Dell XPS 710 H2C review

Average user rating

8.0

excellent

Average user rating from 3 users

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Dell XPS 710 H2C user reviews

May 1, 2007

Posted by: Ryan_L

"Almost, but not quite"

What I like:

Design & simplistic size is enough to make you wet your pants & hand over your wallet

What I don't like:

Hugely expensive, temperamental to crashing constantly, built like a Dell (i.e. badly)

Review:

Let me get one thing straight early on, I like this computer (or should I say nuclear powered, kick boxing Black Mamba); in fact I so badly wanted to come and describe it as phenominal. But it just isnt.....I feel disappointed.

The H2C looks incredible, night or day. Its larger then most cars, has a specification that at least on paper causes its competitors to simply curl up in a corner and weep uncontrollably; and consumes more electricity than most major South American cities. Dell have definitely pushed out all the stops with this creation, allowing frame rates, rendering times & multiprocessing to break new records. The XPS range can finally enter into the Direct X 10, Quad-Core, MacPro world all us gamers demand.

BUT (and its a big one) H2C still fails to meet expectations let alone surpass them with a system of this price! Firstly, its built like a Dell..i.e. badly; with poor quality wiring, disk drives made from the cheapest of Chinese plastics and general fittings not up to par. Secondly, is the systems instability. I have had it for over 3 months now and I have lost count of the number of restarts, shutdowns, CTRL+ALT+DELETES I have done. Games shutdown unexpectally & BLUE SCREENS with graphics driver errors are a common sight.

But probably the biggest upset has been its performance. Yes with the Half Life's, Battlefield's and even Oblivion's of the gaming world, it has no problems. FSX is a different story with jittery frame rates at max resolution, slow responses. Playing Test Drive Unlimited is near impossible with STOP START part of the experience.

I am going on a bit but unlike other 'review' sites, I am tell the perspective of a real world user. Dont get me wrong, the H2C is a hysterically fast computer be it for video editing, current gen gaming & multiple program use. However I always thought it would be faster, free of problems......my mistake.

With Vista arriving asap and the impending launch of Direct X10 games, I hope this £6000 machine will start to impress...justify its price......even though simular power is available for 1/2 if u DIY!

Conclusion: A beautiful, fast, some may say dangerous machine only reserved for a select few. Yet with its dependance on the awful XP OS & slightly nubb real world gaming performance.....thinking twice about becoming an XPSer has become a real possibility.