Hewlett Packard Co.‘s (NYSE: HPQ) peddles a plethora of PCs to match every conceivable computing need, and the TouchSmart 310 ($1160, as of 11/11/2010) is a multitouch-capable jack-of-all trades designed to do a little bit of everything. Does it succeed? The answer ultimately depends on your needs, but rest assured the simple design of this 20-inch all-in-one conceals a capable machine that’s equally adept at streaming movies or slinging spreadsheets.
The TouchSmart 310 earned a 94 in our WorldBench 6 suite of tests,outperforming category competitors like the Gateway ZX4800-06, or the MSI Wind Top AE2010 (which scored 84 and 60, respectively). That said, it can’t quite match the 104 of HP’s own All-In-One 200.
Our review unit came equipped with a 2.5 Ghz Athlon X4 615e CPU, 6 GB of DDR3 RAM, and an ATI Radeon HD 4270. Television and movies are handled with aplomb, but don’t expect to play anything more complex than simple Flash games: the TouchSmart 310 chugged through our Unreal Tournament 3 benchmark tests (with maxed-out settings at 1024 by 768 resolution) at an average of 20 frames per second. To be fair, playing high-fidelity games is rarely the strong suit of PCs in this category: competitors like the All-In-One 200 and the Gateway ZX4800-06 also failed to produce playable framerates.
The Touchsmart 310 retains the simple aesthetics that define the TouchSmart line, with a streamlined 20-inch display encased in black and chrome. Its touchscreen is the primary selling point, and HP’s functional multitouch-capable display proves responsive, and quick to the touch.
HP’s bundled the latest generation of their TouchSmart software, and it follows in the TouchSmart tradition of user-friendliness. An overlay offers a layer of finger-friendly customizable apps (including services like Netflix and Twitter), that make it a breeze to quickly navigate and interact with your PC. It’s well-suited to serve as a family PC, as TouchSmart software encourages quick and simple browsing of photos, recipes and social networks with a flick of a finger.
Typing and browsing the internet using the touchscreen is more trouble than its worth. But you can simply plug in a mouse and keyboard to answer emails, edit documents or anything else you might need a workstation PC to handle. Alas, the peripherals bundled with the TouchSmart 310 aren’t wireless — a feature we’ve come to expect with All-in-Ones.
The TouchSmart 310 is really designed to function as a mid-level media center, and the recessed DVD burner complements the 1 TB hard drive and SD card reader in this respect. Video playback looks great on the 20-inch touchscreen, though a maximum resolution of 1600-by-900 isn’t quite enough to attain true 1080p fidelity.
In addition to the afore-mentioned optical drive and card reader the 310 sports line-in and headphone jacks along the right panel, while the left panel offers a pair of USB 2.0 ports. Much of the I/O meat is hidden on the rear of the unit, where you’ll find four more USB 2.0 ports, the gigabit Ethernet port, and the built-in TV tuner. An integrated webcam/microphone combo peeks out from atop the 20-inch display, and a separate IR sensor can be plugged in if you prefer to use a handheld remote with your media center.
Frankly, the price of our review unit is a bit much for the hardware you receive, but that’s par for the course when it comes to all-in-one machines. Touch controls are still a luxury, and rather than performance what you’re really paying for here is convenience; the HP TouchSmart 310 functions equally well as a workstation, family PC or media center, and it does it all from within a compact and attractive case that looks equally at home on your desk or your kitchen counter.
