MSI Wind U230: One Last Hurrah for the AMD Athlon Neo X2 Congo

MSI has opted to outfit the Wind U230 with a hot AMD processor near the end of its life, but a processor that nonetheless at least has some legs to it. What we want to look at is the value angle. Does the Wind U230's last generation technology at least offer a decent value for the price?

Well, there are a lot of drawbacks. The 18-watt TDP of the AMD Athlon Neo X2 L335 is ungainly for a notebook this size and MSI's engineering doesn't seem to manage it quite as well as we might hope. What results is a lot of heat and not much battery life, and one of the real bummers is discovering that somewhere along the line, no one seemed to care. MSI touts a four hour battery life for the U230 like it's a major benefit, but four hours of running time is at the high end of the curve for the mainstream notebook and dismal for an ultraportable; where exactly do we fit the U230 in? Vivek seemed to think six hours was a reasonable expectation in his review of the Acer Ferrari One and that's a fair assessment.

While performance of the L335 is certainly a far cry ahead of the Atom and makes the machine feel more flexible and responsive - like a full-on, fully capable computer - that wattage is onerous, and it's utterly uncompetitive with Intel's CULV platform, to say nothing of the low-voltage Arrandale chips that are wending their way into the market. What you really wind up paying for is the Radeon HD 3200 integrated graphics part, which brings a healthier and more capable driver ecosystem to the table, especially compared to the abysmal GMA 3150 Intel opted to saddle modern Atom processors with.

So what do you get for a touch under five bills? In that respect there's a lot to like in the Wind U230. The 1.6 GHz dual core processor, capacity for 4GB of DDR2, and Radeon HD 3200 IGP combine to form a capable if uninspiring performance profile. You're not going to be running any state of the art games on it, but it's definitely fast enough for the odd jaunt through World of Warcraft or, more importantly for some of us nerds, it plays Magic: the Gathering - Duels of the Planeswalkers - a game truly destined for killing time on ultraportables - quite adequately. MSI also outfits the notebook with all the connectivity you could ask for: gigabit ethernet, wireless-n, and Bluetooth are all available here.

And finally, there are the screen and keyboard. Moving to a twelve inch form factor means vastly improved ergonomics with the keyboard and a substantially less cramped screen, and in each of these cases MSI makes the best of the added real estate. The screen is attractive and easy to use, and the keyboard is one of the better ones we've tested.

It's going to come down to a matter of compromise. A visit to NewEgg shows the Wind U230 is priced about where it ought to be at $479, being neither a mind-blowing deal nor an utter rip-off. If Atom and Ion aren't going to cut it for you as far as performance is concerned, are you willing to deal with a warmer, noisier notebook with substantially lower battery life? It's a compromise most probably won't be willing to make, but it's also not a homerun in favor of Atom and Ion machines either. The tweak-happy user willing to muddle through a couple of days of RMClock and IntelBurnTest may be able to largely mitigate the drawbacks of the U230, but even despite them, it remains an excellent option for users who need a little more notebook than netbook.

The chassis and design elements are about right, but what MSI needs to do now is work on the internals a bit more. Congo is obviously on the way out, and MSI has said that the L335 model will be discontinued rather quickly now. Oddly, the cheaper but substantially less powerful MV-40 equipped model may stick around a bit longer, but with half the processor performance we're less keen on that configuration. What we'd really like to see is an update to AMD's Nile platform, with a substantial boost in battery life. The K325/K625/K665 drop the TDP 3W, and if voltages are tweaked for better idle power draw, such a laptop might be a winner. Early reports of the Dell Inspiron M301z indicate idle battery life of over 5.5 hours, and that's with a 44Wh battery. (Sadly, the M301z appears to be a UK/Europe SKU only at present, as we cannot configure one in the US.) Just imagine what the U230 could do with the new CPU and its 58Wh battery. Hopefully MSI will help us find out.