A year ago, you couldn't find a laptop with an HD DVD drive for under $2,000. The Toshiba Qosmio F45-AV425, with an HD DVD-ROM, is now selling for a cool $1,599 (direct). It's a less luxurious version of the Qosmio G45-AV680—Toshiba's exorbitantly priced flagship media center—but it loads similar processing parts, and you get to watch the latest HD DVD flicks for barely more than half the G45's price.

The Qosmio F45 sports a glossy black finish reminiscent of the Toshiba Portégé R400-S4931. The previous version, the Qosmio F25-AV205, had a funereal-looking matte finish. The F45 is much better-looking, and it's lighter than the F25; compared with the 9.9-pound G45, it's almost three pounds lighter, at 6.8 pounds. It's not as light as the 5.8-pound HP Pavilion dv6500t—a competitor that can also be outfitted with an HD DVD drive—but of this crop, the Qosmio F45 arguably has the sleekest and most attractive design.

With a smaller frame comes a smaller (15.4-inch) screen, though its 1,280-by-800 resolution is more than capable of handling high-definition content at 720p. The 1,920-by-1,200 resolution on the G45 is rated at 1080p, which might be significant to an HDTV expert, but a typical user would be hard pressed to detect any visual differences between 1080p and 720p resolutions, especially on a 15.4-inch screen. (Very few 15.4-inch laptops are 1080p. The Panasonic Toughbook T52 is one of them, but it doesn't come with any HD drives.) The F45 is fine for watching video, editing digital photos, and viewing PowerPoint presentations.

The system has a full-size keyboard, which flexes a little toward the center. The Apple MacBook Pro 15-inch (LED) has a more rigid keyboard, and so does the HP dv6500t. The media buttons above the keyboard are physical buttons, not the touch-sensitive ones that are found on the G45-AV68. The backlit volume dial and arrow scroll wheel are unique to the Qosmio line and can be invaluable when you're cranking up the volume or navigating the Web.

The high-definition experience is what you'd expect on a 15.4-inch screen. The imagery is not as grand as on a 50-inch plasma, obviously, but you can definitely tell an HD DVD movie from a standard-definition one. The F45-AV425's HD DVD-ROM, which is also a dual-layer DVD burner, comes standard. It doesn't burn HD DVD blanks, as the HD DVD-R drive found on the G45-AV680 does, but that's hardly a liability, as prices for HD DVD media are still insanely expensive. Instead of the four speakers you get on the G45, there are only two speakers (Harman Kardons) above the keyboard. It's still one of the most powerful audio systems on a laptop, because of the built-in subwoofer. Sound quality easily surpasses that of the Acer Aspire 5920G or the HP dv6500t.

The F45 comes with ample USB ports (four total) and a FireWire port. It also comes with an HDMI-out port, in case you want to hook this laptop up to an HDTV. The 300GB hard drive makes the competition's storage seem skimpy by comparison; even aspiring video and photo editors will revel in all the space. If you want to record television, however, you may be disappointed that a TV tuner is not built in, although Toshiba bundles an external USB tuner as an option. The 1.3MP webcam is perfect for conferencing in several of your friends for a video chat. Toshiba started integrating an infrared sensor for the remote on the AV660, and it's continued that on the Qosmio F45-AV425. I just wish that the remote were smaller, like the one that fits into the ExpressCard slot of the HP dv6500t. Other features include a fingerprint reader wedged between the mouse buttons and a four-in-one (SD, xD, MS, and MS Pro) card reader.

I do have one peeve. Toshiba loads way too much proprietary software on this laptop, not to mention software from other companies that can gradually paralyze a system. The company is already allowing customers to pick or omit their software bundles on corporate laptops. It should do the same on consumer models.

Toshiba helped keep the system's price in check by not going all out on screen resolution or the number of speakers, and not adding an HD DVD burner, but processing components, for the most part, are near the top of the line. A 2-GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T7250 and the 2GB of RAM are your best line of defense against resource-intensive tasks and applications. Like the G45-AV680, the F45 comes standard with discrete graphics using the nVidia GeForce 8600M GT graphics card. High-definition content benefits greatly from dedicated graphics, because nVidia's PureVideo engine offloads a lot of that work from the CPU. And let's not forget all the latest 3D gaming titles that can also benefit from dedicated graphics.

The F45-AV425 garnered above-average results at low resolutions on gaming tests such as Prey and Company of Heroes. SYSmark 2007 Preview Overall numbers were 34 percent lower than those of the Gateway M-150X and are more on a par with those of the HP Pavilion dv6500t. Photoshop test results were some of the best in its category.

Unfortunately, battery life was pretty poor. The 44-Wh battery is small and its MobileMark 2007 results were some of the worst I've seen on a 15.4-inch laptop. It generated only 1 hour 33 minutes of battery life; its competitors managed more than 3 hours.

Prices on HD DVD-ROM-equipped laptops have gone down significantly and should continue to do so. Starting next year, you'll see these laptops dip below the $1,000 mark, which should make the format wars between HD DVD and Blu-ray a little more interesting. For now, the Toshiba Qosmio F45-AV425 gives you an HD DVD-ROM and a luxury G45-type chassis, albeit smaller, at a competitive price point. I would actually recommend this laptop over the G45-AV680, given that you get a similar high-definition experience for hardly more than half the price.

Check out the Toshiba Qosmio F45-AV425's test scores.

More Notebook Reviews: