Guest: Anonymous
Reviewed on: 16/Jan/2006
80%
Purchased From:
Curry's (Also Dixon's & PC World)
Price Paid:
?399
Introduction
A budget laptop. Celeron M 1.3ghz CPU, 256mb DDR333 RAM, 40gb HDD. 14'' screen with 1024x768 on 64mb graphics extracted from the main memory.
PSU & MS Works8 supplied. DVD+RW, 4x USB2.0, 10/100 ethernet, 56k? Modem, XP Home installed.
Good Points
The machine ran straight out of the box. However, it runs better, when configured correctly. The 7081 can be upgraded to 3GB DDR333 SODIMM across 2 slots & is easily upgradeable to WIFI & Bluetooth. The 40gb hard disk is easily replaced, when the time for upgrade arrives.
Bad Points
Sound quality - get some separate speakers.
Curry's hidden diagnostic partition removed 4gb of useable disk space. This needed a reformat for the user to have full capacity of the disk.
The memory is a bit small. Make a block of 1gb DDR333 SODIMM your first upgrade. Only one memory slot appears to be fully visible, once the 'easy-access' panel on the underside is removed.
No XP Home disk is supplied - make sure you've got one spare. The battery only lasts 90 minutes before needing a recharge. Extra (or longer-charge) batteries don't seem to be available, yet.
The machine runs quite hot.
The Verdict
Once you've tweaked it, for the maximum performance, it's very good, for light use, at the price. It's ok for editing audio (on headphones - NOT the internal speakers!) & general purpose use (photo editing, video, word processing, internet, email etc.). The user, though, would be advised to have a good knowledge of how to improve it's performance.
If you're not going to tweak the machine, then you'll need to look elsewhere for a good laptop for new games, 3D or anything else which requires the latest graphics & processing capabilities.
If you want internet on the move, get a car lighter DC adaptor & wait for WiMAX!
