Even at this resolution it manages an average frame rate of 35fps in F.E.A.R. This was tested with all the detail settings set to maximum, so easing them back a bit should give higher frame rates.

Boosting the gaming experience is integrated 7.1 audio complete with SRS WOW surround sound.

At 5kg, it's not what you'd call lap-friendly

Nothing's very petite with the X770 - even the hard drive is a massive 200GB. The Hitachi drive has a 7200rpm spin speed, a 16MB cache and a 3Gbps SATA interface, so data transfers big or small should pose few if any problems.

Given that the Rock measures 39.7 x 29.4 x 3.7cm and weighs in at 5kg (including the power brick) it's not a notebook you'll want to carry around with you unless you’re having an Arnie moment, but we tested the battery life anyway and a got a reasonable 110 minutes' battery life while watching a DVD - a bit short for a Peter Jackson film maybe, but not too shabby. When using it to do normal notebooky things like office work, it produced a battery life of just under two hours.

Housed in the right side of the chassis are two stacked USB ports, a single four-pin Firewire port, Gigabit Ethernet and modem ports, an ExpresCard 54 slot and a seven-in-one card reader. Our review model also had an aerial socket for the optional Digital/Analogue TV-tuner module. The left side of the chassis holds just the optical drive and a Kensington Lock slot. The rear of the chassis has the DVI and S-Video ports, a serial port and two more USB ports. In the middle of the front panel sit four audio ports, and along with the normal microphone and headphone sockets there are line-in and SPDIF output ports. To connect to the outside world wirelessly there is 802.11a/b/g/n Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.

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Along with the pre-installed Windows Vista Home Premium, the software bundle comprises Roxio Creator 7 and Microsoft Works 8.5. Rock backs the X770 with a three-year collect-and-return pan-European warranty.

Verdict

Rock’s Xtreme X770-T7800 comes with a hefty price tag but it's nonetheless a very impressive notebook. Fast performing, well-built and with a great feature list, including an HD DVD drive as standard, it makes an ideal desktop replacement for gaming or for use as a normal system. You can get a cheaper price tag by removing some of the options the review notebook had, but if you have to keep just one, go for the higher resolution screen – it's just too good to miss.

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