Laptops - Page 85

If you have been following the ExoPC Slate over the last several months, waiting for the day you could order the thing for yourself, that day has come. The ExoPC Slate is now up for pre-order for those who are registered for the site forums. The pre-order offering comes with good news and bad news that may temper your enthusiasm for the Slate.

Toshiba, a leading Japanese electronics maker, has done a voluntary recall of 41,000 laptops nationwide due to overheating issues that could make the laptops a possible fire hazard. In a notice released by Toshiba, they state that "The notebook computers can overheat at the notebook's plug-in to the AC adapter, posing a burn hazard to consumers."

Asus is not doing well with its netbook shipments right now. The company has been shipping tons of the small machines, but over the last few months the netbook market overall has started softening as the market matures. The improving economy also means that more consumers have the extra money to buy a normal notebook rather than a netbook. One other big reasons that shipments of netbooks for Asus are slowing is the iPad.

Field workers that don't have a desk to sit at most of the time would have a hard time using a normal rugged laptop of netbook. Without somewhere to sit the notebook or netbook, typing would be impossible. This type of worker often uses a tablet because input can be made with one hand and these tablets have to be rugged to survive the inevitable drops.

Toshiba has unveiled several new notebook computers today in the dynabook line. The machines all use Windows 7 and have LED backlit monitors. Most of the machines will launch this month. Among the new machines is the SpursEngine packing Qosmio V65. The machine has a special video engine for performance.

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The V65 also has a Blu-ray player and can record to Blu-ray media. It uses a 15.6-inch screen and an Intel Core i5 CPU and has 500GB of storage. Toshiba has also unveiled the 16-inch Dynabook TX with a Core i5 CPU and Blu-ray.

Other notebook offerings include the Dynabook TV notebook with a 16-inch screen, Pentium P6000 processor, and a 500GB HDD. The Dynabook EX has a 15.6-inch screen and a Core i5 CPU. Other EX series machines use Core i3 and Celeron parts.

Dell has been talking up its Android powered Streak MID for a while now and admittedly, the device is pretty cool. Most users who buy a Streak will want to get their hands on some accessories as well. For these folks the official line of Streak accessories are now available.

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Among the official accessories ranging from £24 to £54.99 are extra batteries for the device, a Car Dock kit, and an International Travel kit. The Car Dock Kit includes a windshield mount, DC lighter adapter, and a sync/charge cable.

The Travel Kit includes adapters to work in any outlet around the world. The Home AV dock kit is also offered with various cables for docking and charging the device. Dell is also offering a couple cases for the Stream and some of the bundle cables as separates.

Back in March, we talked a bit about the MSI GX740 gaming notebook. The thing looks cool with its big screen and red accents and it promised some nice specifications as well. MSI has announced that the rig is now shipping in the US.

A German based 'smartbook' maker has caused a raquet in the netbook industry by calling itself what is being argued as a descriptive term and not a valid brand name.

SMARTBOOK AG is the mob we're talking about and Qualcomm is the one with its dukes up at the moment trying to get the german smartbook maker off its high horse.

Tucked away at the back of ASUS' booth was a pre-release version of their upcoming Eee PC 1015T which the folks at Engadget got some brief hands-on time with.