Sony PCV-RS310

WHAT'S HOT: A new member of Sony's crop of PCs aimed at video enthusiasts, the PCV-RS310 carries an affordable $1229 price tag. In addition to a DVD burner and a Sony SDM-X52 15-inch LCD, Sony tosses in plenty of entertainment-related software. The list includes programs that let you organize and edit photos, capture and edit video, and organize your digital music collection.

WHAT'S NOT: The RS310 is best suited to those searching for a basic starter system. For instance, the Sony SDM-X52 15-inch LCD displayed colors that appeared too dark and overly saturated at default settings, and we found ourselves repeatedly re-adjusting the monitor settings for different tasks. Text screens looked better, but only marginally so. While the monitor may be fine for short stints with word processing or Internet surfing sessions, the unit we received wasn't up to snuff for serious video or graphics editing.

The integrated Intel 845GV graphics churned out pokey frame rates for a less-than-thrilling gaming experience. The Sony speakers felt lightweight and produced only muddy bass notes and thin trebles on vocal tracks and a DVD movie, even with the volume settings cranked up to full blast. The 80GB hard drive, while sufficient for most tasks, is small for a system that's supposed to be designed for video editing.

WHAT ELSE: Despite its marketing as a video editing system, our modestly configured test configuration had one open internal drive bay (out of two) for an extra hard drive; one free memory socket; and two available PCI slots (out of five) for add-on cards. The system's cramped interior means that you'll have to contend with messy wiring and awkward positioning when adding more memory or an additional hard drive. To connect USB devices, the system offers four USB 2.0 ports, two of which are located up front, and two FireWire ports (one up front).

Powered by a 2.4-GHz Pentium 4 CPU and 256MB of DDR-266 SDRAM, out test unit earned a score of 104 in our PC WorldBench 4 tests?the slowest of any similarly configured systems we've tested recently, and certainly underpowered compared to most current systems designed for video editing. The Sony keyboard matches the light lavender tones of the PC's chassis and LCD. It has a few hot-keys, including ones for adjusting volume settings. Still, it lacks the full range of programmable hot-keys we've seen on other systems designed for home users. Documentation includes basic setup information, but it's missing a section for adding components.

UPSHOT: This no-frills VAIO is reasonably-priced, but aside from the full complement of software, it seems a less than ideal configuration for the video editing tasks it's supposed to be designed for.

SUMMARY

Sony Vaio PCV-RS310 PC WorldBench 4 score of 104, 2.4-GHz Pentium 4-CPU, 256MB of DDR-266 SDRAM, Windows XP Home, 80GB hard drive, DVD-R/RW drive, integrated Intel 845G graphics sharing main memory, 15-inch Sony SDM-X52 LCD monitor, V.90 modem, network adapter, minitower case. One-year warranty on parts and labor, free unlimited 24-hour weekday toll-free support during warranty period. $1339 877/865-7669 www.sonystyle.com