3. Case And Connections, Continued

The VGA port is also located on the left side of the case and permits the unit to drive an external monitor.

The upper slot is for PCI ExpressCard devices; the lower PC Card slot is also home to a small remote control for the Instant On Player.

An IR receiver is located in the middle front of the case, and receives signals from the remote control to manage the notebook's audio and video functions. This IR "eye" is flanked on both sides by the unit's stereo loudspeakers. LG could have spaced these speakers further apart; this would surely have improved stereo separation when listening to music. The machine does include a software tool to manage audio settings and characteristics, that helps improve sound quality (more about this later).

The front side of the case is home to stereo loudspeakers and an IR receiver for the remote control.

The line-up on the right side of the case includes audio jacks, an IR connector, and a Firewire port. The choice of DVD dual layer burner was something of a surprise inside a notebook from a company that makes optical drives: it's a TS-L632B, a product built by the TSST Corporation, a storage joint venture backed by both Samsung and Toshiba!

The TS-632B DVD burner can write dual layer DVDs.