The RF710 comes in a nice package that provides a quality keyboard, strong storage armour and a welcome Blue -ray addition. There are some question marks as to its gaming credentials, but you will not find any such questions in its desktop applications. The lack of a 1080 pixel display is also a big letdown especially when you put its $1049( as of 19th november, 2010 ) price tag into the debate. All in all the machine has a lot to offer in its underated package.

The system ships in with an intel four -core i7 720QM processor that returns a speed of 1600 MHz. The machine packs a 4 GB DDR3 memory with a speed of 1066 MHz.Its pretty solid storage armour is beefed by a 640 GB hard disk drive with an impressive 5400 RPM speed. The hard disk is divided into two; one set 150 GB boot partition and a healthier 354 GB for data purposes. The storage facility is further bolstered by an SDHC Card and a Multimedia Card. The gaming performance is rather wanting and the biggest culprit is the below -per nVidia GeForce GT330M graphics chipset that has a modest memory of 1024 MB. The machine fails to master 30 frames per second when playing Far Cry 2 game in maximum resolution, it performs even poorer in Just Cause 2 as it fails to top 20 frames per second.

The RF710 uses the 64 -bit Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium Edition Operating System. When put to the test on the WorldBench 6 Suite, the RF710 scored 103 which is in tandem with other peers that use the same processor. The machine is pretty responsive and user -friendly and the fact that it does not get overly heat up is a tick in the box. The battery keeps the clock ticking for two and a half hours, which even though not an earth -shattering time, is quite a commendable time for a machine of its built and power. The system’s network connection comes in the form of Broadcom 802.11n Wi-Fi or Marvell giga bit, you also get Bluetooth. But wireless broadband 3G/4G is not part of the deal.

The RF710 comes with a standard chiclet -style keyboard that offers a nice typing experience, but suffers from its tiny function key rows. The keyboard could also do with an indentation in the middle. There is much to like in its superb trackpad that offers quality sensitivity. It avoids the twinchy and sluggishness of most laptops. The machine produces quality sound due to the SRS TruSound facility. The RF710 comes with an impressive suite of ports including two USB 3.0 ports, two USB 2.0 ports, video interfaces VGA and HDMI. You will also get embedded microphone and webcam. The machine weighs 7.5 pounds when fully ensuite, it measures 16.4 by 10.9 by 1.5 inches.