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Acer Predator G5900 review

Our Rating :
Price when reviewed : £480
inc VAT

Not a bad PC in its own right, but it has an older processor and the graphics card is a bit too slow for a gaming PC

Specifications

3.2GHz Intel Core i5-650, 4GB RAM, N/A display, Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

http://www.simplyacer.co.uk

Acer’s Predator range of performance PCs is firmly targeted at gamers, with neon orange go-faster stripes, hard angular lines and insect-like mandibles that cover the disc drives. However, the G5900 is a much more modest than the heavily-designed, seriously overpowered and very expensive PCs that made up the original Predators.

Acer Predator G5900

The G5900 is part of Acer’s a current range, but despite this, its processor is an original 3.2GHz Core i5-650, rather than a more recent – and more powerful – Sandy Bridge i5. In our benchmark tests, the PC achieved an overall score of just 57, which is poor for desktop a system that costs almost £500. 4GB of RAM is modest but adequate for most tasks, but the 500GB hard disk is stingy.

Similarly, the tiny graphics card – a 1.5GB Nvidia GeForce GT 440 – is drastically underpowered for a PC that’s targeted at gamers. It failed in our 1,920×1,080 Ultra quality Dirt 3 test and in our Crysis 2 test, although we finally managed to get a respectable frame rate of 57fps out of Dirt 3 when we set it to a resolution of 1,280×720 and High quality. This means that you’ll be able to play most of the latest games, but not without some fairly serious compromises when it comes to quality.

Acer Predator G5900 side off

Inside the PC, Acer’s own-brand motherboard is compact, but fairly well laid out, although the case’s interior looks cheap and has one or two improperly finished edges. There’s one PCI-E x16 slot – currently occupied by the GT 440, which isn’t so big as to block access to the PCI-E x1 slot below, although upgrading to a larger graphics card would do so. Fortunately, there’s a second PCI-E x1 slot, as well as a PCI slot. There are six SATA ports – all SATA2 – of which four are connected. Only two of these are actually in use – the other two are plugged into a pair of 3½in hot-plug SATA bays that can accessed from behind the front panel.

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Basic Specifications

Rating ***
Processor Intel Core i5-650
Processor external bus 200MHz (2.5GT/s DMI)
Processor multiplier x24
Processor clock speed 3.2GHz
Processor socket LGA1156
Memory 4
Memory type PC3-10666
Maximum memory 16GB
Motherboard Acer Predator G5900
Motherboard chipset Intel H57

Ports

USB2 ports (front/rear) 4/8
Firewire ports (front/rear) 0/0
eSATA ports (front/rear) 0/0
Wired network ports 1x 10/100/1000
Wireless networking support none

Internal Expansion

Case midi tower
PCI-E x1 slots (free) 2 (0)
PCI-E x16 slots (free) 1 (0)
Free Serial ATA ports 2
Free memory slots 2
Free 3.5in drive bays 3

Hard Disk

Hard disk model(s) Seagate ST3500418AS
Interface SATA2
Total storage capacity 500GB

Graphics

Graphics card(s) 1.5GB Nvidia GeForce GT 440
Graphics/video ports DVI, HDMI, DisplayPort

Sound

Sound Realtek HD Audio
Sound outputs 5.1 line out, stereo line out, mic in
Speakers none

Removable Drives

Supported memory cards SD, SDHC, CF, Memory Stick PRO Duo, MMC, RS-MMC, Microdrive, microSD, Memory Stick Micro (M2), xD
Optical drive type(s) DVD+/-RW +/-DL

Display

Screen model none
Native resolution N/A
Screen inputs N/A

Other Hardware

Keyboard Acer SK-9621
Mouse Acer SM-9020

Software

Software included Nero 9
Operating system Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
Operating system restore option burn own restore disc

Buying Information

Warranty one year collect and return
Price £480
Supplier http://www.simplyacer.co.uk
Details www.acer.co.uk

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