An All-in-One Winner -> Lenovo IdeaCentre B500

PRICE: $1,399 direct

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The IdeaCentre B500 eschews trendy features like a touch screen and HDMI inputs in favor of rocksolid HD and multimedia performance. You won’t miss the touch screen once you put this entertainment oriented system on your desk and rock out to World of Warcraft while simultaneously listening to music. Granted, you’ll pay a couple hundred dollars more for the B500 than for its rivals, but that premium is worth it.

The B500 has an angular look, setting itself apart from the more minimalist all-inones, such as the Apple iMac and Gateway One ZX6900 series. The JBL stereo speakers sit low under the 23-inch widescreen and are highlighted by a show-through perforated grill with orange accents.

The system has a decent number of connections and is mostly wireless, with 802.11n and Bluetooth for the keyboard and mouse.

The system comes mostly free of bloatware, but you do get some useful software, such as WinDVD, and you can watch live or recorded TV in the Media Center interface. You also get a motion-control remote.

The B500’s well-appointed components all worked together to give it excellent multimedia and 3D scores. It smoked Windows Media Encoder at only 38 seconds and finished Photoshop CS4 in a speedy 1 minute 32 seconds. And surprisingly, the B500 achieved playable scores on our gaming tests, turning in 56 frames per second (fps) for Crysis and 49 fps for World in Conflict— almost unheard-of scores for an all-in-one.

So if you’re looking for multimedia prowess, and 3D power, the B500 is the one to get.—Joel Santo Domingo.

Pros Bright, beautiful 1080p HD screen. Less screen/bezel reflections than competitor. Discrete 3D graphics. Blu-ray player. TV tuner. Analog A/V in. Wireless keyboard and mouse. Minimal bloatware. Ambient lighting. Motion-control remote.

Cons No HDMI. No eSATA. Bluetooth keyboard and mouse slow to wake. No 5-GHz 802.11a or 802.11n networking. A little pricier than its rivals.

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