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Engadget's Holiday Gift Guide: Desktops
Welcome to the Engadget Holiday Gift Guide! The team here is well aware of the heartbreaking difficulties of the seasonal shopping experience, and we want to help you sort through the trash and come up with the treasures this year. Below is today's bevy of hand curated picks, and you can head back to the Gift Guide hub to see the rest of the product guides as they're added throughout the holiday season. Let's face it, not everyone needs (or wants) to carry their computer around on the daily routine. Sacrificing portability can have its advantages -- and while nettops and all-in-one PCs have become a much more dominant force this year, the traditional, highly upgradeable desktop tower is still the reigning bang-for-the-buck champ. Just make sure your certain special someone has enough desk real estate for whatever potentially-enormous chassis you decide to take home and wrap. %Gallery-80501%
Lenovo gets official with Win7-powered IdeaPad and IdeaCentre machines
Lenovo already got official with a couple of its Windows 7-powered machines last week, but it looks like the rest of the crop is landing today. Of course, we've already seen the 11.6-inch IdeaPad U150 and 15.6-inch U550 pop up in various corners of the globe this month, and the IdeaPad U350 has been around since the summer. That said, we'll take the OS refresh and minor spec bumps any day of the week (along with new colors on the S10-2), and that's exactly what we're getting. We'll spare you the rehash (it's all there in the read link if you need a refresher), but over on the desktop front, we're pretty stoked about the stylish (and previously rumored) all-in-one IdeaCentre B500. Packing a Core 2 Quad CPU, 1TB of HDD space, up to 8GB of DDR3 RAM and a 23-inch LCD, this thing may actually perform fairly well in tasks more strenuous than checking email. The business-minded K300 and bargain-priced H230 ($299 starting point) are less thrilling from a hardware perspective, but they'll certainly fit their respective molds quite well. The whole lot should be available to order soon directly from Lenovo, and there's bound to be plenty of options for those not content with base configurations. %Gallery-76494%
Lenovo Ion-powered IdeaCenter Q110 nettop on sale now
The slow wave of NVIDIA Ion-based machines continues to wash in -- as expected, the Lenovo Q110 nettop is now on sale. We'd actually wait another couple weeks to score this rig with Windows 7 preloaded, but if you're into Vista you can grab it right now for $399 with 2GB of RAM and a 160GB drive and take a free upgrade disc when it's available. Anyone gonna throw down?[Via Netbooked]
Lenovo teases IdeaCentre Q100 / Q110 nettops, D400 home server
There's not a lot to go on here, but Lenovo's official Twitter account posted pictures of two products that are purportedly being revealed in more detail later this week. The IdeaCentre Q100 / Q110 nettops are said to be "some of the thinnest nettops in the world," and while the teaser image is certainly a looker, for better and for worse we can already smell the Atom processor from here. Also on the menu is the IdeaCentre D400, the company's first home server. We Got Served did a little digging, and as it turns out, the D400 was released in Asia at the beginning of this month, with four hot swappable bays, four USB ports, and an eSATA port. It'd be nice to know when this week Lenovo was planning to lift the veil of secrecy, but at least we won't be worrying about it come Saturday. [Via ThinkPad; thanks, Mark] Read - Q100 / Q110 nettops Read - D400 home server Read - More details on the D400
Lenovo IdeaCentre C300 unboxing and hands-on
Large screen nettops are somewhat of a mystery to us. Lenovo's latest, the all-in-one IdeaCentre C300, is certainly a looker on the outside, but the beauty of that screen real estate is hampered by a 1.6GHz Atom processor / integrated graphics unable to handle our internet streaming needs -- Hulu, Pandora, and Netflix were all but a wash. Still, it's pretty light and sturdy, and when powered on absolutely quiet and cool -- we watched four hours of a DVD with a minimum of stutter and little to no heat or machine noise. We're still putting it through the paces, but in the meantime, feel free to live vicariously through our unboxing in the gallery below!
Lenovo IdeaCentre A600 review roundup
We expected these to launch sometime in late March or early April, but it looks like Lenovo's IdeaCentre A600 is just now started to roll out, and along with it a handful of reviews. There seems to be a consensus that this all-in-one's a really good bang for the buck, especially with the TV tuner and somewhat useful remote / gyroscope controller / VoIP handset. Performance-wise, the Intel Core 2 Duo / ATI Mobility Radio HD3650 powered device is good but nothing worth writing home about. Boing Boing Gadgets suggests it won't match the latest iMac at gaming. While the body's well built and sturdy, the jury's still out on the glossy screen and that front "bump" of sorts -- you should also be warned that there's a rather hefty power brick that comes along with the PC. As with all AIO's, if a 21.5-inch screen isn't large enough, there isn't much you can do about it. If, however, the specs and features are just what you're looking for, you'll be happy to hear the company's turned those bullet points into a well-oiled machine. But don't take our word for it, hit up the read links below for more in-depth critiques. Read - Computer Shopper Read - Boing Boing Gadgets Read - Desktop Review
Lenovo and Acer rumored to be prepping new all-in-one PCs
In recent months, we've seen both Lenovo and Acer push out rather stylish all-in-one PCs. Clearly, both firms are hot to trot for the form factor, with DigiTimes reporting that the duo has big plans for future expansion in the area. Specifically, Lenovo is rumored to launch an entry-level 20-inch unit (C300) next month, a C100 and quad-core B500 in August and an ultrathin A300 variant in October. Meanwhile, Acer is said to be preparing an 18.5-inch model produced by Wistron, though there's no indication if it's actually different from that eMachines EZ1600 we heard about earlier this month. Look out, tower -- the end is nigh. (Just kidding, we only wanted to see your reaction.)
Lenovo's IdeaCentre A600 now available to order, should ship soon
Lenovo's breaking some serious molds with the IdeaCentre A600, and if you've been waiting anxiously ever since we got up close and personal with one back at CES, the patience has (nearly) paid off. As of now (like, right this very moment in time), three variants of the all-black machine are up for ordering, with base prices sitting at $699.99, $799.99 and $999.99. They each show that shipping won't happen for another few weeks, but we'll bet Lenovo's just being conservative.
Lenovo trots out new trifecta of unexciting desktops
Forgive us, but we just can't get jazzed about a trio of Lenovo desktops that offer up nothing innovative whatsoever. Sure, the IdeaCentre K220 may pack a Core 2 Quad CPU, upwards of 4GB of DDR3 RAM and an optional Blu-ray drive, but that's nothing we couldn't slap together ourselves in a few minutes. The K230 ups the ante a bit with room for 8GB of memory and Windows Vista 64-bit, while the lower-end H200 (shown above) becomes Lenovo's first desktop with an Atom under the hood. All three machines will be available this month starting at $449, $499 and $399.99 (bundled with the ThinkVision L195 monitor), in order of mention.[Via InformationWeek]
Lenovo All-in-One IdeaCentre A600 hands-on
We just got a chance to check out Lenovo's All-in-One IdeaCentre A600, featuring the motion-based remote control that doubles as a VoIP handset. Three minutes into the tennis game, we managed to toss the remote into an adjacent HDTV and pulled our shoulder out of alignment. We couldn't call for help -- the VoIP wasn't functional -- but we did manage to snap some screens with our good arm. %Gallery-40969%
Lenovo IdeaCentre A600 All-in-One Desktop unleashed
Lenovo's just announced their newest desktop - the IdeaCentre A600 - for all to wonder at. This puppy's got a 21.5-inch (1920x1080) HD panel with a 16:9 aspect ratio, and the PC packs a choice of Intel Core 2 Duo CPUs, optional ATI Radeon graphics, 4GB of DDR3 RAM, and an up to 1TB hard drive. Optional to the system is a remote control which can also be used as a game controller, a VOIP handset to make and receive calls, and as an air mouse -- that's a lot of functions! The A600 is expected to roll out in March with a starting price of $999. Check out the full press release after the break.
Lenovo gets official with IdeaCentre K210 desktop
We heard that Lenovo was shuffling its lineup a bit earlier this month, and sure enough, that IdeaCentre brand is getting its 15 minutes today courtesy of a fresh press release. Hailed as the outfit's "global entry into the consumer desktop market outside of China," the IdeaCentre K210 comes with a variety of hardware choices including Intel's Core 2 Quad processors, up to 3GB of DDR2 RAM, a GMA X3100 integrated graphics set (or a 512MB ATI Radeon 2600 XT), optional Blu-ray drive, gigabit Ethernet, a 16-in-1 multicard reader and an anti-microbial keyboard that comically stands out more than it was likely intended to. Nevertheless, the tower also includes VeriFace facial recognition technology that enables users to log in by simply gazing into the webcam; if it performs anywhere nearly as poorly as it did on our U110 review unit, however, we'd recommend switching the feature off and logging in as usual. Units are available now from a variety of e-tailers starting at $379 (after mail-in rebate).
Lenovo kills off 3000 line, folds Y Series into IdeaPad family, K Series into IdeaCentre
This probably won't be ruining anybody's day, but if you were hoping to buy a Lenovo laptop with 3000 scrawled somewhere on it, you're pretty much out of luck. Lenovo has apparently killed off the entirety of its budget-friendly 3000 lineups, both laptop and desktop. The Y Series 3000 laptops are now gone in place Y710 and 7510 Series IdeaPads, and the fugly old 3000 K100 desktops gone, with only K210 IdeaCentre desktops available in their place. Not earth-shattering, but the IdeaPad and IdeaCentre brands are already off to a strong start, with much better design than the 3000 series, but similarly low prices. And besides, we suppose they needed all those excess 0's for the Olympics. You know, for the rings. No? You always hate our jokes. Die in a fire.[Thanks, Ian]
