Filed under: Laptops

You probably thought we were done with this latest volley of Merom-powered laptops. Ha — you were wrong. Next up to board the Core 2 Duo train is Velocity Micro’s 15.4-inch NoteMagix L80 “Ultra Notebook Computer,” which adds T5500, T5600, T7200, T7400, and T7600 options (ranging from 1.66GHz to 2.33GHz) to the already available suite of regular Core Duo and Celeron M configurations. So besides the latest processors, what makes this model so “ultra”? Well first of all, it ships with a 256MB nVIDIA GeForce Go 7600GS card standard — a refreshing change-up from the usual integrated graphics we see around here — plus an option to bump the LCD resolution up to 1,680 x 1,050 from a ho-hum 1,280 x 800. You can also cram in as much as 2GB of DDR2 RAM, a 7,200 RPM 100GB hard drive, and dual-layer DVD burner, with WiFi, a card reader, and three USB 2.0 ports part and parcel of any configuration. Available immediately, you can pick up a decently-speced L80 for about $1,655, but of course for the one we’d want, pricing is a little closer to $2,600.

[Via laptoping]

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Filed under: Laptops, Tablet PCs

So Fujitsu’s got four portable machines for us to peep today, but unlike the slew of Merom-powered notebooks we’ve been seeing, only one of these models rock that dual-core goodness. First off are two new members of the 15.4-inch Biblio NF family (pictured above), the NF60T with a 1.6GHz Turion 64 X2 CPU, and the 1.46GHz Celeron M 410-powered NF40T. The 60T rocks ATI Radeon Xpress 1150 graphics, 512MB of RAM (4GB max), and a 100GB HDD, while the 40T also gives you 512MB RAM (only expandable to to 2GB, though) and just 80GB of HDD capacity and integrated graphics; both machines, however, offer a full complement of connectivity options, with WiFi, FireWire, USB 2.0, Gigabit Ethernet, PCMCIA, ExpressCard, and D-Sub standard. Next up is the Core Solo-equipped (1.20GHz U1400) FMV-Biblio LOOX Q, with a 12.1-inch WXGA LCD, integrated graphics, 30GB HDD (hey, it’s really slim, at least), 512MB of RAM, and both WiFi and Bluetooth 2.0 radios. Finally we have the 8.9-inch LOOX P70T/V convertible tablet, which sports the exact same specs as the Q, but obviously replaces the XP Pro OS with Tablet PC Edition 2005. Look for the ¥185,000 ($1,581) NF60T and ¥150,000 ($1,282) NF40T to drop on September 2nd, the ¥260,000 ($2,222) LOOX Q to be available on the 15th, and the ¥250,000 ($2,136) P70T/V to hit shelves on September 28th — all initially in Japan, of course.

Read- Biblio NF
Read- LOOX Q and P

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Despite its excellent design and shiny, new Core 2 Duo processor, the Gateway M255-E fails to make strides with performance or battery life.

We’re not crazy about the PC Club Enpower ENP680′s design, but its initial performance results have definitely grabbed our attention.

The Core 2 Duo-based XPS M1710 provides fast application performance, lengthy battery life, and the best gaming performance you’ll get from a laptop with a single graphics card.

Filed under: Laptops

Custom laptop designs are a dime a dozen these days, with everything from fast car logos to glorious “Pink Feather” designs being stamped onto the back of LCDs in an attempt to draw the eyes of punters looking for a new lappie. The latest custom job on the market is Fujitsu Siemens’ team of soccer themed laptops which don the colors and crests of four different Premiership clubs: Celtic, Aston Villa, Everton, and Tottenham Hotspur, to be precise. Under the soccer shirts, the laptops are Amilo 1536 models featuring 1280 x 800 15-inch displays powered by a 128MB ATI Mobility Radeon X1400 graphics adapter. Dig a little deeper and you’ll find a 1.83GHz Core Duo processor, 1GB of DDR2 RAM, and a roomy 120GB 5400RPM SATA drive. Not quite striker material, we know, but the £1000 (plus three year warranty) price tag ain’t too shabby considering the bundled paint job. Fujitsu Siemens is promising other clubs will join the line-up to celebrate the recent start of the Premiership season, although don’t expect any teams with notable rivalries to be released at the same time. If you follow English football, you’ll notice that the first four club themed laptops are a rather disparate lot: there’s no Liverpool to go with Everton, no Rangers to go with Celtic, and so on. These guys obviously know how to manage their laptop teams without starting a football riot.

[Via Reg Hardware]

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The bulky Satellite R25 offers a beautiful display and plenty of features at a low price, but if you don’t need the tablet functionality, there are better wide-screen notebooks on the market.

The Toshiba Satellite P105-S6024 offers a decent set of features and solid performance for home users who want a Media Center laptop without spending a lot of dough.

We’ve seen plenty of security locks in the past, but this one has a bit of a different twist to it. This security lock operates similar to one of those retractable dog leashes It is small, lightweight and can fit nicely into any laptop bag. Keep your gadgets secure and walk your dog at the same time, now that is a hell of a multipurpose gadget. – Travis Hudson

Travle Security Gizmo for Laptops [BIOS]

Filed under: Laptops

Proving once again that people seem to be willing to overpay for underpowered gadgets that could possibly be seen as “fashionable,” Samsung has released a new £1,300 ($2,460) notebook whose main (read: only) selling point is its bright pink exterior. At this price point we’d expect to see words like “Core Duo” and “GeForce” on the spec sheet, but the new 12.1-inch Q40 only manages to throw down a disappointing 1.2GHz ULV Core Solo processor, just 512MB of RAM, a scant 60GB hard drive capacity, and those integrated Intel graphics which will only please gamers who are into Minesweeper and Sudoku. Still, you are getting a built-in DVD burner and Windows XP Professional as the operating system, so this lappy isn’t a total lost cause. Although the shiny Q40 is available exclusively at PC World, we have a feeling that you’ll soon be seeing it in the hands of celebutantes worldwide, and perhaps even being given away as a door prize on a future episode of My Super Sweet 16.

[Via Shiny Shiny]

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The Fujitsu LifeBook E8210 is by no means exciting, flashy, or inexpensive, but it does offer serious performance and security at a competitive price.

The Fujitsu LifeBook E8210 is by no means exciting, flashy, or inexpensive, but it does offer serious performance and security at a competitive price.

The Fujitsu LifeBook E8210 is by no means exciting, flashy, or inexpensive, but it does offer serious performance and security at a competitive price.

The Alienware Aurora mALX is one of the best, and one of the most expensive, mobile gaming rigs available today. But with Intel Core 2 Duo just around the corner, that might not be the case for long.

The Toshiba Satellite A105 combines Windows XP Media Center Edition with an inexpensive starting price and decent performance, making it a good entry-level media center laptop.

The HP Pavilion dv2000t delivers an eye-catching case, a strong set of features, solid performance with the Intel Core Duo processor, and excellent battery life with the 12-cell extended battery.

The large, 20-inch Acer Aspire 9800 offers a decent multimedia experience, but you'd be better off buying a more portable laptop and a detached display.

Filed under: Laptops

We’ve sure seen a lot of Core 2 Duo- and Core 2 Extreme-equipped desktops today, so props go out to Fujitsu for breaking up the monotony and announcing a laptop spec-bump instead. Available sometime during the fourth quarter, the new and improved LifeBook N6400 series — which was one of the first to get the original Core Duo treatment — stays true to the lineup’s origins by featuring the same 17-inch, Crystal View display and built-in subwoofer as its predecessors, but speeds things up a bit with some of that Merom-style Core 2 Duo love. The rest of the specs probably won’t change too much either, so you can expect to see configurations sporting dual 160GB hard drives, up to 2GB of DDR2 RAM, and most likely a non-integrated graphics chipset of some sort. With the release still more than a month away we don’t have any pricing details to share with you, but the current-generation N6410 (pictured) goes for around $1,700, so maybe that will give you some idea of what to prepare for.

[Via laptoping]

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Filed under: Desktops, Laptops

Seems like only yesterday we were firing off Core Duo announcement after Core Duo announcement (with the occasional Core Solo thrown in for good measure), and now the Merom (aka Core 2) family has finally landed. We can expect ten new Core 2 Duo and Core 2 Extreme chips from Intel today; we'll leave the bithead biz to the fine folks at Tom's and the like, but expect to Leap Ahead into "performance enhancing" buzzwords like Wide Dynamic Execution, Smart Memory Access, Advanced Smart Cache, Advanced Digital Media Boost, and 64 bit processing (from the Core 2 Extremes and Duo desktop chips), as well as Core 2 Duo mobile processors' new Dynamic Power Coordination, Dynamic Bus Parking, and Enhanced Intel Deeper Sleep with Dynamic Cache Sizing, all intended to drop processor juice usage even further. Should we expect to see some announcements of machines based on these long awaited processors? Well, check back in a couple hours, why don't you? In the mean time, Intel assures us that boxes with Core 2 Extreme chips are already ready to rumble, but unfortunately you'll have to wait for the Core 2 Duo desktops and mobiles until early and late August, respectively.

P.S. -If you're of the bencharking ilk -- and somehow we have a feeling you are -- PC Perspective's got a load of early-release performance data they just threw up. Thanks Ryan.

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Filed under: Gaming, Laptops

We know that it’s a bit of a tease to keep featuring products that will never be available in the US, but we figure that if you’re not down with foreign devices, you probably would have stopped visiting this site long ago (or maybe you just skip over these types of posts). Anyway, the latest look-but-don’t-touch model comes from Japanese manufacturer PC-Koubou — the same company that dropped seven new laptops on us not too long ago — who just announced the impending release of its 15.4-inch Lesance AS520AW-DUO gaming notebook. As you probably guessed from the model number, this Windows XP Home Edition-powered machine sports an Intel Core Duo processor of the 1.83GHz T2400 variety, along with ATI Mobility Radeon X1600 graphics (featuring 256MB of VRAM), a 1,200 x 800 pixel display, 1GB of 533MHz DDR2 RAM, and a 60GB hard drive running at 5,400 RPM. Also along for the ride are an ExpressCard slot (though no PCMCIA), 8x DVD super-duper multi drive, and four USB 2.0 ports, though WiFi and Bluetooth are nowhere to be found. If you happen to be visiting Japan starting next month, you can snatch one of these beauties up for just $1,371.

[Via MobileWhack]

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Though the Satellite U205 isn't the best performer, it's inexpensive and powerful enough for productivity tasks, and it has good battery life.

Filed under: Laptops, Peripherals

We've been following Nicholas Negroponte's One Laptop Per Child initiative ever since the machine was still priced below $100, but once they jettisoned the hand crank, we've been wondering how they're going to deliver power to the 500MHz device. Enter Squid Labs, an R&D firm chock full of MIT Media Lab grads -- the same lab that Negroponte founded and ran for many years -- with an innovative human-powered generator that works by repeatedly tugging on a string in a motion similar to firing up a gas-powered lawnmower or snowblower. The team at Squid designed the external generator so that one minute of pulling yields ten minutes of computing, and included an electronic variable motor loading feature so that it can be operated by users of varying strength. Another nice feature of this system is that it can be configured in a number of different ways: users can either hold the device in one hand and pull the string with the other, or clamp it to a desk and operate the string with their legs. As long as further testing confirms the design's durability, and a better option doesn't come along, it looks like we'll be seeing classrooms full of string-pulling students when the laptop finally goes into mass production next year.

[Via Slashdot]

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Dream, fanboys, dream. Here’s the formula for a rumor: Add in the July 27th launch date for Intel’s Core 2 Duo chips (redundant name? yes, and yes.) Add the approach of Apple’s Developer Conference in early August. Bake at 300 degrees, no, wait, 150 degrees, and instantly arrive at the idea that the new chips would show in new a Macbook Pro next month. While we’re cooking up speculation, it would be fair to drool. Those chips are supposed to be a great deal faster than the originals inside of today’s MBPs; a great deal more than what we get in an average game of CPU-speed leap frog.– Brian Lam

New Macbook’s in August(?)[ MacRumors ]
Core 2 Duo: Zippy [ Internal ]

The superthin Fujitsu LifeBook Q2010 performs well and has all the features most business users need in an ultraportable, but it comes at an extraordinarily high price.

The superthin Fujitsu LifeBook Q2010 performs well and has all the features most business users need in an ultraportable, but it comes at an extraordinarily high price.