Overclockers UK Primo 6200a review

Overclockers UK is best known for its component business, but it also builds PCs. The Primo 6200a is the first system we’ve seen – it’s a base unit that’s supplied without a monitor – and we were immediately impressed by the sturdy yet understated case and tidy internal cable routing. The 550W OCZ power supply is also an excellent addition and includes a PCI-E power connector that’s required to power some graphics cards.

The case lacks dust covers and sound insulation, a slight problem, as neither the CPU fan nor the case fan are particularly quiet. Their whirr becomes a piercing whine when the fans spin up to full speed when running demanding tasks.

The processor is an AMD Phenom II X4 850 running at its stock 3.3GHz. Its performance was rather disappointing, with an overall score of 75 in our tests. That’s plenty for most applications, but it’s underpowered compared to the Intel Core i5 processors we’ve seen in similarly priced systems. As this CPU isn’t a Black edition it isn’t as easily overclockable.

The Gigabyte GA-880GM-UD2H motherboard is rather unimpressive, even at this price. It lacks USB3 and SATA3 ports, has just two PCI slots – one of which will block the graphics card’s airflow if used – alongside one PCI-E x1 slot and a PCI-E x16 slot. The latter is occupied by a modest 1GB Nvidia GeForce GT 430 graphics card. It has the usual HDMI, DVI and VGA ports and produced a reasonable frame rate of 20.4fps in Dirt 3 at high quality settings and a 1,280×720 resolution. This is only a little better than the frame rates produced by more up-to-date integrated GPUs but should be able to smoothly play most 3D games at low quality settings.

The Primo is fitted with 4GB of 1,600MHz DDR3 RAM, leaving two memory slots free for upgrades. There’s a DVD writer and a 500GB hard disk – half the size we’d expect, even in a budget PC. If you want to add extra storage there are six free 3 1/2in bays – one of them with front-panel access – and three unused 5 1/4in bays, which is more than enough for the three empty SATA ports.

There are two USB ports at the front of the case, alongside the usual mic and headphone ports. The back panel is fairly well equipped with six USB ports, a FireWire port and an eSATA port. There’s also an optical S/PDIF audio output, 7.1 analogue audio outputs, a PS/2 port and a Gigabit Ethernet port. The PC comes with the Logitech Wireless Combo MK520 keyboard and mouse set, which won our Best Buy award last year. Both are traditionally designed but very comfortable to use.

Although it’s well-made, the Primo 6200a is underpowered and doesn’t make up for it in other areas. Its hard disk is smaller than we’d expect and the motherboard doesn’t have as much upgrade potential as similarly priced PCs. In fact, for £27 less, the Chillblast Fusion Shadow musters almost twice as much raw power, twice the hard disk space and a warranty that’s twice as long.