Medion Akoya P6110D

Editor's note We were originally informed that the price of this computer was £400. Since publication Aldi has increased its price to £430. This doesn't affect our star rating or Buy It award for the P6110D, but we apologise for the incorrect price in the original version of this review, and in the print version which appeared in issue 324 of Computeractive.

This desktop computer uses the same case as the last Medion desktop we looked at, the E4355D model.

Like that one, this is an Aldi special, on sale from 22 July in Aldi shops across the country. Stock can be limited and they tend to sell quickly after going on sale so call before arriving if you are travelling a long way to get one.

Unlike that computer, this one uses an AMD processor rather than the more common Intel models. It’s an AMD Athlon II X4 620 model, and quite a good one at that, roughly in the middle of AMD’s range. The fact it’s not an Intel will make no difference to use.

It includes 3GB of memory and a 1TB (1,000GB) hard disk for storing documents, music, video, pictures and other files. It has no graphics card, which slows things down for games and video work, and makes this PC more suitable for office and internet use, though it will still cope with video playback and editing.

The case doesn’t look great and the drive bays are covered with flimsy plastic panels. It doesn’t come with a monitor, but it does include a standard wired keyboard and mouse. If you are going to be doing a lot of typing it will be worth replacing the keyboard with a better model.

Most desktop computers don’t offer wireless network connections, but Medion’s tend to and this one is no exception. It also connects to wired networks. It has a DVD writer in the front panel (with one drive bay free for expansion) as well as a memory card reader and an eSata port for attaching external hard disks. And it comes with the Windows 7 Home Premium operating system.

On the back panel are VGA and HDMI sockets for attaching a monitor or flat-panel TV, Firewire socket for camcorders, wired network port, surround sound and optical sound outputs, as well as four USB ports (we would have preferred more).

The P6110D has a couple of flaws but they are easy enough to rectify (adding a USB hub and better keyboard, for instance) and at this price it is still a bargain despite those.