CyberPower Infinity i3 Apollo review

CyberPower’s Infinity i3 Apollo, as the name suggests, is the first PC we’ve reviewed to come fitted with a Core i3 processor. The dual-core i3-530 processor has a default clock speed of 2.93GHz, but CyberPower has overclocked it to 3.5GHz.

We know from testing the Core i3-530 that it’s a quick processor, but it’s even faster overclocked. Combined with the 4GB of RAM, the PC managed an overall score in our benchmarks of 121, making it as fast as some quad-core Phenom II systems that we’ve tested.

Fortunately, the Infinity continues its decent performance with the graphics card, a 1GB ATI Radeon HD 5750. This is an incredibly-quick card, and managed to get 64fps in our Call of Duty 4 test and 30fps in our Crysis test. The card has four outputs (2x DVI, HDMI and DisplayPort). You can use up to three outputs for Eyefinity, provided one of the three is DisplayPort, to play games over three displays.

We run all of our tests at 1,680×1,050, which is the native resolution of the supplied Digimate DGM L-2264WD. We’d have preferred a monitor with a 1,920×1,080 resolution, but the screen is bright and has excellent image quality. It has only DVI and VGA inputs, and the DVI input isn’t HDCP compliant, so you can’t use it for playing protected content. If you want to watch Blu-ray movies on your PC, after upgrading the supplied DVD writer, you’ll need to use your computer’s VGA output. Our only other complaint about the screen is its cheap, slightly unstable base and limited range of adjustment.

The MSI H55m-E33 motherboard uses Intel’s new H55 chipset. This supports the built-in graphics embedded on the processor; you’re unlikely to ever use this feature, though, as the supplied graphics card is so good. The board has only a PCI slot and two PCI-E x1 slots for upgrading, although only one PCI-E x1 slot can be used as the graphics card blocks the other.

Memory can easily be upgraded, as two of the four memory slots are free. With Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit installed, the operating system can make full use of any upgrade you make, all the way up to the board’s 16GB maximum.

A 500GB hard disk is pretty standard at this price and provides plenty of space for all of your documents and media files. If you do want to add more storage space, there are six free 3.5in drive bays (you may want to save one for a memory card reader), four spare SATA ports.

Oddly, the PC was shipped without the S3 power saving mode enabled in the BIOS. If this isn’t enabled, Windows can only enter a basic sleep mode, which uses full power. This is likely to be a one-off fault, but it’s worth checking this setting.

The PC comes with a Logitech Deluxe 250 keyboard and an M-SBF96 mouse, which are among our favourite no-frills wired input devices and are very comfortable to use. Thanks partly to its overclocked processor, the Infinity i3 Apollo is an outstanding high-performance computer with an excellent three-year warranty, but Yoyotech’s Warbird i650 is even quicker.