HP Pavilion DV8000Z

The HP Pavilion dv8000z notebook rivals a desktop PC for storage and entertainment while saving room. The unit has a gorgeous 17-inch WXGA+ screen, superb sound (thanks to built-in Altec Lansing speakers), and a full-size keyboard with dedicated numerical keypad.
QuickPlay buttons located above the keyboard provide one-touch access to DVD movies, music, videos, and photos without starting Windows. HP's credit-card-size remote control lets you sit back and control the action on the big screen. When you're not using it, you can store the remote in the notebook's PC Card slot. You could amass a vast number of digital photos, MP3s, and home videos on the maximum dual 120GB 4200-rpm hard drives (which our unit featured), or you could use the second drive for backup.
Add the Windows XP Media Center Edition operating system ($30 extra) and an ExpressCard Analog TV tuner ($130)--both of which the unit I looked at had--and your dv8000z can function as a portable TV, too, letting you watch, pause live action, and record your favorite shows wherever there's a cable connection.

The only one thing the dv8000z doesn't do well is games. The notebook's ATI Radeon Xpress 200M graphics card comes with 128MB of dedicated RAM and can pull up to 128MB more from main RAM. The new memory management scheme is supposed to be faster than traditional integrated graphics because it can take advantage of the bidirectional speed of PCI Express to access system RAM, but this doesn't seem to help much. The best the dv8000z could manage in Far Cry at 1024 by 768 resolution and 32-bit color (with antialiasing turned off) was 23 frames per second. More typical was its performance in Doom at the same settings, where it staggered along at an unplayable 10 fps.
Equipped with a top-of-the-line single-core AMD 2.2-GHz Turion 64 ML-40 processor and 2GB of RAM, the dv8000z turned in an overall WorldBench 5 speed score of 95--strong but nevertheless a little below the marks that most mobile Intel dual-core notebooks we've seen so far have achieved. And in the multitasking portion of the test, the dv8000z was 30 percent slower than the average new desktop replacement at browsing the Internet while converting a sound file, taking almost 12 minutes to finish versus a little over 8 minutes. If you can get by on less than 240GB of storage, you can give performance a boost and save $175 by choosing dual 80GB 5400-rpm hard drives. Though the 8000z is heavy at 9.2 pounds, its tested 3.1-hour battery life indicates that it is truly portable.

The dv8000z is a chunky but attractive black-and-silver unit with many thoughtful design touches that make using it as a desktop replacement a pleasure. Among them are hidden hinges and an easy-to-find eject button on the right-side optical drive (a DVD burner in our review unit). Four USB ports, a FireWire port, and a six-in-one card reader help handle connection and data-swapping needs.

An expansion port mounted on the right side gives the notebook further desktop replacement credentials by allowing docking in the optional HP xb2000 Expansion Base, which features a screen stand, port replication, and housing for a third hard drive.
Even without the expansion base, the dv8000z is a solid all-round option

To review this Laptop, CLICK HERE

Toshiba Qosmio G35-AV650

Qosmio G35-AV650 lets you play high-definition content almost seamlessly.

Toshiba's latest luxury notebook, the Qosmio G35-AV650, is the first notebook available with an HD DVD drive for playing high-definition content. We looked at a shipping unit, and we liked many of the heavy portable's outstanding audiovisual extras. However, while HD content looked fantastic, the pricey Qosmio has some minor limitations.
The $2999 G35-AV650 uses Toshiba's own HD DVD tray-drive, the HD TS-L802A. This combo drive serves as a 4X multiformat, double-layer DVD burner as well as an HD DVD-ROM reader. To enable HD DVD playback, the G35-AV650's 17-inch wide-screen display has a native resolution of 1920 by 1200 pixels, more than enough to support the 1080p HD format. The display also features a glossy coating to increase the viewable angle, and it gets power from two lamps instead of one for greater brightness.
We watched The Last Samurai in HD DVD on the laptop; the video looked sharp, and exhibited incredible detail and depth. (We then watched the same movie in standard definition, and found it lacking in comparison.) The Qosmio's sound is superb as well, thanks to an integrated 1-bit digital amplifier, Harman/Kardon speakers, and Dolby Home Theater enhancements that together simulate easily discernible multichannel surround sound.Connect to an HDTV
Another unique feature of the G35-AV650: It includes an external HDMI port with HDCP support. This lets you connect the unit directly to an HDMI-equipped HDTV for use as a high-priced HD DVD player. If your TV lacks HDMI, though, you're out of luck in regard to an HD signal; the G35-AV650's other outputs are for analog S-Video and a VGA monitor, neither of which will facilitate an HD DVD signal.
If you've hooked the notebook up to an HDTV, you can close the screen and still play content inserted into the HD DVD drive, once you've used Toshiba's power-management tools to prevent the notebook from hibernating. An instant TV-out button sends the display signal to the television. Alternatively, you can use the Fn and F5 keys to toggle through output options.
Using this method we were quickly able to send an HD DVD signal to our test HDMI-equipped HDTV. However, despite HDMI's ability to carry both video and audio, in our tests the audio emitted from the Qosmio's built-in speakers rather than the television. (Toshiba reps said this shouldn't happen; we're still working with the company to resolve the issue.)
Another drawback: Like Toshiba's HD-A1 and HD-XA1 HD DVD players, this notebook outputs video over HDMI only at 1080i, a disappointment considering that Hollywood studios are starting to encode their discs at 1080p resolution.
The G35-AV650 is bundled with a coaxial adapter cable (for use with its coaxial antenna input), as well as a composite video/audio adapter cable (for connection to the composite input, which also doubles as a stereo audio input). The notebook has an S-Video input port, too, but as with the HDMI, no cable is supplied in the box.

Like previous Qosmio notebooks from Toshiba, the G35-AV650 runs Windows XP Media Center and comes with a TV tuner and a remote control. Though using the remote control is easy, we also like the numerous media playback buttons located just above the keyboard, some of which have multiple uses. For instance, if the notebook is on, the dedicated TV and record (DVR) buttons will initiate the Media Center interface. But if you press the TV button when the unit is turned off, you can watch TV via Toshiba's QosmioPlayer interface without having to boot up Windows.

Unfortunately that ability to play media without booting Windows doesn't extend to playing HD content. We were able to play HD DVD movies only through the preinstalled InterVideo WinDVD HD application. Toshiba intends to have "instant on" playback for HD DVD movies in the future. The ability to play content such as MP3s and video files without having to boot up Windows would be an added bonus.Top-Notch Features

The G35-AV650's top-of-the-line features include a 2-GHz Core Duo T2500 processor, 1GB of DDR2 SDRAM, and a 256MB nVidia GeForce Go 7600 graphics controller. It also offers 200GB of storage in the form of two 5400-rpm SATA drives.
Among its other connections are four USB 2.0 ports, one Type II PC Card slot, and one ExpressCard slot compatible with the ExpressCard/34 and ExpressCard/54 standards. A four-in-one media card reader and a fingerprint reader are provided as well.
Though Toshiba's Qosmio notebooks each feature a full-size keyboard, it's worth pointing out that they don't have a dedicated number pad--a feature sometimes prized by gamers and number crunchers alike--though there is room for one.
One feature that does stand out on the G35-AV650's keyboard, however, is the dual-mode touchpad. In addition to controlling mouse-pointer movement plus vertical and horizontal window scrolling, you can use the programmable touchpad to launch up to six programs by holding your finger on one of the designated areas.
In its secondary mode the touchpad's back lights illuminate, and its corners become hot spots for a switching tool; a pop-up interface lets you quickly switch programs or access favorite links and even hard-disk locations you've previously specified. It's quite straightforward to use, as well as to program (via another one of Toshiba's many little utilities).
Though the G35-AV650's glossy silver lid helps it resemble a home theater component, it will probably travel from your desk to the living room only rarely, as it tips the scales at 10.1 pounds.

We're currently running our WorldBench 5 benchmark as well as our battery life tests on the unit, so check back soon for our performance scores and overall rating. We enjoyed our first few hours with the Qosmio. As the first HD DVD notebook to ship, it still has a few kinks--but overall it's a solid, powerful portable that likely won't disappoint early adopters with money to spend.

To review this Laptop, CLICK HERE

Acer Aspire 8920

This big, beautiful consumer laptop's 18.4-inch screen could be brighter, but speed and other features make up for that.

The $2599 Acer Aspire 8920 is a whole lotta laptop, crammed with so many features that we kept checking for a kitchen sink. It has a humongous screen, a Blu-ray drive, six speakers, a giant hard drive, a top-flight processor, and a gadget-laden keyboard. You won't skip the light fandango while carrying this 9-pound monstrosity, but you will get awesome performance (and anemic battery life). In other words, it's a powerful desktop replacement laptop that will take up most of your desktop.

The 18.4-inch screen, with a fully HD-capable 1920-by-1080-pixel resolution, makes the 8920 good for creative types or for a family room. It's a dream screen for watching movies, editing graphics, or engaging in other highly detailed work. The screen is so surreally large that complaining about anything hardly seems fair, but we do wish that it was a little brighter.
Acer offers two fixed configurations of the 8920; we reviewed the beefier AS8920-6671, which includes a 2.6-GHz T9500 Core 2 Duo processor and 4GB of main memory. Given its power, we weren't too surprised when it smoked our performance tests with a score of 97, just one point shy of the Montevina-equipped HP Pavilion dv7t. The 512MB nVidia GeForce 9650M GS graphics card turned in solid gaming scores of 127 frames per second in Doom 3 and 162 fps in Far Cry with antialiasing turned off. One drawback of the 8920: The 2.6-hour battery life will give you more than enough time to move this beast to another room and find a new outlet, but not much else.

Acer switched to a richer-looking, dark-metallic-blue lid and a shiny piano-black keyboard for the 8920, ditching the light case colors of its older Gemstone notebooks. The keyboard has a nice layout, including a dedicated number pad and tons of shortcuts for you to get all sorts of things done with the press of a button. The most conspicuous is Acer's giant 'E' shortcut key in the upper right of the keyboard, shaped and colored like a big fake jewel, which launches Empowering Technology on-screen shortcuts, a drop-down menu for setting sound effects, power management controls, security (file encryption) settings, and Acer eRecovery Management for making full or partial backups to the D: drive. Four long, skinny silver buttons lined up vertically underneath the 'E' handle Wi-Fi and Bluetooth combination power/indicator controls, always welcome conveniences.

To the left of the keyboard is the CineDash Media Console, a large touch-sensitive control pad that resembles a seating chart for a concert hall: The round "stage" area is Enter, the semicircular parts that look like rows are the volume swipe, and so on. It's easy to use once you get your bearings, though it does take some getting accustomed to. (Is that a concession stand or the Pause button?) Too bad the laptop's speakers don't sound better; the bass was so timid that we didn't even know a subwoofer existed until we looked underneath. Still, the speakers are loud and pleasing enough for you to listen to music or watch a movie without headphones.
The 8920 is nearly 2 inches thick, with lots of case space for connections--and this laptop mostly delivers on ports. The stylish dropped hinges leave a clean, port-free rear. A six-in-one card reader and an infrared receiver that works with the included entertainment remote control sit conveniently on the front. The machine has four USB ports--two on each side--and on the left side are an HDMI port and extra audio line-in. Somewhat surprising, though, is this laptop's complete lack of FireWire or eSATA ports.

The 320GB hard drive should be storage nirvana for video fiends. Acer rounds out the package with a set of basic productivity applications, including Microsoft Works 8.5.

If you need a basic, workhorse desktop replacement, you have cheaper, more sensible choices than the Acer Aspire 8920. But if flashy looks and big-screen entertainment are your goals, the 8920 deserves a spot on your short list.

To review this Laptop, CLICK HERE