Chillblast Fusion Pegasus review

Chillblast's Fusion Pegasus has an overclocked Intel Core-i7 920 processor, up from 2.66GHz to 3.8GHz, and comes with 6GB of RAM.

In our 2D benchmarks, the Pegasus flew to a score of 195 overall, which makes it almost twice as fast as our reference system. It's an incredible score that shows what can be done by pushing Intel's most powerful processors.

The Pegasus comes with a 22in monitor, speakers, keyboard and mouse. Asus worked with Chillblast on this PC, and supplied most of the components that make it up. The most visible component is the Asus monitor, the VH222H. This has a full HD resolution of 1,920x1,080, and has a bright, even backlight. There's a cold blue tint to whites, but colours are vibrant and contrast is good.

Asus also supplies the Vento tower case, which is roomy inside, and Chillblast has done a great job of tidying away the internal cables. The Asus P6T SE motherboard has three PCI-E x16 slots, and support for multiple ATI cards in a CrossFire configuration, One of the slots is filled by a fast ATI HD 4890 graphics card, which also obscures the neighbouring PCI-E x1 slot. Thankfully, you can fit x1 cards into the larger x16 slots. The card scored incredibly well in our tests, with smooth frame rates in every game we tried, even at 1,920x1,080.

Although the Pegasus will outperform practically any PC, it doesn't offer any noticeable advantage in games. A budget PC such as Mesh's 9950HD (Editor's Choice, opposite) with the same HD 4890 graphics card would perform very similarly and cost around £700. Where the Pegasus will shine is in video editing, 3D design and other heavy number-crunching applications.

The Vento case has a large grille on the side panel, with two 120mm fans mounted behind it. It's startlingly noisy when you turn it on, before the fan controllers kick in, and it can also get noisy when the machine is working hard. We were initially concerned that the overclocked processor would overheat, especially as Chillblast has used only a standard Intel fan. However, the internal temperatures were reasonable and we didn't notice any instability in our tests.

Chillblast has included a wireless Logitech keyboard and mouse set with the Pegasus. A set of cheap 5.1 speakers complete the package, though we'd rather have had the money put towards a better-quality stereo set or a decent pair of headphones.

Intel Core-i7 PCs are no longer commanding very high prices, as Arbico's £800 Value i7 Gamer proves. You could overclock that PC to get similar performance, although you'd get no support from the manufacturer. It makes the Pegasus look a little expensive, even when you factor in its peripherals and faster graphics card. Still, if you want an incredibly fast PC for both applications and gaming, then the Fusion Pegasus is a decent buy - just get yourself some better speakers.

Author: Barry de la Rosa