Chillblast Fusion Accelerate review

It’s also fairly power-efficient, only drawing 55W when idle. Much of this is down to the PC’s processor; instead of the monstrous overclocked Intel Core i5-3570K chips we’re used to seeing, Chillblast has fitted a relatively low-powered Core i5-3450 running at just 3.1GHz. This led to an overall score of 87 in our benchmarks. That’s fine for desktop applications, but far behind the fastest PCs in intensive tasks.

The PC’s Radeon HD 7850 graphics card is a fine mid-range model and could run our Crysis 2 Ultra detail benchmark at a just-smooth 29.9fps. We normally test graphics cards with Dirt 3, but the game wouldn’t run under Windows 8; instead, we upgraded to the newer and far more challenging Dirt Showdown. Even in this test, which we ran at 1,920×1,080 with Ultra detail and 4x anti-aliasing, the PC managed a smooth 38.5fps, showing modern games aren’t a problem.

The inside of the PC is extremely tidy, with most cables routed behind the motherboard tray and out of sight. Four spare 3 1/2in drive bays and two spare 5 1/4in bays should be enough for most upgrade needs, although there’s only one SATA2 port free; the other two SATA2 ports are taken up by the PC’s Blu-ray reader/DVD rewriter and its 1TB hard disk, and the motherboard’s single SATA3 port is taken up by the SSD boot drive.

This is the PC’s main problem; it has a microATX motherboard which cuts down on the expansion options available. There’s just a single PCI and one PCI Express x1 slot and we wouldn’t be too keen on using the PCI Express x1 slot due to its proximity to the graphics card’s fan.

We’re impressed that Chillblast has taken the time to produce a PC that aims to take full advantage of Windows 8’s capabilities. It’s also quiet and quick in games, but it loses out to some of the other Windows 8 PCs we’ve seen in terms of desktop performance and expandability, such as the Palicomp Alpha Blade. Nonetheless, if you’re keen for a competent desktop PC with the added fun of a touchscreen, it’s a good buy.