Product Reviews

Aiming at the budget business user, Maxdata has used an understated but stylised chassis for the Pro 6100X Select. Its protective alloy lid is decorated with a tasteful striped design, a theme that is carried to the interior.

The keyboard is comfortable to type on and is well proportioned, although it sags under pressure. The touchpad is responsive and easy to use, and while its buttons are not very robust they do the job. As it's clearly portioned off from the rest of the chassis, fingers don't tend to stray to it. Its white finish looks great at first, but will almost certainly turn a grubby brown over time.

It may be well protected against knocks but the screen has weak hinges and, at its base, flexes quite a bit. A native resolution of 1,024x768 is lower than we'd expect from a £1,000 notebook and the screen isn't especially bright or colourful to compensate. Strangely, there is a notable flicker when the optical drive eject button is pressed, which is most likely due to some of the internal components not being particularly

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well shielded.

The Intel Pentium M 1.7GHz processor and 512MB of RAM mean the 6100X has enough punch to handle typical office tasks without too much strain, as indicated by our benchmarks. Intel's Extreme Graphics 2 with 64MB of memory apportioned from the main system memory is adequate for 2D applications, but it struggles to cope with 3D so all but the most basic gaming is out.

Its 40GB hard disk is small and will be easy to fill, especially if you have a large collection of digital photos or music files. We'd expect a minimum of a 60GB hard disk at this price. There's the option to archive files to a CD, as a DVD/CD-RW combo drive is installed. Again, for this money we'd really expect a DVD rewriter.

Four USB ports and a small FireWire port are well positioned and easily accessible on the right edge of the notebook, while a three-in-one card reader sits alongside a front-mounted infrared receiver. S-video and D-sub outputs allow you to connect an external display, while a parallel port accommodates an older printer. A modem is included for direct dial-up connection, while Ethernet and wireless 802.11g network adaptors are fitted to connect to a home or office network.

Battery life, at three hours 38 minutes, is pretty good. With the robust Windows XP Professional installed and Works Suite 2004 bundled with the Pro 6100X Select, the software certainly adds value. We don't think it's enough to make up for its poor screen and average component selection, though. At this price it's hard to recommend the 6100X when much better notebooks are available for the same amount of money.