Averatec D1133

Averatec D1133 All-In-One

Does a certain price make a nonmobile computer a Nettop? How about a particular CPU or case design? The Averatec D1133 All-In-One blurs the lines. Its low price and relatively slow performance make an argument for calling it a Nettop. But even though it's slow by conventional PC standards, thanks to a low-power AMD Athlon X2 CPU, it's faster than PCs that use Intel's Atom chip, a part that generally signals "Nettop." Regardless of how you classify it, the $549 Averatec offers better performance than a typical Nettop and the convenience of a self-contained PC for a low price. It also suffers from a smaller screen than a recent Lenovo Nettop, and still-weak performance outlook due to a recent batch of speedy budget desktops. The Averatec D1133's extra speed might make it a lesser evil than a Nettop, but especially if you already have a monitor, it doesn't close the price-performance gap with standard budget PCs. The Averatec D1133 has the same design as the D1100 model we reviewed last November. An 18.4-inch LCD connected to a base unit via a movable arm, the D1133 has roughly the same range of motion you'd find in a standard foot-supported all-in-one, the only difference being that you can actually bend the screen back so it lies parallel to the tabletop, facing up towards the ceiling. With no touch screen, we can't quite see the benefit of the D1133's unique screen positioning, but if Averatec rolls out a touch screen in the next product revision we could be looking at the virtual air hockey platform we've all been waiting for.