Hasta La Gadget!

It’s not every day you see something thoroughly distinct in the laptop scene — or even barely off the beaten path — so we were quite happy to behold Dell’s new Latitude Z 600 outside of the narrow confines of the FCC. The machine combines a 16-inch 1600 x 900 display with a Core 2 Duo processor and a thin (0.57-inch) and light (4.5 pounds) chassis — a rather rare trifecta. Dell’s gone with premium soft touch materials, a large multitouch touchpad, a 2 megapixel webcam with included security and document scanning (like business cards) software, and a rather novel capacitive “EdgeTouch” sensor on the side that can be tapped for a quick launch bar of apps. Remember that 802.11g radio that had us scratching our heads in the FCC docs? Well it’s actually one of two WiFi radios in the machine (the main radio is 802.11n, just like mother used to make), and belongs to Latitude ON, that instant-boot ARM-based Linux system that co-exists inside the computer (which first made an appearance in the Latitude E series). For security reasons it doesn’t share a lick of data with the main OS, but it can hook up to Exchange and handle basic browsing tasks. In addition to its quick-booting properties, the low-power nature of the ARM chipset means you can get “days” of computing out of the machine, despite the 16-inch screen the battery is up against. But that’s not all! Dell has built in a UWB radio for communicating with an optional wireless base dock (out in November) that pumps out DVI and USB, and there are also induction charging contacts on the bottom of the laptop for use with an optional induction charging stand. Other features include a built-in Smart Card reader and room for dual SSD drives.

We got to play around with the laptop briefly, and it doesn’t just pile on the features — it’s really a pretty tight design from Dell, and oozes quality. Some of the features make a bit less sense, like the EdgeTouch sensor, but if you’re going to go all out on a laptop for executives, you might as well really go all out, right? The keyboard is one of the best laptop keyboards we’ve played with in a while, the touchpad is expansive, and the machine doesn’t seem brittle despite its wild surface-area-to-thickness ratio. The screen did seem a little dim to our eyes, but it was mercifully matte, and that 2 megapixel camera up top really comes in handy with Dell’s bundled software, reading and deciphering a business card of ours without a problem. It’s a three way tie for neatest feature between UWB, Latitude ON and induction charging, but we’d probably have to go with UWB — unlike Toshiba’s similar solution, which relies on a dongle, Dell’s built-in implementation actually makes a lot of sense for a premium laptop. It was also surprisingly quick at pairing with the wireless dock, and there’s no harm done by pulling the laptop out of range of UWB — a quick screen flicker and it’s back to regular. Our biggest downers about the laptop probably have to do with the odd color choice (a bit too personal of a preference to be made a default) and the understandable but painfully sky-high $2,000+ pricetag.

Update: Smarmy infomercial and in-depth look at Latitude ON now posted after the break.

Continue reading Dell’s Latitude Z 600 is a 16-inch thin-and-light, makes overcompensated CEOs out of us all (update: video!)

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Dell’s Latitude Z 600 is a 16-inch thin-and-light, makes overcompensated CEOs out of us all (update: video!) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 29 Sep 2009 00:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The last time Haier really wowed us was back in 2007 when the company was peddling its “screen-on-a-stick” laptop tech. Two years later we’ve got this little beauty to drool on: the Jian i7. The 13.4-inch Core 2 Duo ULV laptop is pretty dang thin, weighs 3 pounds, and retails for a mere 6,000 Yuan (about $879 US). Where do we sign up?

Filed under: Laptops

Haier steps out of character, builds ultra-desirable Jian i7 ultra-thin laptop originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 19 Sep 2009 15:03:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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HP and Dr. Dre team up to shill a limited edition Envy 15 originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 18 Sep 2009 02:57:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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There’s no getting around it, so we’ll just say right at the outset: HP’s new ENVY 13 and 15 laptops might’ve been built on the “Voodoo ENVY legacy,” but they sure look a lot like Apple’s unibody MacBook Pros. Of course, there’s much more than meets the eye. The ENVY 13 is a bit of a mix between a traditional 13-incher and a real thin and light, weighing in at 3.74 pounds and packing in Radeon HD 4330 discrete graphics, but still forgoing an internal disc drive. The 13.1-inch WXGA display is the real draw, offering impressive colors (82% color gamut) and brightness (410 nit). The other big winner is the optional Slim Fit extended life battery, a slice which snaps onto the bottom of the laptop, hardly protrudes, and more than doubles the standard 7 hour quoted battery life. The laptop body is magnesium coated with aluminum — which gives it the texture of a MacBook Pro, but a bit less of the weight. In our non-scientific tests the build wasn’t exactly as rigid as a MBP, but still quite a bit stronger than the average laptop — and quite nice to the touch. The MacBook-style glass clickpad, however, is not an exciting addition in our book, since the software to support the automagical detection of left and right click — not to mention zoom, rotate and scroll gestures — just wasn’t very tight. Please, give us back our buttons.

HP’s ENVY 15 isn’t much of a “thin and light,” really, more of a straight up premium 15-incher crammed into a 1-inch thick 5.18 pound form factor. It keeps the ENVY 13’s unibody-style construction, and, sadly, the single button glass trackpad, but also works in a new Core i7 processor, makes room for dual SSD drives and adds high-end Radeon HD 4830 graphics with 1GB of VRAM. The 15.6-inch LCD isn’t quite as stellar as the 13, at 300 nits, but HP did manage to include support for a Slim Fit battery for the ENVY 15 — though with non-switchable discreet graphics, you’re not going to get much longevity out of this laptop either way. The two laptops start at $1,699 and $1,799, respectively (a far cry from the original ENVY 133‘s $2,100 starting price), and will be available on October 18th with Windows 7 pre-loaded. Check out video of the ENVY 13 after the break.

Continue reading HP ENVY 13 and 15 bring luxury to the everyman, look like MacBooks

HP ENVY 13 and 15 bring luxury to the everyman, look like MacBooks originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Sep 2009 00:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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There’s not really much to say about MSI’s X600 that can’t be said about the X340: both laptops slightly improve upon the (rather shoddy) build quality of the X320, but the X600 is just bigger, and packs a numeric keypad. The keyboard is really the definition of mushy, though it’s at least got a bit of a backbone underneath now, and the machine overall feels like it could snap in half at the slightest bit of misapplied pressure. We’re sure that’s an overstatement, and it’s hard to find this much computer in this thin of a form factor at this low of price, but you might want to save a few dollars for a new pair of kid gloves if you’re thinking of making the plunge.

Filed under: Laptops

MSI X600 hands-on: 15.6-inches on a slim plastic platter originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 06 Sep 2009 15:59:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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