Systemax Beast V Budget Desktop PC

Apr 29 2009 - Systemax's Beast V desktop is a surprisingly well equipped system for under $600. This includes and AMD quad core processor, 8GB of DDR2 memory and a large one terabyte hard drive. All of this make the system very attractive to those looking for a very high performance system on a tight budget. Be warned though, this uses one of the earliest AMD Phenom processors that has a code bug that makes it one of the slowest quad core processors on the market.

Apr 29 2009 - For a desktop PC under $600, the Systemax Beast V has some pretty impressive specifications. The AMD Phenom X4 9500 quad core processor does provide it with some excellent performance for multitasking and multithreaded applications. It is one of the slowest quad core processors on the market though because of a bug found in the first generation processor. The bug was corrected with firmware updates but it slows it down the processor from its full intended potential.

One thing that Systemax did to mitigate performance issues when using a large number of applications was to include 8GB of PC2-6400 DDR2 memory. This prevents the system from relying on virtual memory when it is running a large number of applications that can significantly decrease overall performance.

Most budget systems now are coming with a 500GB hard drive. The Beast V doubles this by using a 1TB hard drive to provide a large amount of space for applications and data. A standard dual layer DVD burner is included for handling all CD and DVD media. The drive also has the ability to burn labels to LightScribe compatible CDs and DVDs.

Like most low cost desktops, the Beast V uses an integrated graphics. The ATI Radeon HD 3200 does a fairly good job and is able to handle HD video streams but it lacks sufficient performance for any real 3D applications. There is space for a PCI-Express card but the 350W will prevent the use of some higher performance cards.

Probably the biggest issue with the Systemax Beast V though is the lack of peripheral ports. The system only has six USB 2.0 ports total and lacks many other peripheral ports such as FireWire or eSATA. This may not be much of an issue for some people but could cause some issues for those with certain or a large number of peripherals.