Pros: This product is used for Computer Animation. It renders in Mental Ray faster then several Macintoshes I've seen by 4 times! A previous buyer stated this laptop can play World of Warcraft at full settings. I confirm that. This laptop runs 3D Studio Max, Maya Unlimited 7.01 and Photoshop CS2 at the same time effectively. This laptop is user friendly. Its wireless functionality makes life simple. I’m normally a person who believes that an antivirus software product should NOT be installed on the same machine but rather on a server. The laptop comes with a copy of Norton which has thus far caused me to speculate on that opinion. The laptop’s camera has proven itself to be more powerful then a few other desktop cameras’ I’ve used. The laptop also has an interesting AI (Artificial Intelligence) which alters the functionality of the computer when you are or are not plugged into AC. The AI appears to run very effectively when preserving power for your battery.

Cons: The laptop's sound system is a major draw back. When playing World of Warcraft, the sound comparison between this laptop and a desktop running with Sound Blaster Audigy is big. The laptop meets less then 50% its quality in the comparison. Also, this laptop heats up fast, so do not cover the vent! Any laptop this powerful would heat up. Do not be discouraged by the heat. However, be cautious and smart on your buying plans. Because heat can damage, and heat is caused by the machine, buy an extended manufactory unlimited warrantee plan. Do not cover the vent! It is big and for good reasons. The laptop specifications state the battery life time is 3.5 hours. I have confirmed it is more realistically 3 hours. It may be wise to be a backup battery. Because this product uses ATI video cards, its video compatibility with Linux may be questioned. More over, using Cedega (Windows Game Translator for Linux) may not be as effective as using something with NVIDIA.

Overall Review: This laptop has proven itself to be a worthy buying machine. Also, what is not stated is this machine is confirmed to be Windows Vista Ready. This means, when Windows Vista is released, the laptop should have no problems running it. I spoke with a few programmers who have been beta testing Windows Vista, and they feel this OS (Operating System) is VERY good! Having a laptop ready to run it is IMPORTANT! The laptop has 4 USB slots, 2 on each side. It is not necessary to buy a USB panel or a cooling device which must have one built in. The laptop does not have a keyboard lighting system, so if you plan to use this in the dark, buy additional parts to light up the keyboard. Regardless of the pros or cons, this laptop is worth every penny I spent on it. I highly recommend buying this product if you render, play games, or simply wish to have a computer to do basic media related things. FYI for Mental Ray Renderers: Product Renders at 8 satellite CPUs.

Comments: This card is absolutely fantastic. It’s very much worth the cost. There are some draw backs to the card however. Looking at the report found at devhardware.com for the Inno3D-GeForce-6200A you can verify this card and the ATI Radeon 9600 are one of the same as far as power goes. However, the ATI Radeon 9600 processes better for most applications. The reason being for those who don’t know, ATI’s focus was to design the hardware around DirectX; NVIDIA OpenGL. This means it all comes down to code and when you play a game, which rendering library (OpenGL/DirectX) the software was designed for will make the difference on which card it will work better on. Running games like Warcraft 3, World of Warcraft and DOOM 3 should work better on this card. These games were designed for OpenGL with DirectX support. If you plan on playing games which do not provide any OpenGL support, I recommend sticking with ATI. Also, the benchmark was taken with a NVIDIA 6200A with only 256MB of memory. This card has twice as much, which makes a big difference. Another draw back is the 3D Stereo Vision. NVIDIA ForceWare Drivers Version 71.xx does not work for this card though it states it supports the 6200 chipset. In order to get 3D Stereo Vision to work, the version number of the Stereo Vision Drivers must be identical to the ForceWare Driver Version. This means for the time being, they don’t work on this card. Stereo Vision is used for 3D glasses and devices which provide virtual reality. This card does work on Linux and does so wonderfully. I have tested it on Fedora Core 2. If it works for FC2, I know it will work for FC3 as well. I believe this card will work for SuSE as well. This card should be the crown on a king’s head for those who choose TransGaming Cedega over Windows. The extra memory should help a great deal. I gave this card 5 stars because the only thing that bothers me about it is the drivers, and that will eventually be a problem in the past. I’ve sent a trouble ticket to Chaintech (since NVIDIA does not provide direct customer support to consumers). NVIDIA should be aware of it and hopefully, the next few 3D Stereo Vision drivers that come out will have this card supported. Over all, I highly recommend this card. Very few cards at 512MB of RAM cost only a few dollars over a $xxx. The memory makes a big difference in rendering (Hint: 3D Studio Max/Maya) and runs nicely in populated areas within MMORPGs.