Averatec 18.4" All-in-One Desktop with Intel Atom Processor

Here’s a review from TechSpot

Woot, I love you guys, and don’t want to sales-block you here, but having owned Averatec products, I cannot recommend them to anyone, for any reason.

Primarily the problems were manufacturing defects. Shoddy soldering on their system boards/DC power jacks resulted in endless headaches with Averatecs hardware that cropped up about 6 months in to ownership/use.

There were endless posts about these issues on Averatecs forums, which the company then completely took down, and started again from scratch.

I cannot emphasize enough that Woot should avoid selling even refurbished Averatec products.

Sorry guys, but in this case, buyer beware… even more than usual.

It would be great for my 75 year old Mom. She complains she doesn’t like a laptop because her fingers are too close to the screen. And the desktop I gave her takes up too much room. She has a dumb terminal at the hospital she works for. (she doesn’t need the money, she just needs to be active. She’s a dynamo)
So something like this would be perfect for her. All she does is pay bills and email.

would be cool to mount on a wall, although a touch screen would be more useful for that purpose.

Seems like an idea candidate for a kiosk. Might be just what our office needs.

I don’t like the glossy screen. Fingerprints show up terribly. And you have to face it into your light source. (the back of the screen) or the glare will blind you.
hehe

When I first saw the picture, I thought that thin arm meant you could tilt the monitor. If that was the case, I’d buy this as a 2nd coding station in a heartbeat. Buy alas, it’s not to be.

For all the haters out there, just think “thin client” and this machine starts to make sense. Where I work almost every workstation is a RDP thin client and this computer would be a mega-hit with most of my coworkers.

When you get this computer it’s going to be SLOW and have OUTDATED programs on it. OEMs ar paid to include horrible programs that slow your computer in the hopes you’ll buy them. Don.t Here’s how to make it faster and more secure:

Remove every single program you feel comfortable removing, ESPECIALLY
-Acrobat Reader 8, which means if you just open an infected PDF file you can get a virus
-WildTangent (crapware)
-Norton Antivirus Trial (crapware)

Here’s a loadout of standard programs all computer should have

Adobe Reader 9.3.1 (or Foxit Reader)
7zip (don’t use WinZip)
CCleaner (cleans temp files and such)
Microsoft Security Essentials (antivirus)
VLC Media Player (plays almost ANY audio or video file)
Mozilla Firefox/Google Chome
Java (latest version)
Flash (latest version)

You can rotate the monitor AND the arm.

Idea:
This would make a GREAT kitchen PC. Surf while eating dinner, look up recipies, listen to music or watch videos while cooking (does it have speakers built in?..), etc.
It’s got WiFi so all you need is a power cable. You could replace the keyboard with a smaller version if you wanted.

This device as an “appliance” makes more sense than using it as a full-time computer.

The kitchen is exactly what came to my mind first. But it might be ideal for set up in my retail area to run some info clips.

But I think the little ASUS or similar come with vesa mounting so you might get a nice monitor and mount it on the back. You would get a better system but no dvd burner.
Would you really need a burner in the kitchen?

This will be perfect for my wife to attach to her Sewing Machine. I might not even get in trouble for buying another PC.

imac’s suk a’lil, but these are much better @ it

If you can install OS X on a netbook with the same hardware couldn’t you do the same with this? Worked great on a Dell Mini 9.

Its way cheaper, way more crappy and it runs on windows

Calling that review “mediodre” is being very kind to this machine … they actually recommended another NetTop machine as a “less terrible decision” … although, admittedly, it sounds like the CNet reviewer just hates this whole category of PC in general …

I’m not about to buy ANYthing with Wild Tangent software on it. I’m not keen on them reporting back personal info without my knowledge, and I’ve had an incredibly difficult time getting it dug out of one machine already.

Rather than try to dig it out, you could just wipe and rebuild from scratch so that you start out only with the software that you really want …

Would be nice for kitchen if it was a touchscreen, but that wired keyboard and mouse would get in the way.

What would make sense, outside the kitchen, is if bluetooth was included, with bluetooth keyboard and mouse. I know you can add the bluetooth dongle and use a wireless keyboard and mouse, but that’s just more to buy. Probably just wanted to keep the cost down, but with a screen that size, it’s just begging to be on the coffee table while you’re laying down on the couch (you could swivel the monitor to match your orientation). Tough to use the mouse lying down, but I’d find a way.

A reminder for anyone interested in this:

The Atom processor is not really adequate for video streaming. Youtube will work fine when not multitasking, but higher bit rate video will suffer.

If the cooling is good it might perform a little better - in fact, a little notebook cooling pad might go well with this. I have an ASUS with the same Atom processor and it is extremely temperature sensitive - when I stick an ice pad underneath it instead of resting on fabric or my legs, the frame rate of CBS online videos goes from unwatchable to smooth.