Stories by Elias Plastiras

  • Epson RX700 offers zippy photo printing

    The RX700 is an all-encompassing digital photo production unit. It can print full-bleed A4 and 4x6in photos either from your PC or directly from your PictBridge-enabled digital camera's memory card. It can also produce excellent photocopies, not only of magazine clippings and thick books, but also of CD/DVD artwork. Simply place the disc you want to copy in the scanner, place a printable disc in the input tray and you're set. We tested this function with printable Ritek DVD-R discs and the results were impressive.

  • WD serves up Caviar class

    Western Digital's new Caviar WD2500KS is an amazingly quiet 250GB Serial ATA II drive that is suitable for a silent PC or media centre. We could barely hear it spinning or seeking during file transfer tests. This is due in part to its fluid dynamic bearing motor, more efficient algorithm designs for the supply of power to this motor and also to the mechanics that control the read/write heads.

  • Acer Aspire EL

    Within the confines of this machine's mini-tower case, Acer has packed components that could put many larger units to shame.

  • Shrinking form factors: Dream PC

    Styled with acrylic and best orientated vertically, the pre-production Dream PC we saw packs all of the functionality expected of a mid-tower PC, plus the mobility, but without the expansion possibilities.

  • Windows XP: Make tasks easier

    Windows XP is very helpful when it comes to getting things done. It aims to simplify things by making links to common tasks easily visible, and will even let you automate some procedures, such as opening a data CD to view its contents as soon as it's inserted.