A capable and solidly built ultraportable that's worth considering. It could use some refinement, but its strong case, built-in DVD burner and long battery life are major positives.

Although the Panasonic Toughbook CF-W5 is not the most stylish or powerful machine, it does offer some good battery life and should take a few knocks without any trouble. However, for the premium price it is short on ports and other features, a disappointment despite the advantages of its rugged design.

This mid-sized widescreen has plenty of power and a sizable, speedy hard disk, and it's backed by a three-year warranty.

Unfortunately there is no microphone, and the specs are a bit weak where it matters.

The Fujitsu LifeBook S6311 is a professional notebook with some nice features. It performed well in our tests and it's fairly priced for it's quality.

The VAIO is an excellent option for anyone after an ultraportable with good performance, solid battery life and an excellent design.

If you consider battery life and light weight the most important laptop criteria, give the LifeBook P7010 a close look. You could probably live with this 1.5-kilogram unit's less-than-perfect keyboard and screen.

Although there's a notable premium on the solid-state hard drive and ultra-portables don't often come cheap anyway, this is a good little buy. It's got enough power to handle the most basic tasks and its implementation of flash memory should please those wanting to be on the cutting edge.

Well built and full of features, this lightweight laptop is perfect for professional users who need good speed and ease of use while on the road.

It looks great and has fast specifications for an ultraportable laptop. It's a good thing it comes with a second, larger battery though, because its small battery produced a very low run-time in our tests. Nevertheless, if it's a lightweight powerhouse that you want, this one is ideal.

While it has a fast CPU and good features, such as built-in 3G connectivity, the U6Sg is let down by poor battery life. This is a major drawback for a unit that's pitched at style-conscious road warriors. If considering this unit, you should either opt for the slower CPU, or the larger, 9-cell battery.

This laptop is the perfect size for the road warrior who wants to get online while on the go, and who also wants something that looks flashy. Its colour might be a little too feminine for most guys' taste, but women might find it irresistible.