HP Pavilion zv5000, Athlon 64 Widescreen Laptop

Co-Published with BIOS

HP’s Athlon 64-based Pavilion zv5000 is a great value laptop. Its 15.4in. wide-screen display is bright and crisp and the superior-sounding Harman Kardon speakers make for an excellent movie-viewing experience. It also has a 3.5-hour battery life and runs cool to the touch, integrates a 5-in-1 memory card reader, and comes with a raft of productivity and multimedia software…

For the price, it’s hard to beat. Gamers beware though – nVidia’s low-end GeForce4 440 Go comes with just 64MB of video memory, making it a sub-par solution for running the latest 3D games.

Pros: Bright, crisp screen; 64-bit CPU; card reader; good battery life
Cons: Low-end GPU; no built-in Wi-Fi; no ExpressCard