Manufacturer: SYS Technologies
Pricing: $3139 (as configured)
Availability: Now

How much are you willing to spend to get the most out of your Athlon system/processor? The folks at SYS are looking to find out, pairing up with Kryotech to put together a setup that offers customers a really fast Athlon system at a really high price. Their SYS Cold-Fusion, in fact, pumps the 1.4GHz Athlon up to an impressive 1.886GHz, something made particularly impressive by the fact that even at its default speed, the 1.4GHz Athlon has been giving 1.8, 1.9 and even 2.0GHz P4's a run for their money.

This performance boost, however, comes at a premium of more than twice what an otherwise identical system from SYS costs without the Kryo cooling. That's an awful lot to spend on bragging rights, particularly when the impact of telling people you have a 1.886GHz Athlon system will be somewhat diminished by the fact that Intel already has a 2.0GHz processor on the market... and we all know that in the minds of all too many who don't read all the benchmarks, bigger always equals better.

So is the SYS Cold-Fusion 1866 Desktop worth the money? Well let's take a look at it, before making any conclusion, and let you decide for yourselves how your assessment compares with ours. With the 1.4GHz Athlon's days numbered as king of the hill, though, we're not going to make this an exhaustive review. Rather, it will be a glimpse at a product on the market to see if it's worth looking into for the average enthusiast reading this site.