Samsung R410 review

Samsung's new R410 might look a lot like other general-purpose laptops, but it has a slightly unusual screen size of 14.1in.

This makes it a little smaller and lighter than many of its 15.4in rivals. It weighs 2.4kg, so it isn't quite as light as some 12.1in models, such as Samsung's own Q45. However, the 1,280x800 resolution is a good match for a screen this big. Icon text is easy to read and you never find yourself moving closer to see what's what.

The screen is bright and sharp, while the glossy finish makes colours vivid, but there are plenty of reflections. Viewing angles are wide and the lid opens to around 120°, giving sufficient flexibility.

Although the keyboard doesn't use the entire width of the case, the keys are large and require only a light touch. This, along with the sensible key arrangement (there are no half-height or half-width keys), makes it a pleasure to type on for long periods. The touch pad is large and the mouse buttons don't require a lot of force. The silver nano coating on the keyboard prevents bacteria build-up.

When closed, the glossy black lid looks wonderful, but it will soon get covered in fingerprints. Open it, and the acres of matt-black plastic hint at the R410's low price. However, build quality is very good and there's no flex in the base. The lid flexes if you apply firm pressure, but should protect the LCD from occasional knocks.

Performance from the Core 2 Duo T5550 is in line with what we'd expect at this price, and it's nice to find 2GB of RAM to keep Vista Home Premium running smoothly. The Radeon Xpress 1250M graphics processor is nothing to get excited about, though; it isn't powerful enough even for older 3D games.

We didn't expect many luxuries at this price, so it was a surprise to find a 320GB hard disk; this is much larger than we've seen in similarly priced laptops. Gigabit Ethernet is the second luxury, but we'd rather have Draft-N wireless networking instead of the standard 802.11g. There are three USB2 ports, but two are awkwardly placed round the back. There's only a VGA output and no DVI or HDMI. You get a webcam, an SDHC card reader and an ExpressCard/34 slot, but no FireWire.

The R410 has one weakness: battery life. The standard six-cell battery lasted just two hours and 30 minutes. Upgrading to a nine-cell will cost £130. Dell's Inspiron 1525 (see Labs, Shopper 246) is a better choice if battery life is important to you - it lasts around four hours. However, if you are simply looking for a low-priced, good-quality laptop with a big hard disk, the R410 is hard to beat.