A teaser of a great workhorse PC, we just hope Asus can get the price down on release.

Quad core at this price is fantastic, but it’s not as fast as it should be.

Another big name brand PC gets a cutting-edge, all-format, high-def optical drive capable of playing Blu-ray and HD DVD.

A monster PC thanks to some very high-end components. But it’s noisy and expensive.

Not very competitive on price, but there’s plenty of scope for performance

A very fast, well-built high-end PC. But a few niggles and high price keep it off the A-List.

An adequate Media Centre PC, but Asus’ competitor blows it out of the water.

Not great value for money, but the XPS 700 offers plenty of power and striking looks.

Aztec’s PC is a very different take on our $4000 PC A-List challenge.

The Acer Aspire SA20 is a machine built on a budget and it performs accordingly.

Shuttle's SB95P is a small form factor (SFF) aimed at the enthusiast/gamer market, and it takes advantage of the i925 iteration of PCI-E. Though Shuttle are known for their XPC’s striking looks, in this case the colour scheme is nothing to write home about: is gun-metal anyone's favourite colour?

Like clowns piling out of the other kind of Mini, you’ll be similarly surprised at how much Apple has managed to squeeze into the Mac mini.

This is one nice looking white plastic and aluminium barebones system, with smooth lines and compact minimalism. Being a SFF PC makes ventilation vital, and the Kloss is built from the new BTX standard, which was designed with thermal effectiveness in mind.

FIC's Condor has answered the call this month, offering gamers an easy to upgrade system, wrapped up in a one of the most innovative cases we've seen.

A decent PC with media abilities bolted on, transforming this into a good lounge machine.

Windows Media Center Edition (MCE) 2005 was launched with quite a bit of fanfare late last year, and not least of all because it was the first time in its 18 month life Australians could buy systems based on the OS.

Small form factor (SFF) PCs now have their foot well and truly in the home entertainment and IT/CE crossover market due largely to their aesthetics, functionality and quietness of operating volume. Westan's Biostar product looks to continue along these lines, offering a multimedia PC with all the performance of AMD's 64-bit desktop processor architecture.

The Mega 2801 has one of the coolest features seen on a HTPC: it lets you play CDs (but not DVDs) without the computer turned on. It has two red buttons on the fascia that let you choose between CD or PC.