PowerHouse 148

CADalyst, March, 2004

PowerHouse 148

SYS Technology

www.sys.com

Star rating: 4 stars out of 5

Price: $5,321

The SYS Technology PowerHouse 148 is a squat, compact, and solidly built system that shows careful attention to detail in both its components and finish. One nice touch is a cantilevered drive bay cover that lies back against the system case--out of harm's way--when you fully open it.

The PowerHouse 148 is built around an Asus SKU8 motherboard using an AMD64 148 2.2GHz processor supported by the Via K8T800 chipset. Though the C2001 test score of 115.39 is a respectable figure, it's not up to what this system should be capable of producing. This is most likely due to the AGP slot problem mentioned in the introduction that currently plagues some 148 processor, motherboard, and chipset combinations. I expect to see better performance from this system once the problem, wherever it lies, is rectified.

Although the C2001 test scores are lower than I expected, the SPEC ViewPerf proe-02 and MAXBench4 scores are good.

Like most other systems tested here, the PowerHouse 148 includes a speedy PNY/NVIDIA FX 3000 graphics card, which accounts for a significant portion of its $5,321 price tag. The higher price, which includes some extras such as drives, results in a grade reduction for price--it's the most expensive system tested in this group.

The SYS Technologies PowerHouse 148 offers much in the way of expandability, both in internal and external drive bays and the standard 460W Enermax power supply.

The workstation includes a Lite-On 48X/24X/48X/16X DVD drive as well as a Plextor PX708A DVD /- R/RW drive. A Microsoft Wireless Optical Desktop Elite keyboard and mouse combination handles input. Two 200GB Western Digital hard disks are configured in a Raid 0 configuration to provide 400GB of total hard disk space. All these niceties also contribute to the high price of the system, so keep that in mind when you compare prices.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

STAR RATINGS EXPLAINED

Under Cadalyst's comparative review rating system, each product receives a star rating based on the Reviewers' Report Card.

***** Five stars: Highly Recommended. Product is superior to others in its class. Any flaws are minor and do not interfere with overall performance.

Four stars: Product does what the manufacturer claims, improves productivity, and is a valuable tool.

Three stars: Product has limited value for most readers.