Laptops Arena

When it comes to Lenovo laptops, we think that the ThinkPads are some of the greatest laptops made by this manufacturer. A ThinkPad T500 notebook review will reveal some interesting aspects about this $1135 laptop. The ThinkPad T500 runs on a 2.53 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo P8700 processor and 2 GB of DDR3 RAM. The storage capacity of the hard disk is 160 GB and for the graphics card you can choose between the Intel Graphics Media Accelerator X4500 or the ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3650 with 256 MB of video memory.

The keyboard on the ThinkPad T500 is awesome as it feels pleasant to the touch and offers great response and positive feedback. There is a slight flex noticed in the keyboard are but there is nothing to be worried about. The TrackPoint is easier to use than the touchpad which is a bit too small for our taste. The 15.4 inch display has a native resolution of 1680 x 1050 pixels and it has a CCFL backlit display.

The colors are sharp and vibrating and they do not have that washed and faded aspect even you turn the display brightness all the way up to the maximum level. The levels of brightness are acceptable. There is a matte covering to the display and the horizontal viewing angles are above average. The speakers on the ThinkPad T500 are located right above the keyboard but the quality of the sound is not that great.

No ThinkPad T500 notebook review can be complete without referring to the selection of ports and features. The unit hosts a total of 3 USB ports, an Express Card slot, a display port, a VGA out, an Ethernet jack, a PCMCIA port, a FireWire port, a 4-in-1 media card reader and the regular headphones out and microphone in jacks. There is absolutely nothing to complain about the heat and noise chapter. The laptop manages to stay really quiet under mainstream usage. You will never hear the fans except for the cases when you work in a very quiet environment.

The laptop remains pretty cool to the touch even after a couple of hours of word processing.  The performance of the battery life is above the average of the 15 inch category. With the display brightness set at the medium level, and surfing the internet via a wireless connection plus doing some word processing, the 9 cell battery managed to keep the laptop up and running for 7 hours and 30 minutes. This is quite an amazing score for a 15 inch laptop.

The laptop does offer good balance between power and price as it is a good notebook for both personal and professional use. The battery life is amazing and no one ever expected to get such good performance out of a 15 inch laptop. The built in construction of the unit is very solid as there in no flex registered in almost any parts.  Ok, so there is no FireWire, no HDMI and no eSATA port; does that really bother you.





Samsung notebooks are not something we hear or read about every day. In fact, I am quite curious as to why they are not as promoted as Acer or Toshiba laptops. I’m not sure if the Samsung notebooks category has something new on the market but I can tell you that one of their coolest models is the Samsung R40. This model was released back in 2006 and it runs on a 1.66 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T2300E processor and 1 GB of RAM. The storage capacity of the hard drive is 80 GB and the graphics card is the ATI Mobility Radeon Xpress 200M with 128 MB of video memory.

The selection of ports and connections is very good for a 4 year old 15 inch laptop. The unit hosts 4 USB ports, a TV out, a VGA port, an Ethernet port, a modem port, a Kensington lock slot, a 6-in-1 memory card reader slot and the headphones and microphone jacks. Too bad there is no FireWire and no HDMI port. As for the display, the 15.4 inch widescreen on this Samsung notebook it goes with a maximum resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels.

The display is matte which is a nice touch compared to all the glossy displays we find on the market these days. The horizontal viewing angles are good which means that watching a movie when you friends some to visit is not a problem with the Samsung R40. The brightness of the display comes in 8 different levels.

The battery does not offer outstanding performance but it is in the category limits. The 6 cell battery can provide 3 hours at almost high settings. The unit comes with a preinstalled version of the Windows XP Professional operating system. There is also a lot of preinstalled software which a lot of laptop users call “bloatware” as it is completely useless to them. Examples of programs would be the Norton AntiVirus, the FirstWare Pro, Update Plus, AVS Viewer and Adobe Reader.

Check out www.samsung.com to see the prices on this configuration and you can also check out some other Samsung notebooks and make a comparison to see if there is a better model that suits both your needs and your wallet.  The design of the unit is quite simple and the combination of black and silver indicate that this is a business laptop. It has a lot of positive aspects as it is cool and quiet, it is capable of running on the Windows Vista operating system, it has a good and quite fast processor, a nice looking display, a high quality keyboard and a good overall built in quality.

There are also some disadvantages to this particular laptop model: it would have been nice to get a webcam with this unit, as well as an integrated Bluetooth. The battery life could have been better but I guess it is better than other 15.4 inch laptops. I guess you could say this makes a good cheap laptop (the specs and the release date allow me to assume that it is cheap).

When it comes to HP mini notebooks, the HP 311 has to be one of the best choices ever. I’m saying that because the standard unit comes at a price of $400 which makes this mini notebook a real bargain.

The HP Mini 311 is a 1.6 GHz Intel Atom N270 notebook with 1 GB of DDR3 RAM and a hard disk storage capacity of 160 GB.  The 11.6 inch display has a native resolution of 1366 x 768 pixels. To our surprise, the glossy screen does not render the same color quality that glossy displays normally do. In general, a glossy screen provides sharper and more vibrating colors but the color seem faded, washed away on the HP Mini 311.

The horizontal viewing angles are good. The built in speakers produce much better sound than speakers on other HP mini notebooks. The truth is we expected the sound to be very muffled since the speakers are located on the bottom of the front edge but the sound quality is good and even when you turn up the volume, there is no disturbing sound distortion.

The keyboard is a beauty as the keys are 92% of the original key size. The keys have good travel and even better response so it will never feel uncomfortable using this keyboard. The touchpad is very sensitive and pleasant to the touch. The annoying part about the touchpad is the left and right mouse buttons which are a bit too noisy whenever you click on them. The selection of ports and connections is ok for an 11 inch laptop as it features 3 USB ports, one VGA out, the Ethernet port, a security lock slot, a HDMI port, a 4-in-1 media card reader and the headphones plus microphone jacks.

Battery life is very important on a 3 lbs. unit which was designed to be highly portable. Since this type of mini laptop is often used in travels, there is good chance you will not always have a power outlet in handy so the battery performance of the HP Mini 311 has to be good. The standard battery that comes with this unit is a 6 cell which manages some pretty cool performance.

If you turn the display brightness to 70% and activate the wireless card, the HP Mini 311 will stay on for 6 hours and 20 minutes of continuous use. Some experts say that there are netbook which can last for up to 10 hours but the nVidia Ion graphics card on this unit is probably eating up a lot of battery life. In fact, it is surprising to see a good graphics card on an 11.6 inch laptop. The pot selection is also neat as the HDMI port is another pleasant surprise. The battery life is acceptable considering that it could almost get you through a day’s work. The processor could be considered weak if we compare it to the GPU but, on the other hand, Intel Atom processors are quite common on netbooks.

Reading an Asus notebook N80V review has revealed a very stylish, beautiful and powerful laptop. With a price of 640 pounds back in May 2009, this unit cannot be considered expensive. A quick look though the specs will determine if this laptop is worth the effort, or it’s just cheap notebook with nothing particularly special to offer.



First of all, the laptop is gorgeous. You cannot write an Asus notebook N80V review without saying a couple of words about the design. In my opinion, the looks are to die for. You will never be ashamed to take out this laptop in public as the bronze glossy chassis almost makes it seem like the laptop is made of wood. It has a 14.4 inch display with a native resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels which is ok considering the fact that this is a resolution commonly found on 15.4 inch laptops.

With 2.6 kg in weight, you can say it’s heavy, but not too uncomfortable to determine you to keep it inside the house forever. Besides, who is going to admire the unit if you don’t take it our “for a spin”? The unit runs on a 2.0 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T5800 processor which is combined with 4 GB of RAM. This means that our N80V can handle multi tasking at an excellent speed without having to wait too long for programs to launch and switching between tabs is not going to be a nightmare.

We did not expect to get a powerful graphics card on this unit. To our huge surprise, the notebook came with the nVidia GeForce 9300M GS graphics card which has 512 MB of video memory. It may not be able to handle ultimate game play, but games are not a mystery to this unit either. No super cool 3D games for you but you can play some good games at average frame rates nevertheless. 320 GB of free disk space are more than enough so you don’t have to worry about running out of laptop memory too soon.

Oh yes, the unit does come with goodies. You get a Blu-ray optical drive which means you can now watch DVD movies in HD on your 14.1 inch display. And another thing: this wonderful laptop also has a HDMI port. Not only can you watch HD movies on the 14.1 inch display, you can also attach a TV or a HD monitor and get an ever bigger kick out of this whole movie watching experience.

Here is another amazing thing: 5 USB ports on a 14 inch laptop?! Could this get any better? There is also a 1.3 mega pixel webcam if you ever want to have pleasant video calls with your friends via Skype, MSN or Yahoo! Messenger. I’m starting to wonder why I didn’t buy this laptop yet. It also comes with an integrated Bluetooth so file transfer between your laptop and your phone (and even between your laptop and another laptop) is now much easier and faster.

The HP Compaq 6735b notebook is a business model which is surprisingly cheap as we know that business laptops are somewhat expensive. The unit reviewed here is as cheap as $829 which will bring up certain question marks regarding the quality and performance of this business laptop. Let’s see if we can bust the myth. It’s true. This is a business laptop. Except for the fact that it’s more dedicated to the small business market segment. The HP line with the best business notebook is definitely the EliteBook.

The combination of black and gray seems to be quite appealing to the eye, making this notebook look really elegant. The keyboard is very pleasant to type on, providing the user with good tactile feedback and great key response. With 4 USB ports, one FireWire port, a VGA out, an Ethernet plus a modem jack, an Express Card slot, a docking station connector and the regular headphones out and microphone in jacks, I have to say that I miss a HDMI port which would have been a nice touch.

However, the HDMI port is not mandatory since this is not a multimedia laptop. The 15.4 inch display comes in a native resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels but you can go with the 1680 x 1050 pixels screen which is going to cost an extra $25. The HP Compaq 6735b notebook runs on a 2.0 GHz AMD Turion RM-70 processor and 2 GB of RAM which can be upgraded to a maximum 8 GB. The storage capacity of the hard drive is 120 GB, quite small for a business laptop if you ask me.

Companies should not be worried about having to delete files from their computer due to the lack of free disk space. The unit does come with a DVD burner so you can make back-up copies of your files and store them safely on DVDs. The graphics card is the ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3200 with 256 MB of video memory.

I’m not sure how important battery life is to a business notebook. I’m sure that most small companies buy these laptops so the office workers can use them but there are cases when firms buy laptops for their sales personnel, in which case, the battery life makes all the difference. The unit comes with a standard 6 cell battery that offers average battery life performance.

If you use the notebook to surf the internet continuously via a wireless connection (which means the wireless card is always enabled) the laptop will stay on for about 2 hours. Wireless connections eat up a lot of battery life so if you disable the wireless card and use the notebook for something as basic as word processing, you should get more than 3 hours of battery performance. In conclusion, this notebook is not a bad choice if you are running a small business as it makes a good working station for office usage. a lot of aspects can be improved, but you can never expect too much from a $800 notebook.