Rock Hardbook

The Rock Hardbook is a semi-ruggedised notebook designed to survive the rigours of daily use. Its biggest asset is the partial magnesium alloy casing which, according to Rock, is 20 times stronger than the plastic used in most notebook chassis.

In tests, the casing proved very resilient. Several PCW staff members (of varying weights) stood on the notebook with the lid closed, and the TFT panel emerged unscathed. We also took great pleasure in dropping it from Rock’s recommended drop height of 70cm without causing any damage.

Unfortunately, the Hardbook’s 60GB hard drive does not automatically shut down when it senses tilt, vibration or shock, so dropping it while the notebook is in operation could result in damage.

The eight-speed dual-layer DVD drive has a lockable CD tray. Rock claims this can reduce the likelihood of the drive being damaged, but we cannot envisage many cases in which this would be useful.

More practical is the fact that the Hardbook’s keyboard can resist liquid spillages of up to 100cc. We tested this and, again, it did not cause any damage, as you can see from the photo.

The Hardbook uses a 1.73GHz Pentium M CPU and 512MB of Ram. This configuration helps it churn through most applications at a decent rate. We were impressd by the battery life of four hours, 31 minutes.

The Hardbook survived rough treatment in our Labs, but it isn’t invincible. There are other notebooks such as Panasonic’s Toughbook that have a higher recommended drop height and resistance to small particles, extreme temperature and humidity.

But if you are after a sturdy portable that is relatively cheap, the Hardbook is an impressive piece of kit.

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