Bottom Line on Desktop Buys
By MARK PRIGG
CHOOSING a new desktop computer is possibly one of the most confusing purchases you’ll ever make. Walk into any computer store and you’ll be bombarded with dozens of seemingly identical boxes.
They all offer different speeds, memory and hard drive sizes. Here, the experts at Stuff Magazine choose their favourite systems. It is worth bearing in mind that, for your average web surfer, it’s not hugely important to have the latest and greatest, but for games players spend all you can – any extra speed in the machine will make games that little bit smoother.
There’s also a whole new class of machines, called media centres, to consider. These aim to take computers into the living-room, and can even connect up to your TV. They’ll play CDs, DVD and video you’ve downloaded online, all controlled from the comfort of the sofa with a remote control.
PACKARD BELL IPOWER 6800 SLI Pounds 1,500+ We have been chuntering on about what good value the 6800 is, so imagine how bowled over we were when Packard Bell blithely updated it. It has only gone and got two of your finest gigabytes of RAM and loads of other wee tweaks.
.
packardbelleurope.com
HUSH E2 MCE Let’s have a moment’s silence for the demise of noisy PCs.
Actually, let’s make that moment permanent. Hush’s brand-new Media Center PC uses case-cooling technology to kill the need for internal fans, making it the most livingroomfriendly computer ever.
. hush-technologies.net
CHILLBLAST FUSION FX57 ULTRA The ultimate games machine, this being Chillblast’s flagship gamer, is a stonker. Pretty much every bit of installed kit is the finest example of its kind, from the Asus A8N motherboard to the twin nVidia 7800 cards.
The result is unsurprising but exhilarating.
Topclass graphics performance, and massive capability to handle any kind of gaming you throw at it.
. chillblast.co.uk
APPLE IMAC Pounds 880+ This is the new, superfast iMac from Apple.
The Intel Core Duo models come in 17in and 20in, 1.83GHz and 2.0GHz versions, both with 512MB, 128MB ATI X1600 graphics and iLife ’06 as standard.
. apple.com/uk
APPLE POWER MAC G5 Pounds 1,400+ No word yet about when the top- oftheline desktop will get Intel processors, except that all Apples will “by the end of the year”. In the meantime, this loony quad- core version is still quite a machine, as long as you can handle its inherent obsolescence.
. apple.com/uk
APPLE MAC MINI The Mini is an obvious choice for Apple’s new bed- partner Intel but no word yet. But will they manage to make the dual- core version cheaper? Right now, it comes in 1.25 and 1.42GHz G4 varieties, with up to 1GB RAM and 80GB HD space.
Pounds 350 . apple.com/uk
SCAN 3XS CHAMELEON Pounds 4,800+ Possibly a little over the top, this machine even includes heatsensitive paint. Click the internal spray option and you break the Pounds 5k barrier before you even begin up-speccing the components.
Beautiful but dear.
. scan.co.uk
What to look for
PROCESSOR Speeds of up to 3.8GHz are possible from PC chips. Look for at least 3GHz on a PC. Slower speeds on Macs equate to similar performance, complicating matters a little.
STORAGE The key here is to choose your system depending on what you’ll use it for.
Basic word processing requires minimal memory and hard-drive space.
Complex multimedia and gaming require much more.
PERIPHERALS There’s little point in owning a cutting-edge machine if your keyboard and mouse make using it a chore.
Look for high-quality components from the likes of Logitech and Creative.
CONNECTIVITY Extra peripherals eat up USB ports. Ensure you have plenty of connection options. Look for USB 2.0 and FireWire ports on new machines.
ALIENWARE AURORA STAR WARS EDITION
Even the learned gurulike members of the Stuff team succumb to gimmicks. This is perhaps the best yet – its huge Star Wars decals don’t improve the performance of this state-of-the art gamer but the optional nVidia SLI graphics and AMD FX55 processor do.
. alienware.co.uk Pounds 1,620+
UVEM CLASSIC Pounds 1,900+ Does buying a PVR, DVD recorder and separate PC make sense? Not when a whisper-quiet, home-cinema media centre such as the Uvem Classic is around. Built to daft standards and blessed with up to 1.5TB of HD space, it’s the best way to get high-def at home.
. uvem.com
SONY VAIO VGC-V3 Pounds 1,175+ The latest iteration of Sony’s personality crisis (PC) comes in two flavours.
The S is the dominant species, packing a 20in LCD display, 3.4Ghz processor and dual-layer DVD recorder. It’s as good for watching TV as it is being an office workhorse, and looks great to boot.
. sony.co.uk