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Written by Sasa Pantelic
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Wednesday, 08 July 2009 |
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Page 2 of 3
Interior
MSI X320 has some new components that we didn’t see so far. Instead of usual Atom N270 CPU, this notebook is based on Atom Z530 that was developed under code name “Silverthorne” which has even lower power consumption than its predecessors. It operates at 1.6GHz so difference in raw CPU power compared to usual netbooks it not that great. On the other hand difference in chipset is very significant. Netbooks are, in most cases, based on 945GSE chipset, while in X320 we found US15W version that is meant to be used in MIDs (Mobile Internet Device). US15W variant was significantly lower power consumption as you all assumed. Base of MSI X320 has TDP of 4.3W while most of the other netbooks has TDP around 8-11W. Thanks to this MSI X-Slim X320 has very low power consumption. Despite low power consumption X320 can get very warm, especially around touch pad. Since we tested this notebook during hot summer days, and didn’t found touch pad, in any given time, to be unpleasantly hot, you shouldn’t worry about this.
US15W chipset has new integrated graphics card: GMA 500. Interesting detail is that core of GMA 500 wasn’t developed by Intel, but instead was licensed from Imagination Technologies. GMA 500 is slightly better solution than GMA 950 if we look at specifications, because GMA 500 supports wider range of advanced technologies, but in real world GMA 950 offers better performance levels. Since GMA 950 cannot be used for much more than 2D pictures and GMA 500 in this category offers the same, slightly lower performance levels are not that important.
We were pleasantly surprised by speakers and their power output. Sound quality has good, and even low frequency (bass) sound was noticeable. Wireless adapter has great signal quality and we enjoyed in good and stable file transfers in our local wireless LAN. This wasn’t the case with some other notebooks that we tested lately. On the other hand webcam offered very average picture quality.
Despite the fact that MSI considers X-Slim X320 as notebook, it has connectors like any netbook model. VGA, LAN and one USB are located at left side, while two USB and audio connectors are located at right side. Card reader is also located, very inconveniently at left side.
Flat and wide battery is nicely fitted in chassis, but it has low capacity. Luckily, thanks to low power consumption, autonomy is, actually, very decent.
One of the peculiars of this model is the fact that this is the first notebook based on Atom CPU that comes with Windows Vista OS preinstalled. MSI X-Slim X320 can cope nicely with this OS since it has 2GB RAM. Transition to Windows 7 will most definitely have positive impact on performances since we tested that combination also.
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