Compaq Armada M700

Compaq's Armada notebooks are very much corporate products, complete with some of the classic identifying traits such as scary price tags and Windows 95 or NT as your first choice of OS. The new Armada M700 doesn't break the mould as far as the choice of operating system is concerned - our review sample came with Windows 95 installed - but a typical buying price of around £1,900 is a welcome change.

Although the M700 is a full-sized machine with a 315 x 249mm footprint, it's very light at only 2.35kg. This has been achieved by keeping the case nice and slim - 28mm thick when closed - but as a result the designers have opted for modularity rather than an all-in-one approach.

This means you get a multi-purpose bay, here in the right side of the case, which can be used for either the floppy drive or the 24-speed CD-ROM drive. Compaq hasn't missed the opportunity to add some extra flexibility and the bay can be used for several other options, including a DVD-ROM drive, a second hard disk or a second battery pack. I was pleased to see that not only can you run the floppy drive externally from the parallel port, but the adaptor cable was also included as part of the package.

Despite being so light, the Armada is more than usually robust thanks to a solid body and the always-desirable magnesium alloy lid for protecting the screen from the perils of travel. The case is the usual dark graphite grey, which could have looked quite stylish were it not for a light-grey keyboard that looks tacky and out of place.

The M700 has an expansion bus for connecting to the Armada docking station option, but the machine itself has its own USB port and a composite video output for use with a TV set or OHP during presentations. The standard pair of Type II PC Card slots are present and the review machine also has an internal V.90/K56Flex fax/modem. There's even space for an internal Fast Ethernet adaptor too, so you aren't forced to rely on the PC Card slots alone.

Removing the hard disk is an easy enough procedure, although a screwdriver is necessary to loosen the security screw holding the drive module in place. Memory upgrades are equally straightforward: you just need to release a couple of catches and lift the keyboard to reveal a pair of SODIMM sockets, one of which is free.

Compaq has stuck with the trackpoint, so if you're a touchpad fan then you might not be too keen on the Armada's keyboard-mounted stud. The keyboard itself is quite nice to use though, since it isn't cramped and it benefits from large keys where they're needed, especially Enter, Backspace and the spacebar. The action is light but decisive and while there aren't any tilt feet to improve the typing angle, the thin body of the machine helps make it reasonably comfortable to use.

The TFT screen is a fairly standard affair, with a 13.3in diagonal and a default 1,024 x 768 resolution, but it's reasonably brightly lit and rounds off the ergonomics nicely. It's debatable whether you really need the 8Mb of video RAM supplied with the Armada's ATi Rage Mobility-P graphics chipset, but overkill or not, it provides all the power you're likely to want for 2D business applications or using an external display.

Unfortunately, when it comes to providing all the power you need, the Armada's lithium ion battery didn't do quite so well. There are detailed and easy-to-use controls over power saving from a customised utility in the Windows Control Panel, but this couldn't disguise the fact that the battery didn't last very long. I started getting the dreaded beeps after only one hour 40 minutes, which isn't good enough, especially when machines like Toshiba's PortÚgÚ 3110CT (reviewed p173) can keep going for over three hours.