Epson's budget slim-line tower, the Endeavor AT960

Japanese consumers looking for a slim-line tower PC on the cheap could probably do worse than Epson's latest Endeavor desktop, the AT960, which features a 2.53GHz Celeron D processor and 256MB of DDR2 RAM for $420. More yen lets you step up to a Pentium 4 chip as fast as 3.8GHz, up to 2GB of RAM and 250GB of hard drive space (compared to  the sparse 40GB in the base configuration), WiFi, and a DVD burner -- but no amount of money can improve upon the ATI Radeon Xpress 200 integrated graphics. Likewise, there's not much you can do about the dearth of input options, so the four USB 2.0 hookups and serial and parallel ports are gonna have to stand in for the missing FireWire.

[Tylizzle @ May 30th 2006 1:15PM]

Is this the same company that produces Printers? haha

[dzieci @ May 30th 2006 1:30PM]

and scaners :) but this configuration looks real nice (special with 2x lcd) to use it for digital photography.

[Cass @ May 30th 2006 1:33PM]

Hey, Epson used to make great PCs. My parents had a 4.77 MHz Epson Equity I when I was really little. Plus, in Japan they've had PCs for ages and were at least better than some of the PC98 crap you had to buy in the 90s.

[slysithesuperspy @ May 30th 2006 1:35PM]

I never knew they made pc's.

Isn't the celeron D only a single core?

[Duodave @ May 30th 2006 1:51PM]

Considering that it starts at $421.00 (USD) that's not a bad system. Slim machines are nothing new. "Pizza-box" style machines were all the rage a few years back, this is the same turned on it's side. I must say, however, I've never liked the vertical CD-ROM setup. Seemed like it might scratch.

[MARSHAK @ May 30th 2006 2:36PM]

should have used something like a laptop optical drive. where u can click the disc in (dells slimlines have this). still...good price. room for an agp or pci-e card?

[Will @ May 30th 2006 3:00PM]

Yeah the specs are kind of weak, but I think that we are forgetting that for the vast majority of people, a PC is only used for surfing, and maybe e-mail. We are seeing the transformation of the PC from a specialty device, to an appliance. Sadly I think we'll see a day where PC's come with a propietary OS, like a DVD player.

So, for the money, it's not a bad system, and it looks similar to the Dell's that are advertised for 399.00. And it's head and shoulders above what you could get just a few years ago.