HP Pavilion Elite HPE-410y

HP Pavilion Elite HPE-410y

With a generous feature set and a sub-$1,000 price tag, the HP Pavilion Elite HPE-410y ($929.99 street) desktop, available at Best Buy, should meet the needs of a wide range of users. The 1TB hard drive can store tons of media, the Blu-ray drive can dish out gorgeous-looking high-def movies, and the Wi-Fi radio will let you work wirelessly. Application performance is decent as well; but you can find better performing desktops in the same price range. Nearly all HP Pavilion desktops apply a subtle variation on a theme of a black metal chassis with a glossy black plastic front bezel. The HPE-410y's mid-tower case follows suit, and, in fact, uses the identical design as the HP Pavilion Elite HPE-447c-b ($1,349.99 list, 3 stars) and HP Pavilion Elite HPE-367c-b ($1,499.99 list, 3.5 stars) desktops. This includes a 15-in-1 media card reader and two USB 2.0 ports at the top of the front bezel, as well as a door on the bottom left that swings out in order to grant access to another USB port and mic and headphone jacks. Below the card reader are two 5.25-inch drive bays, one of which is populated with a Blu-ray drive, while the other remains vacant.