The Highest-End Notebooks, 2009

AVADirect Clevo D900F Design

The basic external design of the Clevo D900F hasn't changed much from the Clevo D901C. It is a very large chassis with a 17" WUXGA LCD. AVADirect does offer custom paint jobs if you don't like the default colors, but the core features remain the same. Here's our pictorial overview of the system to get us started.

Some people like flashy in-your-face notebooks, and the grey/black aesthetics aren't likely to please such users. Those who prefer stylings that are more subdued on the other hand will be right at home.

In terms of expansion ports, it's a little odd that all of the USB ports come off the right side. This can be a bit irritating when you connect the mouse and have to deal with the cable jutting out the side of the laptop. It's not a huge issue, but it would have been nice to get at least one USB port on the other side of the system. We're also still stuck with a total of four USB ports, and while we never had a need to connect that many devices we have heard a few users ask for a couple more USB ports -- especially on large desktop replacement notebooks. One area where Clevo/AVADirect deserves some accolades is in the inclusion of two digital video ports, one DVI dual-link and the other HDMI. We didn't receive any dongles to convert the DVI into VGA or the HDMI into DVI, unfortunately, but such dongles should work.

Looking at the rear of the system, it's easy to understand why there aren't many expansion options on the back. Almost the entire rear of the laptop is dedicated to cooling vents for the hot CPU, GPU, and chipset. The D901C used two of the ventilation slots for graphics cards, while the D900F dedicates two large HSFs and one smaller HSF to cooling the CPU and chipset, with the GPU getting its own large HSF. Obviously, keeping a 130W TDP CPU and 24W TDP X58 chipset cool is no small task. Clevo essentially crams a large desktop cooling solution into a notebook chassis, and in practice it works reasonably well. The D900F isn't a silent laptop by any stretch of the imagination, but it doesn't generate any more noise than other desktop replacement notebooks that we've looked at. Even with a heavy CPU load (i.e. 3D rendering), the system runs stable. The bottom and back of the chassis definitely get warm and you won't want this system sitting on your lap, but we can say the same about any other desktop replacement notebook.

There are a few continued sore spots with the Clevo design. One is the keyboard, which still has an odd arrangement for the number keypad. Placing the decimal key at the top left of the number keypad means that anyone used to a standard 10-key setup will invariably hit the wrong button without a lot of time spent adjusting -- and every time you use a regular keyboard you'll need to readjust. Considering there's ample room for a different arrangement, we wish Clevo would make the keyboard a bit wider and give us a standard 10-key layout -- that means oversized Enter and Addition keys on the right, a large Zero key at the bottom left, with the decimal point sitting between the Enter and Zero keys. We would also like to see dedicated Home/End/PgUp/PgDn keys, and again that shouldn't be difficult considering the size of the chassis.

Our other complaint is that Clevo continues to offer a glossy LCD as the only option. We have heard from so many users that feel glossy LCDs have no place on laptops that we're very surprised high-end notebook manufacturers don't even provide matte displays as an option. The Dell Precision M6400 gives users the option of choosing a matte display, and since the D900F uses the same size LCD panel it could follow suit. It may be a bit more difficult for Clevo to go that route, since they don't typically sell direct to customers and rely on partners with rebranded notebooks -- i.e. AVADirect -- but we really would like to see fewer "mirror finish" LCDs on notebooks and laptops. The LCD on the D900F also isn't as bright as other current laptops. It's not dim, per se, but 156nits is nowhere near as bright as the 200 to 250nits we see on most other notebooks. The palm rest also has a shiny surface, and we would prefer a matte exterior to avoid fingerprints (at the cost of "pretty" photos).

None of these complaints qualifies as a deal breaker, at least in our view, but considering the wealth of customization options available for other components, we really would like more choice in these areas.