Eurocom Racer

Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary evidence—or, at the least, an extraordinary laptop. Perennial speed-laptop maker Eurocom must have taken that advice to heart, because the company set—and met—some very high expectations with its Racer, a 15.6-inch gaming machine. The company dubs this machine "the world’s most powerful 15.6-inch notebook," and, while we can't vouch for the entire world, our tests supported this lofty claim within Computer Shopper's universe of all laptops we've tested. This workstation/gaming machine really put its money where its drive slot is.

Design

You would think that a notebook with a name like the "Racer" would be decked out in racing stripes or an edgy design, but that isn’t the case here. The 6.8-pound chassis sports a plain, matte-black finish with a rubbery texture. The surface doesn’t magnify every fingerprint smudge, like a glossy finish does, but it's not quite impervious to them, either. The exterior doesn't flash with the typical signals of a gaming laptop; there are no lighting effects or shiny chrome trimmings, which is good for those who would use this as an office workstation instead of a gaming powerhouse. The only adornment is a slightly raised Eurocom logo on the center of the lid.

A generous array of ports provides lots of connectivity options. Video outputs include HDMI and DVI, and you get a total of five USB ports, two of which support USB 3.0 connectivity. One of the USB 2.0 ports is an eSATA/USB combo port that allows you to connect external storage devices. If your camera or camcorder uses FireWire rather than USB, the Racer has you covered there, as well; a mini-FireWire port is on the left side of the notebook, right next to the nine-format card reader.

This model is equipped with a standard DVD-burning optical drive, a tray-loader on the right edge. In our view, a Blu-ray reader would have been a much better companion to the Racer’s high-resolution display.

Features

The 15.6-inch screen has a native resolution of 1,920x1,080 and a matte finish that does a great job of reducing glare. The panel delivers dark blacks, which in turn gives colors some pop without oversaturating them. Scenes from one of our test movies, Iron Man 2 on DVD, were bright, and image detail was sharp. We did not note any motion artifacts, and skin tones were spot on. Gamers will appreciate the screen’s motion-handling prowess, as it delivers fast action without blurring. We also tried the combat action game Assassin’s Creed II, and it too looked excellent, with game play that was fluid and clean.

Wireless connectivity comes by way of Intel’s Advanced N-6230 adapter, which provides 802.11a/b/g/n Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity. Our review model came configured with a 500GB Seagate hybrid drive, which is part 7,200rpm hard drive and part solid-state drive. (Our testing experience with hybrid drives, detailed in our review of the 2.5-inch Seagate Momentus XT, has generally been good.) The Racer also has a secondary drive bay, accessible from the bottom of the chassis, which allows for additional storage and various RAID configurations. (Our test model only had the single drive, however.)