Best Desktop Replacement: Compaq Presario X1000

While not the most road-friendly laptop, this super thin, 6.5-pounder with its 15.4-inch screen will certainly make you forget your desktop the minute you see its striking good looking metallic casing and colored front light panels and, of course, give its mobile Pentium M processor with Centrino integrated wireless technology a spin.

Why Widescreen? Obviously DVDs look fantastic, but for more practical purposes (after all, you’ve got to work on these things) widescreen notebooks allow you to view two applications side by side (i.e. Outlook and Internet, or Photoshop and your image viewer). But, of course, who can resist DVD movies, and the X1000 delivers great video playback on its bright XGA screen and, as with most Pentium M chips, battery life is out of this world. Mine ran for four hours even after viewing a 1.5 hour movie.

Two smart features include a scroll bar on the mouse pad and a one-touch mute button that instantly quiets the JBL Speakers without having to point and click away to your volume controls. Other features include a SD (secure digital card slot), three USB ports, fire wire connectors and an internal DVD recordable drive. While the $1300 entry level X1000 is a great bargain, if you are going to replace your desktop step-up to the 1.5 GHZ Pentium M class with 60GB hard drive for a few hundred dollars more. www.compaq.com.