Notebook Hunter

Dedicated graphics cards drive notebook prices up significantly. While the $591 the Toshiba Satellite C650D/006 doesn't have a dedicated card, it has a graphics chipset that boosts graphics performance. That's significant because, in notebooks at this price, it's normally the CPU that's expected to do all the graphics work. The ATI Radeon HD 4250 graphics chipset (like a dedicated card except that it borrows memory from the laptop's own RAM) will let you play older DirectX 10 games on low settings. The AMD V120 CPU CPU is not much better than an Intel Atom N450, but makes general computing possible. The remaining specs include a 320GB hard drive,  15.6in (1366x768) screen, and 2GB RAM.

Really, the only thing holding this low end notebook back is the CPU. The low-end CPU is a sacrifice that has to be made to keep it at such a low price, but it still leaves this notebook on the border of netbook territory. It’s also on the brawny side, weighing 2.8kg and measuring 380x250x37.9 mm, however, if you want a netbook with additional graphics processing to get some low-end games out of bed, this one’s for you.

See the ad below.