Sys Performance 2400

WHAT'S HOT: The Sys Performance 2400 comes with three FireWire (IEEE 1394) ports and four USB 2.0 ports, so you can connect several high-speed devices like digital video camcorders and CD-RW drives. This system's floppy drive has slots for SmartMedia and CompactFlash cards, so you can easily insert and read memory cards from digital cameras or PDAs.

At its native resolution of 1280 by 1024, the 18-inch Sys 180L LCD monitor rendered legible text and sharp icons in our test document, and produced rich colors and accurate flesh tones in our test photo.

WHAT'S NOT: Although the system has six USB 2.0 ports on the rear, two of them don't work because their connectors on the motherboard are used for the SmartMedia and CompactFlash readers in the floppy drive instead. The faceplate of the DVD-ROM drive is a slightly different color than the rest of the system, which makes the front panel look slightly odd.

WHAT ELSE: With the combination of a 2.4-GHz Pentium 4 processor and 512MB of 266-MHz DDR memory, the Performance 2400 earned a PC WorldBench 4 score of 116--about what we expect for a system of this configuration.

Sys supplies a respectable manual with the system: It's spiral-bound and lies flat when open, making it easy to read while you work with the system. The manual includes detailed chapters on upgrading and troubleshooting, but it's short on illustrations.

It's easy to reach the PCI slots and drive bays in the neat and spacious interior; our system had three open slots and four open bays. One of the bays in use holds a 40X/12X/48X Lite-On CD-RW drive, which provides a speedy way to back up data or burn Audio CDs. Sys includes Corel's WordPerfect Office 2002 suite in the software bundle.

UPSHOT: The combination of the memory card readers, high-quality LCD monitor, and high-speed ports will appeal to graphics and video editors looking for a well-priced system.

SUMMARY

Sys Performance 2400 PC WorldBench 4 score of 116, 2.4-GHz Pentium 4 CPU, 512MB of DDR266 SDRAM, Windows XP Professional, 80GB hard drive, 40X/12X/48X CD-RW drive, 16X DVD-ROM drive, Matrox Millennium G550 graphics card with 32MB of DDR SDRAM, 18-inch Sys 180L LCD monitor, integrated Creative Labs CT5880 sound, Altec Lansing AVS300 speakers, network adapter, V.92 modem, midsize tower case, WordPerfect Office 2002. Three-year parts warranty (five years on CPU and RAM), three-year labor warranty; free, unlimited 24-hour daily tech support. $2469 800/613-9963 www.sys.com