NEC PowerMate VL360 review

If you only want a PC for office work, browsing the internet or listening to the occasional MP3, then it makes no sense to spend a lot of money on a powerful gaming computer.

NEC's PowerMate VL360 is a no-frills PC aimed at businesses that's also suitable for everyday home use.

We usually expect to find cheap business PCs equipped with a slow Celeron or Sempron processor, but the VL360 has a speedy dual-core Athlon 64 X2 4800+ chip. It did particularly well in our video-encoding test, with a score of 205, so it's more than fast enough for everyday tasks.

If you regularly undertake memory-intensive tasks such as image editing or running multiple applications simultaneously, you'd benefit from adding more RAM to the 1GB already present. Unlike many cheap PCs that already have all their memory slots filled, the VL360 has two empty RAM slots so you won't have to throw away your existing memory when upgrading.

As expected, the VL360 isn't suitable for playing modern 3D games, as the integrated GeForce 6150LE graphics chip couldn't even run our demanding Prey benchmark. It can accommodate a faster PCI Express x16 graphics card, but the half-height slot means you're restricted in your choice of upgrades if you later decide to start gaming.

The VL360 is whisper-quiet, so it won't distract you from your work. The cooling fans were so hushed, even during intensive tasks such as video editing, that we could hear the usually obscured whirring of the hard disk. It's compact, too, and could easily fit in a granny trolley.

If you outgrow the 160GB hard disk there aren't any internal drive bays for adding more, although you could use the external bay rather than fit a floppy drive or memory card reader. The hard disk is mounted in a slide-out tray, so it is easily replaceable, as is the DVD writer. There are also two half-height PCI slots and one PCI Express x1 slot for adding peripherals such as TV tuners or wireless networking cards.

Serious typists may find the Logitech USB keyboard too springy and unresponsive for sustained use, but the mouse is comfortable to hold. Windows Vista Business is included instead of Home Premium. Vista Business lacks certain features such as Media Center for managing your music, photos and videos, but it does come with a faxing and scanning program as well as Remote Desktop support so you can remotely control another computer on your network.

If you don't want to play modern games and already have a monitor you're happy with, the PowerMate VL360 is an attractive choice. Otherwise, PC Nextday's Zoostorm 2-3413 Versatile is better value.