the Insignia NS-L42X-10A HDTVs

Insignia NS-L42X-10A

Not everyone has the need—or the budget—for the latest and greatest in television technology. Features such as LED backlighting, 240Hz refresh rates, and Web connectivity are all the rage right now, but as is usually the case with new tech, you’ll pay a premium for it. Enter the Insignia NS-L42X-10A, one in a series of four low-cost 1080p 120Hz HDTVs offered exclusively by Best Buy. Priced at $749.99, this 42-inch LCD model may not offer much in the way of features or aesthetics, and its picture quality is less than perfect, but if you’re looking for a cheap, no-frills flat-screen TV for, say, the basement, or a playroom, it’ll fit the bill.

Design and Appearance
The 42-inch panel is housed in a plain-looking black cabinet. The display is bordered by a relatively wide glossy black bezel on three sides, and an extra-wide lower bezel which curves upwards at the bottom. I’m not a fan of the design: it looks a bit flimsy and lacks the clean lines found on much-pricier models such as the LG 42SL80 and the Toshiba Regza 46SV670U. The matching stand is fairly stable and does a good job of supporting the 37-pound screen, and it swivels so you can position the display for optimal viewing. The two 12-watt speakers provide plenty of volume, and the SRS TruSurround feature does a fairly good job of simulating a multi-channel audio experience, but you’ll need a subwoofer if you want pumping bass, since you won’t find any here.

Recessed into the right side of the cabinet are buttons for powering up the set, changing channels, selecting an input source, raising and lowering the volume, and accessing the on-screen menu system. On the left are two of the five HDMI ports, VGA (PC) and S-Video inputs, a PC audio input, composite audio and video ports, and a headphone jack. Around back are three additional HDMI ports, two sets of component audio and video inputs, a digital (SPDIF) output, one set of analog stereo audio outputs, a secondary S-Video input, and a secondary set of composite A/V inputs. While it’s nice to have five HDMI ports, you won’t find a card reader, Ethernet, or USB ports—features which can be found on many of today’s midrange models such as the Sharp Aquos LC-40LE700UN and the Toshiba 46SV670U.

The 52-button remote is tapered in the middle and fits comfortably in your hand, but it’s a bit on the small side and the buttons feel slightly crowded. The four-way rocker is very responsive, however, making it easy to zip through the on-screen menus. The uncomplicated menu structure is broken into four basic submenus; Picture, Audio, Channels, and Settings. The Picture section is where you can tweak brightness, contrast, sharpness, color, and tint levels. In the Advanced video menu you can adjust backlighting and color temperature settings and enable/disable noise reduction and dynamic contrast ratio functionality. Here you can also choose one of three Digital Clear Motion levels (DCM), which uses 120Hz technology to help reduce motion blur, or you can disable the feature altogether. There’s also a switch that enables a light sensor, which adjusts the screen’s brightness according to the ambient lighting environment. I suggest leaving this feature off; in my tests, the luminance level, which changed often, was very distracting.

The Audio menu provides settings for bass, treble, balance, and SRS TruSurround as well as a dynamic volume setting that compensates for sudden changes in sound level during broadcasts. The Channels menu lets you hide channels and create a favorites list, and the Settings menu is where you can set up parental controls and assign a parental-control password.

Image Quality and Performance
After a darkroom calibration using the DisplayMate for Windows Multimedia Edition diagnostic software, the NS-L42X-10A turned in a contrast ratio of 3207:1, which is quite good for an HDTV that uses CCFL backlighting. It takes more than a high contrast ratio to deliver a high quality picture, though. Greens and blues were saturated, resulting in uneven skin tones and tinting in certain shades of gray. The high contrast ratio helped deliver deep blacks, but I noticed significant motion artifacts in the form of background noise while watching scenes from The Matrix in standard definition. There was a fair amount of image smearing as well. Not surprisingly, the panel was unable to pass the HD HQV Jaggies benchmark, which tests de-interlacing performance.

The set fared better with 1080p HD content. Mission: Impossible 2 on Blu-ray was sharp, but once again I observed subtle smearing and some judder, particularly during the opening rock climbing scene where the camera is continually panning. Enabling the DCM feature helped reduce the judder effect, but the resulting picture looked too sharp and overly noisy. In my tests, viewing angles were fine up to around 165 degrees off center; after that, colors began to fade.

The NS-L42X-10A draws an average of 220 watts, which means it’ll cost around $3.60 a month to run (based on five hours of daily use using the 2008 national average cost of $0.1135 per kWh). While not as energy efficient as some of the newer LED-backlit HDTVs like the 40-inch Sharp LC-40LE700UN, which draws only 120 watts, it’s far from a power hog. Whereas most HDTVs come with a one-year warranty, Insignia provides a two-year plan at no extra cost.

Overall, the big draw of the Insignia NS-L42X-10A is its rock-bottom $750 price. Even in these days of freefalling HDTV prices, it’s tough to find a 1080p 42-inch set for less, let alone one with a two-year warranty. It’s certainly not the sexiest-looking model you’ll find, and its performance is pretty much what you’d expect from a low-cost HDTV, but despite these shortcomings, its low price, two-year warranty, and plethora of HDMI ports help to redeem the NS-L42X-10A . That said, if you have a few extra bucks to spend, the 40-inch Sharp Aquos LC-40LE700UN offers better performance and a more robust feature set, and can be had for around $950 online.

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.