We just got our invitation to Microsoft’s debutante ball in Spain for Windows 8 beta– dubbed Windows 8 Consumer Preview–which will take place on February 29th during Mobile World Congress and will hopefully culminate in the release of a public beta of Windows 8. Though the OS will still need some primping and preening before it’s official release later this year, it’ll give the general public a chance to dance with the new Metro user interface, the same interface overlay that’s currently on Windows Phone. 

Microsoft has stated that their goal with Windows 8 is to optimize the tablet experience while still providing the power and versatility needed for desktop users. Users will be able to purchase apps from the Windows Store for simplified software installation across a variety of devices. We got a hands-on look at the developer preview of Windows 8 and came away impressed not only by the operating system’s touch capabilities, but also by how well it handled on a traditional laptop. 

LAPTOP will be at Windows 8 Consumer Preview’s debut at Mobile World Congress in Spain later this month, so stay tuned.

• Samsung Windows 8 Preview PC Hands-on: The Future of Tablets?
• Windows 8 on a Laptop: Why It’s Even Better Than Touch
• Windows 8 Developer Preview Hands-on: Inside All the New Features

You know that sinking feeling. That sense of desperation when your gadget’s battery meter says 10 percent . . . or less. Without your phone—or tablet or laptop—you’re lost, unable to work, unable to communicate with loved ones. And the really scary thing is that the lower the battery meter gets, the faster it seems to deplete.

Over the past few years we’ve seen some pretty amazing advancements in mobile technology. There’s now quad-core processors inside tablets, high-def displays for phones and don’t forget 4G. Meanwhile, laptops are now so thin you can practically floss with them, but there’s less and less room for beefy batteries.

So what are the juice-starved masses supposed to do, walk around with a power cord hanging out of their pocket? No, but there are plenty of small tweaks that can make a big difference. “When I pick up some of my friends’ phones, I look at all of the stuff that they’ve downloaded once and don’t realize that it runs a background service,” said Rob Chandhok, senior vice president of software strategy for Qualcomm. “You get to a point where you have to get some help in managing that.”

To help you squeeze more juice out of your gear, we’ve rounded up dozens of tips and broken them down by platform, including Android, iOS, Mac and Windows. The good news is that tech companies aren’t just leaving users to fend for themselves.

• Top 10 Battery Saving Tips for Android
• 10 Ways to Increase iPhone / iPad’s Battery Life
• 10 Tips to Extend Your Mac Laptop’s Battery Life
• 11 Ways to Increase Your Windows 7 Laptop’s Battery Life

Mac OS X Lion was designed to save time with its Mission Control view, iOS-like Launchpad and ability to run several apps at full screen. Apple put a lot of thought into how the hardware and software work together to maximize user productivity and minimize extra work. With these battery-saving tips, you won’t have to worry as much about your Mac running out of juice when you need it most.

1. Turn Off Bluetooth and Wi-Fi.

Disabling your notebook’s wireless radios is one surefire way to eke out more juice. While turning off Wi-Fi may not be practical in every situation—especially if you need to access the Internet often—it will give you more endurance if you’re using your laptop to watch a movie on an airplane.

To turn Bluetooth off:

• Click the Bluetooth icon in the upper right-hand corner of the desktop.
• Select Turn Bluetooth Off. The icon should now be grayed out.

Alternatively:

• Select System Preferences > Bluetooth.
• Uncheck the box marked On.

To turn Wi-Fi off:

• Click on the Wi-Fi icon in the upper right-hand corner of the desktop.
• Select Turn Wi-Fi Off. The icon should change from a number of concentric arcs to an outline that looks like a baseball diamond.

Alternatively:

• Open System Preferences > Network.
• Uncheck the box marked Turn Wi-Fi Off.

2. Adjust Screen Brightness.

At full brightness, the 13-inch MacBook Air’s screen measures an average of 285 lux. At 40-percent brightness (6 bars), it’s just 29 lux, but still very viewable. And brightness eats power.

To lower screen brightness:

• Tap F1 repeatedly until the brightness is at a level just tolerable enough to view comfortably.

Alternatively:

• Open System Preferences > Displays.
• Adjust the Brightness slider to the level you’re most comfortable with.

3. Tweak Energy Saver preferences.

Changing these settings will cause your Mac to power down energy-consuming components—such as the screen and the hard drive—sooner during periods of inactivity.

• Click System Preferences.
• Open Energy Saver.
• Select the Battery tab.
• Move the slider bars for Computer Sleep and Display Sleep as far left as you believe is comfortable. You probably don’t want your computer going to sleep after just one minute but don’t want to leave it on indefinitely either.
• Below, select the following checkboxes:
• Put the hard disk(s) to sleep when possible.
• Slightly dim the display when using this power source.
• Automatically reduce brightness before display goes to sleep.

4. Quit runaway applications.

Occasionally, an app will consume an inordinate amount of system resources even when not in use. Not only does this impact your notebook’s performance, but it also seriously degrades battery life.

• Open the Applications folder > Utilities folder.
• Click Activity Monitor.
• Select the CPU tab.
• Select All Processes in the drop-down menu.
• Sort the apps by CPU percentage.
• Look for any app that is consuming a large percentage, such as more than 70 percent.
• Select that app and press the Quit Process icon.

Alternatively, if you know an app is hanging, you can force-quit the app.

• Press Command + Option + Esc.
• In the window that appears, select the app that’s not responding and force-quit.

5.  Turn off backlit keyboard.

While it’s a great feature, the backlit keyboard on Macs can shave precious minutes off your runtime.

To turn off the backlit keyboard:

• Hit the F5 key repeatedly until the on-screen icon shows no bars lit.

Alternatively:

• Open System Preferences.
• Select Keyboard.
• Uncheck the box marked “Automatically illuminate keyboard in low light.”
• Underneath where it says “Turn off when computer is not used for,” move the slider to 5 secs.

Ten Tips to Extend Your Mac’s Laptop Battery Life

• Tips 1 through 5
• Tips 6 through 10

Watching the life drain from your laptop when you’re on the move is stressful. Sure, there are extended and slice batteries for a variety of machines, and portable laptop battery packs are available from companies such as Duracell and Lind Electronics. But those options can mean carrying more bulk in a bag already bogged down with cords, files and accessories. One surefire way to preserve the battery you do have is to follow these 11 tips.

1. Lower your screen brightness.

Your screen backlight uses the most power of any component in your notebook, so you can save a lot of juice by turning it down to the lowest acceptable level. You can manually raise and lower the brightness in increments of 10 percent by hitting the appropriate key combination for your laptop (example: Fn + left/right arrows on the Acer Aspire TimelineX series), but we recommend changing the brightness in your power profile so it lowers automatically every time you unplug.

To lower the brightness level in your power profile:

• Select Power Options from the control panel.
• Click Change Plan Settings next to your current power plan.
• Select “Change advanced power settings.”
• Expand Display, then Display brightness.
• Enter a brightness percentage for On Battery, then Click OK.
• Experiment with different brightness levels to determine which is the lowest you can tolerate.

2. Prevent scheduled tasks from running on battery power.

Your virus scanner and disk defragmenter, along with auto updates from the likes of Apple and Google, are scheduled to run themselves on a regular basis—often without your knowledge or consent. Set these tasks to run only on AC power so they don’t eat up precious juice running your hard drive, CPU and wireless while you’re unplugged.

• Select Administrative Tools > Task Scheduler in the Control Panel.
• Select Task Scheduler (Local) in the left window pane.
• Go through each active task that has a future date in the Next Run Time column and do the following:
• Double-click the task.
• Select the Conditions tab.
• Toggle on the first two power options: “Start the task only if the computer is on AC power” and “Stop if the computer switches to battery power” if they are not already checked.
• Click the back button to return to the list of active tasks.

3. Turn off backlit keyboards.

If your notebook has a backlit keyboard, it will certainly help you see keys in a dark room, but it’s also sucking juice out of your battery. You’ll save some power by turning off that light. Every notebook has its own way of enabling or disabling its keyboard backlight, but the method usually involves hitting a Function key on the top row of the keyboard.

4. Unplug all USB devices and remove all discs.

Every USB peripheral attached to your notebook is eating up power just by registering itself with the operating system. By the same token, CDs, DVDs and Blu-rays can drain battery life, even when they’re just sitting idle in your optical drive. Remove any discs along with USB keys, card readers, modems or other peripherals you don’t need while on battery power.

5. Turn on High-Contrast mode.

The LED-backlit screens used on most modern notebooks expend less energy displaying black pixels than those showing colors. Setting your computer to show white and yellow text on a black background can improve battery life and even make text more readable when sunlight is hitting your screen.

To enable High-Contrast mode in Windows 7, simply hit the key combination Left Shift + Left Alt + Print Screen and click Yes when asked to confirm. You can turn off High-Contrast mode by hitting the same combo.

High-Contrast mode will affect your desktop and most Windows programs, including the latest versions of Internet Explorer and Firefox. However, if you use the Chrome browser, you will need to install the Change Colors extension, which is available for free from the Chrome Web Store. Once the extension is installed, it will show an icon in the right side of your address bar. Click that icon and select “Apply override on all pages” to enable high-contrast mode.

6. Close messaging software and apps that ping the Internet in the background.

While you’re surfing the Web, checking email or watching a movie, messaging apps such as Google Talk and Skype are hitting the Internet constantly, just to see which of your contacts are online and whether you’ve received any messages. Automatic updating apps from the likes of Adobe, Apple and Google may also be pinging the Internet to see if there are updates to your copies of Adobe Reader, Chrome browser or iTunes. To stop these silent power vampires before they start, prevent them from loading at boot time.

To see and disable programs from starting when your computer starts:

• Type msconfig into the Start Menu text field, and click msconfig.
• Select the Startup tab.
• Uncheck messaging programs such as AOL Instant Messenger, Gtalk and Skype. You can always launch them manually if you want to use them.
• Uncheck autoupdaters such as Adobe Update, Apple Update, Google Update and Java Autoupdater.
• Click OK.

Top Windows 7 Battery Savers

• Tips 1 through 6
• Tips 7 through 11

Matt Hickey at The Daily reported last Friday that Microsoft plans to bring its popular Kinect motion-sensing device onto laptops in the near future. The preview laptops, which appeared to be ASUS netbooks running Windows 8, feature a number of sensors running across the top of the screen where the webcam would normally be positioned. The Kinect will be able to function at such close distances thanks to the device’s new ”Near Mode,” which allows it to detect movement from a distance as close as 40 centimeters. Although Steve Ballmer announced Kinect for Windows at CES, this is the first time that a device has been integrated directly into the hardware of a notebook.

Since the Kinect was first released in 2010, hackers have been devising ingenious ways to transform the device into everything from a virtual fitting room to a robotic, lightsaber-wielding “Jedibot”. As astoundingly creative as these projects may be, however, ordinary users may be less thrilled about how – for instance – surgeons are using the hands-free motion controls of the Kinect to manipulate images, speeding up operations and reducing the risk of contamination. So what kind of practical applications can the average user expect? Here are five ways the Kinect can be used to enhance your daily laptop experience:

1. Hands-free browsing – browse the Internet by swiping aside windows and tabs, Minority Report-style. Tablet users already enjoy the sensation of whisking away windows with the flick of a wrist; imagine being able to do the same on a laptop, without touching anything at all. Moreover, users would be able to use multi-touch gestures such as pinch-to-zoom and four-finger flick to quickly and easily navigate websites, without dealing with obnoxious clickpads. British website Electricpig goes a step further, theorizing that one day we’ll be able to browse the Web without our hands at all, using eye-tracking software developed for the Kinect.

2. Hands-free media control – Xbox owners quickly fell in love with the Kinect’s ability to let them fast forward and rewind movies just by moving their hands through the air or speaking aloud to the device. Laptop users should enjoy the same capabilities, as well as greater possibilities. For instance, the Kinect could be used to navigate PowerPoint slides without needing to stand by the computer or use a remote control, skip or queue up songs without getting up from the couch, or manipulate photos without using a cumbersome mouse.

3. Hands-free typing – Windows already features voice commands and dictation for visually impaired users, but the software can be difficult to set up and use. With its sophisticated voice recognition capabilities, the Kinect could make dictation more accessible to mainstream laptop users. Imagine being able to write a Word document using nothing more than your voice, and quickly editing it with little more than a flick of your wrist.

4. Enhanced security – Ice Cream Sandwich already boasts a Face Unlock security feature for smartphones and tablets, but the tool can be easily fooled. Facial recognition software on the Kinect, which can detect the skeletal frame of a user, may be much harder to beat – particularly if the facial recognition software is paired with the Kinect’s voice recognition capabilities. For an added layer of security, laptop manufacturers could support gesture-based lock screens.

5. Social network integration – In an age of instantaneous status updates and photo-sharing, nothing could be more instantaneous than a person’s voice. Laptops featuring an integrated Kinect could allow users to tweet using their voice, use the device’s motion sensors to drag and drop photos into their Flickr albums, or “like” a YouTube video or a Facebook post by giving a thumbs-up in front of the camera.

• Kinect Hacked to Run Gesture Controls on a Windows 7 PC
• Kinect for Xbox 360 Video Review: The Future of Gaming?
• Tech to Watch 2012: Windows 8 Finally Answers the iPad

• Top 8 Laptops Under $500
• Average Windows Laptop Costs $456
• Top 10 Laptops Available Now

Next

HP g6t ($494)

HP offers the 15.6-inch, 2.1-GHz Core i3 HP g6t for only $494. We reviewed its cousin, the HP Pavilion g6-1c77nr, very favorably in 2011, praising it for its solid performance, comfortable keyboard, and good speakers.The Pavilion g6t is no slouch compared to the g6-1c77nr, featuring a 2.2-GHz Intel 2nd Gen Core i3-2330M CPU, 4GB of RAM, and a 320GB hard drive. Although the Gateway NV55C54u (also on this list) offers slightly better performance and longer battery life, this is a great deal for a performance laptop.

Find the HP g6t On Sale at HP

• Laptop Buying Guide: What to Look For
• Top 10 Notebooks Overall
• How to Set Up Your New Notebook

The last two years have seen a slow but steady decline in the price for PC notebooks, with the average cost dropping from $530  in January 2010 to $456 in December 2011, according to U.S. sales numbers compiled by Market Research Firm NPD. Although a sharp drop to just $407 in November is undoubtedly due to steep Black Friday sales, the overall decline points to a glut of cheap laptops combined with user demand for the lowest priced systems.

The average U.S. notebook price overall, which includes Macs, has risen and fallen over the past 24 months but now sits at a much-higher $631, about the same average as in January 2010 ($635). Clearly, Macs have been able to hold their prices even as PCs have gotten cheaper and cheaper. The least expensive Mac notebook is still $999, while Best Buy alone sells two dozen PC notebooks for less than $400 on its website.

Deron Kershaw, a notebook market analyst for Gap Intelligence, said the decline in PC notebook prices is particularly impressive because most of the low cost systems are not netbooks. “It’s the 14- and 15-inch laptops being aggressively priced,” he said. “In the US retail channel, netbooks account for just 4.6% of all models now, compared to 15.4% last year.”

How much notebook can $456 buy you these days? Searching around the web today, we were able to find a number of sub-$456 notebooks with Intel’s 2nd generation Core i3 CPU on board. Bestbuy.com offers an Acer Aspire AS5742 with a 2.4-GHz Core i3 CPU, 15.6-inch screen, 4GB of RAM, and a 320GB hard drive for just $399. HP is currently selling a 14-inch Pavilion G4 notebook with a Core i3 CPU, 4GB of RAM, and  a 500GB hard drive for only $454.99.

Although declining PC notebook prices may be good for the consumer, manufacturers are less thrilled. In the face of shrinking profit margins, manufacturers such as Acer, ASUS and HP are turning to Ultrabooks to buoy the average price of laptops.  

“The retail market continues to focus on high-volume SKUs, which right now are the $399-$499 full-size notebook segment,” said Stephen Baker, director of industry analysis at NPD. “The reason the industry is looking for Ultrabooks to be a game changer is to help stop this cycle and create a more stable market for mainstream consumer notebooks in the $500-$800 price range.”

• Top 10 Notebooks Now
• 10 Hottest Ultrabooks
• Ultrabook Buying Guide

While tablets get all the attention these days, there’s a reason why laptops continue to be the computing device of choice for most people. Notebooks offer real keyboards for faster typing, they’re better at multitasking, and they offer a lot more power for everything from editing video and creating PowerPoints to playing the latest games. So what type of laptop should you get?

There’s a wide variety of sizes, features, and prices, which makes choosing the right notebook a challenge. That’s why you need to figure out what your needs are. To make the right call, just answer the following seven questions.

1. What Size Do You Need?

If you’ll be using your laptop primarily at home and won’t be moving it much from room to room or using it on your lap, get a laptop with a 15-inch display (generally 6 pounds and up). This is the most popular screen size.

However, for the best balance of mobility, performance, and battery life, consider a laptop with a 13- to 14-inch display (3.5 to 5.5 pounds). If you want to travel really light, get an ultraportable laptop with an 11.6- to 12-inch screen (3 to 4 pounds).

Opt for a 17-inch or 18-inch notebook if you plan on moving your machine rarely or not at all. Having a bigger screen is better for watching movies and working with multiple windows open at once. But we only recommend stepping up to a large display if you get a resolution higher than 1366 x 768 pixels. Otherwise, it’s a waste of extra space.

Netbooks (10 inches) have pretty much fallen out of favor because of tablets, but they’re still available. If possible, get a model with a resolution of 1366 x 768.

• 13-inch Laptop Reviews
• 14-inch Laptop Reviews
• 15-inch Laptop Reviews
• 17-inch Laptop Reviews
• All Laptop Reviews

2. How Much Can Your Get for Your Money?

• $500 to $600: These days, you can easily find an all-purpose laptop with good performance for about $500. We’re talking about a speedy dual-core Intel Core i3 or an AMD A6 processor, 3 to 4GB of RAM, and at least 320GB of hard drive space. That’s good enough for most consumers looking to surf the web, go on Facebook, check email, and play casual games.
   
• $600 to $800: As you get above $600, you’ll start to see more premium designs, such as metal finishes. Manufacturers also start to add in other features as you climb the price ladder, including better audio and backlit keyboards. Look for a second-generation Core i5 processor in this range, as well as 6GB of RAM and a 500 to 640GB hard drive.

  If you’re willing to spend $700 or more, expect laptops with faster processors (such as Intel’s quad-core Core i7) and/or dedicated graphics cards from AMD or Nvidia for gaming. Adding a Blu-ray drive will cost at least $75 more.

• Above $800: If you have $800 or more to spend, you’ll mostly be looking at laptops that focus on multimedia and gaming, as well as highly durable and secure business machines. Higher-resolution screens are also expected.

  All of Apple’s laptops also fall in this price range, as the company focuses on premium designs and higher-end features, such as solid state drives in the MacBook Air. MacBooks start at $999. So-called Ultrabooks, which compete directly with the MacBook Air in terms of thinness, start as low as $799 but go up to and beyond $1,499.

• Laptops Under $600
• Laptops Under $800
• Laptops Under $1,000
• Laptops Over $1,000

3. Will It Be Comfortable to Use?

The most impressive specs in the world don’t mean diddly if the laptop you’re shopping for doesn’t have good ergonomics. Does the keyboard have solid tactile feedback and enough space between the keys? Is the touchpad smooth to operate or jumpy? Do the mouse buttons have a satisfying click, or do they feel mushy? How well do multitouch gestures work? You should be able to zoom in and out with ease, as well as select text with the touchpad without the cursor skipping around.

In general, Apple and Lenovo offer the best keyboards and touchpads. Toshiba is generally pretty reliable in this category, as is Sony. Acer and ASUS don’t offer the most ergonomic designs, so you’ll want to try before you buy.

Five Things to Look for in Your Next Notebook Keyboard

4. What Specs Do You Need?

Notebook specs such as CPU, hard drive, RAM, and graphics chip can confuse even notebook aficionados, so don’t feel bad if spec sheets look like alphabet soup to you. What you need really depends on what you plan to do with your laptop. More intensive tasks such as 3D gaming and HD video-editing require more expensive components.

Here are the main components to keep an eye on.

• CPU: Bargain hunters will find AMD’s E Series processor in machines that cost less than $400, which offers better performance than a netbook but not very good multitasking chops. Similarly, Intel’s Pentium CPUs can get the job done, but you can do better if you spend a little bit more. (Intel Atom processors are only for netbooks, a category that’s on the decline.)

  For mainstream performance, we recommend Intel’s Core i3 processors. AMD’s A Series processors aren’t as fast as their Intel counterparts, but they offer better graphics performance.

  Power users and gamers should consider higher-end Intel Core i5 or Core i7 CPUs.

• RAM: When it comes to memory, or RAM, opt for a minimum of 3GB (4GB is better) to run Windows 7 Premium. Those who demand more performance will want to spring for 6GB or even 8GB of memory.
   
• Hard Drive: For most users, a fast drive is more important than a large one. If you have a choice, go for a 7,200-rpm hard drive over a 5,400-rpm unit. Even if you have several movies and games on your hard drive, a 320GB should provide more than enough space, but 500GB drives usually don’t cost much more.
   
• Solid State Drives (SSDs): These drives cost quite a bit more than traditional hard drives and come with less capacity (usually 128 to 256GB), but they dramatically improve performance. You’ll enjoy faster boot times, faster resume times, and faster application open times. Plus, because SSDs don’t have moving parts such as mechanical drives, failure is much less of an issue.
   
• Display:The more pixels you have, the more content you can fit on-screen, and the sharper it will look. Most notebooks come with 1366 x 768-pixel resolutions. However, if you have the option to choose a laptop with a higher pixel count—1440 x 900 or 1600 x 900—always choose the highest res you can get. You’ll see more of your favorite web pages, multitask better, and have a better movie-watching experience. Full HD panels (1920 x 1080) cost about $150 more than your typical display, but are worth the splurge, especially on larger screens.
   
• Graphics Chip: For the most part, an integrated graphics chip (one that shares system memory) will be fine for basic tasks, including surfing the web, watching video, and even playing some mainstream games. But a discrete graphics processor from AMD or Nvidia (which has dedicated video memory) will provide better performance when it comes to the most-demanding games. Plus, a good GPU can accelerate video playback on sites such as Hulu, as well as speed up video editing.

  A couple of quick notes on graphics cards. In general, 1GB of video memory will be fine for mainstream games, but more-demanding gamers will want 2GB of dedicated memory. If you like the idea of your laptop switching between integrated and discrete graphics to save battery life, Nvidia’s technology (called Optimus) is superior to AMD’s because it’s seamless.

• DVD/Blu-ray Drives: Netbooks don’t have optical drives, and they’re also disappearing from lightweight notebooks. That’s because you can download most software and download or stream video from the web. Unless you burn discs or want to watch Blu-ray movies, you don’t need one of these drives and can save some weight by avoiding them. At this point, DVD drives are a safety blanket.

5. Mac or Windows?

This is not an easy question to answer, especially if you’ve never considered making the switch from Windows to Mac. But this quick overview of each platform’s strengths and weaknesses should help.

Apple’s MacBook Airs and MacBook Pros offer an easy-to-use operating system in Mac OS X Lion. It offers iOS-like features such as Launch Pad for your apps, superior multitouch gestures, and Auto Save and Resume so you can pick up on your work right where you left off. Macs also tend to outperform similarly configured Windows machines, especially when it comes to boot and resume times. While Windows PCs offer more software choices, Apple makes it easier to find and install programs with the Mac App Store.

MacBook Airs and MacBook Pros also tend to outclass most Windows machines when it comes to the sturdiness of their industrial designs, the touchpad, and display quality. However, Apple’s notebooks start at $999.

Windows 7 notebooks are generally more affordable and offer a much wider range of design choices from more than a dozen major vendors. Windows machines also have access to a much bigger selection of software, especially when it comes to games. Windows 7 is certainly easier to use than previous versions of Windows, and includes convenient features such as Snap (to view two open windows side by side). And if you care about security, there are many Windows notebooks explicitly designed to appeal to the business crowd.

Mac OS X Lion vs. Windows 7: Which OS is Best?

6. How Much Battery Life Do You Need?

Even if you only plan to move your laptop from the desk to the couch and the bed or from your cubicle to the conference room, battery life matters. Nobody wants to be chained to a power outlet, even if there’s a socket within reach. If you’re buying a 15-inch notebook, look for at least 4 hours of endurance.

If you expect to be fairly mobile, shop for notebooks that offer more than 5 hours of battery life, with 6-plus hours being ideal.

If given the choice, pay extra for an extended battery; you won’t regret it. Keep in mind that some notebooks (such as the MacBook Air) feature sealed batteries that you can’t easily upgrade yourself.

To determine a notebook’s expected battery life, read third-party results from objective sources—LAPTOP notebook reviews, for example—rather than taking the manufacturer’s word for it. Your actual battery life will vary depending on your screen brightness and what tasks you perform (video eats more juice than web surfing).

Best Battery Life: Laptops That Last 7+ Hours

7. Do You Trust the Brand Behind It?

Your laptop is only as good as the company that stands behind it. Accurate and timely technical support is paramount, which is why LAPTOP evaluates every major brand in our annual Tech Support Showdown. This past year Apple came in first place, followed by Dell, Samsung, and Lenovo.

Support is only part of what makes a notebook brand worth your money. You also have to consider how the manufacturer stacks up to the competition in terms of design, value and selection, review performance, and other criteria. Apple, Lenovo, and HP notched first, second, and third place, respectively.

• Top 10 Notebooks Now
• Best & Worst Laptop Brands 2011
• Best Laptops of CES 2012

Despite their early hiccups (jumpy clickpads anyone?), Ultrabooks appear poised to make a rather impressive impact on the consumer electronics market in the coming years. According to a new report by Juniper Research, shipments of laptops packaged in the Intel-backed form factor will grow at triple the rate of tablet shipments over the next five years.

But in order to reach that level of sales, the Juniper report states, Ultrabook makers will have to figure out a way to offer their devices at a more appealing price point than they are currently selling for. Unfortunately, meeting Intel’s design standards today means pricing Ultrabooks higher than most consumers can currently afford.

And while the growth of Ultrabook shipments may outpace the growth of tablet shipments, there will still be a larger volume of tablets shipped due to the already high number of tablets hitting store shelves. In fact, market saturation for tablets has already reached roughly 19 percent, according to a new report by the Pew Internet & American Life Project, with 10 percent of that number coming this past holiday season.

That makes the Ultrabook numbers seem somewhat less impressive. Since more people already own tablets than Ultrabooks, its only natural that shipments for the latter would trump those for the former. That said, five years is a long time, and who knows what new technology will be available to consumers by then. Remember, it wasn’t that long ago that people were snatching up netbooks left and right.

• 10 Hottest Ultrabooks
• Ultrabook Buying Guide: 6 Essential Tips
• Best iPad Alternatives