Radium’s latest gamer machine confidently entered our test lab to prove that it can really withstand the persistent whining of PC gamers. We didn’t spare it.
Prestigious, luminous, hot and very powerful – this is how a gamer PC should be in 2016. Radium thought they knew exactly what a PC gamer needed, and they made a PC that you can play any game on, you’ll still get the perfect gaming experience, and even if you’re into VR, well, not even then. we have to carry out an expensive PC expansion before it. We took the desktop computer that arrived for the test to taste, carefully reviewed the component selection, assembly, ventilation, and then tested it with many, many games to see what a computer costing almost 300,000 forints can do today and what extras we get from Radium, which we have with a machine assembled by ourselves. we wouldn’t get it.
Hot exterior
Nearly HUF 300,000 for a PC without a monitor, input devices and operating system is a lot of money, for which you can expect a durable, high-quality machine. The exterior of the Champion XT is attractive, the jet-black housing is streamlined, and the side, full-size transparent panel looks good. Behind this is an organized interior, nowhere is there a hanging cable or an ugly component that does not fit the red and black color scheme. The machine housing is a Kolink Punisher model, the layout and cableability of which are quite good, and the exterior is streamlined and rounded. It looks good, but the all-plastic cover attracts fingerprints and scratches easily, which is not good news for durability. The ventilation is first-class, two 12 cm fans at the front draw in the cold air, and a 12 cm fan at the back draws the heat out of the house. Unfortunately, we were not happy that there is no speed control for the fans in the house (they can only be turned on/off together with the lighting), and the dust filters were also left behind. The Punisher also accepts full-sized ATX boards, and thanks to the elevated, modular design, we can even install a double-unit water cooling radiator.
While still talking about the exterior and the cooling, we would like to draw your attention to the button located in the upper part of the machine housing: pressing it turns on the three housing cooling fans in red, which looks very good behind the transparent front panel. This overall picture is very effective, the machine lights up, and its fashionable appearance is convincing, although we did not like the shiny, fingerprint-attracting plastic cover, the side panel is not glass either, but simple Plexiglas, there are no dust filters and we also missed the speed control. For those who find so many negatives more painful than the hot exterior and many positives, you can also request the Champion XT with Bitfenix Aegis housing.
Discipline and strength
Inside, as we have already mentioned, you are treated to military order, which can only be said about very, very few machines assembled at home. The interior of the Champion XT looks really good, and the ventilation is excellent, nothing gets stuck in the free hanging cables – because there are none. A micro ATX-sized MSI B150M Night Elf motherboard was added to the ATX case, so you can easily guess that we are getting an Intel sixth generation Core platform. It’s the most advanced currently available, although the B150 is only the mid-range chipset for it. Unfortunately, this can be seen in the fact that we do not get an integrated USB Type-C connection on the motherboard, a Thunderbolt 3 controller, or an M.2 slot that accepts an NVMe SSD. Apart from these shortcomings, the motherboard is reliable, the sound part and the LAN are of high quality (the latter has an Intel chip, a really good copy!), and the black and red exterior matches the color scheme of the machine well.
A really powerful Core i5-6500 CPU has been added to the motherboard, which is an excellent choice for a gamer PC, be it FHD, 4K or VR games. If we weren’t playing a game, but rather compressing a video, the CPU wouldn’t let us down. The processor is accompanied by 8 GB of HyperX DDR4 RAM, which is still sufficient today and can be easily expanded later thanks to the two empty DIMM slots. The processor is kept cool by a Raijintek Themis tower cooler with two fans. Fortunately, this is a very good choice, because it is quiet and does not even bother you with tuning, as it can keep the more powerful Core i7 quietly cool. We will not have any problems with the power supply during a possible later expansion: the Cougar VTX600 can even serve components with a much higher consumption, and thanks to the 80Plus Bronze rating, its efficiency is guaranteed to be excellent, and the necessary protection circuits are also not missing.
The operating system (we used Windows 10) runs from a 120 GB Kingston UV400 SSD, and a 1 TB Toshiba HDD provides storage for larger data and games. Fortunately, the latter is not a slow, energy-saving copy, but a 7200 rpm version, so there will be no major problems with the speed. Despite its extremely small 120 GB size, the SSD is also quite fast when writing, but we would have been happier with a 240 GB model, which is only a few thousand forints more expensive.
We left the most important thing for the end, i.e. the video card. Fortunately, there is no question that we will receive outdated, stock VGA, in fact. The latest GeForce GTX 1060 was added to the machine, which is more powerful than the popular GTX 970, while it consumes less, does not heat up as much, and under the latest standards pulls away from the field even more. What’s more, the Champion XT is not equipped with the 3 GB, weaker version, but with the noticeably stronger version equipped with 6 GB of on-board memory with two fans and silent cooling.
Competition, extra offers
A full-blooded gamer machine will not hesitate if you attack it with the latest games, in fact, for HUF 300,000, you can expect that the minimum speed will not drop much below 30 fps with maximum detail and at least FHD resolution. In addition, you must take the obstacles in such a way that the cooling does not begin to suffer loudly, none of the components get hot, and there is no question of freezing.
The installation of the Radium Champion XT went without any problems, although we like a bad experience from the very first moment: the BIOS was not set correctly, it was at factory default values and last year’s BIOS was left on it, even though the newer versions have greatly improved the board’s performance and compatibility. We installed this, as well as Windows 10 in 64-bit, UEFI mode. This was followed by the games, which all ran super well, never got stuck, and there were no inexplicable freezes, shutdowns, or exits. 30 fps was not out of the question, but most games also achieved a stable 60 fps, and in several cases we even saw the number 100 in the fps indicator. The cooling was not completely silent, the wind noise was clearly audible especially under load, but this is still forgivable and not disturbingly dangerous.
Overall, we are satisfied with the Champion XT configuration, which offers a very good, high-end gaming experience at a realistic price, and we can even try VR with it. In addition, some weak points should not be forgotten, such as the shiny plastic housing, the small SSD and the mid-range motherboard. Radium even covers its configurations with special offers. This is the special Evolution Upgrade warranty package, which provides free replacement for all components for three months, without a service fee. In other words, if one of the components is not suitable, for example the VGA is weak, it will be included in the full price by the company, and when switching to a stronger VGA, we only have to pay the difference between the two cards. If we miss the quarterly period, our parts to be replaced during machine development will be calculated according to an individual, naturally favorable assessment.
And if even that wasn’t enough, within the framework of the 2+1-year Radium+ warranty, they also undertake courier delivery and return, and the warranty also applies to errors resulting from tuning!
Info
Distributor: Radium.hu
Price: HUF 284,990
Web: Radium Champion XT
Data
MSI B150M Night Elf motherboard
Intel Core i5-6500 CPU
2×4 GB HyperX DDR4-2133 RAM
Raijintek Themis CPU Cooler
Kingston SSDNow UV400 120 GB SSD
1 TB Toshiba 7200 rpm HDD
GeForce GTX 1060 6 GB video card
Kolink Punisher house
Cougar 600 W 80Plus Bronze power supply
DVD writer
5091 points PCMark 8
2976/5648/10268 points 3DMark13 Fire Strike
5555 cbs CineBench R15
463.1/364.5 MB/s CDMark Sequential Read/Write (SSD)
83.22 fps Dirt Rally
1616/2770 points Unigine Heaven/Valley
89 fps Batman: Arkham Knight
96.3 fps Metro: Last Light Redux
40/223 W total consumption (min/max)
Rating: 8.7
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