Where Can I Find The Best Case Mods Online and Save Money?
Are you captivated by the stunning Case Mods you've seen online but shell shocked at some of the prices. What is a case mod, some of you may ask? Have you every wanted to spice up that boring bland box you call your computer? Well you can and there are lots of people online with fantastic clever ideas on themes, gee whiz lights, sounds, and much much more. Here is a list of top places where you can get information, buy stuff, and chat with others about your ideas. If you want great case mod information you should go to the Best Case Scenario; http://www.thebestcasescenario.com/ There you will get great advice on do it yourself case mod projects that will save you money. You will find "well written and photographed case modding worklog that allows us to follow a modder's project in a step-by-step fashion". If you want to buy great case mod items at low prices you should go to: http://www.case-mod.com/store Their statement sums up what the site is about; "A unique shopping experience for the Hardcore PC Enthusiast! Along with providing an excellent selection of high quality items and offering exceptional and personal customer service, Case-Mod.com has found many unique ways to save you money and make your shopping experience an enjoyable one." If you want case mod forums and galleries go to; http://www.casemodgod.com Do it yourself case modding projects. "If you want guides to dozens of creative modding projects, this is your site" These sites have great advice and products on all kinds of case mod ideas. Now First-Ever Star Wars PC
(more info at http://www.maxsvr.com/case-mod-information/) Alienware now has a line of Star Wars PCs. In addition to stunning Star Wars graphics on the case, the systems also come with spectacular Star Wars skins and Wallpaper. (more info at http://www.maxsvr.com/case-mod-information/) According to Alienware; "As possibly the most popular movie franchise of all time, Star Wars has appeared on countless products and become an indelible part of pop culture. Despite all of that, however, there has never been a PC that Star Wars fans could call their own. Until now. The first-ever Star Wars PC, the Alienware Aurora: Star Wars Edition, has arrived, bringing together one-of-a-kind Star Wars style and award-winning Alienware power to forever transform your computing experience." The Star Wars graphics on both the "light side" and the "dark side" versions look as impressive as it gets. (more info at http://www.maxsvr.com/case-mod-information/) Kevin Taylor is a freelance writer/webmaster and lives in Toronto, Canada. http://www.maxsvr.com/case-mod-information
Related News
Apple Is Flailing Badly At The Edges - Washington Post
Apple Is Flailing Badly At The EdgesWashington Post, United States -16 hours agoI was pretty excited about my Macbook Air, which packs a ton of hardware into a slim and elegant case. But it was unable to stay connected to Wifi for more ... |
Andrews Awarded Aerojet Contract to Build Hardware for Sundancer - MarketWatch
Wear and tear lead to more hardware - Globe and Mail
Wear and tear lead to more hardwareGlobe and Mail, Canada -18 hours agoKaren Cockburn had just won a medal in her third consecutive Olympics - one of a handful to do it - as one of the world's best and most endurable bouncers, ... |
Microsoft Drops Virtualization Fees For SQL Server 2008, Other Apps - InformationWeek
Hardware chain seeks to lend hand to non-profits - Columbus Ledger-Enquirer
Hardware chain seeks to lend hand to non-profitsColumbus Ledger-Enquirer, GA -5 hours agoBy Allison Kennedy - AKennedy@ledger-enquirer.com -- Each year, as part of its “New Faces for Helpful Places” campaign, Ace Hardware selects ten “Helpful ... |
A not-so-magic lamp guides me back to my neighborhood hardware store - Bridge
The Death Of Storage Hardware - InformationWeek
The Death Of Storage HardwareInformationWeek, NY -Aug 18, 2008Typically they are just off the shelf hardware, probably running Linux in some form. The special part is that it is a "known" and no longer a variable. ... |
Sharonville building products company buys Centerville business - Bizjournals.com
NASA Closes Florida Spaceport for Tropical Storm Fay - Space.com
FalconStor Moves To Software-Only Model, Will Drop Hardware - CRN
|
|
 |
|
|
RELATED ARTICLES
Rackmount Computer Keyboards
The other piece of vital equipment to accompany the rack mount computers and the monitors are the rack mount computer keyboards. Rackmount computer keyboards are built with durability and reliability in mind.
Ten Tips to Safeguard Your Laptops
The following is a list of tips to help safeguard your laptop while traveling or conducting business.
How To Choose The Best Student Laptop?
How To Choose the Best Student Laptop?
Preventing Tape Drive Failure
Contrary to popular belief, tape drives are generally robust and reliable. However, there are three common mistakes that people make that dramatically increase the probability of
tape drive failure.
TiVo: An Introduction for the Few Who Dont Know Yet
TiVo will change your life... for the better. Plain and simple: record shows by telling TiVo to record them (not when, what channel, how long, etc.), record all new episodes of X, record all movies w/ so-and-so in them, etc.
War of the Disks: A Close-in Analysis of the Hard Disk Drive vs. the Solid State Disk
Much has been written about solid state disks (SSDs) becoming the next big thing1 in the IT industry(1). But as to whether or not we have enough knowledge of how it will revolutionize the industry is a different question. How much do we really know about SSDs? If we are to ask people on the streets, it wouldn't come as a surprise that they dont know much of what an SSD is. Even if they do know, most probably it would be limited to a USB pen drive, a CompactFlash or a Secure Digital card, which are more on the consumer side of the storage industry.
Technically speaking, they are not wrong. Most web definitions describe an SSD as a high-performance plug-and-play storage device that contains no moving parts. Therefore, given that most of the aforementioned mobile disk storage devices contain no movable parts, they can certainly be categorized as SSDs.
But then again, there's more to SSDs than being a non-volatile device. The purpose of this article is to give readers a clearer picture of what an SSD is, its usage as well as its difference when pitted against the predominant data storage device at present - the hard disk drive (HDD). More than its non-volatility, this article will reveal how much potential SSDs have in optimizing the performance of the computing system.
SSD Defined
Here are several ways the SSD is defined:
"A solid state disk (SSD) is electrically, mechanically and software compatible with a conventional (magnetic) hard disk or winchester. The difference is that the storage medium is not magnetic (like a hard disk) or optical (like a CD) but solid state semiconductor such as battery backed RAM, EPROM or other electrically erasable RAM-like chip. This provides faster access time than a disk, because the data can be randomly accessed and does not rely on a read/write interface head synchronising with a rotating disk. The SSD also provides greater physical resilience to physical vibration, shock and extreme temperature fluctuations. The only downside is a higher cost per megabyte of storage."(2)
"Abbreviated SSD, a solid state disk is a high-performance plug-and-play storage device that contains no moving parts. SSD components include either DRAM or flash memory boards, a memory bus board, a CPU, and a battery card. Because they contain their own CPUs to manage data storage, they are a lot faster (18MBps for SCSI-II and 44 MBps for UltraWide SCSI interfaces) than conventional rotating hard disks ; therefore, they produce highest possible I/O rates. SSDs are most effective for server applications and server systems, where I/O response time is crucial. Data stored on SSDs should include anything that creates bottlenecks, such as databases, swap files, library and index files, and authorization and login information."(3)
For the rest of the article, we will compare the HDDs and Flash-based SSDs. The latter are the most popular type of SSDs employed by the military, aerospace, industrial and embedded systems industries.
Mortality Rate
Hard disk failure is a common occurrence in this age of desktops and notebooks. A lot of horror stories have been told, passed around and even published about how valuable data was lost and the agony of trying to retrieve or at least save a portion of the crashed hard drive. It is during this time that people wonder, why do hard disks fail?
The reason is simple - wear and tear. Just like any good old machine with mechanical components, HDDs tend to deteriorate over time. HDDs consist of rotating, magnetically coated disks, known as platters, that are used to store data. This rotating motion of the mechanical arms results in much wear and tear after long periods of use. The operational lifespan of a computer HDD is over three years.(4)
A Flash-based SSD is different. Although the most common Flash chips have around 300,000 write cycles, the best Flash chips are rated at 1,000,000 write cycles per block. On top of that, Flash SSD manufacturers employ different ways to increase the longevity of the drives. In some cases, they use a "balancing" algorithm to monitor the number of times each disk block has been written, which greatly extends the operational lifespan of the drive. Furthermore, these manufacturers also designed special "wear-leveling" algorithms where once a certain percentage threshold for a given block is reached, the SSD will swap the data in that block with the data in another block that has exhibited a "read-only-like" characteristic in the background. This reduces performance lag and avoids further wearing off of the blocks and thrashing of the disk. Even with usage patterns of writing/reading gigabytes per day, a Flash-based SSD should last several years, depending on its capacity. Add to that the inclusion of a DRAM cache in the disk architecture that further enhances its operational capabilities as well as lifespan.
Speeding Up
With the very fast paced lifestyle these days, most businesses are time-bound and cannot afford a slowing down in their transactions. This makes speed of HDDs a crucial point in technological purchases. The typical access time for a Flash based SSD is about 35 - 100 s, whereas that of a rotating disk is around 5,000 - 10,000 s. That makes a Flash-based SSD approximately 100 times faster than a rotating disk.
This however raises another point - what's the benefit of a high-speed SSD when the entire system cannot support it? The evolution of CPUs in terms of performance has far surpassed the development of the data storage system. The HDD is actually limiting the potential of a computer system when they are not able to keep up with the performance of the other components, particularly the CPU. If an HDD is replaced by a high-speed SSD, the performance would significantly improve. The resulting system would be a high-powered set-up that can go beyond the demands of high-speed business or military environments.
Size Matters
To be a true plug-in replacement for HDDs, Flash-based SSDs are manufactured in standard 2.5" and 3.5" form factors. 2.5" SSDs are normally used in laptops or notebooks while the 3.5" form factors are used in desktops, or in JBOD or other SAN/NAS/DAS configurations. They can often be used to replace traditional disks in storage arrays or in a server's internal disk bays. Flash-based SSDs certainly fit the storage needs of most embedded systems that require much smaller form factors.
Reliability
In terms of reliability, conventional HDDs pale when compared to SSDs. The absence of mechanical arms and spinning platters is the reason behind its reliability. In demanding environments, SSDs provide the type of ruggedness required for mobile applications. Unlike the HDD, SSD's can withstand extreme shock and vibration with data integrity and without any danger of data loss. This feature is very important in industrial applications where exposure to highly combustible materials and electromagnetic radiation are typical. Their ability to deliver unnerving performance in extreme conditions also makes SSD play a vital role in military operations, be it in defense, aerospace or aviation applications. Military applications require, in most cases, an operating temperature range of -60C to +95C. Shock, vibration, and temperature ratings of HDDs cannot comply with military standards, only SSDs can.
Power Play
In addition to speed, reliability and mortality rate being positively affected by the SSD's non-volatility, they also consume much less power than traditional HDDs. No additional power is required to activate the platters or the mechanical arms present in most HDDs. Its power consumption is practically only a fraction of a hard disk drive.
Heat Dissipation
Along with the lower power consumption, there is also much lesser heat dissipation for systems using Flash-based SSDs as their data storage solution. This is due to the absence of heat generated from the rotating/movable media. This certainly proves to be the one of the main advantages of Flash-based SSDs relative to that of a traditional HDD. With less heat dissipation, it serves as the ideal data storage solution for mobile systems such as PDAs, notebooks, etc. Users can do away with large cooling fans, internal power supply and batteries for large storage arrays in storage area networks.
Cost Considerations
Of course, everything comes with a price. Based on a cost-benefit logic, it is but expected that something with very impressive features be priced higher than something that offers fewer benefits. SSDs as being a bit more pricey than the traditional hard disk drive may be one of the compelling reasons why up to now it hasn't gained as much popularity as it should be getting with all its brilliant functions.
While the use of SSDs today have mostly been limited to industrial and military implications, enterprise are now looking closely at SSDs for implementing tiered storage and optimizing their storage architectures.
To quote from the Solid State Disks Buyers Guide published by storagesearch.com, "In fact the SSD is replacing servers and software licenses. SSDs can be used either to speed up the response time of existing applications as an alternative to buying more servers, or to reduce the number of servers and software licenses deployed. The economics can be compellingly in favor of an SSD deployment". The industry is also expecting more breakthroughs as higher memory capacities and faster performance are now being produced for a wider array of choices fit for any mission-critical application.
Analysts foresee a rapidly closing gap between HDD and flash SSD pricing (see related article "Are Flash Solid-State Disks Ready for the Enterprise"(5) ). This vision is also bolstered by a recent announcement(6) of electronic giant Samsung that they will invest heavily in improving their flash and DRAM production lines and flash SSD equipped laptops. Only time will tell if we will witness widespread commercial adoption of SSDs.(end)
This article has been reprinted from www.e-disk.com
Expansion Cards Part 2: AGP
Expansion Cards Part 2: AGP
Selecting a Laptop
Small Can Be Beautiful
Is A Laser Printer Right For Me?
The average home computer user definitely does not need a laser printer. Sure laser printer prices have fallen considerably in the last couple of years. But have you look at the cost of laser toner? The average laser toner cartridge sells for over $100. The cost of replacement ink can really ad up on you. Cost of ink should not be the only factor that deters you from buying this kind of printer though.
Heliodisplay --Computer Video With No Screen
Science-Fiction meets reality with this new video display technology.
Inkjet Jargon Explained
With all the technical terms out there, it is becoming increasingly difficult to keep up with inkjet jargon. Unfortunately, understanding the differences between the various terminologies is a must in todays advanced technological age. Below are a few of the more commonly used inkjet jargon terms you might come across and some information that will help you keep it all straight in your head.
Portable MP3 Player Based Education
A revolution in learning technology has taken place. Actually, it took place a few years ago, and I'm only just now catching up. The reason is that no one connected the dots for me, and I guess I'm a bit slow. :)
How To Stop Junk Faxes From Wasting Your Paper and Toner
Junk faxes waste the resources of every business. It is estimated that they cost businesses tens of millions of dollars a year in wasted paper, toner and fax machine maintenance. There is nothing more aggravating then coming into the office each morning to find a pile of junk faxes promotion everything from mortgage refinancing to septic tank solutions. I don't even have a septic tank!
At War With The Internet
When it comes to sales of technology products over the Internet, there are now two factors that potential buyers must consider as possibly 'too good to be true'. In the past, there was only price to worry about. If the price was too low, buyer beware. But now a second factor has emerged, in the form of a new kind of company for web surfers to consider as possibly also 'too good to be true'. For if this company is 'good', then a new revolution on the web is about to occur. Because if this company is 'true', then the cleansing of the internet of corruption and lies has finally begun in earnest, with one company willing to police itself.
Five Band Resistor Color Code-What Does The Last Band Of White Color Represent?
In electronic repair, most of the time i came across five band resistor color code. The purpose of using the five colour band resistor in a circuit is that it provide a more accurate value compare to the four color band. For example in order to get the value of 22.6kohm, with four colors band resistor you will not be able to find it. The most you can get is 22k
(red,red,orange and gold). If with the five color band you will be able to calculate it (red, red, blue, red, brown)the last color which is brown represent 1% tolerance. You may go to google search engine and type resistor color code, resistor color coding, resistor color code calculator, or resistor color code chart to know more about how to calculate a five band resistor values.
Pixel Disruption To Cause Nausea From User of Computer Screen
As we study the issues associated with teaching kids in the classroom we find that fluorescent lighting can plague the learning abilities. A slight flicker from such a light can cause disruption in normal brain patterns. Flickering lights at discos and in psychotherapy are used for proper mood enhancement. At a disco it can loosen up a dancer and put the mind in a certain transient state allowing for the movements, mood and mind to flow in the desired pattern. For psychotherapy it can be used to put a subject in a theta state of mind to remember old memories through hypnotic states, relax a patient or even change behavior through the art of suggestion permanently by putting certain commands into the subconscious.
Where Can I Find The Best Case Mods Online and Save Money?
Are you captivated by the stunning Case Mods you've seen online but shell shocked at some of the prices.
What Can You Do With A Mac Mini?
If you have not seen the newest addition to the Macintosh line, it is worth taking a look. It is a very small computer that is only 6.5 x 6.5 x 2 inches. The Mac Mini is about the size of one of those internal CD-ROM drives you install into a PC. By far one of the smallest computers you can buy. And its relatively in expensive, the base model costs only $499. Additionally, you need not buy a new monitor, mouse or keyboard. It is 100% compatible with PC monitors and PC USB keyboards and mice.
The Printer Cartridge Wars: Generic or Remanufactured Cartridges Right for You?
Overview
Nvidia Geforce 7800 GTX Review
Nvidia has done it again, with it's newest video card, the geforce 7800 GTX. If money is no object and you demand the best, this is the video card for you.
|
