Scan 3XS Cyclone PC Review

Performance Analysis

The Cyclone tore through our Media Benchmarks with as much force as its name suggests – its overall score of 2,117 is only slightly behind that of the Gladiator Titan Prometheus PC. When it came to gaming performance, the Cyclone had the edge over the Prometheus, with the heavily overclocked GTX 480 outpacing the stock-speed HD 5870.

We saw an average frame rate of 62fps in Crysis at our standard settings, and a minimum frame rate of 42fps – this is a great result, and roughly 10 per cent faster than the Gladiator PC in the same test. As you’d expect, the Cyclone delivered similarly awesome performance in our other games, running Battlefield: Bad Company 2 and Dawn of War 2: Chaos Rising at 1,920 x 1,200 with 4x AA and maximum detail settings without any problems.


Coaxing extra performance from the system proved a little difficult though. While we were able to nudge the CPU up to 4.12GHz with a QPI of 196MHz and a vcore of 1.36V, we couldn’t force any extra frequency from the graphics card. This demonstrates that Scan has pushed the Cyclone pretty hard by default, so there’s little value in voiding the PC’s one-year on-site warranty.

The superb performance of the Cyclone wasn’t spoiled by intrusive fan noise either. It’s much quieter than the Prometheus and won’t intrude on your gaming even if you use speakers rather than a headset.

Conclusion

Scan has built a great system with the 3XS Cyclone, and used some cunning tactics in not only taming the heat and noise of the GeForce GTX 480 graphics card, but also cranking some extra speed from it. The performance of the Cyclone is excellent, and the build quality throughout is also absolutely top notch, with immaculate cable routeing.

Our only issue with the Cyclone is its price: despite costing over £350 more than Gladiator’s Titan Prometheus, the Cyclone delivers the same level of application performance and only around 10 per cent more gaming power. As such, the more expensive GTX 480 and its water-cooling accompaniment hasn’t paid off for Scan.

The Cyclone is a desirable and wonderfully crafted PC, but it’s too expensive for the performance it delivers. PCs running an air-cooled Radeon HD 5870 instead of the GTX 480 will not only be much cheaper, but will also perform very similarly in the majority of games.

• Performance
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• 9/10

• Design
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• 9/10

• Hardware
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• 8/10

• Value
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• -
• -
• 6/10

• Overall
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• 8/10

Score Guide