Verdict: The Deuterium might sound like it should glow in the dark, but that's not the only reason why it's our Dream PC 2004

According to its own literature 'SavRow prides itself on making the world's most exclusive computers tailored to the needs of the most discerning clients'. Well, as the Custom PC office can attest to, I'm not particularly fashion coordinated but I am rather discerning, some might say 'downright Stalinist' when it comes to what I want from a PC.

The Deuterium is the second ludicrously fast (and expensive) PC that SavRow has submitted for review in CPC, the first being the Plutonium. Even though the Plutonium was built around an off-the-shelf Asetek VapoChill XE phase-change cooling system, which allowed SavRow to overclock the CPU from 3.2GHz to 4GHz, it failed to impress us because it was so noisy, not to mention ugly as sin.

SavRow has taken a completely different approach with the Deuterium, and attempted to create a high-performance, low-noise system inside a standard PC case. The key to the problem is cooling, and SavRow appears to have pulled out all the stops. Rather than settling for another off-the-shelf cooling system, SavRow has designed its own liquid-cooling system. This comprises a pump and two radiators, which feed two separate cooling loops, one for the CPU, and one for the GPU and Northbridge. The coolant in each loop is pre-chilled by a radiator with a 92mm fan before passing through the waterblock, and then back to the reservoir.

The real magic, though, are the four TECs attached to each radiator, which help to draw heat from the liquid and into the radiator.

TECs are arguably less extreme than phase-change cooling, but the array of eight TECs in the SavRow should be extreme enough for even the most discerning power user. The coolant itself is a mixture of Prestone antifreeze and distilled water. The antifreeze is there to stop the coolant freezing (obviously) but it will also stop the build of algae and other contaminants over time. Collectively, the cooling system is known as the dual Heatseeker, and we wouldn't mind seeing SavRow selling it by itself as a high-end cooling kit.

A mighty PSU is required to cope with the demands of eight TECs, and the SilenX 600W Pro iXtrema is more than up to the job. It's capable of kicking out a mighty 36A on the 12V rail and 42A on the 5V rail, and it's quiet - even under load. The Nvidia GeForce 6800 Ultra graphics card is another power-hungry component, requiring two independent Molex plugs. Because the GPU is also liquid cooled, SavRow has clocked it from 400MHz to 450MHz, although the RAM has been left at 1.1GHz.

However, SavRow does reckon it should be able to ship cards with the RAM clocked at 1.2GHz when the Deuterium goes into full-scale production. The monitor is the award-winning 20in TFT Iiyama ProLite E511S-B - a near perfect choice for a Dream PC.

The beating heart of the Deuterium is the latest AMD processor, an Athlon 64 3800+. At the standard frequency settings it runs at an FSB of 200MHz with a 12x multiplier, but SavRow has overclocked it by raising the FSB to 210MHz. The CPU is accompanied by 1GB of Geil PC4000 RAM (2 x 512MB DIMMs), leaving two DIMM sockets free on the Abit AV8 motherboard.

You could store the entire Moscow State Archives on the 640GB of hard disk space the Deuterium provides. This consists of three 160GB Hitachi Deskstar 7K250 S-ATA drives in RAID 0 on an 3ware Escalade 8506-4LP controller, and another 7K250 as a standalone data drive. The dependable Plextor PX-712A DVD writer makes another appearance in a Dream PC.

This collection of components would make any commissar proud, and it's all housed in one of the coolest cases money can buy - the SavRow SR-71 Blackbird. There's an additional blowhole in the case roof for one of the two 92mm radiators, with the second radiator mounted at the rear. A 120mm fan sucks cool air into the case at the front. All three fans can be adjusted on the Akasa Fan Control Pro mounted in one of the 5.25in drive bays, although at the SavRow recommended setting of 10 o'clock the system is already very quiet. Creative S750 7.1 THX certified speakers, and a Logitech wireless keyboard and mouse round off the bundle.

PERFORMANCE

The Deuterium positively sizzled in our new Media Benchmarks, screaming through the CD ripping, video encoding and image editing tests.

While the Deuterium wasn't the fastest Dream PC in any one test, it would be pretty difficult to spot any real difference between it and the Alienware. Both are powered by Athlon 64 processors - the best CPUs for hardcore gamers - and so would be perfect PCs for playing Doom 3 and Half-Life 2 when they finally make an appearance this summer.

SavRow told us that by the time you read this an updated BIOS for the Abit motherboard should be available. This should allow for further overclocking, but as it stands we were unable to take the CPU past its pre-overclocked settings (210MHz x 12).

CONCLUSION

In a highly competitive market it's always going to be difficult to make one PC stand out from other models, but SavRow has pulled a rabbit out of the hat with the Deuterium. It sounds as though it should be nuclear powered, and although it doesn't shoot photons at the CPU to cool it down, the dual Heatseeker array of liquid-cooled TECs does a wonderful job of keeping everything cool. The Heatseeker cooling kit isn't something you can buy from any component retailer either; it's specially designed for SavRow and has been lovingly installed by hand.

Even the paint job has a silly name - Ferrari Nero Metallico. Personally, I think it's enough to say it looks lovely. And there are tons of innovative little touches too, such as a spare pot of paint for touching up any scratches on the case, and a Maglite for lighting up the inside of the case when you're performing upgrades. It's touches like these that make the Deuterium so special and a Dream PC indeed.

• Cases - 21st November 2008
• Motherboards - 24th October 2008
• Gaming Headsets - 26th September 2008
• Dream PCs - 24th September 2008
• Headphones - 12th September 2008
• Media PC components - 22nd August 2008
• PSUs - 14th July 2008

• Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB - Hard disks / storage
• Asus EAH4870 TOP - Graphics cards
• Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Pro - Sound cards
• Multiwinia - Games
• Zotac GeForce GTX 260² - Graphics cards
• Sapphire Radeon HD 4850 X2 - Graphics cards
• Scan 3XS X58 Core i7 - Desktop PCs