GeForce GTX 480 and GTX 470,W860CU-3D, multimedia notebooks from Clevo

GeForce GTX 480 and GTX 470, Nvidia-based graphics chip directly presenting their Fermi architecture in the form of GeForce GTX 480M.Upper-class chip, the Nvidia mentioned on his official blog, as the fastest notebook graphics chips in the world.As the available chip similar to a desktop PC platform, the chip supports many commonly available features including 3D Vision, PhysX, Cuda, two-way SLI, and supports DirectX 11.

To guard the chips stay cool to the size of a notebook, Fermi mobile version is only set at 425MHz speed. A total of 325 stream processors are set to operate at 850MHz, as for GDDR 5 memory used by running at 1200MHz frequency.Compare with the GeForce GTX 480 core version of its desktop that runs at 700MHz and memory speed of 1848MHz.

Currently no information on the consumption of power used. Although it seems notebooks with GeForce GTX 480M is not for users who need a notebook with a long active period, but the notebooks are certainly attractive to the user segment of the media editing and gaming.As quoted from Hexus, May 26, 2010, the first notebook manufacturer to take advantage of GeForce GTX 480M is a Clevo, the manufacturer from Taiwan notebook makers.

The Apple iMac 21.5-inch (Core 2 Duo) is perfect as an all in one PC

The Apple iMac 21.5-inch (Core 2 Duo)

The iMac 21.5-inch (Core 2 Duo) is a study in duality: It has the Apple design and mystique that looks and feels pricey, but the system is also a lot less expensive than the 27-inch version. Less expensive in Apple’s case means a starting price of $1,199, and while the competition is cheaper at similar screen sizes, those competitors have to compromise on features like less memory or downgrading to slower Intel Pentium Dual-Core processors. The “baby” iMac still manages to fit true 1080p HD screen resolution, a speedy 3.06GHz Core 2 Duo processor, and wireless everything into an attractive aluminum and glass all in one desktop. It’s the Mac desktop to get if you want to get multimedia work done, and as such earns our nod for Editors’ Choice.

Design
The “less expensive” Apple iMac is a bit smaller than its 27-inch big brother, but that also means that it seems more proportional to the included wireless keyboard and Magic Mouse. The compact wireless keyboard in particular looks like a toy when placed under the 27-inch iMac. The 21.5-inch iMac looks similar to its 20-inch predecessor, but the 16:9 screen makes it a little wider. This wider stance minimizes the “Jay Leno chin” of previous models, but there’s still a bunch of chassis visible below the screen. The back panel is now aluminum like the front (the old back was black polycarbonate plastic), and there are still Apple icons strategically placed to remind you of what you’ve bought.

Features
The system contains the same 3.06 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo E7600 processor found in the base 27-inch iMac. The system comes with 4GB of DDR3 SDRAM, 500GB hard drive, integrated Nvidia GeForce 9400M graphics, and a slot loading DVD burner. The memory, graphics, hard drive, and processor can all be upgraded when you order it from Apple, but the base configuration we look at here is pretty good on its own. The 21.5-inch model’s 1,920 by 1,080 (true 1080p) screen resolution is an improvement over the old 20-inch model’s 1,680 by 1,050 resolution that couldn’t quite show all the pixels in HD movies bought from iTunes. Unfortunately, none of the iMac models can be equipped with a Blu-ray player; you’re limited strictly to downloads and Web videos.

The system is essentially wireless, with the only tether that’s absolutely necessary being the power cord. The keyboard is wireless, the Magic Mouse is wireless, and the system has 802.11 a/b/g/n Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 2,1+EDR for everything else. You can of course hook up hard drives to the iMac’s four USB ports or single FireWire 800 port. I’d like to see an eSATA port on a future Mac, but for now FireWire 800 is fast enough. The iMac has a Mini DisplayPort output for extending the desktop or mirroring, but you’ll need to upgrade to the 27-inch model if you want Mini DisplayPort input. You’ll need an adapter to connect the iMac to anything but Apple’s 24-inch LED Cinema Display. One other nit is the new SD card reader: it only accepts SD cards. Single-slot media card readers on Windows systems will usually accept SD, Memory Stick, and xD cards with or without an adapter. Good thing the majority of digital cameras these days use SD.

Like other Macs, the iMac comes with Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard), iLife ’09, and a few other programs like Photo Booth and Front Row. Apple should be applauded for limiting the software to useful programs and avoiding all the bloatware and trial software that seems to infest some Windows PCs. You can run Windows XP, Vista, or Windows 7 on the iMac in Boot Camp, but of course, you’ll have to buy Microsoft’s OS separately. Windows 7 isn’t officially supported at this time, but we were able to install Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit without any trouble.

Performance

The 21.5-inch iMac is a power miser: it uses only 70W while idling with the screen on, and 91W while under load on our CineBench R10 test. This is very good, considering its 27-inch big brother idled at 120W and ran at 150W, and matches the energy use of the Lenovo A600 (3011-4BU). It’s a little more than leading energy-saving SFF desktops like the Lenovo ThinkCentre M58p ECO (40W idle, 76W load), but then again the iMacs and A600 have built in screens using power.. This is in addition to Apple’s recycling programs, EPEAT Gold certification, Energy Star 5.0 certification, RoHS compliance, and reduction in packaging. All this earns the iMac our Green Tech Approved award.

The iMac is a better performer on the benchmark tests than its predecessor the iMac (Nvidia GeForce 9400M), thanks to a faster processor. It completed the PhotoShop CS4 test in just under two minutes (1:58), while the older iMac took 2:23. The new iMac was a good performer in Windows 7 as well: it took a sprightly 49 seconds for the Windows Media Encoder test and 1:32 for CS4. In fact the iMac’s CS4 score was better than the quad-core powered Gateway One ZX6810-01 (1:39), a notable achievement. I could certainly see artists on deadline switching their iMacs from the Mac OS to Windows in order to save a few minutes here and there to meet a deadline. The iMac’s 3D performance wasn’t groundbreaking, but it was at least able to complete our 3DMark Vantage and 3D game tests at 1,280 by 1,024 resolution. That said, the iMac’s performance at Crysis (10 frames per second) and World in Conflict (12 fps) were essentially unplayable. Older games should work fine on the integrated Nvidia GeForce 9400M graphics, but if 3D games are important to you then consider one of the upgraded iMacs with ATI Radeon HD 4670 discrete graphics.

Compared with rivals, the Apple iMac 21.5-inch comes across as a bang for the buck win. It’s cheaper than the Gateway One ZX6810-01, yet performs similarly in day-to-day and multimedia performance. It’s certainly faster overall than other all-in one desktops like the Averatec D1200, HP TouchSmart 600-1055, and Lenovo IdeaCentre A600 (3011-4BU). The iMac 21.5-inch doesn’t have the HDMI-in capability of the HP TouchSmart, nor does it have Blu-ray capability, but that’s not a deal breaker at the sub $1,200 price point. The TouchSmart 600-1055 is really in a higher price category at $1,599 list. Plus the iMac certainly isn’t encumbered by the bloatware that all these Windows PCs have.

At $1,199, the Apple iMac fits neatly in the mid-price slot between the two other Editors’ Choice all-in-one desktops: the $1,599 HP TouchSmart 600-1055 and the $549 Lenovo C300 (3012-2DU). The HP TouchSmart 600 is more HDTV-consumption oriented, and the Lenovo C300 is an inexpensive nettop better suited to viewing Web sites, photos, and videos rather than actually doing multimedia projects. The Apple iMac 21.5-inch (Core 2 Duo) is perfect as an all in one PC for those that want to get some work done, whether for business or pleasure. If you want a $1,200 system with a decent screen resolution that also has multimedia processing power to spare, get the iMac 21.5-inch.

The VAIO VPC-L117FX/B looks like it could be a Sony Bravia HDTV

Sony VAIO VPC L117FX B

Among the all in one all-in-one desktop PC, the Sony VAIO VPC-L117FX/B ($2,000 list) is certainly one of the best looking. It has the look of a 24-inch HDTV, an intentional design choice. Inside that sexy shell is the heart of a power user’s PC: quad-core Intel processor, 6GB of memory, 1TB hard drive, Blu-ray burner, and a decent Nvidia graphics card. Placement in the kitchen, den, home office, and living room come to mind, but like its Sony VAIO all in one predecessors, it will even work in the most design critical room in the house: the bedroom.

Design
The VAIO VPC-L117FX/B looks like it could be a Sony Bravia HDTV. That is one of its greatest strengths, since it can blend in anywhere a smaller (20- to 36-inch) HDTV fits. It can even replace a TV in the bedroom, since it has a built-in Blu-ray drive, ATSC tuner, and HDMI-in ports. Viewing Blu-ray videos on the VAIO give you that “view through a window” effect that makes it seem like the action is happening on the other side of the display glass. We tested the system with films made before (Coming to America, The Warriors) and after the advent of CGI (Star Trek, Mission Impossible II). All of the films looked great. The picture is vivid, accurate, and noise-free. The HDMI-in port lets you connect a game system like a Sony Playstation 3 or a set-top box like the one from you cable TV company. The built-in tuner grabs over the air HDTV signals and displays them in Windows 7’s built-in Media Center interface. There’s a slot built into the base of the unit, so you can stow the wireless keyboard out of the way when you’re not using it, and the keyboard and mouse can easily reach a bed or couch 10 to 15 feet away. The system is wall mountable with a kit you can buy separately.

The all-in-one comes with five USB ports, a FireWire/i.Link port, and that 24-inch 1,920 by 1,080 resolution screen (which is true 1080p HD). This is truly a power-users’ system, and it better be one for $2,000. The system also comes with 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi and an IR remote control so you can work almost completely wireless.

Features
The system’s touchscreen is responsive, though it takes a few seconds for your finger to learn exactly where to point to get the screen to recognize your commands. The HP TouchSmart systems are a little more forgiving with finger placement, but both the Sony and HP all in one PC’s screens are multi-touch enabled and can use standard Windows 7 touch command functions like swipe, flick, pinch, and rotate. The system’s quad-core processor makes the Sony VPC-L117FX/B just a little more responsive than the TouchSmart 600, but you’re unlikely to notice the difference unless you have the two side by side. Aside from the usual Windows 7 apps, the VAIO VPC-L117FX/B comes with VAIO Media Gallery, a unified multimedia viewing interface that lets you quickly view all your music, photos, and videos on a variety of formats, including neat calendar-organized formats. This serves a range of users from the “messy but organized” types to the obsessive compulsives that have to have their photos organized by time stamps. Media Gallery allows you to group photos arbitrarily or via searchable criteria; then you can create a quick slideshow with a couple of touches, then export to VAIO Movie Story. VAIO Movie Story is a quick way to create well, if not edited, then concatenated home movie made of your pictures, clips from your digital camera, and clips from your cell phone. Movie Story can either use music you choose, or it will check the videos with an algorithm and automatically suggest or add music. You can then burn the resulting movie to DVD or Blu-ray disc, save the file in a variety of media formats (including MPEG-2, MP4, etc.), or export your file to a Sony Media device like a PSP or a Mylo. I’d like to see an integrated export to iTunes/iPod or better yet an export to Facebook or Youtube, but you could of course do that manually after you create a file.

The VAIO VPC-L117FX/B comes with Google’s Chrome as its default browser, but like all Windows 7 PCs, it also comes with Internet Explorer 8. I found that touch navigation works better in IE8, since I couldn’t scroll slowly in Chrome—it only recognized flick commands like page forward/back and page up/down. Scrolling up and down in IE8 using finger gestures was smooth and worked as expected. I’m sure Google will improve the interface over time, but for now IE8 is the better touch-enabled browser on the VAIO.

Aside from the useful software above, there’s very little in the way of bloatware on the VAIO VPC-L117FX/B. There’s a copy of Microsoft Works, which is useful. Then there’s an installer for a 60-day trial of Microsoft Office, which is the right way to both satisfy Microsoft’s agreements with Sony, and to avoid the dreaded “pre-installed Office” syndrome. Likewise, there’s a link to Quicken’s Website for offers on QuickBooks and Quicken, but you have to download and install them. Believe me, this is a good thing. You don’t have to install Office or Quickbooks unless you want to, so there’s nothing to clean up and therefore no stray .DLL files or leftover detritus to muck up your hard drive. If there’s any drawback to the Sony VAIO Media software, it’s that it’s not as modular as HP’s TouchSmart interface, with its widgets and iPod Touch-style apps. On the other hand, VAIO Media Gallery and Movie Story are some of the most intuitive and easiest to use pack-in multimedia apps outside of Apple’s iLife (iMovie, iDVD, etc.).

Performance
The VAIO VPC-L117FX/B’s performance is very good, thanks to its Intel Core 2 Quad 8400S processor and Nvidia GeForce GT 240M graphics, though it’s tied for the class leader in only one of our standard benchmark tests. The VAIO is speedy at the PhotoShop CS4 test with a class-leading 1 minute 39 seconds, tied with the Gateway One ZX6810-01. It’s also only one second behind the Gateway FX6810-01 at the Windows Media Encoder test (43 seconds), which makes the VAIO VPC-L117FX/B an excellent choice for the multimedia enthusiast. It’s other scores are competitive in the field of multimedia all in one desktops, including the dual-core powered Apple iMac 27-inch (Core 2 Duo), Lenovo IdeaCentre A600 (3011-4BU), and the Editor’s Choice HP TouchSmart 600-1055 PC. The VAIO VPC-L117FX/B can be used for light gaming: it played World in Conflict at a smooth 39 frames per second (fps), but is a little too slow playing Crysis at our standard settings (30fps). If you push the quality levels and/or resolution down you can likely get a playable frame rate in Crysis. The GPU does help with programs like Microsoft’s Virtual Earth and HD video playback from the web.

As a high-end all-in-one desktop PC, the Sony VAIO VPC-L117FX/B is a little pricey at about $2,000, but you can just about rationalize the added expense if you consider the system has one of the best quality screens in the business, Blu-ray burner (as opposed to just a player for the Lenovo A600 and HP TouchSmart 600), and its looks more like an HDTV than a PC, unlike the iMac, Gateway One, Lenovo IdeaCentre, and HP TouchSmart. That said, these other four are a lot less expensive, especially in the case of the Gateway One and Lenovo A600 (both $1,399 list). The Gateway One is the performance leader overall, with a speedy Solid State Drive (SSD) helping its quad-core processor take five wins out of the seven benchmark tests. However, the Editor’s Choice winning HP TouchSmart 600-1055 has the most polished implementation of touch technology in Windows 7, along with the best bang for the buck ($1,599 list) out of all the multimedia all in ones. The Sony VAIO VPC-L117FX/B is a “better quality” choice if you’re willing to spend the bucks, but you’d have to be a individual who’s really hard to please to justify an almost $500 price premium.

Fujitsu LifeBook P3010 at 2010

Fujitsu P3010

As of this moment, I don’t have enough fingers to count the amount of oversized netbooks that are being sold in retail. Oversized netbooks typically have 11 to 12-inch widescreens and have parts with names like Nvidia’s ION, AMD’s Neo, VIA’s Nano, and the most popular of which, Intel’s Atom. Fairly late to the game is Fujitsu’s LifeBook P3010, an 11-inch, oversized netbook that runs on AMD parts, which have an edge in speed over the Intel Atom but trails it in battery life. Even if Fujitsu were to knock down the price from $549, it would still be just an okay netbook.Design  I’m usually a sucker for vibrant colors. The P3010’s shiny red plastics, though plain in design, still grabs a hold of your attention immediately and beats the drab, neutral hues found on the Lenovo IdeaPad S12, Samsung NC20 (21GBK), and MSI U210 (008US). Over on the corner of the lid is Fujitsu’s signature infinity logo, which is always a nice finishing touch. It’s a heavy netbook, though, as its 3.5-pound frame outweighs many of its netbook peers, including the Asus EeePC 1101HA (3 lbs), HP Mini 311 (3.3 lbs), and MSI U210 (3 lbs). Only the HP Pavilion dv2-1030us is heavier, tipping the scales at 3.8 pounds.

As with any oversized netbook, the sweet spot is the extra screen real estate. The P3010 has an 11.6-inch widescreen, which not only gives you more to look at than the typical 10-inch ones, but the resolution is higher as well. Case in point: Ten-inch netbooks like the Toshiba mini NB205 and HP Mini 5101 default to 1,024-by-600 resolutions; the P3010, like all oversized netbooks, has a 1,366-by-768 one, or WXGA. Oversized netbooks like the Lenovo S12, Samsung NC20, and MSI U210 have bigger 12-inch widescreens, which you might consider if you want to push this boundary.
Features Another thing that the P3010 can afford to do with a bigger screen (hence, wider dimensions) is put in a full size keyboard. Its keyboard size is comparable to the ones found in the Lenovo S12, Samsung NC20, and MSI U210. In contrast, others in its size class, namely the HP Mini 311, ASUS 1101HA, and HP dv2, top out at 92% of full size. The touchpad seemed agonizingly small at first, but wrapping the chrome mouse buttons around the front bezel, thereby widening the pinch between the thumb and index fingers (used to navigate), made it tolerable. Nevertheless, Fujitsu needs to find a way to increase the size of the touchpad.

The P3010’s other features are average at best. Its most glaring omission is an HDMI port, given that the HP dv2 and MSI U210—netbooks that run on similar AMD parts—are including it. The three USB ports can be found in smaller 10-inch netbooks and 802.11g Wi-Fi seems average, too, when others are bundling 802.11n. Fujitsu is including a 320GB hard drive, though, which gives you more storage than MSI U210’s 250GB drive. Aside from that, it has Bluetooth, a 4-in-1 media card reader, Webcam, an Ethernet and a VGA port.

Performance
To date, I’ve looked at about four netbooks that run on the 1.6GHz AMD Athlon Neo MV-40—a single-core processor and one of AMD’s answers to the Intel Atom. A dual-core Neo is already shipping, but hasn’t shown up in many netbooks. The advantage of using an AMD Neo is that there isn’t a RAM restriction (Intel Atom-based netbooks can only ship with 1GB of RAM, but can be manually upgraded to two), so the P3010 ships with 2GB of DDR2 memory. In terms of raw speed, the Neo is a faster processor than the Atom; its score on our video encoding tests bears this out: The P3010’s 3-minute 56-second score convincingly beat out the Lenovo S12 (4:40), Samsung NC20 (5:30), and ASUS 1101HA (5:32). It has a minor graphics advantage, too, as the ATI Radeon 3200 chipset (with the Neo processor and 2GB of memory) handled high-definition clips (1080p and 720p) reasonably well; at least better than with Intel’s integrated graphics.

As a result of using AMD chips, the P3010 had to sacrifice battery life. As with the MSI U210 (4:13) and the HP dv2 (3:08), the P3010’s 3 hours 25 minutes score on MobileMark 2007 is sufficient enough for a half-day’s work, but falls well short of the 5- to 7-hour scores amassed by the Lenovo S12 (5:19), ASUS 1101HA (6:50), and HP Mini 311 (5:29). Against a smaller netbook like the Toshiba NB205 (8:27), the P3010 gets less than half its battery life.

It’s hard enough to compete as a latecomer, but when you’re priced more than similar netbooks (i.e, the MSI U210 runs for $430), it makes the Fujitsu LifeBook P3010 difficult to recommend. The P3010 does have very good qualities for a netbook, such as speed, ability to playback HD video, and a full size typing experience, but its battery score and price can’t compete with its peers. Consider the MSI U210 and the Lenovo IdeaPad S12 instead.

The Alienware M15x (Core i7) is essentially the smaller version of the M17x

Alienware is at the top of its game, as its otherworldly creations have few equals when it comes to gaming laptops. The Alienware M15x (Core i7) is essentially the smaller version of the M17x, which, covered in heavy metals, dominated opponents in both looks and performance. Though smaller, the M15x is actually the more powerful of the two, thanks to the fastest mobile processor on earth. The Intel Core i7 920XM, along with a midrange Nvidia GeForce GTX 260M graphics card, continues Alienware’s tradition of dominating opponents. For its price and a great deal of heft, however, I would much rather wait for the M17x to get the same Core i7 treatment.

Design
The M15x opted to use magnesium metals instead of the aluminum ones found in the M17x. Magnesium is rugged and used often in corporate laptops, so it’s not like Alienware is skimping in the toughness area. The metals, as well as the frame itself, are thicker so that they can accommodate all the cooling fans and hardcore gaming parts. It’s built like an all-terrain vehicle, with a front bezel that looks like the grill of a muscle car or something Batman could be proud of. In terms of shape, the M15x’s front side slopes downward at 45 degrees. Likewise, the back of the unit has a reverse slope, giving the entire frame a weird rhomboid look. Other gaming laptops like the Toshiba Qosmio X505-Q850 and Falcon Northwest Fragbook DRX are boxy-looking and resort to plastics and fancy paint jobs, which don’t have the same luxurious appeal.

The M15x does have one drawback, though: Its 9.2 pound frame is very heavy for a 15.6-inch laptop and weighs as much as the Acer Aspire AS8940-6865 (9.1 lbs) and Asus G71G-Q1 (9.1 lbs)—17- to 18-inch media centers.

The 15.6-inch widescreen suffers from the same glare issues as the one on the M17x; a black desktop wall paper and the black area bordering the screen didn’t help either, magnifying the glare coming from the edge-to-edge glass panel. While the intense brightness levels and an awe-inspiring 1,920-by-1,080 resolution are top-notched, the screen itself is essentially a mirror. Changing the black Alienware background and minimizing surrounding light sources should help reduce glare.

Features
Included with your purchase is a built-in light show. Alienware implanted every vent, button, and key with LEDs. It even went as far as illuminating the power button, the feather touch keys, and the signature Alien head logo. Through Alienware’s FX software, each of these areas can be customized with up to 20 different colors. The keyboard itself is separated into three quadrants (because of an adjacent numeric keypad, the M17x has 4 quadrants), each of which can be infused with a different color. The full size keyboard is well made and very responsive during game play. Though most gamers will probably attach an external mouse anyway, the slightly textured touchpad is great for everything else besides gaming. The mouse buttons make faint clicking sounds, but aren’t overly resistant, like those found in the Acer AS8940.

Because it’s a smaller system, the M15x doesn’t have as many ports as the M17x. It has a total of 3 USB ports (one of which is an E-SATA combo port) compared with the M17x’s five. And the M15x settles on DisplayPort only, instead of including that and HDMI-Out, as with the M17x. It’s a single hard drive configuration, which can be swapped with numerous spinning and non-spinning options (my configuration runs on a 500GB, 7200rpm drive). It doesn’t have an internal TV tuner like the Fragbook DRX, but there is an ExpressCard TV tuner option available ($76). The slot-load optical drive is a Blu-ray burner, but you’re better off with the cheaper BD-ROM (which takes $150 off the final configuration price) or dual layer DVD burner (which takes $300 off the final configuration price).

The aluminum metals also serve as one giant heat sink, because the amount of heat generated by the processor and graphics card demands as much cooling as possible. For this, numerous fans, which can be heard at all times, and vents, are necessary to cool this beast. For the time being, the M15x is the only Alienware laptop available with Intel’s latest Core i7 processors (the M17x should be getting it shortly). The 2GHz 920XM CPU is the Extreme Core i7 version and currently ranks as the fastest mobile processor available. Even though the moniker “Extreme” means that it’s sanctioned for over-clocking, the M15x doesn’t officially support it in the BIOS yet (third-party tools, for the time being, can be used to over-clock the processor, according to Alienware). It’s faster than the Core i7 processors found in the X505-Q850, HP Envy 15, and Acer AS8940. Ignore the Gigahertz rating for a minute, and realize that this processor bears 4 cores (8 threads) and is based on an entirely different ecosystem.

The next step up would be the Fragbook’s Intel Core i7 options—desktop processors, mind you. Unfortunately, it’s also the most expensive part, costing $900 of the Fragbook’s $3,224 configured price. You can easily downgrade to a less expensive Core i7 processor and achieve similar frame rates, though.

Performance
As most gamers will tell you, the key to 3D prowess is not in the processor, but in the graphics card. Though it’s not nVidia’s top of the line card, the GeForce GTX 260M performed well enough to beat all of its peers during low resolution game play. The impressive frame rates in games like Crysis and World in Conflict were driven by the combination of the processor and graphics card. At native resolutions (1,920-by-1,080), the M15x wasn’t as dominant as the M17x and the Fragbook DRX came out on top in 3DMark 06 tests. The M15x is only available with a single GPU, whereas the M17x has up to three: Nvidia’s SLI technology and the integrated Nvidia GeForce 9400M chipset, which you can switch to when you’re not running 3D-intensive task.

Until a gaming laptop uses the same processor, the M15x simply has no equals in terms of raw speed. It demolished the M17x in PCMark Vantage tests and dominated other Core i7 laptops like the Toshiba X505-Q850 and Acer AS8940 in video encoding and Photshop CS4 tests. It racked up a Cinebench R10 score of 14,857, second only to the Fragbook’s 19,314 score (remember, the Fragbook runs on a desktop processor).

The M15x has another interesting feature called “Stealth” mode, which, when activated (by pressing the media button that looks like a speedometer), pares down the processor’s and graphics card’s clock speeds, thereby reducing power consumption. This mode is especially handy when extending battery life, as MobileMark 2007 tests were able to surpass the 2 hour mark (2:11) with this mode enabled. Otherwise, the 85WH battery would’ve fared a lot worse, based on how the Acer AS8940 (1:11) and the X505-Q850 (1:30) did on the same test.

Alienware laptops command a huge premium because they spare no expense with parts and allow their imaginations run wild with their otherworldly designs. Hands down, the Alienware M15x (Core i7) is the best-looking gaming design out there, while parts, depending on your budget, can be chosen from an endless list—one that includes the fastest processor available: The Intel Core i7 920XM. It’s a heavy laptop and lacks some of key features found in the M17x, though. If you’re looking to save some money on an Alienware brand, the M15x is a great pick. Otherwise, wait for Intel’s Core i7 to arrive on the M17x.