Yes, actually, you can have it all. In this Spotlight illuminating today's latest and hottest graphics boards, ATI's All-In-Wonder 9800 Pro stands out, delivering awesome graphics and speed when you want your entertainment fast and furious, and television and radio on your PC when you need to relax. Somewhat less adaptable, but no less adept in performance, our group of five power graphics boards produced impressive speed and image quality when running our Test Center's suite of games. ATI's Radeon 9800 Pro led that pack in overall speed. With faster processors, more memory, and support for Microsoft's DirectX 9, all of these boards are well-equipped to run the next generation of PC games. (read story)
Photograph: Marc Simon
Your Guide to the Top 100
Each month, we test a large number of PCs, printers, monitors, and other products. Only the best products land on the charts, which are refreshed monthly.
Configurations are shown as tested. The overall rating for each product is calculated on a 100-point scale and reflects results from our hands-on evaluations and performance tests. A 90-point score is exceptional, while one in the 70s is above average.
For desktops and notebooks, the PC WorldBench 4 score is a measure of how fast a PC can run a mix of common business applications as compared with our baseline machine, a Gateway Select 1200 with a 1.2-GHz Athlon processor, 128MB of PC133 SDRAM, and a 20GB hard drive. For example, a PC that scores 120 is 20 percent faster than the baseline system. The support policies score is based on vendor support policies (not shown on charts). Click here for additional details on how we compile charts for the Top 100.
Freelance writers Dan Littman, Mick Lockey, and Carla Thornton and PC World editors Richard Baguley, Eric Butterfield, Tracey Capen, Rebecca Freed, Kalpana Ettenson, Alexandra Krasne, Melissa J. Perenson, and Alan Stafford all contributed to the Top 100 section this month. Ulrike Diehlmann, Julio Giannobile, Elliott Kirschling, Jeff Kuta, Tony K. Leung, and Thomas Luong of the PC World Test Center performed testing on the products reviewed in this section, with logistical support provided by Julian Weatherby.
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