Top 15 Desktop PCs

Systems powered by AMD's new Barton processor, the 2.167-GHz Athlon XP 3000+, cap this month's power PCs list. Barton processors have twice the Level 2 cache (512KB) of earlier Athlon XP CPUs, and this upgrade seems to provide a boost. Running our benchmark, PC WorldBench 4, nearly all of the XP 3000+ PCs we've tested have outscored systems that use AMD's non-Barton 2.25-GHz Athlon XP 2800+, which has a faster clock speed.

New Barton systems from ABS and Micro Express join the number two Sys Performance 3000+, which remains the fastest PC in the Top 15. Leading the power group, ABS's Awesome 3450 posted one of the highest PC WorldBench 4 scores we've recorded. Equipped with a Sapphire Radeon 9700 Pro graphics card, it also produced some of the fastest frame rates we've seen on Unreal Tournament 2003.

The number three power spot goes to Micro Express's Barton-based MicroFlex 30A, which scored 131 on PC WorldBench 4 and has a rich set of features. Its ATI All-In-Wonder Radeon 9700 Pro graphics card delivers top-tier frame rates and provides a TV tuner and TiVo-like video recording capabilities. A 19-inch LCD monitor nicely rounds out this system.

Another well-equipped multimedia PC, the number six MPC Millennia 910i Dream Machine, has two Serial ATA hard drives in a RAID configuration and comes with a scanner. But at $3499, "Dream" appropriately describes this system.

The Barton processor debuts on the value side in the Polywell Poly 880NF2-2500. Powered by a 1.83-GHz Athlon XP 2500+ processor, it posted a respectable PC WorldBench 4 score of 125--just beating the score of an older Polywell, the number seven Poly 884RF-2600, which carries an earlier-generation 2.13-GHz Athlon XP 2600+ chip. The other value newcomer, Gateway's Pentium 4-based 500X, offers a nice 17-inch LCD monitor and a DVD-ROM and CD-RW combination drive. For more on the latest combo drives, see "Tech Trend" below and our Top 10 CD-RW Drives chart.

New Intel Systems Coming

Though AMD dominates the news this month, PCs with new Intel chips will follow soon. At press time Intel announced a new system chip set, the 875P (code-named Canterwood), which offers an 800-MHz frontside bus (up from 533 MHz), support for 400-MHz DDR RAM, a Serial ATA controller, and gigabit ethernet networking. For details and test results, see our News & Trends story "A Fast Bus, but Catch It Later." Soon Intel should release another chip set, code-named Springdale, that supports an 800-MHz bus and 400-MHz DDR RAM, and promises better integrated graphics.

Manufacturers are upgrading to the 875P chip set, which explains why some systems that made our power chart last month, such as Dell's Dimension 8250 and Gateway's 700XL, vanished. Dell will use the 875P in its Dimension line, starting with two new models: the 8300 and an enthusiast PC called the XPS. Gateway is building an 875P-based version of its 700XL, and MPC plans to use the new chip set in its Millennia 900i series.

Tech Trend: Can You Get It All in One Drive?

Already de rigueur in the confined spaces of notebook PCs, DVD-ROM/CD-RW combination drives are migrating into desktop systems--especially into small PCs (such as Gateway's 300 series models) that have just one optical drive bay. Also, combos are generally a bit cheaper than separately purchased CD-RW and DVD-ROM drives.

Opting for a combo drive used to mean sacrificing speed, especially on recordable CD functions. That's changing, however. The newest DVD-ROM/CD-RW combo drives, such as the LG Electronics GCC-4480B and the Samsung SM-348 on our Top 10 CD-RW Drives chart, are rated at 16X (DVD-ROM read) and 48X/24X/48X (CD-R write/CD-RW write/CD-ROM read)--only a step behind today's fastest CD-RW drive speeds of 52X/24X/52X. (The effective speed difference is negligible, and media for 52X drives is currently hard to find.)

Adding a DVD-ROM/CD-RW combo drive is a smart move if your system has just one optical drive bay and you're ready to replace your CD-RW, DVD-ROM, or CD-ROM drive. And if you have an older or low-end system with only a CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive, adding a combo model to a spare bay and keeping the old drive will make disc-to-disc CD copying easier. Also, consolidating drives lets you free up a bay for another device, such as a memory card reader.

Combo Phobia

Despite the recent advances, old biases against combination drives appear to persist among PC vendors. Most of the desktop systems we test have separate CD-RW and DVD-ROM drives; and some companies, including ABS Computer and EMachines, don't even offer a combo-drive option for their desktop lines. According to an ABS spokesperson, customers have not been requesting combo models.

But other vendors are embracing the high-speed products. The Gateway 500X we reviewed this month, for example, has an optional 16X DVD-ROM and 48X/24X/48X CD-RW combo drive that comes standard on Gateway's budget-priced 300S and 300X PCs. Dell and Sys Technology offer fast combo drives, too.

Should you need to archive large amounts of data or to store video, consider the ultimate combo model--a rewritable DVD drive that writes one or more DVD formats, reads DVD-ROMs, and provides CD-R and CD-RW functions (albeit at slower ratings, typically topping out at 24X/10X/32X). But even with one of these drives installed, you might want to put a DVD-ROM/CD-RW combo unit in the second bay, as it will give you better CD-RW performance and will provide a handy place to test discs you've burned in your rewritable DVD drive.