I see it is bluray, I see it's talking about high def...and even the cable box. I'm still confused by all the distinctions on HD processing though - will this get HD over the air, record HD, and take HD through the cable signal (assuming you pay for HD service)?

kliu0x52 wrote:Okay, that's exaggerating, since the mid-range 5570 can easily beat the top-tier 2006 video card, and many games do not require top-tier cards.

I can play BioShock (2007 game) on "high" settings at my monitor's native 1280x1024 resolution (higher res than the 720p used by consoles) at playable framerates with my 6EU (non-K version) Sandy Bridge IGP. A 5570 is MUCH better than the Sandy Bridge IGP.

The 5570 is a fairly good card, and if you consider that this is a consumer-grade prefab PC and not a self-build or a niche-market Alienware, I am surprised that HP would include something this far up.

The 5570 really isn't mid-range. It's a low end card designed to be passive or small fan on half height normally.

I won't deny that Bioshock runs well like that, but the core engine is quite well scaled to lower end hardware. Ditto for most Source games.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not knocking the choice of card. I'm just letting people know that this machine most likely won't crunch Crysis 2 at a good performance:quality ratio.

The 5570 in this machine would be excellent for a little multi-monitor goodness, but I certainly wouldn't purpose any computer for gaming with a card as low as that, personally. As I said, I think this thing would make for a decent little workhorse, or a nifty HTPC, though.

peaceetc wrote:Anyone who will want to do any upgrades to their computers before the end of their warranty will want to avoid HP. From what I understand, opening the computer voids the warranty. I'd suggest Dell, who actually encourages people to make changes. They build a lot of their cases with room to add more hard drives, etc.

Important point you make there: I've got one of the HP 'Elites' Woot sold a while back, and this case has very little internal room for adding drives. I use it as a media server, and HP's got this funky internal drive bay and short cables that severely limits your ability to add drives. Not to mention that 300W power supply.

DrunkCat wrote:As gamer who was in the hobby back when ATI was just coming out with the HD series and AGP still existed; how good is this in terms of being able to pimp out?

i.e. Is it good enough to game with out of the box and at a later date, be able to upgrade to game even better? (Will it be compatible with stuff for the next two years. ?)

I bought an i3 quad core processing lenovo w/8 gb ram and tb hd at BB for $599 just a month or two ago...

Added a $280 XFX HD Radeon 6950 2gb and a 750w ultra psu for $75 and can play anything Ive tried, on max settings.

DrunkCat wrote:As gamer who was in the hobby back when ATI was just coming out with the HD series and AGP still existed; how good is this in terms of being able to pimp out?

i.e. Is it good enough to game with out of the box and at a later date, be able to upgrade to game even better? (Will it be compatible with stuff for the next two years. ?)

NO. The 5570 is NOT a gaming g-card, it would be a good media center PC, but that is about it. To even a decent GAMING PC you would need to upgrade the power supply (min $50, but I'd go with about 700w at around $100) and the g-card (another $100ish for a decent 5770 or better.)

Anyone talking about gaming on this card is either playing an old game, on low resolution or low settings. This setup would have trouble running even WOW on high. It certainly isn't going to hold up for the 6 months (Battlefield 3) let alone 2 years. To touch BF3, you'd be lucky to run it on low with this setup!

This computer would be good for someone heading off to college (if they didn't mind not having a laptop) or for audio/video editing, even for a home media center PC. I wouldn't buy it to upgrade, look for a more gaming specific setup or build your own. My brother in law just built a similar setup with parts from newegg for $550, though it had a very nice g-card that would most certainly rock for the next 3 years.

One more thing, quad core vs dual core... it only matters if the software is built to utilize quad core technology (multi-threaded.) Unless you are getting into some heavier stuff and if it was a game that could, the g-card couldn't handle it. Windows 7 64bit will help some with this, but quad could be overkill. Maybe in 2 years it'll be different, but current software just isn't there, imo. - Source on this is I monitor my cores and their loads, I do light audio editing, heavy gaming, a lot of office work on Office 2010, web programming and application development and I have an old quad core Q6600 that hardly ever sees more than 2 cores being used and that is with Win 7 Pro.

Here's a decent build from Tom's Hardware forums. If you are curious about what my bro-in-law built pm me I'll send the specs.

This kind of money and a wired keyboard and mouse? Why not an old fashioned ball mouse?

I had an older model AMD version of a similar HP HTPC, and it is pretty sweet and still alive and kicking. If you are looking to upgrade though be aware that it is really tight so any chunkier graphics card may not fit in the space.

*ahem*

TEEERRRABYYYYTEEEE!

That is all.

I am actually thinking that this isn't too great of a deal. If you have a Costco or Sam's Club near you, check out what they have in stock. For the same price or about $100 more you can get something just like this but with a nice big matching monitor.

DoDred wrote:This kind of money and a wired keyboard and mouse? Why not an old fashioned ball mouse?

For "this kind of money" most people will have their favorite keyboard and mouse already. I look at the wired mouse and keyboard as backups in case those have failed or we're linking our old system to the new without a switch.

DrunkCat wrote:Is it good enough to game with out of the box and at a later date, be able to upgrade to game even better? (Will it be compatible with stuff for the next two years. ?)

Yes (more or less) and no, it doesn't make much sense to upgrade. Nice box for now, but HP has filled all the memory slots and given you such an anemic power supply, you'll have to throw away more than the graphics card when you upgrade. Also, in my experience, HP engineers their towers so that upgrades are a total pain in the butt. I'd recommend a Dell or DIY rig, if you want to upgrade later.

Sorry Woot... this is way over priced

sleepygamer wrote:Unless you are playing at a crazy small resolution, I'm gonna call Agrajag's life on that one.

I have a desktop for recording with specs far higher than this (i7 950 / 12GB RAM / HD5750) and Crysis on high at 1080p? Hell no. It runs like crap.

I don't know what to tell you, I'm not making this up. Running at 1080p on my 23'' monitor, the high settings on Crysis are the games own optimized settings, I actually have a few settings (physics, water, shadows) cranked to very high and the game runs fine.

Don't mean to be picky but the memory card reader does not support SDHC.

I would say go with a DIY before anything else. This comp isn't bad but its true that you will ahve to update the power supply before the g-card, and thats assuming the new g-card even fits in the space provided

Barkoff99 wrote:Sorry Woot... this is way over priced

So ... where can I get a comparable machine for less, and how much should it cost? (I'm looking for a HTPC; not for gaming).

vladistov wrote:Celebrating the death of any creature is a disgusting act of hubris.

I'll remember that the next time I wipe out a giant hill of fire ants in by back yard. Hubris is my motto in that situation.

How would this machine do editing 1080i/p video?

For those familiar with TV Tuners: The specs say, "QAM HDTV for cable broadcast, does not require the use of a set-top box." So, will this display premium channels I've subscribed to, HBO and the like, or does premium content still require an external switch or filter that would be exclusive to the cable company's equipment?

SO, is this PC can burn blue ray discs? Please reply.

toniob wrote:I have aa DVD recorder which needs replacement.

Any knowledge of how this would work?

I've never seen the need for a dedicated DVD recorder. Nearly any PC made in the last ten years will do the job.

D3lusional wrote:I don't know what to tell you, I'm not making this up. Running at 1080p on my 23'' monitor, the high settings on Crysis are the games own optimized settings, I actually have a few settings (physics, water, shadows) cranked to very high and the game runs fine.

I don't doubt you can "run" crysis at 1080p with high settings, but a Radeon 5570 is not capable of running it at those settings at a decent framerate.

http://www.techspot.com/review/245-ati-radeon-hd-5570/page4.html

Look at the bottom chart here, this is Crysis Warhead and at 1680x1050 (a lower resolution than 1080p) with medium settings and absolutely no AA or AF you're still not going to break 20 FPS. A 5570 is a mid range card at best and it's a stretch to even consider it a gaming card.

Here's a second source showing performance at two different visual settings and it is barely playable at minimum settings as seen in the first test:

http://www.hardocp.com/article/2010/02/09/amds_ati_radeon_hd_5570_video_card_review/4

See costco below for the same price w/ZT Affinity AMD Phenom™ II 1055T Six-Core Processor (2.8 GHz); AMD® 760G+SB710 Chipset;16GB DDR3 Memory; 2TB SATA II Hard Drive AND ZT Affinity Core i7 Intel® Core™ i7-2600 Processor (3.40GHz); Intel® H67 Express Chipset; 12GB DDR3 Memory (32GB MAX); 1TB 7200RPM SATA II Hard Drive

http://www.costco.com/Common/Category.aspx?whse=BC&Ne=5000001&eCat=BC|84|56671&N=4047237+4294908621&Nr=P_CatalogName:BC&Ns=P_Price|1||P_SignDesc1&lang=en-US&topnav=

bigfink wrote:Ok first of all the amount of ram in your computer is not utilized by the given speed of a processor. It only matters how many programs you run at any given time. You have no idea what you are talking about.

I *think* he might have been talking about the 64 bit part in the first half of his statement. Granted, he could have been a little confused (hence the part about speed vs. RAM and "feeling it"), but he's right about the first half of his statement. Namely, that 8 Gigs of ram won't be fully utilized by the kernel on a 32 bit system, it takes a 64 bit processor to allocate higher amounts of memory.

replytovi wrote:SO, is this PC can burn blue ray discs? Please reply.

I don't think so. The term "SuperMulti Blu-ray Player" implies that it will play Blu-ray, but not record it. It will surely record any type of DVD or CD, but I suspect Blue-ray, no.

mrclass wrote:Don't mean to be picky but the memory card reader does not support SDHC.

That's really quite telling, since virtually ALL digital cameras now use these HC cards and people seldom buy 2 GB ones. Looks like they got stuck with a bunch of older internal readers and are hoping you won't notice.

I bought one of these back in September. The letters on the keyboard are all rubbing off. I called HP support and they said the keyboard is not a warranty item. I've owned computers for over 30 years and this was the first time I've seen this type of defect. Needless to say, it's the last HP product I will ever buy. I'llbuy another keyboard but what else will crap out is my nagging question.

DoDred wrote:This kind of money and a wired keyboard and mouse? Why not an old fashioned ball mouse?

I honestly prefer wired keyboards and mice. I have NEVER ONCE wanted to use my keyboard or mouse more than about 2 foot from my monitor. The bonus being no batteries to replace.

If you're using this for a home media center on your TV, then sure. I can easily see why someone would want wireless mouse/keyboard. But if I'm so far away I can't see what's on the screen, then what good does it do?

I was an HP fan for years for cheap reliable media pc's. Always worked, until the one i bought last year to replace the previous one that died. Both died within a year of purchase. I just built my own for the same price and it would rock the socks off of 4 of these put together, if it was possible. HP has lost its quality build. Build your own. Also, if you ever want to upgrade your mobo, hdd, you can NOT. you will need your own copy of windows and another computer to use to format the hdd, because the coding will not allow you to fresh install windows on the hdd unless its a slave drive. Save your cash and build your own. Why buy cheap crap nowadays?

I guess it's OK if all you want to do is watch TV or play games, but little kids and old people can do much better than this machine.

(I've always wanted to say that...)

who gave hp the right to determine what is "elite" or not?

Somebody asked upthread if this unit lent itself to being tricked out.

Short answer, NO.

MicroATX ("Micro" means, very small) board with only one PCI slot open, and I've never seen an HP box sold here (or anywhere, actually) with the kind of beefy power supply you need to swap out for industrial strength video cards.

Disclaimer, I'm pretty down one the whole line of HP/Compaq "value-priced" consumer machines ever since Carly Fiorina took over HP and fired everybody who gave a darn about the boring old hardware.

Not as bad as the Acer/Gateway/eMachines nightmares, but pretty poor. Lot of shortcuts taken to save a penny that seriously affect future reliability.

The business line of HP machines seems to still be pretty good, but you'll pay for those.

JinnRikki wrote:A 300 watt power supply is a little on the lite side, especially if you plan on any upgrades (video card). Buy this, get yourself a good 600 watt supply and have happy computing for years to come.

Agree, I have a HP Elite, the Power supply failed pretty quick, also the space is too small to fit in a good PS

RWoodward wrote:For those familiar with TV Tuners: The specs say, "QAM HDTV for cable broadcast, does not require the use of a set-top box." So, will this display premium channels I've subscribed to, HBO and the like, or does premium content still require an external switch or filter that would be exclusive to the cable company's equipment?

No. You will only be able to view cable channels which are sent unencrypted - which is normally just your local broadcast stations.

NTSC - Can display analog channels received over cable (also over antenna, if any are left). Some cable companies (including mine) are doing away with all analog signals, thus making this a thing of the past.

ATSC - Can display digital channels received over antenna. This should be all of your local broadcast channels, if you are in range.

QAM - Can display any digital channel that your cable company is broadcasting unencrypted over the cable. This normally is the same channels that you would get over ATSC with an antenna.

The only way to get premium channels (or even standard digital channels outside of your broadcast stations) through a tuner card is with an attached cable box - and setting this up isn't always easy.

replytovi wrote:SO, is this PC can burn blue ray discs? Please reply.

I love how your horrible grammar got a Quality Post

mollytim wrote:Not Sandy Bridge; anyone else disappointed?

Yes! This is what I would expect a top i5 2nd generation sandy bridge would cost. No deal here.

HP computers suck PAAAAAAASS

truspector wrote:I don't doubt you can "run" crysis at 1080p with high settings, but a Radeon 5570 is not capable of running it at those settings at a decent framerate.

http://www.techspot.com/review/245-ati-radeon-hd-5570/page4.html

Look at the bottom chart here, this is Crysis Warhead and at 1680x1050 (a lower resolution than 1080p) with medium settings and absolutely no AA or AF you're still not going to break 20 FPS. A 5570 is a mid range card at best and it's a stretch to even consider it a gaming card.

Here's a second source showing performance at two different visual settings and it is barely playable at minimum settings as seen in the first test:

http://www.hardocp.com/article/2010/02/09/amds_ati_radeon_hd_5570_video_card_review/4

I went and confirmed it myself, the framerate is very slow, hovering around 15fps on high settings. Honestly I can't tell much of a difference. On medium framerate runs at ~26fps.

You're right this isn't a gaming card and this isn't a gaming PC, but it will play games. I'm not trying to claim this makes a good gaming PC(if that's what you want it for), but if you are a casual gamer, like myself, it's adequate to play recent games at decent mid to high settings.

cgarners wrote:No. You will only be able to view cable channels which are sent unencrypted - which is normally just your local broadcast stations.

NTSC - Can display analog channels received over cable (also over antenna, if any are left). Some cable companies (including mine) are doing away with all analog signals, thus making this a thing of the past.

ATSC - Can display digital channels received over antenna. This should be all of your local broadcast channels, if you are in range.

QAM - Can display any digital channel that your cable company is broadcasting unencrypted over the cable. This normally is the same channels that you would get over ATSC with an antenna.

The only way to get premium channels (or even standard digital channels outside of your broadcast stations) through a tuner card is with an attached cable box - and setting this up isn't always easy.

Thank you very much for that outline. I'm also aware that when you try to tell your cable company you should be able to view w/o their box they often feign or display genuine ignorance that life w/o the cable box is possible.

I have this same type of setup and that spiffy remote ALSO changes the cable box. However, I'd really like to ditch the Jatravartid box entirely for faster changing and lower fees. I don't get HBO etc., but until they went digital my brand new samsung led tv got most channels w/o the box until comcast converted to digital only. My tv gets digital, but no longer gets the channels as they are now all scrambled.

I like this (though the price is a bit steep for me) but am unsure if it gets and records HD, and what the sound might be like even pumped into a good system. Tempting though, just as my media tv system.

tsfisch wrote:How would this machine do editing 1080i/p video?

I'd be solid. The only downside is that the processor is an i5 rather than an i7 (if you really wanted more juice) for converiting video....but that's not going to be a real show stopper as long as your encoding/decoding apps are multi-threaded (most are for Windows in the past few years)

The 1TB disk included is SATA3. Having a SATA3 bus is a pretty big deal because it will help relieve possible bottlenecks if you go with SSD for video processing. I would recommend looking at Crucial for SATA3 SSD support if you want that. Typically when processing large files, you need to be able to copy the data from memory to disk fast and it's where most systems start to slow down.