Packard Bell ONETWO M
Packard Bell's oneTwo M is another all-in-one machine aimed at the budget end of the market.
It is also of two machines in our test that ships with a TV tuner built in (for reception/recording of one Freeview or analogue terrestrial channel at a time).
The portable aerial supplied failed to produce satisfactory results in our test area but you can connect a rooftop alternative. The oneTwo M may well be less than half the price of Apple's latest all-in-one iMac, but is let down by the quality of its design and peripherals.
The 20in screen looks OK from the front. The glossy plastic bezel surrounding the oneTwo M is split by an insert of clear acrylic between the front and back of the PC. There's no Blu-ray drive, but you do get a DVD writer. Five USB ports are included – four on the back of the machine and one on the rear as is a 5-in-1 multimedia card reader.
Disappointing
On the downside, the grey plastic stand on the back of the machine looks quite ugly and proved stiff and difficult to use when we were trying to alter the angle at which the PC was stood on the desk.
This is disappointing compared with the attention to design seen on the Asus and MSI machines. There are no operating buttons on the side of the screen but you do get a decent Windows Media Center remote controlled bundled in with the package.
Powered by an embedded Intel Graphics Media Accelerator and 3GB of DDR2 RAM, the oneTwo M has a 20in touchscreen with a maximum resolution of 1600 x 900 pixels. Again, while this is adequate for watching standard-def video, including Freeview and films, it just does not match the 'full HD' offerings of the other machines in our test.
However, the touchscreen functionality works well. We should also mention that Packard Bell does sell a 23in oneTwo L model with a faster quad core CPU and full HD resolution, although that will set you back around £900.
