System setup and notes
Hardware and Software
Test Platforms
| MV Cubik GamePro System | Dell XPS Gen-4 System | |
| Processor(s) | AMD Athlon 64 3500+ (Winchester core) 2.2GHz | Intel Pentium 4 560 - 3.6GHz |
| Mainboard | Shuttle SN95G5 chassis (FN95 m/b) | Dell i925X |
| Memory | 1GByte (2x512MB) Corsair XMS3200C2PT | 1GByte (2x512MB) Infineon DDR2-PC4300 | Memory timings | 3-3-3-8 | 4-4-4-12 |
| Graphics Card | Inno3D GeForce 6800 GT 256MB - AGP - ForceWare 71.89 | ATI RADEON X850 XT PE 256MB - PEG16X - CATALYST 5.3 | Disk Drive | Hitachi Desktar 7K250 250GB SATA | Maxtor MaxLineII 250GB SATA |
| BIOS Version | 10/08/2004 | 21/02/2005 |
| Operating System | Windows XP Home w/SP2 | Windows XP Professional w/SP2 |
| Price | £1,129 inc. VAT (base unit) | £1,799 inc. VAT (inc. 19" CRT and Creative speakers |
Benchmark Software
HEXUS Pifast Benchmark
ScienceMark 2.0 (7th February 2005)
Realstorm 2004
CINEBENCH 2003 multi-CPU render
HEXUS.in-house MP3 Encoding Benchmark using LAME 3.97a (Intel HT compiler) - 701MB WAV
picCOLOR 32-bit v4.0
KribiBench v1.1.9
Microsoft Movie Maker 2.1
USB2.0 transfer test
DOOM 3 Timedemo 1
3DMark05 v1.2.0
3DMark2001SE b330
UT2003 Bot Match
Notes
No problems to report during a weekend of usage. MV has taken a proven platform and assembled a PC that's as stable as any other system I've tested. As a performance comparison, and perhaps somewhat unfair, is a top-of-the-line Dell Dimension XPS Gen-4 that features a Pentium 4 560 CPU, ATI's excellent X850 XT PE PCI-Express video card, and 1GB of PC4300 DDR2. It's a full-blown tower that weighs in at around 18KG, so it's on the opposite end of the physical scale to the 7KG MV Cubik GamePro. The £1,799 asking price, albeit with 19" CRT and Creative speakers, puts it a notch or two above the Cubik's immediate competition, too.
Overclocking
Hopes were high that the combination of Athlon 64 3500+ Winchester CPU and NVIDIA nForce3 Ultra would yield an impressive FSB-overclocking result. CPU voltage was raised to 1.55v, DDR was dropped to maximum memory limit of 166MHz, HT frequency reduced to 3x, and AGP locked in at 66MHz. Further, fan speed was increased to the maximum setting. Imagine the surprise, or shock, of tinkering with the system for 30 minutes and only achieving a maximum, stable overclock of 221MHz, equating to around 2430MHz. Performance for free, sure, but lower than the 2500MHz+ that I presumed was a given. The usual caveats apply. This sample probably isn't indicative of SN95G5's in general. Indeed, reports of 250MHz+ are common.