For $50, HP will assassinate the bezel on this all-in-one PC
Plus a pop-up camera to protect your privacy.
Slowly but surely, computers are melting into the world around us. And I'm not talking about fancy holographic glasses or roll-up, newspaper-like screens. Thanks to razor-thin bezels, even an ordinary flatscreen computer display can feel like it's floating on air. Dell's new XPS laptops use the technique wonderfully, and now HP's new Pavilion All-in-One has the same barely-there bezel.
Starting at $750 (roughly £510 or AU$980 converted) -- just $50 more than the company's standard 23.8-inch all-in-one PC -- the new All-in-One with Micro-Edge Display shaves off a full three-quarters of the tacky black border around the screen.
That doesn't leave a lot of room for a webcam, but HP has a pretty cool solution for that, too: a spring-loaded webcam module that pops up out of the top of the computer. Want to make absolutely sure your camera and mic are off? Just push down to put the module away, and it won't just turn off -- it'll completely disconnect itself from the computer to ensure total privacy. (You can't hack a webcam that isn't plugged in at all.)
It's just a shame that HP's sleek new all-in-one doesn't have quite as many options as its counterparts. While you can outfit it with up to 16GB of RAM and an Intel Core i7 processor, you won't find a touchscreen, an optical drive, or a QHD-resolution display. You're stuck with 1080p.
The Pavilion All-in-One with Micro-Edge Display will be available this summer, and it's just the tip of HP's back to school spear. It'll arrive alongside a host of new HP Pavilion laptops and HP Pavilion x360 backflipping convertibles that are thinner and faster than ever.
HP's new Pavilion x360 convertibles have a vastly better hinge and some attractive new color options.
I'm planning to keep an eye on the new HP Pavilion x360, in fact. Last year's model felt pretty cheap, but these new ones have an improved hinge (borrowed from the pricier Spectre x360, one of my favorite laptops) and vibrant color options that make them look and feel much better.
HP isn't the only company with razor-thin bezels on an all-in-one PC, by the way. You might also want to check out the Lenovo Ideacentre AIO 510S.