The Bottom Line
iBuyPower's Battalion 101 LX-795 may look very similar to laptops from several other manufacturers because they all use the same base laptop chassis. This means that their systems will have roughly the same features and performance because they share so many similar components. In terms of a 17-inch laptop, it is very much a average overall system that doesn't distinguish itself very much from a very crowded field. Performance is decent as are features but nothing that really stands out in the crowd.
Pros
* Fast Core 2 Duo Processor
* Relatively Slim And Small Dimensions For 17-inch Laptop
Cons
* Uses Slower DDR2 Memory
* Not As Customizable As Offerings From Companies Like Dell, HP
Description
* Intel Core 2 Duo T9400 Dual Core Mobile Processor
* 4GB PC2-6400 DDR2 Memory
* 320GB 5400rpm SATA Hard Drives
* 8x DVD+/-RW Dual Layer Burner
* 17-inch WSXGA+ (1680x1050) Wide LCD Display With 2.0 Megapixel Webcam
* NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT Graphics With 512MB Graphics
* v.92 56kbps Modem, Gigabit Ethernet, 802.11a/g/n Wireless and Bluetooth 2.0
* Three USB 2.0, FireWire, eSATA, HDMI, Express/54, 4-in-1 Card Reader
* 15.6" x 11" x 1.4" @ 7.5 lbs.
* Vista Home Premium 64-bit
Guide Review - iBuyPower Battalion 101 LX-795 17-inch Desktop Replacement Laptop PC
iBuyPower's Battalion 101 LX-795 is based around an MSI white box laptop chassis. What this does is set a large number of the features such that they can't be modified or upgraded by a customer purchasing the unit from iBuyPower. These include the LCD panel, graphics processor and optical drive. Basically, the consumer can choose between what processor, the amount of memory, hard drive and software that will be installed in the system.
In terms of the processing power, the Battalion 101 LX-795 comes equipped with a fairly high end Intel Core 2 Duo T9400 dual core mobile processor. This does sacrifice a bit more battery life than the similar speed Duo P9500 processor that is available. Of course, to save a little money one can drop to a lower P8000 series CPU. The system does come with 4GB of memory, but it uses the slower and less expensive DDR2 memory standard than the newer DDR3. This does put the system at a disadvantage compared to some newer laptops.
With the chassis having a built-in dual layer DVD burner, users will be a bit disappointed that they can't upgrade to a Blu-ray drive for HD movie playback. Consumers are able to customize what hard drive they would like to have in the system though. The base 320GB drive provides a good amount of storage space but spins at a slower 5400rpm rate compared to many competitors using the 7200rpm desktop speeds. Users can elect to get a smaller drive to save some cash or they can also upgrade to a variety of solid state drives for higher reliability but with less storage space.
The net result is that the Battalion 101 LX-795 is a decent all-around 17-inch laptop computer but similar systems can be found by other companies for roughly the same price.