WHAT'S HOT: The Mach V comes in a sleek silver midsize tower with a sheer front panel (a door swings open for drive access). Its score of 125 on our PC WorldBench 4 tests falls just a single point below the highest Windows XP Home system we've tested--another Falcon system with an Athlon XP 2000+ CPU that benefited from a gigabyte of DDR memory.

Gamers will appreciate the PNY Verto GeForce4 Ti 4600 graphics board with 128MB of memory, and the excellent ViewSonic P95f flat-front 19-inch monitor that came with our test system. The Mach V earned the highest rating at all resolutions and color depths during our gaming tests, with sharp contrast and bright, rich colors.

And you won't find much better sound than the Klipsch ProMedia 4.1 five-speaker set (unless you opt for Klipsch's 5.1 version, which has six speakers in all, including a center speaker, available from Falcon for an additional $100). They delivered thunderous bass and crisp, clear treble notes in our audio and DVD movie tests.

WHAT'S NOT: At just over $3200, the Falcon Mach V is high-priced. Although Falcon gives you the documentation for individual components (including information on this specific system) assembled in a personalized binder, overall information for troubleshooting and upgrading the system is sparse.

WHAT ELSE: Though many PC companies add older optical drives to their systems, Falcon includes a top-of-the-line CD-RW drive--the Plextor 40X/12X/40X. And the system uses two 40GB hard drives connected to an IDE RAID card; the logical configuration as a single, 80GB drive will speed disk access for such tasks as video editing and database searches.

The motherboard provides plenty of room for upgrades, with five open drive bays--three for removable-media drives--and two open PCI slots. Thumbscrews secure the PCI cards, but a panel obstructs them, so you must use a screwdriver instead of your fingers.

A single expansion card provides three USB 2.0 ports and two IEEE 1394 ports (two integrated USB 1.1 ports are located on the rear panel).

The Microsoft Internet Keyboard allows smooth, accurate typing and provides 10 shortcut keys for quick access to Internet sites.

UPSHOT: The Falcon Northwest Mach V is very expensive, but it is also a gamer's delight as well as a high-octane machine for burning CDs and DVD movies.

SUMMARY

Falcon Northwest Mach V (Athlon 2100+) PC WorldBench 4 score of 125, 1.73-GHz Athlon XP 2100+ CPU, 512MB of DDR-266 SDRAM, Windows XP Home, two 40GB hard drives, 16X DVD-ROM drive, 40X/12X/40X CD-RW drive, PNY Verto Ti 4600 graphics card with 128MB of DDR SDRAM, 19-inch ViewSonic P95F monitor, Creative Audigy sound card, Klipsch Promedia 4.1 speakers, network adapter, midsize tower case; Deus Ex, Giants (games). One-year parts and labor warranty; free, unlimited 9-hour toll-free weekday and Saturday tech support. $3249 888/325-2661 www.falcon-nw.com