Below you can see the GammaTech Durabook S15C from the top and all four sides. The magnesium alloy case is light, yet, GammaTech points out, many times stronger than ABS plastic. The computer doesn't flex and twist like most plastic consumer laptops. The top of the LCD case is matte silver with black plastic top and badge holder. The top could perhaps be a bit more contoured so as to add extra stiffness and better project the tough tool-for-the-job look common in most semi- and fully rugged notebooks. The LCD hinges offer just the right degree of resistance when opening and closing the computer. When you close the lid, two small latches snap into place, securing the LCD case in place when in closed position. To open the notebook again, you simply pull.

Ports and connectivity are located on the left and right side and the front of the computer. All ports are exposed, except for the LAN and modem port on the right that has a detachable protective rubber plug.

The two pictures below show a more detailed view of the left and right side of the Durabook.

On the left side (above), from left to right, are vents for the unit's heat exchanger fan, the power jack, a standard VGA port, two standard USB 2.0 ports, separate headphone and microphone jacks, an ExpressCard 34/54 slot, and a Smart Card socket.

On the right side, from left to right, is a IEEE1394 "FireWire" port, a standard 9-pin RS232 serial port, a third USB 2.0 port, the unit's optical drive (a DVD Super Multi writer in our evaluation machine), and next to that an RJ11 modem jack and a RJ45 gigabit LAN jack. The latter two share a detachable (and thus easily lost) protective rubber plug.

On the front of the machine you find a 4-in-1 card reader. The four formats supported are MMC, SDHC (a 32GB card read fine), as well as the Sony Memory Stick and Memory Stick Pro. There are also six indicator lights (power status, WiFi, rotating media operation, num-lock, caps lock, and battery status (green to orange to red)).

Below you can see the bottom of the Durabook S15C with its access covers removed.

On top you can see the 11.1 Volt/ 4,400mAH battery that slides into the back of the system netbook-style (and with 48 watt-hour also provides no more than netbook style capacity. It secures into place with a spring-loaded lever. A higher capacity 9-cell battery appears to be optionally available.

On the bottom left is the storage compartment that houses the hard disk. The disk sits in a separate shock-mounted caddy. Our tester came with a 320GB Hitachi TravelStar spinning at 5,400 rpm and using a 3Gb/s SATA interface. GammaTech offers hard disks up to 750GB, and also 64, 128, 256 and even 512GB solid state disks. If additional ruggedness and performance are an issue, SSDs bring substantial benefits.

On the bottom right is there is a wireless communications compartment with two mini PCIe slots. In our unit, one was taken by an Intel WiFi Link 1000 single band 802.11b/g/n "half card" module (see Intel Centrino Wireless-N 1000 here). The little module supports some Intel-only features, such as Intel Wireless Display that allows wireless sharing of video, pics or internet on wireless-enabled HDTVs. Both the main and the auxiliary antenna were connected. The second mini PCIe slot sat empty, dual antennas ready for connection to a WWAN radio module or similar.

Underneath the largest of the four covers are the Durabook's two DDR3 SODIMM memory slots and the thermal hardware that keeps the machine cool even with its rather powerful processor. It consist of a metal heat spreader plate conducting heat away from the Intel Core processor and accompanying chipset. A copper heat pipe then transfers the heat to the system's fan.

The Durabook S15C's keyboard is full-scale and has 88 keys. The key design is standard notebook (as opposed to the "chiclet" style keys often found in rugged machines) and the keys are black with white letters, numbers and symbols. Functions are indicated in blue. The keyboard doesn't have a backlight.

Below the keyboard is the unit's touch pad. It is a properly sized and flush-mounted affair with two large and very responsive mouse buttons in front of it. The touch pad is a pleasure to use, but it can't be operated with gloves on (though it does pick up through some materials, like suede).

The lower left corner of the picture you can see six notification lights. Above the keyboard on the right are the power button and the wireless on/off button. Both have a strong blue backlight and they are clearly marked (in addition to the power button being round and the WiFi button oval).

Performance

Gammatech Durabook S15C Benchmarks and Comparisons (PassMark 6.1, 32-bit version)

PERFORMANCE COMPARISON	Gammatech	Gammatech	GD-Itronix	GD-Itronix	Getac	Getac	Panasonic
Model	S15C	D14RM	6000	Topaz	9213	B300	CF31
Processor Type: Intel	Core i5	Core 2 Duo	Core 2 Duo	Core 2 Duo	Core 2 Duo	Core i7	Core i5
Processor Model	M460	T9600	T9400	T9400	SU9400	LM640	M540
CPU Speed	2.53 GHz	2.80 GHz	2.53 GHz	2.53 GHz	1.40 GHz	2.00 GHz	2.53 GHz
Turbo Speed	2.80 GHz	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA
Thermal Design Power (TDP)	35 watts	35 watts	35 watts	35 watts	10 watts	25 watts	35 watts
BatteryMon min draw	11.0 watts	16.2 watts	14.5 watts	20.0 watts	6.2 watts	8.9 watts	12 watts
CPU Mark	949.3	1,827.1	1,538.8	1,636.4	838.4	926.6	1,008.8
2D Graphics Mark	280.3	261.1	294.8	447.6	176.0	258.3	249.6
Memory Mark	701.0	736.4	696.8	668.9	347.9	629.5	737.7
Disk Mark	520.5	619.3	378.0	615.8	390.2	575.1	589.1
3D Graphics Mark	308.1	134.7	180.7	238.8	102.0	272.7	352.3
Overall PassMark	562.8	802.4	679.5	776.7	403.9	547.4	600.2

The benchmarks show that our Intel Core i5-based Durabook performs quite well. The overall PassMark score of 562.8 is roughly three times what we see in a typical netbook, and comparable to the more performance-oriented semi-rugged and rugged notebooks available today.

Benchmarks, of course, are notoriously difficult to compare over different processor types, and results often greatly vary from benchmark to benchmark. When you look at the CPU Mark scores, machines with older Core 2 Duo chips actually scored higher than newer Intel chips at comparable clock speeds. Go figure on that one. Overall, the Durabook scored consistently good results without weakness in any of the tests.

We did notice one weirdness, and it's one that we had already come across when we benchmarked the Durabook D14RM: our initial benchmarks for the S15C were unexpectedly low and did not seem up to par at all with its impressive specs. We made sure the system was actually set to "High Performance" in the Windows 7 Power Options control panel and the processor cores were running at full speed. Everything was fine. Yet even after running the benchmarks twice more, the results did not improve. With Windows it's often, "when in doubt, reboot," and so we did that. Lo and behold, the Durabook now seemed a changed machine and sped through the benchmarks almost twice as fast.

Performance bottom line: Our Durabook with its mid-range i5-M460 was a good performer and can hold its own in good company. When selecting the options on a S15C, unless cost is the primary issue, we'd probably stay away from the Pentium (only two threads) and the i3 (no turbo boost). The high-end i5 and i7 options have slightly faster graphics and higher maximum Turbo Boost frequency, but for a real performance boost, switching from a hard disk to a solid state disk (GammaTech offers several Intel SSD options) and adding the optional nVidia N11M GE2-S discrete graphics would probably make a far bigger difference.

Power and Battery Life