Geek Junk – The musings of just another Geek and his Junk

The HP Slimline class of desktops offer mid range quality computing for a low end price, creating the perfect product for home users that want more than just casual surfing and e-mail capabilities but do not want, or do not need the higher cost of a full sized desktop. The Slimline offers up decent specs and a small form factor making it easy to place in even the most cluttered of work areas. Despite its small size though, it packs a lot of punch making it an ideal workstation for a cost conscious consumer.

In terms of specifications, the Slimline s3700y, offers up a duel core AMD Athlon processor operating at 2.6 GHz, which offers smooth operating experience even when running multiple programs. It also comes with 3GB or RAM, and a 360GB Hard Drive, making sure that you will be able to run and install plenty of new programs on the market today, from word processing programs, chat programs, as well as DVD players. These specs make this desktop a great choice for people who want to be able to multitask while working on different multimedia projects.

The graphics card in the Slimline is a NVIDIA GeForce 6150 SE, which is a mid level graphics card. It is built into the motherboard of the computer, yet still has its own separate processor, making it a hybrid graphics card not quite as capable as a stand alone addition, but still more capable than your average built in graphics processor. This graphics card is more than capable to play older computer games, as well as new ones so long as the settings are turned down.

This PC also offers up some very nice media center features. First and foremost it comes with Vista Home Premium. Home Premium, offers all the new features of Windows Vista such as enhanced desktop search and built in security, but it also offers up the Media Center bundle, which allows your computer to act as the true center of your home entertainment network. In addition to that, the Slimline also comes with a Light Scribe enabled DVD burner, allowing you to not only burn content to CDs and DVDs, but to etch in a label to the top of your disc creating a neat professional look to your media. There is also a built in multi media card reader, allowing you to transfer photos and video directly from your camera or any device that uses a removable media card. Finally, the Slimline also offers up the capability to run a 6 speaker configuration directly from the computer, making a nice addition to any home entertainment system.

The Slimline s3700y comes with a 1 year manufacturers warranty protecting from any defects. Many other retailers also offer warranty protection plans covering protection from other amount of wear and tear such as dust build up, however, you can usually forgo these extra protections so long as you apply the occasional amount of preventative maintenance.

The specifications of this computer, combined with its small easy to place size, as well as its low cost compared to similar but larger counterparts, makes this an excellent choice both for people needing to spend a little less, and those that want quality and affordability wrapped into one package.

Specifications

• 1 Year Warranty
• AMD Athlon X2 2.6GHz Processor
• 3GB DDR2 System Memory (RAM)
• 320 Gigabyte Serial ATA Hard Drive
• NVIDIA GeForce 6150 SE Graphics Card (On board)
• 6 Speaker Capable Sound Card (On board)
• 56 Kbps Modem (PCI Card)
• 10/100 Network Interface (On board)
• Duel Layer DVD±RW/CD-RW
• Multimedia Card Reader
• 1 PCI-E x 16
• 1 PCI-E x 1 (Modem comes in this expansion slot)
• 6 USB 2 Front 4 Back
• HP Multimedia Keyboard
• HP Mouse
• Windows Vista Home Premium SP1