Samsung Q310 review

With netbooks stealing all the limelight, it'd be easy to forget that mainstream laptops are also getting better and better.

They might be cute and incredibly portable, but with their restrictive keyboards, small screens and low-power processors, netbooks are no replacement for a proper PC. Sure, they're ideal for slinging in a bag or briefcase and heading for the plane or the local WiFi-equipped coffee shop to hunt down old friends on Facebook while pretending to work, but if you want a versatile machine that actually gets the job done, you'll be better off looking at something slightly more capable.

The Q310 comes from Samsung's new Touch of Colour range, and it certainly is an attractive little devil. But that's not the reason why it costs twice as much as your average netbook. With a 13.3 inch display to balance screen space against portability, and processing power to rival desktop PCs, it spends your money very wisely.

The familiar Samsung glossy black paint job always looks good, but tilt back the smoothly contoured lid and you'll find that touch of colour: the wrist rest gently fades into a deep maroon. Whatever you think of that, the keyboard is one of the best we've seen on any laptop. Each key has a nice delicate feel, and typing long documents is a breeze thanks to the full sized key tops. The wide trackpad is similarly fine, and accompanied with buttons that respond with a light click.

The display is praiseworthy, too. Packing in the same 1280x800 pixels as bulkier 15.4 inch units, it gives you enough room to work with two documents side by side, or see a photo clearly at the same time as all the toolbars and palettes of the program you're using to edit it. The panel was bright enough, and the colour reproduction kept the skin tones in our test photos looking natural. A slight lack of contrast counted against it, and the narrow vertical viewing angles meant pictures could look faded if the screen was tilted back or forward. This could be annoying if you were trying to show someone else the screen.

Chips with bite

But these were minor quibbles, and elsewhere the Samsung continued to impress. Performance was far from lacking. The Q310 uses the latest Intel Centrino 2 hardware, and with a Core 2 Duo P8400 processor and a generous 4GB of fast RAM it turned in a speedy 178% in our 2D (general) benchmarks. That's fast enough to embarrass quite a few budget desktop PCs.

Not all laptops offer any 3D performance at all, but the Samsung's dedicated nVidia GeForce 9200M GS graphics chipset had a good stab at our Call of Duty 2 gam,ing test, achieving a score of 42%. That's not enough to cope with the latest titles, such as Crysis Warhead, but gives you the option of a little casual gaming now and again. Nor have other areas been skimped on: WiFi, Bluetooth and a memory card reader are all included.

Unusually, this fine performance was matched with surprising stamina. In our light use test the Q310 lasted over five hours, twice as long as many laptops. Even playing a DVD, it stretched to three hours and 19 minutes, making this a machine that's ideal for entertainment as well as productivity on the move.

Fast components and a high capacity battery should make the Q310 too heavy to carry around a lot. But they don't. At 2.15kg, it may be heavier than any netbook, but in the laptop category it almost qualifies as ultraportable. For £650, you get a PC that compromises neither on performance nor mobility, and looks and feels great too.