The proliferation of multimedia audio and video formats, including Blu-Ray, and an increasing array of TV and web based services have made the home theatre personal computer (HTPC) a powerful convergence device. With the imminent release of Microsoft's Windows 7 Operating System, Benchmark Reviews explores the evolution of the Windows HTPC Platform. We will also examine the efforts of a global community of users and premium developers, who have used Microsoft's product to showcase their skills and highlight their passion to make the PC a core component of the home entertainment setup.

For computer enthusiasts, the last Intel milestone was the Core i7 processor launch that paralleled the X58-Express motherboard chipset launch back in November of 2008. Ten months later and well into September of 2009, Intel has returned with the P55-Express chipset for mainstream users who pair it with the new LGA1156 socket. On the outside little more than the processor socket and memory configuration has changed, replacing dual-channel for triple. PCI-Express now offers only one 16x lane instead of two, while the number of SATA and USB ports continues to give more expansion room than the average user might need. The consumer might not know what to expect when choosing between the two products, other than one is mainstream (P55) and the other is for extreme enthusiasts (X58). In this article, Benchmark Reviews directly compares the Intel Core i7-860 equipped Gigabyte GA-P55-UD6 motherboard against the GA-EX58-UD4P with Intel Core i7-920. Testing a Core i7-860 against an i7-920 might not seem fair, and it's a little biased to compare P55 against X58, but the final outcome might just surprise you.

OK, we're through playing nice with these new ATI 5xxx video cards. The corporate logo for XFX says: "play hard.", so Benchmark reviews is going to take that motto to heart and show what this cards can really do. Almost every single competing card runs at higher than reference clock rates, and they all come that way from the factory. Every single card I compared the HD5770 to, when we reviewed the reference design from ATI, was factory overclocked. That's just the way it is with video cards built on mature GPU technology. Well, every ATI 5xxx card can easily be overclocked using the standard driver package from ATI, Catalyst Control Center, since it includes ATI Overdrive. So let's do it, let's compare apples to apples, and as a bonus, I'll throw in some CrossfireX results, too.

Until SSDs can safely prove that they're a reliable long-term media for Enterprise storage, the Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) interface owns the market share for server storage. Until Seagate launches their Solid State Drive counterpart, the 600GB Seagate Cheetah 15K.7 SAS Hard Drive ST3600057SS delivers safe and affordable high-capacity storage to data servers and Enterprise environments. The 4Gb/s FC or 6-Gb/s SAS 2.0 interface allows the perpendicular storage technology to deliver 15,000 RPM data bandwidth for an industry-leading 1.6-million-hour MTBF. In this article, Benchmark Reviews tests the Seagate Cheetah 15K.7 SAS hard drive against a wide variety of storage solutions.

The launch of Radeon HD57xx Juniper-GPU series cards is going very smoothly. ATI learned some hard lessons when they launched the HD4850 a couple years back. All the partners seem to have their cards ready for distribution this time, and there's no price gouging, due to the stable supply. This is doubly important for the HD57xx, since they're in the middle of the pack, performance-wise, and there are lots of competitors. XFX is one of the premium retail partners in the video card industry, although they're a relative newcomer to the ATI camp, and they've supplied Benchmark Reviews a model HD-575X-ZNF7 Radeon HD5750 to review. We recently looked at an early engineering sample of the HD5770, now we have the opportunity to take a look at a production version of the lower priced companion card, the XFX Radeon HD5750. We already know it's not going to challenge the HD5770, but can it beat out its real competition at the lower price point?

Cell phone laws are rapidly becoming more and more restrictive. At the time of this writing, 36 states have some sort of cell phone restriction while using a motor vehicle. This up from 24 states just a year ago. The hands-free revolution is well under way. Some people even wear a bluetooth headset practically from the time they wake up in the morning. For those of us less fashionable than they are, handsfree kits are more our style. We are constantly looking for the best in quality, versatility, and function for our inevitable daily phone use. Enter the BlueAnt Supertooth 3 Handsfree Kit. Released last year, this device was an upgraded version of their hit Supertooth Light kit. Benchmark Reviews has tested the Supertooth 3 extensively over the past few weeks to see if it can meet the needs of the cell phone users, both casual and talkative.

Coming right on the heels of the HD5800 series launch, ATI brings us another batch of cards based on class-leading 40nm GPUs and GDDR5 memory. The new cards, Radeon HD5770 and HD5750, use the same architecture as the new HD5800 series, but ATI basically cut the Cypress chip in half to create a brand new video card with hardware specs somewhere between an HD4870 and an HD4890. If you're thinking that's not a bad place to be, but want to see some proof of how the HD5770 performs, Benchmark Reviews is pleased to offer you the results of our extensive testing.

AMD has leap-frogged NVIDIA by launching the DirectX 11 compatible Radeon HD 5870 video card. Armed with 1600 shader cores, the 40nm Cypress GPU claims to push video game frame rates well-beyond what NVIDIA offers from their GeForce GTX 285 counterpart. While the list of DirectX 11 video games has just started to grow, with one of the first being a free Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game (MMORPG) named Battle Forge. Perhaps ATI has created the perfect storm for their Radeon HD 5800-series by offering a price-competitive graphics card with several free games included or available. While NVIDIA toils away with CUDA and PhysX, ATI is busy delivering the next generation of hardware for the gaming community to enjoy. In this article, Benchmark Reviews compares the Sapphire Radeon HD 5870 video card, model 21161-00-50R, against a cross-section of modern graphics accelerators.