Averatec AV2150-EH1 Notebook
The Averatec AV2150-EH1 is notebook for a college student or who have basic computing needs on the go. This notebook is built entirely out of plastic but still feels solid. The hinges is from metal and it under the cover. There’s no ripple when pressure on the lid. The two latches used to keep the lid closed are made from plastic and are very fragile. The 2150 built is good with only minor bumps. With only word of Averatec with silver trim on the lid, this laptop exterior is very minimalist. The located of vent at the bottom of notebook is the big flaw of the design. But with only 4.4 lbs and 1.2″ thin, this laptop is easy to carry around. The AC adaptor is also very small and light, only 0.7 lbs.
The AV2150-EH1 specs :
Processor : AMD Turion 64 MT-28 1.6GHz
Graphics : ATI Radeon Xpress 200M
Hard Drive : 80GB
Operating System : Windows XP Home Edition with SP2
Memory : 512 MB DDR333 RAM
Display : 12.1″ widescreen WXGA LCD
Optical Drive : DVD +/- RW Dual Layer
Dimensions : 11.9″ X 8.86″ X 1.2″
Battery : 4-cell, 2200 mAh
Weight : 4.4 lbs
The AV2150-EH1 comes with the Turion 64 MT-28 processor 1.6GHz,512 KB L2 cache. The graphics is ATI Radeon Xpress 200M and RAM 512 MB DDR333. The notebook performance is very satisfied. It’s snappy at heavy multi tasking situation. Used Super Pi to get benchmark of the computer, the result are Averatec AV2150-EH1 AMD Turion 64 1.6GHz took 131 seconds to calculate Pi to 2 Million digits of accuracy. The Dell Inspiron e1705 2.0GHz Intel T2500 took 71 seconds, the Dell Inspiron 600M 1.6 GHz Pentium M took 130 seconds and Lenovo ThinkPad T60 2.0GHz Core Duo took 78 seconds to calculate the value.
The AV2150-EH1 comes with Windows Home Edition with no operating system CD or system recovery CD is included. The notebook has only a few trial software, Norton Antivirus 2005, Netzero, and First Backup.
The screen is delightfull with 1280×800 of resolution. The backlight is even with no leakage or dead pixels. The screen is fairly bright because of the glossy finish. The color and contrast are good too. But maybe some people don’t like to set the brightness at maximum.
The kayboard’s key are pretty good size. There is some flex to the keyboard, but the key travel is good. Above the keyboard are five buttons, they are the power button, two quick launch buttons for e-mail and internet browser, the power button are on/off switch for Wi-Fi and button for search function in Windows. The touchpad is small but smooth and feels different from the plastic case surface. It’s not too sensitive and only allows vertical, not horizontal scrolling. Below the touchpad are the mouse buttons, but they are more like cut-outs from the plastic case than real buttons.
The AV2150-EH1 use the lower-powered MT version of the Turion processor. Under normal use, there’s warm in the palm rest area. The bottom gets warm to but still comfortable. The fan is not loud but still audible in a quiet room. The fan stays on under heavy uses. The hard drive and DVD burner are fairly quiet too.
The speakers that located right below the screen is very weak. External speakers or headphones are highly recommended in this case.
The ports at AV2150-EH1 are a USB port, a PCMCIA (PC card) slot, and a 4-in-1 memory card reader on the left, 4-pin FireWire port, the audio ports, and a set of status LED on the front and two more USB ports, an RJ-11 (modem) port, and RJ-45 port, a vent, a VGA port, and the power connector to the AC adapter on the right.
The AV2150-EH1 comes with a mini wireless LAN from MSI 802.11b/g. It has pretty decent range and the speed is consistent. But the 2150 have no built-in Bluetooth and infrared port.
The 4-cell battery life is very weak. On a full charge, with Wi-Fi on and the screen brightness set low it’s only 1 hour 35 seconds. There is an optional 8-cell extended battery that should double the battery life.
The Averatec AV2150-EH1 have an efficient processor with decent integrated graphics. The screen is beautiful, the build is sturdy with minimalist design ann have a built-in DVD burner and memory card reader. Although this notebook have a short battery life, no blueetooh and infrared port and difficult to upgrade, the Averatec AV2150-EH1 is a good and very inexpensive choice for people who need a portable notebook for basic uses.
