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Dino PC’s Jurassic 2500 may look rather plain, but the large case has plenty of room for expansion. There’s already an Intel Core i5-2500 processor with 8GB of RAM, plus a 1TB hard disk and a Blu-ray drive. You also get an excellent BenQ 24in monitor with a 1,920×1,080 resolution.
Given this specification, we weren’t too disappointed to find no dedicated graphics card, and if games aren’t a priority, you’ll appreciate that Dino PC has sensibly used the money saved on a decent monitor. If you want to upgrade later, the Jurassic 2500 has enough room for long AMD cards, and the 500W power supply should have enough headroom for the extra power draw. You’d be well advised to add a couple of fans to the front and rear panels as well, as the only fan is the one that cools the CPU.
This isn’t an oversight, as the Core i5-2500 can’t be overclocked and only draws 94W at peak power, so heat build-up isn’t an issue. A score of 101 overall in our benchmarks is exactly what we’d expect and the 8GB of RAM means you’ll be able to work with larger files, such as HD video.
The integrated graphics processor isn’t up to much, and failed most of our gaming benchmarks. It’s powerful enough to play Full HD video with ease – handy as there’s a Blu-ray drive. The PC has DVI and VGA outputs, but there’s no DVI cable in the box. You’ll also have to install the Blu-ray playback software from the bundled disc before you can watch any movies.
Although the motherboard has four free expansion card slots – one PCI-E x16, two PCI-E x1 and one PCI – it doesn’t include support for USB3. You get a total of eight USB ports, with two on the front panel, but two of these will be taken up by the Logitech keyboard and mouse set. This is a fairly basic set, with bouncy keys and a lightweight mouse, but it’s fine to get started with. Audio output is limited to three 3.5mm jacks, but this supports up to 5.1-channel surround sound.
The star of the show is undoubtedly the BenQ G2420HDB monitor. It has a bright and even backlight, great contrast and natural-looking colours. AOC’s 24in 2436Vwa has a slight edge in picture quality, but it doesn’t have BenQ’s clear and easy-to-use menu system.
Other than the lack of USB3 support, the Jurassic 2500 is a well-rounded PC, providing a good balance of performance, expandability and quality peripherals. The three-year warranty is deceptive, though, as it includes replacement parts for only a year. But despite this, the Jurassic is still a great buy.
