Dell Latitude C640

WHAT'S HOT: The Latitude C640--a refresh of another Dell business-focused laptop, the Latitude C610--has a modular bay located conveniently on the front that can hold an optical drive (in this instance, a DVD-ROM/CD-RW combination drive) or the included floppy drive. Optionally, it can hold an extra-cost secondary power pack for stretching the already-good 3-hour battery life. With the optical drive inserted into the bay (and not including the power adapter or the external floppy drive), the Latitude C640 weighs just 6.1 pounds.

WHAT'S NOT: The C640 inherited the C610's bouncy-feeling keyboard and stubborn screen latch. We had difficulty removing the hard drive from our review model--the attached end cap was on so tight we had to use a flathead screwdriver to pry it loose. The C640's $2206 price does not include a productivity suite.

WHAT ELSE: The C640 is an average performer for a 2-GHz Pentium 4-M-equipped notebook; it pulled down a PC WorldBench 4 score of 98. The flashiest thing about the C640 is its purple eraserhead. The notebook--fairly thin, and fairly lightweight without peripherals--offers plenty of screen at 14.1 inches, and 40GB of storage. Otherwise its features are low-key, especially in the multimedia department: You get an S-Video port for TV hookups, but the C640 lacks the increasingly common FireWire port and offers just one USB 1.1 port. Missing are external volume controls for the built-in audio, the quality of which is nothing to shout about.

Aside from its springiness, we found the keyboard easy to type on, and we thought that the double set of mouse buttons was easy to use with the pointing devices. But don't look for any keyboard extras, such as shortcut buttons. We did appreciate the all-too-rare power gauge on the battery.

Dell relegates most of the useful documentation for the notebook to a software-based manual buried in the Windows Help and Support Center. When we unearthed it, though, we found that it provides complete information.

UPSHOT: Though other notebooks offer more bang for the buck--better sound, more connections, built-in wireless--the C640 may please businesses that benefit from its light weight and practical, versatile design.