In the U.S., at least, MSI isn't known as a purveyor of business notebooks. While its Akku Sony VGP-BPS8 ultraportable X-Slim series is light enough for executives on the go, the brand-new MSI P600 (the P is for "Professional") is the company's first North American notebook marketed toward the small- and medium-size business market. With a powerful Core i5 CPU, long battery life, fantastic webcam, and budget-friendly $650 price tag, the P600 has benefits anyone can appreciate, but not much in the way of business-friendly features.

Design
At 15.4 x 10 x 1.1 inches and 5.4 pounds, the VGP-BPS8a MSI P600 isn't the lightest notebook on the block, but it's on a par with other 15.6 systems in the same price range, such as the Dell Studio 15z (5.4 pounds, 15 x 9.9 x 1 inches) and the Toshiba L505-GS5035, which is heavier at 6 pounds.

The P600's chassis has a conservative look that fits in the home or workplace. Its light-gray lid has a subtle grid pattern and hardly shows Sony VGP-BPS8 Battery fingerprints, despite its glossy plastic finish. The black interior of the system sports a classier design as its textured deck and palm rest combine with an attractive island-style keyboard.

Buttons for the power, web browser launch, custom configurable shortcuts--and something sony VGP-BPS9/B Battery rarely seen, an eject button for the optical drive--all sit above the keyboard. Strangely, there is no button on the optical drive itself.

Keyboard and Touchpad
The island-style keyboard looks attractive,Sony VGP-BPS9A/B Battery has a numeric keypad, and offers an acceptable, though unexceptional, level of tactile feedback. However, the palm rest is so deep we felt like we had to reach too far to get to the home row. We also found the CTRL and Fn keys to be a bit undersized, making it difficult to do things such as lower and raise the brightness without looking. We were able to achieve our typical rate of 80 words per minute on the Ten Thumbs Typing Test, though our 2 percent error rate was a bit higher than normal. Considering that the MSI P600 is marketed as a business notebook, we were surprised that its keyboard is not spill-resistant.

The 3.1 x 2-inch touchpad seems small in relation to the P600's giant palm rest. The pad has an attractive dotted surface that offers a bit too much VGP-BPS9 resistance. As we tried to navigate around the desktop, our finger kept getting stuck on the textured dots. Multitouch gestures, such as pinch-to-zoom, work but aren't as smooth as we'd like. The two discrete mouse buttons were just a little bit stiff, but more inconvenient was their placement nearly an inch deep into the palm rest, wasting valuable space and forcing us to reach farther than we'd like to click. If you choose to use an external mouse, there's a touchpad lock button located directly above the pad.

Heat
The P600 stayed cool throughout our testing. Even after playing 15 minutes of full-screen video, we VGP-BPS9/S measured the touchpad at a pleasant 86 degrees, the keyboard at 90 degrees, and the underside at a frigid 85.5 degrees Fahrenheit. We consider temperatures below 95 degrees acceptable and those below 90 degrees so low that you can hardly tell the system is on by touch.

Display and Audio
The 15.6-inch, 1366 x 768-pixel glossy display Akku HP PB992A provided sharp images and reasonably bright images, though colors began to wash out at a 45-degree angle to the left or right. Whatever video we played on the system was sharp and smooth, from a streaming 720p episode of "Fringe" and a 1080p WMV file from Microsoft's HD Showcase to a DVD of "Dark City."

The sound quality of the speakers, mounted below the front lip, leaves a lot to be desired. When we streamed an R&B song, "Forget Me Nots" by Patrice Rushen, the bass was drowned out by a drummin that sounded like someone banging on tin foil. Even maximum volume wasn't strong enough to make a hard rock tune, "Smoke Akku HP NX7400 on the Water" by Deep Purple, loud enough to fill a room.

Ports and Webcam
The MSI P600 has a pretty standard array of ports. On the right side are a USB 2.0 port, an good battery Ethernet port, and a VGA-out connection. On the left are Kensington lock slot, audio in/out jacks, an HDMI port, an eSATA/USB connector, and one more USB port for a total of three. The front lip has a 3-in-1 card reader.

The 1.3-megapixel webcam provided bright images even in low light. When chatting on battery Skype in a dark area, we found the image was still visible and smooth though a tiny bit noisy. Even with just a dim light behind us, the image remained strong.