VIEW FROM THE LABS
AFTER A MONTH WITH THE COUNTRY’ S FINEST THIN-AND-LIGHT LAPTOPS, STUART ADMITS THAT HE’ S A CONVERT TO THE CAUSE
Iused to think the whole idea of one PC that does it all was the rainbow-coloured unicorn of the IT landscape. Like many more enthusiastic PC users, I tend to bounce between a desktop and a laptop or, in my case, two: a ThinkPad for serious work and a lightweight Chromebook for surfing and browsing.
When the first Ultrabooks arrived I found them very tempting, but were they genuinely practical? Could you really work across multiple apps or documents? Could you sit at a desk and work all day long? Could you see what you were doing when working in Vegas or Lightroom? Could you do all the things that a PC is best at doing?
As a games addict, I also wanted to sneak in a little light gaming. I’m not expecting to play Assassin’s Creed or
Battlefield, but how about Diablo III or the latest Total War?
Now, I know I’m not exactly the average user, but I still had my doubts about whether these ultra-mobile, do-it-all PCs really had the comfort and the chops. I’ve flirted with the idea of buying a Microsoft Surface Laptop or an Asus ZenBook in the past, but I could never pull the trigger and commit.
Now, however, I’m coming round. I’ve fallen big time for the HP Spectre and Dell XPS – if only I had the wonga in my wallet to make the dream happen. I’m seriously impressed by the HP Envy, Asus ZenBook and Acer Spin 7, and the ThinkPad X380 is exactly the kind of business-ready laptop I respect. These are great laptops with large, sharp and more than usable screens. They have comfortable keyboards that feel good to type on, and massive trackpads that even make me think that I could live without a mouse (well, some of the time).
They’re quiet, they don’t get hot, and I’m as comfortable working at my desk, writing this, as I would be surfing on the sofa. These are laptops I could slip in a bag for a trip or client meeting, yet could still bear the brunt of my everyday work at home.
And while I wouldn’t want one as my only games machine, I would be tempted to ditch my desktop, switch my next PC upgrade for an Xbox One X, then hook one of these beauties up through a dock to a keyboard, monitor and mouse, all with just a single USB-C connector. I never thought I’d see one PC that does it all. Perhaps, finally, I have to admit that unicorns do exist.
“I’ve fallen big time for the HP Spectre and the Dell XPS – if only I had the wonga in my wallet to make the dream happen”