CyberpowerPC Gamer Ultra GUA880 Review
Michael C. Smith
- Enough real-estate for expansion
- improved performance from previous model
The CyberpowerPC Gamer Ultra GUA880 is a budget gaming system from a boutique builder. CyberpowerPC company did have to make a couple of concessions to reach this price, but they created an expandable system that will grow with your gaming prowess (and your funding). For the ‘new-eggs’ in gaming, the Gamer Ultra GUA880 is a better bet than making a purchase from one of the top five computer manufacturers and slapping a gaming card into it.
It has a speedy 3.8GHz AMD FX-4300 Quad Core Processor (4MB Cache), an ultra-fast 8GB DDR3 RAM, a subtle 1024GB 7200rpm Hard Drive and a Nvidia GT610 graphics card with 1GB of graphics memory (which is average these days for a discrete graphics card).
Design
The CyberpowerPC Gamer Ultra GUA880’s “Smilodon” (which depicts a Smilodon, aka a saber-toothed tier) which provides enough estate for more expansion, including at least three or four more hard drives, two more memory DIMMs, two more PCIe x1 cards (depending on the spacing of the graphics cards), and two more PCI cards. The case is easy to get along with, with easy to open latches.
However, you’ll need to be a bit careful with the lead wire from the case door fan.This is why mid-tower cases are popular for: future expansion. The case down sides are small case fans on the side and back of the system. They are quite loud, and though they don’t sound like jet engines, they do pump a lot of white noise into the room. To be comfortable, you’ll probably want to turn the built-in speakers up, or wear headphones while playing.
Performance
The Ultra GUA880 doesn’t blow the gaming benchmarks away, but it makes a good showing for budding gamers. It will perform well on less RAM intensive games, but playing at 1,280-by-1,024 resolutions will be jerky in most high-action situations. But you can easily get away with playing at lower resolutions or turning off some eye candy.
Most games will be abysmal at 2,560-by-1,600 resolutions, but that’s expected since you really need a high-powered dual-card system (which costs more) for good performance on a 30-inch LCD panel. what is notable about the 610GT is that it does support 30-inch panels, at least in 2D tasks such as Adobe photoshop and videos.
The GUA880 scores well on Photoshop CS2 tests, and the same can be expected on Windows Media Encoder activities. This makes the system a big deal for photography and graphic arts students or budding videographers. Its multimedia card slots and FireWire port are also good to have for the photographer or the videographer, respectively.
Conclusion
The CyberpowerPC Gamer Ultra GUA880 is a cheaply priced performance system, with lots of notable features going for it. It is a good choice for the beginning gamer or for someone who needs just a bit more oomph than they’d get with a plain old mainstream system. However, there exist other gaming PCs that outshine the Ultra GUA880, but are quite expensive.
Amazon.com
Amazon.com
Amazon.com
