By Joonyoung Ryu, ZDnet Korea, and CNET Asia staff (products@asia.cnet.com)
Nov 20, 2006
URL: http://asia.cnet.com/hd-world/0,3800011581,61968889,00.htm

Not all notebooks are made alike. Whether your laptop is high-definition (HD) ready does not depend solely on price or looks. To get the most of your HD experience, you need to meet a specific set of requirements for your equipment. Read on for a handy guide on choosing a HD-ready portable.

Requirements
DVI port: This port can transmit digital broadcasts to an HDTV without any loss of video quality, which allows you to fully enjoy the quality of the original video.

High-capacity HDD: High-capacity HDDs are indispensable for recording HD broadcasts. Toshiba G30 is equipped with a 240GB HDD and can record 28 hours or more of video.

Memory capacity: Memory of 1GB or more is required to perform various high-resolution tasks. (Compaq nw9440 supports 2GB or more memory.)

HDMI port: High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) is the first multimedia interface developed for transmitting uncompressed full digital audio and video, and is defined to transmit 182KHz, 24-bits and eight channels of uncompressed audio. It also supports multiformat audio such as DTS or DolbyDigital . Its performance equals the output of the existing component system, and it is compatible with ordinary DVI terminals. HDMI's advantage over other connection cables is its ability to retain the video or audio quality. It outputs video in full digital format so you can enjoy multimedia videos in optimal quality within 30m. All connection is accomplished in one cable, making it very easy to install.

HD notebook accessories
HDTV tuner: An HD notebook equipped with an HDTV receiver may be utilized by 110 percent. For USB-type HDTV receivers, all you need do is install the program and connect the receiver with its USB cable. The HDTV receiver has an external video input f unction, making it easy to record the video played on a DVD player or VCR on the PC through an HDTV receiver.

Various application software: You can edit video easily and quickly through Sony’s Vaio Edit Components or Adobe’s Premier Standard.

Features of HD-DVD support notebook (Toshiba) and Blu-ray notebook (Sony) Toshiba: Toshiba Qosmio G30 is a 17-inch widescreen notebook equipped with a next-generation optical HD–DVD drive. This notebook can show extremely sharp images in full-HD-class resolution of 1,920 x 1,200 on a 17-inch widescreen high-glossy LCD. It supports HD-DVD movie playback as well as reads/writes existing DVDs and CDs. It has an HDMI port that can be used when connecting with a large TV such as LCD and PDP. You can enjoy any HD-class video on the large screen by connecting to a TV. Using its S/PDIF optical output, 7.1 audio channel support, SRS 3D sound functions, you can establish a realistic A/V environment by connecting it to a home theater system. You can utilize the notebook with Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR and a multimedia remo-con conveniently when listening to music or watching movies. In addition, it is equipped with an Intel dual-core CPU and a high-performance NVIDIA GeForce 7600 graphics chip.

Sony: VGN-AR18LP is the world's first computer that can read and write Blu-ray discs. It is compatible with other storage media such as CD and DVD, and supports the WUXGA resolution of 1,920 x 1,200. Using the clear, bright, high-color LCD developed by Sony, this model can perfectly show real full-HD images of 1080p, making it very suitable for viewing HD videos on Blu-ray discs. In addition, this model is equipped with a dual-core CPU, a RAID-type harddisk drive, and an NVIDIA GeForce Go 7600 GT graphics card with GDDR3 memory. It also comes bundled with various application software and full-HD editing solutions from image capture to storage. The AR18LP model supports the HDMI port, which is used to connect with a large TV such as LCD or PDP so you can enjoy HD videos on a large screen. Furthermore, it has Bluetooth support so you can easily utilize wireless Bluetooth devices. The MOTION EYE camera of 300,000 pixels can be used in video conferencing or for taking pictures.