Top 3 Vista-Capable Media Center Laptops

In a recent review, we had spoken about multimedia PCs which sport the Microsoft Windows XP Media Center OS and are designed to be entertainment hubs at home, with a selection of complimentary software and matching hardware.

Over the last few years, these particular types of PCs have become quite popular, with everyone jumping onto the bandwagon. The fun has not stopped there. Recognizing its potential, major manufacturers who have a presence both in the laptop and desktop markets, started offering laptops with media center functionality. This led to the birth of a whole new category of powerful laptops —that not only are your productivity tools, but serve as mobile entertainment centers.

Till now the only OS, that was available which took advantage of these particular notebooks and acted as the software interface, was Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005. It offered a robust set of features and found quick acceptance in mainstream markets. Keeping this in mind Microsoft decided to take a different route with its latest customer OS Windows Vista. Its mainstream and premium offerings, Windows Vista Home Premium and Ultimate, ship with media center functionality built in. The new OS will be out in less than 8 days now and will certainly be a driving factor in the sales of media center based laptop’s this year.

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Here is our pick of the three best media center laptops which will run Vista without any issues. Please note due to the demanding nature of Vista, all these laptops are fairly expensive. But come loaded to the hilt. All these laptops are 1080p ready and pack in powerful Core2duo processors to run your next-generation Hi-Def digital media without stuttering or behaving like Celeron powered systems.

Dell XPS M1710
I often wonder what it would be like to make a roundup that didn’t have a Dell in its ranks. Dell has certainly learnt the art of reading trends and serving up laptops that will satisfy even the most demanding consumers. One of the things we really like about Dell is the amount of choice we get in terms of budget and tech offerings. In case you were wondering where you have seen this laptop earlier, it was a part of our desktop replacement roundup from some time back. Considering its healthy specifications, Dell decided to offer this laptop as a media center laptop offering. Its latest (re)incarnation sees it move to the Core2Duo platform. The new refresh changes the CPU to the fastest Core2duo chip available the T7600 (clock speed of 2.33 GHz). It also gets an upgrade to its graphical subsystem and is now powered by the 7950 GTX 512 MB card.

The laptop’s 17 Inch LCD panel also remains the same and retains its HD-ready resolution of 1900x1200 (WUXGA). The storage space has been upgraded from 100 GB to 160 GB and system memory doubled from 1 GB to 2 GB. In terms of connectivity, the laptop continues to be fully equipped with six USB 2.0 slots, VGA and DVI outputs, a 4-in1 memory card reader and Firewire. An interesting upgrade to the Wi-Fi connectivity is the upgrade to 802.11n, which is a good move as it makes the laptop future ready.

All in all priced at Rs. 1,49,000 this laptop is a perfect machine to run Vista on and enjoy full media center functionality on the move.
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Toshiba Qosmio G30
Anyone who has ever followed the laptop market or glanced at a laptop review over the last few years will certainly know the important position Toshiba holds. For a long time now, Toshiba has been the trendsetter’s and CEO’s choice for mobile computing. Their laptops not only look good but are extremely powerful machines.

The Toshiba G30 is a completely loaded laptop, featuring a 2.0 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo Processor (T7200), an HD-Ready 17 inch display panel (1920