This article is more than 1 year old

Advent AIO-100

When a netbook's screen is just too darn small...

Review At first glance, you could be forgiven for mistaking the Advent AIO-100 for just a normal 18.4in monitor with what looks like a very sturdy base. However, inside that oversized foot sits a full working PC.

Advent AIO-100

Advent's AIO-100: netbook internals

The AIO-100 uses components you're more likely to see living inside a netbook - so you'll find the standard 1.6GHz Intel Atom N270 processor, 1GB of DDR 2 memory and a 160GB Sata hard drive.

As size and weight are secondary issues for a machine that's going to spend the bulk of its life stationary, sitting on desk, Advent has also included a DVD writer, something you'd be hard pushed to find on any of the netbook models out there.

The biggest thing that sets it apart from a netbook, however, besides the lack of battery, is the big display that sprouts from its top, fixed to an adjustable arm. There's also a keyboard and mouse thrown in, so it comes with everything you need in the box.

Running around the edges of the base, on the left-hand side you'll find the DVD writer, which is a slimline laptop model. Round the back you'll find a wired Ethernet port, power connector and three USB ports. In the far back right-hand corner, underneath a protective cover, there's a VGA connector for hooking up an additional display. Towards the front you'll find a further two USB ports, plus headphones and microphone sockets, with an SD/MMC/Memory Stick card reader sat just above.

Advent AIO-100

DVD writer built-in

Along the front edge, over on the left hand side, you'll find power and hard drive LEDs, power switch, volume controls and a mute button. There's also a single button for screen brightness - each press will make it a little bit brighter until the fifth click when it will reset it to its lowest level. There's also, curiously, a button to switch off the display backlight completely. You could save some energy by turning the backlight off when you're not using the machine - it's impossible to use without it on as you can hardly seen anything - but putting it into standby is almost as quick and would save even more, surely?

More about

More about

More about

TIP US OFF

Send us news


Other stories you might like