Product Reviews

This first entry in our Labs for Midlands-based Multivision is clearly trying to make an impression with a slightly bizarre case and snazzy monitor.

Features

The Fujitsu hard disk offers a decent 19Gb of storage, while the 12-speed DVD drive also spins CD-ROMs at 40-speed. The Samsung CD-R/W drive can burn CD-Rs at 8-speed, better than the CD writers in the Atlas and the Mesh. Sound is built into the motherboard, and output to a set of Labtec LCS-2414 speakers. The subwoofer is well made, but its satellites are too small to make a great

Ergonomics

The monitor's slotted shadow mask tube produced a picture of excellent brightness and sharpness. The OSD buttons are in a circle around the 'on' switch, and are heat-sensitive - space age stuff. The Microsoft Internet keyboard, equipped with extra shortcut keys, is excellent - as is the IntelliMouse. The case is not so great. Its power buttons are on the top - we placed a box on it and sent the PC straight into standby mode!

Expansion

Five of the motherboard's six PCI slots are free, and there's an old style ISA slot thrown in too. Two DIMMs can be added to the 128Mb memory already fitted. One 3.5in and one 5.25in external drive bay are free, but sadly no internal bays is.

Performance

The Athlon 900 and GeForce2 MX graphics ensure a strong 2D score of 3378. But in 3DMark, the system wouldn't perform nearly as well as it ought to, despite lengthy testing. The score of 2046 may have been down to a faulty motherboard.

Overall

An average machine for this Labs. The core spec is reasonable, but what stands out is the odd case and the disppointing 3D result.