This time round, we looked at PCs for regular office
productivity kind of work, for which we invited vendors to submit their best
models in the 30K price range. We were quite astonished by some of the models
that we received at this price point. They shipped with LCD monitors, Athlon
64s, and there was even one with a Pentium D (dual core). Then of course there
were also completely barebones machines, which you'd consider only if you were
on an extremely tight budget.
What we learnt after doing this shootout was that there are
plenty of options to choose from out there today for an Office PC. So you have
to be really careful when buying. Go through the system specs very carefully.
Sometimes a vendor could ship you a machine with outdated components, such as an
old 40 GB regular IDE hard drive, or a motherboard based on an older chipset. As
you'd be buying these machines for your office, you'd want them to last you
for 2-3 years. This will only happen if they don't use oudated hardware. So if
you're a little extra careful when going through the system specs, you could
get a pretty good bargain for 30K.
We used our three-axis model of performance, price, and
features to evaluate all PCs and arrive at the results. On the test bed, we used
Windows XP with SP2 for running the benchmarks so that we could compare their
performance. Before running our suit of benchmarks, each system was optimized
for best performance.
Here's a break up of how we checked out all machines.
Performance
In order to stress the machines, we used various benchmarks. These included
the following:
SYSmark 2004 SE:
This benchmark checks elaborately for the overall machine performance by running
office productivity and Internet content creation applications. In office
productivity, the system is checked for communication, document creation and
data analysis, while the Internet content creation puts stress on the 2D, 3D
creation and web publication.
3D Mark 05: This tests the
motherboard's graphic subsystem to the fullest. It also has a separate test for
the CPU. Some of the machines we'd received were running old hardware, which
was not compatible with this benchmark. While we don't expect users of these
machines to run graphics intensive applications, one thing of concern that this
benchmark does check for is DirectX 9.0 support. It won't run if the machine
doesn't support DirectX 9. Incidentally, the upcoming Windows Vista also
requires DirectX 9 support.
PCmark 04: This benchmark checks for
performance of the system's CPU, memory, graphics and hard disk individually
and gives a combined score.
Business Winstone 2002:
This benchmark was used to check how well the PC's can do in running
regular office productivity apps like MS Office, email, anti-virus, WinZip, etc.
Features
We considered the following features while evaluating the PCs:
Upgradability
In this, we checked whether the PC had a separate slot for adding a graphics
card, as well as ports for adding SATA hard drives. Some machines came with
onboard graphics only, while others came with either an AGP or a PCI-Express x16
slot. Yet others came with both these slots. A machine that had a slot for
adding a graphics card was given higher weightage over one that didn't.
Similarly, there were also machines that didn't have any SATA ports at all for
hard drives. We felt that a machine should have SATA ports, as that's the
default connectivity for hard drives these days, while the older PATA technology
is fading away.
HDD capacity
Today there's hardly a price difference between a 40 or an 80 GB hard
drive. So why should you settle for anything less than 80 GB? After all, the
applications are growing in size, and so is the data, so it's better to have
more capacity in the beginning if it's affordable. That was our logic when
looking at hard drive capacity. In addition to capacity, a vendor that shipped
with a SATA hard drive was given additional weightage than somebody who gave the
older IDE hard drives.
Optical drives
We received machines with the entire range of optical drives, which included
CD drives, combos, CD-writers, and even DVD-Writers. Here of course, least
weightage was given to plain CD drives and maximum to DVD-Writers.
Monitor
To our surprise, some machines even shipped with LCD monitors, which just
goes to show how prices have really crashed. So obviously, LCD monitors were
given higher weightage than CRTs. The benefits of LCDs are fairly well known.
They save desktop space, are more energy efficient, and cause lesser eye strain.
Software
None of the machines really came with very exciting software. Some did come
with recovery options either in the form of recovery CDs, or a recovery system
built-into the machine itself. They were given higher weightage than those that
didn't come with anything.
Convenience
How many times have you had to strain yourself to reach behind your PC to
attach a USB device? It's much more convenient if you have frequently used
ports such as USB and audio on the front of the PC than behind it.
Extras
What more could a PC possibly ship with in addition to a DVD-Writer, a LCD
monitor, and similar hardware? Whatever extra came was included under this head.
Some machines came with multimedia keyboards, speakers, and even a webcam.
Pricing
Lastly, of course, price is a key consideration when buying any IT product.
Many machines didn't ship with an OS, while some shipped with either Linux or
Windows XP. To be fair to all, we didn't include the price of OS for any
machine. Besides price, we also took warranty into account.
Lastly, we used the Brown Gibson model to arrive at the
weightages for all the parameters. Read on to find how they fared in our
evaluation.
Millennium Tornado
Quick Specs |
Price: Rs. |
True to its name, the Millenium Tornado shot up to the top
of the charts to win the coveted Editor's Choice, virtually out of nowhere.
This is because it maintains a perfect balance of features, performance and
price and we would certainly love to see more PCs do the same in the next
shootouts.
The machine has a P4 3 GHz processor on an Intel 915G board
with 512MB DDR memory. It has a standard 15” CRT monitor with onboard
graphics. The hard drive is an 80 GB SATA. They have managed to ship a DVD-RW
drive with the PC (among the only two systems to have this). The Tornado offers
good expandability with 4 PCI and 2 PCI-E x1 slots and a single PCI-E x16 slot.
It also has the usual 8 USB ports and standard audio. Like a lot of low-cost
vendors, Millenium bundles Linux with the Tornado. As extras, you get a set of
speakers (quite good ones too) and a web cam.
The performance score of 86, though 3rd on our charts is
only there because the Xenitis and the Krypton are above it. And that is only
because the Xenitis is a dual core PC and the Kyrpton is a 64-bit Athlon powered
monster. So, among the 32-bit P4s, this Tornado is actually the king. The area
where it does a little lower is in features, where it goes to the fourth spot
because it doesn't have a LCD or a 17” CRT monitor, there's no recovery
CD, and the audio/USB ports are all at the back of the machine. The Tornado made
it to the 2nd spot in the pricing as the machine is decently priced with a three
year warranty. Overall, it is a decent configuration with good performance at
the price.
Intex Gold PC
Quick Specs |
Price: Rs. |
Intex is well known for its good quality low-cost
components in the market and we expected to see nothing less from this PC. And
we were not disappointed. This was the most feature rich PC in our shootout. It
came with a P4 2.6 GHz CPU on the Intel Grantsdale-G i915GL chipset motherboard
with 256 MB RAM. It had 80 GB SATA hard drive and a 15” LCD monitor with
integrated speakers.
It has 6 USB ports in total, four at back and two at front
and has two audio jacks in the front for convenience. It also has a multimedia
keyboard, a CD-rewriter (no DVD) as well as
a built-in modem. It has two DIMM slots, Two PCI slots, one PCI-E X16
slot and an AGP slot. The OS
bundled the PC is Linux, this could be why this is at a low price. You might
want to keep this in mind when placing your order. This Intex Gold PC is a
frills-free system, did not feature much in the way of extras. This did lose it
some points.We liked its LCD monitor, which both looked good and was easy to use
with good quality display.
This PC stood at 7th spot in performance, mainly because of
its lower processor speed and lower RAM compared to the other systems that did
better. It could have done better
if it had had 512 MB of memory or a 3 GHz CPU. It is priced exactly at 30K and
has an ample warranty of 3 years. Overall,
if you're looking for a feature rich PC for your desktop, and don't want the
best of performance, then this is a great buy.
This is why we give it the Labs' Highly Recommended award.
Xenitis ApnaPC P-series Model 8xx
Quick Specs |
Price: Rs. 29,900 |
This was the only PC that shipped with an Intel Pentium D
dual core CPU, and that too within a 30K price tag-but do note that it only
carries a one year warranty and there is no bundled OS. The machine had a
Pentium D 820 2.8 GHz processor, ATi RC410L chipset with 512 MB DDR RAM, which
can be upgraded to 2 GB on its 2 DIMM slots. We would like to say that the we
did not receive a monitor of either kind with this PC. When contacted, the
vendor told us that it ships with a 15” CRT monitor in the market. Before you
go ahead and buy this PC, you might want to check that out.The system has 80 GB
SATA drive and a DVD-CDR combo drive. Having three PCI and one PCIE x16 are
adequate to make it future proof. The machine's front panel has both USB slots
as well as audio jacks for convenience. The system comes with a multimedia
keyboard.
Initially we
had problems running our benchmarks on it because the system kept freezing. We
found the RAM to be the culprit, and after changing the same, the machine ran
smoothly. As expected, being a dual core, it gave the best results in the
overall SYSmark and PC mark results and scored second in BW and 3Dmark 05 tests.
This actually made it the top performer (and hence gets the 'Best Performer'
award) in the shootout.
It did loose out in the features (5th place) and pricing
(last place) a bit against the others, but then it's not as if it has a poor
configuration. It has all the regular features that an office user would like to
have in a PC. The machine managed to grab the 3rd spot in the overall score. We
find it to be a great buy at this price point.
Priya Krypton Voyager
Quick Specs |
Price: Rs. 28,000 |
This was the only machine in the shootout based on an
Athlon 64 2200 MHz processor. It's based on the GeForce 6100 chipset, and was
one of the few machines to ship with an ample 512 MB RAM. It even has a DVD-writer
thrown in. With such impressive features, the regular 40 GB IDE hard drive it
ships with sticks out like a sore thumb. We wished that it
had shipped with at least a SATA drive, because it has the ports for the
same on the motherboard. The PC only ships with a 15” CRT monitor, while an
LCD screen would have been nice. The machine has four DIMM slots, one PCI-E X1
and X16 slot each. It has five USB ports, two on the front for convenience and
three on the rear panel. There are audio jacks for your headphones on the front
panel should you want to enjoy some music while working.Do note that the machine doesn't ship with an OS at this
price. The PC comes with a normal keyboard and an optical scroll-mouse. The
optical drive bay is placed sideways in the cabinet and this means you cannot
use those mini CDs on it.
Its 64-bit processor and high RAM helped Krypton perform
really well in the performance tests, and finishes second, just behind the
Xenitis. Krypton gave best results in
Business Winstone and 3D Mark tests.
Through out our scoring, this PC was neck and neck with the
Xenitis for 3rd place before it was finally beaten for features, It's a great
PC considering the price tag and the performance.
eSys PC Model EDX4111
Quick Specs |
Price: Rs. 25,990 |
This machine ships with a P4 2.8 GHz pocessor on an ASRock
motherboard based on the 915G chipsetand 256 MB DDR. For upgradability, it has
two PCI slots, an 8x AGP slot and a PCI-E X4 slot. This one even has an AMR slot
(Audio/Modem riser), but card availability for this slot is very limited. The
machine ships with a 15” LCD. Also thrown in a few extras like a multimedia
keyboard and a transparent USB mouse.
On the performance front, its score was average,
understandable because of its specs .
The machine ships with Norton Antivirus '05 and an eSioux
GNU/Linux 2.0 CD, which cannot detect the SATA
hard drives, but the unit we received had a SATA hard disk in it. We
wished that the machine would ship with at least a DVD combo instead if the
regular CD drive it shipped with.
Overall, it's an average machine with ordinary features,
suited for basic productivity work in a small office. The machine ships with 3
years warranty.
Lenovo ThinkCenter E50
Quick Specs |
Price: Rs. 24,692 |
Interestingly, Lenovo India's website doesn't list this
model. Possibly this is a new entrant. The machine ships with a P4 3 GHz CPU on
a SiS 661 FX/Sis 964 chipset motherboard, with 256 MB. It does have an AGP slot
to add a graphics card later if you wish. 3 PCI slots are there for future
expansion. As compared to other machines, this one is the most software rich,
featuring Access IBM, runtime environment for Java, and of course IBM's rescue
and recovery, which will help you put the machine back to normal condition were
it to crash.
We weren't really impressed with its performance, in
which it stood second last. This was because it couldn't run 3D Mark for lack
of hardware support. We wished it came with at least a DVD-combo drive instead
of a CD-drive, as that's become pretty much standard everywhere. Overall,
it's an average machine.
Spice PC Model P30B
Quick Specs |
Price: Rs. 28,900 |
Spice comes with a P4 3 GHz processor and a 915 GL chipset
based motherboard. It has support for up to 4 GB DDR 400 RAM in its two Dual
channel DIMM slots. The PC ships with a single 256 MB RAM module though. Plus,
it has 2 PCI slots, a PCI-E X16 slot, and a GEAR slot that supports AGP card.
This gives it the flexibility to use the old AGP cards as well as new PCI-E X4
cards, if the need arises. With a 15” LCD monitor, multimedia keyboard, SATA
80 GB hard disk, speakers and combo drive, the spice stood third in features.
In performance it comes equivalent to the eSys PC, and is
an average performer. The machine does ship with a 12 CDs bundle, and some of
software includes word-processing, anti virus and various browsers.
Overall an average machine, which would suite the
requirements of a regular office PC.
HP D260MT
Quick Specs |
Price: Rs. 32,990 |
This machine had a P4 3 GHz CPU and was the only one to
ship with an Intel 865GV chipset based board. It had 256 MB DDR 400 MHz memory,
which can be upgraded to a maximum of 2 GB in its two DIMM slots. The machine
shipped with a 80 GB IDE hard drive and a regular 15” CRT monitor.
We did wish that it shipped with a combo drive instead of
the existing CD-ROM drive though. The machine has 3 PCI slots for future
expansion, but there were no PCI-E or AGP slots, meaning you can't really add
another graphics card should the need arise in the future.
The machine stood 5th in performance scores. It failed to
run the 3DMark 2005 benchmark, because it requires DirectX 9 support, which is
not there in the hardware. The system comes with standard driver and software
disks that also let you recover the system should it crash. Overall, it's an
average machine.
Zenith 6D
Quick Specs |
Price: Rs. 26,500 |
This is another P4 3 GHz machine based on a 915 chipset
with 256 MB RAM, 40 GB IDE HDD, and a CD-ROM. These are fairly ordinary specs.
It ships with a 17” Flat CRT Monitor. The motherboard has 4 DIMM slots and
2PCI slots. There are no PCI-E or AGP slots available. It has the usual six USB
ports, four of which are on the rear, while two are on the front panel for
convenience. The audio jacks are also there on the front panel.
It performed well in our benchmarks and managed to get
second highest scores in PCMark04.it got a fourth spot in our performance
section. It has a warranty of 1 year, but Zenith also provides warranty of 3
years at 5% extra cost. The price of the OS is extra, so you can choose what
you'd like installed on the machine. An average machine, but with some good
features like a large monitor and warranty.
Zenith 8D
Quick Specs |
Price: Rs. 28,100 |
This machine scores much better on features compared to the
6D. It has the same P4 2.6 GHz processor, but a 945G motherboard. It has 256 MB
DDR2 400 MHz memory and an 80 GB SATA drive, The system has only a regular
CD-Drive. It shipped with a 15” LCD monitor. Plus, it also has 2 PCI, one PCI-E
X4 and a PCI-E X16 slot. So you can add better graphics later. Both USB ports
and audio jacks have also been provided on the front panel for added
convenience. This is one of the better machines when it comes to features.
The machine's performance wasn't as impressive as the
others, possibly because it uses an older 945 chipset based motherboard.
So if you're looking for a regular PC that is feature
rich and economical, then this could be your one of your options. How ever, keep
in mind the one year warranty while making the purchase.
Anubhav Verma, Swapnil Arora, and Abe Kurian