CyberpowerPC's Compal PBL21: The Shark's New Teeth
by Dustin Sklavos on July 11, 2011 12:30 AM ESTConclusion: If Not For Competition
The Compal PBL21 is a solid evolution of the NBLB2, bringing with it the upgrade to Sandy Bridge, slightly improved graphics hardware, and a much better chassis. Including USB 3.0 is a nice touch, and the 1080p panel is always welcome. In a vacuum, this would be an easy enough laptop to recommend.
Unfortunately, as with the NBLB2, the PBL21 doesn't exist in a vacuum. In our review it butts up squarely against two impressive competitors. The Clevo P151HM sports a great screen, too, and it has a vastly more powerful GPU that's actually capable of handling gaming at 1080p. CyberpowerPC is willing to sell you that notebook upgraded with the new GeForce GTX 560M (which also supports Optimus!) in an otherwise identical configuration to this review unit for $1,460, or about $300 more. At least there you have a reasonably hard decision to make, though if gaming is important to you it will be worth taking the plunge.
And then there's the Dell XPS 15. Jarred's been a big fan of Dell's revived XPS line and it's not hard to see why. Dell will sell you the XPS 15 in a comparable configuration for $1,344, although you sacrifice the SSD. In exchange you get better speakers, an even better screen, a good keyboard, and improved battery life.
Pricewise the PBL21 is more or less where it needs to be. It's the least expensive option in the bunch, with a fairly well-rounded form factor and a decent GPU. This is if nothing else a balanced design, and the benefit of ordering from a boutique like CyberpowerPC or AVADirect is that they're far less likely to rip you off on upgrade costs. Case in point: CyberpowerPC upgrades you from 4GB to 8GB of RAM for $69, while Dell will ding you $120 for the privilege. You can grab the Compal PBL21 (Xplorer X6-9600) with a quad-core processor starting at less than $1000, which is a lot of performance all things considered.
The price is right on the PBL21 and it's not necessarily a bad notebook. I just can't help but feel like it's a situation where you may want to budge in one direction or the other. But if you want a 1080p screen, quad-core processor, SSD, and a decent GPU at a good price, you'll have a hard time doing better.
We'd like to thank CyberpowerPC for giving us the opportunity to review the Compal PBL21.
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Hrel - Monday, July 11, 2011 - link
I wish compal would release a 15.6" with a GTX560 in it... sigh. Oh well, just ordered the Clevo.I'd be curious to know if DDR3-1333 with CAS latency 9 is faster or if 1066 with latency 7 is faster. Like I said, I just ordered this laptop and intend to add or swap out the RAM. Came with 1333, so I know it's CAS 9. It's always made sense to me to reduce latency whenever possible. But I'd like to know for sure. What do you think, 1333 at CAS 9 or 1066 at CAS 7? Gaming, video editing, web surfing. Media playback is the usage model. Tests would be great, but that's asking a lot.
It annoys me that they put so much RAM on GPU's in notebooks. Like you said it can't use anywhere near that much. They just wanna sell more RAM and don't want you to have a choice. So they just let the price creep up. Similar feeling to the old RAM price fixing issues from a decade ago. Same idea, just forcing quantity on you instead of straight price.
Finally, I'd like to see the Seagate Momentus XT compared to a laptop 7200rpm drive. Anand's review of it compared it to a 5400rpm drive, hardly a reasonable comparison considering the XT runs at 7200rpm AND has 32MB of cache. I ordered it already anyway, but I like numbers:)
On to the rest of the review!
Hrel - Monday, July 11, 2011 - link
I like the keyboard mostly. The NBLB2 never bothered me except where the ctrl key is. They 10-key on this looks good, all the numbers and enter key at least. The other keys I just couldn't fit to the right. I'm ok with that. I can still do the number part as fast as ever, just have to alter brain patterns to hit the + - / * keys.I hate one mouse button, give me two actual buttons please.
I know it's silly but I want a fingerprint scanner. Seriously, how much can they cost? 15 bucks? I got that.
Overall I agree. Much improved but still in need of work.
Hrel - Monday, July 11, 2011 - link
Final thing I should mention. If you google "cyberpowerpc coupon" you will find multiple coupon codes that STILL work. Can save you about 20-80 bucks depending on some variables. Basically paid for shipping and then a little thank you for me.GuinnessKMF - Monday, July 11, 2011 - link
The latency is a measure of how many clocks, so comparing latency directly is misleading. 1333mhz, 9 clocks is 6.75 microseconds (my units might be off, but I'll be consistent), and the 1066 with CAS 7 is 6.56 microseconds, less than a 3% degradation in actual latency, but you're looking at about a 25% throughput improvement. Different applications demand different performance characteristics, but I think for the most part a DDR3-1333 at CAS 9 is going to be an improvement over DDR3-1066 CAS 7.PlasmaBomb - Monday, July 11, 2011 - link
It would be nanoseconds (ns), and I don't think 3% is enough to be worried about (you probably won't notice it due to benchmarking variations). Other than that thumbsup.tzhu07 - Monday, July 11, 2011 - link
Tacky build quality and design + glossy screen on a laptop = auto-failBleh.
DanNeely - Monday, July 11, 2011 - link
"Unfortunately, the PBL21's keyboard is more of a lateral move than anything and I'm beginning to think that despite the ability to cram a 10-key into a 15.6" chassis, manufacturers should probably just avoid it."Yeah, if there's only room to fit 3 columns naturally I'd much rather see the ins-pgdn keys and the arrow T in a proper desktop layout than anything else.
wurizen - Monday, July 11, 2011 - link
why does a modern gpu like the gt 540m have trouble playing in 1080p when console games like the PS3, which is like 5 yrs old have no problem w/ it?Dustin Sklavos - Monday, July 11, 2011 - link
Consoles typically render at 720p (sometimes lower) and then upscale the image. The lion's share of the time they're not ACTUALLY rendering at 1080p.wurizen - Monday, July 11, 2011 - link
huh? aren't ps3 games already 1080p? no need to upscale. are you saying ps3 developers render their games at less than 1080p and tell you it's 1080p? i think you can sue them for that.