Mick Lockey
FreewayTech Predator ZB800
The Predator is sheathed in an aluminum case with a teal-accented front panel. Its side panel has a flower-petal design etched in a clear window so you can peek inside the system's interior.The 18-inch ViewSonic VG800 LCD monitor handled our image-quality tests with aplomb when set at its native resolution of 1280 by 1024. In photo tests, colors looked vivid, and text looked sharp on both a newsletter and a screen with a variety of typefaces, even down to the smallest font sizes.Gamers will like the system's ATI Radeon 9700 Pro graphics card and its 128MB of DDR memory, currently number four on our Top 10 Graphics Board chart. Frame rates were solid, hitting around 100 fps or above at all resolutions in our tests, and game play looked smooth and colorful. When not used as a gaming machine, this well-priced system could double as a video editing workhorse, thanks to the Toshiba DVD-RW drive and colossal 200GB hard drive, not to mention the two FireWire ports (one on front and one on back) to quickly load video from the digital camcorder to the PC.Our test unit didn't include a set of speakers, an obvious oversight for a system aimed at gamers. (You can add a Creative Inspire 5.1 5700 six-speaker setup for an additional $219 when configuring the system at the company's Web site.) Plus, we expected a better software bundle; the titles in our unit included only an application for recording DVD and CD-R discs.FreewayTech's nine-hour weekday tech support is paltry compared to other vendors' offerings. Many companies provide round-the-clock technical support.
Powered by a 2.4-GHz Pentium 4 CPU and 512MB of PC800 RDRAM, this Predator earned a score of 119 on PC WorldBench 4, about average for PCs with similar configurations and running the Windows XP Professional operating system.The eight open drive bays (four externally accessible) are probably more than you'll ever be able to use. The system has a total of five PCI slots, only one of which was open in our test configuration.The Microsoft Internet keyboard is wide and offers a broad space bar. While it includes hot-keys for launching Internet-related applications, it lacks keys for adjusting volume levels.
Despite some minor omissions, the Predator ZB2800 offers a solid mix of gaming and video editing features at a reasonable price.
| Buying Information |
| FreewayTech Predator ZB800 PC WorldBench4 score of 119, 2.8-GHz Pentium 4 CPU, 512MB of DDR800 RDRAM, Windows XP Home, 200GB hard drive, 16X DVD-ROM drive, 12XDVD-ROM/16X/12X/40X CD-RW drive, ATI Radeon 9700 Pro graphics card with 128MB of DDR SDRAM, 18-inch Viewsonic VG800 LCD monitor, Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy sound card, network adapter, midsize tower case; 3-year parts and labor warranty; lifetime 9-hour weekday toll-free support. $ 2400 PC WorldBench4 score of 119, 2.8-GHz Pentium 4 CPU, 512MB of DDR800 RDRAM, Windows XP Home, 200GB hard drive, 16X DVD-ROM drive, 12XDVD-ROM/16X/12X/40X CD-RW drive, ATI Radeon 9700 Pro graphics card with 128MB of DDR SDRAM, 18-inch Viewsonic VG800 LCD monitor, Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy sound card, network adapter, midsize tower case; 3-year parts and labor warranty; lifetime 9-hour weekday toll-free support. http://www.freewaytech.com 888/595-9866 |