Top 5 Entertainment PCs

Let These PCs Entertain You

Two PCs loaded with Microsoft's Windows XP Media Center debut on our Top 5 Entertainment PCs chart. Designed more for the living room than for the office, these machines include several component hookups, along with a remote control, VCR-like television recording capabilities, and video editing software.

One of the new models, Gateway's Media Center PC 500 Series, tops the chart. By far the least-expensive model of the five, it's equipped with a rewritable DVD drive and plenty of hard-drive space to record your favorite shows. Its gaming capabilities pale in comparison with those of the non-Media Center systems on the chart, however, so its best use is as an entertainment system rather than as a gaming powerhouse.

HP's Media Center 883n PC joins the ranks in third place. It too offers a rewritable DVD drive, a 120GB hard drive, and personal video recording capabilities. Its rather pedestrian 64MB GeForce4 MX 420-based graphics card contributed to relatively slow frame rates in our gaming tests. On the other hand, its bright 17-inch LCD monitor and set of Klipsch THX ProMedia 5.1 surround-sound speakers round out the system's package very well.

Even though Microsoft's Windows XP Media Center Edition makes recording video easier, you don't need to buy a computer loaded with that OS to get those nifty options. In fact, all you need is a graphics card that includes an antenna input and a TV tuner, video recording software such as SnapStream (see New Products), and a roomy hard drive for storing TV shows on. Of course, if you want to watch shows on your TV rather than on your monitor, the Gateway and HP models both include S-Video-out ports, too. If your system lacks a graphics card with TV-tuner functionality, a separate TV-tuner card costs as little as $30. (You don't get a remote, though.)

Falcon's pricey but loaded Mach V 2800+ DV slides into the second spot, just a hair behind the number one Gateway model. With 360GB of storage space (split between two hard drives), a high-end video editing software bundle, a fast AMD Athlon XP 2800+ processor, and a top-notch ATI Radeon 9700 Pro graphics card, Falcon's Mach V is a dream machine for gamers and video aficionados alike. Producing five times the average frame rate on our tests than the two Media Center machines did, this Falcon is much better suited for gaming. Even for most gamers, though, the $5245 price is a budget buster; still, the PC includes plenty of the high-end stuff that you would expect to find on such a costly system, and you can knock a substantial chunk off the price with a judicious selection of options.

And finally, FreewayTech's Velocity EA50, a glossy black system, comes loaded with a raft of gear for gaming and video editing, but its high price and its low PC WorldBench 4 score of 111--about six points lower than average for this configuration--kept it off the chart.