Notebook MSI M670X
Detailed Informations, personal experiences and miscellaneous hints for notebook MSI Megabook M670X

Believe me, it was really hard to choose good new notebook for the first time. But if you want to invest big amount of money, it is probably necessary ;) After few days without sleeping ;-) my choice was MSI branded notebook. Their biggest advantages are very friendly prices, but also keyboard with numeric keypad.

My first choice was notebook with 17" display, but I change that decision later. Thanks to bigger mobility I choose 15,4" display - and I think that decision was very good. Besides Notebook MSI M670X has display with resolution 1280 x 800 pixels, which is sufficient for most users.

OK, I admit. Biggest argument for notebook MSI M670X is very low price - only 560 EUR or 750 USD (at 3.3.2007), but I also get USB Bluetooth adapter and USB HUB for free with this notebook. In my opinion, this is very cheap low-end notebook, but with enough hardware power for all users. If you want to work with Office or looking at movies, it will be OK for you. If you want to play newest games, this notebook is NOT for you.
This notebook is cheap, so you can't expect big hardware performance. If you compare this notebook with newest notebooks with two processors like Core 2 Duo, performance is of course lower. But if you compare this notebook with older generation with Pentium M, MSI M670X with processor AMD Sempron 3400+ is better. It's still not for newest games with demanding graphics, but Windows XP is very fast, DivX movies also and you can also watch HD movies on this notebook.

In the other hand, there were two problems - Battery life and webcam. My requirements was 3 hours of battery life and internal Webcam. Notebook MSI M670X have 2-2,5 hours of battery life, but you can always buy second battery (around 107 EUR or 141 USD). This notebook also don't have Webcam, but fortunately you can always buy external Webcam. My preferably size of Harddisk (HDD) was something around 100 GB. This notebook has 80 GB, which is acceptable. Even when you can buy much more expensive notebooks with usually Harddisk size 120 GB, which is not that big difference. Anyway you can always buy external USB 2.0 Harddisk like Western Digital MyBook Essential USB 2.0 with great capacity of 500 GB and price 160 EUR or 214 USD:

Technical Specifications:
CPU AMD Sempron 3400+ (64-bit, Keene, 1.8 GHz, 128MB L2 Cache)

Memory 512 MB DDR2 533 + one free slot (up to 2GB)
Display 15,4" WXGA (1280x800), Glare TFT LCD
Integrated graphics nVIDIA® GeForce 6100, memory up to 128MB shared

Audio 8.1 channel Azalia sound - RealTek ALC883
Harddisk 80 GB, SATA, 5400 rpm
DVD drive Multi DVD±R/RW with support of DVD-RAM Philips SDVD8821, detailed specifications are here

Communications
LAN 10/100/1000 Mbps Ethernet adapter (RealTek 8111), WOL, Lan Boot
WLAN Wi-Fi, 802.11b / 802.11g (Ralink RT2560F)
Modem 56k / V.92 modem (Agere HDA v6081)

Ostatní
Express Card slot, 4-in-1 Card Reader (SD/MS/MMC/MS), VGA CRT (D-Sub), TV-out (S-Video), 4x USB 2.0, FireWire IEEE 1394a - 4pin, internal microphone, input for external microphone, output for external speakers, line in
Dimensions and Weight 358 x 259 x 27~33 mm / 2.9 kg
Battery life approximately 2,5 hours (it depends on type of work - Office software consumpt less energy then playing DivX movies at full screen)

First experiences with notebook MSI M670X
In front of detailed informations I tell you few of my first impressions. After I opened box with notebook, I found some basic cables, few uninteresting handbooks, main notebook and battery. So you just need to insert battery, lock it, connect to electricity and switch on the notebook.
Then you need to instal Operational system like Windows XP and then load drivers from attached CD. That CD has graphical interface, so it is really easy to install all drivers. Only one problem is with audio drivers, becouse they need minimally Service Pack 1 so you need to update Windows before installing them.

I have read in one review, that there is some problem with touchpad - they write, that it's not too much sensible. I didn't found this problem and touchpad was working normally. The true is, that it might be little more sensitive. But I have no problem with touchpad. When you want to achieve fastest moves with touchpad, move from the centre of it. Corners are not too high sensitive, but this is becouse you are at the end of touchpad and you can also stop there and your pointer will be still moving. In the right side of touchpad is scrolling space, when you can move upside and downside like mouse scrolling wheel. I also buy classical USB mouse, it is practical when you are not at move and you are sitting at your office or home. My mouse is now OEM Microsoft® Basic Optical Mouse Black USB, which costs me only 5 EUR / 7 USD (and I really reccomend you buying of external mouse anyway):

I was really nicely surprised with great quality of LCD display with very vivid colours. It is Glare TFT LCD displej, so you will maybe see yourself sometimes ;). It is (in my opinion) worstest in dark surfaces in dark room, when in my opinion dark is not dark but it looks a little bit white in some surfaces - it also depends on view angle), and a lot of Sun or light is also not good, but Glare displays looks like a trend now and you can survive those glares anyway and don't forget - you will have very nice vivid colours with this kind of LCD display.
My next impression was very quiet running of this notebook. You can hear some noises only when you insert DVD and start high-speed playing of that DVD disk. But it is in standard levels.

Notebook MSI M670X - Detailed Informations

Closed notebook doesn't look anyhow interestingly. Silver plastic chassis evoke cheap feeling from this notebook (at least my opinion) and logo MSI in the middle isn't also too much nice. At least it is lightning, so it looks fine at dark, and it is also free advertising for MSI :). You can have much more better impression, when you opens this notebook. I think at first catch your eye black keybord with great font on it and with numeric keypad. I like chassis of this notebook all in black, but unfortunatelly I have silver version :( But it looks much more better in real then in picture. I definitely like design of this notebook.

Keyboard layout is almost the same as classical desktop computer keyboard, only except few details. Of course, it want's a while to adapt to this notebooks keyboard. First major difference is in right corner, where you can always find "Ctrl", but here is "Fn". Keys "Enter", side keys and question mark are smaller. For me important keys "Home" and "End" are only available with at the same time pushed "Fn" key.

You can find another "Fn" keys at main numeric keyboard:
Fn+F2 - switching between LCD display and external computer monitor (must be connected to VGA CRT (D-Sub))
Fn+F3 - touchpad off (this is very practical, when you have external mouse connected and you want to write something - becouse when you write, you may touch the touchpad and move cursor to somewhere else and start writing in wrong place)
Fn+F4 and F5 -  increasing and decreasing display luminosity (this is practical, becouse you may save more battery life when you decrease level of luminosity)
Fn+F7 and F8 - increasing and decreasing of sound
Fn+F9 - switch all sound off
Fn+F12 - switch to sleep mode

Another set of keys is in upwards right og the keyboard. Big button with blue illumination around it is on-off switch and beside are four more buttons:
1. Starts your main email software
2. Starts you main Internet explorer
3. On / Off wireless net
4. Starts software Dual Core Cell

Opening and closing of notebook itself is with no problem. You can find little switch in the middle of front pannel. Before you close notebook, it is also recommended to cover the keyboard with textil cover (which is also included).  This is becouse of scratches at LCD display. This notebook has also some sensor, so when you close notebook, it will go to sleep mode or it may switch off (you can set desirable action in Windows). Sensor reacts, when you move display to approximately 2 cm to keyboard (so you don't need to close it completely).

After you install Windows XP or any other operating system, all you need to do next is insert included CD with drivers (for Windows XP). You can install all drivers from CD easily, becouse it have graphical interface. You will install chipset driver, graphical drivers, wireless net drivers, modem drivers and card reader drivers. After restart it should be done. After you install graphical drivers, display automatically set to resolution 1280x800.
Then you may install another included software(in CD under menu utilities):
1. CyberLink DVD Solution (PowerDVD 5 player, Power Producer 3, PowerDirector 3 Express. Software for watching DVD's,basic video editing software and making of DVD's. I don't like, that this software get into your content menus so I uninstall this. My favourite DVD and DivX player is great KM Player)
2. Norton Internet Security 2005 (I didn't try this software)
3. System Control Manager (more down)
4. Adobe Reader (software for reading .pdf documents)

In my opinion controversial application is Dual CoreCell, which is included in System Control Manager and is supposed to set your notebooks Power Management. In my opinion, benefits of this applications are small. Anyway this notekook contains AMD PowerNow! technology, which set performance of processor automatically (which is good for longer battery life). Another function of this software is set luminosity od LCD display, but you can always do it manually with "Fn" + F4 or F5. System controll Manager is displayed as weird icon of eye in system tray. This application may also check your email account and inform you about new emails, but if you have for example Thunderbird, you don't need this.
At last in System Control Manager you may set some hot keys, but I didn't try this. Personally I uninstall this application - it was useless for me. After uninstall small informative icons after some "Fn" actions stops displaying, but it is no problem.
 

Hardware of MSI M670X
I was pleasantly surprised with hardware. Based on actual comparisons with newest dual-core CPU notebooks I was expecting something worster. But work with this notebook is very fast and hardware doesn't protest even when you use some more exacting software (you may find some tests down). It feels like that this notebooks hardware is well designed and coordinated. But with one exception - this notebook is really not ready to run some demanding software like newest computer games in full resolution and details.
AMD compares power of this CPU AMD Sempron 3400+ with CPU Intel Celeron D 2,8 GHz. Sempron is in most test better.
I can rate hardware of this notebook: graphics + CPU in games or 3D applications - low performance, RAM - good performance, Harddisk - great performance, battery life - medium.

Tests - 3D software Blender
Becouse I sometimes work with 3D modeling software Blender (it's like 3D Studio Max, but absolutely freeware), I wonder, if it will be possible to work with this software in this notebook. After installation I see, that modeling and working with this software is no problem for this notebook. I also compare rendering of one scene with usual PC with CPU Pentium 4 3,19 GHz and 512 RAM. This notebooks renders that scene at 8 seconds, while usual laptop PC renders scene in time 6,5 seconds. So result of this test satisfactory.

Tests - computer game Hidden & Dangerous
I also test this older 3D action computer game. Game works with no problem and you may play this game at 1280x800 resolution.

Battery
Stated battery life is 2,5 hours. After few first test I suppose, that real battery life is a little bit smaller. It looks like to me, that real battery life is something around 1,75-2 hours (watching DivX movie). You can probably increase battery life with decreasing luminosity of LCD display (with Fn+F4). When I was today working with some office applications and with decreased luminosity of display, battery life was 2 hours and 16 minutes.
But there is always another option - you may buy second battery, it costs 89 EUR or 119 USD.

Multimedia
Notebook contains internal DVD Philips SDVD8821. You can see it's specifications here. One DVD will be burned after 13,5 minutes. Of course performance of this DVD is slightly lower than usual laptop PC DVD burners.

Unfortunatelly this notebook doesn't contains webcam, but at least you can find integrated microphone, which is placed above keybord on left corner. I try record few voice messages, but even when I set volume for microphone to highest level, record was silent. So I think that this microphone isn't too much good.

Notebook also contains stereo speakers, they quality and volume is great, despite it I recommend for perfect listening external speakers, like great 2.1 repro Creative Inspire P380 speakers, which costs 32 EUR or 43 USD:

The Rest, Inputs, Outputs, connection with Tv
Audio connectors and Card Reader are placed in front panel. For headphones it is logical, but when you want to connect external speakers, it's not that good. I appreciate output for external speakers on sideways. On front panel is also Line-in input and external microphone output.
On left side are net connectors (RJ 45 - intranet, net) and modem (RJ 11 - phone), 2x USB 2.0 port and DVD drive.
On right side are electrical input, D-Sub output to monitor, S-Video to Tv, another 2x USB 2.0 ports, FireWire(IEEE 1394) and ExpressCard slot:

Cooling exhaust is on rear side of the notebook, which I think is very good solving. I also like to be electrical input on rear side, I don't know, why they put it on right side.
You can also connect this notebook with your television. It is possible with S-video output and S-Video cable. You just connect that cable to your television and switch to output video mode by switching Fn+F2 like when using external display. If you want to play audio from Tv, you must also connect audio cable (in my case I connect audio cable to the output on the front side of notebook in the most right). If is anything OK, you will be able to play movies or games and watch them on your television. If you have classical CRT 4:3 television, you will not be able to see all picture, but when you move with mouse to the right or left, you will see that image. Or you can change resolution on your notebook. New MSI notebooks, which are equipped with better graphical chips you can also connect your notebook with HDMI to your new LCD or Plasma television.

Card Reader 4 in 1

Big advantage of this notebook is also Card Reader. It is placed in front panel on left side from audio connectors. It is covered with plastic blind flange. If you want to use Card Reader, just push it a little and it will release then and you can push out that plastic blind flange. Card Reader is compatible with SD, MMC, Memory Stick a Memory Stick Pro cards. Very the Memory Stick cards uses mobile phones Sony Ericsson like Sony Ericsson K 750i. Card from mobile telephone is necessary insert into small adapter (which is included in package with Sony Ericsson K750i) and after that you may insert card to Card Reader (becouse mobile this phone uses smaller cards Memory Stick Pro Duo). After that your card will be automatically detected and you will be free to upload or download any files (like photos, mp3's or video). If you want do eject card, just push it again a little bit and than it will be free to eject.
If you need bigger card for your mobile phone, you can buy memory card with 1 GB capacity SanDisk Memory Stick PRO DUO, which costs 36 EUR or 48 USD:

Bluetooth
Even if this notebook has Card Reader, which you can use to load or upload pictures/movies/music from your mobile phone, yet you maybe need sometimes direct connection to your mobile phone with bluetooth (backup numbers and other files, connection to internet through mobile phone or upload photos/videos/music directly to memory of your mobile phone) or you just need to connect another bluetooth device like mouse or keyboard. This notebook is without bluetooth, but you can use external USB bluetooth adapter. I reccomend MSI Star Key 2.0 - USB Bluetooth adapter with speed up to 3Mbps and range of 100 m and support of standard Bluetooth Ver. 2.0. Price of this device is 18 EUR or 24 USD:

Comparison of M670X with model M677X Crystal Edition
One of my favourite notebooks, when I was choosig new notebook, was notebook MSI M677X, which atracts me with his great black design (but it looks like, that plastic components are the same as in notebook MSI M670X, different are only colours). Of course problem was relative high price of notebook M677X Crystal Edition - his price - 1179 EUR or 1574 USD - is two times higher then price of notebook M670X! The biggest difference of those two notebooks is perhaps hardware configuration:

	MSI M670X	MSI M677X
CPU	AMD Sempron 3400+ Keene, 1.8 GHz	AMD Turion 64 X2 Dual-Core MP TL-56, 1.8 GHz
Memmory	512 MB	1024 MB
Video Card	nVIDIA® GeForce 6100, up to 128 MB shared	nVIDIA GeForce Go 7600 256 MB
Harddisk	80 GB	120 GB
Battery life	2-2,5 hours	3 hours
Accessories	nothing	MSI bag, MSI mouse
Price (03/2007)	561 EUR or 748 USD	1179 EUR or 1574 USD

So when are those two notebooks similar (except hardware configuration), for users, who do not need high hardware performance, is very advantageous to buy much cheaper model MSI M670X. LCD displays are probably the same, keyboard too, both notebooks has 4x USB 2.0, almost same weight, net card up to 1000 Mbps, FireWire port or ExpressCard slot. On the contrary M677X has internal Webcam 1,3 Mpix, Bluetooth 2.0 and by 40 GB larger Harddisk. And of course -  M677X  has some Swarovski crystals on its cover, around MSI logo - it's that place, which you almost never didn't see when working with this notebook :) But black colour of M677X is great.

Verdict
I must agree, as though I buy this notebook MSI M670X only for a trial, I will keep this notebook for a while. I am satisfied with this notebook and at this time I don't need high hardware performance of Dual-Core CPU or expensive graphical card. And anyhow - when that time comes - it will be easy to buy this technology cheaper. And that's the point - buy expensive notebook for 3000 EUR or USD is not a problem, but buy a cheap and powerful notebook - that is the key for good buy. However you decide in your buy, I wish you to be pleased and benefit of your new notebook.
You may buy (under new marking) notebooks VR601X (platform Intel) or VR610X (platform AMD) - which are similar with this notebook (old marking "M670X").

List of mentioned hardware and software

Download, drivers and the rest
Official M670X site: http://eu.msi.com/index.php?func=proddesc&maincat_no=135&cat2_no=&cat3_no=&prod_no=1058

Utilities to download: http://eu.msi.com/index.php?func=downloaddetail&type=driver&maincat_no=135&prod_no=1058
At this time you may download those utilities:
System Control Manager - version 1.0107.0724.G608 for Windows Vista
System Control Manager - version 1.79.30 for Windows 2000/XP

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