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Strange how life works, no notebooks for ages then just like buses a glut. However this cannot be more different from the recently reviewed Dell offering, that was small and light, this is large and full featured.

It is 35x27x3cm in overall size and weights 3kilos. The screen is 21x33cm giving the 15.4inch WXGA size that's 1280x800 resolution. It also has 128MB of dedicated video memory, ATI Mobility Radeon X700 PCI Express.

The standard memory is 1024MB (made up of two 512MB strips of DDR2 533MHz) maximum supported memory is 2048MB. The hard disc is stated to be 100GB the actual 'real' size is 93.1GB.

The processor is a Centrino Mobile 1.73GHz Pentium M processor 740 with 2MB of level 2 cache and a 533MHz front side bus. For the slightly less technically minded it handled everything I asked it to do rapidly and without any substantial delays apart from when I asked it to open something while still booting and then it more or less said wait your turn. The unit does support standby and hibernation but just shutting the lid turns off the screen and opening it again has you back working where you were within three seconds. This action of course aids security as if you have a password set it needs to be entered and of course improves battery life as the screen is off. I used it in this manner with it being used for around 90 minutes with lots of short uses a total of around 30minutes of use in Word and used only 20% of battery so that way you should get around 6 or more hours of use per charge.

See also: Laptops

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The optical drive is a DVD writer both + and - formats and it also supports dual layer. As stated in my recent review of the Dell unit, not quite sure why a DVD writer is required on a notebook but here if you use it as a Desktop Replacement there is more reason for one, same warning as with the Dell using DVD or CD writing while on batteries will cut battery life.

I found I got around 135 minutes when using the unit for a raft of work including some wireless Internet use. Recharge time from total discharge was almost the same as use. Boot up was around 55seconds and full shutdown (switch off) was around 15 seconds. When used on batteries the normal processor speed is 795MHz. This unit comes with a whole raft of software and 12GB of your 93.1GB hard disc is already occupied I note that you already have over 130,000 files. I know this only because when Norton Internet Security does it's first scan it told me so.

So now a very deep breath while I tell you about the sockets that surround the unit. Firstly should you be a really heavy user there is a connection on the side for an HP dock (Expansion Port 2) This left side of the notebook also sports power input, modem and LAN, two USB2 and a four pin FireWire port, next is a 6 in 1 card socket and a double PCMCIA slot. The back of the unit has nothing enabling the notebook to sit close to a wall or other solid object.

The front is also sparse with the Altec Lansing speakers dominating along with five indicator lights in one housing and the open unit latch. The right side has the DVD unit, headphone and external microphone sockets, two further USB2 sockets the external video and PS/2, finally a Kensington lock anchor point.

There is an 86key keyboard with 11cm in front with 8x8cm trackpad in the centre of this space. I found the slightly raised left/right mouse buttons strange to begin with. The on/off button and five others are behind the keyboard in the final 4cm of space.

A whole raft of Microsoft software including Works Suite (this includes Microsoft Word) and other goodies such as Encarta, AutoRoute, Money and Picture It! as well as several programs bearing the Sonic name. This is where a good chunk of the 12GB of used hard disc space went.

This is a very full featured unit, I used both wireless and wired connections to the Internet and was more than happy with the download speeds. I did the long Norton Internet Security downloads using wireless as I was testing the Netgear MIMO modem that was reviewed on the 1/3/06.

The stated price from HP is £899 and the link from their site takes you to Micro Anvika link below.

http://www.microanvika.com/hp/product.asp?TXT=INFO&PNO=HEW14095&ref=hp&cam=HEW14095&key=13

http://h10010.www1.hp.com/wwpc/uk/en/ho/WF06b/21675-38187-38191-38191-38191-12256050-64829181.html