Dell, HP, Apple Consumer Reports' Best Desktops

Yesterday we took a look at Consumer Reports’ latest laptop ratings and saw that Apple cleaned up all three segments with MacBooks taking home all top scores. Could Apple do the same thing again for desktops with its iMac, Mac Mini and Mac Pro? Nope.

In the four desktop categories – standard, multimedia, gaming and all-in-one – HP topped one and Dell took the remaining three.

Well, actually Apple managed to sneak in at the top of the standard desktop rating with its Mac Mini as the HP Pavilion Slimline s3620f, which took top spot with 61 out of 100, is discontinued. The Mac Mini shared a rating of 59 out of 100 along with the HP Pavilion a6600f and HP Pavilion a6700y.

Dell ruled the multimedia desktop class, taking the top four spots out of the six computers ranked. The top four in order were the Dell Studio XPS, Studio Mini, Studio Slim and the Insprion 518.

Only three gaming desktops were ranked by Consumer Reports, with the Dell XPS 630 taking the highest score on the page with 81 out of 100. The other two were the HP Pavilion Elite d5000t ATX and the HP Pavilion Elite m9450f, both with 78 points and both discontinued.

In the all-in-one category, one that’s popularized by the iMac, Apple only managed to take second place with its 20-inch offering. The leader of that pack was Dell with its 24-inch XPS One Red. Dell also grabbed third place with the 20-inch version of the XPS One.

Check out the latest Consumer Reports for the full ratings (or subscribe to the website).

Marcus Yam
Marcus Yam served as Tom's Hardware News Director during 2008-2014. He entered tech media in the late 90s and fondly remembers the days when an overclocked Celeron 300A and Voodoo2 SLI comprised a gaming rig with the ultimate street cred.
  • grieve
    Custom built systems took #1 in all my categories….
    #1 Value
    #1 Performance
    #1 appearance
    #1 Blending
    Reply
  • thundercleese
    In the end they are all crap. Which is why I always build all my computers.
    Reply
  • rwpritchett
    I wonder how many people choose to purchase an Apple display to match their mac mini? The smaller 24" model is $900... that's more than the mini itself. But, that's the price to pay if you want to be chic.

    I agree, homebuilt beats all of these.
    Reply
  • falchard
    lol I think that consumer report is way off. How can macbooks beat ASUS and MSI laptops? Its completely baffling. How can HP gain #1 desktop brand, and Dell even be on the list? I think someone was paid.
    Reply
  • tayb
    What were there like a total of two dozen Mac Pro's sold? I'd rather buy a new car.
    Reply
  • eklipz330
    ok homebuilt DEFINITELY beats store build, as long as its over $800. but i think under that, you can find pretty slick deals on store built computers.
    Reply
  • Nuke_Meltdown
    And that is without custom built computers number.....
    Reply
  • Raidur
    I don't trust consumer ratings, considering the average consumer doesn't know the difference between memory and hard drive space. "That website loaded up mighty fast, this computer is awesome!! +100 rating!!" Or the classic saying from my dad "This god dmn piece of sht computer! (mind you, it is a $2000 laptop and never even a year old, its pretty nice) We need to return this crap and get a new 'different' one!! (+0 rating)" I look on his screen and he is typing web addresses into google search and wondering why it keeps going 'back' to google. *sigh
    Reply
  • chise1
    Can someone please explain to me why only Dells, HP's and Macs are on the list? Yes, we all know that it's better to build your own computer, but unless there is a strict price limit (which Consumer Reports didn't seem to follow when it proclaimed that Apple produced the best laptops, comparing computers that were 3-4x more expensive than others)? The XPS 630 isn't even Dell's best model!
    Reply
  • frozenlead
    chise1 has a big point. There seems to be no convention for choosing specific models. I really hope people don't read this BS. Choosing a discontinued model? What?
    Reply