STACK #163 May 2018

GAMES FEATURE TECH FEATURE

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Netgear Nighthawk XR 500 Pro Gaming Router

giving players an advantage by limiting the lag in their game. And it works well, delivering a reliable performance on the two games we tested on it: Call of Duty: WWII and League of Legends . The XR 500 is a good, dependable router, but the real drawcard here is the DumaOS software,

Netgear's stellar reputation in home networking now extends to a specialised gaming router.

What sets the XR 500 apart though is the implementation DumaOS operating system; a result of a partnership between Netduma and Netgear. Through the completely customisable

I t makes perfect sense for a company like Netgear, that has an excellent reputation for delivering quality products in the field of home networking, to pool its expertise and create a router specifically for gamers. That’s precisely what they’ve done with the Nighthawk XR 500. Aesthetically, this is a bit of kit you’ll want to display for all to see rather than hide behind the entertainment unit or under a desk; it looks like it could make the Kessel run in less than 12 parsecs. As with all Netgear products, set up is an absolute breeze and totally luddite friendly. Under the hood, the XR 500 has a dual core 1.7GHz CPU and can achieve speeds of up to 2.6Gbps. It has two USB ports on the side of the unit and 4 LAN ports and a broadband port at the rear; the four powerful antennas ensure that, unless you live in Buckingham Palace, you’ll get solid coverage from anywhere in the house.

which will appeal to gamers. For prioritising your gaming devices on the network and optimising your online gaming experience, the Nighthawk XR 500 is the perfect solution.

dashboard, users have the option to apportion bandwidth how they see fit – in real time. In other words, you can manually prioritise bandwidth to your gaming rigs and consoles to cut lag, and leave everyone else on the network with non-gaming devices to pick over the bones. Better still is the geo-filter function. In order to minimise the ping in a game, it is possible

to set a radius in the dashboard to connect to a local server. Any servers outside of the radius are effectively blocked,

NEXT LEVEL Racing Lite Wheel Stand

A portable and easy-to-store racing experience from the masters of immersion is now on hand.

construction for the fumble fingers amongst us. The frame is pre-drilled to take the wheels of popular third-party racing brands, and we trialed it with Thrustmaster’s T300 RS GT racing wheel and the T3PA pedals. The quality frame is sturdy considering the single post build, and the height and the angle on the pedal plate is completely adjustable. There is also an included gear stick plate that can be moved to either the left or the right hand side. The manufacturer claims that the stand can be folded down in ten seconds, and with a bit of practice this would probably be possible. In summary, the Next Level Racing Lite Wheel Stand is a an excellent solution for gamers looking to increase their racing experience but have limited space and storage capacity.

C ar racing peripherals have come a long way since the Tomy Turnin’ Turbo Dashboard. Now, with a reasonable budget, you can get a solid rig for home or office for that total racing sim experience. One such purveyor of racing frames is Next Level Racing. We use one of the company’s full-sized rigs in the office already and it’s quite the conversation starter for visitors. Early last month we received the Next Level Racing Lite Wheel Stand to review. Designed to be incorporated with any existing chair in the house, this is the perfect solution for folks with limited space or those looking for portability. The unit comes largely assembled straight from the box, so there’s little fiddling about with the

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MAY 2018

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