Dell XPS 8300 (X8300-4004NBK)

The Dell XPS 8300 (X8300-4004NBK) ($699.99 list at Best Buy) is a desktop tower PC with some expandability and a true quad-core processor. It has the power to take care of your multimedia tasks, like editing photos and encoding videos to work on your smartphone. The desktop has a discrete graphics card for multi-monitor setups and (very) light 3D gaming. It's decently priced, but there are less expensive systems that equal it in features and performance, like the Editors' Choice Gateway DX4860-UB33P ($599.99 list, 4 stars).

Design and Features
The latest version of the XPS 8300 looks like previous versions. If you weren't looking too closely at the back panel or the model number on the box, you'd probably couldn't tell it apart from the Dell XPS x8300-1225NBK ($749.99 list, 3 stars). It has the same glossy black front face and matte black sides. It's more stylized than its Dell Inspiron siblings, with a chrome-colored ring around the bezel. Dell has also updated the interior allowing for more expansion room, but you'll have to take into consideration its 460W power supply if you're planning on making any upgrades of the GPU nature. There's space for one additional hard drive on top of the 1TB, 7,200rpm drive, one more optical drive in addition to the dual layer DVD +/- RW one, and three PCIe x1 cards. The system's single PCIe x16 graphics cards slot, four DIMM slots, and single miniPC card slot are filled by components: a 1GB ATI Radeon HD 6450 graphics card, 8GB of memory, and the 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi card, respectively. Outside, there are eight USB 2.0 ports, audio ports, HDMI, and eSATA. The system lacks USB 3.0, which is more consumer-oriented than the slower eSATA interface.

The system comes with a few pieces of pre-loaded software: The McAfee Internet Security software, which has a very short 30-day subscription, and Microsoft Office 2010 Starter are commonly found on systems. Office is fully functional for basic document editing, but McAfee becomes almost useless after the 30 days unless you purchase a full subscription. The system also comes with Dell's Stage launcher, which hangs over the desktop. The Dell Stage launcher makes more sense on touch screen PCs, but at least you can hide it. The system also comes with Cozi, a family scheduling calendar app.

Best Buy has an extended warranty program, which offers customers an extra year of protection beyond the one-year warranty of most system manufacturers. There are two plans in this extended warranty program. The standard plan ($119.99) covers the system against normal wear and tear, power surge damage, and includes a "No Lemon" guarantee in which Best Buy will simply replace the computer if it requires more than 4 repairs during the coverage period. Best Buy's advanced plan ($219.99) offers all this, and also covers the system against accidental damage from drops and spills. Other special offers can be found online or in stores, like discounts on printers, software, and tech support plans which are available with any new consumer PC purchased through Best Buy.

Performance
The 3GHz Intel Core i5-2320 processor and 8GB of memory helped the X8300-4004NBK get great scores on our multimedia benchmark tests, but the ATI Radeon HD 6450 graphics card gives the system little extra in the way of 3D power. The system completed the Handbrake video test in 1 minute 21 seconds and the Photoshop CS5 test in 3:35. However, the current Editors' Choice Gateway DX4860-UB33P completes it faster (1:19 Handbrake, 3:25 CS5). Both are faster than the compact Editors' Choice Apple Mac mini (Thunderbolt) ($799 list, 4.5 stars) (1:42 Handbrake, 3:47 CS5). On 3D tests, however, the X8300-4004NBK was weak: an unplayable 29 fps on Crysis (DirectX 10) and 13 fps on the Lost Planet 2 (DirectX 11) test means that the system can't handle strenuous 3D games. The Gateway DX4860-UB33P and its integrated graphics isn't much better (13 fps on Crysis) Mac mini at least gets an almost playable score on Crysis (48 fps), thanks to its more powerful ATI Radeon HD 6630M graphics.

Compared with the current Editors' Choice for entry/mainstream systems, the Gateway DX4860-UB33P, the Dell XPS 8300 (X8300-4004NBK) is $100 more expensive, with not a lot to show for it. True, the X8300-4004NBK has a discrete ATI Radeon graphics card, but unless you're dead set on using a mutli-monitor setup, you won't get a lot of extra 3D performance from the card. Both systems have the same quad-core Intel Core i5-2320 processor, 1TB of hard drive space, and 8GB of memory. Both even have an HDMI-out. The DX4860-UB33P also has a pair of fast USB 3.0 ports, giving it a bit more in the way of future proofing features.

BENCHMARK TEST RESULTS

COMPARISON TABLE
Compare the Dell XPS 8300 (X8300-4004NBK) with several other desktops side by side.

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