Digital Storm VIRTUE: Intel Haswell-Powered Gaming PC

by Seth Colaner — Wednesday, July 10, 2013, 11:06 AM EDT

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Performance Summary and Conclusion

Performance Summary: We saw solid scores across the board from the Digital Storm VIRTUE, and although it didn’t top the charts, it performed well against some very stiff competition. In any case, this system handled all of our benchmarks with aplomb, hardly breaking a sweat.

The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 at the heart of this rig wasn’t quite enough to push the VIRTUE over the top against more robust multi-GPU graphics options of the GTX TITAN, though, which is saying something, because the GTX 780 is a beast in its own right. The factory-overclocked (and liquid-cooled) CPU gave the VIRTUE a nice boost here and there, and we were pleased with the low noise level.

The understated chassis doesn’t get the juices flowing as much as a more flamboyant case might, although at least the all-black-everything look extends to the interior and almost all of the components. This system's price tag is steep at $2,563, and one could argue that the $2,614.84 AVADirect Mini Gaming PC and $2,199 CyberPowerPC Gamer Xtreme 5200 are better deals for the performance they offer. That said, configuration options and build-out tweaks at Digital Storm's site could net you a better value depending on your specific needs.

Still, the Digital Storm VIRTUE is an excellent, well-made machine--it’s not like it can’t handle anything you’d throw at it and then some--but for the money, you may be able to configure a rig with similar performance and hotter looks in Digital Storm’s own product line.