No hot crotch burns: Acer launches 3810T, 4810T, 5810T laptops

If you've ever used a laptop on your lap -- yeah, we know, madness -- and found your nether regions a little too toasty for comfort, you'll appreciate Acer's latest line. The Timeline series uses Intel's new Laminar Wall Jet technology, which aims to keep a system's chassis much cooler during use by firing cool air along the inner wall.

Cooler gonads on the train? Now there's a dream Martin Luther King never had. The 13.3-inch, 14-inch and 15.6-inch Timeline systems -- 3810T, 4810T and 5810T, respectively -- incorporate multi-touch trackpads for enhanced one-handed fingering, 16:9 aspect ratio LED-backlit displays, Intel Core 2 Duo processors, and up to 500GB of hard disk space (or a 64GB solid-state drive shouldst thou requireth).

But the other selling point of these full-size laptops is their battery performance -- 8 to 10 hours, says Acer, according to our New York CNET colleague Dan Ackerman. But as Dan points out, these figures are often radically overstated when compared to real-world use. Our full review will shed light on all this.

Our hopes are pinned on a summer release, with UK prices to be confirmed closer to the time. But if the top-end US price of $899 (£610) is anything to go by, the 'we're-nuts-about-cooler-balls' Timeline systems should be pretty compelling systems.