Holiday Buyer's Guide: Notebooks
by Dustin Sklavos on November 15, 2010 9:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Laptops
- Guides
- Holiday 2010
Best Mainstream: Dell XPS L501x ($980 with 1080p)
This one should really come as no surprise: it seems like Jarred fell in love with the L501x the moment he laid eyes on it. While some commenters found Dell's styling on their reinvigorated XPS line less than appealing, it must be said: the L501x has a great personality.
Our review unit brought the usual Core i5 along with some new hotness in the form of Nvidia's GeForce GT 420M graphics. While the GeForce GT 430 may not be a very exciting desktop part, it seems to shine a lot brighter in a mobile form factor, as the 420M brings 96 of Nvidia's shader processors to bear and is able to produce gaming performance that can finally catch up with ATI's Mobility Radeon HD 4650/5650 and even scrape or beat the GeForce GT 335M. That kind of advance was a long time coming.
But wait, there's more! The L501x offers an incredibly tantalizing upgrade at a reasonable price: a WLED backlit 1080p screen that ranks among the best we've ever seen. At a time when we'd gotten frankly depressed by the idea of having to test yet another dismal TN panel, the L501x's upgraded screen blew away our testing by producing a staggering 692:1 contrast ratio and 98.3% of the AdobeRGB color gamut, well above the usual 45%-60% we're used to seeing. Oh, and did we mention the speakers are among the best we've heard on a notebook?
Those looking for a well-rounded [Ed: pun intended?] laptop are going to have a hard time doing any better than the Dell XPS L501x, and we gave it our Gold Editors' Choice award.
Mainstream Runner Up: HP Envy 14
You know, it's frustrating because we'd really like to be able to lay hands on the mythical HP Envy 14 that regularly gets recommended in our comments and deliver the final word, and that's part of the reason it hangs out in runner up territory.
HP's Envy 14 brings a Mobility Radeon HD 5650 to the party along with the usual Core 2010 series of processors, and it does this in a unique 14.5" chassis. The performance and high quality design have become the stuff of myth around here, and we'd likely be crucified not to bring up the HP Envy 14, so here we offer it as a potentially worthy alternative to the L501x. We're still waiting on our review unit (we expect it to be personally delivered by Godot), but our comment boards light up each review with glowing endorsements of the Envy 14. It looks great on paper, great in pictures, and everyone loves it, and that's enough for us to tentatively recommend the Envy 14.
Mainstream Alternatives
This one is a bit more difficult, as you need to define the target audience and decide on what classifies as "mainstream". For us, mainstream means that a laptop can do everything reasonably well, even if it doesn't excel in any one area. The XPS L501x works great for music, movies, and even moderate gaming, and the same goes for the Envy 14. If you're looking for something similar but you're willing to give up build quality and features, there are other options of course.
Acer/Gateway are the quintessential budget laptops everyone sees at Wal-Mart, Best Buy, CostCo, etc., and while they may not win any beauty pageants they certainly are affordable! Toshiba also has some viable notebooks in the realm. For those who want it all, the minimum you can spend while still covering your bases is around $750. That will get you a reasonable CPU and dedicated GPU, with switchable graphics giving you better battery life when you don't need the GPU. The Acer 5742G-7200 gives you i5-460M with GT 420M and Optimus, or the Toshiba A665D-S6059 gives you Phenom P920 and HD 5650 with a backlit keyboard; for pure performance, the Acer 5742G definitely has the edge, particularly when you consider the 450MHz clock on the Toshiba's GPU and the fact that even an i3-330M CPU manages to beat the P920 in nearly every benchmark.
If you're willing to sacrifice battery life and give up switchable graphics, a few other alternatives show up. Acer's Aspire 5551G starting at $630 can certainly play games with its dual-core P520 CPU (2.3GHz) and HD 5650 graphics, but again you have to live with the keyboard and overall aesthetic. Toshiba's L655-S5111 gives you a faster Intel i3-370M CPU with the same HD 5650 GPU for $70 more. If you don't mind last-gen DX10 graphics, the Gateway ID49C (i3-370M and GT330M) and ASUS N82Jv (i5-450M and GT335M) also include Optimus and reasonable prices. None of the alternatives really manage to knock it out of the park, with various compromises in each case, but they can all handle just about any task you might want to throw their way.
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FATCamaro - Monday, November 15, 2010 - link
For most comparable system it is around 5-20% which isn't steep.Cuhulainn - Monday, November 15, 2010 - link
I'm 5'9" and weigh 168 lbs. This is in the normal weight range for body mass index.If I gained 20% more weight, I'd weigh 200 lbs and would be considered obese.
Just sayin'.
th3pwn3r - Saturday, November 20, 2010 - link
What in the world does BMI have to do with anything? Not to mention BMI is a failed investment that they won't let die. If you're judged as being obese just because you're a certain weight/height ratio it's stupid. Most body builders and fitness athletes are classified as obese through BMI.JarredWalton - Monday, November 15, 2010 - link
Well, here's steep for the MacBook Pro 15:- 2.4GHz Intel Core i5 (i5-520M or i5-450M?)
- 4GB (2x2GB) RAM
- 320GB 5400rpm Hard Drive
- SuperDrive
- NVIDIA GeForce GT 330M 256MB Graphics
- 15.4" Glossy 1440x900
- Secure Digital (SD) Card Slot
- iSight Webcam, Bluetooth 2.1+EDR
- 802.11n AirPort Extreme
- Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, 5.6 lb
Total price: $1707 online, $1800 from Apple.
I get more than that in every area with an XPS L501x, with a price of just $1000. Heck, we can toss out the Dell Precision M4500 as another comparison, which is really quite expensive since it's a mobile workstation:
Windows 7 Professional 64-bit
Core i5-520M (2.40GHz)
3 Year Basic Limited Warranty and 3 Year Next Business Day On-Site Service
NVIDIA Quadro FX 880M 1GB
2x2GB DDR3-1333MHz
15.6" HD+ (1600 x 900) Anti-Glare LED Display with Premium Panel Guarantee
320GB 7200rpm Hard Drive
8X DVD+/-RW
6-cell (60Wh) Lithium Ion Battery
Dell Wireless 1501 802.11b/g/n Half Mini Card
Dell Wireless 375 Bluetooth Module
Integrated webcam with microphone
Internal English Backlit Keyboard
Total price: $1750 (though granted that's with the current sale Dell is doing--which they do all the time)
There's no question NVIDIA charges more for Quadro 880M vs. GT 330M, though they're basically the same chip. Many of the other areas are a wash as well, but the upgraded LCD should be good (hopefully as good as the MacBook, but without testing I don't know). And of course, we're comparing 3-year warranty with on-site service to the standard 1-year Apple store warranty. This is about as close as the comparison gets.
For consumer oriented offerings, the Dell XPS and HP Envy 14 cost about half of the MacBook Pro 15 while delivering similar features. Yes, you can complain about the XPS aesthetics, but they do manage to deliver a lot for the price. So you're looking at Dell on the one hand making the XPS 15 with all the features that Apple MBP 15 has but worse aesthetics and a price of $1000. On the other, you can't actually find anything else with a decent LCD and build quality unless you move into business laptops (which not surprisingly carry a price premium), and even then Apple is priced higher for what you get.
I suppose the real question is to define "steep". 5% markup on Apple relative to Windows laptops if you include a student discount perhaps, but for average buyers the markup is at least 20%, and I'd qualify that as pretty steep considering the cutthroat nature of the computer industry.
FATCamaro - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
Point taken. The XPS L501x is a winner vs the 15" MBP for value.MeesterNid - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
Right, but if we really are talking mobile here then you have to consider the battery power and the weight of the machines. I'm not sure about the Dell, but the MBP is a fairly portable (not too heavy) device that gives you a fair amount of battery-powered computing time.awaken688 - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
You are comparing the chips inside which is very important. But what about weight and battery.I'm still waiting to see a true side by side with the price comparison.
I still think the Apple 15 is overpriced, but some people value certain things much higher than others such a true portability (weight and battery).
Separate topic:
Long term battery test. I have 3 friends that just bought Apple laptops last year (2 MBP 15", 1 vanilla MacBook). Both are their batteries killed my PC laptop at the start. Now all 3 of their batteries can't even make it through a 1 hour meeting/class unplugged while using it.
bah12 - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
Well certainly the 20% buys you some weight/battery life (hell 20% better get you something), but then subtract from those gains the hassle of OSX or Bootcamp, and the small gain is not worth it IMO. Its strictly a matter of personal opinion of course.Also all batteries degrade over time, as your experience shows Apple is not immune to this either. So replacement part cost should be a concern, and I'm sure you will see that Apple tax sneak it's way back in there too.
awaken688 - Thursday, November 18, 2010 - link
I can't comment on OSX. Most people that use Macs enjoy OS-X. I know Anand and company does. I still don't understand why someone besides the Sony Vaio Z can't produce a similar quality (speed, battery, weight, screen, usability) to a MacBook Pro. Yes I know it will be just as expensive, but we really don't even have a choice.Maybe Jared knows of one.
- 15"
- 1680x1050 Quality Matte Screen (no I don't want 1920x1080 or 1920x1200. I have a 1920x1200 Dell Precision Mobile Workstation now and that resolution is just too intense for that screen IMO)
- Core i5/i7
- 4GB+ Ram
- Decent GPU (I don't care about games. That is what consoles and desktops are for)
- Under 6 lbs.
- Less than 1" thick (although 1.1" is alright)
- Battery life under light surfing over 5 hours
I know this is a MacBook Pro basically, but is there anything out there that is like this other than Apple's offering?
8steve8 - Monday, November 15, 2010 - link
Anandtech is not entirely different, but the whole geeky media is over-obsessed with gpu performance on laptops. Very few people rely on a portable laptop for demanding 3d games, and the core i5/i3/i7 gpu is fine for non-cutting edge games like warcraft 3, and playing any sort of compressed video.Stressing gpu performance in the media forces the mfgrs to create laptops with discrete graphics, which means wasted volume, weight and energy.
case in point, even the new lenovo U260 seems to have allocated space for a gpu, in its 0.7" thick frame, and partially because of this, it can only fit a 29Whr battery.
http://shop.lenovo.com/gbweb/gb/en/learn/products/...
^ ^ you will see discrete graphics is an option... amazingly stupid trade-off on an ultra-portable.
apple stubbornly sticking to nvidia for GPU, at the cost of several years of cpu progress is not even worth a second of debate, especially on an 11" machine.
I'm not hating on anandtech, just the whole industry, reviews shape future designs, and as we are seeing now, even with good-enough-for-non-gamers igp performance, laptops of all sizes are being outfitted with discrete options. Stupid.