Photos: Sony's Vaio RM1N quad-core video-editing monster
Want a machine that can edit video in its sleep? Then you need the brand new, super-fast, quad-core Sony Vaio RM1N
Most people think two heads are better than one. Not Sony -- it reckons you need at least four. That's why it's sent us the Vaio 'R Master' RM1N quad-core desktop.
It's one of the first consumer desktop PCs to use an Intel Core 2 Quad CPU clocked at 2.4GHz. In other words, it's fast -- very fast. It offers 2GB of RAM, an Nvidia GeForce 8600 GTS graphics card and 1TB of hard disk space.
The most bizarre thing about the RM1N, however, is that it comes in so many different bits. There's the main base unit, a separate Access Unit housing the hard and optical drives (separate Blu-ray drive and DVD rewriters) as well as the mouse, keyboard and speakers, and a separate jog controller for cycling through video.
Obviously this thing's designed for high-definition video editing. We let our own video monkeys have a go on it and they virtually drooled over the thing. Not once did they mention the Apple Mac Pro, which is pretty remarkable.
The R Master ships with Adobe Premier Pro 2, WinDVD BD For Vaio, Windows Vista Business. It'll set you back a fair wodge of course -- from £2,500 when it's released in August. You can check out more pics by clicking the 'Next Photo' link below. -Rory Reid
Update: A full review of the Sony Vaio VGC-RM1N is now live.
Sony felt it would be too cliched to put everything in one box, so it's put the primary components in the base unit, and the hard drives and optical drives in a second Access Unit, which sits on top. It's a weird setup, but there's no arguing it looks impressive.
The industrial-monolith styling won't be to everyone's taste, but the PC is very well equipped. There are four front-facing USB ports, with up to eight more at the rear.
The Access Unit comes with its own cradle so you can mount it vertically as well as horizontally. We don't particularly like the way it looks in the vertical setup, but it makes sense for people who want to put their monitor on top of the base unit.
Here's the aforementioned jog dial. It works a bit like an iPod's Click Wheel, except it's used for moving quickly (or really slowly) through media files in video-editing software. We think everybody should have one of these -- if only to show off with.
Here's the rear. The Access Unit connects to the base unit via the white ports on each of the boxes. There's even a parallel port so you can connect legacy (old) devices.