Notebook review: Evesham Voyager A215

This is one of four notebooks here that uses a version of AMD’s budget Turion 64 MT-34 mobile processor.

The MT-34 CPU runs at a frequency of 1.8GHz and is supported by 512MB of DDR Ram. Its Sysmark result of 130 and PCmark score of 1,497 are nothing to crow about, but the Evesham Voyager outperformed the AJP M551G-E, which uses Intel’s low-spec 1.4GHz Celeron M.

The Via chipset with S3G integrated graphics, which uses 64MB of shared system memory, is also pretty unimpressive – it achieved 6.04fps in Far Cry and wouldn’t even run 3Dmark05 (which requires at least 128MB of graphics memory) – but we weren’t expecting any notebook here to dazzle us with 3D capability.

It should have no problem dealing with Adobe Photoshop and similar programs, but exert heavy video-editing burdens and it will slow right down.

An 80GB hard disk is what you should expect for a notebook of this price, as is the 15in XGA screen that displays a maximum resolution of 1,024 x 768. Anything over and above this is good value for money.

Its design is typical of a low-cost notebook; nothing flashy, plastic everywhere and components incorporated into the case wherever they’ll fit.

Four USB ports and a VGA socket sit awkwardly either side of a vent on the left-hand side and a dual-layer DVD writer overhangs the otherwise neat finish on the right. Headphone and microphone sockets are positioned on the front and sit below a standard row of status LEDs.

This is a solid notebook with a robust keyboard and trackpad. Its 2.8kg weight makes it just about portable, but there’s no memory card reader for transferring data quickly while on the move.

It comes with Microsoft Works 8, Roxio Easy Media Creator 7, Bullguard Internet and PC Angel, as well as a three-year warranty (two years on-site, one year return-to-base).

This article is part of a group test on £699 notebooks. Others are:
Intro and Editor's Choice
Acer Aspire 9503EWSMi 
AJP M551G-E
Elonex Prowire 153
Evesham Voyager A215
Fujitsu Siemens Amilo M 6450G
Hi-Grade Notino C5515-1700
HP Compaq nx6125 (EK157ET)
Mesh Pegasus 3070
MV Sirius+
The next level - improving laptop performance
Living with a laptop: pitfalls to avoid

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