Launch

Asus and MSI have released details about their new Z590 motherboards with the LGA 1200 socket that offer support for Comet Lake and Rocket Lake chips from Intel. MSI’s range features 12 boards that are headlined by a revamped MEG Z590 GODLIKE while the 13 boards from Asus are led by the pricey ROG Maximus XIII Extreme Glacial.

Asus has released its new ZenBook 13 OLED UM325 and ZenBook 14 UM425 thin and light laptops. These ZenBooks differ primarily with respect to the display and available Ryzen 5000 APU options. While the ZenBook 13 OLED UM325 offers a mix of both Cezanne and Lucienne APUs, the ZenBook 14 offers only Lucienne parts.

Asus has upgraded its ROG Strix Scar 17 with AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX and RTX 3080 Mobile. Like all ROG models in 2021, the Scar 17 will use liquid metal as the thermal interface material for the CPU. The Scar 17 also features a 360 Hz display, optical mechanical keyboard, ROG Keystone II, and more.

XMG has announced that the 2021 iterations of its PRO and NEO 15/17 laptops will have new, slim cases in addition to new specs. The NEO 15 and 17 also boasts fresh Ryzen 9 5900HX or 7 5800H AMD platforms, while the PROs stick with a Core i7 processor so as to be among the first on the market to combine RTX 3000 graphics with Thunderbolt 3.

Asus has refreshed the ZenBook Duo 14 with Intel 11th gen Tiger Lake and NVIDIA MX450 graphics. In our time with the unit, we found that the new ZenBook Duo 14 UX482 offers better sustained boost performance and an improved ScreenPad Plus experience.

Asus has refreshed its unique ZenBook Pro Duo design with updated internals. The new ZenBook Pro Duo 15 OLED comes with Comet Lake-H and RTX 3070 Mobile options. Asus has also improved the multi-tasking experience with the new ScreenPad Plus that now brings native support for Adobe apps.

Asus has upgraded its ultralight ExpertBook B9 line of business laptops. The new ExpertBook B9450CEA features Intel 11th Gen Tiger Lake Core i7 CPUs, Intel vPro, and are Intel Evo certified.

Asus has debuted its new Instant Guard facility in the new RT-AX68U Wi-Fi 6 home router. The device also sprouts 3x3 MIMO antennae for speeds of up to 2.7 gigabits per second (Gb/s). It also supports the OEM's AiMesh software, so as to integrate into and proliferate any such network it finds itself in.

The Asus BR1100 is a new ruggedized convertible designed for the education market. In addition to features typical of a ruggedized school notebook (e.g., a rubberized bumper), the BR1100 includes an active stylus that can detect up to 4096 levels of pressure. The laptop can charge the stylus for up to 45 minutes of use in just 15 seconds.

Asus announced two new ProArt displays, one of which is a portable 14-inch touchscreen monitor. This little display also has hotkeys and a physical dial for use with Adobe software. Asus also released a 15.6-inch portable monitor for business users.

The new ChromeBook CX9 and Flip CX5 models from Asus powered by the latest Intel Tiger Lake-U CPUs show that the Chrome OS laptops can easily match the performance of the traditionally more powerful Windows-based systems. The new premium-grade CX9 business laptop comes with enhanced security features and two Thunderbolt 4 connectors, while the Flip CX5 focuses on an expanded cloud-connected gaming experience.

The Asus VivoBook S14 (S435) is a Tiger Lake refresh of the existing VivoBook S14 (S433). The 14-inch laptop is Intel Evo certified and supports up to a Core-i7 CPU, 16GB of RAM, and 1TB of storage. It will be available for purchase sometime in February 2021 for an unspecified price.

The Asus TUF Gaming Dash F15 is the newest addition to Asus' TUF line of gaming laptops. It comes with 11th-generation Intel Tiger Lake processors, an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 graphics card, a 15.6-inch 240Hz screen, up to 32GB of user-upgradable RAM and 2TB of solid-state storage. It will hit stores in Q1 2021, with the price to be revealed at a later point.

MSI has unveiled an upgraded Stealth 15M gaming laptop at its MSIology event at CES 2021. MSI calls the Stealth 15M the world's thinnest gaming laptop. The Stealth 15M is powered by the Core i7-11375H and RTX 3060 Mobile and comes in Carbon Gray and Pure White variants.

The MSI GP76 Leopard and GP66 Leopard gaming laptops have been unveiled at CES 2021. Both notebooks come with a 144Hh screen, 10th-generation Intel CPUs, Nvidia GeForce RTX 3000 series graphics cards, up to 64GB of RAM and 2TB of solid-state storage. Their prices and availability will be revealed at a later time.

At its MSIology event, MSI has taken wraps off the GE76 Raider Dragon Edition Tiamat. Embodying ancient Babylonian folklore, the new GE76 Raider will replace the GT Titan as MSI's 2021 flagship gaming laptop. The GE76 Raider is also available in a non-cuneiform design and sports the same internals including the Core i9-10980HK and the RTX 3080 Mobile/RTX 3070 Mobile options.

Rumors about upcoming new hardware from Nintendo have been flying around more furiously than ever, with mention of the codename “Aula” that could represent a Switch Pro, Switch 4K, or even a next-gen Switch 2 console. Nintendo has launched the Switch Mario Red & Blue Edition console amidst the speculation circus.

Gigabyte has introduced new mid-range gaming laptops powered by both Intel Comet Lake-H and AMD Ryzen 5000H Zen 3 options. These laptops are aimed at the multi-tasking crowd that also likes to game. The Intel-based Gaming G5 and G7 and the AMD-based Gaming A5 and A7 share many features with the Aorus gaming series including the Windforce cooling system.

Gigabyte has refreshed its Aorus gaming laptop lineup to feature NVIDIA RTX 30 Mobile GPUs. The Aorus 15P and Aorus 15G offer largely identical specifications including the Core i7-10870H. The new Aorus laptops take advantage of Microsoft Azure AI to offer automatic performance optimizations depending on the use case.

Acer is offering an all-AMD Aspire 5 powered by AMD Ryzen 5000U APUs. The Aspire 5 is aimed at students, hobbyists, and bloggers and features the Radeon RX 640 dGPU for light graphic workloads.

Acer has introduced the Aspire 7 featuring Ryzen 5000U APUs and NVIDIA GTX 1650 graphics. The Aspire 7 features an FHD display that uses Acer Color Intelligence to adapt the display gamma and saturation in real time to deliver an optimal viewing experience.

Acer has introduced a refreshed Nitro 5 with AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX and NVIDIA RTX 3080 Mobile internals. The Nitro 5 is also being offered with three display options, one of which includes a 360 Hz FHD panel.

Dell has refreshed the Alienware m17 with NVIDIA Ampere mobile graphics. The Alienware m17 R4 features a largely similar configuration as last year and offers a slew of customization options including a 360 Hz FHD panel. The laptop is also recognized as a CES 2021 Innovation Award Honoree in the Gaming category.

Asus is throwing all of its craziest ideas onto its latest 13-inch convertible laptop including liquid metal cooling, an AMD Ryzen 9 5980HS CPU, vapor chamber external graphics, proprietary PCIe x8 connector, and a 16:10 120 Hz Gorilla Glass touchscreen.

Asus will be dropping last year's Core i9-10980HK in favor of the AMD Ryzen 7 5800H and Ryzen 9 5900HX on its latest dual-screen ROG gaming laptop. It's not coming cheap, of course, with a starting price of almost $3000 USD.

Asus has launched two new AMD-powered gaming laptops in the Asus ROG Strix G15 and Strix G17. Both notebooks can be configured with up to an AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX CPU, Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 GPU, up to 32GB of RAM and 2TB of solid-state storage. The ROG Strix G15 will be available in Q1 2021 from €999 (US$1,215) and the G17 from €1,599 (US$1,945).

Asus' top-of-the-line ROG Strix Scar 15 gaming laptop has been unveiled at CES 2021. Some of its specifications include an AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX/Ryzen 7 5800H CPU, Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080/3070/3060 graphics card, 165Hz QHD/300Hz FHD, up to 32GB of RAM and 2TB of solid-state storage. It will be available for purchase sometime in mid-Q1 2021 for €1,499 (US$1,825).

TCL's new product launches are mainly display-centric; however, it has also announced the expansion of its smart device ecosystem at CES 2021. They include the new Wearable Display, a name the OEM has seen fit to give its first pair of smart glasses. They are joined here by other devices such as the hybrid ANC-enhanced MOVEAUDIO S600 earbuds, the MOVETRACK PetTracker and the LINKHUB 4G/LTE Outdoor CPE.

NVIDIA has introduced a new member to the RTX 30 family, the RTX 3060 12 GB. The RTX 3060 is intended at those who are looking to upgrade from a GTX 1060-class card and features 3,584 CUDA cores, 12 GB of GDDR6 192-bit memory, and will be the first RTX 30 card to support resizable BAR. The RTX 3060 12 GB will be available in late February starting from US$329.

The 2021 Blade 15 and Blade Pro series will carry on the same chassis designs as previous generations. Instead, the biggest gen-to-gen changes will be the new high refresh rate display options and mobile Ampere GPUs.

Acer's newest Predator Triton 300 SE gaming laptop comes with a 14-inch FHD screen clocked at 144Hz, 11th Generation Intel Tiger Lake CPUs, an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Max-Q graphics card, a dedicated 'Turbo' button, and 10 hours of battery life. The notebook will be available for sale in March 2021 starting at €1,399 (US$1,700).

The refreshed models still feature the Comet Lake-H CPUs, as they are limited to Thunderbolt 3 connectors. However, Gigabyte is now offering upgraded professionally calibrated displays, as well as the newly released RTX 3000 mobile GPUs, plus redesigned thermal management. The new AERO laptops are also among the first to feature HDMI 2.1 connectors.

Gigabyte has updated its flagship Gigabyte Aorus 17G gaming laptop with next-generation hardware such as 11th-generation Intel Tiger Lake CPUs and an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 graphics card. Everything else is mostly the same, including the fully-mechanical keyboard with Omron switches. The company will tell us more about its price and availability on January 26.

Dell has refreshed the Alienware m15 to feature Intel Comet Lake-H and NVIDIA Ampere mobile offerings. The Alienware m15 R4 continues to offer vapor chamber cooling, up to 4 TB of PCIe storage, and also comes with an OLED panel that is HDR500 compliant.

TCL's latest generation of mini-LED panel is called OD Zero, ostensibly as the OEM claims to have reduced the distance between the backlight and diffuser layers in these panels to "zero millimeters". This could improve on luminance and color-depth for the devices based on it, not to mention their form-factor. TCL has also announced that its 2021 smart TVs will launch with Google's new UI.

Lenovo has launched the ThinkBook 13x today at CES 2021, a lightweight ultraportable business machine that shares the new display aspect that Lenovo is transitioning products to this year. It is also compatible with Lenovo's new wireless laptop Charging Mat.

Lenovo has announced a refresh to its Legion 5 15 and Legion 5 17 laptops to bring the latest AMD Ryzen Mobile CPU and Nvidia GeForce GPU options to consumers. Both offer good higher framerate displays with the 15.3-inch reportedly having a sub-3ms response time.

The Lenovo Legion Gaming Dock S600 has been launched at CES 2021. It comes with two USB ports and a wireless charging pad that can charge Qi-enabled devices at up to 20W. The gaming dock will be available for purchase in April 2020 and cost US$89.99.

The Lenovo Legion H200 and Legion H600 are Lenovo's newest entry-level gaming headsets. The former is wired, while the latter can connect with devices in wired and wireless modes. Both headphones will hit the shelves in April 2021. The Legion H200 will cost US$49.99, and the Legion H600 US$99.99.

AMD has taken the wraps off the much anticipated Ryzen 5000 mobile lineup based on Zen 3 Cezanne. The Ryzen 5000 series now includes a couple of HX SKUs that can be configured with TDPs above 45 W. AMD has also updated the H and HS offerings along with enabling SMT in odd-numbered U-series chips, which are essentially Zen 2 Renoir refreshes under the codename Lucienne.

Even though the spec sheets do not mention the exact processors, the ACH denomination added to the products names suggests that Lenovo is equipping these models with AMD's Ryzen 5000H processors. The 14p model does not get discrete graphics, but offers an OLED panel option, while the 16p version offers Nvidia RTX 3000 dGPU options and a Pantone calibrated IPS panel.

The new ThinkBook Plus Gen 2 i hybrids are essentially compliant with the Intel EVO specs, as they are powered by Tiger Lake CPUs, come with 2x Thunderbolt 4 connectors and total weight is kept at 1.3 Kg / 3 lbs. Lenovo also offers larger e-Ink and main IPS touchscreens with 16:10 aspect ratio and 2560 x 1600 resolution.

AMD has launched two new members of the Ryzen 5000 desktop processor family in the forms of the Ryzen 7 5800 and Ryzen 9 5900. Both CPUs have lower TDPs than their similarly named Zen 3 counterparts, and the Ryzen 9 5900 offers an average of 24% faster gaming performance at 1080p than the previous-generation Ryzen 9 3900.

Samsung's high-end Exynos 2100 SoC is finally here. Some of its features include an ARM Cortex-X1 CPU core clocked at 2.9GHz, an ARM Mali-G78 GPU, integrated 5G modem that supports sub-6GHz and mmWave networks, and more. It will debut alongside the Samsung Galaxy S21 series on January 14.

LG asserts that it has brought the "ultimate" slew of updates to its premium TV offerings to CES 2021. The OEM has even invented a new sub-category for this year: QNED, a combination of its mini-LED and Quantum NanoCell Color technologies. As for the OLEDs, the 48-inch C1 has already won a Best of Innovation Award at the show.

The TCL 20 SE is a low-cost smartphone with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 460 SoC, 4GB of RAM, 64GB of storage, four rear cameras, and a 6.8-inch screen and a 5,000mAh battery. It will be available for purchase worldwide in late January 2021 for €149 (US$181).

Lenovo has launched two new docking stations at CES 2021. One connects to a notebook via a USB Type-C cable, while the other requires a Thunderbolt 4.0 port. Both docks can power 4K displays and charge peripherals at up to 100W. Their pricing and availability will be revealed at a later date.

At CES 2021, Intel has unveiled the Tiger Lake-H 35 W processors for ultraportable gaming laptops. With the introduction of these processors, Intel is not only offering further market segmentation among gaming laptops but also is looking to take on AMD's Renoir Ryzen 7 4800HS and the Ryzen 9 4900H in single-core performance. The new Tiger Lake-H35 processors led by the Core i7-11375H Special Edition can boost up to 5 GHz and also offer resizable BAR support with NVIDIA's upcoming Ampere mobile GPUs.

TCL has launched a new low-cost 5G smartphone called the TCL 20 5G. It comes with a 6.6-inch FHD IPS LCD panel, a Qualcomm Snapdragon 690 chipset, 6GB of RAM, three rear cameras and a 4,500mAh battery that can be charged at 18W. The smartphone is up for sale in Italy for €299 (US$363) and will be available in other regions soon.

The Amazfit GTR 2e and Amazfit GTS 2e smartwatches from Huami have now officially become available to customers in North America. Both watches are priced at US$139.99, with the main differences between them being design and battery life. The Amazfit GTR 2e and Amazfit GTS 2e come with a data sensor for blood-oxygen saturation measurement.