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Filed under: Desktops

PC World has branched out its Advent brand, offering the Eco PC through its UK online store, aiming to best the average desktop power consumption by 78 percent. The system is priced at just under what you might expect to pay for a slightly dusty super computer — £599.99 (or about $1100) — but the specs don’t quite match up: 1.5GHz Core 2 Duo T5250 CPU, 2GB RAM, 160GB hard drive, 802.11b/g, and Vista Home Premium onboard. The environmentally-friendly PC is made from recycled materials, so don’t be surprised if it starts to reek of old banana peels after a while.

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Source: Stephanie Patterson

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Filed under: Desktops

If you’ll recall, we already witnessed a pre-production Wolfdale CPU outpace its competition back in August of last year, but the real deal has finally arrived. Over at Hot Hardware, the folks were able to crack open a retail Core 2 Duo E8500 processor, which comes in at 3.16GHz and features 6MB of L2 cache, a 1,333MHz FSB speed and is built on 45-nanometer technology. When put to the test, reviewers found this luscious piece of silicon to be quite the performer, noting that it was probably a better choice for gamers than a low-end quad-core chip. Still, with an expected price of just under three bills, it wasn’t exactly seen as the greatest of values, but if you’ve got the coin and happen to fit the market, the “Recommended” badge tells you everything you need to know.

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Source: Darren Murph

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Filed under: Desktops, Laptops

Oh, Merom. It felt like just yesterday that we were shaking our heads in disappointment after reading lackluster reviews and wondering when you’d finally make an appearance in Apple’s MacBook Pro. Thankfully, times change, and with Intel’s mobile Penryn stealing all the limelight of late, we ’spose it’s about time the Merom lineup cashed out its 401(k) and sailed off to Maui. According to a PCN (product change notification) from the chip maker, the Core 2 Duo T7200, T7600, T5500, T5600 and LV L7200 are being flagged for discontinuation along with the less potent Celeron M 520 and 530. Granted, the whole family will still be available to ship until sometime in 2009, but for us, it’s on to bigger smaller and faster things. [Warning: PDF read link]

[Via TGDaily, image courtesy of Gutenberg]

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Source: Darren Murph

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Filed under: Laptops

Just in case Fujitsu’s colorful new line of LOOX U50XNs weren’t enough for ya, the outfit is also giving a vivid facelift to its LOOX T70XN. This ultraportable sports a 10.6-inch LED-backlit display, a 1.2GHz Core 2 Duo U7600 processor, up to 2GB of DDR2 RAM, between 80GB and 100GB of hard drive space, and Intel’s GMA950 graphics set. Moreover, this bad boy can get up to 13.8-hours of battery life when hooked up with optional cells, and connectivity shouldn’t be an issue considering the built-in WiFi, Bluetooth, 56k modem, 4-pin FireWire, twin USB 2.0 sockets, multicard reader, and audio / in outs. This well-spec’d little machine can be had right now for around $2,650 depending on options, but it’s the nine color choices that are likely to give you the most pause when ordering.

[Via AkihabaraNews]

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Source: Darren Murph

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Filed under: Laptops

If you’ve been waiting patiently on Dell’s monster of a laptop, the 17-inch, Santa Rosa-based behemoth known as the Precision M6300, feel free to get really excited. Very soon, all of you business boys and girls will be able to get your hands on the company’s new enterprise-centric laptop (a follow up to the M90), that rocks a Core 2 Duo X7900 CPU (2.8GHz with an 800MHz FSB), Nvidia’s Quadro FX 1600M graphics chipset, up to 4GB of RAM, and a 120GB or 200GB hard drive. Dell also plans to make a SanDisk 32GB SSD available for the road-ready laptop, and is offering a DVD, DVD-RW, or Blu-ray writable optical drive. Of course, the M6300 has all the regular bells and whistles, like 802.11a/g/n, Bluetooth 2.0, DVI, Firewire, plus a not-so-usual optional AT&T HSDPA card. You can also choose between XP, Vista, or RedHat Linux for the OS. No word on price of availability, though it appears these will be landing sometime this month.

[Via DailyTech]

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Source: Joshua Topolsky

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Filed under: Desktops, Laptops

According to Intel, your computer-security fears will be a thing of the distant past thanks to its latest vPro technology update. Apparently, the new safe-guarding apparatus is a combination of the company’s Core 2 Duo processors and the Q35 Express chipset, in addition to several “technology innovations” that the chipmaker says will fortify business-centric systems against “software-based attacks,” as well as viruses and the ominously vague “other threats.” New components of the technology include Intel’s Trusted Execution Technology (TXT, AKA LaGrande), which isolates assigned memory and protects it from access via unauthorized software, and improved system defense filters, which can identify a larger number of threats in network traffic. “Today, the business desktop PC just got more secure,” says a company spokesperson, though for our system “protection” we’re sticking to NoDoz and nunchucks.

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Source: Joshua Topolsky

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Filed under: Desktops

Nah, it’s not surprising that yet another company is tacking an “i” onto its product line and dousing each unit in glossy white, and Mouse Computer’s latest lineup of desktops certainly fits the aforementioned mold. Arriving in both micro tower and slimline models, these new machines offer up a multitude of hardware options including a number of Intel Core 2 Duo processors, a dual-layer DVD writer, up to 2GB of RAM, a 15-in-1 flash card reader, and NVIDIA’s 256MB GeForce 8500 GT (or the 8400GS in the slim model). Additionally, the skinnier sibling (seen after the break) can be equipped with up to 250GB of SATA hard drive space while the micro machine can house 320GB of capacity. Each model in the new i-Friend series looks to be on sale now, and prices will range from ¥79,800 ($676) to ¥129,800 ($1,100) depending on how you configure.

[Via Impress]Continue reading Mouse Computer intros glossy white i-Friend desktops

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Source: Darren Murph

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Filed under: Desktops

Although we certainly noticed that Apple’s latest iMac felt snappy enough, the folks over at Primate Labs have cranked out a few numbers for the data freaks in the crowd to chew on. Granted, these benchmarks do not include the Core 2 Extreme iMac nor are they the most complete set of tests we’ve ever seen, but they do seem to give those on the fence a decent look at what level of performance increases they’ll be dealing with. Put simply, the new 2.4GHz 24-inch iMac posted “modest gains” across the board compared to the previous iterations that clocked in at 2.33GHz / 2.16GHz, and while the results don’t seem earth-shattering, those who rely on “memory-intensive applications (like Aperture or Photoshop)” would likely benefit most from the improved “integer, floating point. and memory / stream performance.” As you’d expect, the full skinny on the test results await you in the read link.

[Via AppleInsider]

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Source: Darren Murph

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