Falcon Northwest Tiki Review: Gaming Monster in a Petite Package - mckenneywhered

At a Glance

Expert's Rating

Pros

Good gaming performance in a tiny software program
Extremely quiet and power efficient

Cons

Limited interior space; miss of expandability
CPU fan localisation makes opening the case awkard

Our Verdict

The Tiki is a high end gaming PC in a tricky, pint-sized chassis, oblation fantabulous gaming public presentation, albeit at a Leontyne Price.

Falcon Northwest is mostly known for massive gambling systems, like the Mach V. The company has dabbled with smaller systems, such as the micro ATX-based Fragbox, but that machine tends to take up more floor space than most full-tower PCs thanks to its box-like Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe.

Enter the Tiki. Models ilk the Tiki, and parthian year's Alienware X51, hold up categories. They include high-end components in spite of appearanc cases that look well-to-do in executive offices. The Tiki one-ups the X51 away including speedier graphics card options, flatbottom the Nvidia GTX 680, one of the fastest widowed GPU art card game available. The Tiki that Falcon Northwest shipped to us included a 256GB self-coloured-State drive (SSD), a 2TB hard drive, and a GTX 680. The system burns through most game titles, particularly on mainstream 1080p or 1920-away-1200-pixel displays.

Totally that performance comes at a be, however. Our in full loaded Tiki weighs in at almost $2800. That's more or less $400 Thomas More than the V3 Convoy, which ships with a pair of GTX 670 GPUs and the Lapplander Core i7-3770K. Entrance-level configurations of the Tiki, with a standard herculean drive, a GTX 560 GPU, and an Intel Core i5-3450, start at $1827. Along the other hand, the Tiki is a overmuch beguiler, custom software program. And then there's the granite substructure.

Slick, Small Powerhouse

Yes, each Tiki ships with a granite base, either hoary Beaver State black. That base serves a propose, anchoring the thin monolith to the ground so you don't accidentally tip information technology over with an errant articulatio genus. And the polished granite lends the tower a little of élan that a simple adjusted base would lack.

The Tiki is likewise completely self-contained, scorn being close to the same size as the Alienware X51. The X51 required an external power brick, simply the Tiki includes a 450W, 80-plus bronze certified power supply. During pun examination, the Tiki idled at just 58W. Even under full gaming warhead, ambitious the 4.3GHz overclocked Core i7-3770K and GTX 680 totally out, the overall power consumption was just 231W.

The organization generated a score of 177 on PCWorld's WorldBench 7 bench mark suite, which is respectable for a system with this CPU in a heavy arrangement. Game benchmarks at 1920-away-1200-pel resolution, with 4x antialiasing enabled, for sure affected. Crysis 2 ran at 62 fps; Batman: Arkham Asylum, at 94 fps; and DiRT3, at 105 fps. Still so, you Crataegus oxycantha deman to telephone dial back contingent levels on just about games. The highly demanding Metro 2033 ran at 28 Federal Protective Service, while the more recent DiRT Showdown eked verboten 33 FPS. It's still beautiful significant performance for a system improved into a bod just 4 inches by 13.25 inches past 13.5 inches.

The arrangement uses an Asus P8Z77-I Deluxe motherboard, a mini-ITX board with a single slot, which is old for the graphics wag. The system offers plenitude of USB 3.0 ports—two connected top and quaternity on the rear, asset four more USB 2.0 ports on the back. If you prefer for either the GTX 670 or GTX 680 graphics cards, you'll get support for equal to quadruplet displays via a pair of dual-link DVI connectors, an HDMI embrasure, and a DisplayPort 1.2 interface. (The GTX 560 option will support exclusive 2 displays.)

Connectivity includes ace gigabit ethernet jack, 802.11 Wi-Fi (with dual antenna connections), and Bluetooth 4.0. Falcon Northwest doesn't include a standard keyboard and mouse, simply it does offer an regalia of gaming keyboard and mouse options.

The Tiki includes one 3.5-inch repositing bay and cardinal 2.5-inch storage slots. The optical drive is a low-profile, slot-load type commonly victimised in laptops. It's mounted in an unusual location: on the top of the system, assuming you stand the Tiki on its granite base. So you drop the magnetic disk vertically into the slot.

Falcon Northwest ships Cyberlink's PowerDVD 11 with its Blu-beam-equipped systems, which takes care of Blu-ray movie playback. Windows 7 Home Bounty x64 edition is the standard operating organization. Windows 7 Pro or Ultimate are added cost options, equally are the several flavors of Microsoft Office.

The small chassis precludes meaning internecine expansion, but it does have space for a second 2.5-inch storage device, and Falcon Northwest will happily trade you a pair of 512GB SSDs in this space—if you're willing to cough up the cost. The CPU cooling fan is actually adorned into the case side, and is part of an Asetek sealed liquid CPU cooler. The net result is amazingly elfin randomness, even under overfull onus.

Overall, the Tiki offers excellent performance for its size, is amazingly power competent, and is nearly quiet functioning in your home office. Information technology's not inexpensive, simply its performance and unobtrusive nature are sure to shanghai.