Back-to-School (and Business??) with a $299 Laptop?

How do they do this? A $299 laptop? Just in time for a flat-ish economic recovery (uh, hey man, it's not really a recovery) and the kids heading back to high school, upper Forms, college and university, WalMart is flogging a $298 Compaq laptop and Best Buy was flogging a $299 Acer. Why, you ask, and how good/useful/reliable could they possibly be? A fine question, we reply. Our answer is a resounding, "NUH-UH!" We've actually tried the Celeron-underpowered, slow-ish cheap-o laptops and found them, um, somewhat wanting. The keyboards, while larger than the slightly zippier Netbooks that are all the rage right now (but way too small and unresponsive for extended typing), are merely a larger version of the generally sucky Netbook and cheap laptop mushboards - fine for surfing and email, but awful for note-taking, report writing and other important education-like stuff and work. The three best and most reasonably priced school and small business laptops we've seen (and, more important, tried) in the more quality-realistic price range of US$600-$1200 will take the bumps & bangs of daily use, speed everything along, ease some of the stress of long hours of typing, and provide a a screen that won't burn your eyes out during hours of concentration, and with even a slight amount of care will continue to work just fine for the next couple of school years. Beat the rush at Amazon.com. They're the Compaq Presario CQ60Z, the Toshiba E105-S1602 (everybody's best buy it seems) along with the superb Toshiba L300, the Apple MacBook Pro, and last but not least the Dell Vostro 1500. Why wait? Stick a crowbar in your wallet and lever out enough cash to buy the kid a decent laptop. It's got to be done and, believe us, we share your pain.

Apple Update Macbooks and Cinema Display

Apple have updated a whole bunch of their products, including their Macbooks, Macbook Air and Macbook Pro lines. They have also updated their 24 inch display, which now includes an integrated isight camera. The machines now use Apple's new unibody manufacturing technique, which uses a solid piece of aluminum that then has sections removed. There is also a black bezel surrounding the screen and a buttonless, glass, multi-touch trackpad. Apple have made it substantially simpler to change out hard drives. The drive is now stored in a compartment with the battery, meaning it can be removed without having to use any screwdrivers. The MacBook Pros are available immediately, with models priced from $1,999 to $2,499 for stock units and the high-end Macbook Pro with a 2.8 GHz processor for $2,799.

Apple MacBook Pro 2007 Edition — More Power

With a starting lineup that starts with the Intel Core 2 Duo 2.2GHz processor, 2GB RAM and a 120GB hard drive, the Apple MacBook Pro 2007 Edition laptop series looks poised to add another bump in sales to Apple's bottom line. They're fast, they're equipped with highly quality screens and there's more than ever before available for Mac OS X. You could do worse than considering a MacBook Pro 2007 Edition if you need a mobile DTP, graphics, video or general multimedia workstation. Nice machines. Check them out at the Apple Store. We did and we liked what we saw, especially the 2.4GHz 17" model. The NVIDIA 8600M GT graphics are lovely (and fast).

Mac Book Mini Rumour

There are rumours that Apple are working on a Flash drive based Ultraportable called the Macbook Mini by a number of of sites online. At present there are only renderings and concepts online from Mac fans but I can't see why Apple couldn't seriously do this... Visit Keith Wilsons take on this idea, for a possible configuration. I'm more interested in a Mac Tablet with Wacom enabled pen technology, than the ultraportable.