macbook

Apple announced the new iPad yesterday in San Francisco, and with the reactions ranging from disappointment up to stores already running out of stock, Ty Pendlebury joins us today to give his take on the amped-up display, the updated nomenclature, and a rundown of the new iOS 5.1 features.

We'll also talk about Netflix coming out of your cable box, a new Sim City announcement, and a quick review of The Simpsons: Tapped Out.… Read more

Timbuk2 makes some interesting laptop and tablet cases, and I thought it was worth highlighting the Crater laptop sleeve, which hit the market a few months back and is ostensibly designed for Apple's MacBook Air models but can also be used with slim Windows ultrabooks.

It has a rubbery, meshlike feel to it, and is very lightweight (I've used it for the last week with an 11-inch Macbook Air). The key feature is that if you hold it up to the light (or just look at it), you'll notice that it has lots of little perforations or &… Read more

Dell's first ultrabook, the XPS 13, is now available. And it's attracting a lot of attention as one of Dell's best laptop designs to date.

The XPS 13 boasts solid specs for the base $999 configuration, is priced well below the MacBook Air, uses a smaller footprint than 13-inch competitors, and taps carbon fiber materials in the chassis to keep the weight below three pounds.

And Dell will announce Tuesday that it is seeing lots of demand already. "We're seeing strong consumer and business demand for the new XPS 13," said Michael Tatelman, Dell Vice President and General Manager of Americas Consumer, in a statement to be released Tuesday.

The XPS 13 wil also be sold at Best Buy from Tuesday.

Starting at $999.99, it comes -- at that price -- with a 13.3-inch/300-nit/1,366x768 display squeezed into a 12-inch chassis (roughly), an Intel Core i5-2467M processor, Intel HD Graphics 3000, a 128GB solid-state drive, 4GB of memory, backlit keyboard, and Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit. It is 0.71 inches at its thickest point.

Other standard features include a 47WHr 6-cell battery (built into the laptop and not replaceable by the customer) rated at a maximum of over eight hours, one USB 3.0 port, one USB 2.0, mini Display-Port, 1.3-megapixel Webcam, and dual-array digital microphones. … Read more

Apple is working on a laptop with an internally-designed chip, a project that might pose a serious risk to Intel, an analyst said today in a research note.

"We have numerous datapoints that Apple's processor design group is working on an ARM-based product for its notebook line. Whether or not it goes into production remains to be seen, but it is the highest probability risk to Intel from the ARM camp in the PC market," said Piper Jaffray analyst Gus Richard in a research note today.

U.K.-based ARM provides the basic design for chips that … Read more

I'm not really sure who uses a business laptop. Now that ultrabooks are here and spreading, I'm even less sure.

Case in point: the HP Folio 13.

Here at the CNET offices, I've seen more and more people asking (and hoping) for MacBook Airs. Apple's never had a problem with differentiating between business and personal computers: It simply make products, period. Our IT department allows Apple computers, but they're not technically business laptops. No one seems to mind.

On the Windows side of things, there's been a bit of a divide between some business-targeted laptops--some with crypto-enabled TPM, or Trusted Platform Module chips, others with Intel's vPro technology--and "consumer" computers. That divide is old-fashioned. … Read more

MacFixIt Answers is a feature in which we answer questions e-mailed in by our readers.

This week people wrote in with questions on text highlight color turning gray, memory running low on a Macbook system, an optical drive no longer reading some discs, and iTunes unable to locate original song files. We continually answer e-mail questions, and though we present answers here, we welcome alternative approaches and views from readers and encourage you to post your suggestions in the comments.

Question: Text highlight color turning gray MacFixIt reader Emory asks:

We discuss our personal tech hits and misses of 2011; what we loved, hated and was overrated. Also, Scott and Ty weigh in on what will most likely be going on at CES 2012; the who, the what, and the why.

… Read more

HP open sources WebOS as the fire sale on the TouchPad burns out in minutes; Apple announces that 100 million apps have been downloaded from the Mac App Store; and Amazon promises a software update to the Kindle Fire to alleviate some of the user interface issues.

Links from Monday's episode of Loaded:

Best Buy is doing its part to make MacBooks more affordable--and also offering decent deals on Windows laptops.

11.6-inch MacBook Air: In the shadow of Apple's Black Friday deals, Best Buy is striving to stand out with better deals. And it's succeeding in some cases. For instance, the retailer is selling the 11.6-inch MacBook Air with an Intel Core i5 chip, 2GB Memory, and 64GB solid-state drive (model: MC968LL/A) for $849--that's about $50 less than Apple's Black Friday $898 sale price. (And note that MacMall has been selling a 2010 11.6-inch MacBook Air for $799.)… Read more