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Engadget's back to school guide 2011: desktops
Welcome to Engadget's Back to School guide! We know that this time of year can be pretty annoying and stressful for everyone, so we're here to help out with the heartbreaking process of gadget buying for the school-aged crowd. Today, we're settling down with desktops -- and you can head to the Back to School hub to see the rest of the product guides as they're added throughout the month. Be sure to keep checking back -- at the end of the month we'll be giving away a ton of the gear featured in our guides -- and hit up the hub page right here! Truth be told, if you only have the money to swing one computer, it should probably be a laptop. Better, we think, to have the option of relocating to the library when your hallmates launch an impromptu game of beer pong as you're trying to wrap up that 10-pager on Othello. And yet, we can still appreciate why some of you might want to kick it old-school and opt for a desktop instead. Maybe you're planning on using a netbook or tablet as your day computer, and can afford to leave a desktop parked in the dorm. Or perhaps you're a gamer, and have long since sworn off mobile GPUs. Whatever your reasons for bucking the trend, we found a selection of towers and all-in-ones aimed at game fanatics, power users and folks trying their darndest to save money and space. Oh, and you haven't forgotten about all of the other gear you need for the semester, have you? We're giving away $3,000 worth of stuff to 15 lucky readers, and you can enter to win simply by leaving a comment below. So what are you waiting for, folks? Follow us past the break and see what made the cut.
HP TouchSmart 610 review
Is it just us or do all-in-ones seem to be having a moment? Over the past two months, we've seen Toshiba make a belated jump into the market, while Lenovo went and added one to its family of Think-branded laptops and desktops. And that's not even counting models by old-timers like Apple, Dell, and MSI. And then there's HP, which has been making touchscreen all-in-ones for three years -- long before they were a thing. The company's had plenty of time to fine-tune its finger-friendly TouchSmart software, and now, its newest model, the TouchSmart 610 ($899 and up), ushers in a fresh design, highlighted by a hinge that allows the display to slide down and lie nearly flat. Although it's been shipping since this spring, it's only been available with Sandy Bridge for about a month now. We took one of these tricked-out beasts into our living room and got reacquainted with the comforts of not-so-mobile computing. At the risk of spoiling everything, we think this should be on your shortlist if you're considering an all-in-one, especially one with a big 'ol touchscreen. Read on to find out why. %Gallery-127193%
HP twirls out TouchSmart 610 and 9300 all-in-one PCs
When almost every other computer manufacturer has copied its touchscreen all-in-one, what's a company like HP to do? Create a totally crazy pivoting and reclining one, of course! Yep, HP's newest TouchSmart 610 and 9300 Elite Business PC may look like typical 1920 x 1080-resolution, 23-inch all-in-ones when positioned upright, but that all changes when their screens recline up to 60 degrees or the entire body of the rig swivels around to do a 180. It's one seriously flexible AIO, but the new design isn't just about yoga-like tricks -- it aims to make touch interaction more comfortable and ergonomic, and on that vein HP has also updated its TouchSmart 610 consumer model with its latest TouchSmart software layer, which includes finger-friendly Hulu, Netflix, and Twitter apps as well as a TouchSmart Apps Center. The 9300 Elite Business all-in-one, as you may have caught from its name, is meant for enterprise and "customer spaces" (aka kiosks, counters, etc.), and thus only comes loaded with Windows 7. Spec-wise, the 610 can be configured with Intel and AMD desktop processors, up to 16GB of RAM, a terabyte of storage, a Blu-ray drive, while its 1.3 megapixel camera and Beats Audio speakers come standard. Naturally, the 9300 has to keep up its professional reputation, and though it cuts out the Beats, it gains Intel's latest Sandy Bridge processors, a 160GB SSD option, and a higher quality two megapixel cam with facial recognition software. You know, for "enhanced security." So, when can you pick up one of these monsters? The $900 610 is expected to start shipping on February 9th, while the 9300 will hit in May for an undetermined price. We're hoping to bring you a full review of the 610 soon, but we can tell you from our early look at it that the viewing angles were sufficiently wide and the tilting mechanism fairly rigid. Man, it's already turning out to be quite a week for HP -- that webOS event is coming up on Wednesday, but in the meantime you'll want to hit the break for the full TouchSmart press release and a short video of the reclining mechanism in action. %Gallery-115790% %Gallery-115791%
