Dell Inspiron One 2205 desktop review

The Dell Inspiron One 22 is an All-in-One desktop computer incorporating a wireless keyboard, mouse and a Full HD screen. It plays little brother to the Dell Inspiron One 23, which is both larger and dearer. Is it inspiring enough to warrant purchase? PC Site takes a look.

What we like best

The Dell Inspiron One 2205 model features a dual-core AMD Athlon II dual-core 250e processor, 4Gb RAM and 500Gb worth of hard drive storage – all very decent specs, and the result is a great platform to work from.

Thanks to the Full HD display, users will be able to enjoy high-quality video playback, too. The contrast is fantastic and horizontal viewing angles are wide enough to allow for family viewing.

The Dell Inspiron One 2205’s matt black keyboard is well-designed as well: there’s a palm rest, and the action of the keys is soft but distinct. For extra convenience, the mouse and keyboard both connect to the same USB stick.

What we like least

The lack of a Blu-ray drive seems like a bit of a missed trick considering the good graphics specs and the very impressive screen. You can manually upgrade the DVD drive to a Blu-ray drive, but unless you know your way around a computer’s intestines we wouldn’t recommend it.

The lack of any USB 3.0 ports is similarly surprising, and actually a bit annoying if you expect high-speed data transfer from an external hard drive onto your desktop.

Also, it pretty baffling that the Dell Inspiron One 2205 doesn’t have video-in or outputs (e.g. HDMI) – if you want to connect your desktop to your TV or a gaming console, you’ll be sorely disappointed.