![]() You won't mistake it for a deluxe workstation or a gaming rig, but as budget laptops go, it's kind of a big deal if you need the biggest screen possible but don't have the room for a desktop monitor. The VivoBook's seven-hour battery life is disappointing, but 17.3-inch laptops are rarely seen hauled around campus (and seven hours is enough to get through two or three classes in a day if you do decide to take it with you). Part of its low price comes from an AMD Ryzen 3 processor that's a couple of generations older than the latest and greatest, but its performance is perfectly adequate for everyday apps, and its matte-finish screen kills glare without killing color brilliance. The Asus VivoBook 17 M712 not only weighs less than most machines its size-five pounds, which may be a chore to carry to class but sure beats the seven- and eight-pounders we've seen-but costs considerably less, with our test unit only $550 at Amazon. ![]() ![]() Speaking of giving your eyes a break, there's no mainstream laptop display larger than 17.3 inches diagonally. The MacBook Air remains a great grab-and-go productivity partner for almost any around-campus computing task short of hardcore gaming. Who It's ForĪpple still insists touch screens are only for tablets and phones, but otherwise it's hard to find fault with the system that invented the ultraportable category. Weighing a trim 2.8 pounds, it offers a sharp 13.3-inch Retina display elegant unibody metal construction in Space Gray, Gold, or Silver one of the best keyboards and arguably the best touchpad on any laptop snappy performance and unbeatable integration with the iPhone and phenomenal battery life (29 hours in our video-playback test). But the M1 version of Apple's lightest portable is still a highly capable, lovable laptop for $999. To get the obvious out of the way, the new-for-2022 MacBook Air with Apple's more powerful M2 processor is a faster, more desirable machine if you can swing its $1,199 starting price or a costlier upscale configuration, don't look back.
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February 2023
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