Notebook Computers

Only a few years ago, when Notebooks were a novelty, they were considered expensive toys. Anyone carrying a Notebook was assumed to be either a rich geek or a corporate biggie flaunting his status or making a style statement.

Today, ofcourse, the case is vastly different. And while Notebooks have become common, another genre has spawned: the lifestyle laptop. These combine top - of - the - line hardware with the most gorgeous-looking exteriors you could hope for. These are geared specially for those who enjoy showing off, like gamers and businessmen!

The deadly combination of looks and performance make these laptops objects of desire. They are something to be owned, and are not meant for those who just want a laptop for work.

Well, what constitutes a lifestyle Notebook? This is hugely influenced by the brand of the Notebookand also on its looks, design and build quality. And a designer name thrown in is the icing on the cake!

We categorised the laptops as ultra-portables and workhorses based on their screen size and weight. The ultra-portable category comprised laptops that had a diagonal screen size below 14 inches and weighed less than two kg-in other words, small form factor laptops.

How We Tested

Here's a description of the tests and benchmarks we used to compare the laptops.

Features

Features such as the size of the LCD, the number of 1/0 ports, hard disk size, type of optical disk drive, etc. were noted and rated. Extra features, if present, were also noted. Weightages were assigned to the noted features according to their importance.

Usability

The usability of a laptop is evaluated on the basis of how easy it is to handle in day-to-day life. Importance was given to weight and dimensions, as well as the ergonomics of the keyboard, touchpad, etc. We played music files to rate the speakers on a scale of five.

Package contents

Did the vendor provide an operating system, recovery CD and driver CDs with the laptop? We also looked at the extra software provided, as well as bundled accessories-power adapter, carry case, etc.

Performance

To gauge performance, we ran a battery of tests that evaluated each individual sub-system. We used all the following benchmarking suites:

PCMark 2004 v1.30 is a system-wide benchmark that tests the complete system as well as individual components such as the processor, memory, hard drive and graphics subsystem. It returns an aggregated score as well as individual scores by running applications used in daily work such as file encryption applications, virus scanning applications and so on.

SiSoft Sandra 2005 Professional SR2 is another system-wide benchmark suite. We used it to evaluate the performance of the CPU, memory and hard disk. The scores for the individual subsystems were noted.

Ziff Davis Business Winstone 2004 tests the system by performing a scripted run of applications that are used on a daily basis, such as MS Word, PowerPoint, Excel, etc., as well as applications such as Norton Antivirus and WinZip. The overall system performance is evaluated, and a unified score is returne at the end of the run. The higher this score, the better is the system's performance.

Some of the other tests we did were:

Video encoding: A 100 MB VOB file was encoded using Dr. DivX 1.0.6 to convert it to AVI, and the encoding time was noted. Gaming benchmarks: We wanted to test both OpenGL as well as Direct3D graphics capabilities. Call of Dutytests the OpenGL sub system. The game was run at 800 x 600 and at 1024 x 768, and the average fps was noted. FarCry was the new game we included.It is a highly scalable game and uses Direct3D API. The game was rUN at 640 x 480 and at 1024 x 768, and the average fps was noted.

LCD screen display tests: DisplayMate Video Edition was used to gauge the sharpness and level shift of the LCD screens. We also used the LCD Pixel Persistence test from the PassMark Monitor Test suite; here, white moving blocks were observed for the tearing effect, and the screens rated accordingly.

Digit Battery Meter: In order to stress the battery to the utmost, we ran a VOB file-a DVD rip-after recharging the battery to capacity until the battery ran out. The battery time reveals whether the notebook will last a full movie-pretty real world. During this test, the screensaver as well as the power management features were disabled. Also, the volume level was maximised, the brightness was left at half, and the Wi-Fi was turned off.

Wi-Fi Test: To evaluate thedata throughput over Wi-Fi, we used NetCPS-a utility that pumps data to check the TCP/IP connection and returns a score that reflects the throughput. We also copied 100 MB of assorted data and noted the time taken for the transfer.

Flaunt Value: Since this was a comparison test of 'lifestyle' laptops, we decided to include a new parameter-'Flaunt Value'. Since this is a completely subjective rating, we decided that a plebiscite was in order. We asked each voter to rate the laptops on a scale of 10 for design and looks, form factor, build quiality, features and specs, package contents and brand value. An average of the ratings for each parameter was calculated and the average of all parameters for a particular laptop was recorded as its Flaunt Value.