MSI CX640-i347W7P

Zitat: Pro: + Aesthetically pleasing Above-average speakers Con: - Keyboard and trackpad are below-par - Software bundle not the most intuitive to use Thoughts On the face of it, MSI´s good-looking CX640 laptop has most of the bases covered. £600 is a reasonable outlay for a 15.6in machine with an Intel Core i5 2410M chip, discrete GeForce GT 520M 1GB graphics card, 4GB RAM, USB 3.0, and 500GB hard-drive. The seamless switching between integrated graphics and GeForce is taken care of by NVIDIA´s excellent Optimus technology, and battery life, via Intel´s HD Graphics, is decent, hovering around three hours for movie playback. But specifications are just one part of a modern laptop. MSI´s build quality could be better, particularly for the keyboard and trackpad, which are both sub-par, and a little more care with the bundled software wouldn´t go amiss. It´s little touches like these that dictate a laptop´s appeal, we think, and MSI would do well to take another look at what competitors such as Dell are doing in this space. The MSI CX640 plies its trade in a cutthroat market that demands excellence to stand out. With average integration of quality components, the laptop floats in a sea of mainstream homogeneity. Worthy of being put on a basic shortlist if you´re after an all-purpose notebook, it´s a a distinctly reasonable proposition at £600.