Laptops Arena

Even if a notebook cooling pad is considered to be an accessory by most people, it is in fact more of a necessity. As we have explained in some of our past articles, an overheated notebook can be a serious problem as the heat generated without proper ventilation is what causes the components inside to get damaged. This is why a notebook cooling pad should owned by everyone that has a laptop as it is going to help you extend the life of your unit by properly ventilating the components inside.

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In this article we are going to show you some notebook cooling pad and shortly present their features and maybe we can convince you that it’s small price to pay in order to get a long living laptop. I keep hearing nothing but positive things about the Belkin laptop cooling pad. The price is as low as $30 so buying this notebook cooling pad is not exactly going to make a hole in your budget.

The shape and dimensions of this cooling pad make it easy to still use the unit on your lap. There is a gentle slope with improves you typing comforts and it also reduced wrist strain.  Thanks to the dimensions, the unit also fits into your laptop bag so you can take with you wherever you think it is necessary.

It can be connected to your notebook via one of the available USB ports and it takes its power from there which means you don’t have to mess around with any other cables except the USB one. The grips pads are going to prevent your notebook from slipping.

For about $35 you can buy the Thermapak HeatShift Cooling Pad which is available in different sizes, including the 17 inch model. When you first the HeatShift, you can tell that it is a bit different than what you usually see in laptop cooling pads. Inside this Thermapak you can find the phase changing material which is a crystal compound essential for the cooling process.

These crystals are the ones that absorb the heat inside the laptop and the grooved channels are used to blow the air away from the unit. This notebook cooling pad is special and different because it does not use the traditional air fans which are normally used in laptop cooling pads.

Due to its construction, this notebook cooling pad is very easy to roll up and just place it anywhere you like. It is highly transportable since it can be folded. The bottom of the pad has some rough plastic material which helps keep the pad together with the laptop into one place when you put it on the desk. You can but this cooling pad even if you have a 17 inch laptop.

Even if it does not use the conventional technology, it still manages to keep the whole surface of the laptop cool. There is no additional power necessary and this cooling pad is also environmentally friendly. It is very easy to maintain and it has an ultra slim design which increases its portability.

When it comes to an LG notebook review, the P300 is one model that we simply had to share will all of you. Back in 2008, the price of the unit reviewed here was approximately $1800. This unit was based on a 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T8300 processor and 2 GB of RAM. The graphics card was the nVidia GeForce 8600M GS with 256 MB of dedicated video memory.

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The 13.3 inch display of this notebook comes is a native resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels and the glossy coating provide more sharp and vibrant colors. Horizontal viewing angles are great and distortion is only noticeable from extreme angles. The maximum display brightness level can handle even a powerfully lit room. The keyboard is very nice to type on and users will not feel they are working on a cramped space.

There is no flex registered in the keyboard area and the touchpad does not provide us with any complaining material either. The touchpad surface is very pleasant to the touch, with no friction and good sensitivity levels. The speakers are about as good as they can get on a 13.3 inch notebook. You can use them for all the regular computing activities, listening to music, watching movies and other Windows sounds and alerts.

The unit hosts 3 USB ports, one Express Card slot, an SD card reader, a Kensington lock slot, a HDMI port, a VGA out, an Ethernet port, a modem port and the headphones and microphone jacks. Quite a good selection for a 13.3 inch laptop I could add.

When first reading this LG notebook review, we never expected to find a HDMI port on this unit. When it comes to battery, we do have our preferences. And we would definitely prefer that since we buy an ultraportable laptop which we want to carry around here and there and everywhere, that this laptop also provides us with good battery performance (power outlets do not grow on the street, you know).

With the display brightness adjusted to 70% and the Windows Vista power management profile set to “balanced mode”, tests have managed to squeeze some 3 hours and 40 minutes out of the battery. It’s ok, considering that we can raise that score by lowering the display brightness with a couple of levels and set he power management profile to “power saver”.

In order to get a slimmer and lighter notebook, LG has chosen to remove the optical drive from the unit and so you will have to go with an external one. The drive that LG offers is quite slim and covered in a glossy black coating. It’s very easy to store this drive as it is small and light so no worries when you must travel. With a solid built in quality and even good gaming performance is we consider what the category average has to offer. With cool features like an integrated 1.3 mega pixel webcam and also an integrated Bluetooth, this is one ultraportable which you can’t go wrong with.

Acer notebooks have always been known for delivering good performance at a not-so-expensive price. One such example is the Acer Aspire 8940G, a unit which for $1329 manages to deliver power without making a hole in the family budget. Let’s take a quick look at what you get for this price tag. The Acer Aspire 8940G runs on a 1.6 GHz Intel Core i7-720QM and 4 GB of DDR3 RAM. The total storage capacity of the hard drive supports 500 GB and the graphics card is the nVidia GeForce GTS 250M with 1 GB of DDR3 video memory.

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If you are looking for portable Acer notebook, this 18 inch monster is definitely not on your shopping list. The glossy display is very shiny and also very reflective. On the other hand, the colors are superb and the quality of the image is superior compared to other Acer notebooks. Leaving aside any matters of the display, the sound chapter has some interesting things to reveal. This 5.1 Surround system is going to offer incredible sound quality with the 5 integrated speakers and the Tuba CineBass Booster.

The keyboard of the Acer Aspire 8940G is pretty common, with no special or fancy design. The backlight will make typing in the dark an easy activity. The keys have good travel and even better response. They are very easy to press and the proper spacing between them makes it very easy to get used to it. We can say that the placement of the touchpad is a bit odd as it is located extremely close to the left side of the notebook rather than in the middle of the palm rest area. The matter finish that Acer has chosen makes the touchpad feel very pleasant to the touch and fingers seem to slide of easier. The touchpad is big and some people will never consider attaching an external mouse.

Let us see what there is to say about the selections of ports and features of this Acer notebook. The unit comes with 4 USB ports, one Ethernet port, an SDHC card slot, a Kensington lock slot, a Blu-ray optical drive, a VGA out, a HDMI port, a FireWire, an Express Card slot and the headphones out and microphone in jacks. You can never expect good battery life out a unit with an 18.4 inch display and which has some super cool components inside the unit.

If you turn the display brightness to 70%, activate the wireless card and set the Windows 7 power management profile to “balanced mode”, you can get about 3 hours and 10 minutes of battery life. I have to say that my 15.4 inch Toshiba can only achieve about 1 hours and 30 minutes on the same settings so the result of the Acer Aspire 8940G are not that low. With a huge touchpad and even an integrated Blu-ray optical drive (and its best friend: the HDMI port) I am beginning to wonder how come this notebook is so cheap. Is there something wrong with it?



The Pavilion dv6z is one HP entertainment notebook which has proven to be a great desktop replacement and a laptop that offers a lot of power for a starting price of $599.  The price of the unit reviewed here reached $775 so let us see if this laptop is as good as they say it is. This HP entertainment notebook runs on a 2.1 GHz AMD Athlon X2 QL-64 dual core processor and 3 GB of RAM which can be upgraded to a maximum 8 GB. The storage capacity of the hard disk is 250 GB and the graphics card is the ATI Radeon HD 4530 with 512 MB of video memory.

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The 16 inch display has a native revolution of 1366 x 768 pixels and it offers a good display quality with great images. The horizontal viewing angles will allow movie watching with friends gathered round. The levels of brightness are acceptable as they manage to cover even the more powerfully lit rooms.  The keyboard is fully sized and it is accompanied by a numerical pad which makes working with spreadsheets a lot easier.

There is some flex in the keyboard area but nothing too disturbing. The keys are entirely black and shiny and they feel very pleasant to the touch. Even if the keyboard looks nice, the glossy coating of the keys is a fingerprint magnet so every time you have dirty, oily fingers, this will eventually be visible on the keys as well. The touchpad is silver and extremely glossy. In fact, this laptop is one glossy surface. I guess that the functionality of this touchpad depends mostly on how dry or wet tour finger really are.

A HP multimedia notebook always has a good selection of ports and features so here we have 4 USB ports, one Ethernet port, one HDMI port, a FireWire port, an Express Card slot, a media card reader, a VGA port plus a docking station connector and the regular headphones out and microphone in jacks. As usual, HP has chosen to integrate a pair of Altec Lansing speakers which are quite above the category average. The sound is clear and there is a bit of noticeable bass. The best part is that the speakers are located right above the keyboard so the sound is projected straight up, making the sound quality better as the sound is more clear.

Generally we never expect good battery life out of a 16 inch laptop which is meant to be a desktop replacement. The unit of the Pavilion dv6z can achieve about 2 hours and 10 minutes of battery performance with the screen brightness set to the medium level, the wireless card activated and the Windows Vista power management profile set to “power saver”. In the end, you have to admit that this unit offers good value for the money that you pay and even if the battery does not achieve any outstanding performance, you still get a good looking notebook, with a good processor and graphics card and good Altec Lansing speakers.

The notebook HP Compaq 6730s is considered to be a small business laptop for people who are not too pretentious about their working station as you will see later in this article that the unit does not exactly have the most powerful specs. As expected, the laptop does have a low price tag because it has some pretty basic specs inside.

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The reviewed unit came with a 1.8 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T5670 processor and 1 GB of RAM. The total storage capacity of the hard drive is 160 GB and the graphics card is the ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3430 with 256 MB of video memory. When it comes to the looks of this unit, I have to say that too much black is sometime too dull. From the distance it does have the aspect of a business notebook but maybe a touch of silver here and there would have been a nice idea.

Since there are no glossy surfaces on this notebook (that’s right, not even on the lid) the unit is easy to be kept clean as it is not such a fingerprint magnet when you are dealing with matte surfaces. With 2.7 kg in weight it is not exactly a heavy notebook so let’s say that you can carry it around here and there whenever it is really necessary. Or maybe it should just stay on your desk in the office. The unit could come with the preinstalled version of Windows XP Professional but Windows Vista operating system will work fine even if the unit only has 1 GB of RAM.

The 15.4 inch display is average, with good horizontal viewing angles and good level of both brightness and contrast. The glossy covering of the display is a pain when you use it in a powerfully lit room or outdoors. The screen reflects pretty much everything that is in front of it when the light is too powerful in the working environment. When it comes to the performance chapter, this notebook HP Compaq 6730s was not that keen on achieving good benchmark results.

In WorldBench 6 is got the score of 63 which is very low. Some tests were difficult to run and since there were some problems with Microsoft Office 2003, experts blame it on the Windows XP Professional operating system. When running Blender 3D to check the CPU performance, the task was completed in 1 minute and 45 seconds which is pretty ok compared to the price and components of the unit.

If you were planning on running any games on this unit there are some good news and some bad news. You cannot run any DirectX 10 games as the unit is not capable of handling such gaming pressure. You should be able to run some DirectX 9 games on the other hand, but don’t expect the best frame rates of gaming performance. Playing older games is not a problem. Overall, the unit offers poor performance which is ok considering the price tag is “poor” as well.