MPC TransPort U1000

The MPC TransPort U1000 is an attractive notebook that packs a lot of mainstream features into an ultraportable body. This 3.8-pound system is quite fast, but its speed comes at the expense of endurance. Security features, a great warranty, and a lot of ports and slots push this notebook towards worthiness of its large price tag, but in the end the price is this laptop’s biggest weakness.

With two USB 2.0 ports on one side, one on the other, and a FireWire port in the back, there’s no worry about too much clutter in one small area of the U1000’s compact chassis. Another welcome feature is the Kensington Lock Slot, a security precaution that frequent travelers will find reassuring.

The keyboard is as wide as it can be given the size of the system and the feel is uniform over the entire layout, which is good news for touch typists. The touchpad, by contrast, is small and lacks a dedicated scroll area. By way of compensation, MPC provides an optical mini-mouse complete with a scroll/click wheel.

The U1000 is more than capable of handling the full gamut of productivity applications, with plenty of processing power provided by Intel’s 1.8-GHz Pentium M processor, 768MB of memory, and a small, but fast, 5,400-rpm 40GB hard drive. Its MobileMark performance score of 243 is much higher than what most other ultraportables register, and you should expect excellent multitasking performance.

The integrated graphics accelerator does a terrific job of driving the 12.1-inch display for basic tasks and DVD playback. You won’t be troubled by ghosting even during low-contrast, fast-action scenes. The system comes with an optical drive that can burn DVDs in both + and - formats, but stops short of supporting dual-layer discs.

You can forget about playing anything above Solitaire with the embedded graphics. The sound from the necessarily tiny speaker was unbearably harsh, especially when it was cranked up high enough to overpower the shrill whine of the cooling fan. Keep a set of headphones handy.

An area where the U1000 falls severely short is an important one when it comes to its class: endurance. The MobileMark battery life test clocked this machine a little above two hours, whether wireless was off or on. That’s at least an hour less than we’ve seen from other ultraportables. You could upgrade to an extra-capacity six-cell or nine-cell battery to increase the U1000’s runtime, but that will run you an extra $59 or $79, respectively.

The system faired better when we performed our wireless test. The U1000 offered 14.1 Mbps of throughput from 5 feet and kept a strong 13.7-Mbps signal from 50 feet. Surfing the Web at a hotspot should be no problem for the U1000, as long as you spring for a beefier battery.

In all, the TransPort U1000 has the performance and portability road warriors require, and the three-year warranty offers peace of mind to those who might not be comfortable going with a lesser-known brand. Unfortunately, this notebook’s battery life is entirely too short as configured and its price is too steep.