Evesham Evolution 3 review

Can you believe it? We've crossed the 3GHz barrier already, and I hadn't even decided whether I wanted a 2GHz system or not. Evesham and Dell are among the first to market, but you have to pay for it at the moment - £1,999 for the Evesham Evolution 3 to be precise.

This, again, is the unfortunate downside of buying into Intel's latest and greatest. With a 3.06GHz processor, 512MB of PC2700 memory, two 80GB hard disks in RAID formation and an equally inflated price, the Evolution 3 ought to be the fastest system on the planet. Unfortunately, in terms of raw 2D performance, it isn't.

The overall 2D benchmark score of 1.74 is undoubtedly fast, but it's eclipsed by the1.84 from the £1,099 Mesh Matrix XP 2700+RD97 (see Reviews, issue 98, p128) based on a significantly lower-clocked 2.17GHz Athlon XP 2700+ with Nvidia's latest nForce2 motherboard chipset. Benchmarks don't show the whole picture though, and Intel's new Hyper-Threading technology (see Hyper-Threading: best thing since sliced thread?) can improve the performance on multithreaded applications and multitasking.

The Evesham is also faster than the Mesh in 3D, assisted in part by the processor's SSE2 instruction set, as well as the ATi Radeon 9700 graphics card. We ran 3DMark2001 SE at 1,024 x 768 in 32-bit colour and got a proud score of 14,901. It's faster than necessary at 1,280 x 1,024 too, but its score of 12,387 shows you can play the latest and future games comfortably at the monitor's native resolution. This is great, as the LG 1810B is a great-quality and stylish TFT. Its viewing angles are superb, and the image is bright and sharp.

What's more, the Evesham is brimming with features in every other area. Just take the hard disk setup - there's not one but two 80GB 7,200rpm Western Digital WD800BB hard disks attached to the Gigabyte GA8PE667 Ultra motherboard's RAID controller, which means fast performance and enough space for all the applications and file storage you'll ever need.

This will be particularly useful for the video-editing enthusiasts, as will the LG combo drive for creating DVDs and large-scale backup to DVD-R, DVD-RAM and CDs. There's even the provision of a FireWire-compatible SB1394 port on the Sound Blaster Audigy, along with several USB 2 ports, which means you can hook up high-speed external peripherals easily.

Meanwhile, the Audigy is perfectly complemented by the Creative Inspire 5300 speakers, providing kicking surround sound for games and DVD movies. They're not as impressive as those supplied with the Dell Dimension 8250 (see right) in terms of size and sound quality, but they do the job nonetheless.

A two-year, on-site warranty comes with the Evesham as standard, with a third year of return-to-base cover to see the machine through a three-year lifespan. All of this makes for a well-rounded package with all the performance and modern extras you need, but there's one major drawback - price.

For £1,999, you'd at least expect Windows XP Professional and Microsoft Works Suite 2003, but you only get XP Home and the basic, if capable, Ability Office 2002. Evesham has produced a fine PC, and Intel has shown some impressive technology with Hyper-Threading, but if outright speed is your main priority opt for a cheaper Athlon XP 2700+ and nForce2-based PC for the moment.

Author: Ben Hardwidge