AMD powered desktop replacement notebooks

THE PREVIOUS Cheap Basket column last week where I did a round-up of desktop replacement Pentium 4 notebooks generated lots of feedback, a hundred people responded to my request and voiced their opinions on the candidates presented. Some AMD fans, however, accused me of pro-Intel bias. "You should know that the AMD Athlon64 based notebooks have better price performance over the P4's. Why would you restrict your choices to the obsolete P4 technology when the AMD Athlon64 technology is better and cheaper?" one reader accused. I imagine him with with an angry expression and his index finger pointed at me like the famous Uncle Sam poster.

"Obviously, this comparison is bias from the start and shame on you for purposely setting it up that way", he concluded his friendly message. See what we have to put up with. Obviously I have no pro-Intel or anti-AMD bias. I just thought at the time of writing that Pentium 4 notebooks were ridiculously cheap and that I would get a better bang for the buck by going with the heavy and bulky P4 technology (which is no problem for a desktop replacement) instead of a "Centrino" based notebook.

But anyway, that angry AMD fan actually helped me, as I realised that there are several great deals on AMD powered notebooks that can be excellent desktop replacements, with enough memory (512MB or above), large screens (15 inches and more) and plenty of storage. That's why I'm including the best AMD powered desktop replacement notebook bargains that I could find.

All prices in US dollars, at time of writing, and from US sellers, of course. Remember also that there are companies out there offering your own personal US Mailing address. With these services you can buy goods from North American sellers like Amazon.com USA, receive the items in your "personal" US address, and then have the items shipped back anywhere in the world to your door by the same forwarding company.

eMachines Athlon 2800+, with 60GB HD, 512MB RAM, and 15.4 inch WXGA wide LCD screen for $989

I've never bought a refurbished computer, nor I am a big fan of "refurbished" items. Yet this one is too good of a deal to let pass unnoticed. The eMachines M2350 sports an Athlon XP (32 bit not 64) processor, plenty of memory (512MB), a nice big LCD screen (15.4 inch WXGA), a 60GB hard drive, and built-in 802.11g WI-FI. finally, it includes the usual four USB ports, a FireWire port, an ethernet port and a dial-up 56K modem. The video chipset (very important in notebooks if you intent to install Linux) is an IGP 320 (which I have to admit I'm not familiar with) with 64MB of VRAM. Find it here.

Compaq Presario R3260 with a 2.20 GHz Athlon 64 cpu, 512 MB RAM, 80 GB HD, DVD+RW/CD-RW Drive, 802.11g and Bluetooth on board, plus a 15.4 inch WXGA wide LCD screen for $1600

This Compaq is an eye-opener, there's hardly anything missing on it. Included is everything in anyone's wanted list: a 64 bit Athlon64 cpu, a large 15.4 inch wide screen (WXGA), DVD burner (DVD+R) and CD-RW, 802.11g WI-FI _and_ Bluetooth, one S-Video out connector to connect your laptop to a television or vcr, and finally excellent video due to the NVIDIA GeForce4 440 graphics chipset with 64 MB of dedicated video memory. Did I mention there's 80GB of hard disk space?. Find it here.

HP Pavilion zv5260us with a 2.8 GHz AMD Athlon 64, 512 MB RAM, 60 GB Hard Drive, DVD+RW/CD-RW Drive and 802.11g built-in WI-FI for $1629

This is what our beloved Carly must use on her executive trans-continental flights on the corporate jet, I guess. It has almost the same feature set as the Compaq Presario R3260 above, perhaps notably with the addition of a 1 5-in-1 integrated digital media reader for Secure Digital cards, MultiMediaCard, Memory Stick, Memory Stick Pro, or SmartMedia cards. The CPU is a bit faster, and the video chipset is the same (even featuring the same S-video out connector). It weights 7.9 pounds vs 7.8 for the Compaq. There's not much more to say. Find it here.

eMachines M6810 Notebook PC (2.00 GHz Athlon 64 3200+, 512 MB RAM, 60 GB HD, DVD-ROM/CD-RW Drive for $1499

Of all the ones in this round-up, I really like this one, specially for the low price which matches my $1,500 budget I originally set to myself when I first started looking at P4 notebooks.

At 7.5 lb. it's slightly lighter than the Compaq and HP ones, and sports an AMD Athlon 64 3400 cpu at 2.2 GHz and featuring 1MB of cache, 512 MB of memory and 60GB of hard disk space. It also includes 4 USB 2.0 ports, one FireWire, and one S-Video Out. Then there's the usual large (15.4 inch, which seems to be the norm) wide LCD screen, and a 6-in-1 Digital Media slot which accepts Compact Flash, Micro Drive, MultiMedia Card (MMC), Secure Digital (SD), Memory Stick, & Memory Stick Pro.

I know that for some, the "eMachines" brand might not inspire much confidence, but they're Gateway now (since March 2004), so perhaps you have heard of them ;). Finally, graphics is handled by an ATI Mobility Radeon 9600 graphics with 64MB of DDR video memory. Find it here.

Thoughts? Comments? Insults for not including Cyrix, VIA and z-80 CPUs? Let me know ;).
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