Pogo Linux: 1GHz for under $1000

Final Thoughts on the Linux Installation

What you're getting here is Red Hat 7.0 with a few modifications and everything works right out of the box. Aside from a few relatively picky details, there aren't any major problems with the setup. As with any machine, check out what was installed and customize it to suit your needs. If the machine is for playing games, you likely won't need Apache running, so there's a good place to start. Further, the shipped NVIDIA drivers are extremely fast and provide excellent performance. If the machine is for more business-like activity, the hardware speaks for itself: this is a nice machine. We like Red Hat (even 7.0) and by remaining fairly close to the base install, users will have the advantage of easier software upgrades as new versions of the distribution are released.

Final Thoughts on the System

Because of the configuration of the Pogo Altura system, the performance of the machine was nearly identical to one of our test beds. Pogo used the same hard drive and motherboard that we use in our own in-house Athlon tests, and with the newest Altura systems shipping with 256MB of PC133 SDRAM by default, the only difference in performance between the Altura and our CPU test bed is that the Altura uses CAS3 memory while we use CAS2 PC133 SDRAM, which gives us a 2- 5% performance advantage.

Other than that we had very few complaints about the system, most of them were in regards to small issues, such as the use of a plastic hard drive cage which really isn't necessary for a system like this.

Pogo isn't meant as a replacement for those that would otherwise custom build their own systems. However it is a good alternative for those that must have pre-built systems for work or personal use and want to have something that uses the same type of components that we would suggest the performance enthusiasts use in their own systems.

Quite possibly the biggest selling point for Pogo and the Altura is the fact that their pre-built systems are actually quite a bit like what your average hardware enthusiast would put together if they were given $1000 to spend. The fact that Pogo offers Linux as a primary OS on their creation is yet another point that helps to set them apart from the competition.

So when your boss asks you to have 10 new systems up and running by next week, you could kill a weekend building them yourself, or you could give Pogo a call and have them do the work for you and your boss would never know the difference.