VeryPC GreenPC BE 2 Business review

VeryPC has set out its stall as a 'green' PC company, reducing plastics, planting trees and shaving wattage off its systems in an attempt to prove you needn't overload your conscience to get a decent computer.

The Be 2 Business sounds a bit more hard-headed, but it shares the same ethos, and if business isn't what you're looking for it packs enough into its small chassis to please demanding home users too.

3D graphics are out; the integrated graphics won't cope with modern games. The main processor, though, is an AMD Athlon X2 Black Edition 2400, the top of the Black Edition range of chips, which claim extra energy efficiency thanks to their decreased power draw. In our 2D (general) benchmark test, the VeryPC scored 144% - no challenge to all-out performance systems, but more than capable of handling web browsing, office applications, image editing, and plenty more besides.

As well as a relatively small carbon footprint, the BE 2 Business, like some of its VeryPC stablemates, has a tiny desktop footprint. Its custom designed chassis can be placed on its side or laid down, which is handy. Though small, it still manages to offer a few internal upgrade options.A free full size 5.25 inch bay, ready for another optical drive, sits alongside a 3.5 inch bay that would house a second hard disk - something that might soon interest you, since the included 160GB could fill up pretty quickly, especially in the home.

That integrated graphics chip is by no means bottom of the range - the ATI Radeon HD 3200 comes with 256MB of its own memory, rather than relying on sharing RAM. But don't get any delusions of grandeur: our 3D game benchmark wouldn't even run. Playing DVDs is more the BE 2's kind of leisure activity.

On that front, it's a shame the monitor isn't widescreen, but the 19 inch LG Flatron is perfectly competent for both work and play. The backlight bled through a little bit at the top and bottom, but it wasn't distracting, and the display would be fine for anything except the most precise and demanding tasks. Unfortunately, it's only got an analogue VGA input, even though the PC has a digital DVI-I output that could have offered a sharper picture.

Joined-up thinking

The case features a surprisingly extensive range of connectors. There are two FireWire sockets, Gigabit Ethernet, and six USB 2.0 ports, all available for use since there are separate PS/2 sockets for the supplied Microsoft Comfort Curve keyboard and mouse. Alongside DVI-I, there's an HDMI output for plugging into an HDTV, and an eSATA socket lets you add fast external disks.

The three year warranty is generous, and Very PC will add an extra two years if you maintain your subscription to the included Kaspersky 7 anti-virus suite. They'll even take the machine back, clean it and give it a free health check.

OpenOffice 2.4, the free Open Source office suite, is also included, along with Firefox and Thunderbird, the Mozilla Foundation's free web browser and email client. Microsoft's only contribution here is Windows XP Professional, better for business users (who may have crucial bits of software that don't like Vista) than consumers, who'll miss features like Media Center.

Whether the environment is your first priority or not, this is a capable machine with low power requirements - and the side benefits of low heat and noise - at a good price. It's a sound choice as a modest but effective PC to use every day.

Author: Mike Jennings