A Review of the HP Pavilion TX1210US 12.1" Laptop

Small sized notebooks are what the market is about right now. Since the hoopla over Apple's Air the market has gone in two directions bigger, and smaller. Today I'm concentrating on the latter. The HP Pavilion TX1210US 12.1" Laptop is an ultra mobile laptop originally designed as a tablet. This notebook curiously has a swiveling screen but the display isn't a touch screen. Out of curiosity I've decided to give this notebook a review. First let's get started with a few of the basics.

Hardware:

Imaging: an integrated 1.3 megapixel Web Cam (this produces an image about as good as a cell phone's camera)

Processor: 1.9 GHz AMD Turion 64 X2 TL-58

Storage Space: a 160 GB hard drive

RAM: 2 GB RAM (this is an unupgradable maximum)

Optical Drive: a CD R/RW with integrated LightScribe DVD -/+ burner

Graphics Card: Nvidia GeForce Go 6150 video card (using up to 287 MB shared system memory)

Dimensions: 8.8" x 12.0" x 1.5" and weighs in at 4.2lbs.

The performance in this notebook is exceptional thanks to the power sipping AMD. This notebook has the perfect amount of memory for its size boasting the 160GB hard disk as well as the 2GB of RAM (which is what I consider the minimum to run Vista smoothly). This notebook has great battery life and is surprisingly light weight considering its performance. The swiveling display is atypical for a pure notebook but nice especially when you're watching movies as a group.

Connectivity:

Integrated Wireless

3 2.0 USB ports (The gold standard in peripheral connectivity use with the likes of mice, keyboards, digital cameras, and iPods)

1 FireWire port (these ports are used for high speed data transfer typically between digital camcorders or other compatible computers)

1 Ethernet port (this allows the notebook to connect to wired networks)

1 VGA output (this is a typical monitor connection)

1 S-Video port (this is used as a typical projector connection, and sometimes a compatible TV)

1 ExpressCard slot (to add temporary hardware like a Bluetooth adapter or cellular modem)

2 audio outputs (1 S/PDIF digital audio compatible) and 1 microphone input

5 in 1 memory card reader (these slots allow users to directly insert the memory from their mobile devices into the notebook)

The connectivity is nice and surprisingly robust considering its small size. I' m pretty sure that this notebook would please about anyone who could get their hands on it. It is the perfect mixture of performance and portability. Thanks to the removal of the touch screen portion of the notebook the price is surprisingly reasonable at an average online retail price of $800. I don't foresee this notebook experiencing any price reductions anytime soon so don't hesitate to pull the trigger on this bad boy.