Desktop PCs - 11 systems are reviewed - includes ratings table - Hardware Review - Evaluation

Home Office Computing, Nov, 1997 by Rick Broida

The latest crop of powerhouse desktops aims to let you accomplish more work in less time, so you can spend more time cultivating your business.

Ho-hum. You've heard it all before, right? Another day, another new processor. The difference this time is that Intel isn't the only player in the game, nor is Apple the only vendor of PowerPC systems. Whether you're looking to replace your current computer or bring additional machines into your office, you'll find you have more choices than ever before.

More choices, more power, better performance. That's the impetus behind this Buyer's Guide, which features II of the latest and greatest systems from Apple, CyberMax, Dell, Everex, Gateway, IBM, Micron, Polywell, Power Computing, and Umax. Inside them purr state-of-the-art processors from AMD, Cyrix, Intel, and Motorola, each with enough power to keep you computing happily from now until the millennium.

Chips Ahoy!

Indeed, these II machines deliver a staggering amount of raw computational power, thanks to some new technologies and higher clock speeds. Intel's new Pentium II, for instance, comes in 233MHz, 266MHz, and 300MHz flavors. It combines the multimedia enhancements of MMX technology (great for such applications as Adobe Photoshop) with the processing advancements of the Pentium Pro (great for heavy-duty number crunching).

Intel's new Pentium II chip appears in the majority of the eight Windows-based systems we reviewed: Dell's Dimension XPS H266, Gateway's G6-266, IBM's Aptiva L61, Micron's Millennia XRU, and Umax's UmaxStation 6000. Other manufacturers, such as NEC, Packard Bell, Compaq, HP, and Toshiba, did not have 266MHz Pentium II systems available for our review, but we'll be featuring models from these companies, in side-by-side comparisons, in upcoming New & Noteworthy reviews. And as we mentioned, Intel is no longer the only game in town. AMD and Cyrix have stormed onto the scene with impressive, competitive offerings, and the systems that use them can save you a bundle.

AMD's new K6 chip, which appears in the Everex Tempo K and Polywell Poly K6233Mx computers, delivers MMX functionality--basically enhanced multimedia support--and full Intel Pentium MMX compatibility. Ditto Cyrix's 6x86MX, which is the brains behind the CyberMax 6x86MX.

For Windows-based systems, each of these three chips--the Pentium II, K6, and 6x86MX--offers increased performance over systems that were new just six months ago (see our Hardware Buyer's Guide in the June issue), but each employs different motherboard architectures to do so. The K6 and 6x86MX both use socket 7 architecture motherboards. This is the standard, square chip design with pins that go into a pin grid array (PGA) socket on the motherboard, the same as Intel's Pentium with MMX technology. The newer Intel Pentium II employs an entirely new motherboard and chip design, incorporating both the CPU and the L2 cache onto a circuit board housed in a plastic case.

Suffice it to say that both AMD and Cyrix claim their respective chips offer the same level of performance as Intel's Pentium II. Performance claims aside, the difference you'll see in real-world usage is based on more than the clock speed of the chips. It also has a lot to do with the individual components used--hard disks, CD-ROM drives, video graphics cards, and Level 2 cache. A slowdown in any one of these components can cause an otherwise fast system to crawl.

On the Macintosh side, the Apple Power Macintosh 6500/250 and Umax SuperMac C600x employ 250MHz and 240MHz versions of the 603e, respectively. Power Computing's PowerCenter Pro 210 features a 210MHz 604e PowerPC chip. Although all three computers were delivered to us with slightly different revision numbers of Apple's System 7 operating system, the recently introduced System 8 should be shipping by the time you read this.

How We Selected

We chose Windows-based systems that each had a minimum 32MB of RAM, 3GB hard-disk drive, I2X CD-ROM drive, I7-inch monitor, and 33.6Kbps modem. Mac-based systems had similar requirements, but we dropped the monitor requirement since that choice is often left to the dealer, and we lowered the minimum hard disk size to 2GB. We did not specify a minimum price, leaving it to the vendors to craft their ideas of the perfect small-business system.

A pleasant surprise as we unpacked these systems was the widespread adoption, on both platforms, of an included Zip drive, which can store up to 100MB of data on a single cartridge. This drive has received many accolades from us (see our Hardware Buyer's Guide in the August issue) and it was equipped on six of the II systems we reviewed.

This roundup marks the first appearance of a DVD CD-ROM drive. IBM's Aptiva L6I and Micron's Millennia XRU provide out-of-box readiness for next-generation DVD titles, even though no titles currently ship with the system. Many of the other vendors offer optional upgrades to DVD drives for $300 to $500. We're not sure what the impact of DVD will mean to standard software titles but multimedia reference, movies, and games will be the likely early winners. We're betting that by this time next year, a DVD CD-ROM will be a commodity item in all PCs.