If you are looking for a pc above 2grand don’t waste your money on a Pentium 4 right now. As of January 2001 the Pentium 4 does not provide you with great returns for the extreme premium you are going to pay. Why is this? Well it is because none of the software developers have started to optimize their code for the processor. For any computer to run fast it takes more than a fast processor and hard drive. The Programs must be written to take advantage of the new technology or else it would be like sticking a candle in a light socket. Sure the candle will make light, but it wont use electricity to do it.

The Stuff inside the new dell computer is top notch. This is not the source of the problem, or the reason I would not recommend the system.

This dell has fantastic memory bandwidth! This is because of the new Intel chipset using the quad pumped memory system. I wont get into details because you can read more into that on other websites. What I will tell you is that the memory system does help increase performance massively. This is a major bottleneck in many systems today.

The drawback is that it is using the RDRAM from rambus. The people in the industry have boycotted this type of memory and it is due to become archaic in the very near future with the advent of DDR ram. Rambus has gotten itself into hot water with the latest round of lawsuits so I wouldn’t put my chips down on this technology lasting a long time.

Sure you have plenty of memory bandwidth now but nothing is taking advantage of it. It would be akin to making a 6-lane highway for farmers to use in a small town. Sure there is room for growth but it is overdone. By the time the town was large enough to take full advantage of the roads the roads would be in horrible shape and have to be rebuilt. The same is applies here.

Pentium 4 benchmarks are not that impressive. The AMD chip running at 1.0 - 1.2 GHZ can best the Pentium 4 in most all CPU tests. The only benchmarks where the P4 setup really shines is in the memory intensive tasks, or directly under memory benchmarking where the processor is hardly part of the test.

To have a good machine all performance levels should be in some sort of harmony. In other words the system should not have insanely fast disk access and poor CPU performance. Or in this case, astounding memory performance and no way to use it.

The only place where this system might be of some benefit right now is in the professional graphics industry where you were using image or video editing programs that toss around huge amounts of data in ram.

For home users, you can get equally good performance out of a p3 for a long time to come. Just think, You are paying a premium for the rambus ram and the p4 processor. Sometimes as much as $500 extra for the processor and 128 Megs of ram. If you begin to add more memory to the system the difference skyrockets when compared to a p3 or athlon that runs the SDRAM memory.

Think of all the extras you could add to your system for $500 or $900. You could get a 19 or 21-inch monitor that will last for 5 or 10 years. (I think this is the smartest up grade on a computer because the monitor can always be moved computer to computer as you get new ones or update technology) You could get that top of the line graphics card, or wicked speakers. You could get any of these things with a good P3 or Athlon and still slip in under 2grand.

Bottom line, this machine is not here for the long haul. The technology in it is too new and not being used yet. It will be 6 months to a year before we see programs, which can really use this new Pentium 4 processor. By that time we will have many new processors on the market and new chipsets, which will perform even better. So there is no real value in the system.

So the expense of this computer when configured to really shine at over $2500 is not justified. You can pick up many other systems based on the Athlon or Pentium 3 processor for much cheaper prices. They will provide the same margin of performance for about the same length of time as if you purchased the P4 NOW. Sure if you are the must have it kind of person then this doesn’t mount to a hill of beans for you. However many consumers want some value out of their system and with technology moving so fast it is easy to get sucked into the newest thing and be burned 3 months later.

In 6 months the Pentium 4 may be a good buy when it is able to run on other chipsets, or perhaps be matched with a new type of memory. Don’t waste your money now! If you already have a 600 to 700mhz machine sit on your money and wait a few months. There are some very bright products coming out in the near future from both Intel and Amd.

Overall the machine is good. It IS fast, just not as fast as it should be for your hard earned cash.


Recommended: No

Amount Paid (US$): 2500
Operating System: Windows
Processor: Other
Processor speed: over 1000
RAM: 128
Internal Storage: CD-RW
Hard Drive (GB): Over 50