Labs

Sony's VAIO range has become a big name in computing and this tiny machine shows why. If the X505VP were any smaller, we'd have to call it a PDA. It weighs 825g, and has a thickness of just 20mm.

Build quality is superb and the looks will wow all who see it. We noticed two pressure points showing in the screen when we pressed on the lid though, so we'd advise not placing anything heavy on top of it.

As you'd imagine, compromises have been made to make the X505VP so small. The 20GB hard disk is by far the smallest on test, and the ULV (ultra low voltage) 1.1GHz Pentium M 713 processor offers little power, scoring just 0.47 in our application benchmarks. That said, Windows XP runs fine in the 512MB of integrated RAM and office tasks run smoothly.

The 10.4in screen also smacks of compromise. Although it's fine if looked at head-on, viewing angles are poor, with top-to-bottom colour shift

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discernible even before tilting the screen. Horizontally, brightness fades too quickly for more than one person to view the screen at a time. If you need an ultra portable with a high-quality screen then look to the Fujitsu Siemens instead.

The ultra-thin keyboard is surprisingly usable given the size. Although the Shift keys aren't double-length and the spacebar is short, there's a decent amount of travel. The keys are also well spaced, but we weren't so enamoured by the stiff IBM TrackPoint-style mouse pointer.

The X505VP matches other notebooks on show by sporting two USB 2 ports. Sony has also partnered a mini-FireWire port with a power socket to provide for the bundled external DVD writer. This is slim and stylish but very slow, writing CD-Rs at 8x. A port replicator houses VGA and 10/100 LAN ports.

Despite a small battery, the X505 outperforms the larger models from Acer, Alienware, Asus and Voodoo. You still won't be able to roam too far from a socket though, as it gave up after 1 hour, 34 minutes in our intensive tests and 3 hours, 14 minutes under light use. Plus, the external drive drains too much power to last much more than an hour when watching DVDs.

The X505 is an incredible engineering achievement from Sony, but the exorbitant price and poor single year of return-to-base warranty hold it back. We can't recommend it for serious, heavyweight work, but if your priorities are designer looks and minimal weight then this is the notebook to choose.