Packard Bell Chrom@ LS

The Chrom@ LS is aimed at all-round multimedia users and is meant to be an ideal mobile solution for film and music buffs, and gaming and internet fans.

With a super-wide screen and silver finish its looks are vaguely reminiscent of the attention-grabbing Apple Powerbook G4. But is it all it's cracked up to be?

Although Packard Bell pitches the machine as a 'mobile entertainment centre', it is heavy and bulky. At 4kg, the Chrom@ LS is more a desktop replacement than a mobile system. Besides, with a battery life of just one hour and 25 minutes, portable use is limited.

Viewed even as a desktop replacement system, the Chrom@ fails to shine. With the Mobile Pentium 4 chip now on sale and many modern notebooks surpassing the 2GHz speed barrier, Packard Bell's choice of a 1GHz Pentium III seems disappointing. The machine managed middling performance in our benchmark tests.

However, the Chrom@'s 15.3in display and 1280 x 768 resolution make DVDs look fantastic, and the Yamaha sound hardware produces an admirably deep tone from the built-in speakers.

Games look slightly less impressive as the 16Mb ATI Mobility Radeon graphics chip exhibits jerkiness when there's a lot of action on screen.

Connectivity is impressive, with three USB ports, an S-video out and two FireWire ports for transferring video footage, although the 30Gb hard drive would quickly be filled by anything other than light video editing work.

The floppy disk drive must be removed to use the serial and parallel ports. But with a modem, network port and a set of digital S/PDIF outs as well this is a notebook you can link up to just about anything.

Price: From £1,999 (inc VAT)

Specifications:

• 1GHz Pentium III SpeedStep processor
• 256Mb Ram
• 30Gb hard disk
• 15.3in WXGA TFT screen
• DVD-Rom/CD-RW combination drive
• 56Kbps modem, 10/100 network adaptor
• Two Type II and one Type III PC Card slot
• Two FireWire and three USB sockets
• S-video out connector
• Dimensions: (W x D x H, in mm) 365 x 250 x 50; weight: 4kg

Contact: Packard Bell 01628 512400
www.packardbell.co.uk

See also:

Apple Powerbook G4 1GHz

The ultimate workstation for graphics professionals on the move.  18 Feb 2003

Hewlett Packard Pavilion 1175a

A stylish notebook with plenty of extras and some interesting new features.  08 Jul 2002

Hi-Grade Ultinote M6400-2000-1

If you're looking for a system you need to only take out occasionally, this could be the answer.  18 Apr 2002

Sony Vaio PCG-R600HEP

A very light and portable addition to the Vaio family.  28 Mar 2002

IBM R30 62G

The R30 line continues the heritage of excellent Thinkpad keyboards.  08 Mar 2002

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