CNET editors' review
CNET Editors' ChoiceJan 09-
CNET editors' rating:
stars
Excellent
Detailed editors' rating
- Reviewed on: 01/27/2009
- Released on: 12/01/2008
Even though lots of vendors offer the capability, we've resisted reviewing a three-way SLI PC until now. Our hesitation had to do with a desire to keep the high-end PCs we reviewed at or around the $6,000 mark, hard to do with $1,800 worth of graphics cards alone. But last November our reservations were steamrolled by a crush of new technologies. Intel's expensive solid-state hard drives proved too enticing for gaming PC vendors, and by supporting triple channel memory, Intel's Core i7 chips invited loads of pricey high performance RAM. As a result, we agreed to review Falcon Northwest's $8,000 Mach V back in November, and it's also why we let Maingear submit this triple-SLI $8,798 Ephex desktop. That price makes this Maingear the most expensive desktop we've ever reviewed. Provided you have that kind of commitment to PC gaming, you'll find the Ephex delivers an exceptional entertainment experience.
By giving the Ephex a $4,600 price tag for its most basic configuration, Maingear seems to be making a distinct effort to put its flagship PC out of reach for most gamers. And as expensive as it sounds, even our $8,800 model lacked features such as a mouse and a keyboard, a monitor, or extras such as a Bigfoot Killer NIC, a Wi-Fi adapter, or speakers. On the flipside, you can shed $1,100 off the price of the system if you opt out of the fancy paint job and the transparent side panel. None of this is to say that value is a primary concern in reviewing this PC, but if all you care about is clean design and performance, you can get all of this configuration's core functionality for less.
Like most boutique PC vendors, Maingear pays special attention to the design and wiring of its systems, and if the build quality of this Ephex is any indication, Maingear has shown that it can rival the meticulousness of Falcon Northwest. The liquid cooling plates on the graphics cards hardware obstruct the free card expansion slots, but that's our only major complaint. Adding hard drives is simple with outward facing drive bays, and overall both the external and internal appearance of the system show that it was assembled with great care.
| Maingear Ephex | Falcon Northwest Mach V | |
| Price | $8798 | $8,028 |
| Motherboard chipset | Intel X58 | Intel X58 |
| CPU | 3.925GHz Intel Core i7-965 Extreme Edition (overclocked) | 3.79GHz Intel Core i7-965 Extreme Edition (overclocked) |
| Memory | 12GB 1,600MHz DDR3 SDRAM | 12GB 1,066MHz DDR3 SDRAM |
| Graphics | (3) 1GB Nvidia GeForce GTX 280 | (2) 1GB ATI Radeon HD 4870 X2 |
| Hard drives | 80GB Intel X-25M solid state hard drive; (2) 1TB 7,200 rpm Western Digital hard drives | 80GB Intel X-25M solid state drive; 1TB 7,200 rpm Hitachi hard drive |
| Optical drive | 20x dual-layer DVD burner with LightScribe; 4x dual-layer Blu-ray burner | 20x dual-layer DVD burner with LightScribe; 4x dual-layer Blu-ray burner |
| Networking | Gigabit Ethernet | Gigabit Ethernet |
| Operating system | Windows Vista Ultimate SP1 64-bit | Windows Vista Ultimate SP1 64-bit |
It's almost silly to talk about this system from a value standpoint given its price tag, but we'll do it anyway, comparing it with Falcon Northwest's recent Editors' Choice winning Mach V. One of the complications of reviewing PCs in this price range is that by assuming potential buyers have the means to spend near-unlimited funds to get the best hardware, it's easy for one vendor to trump another by simply ensuring that its rig has more features than the last high-end PC we reviewed, regardless of cost.
For the sake of making this an apples-to-apples comparison, we configured a Mach V from Falcon as closely as we could to the Maingear Ephex and came up with an $8,753 system with two GeForce GTX 295 cards (which are also an option from Maingear). Falcon has no tri-SLI option, and without testing we don't want to speculate which configuration would be faster. Suffice it to say, we find Maingear's asking price for this system right in line with similar configurations from other vendors.
(Shorter bars indicate better performance)
(Shorter bars indicate better performance)
(Shorter bars indicate better performance)
(Longer bars indicate better performance)
 |
Rendering Multiple CPUs | |
Rendering Single CPU |
That brings us to performance. As you might expect, the more aggressive overclocking, the speedier memory, and the powerful graphics hardware serve the Maingear Ephex well on our benchmarks compared with the Falcon Northwest system. The Cinebench test provides evidence that you really do get more performance from the Maingear's more aggressive overclocking. Because overclocking is tied so closely to the specific tolerance of each individual CPU, the speeds on display here may vary from both vendors in any hardware you purchase. In either case, by overclocking Intel's already impressive Core i7 965 Extreme Edition chip, both Maingear and Falcon Northwest have produced some of the fastest benchmark scores we've ever seen.
(Longer bars indicate better performance)
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1,920 x 1,200 | |
1,280 x 1,024 |
(Longer bars indicate better performance)
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1,600 x 1,200 (high, 4x aa) | |
1,280 x 1,024 (medium, 4x aa) |
At this point our Unreal Tournament 3 test is laughably easy for these high-end PCs, and we're working on phasing it out in favor of Far Cry 2. Once we get enough test results on that game we can switch over, but for the moment, about all we can say is that you'll have no problem playing older PC games on the Maingear Ephex.
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