UK's cheapest Dual Core PC tested

DELL'S relationship with its UK customers has been very good and has forced prices downwards and performance in the other direction. I managed to get my hands on one of its machines in the form of a Dell Dimension 5150 computer. The 5150 is situated above the Dimension 3100 and the 1100 which are dirt cheap so to say. The model which I've tested comes with a Dual Core Pentium D 820 processor. The rest of the specs are fairly impressive, given the price £297.08+VAT - I must say though that the freight adds a hefty £51.06+VAT - although I suspect that a fraction of it might be going towards helping Dell's bottom line.

So what did Dell throw in the bag. Well, you get a Windows XP Media Centre Edition, free 15-month McAfee Security Software, a 19-inch LCD monitor with a thin bezel, 512MB DDR2 memory - Dell is currently offering 1024MB for the same price, a 16x DVD ROM, a 80GB SATA HDD, DVD software, a scroll mouse and a QuietKey keyboard - I would argue whether it is really quiet; by my low standards though, it is a pretty good keyboard and importantly more compact than my previous encounters. But that's not all obviously; You get trial version of the latest Corel Paintshop Pro software, MS Work 7.0, Photo Album SE, 60 days access to Dell's learning centre, plus a free Dell 725 colour printer. I call it a disposable printer since the price of the ink cartridge itself could buy a new printer. Still usable though.

Other interesting stuff includes loads of cables, a few CDROMs and manuals and plenty of recycling cardboard. The system comes with an Intel 945G Express chipset - which supports RAID 1 - with an integrated video module based on Intel's GMA 950 and the motherboard offers 7.1 Dolby Digital sound capabilities although surprisingly, there are not seven outputs to match it. That's on top of the two free PCI, the PCIe x1 and the PCIe X16 slots. There are seven USB 2.0 ports in all including two in front - as well as audio sockets, plus the usual integrated Ethernet one. No media card reader, floppy disk drives, USB cable for the printer, modem or speakers. I keep the best for last.

The Dimension 5150 is actually housed in an Arctic Silver and Alpine White BTX chassis - that's from Dell's literature. It is way cooler than all cases I've used until now. There is an air vent which cools the whole system. As for the noise, well, it is quite difficult to say whether the system is actually working or not when it is switched on. It is by far, the most silent system I've ever encountered, a far cry from the Toshiba Equium E60 laptop I once owned.

The 19-inch monitor is actually the E193FP model which is a basic 19-inch LCD model without any bells-and-whistles; 1280x1024 pixels, 500:1 contrast ratio, 8ms response time, internal power supply and a light 4.1 Kg weight. It is still a capable display unit which rivals the EIZO Flexscan L680 that I use daily, in terms of brightness and refresh rates. Plus the thin bezel and the aesthetics make it more attractive overall than the Flexscan. There's no DVI ports on this one though which might annoy some of you but the controls are very simple and ideally situated.

I did no benchmark since I did not think this was actually worth it for objectively, this is fantastic value for money. Let's think about it. For £297 plus P&P and VAT (£399 all inclusive), you get what is essentially a Dual Processor system, 512MB RAM, 80GB HDD, a 19-inch TFT screen, a colour printer plus a one year Collect and Return and the peace of mind of a brand name - Dell won't disappear overnight like Time or Tiny. You have to wonder how Dell makes money on deals like that. Funnily, they are offering the Pentium 4 640 - 3.2GHz with 2MB cache and HT - as an upgrade to the Pentium D 820 - which comes with two 2.8GHz core, 2MB cache and a 800MHz FSB. Dell must have snatched quite a good deal on those dual cores as it costs Intel more to produce them.

The competition at this price range is non-existent. You simply can't find a dual core at this price, let alone one with Windows XP Media Centre and a 19-inch LCD. For the same price, PC World sells a 2.8GHz Celeron D system with a 14-inch TFT, clearly no match. So I wondered how much it would cost to build it. Here is the break down of prices according to a popular price search engine: P D 820 - £152.56, DVD ROM - £12.50, Motherboard - £42.24 , 80GB HDD - £26.21, Printer - £17.99, Keyboard and Mouse - £5.88, Monitor - £144.51, Windows MCE - £81.08, Memory - £23.02, Casing - £17.10. Grand Total - £523 including VAT and excluding P&P. Don't even bother to go on Ebay. So except if you want to build your computer by yourself or want to spend more - more than an excess £100 - than one would possibly recommend, it seems that it would better or even desirable to buy a ready made computer complete with after sales warranty. ?