PC Specialist Enigma K6 A decent all-round desktop PC that doesn’t keep you waiting
I3 times two equals i5?
You don’t have to be a mechanic to buy a car, but most of us know a few basics. For example, the bigger the engine, the more oomph you’ll get when you put your foot down. Of course, it’s not quite that simple, and a modern one-litre engine might do just as good a job as a gas-guzzler of yesteryear. The same applies with PC processor chips, except that they tend to change faster.
In recent years, Intel’s numbering system for processors made things relatively simple: i3 was suitable for basic Windows use, i5 for decent performance and i7 for number-crunching and creative jobs. Each year’s new versions were a little faster than the last. Then in 2017, AMD complicated matters by bringing out rival processors called Ryzen. These are a bit slower than Intel’s similarly priced i5s and i7s at basic tasks that use one core, but a lot faster in more demanding programs.
In case that wasn’t confusing enough, Intel has now released its latest update, known as Coffee Lake (it’s the name of an actual lake in Wisconsin, not what you get on your lap when you’re distracted by a new series of processors while drinking your morning beverage). This is a quantum leap for the humble i3. The i3-3800 in this new desktop PC has four cores – twice as many as any previous i3. This is accompanied by a slight reduction in clock speed, which reflects priorities similar to AMD’S: you probably won’t be too upset if processes that are fast anyway are a fraction slower, but you’ll be satisfied if tasks that usually cause delays go much faster.
PC Specialist has taken the same approach to the entire system: the Enigma K6’s relatively modest CPU comes with a very respectable graphics card: an Nvidia GTX 1060 with 6GB of fast memory. If you never play 3D games or use creative software that benefits from a dedicated graphics card, you may be better off buying a PC with a top-end i5 or i7 processor and no graphics card (both have built-in Intel graphics processors that can handle general tasks and some gaming). But if you’re looking for a fully rounded PC, the Enigma K6 is a good choice, as its results in our speed tests show.
In 3D games, the GTX 1060 wasn’t held back by the new i3, and the PC’S scores were similar to those of the Ryzen 5 1600X-based Wired2fire Pyro Reactor (see Issue 516), which has the same graphics card but costs over £200 more. In our processor tests, the i3-3800 managed to keep up with the old i3-7100 in image editing, but in multitasking and 4K video processing, which use all the cores, it performed as well as previous i5-7500 PCS.
The Enigma K6 comes in a mid-sized case with a full ATX motherboard and plenty of room for drives, including two M.2 sockets for fast SSDS. The only drive fitted is a 1TB ‘hybrid’ – a hard drive with a small cache to make it faster – although this means slower booting and loading than if Windows 10 were installed on an SSD. You might want to budget another £75 or so for an SSD or an Intel Optane card for more advanced caching. We weren’t too keen on the case’s styling, though, and it lacks USB 3.1 ports for adding fast external storage.
VERDICT: The balance of components won’t suit everyone, and the lack of USB 3.1 ports limits upgrades, but this is a fast all-rounder at an attractive price
★★★★☆
ALTERNATIVE: Overclockers Titan Merlin £720 This cheaper version of the little Ryzen 5 1400 we tested in Issue 509 is about as fast as the K6 but less upgradable
If you're looking for a fully rounded PC, the Enigma K6 is a good choice
VERDICT: We like the idea of a clutterfree home PC system that doesn’t compromise on performance, but we can’t justify the price of Dell’s effort
★★★☆☆
ALTERNATIVE: Apple imac 27in From £1,749 If the more elegant macos doesn’t suit you, install your own copy of Windows and it’s still better value for money