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HP and the great glass ultrabook: Envy 14 Spectre, hands-on

It takes a lot to stand out in the crowded world of ultrabooks, but HP is betting that a liberal dose of Gorilla Glass will do the trick.

The newly announced HP Spectre is the most glass-covered laptop we've ever seen. Is that a good thing? We've seen glass-heavy smartphones like the iPhone 4, but not so much in laptops...until now. At CES 2012, we got a good close-up look at HP's bold Envy redesign.

The Spectre is HP's first consumer-oriented ultrabook (the HP Folio 13 released last year was technically HP's first ultrabook, … Read more

Hands-on with the Samsung Series 5 Ultra: Like a Series 9, but affordable

For those who have been craving a more affordable Samsung ultrabook, here's your savior: the Series 5 Ultra.

Last year, the Samsung Series 9 nearly stole the show as one of the must-have laptops at CES, but the thin 13-incher--an ultrabook before the name ultrabook was coined--cost more than a MacBook Air.

This year, the Series 9 survives, in an even sleeker yet still expensive iteration. The Series 5 Ultra, which comes in both 13 and 14-inch varieties, starts at $899. That's the price we've come to expect from a Windows ultrabook, and surprisingly enough, the Series 5 Ultra looks like it hasn't made too many concessions to get there.… Read more

Toshiba teases a 14-inch ultrabook prototype, we go hands-on

LAS VEGAS--While Toshiba usually has a flood of new laptops every year, the company surprised us this CES by highlighting a single model.

Even more unusual, instead of a ready-to-ship product, it is a still-unnamed 14-inch ultrabook prototype. The unit we saw had a Satellite logo on it, rather than the Portege branding we saw in last year's Z835 (a 13-inch ultrabook currently available for a rock-bottom $799).

Otherwise, it looked very similar, with Toshiba's standard business/consumer crossover look of a gray brushed-metal lid, rounded corners, and an inset screen with a too-thick black plastic bezel.

The keyboard was a standard island-style design, with Toshiba's custom row of page navigation keys along the far right side. We haven't had a chance to use it more than briefly, but the large clickpad looked interesting, with small left and right clickzone indicators etched into it. … Read more

Lenovo ultrabooks add colors, larger hard drives, and a 14-inch version

LAS VEGAS--Ultrabooks are everywhere here at CES 2012. More importantly, a new class of ultrabook has emerged: the 14-incher.

Last year's Lenovo IdeaPad U300s was one of our favorites in an early first wave of ultrabooks. The new IdeaPad U310 and U410 alter the equation somewhat with the addition of standard hard drives instead of solid-state drives (SSDs), but that extra storage option could be exactly what attracts some buyers who might otherwise be turned off by the limitations of lower-capacity flash storage.… Read more

Fix faces with Cosmetic Guide Lite

Cosmetic Guide Lite cosmetically corrects portraits, especially full-face portraits, with graphics editing tools instead of makeup. The Lite version is a freeware release of a premium tool. Unfortunately, it contains few of the cosmetic-specific features of the paid version, making it of little use beyond demonstrating the paid tool's capabilities with video demonstrations.

Cosmetic Guide Lite is essentially an image editor, like Photoshop and many others, but with reduced and simplified features. The Lite version includes the standard Smudge, Brush, Crop, Resize, and Text tools, as well as the Smart Patch and Bleach Teeth tools from the premium version. … Read more

Test multiple sites with Download Speed Test

We've seen plenty of Internet bandwidth speed tests, both the online and standalone kind. Download Speed Test from AB-Tools.com is a standalone freeware speed test, which means it tests your bandwidth from your PC instead of from a Web site. This approach has advantages, such as letting you choose any download for your speed test. Download Speed Test also lets you run continuous tests, yielding a better average score over time.

Download Speed Test's twin automotive-style gauges display the current and average download speed. A line graph beneath the dials displays download times graphically, and the lower … Read more

Best Buy, Verizon, Dell launch Cyber Monday deals

Best Buy, Amazon, Verizon, and Dell launched Cyber Monday deals featuring discounted laptops, tablets, and smartphones.

Best Buy is calling its sale "Cyber Week" and puts Lenovo, Hewlett-Packard, and Toshiba laptops at the top of the list on its launch page. All three come with Windows 7 Home Premium.

Best Buy laptops listed on Cyber Week page:

Lenovo, $299.99: Model: 1450ABU. 15.6-inch LED-backlit display, AMD dual-core E-450 accelerated processor, 4GB memory, 320GB hard disk drive, and optical drive. HP Pavilion, $349.99: Model: g4-1229dx. 14-inch LED-backlit display, Intel dual-core "Sandy Bridge" Pentium B950 processor, 4GB memory, 500GB hard drive, and optical drive. Toshiba - Satellite Laptop, $379.99: Model: C655-S5305. 15.6" LED-backlit display, Intel Sandy Bridge Core i3-2330M processor (2.2GHz), 4GB memory, 320GB hard drive, and optical drive.

Run a thorough inspection of your PC with Computer MOT

A MOT test is a U.K. Ministry of Transport vehicle inspection. It's thorough, so any rigorous checkup is apt to be called a "MOT test." Computer MOT from Dizzy Solutions is a free utility that automatically cleans your system, scans it for spyware and adware, and performs a variety of maintenance and tune-up operations. It uses two of the most-popular freeware utilities, CCleaner and Spybot, plus built-in Windows utilities like the disk defragmentation tool and CheckDisk. And when we say automatic, we mean "automatic" as in "no manual options" and no stopping … Read more

Embiggen menus with Moo0 WindowMenuPlus

When you open a Windows program like Notepad or Windows Update, the program's name appears in the window's title bar. Right-clicking the tile bar calls up the system window menu, which accesses commands such as Minimize, Maximize, and Close. Moo0 WindowMenuPlus is a simple tool that can add extra entries to the system window menu and taskbar button, everything from Keep on Top to Kill Process. It's easy to use and totally free.

When it's active, WindowMenuPlus lives in the system tray, also known as the notification area. Its menu accesses entries labeled Turn On, Show/… Read more

Dell XPS 14z review: Thin is a state of mind

The latest generation of Dell XPS laptops, with the "z" designation, kicked off with the 15-inch XPS 15z. Dell claimed that laptop was the world's thinnest 15-inch laptop (Windows laptop, that is), and the new 14-inch XPS 14z makes a similar claim, again with a few asterisks to keep in mind. With the XPS 14z, Dell says that this is the "thinnest fully featured laptop on the planet." What does that mean?

According to Dell, it's a laptop with an internal optical drive and discrete graphics. More impressively, this is a 14-inch laptop screen in a body with the smaller footprint of a 13-inch laptop. We like more screen in less body, but it also has one unfortunate side effect. … Read more