2 MAXIMUMPC DECEMBER 2006
5
GAMERS’ EDGE PCX
$2,500, http://www.velocitymicro.comV
elocity Micro has a reputation for building tight
systems that outperform their price tags, so we
were really excited to see what the company would
submit to our $2,500 roundup. Unfortunately, while
Velocity’s overclocked Core 2 E6700-powered rig was
beautifully appointed, it just wouldn’t run at its shipped
clock speeds.
Velocity made a couple of very interesting com-
ponent choices for its Gamers’ Edge PCX. Instead of
a more expensive nForce 590 board, the PCX sports
a prototype nForce 570 motherboard. The 570 board
offers a pair of x8 PCI Express slots, and it dispenses
with the automatic PCI Express overclocking feature in
the 590 offering. Like Polywell, Velocity dropped a pair
of GeForce 7950 GT boards running in SLI into the PCI-E
slots. We appreciate that Velocity equipped the PCX
with a spacious 320GB Western Digital drive, but we
lament the absence of a soundcard.As for the benchmarks: Anytime we get an
unstable system in for review, its verdict is going
to suffer. In order to get any of our tests to run
on this rig, we had to clock the front-side bus
down from 1,195MHz to the default 1,066MHz,
which dropped the CPU clock speed from 3GHz
to 2.66GHz. At its stock clock speeds the rig ran
stable, with middle-of-the-road performance in
both games and applications, and nary an exciting
or redeeming feature to sauce up an otherwise
bland performance package.
Velocity gains an aesthetic edge with its
custom Lian-Li enclosure and near-Voodoo-quality
wiring job, and the Peltier-powered water-cooling
setup adds a splash of pizzazz, although it chills
only the CPU. But good looks can’t mask the PCX’s
instability issues and middling performance.The custom Lian-Li case and active
water-cooling setup make a fine first
impression—too bad performance falters.6
AREA-51 5500
$2,500, http://www.alienware.comAlienware Area-51 5500
It never pays to bring a knife to a gun fight
HOW VELOCITY MICRO SPENT $2,
HOW ALIENWARE SPENT $2,
Velocity Micro Gamers’ Edge PCX
Pretty, but slow and unstable
Alienware’s mid-tower case offers
plenty of room for kick-ass hardware—
so where is it?W
e expected Alienware—the largest system
vendor in this roundup—to leverage its buy-
ing power to offer the best value for the buck. But
based on the exceedingly underpowered system we
received, we can only conclude that the company
severely underestimated the competition.
Sporting an Intel Core 2 Duo E6700 CPU run-
ning at its stock clocks, an Intel D975XBX mother-
board, and a lone Radeon X1950 XTX, this machine is
simply outclassed by every other system here.
Look at the benchmark scores. The Area-
5500 chalks up the lowest marks in almost every
test, performing especially poorly in the gaming
benchmarks. Mind you, all the vendors were specifi-
cally told that this was a gaming roundup, and that
gaming performance was paramount. A single-GPU
config is plain inexcusable.Alienware made some other goofy parts
choices. The included water-cooling rig just
doesn’t make sense. A self-contained internal
water-cooler cries out for overclocking, but this
CPU runs at stock speeds. Sure, the machine runs
fairly quiet, but the cooling scheme seems over-
kill, especially given the meager amount of hard-
ware populating the case. We do like the wireless
fan on the case door—it draws power from a
contact panel built into the case. Unfortunately,
one of the front-mounted fans was knocked loose
during shipping—disappointing.
Alienware’s new mid-size case has the
company’s signature stylishness and sports a
respectable wiring job. Too bad the configuration
is so uninspired.THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN 777 7777 777
CPU/MOBO 26%
STORAGE 4%GRAPHICS 24% OTHER 46%CPU/MOBO 30%
STORAGE 2.8%GRAPHICS 16.8% OTHER 50.4%