Model: MSI CX620
Price: $AUD1499
Rating: 7.5 out of 10
Web: www.msicomputer.com.au
Chip giant Intel has flooded the market with Core i-series mobile processors in the first few months of this year to the point that it can be quite difficult to work out what the differences are.
If you’re thinking Core i3 means “dual core” and Core i5 means “quad core”, think again.
The MSI CX620 is the first notebook we’ve seen in Australia to feature a Core i5 dual-core chip for under $1500. The Core i5-430M runs at 2.26GHz and features 3MB of cache memory. In our NoteBench test, the audio/video performance score topped 376.8, which is a pretty decent score although other models we’ve seen have topped the 400 mark. (Samsung’s N210 netbook scored 83.8 on the same test.)
The 15.6-inch widescreen LCD panel delivers 1366×768-pixel resolution and is driven by your choice of graphics options – Intel’s integrated GMA HD graphics or ATI’s Mobility Radeon HD 5470 chip. You can switch between them to gain greater gaming speed (ATI) or better battery life (Intel).
Storage is a 640GB Western Digital WD6400BEVT hard drive with plenty of room to play with LG’s CT21N Blu-ray/DVD combo drive, you can play Blu-ray movies or burn CDs and DVDs.
One odd thing about the CX620 is the combination of 4GB of DDR3-1066 memory and the 32-bit version of Microsoft’s Windows 7 Home Premium operating system – with the 32-bit version, the notebook can only access 3245MB of that memory so you’ve got the better part of 1GB of memory flapping in the breeze doing nothing. It might be useful if you decide to upgrade to the 64-bit version of Windows 7 but otherwise, it’s money you’ve spend that you can’t use.
There’s a decent array of ports on this one with HDMI, eSATA and a number of USB ports to keep you going.
MSI supplies a standard 11.V/4400mAh Lithium-ion battery but on our testing, it delivered a disappointing 1hr38mins. Now our testing involves pushing the screen brightness all the way up to obtain a worst-case figure but even so, other notebooks of similar performance and battery capacity deliver beyond the two-hour mark.
Weight for the notebook itself came in at 2.491kgs.
Overall, given the list of features, it’s not a bad model. Getting a Blu-ray drive and HDMI output means you’ve got big-screen movies covered (the LCD panel cannot give you 1080p playback through lack of resolution) and there’s plenty of performance and storage to go around. What is missing is battery life – but otherwise, it’s got enough at this price to make it worth a look.