HP dv2036ea review

In our recent mid-range notebooks review (Labs, Shopper December 2006) we looked at nine notebooks costing £699 including VAT.

The compact HP dv2036ea was supposed to have been included, but it didn't arrive in time. Though it didn't make it into the test, it's a great addition to the range.

The upper chassis is decorated with a series of subtle lines, dark grey on the black lid and light grey on the silver inside. These curve and overlap across the surface, creating a pleasingly original finish. If style is as important to you as performance, you'll love the dv2036ea.

Its 14.1" display means the chassis is rather more compact than the 15.4" notebooks in this month's Labs Notebook Price Test on page 74, and weighs just 2.5kg. The display has a native resolution of 1,280x800 pixels, giving you enough space for day-to-day tasks. Quality is good and it displayed a crisp image with decent contrast and vibrant colours.

Above the display is a 1.3-megapixel webcam for video calls. Below, just above the keyboard, is a slender row of illuminated touch-sensitive media short cut controls. You can use these to launch HP's QuickPlay software, which lets you browse your media files and play DVDs from one interface. It's useful, but we'd prefer to have Windows XP Media Center Edition.

The speakers are loud, and the sound is crisp and clear. They're definitely some of the better sets we've heard. A mini remote control is also provided, which can be tucked away in the ExpressCard/54 slot. There are three USB2 ports for peripherals, a FireWire port and a memory card reader, too.

The keyboard is of good quality, with lovely big keys that have plenty of feedback. However, the touch pad is a big disappointment. It's inaccurate and is far more sensitive vertically than horizontally, while the buttons are unresponsive. There's a small button that disables the touch pad, so at least you won't activate it accidentally when typing.

Inside that attractive chassis is a respectable specification. Its dual-core 1.6GHz AMD Turion 64 X2 with 1GB of RAM made short work of our benchmarks, and is ample for all but the most power-hungry of users. A large 100GB hard disk provides plenty of storage. Battery life was less impressive, however, providing only two hours and 23 minutes in our light-usage test. It's a pity such a compact notebook couldn't manage a little more.

This is a decent notebook and we like the chassis, but you'll find better-specified notebooks that cost less in this month's Labs.