Labs

Acer's TravelMate 6292 and Rock's Pegasus P335-T72 are the most powerful laptops in the group, thanks to their 2.0GHz dual-core Intel processors and generous 2GB of memory.

The TravelMate has enough power for processor-intensive applications such as video encoding and image editing, and there's plenty of room for

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both video and images on its huge 160GB hard disk. It came second behind the Rock in our 2D benchmarks with a score of 163, but unlike the Rock the Acer has reasonable battery life, lasting for three hours and 17 minutes in our light use test. It also kept going over three hours in the DVD playback test.

The laptop is the thickest in the group, but the base has plenty of ports. There are three USB2.0, mini-FireWire and D-sub and S-video outputs, so you can connect the laptop to an external monitor or a TV. The screen has a matt finish and is bright but grainy. The touchpad looks tiny compared to the MacBook's, but it's highly accurate and easy to use. Unfortunately, the keyboard suffers from a degree of flex, so typing isn't particularly comfortable.

Acer's TravelMate 6292 is a powerful laptop with a generous specification, but it can't compete with Samsung's Q45 for battery life and value.