Acer Debuts Its First Ultrabook, the Aspire S3-951

It's finally official: Acer revealed its first Ultrabook to North America today, the Aspire S3-951. The S3-951 is a 13.3-inch, half-inch thin ultraportable notebook weighing just under three pounds. The notebook sports a 20GB solid state boot drive and 320GB 5400rpm hard drive, a second-generation Intel Core i5-2467M processor at 1.6GHz, (2.3GHz with Turbo Boost) Intel HD Graphics 3000, and 4GB DDR3 memory.
Among some of its features include the ability to perform tasks within seconds, such as connect to the Internet in 2.5 seconds with Instant Connect and resume from sleep mode in less than two seconds with Instant On. Acer claims up to six hours of battery life with the S3-951, and up to 50 days of "stand-by time" when the notebook is not in use.

The Aspire S3 has an aluminum and magnesium chassis, weighs 2.98 pounds, and has a half-inch thin design. Its exact dimensions are 12.59 x 8.52 x .51~.68 inches. The display cover carries a fingerprint-free finish in metallic silver. The display itself is 13.3 diagonal inches with a 16:9 aspect ratio and has 1366 x 768 resolution.
The notebook also has an integrated 1.3 HD webcam, Bluetooth 4.0, a 2-in-1 Digital Media Card Reader (SD/MMC), HDMI and VGA, and two USB 2.0 ports.
Pricing and Availability
The Acer Aspire S3-951 will be available in select stores in the US and Canada. It has an MSRP of $899. More Ultrabook models will be announced in the months to come and Acer states that the notebooks will include Intel Core i3 or i7 processor with higher capacity SSDs.
More Specifications and Features:

• Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
• Intel UM67 chipset
• Multi-gesture touchpad
• Chiclet-style keyboard
• Dolby Home Theater v4
• 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi
• 3-cell Lithium polymer battery (3280mAh)

Toshiba Satellite L735-S3220RD Full Review: A Good Deal on a Budget Laptop?

On the bright side, the Toshiba Satellite L735-S3220RD is an entry level notebook with good performance thanks to the Intel Core i5-2410M dual-core processor and enough memory. It also has a fashionable design that's light enough to travel with. On the other hand, the notebook was only able to provide about three and a half hours of battery life and has an all-plastic, somewhat flimsy construction.
Build and Design
Like most of the entry level notebooks in the Toshiba Satellite series, the new 13.3-inch Satellite L735-S3220RD is made almost entirely out of molded plastics and has the familiar rounded clamshell construction on the display lid and around the chassis. This notebook sports a red and black dot matrix design with a glossy Toshiba Fusion finish. The glossy finish embodies the display cover, screen surround, keyboard, and palmrests. To add a touch of style, the area just below the LCD has a bumpy textured feel to it along with the dot matix design. The overall dimensions are 12.95” x 8.7” x 1.10”~1.45”, and it weighs 4.6 pounds without the battery. This notebook is meant to appeal to those who want to have a travel-friendly notebook with a slightly bigger screen size than your typical ultraportable netbook.
All in all, the structure and design of the Toshiba Satellite L735-S3220RD is made to fit the average budget-conscious consumers' needs while on the go. The design is quite stylish, even though the glossiness tends to collect fingerprints easily almost entirely throughout. Our only question now is, how will its build and construction hold up while traveling?
Pressing down with a good amount of pressure in the center of the keyboard resulted in the chassis giving way; this is due to the all-plastic construction. Although it didn't dip down horribly, it was certainly still noticable and might be a problem with users who normally press down hard while typing. The area above the keyboard and beneath the display gave way even more when we pressed down on it, which may cause problems while traveling. Likewise, the display lid flexed too much for comfort and caused "ripples" when bending the corners inward. The palmrests and bottom of the notebook were the only areas with firm construction. Overall, though, the build quality is not what we would call travel-friendly and it is of questionable durability--the notebook could be easily scratched or beaten up if you are a heavy traveler.
The L735 is somewhat upgradeable and getting to the hardware that you can upgrade is simple: remove two screws and pull upward on the access panel and you can remove the Toshiba hard drive and RAM. The L735 has two RAM slots for up to 8GB of memory.
Ports and Features
The ports and features selection on the L735 is considerably above average. It has HDMI, VGA, three USB 2.0 ports, and an 8-in-1 memory card reader (not to mention a Blu-ray player). On the downside, it does not has a USB 3.0 port or eSATA. The memory card reader supports SD, SDHC, SDXC, miniSD, microSD, Memory Stick, Memory Stick PRO, and Multi Media Card formats. Strangely enough, you will not be able to notice the memory card reader unless you lift the notebook up...it's nearly beneath the chassis.

ASUS U36S Full Review: Better Than A MacBook Pro?

The ASUS U36S is a 13.3-inch ultraportable featuring a magnesium-aluminum chassis that weighs just 3.1 lbs. At just 0.75" thin and with over 8 hours of battery life, could this laptop be one of this year’s best buys? Here's a tip: Keep reading if you are thinking about buying a MacBook Pro for Christmas.

 

Build and Design
The ASUS U36S ($899.99) has a rather unsuspecting gray and black exterior. The surfaces of the notebook are made of a magnesium-aluminum alloy which is strong and extraordinarily light. The whole notebook including its large 8-cell battery weighs just 3.11 lbs. Additionally the notebook is exceptionally thin measuring just three quarters of an inch with the lid closed.

The build quality is excellent; the chassis is nearly inflexible and the lid has strong protection from the metal alloy backing. I like how the top of the chassis is molded from a single piece of metal alloy including the keyboard surround. Finally, the anti-glare properties of the metal alloy do not show fingerprints or dust and should resist scratches fairly well. The only area of the build quality that could use improvement is the screen bezel; the glossy plastic is difficult to keep clean as is the glossy screen surface.

Unlike many other metal-clad laptops (the ones with fruit logos on the lids), upgrading the RAM inside the U36S is easily accomplished by removing the user-serviceable panel on the bottom of the chassis. Getting to the hard drive is another matter; the whole chassis needs to be taken apart. This is a shame; I imagine a good number of customers will want to upgrade to an SSD or at least a faster hard drive.

Ports and Features
The ASUS U36S has a standard array of ports for a 13.3-inch notebook including a single USB 3.0 port. It does not have an internal optical drive, an ExpressCard slot, DisplayPort, or eSATA. All picture descriptions are listed from left to right.