Sony brings a media PC to the masses
Sony VAIO RB series
The product: With the announcement of its first RB-series VAIO desktop, Sony rounds out its desktop lineup with a chassis design that complements the high-performance R series. Straightforward media PCs, VAIO RB-series models come in a standard tower desktop modeled after the innovative RA-series design, and they use Windows Media Center for TV recording and other media tasks. And while the $800 default configuration may be modest, you can be assured of future upgradability, thanks to the RB series' Intel 915G chipset, which includes an x16 PCI Express graphics card slot. Featured specs in the PGC-RB38G include:

• 3.4GHz Intel Pentium 4 550 CPU
• 1GB PC3200 400MHz RAM
• Double-format/dual-layer DVD burner
• 128MB ATI Radeon X300 PCI Express graphics card
• GigaPocket RealTime MPEG-2 encoder/decoder with TV tuner

The price: Because it starts at $800, the RB series represents a substantial movement by a major vendor to get media PCs out in the world en masse. Better, because of its 915G chipset, you can even start low and build it up later, making this PC fairly versatile.

The prospects: It makes perfect sense that Sony would want to extend the brand identity introduced in the high-end RA series to a mainstream desktop. And while the new VAIO RB series doesn't do anything that's particularly technically innovative, the simple fact that it's an affordable media PC from a major vendor is significant. The biggest stumbling block we can see is that it still uses a living room-unfriendly desktop PC case.

By Rich Brown, associate editor, CNET Reviews