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Systemax to Offer 'Hot-Rod' PC
Professor_Quail writes "C|Net News reports that PC maker Systemax is going to be offering a new line of PC's aimed at gamers and performance enthusiasts. The computers, priced at approximately 3-4 thousand dollars, are touted by the company specifically for their overclocking performance; the DoubleX line comes equipped with a water-cooling system and dual hard drives configured with RAID-0. The systems will be sold through the company's TigerDirect subsidiary."
I would *never* buy a system from Tiger Direct. My work used to buy stuff from them a lot and they really suck.
Customer reviews of Tiger Direct
will give you 90% of the experience of some absurd $3000 pc.
The computer featured in the article is water cooled.
With a 50% increase in clock speed, overclocking was well worth it. Even when I spent almost as much on my cooling solution as I did on the processor ($55 for former, $65 for latter). It let me build a system I was happy with for 2+ years at an unbeatable price.
Later, I went to a 800MHz Celeron. Just as I was considering pushing it to a 1.8GHz Celeron through an upgradeware upgrade, a fellow LANner managed to snap two capacitors off my motherboard and fry the whole box. (Don't ask how - and no, he's not going to pony up).
I just didn't see the point in upgrading my box except with processor b/c I was maxed with 1GB of RAM and the box performed (almost) flawlessly. Need ATA-133, pop in a card. Yeah, I only had AGP 2x, but I held my own fraggin' with a low-end GeForce2. If it hadn't been for the accident, I wouldn't have upgraded.
Now I'm the proud owner of a Shuttle SS51G-based system. With a DVD-burner, a smokin' WD 120GB drive, and a GeForce4 Ti 4600 w/VIVO. I wanted to wait for the Athlon/nForce2 based systems to come out in October, but I had a dead box and couldn't really wait. Being an old-school overclocker, I decided to see how far the CPU would go:
I started with a stock 2.4GHz rev B Pentium 4 and cranked it up to 2.52GHz. Went a tad higher, but had to clear CMOS and start over. When I benchmarked the system at different speeds, there was negligible difference. Why make the extra heat? Bah.
My system absolutely smokes. I'm extremely happy and if current trends continue, I won't feel the need to replace this box for another 3-4 years. And the size is perfect for toting to LAN parties. Now I just need a sweet LCD monitor without tracies....