers on some of the other R9 380 cards on test.…

The main attraction is the ability to freely cause havoc wherever you want DEVELOPER Avalanche Studios / PUBLISHER Square Enix / WEBSITE http://justcause.com Where most open-world games would spend an hour or two setting up a half-baked drama about a gruff vigilante who must destroy an entire city in order to avenge their son, wife or dog, JC3 commences with you shooting rockets while standing on the wing of an aeroplane. It knows what it wants to deliver – namely lots of huge explosions – and it isn’t going to let inconveniences such as plot coherence or character depth get in the way. Instead, JC3 brings more of the madcap action of its five-year-old predecessor. There are more settlements to liberate, more gadgets and, most importantly of all, more stuff…

DEVELOPER Codemasters / PUBLISHER Codemasters / WEBSITE www.codemasters.com/game/dirt-rally Dirt Rally is a racing simulation so brutal and uncompromising it could reasonably be classified as a horror game. The line between speed and control must be navigated with the balance of a mountain goat if you want to avoid turning your car into sponsorship-branded scrap. The bodywork of Dirt Rally will be familiar to any racing fan, framed largely around a career mode that involves working your way up a series of rally championships, unlocking better cars and more difficult race types as you progress. Unlike previous Dirt games, however, Dirt Rally is focused entirely on rallying experience, and refuses to accommodate many of the safety nets that crept into previous Dirt games. The flashback ability that let you rewind a…

If you’re finding Fallout 4 to be a tough customer on your current gaming rig, we have just the feature for you this month. In addition to featuring the game in our new graphics card benchmark suite, as used in our GTX 970 and R9 380 group tests (see p36), we’ve also looked at Fallout 4 GPU performance and fine-tuning its settings (see p90). If you’re looking to build a whole new gaming PC, though, then over the next few pages, we’ll look at all the gear you need to build a PC to play Fallout 4, as well as all the other latest games. We’ll be taking a look at which graphics card you need to play the game at various resolutions, and discussing the rest of the PC…

Bethesda’s latest post-apocalyptic RPG is admittedly a cross-platform game, and not a graphical masterpiece in the way as The Witcher 3 but nonetheless, as you’ll see, good PC hardware is needed to show off the game at its best. The game is the second major release to use Bethesda’s own Creation Engine, the first being The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. As you’d expect, however, Bethesda has made some tweaks and introduced new rendering features to Creation for Fallout 4. There’s a clear visual upgrade as a result, and in parts, the game will make even top-tier cards cry in agony. A major new feature is the physically based deferred renderer, which affects lighting and how it reflects off distinct surfaces, particularly metals compared with non-metals. Dynamic volumetric lighting is the…

2015 – the best case modding year ever The sheer amount of PC modding talent on show in 2015 has amazed me. We’ve seen smaller case manufacturers such as Parvum Systems, Hex Gear and EKWB showcase their products by sending them out to some of the best modders, with some spectacular results – Hex Gear’s own Hans Peder Sahl is in Readers’ Drives this month (see p108) with his personal project using the company’s R40 case. This system is in my top five projects of 2015, but there are numerous other R40 projects that are absolutely stunning too. Thermaltake has also held several modding competitions, where its Core range of cases featured heavily, and Cooler Master has held similar competitions too. I’m also hearing rumblings various other case makers planning…

How important is efficiency? Is efficiency important? No, at least not as important as noise and heat. I have a very efficient PSU, but it’s also very loud. I’ll replace it with something quieter the first chance I get – if it’s less efficient, then so be it – that may well be the case, given that my current one is already 80-85 per cent efficient. Power efficiency may be an issue if you expect your Bitcoin mining to pay for itself, but gaming is an expensive and indulgent hobby anyway, price be dammed. Families are expensive to run at the best of times, so saving a few beans here or there will just be soaked up elsewhere anyway. Good pie test, by the way. Cheers, and merry Christmas to…

Corsair introduces low-profile liquid cooler The need to find space for a radiator mount has previously limited all-in-one liquid coolers from being installed in very small mini-ITX rigs and low-profile HTPC systems, but Corsair has revealed its intentions to conquer these areas with its liquid-cooling systems too. The company’s new H5 SF cooler squeezes the radiator and cooling fan into a flat unit that sits on top of a mini-ITX motherboard, without the need to incorporate case fan mounts. The unit measures 84mm tall and features an integrated low-noise 120mm blower fan, which Corsair says will effectively draw heat from other components on the motherboard, such as the VRMs, and exhaust it out the vents at the back. The H5 SF is available to order for £80 inc VAT from…

We managed to fit a Corsair H100i radiator in the roof mount SUPPLIER www.ebuyer.com / MODEL NUMBER FD-CA-CORE-500-BK /SPECIFICATIONS Dimensions (mm) 250 x 380 x 213 (W x D x H) Material Steel, plastic Available colours Black Front panel Power, reset, 2 x USB 3, stereo, mic Drive bays 1 x 5.25in, 3 x 3.5in, 3 x 2.5in Form factor(s) Mini-ITX Cooling 2 x 120mm/140mm roof fan mounts (fans not included), 1 x 120/140mm rear fan mounts (1 x 140mm fan included) CPU cooler clearance 170mm Maximum graphics card length 310mm As you shrink cases down to sizes that cater exclusively for mini-ITX motherboards, the layout becomes far more critical than for larger cases. Including numerous drive bays often results in poor cooling and it’s unusual for a small…

The wheel sports a rubberised surface and has a lovely action SUPPLIER www.cclonline.com /SPECIFICATIONS Connection Wired, USB Sensor Optical Resolution 3,500dpi native; 7,000dpi overdrive Cable Braided Material Plastic Extras None Unusually for an ambidextrous mouse, the Kova is comfortable to wield. While it lacks proper ring-finger and pinky support, it’s otherwise well suited to a palm grip with a comfortably placed hump and no protruding edges where your hand rests. A claw grip is feasible too, although there are no high-grip rubber sides. That said, while the matt plastic is smooth and pleasant to rest against, it isn’t too slippery either, so you won’t lose control. The build quality impresses too – the body is solid and the 1.8m braided USB cable is kept slightly elevated by its connection,…

While the Internet of Things may be an awfully titled concept, the potential for having everyday items such as the Myfox Home Alarm linked to the Internet is pretty exciting. The alarm can buzz your phone if it senses an intruder, and if you have the optional Security Camera, it will even send you a clip of said intruder. The alarm is operated by either a smartphone app or a key fob, each of which can be assigned a name. As a result, you’re then able to see who has turned the alarm on or off – ideal for letting you know the kids have got home safe. A few issues sour the experience, however. Firstly, despite costing £249 inc VAT, the alarm pack includes only one IntelliTAG door/ window…

All our graphics tests are performed on an Asus Maximus V Extreme LGA1155 motherboard with an Intel Core i5-3570K running at 4.2GHz. Alongside these parts are 8GB (2 x 4GB) of Corsair Dominator 2400MHz DDR3 RAM and a 480GB SanDisk Extreme Pro SSD. Power comes from a LEPA G1600 PSU and the system runs Windows 10 64-bit. While our regular GPU Labs tests are focused on finding the best-value GPU for attaining playable frame rates at a given resolution, assessing the best third-party card shifts the focus to other factors such as features, overclocking potential, noise and thermals. After all, that’s where the differences will lie – if you’re buying an R9 380 or GTX 970, you already know roughly what performance you’re getting. A higher factory overclock is certainly…

SUPPLIER www.overclockers.co.uk Inno3D’s iChill Black Edition carries a significant premium over the alternative GeForce GTX 970 cards on test, thanks to its all-in-one liquid cooler. Although the card isn’t particularly long, measuring 268mm long and 125mm high, the 120mm radiator takes up additional internal space in your case. It needs a spare 120mm fan mount for the radiator, a spare Molex plug and you’ll need space for the extra tubing inside your PC case as well. The practicalities alone mean that not everyone will be able to accommodate this card. But they’d be missing out on the most overclockable GeForce GTX 970 card we’ve tested. What’s more, its default 1228MHz GPU base clock is higher than that of any other card on test, with a massive 16.9 per cent…

SUPPLIER www.overclockers.co.uk The OCUK Nvidia 970 Cooler Edition is a fancy name for what’s essentially a stock-clocked GTX 970 with a reference cooler, with OCUK’s in-house graphics card expert, Gibbo, putting the design together using genuine Nvidia components – the idea is that you get the fancy reference cooler from Nvidia’s high-end GPUs, but on a GTX 970. Since Nvidia never released a reference PCB of its own into retail, it can now be tricky to hunt down a reference card, with most vendors only selling overclocked and modified GTX 970 cards. It’s a beauty though. The cooler looks very slick, with a simple green LED Nvidia logo on the top. It’s quite big, measuring 268mm long, but not too tall, being just 110mm high. The cooler is quite…

It’s hard to imagine squeezing much more from such a diminutive graphics card SUPPLIER www.scan.co.uk As its name suggests, the Sapphire Radeon R9 380 ITX Compact OC has a small PCB, with an overall package that’s designed to fit into a compact mini-ITX chassis where space is at a premium. It measures just 171mm long, making it just 1mm longer than a mini-ITX board. Its height of 107mm means it’s quite short too. With no room for a substantial cooler, the default overclock only raises the clock frequencies by a small amount, with a 980MHz core and 5.6GHz (effective) for the memory, mere increases of 1 per cent and 1.8 per cent respectively. However, it’s good to see at least a small overclock has been applied – it’s hard…

Build a home theatre PC The parts you’ll need to build an affordable, home theatre PC that’s ideal for putting in the lounge and playing back all manner of video formats. This machine will handle general computing and media tasks with no trouble, and its dual-core Skylake CPU can even handle 4K video playback. Meanwhile, its super-quiet Noctua CPU cooler prevents it from making a racket. Build a budget gaming PC The parts you’ll need to build a budget machine capable of playing the latest games at maximum settings on a 1080p monitor, and even some games at 2,560 x 1,440. The machine has a discrete graphics card, a highly overclockable dual-core CPU and high-speed memory. Meanwhile, the Z97 motherboard gives you headroom to upgrade to a faster CPU later.…

Graphics modding has been a huge component of PC gaming culture for years. Many major games, from Skyrim to Starcraft, have an abundance of mods that tweak, enhance and optimise their games’ technological components, and some even introduce completely new effects. One of the most striking recent graphical mods is the Pinnacle of V. A comprehensive visual and mechanical update for Grand Theft Auto V, the Pinnacle of V was created to push GTA V as close as possible to realism. It alters and enhances almost every aspect of Rockstar’s open-world game. The Pinnacle of V was created by Josh Romito, a first-time modder who was inspired by the modding community’s work on enhancing the previous Grand Theft Auto game. ‘Originally, my work began as something personal. I later decided…

Regular readers will know there’s never a shortage of single-board computers for me to review, but this month’s arrival is the first such computer I’ve seen that costs less than £5, putting it firmly into the pocket-change bracket that was previously the exclusive domain of microcontrollers. Yes, it’s the Raspberry Pi Zero – and if you’re lucky enough to have picked up some of the early stock, you’ll know it’s very special indeed. First, though, we need to address the elephant in the room: this isn’t a £4 computer. Even assuming you don’t have to pay postage – £2.50 from https://shop.pimoroni.com for a Pi Zero on its own – there are a few other bits and pieces you’ll need to get going: a micro-SD card, from £2; a power supply…

Early attempts at living room PCs were embarrassingly large and clunky For decades, the industry has been desperate to move our PCs from the study/second bedroom into the living room. Microsoft pushed Media Center for many years, starting with a special edition of Windows XP before finally giving up after Windows 8. Intel ploughed millions into Viiv, a collection of technologies that was supposed to create a level playing field for media PCs, but got bogged down by terrible DRM and a lack of software support. AMD also tried with LIVE!, which failed even quicker than Viiv because of its lack of supported media content. Valve has also now released SteamOS, a Linux-based alternative to Windows for lounge gaming. However, while the interface is easy to use, Valve still has…