Alienware Area-51 7500 - overclocked CPU offers plenty of horsepower.

Pricey system has good looks, and its liquid-cooled, overclocked CPU offers plenty of horsepower.

The impressive Alienware Area-51 7500 delivers strong performance and excellent features. At $6007 (as of July 11, 2007), it's the most expensive quad-core model we've tested thus far. You get a lot for your money, though.

Our review system carried 2GB of 800-MHz DDR2 memory and Intel's 2.66-GHz Core 2 Extreme QX6700 quad-core processor, overclocked by Alienware to 3.2 GHz and kept stable with liquid cooling. It's the first overclocked Area-51 7500 system to come through the PC World Test Center. Alienware began overclocking the line only in March 2007; the company previously reserved such CPU tweaks for its premium ALX machines, in which pricey extras like liquid cooling and 1066-MHz RAM are standard. Alienware's adjustments helped the Area-51 7500 to a WorldBench 6 Beta 2 score of 125, a mark on a par with those of other overclocked gaming PCs and just four points behind the fastest PC we've tested to date, CyberPower's Gamer Infinity Ultimate.

The Area-51 7500 uses two 768MB EVGA GeForce 8800 GTX graphics boards in SLI mode, providing plenty of muscle and Direct X 10 gaming capabilities under its preinstalled Windows Vista Home Premium operating system. The Area-51 7500 averaged 165 frames per second on our Doom 3 test, versus the average of 143 fps set by the rest of the gaming PCs we tested. It averaged 187 fps on our Far Cry test at the same resolution settings, tying with the Gateway FX530XT but falling well behind the 202-fps result of the Dell XPS 720, which was equipped with a 768MB nVidia GeForce 8800 GTX board.

Our test system had plenty of storage, as well. Two 150GB, 10,000-rpm Western Digital Raptor hard drives were installed in a RAID 0 configuration, and the PC also had a 250GB, 7200-rpm Seagate drive. An additional unoccupied internal drive bay can accommodate yet another hard drive.

The Area-51 7500 has Alienware's signature imposing black case, with clean lines and a sizable footprint; unfortunately, its shiny plastic tends to show fingerprints easily. Closing the side panel entails maneuvering several metal tags into place before the panel clicks back into position. The fans in the case's removable side are powered by touch contacts instead of cables, so you can easily remove the side panel without having to unplug the fans first.

The system has backlit, front-mounted ports, including two USB 2.0 ports, a FireWire port, and microphone and headphone sockets. The system's Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeGamer sound card pairs well with the bundled Logitech z-5300E 5.1 (280-watt) speakers. Our test system also featured Logitech's G15 gaming keyboard, which has a small LCD panel for showing game info or song titles, and Logitech's G5 mouse, which lets you add or remove small weights from its underside to get the right feel for your hand. The mouse has three settings for tracking sensitivity, with two buttons below the scroll wheel for attaining fast or precise movement.

Our test system's 24-inch wide-screen Dell UltraSharp 2407WFP LCD monitor produced attractive, bright, and sharp images, and showed smooth motion when playing back a movie DVD (though it needed some tweaking to produce optimum image quality).

The powerful, full-featured Area-51 7500 is great for gaming. For the high price, you get Alienware's thoughtful design and attractive styling--as well as DirectX 10 readiness.

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CyberPower Gamer Infinity Ultimate - blisteringly fast and comes with the works

This overclocked system is blisteringly fast and comes with the works, justifying its high price.

The Gamer Infinity Ultimate may lack the exotic looks and customized touches that uber-gaming systems from high-end boutiques like Voodoo and Alienware possess, but it makes up in function and price for any shortcomings in form. At $4399 as of March 16, 2007, including ViewSonic's VG2230WM (a $320, 22-inch, flat-panel display), the Gamer Infinity Ultimate costs thousands of dollars less than some gaming systems, yet delivers top-flight performance and first-rate hardware.


For gamers, performance is king, and the Gamer Infinity Ultimate qualifies as royalty. Its WorldBench 6 Beta 2 score of 129 was the highest of the eight power systems running Windows Vista that we tested recently. The Gamer Infinity Ultimate runs on Intel's latest quad-core, Core 2 Extreme QX6700 CPU, which CyberPower overclocked to 3.46 GHz. Notably, the system scored very well on the multitasking portion of WorldBench 6 Beta 2--second only to the Xi MTower IGE-SLI, which runs on Intel's dual-core Core 2 Extreme X6800 CPU.

Using dual SLI XFX GeForce 8800GTX graphics boards, our Gamer Infinity Ultimate scored very well: Frame rates while running Doom 3 and Far Cry were very high for most resolution settings; in some cases they were second only to the Xi MTower IGE-SLI, which used a single 768MB XFX GeForce 8800GTX graphics board.

In lieu of occupying an exotically sculpted case, our test PC came in a relatively staid Cooler Master CM Stacker 830 tower. Unlike many aluminum cases, the CM Stacker feels sturdy, and--as the name implies--it offers excellent cooling. Every face, including the bottom, has vents in it; and the interior holds five fans. Speed-hungry overclockers who aren't fans of liquid cooling systems will like the included Vigor Gaming Monsoon II CPU cooler, which combines airflow with a powerful Peltier cooler.

Data storage should be no problem for even the most inveterate digital packrats. Our review model came with two high-performance 150GB, 10,000-rpm Western Digital Raptor hard drives configured in a RAID 0 array, an additional 500GB hard drive, and a LiteOn Blu-ray DVD drive that can stores up to 25GB of content per disc. The $557 Blu-ray drive included with our test model is nice, but a frugal buyer could substitute a far less expensive DVD drive to lower the overall system cost. Gamers will like the Logitech G15 gaming keyboard, which carries its own LCD display for gaming stats plus 18 programmable buttons for gaming shortcuts.

Latches enable you to release both side panels for quick access to the case's interior, and the bank of four cooling fans located under one side panel pops off easily. You can add a card or drive without tools, but the bulky graphics cards block several of the expansion slots, and you have to remove a graphics card to reach the hard-drive bays.

The ViewSonic VG2230WM flat-panel display that accompanied our review unit displayed crisp details and rich colors, though we had to adjust the contrast to brighten the screen for DVD movie playback. Small type (6.8-point font) was sharp and readable at 1024 by 768 resolution.

The Gamer Infinity Ultimate may be expensive, but it packs a lot of value for gamers and power users who need speed, storage, and the ability to upgrade.

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Compaq Presario SR5350F Value Desktop PC - its graphics are too weak for serious gamers?

Inexpensive PC with big hard drive succeeds at standard multimedia tasks, but its graphics are too weak for serious gamers.

The low-cost Compaq Presario SR5350F is an enticing Vista Home Premium system that's well-suited for running standard applications and for managing a large digital library of video, music, and photos. Like the eMachines T5246, the SR5350F is a prebuilt retail system available in only one configuration, so you can't select different components before you buy it. Priced at $680 (as of 2/7/08), the system's components include a 1.8-GHz Intel Pentium Dual-Core E2160 processor and two sticks of 1GB PC2-5300 DDR2 memory (2GB total) mounted on an Asus IPILP-LC motherboard with integrated Intel GMA 950 graphics.

The SR5350F also comes with a 360GB Seagate hard drive that provides much more storage space than most value systems. Other goodies include a DVD/CD combo writer with LightScribe labeling capability, and a memory card reader. The bundled Compaq Wf1907 19-inch LCD (1440 by 900 native resolution) has lightweight built-in speakers that are best suited for Windows sounds rather than movie sound tracks. Though the monitor provides both digital and analog inputs, the SR5350F's integrated graphics allows only a VGA connection. Still, image quality was good, and the screen displayed accurate color graphics and readable text even at small sizes.

The SR5350F earned a score of 71 on WorldBench 6 Beta 2, placing it just behind the 73 scored by the Dell Inspiron 530, which uses the same CPU. Its performance in the Nero image-burning component of the test suite was the best of all value systems we've seen of late. But the SR5350F's graphics performance in running our gaming tests was poor, due to its underpowered integrated graphics, which also lacks full-scene antialiasing support for rendering smoother edges in graphics frames during game play.

In addition to stickers for system components, the SR5350F's glossy black-and-silver minitower case is peppered with connectivity port labels and customer support info-nice hand-holding for the complete novice. All external connections are easy to access, but you'll find no FireWire ports. Though thumbscrews hold the side panel in place, inside you'll need a screwdriver to secure any expansion cards and to work on the drive bays. Three open drive bays (two 5.25-inch external, one 3.5-inch internal) and three card slots (one PCIe x16, one PCIe x1, and one PCI) are available for upgrades.

One slight hassle: Accessing the open internal drive bay requires unscrewing the internal drive cage first, since its opening is blocked by the external drive bay cage. (Other systems position the internal drive cage in such a way that you can access the open area without having to remove the drive cage.)

As for the Compaq-branded input devices, the multifunction keyboard worked fine, but the ball mouse felt clumsy compared with the optical mice bundled these days with most value systems. Compaq's helpful online documentation is thorough and nicely illustrated.

All in all, Compaq's Presario SR5350F is a good-performing system with plenty of storage space, but you may want to add a discrete graphics card after you get it home.

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HP Pavilion a1510n - inexpensive PC

This inexpensive PC gives you a little more to work with than most other base-model PCs.

The Pavilion a1510n puts together an appealing mix of performance, cost, and features for anyone seeking an affordable, basic PC.

Ultra-budget-conscious buyers can certainly find a cheaper PC; a bare-bones HP a1400 series system, for example, starts at under $300. But anyone who wants to run an e-mail client, Web browser, and several other programs simultaneously or who wants to work occasionally with photo or other large data files will appreciate the extra processing power that the system's Athlon 64 3800+ CPU and 1GB of DDR2 RAM deliver--especially if an upgrade to Windows Vista is in their future.

The a1510n earned a performance score of 97 on PC World's WorldBench 5 test suite, a mark that ranks it a few percentage points below other systems running on the same CPU.

Due in part (we imagine) to its integrated GeForce graphics, which relies on both dedicated graphics RAM and system RAM, the a1510n posted an abysmal frame rate of 20 frames per second on our Return to Castle Wolfenstein test at 1280 by 1024 resolution; that's one of the lowest marks we've seen in recent times. Game play at chez Wolfenstein was choppy at best, and images displayed on the HP vx17e screen were far too dark for comfortable viewing. Nevertheless, other images and small (6.8-point) text appeared clear and readable.

HP has left the door open to faster graphics by providing an open X16 PCI Express slot on the motherboard. Adding a decent graphics card could be your ticket to a meaningful performance boost. Beneath the easy-off cover, a relatively uncluttered interior presents no obstacles to the open RAM and PCI slots, so you could easily add a TV tuner, which this bare-bones Media Center PC lacks. A single-screw clamping bracket secures all of the expansion cards, but you may have to wrestle with a wad of unkempt wires and cables to reach the open drive bays.

Other pluses for this budget system are a LightScribe DVD burner that introduces text and images on the "top" side of recordable CD and DVD media--at a price of around a $1 a disc--and a keyboard that offers lots of big, easy-to-reach control buttons.

As usual, HP's documentation includes a well-illustrated setup poster and excellent setup guides, making this system a great choice for a cost-conscious novice who wants a little more processing power than the typical entry-level PC offers.

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Top 5 Power Desktop PCs, Very powerful

These powerful desktop PCs are the right choice for demanding users. Ratings and rankings can change due to pricing and technology changes, so check back frequently for the latest info.

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Top 5 Gaming Desktop PCs, what do you want to have?

These powerful desktops use overclocked CPUs, one or more ultra-high-end graphics cards, and gobs of high-speed storage to put performance above all else.

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eMachines T5246 Value Desktop PC, low price

Low-priced PC has capacious storage and good expansion options, but graphics performance and small monitor disappoint.

At $620 (as of 2/7/08), the eMachines T5246 is the least expensive value PC in our lineup. But since it's a prebuilt retail system available in only one configuration (it's sold as the 4200+ Desktop at Best Buy), you can't mix and match components before you buy it. The T5246 comes with a 2.2-GHz AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+ CPU and two sticks of 1GB PC2-5300 memory (2GB total) mounted on a Gateway motherboard with integrated nVidia GeForce 6100 nForce 405 graphics. Our test unit also came with a 400GB Western Digital Caviar hard drive, providing more storage space than most value desktop PCs.

This test T5246 included essentials like a DVD/CD combo writer and a memory card reader; and for those still on dial-up, it even had a 56KB modem. But the 17-inch, $190 eMachines E17T4W LCD monitor (with 1280 by 720 native resolution) that was included in the price of our unit had only a VGA input. Although the flat panel produced sharp text and realistic color graphics, its screen space is considerably less than the 19-inch (and larger) LCDs that ship with some value business desktops we tested. My recommendation would be to go for a larger wide-screen LCD--such as the $210 eMachines E19T5W or the $220 eMachines E19T6W (both 19-inchers sold at Best Buy)--instead of this 17-inch model. For my money, the added screen real estate is worth the extra $20 to $30 you'd spend on one of these alternatives.

In our WorldBench 6 Beta 2 performance tests, the T5246 earned a score of 70--average for our test group. However, its scores in the Firefox and multitasking parts of the test suite were the best of the sub-$750 PCs here. But like most of the other systems that rely on integrated graphics rather than a discrete graphics card, the T5246 fared poorly in graphics performance--it's inadequate for fast-action 3D games.

The T5246's black-and-silver mini-tower case is a no-frills design with no front panel to cover the external drives and connectivity ports. Although the system includes parallel and serial connections for attaching older peripherals, it lacks FireWire ports. Open expansion options inside the generally neat and tidy interior include one external 5.25-inch and one internal 3.5-inch drive bay, and three card slots (one PCIe x16, one PCIe x1, and one PCI). Although you can add a discrete graphics card to the PCIe x16 slot, it will work only at half speed (x8) rather than at full speed (x16). So gamers take note: This system isn't well-equipped for upgrading to faster graphics.

The bundled input devices were a mixed bag: The eMachines multifunction keyboard worked fine, but I would have preferred a more precise optical mouse instead of the clunky ball mouse that was included. Gateway's setup guides and online documentation for this system are helpful and well done, and a final plus is the addition of a small set of dual speakers.

The T5246 provides respectable speed for everyday computing and a sizable hard drive. However, the small size of its bundled LCD and its weak graphics performance limit its appeal. Of course, you could spend an extra $70 or so to get a larger LCD and a cheap add-in graphics card, bringing up the price of the T5246 to approximately that of the $689 Dell Inspiron 530. But the Dell system would still provide better overall performance, including faster, full-speed (x16) graphics.

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Polywell Poly i7050 Value Desktop PC, mid-end PC

Delivers solid performance for basic tasks but not for fast-action games, and its compact case limits expansion.

If you want a space-saving value desktop computer that's powerful enough for general applications, Web surfing, and other routine tasks, the $729 (as of 2/7/08) Polywell Poly i7050 fills the bill. The i7050 weighs only about 12 pounds, versus 28 pounds for Dell's Inspiron 530. But as with nearly all compact models, the trade-off is that you have fewer expansion options inside.

The configuration we tested was equipped with a 2-GHz Intel Pentium Dual-Core E2180 processor and two sticks of 1GB PC2-5300 DDR2 memory (2GB total) mounted on an EVGA NF77 nVidia nForce 630i motherboard with integrated nVidia GeForce 7150 graphics and HDMI output.

Despite the entry-level CPU, the Poly i7050 scored admirably in our productivity application benchmarks. It tied with the Sys Technology Sys Slimline Si200 in earning a WorldBench 6 Beta 2 score of 77, the best in our roundup. But like all of the other low-priced systems that use integrated graphics instead of a discrete graphics card, the Poly i7050 tested poorly in graphics performance, so it's not a good choice for 3D gaming fans. However, you can add a low-profile (half-height) graphics card in the system's open PCI Express x16 slot if you want to improve graphics performance; Polywell charges $72 for a 256MB nVidia GeForce 8400GS card (which has twice the memory as the one in the Dell Inspiron 530 we tested) and $85 for a 512MB nVidia GeForce 8500GT.

The Poly i7050's components are housed in a small, 13-by-16-inches, black-and-silver case that's barely 4 inches high. (You can get the same Poly i7050 system components in a cube-shaped case, as well.) Numerous vents--sides, top, and rear--helped keep our test unit cool, along with a quiet CPU fan inside.

The unit we tested had a 250GB Seagate hard drive and a DVD/CD combo writer, leaving only one drive bay (an external 3.5-inch one) free; accessing it requires unlocking a large metal cage and tilting it upwards, a somewhat cumbersome procedure.

Our i7050 also included a KDS K-92BW 19-inch LCD (1440 by 900 native resolution) with a VGA analog-only interface and decent image quality, though it wasn't quite as bright as some of the other 19-inch LCDs on competing systems. The i7050's USB-based Logitech RX300 optical mouse and Logitech 350 keyboard are better than the bare-bones input devices bundled with some budget PCs, but they also take up two of the PC's seven total USB ports.

If small size matters most to you, the Poly i7050's strong performance and features make it a good candidate among the budget-priced compact models. Otherwise, the midsize, $689 Dell Inspiron 530 is arguably a better deal, since it costs a bit less and comes with a discrete graphics card.

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Dell Inspiron 530 Value Desktop PC, powerful PC

Impressive performance aided by dedicated graphics makes this model the best value in our test group of low-cost desktops.

The Dell Inspiron 530 was powerful enough to earn superior scores (for a value PC) in both its productivity and graphics performance tests, yet it's quite inexpensive at $689 (as of 2/7/08).

Our test system was based on a 1.8-GHz Intel Pentium dual-core E2160 processor and had two sticks of 1GB PC2-5300 DDR2 SDRAM, for a total of 2GB of memory. It came with a 19-inch Dell SE198WFP wide-screen LCD (1440 by 900 native resolution), as well. Most value systems use integrated graphics that rely on main system memory, but the 530's graphics duties are handled by a 128MB nVidia GeForce 8300GS graphics card. The 250GB Western Digital Caviar hard drive provides an average amount of storage space for PCs in this price range, and our test unit had a DVD/CD combo writer, too.

As for performance, the 530 earned a WorldBench 6 Beta 2 score of 73--commendable in the value desktop category, and slightly better than the 71 earned by the Compaq Presario SR5350F, which uses the same Intel Pentium dual-core E2160 CPU. The Inspiron 530 provided the best performance in the 3DS Max DirectX component of the WorldBench suite of all the value systems recently tested. Not surprisingly, therefore, it also earned the top scores among value systems for its graphics performance, making it the best choice for playing simple games. Because its graphics card has only a modest 128MB of memory, however, it still isn't powerful enough for intensive gaming titles, such as Doom 3 and Far Cry. In our Doom 3 tests, the system earned only a subpar score of 20 frames per second running at 1024 by 768 resolution with antialising turned on.

The 530's attractive, glossy white-and-silver midtower case is well ventilated, and its sliding front panel covers an external bay module containing a media card reader and connectivity ports. Inside the 530's case, you'll find that good old-fashioned screws secure the components, so you'll need a screwdriver when installing expansion cards and optical drives. Like most other value systems, the 530 uses a smaller motherboard that supports fewer expansion options than larger (and pricier) boards. Available expansion options include one 5.25-inch external and one 3.5-inch internal drive bay, two PCI and one PCIe x1 card slots (the PCIe x16 slot is filled by the discrete graphics card), and two (out of four) DIMM memory sockets. The 530 lacks FireWire ports, but they can be added as an extra-cost ($30) option.

The Dell monitor delivered sharp text and fine color quality in both still and moving images. The USB-based optical mouse and enhanced keyboard that Dell bundles with this system are comparatively better (in performance and features) than the standard-issue input devices that come with most value systems. Among the keyboard's extras are several quick-launch keys, a retro-style volume knob, and two upstream USB ports. The 530's online-only documentation is exemplary, with thorough, well-written instructions that are (thankfully) specific to the actual model, unlike the more generic documentation that some vendors often include.

If you want a value desktop with an excellent price-to-performance ratio and some room to grow, Dell's Inspiron 530 is arguably the best deal among the budget PCs we've tested recently.

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