SONY VAIO VGC-RT150Y

A Digital Artist's All-in-One PC

Look out. Apple—there's a stylish new all-in-one desktop in town. The Sony VAI0 VGC-RT150Y, a sleek black multimedia PC with quad-core power, can compete with the best Macs out there. Unlike the VAIO TV/ PC combos of yore, the RT150Y is a professional-grade system—with a price to match.

The RT150Y's centerpiece is its 25.5-inch LCD screen. with a native resolution of 1.920-by-1.200 (16:10), which is perfect for creating 16:9 HD video content or viewing a two-page spread. It has a matte finish for combat ing glare and Sony's XBrite-FullHD technology—along with 1080p support. Inside, this system has powerful components. including a 2.66-GHz Intel Core 2 Quad Q9400 processor, dual 500GB hard drives in a RAID 0 array, and 8GB of RAM. Most notable is its envy-inspiring multimedia hardware: an ATSC/HDTV tuner, a Blu-ray burner, flash memory card readers, and HDMI input and output ports. This is the first system I've seen that has HDMI input as well as output. The system's 512MB nVidia GeForce 9600M GT graphics card is good enough for medium-level 3D gaming.



The RT150Y is a very good multimedia performer, scoring 28 seconds on Photoshop CS3 and 40 seconds on Windows Media Encoder, among thebest scores I've seen for multimedia PCs. This system can play newer 3D games like World in Conflict (35 frames per second), but it struggled with Crysis (27 fps). I was pleased to find that the crapware typically found in VAIO systems has been cut way back, which gives a nice performance boost. Although this VAIO is a bit overpriced. high-level pros who love
good design and want to stick with Windows should consider the RT150Y.—Joel Santo Domingo



Specs: 2.66-GHz Intel Core 2 Quad Q9400 processor; 8GB 800-MHz DDR2 SDRAM; two 500GB, 7,200-rpm SATA hard drives in a RAID 0 array; 512MB nVidia GeForce 9600M GT graphics card; Blu-ray writer; five USB 2.0 ports, one Fire Wire port, integrated 2.1 speakers, Windows Vista Ultimate (64-bit).

PC Magazine January 2009