Laptop

The Acer Predator Helios 300 Special Edition is a sleek limited-edition variant of the standard Helios 300. A new 144 Hz IPS display has been used, and the chassis uses an unusual all-white with gold trim design. Acer plans to discontinue this variant within a few months of sales starting.

On this page we list all reviews, news and articles regarding laptops.

The latest BIOS update for the Dell XPS 15 9575 convertible should take care of the fans issue, revealed Frank Azor on Twitter yesterday. In the last month, more users complained that the fans of the new XPS 2-in-1 are extremely loud even under light load, some of them even stumbling into this problem on more than just one XPS 15 9575.

Razer managed to squeeze the 15.6-inch systems inside the older 14-inch Blade chassis. This makes the new Blade gaming laptops some of the slimmest models on the market to date. The refreshed specs include Intel's gen 8 hexa-core CPUs coupled with 16 GB of DDR4-2666 RAM, and, depending on the budget, users can choose among a GTX 1060 or 1070 Max-Q GPU, FHD or UHD displays and 256/512 GB SSDs.

A new variant of the GeForce GTX 1050 GPU has been spotted on the Nvidia website. The latest addition to the GTX 1050 series is the GeForce GTX 1050 (3 GB). The GeForce 10 series was released in 2016, and the GTX 1050 GPU originally came in the forms of a 2 GB base model and a 4 GB Ti model.

Major cities in the US and across the globe are testing 5G services throughout this year, and some areas might even get limited 5G connectivity in the second half of 2018. Tis has prompted some OEMs to pressure Qualcomm into allowing them to integrate the X50 5G modem and maybe even the upcoming Snapdragon 855 SoC in several smartphones that could launch by the end of 2018.

Control your smart home with a compatible Acer laptop. The free update will begin rolling out today for Spin 3 and Spin 5 owners with more on store shelves beginning in June. Instead of offering the software as an option, however, owners will have one more pre-installed software application that they will have to manually uninstall if they have no interest in Alexa or if they prefer Microsoft Cortana.

The $300 USD gift card will apply to new purchases of the MateBook X Pro made through Amazon and NewEgg in an attempt to create buzz. The promotion will end after June 10. Huawei's latest 13.9-inch laptop is thicker than its last but also significantly more powerful to justify the larger dimensions.

Throttling behavior has improved over the MSI GS63, but that is only because initial clock rates are lower than what the Core i7-8750H CPU is capable of when compared to the same CPU in the latest Zephyrus or Aero. Multi-thread performance is around 5 to 10 percent slower on the MSI as a result. Fortunately, the differences are minuscule for gaming purposes.

Promising to bring a "new attitude" to Europe, Xiaomi is ready to enter the French market. The Chinese brand will open its first Mi Store in Paris on May 22, but more are expected to follow in other French cities over the coming months. Two days later, Xiaomi will also enter the Italian market.

The EM-B13KG mini PC and EM-NM14KG 14-inch gaming laptop from Emdoor will most likely come with very affordable prices. Both can be equipped with the i5 and i7 Kaby Lake-G CPUs that integrate AMD's Radeon RX Vega M GPUs, up to 8 GB DDR4 RAM, SSD storage (+HDD for the mini PC), and the list of connectors is quite generous.

Together with the recently leaked Core i3-8121U, the M3-8114Y will be one of the first 10 nm ULV CPUs launched by Intel this year. As far as performance goes, the new M3 will be a tad slower than the i3, with a 1.5 GHz default clock and boost clocks reaching around 2.2 GHz. TDP should be around 4 W, making them ideal for fanless entry-level notebooks.

It looked like Intel is going through some production problems with the 10 nm Cannon Lake chips, but the latest leaks involving Lenovo's IdeaPad 330 series powered by the Core i3-8121U CPU signals the fact that Intel will actually be the first to achieve the 10 nm milestone this year. Since the i3-8121U is an entry-level dual-core, the SiSoft Sandra results are not great, but still decent for a 15 W TDP CPU.

Lenovo has partnered with Ubisoft to furnish the Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege Pro League and Majors eSports events with Legion hardware including desktop PCs, laptops, and monitors. The partnership extends from Spring 2018 to Spring 2019 worldwide across North America, EMEA, Asia Pacific, and Latin America.

Alongside many of its premium reveals, HP has also introduced the Elite x2 1013 G2. The Elite x2 is being billed as the world's smallest business detachable and comes with upgraded internals, ultra-thin bezels, and two high resolution display options.

After a painfully long wait — for those interested — the Intel Core i9-8950HK processor is now present in two XPS 15 9570 models. Unfortunately, they have only been listed on the Dell Spain website, so US customers still have to wait a few more days (or weeks) until the XPS 15 9570 gets this high-end mobile processor stateside.

AMD announced new Ryzen Pro APUs and all three major OEMs Dell, HP, and Lenovo were on display with corresponding products. We had the chance to talk with the manufacturers and check the new models hands-on.

The market for premium laptops has been growing in recent years, with thin and powerful 15-inch laptops like the Dell XPS 15 or Apple MacBook Pro 15 as one of the growth-segments. Reason enough for HP to release the new EliteBook 1050 G1, which offers a hexa-core CPU and the Nvidia GeForce GTX 1050 in a thin 15-inch chassis.

Although those who purchase the Dell XPS 15 9575 2-in-1 can already choose to have it in black, Frank Azor has recently confirmed that the Dell XPS 15 9570 laptop will not get such a color option anytime soon. The XPS 15 9570 is only available in a platinum silver finish and starts at US$999.99.

HP has announced refreshes to its Envy notebook lineup including the Envy 13, Envy 17, Envy x360 13, and Envy x360 15. The standout feature of these notebooks is the new minimalist chiseled appearance similar to the patterning found in sword blades made from Damascus steel. Internally, all notebooks receive an upgrade to the Intel 8th generation CPUs with the Envy x360 offering AMD Ryzen with Vega graphics options as well. The Envy x360 15 also sports a 650-nit bright panel for excellent outdoor legibility.

Intel Cannon Lake once was a very highly anticipated CPU-release. After massive delays, the first Intel CPU generation that is manufactured in the advanced 10 nanometer process has finally arrived – and it enters the market silently, in a low-budget device.

The service manual for the Dell XPS 15 9570 has been posted online and it looks like the notebook will sport a similar heatsink design with 2 heat pipes as its predecessor. This raises concerns about the possible throttling issues as the previous XPS 15 9560 had to be undervolted and thermal pads applied to the VRMs in order to prevent performance drops due to thermal throttling and power limits.

Taiwanese motherboard specialist Gigabyte has announced an entry into the SSD market. The company has published a press release detailing its new UD PRO Series. The series currently consists of just two SATA III drives: a 256 GB model and a 512 GB model. Prices are expected to be around US$68.99 for the 256 GB variant and US$119.99 for the larger drive.

With the 13-inch variant of the Yoga 730, users can get an FHD IPS touchscreen, and can opt for an i7-8550U or an i5-8250U CPU. They can further add 8 or 16 GB of DDR4 RAM and up to 512 GB of NVMe SSD storage. This model specifically impresses with the 2x Thunderbolt 3 connectors that come standard on any variant.

If the ROG Zephyrus seems too expensive for your budget, you may want to take a look at the ROG GU501GM instead. The more affordable GU501GM comes with almost the same design features, and the specs are still very solid, as it includes the i7-8750H six-core CPU, a GTX 1060 6 GB VRAM video card, 16 GB DDR4-2666 RAM, a 128 GB SSD + 1 TB Hybrid HDD, and a Thunderbolt 3 connector.

Lon Seidman recently hosted a podcast with Notebookcheck's own Douglas Black. Over the hour, Douglas discussed his work with Notebookcheck and UltrabookReview with Lon and the process behind writing reviews of laptops in the online era. The duo also discussed the laptop market at large and some interesting trends they are currently watching.

Today Lenovo announced the new IdeaPad 330 and IdeaPad 320S which they claim to meet the specifications, price, and looks that most consumers want in an affordable laptop. The Lenovo IdeaPad came about in the late 2000’s as a consumer-oriented counterpart to the hugely successful business-orientated ThinkPad. Dedicated GPU options include the MX110, MX130, MX150, and GTX 1050.

The Lenovo IdeaPad 530S is a relatively thin and light notebook compared to the screen sizes on offer and the price segment which it occupies. Equipped with a Core i7 (probably U-series), up to an MX150, and a 1440p display, this laptop will sit well with consumers who want a good looking and decently priced mid-sized computer.

Lenovo has released many ThinkPad laptops in this year already, but no models with AMD Ryzen so far. This apparently changes soon, as the new models ThinkPad A285 and A485 have been listed on the Lenovo website for the first time.

American computer manufacturer System76 has offered the company’s updated Oryx Pro for pre-order. For US$1,599, the buyer would receive a 15.6-inch, Ubuntu-based laptop sporting an i7-8750H processor, Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 GPU, 8 GB RAM, and a 250 GB M.2 SSD. The official System76 website offers a generous amount of configurations for the Oryx Pro update.

The 7 nm manufacturing process will be superseded by the 5 nm one by 2020. Right now, TSMC is working to improve the extreme ultraviolet lithography tech that should lead to reduced power consumption and considerable performance gains for the 7+ nm chips in late 2018. TSMC estimates that the performance gains and power requirements will see minor improvements with the 5 nm stepping.

The latest solid state drives from Samsung have only just been launched, and they have already received price cuts. The tech giant announced the 970 Pro and Evo NVMe SSDs in April, with the devices being made available for purchase on May 7. It is now possible to obtain the drives at cheaper rates than the suggested retail prices listed in the April press release.

The UX550VE is being refreshed to the UX550GD with i5-8300H, i7-8750H, and even i9-8950HK SKUs. At just 18.9 mm thick, this would make the Asus notebook one of the thinnest to ship with a Core i9 processor. No other changes have been made to the chassis including the 8 to 16 GB of DDR4 RAM, FHD or 4K UHD touchscreen, glass trackpad, 1.5 mm keyboard keys, and selection of ports. Prices and availability are not yet known.

Responding to a question on Twitter, Frank Azor bluntly stated that the likelihood of a dedicated GPU making its way into Dell's XPS 13 2-in-1 is slim to none. "Don't hold your breath," said Azor, effectively squashing any hope of a variant of the convertible with a dGPU. However, is that such a bad thing?