Laptop Review: Samsung R440-11

What do most business travelers want out of a laptop? Flexibility, portability, and ease of use at a reasonable price -- pretty much what most students and home users are looking for, too. It's no surprise, then, that many notebook manufacturers position their models as suitable for slipping into a briefcase as well as shoving into a backpack.

With its recently released R40 series of laptops, Samsung is looking to show the world that they have met those needs by striking just the right balance for a variety of users. The R440-11 ($729) is a 14-inch laptop that packs a fair amount of functionality into its 4.9-pound chassis. And in this review, we'll be looking at just how well Samsung has positioned it to go toe-to-toe with similarly positioned offerings from its competitors.

What Does it Bring to the Table?

Powering the R440-11 is an Intel Core i3-330M processor, a dual-core chip that is clocked at 2.26GHz and has 3MB of L3 cache. The unit we reviewed came equipped with 4GB of system memory and a 320GB hard drive. And for optical media, it comes with a super multi dual-layer drive that will let you read and write to most DVD and CD media formats.

Moving on to the display, the Samsung's 14-inch LED-backlit screen offers 1,366 by 768 resolution with a 16:9 aspect ratio, allowing it to display 720p HD content. This glossy screen looks great and is adequately bright, though it does reflect light, as glossies tend to do. Viewing angles are what you'd expect from a laptop display, with screen images looking best head-on and distortion increasing along with viewing angles.

The graphics, meanwhile, are handled by Intel's GMA 4500MHD integrated adapter with 256MB of shared memory -- a solution that will meet the needs of most users but which isn't going to let you run the latest and greatest 3D games and applications. If you're looking for something a bit more gameworthy, you can consider stepping up to the R540-11 ($999), a 15.6-inch Core i5-powered notebook that comes equipped with ATI Mobility Radeon HD545v graphics with 1GB of dedicated memory, not to mention a Blu-ray player.

The sound produced by the R440's two 1.5-watt internal speakers was pretty good and should meet the needs of most users; it's not going to knock anyone's socks off, but it wasn't as tinny as the audio we've heard from many laptop PC speakers. If you're looking to take this notebook along, though, you'll probably spend more time using headphones than the system's speakers regardless.

The keyboard was comfortable to use and let you get at the notebook's various multimedia capabilities using a function key, but didn't dedicate any space to volume control buttons. The touchpad resting just below it worked well, with an included scroll function to let you make your way down long pages without using the arrow keys.

As far as connections goes, Samsung didn't skimp on much. Wireless connectivity is handled by the Atheros AR9285 Wi-Fi adapter, which is 802.11 b/g/n compliant, while the wired controller provides 10/100Mbps Ethernet capabilities. A total of three USB 2.0 ports are available, along with a 3-in-1 flash-card reader. And finally, both a VGA and an HDMI connector are available for external display output, along with microphone and headphone jacks.

Software-wise, Samsung has done a fairly good job of keeping clutter under control. But as is often the case with systems intended more for home-users than for business environments, some bloatware did come along for the ride.

Running the 64-bit version of Windows 7 Home Premium, the R440-11's other software primarily consists of a number of Samsung utilities, perhaps most notable of which is the Battery Life Extender, which claims to extend the life of the battery by limiting its charge to 80 percent of its full capacity. Additional software includes Microsoft Office Starter 2010, which gives you use of Word Starter 2010 and Excel Starter 2010, Windows Live Essential, Skype, and Cyberlink YouCam, a tool that lets you use your webcam to create videos.

Perhaps the biggest sign that the system is not optimized for business users is the desktop icon for the "Game Pack," giving you access to a bunch of those downloadable time-killer games that you can find on countless casual gaming sites.

How Does it Perform?

We tested the Samsung's performance with PCMark Vantage, 3DMark06, and Cinebench. And predictably enough, based on its specs, it did ... OK. In PCMark Vantage, it managed a score of 5,161, while in Cinebench's CPU test, it rendered the sample scene in 3 minutes and 38 seconds.

Its graphics performance, meanwhile, was similarly acceptable, managing a 3DMark06 score of 1,732 and a Cinebench OpenGL rate of 1.25 frames per second. So no records were broken (nor were they expected to be), but the R440-11 offers a level of performance that is very much in line with its price tag.

As far as battery life goes, meanwhile, we managed to get just under two and a half hours of mixed use out of the R440's 6-cell battery. Not quite the four hours it's listed as being able to provide, but not bad for a 6-cell, either.

If you're looking for a good system for home or school use, or even something that you'll be able to take along on trips (business-related or otherwise), the Samsung R440-11 might be right up your alley. Its size, its weight, its capabilities, and its price -- well under $700 at discounters like Amazon.com and Newegg.com -- all make it an attractive choice.

But if your needs are more enterprise-computing-related, it may or may not fit the bill (as hinted by its choice of Win 7 Home Premium instead of Professional). So take a look at it, in person if you can, and see if this is the system you want sitting in front of you when you're at home, in the office, and/or on the road.