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Arbico Elite 8400 OCX review

Our Rating :
Price when reviewed : £840
inc VAT and delivery

Specifications

3.6GHz Intel Core 2 Duo E8400, 4.000000 RAM, 22in 1,680×1,050 display, Windows Vista Home Premium

Arbico

Arbico’s Elite 8400 OCX blitzed through our 3D graphics tests thanks to its powerful Radeon HD 4870 graphics card.

It scored a remarkable 74fps in Call of Duty 4 and managed a smooth 35fps in Crysis. It’s easily the most powerful PC here for gaming. Unfortunately, the Elite’s constant humming makes it one of the noisiest PCs in our round-up, so you’ll definitely want to keep it under your desk.

The Elite wasn’t quite as record breaking in our applications benchmarks, since it’s one of only two PCs in our £800 category to have a dual-core rather than a quad-core processor. Despite Arbico overclocking the E8400 from 3GHz to 3.6GHz, we’d have expected better performance from a PC costing this much.

There are plenty of ports, slots and bays for adding extra peripherals and upgrades. The Elite has 11 USB ports in total – more than any other PC here – so you’re unlikely to need a USB hub. There are two PCI and two PCI Express x1 slots for installing peripherals such as TV tuners and WiFi adaptors. If the 500GB hard disk isn’t large enough, you can slot more hard disks into the five empty 3?in bays, but there are only four free SATA ports. If you need to add a Blu-ray drive or a second DVD writer for faster disc copying, there are three spare 5?in drive bays.

Although the 22in Acer widescreen display doesn’t have as high a resolution as the Iiyama monitor that comes with Mesh’s Matrix II 940 CS, its resolution of 1,680×1,050 is still enough for working in large documents. It’s bright with reasonably wide viewing angles. Large areas of white look greyish, but it’s still one of the better-quality monitors here.

If you want the fastest possible 3D performance out of the box, Arbico’s Elite 8400 OCX is the one to buy. Its noisiness can be distracting though, so it just misses out on an award. If you’d rather have a powerful PC that doesn’t make as much racket, opt for Mesh’s Matrix II. It’s not quite as fast in 3D games as the Elite, but it’s better value overall.

Basic Specifications

Rating *****
Processor Intel Core 2 Duo E8400
Processor external bus 400MHz (1,600MHz quad-pumped FSB)
Processor multiplier x9
Processor clock speed 3.6GHz
Processor socket LGA775
Level 1 cache 2x 32KB
Level 2 cache 6,144KB
Memory 4.000000
Memory type PC2-6400
Maximum memory 16GB
Motherboard GA-EP43-DS3L
Motherboard chipset Intel P45
Power consumption standby 2W
Power consumption idle 110W
Power consumption active 240W

Ports

USB2 ports (front/rear) 3/8
Firewire ports (front/rear) 0/0
eSATA ports (front/rear) 0/0
Wired network ports 1x 10/100/1000
Wireless networking support none
Other ports none

Internal Expansion

Case midi tower
PCI-E x1 slots (free) 2 (2)
PCI-E x16 slots (free) 1 (0)
Free Serial ATA ports 4
Free memory slots 2
Free 3.5in drive bays 5

Hard Disk

Hard disk model(s) Samsung SpinPoint F1 HD502IJ
Interface SATA 300
Total storage capacity 500GB
Spindle speed 7,200rpm

Graphics

Graphics card(s) 512MB ATI Radeon HD 4870
Graphics/video ports 2x DVI

Sound

Sound Realtek ALC888
Sound outputs 7.1 line out, coaxial/optical S/PDIF out
Speakers none

Removable Drives

3.5in floppy drive no
Supported memory cards Secure Digital, SDHC, CompactFlash, Memory Stick/PRO Duo, Microdrive, MMC
Optical drive model LG GH22NS30
Optical drive type(s) DVD+/-RW +/-DL

Display

Viewable size 22 in
Screen model Acer X222W
Native resolution 1,680×1,050
Response time 5ms
Screen inputs DVI, VGA

Other Hardware

Modem No
Keyboard Logitech Deluxe 250 Keyboard
Mouse Sumvision Optical Net Mouse

Software

Software included Ahead Nero 8 Essentials, OpenOffice.org 3.0
Operating system Windows Vista Home Premium
Operating system restore option Windows disc

Buying Information

Warranty two years RTB
Price £840
Details www.arbico.co.uk

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