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SiSoftware Sandra (the System ANalyser, Diagnostic and Reporting Assistant) is an information & diagnostic utility. It should provide most of the information (including undocumented) you need to know about your hardware, software and other devices whether hardware or software.Sandra is a (girl’s) name of Greek origin that means “defender”, “helper of mankind”.
We think that’s quite fitting.It works along the lines of other Windows utilities, however it tries to go beyond them and show you more of what’s really going on. Giving the user the ability to draw comparisons at both a high and low-level. You can get information about the CPU, chipset, video adapter, ports, printers, sound card, memory, network, Windows internals, AGP, PCI, PCI-X, PCIe (PCI Express), database, USB, USB2, 1394/Firewire, etc.Native ports for all major operating systems are available:
- Windows XP, 2003/R2, Vista, 7, 2008/R2 (x86)
- Windows XP, 2003/R2, Vista, 7, 2008/R2 (x64)
- Windows 2003/R2, 2008/R2* (IA64)
- Windows Mobile 5.x (ARM CE 5.01)
- Windows Mobile 6.x (ARM CE 5.02)
All major technologies are supported and taken advantage of:
- SMP – Multi-Processor
- MC – Multi-Core
- SMT/HT – Hyper-Threading
- MMX, SSE, SSE2, SSE3, SSSE3, SSE 4.1, SSE 4.2, AVX, FMA – Multi-Media instructions
- GPGPU, DirectX, OpenGL – Graphics
- NUMA – Non-Uniform Memory Access
- AMD64/EM64T/x64 – 64-bit extensions to x86
- IA64 – Intel* Itanium 64-bit
The processor performance is reasonably good, especially considering the very modest price point. Memory performance is actually pretty good for 1,600mhz rated memory at 9-9-9-24 timings.
How much extra would it have cost to include a 64GB SSD? including a 2.5 inch 5,400 rpm laptop drive seems weird.
getting a system out at £500 quid with everything ‘cool’ in it, is difficult. I think this is quite good. Maybe dropping the LE to a HD7850 and putting in an SSD would have worked out the same price, but overall a better all round performance?
@ Davis. I dont agree. its easy to upgrade with an SSD later, for say £60, and you dont have to bin the 500gb mechniacal drive in the system. the hD7850 is much weaker than a HD7870 Tahiti LE and you would have to bin the HD7850 for an upgrade later.
But if you had an SSD in the system then you could save that £60, and get another HD7850 for crossfire, they are cheap right now, that would buy half of one. and you would be faster than a single HD7870.
The CX500 can’t handle 4 PCI E connectors, it only has 2, so Crsossfire is out of the question, unless its low end hardware.
Have just received one of these systems for my son. Nicely put together. The 7870 Tahiti LE was by far the better choice as they have used a micro ATX mobo that does no support Crossfire. Installing an SSD later will be the way we go.
Also to let folk know, the system comes in the case box with the mobo box taped to the top with all the driver CD’s etc. That then comes in a bigger box with more than enough protection for a sate journey. Our one arrived with the mobo box looking like new. Looking forward to giving it a run later.