Introduction & Design
We're not sure, but we suspect that today's all-in-one PCs hark back to 2003, when the Pentium M was first demonstrating that CPUs could perform well while sucking down less energy and Intel made noises about pushing a "mobile-on-desktop" platform. The idea was that you could take mobile components, put them into a small desktop form factor, and have yourself a greener, quieter system in a more compact footprint.At a time when the race to 4GHz single-core processors was all the rage, no one on the PC side was interested, but the iMac G5—the first iMac to integrate the main system within the LCD enclosure—arrived in 2004. (Apple purists may argue that 2002's iMac G4 used SO-DIMM laptop memory and so beat Intel to mobile-on-desktop. Feel free to debate amongst yourselves.)
Today, all-in-ones (AIOs) and their use of laptop parts on the desktop are well established—and, if someone asks, you'll probably say they're well established in the $1,000 and up range. But how about a touch-screen AIO that lists for $519 and sells for $459 from Amazon and Newegg? Roll that number around in your head: $459.
No, it's no gaming rig. But it's an Internet client, a homework station, a productivity hub, a videoconferencing center, a learning pad, a multimedia console. And it's practically an impulse buy for many first-world families, even (Heaven and the environment forbid) almost disposable for a few.
This is the context in which we must consider Lenovo's C260 Touch, an intriguing all-in-one that pleasantly under-promises and over-delivers.
Design
Our C260 Touch arrived in a sub-10-pound carton not much larger than that of a smallish LCD monitor. Thinking it might be fun to put Lenovo's out-of-box experience to the test, we handed the package to nine- and ten-year-old members of our at-home IT department and instructed them to set up the system.Without ever having set up a PC before, they had it unpacked and playing YouTube videos in less than 20 minutes. Points for Lenovo on intuitive design and documentation, even if the touch-screen instructions include an illustration of how not to interact with the display using a box-cutting knife
The entire C260 chassis is fashioned in black plastic. The screen bezel varies from just over an inch on the top to about two-thirds of an inch along the sides—not exactly thin, but not bad. An integrated 720p Webcam and two array microphones sit within the top bezel, while integrated speakers rest atop the left and right forward feet. The hinged stand that attaches to the center of the computer's back can swing somewhat, allowing the screen to stand 15 to 45 degrees back from vertical. We found the design to be quite stable against jostling and vibration.Just above the right speaker, Lenovo embeds volume and brightness control buttons. Around the corner to the right, you'll find the power button hiding under the DVD±RW drive. For a moment, we pined for a Blu-ray drive, then figured anyone serious enough about entertainment to want to watch high-definition movies on a PC would probably want a display larger than 19.5 inches.
Features
Along the left edge, you'll find two USB ports (one each of 3.0 and 2.0), headphone and mic jacks, and a memory card reader. Tucked inside a rectangular inset on the back, you'll see the power input, Ethernet port, HDMI output, and two more USB 2.0 ports. What little heat the C260 generates escapes from an air vent along the top edge.
Lenovo throws in a corded USB keyboard and scroll wheel mouse. On the plus side, the keyboard is respectably low-profile, so you can get away with not using a wrist rest if use isn't heavy. It also includes a full numeric keypad. The symmetrical two-button optical mouse includes a scroll wheel.On the other hand, these are the cheapest of peripherals. The chiclet keys' action feels flimsy if functional, and the mouse fares little better. But of course, we're spoiled by years of ergo-this and mechanical-that. Again, consider the usage scenario and see if $5 peripherals are all you need, or if a slight after-market upgrade might be in order.
Now let's look under the hood (figuratively; the C260 Touch is sealed too thoroughly to let you do so literally). We went into our review expecting the Lenovo to have the weakest and wimpiest of CPUs, but would you believe it's a quad-core? Of course, there's a rather large catch: Though classified as a desktop rather than mobile part, the Pentium J2900 processor is a member of the "Bay Trail" family that Intel sells to tablet and Chromebook manufacturers, and it lacks Intel's Hyper-Threading Technology so it's limited to four, not eight, processing threads at a time.
But the 2.41GHz (burst mode 2.66GHz) chip chugged along just fine during our month with the system. We can't even complain much about the integrated Intel HD Graphics, which include hardware-accelerated MPEG-2, VC1, and AVC/H.264 decoding so videos look smooth. While it's true that modern 3D games have no place on integrated graphics, we enjoyed plenty of 2D and Web-based games with no issues whatsoever.
The C260 carries 4GB of DDR3L memory, which proved ample for the included installation of Windows 8.1, along with a 500GB hard drive. (A little 8GB or 16GB hybrid drive cache would have been a nice perk, but would have put the system in a different price band.)
Our only real complaint with the specifications was Lenovo's opting for an HD+ display, meaning 1,600x900 resolution. These days, there's simply too much 1,920x1,080 content about to not feel a bit cheated at almost being able to see it at native resolution. The screen proved sufficiently bright and sharp for text, graphics, and videos alike and its 10-point touch worked smoothly, so we decided to look on the bright side (i.e., it wasn't 1,366x768), but 1080p would have been worth at least a small upcharge.
Lenovo makes amends with its integrated 2.4GHz 802.11b/g/n wireless adapter. We ran the C260 Touch all month right next to a conventional tower system getting its Wi-Fi via a Cisco 802.11n dongle that cabled up from the system and attached to the wall nearby. Both systems were in a rather challenged reception area in our environment. The Lenovo consistently pulled two or three more bars than the Cisco adapter and delivered markedly faster throughput.Discounting the trialware, Lenovo bundles a Webcam app, Skype, some educational titles, CyberLink PowerDVD, Nitro PDF Reader, and its own system rescue utility.
Performance
Without many direct competitors to the C260 Touch in our benchmark database, we chose three AIOs reviewed by our sister site PCMag.com for our comparison charts. The Gateway ZX4270-UB31$449.99 at Amazon is a 19.5-inch model with an AMD A4 processor; the Acer Veriton VZ2660G$720.99 at Amazon is a 19.5-inch Core i3 all-in-one; and the Lenovo C560 Touch is a step up from the C260, a 23-inch model with Core i3 power.The Pentium-powered C260 Touch topped the AMD A4-based Gateway, but trailed the two Intel Core i3 machines, in PCMark 8, a synthetic suite whose Work scenario assesses overall system performance for tasks like word processing, spreadsheeting, and Web browsing.
The C260 took another third-place finish in our CPU-crunching Cinebench test, which renders a complex image to show a PC's suitability for processor-intensive workloads.
Multimedia Tests
The four systems were well spread out in our Handbrake video editing benchmark, which times systems as they transcode a five-minute 1080p clip to smartphone format.
The 2.9GHz Core i3 AIOs finished well out in front in our Adobe Photoshop image editing test, which applies a series of complex filters and effects to a large JPEG.
Graphics & Gaming Tests
The Acer Veriton and Lenovo C560 traded wins in the two halves of our overall graphics test 3DMark, but all four machines' scores were in the low to middling range at best. Casual and Web-based games, not top-tier titles, are their forte.
For proof of that, check out the results of our challenging DirectX 11 gaming sim Valley, where none of the AIOs, even at reduced resolution, came near the 30 frames per second threshold for smooth gameplay.
Conclusion
Don't let the Lenovo C260 Touch's mediocre benchmark showing fool you or discourage you. Keep your eye on three things: 1) Above all else, the C260 only costs $459. 2) It features a 19.5-inch touch screen—for $459. 3) Its day-to-day performance across a wide range of non-3D tasks is not abysmal—for $459. It's compact. It's simple. As we said, it under-promises and over-delivers.
Obviously, if you're a heavy multitasker or the kind who keeps 20 Chrome tabs open, 4GB of RAM under Windows 8.1, especially backed by Pentium power, may not suffice. But for a secondary or tertiary system, an input terminal, a kid's PC, yes, the C260 Touch performs admirably, is easy on the eyes, and is a stunning value.
Source by computershopper.com
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