Computer Planet Nvidia Battlebox Review

Performance Analysis

We've added a couple of new benchmarks to our PC testing, including 4K resolution game tests in Battlefield 4 and Crysis 3, along with the latest version of Cinebench - R15 and a more up-to-date version of Planetside's Terragen, which now stands at version 3. As such, we have limited comparison numbers for these tests but where we could we've included results from one of our other overclocked test systems.


First up then is Terragen 3, where our demanding test loads all of the CPU cores to 100% to deal with the render file and we have yet to see a CPU break the six minute mark - something even a 4.6GHz Core i7-4960X Extreme Edition failed to achieve. However, thanks to the Core i7-4770K's Hyper-Threaded cores and overclock, it wasn't too far off with 396 seconds, although this is still nearly a minute and a half behind the more expensive CPU.


There was plenty to be happy about in our image editing test, though, where the Battlebox came top, beating the last PC we looked at - the Utopia Ballista Limited Edition and adding nearly 20 per cent to the score of a stock speed score of a Core i7-4770K. The Battlebox was also blisteringly fast in our video encoding test, again out-stripping a stock speed Core i7-4770K by a large margin.

Our multi-tasking test takes into account many different factors including memory speed, hard disk access as well as raw power and the Battlebox once again managed a high-table result in our tests, although the Utopia Ballista Limited Edition was slightly faster here thanks to its 2,133MHz memory. Overall, the Battlebox was just three points behind the Utopia system, coming second in our graph.


In Cinebench, the only CPUs to out-strip the Battlebox were the super-expensive LGA2011 models - the Intel Core i7-3960X Extreme Edition and Intel Core i7-3960X Extreme Edition. Considering they retail for several times the price of the Battlebox's Core i7-4770K, it managed to keep pace fairly well with a score of 9.70 compared to the top score of the overclocked Intel Core i7-3960X Extreme Edition at 13,87 - that's two additional CPU cores gets you. It was a similar result in Cinebench R11.5

Finally on to our game tests and if you're in the market for a 4K monitor, you'll certainly want to add the Battlebox to your shortlist of PCs to handle the latest games at this resolution. In Battlefield 4, it managed a minimum frame rate of 31fps at 5,760 x 1,080 - our triple 1080p setup using Nvidia Surround. This is a massive 10fps or around 50 per cent faster than our test system with a single GeForce GTX 780 Ti 3GB. Switching to our 4K monitor but dropping anti-aliasing from the settings, the frame rate held steady at 32fps - both results well within playable levels and actually providing a fair amount of headroom.

Crysis 3 was another tough customer at these kind of resolutions, but the Battlebox managed a minimum frame rate of 37fps on our three-screen Surround setup, falling to a still very healthy 30fps at 4K, with both results a huge improvement over our single GPU test system. At full load, using Prime95 and Unigene's Valley benchmark to stress the system, we saw a peak power draw of 501W. However, this did raise our only issue with the system which was the Corsair HX PSU.

It proved to be very noisy during extended testing, with its fan out-blasting the noise the two graphics cards made during our stress test. This was a shame as at other times, the system was blissfully quiet. The cooling system kept the CPU very cool indeed, with a delta T of 52°C and a peak GPU delta T of 59°C (the absolute temperatures being 75°C and 82°C respectively).


Conclusion

Computer Planet's take on Nvidia's Battlebox looks absolutely fantastic. The acrylic case is solid and impeccably well-made by Parvum Systems and the fact that you can customise it is an added bonus. The only fly in the ointment is the Corsair HX PSU, which did make quite a racket even at moderate system loads. However, looking around on various forums it appears this might be a general issue with certain models in the HX range as other models of Corsair's otherwise highly-acclaimed power supplies have been very quiet in our experience. In any event, it's a single-click job to change to another PSU in Computer Planet's system configurator so solving the issues is easy.

There are faster CPUs out there too, but only if you start looking at the far more expensive LGA2011 models, which will likely see a substantial price hike in the overall cost of the system. If you're desperate for the extra grunt in multi-threaded software, there are micro-ATX LGA2011 motherboards out there too meaning Computer Planet could in theory bow to your demands. Its the game tests where the Battlebox really shines, though, and even though it used two GeForce GTX 780 3GB's instead of the newer 'Ti' model, it still battered Crysis 3 and Battlefield 4 into submission, even at 4K and maximum settings, making it the fastest gaming PC bit-tech has ever tested. PS4 and Xbox One, eat your heart out.