To help us provide you with free impartial advice, we may earn a commission if you buy through links on our site. Learn more
Medion is a well-recognised name when it comes to getting inexpensive but surprisingly powerful PCs into big-brand stores and supermarkets. The Medion Akoya E4057 D isn’t much to look at, but with this quad-core system’s price of just £349, it’s definitely attracted our attention.
The PC has one of AMD’s latest Trinity processors, the 3.4GHz quad-core A10-5700, which includes an integrated AMD Radeon HD 7660D graphics processor. Although you’re not going to get performance to rival an Intel Core i5 out of this processor, it’s powerful enough for the vast majority of uses, while the its integrated graphics do a remarkably good job when it comes to games.
In our application benchmarks, the processor produced an overall score of 58 – that’s absolutely fine for any kind of program, from video editing to spreadsheets. The processor’s four cores mean that the A10 has plenty of potential for smooth multi-tasking, too, while 8GB of RAM means that it won’t struggle when confronted with large images or video files.
512MB of that memory is used by the graphics processor. We’re used to AMD Vision on-chip graphics being very capable and this system proves that in our 3D gaming tests. While it can’t handle Dirt Showdown at a full 1,920×1,080 resolution and Ultra quality, dropping the settings to 1,280×720 and High quality produced a fantastic frame rate of 42.9fps. Even at 1080p, keeping the resolution at high quality meant that we got a playable 27.9fps. You’ll be able to quite happily play 3D games on this system, if you’re prepared to make a few compromises when it comes to graphical quality (that said they’ll still look better than current consoles).
If you later decide you want or need more GPU power, then there’s room to add a dedicated graphics card thanks to a vacant PCI-E x16 slot. The 450W power supply should be able to handle all but the most insanely power-hungry graphics cards, too. There are also two PCI-E x1 slots, which you can use to add expansion cards such as sound cards, TV tuners and wireless adaptors. There are two memory slots, both of them currently occupied by 1,600MHz 4GB DDR3 modules, and four SATA ports, of which two are in use.
The motherboard itself – a Medion own-brand model – is a bit of an oddity in all its classic green-PCB glory. The case isn’t particularly spacious, and its interior looks and feels cheap and unfinished, but we didn’t encounter any sharp edges. There’s an ugly bundle of cables leading from the PSU, which are bunched up in the middle, but a black plastic cowling direcs the warm air outflow from the CPU cooler to a vent in the case’s side panel.
There aren’t any case fans, although there’s space to mount them, but the system didn’t get too warm or make a great deal of noise. There are only two 5 1/4in drive bays and two 3 1/2in bays. One of each is occupied, by a DVD-RW and a 1TB hard disk respectively. The scarcity of bays is unlikely to be a problem for the vast majority of owners, and there are only two free SATA ports anyway.
The front panel is glossy, unremarkable and inoffensive enough to fit into most rooms. It has two usefully-positioned USB3 ports, along with a handy multi-format memory card reader and the obligatory 3.5mm headphone and mic ports. The case’s back panel has two more USB3 ports, along with four USB2 ports, a Gigabit Ethernet port, an optical S/PDIF output and 3.5mm outputs for analogue 7.1 surround sound. There are also VGA and HDMI outputs that allow you to connect up to two displays to use with the integrated graphics processor. There are also PS/2 mouse and keyboard ports, which could help to keep a couple of USB ports free for other things.The supplied keyboard has a PS/2 connector, although the mouse is USB. Both are basic but very functional and we found the keyboard particularly comfortable to use.
‘Basic but functional’ is an apt description of this PC in general. It’s installed with Windows 8, so is relatively fast to boot, even though it has a traditional hard disk rather than an SSD or a drive with flash memory cache. We had to manually install the AMD Vision graphics driver so we could correct the integrated HDMI output’s failure to fill the screen of a 1080p display, but this is supplied on an accompanying disc.
The E4057 is a no-frills budget system, but it’s up to almost any task and is a great all-rounder with a fair bit of upgrade potential. It’s not elegant or pretty, but at £349, it’s an ideal family PC and a great Budget Buy. It’s currently available only from ASDA, both online and in selected stores.
