Cyberpower Infinity X55 Pro GT Review

Performance Analysis

In our 1080p Battlefield 4 benchmark, the Infinity X55 Pro GT proved to be noticeably quicker than our standard graphics test system with a standard GTX 970 installed. A minimum frame rate of 65fps and average frame rate of 78fps means you'll have comfortable viewing even if you crank up all the settings to maximum. This was also nearly twice as fast as the PC Specialist Apollo 703, equipped with a GTX 960. At the same ultra detail settings, it was again more than happy to run at 1440p as well, with a minimum frame rate of 42fps way above our minimum. Using a GTX 970 for 4K gaming is cutting things very fine, which is why we only test at 4K with GTX 980-based systems and above.

You'll likely have to drop a few settings to get playable frame rates here - our standard graphics test system usually returns results around the 25fps mark with GTX 970s so you can expect between 25-30fps minimum with the Infinity X55 Pro GT. Sadly Crysis refused to play ball despite numerous attempts to get it working on Windows 10 so we've had to skip it for this review. Switching to Unigine Valley, the Infinity X55 Pro GT scored similarly to other GTX 970-based results we have with a score of 2,679. The Utopia Pandora, which sported a GTX 980, managed 3,197, while the GTX 960-based PC Specialist Apollo 703 scored 1,756.


The overclocked Skylake CPU returned some useful numbers in our benchmarks too, coming close to the top spot in the PCMark 8 video editing test and was the fastest Core i5 result on test in the photo editing test too - only systems with eight or more threads were faster. The system put in a fantastic result in Terragen of 379, which was a match for several previous generation Core i7 CPUs, although the latter were noticeably faster in Cinebench.

As expected, with a monster SSD at the helm, the storage benchmarks were mightily impressive, with the results all but matching Samsung's claimed figures, with a read speed of 1,607MB/sec and write speed of 664MB/sec. These were matched by chart-topping results in the PCMark 8 storage tests too. The system was certainly very quiet under full load, and the CPU only reached 85°C in our 24°C lab in Prime95, with Unigine Valley running at the same time seeing the GPU max out at 77°C. Both within during what is pretty much a worst case scenario.

Conclusion

As always with a pre-built PC, the value involved is key and the Infinity X55 Pro GT delivers a solid offering that will save you quite a few notes in hardware costs alone, not to mention the fact the CPU comes pre-overclocked to 4.4GHz, several games are thrown in and you get an extensive three-year warranty. The raw specification is full of good choices too. The SM951 SSD makes great use of the extra bandwidth provided by the Z170 chipset and it's great to see this in the first Intel Z170 system to arrive in our lab. However, it's also the only sticking point with this system. 128GB really isn't enough space - certainly not what we'd want from a £1,000 PC. It's clearly been used to keep the price below £1,000, but the fact is it's not really enough for modern games if the OS is on there too. For example, GTA V, Battlefield 4 and Crysis 3 would bring the total used space to 100GB and that's without taking the OS and any other programs into account. The extra hard disk storage is welcome, but in this day and age, you ideally want to store your OS, games and programs on an SSD. As it stands, 128GB will only suit those that use their PC for gaming and nothing else and prefer to have just two or three top titles installed at any one time.

The more reasonably-sized 256GB model will see the system price increase by £66 (this is worth paying if you want faster than SATA 6Gbps speeds but need more space) while ditching the SM951 and opting for a 250GB Samsung 850 EVO doubles your storage space and actually saves you £25. While it's not as fast as the SM951, the difference won't be that noticeable outside of benchmarks. It's great to see a PC builder that's aware of next-gen storage options though and offering flexible ways for you to include them so Cyberpower should be commended for having its finger on the pulse of the PC industry. Cyberpower's configurator is brilliant too so we can't get too hung up here - you can easily swap to a larger SSD and for not a lot more cash, or switch to SATA 6Gbps instead. The SM951 might not be the best option for a £1,000 PC, but if you can stretch to the 256GB version, the Infinity X55 Pro GT is a great example of a super-fast, modern, 1440p-capable gaming PC that makes real use of Intel's new platform.