Maingear joins the 11-inch gaming laptop battle with the Pulse 11

Add Maingear to the very short list of PC vendors selling an 11-inch gaming laptop, with the new Pulse 11.

The 11-inch gaming laptop has had a bit of an up-and-down history. First the Alienware M11X made a big splash at CES in 2010, then it was quietly discontinued this year, just as Intel's new Ivy Bridge CPUs hit. At the same time as the Alienware model was going away, boutique PC maker Origin introduced the Eon-11, an 11-inch gaming laptop in the same vein. … Read more

Intel redefines ultrabooks for the Ivy Bridge era

With the first ultrabook-friendly CPUs from Intel's third generation of Core i-series parts showing up (and being benchmarked), it may be time for a refresher course on what it means to be an ultrabook.

This trademarked Intel marketing term is generally taken to mean "a Windows laptop kind of like a MacBook Air." But, it's actually much broader than that, and we've seen ultrabooks that have 14-inch displays, non-SSD hard drives, and even discrete graphics.

The precise definition can be a bit slippery, and different standards apply to different screen sizes. With the launch of the new Ivy Bridge ultrabooks (which I'd call the third wave of ultrabooks), here's how Intel breaks down the required and recommended specs, as noted on the Technology@Intel company blog. … Read more

Dell upgrades Latitude laptops with Ivy Bridge

Along with Lenovo's ThinkPad, the Dell Latitude is the laptop brand we see most often issued by corporate IT departments. While more and more office workers are using consumer-level systems (including MacBooks), there's still a need for laptops and desktops designed around the security and corporate infrastructure concerns of big IT departments.

The Latitude line has just been updated by Dell, most importantly to include the option of the latest third-generation Intel Core i-series CPUs. The new models include:… Read more

Hands-on with Intel's new ultrabook-friendly Ivy Bridge CPUs

The first batch of Intel's third-generation Core-i-series processors (also known by the code name Ivy Bridge) arrived in late April. But, those initial chips only covered the very high end of the spectrum, being quad-core Core i7 CPUs destined for high-end gaming and multimedia laptops.

While more mainstream Ivy Bridge CPUs have been expected for some time, Intel has now officially revealed new details of the Core i5 and low-voltage Core i7 chips. We've been testing systems with some of the new processors, most notably the 1.8GHz Intel Core i5-3427U. This is a low-voltage mobile processor specifically … Read more

New 27-inch Dell all-in-one matches iMac pixel for pixel

HP and Asus released the first 27-inch Windows-based all-in-ones this year, but with 1,920x,1,080-pixel resolution screens, they failed to match Apple's high-density, 2,560x1,440 iMacs. Dell's new XPS One 27 does.

Dell says the starting price for the new XPS One 27 is $1,399. That puts it ahead of the $1,249 HP Omni 27, but on par with the Asus ET2700I. All are also at least $300 below the most affordable 27-inch iMac.

At least for now, those other 27-inch all-in-ones also all use second-generation Intel Core CPUs, aka Sandy Bridge. The XPS One 27 has third-generation Core i5 and Core i7 CPUs, aka Ivy Bridge.… Read more

Intel's latest desktop board: Finally Thunderbolt and USB 3.0 coexist

More than a year after it was first launched exclusively for Macs, the Thunderbolt standard is now officially available for PCs, too. And by "officially," I mean you can literally buy a motherboard and build a system on your own that supports Thunderbolt.

There's been a lot of talk about Thunderbolt getting to PCs since the standard was first launched. Rumor had it Intel would show off PC motherboards that supported Thunderbolt at CES 2012 (which it didn't). On Monday, however, Intel quietly launched the standard for the PC platform, and today I have in my hand the Intel Desktop Board DZ77RE-75K, the first Thunderbolt-certified motherboard that comes with a built-in Thunderbolt port. The wait is finally over.… Read more

Google Drive and the end of sneakernet

For many years I've always carried a high-capacity USB key with me. The actual unit has changed size, shape, and capacity, but its purpose has always been the same: to easily transport files too large for convenient e-mailing.

This idea is usually called "sneakernet," as in, you physically walk the files from your current location to wherever they need to go, either across the office, or the other side of town.

My current sneakernet device is an 8GB LaCie IamaKey -- conveniently shaped like a key and easy to attach to a key chain. It was usually … Read more

Does Diablo III's big online-only bet pay off?

One week after its release, Diablo III remains the only PC game anyone is talking about. Some of that talk is about how the game, a decade in the making, is a huge hit, with millions of copies presold before the May 15 launch. But much of the talk is also about the big bet developer and publisher Blizzard is making by forcing even solitary players to log in online to play.

Dan: I've spent years attempting to divine the line between mainstream and enthusiast gaming, trying to figure out which games could cross over into popular culture, and which ones were going to stay locked into a small, but dedicated, core audience.… Read more

Why a Retina Display on a MacBook could be a bad idea

One of the most persistent rumors about possible upcoming new Apple MacBook laptops (aside from a 15-inch MacBook Air or the end of the 17-inch MacBook Pro) is that they will include upgraded high-resolution Retina Displays, like those on the iPhone 4/4S and third-generation iPad.

But, would this fairly significant change be worth it? If Apple breaks from the laptop norm (for example, by upgrading the 15-inch MacBook Pro's 1,440x900-pixel display to a purported 2,560x1,600 pixels), I'd have concerns about battery life, system size and weight from a potentially larger battery, and even price, as higher-resolution panels cost $100 more by some estimates. And consumers could be confused if Apple breaks a long-standing tradition of how laptop screen sizes and screen resolutions relate.

The current high-end resolution for laptops is 1,920x1,080 pixels, which we sometimes refer to as full HD or 1080p -- that's the same as Blu-ray HD video. On a 17-inch desktop-replacement laptop, it's great, and it mostly works on a 15-incher as well. The handful of 13-inch laptops with 1,920x1,080-pixel screens I've seen are hard to read. For even higher resolutions, Apple would have to have a workaround for this. The most likely way a Retina MacBook would work would be using HiDPI. My colleagues Josh Lowensohn and Brooke Crothers explain:

If Apple bumps up the resolutions on these displays and keeps them the same size, it has to treat pixels differently using a a special mode called HiDPI. The feature understands that there are more pixels, but that the scale of the display is the same. Apple added the feature to its OS X 10.7 software last year, but it isn't readily available to users. Some third-party software, including the recently-updated Air Display app for iOS have unlocked it so that users can try it out on their third-generation iPad.

Most MacBooks are already outside of the laptop resolution mainstream, with 16:10 screens on everything except the 11-inch MacBook Air, which is the company's only 16:9 laptop. As these are some of the only 16:10 laptops left, some kind of change wouldn't be surprising.… Read more