A Notebook for Every Budget

Remember the time when PCs cost a bomb and were worshipped like God? They were kept in a separate air-conditioned room, and you had to remove your shoes before entering it. Of course, you needed special permission to use the computer. And then prices nosedived and PCs became a common commodity. Today, the same seems to be happening with notebooks.

Once considered an elite product, notebooks are increasingly becoming a mass-market product. Most companies in the West provide notebooks to their employees so that they can work from anywhere. Though India might take a while to reach there (some compaies move), we’re already seeing a flood of notebooks in the market.

	IBM ThinkPad T30
	PowerBook G4
	Toshiba TE2000
	Connoi NB4014
	Fujitsu LifeBook P Series
	Moon Nutech
	SES Technologies BTO Notebook
	Apple iBook
	Sunu Azure PIII
	Dell M50 Mobile Workstation
	Notebooks at a Glance
	Notebook Test Results
	Companions for your Notebook With miniature notebook accessories becoming popular, it’s time to sit up and take stock

After a preliminary study of the notebooks market this time, we found that they can be classified into four categories. There are the budget notebooks, also known as the all-in-one value types. These cost between Rs 70,000 to a lakh. Then there are the regular mainstream notebooks and desktop replacements. Mainstream are commonly available notebooks, which most vendors have. Desktop replacements are high-end performance workhorses, which eliminate the need for even a professional desktop workstation. Finally, there are the extremely small and lightweight ultra-portables. What makes it even more interesting here is that there’s no fine line between these categories as far as configuration goes. You’ll find an Intel P4-based notebook with 256 MB RAM costing below a lakh, and you’ll find a PIII-based one costing more. With so much variety, the million-dollar question is which notebook to choose?

To answer that, we took a cross section of all types of notebooks. So in the pages to follow, you’ll find reviews of what you can expect to find in the market. One interesting thing we noted was the arrival of the so called ‘assembled’ notebooks. So after the classic debate between assembled vs branded PCs, maybe it’s now time to have the same on notebooks. Some of you might also be familiar with BTO (built-to-order) notebooks. This is an Intel program, where a barebones notebook is given to OEMs, who then place a processor, RAM, and hard drive of their choice in it. The vendor can then sell the notebook under his own brand name and provide warranty and services for the same.

Apart from the increasing popularity of notebooks, we’re also seeing a large number of external accessories and companions for them which are discussed towards the end of this story.

Anil Chopra

Our Notebook Tests

As we got a cross section of all types of notebooks in the market, we decided to run the following basic benchmarks on them 

Battery life: As the name suggests, here we tested how long a notebook can last on its batteries. For this we used the BatteryMark benchmark. Once completely discharged, we also measured the time it took to fully recharge.

Productivity apps: These are the standard applications that most users run on their machines–office suite, Web browser, etc. We used Business Winstone 2001 to judge this.

High-end apps: Some of you might need to run high-end applications like Adobe Premiere. We ran the Content Creation 2001 benchmark for this.

3D graphics and gaming: We used Quake III Arena game demos, which give the result in fps (frame per second). A higher fps indicates better

performance.

10 Notebooks Reviewed

IBM ThinkPad T30



This notebook is from the latest range of Thinkpads from IBM, the T30. This

particular notebook was one of the most feature-rich and best performing

PC-based notebook tested this time. It has a powerful configuration with a P4

1.8 GHz processor, together with 256 MB of RAM. It also has a huge 40 GB hard

disk and finally what really adds punch is an 



ATI Mobility Radeon 7500 with 16 MB VRAM. 

The notebook provides both a stick and touch pad for controlling the mouse

pointer, so you can use the one that feels most comfortable to you. Also, apart

from the regular built-in network card and modem, it has a built-in Intel High

Rate Wireless adapter. What’s more, the wireless antennas are located on the

edges of its LCD panel, which is far more convenient than protruding probes. It

also has an IR port, S-Video out, and a connector for an external display. 

Battery backup time for this notebook was 2 hours 32 mins, which is quite

good. And recharging them took 2 hours 22 mins, which is again good. However,

performance is where this notebook really shines. With scores of 35 and 47 in

Business and Content Creation Winstone 2001, you’ll never miss being away from

a desktop system. What’s more in Quake III Arena it managed to get 133.5 fps,

thanks to the onboard graphics. 

The Bottom Line. As oft repeated, performance and features come for a price. And this notebook is priced around Rs 2.5 lakh. But considering its superb combination of features and performance, the money is well spent.

PowerBook G4

One look at its sleek titanium exterior and you’ll be swept off your feet. The PowerBook G4 is only 2.6 cms thick and weighs just 2.45 kg. It has a massive 15.2” widescreen format display, which supports resolutions of up to 1280x854, giving you more desktop space. The heart of the PowerBook is the latest 800 MHz G4 processor, which has 1MB of L3 for really fast performance. This together with 512 MB of RAM should mean that it will blaze through any type of application you run on it.

This notebook even has a slot-loading DVD-ROM/CDRW combo drive SNAPSHOT POWERBOOK G4 Price: Rs 236,700 Pros: Excellent configuration, jam packed with features, awesome looks Cons: None

Graphics are handled by an ATI Mobilty Radeon 7500 with 32 MB of DDR VRAM, which has one the fastest and feature rich graphics engines available for notebook systems. The icing on the cake is a slot-loading DVD-ROM/CDRW combo drive, which you can use to instantly burn your audio, video, or data files or watch the latest DVD release. 

The PowerBook also has the widest range of video output options, which include DVI, VGA, S-Video and a composite out. On the communication front, it has a built in modem, a Gigabit Ethernet port and a built-in AirPort card for wireless connectivity. 

Being a completely different platform, we couldn’t run the same benchmarks as we ran on the PC based notebooks. So, for testing the battery life of this notebook, we ran Macbench 5.0 to keep the notebook loaded until its batteries drained out completely. It lasted for a good 2 hours 37 mins. Recharging the notebook took just 2 hours, which is quite fast. Another good thing about the PowerBook G4 is the huge list of bundled software, which includes things like iMovie 2, iTunes 2, iPhoto and much more. 

The Bottom Line. Given the number of features and stunning looks, it’s a great buy for Mac lovers, and of course those who want an alternative for their PC. 

Toshiba TE2000

Its battery backup is exceptional, running for a full 3 hours 3 mins SNAPSHOT TOSHIBA TE2000 Price: Rs131,999 Pros: Great features, warranty, excellent performance in most areas Cons: Gaming performance

The TE2000 from Toshiba is another feature rich notebook, with great performance. The notebook runs on a PIII 1GHz processor together with 256 MB of RAM out of which 16 MB is shared with the display by default. It also has a large 30GB hard disk, a DVD drive and a Trident CyberBlade XP display adapter. Apart from the regular Ethernet port and modem found in all notebooks, this one also offers an IR port, a Video out port and a connector for an external display such as a monitor.

The battery backup was exceptional. It ran for a full 3 hours and 3 mins. Recharging though took a full 2 hours 34 minutes, which was slightly longer than what others took. Its score in running productivity applications, namely the Business Winstone 2001 benchmark was pretty good at 30.3. But in running high-end applications, it did very well with a score of 45.9 in Content Creation Winstone 2001. 3D performance was a little disappointing with a frame rate of only 23.1 fps in Quake III Arena.

The Bottom Line. The notebook is a good all round performer in battery backup, and in running productivity and high-end applications. Plus, a warranty of 3 years makes it lucrative option. At a price of

Rs 131,999 this is a very good buy.

Connoi NB4014

This notebook from Connoi is based on a P4 1.5 GHz with 128 MB RAM, a 20 GB hard disk, and a GeForce2 Go with 16VRAM and a DVD-drive, which all adds up to a pretty mean set of features. For office connectivity you have the option of using the built-in modem or Ethernet port.

Performance in business and high-end applications using Business and Content Creation Winstone 2001 was also very good with scores of 32.4 and 37.7 respectively. So you should have no problem running things like office and graphics apps, presentations. The notebook gave us a backup time of 2 hours 22 minutes, which is average, and a quick recharging time of 2 hours 14 minutes. It gave a frame rate of 61.5 fps in Quake II Arena, which indicates good 3D performance. So, when it comes to any kind of performance be it office apps, high-end apps or even gaming, this notebook won’t let you down.

The Bottom Line. At a price of Rs 110, 250, this is a very good choice for any notebook user looking for a feature rich notebook, which performs well and is not heavy on the pocket either.

Fujitsu LifeBook P Series 

You can use either the built-in modem or Ethernet port for office connectivity SNAPSHOT FUJITSU LIFEBOOK P SERIES Price: Rs 100,000 Pros: Compact size, Light Cons: None

This is one of the smallest and lightest notebooks we’ve seen so far, weighing less than a kilogram. Its shiny silver body also makes it one of the most attractive notebooks out there. The LifeBook as it is called, is an ultraportable notebook, about half the size of a normal notebook, having an 8.9-inch wide TFT screen. It runs on a 700 MHz Transmeta Crusoe processor, also the first we have seen. This processor is supposed to consume much lesser power than other notebook processors, thus extending notebook life. It has 112 MB RAM, and 4 MB with the ATI Rage Mobility display card. A 20 GB hard disk completes the storage requirement. Connectivity is also not a problem with an inbuilt modem, network card, and a PCMCIA slot. It also has 2 USB ports and a connector for an external display, which comes in handy for connecting to LCD projectors and monitors during presentations. However, due to its tiny size it misses out on an optical and floppy drive. These are available as USB options, but of course at an extra cost. Some other neat features include a small LCD panel at the bottom of its display to indicate the status of its various functions like battery and hard drive activity. Plus, there’s a separate button for launching your mail client and downloading your mail. 

Being based on a Crusoe and having a smaller screen size it was not surprising that this notebook gave us the longest back up time of 3 hours 7 mins. Recharging the battery was also quick taking only 1 hour and 54 mins. Unfortunately the notebook could not run Business Winstone as it did not have the required amount of RAM needed by the benchmark. However, we did work on it for quite a while and all applications ran pretty smoothly. The only thing is that you will need some time to get used to its smaller keyboard. The notebook is good for running regular productivity applications like word processing, Internet surfing, watching movies, etc. 

The Bottom Line. All said, at a price of one lakh, this ultraportable is a very attractive option for people who are always on the move and don’t like to lug around heavy notebooks.

Moon Nutech

A feature-rich notebook with a large 15” display SNAPSHOT MOON NUTECH Price: Rs 100,000 Pros: Good features, excellent performance, Attractive price Cons: Heavy

This notebook from Moon Computers is based on a PIII 1GHz, and came with 380 MB of RAM. It also had a large 30 GB hard drive and an S3 Twister graphics adapter with 16 MB VRAM. It had a 15” TFT display, one of the largest screen among all notebooks reviewed this time. This together with the DVD drive should be great for enjoying movies. Connectivity is also taken care of by an inbuilt network card and modem. One unique feature of this notebook was that it had a FireWire port.

Battery performance was also pretty good, with the notebook lasting for 2 hours 39 mins, and taking 2 hours 16 mins to recharge. In performance, the notebook gave the highest scores in both Business and Content Creation Winstone 2001 at 35.6 and 48.2 respectively. These are used for testing a notebook’s capabilities in running productivity and high-end applications. This could be due to its large amount of RAM. Its speaker quality was also one of the best offering a frequency response from 50 Hz to 18500 Hz. Where it didn’t score was 3D and gaming performance, giving a mere 22.9 fps in Quake III Arena.

The Bottom Line. At a price tag of just 1 lakh, this notebook is a great option for people looking for a notebook that performs well, has lots of features, and don’t mind the extra weight.

SES Technologies BTO Notebook

It also has a DVD-ROM drive and a 14.1-inch screen SNAPSHOT SES TECHNOLOGIES BTO NOTEBOOK Price: Rs 96,999  Pros: Feature rich, attractive price  Cons: Battery backup and charging a little disappointing

This notebook has a pretty mean configuration consisting of a P4 1.6 GHz, 128 MB of RAM and a GeForce2 Go display adapter with 16 MB VRAM. It also has a DVD-ROM drive and a 14.1-inch screen which movie buffs should really enjoy. The only thing that was a little disappointing was the small 6 GB hard disk. 

For connectivity the notebook offers both a built-in modem and a network card. It also has a PS/2 port, which can be used to connect a mouse or keyboard if required. Besides this, it has all the regular ports like 2 USB, a parallel, serial, and VGA. 

The battery backup time was a touch disappointing at just over 2 hours, and the recharging taking over two and half hours. Performance scores for Business and Content Creation Winstone 2001 were average. In Quake III Arena however, it gave a decent frame rate of 73 fps, thanks to its GeForce2 Go adapter. This makes the notebook good for 3D work when on the move. 

The Bottom Line. The highlights for this notebook are its features, an attractive price tag of 97 K, and good 3D performance.

Apple iBook

The iBook would be a sure winner when it comes to looks. It has a beautiful white casing made out of an impact—resistant polycarbonate plastic. The iBook is also quite light weighing just 2.2 kg. It also has a unique circular shaped power adapter, which allows you to wrap the cord around it, to keep things neat and tidy around you. 

It has a magnesium frame which helps to keep its weight down to just 2.2 kg SNAPSHOT APPLE iBOOK Price: Rs 92,000 Pros: Good looks, Lots of features Cons: None

The model we got for review had a 500 MHz G3 processor, with 128 MB RAM, 10 GB hard disk, and a DVD drive. The graphics department is taken care of by an ATI mobility with 8 MB VRAM. However when we checked the Apple India website, we found that this model has been upgraded with a 600 MHz G3, with a 20 GB hard drive, and 16 MB VRAM. This might also have affected the notebook’s price. 

The iBook has a 12.1-inch TFT XGA display which can support up to 1024x768 pixel resolution. It even has built-in antennas, which would work when you plug in an optional Airport card for wireless connectivity. 

Battery performance was tested the same way as done on the PowerBook. It lasted for 2 hours 47 mins, which is very good. Recharging however was a little slower taking about three hours. Like the PowerBook, the iBook also comes with the latest Mac OS X version 10.1 and even the older Os 9.2. Apart from this it also comes with a large and useful software bundle.

The Bottom Line. The iBook is definitely a good choice for people looking for a stylish notebook, with great looks and a host of features. The model we got for review is priced at just Rs 92,000, which makes this a great buy.

Sunu Azure PIII

This is an attractive option for the budget concious SNAPSHOT SUNU AZURE PIII Price: Rs 72,000 Pros: Good price Cons: Poor 3D graphics and gaming performance

This is a new entrant in the Indian market, having a good introductory price of just Rs 72,000. The notebook is based on a PIII 1.13 GHz with 128MB RAM. By default 8MB of this RAM is shared with the SiS630 display adapter, which can be increased to 32MB. The notebook also has a 20GB hard drive and a CD-ROM drive. Plus, it has onboard sound, modem, and network connectivity. There’s also an IR port, and a port for an external display. 

There were no problems with the notebook’s performance. It gave a score of 32.1 and 39.2 in Business and Content Creation Winstone 2001, which are both pretty good. This makes it a good choice for running both regular and high-end productivity apps. However, gaming and 3D is definitely not one the notebook’s strong points, managing only 5 fps in Quake III Arena. There was a slight problem with the notebook’s battery, which lasted for just an hour and 33 minutes. Unfortunately, due to lack of time, we couldn’t get a replacement piece to check out its true battery performance.

The Bottom Line. This notebook is great when it comes to doing productivity and even some high-end work. However don’t expect great 3D graphics and gaming experience from it. Finally, this notebook comes with a three-year warranty.

Dell M50 Mobile Workstation

The impressive configuration of this notebook is suitable for high-end applications SNAPSHOT DELL M50 MOBILE WORKSTATION Price: Rs 297,421 Pros: Excellent features, great performance Cons: None

The latest workstation class notebook we got from Dell had impressive specs: Intel P4 1.8 GHz with 512 MB DDRRAM, and a 40 GB hard drive. The graphics department is taken care of by Nvidia’s hot new Quadro4 500 GoGL workstation graphics chipset, which is 4x AGP having 64 MB DDR memory. Plus, the model we received for review had a CD-ReWriter/ DVD combo drive and an extra battery pack, which can be swapped with the floppy drive, thus doubling battery backup time. Also included are a spare CD drive and a leather carry case.

The notebook’s performance was of course the best among all notebooks tested this time, owing to high-end specs. It gave scores of 39.9 and 62.5 in Business and Content Creation Winstone 2001 respectively. These were basically to check the notebook’s capabilities in running regular productivity and high-end graphics applications. In 3D graphics and gaming performance, the notebook was again ahead of the lot, giving 172 fps in Quake III Arena. Battery backup time was at a decent 2 hours and 52

mins.

The notebook doesn’t let you down on features either. For instance, it has a S-video TV-out jack. Plus, it also has an adapter that plugs into this jack, and provides three ports for S-video, composite video, and digital audio. It also has a FireWire port, and two PCMCIA slots. The software bundle is quite decent with a recovery CD containing Win 2000 Pro with SP2,

WinDVD, and Roxio EasyCD Creator for the CD-ReWriter.

The Bottom Line. The notebook has an impressive configuration and gives great performance, which justifies its price of

Rs 2.97 lakh. It is supported with a three-year onsite warranty, and technical support for workstation related issues on various high-end software like MCAD and various Discreet products.

Sachin Makhija at PCQ Labs