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Mesh send the systems in several boxes with the main box housing the system and the peripherals, such as the keyboard, mouse and manuals. Another box contains the Ilyama 22inch Prolite E2208HDD with full 1080p (1920×1080 resolution).
This has a response time of 5ms, 300 cd/m2 brightness and a 1,000:1 of contrast ratio (10,000:1 dynamic). Other features including D-Sub and DVI for connectivity as well as 43W of typical power consumption. This is a decent budget panel which retails for around the £125 price point. You can ask for upgrades to the 24”, 26” or 27” models.
After using it for a week or so we can safely say it is very good value, even if it is obviously built to a very tight price point.
The chassis of choice is the Thermaltake Element ‘S'. This is a reasonably good budget case with decent airflow and we were sent the models without the side window panel and 240mm fan. MESH engineers pointed out that the GTX 480 noise levels were higher with this side panel in place. That said, KitGuru values airflow above noise levels and we would have preferred the side-fan option as the nVidia GTX cards run HOT! Both options are available from MESH when ordering at no extra cost, so you will need to specify.
We like the front of the Element ‘S' – it has all the necessary buttons at your disposal, as well as a handy eSATA front mounted port with 2 USB's for ease of connectivity.
On the top there is a large 230mm fan which helps to keep the thermals in check – it spins fast enough to expel ambient heat, but not enough to create a racket. Would be nice if companies like Thermaltake offered all of their ‘coloured’ chassis with red, green and blue options (fans + paint stripes) so you could appease nVidia, ATI and Intel fanbois – but maybe this is too complicated for a mass production run.
The insides are finished in a lovely matt black and there is plenty of room to work inside. It is not a class leader, but we really like this chassis, especially for the modest asking price. The plastic-over-steel construction is good for noise reduction. If you’re a hardcore aluminium fan, then you can stop reading now as it will never satisfy you.
Those 480GTXs need far too much cooling.
prices seem competitive, but the CPU cooler and ram put me off. ill go check out the customisations.
they need a hardcore case for 480, that thing is getting way too hot.
465 is solid performer, id opt for the cheaper system and maybe add a reasonably priced SSD for the OS drive.
good review, noise seems a bit high with 480 and those temps scare me. 98c long term? thats an RMA waiting to happen. guess the warranty is a good option! would make more sense for Mesh to offer better cases for 480 to save their potential costs in 9 months time. I can see a lot of those failing.
good review, the one thing that put me off the system is the use of really cheap ram without heatspreaders. I know the audience wont care, but Mesh really should.
Nice enough system, I dont overclock and don’t care about state of the art cooling,. I like warranty cover from companies, so im not ashamed to say I buy them prebuilt. worth the hassle free gaming experience with long term peace of mind 🙂
ITs not a bad system and very competitive, which I think MESH aim for. nothing fancy, but solid workmanship and good warranty cover with good parts.
Nice to see a zotac branded card in the system, I have always liked them.
That CPU cooler is pretty good for a reference cooled system. Would like to see branded ram from OCZ or Corsair, or even Crucial with heatspreaders however. That really does add a feeling of “our audience wont care to open the case, lets put in cheap ass modules to make a few more quid on profit”.
Just my views anyway, but its a generally positive looking system(s)
I would agree, of everything in the system, I would only be unhappy about the use of unbranded, low spec memory. Surely for a company like MEsh, spending £3 more in a build to use good ram would be better not only for the customer but them long term.
If this review has whet your appetite at all, then give the MESH team a shout and ask them what the price would be with 1600Mhz ram, an improved cooler and the fan-side-panel version of the Element S case