The U505-S2930 is surprisingly well-equipped for an $800 thin-and-light. This model includes a 2.1GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T6500 CPU, 4GB of RAM, a generous 320GB hard drive with active protection, a tray-loading multiformat DVD burner with LabelFlash technology, 802.11a/g/n Wi-Fi, a 1.2-megapixel Webcam, an HDMI display output with full HD (1080p) support, USB Sleep-and-Charge ports (to charge mobile devices even when the machine is off), an eSATA port, and ExpressCard/54 and memory-card slots.
Granted, moving up the price ladder in the U505 family nets you such goodies as an LED-backlit screen with edge-to-edge glass, Dell Inspiron 6000 battery,a backlit keyboard, and a slot-loading DVD burner—but none of those is essential, especially if budget is your primary concern.
Falcon went with a standard LCD. There was no need to add an LED screen, since it wouldn’t make this laptop any thinner, and energy efficiency wasn’t in the cards from the get go. The 17-inch widescreen is equipped with the best resolution available, however: 1,920-by-1,200 or 1080p. Its brightness levels and viewing-angle range are on a par with other generic screens, Sony VGP-BPS2C battery,and this resolution is available in other gaming systems like the ASUS G71G-Q1 and the P7808u. I don’t have any complaints about the typing and navigating experience, as the full-size keyboard, touchpad, and mouse buttons are more than up to the challenge.
Most all-purpose machines offer three or four USB ports, an SD/Memory Stick flash card reader, a Webcam, headphone jacks, VGA ports, and ethernet jacks. And without exception, Latitude D620 battery,such notebooks also have at least 802.11g wireless (802.11n should be ubiquitous within the next few months).
Now, those two exceptions: ATI and Nvidia both have integrated graphics parts that, when combined with a low-end discrete part, can be used in Crossfire/SLI and thus improve performance substantially. These solutions are still nowhere near as good as mid-range and higher options, but they’re also economical and good for Toshiba PA3356U-1BRS battery life. Nvidia’s solution with the GeForce 9400M, in particular, can also swap between a mid or high-end discrete part to the IGP when the notebook is running on the battery, resulting in substantial power savings.
Content from many digital cameras and camcorders can be accessed directly as local files without USB cables, adapters, or the need to put the device in a special PC connection mode. The cost of SD is falling as speed (expressed as “Class;” higher is better) rises. Even if you don’t use the slot for multimedia, you’ll find that SD is the perfect removable medium — faster, more portable, and more reliable than optical. The point I made earlier about using SD to extend Dell Inspiron Mini 9 battery life bears emphasizing. In two scenarios, Office document manipulation and digital media viewing, moving files to SD let the 15-inch MacBook Pro’s hard drive motor, a prime consumer of power, remain in a spun-down state much longer.