July 1 - 9:05am EDT   eMachines today gave a new look to its least expensive ET series desktops along with hardware upgrades to match. Like the recent EL1300 slimline PC, the ET1300 and ET1810 shed the company's previous black-and-silver look for a sleeker, glossy white. They all also make NVIDIA's lower-end graphics standard for slightly faster than usual performance in the category. [full story]

June 26 - 10:55am EDT   Acer on Friday announced it has redesigned its Acer Aspire M5, M3 and X3 Series of consumer desktops, including the high-end Aspire M5800 with its brushed metal chassis, the value-oriented Aspire M3800 and the small form factor Acer Aspire X3810. The Aspire M5800 sports a silver chassis that matches the keyboard, speakers and mouse, with all featuring chrome and dark gray accents. The card reader, audio jacks and USB ports are on behind a hinged door on the front of the chassis. [full story]

June 22 - 9:40am EDT   Acer on Monday added three 16:9 ratio notebooks to its media-centric Gemstone Blue designs that all focus on price over raw performance. The 15.6-inch, LED-backlit Aspire 5739G is the fastest of the trio with a 2.1GHz Core 2 Duo, 4GB of RAM, a 250GB hard drive, an 8X Blu-ray drive and a GeForce GT 130M for video. It comes with a multi-touch trackpad and ships at the end of June for a particularly low $750, making it the least expensive new Blu-ray notebook today. [full story]

June 18 - 2:20pm EDT   Intel is having enough success with its 32 nanometer manufacturing process that it plans to skip certain 45nm processors entirely, tips from within the mainboard industry. Rather than produce Havendale, the 45nm dual-core, desktop processor based on the Nehalem architecture, the company is purportedly ready to skip to its 32nm equivalent, Clarkdale. The new chips would arrive slightly later, in early 2010 instead of late 2009, and would be priced between $60 and $190 depending on clock speed and features. [full story]

June 17 - 4:00pm EDT   Intel's corporate communications manager Bill Calder, in a Wednesday post on the company's corporate blog, informed readers of forthcoming changes in the chipmaker's brand structure. Calder admits Intel's current complex structure has too many platform brands, and product names and brands, which confuses customers. This will start with leading with Intel and what it has done for technology, with Calder pointing to the company's Sponsors of Tomorrow ad campaign. [full story]

June 11 - 8:50am EDT   Intel has quietly a pair of new Consumer Ultra Low Voltage (CULV) processors to its lineup to help drive the costs of ultraportable notebooks downwards, an industry leak claims today. Although it doesn't yet show in Intel's processor list, a 1.3GHz Celeron 740 would be Intel's first dual-core Celeron, keeping the costs low but still taking advantage of modern operating systems; DigiTimes says it would have 1MB of Level 2 cache and an 800MHz front-side bus. A 1.2GHz SU2300, badged either as a Core 2 Duo or Pentium dual-core, would step in with more software features but similar specifications. [full story]

June 9 - 7:45am EDT   HP this morning rolled out a trio of notebook refreshes it's gearing towards students, particularly in price but also in design. The Pavilion dv6 is being given a headlining dv6z Artist Edition 2; the 16-inch notebook has special lid artwork that won a recent MTV design contest and also comes with relatively high specifications for an AMD-based system, including a 2.3GHz Turion X2 Ultra, 4GB of RAM, a 500GB hard drive and a Mobility Radeon HD 4650 for its video. It also gets a bundle of three Corel audiovisual editing apps and will launch on June 10th for $950. [full story]

June 8 - 11:00pm EDT   TriGem's US label Averatec today introduced a new flagship all-in-one PC, the D1200. As the largest model, it's treated as a media center with a 25.5-inch, 1080p display and an internal ATSC TV tuner to pick up over-the-air HD signals. Combined with 802.11n Wi-Fi, the system is treated as a hybrid PC and TV combo that can be used either as a kitchen PC or a combination unit that can handle both roles in a very tight space. [full story]

June 2 - 9:05am EDT   Acer today provided US details of its Timeline notebooks using Intel's new CULV platform for ultraportables. The least expensive of the group is also the largest and starts with the 15.6-inch AS5810TZ-4657; it costs $598 with a 1.3GHz Pentium, 3GB of memory, a 320GB hard drive and an internal DVD burner. It totes the Timeline series' multi-touch trackpad as well as 802.11n Wi-Fi, a webcam and HDMI output. [full story]

June 2 - 7:45am EDT   Intel at Computex today formally outlined the details of its mid-year refresh of its notebook processors, including its Consumer Ultra Low Voltage (CULV) platform. The new platform is intended to bring ultraportable designs to low-cost but still reasonably fast systems and centers on Intel's new GS40 mobile chipset. The technology is a fraction the size of the regular notebook platform, permitting far smaller and thinner systems, but still has a GMA 4500 graphics core capable of full hardware HD video decoding, higher-level 3D features and native HDMI output. [full story]

May 28 - 8:10am EDT   Dell this morning has launched a new, relatively thin-and-light portable that nonetheless promises to be fast. The Studio 14z is the first notebook in the Studio line to drop the optical drive and does so in the name of both size and weight: unlike the 15 or 17, the 14z measures 1.2 inches at its thickest point while also weighing 4.3 pounds. A 14-inch, LED-backlit, 1366x768 display contributes to the thinness as well as to battery life that can run as long as 6.75 hours with an optional 8-cell battery. [full story]

May 25 - 7:55am EDT   Lenovo chose Memorial Day to launch a range of PC updates that include a world-first. The IdeaPad S12 is the first netbook to have an option for NVIDIA's Ion platform and overcomes one of the performance setbacks for netbooks: the advanced graphics can fully decode 1080p HD in hardware and is capable of 3D that would be off limits for Intel-based video. It also helps drive visuals on the newly enlarged 12-inch, 1280x800 display or the (optional) HDMI output. [full story]

May 14 - 4:05pm EDT   The US Federal Trade Commission today dropped its antitrust case against memory producer Rambus. The company had previously been found guilty of abusing its monopoly power but successfully won an appeal in 2008; the FTC's decision to quit follows after its own appeal was rejected in February and the government body considered its options. Officials say the departure comes after they decide it would "not be in the public interest" to pursue Rambus further. [full story]

May 5 - 9:00am EDT   ASUS has fleshed out the details of its designer U series notebooks. Ostensibly based on the shape of a butterfly, the systems share the same tapered shape of the MacBook Air and are also faster, larger versions of the Eee PC 1008HA. The 12-inch U20A, 13.3-inch UX30 and 15.6-inch UX50V are all based on the basic processors expected to be part of Intel's Consumer Ultra Low Voltage (CULV) effort and attempt to bring ultra-thin designs to larger systems, ranging from the entry 1.2GHz Celeron M in the U20A to the 1.3GHz Pentium, 1.4GHz Core 2 Solo and 1.6GHz Core 2 Duo in the UX30 and UX50V. [full story]

April 28 - 10:10am EDT   As promised, Dell today made its Studio One 19 all-in-one desktop available in the US. The 18.5-inch system in US trim starts at $699 and has slightly better performance than the Japanese version launched in March. A 2.5GHz Pentium dual-core, 2GB of RAM, a 320GB hard drive and GeForce 9200 integrated video serve as the baseline in the system, which is more consciously designed as a lower-priced alternative to an iMac. [full story]