Kobalt G150 (Clevo P150HM with Geforce GTX485M) Gaming Laptop Review

1. Introduction2. Packaging and Bundle3. The Kobalt G150: Exterior4. The Kobalt G150: Connectivity and Hardware5. Testhing Methodology and BIOS6. Synthetic: Heaven Benchmark7. Synthetic: 3DMark Vantage and 118. Synthetic: SiSoft Sandra 20119. Synthetic: Cinebench R11.5 (64-bit)10. Synthetic: Super Pi Mod 1.511. Synthetic: Crystalmark and HDTach12. Real World: Media Encoding with Cyberlink MediaEspresso13. Real World: Blu-Ray Playback14. Gaming: Crysis Warhead15. Gaming: F1 201016. Gaming: GTA IV: Episodes from Liberty City17. Technical: Thermals and Acoustics18. Technical: Battery Life and Power Consumption19. Closing Thoughts20. View All Pages

KitGuru has looked at a number of impressive gaming laptops over the past few months including the bespoke Cryo Mercia.  Like Cryo, Kobalt Computers is a relatively small operation who cater for the enthusiast end of the market.  Their laptop range starts at £859 inc. VAT with the budget friendly GS510 however many of their laptops cost well over £1000 inc. VAT.

Today we are going to look at one of their most popular laptops, the G150 – offering a good compromise between price and performance.  It comes in around the middle of their range, starting at £1199 inc. VAT with a nVidia GeForce GTX 460M graphics card.  The model we have for review, though, is a little more pricey as it boasts the nVidia GeForce GTX 485M graphics card, an option which commands £320 extra.

Like Cryo, Kobalt builds their entire laptop range using Clevo Chassis which are favored by many gamers across the world.  The G150 is built on Clevo's P150HM chassis which is used by a few other notebooks such as the Sager NP8150 which is available in the US.

Specification

• Processor: Intel Core-i7 2630QM (2.00GHz, 6MB, 4C)
• Display: 15.6″ Full HD (1920 x 1080) LED-Backlit LCD (X-Glass)
• Memory: 6GB (3x 2GB) Corsair DDR3 1333MHz RAM
• Chipset: Intel HM65
• Graphics: nVidia GeForce GTX 485M 1.5GB GDDR5
• Hard Drive: 500GB Western Digital 7200rpm (SATA2, 16MB Cache)
• Optical Drive: Blu-Ray ROM / DVD+/- RW
• Card Reader: 9-in-1
• Sound Card: Integrated 7.1 Channel High Definition
• Audio Connections: Headphone, Microphone, Line-in and S/PDIF out
• Battery: 8-Cell Li-Ion 76.97 kWH
• Power Supply: Full-range 220W AC Adapter, 100 – 240V
• Networking: Gigabit Ethernet, Intel Wifi-Link 6230 ABGN + Bluetooth
• Ports: 2x USB3.o, 2x USB2.0, HDMI 1.4, eSATA, 1394a, DVI-I, Kensington
• Webcam: 2.0 Megapixel
• Dimensions: 376 x 256 x 35-43mm (WxDxH)
• Weight: 3.1KG (with Battery)
• Operating System: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit)

Kobalt supply the G150 in a rather plain brown cardboard box which is a very different approach to the likes of Alienware.  This is no bad thing, though, as it's much less likely to get ‘misplaced' in transit as it doesn't obviously contain over £1000 worth of hardware.  For extra protection, the G150 is packaged within a second box inside the shipping box. The inner box has a handle at the top which makes it very easy to remove.

The bundled items are much more useful than the hat and stickers that Alienware provide with their M17X.  Alongside the comprehensive user manual and driver CD, Kobalt have thoughtfully included a cleaning towel and a DVI-VGA adapter.  Unlike a lot of manufacturers these days, they also include a Windows 7 install CD with the laptop.  This is an OEM version and the product key is affixed to the underside of the machine.

Like we've found with powerful gaming laptops, the included power supply is a brick, which does limit mobility a little.  That said, taking a gaming laptop with a heavy power supply to a LAN event is still a lot easier than lugging around a desktop PC with a monitor and a variety of peripherals.

We're glad to see that many laptop manufacturers are getting over their obsession with glossy plastic and the impractical qualities.  Kobalt is no exception, giving the G150 a soft-touch rubberised finish like that we've seen on gaming mice such as the SteelSeries Xai.

They have opted to use glossy plastic surrounding the screen, presumably to create the illusion of a borderless screen.  This shouldn't pick up fingerprints and scratches too easily, though, as it's not an area that will be touched very often.

One aspect of the rubberised finish that you won't be able to glean from our photos is how great it feels.  It should also prove practical in the long run as it isn't easily scratched and can be wiped clean very easily. Unfortunately, the rubberised finish extends to the touchpad where it isn't ideally suited because it provides far too much grip to move your fingers smoothly. This can cause inaccuracies as it is difficult to judge how much force to apply.

Once you get used to the surface, though, it's  bearable to use when performing general tasks, but a mouse really is necessary for gaming. The touchpad does support multi-touch gestures like two finger scrolling and pinch to zoom which enhances the internet browsing experience.  The buttons require significant pressure to press but this prevents you from activating them accidentally.

Between the two touchpad buttons there is a fingerprint reader which is easy to set up and stops you from having to put in your password every time you start up the machine.

The rubber finish doesn't extended to the keyboard, though, where it would probably better suited.  The keyboard used on this laptop is Clevo's standard model that is used across their whole range of notebooks from £300 budget models to £3000 SLI machines.

It uses chiclet-style keys which are well spaced and have a responsive action, despite being a little noisy in operation.  To reflect the gaming nature of this laptop, Clevo has added red arrows to the WASD keys.  While there is nothing really wrong with the keyboard, it does feel a little cheap for a machine of this caliber and lags far behind the quality of Apple laptops.

Behind the keyboard there is a strip of of textured perforated plastic which contains two of the system's three speakers.  The third is a subwoofer which is located on the underside of the machine.  In the past we've tested a number of Clevo-based notebooks and none of them have impressed us with their sound quality.  But they seem to have improved things quite significantly with this machine and we would easily say it is one of the best we have tested in recent years.

Unlike some laptops, the G150 isn't lacking in bass, producing a full sound throughout all registers.  Obviously the sound isn't as going to be as good as a half-decent gaming headset or set of speakers but it is more than adequate for watching movies on the go or for some casual gaming.

Flanking the soundbar on the left hand side we find the power button which is well-sized and has a good action.  Unfortunately there are no dedicated multimedia buttons to speak of which is a little surprising considering the price of the machine.  Even the volume control buttons have only been added onto the keyboard as an afterthought as secondary functions.  There are a number of other useful function buttons on the keyboard, including a touchpad on/off switch and toggles for the inbuilt webcam, the Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.

Probably the most impressive physical aspect of the G150 is the LED-backlit display.  Rather unusually for a 15.6″ notebook, the G150 has a full-HD screen which is perfect for watching Blu-Ray movies or high definition content from the internet.

Hopefully the nVidia GeForce GTX 485M will provide enough graphics grunt to game at high settings at native resolution.  Both vertical and horizontal viewing angles are good and the display is perfectly bright enough for indoor use. When outside, the glossy coating on the screen does make it difficult to view when in direct sunlight.

The lid of the machine is completely plain in design with no logo to speak of at all.  In fact, there is nothing about this machine that tells us that is it a Kobalt machine. Many people will admire the understated design which is attractive and much less ‘in your face' than other gaming laptops.

Kobalt informed us just before going to press that when the notebook ships to customers there will be a Kobalt logo on the lid.  The designers of this machine have done well to disguise the thickness by incorporating a number of tapered edges and underbelly bulges into the machine.

The G150 boasts almost every connection we could ask for, with only one notable exception.  For some reason, Kobalt haven't included an Expresscard slot in the G150.  The left side of the machine contains two USB3.0 ports, a USB2.0 port, a mini-Firewire port, a gigabit Ethernet jack and an SD card reader.

Moving round to the right hand side of the machine, we find the Blu-Ray drive, a USB2.0 port, a Kensington lock slot and four 3.5mm audio jacks.  From left to right these are: headphone output, microphone input, S/PDIF output and line-in.  Around the back of the machine we find the HDMI 1.4 port, a USB2.0/eSATA port and an AC-in jack.

Kobalt are using the latest Intel Centrino Ultimate 6230 wireless card in the G150 that supports A, B, G and N wireless bands and Bluetooth.  For those who want better wireless performance, there is an optional upgrade to the Intel Centrino Ultimate-N 6300 wireless card which supports higher wireless speeds but doesn't have Bluetooth.

Despite having an understated exterior design, the internals of the G150 are definitely something to boast about.  In our sample Kobalt have installed the Intel Core i7 2630QM Sandy Bridge processor, clocked at 2.00GHz, which provides a decent compromise between price and performance.  This CPU supports turbo boost which lets the system increase the clock speed on one or two of the cores up to a maximum of 2.9GHz to improve performance in single or double threaded applications.

For those who are wondering, the G150 has the Intel HM65 chipset which suffers from the current Sandy Bridge problems.  That said, Kobalt won't be shipping any Sandy Bridge notebooks to consumers until the revised motherboards are ready, so there won't be any SATA longevity issues with production machines.

Kobalt have chosen to use the nVidia GeForce GTX 485M in our sample which is an immensely powerful mobile solution.  This should ensure that gamers are able to max out the graphics settings in all but the most demanding games on the market.

The base model of the G150 comes with the nVidia GeForce GTX 460M GPU which doesn't provide as much power as the GTX 485M but you will save £320, so this will probably be the choice of the majority of consumers.  As you can see from the photo above, there are three thick copper heatpipes and a sizable fan providing airflow to the heatsink.  Unfortunately this heat is generated because of the large power requirement of this graphics card which doesn't leave us with much hope for battery life.

The G150 is one of the only laptops on the market that has four RAM slots which means there are a whole host of RAM configurations available, from 4GB to 16GB.  Our sample has 6GB of ram in the form of 3x 2GB DDR3 Corsair modules which run at 1333Mhz.

Although the G150's real world performance would benefit greatly from the inclusion of an SSD, there is only room for one drive due to the space limitations of a 15.6″ chassis.  A lot of users won't be willing to pay the extra cash for a sizable SSD so Kobalt specified our review sample with their standard 500GB 7,200rpm Western Digital unit.  For those who can afford a solid state drive, Kobalt have a whole host of different drive options in their online configurator to make that decision even harder. If you already have an SSD, then purchase the machine with the basic drive option, clone the drive with Acronis and swap it out.

Today we are going to use a combination of synthetic and real world benchmarks to showcase the performance of the Kobalt G150.

Testing Software

Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit)
3DMark Vantage
3DMark 11
Unigine Heaven Benchmark
Cinebench R11.5
Adobe Photoshop CS5
SiSoft Sandra 2011
Super Pi Mod 1.5
Crystalmark
HDTach
Grand Theft Auto 4: EFLC
Crysis Warhead
F1 2010
Cyberlink MediaEspresso
Cyberlink PowerDVD

BIOS

The BIOS that Kobalt are using on this machine is a very basic affair with no options for overclocking the system, something that isn't wise with any laptop due to the tight thermal tolerances.  The only configurable options worth mentioning (aside from setting the boot order and supervisor passwords) are for setting the SATA mode, bluetooth on/off and legacy USB support.  There is also an option to turn off the battery low alarm, which can get a little annoying after a while.

Unigine provides an interesting way to test hardware. It can be easily adapted to various projects due to its elaborated software design and flexible toolset. A lot of their customers claim that they have never seen such extremely-effective code, which is so easy to understand.

Heaven Benchmark is a DirectX 11 GPU benchmark based on advanced Unigine engine from Unigine Corp. It reveals the enchanting magic of floating islands with a tiny village hidden in the cloudy skies. Interactive mode provides emerging experience of exploring the intricate world of steampunk.

Efficient and well-architected framework makes Unigine highly scalable:

• Multiple API (DirectX 9 / DirectX 10 / DirectX 11 / OpenGL) render
• Cross-platform: MS Windows (XP, Vista, Windows 7) / Linux
• Full support of 32bit and 64bit systems
• Multicore CPU support
• Little / big endian support (ready for game consoles)
• Powerful C++ API
• Comprehensive performance profiling system
• Flexible XML-based data structures

The G150 performed well in this benchmark, outperforming the Alienware M17X that only achieved 24.3 fps average and 13.8 fps minimum.

Futuremark released 3DMark Vantage, on April 28, 2008. It is a benchmark based upon DirectX 10, and therefore will only run under Windows Vista (Service Pack 1 is stated as a requirement) and Windows 7.  This is the first edition where the feature-restricted, free of charge version could not be used any number of times. We are using the Entry preset.

We used the ‘Performance’ settings for our 3D Mark Vantage testing today.

These scores are very impressive for a notebook, especially the CPU score which reflects the great performance of these new mobile Sandy Bridge chips.

3DMark 11 is designed for testing DirectX 11 hardware running on Windows 7 and Windows Vista the benchmark includes six all new benchmark tests that make extensive use of all the new features in DirectX 11 including tessellation, compute shaders and multi-threading.

After running the tests 3DMark gives your system a score with larger numbers indicating better performance.

Trusted by gamers worldwide to give accurate and unbiased results, 3DMark 11 is the best way to test DirectX 11 under game-like loads.  We used a resolution of 1280 x 1024 at performance settings in this benchmark.

If you want to learn more about this benchmark, or to buy it yourself, head over to this page.

The G150 also scored very well in the latest iteration of 3dMark, rivalling many full fat desktop systems out there.

SiSoftware Sandra (the System ANalyser, Diagnostic and Reporting Assistant) is an information & diagnostic utility. It should provide most of the information (including undocumented) you need to know about your hardware, software and other devices whether hardware or software.

Sandra is a (girl’s) name of Greek origin that means “defender”, “helper of mankind”. We think that’s quite fitting.

It works along the lines of other Windows utilities, however it tries to go beyond them and show you more of what’s really going on. Giving the user the ability to draw comparisons at both a high and low-level. You can get information about the CPU, chipset, video adapter, ports, printers, sound card, memory, network, Windows internals, AGP, PCI, PCI-X, PCIe (PCI Express), database, USB, USB2, 1394/Firewire, etc.

Native ports for all major operating systems are available:

• Windows XP, 2003/R2, Vista, 7, 2008/R2 (x86)
• Windows XP, 2003/R2, Vista, 7, 2008/R2 (x64)
• Windows 2003/R2, 2008/R2* (IA64)
• Windows Mobile 5.x (ARM CE 5.01)
• Windows Mobile 6.x (ARM CE 5.02)

All major technologies are supported and taken advantage of:

• SMP – Multi-Processor
• MC – Multi-Core
• SMT/HT – Hyper-Threading
• MMX, SSE, SSE2, SSE3, SSSE3, SSE 4.1, SSE 4.2, AVX, FMA – Multi-Media instructions
• GPGPU, DirectX, OpenGL – Graphics
• NUMA – Non-Uniform Memory Access
• AMD64/EM64T/x64 – 64-bit extensions to x86
• IA64 – Intel* Itanium 64-bit

A solid set of results all round for the G150 which are very similar – although slightly better on the whole – than those we saw with the M17X.  In fact the only scores which aren't as good as the M17X are the memory bandwidth ones, a likely result of using three ram modules, rather than two.

CINEBENCH R11.5 64 Bit is a real-world cross platform test suite that evaluates your computer’s performance capabilities. CINEBENCH is based on MAXON’s award-winning animation software CINEMA 4D, which is used extensively by studios and production houses worldwide for 3D content creation. MAXON software has been used in blockbuster movies such as Spider-Man, Star Wars, The Chronicles of Narnia and many more.

CINEBENCH is the perfect tool to compare CPU and graphics performance across various systems and platforms (Windows and Mac OS X). And best of all: It’s completely free.

The benefits of using multi-threaded programs are evident in this test with the G150 showing a massive 4.24x improvement between the single and multi threaded tests.

Super Pi is software that was designed for overclocking performance testing, it allows to test floating decimal point and mathematics performances of a processor. The test consists in calculating the part PI value with the CPU, the number being infinite.

We can select several lengths of calculations, from 16 KB to 32 MB and are using the modified 1.5 version and are running a 32MB calculation.

Twelve minutes and twenty-two seconds is an awesome score for a laptop which will beat many desktop CPUs out there in this test.

A very important part of overall system responsiveness is down to hard drive performance so we used two of our favourite benchmark utilities Crystalmark X64 Edition and HDTach to test the 500GB 7200rpm Western Digital Drive.

Hard drive performance is the one major area in which the G150 falls far behind the M17X as a result of Kobalt's use of a mechanical hard drive rather than a solid state drive.  But for those who can afford the price premium of a solid state drive, Kobalt have a wide range of drives available that they will happily install into the G150 for you.

CyberLink MediaEspresso 6 is the successor to CyberLink MediaShow Espresso 5.5. With its further optimized CPU/GPU-acceleration, MediaEspresso is an even faster way to convert not only your video but also your music and image files between a wide range of popular formats.

Now you can easily playback and display your favourite movies, songs and photos not just on your on your mobile phone, iPad, PSP, Xbox, or Youtube and Facebook channels but also on the newly launched iPhone 4. Compile, convert and enjoy images and songs on any of your computing devices and enhance your videos with CyberLink’s built-in TrueTheater Technology.

New and Improved Features

• Ultra Fast Media Conversion – With support from the Intel Core i-Series processor family, ATI Stream & NVIDIA CUDA, MediaEspresso’s Batch-Conversion function enables multiple files to be transcoded simultaneously.
• Smart Detect Technology – MediaEspresso 6 automatically detects the type of portable device connected to the PC and selects the best multimedia profile to begin the conversion without the need for user’s intervention.
• Direct Sync to Portable Devices – Video, audio and image files can be transferred in a few easy steps to mobile phones including those from Acer, BlackBerry, HTC, Samsung, LG, Nokia, Motorola, Sony Ericsson, and Palm, as well as Sony Walkman and PSP devices.
• Enhanced Video Quality – CyberLink TrueTheater Denoise and Lighting enables the enhancement of video quality through optical noise filters and automatic brightness adjustment.
• Video, Music and Image File Conversion – Convert not only videos to popular formats such as AVI, MPEG, MKV, H.264/AVC, and FLV at the click of a button, but also images such as JPEG and PNG and music files like WMA, MP3 and M4A.
• Online Sharing – Conversion to video formats used by popular social networking websites and a direct upload feature means posting videos to Facebook and YouTube has never been easier.

For our testing today we are converting a 1.09GB 720p MKV file (43mins 28s) to Apple Mp4 format for playback on a portable device. This is a common procedure for many people and will give a good indication of system power.  We will also be converting a 15 track album from MP3 to M4A format.  Hardware acceleration was enabled for these tests.

This set of results is also impressive for a laptop and really showcase its real world CPU performance.

Cyberlink PowerDVD 10 is one of the finest solutions for the Blu-Ray experience on Windows and we found this software to work perfectly with this chipset. We tested with the Bluray Disc of The Dark Knight, one of our favourite films in recent year

Another solid set of results which prove just how good the G150 is at media playback.

Crysis Warhead, like the original, Crysis, is based in a future where an ancient alien spacecraft has been discovered beneath the Earth on an island east of the Philippines. The single-player campaign has the player assume the role of (Former SAS) Delta Force operator Sergeant Michael Sykes, referred to in-game by his call sign, Psycho. Psycho’s arsenal of futuristic weapons builds on those showcased in Crysis, with the introduction of Mini-SMGs which can be dual-wielded, a six-shot grenade launcher equipped with EMP grenades, and the destructive, short ranged Plasma Accumulator Cannon (PAX). The highly versatile Nanosuit returns.

In Crysis Warhead, the player fights North Korean and extraterrestrial enemies, in many different locations, such as a tropical island jungle, inside an “Ice Sphere”, an underground mining complex, which is followed by a convoy train transporting an unknown alien object held by the North Koreans, and finally, to an airfield. Like Crysis, Warhead uses Microsoft’s new API, Direct3D 10 (DirectX 10) for graphics rendering.

We are using several sections of gameplay which feature some of the most intensive action in Crysis. You can therefore base these results on a firmly ‘worst case’ scenario situation.  We used ‘gamer’ settings and gamed at a resolution of 1920 x 1080 during this test.

Crysis Warhead is no easy task for any computer, let alone a laptop.  But the G150 was able to manage very reasonable framerates at gamer settings at the machine's native 1080P screen resolution.

F1 2010 is the first multi format high def Formula one title, having been in development for almost 2 and a half years now you can tell Codemasters are not messing around when it comes to releasing the best game they can. F1 2010 is packed with everything, from fine tuning your car setup, practising laps with goals to achieve, detailed stats, various difficulty settings for newbs and pros and even a helmet selection!

We maxed out all the settings and played at a resolution of 1920 x 1080.

Even after maxing our all the graphics settings in this game, the G150 managed to keep the framerate above 48fps for the duration of our tests which reinforces our belief that this machine can cope with all gaming titles currently on the market.

Grand Theft Auto: Episodes From Liberty City is a standalone compilation of the DLC episodes for Grand Theft Auto IV, containing both The Lost and Damned and The Ballad of Gay Tony on one disc. It was released alongside the DLC release of The Ballad of Gay Tony on 29 October 2009 for the Xbox 360 and released on 13 April 2010 for Microsoft Windows and Playstation 3. It does not require a copy of Grand Theft Auto IV to play, nor is an Xbox Live or PSN account necessary (except for multiplayer).

The engine is still extremely demanding for this game – even months later for the newest hardware. The latest version changes some of the rendering calls and is used partially within the latest Max Payne engine.  We tested the game using near maximum settings as displayed below.

Grand Theft Auto IV: Episodes for Liberty city is a very CPU intensive game and, after maxing out all the settings in game, we were still able to achieve playable framerates throughout our tests. There was only one instance when the framerate dropped down at 18fps but this didn't negatively effect our gameplay in any way and the framerate quickly increased again to playable levels.  Those who want to ensure this doesn't happen, though, could reduce the graphics settings slightly.

Our temperature tests were performed in a room maintained at 20c for the whole duration.  Idle temperatures were measured after sitting at the desktop for 30 minutes. Load measurements were acquired by running Furmark and Prime95 together for 15 minutes.  Gaming temperatures were recorded after playing Crysis Warhead for 15 minutes.

When evaluating the thermal performance of a laptop, we have to bear in mind the limitations of cooling in such a confined space.  This said, under full load, the CPU and graphics card temperatures are a little higher than we would expect in a desktop machine but are quite impressive considering the cooling limitations of the chassis.  The reason the the idle temperatures appear to be a little on the high side is due to the thermal profiles of the system's fans which are clearly designed to keep noise to a minimum, only spinning up when the temperatures reach a certain level.

We measure from a distance of around two feet from the chassis with our digital sound level meter to mirror a real world situation.

KitGuru noise guide
10dBA – Normal Breathing/Rustling Leaves
20-25dBA – Whisper
30dBA – High Quality Computer fan
40dBA – A Bubbling Brook, or a Refridgerator
50dBA – Normal Conversation
60dBA – Laughter
70dBA – Vacuum Cleaner or Hairdryer
80dBA – City Traffic or a Garbage Disposal
90dBA – Motorcycle or Lawnmower
100dBA – MP3 player at maximum output
110dBA – Orchestra
120dBA – Front row rock concert/Jet Engine
130dBA – Threshold of Pain
140dBA – Military Jet takeoff/Gunshot (close range)
160dBA – Instant Perforation of eardrum

You can never really expect a high powered gaming notebook to be silent and the G150 isn't inaudible even when left idling.  But the fan noise is far from intrusive when conducting menial tasks and only becomes intrusive when the system is subjected to significant load.  But most users will be using the speakers or headphones when gaming which will block out the noise.

To test the battery today we put the machine through three sets of real world situations. One as a media movie lover on the move, a person wanting to watch HD media on a train journey or bus with two thirds screen brightness (any less and quality suffers). Secondly as a business man, using the machine for productivity with wireless enabled and balanced power settings with a mid way (around half) brightness setting. Thirdly as a gamer on the move, with the nVidia solution fully active and screen brightness up high.

We were pleasantly surprised by the battery performance of the G150, especially considering the poor battery performance we have received from almost every Clevo-based notebook we've used in the past.  We achieved just shy of three hours when surfing the web and sending emails which is very impressive for a gaming notebook with such high performance components within.  The battery should also provide enough power to watch most blu-ray movies or to game when you have a free hour.

To test power consumption today we are using a plug in power and energy monitor. We loaded the system using Prime95 and Furmark, when gaming,  and when idle.

As with any gaming machine, the G150 draws a significant amount more power than a normal laptop when under load from the 220W AC adapter.  In our tests, we noted a maximum power draw of 201W when the system was fully loaded, a good chunk of which will be coming from the GTX 485M graphics card.  But we have to consider that this is very little compared to the electricity we would expect a gaming PC to draw so your bill won't be quite so high.

We feel that the Kobalt G150 is ideal for those who are looking for a good all round laptop that provides impressive gaming performance.

We would be pretty confident saying that you won't find this much gaming power in a smaller machine anywhere in the world so the G150 is perfect for people who are looking for the best gaming experience whilst retaining a decent level of portability.  We would definitely recommend upgrading to an SSD for most users as this will boost system wide performance quite significantly.

The nVidia GTX485M really delivered in our gaming benchmarks, providing more than enough power to run the latest games at the native 1080P resolution at high settings.  We were even able to run Crysis Warhead smoothly at gamer settings which isn't something that can be achieved with many laptops.  The only slightly disappointing aspect of the G150's gaming performance is the fan noise which does become a little intrusive when the system is under load.  But if you use a headset rather than the speakers, this probably won't be an issue.

Build quality is decent on the whole as quality plastics are used throughout the chassis and the overall construction is solid.  Our only slight issue with  the G150's build quality is the keyboard which doesn't quite feel like it belongs to a £1500+ notebook.  The rubberised finish of the chassis should also prove durable in the long run and is preferable to a glossy finish that will pick up scratches readily over time.  It does seem to pick up dust quite easily, though, and this can be difficult to shift.

Kobalt include the 1080P LED-backlit screen as standard with this machine and it is one of the best we've seen on a notebook.  It really brings Blu-Ray movies and games to life thanks to it's vibrant colours and high pixel density.

As you are likely to find with most performance computers, the G150 certainly doesn't come cheap.  The basic model costs £1099 inc. VAT and features an Intel Core-i3 processor and a nVidia GTX460M graphics card. Our test machine, which boasts the quad core i7-2630QM processor and GTX 485M graphics card will set you back in excess of £1700 inc. VAT.  Those who can't afford this and don't mind sacrificing some graphics performance could always save £320 and opt for the GTX 460M graphics card instead.  There are so many different configuration options available with the G150 we would recommend taking a look at Kobalt's G150 configurator which will let you select from a plethora of different parts to build your perfect machine.

KitGuru says: An impressive machine that provides a good compromise between performance, portability and price.

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