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Dell's XPS 730x Core I7 Gaming System Reviewed
MojoKid writes "Shortly after Intel released their new Core i7 processors about a month ago, Dell announced a new update to the XPS 730 with Core i7 tech under the hood.
The new Dell XPS 730x is first and foremost a technology update but the chassis has also been buffed up a bit. The Intel Core 2 processor and NVIDIA 790i Ultra SLI chipset powering the original XPS 730 line have been swapped with
the new Core i7 processor and an Intel X58 Express chipset based motherboard. The XPS 730x retains the original 730's ability to
support both Crossfire and SLI multi-GPU graphics. Like all XPS 700 series machines since the XPS 710, the XPS 730x is available with optional factory overclocking and a H2C edition featuring a two-stage liquid cooling system. And yes,
it rips through Crysis quite nicely and puts up rather impressive benchmark numbers."
BTX is a far superior mobo layout for air cooled cases. The only reason it didn't end up usurping ATX is because manufacturers didn't want to spend the money to support the new form factor.
You are using English. Please learn the difference between loose and lose; they're, there, and their; your and you're.
Hmm, this really doesn't make much sense. If you're going to spend that much money, the thing should have four graphics cards and its own nuclear powerplant. The one they reviewed, priced at 5099 dollars, only has one graphics card, so it gets whooped by a $1500 computer at Crysis.
I think it's funny that we're using Crysis as a benchmark, rather than an object-lesson in "what not to do in game development."
The only reason why Crysis is being chosen here is because it's notoriously difficult to get it running on any system maxed out. The article's graph notes that the test was run without adding in anti-aliasing, and it manages to barely squeak out a playable frame rate (on a 22" widescreen lcd resolution).
Crysis looks good, sure, but so do most games at this point. It can scale down to run OK on lower machines, but again, so do most games at this point.
Benchmarking aside, I think it's beyond ridiculous that anyone would buy a $4,500+ PC for home / game use. What could possibly justify that? I have a year old system (quad core, 8800GT) that can literally play every game on the market at max settings... at 1920x1600! Oh, I guess with the singular exception of Crysis, which I haven't bothered with.
I wouldn't dream of spending that much cash on a game system. Think about it this way: You can buy this PC, -or- a used Audi. Or... a well-equipped gaming PC, a Sony XBR TV, a PS3, 360, AND Wii, and still have money left over for games.
Video Game News, FAQs, etc
Yes, but only to use the extra RAM and processing time to "cache" all of the crap you never use
I'm confused, you'd rather Windows just didn't do anything with the extra memory and processing power? If you really don't want you hard drive indexed, you can turn off indexing. The memory used to cache frequently used programs is reallocated when necissary, don't let the little graph in the task manager fool you into thinking you don't have enough memory just because your memory is actually being used for a change.
And lets see how well the SLI/Crossfire graphics cards run games while also being called by the desktop window manager and and explorer to redraw aero effects constantly.
Aero is automatically disabled when running any full screen game. If you really hate it that badly, disable it.
Vista has a lot of problems. Having features that many people like, which can be disabled by those who don't, isn't one of them. The only valid complaint you make, in my opinion, is obnoxious UAC prompts.
Hold it, you are assuming people are going to search only by file name. However, the rest of us do search by content. How will you remember which file contains "int restriction_level = 1;" on a project with thousands of files and a class diagram that looks like spiderweb on steroids? Indexing is very useful in that aspect.
Where is the "Ignorant" mod tag?
There were a lot of reasons. Probably the number one overall was the same reason Mac market share dropped: the large prevalence of cheap PC clones from different vendors. The average user didn't see a real difference between Windows and another OS.
As far as the technical side, you are correct in that the custom chips ultimately held the Amiga back. The updated AGA chipset machines (more or less comparable to VGA at the time) were pricey for the power they offered. For example the A1200 was released with a 68020 at a time when 486s were becoming common on PCs.
Sometimes my arms bend back.