Hasta La Gadget!

Acer’s mammoth Aspire 8930 was on hand at CeBIT, and all 18.4-inches of it demanded an entire end of a pedestal. This one’s been rolling out to homes for a month or two now, but given just how ginormous this thing was, we couldn’t resist snapping a few shots and sharing ’em with the masses. So, is this thing actually too big? Depends on the square footage of your domicile.

Filed under: Laptops

Acer Aspire 8930 gaming laptop eyes-on originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 05 Mar 2009 20:28:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We knew MSI’s newest X-Slim laptops were ultrathin, but it wasn’t until we saw ’em in person here at CeBIT that we truly appreciated the design. These are definitely amongst the sexiest laptops we’ve seen in some time, though it only took a moment for fingerprints to begin marring the previously flawless glossy top. Both were appropriately sturdy and remarkably lightweight, and if these are any sign of where MSI is going with its styling, we can’t wait for the future. On that note, we should also mention that we stumbled upon the absolutely gigantic GT725. Granted, that machine is aimed squarely at the gaming crowd, but it just looked unnatural after toying with its fitness-minded siblings just seconds earlier. We went a little crazy with the camera, but feel free to only peek the thumbnails you like.

Filed under: Laptops

MSI X-Slim X320, X340 and GT725 hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 03 Mar 2009 10:04:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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While HP’s dv7t provides a much more subtle way to game on-the-go compared to say, the HDX crew, we don’t see the necessity in keeping these updates all hush-hush. For whatever reason, it seems that said laptop has been updated overnight from 17- to 17.3-inches (we’re talking LCD size, by the way), and the NVIDIA graphics option has been replaced with a pair of ATI selections: the 512MB Mobility Radeon HD 4530 and 1GB HD 4650. The newfangled 17.3-inch panel sports a somewhat deflating 1,600 x 900 native resolution, though there is good news to be shared. The previous $1,229 starting point has dropped to a decidedly more manageable $799.99, though it’ll cost you extra to equip this beast with the 2GHz Core 2 Quad CPU that it really deserves.

[Thanks, Johnny and Coal]

Filed under: Laptops

HP quietly updates Pavilion dv7t gaming laptop originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 26 Feb 2009 09:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Toshiba’s Qosmio X305-Q725, which was unveiled amidst a flurry of other gizmos at CES, boasts the same incredibly controversial motif as the higher-end X305-Q708, but with an MSRP of $2,700 (versus $4,200 on the Q708), it’s at least a wee bit more affordable. The benchmarking crew over at HotHardware decided to put this newer, marginally more affordable iteration to the test in order to see if it still performed under pressure, and by and large, it did. While it couldn’t go toe-to-toe with higher-end desktops, the GeForce 9800M GTX GPU, quad-core processor and SSD helped it to blaze through everyday tasks and hold its own in the gaming arena. Our biggest issue is the omission of a 1,920 x 1,200 display, but we suppose that’s why there’s the more expensive alternative. Hit up the read link for pages upon pages of test results and impressions.

Filed under: Laptops

Toshiba Qosmio X305-Q725 reviewed: a nice performer, but it’s still ugly originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 17 Feb 2009 17:16:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Not quite an ultraportable, but not quite a behemoth — the 14-inch ASUS N81Vg fits nicely between the two laptop extremes, and given that it’s the first to house NVIDIA’s GeForce GT 120M graphics card, even gamers can feel free to sneak a deathmatch or two in between conference calls. The rig itself can be ordered with one of many Core 2 Duo processors, up to 4GB of DDR2 RAM, upwards of 500GB of hard drive space, an optional Blu-ray burner, 1.3 megapixel webcam and a battery good for three to four hours. The newfangled 120M GPU features NVIDIA CUDA technology, 32 processing cores, DirecX 10 support, 1080p video playback and 110 gigaflops of computing power. Per usual, ASUS is keeping quiet when it comes to pricing and release details, but it ought not be long now, tiger.

Filed under: Gaming, Laptops

ASUS N81Vg: first laptop with NVIDIA’s GeForce GT 120M originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 10 Feb 2009 16:22:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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