Hi-Grade Ultis P4-C17 CA06

The budget Celeron processor has had a varied career. Sometimes loved and sometimes ignored, it has offered computing at a low price. Now it has been brought up to date with a little help from its big brother, the Pentium 4.

The old Pentium III Celeron took a bit of a knock when the AMD Duron arrived, as the latter was faster and cheaper. This new model promises far superior performance, based as it is on the flagship Pentium 4.

This Ultis from Hi-Grade is fitted with a new Celeron chip running at 1.7GHz, making it comfortably the fastest budget processor we have seen.

It is supported by 256MB of DDR memory, which is a realistic amount in a computer at this price. We weren't sure what to expect from our tests but the results were a pleasant surprise. The baby Pentium 4 achieved a very respectable score, making even the fastest AMD Duron look arthritic.

Storage is provided by the usual collection of drives. A generous Maxtor 60GB hard disk supplies the day-to-day usage and, with this amount of storage available, it should be a long time before an upgrade or spring clean is needed.

A DVD-Rom drive and CD-RW drive complete the set, offering all the functions you might need.

The graphics are provided by an ATi Radeon 8500 with a TV-out socket. This is a very good 3D performer, so users with gaming aspirations won't be left behind, despite going for Celeron rather than P4 power.

The supplied display is a pleasant 17in LG model and a TV tuner card is fitted, which is ideal for taking in some of your favourite TV shows without leaving your desk.

A popular way to keep costs down when building budget PCs is to use an integrated rather than separate sound chip. The quality of these systems has improved dramatically since they first started to appear and the one fitted to the Ultis is capable enough to do justice to the supplied Cambridge Sound Works DT2200 surround-sound speakers.

The system is straightforward to set up, with the major plugs colour coded to ease the process. Software includes Microsoft Works 6 and Norton Utilities, which is enough to get you started and keep you going without trouble.

To avoid any fumbling around the back of the system to plug things in, Hi-Grade has helpfully provided some sockets at the front of the machine. These include headphone and microphone sockets.

Two USB ports are provided, while the inclusion of FireWire sockets on the back belies the budget tag that Celeron PCs wear.

The Ultis is a compelling machine. It squeezes some impressive features into a budget package and is an excellent platform to show that the new Celeron is a budget processor well worth consideration.

Price: £999 (inc. VAT)

Contact: Hi-Grade 0800 074 0402
www.higrade.com

Also consider: CyberMaxx 2.2GHz
A very solid PC system. £1,099 - Worth it.