MYTHLOGIC Pollux 1400: Clevo's W150HR Tested

MYTHLOGIC Pollux 1400: A Different Kind of Clevo

Just about every Clevo notebook I’ve tested during the past several years has had a few standard features. They’re high performance, often quite loud under load, generally very expensive, and build quality never quite lives up to my expectations. The W150HR is a break from that tradition in a few ways, though the Pollux 1400 we tested does pack in some high performance and high cost extras (e.g. the SSD and i7 quad-core CPU). However, I tend to value such amenities, and $1600 for a relatively high-end laptop with very snappy overall performance is reasonable.

What’s not reasonable is the poor keyboard layout, plastic build quality, relatively high heat, and poor battery life compared to similar laptops. At $1000 for the base configuration, the Pollux 1400 still feels more like an $850 laptop. Actually, I have an Acer TimelineX AS3830TG that you can snag for $700 from Newegg, and when some aspects of the Acer impress me more than the Clevo W150HR, I get concerned. Ditch the 10-key layout on the keyboard and give me a frame that feels more like a Dell Latitude than an Acer Aspire and the price would be a lot more palatable. Improve cooling if you want a quad-core i7 processor in there (unless you like MacBook Pro levels of heat), and then focus some time on BIOS and power optimizations so that the 62Wh battery can hit at least six hours idle/five hours Internet and we’d be in business.

Along with the bad, we do have some good to help balance things. As far as beautiful displays go, the $120 upgrade pays dividends, and you won’t find such a display in any notebook costing under $1000 (and more likely, it will cost closer to $1500). Combine that with a fast i7-2720QM, 8GB RAM, GT 555M graphics, and one of the best current SSDs and you have a laptop that can do nearly anything you might want. It may not feel or look quite as nice as other $1500 notebooks, and four hours of useful battery life isn’t head-of-the-class material, but that will get you through most plane flights.

Overall, the Clevo W150HR/MYTHLOGIC Pollux 1400 works well, and in a vacuum I’d have no problem recommending it as a decent notebook with an awesome display. We’re not in a vacuum, of course, which means there are alternatives. At the premium end, there’s the Lenovo W520 and Alienware M14x, but Dell’s XPS 15 is right in the mix as well. Outside of these four options, I’m not aware of any other notebooks where you can get the same quality LCD without sacrificing battery life (e.g. you need Optimus), but if you don’t demand a good LCD there are numerous other alternatives. Ultimately, the balance of performance and features is good but not great, and I end up moderately interested but with concerns. It’s the finer details that are lacking but if you don’t want to move up to the Lenovo W520 (note that the Quadro 2000M is an upgrade to GT 555M while Quadro 1000M is a downgrade to GT 540M levels), this is the best way to get a laptop with an awesome 15.6” LCD.

Regarding MYTHLOGIC, our experience throughout the review has been positive. They were helpful and quick to respond to email messages, and their technical knowledge was good. It’s difficult to say whether they’re better or worse than their Clevo whitebook competitors, but they’re certainly in the mix. If you’re looking for a custom notebook or desktop, MYTHLOGIC has up-to-date offerings with the latest hardware and plenty of customization options, and their prices are reasonable. We would also like to thank them for working with Bigfoot to get us the review hardware, and for being patient with us throughout our lengthy review process.