How many of you out there already own a nice HDTV (doesn’t matter whether it is plasma or LCD)? If so, what do you use it primarily for – to watch regular programming, your upscaled DVDs, Blu-ray movies or all three? How about the extremely niche market of folks who use their huge displays to do work over a computer? Silicon Mountain Holdings caters to this handful of people, recently announcing its Allio Lite, a converged LCD HDTV-PC product that won’t bust the lining of your pockets in these difficult times. Available in 42″ and 32″ sizes at 1080p and 720p resolutions respectively, both models will feature a similar selection of inputs and outputs compared to the original at a lower price point (ah, the wonders of mass production and lowered costs!)

This time round, the Allio Lite is powered by an Intel Atom processor and boasts a DVD-CD player/writer as well for one of the more affordable converged multimedia experiences possible, introducing the rest of your home to HD TV and Internet entertainment in the living room. Some of those users who are more comfortable with a beefier processor might wonder whether the Intel Atom processor is up to the task or not, since running processor intensive programs is not the Atom’s forte as it was meant to be a lightweight processor that will handle the most basic of tasks well, including Internet surfing, checking email as well as viewing online video. This is the reason why Silicon Mountain decided to throw in the dual-core Atom 330 processor with hyper-threading technology, making this the most powerful Atom processor to date at 1.6GHz. The inclusion of this processor makes it possible for the Allio Lite HDTV/PC to run Windows Vista Home Premium without suffering from too much performance issues, augmented by 2GB RAM and a 250GB hard drive.

The 42″ Allio Lite will retail for $1,599 while the smaller 32″ model is going for $1,299.

Press Release