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Top 10 Value PCs

A new Dell Dimension 4100 replaces another model of the same name in the top spot.

  

Complete Coverage

Though our Best Buy this month remains a Dell Dimension 4100, it seems like one from a parallel dimension where everything looks nearly the same but details make it better. This 4100 offers a 1-GHz Pentium III CPU (upgraded from the PIII-933 in the previous version). Also new this month are the Athlon-1200-powered Tangent Valera at number four and the inexpensive and speedy Duron-850-based Sys Taskmaster 850D at number six.

Also of Note

The Kingdom Royale PIII-933 competed for a place on our chart this month but fell just short. An Iomega Zip 250 drive adds to this Kingdom's appeal, but the combination of a mediocre monitor and an above-average price of $1799 held it back. The Royale achieved a PC WorldBench 2000 test score of 173--4 points below the PIII-933 group average.

Meanwhile, the Compaq Deskpro EXS came with an excellent Compaq P900 19-inch monitor, which delivered vibrant colors and sharp, legible text at even the maximum resolution of 1920 by 1200. This PIII-800 system earned a 165 on our PC WorldBench 2000 tests--5 points below the average for similarly configured systems. For the PC's price ($1628), we would have liked to see more than a plain 20X-48X CD-ROM drive and a skimpy (by today's standards) 15GB hard drive. These deficiencies helped keep the Deskpro EXS off the Top 10 Value PCs chart.

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