Only a couple of years ago, a typical media center laptop consisted of a 10-pound system that cost an arm and a leg and was married to an electrical outlet. Despite improvements in weight, price, battery life, and features, prices of media center systems have stayed upward of $1,500. The ASUS M50Sa-A1 breaks that price barrier, offering an assortment of features for just $1,299 (list) that is sure to excite home theater enthusiasts. This laptop includes fast parts, such as one of Intel's latest "Penryn" processors and an ATI graphics card capable of tackling the latest 3D games. Although the M50Sa is an incredible bargain, getting hold of one may be hard since it's available only at Newegg—a strictly online retailer.

The tasteful chassis design uses the in-mold decoration (IMD) technique that we've seen on laptops such as the Gateway M-150X and the HP Pavilion dv6500t. This method produces subtle patterns that are coated by a glossy laminate. The finish is sleek and shiny, and does a good job of preventing scratches, although fingerprints and smudges are a downside. I would characterize the 7-pound chassis as tolerably clunky, though it's significantly heavier than both the Fujitsu LifeBook A6120 and the Lenovo IdeaPad Y510 (each at 6.2 pounds).

The laptop's 15.4-inch display isn't the biggest screen available on laptops but is sufficient for a pleasant movie experience. I would argue that a 17-inch screen, such as the ones found on the Toshiba Qosmio G45-AV680 and the HP Pavilion dv9500t, is the optimal size for a media center laptop. The M50Sa's 1,440-by-900 screen resolution matches that of the Apple MacBook Pro 15-inch (Penryn). The keyboard is full-size, adding an adjacent numeric keypad, which comes in handy if you're a number cruncher. The touchpad takes a page out of the Toshiba G45-AV680, embedding touch-sensitive multimedia and application buttons that can be activated by tapping the Mode button on the touchpad. You can disable the touch feature by tapping the same button again.

The M50Sa's other features are impressive for a $1,300 system. The unit includes an HDMI-out port for streaming digital content, whereas other systems, like the Lenovo Y510 and the Fujitsu A6120, do not. The dual-layer DVD burner serves your disc-burning and movie-watching needs quite well. You can also find an eSATA port, useful for adding external storage without getting tied down by USB 2.0 speeds (external SATA hard drives are faster than USB-attached ones). This assumes that your data storage needs will grow beyond the included 250GB hard drive.

The M50Sa's two-speaker system is not as outstanding as the five-speaker system found on the Lenovo IdeaPad Y510, although its Dolby surround sound is nothing to scoff at. Features that you'd normally find in any media laptop include three USB ports, FireWire, and VGA-out. The M50Sa's 1.3-megapixel camera is a handy addition for video chatters, and a fingerprint reader makes logging into Windows easier than typing in a password.

You wouldn't expect the performance of a $1,300 system to be in the same league as the Apple MacBook Pro 15-inch (Penryn), but the ASUS and Apple systems prove to be surprisingly well matched when you compare all their test scores. The M50Sa's 2.5-GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T9300 is part of an impressive crop of Penryn processors that launched earlier this year, and our review model's Penryn was bolstered by 3GB of RAM. The M50Sa's On SYSmark 2007 Preview Overall score surpassed those of the MacBook Pro and the HP dv9500t, both of which use older, "Merom"-based processors, by 3 percent and 11 percent, respectively. Photoshop CS3 scores were the best I've seen.

Battery scores weren't spectacular, but you wouldn't expect them to be, coming from a powerhouse like this. Still, the 2 hours 56 minutes achieved on MobileMark 2007 tests with the 51-Wh (six-cell) battery was respectable. According to ASUS, a nine-cell battery, which will become available through Newegg.com, will bring battery life to about 5 hours.

This configuration comes with an impressive graphics card in the ATI Radeon HD 3600, which is nice if 3D gaming is part of your weekly routine. The M50Sa's performance results were comparable with those of the MacBook Pro, with its nVidia GeForce 8600M GT graphics card—fitting for someone who isn't a hard-core gamer but relishes shooting up virtual aliens once in a while. The graphics card comes with 1GB of video memory, enough to render 3D terrains in great-to-awesome detail. Alternatively, ASUS offers the same system with an nVidia GeForce 9500M GS graphics card in a version called the M50Sv-A1 (the "v" denotes nVidia). This card is as powerful—if not more so—as the ATI chipset.

There's no question that ASUS is raising the bar with its laptops. The only foreseeable problem is retail presence. Because the ASUS M50Sa-A1 is offered exclusively through Newegg, a reputable online retailer, you have to judge systems based on reviews and pictures rather than being able to check them out in person. But since other ASUS laptops are showing up at local Best Buys and popular retail names such as J&R Music World, it's probably only a matter of time before the M50Sa appears at brick-and-mortar stores.

I don't usually talk about warranties, but I've noted that ASUS throws in a two-year parts-and-labor warranty, whereas its competitors typically offer only a one-year warranty. All in all, the ASUS M50Sa-A1 combines stellar performance scores and a wide array of features at a price point you can't argue with, even if it's sold only through a single online retailer.

Check out the ASUS M50Sa-A1's test scores.

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