Polywell Poly 925CV-3600, the "budget" gamer rig

We know being a PC gamer can hit hard on the wallet (we understand how very grueling it can be) but since when is 2,900 clams a "budget" machine? And we want to know why for the Polywell Poly 925CV-3600's price you're stuck getting a Creative 7.1 audio system and not an LCD monitor (you can see where our preferences lie). All that said, at the end of the day PC Magazine gives the 3.6GHz P4, GeForce 6800-based Polywell a pretty good overall rating, and a 94/100 in the gaming category. Whatever.

[Shaniac @ Dec 19th 2005 1:01AM]

Several years ago Polywell burst onto the scene with what seemed to be great machines at great prices. Wrong Wrong Wrong. I along with several tech savy friends got machines from them and the prices were great but the performance was bottom of the barrel. Their customer service stinks and they were very reluctant to fix any of the problems the machines had. It got so bad we all had to have our credit card companies go after them for the refund. Down right nasty they were and I have never been insulted or threatened when calling for service, only from Ploywell.

To add insult to injury, they had the nerve to call me a few weeks ago. As their books are in the red they are desperate to get buyers and were very emphatic about selling me a machine or to have me pimp my friends and family to them. STEAR CLEAR of POLYWELL!!!

[J2thaG @ Dec 19th 2005 1:01AM]

Pure speculation on my part, but most vendors are still hearing from gamers that LCDs are still not good enough for gaming, and CRTs are the way to go. It's been my experience too that reviewers tend to ding packages that don't take full advantage of the system's audio capabilities. In this case 7.1 surround.
As far as the use of budget, I don't think that was Polywell's choice of words, but PC Mag's. Nowhere on Polywell's site do they call this a budget. In fact, it's under the heading "high-end desktop." Besides, who in their right mind would think that they could get those components in a budget PC.

[Maikeru @ Dec 19th 2005 1:01AM]

A cheap CRT probably has less ghosting than a cheap LCD when in a contrasty game situation (such as in a dark room illuminated by a flashlight). Although a 19" CRT is certainly an extreme pain to move compared to a 17" LCD.

[Shaniac @ Dec 19th 2005 1:01AM]

Several years ago Polywell burst onto the scene with what seemed to be great machines at great prices. Wrong Wrong Wrong. I along with several tech savy friends got machines from them and the prices were great but the performance was bottom of the barrel. Their customer service stinks and they were very reluctant to fix any of the problems the machines had. It got so bad we all had to have our credit card companies go after them for the refund. Down right nasty they were and I have never been insulted or threatened when calling for service, only from Ploywell.

To add insult to injury, they had the nerve to call me a few weeks ago. As their books are in the red they are desperate to get buyers and were very emphatic about selling me a machine or to have me pimp my friends and family to them. STEAR CLEAR of POLYWELL!!!

[J2thaG @ Dec 19th 2005 1:01AM]

Pure speculation on my part, but most vendors are still hearing from gamers that LCDs are still not good enough for gaming, and CRTs are the way to go. It's been my experience too that reviewers tend to ding packages that don't take full advantage of the system's audio capabilities. In this case 7.1 surround.
As far as the use of budget, I don't think that was Polywell's choice of words, but PC Mag's. Nowhere on Polywell's site do they call this a budget. In fact, it's under the heading "high-end desktop." Besides, who in their right mind would think that they could get those components in a budget PC.

[Maikeru @ Dec 19th 2005 1:01AM]

A cheap CRT probably has less ghosting than a cheap LCD when in a contrasty game situation (such as in a dark room illuminated by a flashlight). Although a 19" CRT is certainly an extreme pain to move compared to a 17" LCD.