| Performance | 7 | |
| Setup and Ease of use | 9 | |
| Service and Support | 8 | |
| Features | 7 | |
| Design | 8 | |
| Overall | 8/10 | |
The Hewlett-Packard e-PC 42 offers something extra compared to other corporate compact desktops: key-lock access to ports and drives. That's a reassuring feature in a machine that's nearly small enough to stow inside a briefcase. But while HP's space-saving design and security-conscious features merit praise, Compaq's Evo D500 Ultra-Slim seems to offer a lot more for the money. The e-PC 42 is well designed for corporate deployment in cramped cubicles. Its amazingly diminutive 3.7-by-11-by-9.8-inch chassis can fit pretty much anywhere, sitting either horizontally or vertically. The 15-inch, TFT, flat-panel L1520 monitor ($475) that came with our system is equally flexible. It has razor-sharp display quality, both analog and digital inputs, and a spring-loaded arm, which raises the screen an extra three inches when unlocked--nice for those who stand at a counter instead of sitting at a desk. Better still, the L1520 can pivot 90 degrees for a portrait display that's ideal for Web browsing, desktop publishing, and other page-centric applications. A nonpivoting version of the display is available for $409. The e-PC 42 also is able to defend itself from intruders. At the rear of the box, a plastic port-control system can be used in tandem with the aforementioned key lock to deny access to the expansion ports. Though the HP is locked against strangers, IT staffers have easy access to the e-PC 42's vital components. A single, captured thumbscrew unlocks a side panel, revealing a pair of SIMM sockets (one occupied by the installed memory), the power supply, and the hard drive. It's refreshingly easy to remove the latter, thanks to an ingenious lever-lock system. An adroit tech could add more RAM and swap in a new drive in about three minutes flat. One might expect such a pint-sized system to skimp on connectivity, but the e-PC 42 is pretty generous for its size. For starters, it has both parallel and serial ports, which are fast disappearing from many desktops. Furthermore, two of its four USB ports conveniently sit at the front of the case and are secured by software in the BIOS. The system has no modem, but there is an Intel 10/100 Ethernet adapter. Regrettably, the HP e-PC 42 does skimp on options and extras. There's no way to swap the built-in CD-ROM drive for, say, a CD-RW drive, as you can with Compaq's similarly positioned Evo D500 Ultra-Slim. The Compaq has two other valuable features the e-PC 42 lacks: an internal speaker (the e-PC 42 is silent unless you purchase optional speakers) and a built-in, wireless Ethernet module. These omissions make the e-PC 42's $1,600 price as configured (without monitor) seem high compared to the Evo D500 Ultra-Slim's, which is closer to $1,400 for a similar configuration and a bit more flexibility. Our Labs' tests show that the e-PC 42 is ably equipped for mainstream business applications. Its smaller sibling, the e-PC 40, comes with 128MB of SDRAM and a 1.1GHz Celeron processor. The e-PC 42 ups the ante with a 2GHz Pentium 4 and 256MB of SDRAM, resulting in benchmark scores 80 percent to 140 percent faster than the e-PC 40's. By opting for less-expensive SDRAM in place of faster RDRAM, as well as a slow, 40GB, 5,400rpm hard drive, HP created a system that's a bit pokier than the full-sized RDRAM-based 2GHz machines we've tested, such as the Dell Dimension 8200. But the e-PC 42's speed exceeds that of at least three 1.8GHz RDRAM-based machines we've examined and essentially matches that of the similarly configured (but full-sized) Vectra VL420. While the e-PC 42 is well suited for work, it cannot come out and play. The system relies on an older, integrated ATI Rage-based graphics engine, which shares 16MB of system memory. As you might guess from this hobbled setup, the e-PC 42's 3D performance chokes. Its MPEG-2 video-encoding speed looks more like that of a 1.7GHz RDRAM-based system, and its abysmal 10.4fps (frames per second) gaming score precludes it from after-hours Quake tournaments (which, for corporations, is probably a good thing). In addition to Windows XP Professional, HP supplies useful, manager-level diagnostic and troubleshooting utilities. The only documentation, however, is a terse quick-start guide; you must download manuals from HP's Web site. Fortunately, the company's support site is extremely well organized and thorough, providing FAQs, manuals, drivers, and even a matrix of peripherals that have been tested for compatibility. HP's three-year system warranty includes next-business-day onsite service and 24/7 phone support, but the latter is not toll-free. That's the only service disappointment in this otherwise well-supported system.
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The Lowdown: With the e-pc, HP has re-invented the desktop PC as a smaller, simpler and more reliable device to further reduce the cost of acquisition as well as the cost of ownership while improving user experience. The HP e-PC 42 packs capable power into a small package with smart security features.
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