Computer-maker Alienware yesterday at the Consumer Electronics Shows in sunny Las Vegas showed off what the company is calling the “most powerful 11-inch gaming laptop in the universe.”

It’s called the M11x and it supports up HD 720p resolution, a pretty lengthy maximum battery life expectancy of 6.5 hours, and will sell, when available, for less than a $1000.

So much win, so little time.

Electronics blog Gizmodo reports that the mini-rig can handle Crysis and Modern Warfare 2 at max settings and at a nice rate of 50 frames per second.

Even if you buy this rig, you’re still likely to be subject to the “gaming…on a laptop? You cannot be serious” mentality the Internet has bred.

Looks nice though. No mention of a firm release date, but expect the M11x sometime this year.

It's a powerful little guy.

Source and image credit: Gizmodo

The next generation of netbooks are a lot like cell phones, in that they don’t cost much up front, but you’ll be paying for privilege and convenience.

Until December 24, RadioShack is offering the LG X120 netbook for $49.99 with 2-years of mobile internet service.

The netbook is a true cell phone, and it’s a true netbook in every sense of the word. It’s designed for 3G mobile Internet service, but don’t expect to run photoshop or games on it. It does carry a 160GB hard drive and 1GB of RAM, however.

The LG X120 is a 10.1-inch laptop weighing 2.8lbs. that goes for $399 without activation. It’s available at 2,000 RadioShack stores nationwide.

How much does size matter?

One of the best parts about a netbook is also one of its drawbacks.

They’re small.

The keyboards are undersized. The displays are tiny. But the battery life is huge, and that’s why netbooks are the hottest thing going right now.

The Lenovo S12 attempts to bridge the gap by tossing up a 12.1-inch screen and slightly larger keyboard than the usual netbook. But it is still a netbook with out the bells, whistles and optical drives of traditional computers. This model doesn’t yet have the much rumored and hotly anticipated Nvidia Ion chipset, which will let us run 1080p video and modern PC games on a low power netbook. Therefore, we’re still dealing with a regular old netbook that’s a little bigger.

That’s not a bad thing, mind you. The S12 gets more than five hours of battery life during normal use. You can squeeze out more juice if you’re really careful. The glossy screen is surprising light on the eyes. It’s back-lit running at 1280×800, which is much higher than other netbooks we’ve encountered out there.

The S12 has three USB 2.0 ports, an ethernet port, a 4-in-1 card reader, a 1.3-megapixel Webcam, 802.11 b/g Wi-Fi, an ExpressCard slot and a standard six-cell battery, which is very, very necessary. Some earlier models came with the three-cell battery. Don’t bother.

The interface is comfortable, and the touchpad is smooth and easy to navigate with. The keyboard is really comfortable to type on, but Lenovo switched the FN and CTRL keys on the left side of the keyboard. It’s a huge pain, because when you think you’re hitting CTRL-C, you’re actually hitting FN-C and not copying that text you wanted.

The 160GB hard drive and 1GB of RAM are both sufficient for the needs of a netbook user. You can even sneak a few video files on there.

The Intel ATOM N270 processor is also sufficient, especially because the S12 runs Windows XP.

Lenovo also throws in a hard drive backup utility that operates independent of the operating system and a facial recognition security utility that uses the on-board webcam.

If you’re looking for a slightly larger than normal netbook that’s comfortable, with decent battery life, look no further. At $449, it’s pricier than what you might find at the store, but the computer is stable, fairly speedy and still cheaper than a “real” laptop.

Back in March, Dell told us about its new highly stylized Adamo brand. Today we got some photos of the upcoming Adamo XPS super-thin laptop.

Measuring just 9.99mm thick and curiously shapen when its open, the Adamo is intriguing. No word on specs, pricing, etc. Stay tuned on this one.

The Dell Inspiron Mini 10 is great if you get the optional 6-cell battery

Here’s an old reviewers’ question for you. Is it fair to judge a product by its default configuration?

I recently called the Dell Inspiron Mini 10′s 3-cell 24WHr battery a deal breaker, and it’s absolutely true. Dell’s netbook gets just over three hours of battery life, which is poor by both small laptop and netbook standards.

But when you’re buying the Mini 10, you can upgrade to a 6-cell battery with more than six hours of life for just $30.

A lot of people, I’d imagine, just buy the default configuration, not wanting to deal with the specs, like the difference between the hard drive and optional SSD drive.

Even with its 10″ x 7″ x 1″ dimensions, weighing only 2.63 pounds in my test, I’d never recommend someone buy the Mini in its default form.

It’s principle. The Mini 10 is an otherwise stellar computer. It’s fast, light, comes in a variety of colors, has an on-board TV tuner with HD antenna and cable adapter, comes with an HDMI port, SD/MS/MMC card reader, 3 USB ports, ethernet and built-in a/g/n WiFi. Even the display puts it over the top. The Mini 10 standard (as opposed to the V edition) comes with a 720p HD display. The keyboard is small, like on all netbooks, but it’s more comfortable than the Asus Eee PC that won the day in my Globe story.

At $349, the Inspiron 10 is a good value with this anchor called a 3-cell battery holding it down.

Dell should drop the 3-cell battery, make the 6-cell the default and only battery option, and charge $379 for the product. That would still make it cheaper than most of the Asus, HP and Lenovo competitors, and other reviews back up the fact that the Dell is right behind these laptops.

Dell’s idea with the Mini appears to have been to give users more regular “computer” features. The HDMI port is a great touch, and even the digital TV was appreciated. It’s pre-configured, and the software actually works. the Dell TV software fires up, scans the signal for channels, and works quickly and easily — and that’s from Dell. Years ago, if you bought a Dell, you could easily spend an hour or two deleting all their bloated support and utility software.

So let’s do this:

Dell Inspiron Mini 10 with a 3-cell battery.

Dell Inspiron Mini 10 with a 6-cell battery.

If Dell throws in the 6-cell battery and throws out the 3-cell without jacking the price too much, then I believe it’s a winner. Good screen, good keyboard, Atom processor, television, HD video — all great features, but something has to power it all.

When someone asks you to name computer manufacturers, the obvious names pop into your mind: Dell, Gateway, Apple and so on. But within the last couple years, something curious has happened. Computer manufacturers who previously were nameless and fameless are suddenly front and center.

Take Acer for example. The last year has seen an explosion in the popularity of netbook computers, and Acer’s Apsire One line of $270 netbooks are all the rage. Previously, no one has heard of MSI, but now everyone and their mother is hacking their $300 Wind to run OS X. Same with Asus and their EEE PC line.

Some companies ready to break onto the scene are more familiar for their other products. At the Nokia World conference in Germany last week, Nokia announced their Booklet 3G, a sleek, 2 cm thin aluminum netbook, signifying that the company who previously made their mark on the electronics world by manufacturing phones is now trying to expand themselves back onto the PC market after selling that division more than fifteen years ago.

The Booklet 3G is powered by the same Intel Atom processor in the MSI Wind and Acer One lines, but whereas those netbooks are only wi-fi capable, the Booklet 3G will come built in with a 3G/HSPA antenna, giving the netbook data network access wherever cell reception is available, along with the assisted GPS found in mobile phones. The netbook will also have a 10.1-inch HD-ready screen and HDMI port, something typically reserved for higher-end laptops and desktop, and certainly not something offered on current netbooks.

Nokia is truly in a unique position too introduce a computer as ground breaking as the Booklet 3G is. Of course, a netbook this exciting is also rather wallet-breaking as well. While only European pricing has been announced so far, the Booklet 3G will sell for 575 euros, which comes to about 820 dollars. However, netbooks often come subsidized if they have a data antenna. No subsidies have been announced yet, but they would have to be hefty to be anywhere near the sub-$300 prices on other netbooks.

It’s also yet to seen whether or not the subsidized notebook market will even prove to be profitable. Many carriers in the US are offering netbooks for as low as $50 with a 2-year data contract. Considering how much iPhone users complain about being locked into their contracts though, the carriers will probably face some stiff resistance.

Curiously and notably absent form the netbook market though is Apple. Apple even poked fun at the concept of a netbook yesterday at their keynote, showing an image of someone failing to shove a Dell Mini into his back pocket. Apple continues to claim that people don’t want an underpowered netbook; they want fast and they want powerful. Of course this is belied by the fact Apple continues to offer their white plastic MacBook for sale, and that their “mobile computing platform” of the iPhone and iPod touch has half the processing power of current netbooks.

More over, an article Wired ran last month argued that we’re in the middle of the “good enough” revolution, stating that “the low end has never been riding higher.” An interesting point to consider.

In any case, netbooks are here to stay. It’ll be interesting to seem some the innovations that trickle down towards the end user from higher end computers. An always on data connection, A-GPS, and HDMI connectivity are a great start. What’s next?

The Department of Homeland Security wants you to know that they have weighed and considered your privacy and individual liberties when they decided to implement a policy that allows border agents to seize your electronic devices like laptops, flash drives and MP3 players at border crossings and return them to you … within 30 days.

“Keeping Americans safe in an increasingly digital world depends on our ability to lawfully screen materials entering the United States” said Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, in a statement. “The new directives announced today strike the balance between respecting the civil liberties and privacy of all travelers while ensuring DHS can take the lawful actions necessary to secure our borders.”

Homeland security says that only a very minuscule percentage of people crossing the border will be affected (only 46 laptops have been seized in the past 10 months out of more than 221 million people crossing the border) but the implications are serious. Strictly speaking, government agents can seize your electronics, copy all of the files contained therein and store them indefinitely.

But let’s be even more frank. The government is probably not going to take your laptop. Border agents don’t care about your music collection or episodes of “Leverage,” but there are some questions about the effectiveness of this policy. If a terrorist was keeping electronic files, they could store the files in a microSD card that’s smaller than a fingernail. It’s a lot easier to hide a microSD card than it is to hide a laptop.

The ACLU has filed suit, challenging the policy.

One way to ensure your files stay yours is to execute redundancy. If you have files that you need access to wherever you go, you could consider Google Docs or one of the many online file storage sites. Backing up documents at home is, of course, always smart computing practice. Buy a portable hard drive if you don’t already own one.

Our friends at Kensington recently sent us a little care package of goodies to try out, as they debuted a collection of products specialized for the growing number of netbook users.

Netbooks “" those little tiny computers with a dozen hours of battery life “" are growing hugely in popularity lately. Kensington recently came out with an equally tiny wireless mouse, a reversible sleeve, a security lock, a multi-device power adapter and a good, old-fashioned, wired USB mouse.

After toying around on some of the netbooks we’re reviewing for various purposes, we’re impressed, particularly with the Wireless Mouse for Netbooks and its nano receiver. It’s a small but comfortable mouse and a great alternative to the frustrating touchpads. Just keep a supply of batteries or rechargeables handy.

The Security Lock for Netbooks works with any laptop with that security slot, which is nearly every laptop. It features a coil of wire around a four digit combination lock. The wire is thin, but you can’t beat the portability. It won’t stop a pair of bolt cutters, but it will prevent someone from walking off with it at the library.

I’m not a huge fan of sleeves, but the Reversible Sleeve for Netbooks is a great choice for those of you that are. It fits up to a 10-inch netbook and stretches for some accessories. Forget about a full power cable, though. That’s why we tend to use bigger laptop cases. Maybe we’re old fashioned.

If you’re all like “man, I hate battery-powered wireless mice,” boy, do we have a solution for you. The Wired Mouse for Netbooks was actually our favorite device. We didn’t mind the little bit of wire for the security of an “always working” mouse. It beats carrying around an old Dell mouse in our little netbook sleeve. It’s a plug-and-play mouse that tracks really well on these small screens.

The last item up for bid is the Power Adapter for Netbooks. But they didn’t give us one, so we don’t have much to say about it. From the pics, it appears to come with a variety of charging heads, and it charges both the laptop and your USB-compatible phone. That’s handy. Wish we had one.

Docking stations are nice if you use the laptop primarily at one location or have lots of things to plug into it that don’t move — input devices, webcam, monitor. This leaves the BookEndz with a good chance to market third party docking stations. This is a hard thing for the company to manufacture since the laptops don’t just have a docking port like most laptops that have first party docking stations. They are left with plugging into the external ports and then just moving them to the outside their device.

BookEndz still have some options that users can work with, though. With their MacBook docking station, they have a USB hub inside, so you can have 6 devices plugged in, while the MacBook only has two USB ports on the side.

The docking station has all the original laptop ports plus the mini DVI is converted to either a DVI or a VGA. You can only use one at a time. If you plug in both only the VGA is recognized.

The BookEndz also use a sliding switch on the side to plug in the speaker/headphone port. This is important since the MacBook enables the port based on a sensor that detects something plugged into the port. When the headphones or speakers are plugged in the laptops speakers are disabled.

The switch on the Bookendz unit I was given was a very sticky. It is hard to move from plugged in and unplugged. This will loosen over time with usage. The company said that the one I was sent may be an early model and the new ones are looser and easier to switch to plugged in, or unplugged. They do make it easy enough to just plug everything in at once.

I like that when I use a BookEndz I can go from standard laptop to having a big monitor, and normal keyboard. Using a USB video card, it’s possible for a Macbook to now have two large monitors plugged in, and then it’s easy take it away when you need to go.

One part that makes it hard with the newer Apple laptops is the much toted power plug. Apple does not appear to let any third party companies make Mag-Safe adapters. BookEndz have a space for the original power bricks to be used. This could have been done better. They seemed to have decided to make it easy for the user to unplug the power brick to take with the laptop, instead of leaving the power brick in the docking station. This means every time you go to unplug the docking station, not only do you unplug the docking station, but also the power adapter. This also requires sitting the docking station on top of the wire so it will all sit flat. I think they should have made the docking station hold the power adapters more snugly. That way you can just plug everything in at once.

The design of the plastic casing is fairly smooth and flowing like the MacBooks, but the devices have touches here and there that look more hobbyist.

Overall I think it’s a very good and useful product for what it does. I think it beats just plugging in each port separately every time I get to work. For what they had to work with I think they did a great job. I just wish Apple thought of this sooner.

By the way: Because of a reporting error, we removed the line “Apple hasn’t ever produced a docking station for their laptops.” It was incorrect.

Averatec announced Tuesday the availability of two new semi ruggedized laptops in their new Voya series.

The Voya 4473 has a standard 14.1″ screen, while the larger Voya 6494 has 15.4″ widescreen display.

“The Voya line of notebooks are designed with sturdiness in mind. Boasting magnesium alloy outer cases, corner bumpers, and an anti-shock mounted hard drive, the Voya notebooks are up to the rigors of everyday life and more,” the company said in a statement.

The laptops, starting at $1,299, will be available online and through retailers.

Features:

• Semi-Rugged 15.4″ WXGA widescreen notebook supporting 1280×800 resolution
• Drop and vibration resistant inernal components, Spill resistant keyboard and touchpad
  Intel Core 2 Duo Processor
• Windows Vista Home Premium
• 2GB DDR2 System RAM, expandable to 4GB
• 250GB SATA HDD
• 802.11a/b/g WLAN
• Intel Graphic Media Accelerator, X3100
• Built-in SuperMulti dual layer DVD Burner
• 4-in-1 Media Card Reader
• PCI Express Card Slot

I love laptop toys, and since I’m on the road a lot, I try out different products whenever I can to see if it’s any easier to file that tax override story via laptop.

My first experience with LapWorks came in July 2006 on a trip to Vegas, when I go to try their ultralight laptop stand. From what I remember in between eight-hour poker and alcohol binges, it was pretty good.

So when the LapWorks Attach© Stand came my way, I was eager to give it a shot.

It’s not the thin, portable dream that the ultralight model was, — you’re not going to carry it around in your laptop bag — but as a desktop/LAPtop solution, the Attach© is pretty good.

The Attach© features a hinge-adjusted bracket that lets you sit your laptop flush with your lap, or tilt it at an angle for desk/tabletop computing. The whole thing is backed with two virtually silent fans that are powered by the laptop’s USB — no external power source needed.

The stand also gives you four USB 2.0 ports and acts as a hub, giving you a sorta unpowered docking station.

With the notorious overheating problems associated with modern laptops, (cough DELL cough SONY) replacing a battery or, worse, a cooked computer is a bitch. For $70, the Attach© keeps you cool, and it actually works. Three hours of continuous use (and this review) later, my laptop — and this my lap — doesn’t feel like it’s been blasted with hairdryer.

The spinning fans do sort of vibrate on your lap though.

Overall: 4.5 out of 5 stars

There’s been a lot of talk about Apple’s latest laptop the MacBook Air, and a lot of this talk seems to be by people who aren’t quite clear on the concept and target market segment. First announced in the middle of January, the Air is ultra-thin, lightweight, and has a seeming dearth of standard features- a move that’s generated no small amount of controversy.

First though, the raw specs:

Thickness: 0.76in max, tapering down to 0.16
Width: 12.8in
Depth: 8.94in
Weight: 3 lbs

CPU: special micro Core2 Duo running at 1.6 or 1.8ghz
Ram: 2 gb
HD: either an 80 GB PATA, or 64 GB SSD, both 1.8in size.
Screen: 13.3 @ 1280×800

Wifi: b/g/n
Bluetooth: 2 + EDR

… and, most notably, the only ports it has are a single USB, headphone jack, and a micro-DVI, in addition to not having any form of internal optical drive (although an external usb DVD+/-DL is available).

The other big innovation is Remote Disc, a software solution that enables the Air to read (via wifi) discs mounted on another Mac or Windows machine, even to the point of being able to boot off them and install an OS (most likely through some implementation of PXE, although the details are unclear).

Reading the sheet, it seems to me that the Air is intended not as a primary machine or desktop replacement, but as a compliment to an existing workstation or server for people who want to be able to do a few things around the house with said machines without being tied to their desk (a niche known as a ‘fat-client’), and for business execs who need something lightweight they can take with them to meetings to show demos and presentations.

However, having browsed around several forums and listened in on a number of conversations, it seems that most of those with a lot of negative opinions are trying to shoehorn it into the category of ‘submicro roadwarrior’ and then complaining when it doesn’t fit:

“It’s too big/wide/etc. It should be 12/9/5 inches, etc”

People who, say, have a server downstairs that contains all of their movies and want a lightweight laptop with a decent screen that they can watch stuff on while lying around on the couch or cooking dinner in the kitchen, and 13″ gives a good compromise between portability and watchability.

Likewise, for someone trying to present a demo in a meeting without a projector, smaller screens aren’t really a plus.

Also, in relative terms of volume, a thinner laptop gives you more room for carrying extra books or marketing material or a few small packages side by side, whereas lopping off an inch or so from the edge of the machine gives you a long narrow area that rarely translates into usable storage space for anything other than some toothpaste.

Regardless of anything Steve Jobs might say about style, a thinner 13″ is generally more effective than a thick 10″.

“It doesn’t have a replaceable battery”

This isn’t as big a deal as people make it out to be.

The vast majority of laptop owners don’t have multiple batteries for their laptop(s) anyway, and these days it’s rare to be in a location without a power outlet somewhere nearby. On top of that, carrying around spare batteries largely defeats the purpose of having such a lightweight laptop in the first place.

Unless you’re doing a lot of transcontinental flying on a cheap airline with no power sockets, a single battery is plenty.

Apple has already confirmed that the onboard battery is not permanently attached to the motherboard and can be replaced easily by removing a few screws and the bottom panel of the machine (a process that any reasonably skilled technician can perform in a few minutes), and that they’ll be providing and supporting replacement batteries for some time into the future.

“The ram is not upgradable”

The Air comes with 2GB, which is more than enough for the sorts of things this machine is meant for.

For the most part, all the things that really eat up ram (3D gaming, scientific processing, multimedia creation, etc) are not things you’d be doing on a laptop, and even if you had to run Windows in virtualization (via Parallels or VMware) because of a specific application, you’d have enough to do what you needed to.

Sure 4GB would be nice, but if you need to be editing HDTV movies or running a financial database server on the road, the Air is probably not for you anyway.

“It doesn’t have any ports”

Are you really going to be connecting a non-Bluetooth external mouse and a keyboard (with no ports of its own) on the road?

Several external hard drives at the same time?

One usb port really isn’t that much of a limitation for a laptop that doesn’t sit around all the time with a lot of devices plugged into it, and people seem to forget that you can buy a pocket usb hub if you really need it.

The lack of an ethernet port doesn’t phase me either as it’s far more likely I’ll encounter a wifi hotspot in my travels than an wall jack, and if I really need it I can always buy a usb-to-ethernet dongle.

As far as video goes, Apple includes in the box adapters that enable hookup to dvi/vga, anticipating that business folks who do a lot of presentation work will probably be a large part of the core market, moreso than people who need to run a bittorrent server in range of several microwave ovens.

I realize this may come off as sounding defensive, but one thing that’s always bugged me is when people rag on a product when they don’t understand what it’s meant for.

Like when the iPod first came out, the Air is getting bad press from people who don’t understand why it’s so much better than what’s already available.

That having been said, I personally am probably never going to own an Air, precisely because I need neither a fat-client (my primary machine is a MacBook Pro, not a wall-bound tower) nor am I a business exec, but that doesn’t stop me from recommending it strongly to anyone who does fit into those categories.

The Air nicely fills a hole that’s been open in Apple’s laptop lineup for about a decade since the Duo 2300c disappeared in the late 90′s, and is very probably the best laptop on the market within this class.

For more, check out BLAST staffer Mike Preble’s take on it.