Fire Alarms Systems

With the integrated 3-D support and some serious muscle under the hood that offers MSI Wind Top AE2420 3D is a tantalizing prospect for the future of this form factor. A 2.8 GHz Core i7-860, 4 GB RAM, an ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5730 graphics part, Wi-Fi and 1 TB SATA2 storage make this a solid all-in-one PC designed, even if it is a little bit unpolished feel.

With a 2.8 GHz Core i7-860 under the hood and 3D Blu-ray support, MSI Wind has some muscle.

As an example, this was the only system that we connect without integrated Bluetooth keyboard and mouse-we had in the supplied USB dongle to plug the mouse and keyboard. The test is a little rough around the edges. More frustrating was the fact that the mouse does not wake up automatically when you touch, every time we wanted to use the system after they had gone to sleep, we had the Connect button on the bottom of the mouse to make.

In terms of performance, the MSI flexed some muscle, running a close second to HP's very fast TouchSmart. The Core i7-860's four cores and eight threads powered their way through ProShow Producer, and the presence of ATI's mobile Radeon HD 5730 allowed it to post frame rates in the high 30s for our Call of Duty 4 test, which is the fastest of the three systems reviewed here. What's that, you say? You think 35 frames per second for a 3-year-old game isn't all that great? Well, welcome to the world of all-in-ones. Practically speaking, the Wind Top feels snappy, and while the processor speeds allowed us to play Total War: Shogun 2 in campaign mode, when the time came to fight it out on the game's 3D battlefields, we were disappointed.

The top wind comes with two USB 3.0 ports, five USB 2.0 ports, HDMI input, S / PDIF output, a coaxial-in connection and a webcam. The inclusion of a stylus has surprised us, but hey, it's not mandatory, and there's nobody hurt, right? MSI Wind Touch OS layer deserves special mention, there is a fairly simple way to access the media only through the touch screen.

While not as nice as Sony VAIO L-Series, the 23.6-inch screen is pretty decent from visual quality. And, as far as we know, this is the only all-in-one can, with the 3-D Blu-rays you view and play 3D games. It even has a built-in transmitter and comes with a pair of active shutter 3D glasses.

Overall, this show is above average. And if you want 3D content, this is the only gig in town.

$ 1,800 www.msi.com