Arbico OC i355 CS review

The OC i355 CS is housed in a Cooler Master case, with steel construction that felt particularly sturdy. Arbico has relied on the Intel Core i3-530’s integrated graphics chip, which leaves the single PCI-E x16 slot free to add a dedicated graphics card at a later date.

Intel Core i3 processors are excellent value because they overclock so easily, increasing performance for no extra cost. The i3-530 here has been pushed from 2.93GHz to 3.8GHz, which provides an impressive performance boost. The 4GB of RAM should be enough for most tasks, but there are also two free DIMM slots should you want to add more. In our benchmarks, the OC i355 CS produced an impressive overall score of 129; this level of performance should be enough for almost any task, although multi-threaded applications will be limited by the dual-core design.

Unfortunately, the Core i3’s integrated graphics chip isn’t powerful. It’s fine for 2D applications, but it struggles to decode full HD video content. Playing modern games isn’t possible, as an 8fps score in our Call of Duty 4 test shows. For playing games, you’ll have to buy a dedicated graphics card.

The 22in LG monitor is very slim thanks to the bright LED backlight. Brightness was initially too high, but the intuitive menu made it easy to optimise picture quality. Once we’d tweaked the settings, colours looked natural and contrast was good. The 1,920×1,080 resolution provides plenty of room on the Windows desktop, but the VGA and DVI connections aren’t ideal for connecting a games console or Blu-ray player.