Monday, October 20, 2008
HP Releases Two New Desktops and 25.5 Inch Monitor
Posted by Jason Dunn in "Digital Home Hardware & Accessories" @ 02:00 PM
HP has released a trio of new products that are quite stylish - although I'd have preferred to see a new Slimline computer in this mix. Most consumers don't need full-sized computers like this. I dig the paint jobs on these though!
This is the HP Pavilion Verde Special Edition a6645f PC. Rolls off the tongue like peanut butter, doesn't it? I'm impressed with how much hardware they can pack into this for $579: and AMD Athlon X2 4850e dual-core CPU at 2.5 Ghz, NVIDIA nForce 430 chipset, 5 GB of DDR2 RAM, 500 GG 7200 RPM hard drive, and an NVIDIA GeForce 6150 SE graphic card. Really? A 6000 series GeForce, still? The HP Slimline computer I bought earlier this year has the same GPU, and it's not powerful enough to run the screen animations on the Zune software at full tilt - they really need to let that GPU line pass away gracefully instead of cramming it into new desktops. That one issue aside, this looks like a decent computer.
The equally long-named HP Pavilion Phoenix Special Edition a6655f PC is going to be available from Best Buy on November 9th for $659. It will ship with an AMD Phenom X4 9150e Quad-Core CPU running at 1.8 Ghz, the NVIDIA nForce 430 chipset, 5 GB of DDR2 RAM, a 640 GB 7200 RPM hard drive...and the same lame GPU as the machine above: the NVIDIA GeForce 6150 SE.
The short but obscurely-named HP w2558hc boasts a massive 25.5 inches of screen real estate, and an equally large HDMI logo on the front of the monitor. I sure hope that's a sticker that can be peeled off - why would someone need to be reminded that their monitor has HDMI? The w2558hc runs at 1920 x 1200 resolution, has a 3000:1 contrast ratio, a 3 ms gray to gray speed at 1920x1200, a 2 megapixel web cam, and according to the spec sheet, integrated rear-facing four-watt speakers. The price? A very reasonable $599. The HP screens are super glossy though (I have a 22 inch version), so you have to want the hyper-gloss effect. It makes things look nice, but if you have any sort of sunglight hitting the monitor, all you see is glare.
The full press release for all these products is after the break. Read more...
