iBUYPOWER Gamer Power 942i Mainstream Desktop PC

Aug 16 2011 - iBUYPOWER has built a decent system priced at $800 that can be used as a general purpose system that also can be used for gaming. The problem is that they sacrificed too much in the memory system for it to be a very functional system compared to other similarly priced systems. Sure, the graphics are nice and can be upgraded but 4GB of RAM just hampers the performance and forcing users to completely replace the memory for improved performance is just wrong. Still, it does have potential if you don't mind the limitations imposed by the motherboard design.

Aug 16 2011 - The iBUYPOWER Gamer Power 942i is a system that is more of a general purpose system with a slightly bit of emphasis on gaming. It is tough to produce a balanced system at the $800 price point and still offer exceptional gaming performance. In terms of processor, it uses the Intel Core i5-2400 quad core processor. This is a decent choice that offers some solid performance without sacrificing multiple cores. It should provide enough performance for gaming or other demanding tasks such as desktop video work.

One big disappointment is the system memory. First, iBUYPOWER chose to only include 4GB of DDR3 memory. This means that it will encounter times during memory intensive applications or multitasking that it will slow down. Second, there are only two memory slots on the motherboard which are both in use. This means that any upgrades will require that the existing memory modules be discarded.

Storage on the iBUYPOWER Gamer Power 942i is a bit above average. Most systems in the $800 price range are using a single terabyte hard drive. This system comes equipped with a one and a half terabyte drive that provides 50% more space for applications, data and media files. The drive also spins at the traditional 7200rpm spin rate that gives it some solid performance. This is nice as many companies have been moving towards green class drives that are more affordable but sacrifice a bit in performance. A standard DVD burner is included to handle playback and recording of CD or DVD media.

The downside of the system is the peripheral ports. To keep costs down, iBUYPOWER has used a motherboard that does not feature USB 3.0. In addition, the case front has an eSATA port but the motherboard does not feature a header so the port is non-functional. The result is the inability to use high speed external storage with the system. At least there is sufficient space to add addition internal hard drives for extra storage.

Since the system does have a PC gaming focus, the Gamer Power 942i does have a better than average graphics card for this price segment. It uses an AMD Radeon HD 6770 graphics card. This provides it with sufficient performance for it to be used for PC gaming at high resolution but will sacrifice filter performance compared to higher end cards. What is nice is that the system has a decent 700 watt power supply and a second PCI-Express graphics card slot (albeit running at x4 rather than x16). This means that users will have the ability to either replace the card with a higher performance model or add a second AMD card for a CrossFire configuration for added performance.

The closest comparison for the Gamer Power 942i is a similarly equipped Cyberpower Gamer Xtreme 1318. That system offers more base memory while sacrificing the hard drive space. In addition, it uses a comparable graphics card from NVIDIA. Frankly, the two are so similar that it comes down to memory and storage which the Cyberpower system has the edge in.