Belkin Wireless G Router review

For Those Who Need The Space

Belkin’s new router is rather compact and is excellent for cramped tables. The router can also be hung up on a wall if required. The design is pretty and the build quality isn’t too bad either.

It comes with four ports for clients and one for an Internet connection — standard for a home router.

The user interface is boring, and way too bare for most people’s liking. The design doesn’t make it very easy to use either. It has all the features expected, including the ones for security. WEP, WPA and WPA2 are all supported, but the interface is painfully slow.

Routing, as expected, is possible too, and a unique feature is the list of application and games along with the list of ports used by them. This means you can just choose from a list and add to the port forwarding list. Filters can be set up to block access during specified hours or days. Support for DynDNS and DtDNS is also available, which allows the router to automatically update your WAN IP using free DNS services. This allows easy access to your computer or router from other locations. This feature is increasingly popular on routers these days though.

The Belkin Wireless G Router performs well with wired connections, but not so well wirelessly. A gigabyte of data took around two minutes four seconds to download across wires, but the same data took close to seven minutes thirty seconds over the air. Uploading files took a litle longer, but we didn’t have any latency issues. The router does not support 802.11n, for those who might want it. Updating of the firmware can be done using the web interface itself. With everything considered, we can’t highly recommend this product because of its price.

At Rs 2,699, it isn’t overly expensive, but for a little more you can get much better products with the same (or more) features and a much better interface. However, if space constraints are your biggest concern, and you want something really small to hang on the wall or keep on your table, the Belkin Wireless G Router might just be what you’re looking for.

Specifications
Four 10/100 Base-T LAN ports, One WAN port, IEEEE 802.11b, 802.11g

CoolerMaster Cosmos

CoolerMaster (CM) has always catered to enthusiasts with their Stacker series of cabinets, which represent the upper echelon of the world of desktop cases. The Cosmos (codename RC1000) deviates from the hardcore (and pricey) Stackers, with something that offers designer looks.

Brushed steel is rare but always a hit, and the Cosmos sports panel quality and a finish second to none—even better than CMs own RC830 series. It has two aluminium bars on the top and bottom. The front door is equally attractive—tinted fibre and you can change its orientation (left or right). We also noticed the two rubber covered holes in the back of the cabinet—perfect for the tubes of a liquid cooling kit.

There’s a fan on the bottom of the case handling air intake, while the two fans on the top and one rear fan are exhausts. CM states this creates some negative pressure—which explains why they have a VGA duct without a fan—it’s bang in the middle of this negative pressure region, and should divert air onto hot running graphics cards. Our 8800GTX did keep its cool even during long gaming sessions. Dust filters have been provided at appropriate areas—these are easy to remove and clean. The power supply mounts at the bottom—similar to Antec’s P180.

Removing the side panels is as easy as flicking a switch. There’s a lot of space to work with inside, and the first difference is the six hard drive trays complete with handles—hard drives will now sit sideways (vertically), which restricts airflow—particularly since they’re 3 drive rails in a row.

Everything from the side panels and power supply housing, to the HDD trays and the fan mounts have silent, rubber treatment to keep the dBs down.

The Cosmos is undeniably attractive. If you want class and have money to burn, it makes a good buy. It also makes sense as housing for an overclocked, water cooled setup. As far as air cooling goes, the better-ventilated Stacker RC830 will outperform (though it costs more). The only downside we can come up with is the choice of metal—steel—which makes the Cosmos a hefty proposition at 16.9 Kg. We’re told there’s an aluminium (and costlier) version coming soon.
Specifications
Dimensions—W x H x D—266 x 598 x 628 mm, weight—16.9 kgs, Form factor—Mid Tower, 3.5 inch bays—6, No of fans—2 x 120 mm

EVGA nForce 750i SLI FTW Motherboard

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKxLpKKCNqw&feature=PlayList&p=7AB7404C800F19AE&playnext=1&index=6

Gigabyte EP45-DS3R Intel P45 Socket 775 Motherboard

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KTKVYISxwA

Gigabyte EP45-DS3R Intel P45 Socket 775 Motherboard

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KTKVYISxwA

MSI P6NGM

Based on NVIDIA’s new MCP 73 platform, the P6NGM is a mid-sized PCB. It supports all Core 2 Duo and Core 2 Quad processors; there are 2 PCI slots, 1 PCIe x16 slot for a discrete card, 2 memory slots, and 4 SATA ports. The P6NGM supports 1333 MHz FSB (officially) so all Penryn dual- and quad-cores should work fine. A 4-pin CPU power connector defies the new 8-pin standard. The onboard graphics is a GeForce 7050 solution—D-Sub and HDMI connects have been provided as well.

Specs:

NVIDIA MCP 73 chipset; 1 x16 PCIe, 2 x PCI, 1 x PCI X1 slots; 4 x SATA 2.0, 1 x IDE ports, 1 x D-Sub, 1 x HDMI connect

MSI P6NGM