FEATURE / RETROSPECTIVE
Athlon XP 3200+ CPU (which was only
32-bit), 1GB of Corsair PC3700 dual-channel
RAM and a pair of 120GB hard drives in a
SATA RAID array.
Another noteworthy review in Issue 1 is
Corsair’s first liquid-cooling system, the
Hydrocool 200. It used a massive external
pump unit and it cost nearly £200. That would
have been fine if it worked well, but it was barely
any better than a top-end air cooler and it made
a lot of noise. We recommended buying a £25
Vantec AeroFlow air cooler instead.
Finally, there’s a great product at the end of
the reviews section that I’d forgotten about
until recently – the Cooler Master Musketeer.
This module fitted into a spare 5.25in drive
bay and presented you with three analogue
needle meters – one for temperature (with a
sensor probe you would attach to a chip
yourself), one for voltage and one for sound
pressure, with the latter being connected to
your sound card via analogue cables around
the back. It didn’t have much of a genuine
practical purpose, but it gave a lovely retro
analogue touch to your PC case.Labs
There are two Labs test in issue 1. The first is
on cases, which reveals more of the same
issues with cases seen in the PC reviews.
Case manufacturers had clearly started to
notice that there was a market for non-
beige, but there was still a lot to learn. Nearly
every one of the cases in the Labs comesequipped with 80mm fans, and we made it
our mission to persuade people to use
120mm fans instead, so you could get more
airflow and at a slower rotational speed,
helping to avoid the horrible high-pitched
noise often generated by smaller fans.
One case on test, the Beantech BT-80, is
notable for being completely transparent
with three horrible 80mm fans. ‘If you want
a transparent case to show off the internal
components, you have to be prepared to
accept the shortcomings,’ we said, ‘oh, and
buy a pair of ear muffs.’
The other Labs test was graphics cards, all of
which were either based on Nvidia’s GeForceEven high-end graphics cards had small
coolers and took up a single expansion slotFX 5900 Ultra or ATI’s Radeon 9800 Pro. The
latter was the superior GPU at the time, but all
the cards are quite different from today’s
monsters. Both these GPUs were considered
top of the range in 2003, but none of the cards
has enormous coolers. There’s usually a
small heatsink and fan on the GPU, and nearly
all of them take up a single expansion slot
bracket. A notable exception is the Sapphire
Atlantis Ultimate Edition, which has a large
passive heatsink with no fan.WE MADE IT OUR
MISSION TO PERSUADE
PEOPLE TO USE
120 MM FANS INSTEAD,
SO YOU COULD GET
MORE AIRFLOW AND
AT A SLOWER SPEEDThe Beantech BT-80’s transparent design
enabled you to show off all of your PC’s
innards, but its 80mm fans were noisyFEATURE/ RETROSPECTIVE
Athlon XP 3200+ CPU (which was only
32-bit), 1GB of Corsair PC3700 dual-channel
RAM and a pair of 120GB hard drives in a
SATA RAID array.
Another noteworthy review in Issue 1 is
Corsair’s first liquid-cooling system, the
Hydrocool 200. It used a massive external
pump unit and it cost nearly £200. That would
have been fine if it worked well, but it was barely
any better than a top-end air cooler and it made
a lot of noise. We recommended buying a £25
Vantec AeroFlow air cooler instead.
Finally, there’s a great product at the end of
the reviews section that I’d forgotten about
until recently – the Cooler Master Musketeer.
This module fitted into a spare 5.25in drive
bay and presented you with three analogue
needle meters – one for temperature (with a
sensor probe you would attach to a chip
yourself), one for voltage and one for sound
pressure, with the latter being connected to
your sound card via analogue cables around
the back. It didn’t have much of a genuine
practical purpose, but it gave a lovely retro
analogue touch to your PC case.
Labs
There are two Labs test in issue 1. The first is
on cases, which reveals more of the same
issues with cases seen in the PC reviews.
Case manufacturers had clearly started to
notice that there was a market for non-
beige, but there was still a lot to learn. Nearly
every one of the cases in the Labs comes
equipped with 80mm fans, and we made it
our mission to persuade people to use
120mm fans instead, so you could get more
airflow and at a slower rotational speed,
helping to avoid the horrible high-pitched
noise often generated by smaller fans.
One case on test, the Beantech BT-80, is
notable for being completely transparent
with three horrible 80mm fans. ‘If you want
a transparent case to show off the internal
components, you have to be prepared to
accept the shortcomings,’ we said, ‘oh, and
buy a pair of ear muffs.’
The other Labs test was graphics cards, all of
which were either based on Nvidia’s GeForceEven high-end graphics cards had small
coolers and took up a single expansion slotFX 5900 Ultra or ATI’s Radeon 9800 Pro. The
latter was the superior GPU at the time, but all
the cards are quite different from today’s
monsters. Both these GPUs were considered
top of the range in 2003, but none of the cards
has enormous coolers. There’s usually a
small heatsink and fan on the GPU, and nearly
all of them take up a single expansion slot
bracket. A notable exception is the Sapphire
Atlantis Ultimate Edition, which has a large
passive heatsink with no fan.WE MADE IT OUR
MISSION TO PERSUADE
PEOPLE TO USE
120 MM FANS INSTEAD,
SO YOU COULD GET
MORE AIRFLOW AND
AT A SLOWER SPEEDThe Beantech BT-80’s transparent design
enabled you to show off all of your PC’s
innards, but its 80mm fans were noisy