Lenovo ThinkPad W700DS, with Dual Screen

Just when you thought that there are no new tricks left in the notebook world ... Previously along comes something considered impossible.

With its ThinkPad W700, Lenovo was the first laptop with a pen tablet and a color calibration system. Now go up the ante once again with this improved version of the W700 - the W700ds - the first laptop to offer a secondary display, built in the right rear of the primary display.

I use the term loosely laptop, of course, because they have invented a word to describe what this machine really is. Laptop might be more appropriate: The crush 11 pounds W700ds that the femur of the most undernourished geeks, and is clearly designed to be parked at a desk (and, given the price $ 5059, with a major chain Insured, too.)

If you read our review of the W700, you GROK our thoughts on the tablet, and color correction features of this machine. There appears to be unchanged in its entirety, and again the beautiful, incredibly bright 17-inch screen is more than ready to pick up your average animator Pixar drooling.

If he is a true Spitta, why, just to get to the right side and pop in a secondary screen for more real estate - here you get a bonus 10.6-inch LCD, not as beautiful as the largest group, unfortunately, oriented in portrait mode. Although Jaws drop when this trick is for the first time in real life the secondary display is not so useful as you think. You can park here and the message window using whatever the toolbars (this is obviously created with Photoshop jockeys in mind), but is usually too small to hold your web pages or e-mail client.

Under the bonnet, W700ds has quietly upgraded to a 2.53-GHz Core 2 Extreme processors and dual 200 GB hard drive. The 4 GB of RAM, 64-bit version of Vista and Nvidia Quadro FX 3700m GPU remains the same as the mono screen pitifully W700. With its newly enhanced fire, broke all our generals W700ds app-portable performance (almost 15 percent faster than the W700), and that shook our game benchmarks as well. For the permanent record in the PC Mark05 results were 8449 and 5490 PC brand is Vantage.

Ask the W700ds to give all the power in the world, and meets. All we ask in return is, as all his money. And a ruptured disc or two.

Secondary display Wired is a novelty of impressive proportions. Loaded with ports, five USB full-size DVI output and HDMI out. Unmatched performance in a notebook. 94 minutes of battery life is not bad for a team this big.

If you are tired space for two monitors, which is a mistake to think that there should be room for three? Colossal size, weight, price. It smells like burning.

* Manufacturer: Lenovo
* Price: $ 5,059 (as tested)

HP TouchSmart tx2z

HP has been playing with a touch of technology for several years. However, do not claw the bull's eye with the machine that mixes cooking with tactile interface hardware that feels like more than half-Assed effort.

Therefore, we are cautiously optimistic TouchSmart tx2z. The good news? HP as the first convertible tablet multitouch, this is a great potential.

First, from the tx2z touch interface has been improved. It's marketing jargon for expanding the "sophisticated technology to translate multifinger capacitive multitouch gestures like pinch, rotate, blink, double tap and drag to navigation. The big difference is that the functions are not buried in the touch-based suite software. You want to zoom in / shrink, or move in programs like Firefox, MS Office, or even on the desktop? All it takes is a little pinching and put on display tx2z. Although the screen 12-inch does not provide tons of room for all the hot-in-action, finger touch screen, it's a minor objection, given the overall response.

Notebook for the conversion of the tablet was also painless, thanks to a strong hinges and put the pen. After swinging in 1280 x 800 screen around (and sometimes back), we have two Goodies. First, using the touch screen automatically turns off the pen (palm to prevent damage associated with), and second, including the HP Active digitizer input handwriting. Reckless activity is carried out, such as e-mail while you walk around the block surprisingly easy. Even footnote notes quickly using fingers (pen) give us a minimum of complications.

Unfortunately HP does not build a decent tx2z on solid foundations. Even with the 2.4-GHz AMD Dual Core processor and 4 GB of RAM, 64-bit version of Vista that came with your operating freakishly slow. Taking into account, is that many are behind the ridiculous amount of bloatware that was launched at the start - but five minutes to boot is very strong in the laptop is not new.

Hold down the department has integrated graphics ATI Radeon 3200 GPU, which also produced mixed results. Come back this way: Game of lighting and editing images is technically possible, but heavy use of graphics-intensive the application is quite out of the question. However, if you try to get out of the few dozen additional frames Crysis in 3200 was sufficient.

So, here's the skinny: As the productivity-driven convertible tablet, which is the victim tx2z solid. Both touch and pen-based interface is sensitive and useful in a number of controls on the distribution business applications. We would like some gestures thrown into the mix a little more, uh, "Razzle Dazzle", but HP clearly focused on the core of navigation - that apply.

However, when it comes to non-touch/tablet function, which is majority tx2z hat. If you are looking for a portable (and pretty cheap), the car is worth a look. If not, you are better off snagging even more keeles platform.

Service Wired baked as a good touch and tablet devices. Travel in style and well compact chassis. Including quick play button to the screen orientation. Media remote and a mini pen remains comfortable in the chassis. Altec Lansing speakers achieve a decent balance between the volume and clarity. Many other goodies: biometric security, webcam, headphone connectors, compatible with 802.11n, and 5-in-1 card reader.

SO tired swollen hinders another decent performance specifications. Occasionally laggy mode switch between notebook and tablet. No love for the multitouch trackpad. Terrible viewing angle and low visibility in direct sunlight. Fan leaf blower sound like My Bloody Valentine show.

* Style: Tablet
* Operating System: MS Vista
* Display Type: Touchscreen enabled
* Processor Manufacturer: AMD
* Optical Drive: DVD
* Manufacturer: HP
* Price: $ 1550 (as evidence)

Notebook Gateway UC7807u with 13 inch screen

Long before the world began gulping down NETBOOK Kool-Aid, there is one thing the dependable choice for mobile fetishists: The 13-inch laptop. In fact, compared with slightly smaller (but increasingly popular), cousins, I still tend to be slightly compacts offer more satisfying blend of power and portability.

For all purposes, but has a history of suffering from major defects: You must be very far to the bag roll thin and lightweight. No more.

Not only the new portal UC7807u prove (once again) that you can get all types of functions into smaller packages interesting, but also dispels the myth that you must part with more than one G to do so.

About $ 300 more than the average NETBOOK a brilliant offer various specifications UC7807u age. 2.0 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo CPU? Check. 250 GB hard drive? Yep. 3GB of memory, a bright 13.3-inch screen, an optical drive slot-loading, and number of ports (three USB and HDMI)? You Betcha! Best of all, with a brushed aluminum chassis to search for, not the error budget for this laptop.

Unfortunately, UC7807u also has all the obvious signs of cutting a few corners. On the one hand, you can forget about the game. Due to the slow integrated Intel GMA 4500MHD graphics card, even the title is being intense will not work correctly. Our Quake 4 test, which makes scrapbook Abysmal average 16 fps in automatic detection and a maximum of 9 fps settings. So, yes, unplayable. But hey, you do not buy the 13 inch lappy fragments, right?

In fact, our biggest beef with UC7807u has more to do with the low 6-cell battery and weight problems pretty obvious. For one thing the technical category is thin and lightweight, this laptop has a lot of freedom in both fronts. Weight 5.3 pounds, almost half a pound heavier than the Macbook unibody. The battery is also disappointing. We witnessed the disappointing 3 hours, 25 minutes - an average of one hour shorter than most other notebooks in this category.

However, overall, it is difficult to reject this 13-incher from the action - especially when you factor in the basement bid price. May not have NETBOOK acolytes want to surrender all their little gods, but at least you can try with the false idol bovine.

Wired recession-worthy prices. Built like tanks. Slick, touch-sensitive controls for volume and multimedia.

Tired of the scale tips the notebook in this category. Battery faster than an ATM in the strip club. Not epic in a small circular touchpad. A narrow and has no visible effect. On board speakers spit rich, distorted sound. HDMI, but not Blu-ray?

* Style: Thin and light
* Operating System: MS Vista
* Processor Manufacturer: Intel
* Optical Drive: DVD
* Manufacturer: Gateway
* Rate: $ 800 (as evidence)

Why Sony Refuse Vaio P series to be Called Netbooks?

Sony Vaio at the P (or P Life Series VAIO PC to offer full, official name) is not NETBOOK. At CES, a small computer that is clear, Sony made it very clear that was presented ... what, exactly?

To become a P Vaio notbook, there must be some definition of their own NETBOOK. Here we just try to keep track of what makes this fast-growing group of computers.


Processors

With the exception of the initial Asus EHEA using clunky 900 MHz Intel Celeron M processor, all feature today netbooks Intel Atom 1.6Ghz chip. This is more than enough to power a small motor (it is still the way to your desktop).

Sony, once, to select a 1.33GHz processor. Reason seems to be space. This processor can function as Fanless and therefore in a smaller case. NETBOOK level of openness and find a lot of extra air in it.

Keyboard

This is a real problem with netbooks - are too small. MSI Wind has a keyboard horrible. It is sentimental and design means you never know where your fingers. HP Mini is better, and said that reports of the Dell Mini 9, the keyboard also has a useful but that actually work, like writing this post, you need something more substantial.

Sony says it is designed around all P Vaio keyboard. Surely looks good (like the MacBook's keyboard actually chewing gum), and if it is to work, this can be a spiritual successor to the Psion Series 5 which features a small keyboard ever better. Sony even a right to key changes in the right place.

Screen

Almost all 10 "NETBOOK has a screen resolution of 1024x600. The Vaio P squeeze smaller pixels 8" screen - 1600 × 768. Width. Very good, very clear and determined by the size of the keyboard.

Puerto

Reason that the galloping NETBOOK specifications. They are, to the port side. They have a VGA output, three USB ports, an SD card reader, Ethernet, and headphone and microphone jacks.

Sony ditches SD to Memory Stick, but an interesting tweak to make storage space, too. Display Ethernet port connection and the socket is replaced with a slide on the adapter. This technology is complex, and some clear rules for netbooks.

Price

NETBOOK regular to get a few hundred dollars. P $ 900 from Sony. This may be the biggest difference for most people, and give us a clue about the true definition of NETBOOK (below). Sony is known for the high price of hardware, but compared with UMPCs like OQO, this feature is full of small and start the computer looks like a really good deal.

Conclusion

May NETBOOK period was fairly weak, but I think it may have cracked it. A NETBOOK is basically the cheapest can be portable and must be small.

Take a closer look and see that they are all built from the parties, not surprising since the first netbooks come from OEM company that manufactures equipment for the likes of Apple and other hardware re-badgers. They are cheap, standard components (VGA, USB, webcam), which was thrown into a cheap plastic body, with sufficient air cooling will not be a problem. Atom processors that are common but not necessary (will be improved soon anyway).

From this, it is clear that P NETBOOK Vaio is not a standard. For once, we agree with Sony.

Alienware Area-51 m15x, Best Gaming Laptops

Alienware’s big, bright computers and aflame case lights accept tended to bisect the gaming community. While some like clutching a apparatus that takes up bisected the allowance and aloof about its innards, others adopt article a little added demure.

The fresh m15x won’t accelerate anybody into a agitation of envy lust, but it does accept abundant broader address than its predecessors. In fact, for Alienware, it’s about understated.

Look at the admeasurement of that thing

The m15x has a far added bourgeois attending than we’re acclimatized to from Alienware, and we rather like it. The artificial case is still shiny, but it’s additionally chaste with blatant trim or industrialised elastic edges.

With the lid bottomward the alone arresting lighting is abaft the Alien logo. Indeed, look a bit, and from a ambit this silver-sheened apparatus could be an aboriginal MacBook.

That this is, in fact, an Alienware laptop is anon obvious. It’s congenital like a tank, feels around indestructible, and is the better 15.4in awning anthology we’ve anytime seen. In fact, it’s beneath carriageable than best 17 inchers – this isn’t a anthology you can aloof bung in your haversack and balloon about.

Raw power

Underneath the abnormally aerial affection and backlit keyboard is the best recent – and best able – GeForce 8800M GTX cartoon card, forth with the best recent – and best able – Intel Core 2 Extreme CPU.