Wired2Fire Diablo Ultima v2

SCORE ✪✪✪✪✪ PRICE £667 (£800 inc VAT) plus £24 delivery from wired2fire.co.uk

In its unassuming Corsair 88R case, the Diablo Ultima v2 isn’t the most attractive system here, but it’s what’s inside that counts. And Wired2Fire pushes the boat out with a Core i5-7600 – a significantly faster chip than its rivals, with a core speed of 3.5GHz and a maximum Turbo frequency of 4.1GHz.

In our benchmarks, this drove the Ultima v2 to an excellent overall score of 124. If you need hardcore multitasking capabilities then there’s still nothing to match a Core i7, but for everyday workloads this CPU will rarely disappoint.

It’s backed up with 16GB of RAM, and Wired2Fire has also managed to stick an Intel 600p SSD in the M.2 socket. From this we measured sustained read speeds of 1,398MB/sec – almost three times the maximum rate you’ll see from a regular SATA SSD, and fast enough to ensure that applications and documents open snappily. As a special treat, it’s accompanied by a 2TB data drive.

The catch? To fit all this good stuff in, Wired2Fire has compromised on gaming performance, supplying a 2GB AMD Radeon RX 460 graphics card that’s a significant step down from the GTX 1060 cards found elsewhere. In our 1080p Metro: Last

Light Redux benchmark, the Ultima v2 averaged a juddery 18fps: we had to disable anti-aliasing to get it up to a playable 34fps, and drop the detail level to medium for a smooth 63fps. It’s fine for casual gaming, but don’t expect all the visual treats.

There are a few additional bonuses: the Asus Prime B250M-K motherboard offers four USB 3 sockets at the rear, as well as two USB 2 ports, and Wired2Fire also throws in a PCI-E 802.11n Wi-Fi card. Clearly the Diablo Ultima v2 isn’t such a balanced system as its rivals, but if application performance is your priority, then it’s a powerful and well-equipped PC that you won’t need to upgrade for many moons – if ever.

KEY SPECS 3.5GHz Intel Core i5-7600 16GB RAM Radeon RX 460 graphics 256GB M.2 SSD 2TB hard disk 802.11n Wi-Fi 2yr RTB warranty (30-day C&R) plus 1yr RTB (labour only) 198 x 448 x 378mm (WDH)