In the "Sweetspot."
Written: Jul 08 '01 (Updated Jul 08 '01)
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Pros: Solid and usable. Price.
Cons: Lacking some "consumer" touchs.
The Bottom Line: It's not the flashiest, but is an extremely usable laptop, that is currently available at a great price.
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| bergebo's Full Review: Hewlett Packard OmniBook 6000 (F2150WT) PC Noteboo... |
In an effort to avoid paying huge prices for a top of the line notebook, I settled on an Omnibook 6000 for the grand total of $1350. Compared to the "est." price listed here of $3799, it's easy to see what waiting 6 months to a year can do for you in the notebook market. On to the specs.
1.) Processor/Memory. I got the Mobil P3 700 Mhz which steps down to ~550 MHz when running on batteries. Should be good for another year plus. Two memory bays are available, which had one 128MB module. I purchased a second for around $60 and now have 256MB.
2.) Screen/Video. A 14 inch XGA-TFT screen is powered by an ATI Mobility M/M1 graphics controller with 2X AGP. Native resolution is 1024x768. The screen is pretty good, with no bad pixels. Plenty bright, with a bit of darkness in the extreme corners. The video has only 8MB, which is O.K. for mainstream apps, but graphic gurus and gamers would suffer.
3.) Hard Drive and Storage. Mine has a 10GB removable drive. Other options up to 20GB are available. One bay accommodates a Toshiba 6X DVD with a 3.5" drive which can be swapped or used externally if you need to have both active at the same time.
4.) Audio and ports. Typically, laptops suffer in this category, and the Omnibook is no exception. A no-name 16 bit Sound Blaster compatible drives two crappy speakers. Using the headphone-out jack to a pair of powered desktop speakers yields decent sound to watch a DVD in the hotel, give a presentation, etc. A nice touch is external volume/mute controls on the right side of the unit. A standard compliment of ports is lessened by only one USB port, one mouse/keyboard port and no TV-Out, although VGA is included. PC Card support is one Type 3 or two Type 2's. All buttons and ports have a decent feel and are laid out well.
5.) Keyboard/Pointing. I've never had much success touch-typing on laptops, but this one is O.K., with an 87-key full-19mm spacing keyboard. Typically, some keys are cramped and require you to look for them, such as the delete key. I'm a fan of pointing sticks, and when used in conjunction with a touchpad, I can eliminate the need to attach a mouse, which I'll typically do using a touchpad only system. I love the middle button below the pointing stick, which acts as a scroll button.
6.) Communication. 56K internal modem and ethernet. Increasingly important as more users go to broadband and home networking.
7.) Size/weight. With the 14" screen, the unit measures 12.4 x 10.4 x 1.25 inches. It weighs in at a tad over 5 pounds. Nothing earth-shattering here, as these are in line with other laptops in this category.
8.) Power/battery. Battery life is rated at 3.5 hours, I've gotten nearer to three, which is not bad. The fast charge feature shoots the remaining power to about 80% in a tad over an hour, while it takes another hour to get to 100%.
9.) Support. HP's website for this model is outstanding, with drivers available by OS, either singly or packaged. Being a "corporate-class" product, it is completely compatible with Win2K, which has decent support for power consumption and such. The warranty is a ho-hum one year.
10.) Feel and usability. Enough about specs, here's how it feels. Nothing feels "cheapy", as some of their consumer electronics are. The cover is stylish, with a "titanium" swath covering about 3/4's of the top. The rest of the cover and front edges have a "ruggedized" plastic, which allows me to take off the kid gloves and use it like the mobil PC that it is. I'm impressed with HP, as I didn't expect the well-engineered aspects of the unit.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 1350
Operating System: Windows
Processor: Intel Pentium III
Processor speed: 601-700
Screen Size: 14
RAM: 128
Internal Storage: DVD
Hard Drive (GB): 13-20
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Epinions.com ID:
bergebo
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Location: Cedarburg, WI
Reviews written: 4
Trusted by: 0 members
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