The Vortex from PC Specialist is the first machine we have seen that uses Intel's new Core i7 processor architecture and its accompanying X58 chipset technology.

Although you may baulk at the price of the review system (and that's just for the system box) you could have one of the fastest systems around off the shelf. If you want to save some money, the whole system is fully configurable on PC Specialist's website. Equally, if you want to spend more then you can add more memory and a RAID array, for example.

The new Core i7 CPUs are all quad core with Hyperthreading, which means that the OS and some software will see eight cores. Whether they can use all eight is a different matter but they are there, and with the X58 supporting tri-channel DDR3 memory you can have huge amounts of bandwidth. This makes it ideal for building very fast and capable gaming machines or workstations.

Get the latest Dell Coupons and other computer coupons at CheapStingyBargains.com.

Anyway, back to the Vortex. Our review system came with the current flagship of the i7 line-up, the 965 Extreme, which has all four cores clocked at 3.2GHz. As mentioned above you could save some money here as PC Specialist offers all three current Core i7 chips as options, the others being the i7-920 (2.66GHz) and the i940 (2.93GHz). Whichever you choose it will come sitting in an Asus P6T Deluxe motherboard.

Again, you have options when it comes to memory configurations, our review system being equipped with three 2GB modules of fast 1600MHz Corsair XMS3 DDR3 memory in three of the six DIMM slots. You can opt for 3, 6 or 12GB of slower 1333MHz DDR3 or add another 6GB of the faster 1600MHz memory to reach the motherboard's capacity of 12GB.

To give you an idea of the performance the new technology offers, our review sample Vortex gave a PCM05 score of 12,690; far and away the fastest we have ever tested.

You also have plenty of options when it comes to which graphics card(s) you want, as one of the highlights of the X58 is that it supports both ATI's CrossFire and Nvidia's SLI techniques so whichever camp you favour, PC Specialist has an option for you.

The system supplied to us had a pair of ATI Radeon HD4870 X2s setup in a Crossfire configuration so along with the four CPU cores you have four GPU cores. Once again the Vortex outshines anything we've had on the bench with a 3DMark06 score of 23,500. But maybe of more importance to some people is that by using a pair of HD4870 X2s you will have support for up to four monitors - Flight Sim anyone?

For storage our Vortex came with a blisteringly fast 150GB Western Digital Western Velociraptor drive just for the Vista Home Premium 64-bit OS and applications, and a second 1TB Samsung drive for all data, photographs, etc. Again there is a multitude of storage options including RAID arrays which will come in handy if you see the Vortex as an ideal entry level workstation.

If, however, you fancy using your Vortex as a video editing system then there is an LG Blu-ray and DVD-RW drive, which supports Lightscribe technology.

There's plenty of power for all this lot in the shape of a 1,200W (yes that's 1.2KW) power supply and all this hardware is neatly built into one of Coolermaster's massive Cosmos 1000 cases. Despite the number of case fans and general hardware cooling fans, the Vortex is remarkably quiet.

Expensive, well yes, but the Vortex offers you a blisteringly fast gaming PC or powerful entry level workstation straight off the shelf, with the added advantage of plenty of space should you want to add more hardware, and a great deal of future proofing.