Entered CNET Catalog: 04/07/2005
SKU: PS590AA#ABA
Manufacturer: HP
Manufacturer description
Screen your latest home videos, catch up on your movies, and listen to music on this versatile entertainment PC. Or, do all of the above while chilling in the family room. The m7070n puts your entertainment in one place and lets you drive it from your desk chair or sofa.Product summary
The good: Strong Media Center performer; stylish case; quiet; LightScribe drive; lots of A/V connections.
The bad: Monitor and speakers not included; lacks high-end audio; fixed configuration; weak graphics card; wired keyboard and mouse.
The bottom line: The HP Media Center m7070n Photosmart PC is a solid bet for users looking to add some PC muscle to their living room.
CNET editors' review
- Editors' Choice: No
- Reviewed on: 07/07/2005
In a departure from the black-and-silver color scheme we saw on the HP Pavilion m1050y, HP houses the m7070n Photosmart PC in an all-silver midtower chassis, with matching optical drive and accessory doors. While the midtower form factor may not match your existing rack-mount components, its stylish case design and quiet operation still make the system living room-friendly.
On the upper-front bezel sits a 9-in-1 flash card reader and below that two optical drives: a double-layer LightScribe DVD burner and a DVD-ROM drive. HP's LightScribe technology lets you burn grayscale text, photos, and preformatted CD label art directly onto specially coated CD-Rs, using one of three bundled programs (WinDVD Creator, RecordNow, or iTunes) that support LightScribe labeling. The LightScribe media costs $8.99 for a five-pack and adds a professional, if time-consuming, touch to your projects. Once we had our art set up, it took us 30 minutes to burn a disc label containing four 36K images and a small amount of text.
Below the optical drives are two hinged panels. The right contains clearly marked audio and video ports, including S-Video, composite video and stereo inputs, microphone and headphone jacks, two USB 2.0 ports, and a FireWire port. The left panel hides the Personal Media Drive bay, which accepts optional HP removable drives. Personal Media Drives--available up to 400GB--fit snugly in the HP Media Center m7070n Photosmart PC and can also connect to any PC via USB 2.0. Our review system didn't come with a Personal Media Drive, but you can add a 160GB drive for $189. The drive makes data backups a snap and, when used as a removable USB device, provides an easy way to share your music or movie collection with a friend.
Rear-mounted integrated connections include four USB 2.0 ports, a FireWire port, an Ethernet jack, digital audio-in and -out jacks, and audio outputs supporting 7.1 surround sound, courtesy of Intel's High Definition Audio chip. The integrated sound is adequate, but it can't match the quality of a Creative Sound Blaster Audigy 2 card. Only one of three standard PCI slots are available (the single PCI Express slot is occupied), along with two of four memory slots, limiting the system's upgrade potential. Behind a sliding panel on the top of the case is a storage area for recordable media that can also serve as a camera or iPod dock when used with the included adapters.
The HP Media Center m7070n Photosmart PC is powered by Intel's 3.2GHz Pentium 4 640 processor and an Asus Puffer 2 motherboard based on Intel's 915 chipset. The system ships with 1GB of 400MHz DDR2 memory, a 250GB SATA 7,200rpm hard drive, a 128MB ATI Radeon X300 SE video card, and a Hauppauge WinTV TV tuner card. TV tuner cards typically can't match the image clarity produced by a set-top box, but signal noise and jitter were minimal, even if the picture could have been sharper.
Compared to its Media Center competition, the HP Media Center m7070n Photosmart PC turned in solid benchmark scores, thanks in part to its hefty Pentium 4 640 processor and 1GB of memory. On our SysMark 2004 tests, it edged the Gateway 832GM and its Pentium 4 630 processor by 6 percent, but compared to Media Center PCs from HP and Shuttle with a Pentium 4 500-series processor, the m7070n Photosmart PC outpaced them by 11 and 12 percent, respectively.
The m7070n Photosmart PC didn't fare as well on our 3D graphics and gaming performance tests, scoring 18.1 frames per second (fps) on our Half-Life 2 test at 1,024x768. Today's high-end SLI-based gaming systems typically score well above 100fps on this test. However, the m7070n Photosmart PC is a Media Center PC and uses an entry-level 3D card. Upgrading to a high-end graphics card will greatly improve the system's 3D graphics and gaming performance. Unfortunately, the system ships as is, so you'll have to make this upgrade after purchase.
There's no shortage of video connections, as the WinTV card provides inputs for TV, FM radio, S-Video, and composite video; the ATI Radeon X300 SE also has a VGA connector as well as S-Video and composite video outputs. This PC does not use a BTX form factor, but the system fans and the hard drive are virtually silent, making the m7070n Photosmart PC very quiet overall, an increasingly important factor in all PCs, especially Media Centers.
The system doesn't ship with a monitor or speakers, so you'll have to shell out for these components unless you plan on connecting the HP Media Center m7070n Photosmart PC to an existing A/V setup. The m7070n includes a standard USB sensor for the included Media Center remote control, an IR blaster for controlling your cable box with the remote, and a multimedia keyboard and optical mouse that match the system's silver finish, although neither is wireless. Along with Microsoft's Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005, the m7070n Photosmart PC ships with enough software to get you started recording your favorite TV shows, editing and organizing photos, creating DVDs, and recording or playing your favorite tunes. Bundled titles include HP's Image Zone Plus photo-editing suite, Apple iTunes, InterVideo WinDVD Creator, Muvee Technologies AutoProducer, and Sonic RecordNow, as well as Microsoft Works 8.0, Money Standard 2005, and Quicken 2005 New User Edition.
HP includes several printed manuals and a quick-setup card with the HP Media Center m7070n Photosmart PC, and HP's Web site has a comprehensive support and troubleshooting section for this model, including user documentation, setup and installation instructions, drivers and software downloads, and a problem-solving tutorial. The one-year parts-and-labor warranty comes with 90-day software support, and you can extend the service plan to two ($169.99) or three years ($219.99).
(Longer bars indicate better performance)
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BAPCo SysMark 2004 rating | |
SysMark 2004 Internet-content-creation rating | |
SysMark 2004 office-productivity rating |
(Longer bars indicate better performance)
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Half-Life 2 1,024x768 4xAA 8xAF |
N/A
Find out more about how we test desktop systems.
System configurations:Gateway 832GM
Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005; 3.0GHz Intel P4 630; Intel 915G chipset; 1,024MB DDR SDRAM 400MHz; 128MB integrated Intel 915G (shared memory); WDC WD2500JD-22HBB0 250GB 7,200rpm Serial ATA
HP z555 Digital Entertainment Center
Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005; 3.0GHz Intel P4 530; Intel 915G chipset; 512MB DDR SDRAM 400MHz; 128MB Nvidia GeForce 6600 (PCIe); Maxtor 6B250S0 250GB 7,200rpm Serial ATA
HP Media Center m7070n Photosmart PC
Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005; 3.2GHz Intel P4 640; Intel 915G chipset; 1,024MB DDR2 SDRAM 400MHz; 128MB ATI Radeon X300 (PCIe); Seagate ST3250823AS 250GB 7,200rpm Serial ATA
Polywell MiniBox 939AX
Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005; 2.1GHz AMD Athlon 64 3200+; ATI Radeon Xpress 200 chipset; 512MB DDR SDRAM 400MHz; 64MB (shared) integrated ATI Radeon X200; Seagate ST3200822AS 200GB 7,200rpm Serial ATA
Shuttle XPC G5 8300mc
Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005; 3.0GHz Intel P4 530; Intel 915G chipset; 512MB DDR SDRAM 400MHz; 256MB Nvidia GeForce 6600 (PCIe); WDC WD2500JD-98HBB0 250GB 7,200rpm Serial ATA
User opinions
Select a User Opinion to view: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 User Rating: 
2/10
don't buy hp
Pros: liked out of box, everything great
Cons: system died, tech support had me spend 90 min taking parts out, sent for warranty repair. came back NOT FIXED. they changed 1 memory chip. returned with 2 cards just flopping in case hanging on by wires.
NEVER WILL I BUY HP AGAIN. i will tell everyone i see in store and anyone who will listen to buy something else.
User Rating: 
9/10
A powerful and stable machine with all the bells and whistles!
Pros: Lots of in/out connections providing convenient accessibility for external devices, large storage, powerful and stable.
Cons: Only one con...USB connection on front is tight for devices that have the USB connection built-in (eg. some MP3 players).
Running a design studio and office from my home, I often use many of the USB ports, the mic and headphone connections, the Compact Flash and xD memory card slots, along with the large hard drive and DVD/CD writer (although I haven't tried the LightScribe technology yet)!
I run many powerful applications (often at the same time), including Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Premier, Adobe Audition, Macromedia Dreamweaver, Macromedia Flash, Microsoft Office and more! In addition to multimedia and office applications, I have also run many graphic-intensive games without any problems. Windows has it's own stability issues, but it has been as solid as any Windows machine can be.
I don't use the Media Center portion of Windows very often (if at all), but just about everything else has been very useful.
As for the one con noted above, I have a cheap MP3 player with the USB connection built-in...because of this, I cannot plug the player into the USB ports on the front of the machine to transfer music (I have to use the USB ports on the back). If you have a cable with your device, or docking station, you won't have any issues.
I highly recommend this HP PC along with any HP devices...I have gone from building my own PCs to being an HP loyalist.
User Rating: 9/10
A really superb computer
Pros: Great speed, quiet, lots of hook up options
Cons: only to get a wireless mouse and keyboard
User Rating: 9/10
Computer work Great! I like it's overall performance and speed
Pros: Memory 1GB, speed Pentium D Technology, Media Center allow me to connect directly to my DirecTV
Cons: Would have like better software provided machine
User Rating: 9/10
I Love This Computer
Pros: Quiet and useful
Cons: Programs installed by HP
User Rating: 9/10
love this machine
Pros: easy to upgrade,tons of usb & firewire support, media center when recording your fav. shows and burning to dvd an lightscribe is just cool. and you cant hear this thing when its on
Cons: no expanison on the front no open bays but you really dont need it.
User Rating: 9/10
Great Buy For The PriceWhen
Pros: Price, Speed, Easy Use, Lots of Software,WIreless
Cons: Could Have Been Built With A Little Bit better graphics card
JUST LETTING PEOPLE KNOW IT DOES SAY IT DOES NOT COME WITH A MONITOR AND WIRELESS FEATURES ACCORDING TO CNET. BUT I BOUGHT THIS COMPUTER AT COMP USA I ADVISE IF YOU BUY THIS COMPUTER GO TO THAT STORE THEY GIVE ALOT OF REBATES AND THROW IN FREE STUFF LIKE THE 17" LCD AND WIRELESS KEYBOARD AND MOUSE.
User Rating: 
8/10
Everything you want
Pros: Quiet, all features most will want
Cons: So so video, junk ware
User Rating: 
10/10
Killer Computer!!!! The Best
Pros: One of the best intergrated graphics card you can get!!!!
Cons: no video output
Great Computer!!! I love Mine!!!
User Rating: 9/10
Very Pleased But Not Perfect
Pros: Accessories, Hardware & Build Quality
Cons: Large Case, Video Card
User Rating: 8/10
Nice Hardware Spoiled by Junk Software
Pros: Excellent hardware except for the video card
Cons: Junk software forced me to reload OS
