CERISE QUAD-CORE WORKSTATION

Silent Running



The Cerise Quad-Core Workstation is a model of understated efficiency. No frills, no overclocking, no bloatware, no noise. But its unassuming, silver-colored case concoelas a multimedia powerhouse. It's there to get that big photo or video project done, and it does so with aplomb.
The Cerise is powered by a 2.67-GHz Intel Core 2 Quad Q6700, 3GB of 800-MHz DDR2 memory, and a 256MB nVidia GeForce 8600 GT graphics card-a decent and solid DX10-compatible mid-level card. Another of the system's claim to fame is that it's noiseless. Screen vents and a separate chamber for the hard drives help keep the heat and the load on the fans down.


Speaking of hard drives, the Cerise has no less than four 500GB, 7,200-rpm ones. Three of the drives are arranged in a RAID 5 array, which ensures no data lost, even if a drive fails-as they often do when, say, flogged with a string of video-editing projects. And it's fast-the RAID array scored a blazing 6,627 on the FutureMark PCMark05 disk test, far outpacing even a quick eSATA external drive. The downside of RAID 5 is that one drive's space is effectively lost, leaving you a "mere" 1TB of storage space. (There's also the fourth drive, howerver, which acts as the C:drive but can store data in a pinch.)
The Cerise showerd its multimedia chops on our benchmark tests. It finished the Windows Media Encoder test in a respectable 56 seconds and zoomed through the Photoshop CS2 test in a mere 26 seconds. Its Cinebench R10 score, indicative of multimedia performance, was a stellar 9,523. On SYSmark 2007 Preview Overall, which measures the ability to do day-to-day business tasks, it scored 131, in line with otehr high-end PCs. On 3DMark06, an indicator of 3D graphics performance, the Cerise tallied a so-so 5,459-adequate for basic 3D rendering and gaming. (A professional animator would want to go with a higher-end workstation.)
Our test system came with Windows XP Home. Other options are Windows XP Pro, Vista Home Premium, and 32-bit Vista Ultimate.


We've seen screaming righs (literally and figuratively) at this price point. The Cerise Quad-Core Workstaion's quiet efficiency is a refreshing change, and makes the system merit a place on any multimedia pro's short list.
source: PC Media August 2008.