Polywell Poly i680SLI

If you're inclined to overclock your PC, note that the Poly i680SLI relies on a CPU cooling fan; water cooling won't be available until this summer. Surprisingly, the large (120mm) fan embedded in the case's removable side cover makes little noise.

The black, midsize tower case eschews the flamboyant styling of many $5000-plus PCs, but it feels sturdy and offers excellent upgradability. The system's use of a single graphics card leaves the PCI and PCI Express expansion slots freely available; on many dual-card systems, the bulky cards completely block access to these expansion slots. The EVGA nForce 680i SLI 775 motherboard is SLI capable, so you can add a second graphics card if you want to.

The case's interior is well laid out, and cables are neatly bundled and well organized--though they're unceremoniously crammed into an open drive bay, which could lead to trouble if you ever want to add an optical drive. Frequent visitors to the case's interior will appreciate the tool-less quick releases on all of the card slots and drive bays.

On the off-chance that you'll need more internal storage space than the two 150GB hard drives provide, the case has room for an additional drive. You can also take advantage of the eSATA port, which lets you connect an external SATA hard drive without sacrificing drive performance. The placement of the eSATA port, two USB ports, and two audio jacks on the top front of the case works well if you stack devices on top of the PC, but dangling cables could be a hassle every time you open an optical drive.

I liked the 22-inch Samsung 225BW LCD monitor included with the system. Still images and video looked crisp and realistic, and game play on Far Cry was bright and smooth. Small (6.8-point) text was comfortably readable and well defined. On the other hand, I wish that the keyboard and mouse had been better. Despite offering good heft, the simple Logitech Y-SV39 keyboard was marred by mushy key action, and it had only four control keys.

If you want good performance and don't demand a flashy design, the quad-core Polywell Poly i680SLI should live up to your expectations.

Kirk Steers