Digital Storm Bolt Small Form Factor Gaming PC Review

by Seth Colaner — Monday, November 05, 2012, 08:28 AM EDT

Page 7:
Power Consumption and Noise

Before bringing this article to a close, we'll take a look at power consumption of the Digital Storm Bolt Level 3 versus the other systems we tested. We let each system boot and sit idle before measuring idle power and then loaded down each system with both an instance of Prime95 (to load down the CPU) and Furmark (to load the GPU) before taking our full load power consumption measurements. Our goal was to give you an idea as to how much power each configuration used while idling on the desktop and while under a heavy workload. Keep in mind that this is total system power consumption being measured at the outlet.

At idle, the Bolt is the best in the group; at just 47.5W, it pulls just a bit less than the field--even more than the Alienware system that uses an external power brick as opposed to an interior PSU. When under a full load this machine sucks 270W, which is about on par with the other systems.

While the Bolt's power draw is definitely satisfactory, noise, on the other hand, is a different story. Look, we love a lot about this machine, but the noise that the Bolt emits is simply hard to take. It’s grating enough when the thing’s idling, but at full bore it sounds like a tiny airplane is about to take off from your desk.

However, considering some of the Bolt’s better qualities, that’s one annoyance that users may be able to live with.