HCL ME54 - High-priced Average Performer

In a market that’s quite literally flooded with notebooks by premium brands, HCL is one that many people look to for inexpensive, affordable products. The new ME54, one of their latest notebooks to be launched, according to HCL is an eco-friendly one. Is it something that the typcal Indian consumer needs?

Features

The HCL ME54 comes with an LED-backlit 14-inch display that supports a resolution of 1366x768, which is the same sized screen that you get from some of the other vendors. 

HCL EL2 and HCL touch buttons clearly visible on the keyboard

The processor used on the ME54 is a slightly older Intel Core i5 520M, which is a dual core processor that operates at 2.4 GHz and supports hyperthreading. The processor isn’t part of the new Sandy Bridge line from Intel. There’s 4 GB of DDR3 memory onboard the laptop and a 500 GB, 5400 rpm Hitachi hard drive for storage. There is no discrete graphics solution onboard the notebook, which means you’re left with the integrated graphics controller. Gigabit Ethernet connectivity and WiFi 802.11n is also supported. In most aspects then, the HCL ME54 matches products from other manufacturers in this price range.

There are also features such as the fingerprint scanner as well as a memory card reader, eSATA and HDMI connectivity.

A new eco-friendly notebook from HCL

We’re also not fond of the customised trackpad. The trackpad has a mode button on it, which lets you use certain areas of it to control the multimedia functions. The mouse function for the trackpad is disabled when you press the mode option. Dedicated controls on the keyboard are also present for some of the other features. The problem arrives when you’re using the trackpad (which by itself isn’t too bad), and you happen to press the Mode feature by mistake. The trackpad is immediately disabled. Fortunately, there is an option to disable the feature completely using the drivers. 

There are a few unique HCL features onboard the laptop as well. For example, there’s an HCL EC2 button on the notebook, which lets you access a quick backup-recovery utility. Another feature is the HCL touch feature, which lets you quickly get in touch with HCL about problems with the notebook over chat.