HCL Leaptop with AMD Turion 64 x2 Processor. Review on HCL Laptops

I had bought my HCL Leaptop notebook computer from an exhibition at Adyar, Chennai in April 2007. HCL was giving away their laptops for less price due to clearance sale at month end. I found the deal to be quite a handful during that time.

The leaptop had features likes 120 GB hard drive, 512 RAM, DVD Writer, AMD Turion x64 processor, built-in web cam, Wireless LAN, IR, bluetooth, 4 USB slots, 1 Firewire slot, SD/MMC Card reader, 56K Modem, S-Video, Nvidia GeForce graphics card, Windows Vista Home Basic and 1 year warranty, for around 38, 300 Rs. It was an irresistable deal at that time. I booked for the laptop. There was also some free offer for a Reliance Netcard but I didn't take it as the recharge for it was too costly.

I had tried for availing a loan but couldn't get one, so I had to borrow money from my friend to buy this. When I went to the dealer at Adyar, they didn't have the mentioned model there with them. But since I was in urgent need for a laptop, they gave me a similar one without the Vista Pack. I also got a padded bag free with the laptop.

After using the laptop I found that Vista was slowing down the computer a great deal, so I removed it and put XP. Anyhow the graphics on Vista was superb on my laptop screen, also thanks to the AMD processor and the built-in graphics card. Even after putting XP, the screen looked very rich, clear and vibrant. The secret to long life of the screen-never use full brightness of the screen for much time. This will give more life to the screen as well as save a lot on battery too. Also we must not bend or press too much on the delicate screen.

I was surprised and upset to see that the built-in speakers were of no use. It sounded like a whisper due to the positioning of it beneath the laptop. My advice to laptop buyers-do not buy one with speakers beneath the notebook. It will muffle the already weak sound. Anyway I dont use the laptop speakers at all since I have an external sub woofer system as well as Senheisser earphones.

The hard disk size was more than enough for me and the processor also was capable of running most of the good games available during the time, as well as applications like Photoshop, CoolEdit, etc. S-Video out, 4 USB slots and a firewire (1394) slot were all great to have even though I havent used the 1394 slot till now.

I was not impressed with the battery back-up time of the laptop which never gave me above 2 hours. Now it has become just one hour. The DVD writer also at times gives error when writing to discs. This laptop is a bit on the heavier side weighing more than 2.25 kgs.

The motherboard created some problems after 1 year 3 months of usage. I had to buy another 2 year extended warranty for 5K after begging with HCL for almost a month. They replaced my mother board and even delivered my laptop to my doorstep free of cost after I escalated my complaint to HCL's Regional manager. Anyway the laptop is working fine now and I'm satisfied with the performance of it till now. I haven't installed much processor/resource consuming applications, so no problem of the system crashing till now.

I wouldn't anyway recommend anyone to buy an HCL laptop. Please try good brands like HP, Lenovo, Dell, Acer, Toshiba, etc in that order for a good happy experience with your product. Research well about the product you are buying and the customer service they are providing. Then only go for the purchase. Otherwise you will repent for the hasty decision you made. Enquire about each and every feature like-backup time, processor capability, hard disk space, optical drive, speakers, modem/wLAN, other ports available, warranty, extended warranty (you will need it since each spare part of a laptop costs too much if replacing individually), OS installed, etc