Yoyotech Warbird RS review

The Warbird RS is the newest addition to Yoyotech’s expansive range of dedicated gaming desktops – and an impressive addition it is, too. With its imposing chassis hiding some serious hardware, the Warbird RS goes some way to back up Yoyotech’s boast that their range can offer the most “immersive” gaming experience on the market.

As you’d expect of a PC of this ilk, the CPU is top-level: a quad-core Intel Core i7-4770K from the latest Haswell range, overclocked to 4.30GHz and supported by 8GB of RAM. The Warbird RS’ Real World Benchmarks score was a fantastic 1.29, equalling its rival (and current PC Pro A-lister), the Wired2Fire Hal 4000.

However, while the HAL 4000 has two SSDs in a RAID0 array, the Warbird RS features only one 128GB Toshiba SSD, supported by a 1TB Seagate HDD. This setup wasn’t able to match the barnstorming sequential read score the HAL 4000 managed in the AS SSD benchmark, but the sequential write result was faster. As such, the Warbird RS achieved a respectable read and write score of 516MB/sec and 478MB/sec, whereas the Hal 4000 recorded 818MB/sec and 183MB/sec respectively.

Graphics performance is a different story. Our review unit came with an Asus GeForce GTX 780 DirectCU II graphics card which, when combined with the processor, netted fantastic results in our Crysis benchmarks. Posting a score of 112fps in the High quality setting and 88fps in the Very High quality setting, the Warbird RS is a notch more capable than the HAL 4000, which achieved 79fps in the Very High quality test thanks to an Nvidia GeForce GTX 680.

The Warbird RS certainly looks the part, too: its Aerocool DS Cube tower case is tall and broad, with a smooth, rubberised, matte-black finish and textured metal plates along the side. Our review unit came with an attractive red, rubberised front and top panel, although the case can be purchased in a range of colours, including standard black.

The chassis has a good selection of ports. The power button is found along the top of the tower case, alongside a 3.5mm audio jack, two USB 3 ports and a pair of USB 2 sockets. At the rear, there are pairs of DVI, HDMI and DisplayPort video outputs. Along the bottom, you’ll find a Gigabit Ethernet port, D-SUB, DVI, two more USB 3 ports and four additional USB 2 ports.

It’s easy enough to access the machine’s interior; a couple of thumbscrews secure each side panel in place. Once you’re in, you’ll see that the inside is neat and well organised. The motherboard is a mini-ITX MSI Z87M G43, mounted horizontally across the chassis, which makes it child’s play to access the RAM and CPU on one side and the PCI Express slots on the other.

There’s more upgrade room here than the HAL 4000 can offer, too, although it isn’t what you’d call expansive. The graphics card obscures both the motherboard’s free PCI Express x1 slots, leaving room to fit only one more PCI Express card. Both bays in the main, side-facing hard disk cage are occupied, and although you can fit two disks more in another at the rear, it’s rear-facing and more difficult to get to.

A 600W PSU sits in the lower rear of the interior, a comfortable distance from the motherboard. This runs quietly, and the intake and exhaust fans are very quiet. The Corsair Hydro Series H80 water cooler does its job well, too, keeping the GPU and CPU at maximum temperatures of 68° and 70° respectively without the need for a cumbersome heatsink and fan. The system draws 89W when idle and 380W at full throttle.

The Warbird isn’t all about the base unit, however. Our review unit, priced at £1,359, came with a Microsoft Wireless Keyboard 800 and Microsoft Wireless Mouse 1000, both of which are perfectly respectable peripherals. It also came with a 23in, Full HD AOC LCD monitor, which did a decent job without excelling. A maximum brightness of 249cd/m² and a contrast ratio of 891:1 are fine, and it’s reasonably colour accurate, scoring an average Delta E of 4.2. You don’t have to purchase these add-ons, though; remove them from the package and you have a base unit that’s significantly cheaper than the HAL 4000.

Despite the inferior storage setup, then, the Yoyotech Warbird RS beats the HAL 4000 in most categories. It’s a faster gaming machine, there’s a touch more upgradeability and – if you exclude the screen and mouse/keyboard add-ons – it’s more modestly priced. It may not provide the same level of versatility as, say, last month’s Chillblast’s Fusion Photo OC V, but as a gaming platform, it’s our top choice.

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