The EliteDesk 800 G1 from HP is a desktop PC with a very compact form factor, which can be mounted behind a LCD monitor or tucked against it in an upright position. In other words, it’s a great choice for offices where space is at a premium. To give you an idea of its compactness, the PC stands just 34 mm high and weighs a mere 1.3 kg. It comes with a detachable stand to place it in a vertical position next to your monitor. The PC doesn’t ship with a monitor, keyboard, or mouse, so you’ll need to factor those into your cost if you decide to buy this one.
Connectivity is a strength: The mini desktop PC allows you to hook up three separate displays. This could be useful in retail or office environments, which would benefit from a multi-monitor set-up. The compact PC includes two DisplayPort interfaces as well as a VGA port. There’s no HDMI though, so you’ll need to purchase an adaptor if you want to connect an HD display. The Desktop Mini PC is equipped with 4th Generation Intel Pentium Core i5 processor that can easily support three displays.
It has 6 x USB 3.0 (4 at the back and 2 at front) ports available for connecting peripherals. The mini PC doesn’t have Bluetooth connectivity so one or two of these ports are likely to be permanently occupied by the mouse and keyboard. There are headphone and microphone sockets on the front with an additional line-out for external speakers at the back. Also, there is a Gigabit Ethernet interface at the back for wired networks.
Power packed performance: The review unit we received was powered by quad-core Core i3 processor running at 2.9 GHz, 4 GB of RAM and 500 GB SATA hard drive in which about 421 GB is available to the user. The HP mini desktop PC produced a strong overall score in our benchmark tests. It scored P789 on 3D Mark 11 and 2879 on PC Mark 8.
Basic productivity apps run very smoothly, but since there’s no discreet graphics card in the machine, the machine is suited for light graphics work. Like all HP business machines, the EliteDesk 800 G1 also comes with pre-installed security software (HP Client Security). The software enables you to protect your PC. For instance, you can block the USB ports so that only those with a password can access plugged in USB sticks and external hard drives. The tiny machine has an in-built speaker, which is great for regular usage, but don’t expect thumping audio out of it.