Like any SFF machine, the FragBox Pro offers little in the way of upgradability. While this might frustrate those of you looking to add extended media functionality such as a TV-tuner card or a larger hard drive, at least you can customize external components. Thermal issues complicate small-form-factor (SFF) case assembly, which is one of the main reasons Falcon offers only one core configuration for the FragBox Pro. Of course, we saw this case-a rebranded Ice Cube IC-VL67 from First International Computer-last year in the original FragBox. Decked out in clear Lucite with blue fluorescent lighting, it's dressed for a social outing, and the built-in handle invites you to grab it and go. The $2,285 (with peripherals) small-footprint, lightweight Falcon Northwest FragBox Pro just begs to accompany you to your next LAN party. The Falcon Northwest FragBox Pro is a great, easy-to-tote gaming system that can also double as a space-saving primary PC when you're not racking up kills. You can find faster processors than the FragBox Pro's 2.8GHz Pentium 4, but the system's 256MB BFG Asylum GeForce FX 5950 Ultra graphics card helped it turn in excellent frame rates on our 3D tests. (With a bundled 15-inch LCD, a keyboard, a mouse, and headphones, the cost of our test system totaled $2,285.) The locked configuration updates the original FragBox, but without the ability to customize, the FragBox Pro is not quite as versatile as some other small-form-factor (SFF) PCs we've seen, such as the Polywell Qbox 865T. It’s not inexpensive, but its performance and unobtrusive nature are sure to impress.Weighing only 14 pounds, with a tiny footprint and a built-in handle, the $1,695 Falcon Northwest FragBox Pro will interest the nomadic LAN-party set. Overall, the Tiki offers excellent performance for its size, is amazingly power efficient, and is nearly quiet running in your home office. The net result is amazingly little noise, even under full load. The CPU cooling fan is actually mounted into the case side, and is part of an Asetek sealed liquid CPU cooler. The small chassis precludes significant internal expansion, but it does have space for a second 2.5-inch storage device, and Falcon Northwest will happily sell you a pair of 512GB SSDs in that space-if you’re willing to pony up the cost. Windows 7 Pro or Ultimate are added cost options, as are the several flavors of Microsoft Office. Windows 7 Home Premium 圆4 edition is the standard operating system. So you drop the disk vertically into the slot.įalcon Northwest ships Cyberlink’s PowerDVD 11 with its Blu-ray-equipped systems, which takes care of Blu-ray movie playback. It’s mounted in an unusual location: on the top of the system, assuming you stand the Tiki on its granite base. The optical drive is a low-profile, slot-load type commonly used in laptops. The Tiki includes one 3.5-inch storage bay and two 2.5-inch storage slots. It’s still pretty remarkable performance for a system built into a chassis just 4 inches by 13.25 inches by 13.5 inches. The highly demanding Metro 2033 ran at 28 fps, while the more recent DiRT Showdown eked out 33 fps. Even so, you may need to dial back detail levels on some games. Crysis 2 ran at 62 fps Batman: Arkham Asylum, at 94 fps and DiRT3, at 105 fps. Game benchmarks at 1920-by-1200-pixel resolution, with 4x antialiasing enabled, certainly impressed. The system generated a score of 177 on PCWorld’s WorldBench 7 benchmark suite, which is respectable for a system with this CPU in a compact system. Even under full gaming load, pushing the 4.3GHz overclocked Core i7-3770K and GTX 680 all out, the overall power consumption was only 231W. During game testing, the Tiki idled at just 58W. The X51 required an external power brick, but the Tiki includes a 450W, 80-plus bronze certified power supply. The Tiki is also completely self-contained, despite being roughly the same size as the Alienware X51.
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