Notebooks / Accessories

Sony’s VAIO W Eco Edition netbook, priced at $480, seeks to appeal to a wide range of users. The eco-conscious, of course, with a chassis made from 20% recycled material and a 100% recycled carrying case. Plus parents shopping for a netbook that’s safe to give their young ones, thus it’s pre-loaded with a kid-safe browser and some hefty parental controls. Then there’s the multimedia fans who will appreciate the HD screen and robust webcam software. And I would hazard that the color scheme indicates a desire to attract female consumers.

There’s no doubt the VAIO W is full of appealing features and attributes and will shrink your carbon footprint, but is it worth the $80 premium? Click here to read our full review to see how this netbook measures up to the competition.

Quick question: how many tech toys do you tote on a daily basis? Two? Three? Four, maybe?  If it’s anything more than the loneliest number, chances are that you may need a device such as Charge4All’s Charging Tube.

The $29.95 Charging Tube can power up to four devices at once using a  single power outlet.  You can connect cell phones, digital audio players, Bluetooth devices, cameras and more to the available circular ports that require the use of specially cables. Fortunately, the Charging Tube comes bundled with five “Smart Charging” plugs: iPod/iPhone, Micro USB, Mini USB, LG Chocolate, and Samsung SCH.

Charge4All claims that the Charging Tube uses 75% less energy than when powering devices individually because one outlet works as  four. Gadgeteers and hippies, this may be one to check out.

Today, Sony announced the VAIO E Series, a new line of  value-oriented multimedia, centric 15.5-inch notebooks with a giant heaping of style. Starting at $700, the VAIO E series features a 2.13-GHz Core i3 330M CPU, 4GB of RAM, a 15.5-inch screen with resolution of 1366 x 768 or 1920 x 1080 (depending on config), either Intel integrated or ATI Graphics chips are responsible for processing all images sent to your computer?s display.
Learn Morediscrete graphics, a 32o or 500GB The storage device that holds your OS, programs, and data.
Learn Morehard drive, and an optional Blu-ray drive. The base configuration should start at around $700 and includes the smaller hard drive, lower resolution screen, and Graphics chips are responsible for processing all images sent to your computer?s display.
Learn Moreintegrated graphics. A high-end configuration with 1920 x 1080 resolution, Blu-ray drive, and ATI graphics will debut in March for around $969.

Aside from its multimedia oriented specs, what really makes the VAIO E stand-out is its design and controversial color choices. It has an edge-to-edge keyboard with numeric keypad and an interesting gradient pattern on both its lid and deck. A layer of clear, textured plastic overlays the touchpad. More importantly, the notebook is available in Coconut White, Lava Black, Hibiscus Pink, and Iridescent blue.

Controversial Metallic Teal Color

We haven’t seen the white, black, or pink models in person, but yesterday Sony sent us an iridescent blue VAIO E in the mail. From the moment, we removed it from the box, the notebooks’ metallic teal chassis was controversial among our staff. Some editors fell in love with Sony’s bold color choice while others complained that it was way too garrish. It seemed like everyone, from our receptionist to the head of our art department had strong feelings about it.

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Update – 2/2/2010: Microsoft has discontinued the sale and raised the price all the way to $1,599.

Though it came out in the fall of 2008, Lenovo’s ThinkPad X301 remains the rolls royce of ultraportables. At 3.3-pounds and less than an inch thick, the 13.3-inch notebook is one of the lightest business systems on the market. Having reviewed the ThinkPad X301, we can also say that it’s one of the most comfortable notebooks we’ve ever used, with a super-responsive keyboard and a rubberized palm rest that feels soft, yet durable under our wrists. The 1440 x 900 resolution backlit display provides more screen real estate than most 15-inch notebooks, making this an ideal notebook for doing serious work, right from  your lap. It even stays nice and cool after hours of work.

Even though this is a rather mature notebook model, Lenovo continues to charge a starting price of $1,889 for the X301 on its own site, and that base unit comes with a lame 3-cell battery and without an optical drive. As of today, with the coupon code  MSStore-PC-50%, you can buy the ThinkPad X301 for only $800 ($1109 – $309) at the Microsoft Store. That’s an amazing deal on an amazing notebook.

The configuration at the Microsoft Store features a high-capacity 6-cell battery, a DVD burner, 2GB of RAM, a 1.4-GHz Core 2 Duo SU9400 CPU, and Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit. The only real downside is that it comes with a 120GB 5,400-rpm The storage device that holds your OS, programs, and data.
Learn Morehard drive, instead of an SSD, which is normally standard on this system. Considering how much you are saving, however,  you can buy your own 1.8-inch SSD and put it in. Newegg currently has an 80GB Intel X18-M SSD with upgrade kit for just TK.

Click here to go to the Microsoft Store and get the ThinkPad X301 for $800 (using coupon code MSStore-PC-50%).

The ThinkPad T Series has long been popular with businesses because it mixes great performance and durability with a best-in-class keyboard. Arriving in Fall 2008, the ThinkPad T400 had good performance and endurance but it was a little disappointing because its design felt dated and its keyboard was a little less responsive than other ThinkPads we’d tested. Then, in summer 2009, Lenovo released the slimmed-down and sexed-up T400s, complete with a new keyboard, a lighter chassis, and a sleeker design. However, the T400 (without an “s”) remained Lenovo’s mainstream 14-inch ThinkPad, with the T400s offering smaller batteries and higher prices.

Say hello to the ThinkPad T410, an update to the T400 that pairs all the sleek design goodness and awesome keyboard of the T400s with powerful Core i5 / Core i7 CPUs. We’ve just posted our full review of the ThinkPad T410 and found it a significant improvement over the ThinkPad T400. While still much heavier than the T400s, the notebook felt good in our hands and even better when we used it and experienced its speedy performance. That said, the notebook wasn’t perfect, suffering from noisy video playback, muted sound, and warm temperatures on the bottom.

Despite its relatively minor flaws, we strongly recommend the ThinkPad T410 for business users who want the ultimate in performance from a 14-inch notebook. Check out our full review of the ThinkPad T410 for all the details.

Our friends at SlashGear has just posted the first professional review of the 11.6-inch ThinkPad X100e and sadly they’re more than a little disappointed.  While reviewer Ewdison Then praised the keyboard saying that “key feel and response is some of the best we’ve experienced on an ultraportable of this size,” he was disappointed in the overall build quality of the system, opining that it did not match other ThinkPads.

While the 1.6-GHz AMD Neo MV-40 CPU and Radeon HD3200 chipset provided similar performance to an Intel Atom N270 netbook, SlashGear found endurance lacking. Even with the 6-cell battery, they managed only around 3 hours of battery life. Other issues included warm external temperatures and loud fan noise. For all the details, plus lots of pictures, check out SlashGear’s review of the ThinkPad X100e.

Despite SlashGear’s evaluation, we look forward to receiving our own review sample of the ThinkPad X100e in the near future and putting it through our own series of rigorous tests. Perhaps when we get to take our own look at it, things will look a little different. Stay tuned for our review of the ThinkPad X100e sometime in the near future.

One of the things I have found endearing about Sony in the past is their refusal to label their netbook-like machines netbooks. Even though both the VAIO P and X have Intel Atom inside, the vendor hoped that their other attributes would launch them into the realm of high-end ultraportables. The price tags hurt my heart, though, especially because that VAIO X is definitely one slick notebook.

Thankfully, Sony saw fit to release a netbook we can actually call a netbook with the VAIO W series. This sweet little number landed in our offices this week and we’ve been putting it through its paces. The full review is coming soon, but here are three things we like best:

1. The Display: HD resolutions on 10.1-inch screens don’t always work out, but we’re definitely not left squinting with the VAIO P. We’re enjoying the screen real estate as well as the ability to watch HD videos. Bright colors, true blacks, and good horizontal angles earn the display an A. Click here to see what else we like about the VAIO W

The Toshiba Satellite E205, a Best Buy exclusive, sports a futuristic design and fast Core i5 performance for a very reasonable $899. But what makes this 14-inch notebook truly compelling is that it integrates one of the most innovative technologies we saw at this year’s CES: Intel’s Wireless Display. This feature, available on just three laptops at the moment, lets users wirelessly mirror their desktop on their TV or big-screen monitor. Streaming Hulu clips, photo slide shows, presentations, and even DRM content downloaded from iTunes, is surprisingly simple. Best Buy even bundles the small set-top box you’ll need to make this streaming happen.

The E205 isn’t very good at gaming, but if you’re in the market for an all-purpose laptop we strongly recommend it. You’ll be hard-pressed to find better design, performance, and features for the money. For photos, detailed benchmark results, and a video demo of Intel’s Wireless Display technology in action, check out our full review.

Dell recently issued a BIOS fix for its Studio 17 with Core i7, designed to solve a serious crashing issue. However, after the release of Intel’s new Core i5 processor and a number of vocal user complaints about its Core i7 product, the company has made the lower-powered and priced Core i5 the Studio 17’s default CPU choice. Though, as of this posting, we did not see a Core i7 option on Dell.com, a rep assured us that the Core i7 model, labeled the Dell Studio 1747 has not been discontinued and will return to the site within days.

When we reviewed the Dell Studio 17 with Intel’s Core i7 processor (aka Dell Studio 1747) in November, we gave the notebook a 4-star rating due to its blazing performance and relatively affordable price. However, we noted two major problems we experienced with our review unit. First, the initial system we received stopped booting (and made several beeping noises) just after testing had been completed and, second, we noticed that the exterior of the chassis got hot, with the underside of the system registering a troubling 112-degrees Fahrenheit after just 15 minutes of playing a Hulu video.

We returned the first unit to Dell, which repaired it and sent it back to us a couple of days later, saying that the first issue we encountered was an isolated incident. The repaired unit worked, but we did experience experience a couple of mysterious blue screen crashes the first time we tried to play Hulu videos on it, though these seemed to disappear on subsequent tests. After we informed Dell about the uncomfortably hot temperatures, they sent us a second review unit to test. This second unit  did not break or crash, but was just as hot as the original.

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Intel’s release of its new Pine Trail processor, the Atom N450, gave Dell the perfect opportunity to improve what was a middling netbook. Dell’s new and improved Inspiron Mini 10 features not only a much more stylish chassis (no more bulging batteries) but also 9 hours of battery life–almost four hours longer than its original Mini 10.

As we note in our full review, there’s a lot to like about the new Mini 10. Its speakers are loud, its The storage device that holds your OS, programs, and data.
Learn Morehard drive is fast, and  it performs better than most netbooks when streaming video from the Web. Yet, one design decision, held over from the previous Mini 10, still haunts this netbook.  The integrated mouse buttons in the touchpad remain tricky to use, even if Dell switched to Synaptics from Elantech for the drivers, and disabled multitouch functionality.

Still, if you can get around that–as well as the fact that the front right underside got as hot as 120 degrees Fahrenheit–this is a well-rounded netbook with a very competitive price. At $369, it’s less expensive than all other similarly configured Pine Trail netbooks except the Acer Aspire 532h ($349).

Click here for a more detailed analysis in our full review, and stay tuned for a hands-on video.