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Awards 2007 - A Laptop For Every Season

Posted by Ian Bandy

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It's time for this year's awards and some sterling penmanship from the quill of reporter Ian Bandy. Laptops from Asus, Dell, Toshiba, PC MicroWorks have all made the cut.

The four seasonsWhat a year2007 has been, when we think that just a decade ago laptops werean ultra expensive item, about as aesthetically pleasing as a breeze block and with barely more processing power. Yet here we are and attractive, innovative notebooks are everywhere we look, withthe humble desktop often taking a back seat as powerfulportability rules.

How have we reached "Laptopical's Laptop Awards" for 2007 soquickly? The year seems to have come and gone in a blink of aneye, the seasons have passed as if they were weekend visitorsonly.

Now, if each of our awards winners were a season, which wouldthey be?
Spring is atime for new beginnings, the light winds and longer sunlit daystake the hand of winter and draw us to a warmer future, if theEee PC 701 was aseason it would be spring. This lightweight, easy to use, ultraportable is exactly what laptops were when they first startedout. It's not a desktop replacement or a machine that could runthe latest DX10 game without breaking into a sweat.

Indeed, it has middling hard drive space, a tiny 7 inch screenand not even a sniff of a mainstream operating system from Appleor Windows. However, for all of this it sticks to its principalsand fills the niche that exists for people who just want a basicsetup that they can get to grips with straight away. Novices haveno need to trawl through the net for a slight system tweak thatwill make their experience bearable. Simple computing from thechaps at Asus with a streamlined linux OS at a bargain price.That's worth any award going.

As our thoughts turn to Summer, we think of rest, sun, sea andthe thinning of the workload for a bit, and with the Portege R500series you can't get much slimmer. These feather lightToshiba laptops are thinner than a gangster's alibi. Theimpossibly light R500-S5001X limbos in at a tiny 1.72 poundswhile only sacrificing an optical drive in its makeup. In the heat of summer, slim and beautiful is the way to go on the beach.

Autumn brings the falling of leaves, a cold snap to the air andthoughts of hibernation. As the cold spectre of winter beginsknocking on the door making us want to stock up with provisionsto get us through the harsh months. The Black-Hawk XR5 is allyou would need to lead you through those austere times. It hasbeefy specifications and enough RAM, an industry leading 5120 MB,to make sure that every program you throw at its Intel Core 2Quad processor can easily be accommodated. With 3G broadbandbuilt in, 2 top of the range NVIDIA graphics cards, a host ofconnection ports and a widescreen 17 inch display, you'll have agaming laptop that will make sure you emerge from hibernationwith a broad smile on your pasty face.

As the year draws to an end and the snow starts to fall, JackFrost is nipping at our toes and wallets, and sleigh bells can beheard faintly on the chilly horizon, Winter arrives and holdsdominion over us all, especially our wallets drained by theexcesses of summer holidays and autumn extravagances. It's timeto batten down the hatches and endure. If the Vostro 1000was a season it would have to be winter. Rolling in under $500this workman like Dell notebook is just the thing to get the jobdone when you need steady performance but not heavy cost. Thereare no superfluous bells and whistles to grab the attention ofnoobs who also think that the size of speakers is directlycorrelated with the quality of sound produced by them.

A solid laptop with a spill resistant surface speaks of a life ofwork not play for this unpretentious machine. The Vostro 1000won't turn heads at parties, but will be cooking the sausagerolls and handing out the Ferrero Roche to grateful guests. Delldeserves a big pat on the back for producing this workhorsesystem to keep the budget conscious road warrior happy.

So there we are four outstanding laptops in a field ofsignificant maturity in the notebook market this year, with abright 2008 just around the corner. Christmas greetings and avery happy and prosperous New Year to you all.

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