HP Pavilion TouchSmart 23-f260xt review: This clunky-looking budget all-in-one will save you money and space

HP Pavilion TouchSmart 23-f260xt $800.00 HP resurrected the all-in-one concept many years ago, but there's nothing particularly great about this model. Here's hoping the company shakes the industry up again soon.

I love the sturdy, rectangular stands on the Toshiba and Dell all-in-ones, but I must admit they’re not exactly space efficient. HP’s Pavilion TouchSmart 23, which costs $800 as of 8/29/13, might not be the most attractive AIO of the bunch, but its signature picture-frame design certainly helps it take up less desktop real estate, which is always a plus if you’re trying to fit a 23-inch TouchScreen AIO on a cramped dorm-room desk.

The HP Pavilion TouchSmart 23’s design is functional, if not very sexy. The system has a glossy 23-inch touchscreen, which is surrounded by a slim bezel under edge-to-edge glass. Around this bezel is another bezel that’s thicker and fabricated from matte-black plastic. A silver metal frame is wrapped around this, extending past the bottom of the screen (where the speakers are located) to rest on your desktop. The entire system is propped up via an easel-like stand, which is sturdy, space-efficient, and easy to adjust.

HP's Pavilion TouchSmart is a well-built all-in-one, but a middle-of-the-road performer.

The biggest issue with this design is that it’s just not very attractive. While the Toshiba and the Dell look like they’re floating in midair, the TouchSmart 23 just looks clunky. And don’t even get me started on the bezel-within-a-bezel look.

Design issues aside, the HP Pavilion TouchSmart 23 is a solidly average performer, with a Intel Core i3-3220T processor; 6GB of DDR3/1600 memory; and 1TB, 7200rpm hard drive working together to deliver a Desktop Worldbench 8.1 score of 110. Like the other systems in this roundup, the TouchSmart 23 is good for schoolwork and basic entertainment, but not great for graphics-intensive editing or high-resolution gaming. In our Dirt Showdown graphics test (1024 by 768 pixels, image quality at Low), the TouchSmart 23 managed a barely playable 32.5 frames per second. Its BioShock Infinite performance, at the same settings, was worse: just 15.9 frames per second.

None of the all-in-ones delivered great gaming performances, but some machines were definitely better than others.

The TouchSmart 23 display resolution is the typical 1920 by 1080 resolution. It looks good: Images and text are crisp and colors are accurate, but I couldn’t shake the perception that video looked dull on this machine. Perhaps I’m used to looking at oversaturated, strangely vibrant screens, but the TouchSmart 23 just seemed to lack oomph. It is, on the other hand, a very good touchscreen, with smooth, accurate touch and a slick, sensitive surface.

The system also boasts a very usable wired USB keyboard, with flat, island-style keys, excellent feedback, and a comfortable feel. It’s a bit loud, but had no problem typing quickly and accurately on it. The mouse, which is also a wired USB model, felt just a little less comfortable. Its shiny, curved form factor isn’t very ergonomically designed, and it felt a bit awkward in my hand.

PCWorld's Desktop Worldbench 8.1 benchmark suite measures performance with a number of productivity, creation, and entertainment programs.

HP’s Pavilion TouchSmart 23 is a sturdy-looking computer with a slim, space-saving design. Although it lacks the minimalist sexiness that many other AIOs boast, it’s a solid performer with decent peripherals, a good port selection (including two USB 3.0 ports), and acceptable performance.

Editor's note: This all-in-one was reviewed as part of a roundup for back-to-school season. You can read that story, along with reviews of the five all-in-ones we compared it to, here.

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Review: FreeSpace 2 sim launches you into space

FreeSpace 2 $10.00 A true classic, FreeSpace 2 bred several open-source modifications, but the even the original, unmodded game is still fun to play if you don't mind the dated graphics.

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Even great game franchises fall prey to mergers, acquisitions, and the vagaries of the game business. Such was the fate of FreeSpace 2, a space simulator originally released in 1999 to great critical acclaim, as part of the Descent and FreeSpace franchise. Due to business circumstances, it was the last in the series—but it can still be played today for the price of $10. and its source code, released in 2002, has been adopted by an active community of coders and modders.

The FreeSpace 2 mission selection screen looks like the set of a Sci-Fi epic.

The original game remains commercially available to this day through GOG, a service specializing in old-time games. While the original FreeSpace 2 offered very impressive graphics for its time, it can't hope to match modern space-sim games in the visauls department.

Fortunately, it has a lot to offer in terms of gameplay and depth. Cockpit and HUD controls are intricate and well thought out, from subsystem targeting, through automatic speed matching, to smart indicators on your HUD showing a target's distance and bearing even when it's out of your field of view. FreeSpace 2 also makes good use of the keyboard, with an interface that expects you to memorize many keys.

FreeSpace 2 helps you master the complex controls interactively, using tutorials.

If you enjoy FreeSpace 2's detailed gameplay and only wish for some updated graphics, you're in luck: Open-source, free mods dress FreeSpace 2 in updated graphics from franchises you probably already know, and include new storylines and game mechanics to boot. I tried Diaspora, a mod based on the Battlestar Galactica 2004 remake, and was impressed by its slick graphics. It was nice to find myself in the pilot's seat of a Viper, trying to prove myself as a nugget (and badly failing).

The FreeSpace 2 story only serves to show that a great simulator will likely live on, business circumstances notwithstanding.

Note: The Download button takes you to the vendor's site, where you can download the latest version of the software.

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Review: Find out what's taking up space on your drive in seconds with WizTree

WizTree If you're looking for a very quick and simple way to see what's taking up space on your drive, WizTree can get the job done.

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Clearing out hard drive space is never fun, so it should at least be a quick and painless task. Antibody Software's WizTree is a free and tiny utility that scans NTFS volumes at blazing speeds, making it possible to home in on the largest files and folders in no time at all. It's available in a portable version, too, so you can carry it around on your USB stick to help out friends and colleagues in need.

WizTree's simple interface makes it easy to see what's taking up space on your drive.

Unlike SpaceSniffer and WinDirStat, WizTree doesn't represent occupied space using a treemap. In other words, rather than get a graphical display in which each folder is a proportionately-sized rectangle, you simply get an ordered list with the largest files and folders on top. It's a simple format, but it's not as intuitive as a treemap. On the plus side, it's extremelyfast: WizTree took 1.4 seconds to scan my 256GB SSD, and 7.45 seconds to scan my 2TB magnetic drive.

The simple display makes it easy to dig into folders to figure out what exactly is taking up so much space within the folder. The initial scan doesn't just cover the top level: It recurses through the entire drive, so there are no delays as you drill down the folder hierarchy. Subfolders (and sub-sub-subfolders) are instantly displayed with clear percentage bars. The contents of each subfolder is sorted by size, although you can manually sort by name, number of items, number of files, number of folders, or modification time.

Next to the tree view tab, there's a second tab showing the 1,000 largest files on the drive. That's useful for finding individual files that are hogging lots of space, like VM images, HD videos, and archives you may not need anymore.

WizTree's second tab lets you quickly see which individual files take up the most space on your drive.

You can permanently delete files from within WizTree, or send them to the recycle bin, and the display updates accordingly. However, if any external activity changes the drive's contents (such as files being copied from another location while WizTree is open), WizTree will not automatically refresh to reflect the changes. In actual use, this isn't much of a problem.

WizTree is simple, tiny, and has absolutely no frills. It gets the job done and is easy to use. If you don't need a treemap, it's one solid way to figure out what's taking up space on your drive.

Note: The Download button will download the software to your system. This product is donationware. It's free to use, but the developer encourages donations.

From PC World. Electronics product reviews and advice for best reference

10 Best Space Apps in the Universe

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From Laptopmagazine. Product reviews and advice for best reference

Origin Chronos: Awesome Things in a Small Space

The Origin Chronos packs a ton of power in a (relatively) small package. This performance PC is built inside a low-profile Silverstone case, and offers blazing-fast performance on our new WorldBench 7 benchmark suite.

Our review model, priced at $1399, sports an overclocked Intel Core i5-2550K processor (at 4.7GHz, over the stock 3.4GHz), 8GB of RAM, an Nvidia GeForce GTX 560 Ti GPU, and it runs Windows 7 Home Premium. It also has 750GB of hard-drive space, and a 90GB SSD boot drive for quick boot times.

On the PCWorld Test Center's new WorldBench 7 benchmark tests, the Chronos scored an impressive 204. Our baseline testing model (which has a score of 100) is similarly specced, with an Intel i5-2500K processor (at the stock 3.4GHz clock speed), 8GB of RAM, and an Nvidia GeForce GTX 560 Ti. The key differences that lead to the Chronos's considerable performance bump lie in its heady overclocking and its solid-state drive. (You can read up on our revamped testing process in Jason Cross's "How We Test PCs.")

The Chronos also does well in our graphics tests, managing frame rates of 38.4 on our Crysis 2 benchmark at a resolution of 2560 by 1600 pixels. At a resolution of 1920 by 1080 pixels, it earns 70.3 frames per second. These tests are at high settings, so dialing down the resolution a tad (if you're not equipped with 30-inch displays) will give you lots of legroom. In Dirt 3, the Chronos achieved 87.4 frames per second at that 2560-by-1600-pixel resolution. If you're a fan of Codemasters' rally-racer, this isn't a bad place to start looking for your new compact racing rig.

The Chronos is housed in a low-profile Silverstone SG08 case. The chassis features a thick (0.39 inches) black aluminum front panel, and thinner metal sides with lots of vents to help keep components cool. The front panel is elegant and simple, with brushed aluminum styling, Origin's logo in the bottom-right corner, and a large brushed power button in the bottom-left corner. The front panel also has a tray-loading DVD-RW drive, two USB 3.0 ports, and headphone and microphone jacks.

The rest of the Chronos's ports are on the back of the machine. The Zotac Z68ITX-A-E motherboard sports four USB 2.0 ports, two USB 3.0 ports, dual gigabit ethernet, two HDMI-out ports, one mini-DisplayPort, one PS/2 port, support for 7.1 surround sound, and optical audio out. The Nvidia GeForce GTX 560 Ti has two DVI ports and a mini-HDMI out.

Opening up the Chronos is easy enough, but good luck if you're thinking about upgrading or otherwise modifying the interior. The top is held in place with three screws, and slides off easily once those screws are removed. But the Chronos is packed: the CPU is kept cool by Origin's own Frostbyte 120 liquid cooler, coupled with a large fan, and doesn't leave much room to manuever. Don't get me wrong, everything is neat (wires are encased in black mesh), but this very small case just doesn't have a lot of room.

It's a little disappointing that such a speedy machine doesn't include a Blu-ray disc drive, but spend a little more and get one. The hard drive is also a tad on the small size at 750GB, and the system has no card reader (where would you put it?).

But really, there's little to knock about this machine--it's small, lightning-fast, and under $1500. If you don't feel the need to crack open your PC's case and muck around inside, the Origin Chronos does everything a gaming rig should do--deliver astonishing performance at an affordable price.

So--go buy it.

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SpoonFed Mobile: Angry Birds Space, MetroPCS vs Verizon, New iPad Test Drive

The second episode of SpoonFed Mobile is on the air, bringing you the top stories in mobile tech. This week, I take Angry Birds Space for a spin and weigh in on whether small carriers like MetroPCS are a good deal. Last but not least, I test drive the new iPad to find out if it’s the tablet to beat or just a good-looking refresh.

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DigitalVolcano's Duplicate Cleaner Pro Helps You Regain Space and Control

No matter how big hard drives get, they always seem to fill up too quickly. This isn't due just to ever-increasing media file size; it also happens because the same files are often stored multiple times. When moving document folders around, downloading information, or making backups, it's easy to end up with many copies of the same file, sometimes with different names. Duplicate Cleaner Pro ($40, 15-day trial with limitations) is a utility that helps locate such files.

Duplicate Cleaner helps find, and clean, the clutter that any large hard drive accumulates.Duplicate file finders, in general, are nothing new. Many general-purpose disk utility sets, such as Captain Optimizer or Perfect Disk, include this function, but because it's often a secondary or sideline aspect, it can be underdeveloped. DigitalVolcano's Duplicate Cleaner has no other purpose, and thus a high degree of functionality is expected--and in this case, delivered.

You can set Duplicate Cleaner to search specific directories, and filter types of files looked for, using either the preset file types, or your own, or simply "all files". You can compare contents to within a degree of similarity, with the default being 95%, and set upper and lower bounds of file sizes to be included. This last feature requires sizes be specified in kilobytes, making it slightly unwieldy to specify boundaries in today's more common megabytes or gigabytes.

The time it takes to search depends on the size of your hard disk and the narrowness of your filters, but if you have enough files to make a tool like Duplicate Cleaner worthwhile in the first place, it's probably a good idea to start the search in the evening and review the results in the morning. You can stop the process, but doing so will cause you to lose progress on the search and have to restart it. The results will be initially shown as groups of identical files, but it is also possible to sort them by path, name, or size, which can make finding the ones you most want to delete much easier. You can perform multiple selections on the list, open directories, or launch the files. There is also a second list of the folders which contain duplicate groups, so you can delete an entire redundant folder in one go.

Only rarely did Duplicate Cleaner not work as expected. It was not instantly clear how to restore groups after sorting by name. (You need to show the "Group" column, then sort by it.) I found it odd that you can't select more than one folder at a time from the folder listing. These are minor criticisms.

The trial/demo version of Duplicate Cleaner allows you to delete files in only the first hundred groups found, and does not allow you to load or save lists of duplicate files. The 15-day time limit should be sufficient to determine if Duplicate Cleaner will be useful to you.

At $40, Duplicate Cleaner is nearing the top of the cost curve for a single-function utility. However, it can be a tremendous help in cleaning the useless clutter from your hard disk, which consumes not only inexpensive disk space, but expensive time and attention as it bloats indexes and slows search results.

--Ian Harac

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Dead Space Review: Necromorphs Invade Your Android Phone

The sci-fi horror masterpiece DEAD SPACE has finally arrived on Android!

This stunning vision of the Dead Space franchise is truly a landmark in mobile gaming. Featuring hardcore gameplay and a rich audio experience, immerse yourself in bloodcurdling events that unleash the Necromorph horde. Once you’ve played, this sci-fi horror masterpiece will truly change the way you think about Android games.

A CHARGED SENSORY EXPERIENCE

Survive one of the most gripping, bone-chilling experiences on mobile. Cutting-edge visuals – rich in effects and atmospheric lighting – reproduce the cinematic horror of the console game. Featuring a fully voice-acted stereo soundtrack, plus a movie-quality score and sound effects, find yourself fully immersed in the dread of Dead Space.

SHOCKINGLY EASY TO CONTROL

Intuitive controls focus you on the action. The on-screen HUD is seamlessly integrated into the game. Navigate 6 varied environments and battle Necromorphs with simple swipe and tap controls.

FEATURING 2 EXCLUSIVE WEAPONS & CLASSIC MODULES

Access the new Plasma Saw and Core Extractor, plus 3 more weapons from the Dead Space universe. Also utilize Kinesis and Stasis Modules well-known to players of the console game – and get on with the business of strategic dismemberment.

Dare to step into DEAD SPACE? Get this critically-acclaimed horror experience on Android NOW!!

Discover more games from EA like Tetris® free, SimCity™ Deluxe, and Need for Speed™ Hot Pursuit. See all our games for Android now!

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by Sarah Jacobsson Purewal, PCWorld

EA's Dead Space for Android keeps the necromorph story alive with awesome graphics, intuitive controls, and a thoroughly chilling soundtrack.

Dead Space for Android takes place three years after the first Dead Space on consoles, but before Dead Space 2. The game opens with a visually stunning flight through space before zeroing in on the main character, Vandal. A recent convert to the Church of Unitology, Vandal must first go on a mission to disrupt some power supply units on a remote ship. Disaster strikes, however, and necromorphs begin unleashing their horrors upon the people trapped onboard. Vandal, now disillusioned and aware of the Church's true goals, must fix the station and take out any of the monsters he encounters.

Gameplay in Dead Space is surprisingly intuitive, considering the lack of physical controls. You have no virtual buttons--instead, you move your character by sliding your finger over the left side of the screen, and you aim your weapon (and look around) by moving your finger over the right side of the screen. Moving around is a little difficult initially, but it gets easier very quickly.

Although the controls are well implemented, they're definitely not perfect, especially when it comes to aiming and firing your weapon. To pull out your weapon, you tap on the left side of the screen. However, that same action also opens doors and picks up items, and I often found myself bringing up my weapon and shooting it instead of opening doors. This not only annoyed me but also caused me to waste precious ammo.

Once you get used to the controls, Dead Space is a pleasure to play. The graphics are awesome, and the soundtrack is also very good. The game suggests that you put on headphones for the best results, and when I tried it with headphones in a semi-lit room, it was certainly creepy (if not truly terrifying). I'll admit that I jumped several times while playing this game, but I'm not exactly the strongest person in the face of even mild horror.

Dead Space is definitely worth the extra bucks. You'll get plenty of play time out of this game, and you always have the option of replaying it with all of your upgrades if you happen to finish it too soon.

We tested this app using a Samsung Galaxy Nexus running Android 4.0.2.

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Samsung and Rovio Launch Angry Birds Into Space at SXSW 2012 [Hands-On Video]

There’s no shortage of Angry Birds merchandise around — we know this from an abundance of stuffed plush toys, a Mattel board game and even an upcoming film featuring these irked winged heroes. But now apparently, our favorite feathered creatures can’t even be contained by gravity. This afternoon at SXSW, in the Samsung Blogger Lounge, Samsung and Rovio officially launched the angry birds into space while unveiling, well, Angry Birds Space, which they (fittingly) demoed on a Samsung Galaxy Note. 

Samsung chose well when it came to the device onto which to fling our avian friends. The Samsung Galaxy Note, with its dual-core processor and super-sharp 5.3-inch HD Super AMOLED display handled the classic game adroitly. Most impressive of all, the physics of the app were downright believable and made the game completely captivating—for instance, we saw in a video how the planets onscreen actually had the gravity to pull the birds in, and affected their trajectory.

Samsung also stated that some content would be available only to Galaxy users, including the Lazer Bird, an exclusive Samsung character and Danger Zone, an exclusive Angry Birds level. Samsung took the wraps off the game at the event with representatives from the company, Rovio and NASA. (Yes, they got a real astronaut to go onstage.)

The out-of-this-world version hits iOS, Android, PC, and Mac platforms on March 22nd. It’s been a while since we’ve grabbed a new episode of the outplayed game ourselves, but Angry Birds Space looks like such fun that we probably will snatch a copy out of orbit after it blasts off.

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Twitter Client Blu Takes Just a Little Desktop Space

Many of today's best Twitter management applications--from TweetDeck to HootSuite to Seesmic Desktop--take up a good portion of your desktop real estate. If you're looking for something a little smaller, consider Blu. Developed as a concept application for Windows 7, Blu is a slick little Twitter client that leaves you with plenty of room to get some work done.

Blu lets you see @replies and mentions in a conversation view, which makes it easier to understand them in context. Blu's rectangular shape is reminiscent of the dedicated AIM client I've always relied on for instant messaging. But is attractive interface is far superior: It features a muted blue and white design that manages to look both simple and sophisticated at the same time.

Blu's default display shows you Twitter timeline, while icons at the bottom of the Blu client make it easy to view @mentions, favorites, retweets, direct messages, and your own Tweets. I especially like how Blu lets you see @replies and mentions in a conversation view, which makes it easier to understand them in context. It's a handy feature.

Additional icons let you access Twitter search and compose new tweets. Blu's singular column design means that you can only view one of these categories of information at a time. Rival TweetDeck, meanwhile, features a multi-column design that lets you view multiple information streams at once. This omission is the trade-off for Blu's slim footprint, though, and it's one that I'm willing to take.

Blu's social media support is limited to Twitter, and this app only allows you to manage one Twitter account. If you can live with those limitations, you'll find that Blu is a whole lot more than just a pretty face.

Note: The Download link takes you to the vendor's site, where you can download the latest version of the software.

-- Liane Cassavoy

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Imo Instant Messenger Delivers More Features in a Thin Slice of Screen Space

I've long been a fan of imo, the free Web-based chat service that lets you connect with your contacts from multiple services. That's why I was eager to check out the latest version, which adds a range of features. Some of them, such as the ability to create chat groups and a new, thin UI, which lets you pop windows out of your browser, are great. Others, such as the imo network, which allows you to connect with folks you might not otherwise known, are of more dubious value.

Imo's new thin UI lets you pop the application out from your browser window, making it more manageable to work with.Like past versions, the latest iteration of imo still allows you to sign into multiple services--it supports AIM/ICQ, Facebook, Google Talk, Hyves, Jabber, MSN, MySpace, Skype, Steam, VKontakte, and Yahoo--simultaneously. Unfortunately, imo still doesn't let you merge contacts, so if you have the same contacts on multiple services, your contact list can become unwieldy, and fast.

But imo's chat features improve from there. The new group chat feature is nicely integrated and easy to use, allowing you to create and save groups of friends or colleagues for group chats. Imo sends the select contacts an invitation, and lets you choose which service to use when contacting them. Unfortunately, though, all of your contacts will need to switch over to imo to participate in the group chat. They can't do so from their messenger of choice. And, oddly, imo didn't seem to recognize contacts by name once I added them to a group: Instead, it identified them with a long string of numbers. While this only happened within the group view, it still made it difficult to know who was who. Imo says this is a known bug that will be fixed soon.

Imo's new thin UI, which allows you to pop out the application into a smaller, more manageable window, is by far my favorite feature in the latest upgrade. When imo is popped out, it looks more like a desktop product, such as AOL's AIM or Cerulean Studios' Trillian, which is a good thing. It allows you to keep your IM window small, so you can view contacts and messages while still surfing the Web or working on a document or spreadsheet.

I have less regard for the new imo network, which the company says is "a real-time sharing and discussion network that connects you to new people around the world." The obvious risks of meeting new people online aside, I'm not sold on the network's usefulness, and am sure that it does not merit the amount of real estate it occupies on your imo homepage. By default (though you can change this), the left panel of your imo page is devoted to the network, offering you a space where you can "broadcast what's on your mind," and then lists various members. Glancing through the folks listed there, I saw few folks I would want to chat with, and others I was downright wary of, due to their questionable profile pictures

So, I wouldn't turn to imo just to take part in its new network. But as a Web-based messaging service, imo manages to mostly impress. Once the bugs in the group chat feature are worked out--and if they ever add the ability to merge contacts--imo will be top-notch indeed.

-- Liane Cassavoy

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