I liked the Vadim machine I was given to put in the ring against a PS3 so much…. I bought the company! Okay, I didn’t buy the company, but I did buy the rig.

And what a solid gold purchasing decision was that? It’s been a couple of years since I properly upgraded and I’ve grown tired, dead tired, of choosing to stay grounded in Microsoft Flight Simulator X; wait for the baddies to render before sticking my head round the corner in Advanced Warfighter and not even get past install on Rainbow Six: Vegas. So it came as something of a surprise when the carefully manipulated 12 FPS I was beginning to find acceptable in my favourite game WW2Online jumped to a reliable 150+ when I booted up my new machine.

I’ve been gaming for longer than most of today’s hardcore gaming crowd have lived. Really, it was 1982 when I was first fraggin’ (not that you can call four pixels and a frame rate of 5 on Manic Minor fraggin’). What I’m getting at is that I’m coming from a base of experience – so when I say my Vadim machine has rocked my gaming world, you can trust me. And I’m not being paid to say this, I haven’t been coerced any, I am writing this because I appreciate good customer service, value for money, and pixel shifting technology that’s second to non.

And I just dig the database; yes I know that makes me sound like uber geek numero uno, but I loved the process of being able to design my own system with such ease. Indeed, I’ve stopped by since, just to ‘window spec’.

One tip. Go for a less expensive processor than you actually need and then chuck a Vadim overclocking package in your trolley. Don’t get me wrong, I’m no slouch, I’ve installed liquid-cooling myself over the years and messed with overclocking on and off for as long as I can remember. But there’s a difference when Vadim’s surgeons don their gloves and get under the belly of you new machine. The difference is that they really know what they’re doing and they can bring your sophisticated speed machine within a couple of inches of total meltdown and still keep it healthy.

Oh yeah, and the result of the battle between my new rig and the PS3? My machine kicked it’s skinny Sony ass.

Jason writes about gaming and gadgets on his blog. Check him out and leave a comment at www.jasonbradbury.com