PortableOne UX Review

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Introduction

Robin Williams in Disney's Aladdin could have been describing the PortableOne UX when he said, “Phenomenal cosmic power.....itty-bitty living space.”  Perhaps that is a bit of an overstatement, but the Portableone UX packs a lot of power in a tiny frame.  PortableOne rebrands notebooks from various ODMs.  In this case, the UX is a rebranded Clevo M520N.  However, they made some modifications on the original design:

• Placed customized touchpad improver on touchpad
• Added the “Air Vortex”, High-Xchange efficiency copper molding heat sink with heat pipes and Arctic Silver
• Removed ports on the back of the notebook to drop weight

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PortableOne UX Specs as reviewed:

• Processor:   Intel Core 2 Duo T7200 (2.0 Ghz)
• Memory:   Kingston 2 GB 667 MHz DDR2
• Hard Drive:  Hitachi 100 GB @ 7200RPM SATA
• Graphics:   Intel GMA 950 (Integrated)
• Display:   12.1” WXGA (1280x800) Glossy (Manufacturer ID:  MS_A34C)
• Wireless:   Built-In Intel PRO/Wireless 3945 A/B/G with Bluetooth
• Optical Drive:  Dual-Layer DVDRW drive
• Dimensions:   11.4” (width) x 8.5” (depth) x .98-1.26” (height – not including feet)
• Weight:   4 lb with 4-cell battery; 4.5 lb with 8-cell
• 1.3 Megapixel Rotating Webcam
• Batteries:   4-cell (2400mAh), 8-cell (4400mAh) both at 14.8V
• Operating System:  Windows Vista Business

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What's in the Box?

• 1 x PortableOne UX Notebook
• 1 x 4-cell Battery
• 1 x 8-cell Battery
• 1 x Carrying Case
• 1 x OEM Copy of Vista Business (not a recovery cd!)
• 1 x Driver CD
• 1 x Ethernet Cable
• 1 x 1 GB PQI Flash Drive
• 1 x Cyberlink PowerDVD CD
• 1 x Nero CD
• 1 x User Manual

Design and Build Quality

Simple and sleek are the words that come to mind when I look at the UX.  It is all silver, except for the black on the bottom of the notebook and on the trim around the LCD.  I like the fact that the edges tend to be rounded so that it doesn't have the boxy look that a lot of business notebooks have.  I also appreciate the bamboo hinge look that is similar to the Asus W3J.  Its circular nature helps make the notebook seem less “square”.  The brushed metal name plate is also a very nice touch.  I even like how they added the silver accents on the 8-cell battery that mimic the accents on the hinge, blending it into the general looks of the notebook. 

However, not everything is perfect.  One thing I noticed was that the keyboard was not level.  The left part of the spacebar and the right arrow key are raised a millimeter or two above the rest of the keys.  It isn't nearly as bad as the warped keyboard on my N3530, and is probably a problem that is isolated to this unit.  Another minor cosmetic flaw is that the back of the notebook doesn't look very nice due to the missing ports.  In place of the ports, there are black rubber covers that aren't that appealing.  But again, it isn't a huge deal. 

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As for the build quality, the UX feels very solid.  From what I have been told, the only two areas that lack the magnesium alloy are the palm rests and the plastic frame around the LCD (note:  the back of the LCD does have magnesium alloy, and the difference in material is visibly noticeable).  The main reason for not including magnesium alloy in the palm rests was to avoid the shock problem that has been documented with the Sony SZ series. 

Anyway, there seems to be very little flex.  If I put a decent amount of pressure on the palm rest, there is minimal amount of flex of maybe a millimeter or two.  There is noticeable flex on the LCD, but not to the point where I would feel it would be problematic.  If you press hard enough, you can produce a small ripple one the upper portion of the screen.  The hinges on this notebook feel sturdy.  When I shake the notebook, the screen does not wobble. 

Compared to my massive Fujitsu N3530, the UX seems minuscule in comparison.  However, I found that I was quite comfortable with the screen size.  Though it seems to weigh a little more than other popular ultraportables (e.g. Thinkpad X60), it certainly offers more.  Unlike other ultraportables, it actually has an optical drive and a touchpad (no pointing stick, though).  Also, it has more ports and a media card reader.  To fit all that in addition to a magnesium alloy casing in 4 lb is not bad.

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Screen

The UX has a 12.1” WXGA glossy screen.  It is fairly similar to other notebooks of its size in terms of screen quality.  The screen is quite bright.  In fact, I have gotten used to working on it on one notch above minimum brightness, though one or two below max brightness is the most comfortable.  One point that I should note is that its color reproduction was somewhat different than the color reproduction on my N3530.  For example, the blue text of the forum names in NBR is a lighter blue than on the N3530.  Since I am no expert, I have no idea which notebook properly represents the colors.

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As you can see from these pictures, there is some light leakage.  Note that the camera tends to exaggerate the light leakage a bit.

Fujitsu N3530 on the left, Portableone UX on the right (view large image)

Considering that the white seems even across the screen (the picture inaccurately may show some darkness), the backlight is evenly lit throughout the screen.

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Unsurprisingly, horizontal viewing angles are good, but vertical viewing angles are all pretty bad.

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Input and Output Ports and Additional Features

Although the UX is an ultraportable, it surprisingly has a decent amount of ports.

Left side of PortableOne UX (view large image)

• 2 x 2.0 USB ports
• 1 x IEEE 1394 Firewire port
• 1 x VGA port
• 1 x PCMCIA Card Slot
• 1 x RJ45 port (Ethernet)

Right side view of PortableOne UX (view large image)

• 1 x USB port
• 1 x Headphone Jack
• 1 x Microphone Jack
• 1 x Internal Microphone
• 1 x S/PDIF Out

Back side view of PortableOne UX (view large image)

• 1 x RJ11 port (Modem)
• 1 x S-Video Port

Front view of PortableOne UX (view large image)

• 1 x 4-in-1 card reader

Unfortunately, the card reader doesn't support xD card, which is what my camera uses.  Near the front, there are also 3 LED indicators.  The first light on the left shows whether or not the notebook is on AC power.  The next one shows the battery charging status.  It isn't lit when you are not working on AC.  It changes to orange when the battery is charging.  Green shows that the battery is fully charged.  The third LED shows wireless status.  It is blank when neither wifi nor bluetooth is on.  It is orange when only wifi is on, and green when only bluetooth is on.  It turns a yellowish color when both wifi and bluetooth are on.

At the top of the keyboard area, there are four buttons.  The first one on the left is to open up an email client (Thunderbird in this case).  The second is to open your web browser (Mozilla Firefox).  The last of the small ones opens up the webcam software.

As for the webcam...it's okay, I guess.  The image quality is subpar.  The colors are washed out, and the pictures are dark.  The settings on the software don't really improve picture quality.  However, it is nice that the webcam is rotational.  If you're one of those kids that for some reason, likes to record lectures, you can just flip the camera and type while recording.  It can do both stills and video.

Picture taken with web cam (view large image)

Keyboard and Touchpad

Like most other ultraportables, the keyboard is slightly cramped.  According to my crude measurements the keys are approximately one millimeter shorter in height and width than your average notebook keyboard.  There is a little flex on the keyboard that is completely unnoticeable when typing.  The shallow key travel is also quite comfortable for me, but some may prefer to have a longer key stroke.  My biggest gripe with the keyboard is that they shrunk the “,” “.” “/” keys even further.  I would rather have a shorter left shift than have those specific keys shrunk.

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The cool thing about the UX touchpad is that it has an extra layer...and you can't even tell.  The customized touchpad improver seamlessly blends into the notebook.  Since it is a good bit thinner than the non-customized touchpad improvers, the sensitivity decrease is less of a problem, though still noticeable.  Its texture is also less grainy than the original touchpad improvers, making it easier to move across the touchpad.  One problem that I ran into is scrolling.  For some reason, the area doesn't always pick up my scrolls.  If I want to make sure it works, it seems that I have to have my finger all the way to the right edge of the touchpad with part of my finger not even touching the pad, if I want the scrolling to register properly.  I should also mention that the touchpad is shorter than normal touchpads, which may problematic for some.  The buttons themselves were a little stiff. 

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Audio

When I first received this notebook, the audio was abysmal.  With the notebook on my lap, I could barely hear a thing.  But with a helpful tip from Ivan at P1, I got the audio up to an agreeable volume.  Basically, I went to the Realtek Audio Manager and changed the equalization setting to powerful and voila! I have decent audio volume.  I would still recommend headphones because notebooks just don't have great speakers.

Heat and Noise

Regrettably, heat and noise are not the strong points of this notebook.  However, when evaluating this subject matter, one has to understand the drawbacks of shoving high powered components into a small chassis.  When you are using a larger notebook, say a 15.4”, the notebook can support a larger, more efficient cooling system.  There is also a larger area for heat and sound to dissipate.  When you take the same components and put it into a smaller frame, the smaller notebook has to push its cooling system harder to achieve similar temperatures.  Furthermore, the heat produced by those components becomes more easily felt because the heat has less space to dissipate into.  The end result is a warmer, louder notebook.

This notebook tends to almost always be a bit warm.  The keyboard/palmrest area is only slightly warm with the left portion being warmer than the right.  It definitely doesn't get uncomfortably warm.  I have typed on this for hours without being bothered by the warmth felt on the keys and palmrest.  On the other hand, the bottom of the notebook can get quite toasty.  In order to improve the cooling of the internal components, PortableOne implemented the “Air Vortex”.  Mainly, they replaced a portion of the bottom with a more heat conducting magnesium alloy with larger holes for better air flow.  The metal part also works as passive cooling, drawing heat from the components around it.  The problem is that the metallic segment becomes quite warm as it absorbs heat.  With pants on, the notebook was a very warm, bordering on hot.  Regardless, I could still bare through typing with it on my lap for a few hours.  I do not think I would be able to stand the heat without some sort of barrier between me and the laptop.  Using some sort of heat insulator (e.g. the iLap) is recommended.

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The noise produced by this notebook comes from three main sources:  the fan, the hard drive, and the cpu.  Because this is a high performing laptop in a small form factor, the fan is always on.  From the looks of it, there is only a single fan to cool the system.  Compared to other notebook fan noise, this one sounds a bit more grating, like the sound of a box fan versus the sound of a car air conditioner.  On low usage (word processing, web surfing), the fan noise is audible, but not too bothersome.  However, when on high load, the fans become quite loud...almost as loud as my fans on my old notebook with the lap-burning pentium 4. 

The hard drive in this notebook is the Hitachi Travelstar 100 GB 7200 RPM.  While using my Fujitsu N3530 (80 GB 5400RPM Fujitsu HD), I literally forgot what sounds a hard drive made.  When people complained about loud hard drives on the forums, I couldn't even imagine what that could possibly sound like.  Unfortunately, I was quickly reminded of the irksome clicking of hard drives when I received the UX.  Hitachi's 7200RPM hard drives are among the fastest in the market, but you sacrifice quietness for performance. 

Much to my chagrin, the UX also exhibits the dreaded CPU whine.  Because the fans continue to run even after the notebook goes to sleep, I knew this high-pitched whine wasn't due to the fans when the whine disappeared after I closed the lid.  Furthermore, when I was browsing web pages, the sound would stutter to the page scrolling.  What makes things worse is that it is audible only when you are running on battery, which is usually when you want your notebook to be more silent than usual.

Experimenting with RMClock

So is there a way to reduce the heat and noise?  Luckily, the answer is yes.  With the help of a nifty little utility called RMClock, we can reduce fan noise, lower CPU temperature, and even rid ourselves of the pesky CPU whine.  RMClock can do all this by altering the way the CPU operates. 

Undervolting is a common way of reducing heat output in notebooks.  I would have used NHC because it was software I was comfortable with, but of course, it gave me a blue screen of death when I tried to run it in Vista.  With some help from our resident sage, John Ratsey, I got RMClock up and running.  I used CPU Burn In for 20 minutes to stress the processor and raise the CPU temperature.  Here are the results:

Voltage	Core 0 Temp at Max Load
1.237v (Default)	71C
1.137v	65C
1.050v	63C
.987v	61C

As you can see, undervolting gives a significant drop in temperature.  It also means that the fan doesn't have to work as hard to keep the notebook cool.  Thus, there is a marked decrease in fan noise as well. 

The CPU whine can also easily be fixed.  A quick NBR forum search will show you that the CPU whine surfaces when the CPU enters the C3 sleep state (a power saving state).  So how do you stop the whine?  You keep the CPU from entering that sleep state.  You can do this by checking the box to “run HLT command when OS is idle” in the management settings. 

Just like almost every good thing in life, it has its drawbacks.  Undervolting can cause your system to be unstable.  For example, when I finished testing the .987v, the CPU went haywire.  I kept going from 0 to 100% repeatedly, causing major system instability until I rebooted the computer.  In addition, I have gotten different measurements for the loads and clock/throttle speeds in the different runs of CPU Burn In.  If you plan on undervolting, it is suggested that you run some sort of stress test with error reporting for many hours to ensure stability.

Running the HLT command also causes its share of problems.  Because it essentially disables a power saving state, you are destined to lose some battery life.  In the case of the UX, approximately 30 minutes is lost.  Vista seems to have an issue with this command as well.  If you use the Vista sidebar CPU usage meter, running the HLT command on OS idle will cause the meter to read 100% all the time, even on idle.

Performance and Benchmarks

This notebook flies.  Granted, you certainly won't be able to game with this, but it will perform well on any application that doesn't require a dedicated GPU.  FYI, you DO NOT need a dedicated GPU for Vista.  This little system handles Vista without an issue (well...at least performance wise).

SuperPi Benchmark Results

Notebook	Time
PortableOne UX (2.0 GHz Core 2 Duo)	1m 04s
MSI M677 (1.8 GHz Turion X2)	1m 53s
Fujitsu LifeBook N6420 (2.00GHz Core 2 Duo)	1m 02s
LG S1 (2.16 GHz Core Duo)	1m 11s
Dell Inspiron e1505 (2.0GHz Core Duo)	1m 16s
Lenovo ThinkPad T60 (2.0GHz Core Duo)	1m 18s
Toshiba Satellite M100 (2.00GHz Core Duo)	1m 18s
Samsung X60 (1.66GHz Core Duo)	1m 29s
Sony VAIO FS680 (1.86 GHz Pentium M)	1m 53s

 

PCMark05 Results

Notebook	PCMark05 Score
PortableOne UX (2.0GHz Core 2 Duo, Intel GMA 950)	3,607 PCMarks
Fujtisu Siemens Amilo Xi1554 Review (2.0GHz Core 2 Duo, ATI X1900, Windows XP)	5,066 PCMarks
Fujitsu LifeBook N6420 (2.00GHz Core 2 Duo, ATI X1600)	4,621 PCMarks
Fujitsu LifeBook N6410 (1.66GHz Core Duo, ATI X1400)	3,487 PCMarks
Sony Vaio SZ-110B in Speed Mode (Using Nvidia GeForce Go 7400)	3,637 PCMarks
Asus Z84Jp (2.16GHz Core 2 Duo, Nvidia Go 7600)	4,739 PCMarks
Asus V6J (1.86GHz Core Duo T2400)	3,646 PCMarks
Alienware M7700 (AMD Athlon FX-60, Nvidia Go 7800GTX)	5,597 PCMarks

Comparison Results for 3Dmark05

Notebook	3D Mark 05 Results
PortableOne UX (2.0GHz Core 2 Duo, Intel GMA 950)	590 3DMarks
Alienware Aurora M-7700(AMD Dual Core FX-60, ATI X1600 256MB)	7,078 3D Marks
Lenovo ThinkPad T60 (2.0GHz Core Duo, ATI X1400 128MB)	2,092 3D Marks
Asus V6Va (2.13 GHz Pentium M, ATI x700 128 MB)	2,530 3D Marks
Fujitsu n6410 (1.66 GHz Core Duo, ATI X1400 128MB)	2,273 3DMarks
HP Pavilion dv4000 (1.86 GHz Pentium M, ATI X700 128MB)	2,536 3D Marks
Dell XPS M1210 (2.16 GHz Core Duo, nVidia Go 7400 256MB)	2,090 3D Marks

 

HDTune Hard Drive results (view large image)

 

Windows Vista Experience Performance Index score

Battery Life

The UX comes with two batteries, a 4-cell and 8-cell battery. On battery saver mode and with screen brightness at one notch above minimum, I got 2 hours with the 4-cell and about 4 hours with the 8-cell.  It is somewhat disappointing, especially since they advertise up to 8 hours on the 8-cell with the ULV processor.  However, considering the components in the machine and the fact that the fans are constantly on, I think that 4 hours is not good, not bad, but reasonable.

One thing to mention about the power adapter is that it is fairly small and doesn’t really add too much extra weight.

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Software

Vista Business is the OS that comes with the UX.  I have to say that I have some mixed feelings about Vista.  I hate how certain programs that I like using, such as NHC, aren't compatible.  A lot of programs have yet to be “Vista-compatible” so even if they function, they function with glitches (e.g. RMClock).  I couldn't even get Adobe Reader 8.0 to install.  I had to go to Properties &gt; Compatibility and switch it to XP.  This doesn't seem to work for most programs, sadly.  Another problem I had was that the computer would not properly go to sleep when I closed the lid with the webcam on.  When I would open up the screen there is just a blank screen, and I have to power it down.  Luckily, Microsoft/P1 have fixed this issue.  Finally, Ready Boost didn't want to work with my USB drives (not the one included with notebook) even though they met the requirements.  I decided not to pursue it further because Anandtech has shown that Ready Boost doesn't really help with high performance systems such as the UX.

It's not all bad.  Vista has some interesting features that I wished XP had, other than the pretty looks.  I really like how easily the power options are accessible in the tray icons.  Moreover, I think it's great that you can easily change the different things to power down.  For example, if I really needed good wifi signal while on battery, I could change my settings to keep wifi on max performance and power down another feature that I didn't need as much.  Another cool feature is the ability to partition on the fly.  If you right click on Computer (start menu) &gt; Manage &gt; Disk Management, you have the option to delete and create new partitions.  You can also shrink and expand existing partitions.  One shortcoming is that you can only expand your most recently created partition.

The P1 UX is essentially bloatware free.  Other than the drivers, the only other software included was Firefox, Thunderbird, the camera software, and VCOM7 (anti-virus, and maintenance utilities).  They do not even install the CD burning programs that they include disks for.   The Inspice Trace software is part of the package, but it is not pre-installed or on CD.  It is something that you have to set up with PortableOne.

Customer Support

Yeah...I know.  You're thinking that I really can't comment on this because I have a review unit, instead of a system purchased directly from PortableOne.  Admittedly, they were very responsive to my questions and problems, but I honestly do not think it was a guise.  What really surprises me about P1 versus some other resellers is that they actually listen to their customers problems and work with the notebook manufacturer to make a change.  When their customers complained about how frequently the fans changed speeds (and thus, noise), they contacted Clevo and worked jointly to produce a new bios that reduced the amount of times the fan speed changed.  When I told them about my sleep problem, they immediately identified the webcam as the culprit and told me that new drivers were on its way to fix this.  Even though Microsoft was supposed to fix it, they went ahead and made their own driver fix. 

Conclusion

The PortableOne UX is meant for the power user on the go.  It is a great fit for the traveling photographer who needs a durable and portable notebook, and one that can also run Photoshop without a glitch.  I don't think it is the best choice for a student who needs a portable email and word processing machine that they can use at the library.  Although I am not what you would call a power user, I still enjoyed using the UX so much that it’s somewhat difficult to readjust to my large N3530.

Pros:

• The design is elegant
• It has good performance
• It feels sturdy
• P1 adds a second layer on the touchpad that is removable once it wears
• There is no bloatware
• PortableOne will give you top notch customer service

Qualms:

• The keyboard was slightly crooked on certain areas
• There is some light leakage and the screen has poor vertical viewing angles....but then again, so does every other notebook
• The card reader doesn't support my xD card
• The webcam's quality is fairly subpar
• The keyboard is cramped with some important keys even smaller than the other keys
• The scroll function on the touchpad doesn't always register
• I would have liked a little more battery life with the 8-cell battery

Cons:

• It is very warm on the bottom, making it uncomfortable to use the notebook on your lap
• It is quite noisy (loud fan, relatively loud hard drive, and CPU whine)

 

Very good review ejl! Nice picture of yourself btw.
Tim

 

Nice, thorough review ejl. I love the bunny .

 

The question is always asked what machines you can get with performance in an ultraportable size, and this is one of them. Well, it's not ultraportable in the sense it weighs 3lbs like I believe a true ultraportable classification worthy laptop should, but it's certainly going to be easy enough to carry around in a backpack.

The port selection is strong for this sized notebook. I see nothing lacking, the ExpressCard versus PCMCIA choice is up for debate but at this point I think it's half a dozen of this and six of another really.

And while the laptop itself is a strong offering overall, when you buy a laptop remember you're buying into a company as well. Certainly you can be confident when going with P1. Their feedback in the forums here and from everyone I've spoken to is nothing but praise.

 

thanks you for great review
I have a little request would you pls tell me specifically how to undervolt your CPU,i did a google search on NBR but the result doesnt suit me much
@mods:i know this post seems a off-topic,pls forgive me

 

it's a shame the camera couldn't depict the vivid pink of my hair or the purple of my inner ear lobe.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=113653&highlight=rmclock

here is the thread where i talked it out with john ratsey. to change the clock speeds, you should click on the highest multiplier. when you do this, a greyed out box should ungrey itself and you should be able to change the voltage. then go to a specific profile and check off the p-state box. i chose power on demand. for that profile, you can click all the voltages. don't mess with the throttle.

 

Thanks for the review, ejl.

Sounds as though the Portable One is nothing special.

The heat and fan issues point to bad thermal design, bad ACPI implementation, or most likely, both.

Similar sized notebooks from Toshiba (U205), Dell (XPS M1210) and Sony (SZ) don't seem to have this problem. In fact, they weigh about the same or less than the Portable One while carrying a higher capacity battery (and the Sony and Dell do it with a discrete GeForce 7400 GPU), so the size/weight of the POUX is not impressive by comparison.

Oh, and all 3 notebooks above have full 19mm pitch on their keyboards, so the 18 mm pitch on the POUX is...a pox!

Back port hack job looks like something Doctor Frankenstein would have done.

The battery life sounds atrocious (most likely because of the ACPI problem).

I'm hoping the battery life and fan noise issue can be fixed with a BIOS update, but it seems as if the thermal design of the notebook is just not good enough to run the fans silent. As to why the fans are still running in sleep state... @_@. Simply unforgivable.

 

Great review - very thorough. I like how you get two batteries.

I think its a good battery life though, considering your are using the full size T7200 processor, right?

Hey - that's not a unicorn in the picture!

 

you seem to be misunderstanding. first, the heat is only really felt on the bottom. what is most important is that the internal components are cool. thus, the ux designers has chosen to release more heat into the chassis and have the fans on higher keep things on the inside cooler. not to mention on low usage fan noise isn't bad. it is more when it is on high. not to mention that the xps 1210 and sony sz are not completely quiet. plus, both systems have larger frames. fan noise and heat isn't a problem isolated to the the ux when it comes to ultraportables. the fujitsu p7230 manages to stay cool, but it has loud fans and much lower performance parts. the thinkpad x60 has quiet fans, but according to the review, runs somewhat hot.

as for the battery, people are mistaken in correlating a specific number of cells to a specific amount of battery life. what is important is the actual rating (mah). for example, the q35 has a 6-cell battery, but it has a higher rating than the 8-cell in the p1, thus has longer battery life. you can argue that perhaps they should have had a higher rating in their 8-cell, but considering the rating it has, the battery is actually quite decent and not what i would call bad.

as for the fan noise after sleep, that is a function of how hot the notebook is when you shut it off. it certainly isn't on the entire time it is asleep. i sincerely apologize if that is what i have mislead others into thinking. basically, if it was on high load, it will run for a minute or two after closing. if it was on low load, it will run only a couple of seconds after the lid is closed.

 

A very interesting and informative review although, as always, I thirst for more of the less details such as what model optical, what power rating for that small PSU.

"resident sage" - I hope Google picks that up! I'll just note in the RMclock context that the Prime95 torture test (assuming it runs under Vista) will usually pick up CPU instability and then stop itself before the rest of the computer notices a problem. Run two copies to load both cores.

I can't avoid making mental comparisons with my Samsung Q35 with its lowly T5600 (although a T7200 version is available). The UX has an extra USB port, the S-Video port and a second RAM slot but I get another hour of battery time and a computer that looks significantly slimmer. When will Samsung start selling them on the west of the "pond"?

While I wouldn't want the performance hit of one of the ULV CPUs, these 12" machines are the logical home for Intels intermediate (so called LV) CPUs, the L7200 and L7400 which could well give a good balance between performance and battery life.

John

 

Nice Review!

Lots of power in a 12.1" is always great although I think it could have done just fine without the ports removed.

And an expresscard slot rather than PCMCIA.

 

Actually, I was more interested in the *life* of the battery, being its primary function after all.

The XPS M1210 gets about 4.5 hrs battery life (repeatable result here), and the sony SZ reportedly got around 4 hrs according to the notebookreview uh, review. I tested my Portégé (C2D1.83) with Battery Eater Pro and got 4.3 hrs in Reader's mode with wifi on.

The point is that with the *standard* battery, the one where all the notebooks I mentioned weigh the same or less than the POUX with its 4-cell battery, all 3 other notebooks outperform the POUX on battery life with its *extended battery*.

None of them are too hot to use on your lap (I use my toshiba on my lap when I'm in shorts). The toshiba is also said to be remarkably quiet (I can attest to my personal unit on this at least), and I haven't heard any complaints about noise on the other two either.

I'm not trying to pick on you or the laptop, but so far, I haven't seen anything on the POUX that would personally make me rate it favourably. Of course, I don't know how much it cost you*, but unless it's significantly cheaper than the XPS, I'd find it hard to recommend it to anyone in good conscience.

Cheers,
V.

* EDIT: Ouch. I just saw a quote for the POUX for $1499USD with a C2D 1.66. That's a ridiculously high price for a below-average laptop. Tell me I'm not dreaming, someone. I've been trying very hard to come up with some good points for the laptop, and the only thing I can say interests me is the transflective screen (didn't realise it came with one - don't see it mentioned in the review). Yes, I know it comes with 2 batteries, but that's no good if both of them are useless .

EDIT 2: The transflective screen costs a whopping $369 extra?? @_@.
Nobody promised this tech would be cheap, but that's just....wow. So scratch the t'flective screen off my wishlist.

 

i tried to figure out what model optical drive i had on everest, but didn't recognize the string of letters it gave me. i probably should have googled or just asked ivan.

as for the psu, it didn't list the wattage only the voltage, though again, i probably should have just asked ivan. the stopped selling it with the on low voltage option they had before....i wonder if they will add the option once the c2d ulv processors come out.

well, you seem to forget that it also has a magnesium alloy body, which both the toshiba and dell lack. also, though it may be a bit noisy and warm, it does cool the internal compartments quite well with its extra cooling measures. originally, the ux was 3.5 lb with the 4-cell, but they added to air-vortex to ensure optimal cooling, raising the weight to 4 lb. also, you get top notch customer service which is the least i can say for dell, sony, or toshiba.

 

That is an important point which didn't come out in the review because you didn't need to call on their customer service. In past years I have bought a couple of Fujitsu notebooks from P1 and found them to be very responsive.

I would expect Ivan to be reading this review and giving careful consideration to where the UX can be improved. I don't expect that the big names look here to see what we think.

John

 

Nice review, ejl!

I like the high end spec's of this ultraportable.

 

The XPS and Portégé both have magnesium alloy chassis (see here and here).

I have a 24-hour toll-free support line with my Toshiba and 1-yr international warranty. I've also heard lots of people on this forum rave about Dell Complete Cover (never personally dealt with any Dell warranty issues).

Running 2 instances of Prime95 for 30 minutes, CPU temp (measured with Core Temp) holds steady at 62 C. Full disclosure: I'm undervolting to 0.950V, and my C2D is only the 1.83 GHz version. Ambient temperature is 27C. The cooling fan is audible (don't have a decibel meter, but it's about as loud as a 7900GT under load - bear in mind this is a rough estimate from me based on relative loudness, and not a scientific measurement). The Toshiba is still sitting prettily on my lap, though (wearing shorts). One good thing about the Toshiba is that there are plenty of air vents at the bottom - they claim it provides an "air-cushion" for the hard disk if you drop it (which I'm personally a little skeptical of), and they are positioned in such a way that they are not blocked when you put it on your lap.

So all I can infer is that objective measurements of the CPU core temperature show similar performance in the cooling system (yours might be even better since it's running a faster CPU) at cooling down the core, but in subjective testing, the user of the toshiba feels no discomfort keeping the laptop on his lap under load.

Take this with a grain of salt. Maybe I have a higher heat tolerance than you do (I come from the Tropics). Maybe I'm a masochist ^_^. Maybe ambient temperatures are different between the tests.

BTW, you did run 2 instances of CPU Burn-In, right? The program is only single-threaded, so if you want to load both cores to the max, you gotta run 2 copies. Running only 1 copy gave a max core temp of 55C, and 2 copies gave me 61C, which tallies with the Prime95 results. With only 1 instance of CPU Burn-In, the cooling fan actually doesn't ramp up to max on the toshiba.

Just for reference, xbitlabs reviewed the Dell XPS M1210 with a 2.33 GHz T7600 CPU, and it still got 4.2 hrs in Reader's and 2.5 hrs on a DVD with the standard battery. ( link)

Since all standard (non-ULV) C2Ds ramp down to 1.00 GHz @ 0.95V at idle, you probably won't find great differences in battery life under light computing tasks for a given model using different CPU grades.

 

Your right John, I just saw this. Good job on review and the review just states an average battery life. Now running that config 2GB DDR2 4MB 2.0GHz 100GB 7200RPM on various battery eater programs on tests like such you can get over 4.5hrs, so really depends on useage and test. Keep in mind the rotating web cam uses 6 watts of power just being powered on as well. So for a machine that is less than half the size of say a desktop replacement unit like the N6000 series and performs just as well and gets close to 4X the battery life is pretty amazing. Don’t forget that this machine is built solid as a Brick SH*& House using very thick gauged alloy materials, instead of plastics which would have further reduced weight.

 

Hi Ivan,

it's great to see companies take a pesonal interest in consumer experiences.

I'd like to say that I am not simply ragging on your product for the hell of it, and would love to see any issues raised about it addressed (even, or especially, if those issues were simply a product of misunderstanding/miscommunication). After all, the more good products there are in the market, the better it is for the consumer, and the industry in general.

That said, any chance you could comment about the heat/noise issues ejl mentioned?

Re: battery life, I agree that without standardised testing, it's really hard to make comparisons. One person's definition of "everyday usage" might be a hella lot more demanding than another's.

BTW, can you confirm if the key pitch on the UX is full size or slightly shrunk? (Or only shrunk for rarely-used keys).

 

Nice review ejl, that was an enjoyable read.

Yes, that definitely looks like a Clevo, especially from the side. I'm surprised Sager has not rebranded this one.
I can imagine the fan is noisy; I have a Clevo and mine is.

 

voldenuit, you make a lot of great points.

didn't know the xps had a magnesium alloy chassis...and didn't know that toshiba would actually put magnesium into their satellite ultraportable.

anyway, the reason i stuck with cpu burn in was that even with two instances, i couldn't get past the 50s with prime95. cpu burn in with only one running gave me higher temp readings than with2 prime95. since i wanted to get the temp i high as i could, i didn't use prime95. it even says on the cpu burn in site that their program gets higher temperature readings than other stress tests. and interesting thing.....rmclock doesn't seem to read the loads quite right on vista. even when i was running just one instance of prime95 or cpu burn in, on the some of my trials, it read that both cores were at full load and throttle. i have no idea if it is program glitch in the stress tests or in rmclock.

and just to note, i did not have the webcam on when running the battery tests. in the future, if i ever write another review, i will stick with battery eater (if it works in vista that is...) to make things more standardized.

 

Road warriors need durable machines. That is why the UX is, top and bottom, thick gauged magnesium alloys; like the Toughbook 74’s etc. Those other units you mention have thin mag lids, but are plastic throughout the rest of the machines.

Now we could go with plastic bottom encasings and not only reduce weight but heat too; but durability would be sacrificed. Now as long as you are not blocking ventilation system the machine will not get too hot to use like some of the other smaller machines; reason why we precision drill the air vortex’s on each bottom is to increase air flow so machines can be used on your lap. As for fan noise, even machines like the P7230 that use much less powerful ULV processors generate fan noise; I think the P7230 has just as much fan noise or even more so.

These machines are designed to be powerful desktop replacement type units that have a foot print smaller than a standard sheet of paper, yield good battery life as well as can put up with the daily rigors of mobile professionals bouncing around from one place to another.

Send me an email and I will send you detailed pic’s of keyboard or here is some higher res shots: http://www.laptopsinc.com/docs/UX_main.zip

 

Great review ejl. The UX is quite pretty to look at.

 

Thanks for the updates, ivang. I can confirm that although the base of the Toshiba (which I believe is also Mg alloy) is rock-solid, the lid of the display is made from thin Mg-alloy and will flex if pushed (actually, the only solid/stiff lid I have ever seen in a notebook was on a Toughbook W, and that was probably because of the integral stiffener - U-shaped raise in the case).

ejl: My guess is that the U205 is Mg-alloy because it started life in the Far East as a Portégé, and is also sold as a Tecra (sans multimedia buttons).

 

Does how a user treats their computer depend in whether they have paid for it themselves? I've seen some notebooks that look like they have been into battle. These are usually provided by companies. My own notebooks are well travelled but I try to treat them with the care they deserve while not investing in bulky well-padded bags.

John

 

Hi everyone and tnx to EJL for the review.
I'm thinking about buying this great notebook here in Italy from www.dcptech.net that has Clevo notebooks.

Some questions to EJL:
I work with photoshop and I planning to use this notebook with Matrox Dual Head 2 go and my 2 1440x900 displays.
What I would prefer to have is a quite silent notebook and with at least 4 hours battery.
Maybe is better to choose a lower cpu like the T5500-600? Or even a ULV?
Or downgrading the T7200 I can rise battery lifetime and have a more quite fans?
In your review you say that downgrading cpu clock speed will cause instability, it's still the same?

sorry for my English I'm trying to improve it

 

lowering the voltage is different from changing the cpu clock. your cpu can still go to the same speeds, but it just uses less power. what i did was use a second party program to drop the cpu voltages to reduce heat and fan noise. since the this is not the computer's original settings, it will cause instability if you lower the cpu voltage too low, but if you do it right, your computer should be fine.

as for changing the cpu, it should make your computer a bit less power hungry, but i think i read an article in the past that changing the cpu in the t-family of cpus (i.e. not ulv) will not give you a huge amount of battery life....maybe 10-20 minutes. i cannot comment on the heat output, though. getting a ulv processor will probably help your battery life quite a bit. according to portableone's website, with the ulv processor, you can get up to 8 hours of battery life....though i think that is a little bit of an exaggeration. it should make things a bit cooler as well. however, expect to take a performance hit when you move to ulv processors. i

 

Tnx for the answer Ejl, so you drop only voltage not core of cpu.

Voltage Core 0 Temp at Max Load
1.237v (Default) 71C
1.137v 65C
1.050v 63C
.987v 61C

when did you notice instability? at what voltage?
How can you check stability? with PI?.

So you think this is a good notebook?

 

i got instability at .987v. however, that doesn't necessarily mean that it will be the same for your notebook, if you choose to get this model. when i was dropping the voltages, i used cpu burn in to stress the cpu, and it has an error reporting system. i did a 20-minute stress test, and didn't get any errors. however, after i finished the stress test, my cpu behavior became highly erratic, and i had to reboot my computer to return it to normal. to more adequately test your system, you should run a stress test for many hours to make sure your system is stable. prime95 and ortho are some good programs with error reporting to use for longer tests.

i liked the notebook while i had it, but i can definitely see how people can be disenchanted by its loud fan noise, hotness, and cpu whine (though this may have been just specifically for my review unit).

 

I think hotness is the same problem for all Clevo notes. I'll bought it and then I'll try. No problem for Vista drivers? Have you installed even Linux on it?

 

the only problem i had with vista was the sleep issue i mentioned above, where the computer would freeze when i put it to sleep when the camera was on. there should be a fix from microsoft about it. however, i did not install many things on it, so i can't say whether it will have incompatibility issues with other things. but out of the box, everything was fine....but this is also largely dependent on the reseller who sells it to you. as for linux, i have heard of someone doing it in the past, but they could not get the camera working.

 

I have another question for you EJL. What is the max resolution of the external vga output? I'm thinkin about using thi notebook with Matrox Dual Head digital edition and 2 displays at 1440x900

 

unfortunately, i no longer have the ux or two monitors of that resolution to test things out. however, external monitor resolution is a function of the gpu, so all you would have to do is check the max resolution supported by the gma950.

http://www.matrox.com/graphics/en/gxm/support/dh2go/compatibility.php

according to that list (go to the macbook box near the bottom of the page, since the macbook has the same gpu), it will only handle 2x 1024x768, so it looks like it won't be able to handle your 2 displays at max resolution.