Alienware 700MHz Athlon Area 51: Aurora (Page 8/10)
Posted: April 5, 2000
Written by: David "Spunk" Grampa Estimated retail price: $2,399.99 + S&H
Video Card (Visual Quality)
Here are a few snapshots taken in Quake 3: Arena and Unreal Tournament (Click to Enlarge):
Quake 3: Arena
Unreal Tournament
Most gamers crave a fast video card, frames per second and nothing more. As you have seen on the previous page, the Elsa Erazor X2 is fast! Above we took a look at visual quality... Unsurprisingly, the Erazor X2 looked beautiful! Quake 3: Arena displays a wide range of texturing while Unreal Tournament handles lighting. This section was most likely completely unnecessary, but everyone loves pictures. Note: you must run your computer on 32-bit color to see all the beauty of the screenshots above.
Monitor (ViewSonic E790B)
The range of style-compliant black monitors on the market is actually very small. Luckily, Alienware found a good one- ViewSonic's E790. Here are the specifications on this monitor:
Resolution/Refresh Rate: 1600x1280 at 76Hz; 1280x1024 at 88Hz; 1152x870 at 103Hz; and 1024x768 at 116Hz
Dimensions:452mm x 465mm x 468mm (17.8" x 18.3" x 18.4")
Some of the most important performance factors in choosing a monitor is screen size, refresh rate, resolution, and dot-pitch. A 19" monitor is the most popular when looking for a multimedia machine. Unfortunately, most do not take into consideration anything besides screen size. If you go for the cheapest 19" monitor on the market, you'll end up with a headache from poor refresh rate, or your monitor will look fuzzy with a high dot pitch! When it comes down to all these areas, ViewSonic is on the safe side. The E790 remains headache-free with a crystal-clear image and the reputation of best picture quality anywhere. I'm sorry to make this section so short, but unfortunately no benchmarks or words can explain the quality of a monitor. Just know that the monitor Alienware picked is top of the line! The specifications say the rest. Now on to storage...
