HP TouchSmart
Posted by Jon Peddie on August 18th 2008 | Discuss
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By Jon Peddie with Alex Gorvoi, Robert Dow
The Touchsmart in a kitchen.
(Source: Jon Peddie Research)
This is the most impressive entertainment PC I have ever seen, and I think I may have invented the term EPC back in 1999 when I said we would have this kind of capability by 2003—oops.
It’s not perfect, but it is so much closer to the ideal consumer device we all want that its imperfections can be hopefully overlooked, if not, dealt with.
This may not be a machine for your grandma or your technophobic neighbor, but for most techno savvy adults, this machine will satisfy a lot of desires.
At Mt. Tiburon Testing Labs we have this kind of throwback to the late eighties concept that we need to break a thing to prove we’re smarter than its designers. We’re sticking to and true to that somewhat adolescent motif only because we think it makes us real, and not blinded by the light—and it would be easy to fall in love with the TouchSmart, if only we could afford it.
The IQ500 is the second generation unit and it is using an Intel 2.16 GHz Core2Duo CPU with 4GB of RAM,320 GB of (7200 RPM) HDD, a R/W DVD, an Nvidia GeForce 9300M GS (not a particularly exciting GPU), Vista 64 (why?) and tons of super neat HP software, plus the perfunctory Microsoft Media Center.
It’s the UI
The thing that makes the TouchSmart unique and desirable is the screen, a 22-inch wide screen with near HD resolution of 1680 x 1050 and one of the best touch-screen interfaces available (from a clever company in New Zealand).
The system resides in a low-power semi sleep mode and will wake up when you touch the screen—better than any CE TV device, and no more power
hungry.
When it lights up, you see the HP intro screen, which is pleasant, artistic, and not machine-like or ersatz consumer-like in the way of a Vista or an XP.
UI and users
The human interface for this machine is the thing we spend all our time on—the display—and that, in MHO, is how it should be.
The TouchSmart is designed for a specific group (OK, forgive me, market-speak: demographic) of people, who are blithely called “users.” These are people who need, maybe can only afford in space or budget, one universal system, such as dormitory occupants (students, military, company residents in Asia, retirement homes, etc.), small homes, kids rooms, guest rooms, and, (my favorite) kitchens. It can also be used by families looking for an additional PC... for entertainment and internet surfing.
Look at the photo. The overall dimensions are 21”(L) x 2.6”(W) x 17.4”(H/D)—that’s a big picture frame sitting on your desk, kitchen counter or chest of drawers, milk crate, or ammo box.
Also, it’s relatively heavy compared to a “normal” monitor, so it’s got a feeling of realness and importance—I like that, and it’s not going to get knocked over easily.
HP wants to move this technology into the everyday, for every kind of consumer, so they focused on making the the TouchSmart as intuitive as possible.
Out of the box
The machine comes in a huge yellow box, and is totally recyclable—and you pay a little more for that. Once you get all the plastic covers and tie wraps off, plug in the obvious cables, and light it up, your experience is like no other Entertainment PC, and only a Mac comes close to the satisfaction of having a machine wake up, and do exactly what you expected and deserve.
First off it finds, with little to no help, your network (if you’ve got a wireless one). If you hang an antenna or cable on it, it finds all the channels. With one little push, it finds the wireless mouse and keyboard—and they are so nice to use I could write a review on just them.
Why can’t all PCs be like this? Well, for one reason this is a $1,300 PC not a $500 tin-box IGP-based monitor-less box. But, it’s also a full entertainment center with quality built-in speakers, TV tuner, and two user interfaces—HP’s and Microsoft’s. My dear aunt could plug this in and use it in less than 15 minutes.
The TouchSmart is designed to be a self contained unit with no need for additional hardware or software.
Love the screen
The 22-inch glossy screen, set in a black shiny frame looks great—HP has won the style contest.
Sounds good
The system has built-in speakers and they sound good, producing a nice full sound, much more than we expected with decent bass fullness. We plugged an MP3 player in (easy to do BTW), and had a lovely dinner with music. There’s a volume adjustment on the right-hand side of the screen that is convenient. The system has a “coax” (i.e., RCA) audio SPDIF jack and an audio out to run the sound from the system to a bigger amp and speakers (although, I was hoping for a TOSLINK IR jack).
HP is proud of speakers and microphone technology. The speakers extend past the monitor to project sound to the user. This was a conscious decision. In general, similar designs do not extend the speakers, and as a result, the PC sound is projected away or off to the side.
The Microphone is very sensitive. It can pick up voices across room. Designed so people can be doing other things—i.e. household chores—and still communicate with a friend online.
Touch me
The touch screen is responsive and accurate, without training, in all four corners. We had no problem bringing up the clock in the lower right-hand corner, playing with SideShow in the upper right hand corner, picking icons in the upper-left and lower-left hand corners. The touch screen allowed me to use my finger as a mouse and drag and click things all over the screen. And, as mentioned, this is great as a EPC when you want to play some music, or watch a video or TV.
There’s also a remote control—again designed not to intimidate—that looks like an everyday cable remote. The TV Software Interface looks like a cable company interface. Nothing new, and again, designed not to intimidate but to be intuitive.
Full of holes
The unit has a 5-in-1 memory card reader (SD, SDHC, Multimedia Card, Memory Stick, Memory Stick Pro); FireWire (IEEE 1394) port (front); headphone (front); line-in (back); five USB 2.0 ports (two front, three rear); line-out (back); digital audio out (back); S-video, and TV antenna input connectors; and an IR receiver input to sync up with other A/V equipment like cable boxes.
It lacks composite, component, optical hookups for gaming consoles and the like. HP says they considered it but again, this is supposed to be a self contained unit.
Disappointments—just slightly
It’s not a game machine, but it can play games. An EPC is supposed to be able to satisfy all your entertainment needs—music, photos, videos, games, TV, radio, web surfing, and email. That’s a tall order, and maybe unreasonable since not everyone wants all those sources in the same quantity, quality, or intensity as others. So, as the first rule of engineering and politics dictates, compromises have to be made in the name of efficiency, economics, and expediency. The TouchSmart does just that to an amazingly good degree. But, it’s not a FPS game machine. It’s a fine RPG, MMOG and SIM machine, and that’s a larger audience than FPSs, also FPS fans prefer honkin’ badass machines tuned just for that experience that usually cost a lot more than the TouchSmart.
But, we couldn’t get basic game benchmarks to run very fast (4fps). The GeForce 9300M GS, which was introduced in February this year, has a paltry 16 cores and runs at 800MHz core, 700 memory (compared to the GTX200 with 240 cores at 1.3GHz) so it’s naive to consider this a serious game machine (if you want one of those, go buy a Blackbird.) However, HP is unconcerned with Vantage benchmark numbers. To reiterate, the TouchSmart is not a gaming machine. The games it is designed to play are non-graphics intensive or 2D games and there are some of those included with the TouchScreen software.
What do we think
The IQ550 TouchSmart we tested is a jewel—without question the best EPC we have touched (pun intended.) It is the most complete system we’ve found, with a wonderful out-of-the-box experience, and true joy in its use afterwards.
We recommended that HP add voice recognition for certain tasks—like power on, power off, and TV Calendar. HP agrees but says they would need an OS standard. The company said they thought it would be too confusing if every application had its own recognition system.
We also asked why not add software like a cookbook on the desktop where non-tech-savvy people could look up recipes and have cookbook accompanied perhaps accompanied by Food Network videos? This could extend to almost any app, such as exercise videos. However, the one person in JPR who actually knows how to cook says one book isn’t enough and you’d need a library of cook books to satisfy her and any other serious cook—oh well, what do we know?
The unit can cost as little as $1,200 and with a bigger disk is only $1,300.
I don’t know if this is a loss-leader for HP or what, but it costs less than my laptop, which doesn’t do nearly as much (other than have a battery in it.)
This machine gets a giant thumbs up from Mt. Tiburon testing Labs.
