DVD Portables...............................
newmedia.com
By Becky
Waring
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iServ<Picture: i>IBM ThinkPad 770<Picture: i>Panasonic CF-63<Picture: i>Toshiba 750CDT
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The first DVD notebooks from IBM, Panasonic, and Toshiba have hit the streets, and these bleeding-edge vendors have gone all out with CPUs, screen technology, memory, and graphics chips. Yet prices are still lower than previous top-of-the-line models, reflecting general price-cutting in the portables market, even at the high end.
Panasonic CF-63<Picture: CF-63>ÿÿÿ<Picture>ÿÿ But while DVD playback is a sexy enticement for buyers looking at the latest machines, new processors and display technology are the bread-and-butter advancements from which everyone will benefit. IBM's and Toshiba's offerings include Intel's Tillamook processors, Pentium MMX CPUs in smaller die sizes that have drastically lower power requirements, and faster clock speeds (200MHz and 233MHz). The latest graphics chips from S3 and Trident used in these machines also do more with less power. But don't expect suddenly longer battery life; any saved power is quickly gobbled up by bigger screens, more VRAM and DRAM, beefier hard disks, and the DVD-ROM drives.
ÿÿÿ<Picture>ÿÿ IBM's ThinkPad 770 ($5,000 to $7,000) comes in 200MHz or 233MHz Pentium MMX models, with 512K Level 2 cache, a 13.3- or 14.1-inch active-matrix LCD screen, a 5.1GB hard disk (IBM's own, and the largest available in a portable), and 1,024-by-768 (XGA) resolution in full color. It also includes a hot-pluggable Zoomed Video port, 3D surround sound, Windows NT support, and an expansion bay for a second hard drive, Zip drive, or DVD-ROM drive. The DVD and Enhanced Video Adapter provides full MPEG 2 DVD playback, Dolby Digital audio decoding, video capture, and NTSC video out. The ThinkPad 770, which weighs in at about 7.8 pounds with battery, also has a nifty new pointing stick (which can now be tapped like a button).
ÿÿÿ<Picture>ÿÿ Panasonic is holding back on the Tillamook with its new CF-63; it's got a 166MHz MMX processor instead (Tillamook versions will come in 1998). But at $5,999, it's still competitive and loaded every other way. It sports a 13.3-inch active-matrix XGA screen, 4MB of VRAM, a 3.24GB hard drive, and a standard DVD-ROM drive under the keyboard (the DVD drives are optional modules on the IBM and Toshiba). Panasonic also continues with its magnesium-alloy ruggedized casing, which pushes its weight up to 8.7 pounds but is much stronger than plastic. One complaint is that the DVD-ROM decoder module shares a slot with the floppy drive, and it's not hot-swappable.
ÿÿÿ<Picture>ÿÿ To get its new Tecra 750CDT out the door quickly, market leader Toshiba initially shipped it without a DVD-ROM module, but the 750CDT will accept the company's coming slimline DVD-ROM module, which swaps out with the floppy. Like the ThinkPad, the 7.9-pound Tecra ($6,799) sports a 233MHz MMX, 512K cache, 5.1GB hard disk, Windows NT support, a Zoomed Video port, and a 13.3-inch screen. An included videoconferencing camera provides video capture and image scanning too. One nice bonus is that the Tecra has the highest external resolution of the bunch, supporting 1,600 by 1,280 in 16-bit color.
ÿÿÿ<Picture>ÿÿ Just who needs a DVD portable? Manufacturers expect an enthusiastic response from the corporate sector, where the possibility of putting large amounts of information on an easily transportable disc is very attractive. Now that relatively inexpensive DVD recorders are about to appear, companies want playback capability. DVDs can be used for storing video presentations, entire company databases, even large Web sites. |
