Portable Notebook Wrap-Up

Based on our picks, there are some clear trends and patterns that we can see. First, in this space, ASUS is a major player. They have a history of making great performing portable computers, and they’re getting better at it over time, especially with respect to battery life. That they consistently manage to pull 10-12 hours of battery life out of systems with dedicated graphics cards (switched off, but still, the GPU is there if you need it) is definitely worthy of commendation. They simply are more well-rounded than many of the other notebooks in this class.

Another thing to notice: all of the notebooks on this list are Intel based. Each and every single one. This isn’t to say that AMD is bad, but the performance and power consumption figures for AMD’s mobile processors simply aren’t competitive with Intel. The K10.5 derived Congo platform performs somewhere in between dual core Atom and the Core 2 Duo CULV platform, while power consumption is about 60% more than the average CULV machine. The new Nile platform, based on the Phenom II architecture, is faster, about on par with the original CULV platform, but even with improved power consumption, battery life still falls short of Intel’s high standard. AMD has a good thing going in the larger notebook space, offering tri- and quad-core processors on the cheap with very good multithreaded performance. Since battery life doesn’t matter as much in desktop replacement systems, the higher power consumption isn’t a significant issue. But in the portable space, when some laptops are hitting 12 and 13 hours of battery life (see the ASUS UL80Vt), seeing an AMD-based notebook struggle to hit 5 or 6 hours of battery life is definitely a problem that we hope AMD can fix.

Not a lot of big names on this list; HP only had a couple of systems, neither of which were from their mainstream consumer line. Of Dell’s two systems, one is an Alienware, and the other made it on the list mostly because Dell has really slashed the price on a soon-to-be-EOL notebook. Toshiba’s R700 is the first truly compelling notebook to come out of the laptop giant in the span of years, probably since the R400 tablet in early 2007. Sony has its niche with beautiful (and expensive) hardware, but not any exceptional portable systems. Acer’s budget systems are decent, but only if you’re on a budget. The build quality just isn’t at a level to compete with more expensive systems. And Lenovo’s consumer level systems aren’t particularly great. Thankfully, the ThinkPad line is still as awesome and solid as ever.

Evaluated as a product segment though, the portable and ultraportable notebook segment is extremely diverse and has a ton of competition for market share. This is great for the consumer, since it leads to well designed and engineered products in all sectors, meaning that anyone can find a system that fits their needs well. This guide is meant to help people in that search, and our picks are notebooks that we feel are the best in their various categories. To an extent, you could also say that we took the notebooks we thought stood out from their peers and then fit the categories around them. If you disagree, feel we missed something, or have any additional thoughts, your comments are most welcome.