We wondered if Dell was making a passive-aggressive statement when it shipped us its new XPS M1530 in flamingo pink. Perhaps the boys in Austin think the MacBook Pro is a bit effete, so the pink is fitting. Or perhaps someone on the reviews team just finished watching Reservoir Dogs and was channeling Steve Buscemi’s Mr. Pink.

Whatever the reason, the XPS M1530—be it pink, blue, or brown—is a worthy contender to Apple’s vaunted MacBook Pro. Featuring Intel’s 2.5GHz Core 2 Duo T9300, 2GB of DDR2/667, a 250GB Samsung SpinPoint drive, and a GeForce 8600M GT, the XPS M1530 certainly has the specs to compete with the MBP in performance.

With a 15.4-inch screen, Acer’s TravelMate 5720 skirts the edge of what qualifies as a mainstream notebook. But at 7.5 lbs. of carry weight, it’s still pleasantly portable for a device that offers respectable multimedia and gaming functionality with a good-size battery.

Check out our full review of this jackrabbit-of-all-trades laptop after the jump.

Apple’s little white wonder of a MacBook excels against its PC counterparts, but it’s no Gandalf. As expected, gaming is this laptop’s weakest link. And even complex multimedia tasks can cause the MacBook’s magic to wither.

Still, in most applications, the Vista-booting MacBook performed admirably. Find out how admirably after the jump.

Weighing a tad more than 4 pounds, Sony’s Vaio SX is the heftiest laptop in the ultraportable category. Yet despite its larger size, the Vaio isn’t the sturdiest small-size contender. That’s too bad because this little rig packs killer performance in its sexy carbon-fiber shell—it’s the only ultraportable we tested that includes discrete graphics.