Falcon Northwest computer systems is best known for its Mach V series of custom-built gaming PCs, which deliver top-of-the-line performance at budget-busting prices. For a well-tuned gaming PC without the premium cost, the company offers the Talon line. A Talon won't give you the so-hot-it'll-singe-your-eyebrows performance of a Mach V, but it also won't come with the so-expensive-you'll-skip-the-mortgage-payment- this-month price tag.
You can customize virtually every component of a Mach V system, but the Talon comes only in two stock configurations: You choose just the monitor and the speakers. Our evaluation system, the $1,495 Talon 3.1, uses a 1.13GHz AMD Athlon processor and 256MB of DDR memory. Don't judge this computer by its processor cycles alone, however. The tuned- for-gaming Talon left a similarly configured system, the 1.3GHz Athlon- based HP Pavilion 7875, in the dust in our benchmark tests.
The Talon 3.1 doesn't include all the extras of the Mach V, but it's clearly built with the same level of care. A glimpse inside the minitower case shows all the cables routed to maximize airflow around the two case fans. The company gives the same attention to the software installation. You won't...