Toshiba X205-SLi1 17″ Dual Drives, Dual Graphics, Intel Santa Rosa Core 2, nice finish, Speakers, built in subwoofer, HD DVD, $1999 Ok I decided to just walk into a store and buy a Gaming laptop vs Custom ordering a Dell XPS, Sager or Clevo. I came to the conclusion that I don’t need a quad core right now. The biggest downfall of all new windows laptops these days is.. well.. the Windows OS itself… namely Windows Vista. Windows Vista is shaping up to be one of the worst OS releases in history (my own history.. hehe) offering nothing but trouble in the drivers department, software department and introducing lag in boot up time, shut down time, and I could go on and on but the bottom line is if you are using Windows for anything legit these days you really need to downgrade to the aging Windows XP OS to ensure everything is going to work properly. This means 2 gigs or ram and the 2 Ghz Core 2 is good enough. I only wish Toshiba offered a downgrade disc to allow you to install Windows XP on there instead of windows vista. For example, many graphics intensive applications like the Adobe Creative suites, actually run slower under vista on this machine due to Vista bloat, than under Win XP on a year old machine with a slower processor and slower graphics card. In fact even the included Toshiba HD DVD player does not support the Sli architecture under Vista (yet). You need to disable Sli, then reboot, then run the player. Un-installing some of the bloatware (namely Picasa 2) renders your DVD rom drive useless in vista… forcing you do do a Registry fix (or system restore for most people). Unbelievable. Needless to say, I’m installing Windows XP as soon as possible 🙂 Love the Toshiba hardware, Windows Vista however is not ready for prime time.. but it’s getting there…. slowly Those quirks aside, the X205 series is laid out well, I love the keyboard layout, large shift key, etc. The computer itself looks great on the outside (cover) but once opened, you are greeted by this rather semi-ugly overly thick slab of a laptop.. haha. Though ugly serves a better purpose as the heat is kept to an absolute minimum. The best feature about this laptop is the sound. Toshiba has some of the best sounding laptops. I also have a G35 that sounds great, but this unit has a mini subwoofer and 4 speakers that all together offer a great range of sound quality with no distortion from the speakers cranked all the way up. It’s the best sounding laptop I’ve ever heard. The 17″ 1440 x 900 screen is nice and bright, not as bright as an LED or dual lamp, but good enough. I also love that all connections on this box are on the sides.. no less than 6 USB ports, HDMI and S-Video ports, modem, DV, sound and SD card ports. Also included is an HD DVD player that while it will only give you 720p on the laptop, will give you full 1080 through the HDMI out to an HDTV. Specs: Toshiba X205-SLi1: Processor Type * : Coreâ„¢2 Duo Processor Number * : T7250 Processor Speed * : 2.0GHz Front Side Bus * : 800MHz Operating System ** Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium (32-bit) Memory Size * 2048MB Memory Speed PC2-5300 DDR2 667MHz SDRAM Intel® Turbo Memory No Turbo Memory Installed (Default) Display Size * 17.0″ widescreen Display Type * WXGA+ with TruBrite® Technology Display Resolution * 1440×900, Supports 720p content Graphics Engine * NVIDIA® SLI Dual GeForce® 8600M GT Graphics Memory * 767MB total: 512MB DDR3 discrete memory + up to 255MB shared memory w/NVIDIA® TurboCacheâ„¢ technology Hard Drive Size * 240GB: 120GB HDD+120GB HDD Hard Drive Speed 5400rpm Optical Drives * HD DVD-ROM/DVD SuperMulti (+/- double layer) drive (in one optical drive), supporting 12 formats Wireless LAN * ♣ Intel® Wireless WiFi Link 4965 AGN (802.11a/g/n) Bluetooth * Bluetooth® V2.0 + EDR Webcam Webcam and microphone built into LCD bezel Input Devices Internet Launch button, Dual Mode Pad, CD/DVD Buttons, 104 key US keyboard with 10 Key Pad Security Finger Print Reader Modem Modem LAN 10/100/1000 Audio Headphone jack (stereo), Microphone jack (mono), S/P DIF output port (shared with headphone port), 4 harman/kardon® stereo speakers with subwoofer AC Adapter 180W (19V x 9.5A) 100-240V AC Adapter Battery Type Li-Ion (6000mAh) PC Express Slot 1-ExpressCardâ„¢ Slot Media Port 5-in-1 Bridge Media Adapter USB Ports 6-USB (2.0) iLINK i.LINKâ„¢ IEEE-1394 HDMI HDMI output port S/P DIF output port S/P DIF output port S-Video TV-out (S Video) Weight Starting at 9.37 lbs. Color Flare Carmine Warranty * 1-Yr Parts and Labor, 1-Year Battery Also Includes: # Flare Carmine lid color, Microsoft® Works v.8.5, Microsoft Office Trial Home and Student 2007 Edition (60-day trial), Ulead® DVD MovieFactory® 5 for TOSHIBA, InterVideo® WinDVD® 8, TOSHIBA ConfigFree®, TOSHIBA Security Assist, TOSHIBA Disk Creator, 4-Built-in harman/kardon® stereo speakers with subwoofer, 5-in-1 Bridge Media Adapter, ExpressCardâ„¢ slot, 6-USB (2.0) ports, i.LINKâ„¢ IEEE-1394, TV-out (S-Video), HDMI port, Fingerprint Reader, 10/100 Ethernet, Modem, RGB monitor port, Microphone jack (monaural), headphone jack (stereo)