HP Phoenix h9se: The Pavilion Goes Beyond Thunderdome
by Dustin Sklavos on February 29, 2012 12:00 AM ESTGaming Performance
Since we refreshed our gaming benchmark suite, we've had to start from scratch on our gaming charts. Unfortunately that means we've seen two GeForce GTX 580-based systems and a single GeForce GTX 555, which is the reason why the "Unknown Sample" with its Radeon HD 7970 has been included. The recent Skyrim 1.4 patch and high resolution texture pack also invalidated some of our test results with AVADirect's silent gaming system, so those have been omitted.
The GeForce GTX 580 may be in its last days, but it's still plenty of graphics card for our 1080p testing suite. Hopefully Kepler will bring support for three displays with it, because gaming technology just hasn't been keeping up with the performance available from our current graphics hardware at this resolution. Even QWXGA and QHD (e.g. 30" and 27" high-resolution displays) can generally run off a single GTX 580 or HD 7970 with all the settings cranked up.
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gdinero79 - Wednesday, February 29, 2012 - link
The last-generation SSD seems like an odd choice for a system like this.spencerp - Wednesday, February 29, 2012 - link
That sucks. I really like my Blackbird and was hoping to continue its lineage.cjs150 - Wednesday, February 29, 2012 - link
3G SSD?What were they thinking of
No overclocking
Limited GPU options
No crossfire/SLI (not that I am a fan of either)
What market is this aimed at?
And how noisy is it
dave1_nyc - Wednesday, February 29, 2012 - link
There are cases that I don't personally find attractive, but I understand why others do, and I'm sure the same. And if one likes this case, then one likes this case, and that's one's right.But I've been looking at the photos for the last 10 minutes, trying to figure out how one could like this case, assuming of course that you would remove all the stickers. And I don't get it.
This is too trivial to bother with, but I'd like to suggest a "who likes, who hates" survey - something that would help me suspend disbelief.
TrackSmart - Wednesday, February 29, 2012 - link
Very tactfully worded. Personally, I don't think many people would find this case more appealing than your average, cheap-looking $20 computer case. There are uglier cases, but this certainly isn't a looker.GuyIncognito_ - Wednesday, February 29, 2012 - link
> This is too trivial to bother with, but I'd like to suggest a "who likes, who hates" survey -> something that would help me suspend disbelief.
I vote <hate>.
Blibbax - Wednesday, February 29, 2012 - link
If anyone is thinking of buying one of these, please get in touch with me. I can match the performance and beat the looks with an OCd 2600K and a 7950 in a Casecom matx case, for a substantially lower price...bhima - Thursday, March 1, 2012 - link
For those that don't build their own machines there are other options than this proprietary HP. Just did a quick google, found Ironside Computers and built up a HAF 922 with an i7-2600k, SSD, regular HDD, 8GB ram, AMD 7970, Corsair Enthusiast 650w for about $1,900.Of course I would personally never purchase bleeding tech like the 7970 because the cost isn't worth its performance, but hell... for $600 cheaper than that HP you have a system with parts that aren't proprietary and the best single GPU on the market.
softdrinkviking - Thursday, March 1, 2012 - link
cases are too plastic and boring. not really bad looking exactly, but not so interesting either.i'd rather have an old grey 386 case with it's clean minimalist look.
also, HP uses a bunch of proprietary SD card readers and they put an a$$ load of metal brackets and header patch cables inside, the end result being that the inside is extremely cluttered and it's difficult to work on.
they are not upgrade friendly. :(