The iBuypower Gamer Paladin 998 finds itself in the middle of starter gaming PCs and high end gaming machines. It exactly belongs to neither of the two categories. That is why it finds itself in the middle of the two categories of gaming machines, both in terms of performance and pricing. But for many game freaks, it might just be the right gaming device. Housed in a neat black Cooler Master HAF 932 case, the iBuypower Gamer Paladin 998 is designed for maximum airflow over the components.
The machine has space for up to five hard drives and up to six optical drives. The computer is powered with a gigabyte motherboard with DDR3 support, an Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550 processor, an 800W power supply, and an ATI Radeon HD 4870 X2 graphics card. As the features users can also put another PCIe X16 graphics card. An additional PCIe X2 card, two PCI cards, and two additional DDR3 DIMMs can also be housed on the machine.
The computer includes a read-only Blu-ray drive. This enables the user to watch movies but not burn BD-R discs. The hidden routing internal cables give a neat and clean look to the machine’s chassis. The side of the machine houses 12 USB 2.0 ports, 2 FireWire ports, and 2 eSATA ports. An external hard drive power port also rests at the same place. The fans in the machine run slower and quieter than the normal 80mm fans. The liquid cooling system of the Paladin 998’s Q9550 processor prevents it from overclocking all the time. The processor supplies extraordinary speed during applications. The speed ranges from 40 seconds in Windows Media Encoding and 24 seconds in Photoshop. The dual-GPU ATI Radeon HD 4870 X2 card in the Paladin gives it a better gaming performance than its competitors.
At a reasonable price of $1999, the iBuypower Gamer Paladin 998 is not as expensive as the gaming machines that cost around $5,000. But it sure matches their performance and speeds and can be a gamer’s true delight.
