Introduction

Compaq Presario 722US Laptop Review

This content was originally featured on Amdmb.com and has been converted to PC Perspective’s website. Some color changes and flaws may appear.

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For several months now I have been using the Sony Vaio FXA36 Athlon notebook computer as my personal computer, almost never touching my desktop computers anymore. I love the large and bright LCD screen that does not tire my eyes like usual radiation spewing CRT’s and LCD screen sub-pixel rendered fonts. It is also nice to have my entire desktop wherever I go, be it work or school, and it is very useful to have quick portability in demonstrating the Linux operating system.

There are drawbacks to owning these laptops. As this review will show, these AMD powered notebooks tend to have weak and sometimes problematic 3D video controllers. To my knowledge no current AMD powered laptop has a decent video card that even approaches low-end Geforce or Radeon in performance, reliability and compatibility. Several video chipsets in AMD laptops are Trident CyberbladeXP in HP Pavillion 5470, ATI Rage Mobility (Mach64) in Sony Vaio FX(A) series, and S3 Savage4 Pro+ within the Compaq Presario 700 series.

Up until now, AMDMB has not yet reviewed the AMD powered Sony Vaio FXA series of laptops, so this review compares the Compaq Presario 700 series to the capabilities of the Sony series. In a sense this is a review of both laptops, though mostly about the Compaq product.

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Sony Vaio FXA series

Both companies currently sell a line of AMD powered laptops, all with nearly the same motherboard, chipsets and peripherals, but with differing processors. This means that the features and capabilities of both brands discussed within this review apply to all current AMD powered laptops from these respective companies.

    Compaq Presario 722US

  • 1.1GHz Duron Morgan with SSE
  • VIA KN133 chipset
  • JBL Pro laptop speakers
  • 14.1” TFT screen
  • 16MB shared memory S3 Savage4 Pro+
  • 240MB PC100 SDRAM (384MB max)
  • 20GB IDE Hard Drive
  • 2x Standard USB 1.1 ports
  • 1x IEEE 1394 Texas Instruments OHCI
  • 8x8x24 Combo CD-RW/DVD
  • Windows XP Home
  • Red Hat Linux 7.3 kernel 2.4.18-5

    Sony Vaio FXA36

  • 1.GHz Athlon 4 Palomino with SSE
  • VIA KT133A chipset
  • Terrible Sounding Speakers
  • 15” TFT screen
  • 8MB ATI Rage Mobility (Mach64)
  • 512MB PC100 SDRAM (512MB max)
  • 20GB IDE Hard Drive
  • 2x Standard USB 1.1 ports
  • 1x IEEE 1394 Texas Instruments OHCI
  • 4x4x16 Combo CD-RW/DVD
  • Windows XP Home
  • Red Hat Linux 7.3 kernel 2.4.18-5

    Value Desktop for Comparison

  • Athlon XP 1800+
  • MSI K7NPro
  • 256MB PC2100 DDR SDRAM
  • Integrated Geforce2MX 400
  • 30GB 7200rpm IDE Hard Drive
  • Windows 2000 Professional
  • Red Hat Linux 7.3 kernel 2.4.18-5
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