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Advent Sienna 700 review

Our Rating :
Price when reviewed : £500
inc VAT

It may have a fast Core i7 processor, but there are issues with this budget laptop.

Specifications

15.6 in 1,366×768 display, 2.5kg, 2.66GHz Intel Core i7-620M, 4.00GB RAM, 250GB disk, Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

http://www.dixons.co.uk

It’s rare to see an Intel Core i7 processor in a laptop at this price, but Advent has managed just that. Although the Core i7-620M has only two cores as opposed to the four cores of the top-end Core i7s, it’s still a fast chip and not a component you’d expect at this price.

Advent Sienna 700

Predictably, performed well in our benchmark results. An overall result of 105 is impressive, and makes it faster than laptops costing up to £300 more. A result of 130 in the single-threaded Image-editing test shows that when there’s only one application running, it’s incredibly quick. If you’re into photo or video editing, you’ll appreciate this processor’s performance.

Predictably, Advent has cut corners to accommodate a Core i7 into the Sienna 700’s budget. There’s a measly 250GB of hard disk space and although it’s easy enough to add external storage, there are no eSATA or USB3 ports, and only three standard USB slots.

There’s also no dedicated graphics card, so the Sienna 700 relies on the Core i7’s integrated graphics chip, which managed only 12.3fps in our Call of Duty 4 benchmark. It’s also worth pointing out that the faster processer means higher power draw, and the battery struggles to cope, lasting just over two hours in our tests showed.

Advent has used the entire width of the case to fit in a full keyboard and numeric keypad. It’s incredibly firm with no bounce at all and each separated key has a light action. There aren’t any surprises in the layout, except that the numeric keypad has only three columns and so lacks dedicated page navigation keys.

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Basic Specifications

Rating **
Processor Intel Core i7-620M
Processor clock speed 2.66GHz
Memory 4.00GB
Memory slots 2
Memory slots free 0
Maximum memory 8GB
Size 36x382x255mm
Weight 2.5kg
Sound IDT HD Audio
Pointing device touchpad

Display

Viewable size 15.6 in
Native resolution 1,366×768
Graphics Processor Intel GMA HD
Graphics/video ports VGA, HDMI
Graphics Memory 64MB

Storage

Total storage capacity 250GB
Optical drive type DVD+/-RW +/-DL

Ports and Expansion

USB ports 3
Bluetooth no
Wired network ports 1x 10/100/1000
Wireless networking support 802.11b/g/n
PC Card slots none
Supported memory cards SD, MMC, Memory Stick Pro, xD
Other ports minijack audio output, minijack microphone input

Miscellaneous

Carrying case No
Operating system Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
Operating system restore option backup and recovery software
Software included Microsoft Office 2010 Starter

Buying Information

Warranty one year collect and return
Price £500
Details www.dixons.co.uk
Supplier http://www.dixons.co.uk

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