CyberpowerPC's Compal NBLB2: Affordable Gaming
by Dustin Sklavos on December 21, 2010 5:50 PM EST- Posted in
- Laptops
- AMD
- Intel
- CyberPowerPC
- Compal
Conclusion: You Can Make a Case for It
When we reviewed the competing Clevo B5130M from AVADirect (and also offered by Cyberpower), the conclusion was fairly clear cut: it'd be an easy sell if Dell's XPS 15 didn't exist. That was reasonable enough then: the two are comparable in spec, but Dell offers a better screen, better build quality, and better battery life. With the Compal NBLB2 in the mix, though, things get murkier.
Shopping around can get you an NBLB2 for $899 or better, which automatically places it above the B5130M because the 1080p screen is standard as opposed to an upgrade. Compal does well on the insides, too: the AMD Mobility Radeon HD 5650 often comes out ahead of the GeForce 420M/425M that the Clevo and Dell notebooks use, so if gaming is high on your list of priorities there's a strong case to be made for going with this notebook over the competition. You still won't be running most games at high quality settings—and certainly not at high quality and 1080p—but medium quality and 1080p is still within reach, especially if you tweak a few of the settings to get above 30FPS. Clearly, AMD had a great design when the HD 5650 launched, and it has held up well over the past nine months.
Unfortunately, getting decent gaming performance means a fairly large trade-off. The Compal notebook's design is horrendously outdated, and while the battery life is fine in and of itself it's still lagging behind our editor's choice-winning Dell XPS 15, thanks to NVIDIA's Optimus Technology. The Dell notebook also offers the potential for an even better screen than the already impressive one in the NBLB2. [Update: Well, at least it did when the 1080p upgrade was available; that's currently missing, presumably because of insufficient supply.] You'll have to contend with Dell's customer service instead of the more personalized service you'd get from a smaller boutique vendor, but we have to wonder if the trade isn't worth it.
Mercifully, at the end of the day the NBLB2 doesn't feel like a complete "also-ran." While the Clevo B5130M found itself butting squarely up against Dell's incumbent, the NBLB2 presents a viable alternative for those looking to get as much gaming performance as they can out of a 15.6" notebook. At $899 from Sager or $945 from CyberpowerPC the price isn't too steep, either. It's not competing with the freak deals Acer periodically throws into the wild for a couple months, but the Compal has a much nicer screen and a better keyboard. If gaming is a top priority but you don't want to break your back with a big notebook (or your wallet with a big budget), the NBLB2 is very nearly as good as it gets.
Of course, besides the build quality and aesthetic problems, there's one other item this Compal notebook has to contend with: Sandy Bridge is coming next month, along with some other hardware updates from the various parties. We can't go into performance specifics any more than Anand did in our preview, but Core 2010 and the HD 5650 are both due for replacement in the near future. When Compal inevitably updates the NBLB2 yet again, hopefully they can make a break with some of the current design points and deliver a product that's better on all fronts.
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Dustin Sklavos - Wednesday, December 22, 2010 - link
I think that really depends on where your priorities lie.If gaming and budget are top priority, the NBLB2.
If a slightly better screen, slightly better battery life, and slightly better connectivity are important, the B5130M.
If the best battery life is what you're after, we haven't tested the ASUS but imagine it's probably going to do better than the B5130M.
JarredWalton - Wednesday, December 22, 2010 - link
Wow, I hope Dell brings back the 1080p LCD soon; maybe it's just a temporary thing due to demand? (And if that's the case, you'd think they would realize that a good LCD *can* sell lots of laptops!) As for the rest, speak for yourself... *I've* tested the ASUS N53JF; I just haven't finished writing the review yet. ;-) So, um, SPOILER ALERT!Battery life with a 48Wh battery comes to 271 idle, 233 Internet, and 139 for H.264 playback. That's better than the competition (despite having a smaller battery) in two of the tests. Performance elsewhere is in line with the other i5 + 425M configurations we've tested. Here's the kicker, though: The 1080p LCD sucks. Not sucks as in it's worse than 768p, but sucks as in contrast is 233:1. That means that unfortunately, all the 15.6" 1080p LCDs aren't great; only some of them are. Also, the Dell XPS 15 still has by far the best sounding speakers; ASUS has some Bang & Olafsen tech supposedly, but they just don't sound that great -- they really overemphasize the highs, to the point where a lot of MP3s sound like they have tons of static. Anyway, the full review should hopefully be up this week.
debacol - Thursday, December 23, 2010 - link
Whats the price of a Dell XPS 15 with the equivalent 640M CPU and 1080p screen? I have a feeling its a bit north of $1,100.Dug - Wednesday, December 22, 2010 - link
I think this is a great improvement over the last review. Easy to read and very informative. Keep up the good work.mattgmann - Wednesday, December 22, 2010 - link
My only question concerns hard drive space. Is there a second slot to add an SSD, or can the optical drive be replaced with an ssd? I really need to have room for data on my next laptop, so a lone SSD isn't going to cut the mustard. I'd be cool though if adding a second drive meant losing the optical drive.I am super impressed with the hardware in this lappy. I need a new laptop capable of doing some of my production work (mostly web stuff, but also lots of flash and photoshop/illustrator work) while I travel. I'm quite intrigued by the i7 640m.
The build quality looks to be a little on the cheap side, but I'm not one for style anyway. I configured a system on cyberpowerpc without an operating system and slid in at ~1100, well within my budget. The Dell XS 15 isn't available with the i7 640m, and similarly configured systems were much more expensive.
debacol - Thursday, December 23, 2010 - link
I have an old Compal IFL90 and have been using it heavily for about 4 years. I haven't had a single issue with it at all. So even if the build quality doesn't "feel" as great as other laptops, at least from my personal experience, that "feel" hasn't translated into poor reliability.I use my laptop for light gaming and very heavy photoshop use (ie: always working with 300dpi 200+mb files).