Fujitsu LifeBook E8010

The E8010 was built with mobile performance in mind. Its ATI Mobility Radeon 9700 graphics controller returned a very strong score of 10170 in our 3DMark tests and also pushed up the application performance (SYSMark 2001) benchmark score to a lofty 290.

Fujitsu has included Intel's Pentium M CPU, which here runs at 1.7GHz and includes 2MB L2 cache and a 400MHz frontside bus. Other core specifications include a 15" screen with maximum resolution of 1400 x 1050, 512MB of 333MHz PC2700 DDR SDRAM (of a 2GB maximum) and a 40GB 4200rpm hard disk. The multiformat DVD burner is modular and hot-swappable with options such as a second battery or weight saver (a plastic tray that protects the device bay while empty).

The E8010 has great build quality, using silver magnesium alloy on the lid and carbon fibre, strengthened plastic for the base. It includes a keyboard with dedicated PageUp, PageDown and cursor keys (great for word processing).

Four customisable program shortcut buttons above the keyboard are also numbered, allowing you to set them up as a key-combination locking mechanism--what Fujitsu calls the LifeBook lock. This can be applied when the notebook powers on, or alternatively when Windows goes into hibernation or standby. It's easy to set up and is a sensible solution for protecting sensitive data. Take care, though--if you forget your combination the notebook will have to be sent to Fujitsu to be reset!

An Intel PRO/Wireless 2200BG network card provides 802.11b/g connectivity, and Bluetooth, Gigabit Ethernet (10/100/1000) and a 56Kbps modem are also included. The E8010 has four USB 2.0 slots and single FireWire, S-Video TV-out, parallel, serial, PS/2, microphone and headphone connections. There's also support for MMC and SD cards and one Type II or Type III PC Card.

Windows XP Pro, Norman Virus Control and Personal Firewall, Sonic RecordNow! and Power Producer are included.