Godzilla is in my Cart!

I have flipped flop a bit on a few key electronics. At one point I was going to build Mother Cloud- and then given some changing life circumstances I opted out. I bought the Samsumg Galaxy Tab- and then I returned it within seven days. Well, the gymnastics is over- it is time to buy Godzilla.

After much waiting (and ridicule) the time has finally come for me to return to the high-performance PC game. If I get my way, then I will assemble this prize in two weeks with a comprehensive video detailing my excitement. (Put it Pon Youchbe!)

Sourced from Amazon.com

To whet your appetite for the monster that is about to invade Kingston (taking Satellites out of the sky and causing massive blackouts) take a look below at what is in my cart. I hope to order everything by next Monday, April 25, 2011 (in commemoration of the ressurection of Christ?)

Motherboard: MSI AM3 USB 3.0 + SATA 6Gb/s AMD 890FX Chipset Motherboard 890FXA-GD70

Processor: AMD Phenom II X6 Six-Core Processor 1090T (3.2GHz) AM3, HDT90ZFBGRBOX (Black Edition)

RAM: Corsair Vengeance 8 GB ( 2 x 4 GB ) DDR3 1600 MHz (PC3 12800) 240-Pin DDR3 Memory Kit

PSU: Corsair CMPSU-850HX 850-Watt HX Professional Series 80 Plus Certified Power Supply

CPU Cooling: Corsair Hydro Series H70 High Performance CPU Cooler

GPU: XFX ATI Radeon HD6870 1 GB DDR5 2DVI/HDMI/2x Mini DisplayPort PCI-Express Video Card

Keyboard: Razer BlackWidow Mechanical Gaming Keyboard

Mouse: Razer Deathadder 3500 High Precision 3.5G Infrared Gaming Mouse

Sourced Locally

I already have a mechanical hard drive with Windows Vista on it from a previous build. Therefore, in the interest of cost and speed of acquisition I opted to fore-go buying a SSD and Windows 7 on the same cart.

My brother has had some success with finding high-quality cases locally. I am going to shop around locally. I want a case that has cable routing, lots of fans and is not noisy.

I have a 24″ Widescreen HD Monitor waiting to be connected to a real machine. I think I am going to connect it using DVI and not the HDMI interface though.

For the Future

OS Drive and Programme Files: OCZ Technology 120 GB Vertex 2 Series SATA II 3.5-Inch Solid State Drive (SSD)

Media Storage Drives (x2): Western Digital 2 TB Caviar Green SATA Intellipower 64 MB Cache Bulk/OEM

Operating System: Windows 7 Ultimate Edition

 

Review: Samsung Galaxy Tab

I was the proud owner of the Samsung Galaxy Tab for all of one week! It was a great week, and I regret every minute I spent getting a refund on my hard earned J$70k (not really.)

The 7″ tab feels great. It is light and compact but the screen is big enough to enjoy watching movies and browsing the web. One of the reasons I bought it was because of the small form factor compared to it’s closest rivals. Unfortunately the reference design for newer Tablets seems to be stuck at the 10.1″ mark. That kinda makes me sad- because all I want from a tablet is an intermediary between my 24″ monitor desktop, my 15″ laptop, my (hopefully) 40″ TV and my 2-3′ Mobile phone screens.

With all the hype surrounding Dual Core I have to admit that I had no lag or performance issues with the Galaxy Tab. The applications were all fluid and the device was extremely responsive. I was about to do everything I intended- and I had access to all my social networks in a snap.

Couple points to note

- Facebook on the Tab’s browser looks like Facebook mobile. I did not get the rich interface I expected from the default browser (-)

- The device has a front facing camera and a rear camera. Yahoo Messenger did not work from the front facing camera. This ended up being a deal breaker. It means I can’t see who I am talking to the same time they see me. (-)

- I thought the device should have had HDMI out of the box. Instead I spent U$35 on a dock and a bit more on a case. These things should be standard in my humble opinion. (-)

- Fingerprint magnet. I found myself obsessively wiping it at nights when I was preparing to snuggle up for a 7″ movie (-)

- Android rules the mobile OS world. It was Froyo and I am eager to see what Honeycomb can do. (+)

- The Android Market is often accused of not having enough- but I found everything I wanted. The #1 Torrent App for Android is tTorrent. It cost me less than U$3 to get the full version which has no download cap. (+)

- All my calendars were synced up nicely and displayed accurately in the calendar application. Facebook, Work, Google- all in tandem. (Who needs Tungle?) (+)

- I had fully synced access to my Corporate email. This seemed to be built into the default interface. Here I was thinking I couldn’t break free from my Blackberry- when in fact, Android is ready to accept me. If only I could get all my friends to migrate to WhatsApp. (+)

- The service was beautiful! I had it on Wifi and then on LIME 3G and I couldn’t tell the difference (+)

- GPS is a fun toy. My mother loved it and was so disappointed when I returned it- because she wanted to play with the GPS some more on the pending long trips. (+)

The Samsung Galaxy Tab may be the last good 7″ Droid left. It is quick, responsive and begs the question- why all the hype about Dual Core? However, given what is on the market now with default features (eg. HDMI out) and even some players allowing the Tab to function like a desktop replacement- it is hard to hold on to this device. If you absolutely need a Tablet now, and you don’t like Apple then this could do for you. However, wait until the welcome wagon from Google arrives with the new Honeycomb devices that will have everything you need to get going. You probably want to wait on the price drop- because seriously, this is a tablet and not a laptop or desktop!

Score: 7.5/10