Systems and Servers

STATE-OF-THE-ART DESKTOP Gateway 700C Deluxe The Gateway 700C Deluxe isn't the absolute fastest PC we've ever seen, but it's awfully close. A mere 4 percent slower than the Dell Dimension 8200, the cost savings ($440 less based on a comparable configuration) more than makes up for a performance differential you'll never even notice. Even the bare-minimum specs are impressive: 1.8GHz Pentium 4, 256MB of RDRAM, and a 40GB hard disk. A few tweaks here and there and we had a 2GHz system with 80GB of hard disk space, a CD-RW drive, and DVD for only $1,628. While the 700C screams on benchmarks, it's also a pleasure to work with. Gateway's new case design is stylish without calling too much attention to itself—a beige-and-gray box with plenty of expandability and standard front-side USB ports. If money is no object, the Dell Dimension 8200 is an excellent choice for a high-end PC. But in today's tight economy, who couldn't use a little extra pocket cash? Starts at $1,099 / Gateway / (888) 851-7359 / www.gateway.com (Tested March 2002)

LOW-COST DESKTOP   ABS Jaguar ABS may not have the powerhouse name of Dell, Compaq, or Hewlett-Packard, but the company's computers deserve a close look. For about $1,000, ABS will give you a system packed to the gills with an Athlon XP 1900+, 256MB of DDR SDRAM, DVD and CD-RW drives, a 64MB video card, networking and a modem, standard, plus a FireWire port and eight USB ports—four of which are configured for the new, high-speed USB 2.0 standard. The blazing fast SCSI hard drive holds 60GB of data. The system powered through our benchmarks, beating all comers in both business apps and multimedia functions. You'll definitely notice the speed, too. Applications load in the blink of an eye. It stands as one of the best computer systems we've ever used, and we love the price. Starts at $999 / ABS / (800) 876-8088 / www.buyabs.com (Tested June 2002)

SOHO SERVER Compaq ProLiant ML370 G2 The cornerstone of any small business is the file server, and the Compaq ProLiant series is still the best thing going when if comes to reliability, scalability, and price/performance. Our favorite low-end model is the ML370 G2, the upgrade to Compaq's popular ML370 model. Central to the server is a dual processor motherboard, starting with one or two 1.13GHz or 1.27GHz Pentium III CPUs. The model's 256MB of RAM is the bare minimum but is upgradable to 6GB in its six DIMM slots. There's room for six Ultra3 SCSI drives on board, for a total of up to 218GB of storage space even before you hook up external devices. A spare power supply is available, and best of all, everything is hot-pluggable or hot-swappable, even the fans—rare for a low-end server like this one. On the downside, panels don't open and components don't come out as intuitively as we'd like, despite the color-coded tabs. Also, this is a noisy server—all those fans make for quite a racket, so consider that when you decide where to locate the machine. It's hard to find a perfect competitor for the ML370 G2. The Dell PowerEdge 2500 or the IBM xSeries 240 are similar and the prices are roughly comparable at a given configuration, but the ProLiant ML370 G2 edges out the competition all around. Starts at $2,199 / Compaq / (800) 888-9909 / www.compaq.com (Tested February 2002)

Copyright © 2004 Ziff Davis Media Inc. All Rights Reserved. Originally appearing in Ziff Davis Smart Business.