Neat good looks, convenient all-in-one design, decent screen, slim build, low price
Screen can be laggy, Android not optimised for big screen, processor could be more powerful, no FM radio
Windows has been the lingua franca for desktop PCs for just about as long as anyone can remember but there's no law that says it has to be so. Enter the HP Slate 21, an all-in-one PC that runs on Android. So should we think of it as a compact desktop, or a really, really big tablet?
Chassis and screen
As an all-in-one PC the Slate 21 looks pretty slick. It's a decent size at 53x35cm but still relatively slim at a little under 7cm.
The white plastic body with metallic-looking grey plastic banding around the edge and speakers beneath the screen is all very appealing too.
On the side are a full-size SD memory card reader (there's a relatively measly 8GB of memory on board), USB 2.0 port and 3.5mm headphone jack, while a panel on the back conceals two more USB 2.0 ports and another for Ethernet. Also on the back is a kick stand that offers a good range of tilt options. You can set it up like a monitor and use it with keyboard and mouse, or lay it almost flat and just use the touch screen.
The 21.5-inch touchscreen is plenty big enough and is capable of full HD 1,920x1,080-pixel resolution. That may not be quite as pin-sharp on this big screen as you'll see on the better mobile and tablets, but it's more than adequate for browsing and HD movies look fine. The screen doesn't feel quite as sensitive as it should though, and we found it lagging just a little too long and too often before taking note of our brushes and presses.
Processor and software
The quad-core processor is clocked at 1.6GHz and backed by 1GB RAM. Not a great pick by modern standards, and our AnTuTu benchmark test showed up the Slate 21's limitations in more ways than one.
Along with many other apps, it's not optimised for the slate, or indeed for landscape viewing, so some elements insist on displaying in portrait mode and at a relatively low resolution. Not such a problem on a handheld device that you can easily rotate when necessary. But try doing that with a device that weighs 4.85kg and you'll soon find yourself in difficulties.
Other apps like Facebook for instance just show a huge version of the mobile rather than the desktop version -- not ideal. You can't use Windows programs of course, and while there are Android options for most things these days (it comes with Kingsoft Office already installed) there are sure to be times when this gets awkward, such as when you reequire Flash or Silverlight support.
In terms of power, it delivered a benchmarking score of 27,778, which would have looked pretty good this time last year, but it's easily shamed by the latest Android high-enders like the LG G Flex, Samsung Galaxy S5 and Sony Xperia Z2 which churn out scores in the mid 30,000s.
Conclusion
In theory, the Slate 21 is the logical next step as Android becomes the default interface for more and more users -- why not extend it from the mobile to the desktop? Based on this evidence though, it's not quite ready yet. Not enough apps are optimised for the big landscape screen and there's limited crossover with Windows programs.
As a cheap and cheerful home computer you can use for messaging, browsing and streaming movies and music, it's pretty good overall.
But its weak performance in the power department and lack of Android optimisation for the big screen mean it's not quite ready to replace the Windows PC just yet. That day could be coming though.
Software: Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean
Processor: Quad-core 1.66GHz NVIDIA Tegra T40S
Memory: 1GB SDRAM
Memory slot: Yes
Display: 21.5in 1920x1080 pixels
Connectivity: Wi-Fi a/b/g/n, Bluetooth 3.0
Ports: microUSB, 3.5mm headphone jack
Camera: TrueVision HD webcam 720p
Radio: No
Size: 531x354x67mm
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
