We put out the call to Australia’s white box PC manufacturers for a good high-end $4000 PC and PC Express was the first to respond. We were instantly impressed with the black Mercury PC case which looks similar to Apple’s G5. On closer inspection it’s not quite as polished but it will impress most. We were initially concerned that the mesh holes down the sides would lead to a noise increase but turning it on saw a nice quiet system.

On opening the side you’re greeted with a relatively clean layout. Every component is easily accessible and there’s plenty of space to add more – not that you’d want to as this is a very high spec machine. The processor is a super-powerful dual-core Athlon 64 X2 4200+ and it’s flanked by 1GB of PC3200 RAM. The graphics card is an XpertVision GeForce 7800GTX and there’s even a Creative Audigy ZS soundcard. The only potential downside is that the motherboard doesn’t offer SLI – limiting a future upgrade path. However, FireWire is included, there’s a floppy drive and an excellent LG DVD writer which supports 16x DVD+R, 6x DVD+R9 dual layer and 5x DVD-RAM discs. There’s even a second DVD-ROM drive for disc copying.

We’re happy with the connectivity options too, as two USB 2 ports, FireWire, headphone and mic jacks adorn the front. At the back are six more USB 2 ports, two more FireWire, coaxial S/PDIF in and out ports as well as serial and parallel ports for legacy connections.

Storage comes from two WD 250GB hard disks running in RAID 0. This gives a respectable formatted capacity of 465GB. There’s a spare slot to add another if this ever feels limiting. Other free slots for future upgrades include two 1x PCI Express sockets, one PCI slot, two 5.25 inch bays and a 3.5 inch external bay.

Some people should note, however, that there are no case fans. While this keeps the noise down, people who want to tinker and overclock will have to add their own. That said, the case never felt hot inside and we suffered no stability problems.

With such top-end components few people will want for 2D performance as a monster PC Mark 04 score of 6345 illustrates. But the 7800GTX also offers excellent 3D performance and we saw scores of 57.5fps in our Far Cry test and 90fps in Half-Life 2. See our graphics cards labs on this month to see how much further you can push this card.

Just remember, with the bundled LCD monitor you’ll be limited to 1280 x 1024 resolutions. The good news is, that it’s the

A-Listed Viewsonic VX924 which offers a 4ms response time and fabulous colours. Though viewing angles and the ability to show the darkest colour shades may stifle those demanding exacting technical excellence it’s still the best 19-inch display on the market and will please even hardened gamers.

The cordless Logitech keyboard and mouse are also nice touches. Both are comfortable to use and, most importantly, responsive enough to play games with. The mouse is rechargeable and its docking station acts as the receiver for both peripherals.

The crowning touch are the speakers. By bundling Creative’s top-notch T7900 7.1s people are in for an audio feast. The seven satellites offer a very rich sound with great performance in both treble and bass and the sub rounds things off very nicely. They’re great for games, DVDs and music.

It doesn’t come with much in the way of software. The OS is Windows XP Home and the only other applications are Nero 6 OEM and CyberLink PowerDVD 5. Unfortunately the latter is limited to 2-channel audio so you’ll need to upgrade to make use of your speakers.

Finally there’s the warranty which is limited to just one year return to base. Whenever people are paying this much for a PC we’d like to see multiyear on-site support if things go wrong. However, this is the only downside to what is otherwise a very well-rounded system. With all the latest and best components and peripherals, it deservedly takes its place on the A-List this month.