Two laptops with HD DVD drives land in the desktop-replacement portion of this month's chart: HP's Pavilion dv9000t earns the Best Buy, and Toshiba's Qosmio G35-AV660 takes the second spot. Both full-featured notebooks delivered strong performance in our WorldBench 5 tests, and both units provide a slew of features and ports--including HDMI--to satisfy even the most demanding users. Another newcomer, the Alienware Area-51m 5750, turned in the best WorldBench 5 score to date from a notebook.
Among the all-purpose models, Dell's Inspiron E1505 nabs the Best Buy. This well-rounded unit hits all the right notes, with fine WorldBench 5 performance, solid battery life, a great design, and a comfy keyboard. For a reasonable $1186, it's a great deal.
Kalpana Ettenson