Review of the HP Pavilion M9260F Elite Desktop PC

Generally when it comes to high end multimedia PC's the more you pay the more you get. That isn't necessarily true when it comes to the HP "Elite" series. In this series HP really has brought the consumer great features at the fraction of the cost I see in some of the Apple or Sony offerings. In this review I tackle one of those Elite series desktops, the M9260F to be precise, which is about as top of the line as you can get when it comes to the HP Pavilion. I'm going to let you know how well it performs for me and what sort of consumer will get the most out of owning one of these multimedia desktops.

Hardware:

Processor: 2.66GHz Intel Core 2 Quad Processor Q6700

Tuner: Both NTSC and ATSC

Optical Drive: CD R / RW with integrated DVD +/- R RW with dual Blu-ray and HD DVD ROM

Storage space: Dual 500GB hard drives (yielding a total of 1 TB)

RAM: 4 GB RAM (expandable to a maximum of 8 GB)

Video Card: Nvidia GeForce 8600 GT graphics (with 512MB of dedicated video memory)

Operating system: 64 bit Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium

Included in the box: Wireless mouse, 2.1 speakers, keyboard and Remote

This Elite series HP has all the bells and whistles. This is one of the few desktops that boast over a terabyte of hard drive space. This truly belongs in the living room hooked up to your entertainment center. With Vista's integrated multimedia suite this could replace a number of entertainment center components. With 1TB of hard drive space you will have plenty of room to save hours and hours of high definition programming (that's right, vista will allow your desktop act as a digital video recorder replacing your tivo!). I had a great time using this to play games too. They look great on my 37" LCD which is plug and play (thanks to the HDMI output).

Connectivity:

Integrated WiFi

1 Ethernet port (to connect to a wired LAN)

6 2.0 USB ports (these are used to connect your digital camera, mp3 player, printer, whatever)

2 FireWire ports (these are for connecting things like digital camcorders and other PC's for quick data transfer)

Composite input

S-video input

S-Video output (to connect to things like projectors)

DVI output (to connect to some TV's and some monitors)

HDMI output (to connect to HD televisions)

VGA output (to connect to monitors)

Audio out / mic in (plus a digital audio out)

2 PS/2 ports (old school peripheral input for mice and keyboards)

15 in 1 card reader (to directly input your solid state memory from your mobile devices)

56K modem

I love all of the connections. All of the video outputs are great, again that HDMI output allows you to connect to virtually any high definition television. This HP Pavilion Elite would do best in the living room as a corner stone of an entertainment center. It would be a great option for gamers and those that enjoy editing videos and images.

The only thing I don't like is all of the preloaded trial ware. It doesn't really slow down this desktop (like most others) but much of it is unnecessary as many of the features those pieces of software offer are integrated into the operating system. It can be annoying during start up as you wait for all of those programs to load, so I do recommend going through and thinning out those pieces of software you won't use.

Lastly this desktop is priced at around $1500. It is about right considering how loaded this Elite Pavilion is (I mean a terabyte of hard disk space!). I don't expect to see drastic price drops any time soon on this desktop. Perhaps at the end of the year during the most competitive time for manufacturers we'll see some price drops. Bottom line, I wouldn't hold out if you're looking for a desktop, this is the one to get right now if you can afford it.