C-Cube/ATI in Gateway's Destination XTV..........................
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Gateway's Destination XTV Cuts the Cost of Convergence January 7, 1999
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Gateway's Destination XTV Cuts the Cost of Convergence
If you've had your eye on one of Gateway's Destination packages but have been too intimidated by the systems' massive 30-something-inch displays and $3,000-plus pricing, it's time to revisit your desire. Gateway has added a new member to the Destination family, the Destination XTV, equipped with a more manageable 29-inch monitor and a downsized price of just $1,999 direct.
Gateway powers the computer with a 333MHz Celeron processor with 128K of L2 cache. It then adds 32MB of memory, a 3.2GB hard drive, and an ATI All-in-Wonder Pro AGP graphics board with 8MB of SGRAM. The result of this union is a functional though underperforming PC. Its 2-D graphics scores were more than 50 percent lower than those of our 450MHz benchmark system, and its hard drive score was not much better. Not surprisingly, the Destination XTV's Business Winstone 99 score of 11.9 was about 45 percent lower than the score turned in by our reference system.
The choice of the All-in-Wonder Pro, a versatile 2-D/3-D card with an onboard TV tuner and TV-out capability, makes a lot of sense given the system's A/V features. But the ATI Rage Pro Turbo-based All-in-Wonder is also over a year old, which translates to 3-D performance that is well below the average set by the latest generation of 2-D/3-D graphics accelerators. As a result, the Destination XTV's 3D WinMark 99 score was about 76 percent lower than our reference system's.
The system's Quantum Eclipse Ultra ATA 3.2GB hard drive is another point of concern. Although the Destination is clearly positioned as a "living-room PC," the inclusion of a 3.2GB hard drive seems a bit skimpy, especially when you consider that most entry-level systems these days ship with a 6.4GB hard drive at minimum. Since the Destination XTV is likely to be used by several family members, 3.2GB of disk space may prove to be a tight fit for everyone's desired applications.
The trade-off for the system's unexciting overall computing and graphics ability is its outstanding video skills. Not surprisingly, DVD is part of this package, and it works extremely well--in large part due to the C-Cube-based decoder card. That same board provides the Dolby Digital (AC-3) decoding through the system's S/PDIF jack on the back panel. The Destination XTV's television reception comes courtesy of the All-in-Wonder Pro's cable-ready tuner.
The Destination XTV has two composite video inputs on the back panel, with an additional one located on the front. Each has a corresponding S-VHS connector. The back panel also provides RCA connectors for dual audio in, record (line) and stereo (speaker) audio out, and record (line) video out. And in one of the smartest design decisions we've seen to date, the microphone jack and a spare set of audio inputs are situated on the front of the case.
There's no denying that the 29-inch Princeton Graphics Arcadia 2.7AV monitor is the high point of this system. It has a full 27-inch viewing area, and the graphics quality in either of its available resolutions, 800x600 at 60Hz or 640x480 at 75Hz, is so good that you can read onscreen text from across the room. Its video quality also equals that of any high-end television we've looked at. And while the two built-in 5-watt speakers aren't capable of providing much bass response, the sound quality is acceptable, whether it originates from the Creative Labs Sound Blaster AudioPCI 64V card or any of the system's audio inputs. The monitor also supplies the usual assortment of front-mounted controls and is plug-and-play compatible.
All system functions are controlled through Gateway's DestiVu management software. Its main menu, activated from the keyboard or the mouse, is your pathway to several options: A/V, Full-Screen TV or TV in a Window, the PC Desktop, your Web browser, and any games you may have installed. If you're worried about sitting on top of such a large screen when using the keyboard, have no fear. Both the keyboard and the mouse are remote devices, with the latter resembling a TV remote with a trackball. The touch pad and the DestiVu control keys replace the extended numeric keypad on the keyboard.
Not just another beige box, the Destination XTV is housed in a 7x17.5x9-inch (HWD) black desktop case with seven available drive bays. Two of the four accessible bays contain the floppy and DVD-ROM drives. The hard drive occupies one of the three internal bays. An Intel Tabor motherboard with a 440BX chip set is on the inside. Its shared slot and two PCI slots are available for future expansion, and only one of the three DIMM sockets is used for the system's 32MB of memory.
A great Web site and 24-hour daily toll-free customer support have been Gateway staples for some time. Its manuals, too, continue to be excellent. The Destination XTV is covered by a three-year parts-and-labor warranty that includes onsite service for the first year. With a system such as this, you'll want to add the extra two years of available onsite coverage for $99. You'll also want to add Gateway's two-year onsite service extension for the monitor. This costs an additional $119, but it's a far better choice than trying to ship the 81-pound display out for repair.
As with past versions, the Destination XTV provides outstanding A/V facilities. Its computing ability, however, is hardly at the same level. At a minimum, we'd strongly recommend doubling the current hard drive size and memory capacity ($110 and $64 upgrades, respectively) in an attempt to recover some of the computing performance.
Gateway Destination XTV
Gateway
800-846-2000; 605-232-2000
www.gateway.com
Direct Price: $1,999
— Bill O'Brien
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