If CES last year was dominated by tablets, CES 2012 has been the year of the ultrabook. Intel’s ultraportable notebook trademark had already picked up late in 2011, but it’s the Consumer Electronics Show this week where the big guns like Dell and Samsung came out to give it some real momentum. If Intel has its way, one of the following machines will be lightly weighing on your shoulder over the next few months.
Intel has detailed its push to get x86 processors inside next-gen smartphones, confirming deals with both Lenovo and Motorola Mobility to use its Atom Z2460 chip. Motorola will "deliver smartphones and tablets based on Intel's Atom processor to consumers and businesses," according to CEO Sanjay Jha, while Intel has already demonstrated its Lenovo Racer-A reference design to SlashGear earlier at CES.
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"The ultrabook is the new ghetto blaster" claims will.i.am, proving both that CES is never short of bizarre hyperbole and that Intel's "Director of Creative Innovation" can be always relied on to make nonsensical soundbites. Speaking on stage at Intel's keynote at the tech show, will.i.am revealed that he has been carrying an ultrabook - Intel's new take on the ultraportable segment - for some time now, using it for collaborative music creation with colleagues and fans.
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This week we got the opportunity to sit down with HP and Project Runway Season 9's winning designer Anya Ayoung Chee to speak about her win of the Intel & HP design challenge. We were at Showstoppers CES 2012 and spoke about no less than how technology made the task of being a modern day designer a wholly enjoyable one - textiles to integrated media, all of it sits at the heart of her interests. For the HP design challenge she spoke on how the technology the contestants needed to use was very user friendly and made her taking part in the challenge a positive one - an organic feel to the whole situation made for, again, a positive experience from start to finish. Social media, Chee noted, is a part of her every day life, Twitter especially, she connecting with her fan base in a way that designers of the past never had the opportunity to.
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Ultrabooks are sweeping the board at CES 2012, and Dell isn’t prepared to be left out: the company has revealed the Dell XPS 13, a new 18mm ultraportable that fits a 13.3-inch display into a 12-inch form-factor. Running either Core i5 2467M or i7 2637M dual-core processors, paired with 4GB of memory and either 128GB or 256GB SSDs, the XPS 13 measures just 12.4 x 8.1 x 0.24-0.71 inches and 2.99 pounds despite offering up to 8hrs battery life. We caught up with Dell last week to find out why they reckon the XPS 13 is the best ultrabook around.
Razer has delivered on its gaming tablet tease, revealing Project Fiona at CES today. A sub-$1,000 Windows 8 slate that could potentially launch in Q4 2012, Project Fiona packs a third-gen Core i7 Ivy Bridge processor and a hybrid user interface with a pair of integrated game controllers with analog sticks, each of which offers force feedback.
Intel showed off a bevvy of Ultrabooks at its press event, but most of them we'd either handled or reviewed before. Not so with the LG Super Ultrabook Z330, one of the manufacturer's first ultrabook models. We took some time to gather a few impressions and nice photos for all the fans of tiny, speedy laptop out there.
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Intel expanded on its Ultrabook platform at its CES press conference, focusing on a better user experience. With a tacit promise for faster CPU performance, longer battery life and lower prices on the platform going forward, representatives were especially excited for the Turbo mode for CPUs. This allows for a boost in performance, and a not inconsiderable bump for gaming prowess as well.
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Intel seemed most impressed at how compact the new Ultrabooks are compared to the previous models. Closed, the original Ultrabook was 1.26 inches thick, whereas the new generation will only come out to 17.8 millimeters. The barebones/transparent view below shows how the all the hardware has slimmed down.
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The eye-popping Nikiski wasn't the only new form factor that Intel explored in its CES press conference. It also showed off an Ultrabook design called the Slider that's not unlike a few of the smartphones and tablets we've seen in the last few years. Like a QWERTY smartphone, it hides a full keyboard beneath a sliding screen, running on standard x86 hardware and low-voltage chips.
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There are 75+ designs of the Ultrabook already, and now Intel is working with manufacturers to present multiple hybrid/touch designs. From the demonstration, the touchscreens within the Intel were extremely fluid - and didn't skip a beat. We've all been waiting for manufacturers to incorporate touchscreen technology into their hardware, and the unveiling wasn't too surprising.
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So far, Intel Ultrabooks have been largely limited to 13" models. But as we're seeing with new products from Acer, Lenovo and others that break the top of the size barrier. While bragging about thinner, lighter and more efficient component, a representative said that they'll be focusing on a broader market, encompassing more standard screen sizes.
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