Games notebooks play

GIZMO GALLERY

LG is making no mistakes with its latest P300 notebook. An impressive T8300 Penryn processor, NVIDIA 8600M GS graphics card with 256MB dedicated memory (a rarity nowadays) and high-gloss 13.3 inch backlit LCD is a formidable hardware package offered by LG.

All of that alongside 2GB of RAM and a proper 250GB SATA hard drive packed into a case that also doesn’t skimp on ports. Simply put, Microsoft’s Vista is fast, snappy, responsive, quiet and never overloaded. This particular choice of GPU also makes the P300 potentially more power demanding but not powerful enough to be a truly compelling gaming option.

The XNote P300 notebook dares the Apple MacBook Air and Lenovo Thinkpad X300 — both in size and weight — managing to knock the air out of both. When it comes to performance, P300 seems a tough one to beat. It weighs around 1.6 kilograms, which is less than both the MacBook Air and the X300.

Given the amount of typing an average executive manages in one work day, a keyboard can make or break a notebook’s credibility. The ThinkPad X300 actually uses the same keyboard found on Lenovo’s 14 and 15-inch models, which is not the condensed keyboard found on previous X series models and many ultraportable laptops from other manufacturers. P300 has a spacious keyboard too but nothing to write home about.

The X300’s superiority (at least in terms of features) continues over the MacBook Air, which only has one USB port and wireless LAN to its name. Lenovo’s bundled software helps improve the Windows experience on X300, taking its value proposition a nick ahead. For instance, the Rescue and Recovery interface that boots up the X300 and offers some very simple options: restore from a previous backup, go back to the factory fresh disk image, or copy files to an external drive.

LG manages to come close with its Intelligent Update programme, which updates all hardware drivers and the BIOS as well. Looks as if LG has dissected the Apple Mac and Vista, creating this level of synergy between the operating system and hardware. Talk of performance and speed to load programmes, LG beats both Lenovo and Apple hands down. It managed to load Photoshop CS3 in 8 smooth seconds! (Others clocked around 10-15 seconds)

While gaming, the LG P300 can get very hot. Being such a small notebook with a very powerful processor and graphics card, the heat had nowhere to go but out the vents and into the thin metal case. Most of this heat dissipates once gaming was completed, but it would be very toasty during gameplay. The X300 is well-cooled thermodynamically.

A major disappointment for the LG P300 is the lack of a robust battery — it barely manages around 3 hours of workload. Seemingly, no notebook seems to come close to Thinkpad X300’s 6 hours of battery, but for such a thin and light notebook to offer near desktop-replacement performance capabilities, P300 deserves the title of ‘most capable machine’.