Advent Sienna 700 review

The touchpad has a glossy surface covered in small, rough squares. This means your fingertips don’t slide easily, so moving the cursor around the screen is more laborious than it should be. It isn’t helped by a stiff button and the fact that the edge of the case where your hand rests is quite sharp.

This brings us neatly to the Sienna’s design. The sharp edge is a result of the glossy lid’s clamshell design, which could be an effort to make the laptop seem thinner. It also means there’s only a small area along the front edge where it’s easy to open the closed lid.

A fast processor may be good for editing photos and videos, but the Sienna 700’s 15.6in screen isn’t up to the task of displaying them. The backlight is dull and uneven, and as a result contrast is poor. There’s a green cast that mars colour accuracy: overall the image looked lifeless and insipid.

Initially, the Sienna 700 looks like a bargain, but the small hard disk, poor battery life and mediocre screen mean we can’t recommend it. The MSI CX623-203UK is fast enough for most tasks, plus has loads of hard disk space and an excellent display.