Reviews Of Laptops And 2-In-1 PCs
Laptop PCs and 2-in-1 convertible tablet/laptop devices are the cornerstone personal computing systems for getting both work and play done on the road. From the big gun firepower of gaming laptops and desktop replacement machines, to ultra-lights and hybrids, we've got you covered here for what's hot in mobile computing.
Update: 6/25/16 - Check out our full review and deep dive of the Alienware 13 OLED right here.
Dell's Alienware 13 gaming notebook has been a favorite among gamers on the go and power users that want a little more horsepower in a light, 13-inch machine. However, over the past couple of years, the Alienware team...
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CES is a distant memory now, but we’re still seeing new products arrive that were announced in Las Vegas at the beginning of the year. One of those is the Dell Latitude 13 7000 series, the latest in the company's line of business laptops. The 13-inch ultrabook landed several awards at CES for its sleek design and...
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At a time when laptop makers are shunning big and bulky notebooks in favor of thin and light designs, Lenovo went a different direction with its ThinkPad P70, a mobile workstation brimming with high-end hardware for tackling rough and tumble tasks in the field. It's all about finding the right tool for the job, and...
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Update 4/26/2016: We've refreshed our battery life test suite for this review and have new, more real-world metrics to share on page 8. When Dell launched its updated XPS 13 notebook with an Infinity Edge display that squeezes a 13 inch IPS panel into essentially a 12-inch frame, it was met with universal praise for...
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It looks like Microsoft’s grit is paying off. After years of shepherding its Surface tablets, Microsoft seems to have convinced its partners that there is a market for premium, Windows-based ultra portables. HP’s Spectre x2 caught our attention late last year and Dell’s XPS 12 and Lenovo’s Yoga (technically a...
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With the release of Windows 8, Microsoft effectively encouraged its hardware partners to think beyond the confines of traditional PC design, giving them the nudge they needed to introduce bold new products. Lenovo embraced the challenge, and in 2012 it brought its first Yoga system to market, a multi-mode laptop that...
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Update 4/26/2016: We've updated our battery life test suite for this review and have new more real-world metrics to share on page 6. It was just about this time last year that HP first took the wraps off its chic, convertible ultrabook, the original Spectre x360. Although the Spectre name wasn’t new, HP’s approach to the ultrabook’s design...
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Dell recently refreshed its popular XPS 13 with new hardware to bring it up to date with current CPU and storage offerings. The updated model now sports a Skylake-based Intel processor and a Samsung PM951 NVMe solid state drive, plus a few minor tweaks to its already impressive design. When the current iteration of the Dell XPS...
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While discussions about the best desktop gaming PCs tend to be divided between do-it-yourselfers and fans of pre-built PCs, gaming laptops spark a different debate, typically between large system builders versus, smaller boutique system integrators. Many of the industry behemoths kick-started or bolstered their gaming...
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The 2-in-1 and convertible PC space has changed significantly over the past couple of years. What was once a cluttered mess of kludges is now a well-defined market segment packed with refinement, power, and plenty of options. You could partially credit Microsoft's Surface line for making 2-in-1s an object of desire...
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To look at the Dell Precision 15 5510, you wouldn’t know that it sits in the middle of Dell’s workstation lineup. The laptop is thinner and sleeker than you might expect a workstation-class laptop to be and the premium carbon fiber palm rest gives the system a decidedly high-end vibe. But the Precision 15 5510 is...
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We had good things to say about Asus’ super-slim ZenBook UX305 when we evaluated it early last year. Attractive, sturdy, and downright tiny, the UX305 was a good value for the price, and it had good looks too. A year later, the ZenBook is back with the updated UX305CA, so we got one in to see if the newer version is...
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Dell has some enticing new hardware on tap for its newest Inspiron 7000 series laptops, including the latest and most powerful Intel Skylake processors and NVIDIA GPUs, but the computer maker sent us a decidedly modest version for this evaluation. PC makers usually load their review systems to the hilt, in an effort to make them perform well...
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We covered a lot of miles at CES 2016 this year, our fitness trackers often chirping "success" rather early in the day, but we saw a lot of people and a lot of tech gear in our travels. Some of it was hot - damn hot - some of it, not so much. There were some recurring themes this year, as with every year at CES it seems. The hot topics and...
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You could hear the collective groan from the enthusiast community when Dell announced it had purchased Alienware, in what now feels like 100 years ago. It's actually been just shy of a decade since Dell took ownership, and rather than let the Alienware brand wither into irrelevance like some other boutique vendors that were later absorbed...
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When Microsoft first launched its Surface line of products, it caused quite a stir in the mobile PC market. It may have taken a couple of iterations to get things dialed in to the point they are today, but simply entering the market with its own branded hardware put Microsoft in the position of essentially competing with its partners. Microsoft...
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New processor architectures inevitably lead to a flurry of refreshed product lines from PC makers. That's how things have been playing out with Skylake, a "tock" in Intel's tick-tock design cadence and its 6th generation Core processor family. As usual, ASUS is on the bleeding edge with new Skylake systems ready to...
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What a difference a year can make. Now that Intel's Skylake processors are widely available, desktop, tablets, and hybrid convertibles are all being refreshed with the latest hardware. Lenovo, for example, recently introduced its Yoga 900. Though the nomenclature has changed a bit, this machine is effectively a revised Yoga 3 Pro. The...
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Intel's 6th Generation Skylake family of Core processors has been available for some time now. We previously gave you a look at the desktop variant that Intel initially rolled out. However, the mobile variant of Skylake is perhaps Intel's most potent incarnation of the new architecture that's power-optimized on 14nm...
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NVIDIA’s power-efficient Maxwell GPU architecture is a perfect fit for the notebook market, as evidenced by the slew of strong products up and down the company’s mobile GPU line-up. But today NVIDIA is taking things is a slightly different direction at the ultra-high-end, and introducing a “new” mobile GPU, that’s not...
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Utlrabook designs just keep getting thinner, more powerful and more capable with each iteration of the various platforms on the market. Dell's XPS line of ultrabooks has always done relatively well in the arena, with some notable break-out features, like composite carbon fiber construction, that helped them stand out in a sea of offerings...
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Laptops are mostly static devices. What we mean by that is, for the vast majority of laptops, what you get at the time of purchase is what you get, and that's that. Unlike a desktop system, in which each individual component is upgradeable without too much fuss, only certain parts of a laptop are user replaceable, at least without some serious...
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