Finally! Microsoft's second generation Pro tablet is here, the Surface Pro 2. Why are we excited? There was much we loved about Redmond's diminutive powerhouse, but battery life was abysmal, making it a less than ideal 10.6" partner on the go. The second generation Microsoft Surface Pro 2 has much better battery life thanks to the fourth generation Intel Haswell Core i5-4200U. Haswell sips power rather than guzzles, and the result is nearly doubled battery life that's averaged 7 hours for us without draconian power savings.

For those of you who are still understandably confused by the Surface lineup, the Surface Pro 2 runs full Windows 8.1 Pro 64 bit and it can handle anything that a contemporary Ultrabook can do. You can install Photoshop CS or CC, Skyrim and USB drivers meant for Windows. The 1.6GHz Core i5 dual core CPU with Turbo Boost to 2.3GHz means Surface Pro 2 is a powerful laptop, though it happens to look like a tablet. The Pro 2 is available with 4 or 8 gigs of dual channel DDR3L RAM, and your choice of 64, 128, 256 and 512 gig mSATA SSD drives. The price starts at $899, and the keyboard is still an optional accessory.

Design-wise nothing has changed, and that's fine by us because the first gen Surface Pro was a unique and cool looking piece of hardware. The VaporMg metal casing, angled sides and integrated kickstand are here. The kickstand now has two positions, one good for desks and the other for laps and low tables. The fan is quieter and runs less often. Microsoft released the Touch Cover 2 and Type Cover 2 with improvements as well: both are backlit and easier to type on, particularly the Touch Cover 2 (the original Touch Cover sometimes tried our patience). Windows 8.1 Pro is pre-loaded with several improvements, including better handling of display scaling and side-by-side Metro window views.

What's the same? It still weighs 2 pounds and is 0.53" thick. The display is still full HD 1920 x 1080, and that suits us fine since 10.6" is too small for higher resolutions in desktop mode. Microsoft claims the display has a much wider color gamut, though in our tests, we wouldn't call it a huge difference. That said, it's a lovely display and it still comes with the Wacom digitizer and pen that's perfect for taking notes and doing art. You still get one USB 3.0 port, a mini DisplayPort, stereo speakers and a 3.5mm combo audio jack. The battery remains 42 Wh, and it's sealed inside. It has the same Marvell 350N WiFi 802.11n dual band wireless (sorry, no WiDi wireless display) and Bluetooth 4.0.

The design and color haven't changed from the previous model, so we won't go over that again in detail. Suffice to say this is a very well made machine with a sexy look and a durable metal casing.

Skip this if you read the section heading and said "duh", this is for our computing novices. Apart from the obvious price difference (or not since a 128 gig iPad with WiFi and 4G costs near $1,000), some folks can't tell an iPad from an Android or Windows tablet. Even more complicated is that you can buy a budget priced Intel Atom Windows 8 tablet for $500, which is the same price as the base iPad and higher end 10" Android tablets.

Though you can use Surface Pro 2 much as you would an iPad for web surfing, email and playing videos and games, it can do much more since it's a full Windows 8 PC. It has an internal fan like a PC and runs for approximately 7 hours on a charge, while the iPad and Android 10" tablets can run for 10 hours or more. It has a compact laptop style charger rather than a small wall wart charger like mobile OS tablets. It has enough computing power to run Adobe CS programs well and it can multitask since it has 4 or 8 gigs of DDR3 RAM. In comparison, a budget Windows 8 Intel Atom tablet has no fan, runs an average of 8.5 hours on a charge, comes with a wall wart charger and isn't a multi-tasking or computing genius since it has a slower CPU and only 2 gigs of RAM. The Surface Pro line is for those who need the same computing power you'd get from an Ultrabook like the Sony Vaio Flip 13, Acer Aspire S7 or the MacBook Air.

Microsoft revised both the Touch and Type covers, and the first generation keyboards and second generation are interchangeable in terms of compatibility with all Surface and Surface Pro models. The Type Cover 2 has traditional moving keys, as did the Type Cover, but the new model adds multi-level backlighting with a proximity sensor (put your hands above the keys and they light up). It switches from a hard surface trackpad with clickers to a fabric style trackpad with no mechanical buttons. Key travel is slightly deeper on the Type Cover 2 and I'd pick it over the first gen model unless you're tempted by a great clearance sale on the original Type Cover. It's available in black and colors like purple. 

The Touch Cover 2 is a huge improvement over the original Touch Cover. It's much more sensitive so you can type more naturally without working hard to activate each pressure sensitive key. This is a fabric surface keyboard (it feels something like short nap suede) and the keys have ridges around the edges for tactile feel but they don't move. The Touch Cover 2 is a few ounces lighter than the Type Cover 2, but both are quite light. Like the new Type Cover 2, the Touch Cover 2 has multi-stage backlighting and a proximity sensor. The Touch Cover 2 is actually very usable and I haven't run back to the Type Cover 2 when I need to type a few emails or enter URLs. I'd definitely buy the Touch Cover 2 rather than the original Touch Cover, even if you find the old model on clearance.

Both Touch and Type Covers function as display covers and will put the tablet to sleep when you close the cover. The keyboard covers clip onto the Surface Pro and Pro 2 using very strong magnets that don't let go even if you suspend the tablet by the keyboard (not that we recommend doing so), but it's easy to disengage with an intentional twist motion from either end where the keyboard mates with the tablet.

Microsoft now sells an accessory that connect the Touch Cover 2 and Type Cover 2 with the Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2 over Bluetooth just in case you'd rather have the tablet on a table and the keyboard on your lap. But for the $40 MS charges, you could also buy a larger Bluetooth keyboard. Note that the covers themselves use a mechanical connection to the tablet, not Bluetooth, so you'll need Microsoft's accessory if you want to use them over Bluetooth.

This is a small laptop-tablet hybrid with a small 10.6" screen. If you're accustomed to 10" tablets, it won't feel that foreign or tiny, but if you've been using 15" or even 13.3" laptops, you might find it hard to adjust to the smaller display. In its favor, this is a very sharp full HD 19120 x 1080 display with high pixel density (among laptops and tablets). That means text and graphics are very sharp and you'll be hard pressed to see individual pixels.

This is an IPS panel with wide viewing angles and it uses bonded Gorilla Glass to reduce reflections, though we still saw plenty of reflections on the glossy panel. Brightness is excellent at 390 nits according to our Spyder Pro colorimeter, and contrast is very good at 670:1. Despite some glare, the panel is bright enough to combat bright light and it's viewable outdoors, though you'll notice some fade.

Though Microsoft bragged about significantly improved color accuracy, that didn't translate into much improved color gamut. Sure, color tuning out of the box is very good for a laptop or tablet, but the Surface Pro 2 can't compete with the Sony Vaio Pro and Vaio Duo 13, Samsung ATIV Book 9 and Samsung ATIV Book 9 Plus or the late 2013 MacBook Pro 13" with Retina display. That doesn't mean the Surface Pro 2 has poor colors--in fact it looks great when viewing photos and full HD videos with vibrant and lifelike colors. It simply won't display as wide a range of hues as the best panels on the market, which is important to graphics professionals who edit images and video for commercial use. The Surface Pro 2 covers 72% of sRGB (vs. 95% for the top competitors we listed) and 54% of Adobe RGB (vs. 75% for those same top competitors). That still compares well with the lovely Acer Aspire S7 and Acer Iconia W700, and far surpasses most laptops on the market.

If you've ever tried a capacitive stylus on an iPad or Android tablet, you know it's not a rewarding experience. There's no pressure sensitivity, the tips are fat and thus not precise, and there's no palm rejection (if you lean your hand on the screen while writing with the stylus you'll get vectoring, or random lines). The Wacom digital pen is much better because it has 1,024 levels of pressure sensitivity (press hard and you'll get a fat line or paint stroke), palm rejection and the tip is accurate and precise. If you're an artist who paints or sketches, the Surface Pro 2 should be on your short list, especially since Wacom is well supported by Adobe and Corel art programs. You'll need to download Wacom's Feel It drivers from their website to get WinTab support for these programs, but ArtRage, Sketchbook Pro and MS Office including OneNote support pressure sensitivity with no need to download additional drivers. Note takers will also appreciate the digital Wacom pen for its accuracy and palm rejection.

Edge accuracy has improved over first generation Windows 8 tablets with Wacom, one area where N-Trig had the advantage. The pen tracks well at the very edges of the screen on our unit (we loaded Wacom's Feel It drivers). As with the last gen Surface Pro, the included pen clips onto the magnetic charging port for transport (unless you're charging the Surface Pro 2). It's a tablet PC pen, so pens made for other tablet PCs and even Samsung Note products work with the Surface Pro 2.

At the risk of beating the topic to death, this is an Ultrabook in tablet clothing, and that means it's a fast performer that can do anything you'd expect a laptop to do. It's quick and handles MS Office 2013, Photoshop, Illustrator and Premiere well. You can use it for software development and it multitasks like a champ. The base model has 4 gigs of DDR3L RAM and the mid and upper level configurations have 8 gigs of RAM. For Photoshop, Office and video playback 4 gigs of RAM really is fine. If you intend to run several heavy hitting programs at once or are worried about future proofing, then the 8 gig model is a fine choice. The mid level model is competitively priced and that nets you 8 gigs of RAM and a 256 gig SSD for $1,299.

The $899 base model has 4 gigs of RAM and a 64 gig SSD, and 64 gigs is really too small since Windows, the standard Windows programs and the recovery partition eat half of that. We recommend the $999 configuration with 4 gigs of RAM and a 128 gig SSD, which matches what you get with most Ultrabooks today. Regardless of configuration, the Surface Pro 2 comes with the Intel Core i5-4200U 1.6GHz dual core CPU and Intel HD 4400 graphics. This is the latest generation Intel Haswell platform that offers modest graphics improvements over the outgoing Ivy Bridge and much better battery life. There is no i7 option, but honestly the performance gains are slim with the i7 ULT ultra-mobile 15 watt CPU family.

The Surface Pro 2 isn't easy to open for do it yourself upgrades. RAM is soldered and isn't upgradeable, while the SSD is a standard mSATA drive (sorry, not the newer and faster PCIe interface). The dual band wireless card with Bluetooth is socketed. Since opening Surface involves a heat gun to lift the display from the casing, we don't recommend you open it up. Should the tablet require service or an eventual battery replacement, we suggest you send it to Microsoft for service.

The Microsoft Surface Pro Windows 8 tablet is a big deal. If you're a techie you've been following the four months of buzz around Microsoft's second computer, and it looked like the one to beat them all. In those past 4 months we've seen several other hot Windows 8 tablets that may have taken some of the luster off Surface Pro, but we still think it's an important and compelling product for road warriors who need serious computing power. This is no ARM or Intel Atom tablet, but rather a full Intel Core i5 1.7GHz machine with 4 gigs of RAM and the brains of an Ultrabook all packed in a 10.6", 2 pound package. That's currently the smallest Windows 8 tablet with an Intel Core i5 that you'll find on the market (the others like the Samsung ATIV Smart PC Pro 700T and Acer Iconia W700 are about the same weight but are larger at 11.6"). And yes, it can run your Windows 7 apps as well as Windows 8 Live Tile Metro apps.

The Surface Pro looks nearly identical to the Windows RT-based Surface RT that launched in the fall of 2012. It's a little bit thicker at 0.53" and heavier at 2 pounds vs. 1.5 pounds for RT. Some ports are in different locations, but both share the vapor Mg dark metal casing, rear kickstand and compatibility with the Touch and Type covers. Surface Pro runs on the usual Ultrabook Intel Core i5-3317U 1.7GHz CPU with 4 gigs of DDR3 RAM and a 64 or 128 gig SSD. It has dual band Marvell WiFi (that means no WiDi Intel wireless display), Bluetooth 4.0 and two distinctly average 720p webcams. The price starts at $899 for the 64 gig model and $999 for the 128 gig model. What doesn't it have? There's no 3G/4G, GPS or NFC.

It's all good news in terms of quality and stylish good looks: this is a luxury piece and the Surface Pro is a captivating looking computer. To look at it is to lust for it and it could easily inspire an emotional purchase based on the product's unique and attractive design. The incredibly solid metal casing is modern, industrial and understated. It can also take quite a beating as we've seen in drop tests and anecdotal testaments about the abuse Surface RT and Pro have survived. The Corning Gorilla Glass 2 display means that you'll have to worry a bit less about a tablet's weakest point: the glass display.

The corners are angled a bit more steeply than Surface RT's and the Pro is a little bit thicker. You'll notice a very thin air gap running around the sides, and that's perimeter cooling. No ugly big vents here, and it distributes cooling so that your hands won't easily block significant sections of the ventilation system. Unlike many laptops that have cooling vents on the bottom, laying it on a couch won't give it heatstroke, though we'd let the back enjoy wide open spaces for best cooling if you're stressing the CPU and GPU. There are fans inside, but they're nearly silent when doing productivity work and they're as loud as any Ultrabook when playing demanding Windows 7 games.

The rear kickstand deploys and closes with a pleasing damped "thunk". There's a sculpted-out grab point on the left side (when the side with the screen is facing you)-- maybe leftie Bill Gates had a say in this, though it's pretty easy to grab and lift the kickstand from the bottom edge too. The kickstand is very stable in landscape orientation and in fact it's sturdy enough for portrait use, though the 16:9 elongated tablet is a bit tall and thin and thus easier to topple in portrait mode. The kickstand angle isn't adjustable and is set up to work best when Surface is on a desk rather than a low coffee table or your lap. Fortunately, viewing angles are very wide, though that can't make up for the less than perfect ergonomics when used in casual sitting positions.

Unlike Microsoft Surface RT, the microSD card slot that's compatible with SDXC 64 gig cards isn't under the kickstand where you might never notice it. It's on the tablet's side as is the single USB 3.0 port, mini DisplayPort and 3.5mm audio jack. The magnetic charging connector is on the lower right side and the connector is less fiddly to get locked in place than the RT model, but it's still not an easy locate and snap-in experience like the Touch Cover or Apple's MagSafe connector.

Much has been said about Surface Pro's tweener status. Ergonomically it's not the ideal tablet because it's a wee bit heavy at 2 pounds and it gets warm and can make noise via the fans. As a laptop, the fixed angle kickstand and non-lap friendly floppy keyboard covers make it less versatile than Ultrabooks. But it still has a place if you're looking for something that is extremely portable (this is the smallest Core i5 tablet on the market), and is comfortable for note-taking and drawing. Dock it to an HDMI, mini DisplayPort or VGA monitor and full size USB or Bluetooth keyboard and you've got a desktop workstation. It's amazingly versatile, even if it doesn't excel as either the perfect tablet or laptop for the masses. And with a lapdesk, it works fine on the lap when kicking back on the couch, which is how I'm writing this review.

The Touch Cover and Type Cover do indeed home in on the tablet and lock on with a vengeance if you get them within a quarter inch of each other; it's almost scary. And just like the commercials, the keyboard covers lock on so securely that you could grab the Surface by the keyboard and it will stay locked to the keyboard. To remove it, grab the keyboard from a side to break the magnetic hold. These are the same keyboards that are offered for Surface RT, and the neat but perhaps overpriced $120 Touch Cover is available in several vibrant colors as well as staid black. Microsoft has three limited edition touch covers with patterns on the back that sell for $130, which is the same price as the black Type Cover than has traditional moving keys and a nicely curved soft-surface wrist rest. Both Touch and Type covers have a small trackpad that's surprisingly functional.

The Touch Cover is a membrane keyboard with no moving parts. There are ridges around the keys for tactile feel and the tablet makes keyboard key click sounds when you press the keys. Believe it or not, these really help with the typing experience, and I found it easy to type decently in a day. That said, the clicking sounds aren't unpleasant but they still might annoy those around you. If you mainly write a few emails, enter URLs and type passwords, it's a perfect and slim solution to your text entry and screen protection needs. It has a soft, easy-clean surface and a felt-like back that's soft and it's very thin. But if you do lots of typing, you'll probably want to invest in the Type Cover with normal moving keys and a comfy wrist rest area. For a 10.6" keyboard, it's remarkably good. But it is still a small keyboard that makes even the HP Envy x2's 11.6" keyboard seem spacious. And unlike the luxurious Envy x2 and Lenovo laptop keyboards with damped keys, it's a bit rattly and clacky. You could forgo both keyboard covers and use a Bluetooth or USB keyboard for a more desktop-like experience since the keyboard covers are a separate purchase rather than bundled like some Surface RT SKUs. 

Surface Pro has a ClearType 10.6" display with wide viewing angles and 10 points of multi-touch. Colors are natural if a tiny bit less vivid than the Sony Vaio Duo 11 and glare is bearable thanks to the bonded glass that reduces reflections. At almost 400 nits of brightness, it's plenty bright enough for well lit indoor environments, though you may want to disable Windows 8's auto-brightness setting in Windows 8's General settings to see full brightness indoors. That said, Windows 8's auto-brightness feature works better on Surface Pro than other Core i5 Windows machines where it's much too draconian and dim.

Thanks to the 1920 x 1080 resolution on the relatively small 10.6" display, we have 208 ppi pixel density and that means sharp text that's easier on the eyes and you can watch 1080p video without scaling on the internal panel. Yes, it looks very sharp and clear, and once you get used to it, you won't want to go back to 1366 x 768 displays on lower resolution Windows tablets. Likewise, if you're accustomed to Retina iPads, this will look perfectly lovely. The tablet has a mini DisplayPort that can drive higher than 1080p monitors (that's a good thing), and you can get mini DisplayPort to HDMI or VGA adapters as well. Microsoft sells these for Surface Pro for $40 apiece, though you can find other brands for less at Fry's and Microcenter since Apple laptops use the same mini DisplayPort. Speaking of Apple, we didn't have luck with Apple's Cinema Display or their ThunderBolt display, though Dell's high resolution monitors with a DisplayPort did work.

The display is clad in Gorilla Glass 2 and has a Wacom active digitizer with digital pen. The pen is a good size and is nearly identical to the one included with the Samsung Series 7 Slate. It has an eraser (flat-topped rather than the usual rounded top that we prefer) and a side button. The button is actually magnetic so it can clip onto the magnetic charging port on the tablet's side. No, the pen doesn't require charging, it's just a way of securing the pen to the tablet since there's no silo or garage. Artists take note: the included pen's opening is just a teeny bit smaller than other Wacom pens, and that means my collection of Wacom nibs were too fat to fit in the Surface pen. The Surface nib looks to be the same diameter, but apparently the opening for the nib isn't quite as large.

Inking works fluidly and responsively, and we had great results with Microsoft Journal and OneNote 2013. Graphics apps that support the more modern Windows pen API offer up to 1,024 levels of pressure sensitivity and the eraser works as an eraser. This includes Autodesk Sketchbook Pro 6, ArtRage 3.5 and Fresh Paint. But those of you who require pressure sensitivity in apps that use the older WinTab driver architecture like Photoshop and Corel Painter 12 are out of luck for now. As is almost always the case (unfortunately) the tablet doesn't ship with WinTab drivers pre-installed. Worse yet, at this point Wacom doesn't have an updated driver on their site for download. Microsoft has stated that they're working with Wacom and Adobe to get WinTab drivers out for the Surface Pro, but we don't have an ETA.

Though Surface Pro looks like a mobile OS tablet and is the same approximate size as the Surface RT, iPad and Nexus 10 Android tablet, it's every bit a full Windows 8 64 bit computer running Windows 8 Pro. Anything an Ultrabook can do, Surface Pro can do, which is quite an engineering feat given its small size and limited real estate for cooling. The tablet's back is always warm (think of a warm roll that came out of the oven not long ago) but not burning hot. Even when doing demanding tasks like HD video editing or playing 3D games, it doesn't get burning hot and the casing stays below body temperature. The display actually gets a bit warm, which you'll notice since it's a touch screen. When doing productivity tasks and playing video the fans are nearly silent. But stress it with Skyrim and Civ V and you'll hear it blowing like any laptop doing the same task.

The Microsoft Surface Pro is still an Ultrabook with Intel HD 4000 integrated graphics: it's not a gaming rig. That said, we played Civ V at 1080 resolution with low settings and the DirectX 9 Touch UI enabled and it played fine. Skyrim was good at 1366 x 768 with low settings for better than 30 fps, but native 1080p resolution was weak at 20 fps. Older games should play fine as will Windows 8 Metro games, but not Crysis 2 or the latest Call of Duty.

The 64 gig Surface ships with 30 gigs of available storage and the 128 gig has 90 gigs free (we have both models and checked available storage in Windows Explorer). That's in line with other Windows laptops equipped with the same capacity SSD drives as well as the MacBook Air. Repeat after me: this is not an iPad. Windows 8 Pro, bundled Microsoft apps like Windows Journal, Windows Media Player and Calculator take up space. So does the recovery partition at 8 gigs. You can make a recovery USB drive via Windows settings and remove the recovery partition; just don't lose that USB flash drive or overwrite it! We do recommend you get the 128 gig since you can install all sorts of huge Windows 7 programs on Surface Pro. For around 10 percent additional cost, you double your storage and that's a good deal. You can of course use SDXC microSD cards to expand storage, but remember Windows doesn't let you install programs to SD cards, but you can put everything else there.

The Surface pro has 4 gigs of DDR3 dual channel RAM, which isn't upgradable. The SSD is made by Micron and uses the standard mSATA interface, but it's a horrendous chore to open up the Surface. First you'll need a heat gun to soften the heaps of glue that secure the display to the unibody tablet casing. Then you'll have to pry off the display to get at the largely not-upgradable internals. Should the battery wear out, you'll want to send it to Microsoft for replacement rather than trying it at home.

Though we wish Microsoft had used Intel WiFi since that supports Intel's WiDi wireless display, we don't have any other complaints about the Marvell dual band WiFi 802.11b/g/n module in Surface Pro. It managed good download and upload speeds, even when it fell one bar short of our bigger laptops with Intel wireless (-6 db signal difference). Even better, since it's dual band WiFi, we could take advantage of the 5GHz band, unlike Lenovo IdeaPad tablets and Ultrabooks, to avoid interference with Bluetooth on the 2.4GHz band. That's important if you're using Bluetooth headphones or speakers when streaming video from Netflix, YouTube or Hulu.

This will be a short section: the front 720p camera is adequate for Skype video chat and it's largely the same stuff you'll find on other tablets and smartphones. The rear 720p is sad. Clearly Microsoft intended this for video chat use and not much else. While other tablet makers are rolling with 5 to 8 megapixel rear cameras, some with LED flashes; the Surface Pro takes photos and video as well as a 2007 camera phone.

No, this isn't a mobile OS tablet like Android or the iPad. This is a power hungry Intel Core i5 laptop in a tablet disguise and it guzzles. We averaged 5 hours of use in a mix of productivity tasks (MS Office 2013, drawing with ArtRage, social networking, music playback and 45 minutes of streaming video) with brightness set to a very adequate 50% and WiFi on. We managed 2.4 hours of Civ V unplugged and 4 hours of MPEG4 video playback. That's obviously comparable to a Windows 8 laptop rather than a mobile OS tablet like the Nexus 10. But then, this isn't a mobile OS tablet, is it? Standby times were better than average and the tablet goes into a deep sleep state to conserve power (it takes ~ 8 seconds to wake from deep sleep). I honestly hate having to turn my tablets on and off several times each day, and have been happy with Surface Pro's very efficient sleep mode.

The included 48 watt compact brick style charger has a USB port to charge your smartphone or tablet. The 42 W-h battery is sealed inside the tablet.

Sony's not afraid to take chances with design, and we love them for that reason. The Sony Vaio Duo 11 Windows 8 convertible slider was bold but a little complex in terms of hinge design, so Sony refined it with the Vaio Duo 13. Now they've got the Sony Vaio Flip in your choice of 3 sizes. Smart move since some folks want ultraportables while others crave a bigger display. We look at the Flip 13, a 13.3" Windows 8 64 bit convertible with Ultrabook specs that include an SSD. The 14 and 15 inch Flips come with conventional spinning hard drives, though you can order them with SSDs. If you're interested in the 15.5" model, be sure to check out our reivew of the Sony Vaio Flip 15.

The Sony Vaio Flip 13 has the cleanest and most unusual hinge design we've ever seen. The display portion's aluminum back panel has a visible split and this is where the machine does its transformation from laptop to presentation mode to tablet. It's a better design than the Lenovo Yoga 13 and Yoga 2 Pro whose keyboards face down to rest on the table or your legs in presentation and tablet modes. At 2.89 lbs. the Flip 13 is also bearable to use as a tablet. With the 4.32 lb. Flip 14 and 5.05 lb. Vaio Flip 15, you'll likely rest the Vaio on the table or your leg rather than hold it for extended periods of time.

Build quality is superb with no uneven seams, no creaks or ugly hinges. Though the display back plate is very slim, the hinge is actually very firm so there's no display bounce when you use the touch screen. Magnets hold the screen in any of 3 positions and the whole thing feels solid despite the thin ribbon cable tucked safely inside. The lid and keyboard deck are made of brushed aluminum (your choice of black or silver) and the machine looks svelte, modern and classy. The bottom is plastic, which we actually don't mind since it doesn't feel cold against the legs. Plastic doesn't get as hot as metal, so the bottom of the Vaio never gets beyond warm.

The Flip 13 is an elegant and classy looking laptop and we appreciate the more rigid and elegant looking aluminum that Sony used this time rather than their signature flexible carbon fiber. Unlike the Sony Vaio Pro 13, the Flip has very little flex and pressing the trackpad doesn't cause a sympathetic dip in the Ultrabook's underside as it does on the Pro 13 (which in all fairness is even thinner at the front edge). The sides have an interesting design: the keyboard deck extends beyond the sides. It looks interesting and provides grip points, but that small ledge might get in the way of bulkier USB accessories like 3G/4G modems. More likely, the fact that the two USB 3.0 ports are so close together will be an issue if you use both ports at once with devices that have bulky connectors.

Stereo speakers fire from the sides, and after an audio driver update from the Vaio update program, they went from meek to bold. They're loud by Sony standards (Sony laptop speakers are oddly quiet) and stereo separation is good. Bass isn't great however, so at high volumes, the speakers can sound shrill.

The Sony Vaio Flip 13 matches the Duo 13 and Vaio Pro 13 for ports: two USB 3.0, full size HDMI, 3.5mm combo audio and an SDXC/Memory Stick card slot (an SD card will not protrude from the slot). The 14 and 15 Flip models add a gigabit Ethernet RJ45 port. Sony changed the charger's tip so the Flip 13 charger isn't interchangeable with the Vaio Duo or Pro chargers. The charger is otherwise the same as with other Sony Ultrabooks: small and light with a USB port for charging your smartphone or tablet. All models have NFC, Intel N-7260 802.11n dual band WiFi (a more stable adapter than Intel's 802.11ac adapter used in the Sony Vaio Pro) and Bluetooth 4.0 + HS. There's a front 720p webcam and a surprisingly capable rear 8 megapixel camera with EXMOR sensor on the back.

The large Elan trackpad has a slightly rough texture and it worked quite well for single and multi-touch gestures. We did notice occasional cursor jumping when holding the mouse button down and dragging a finger across the trackpad to move a file or highlight text. Like most trackpads today, this is a buttonless model, which means that the buttons are concealed under a unified trackpad surface.

The keyboard has typical Ultrabook shallow travel, but tactile feel is excellent and I had no trouble typing out several reviews efficiently. The keys make enough noise to provide auditory feedback without being overly loud and key damping is good. If you're a hard-handed typist you might flex the keyboard a little bit, but I didn't have trouble with it in the least. The keyboard is backlit and is controlled by the ambient light sensor. There's no way to change backlight levels on the keyboard, and it's a fairly bright white that rings each key and illuminates the letters.

This is the same excellent Sony Triluminos IPS display with quantum dot technology found on the Duo 13. The 1920 x 1080 panel has 300 nits of brightness (you may need to disable Windows 8's auto-brightness feature to reach 300 nits), 700:1 contrast (excellent) and wide color gamut. Like the Vaio Duo 13 and Vaio Pro 13, the panel achieves 95% of sRGB and 75% of Adobe RGB, making it a good choice for graphics professionals and one of the widest color gamut displays available in a laptop. Even if you don't work with photos and video for a living, you'll appreciate the rich, saturated and vivid colors when watching movies; it really is a stunning display. Viewing angles on IPS displays are very wide, and the Flip 13 has good but not the best viewing angles we've seen on IPS displays. It does have wider viewing angles than the Duo 13, but it's not as wide as the Samsung ATIV Book 9 Plus (PLS) or 13" Retina MacBook Pro (IPS). In competition with the ATIV Book 9 Plus, the Sony makes up for that by reproducing yellows more accurately than the Samsung whose yellows turn mustard when the machine is unplugged from AC. But the 9 Plus fights back with an insanely high 3200 x 1600 resolution display.

All Flip models, regardless of size have at least 1920 x 1080 displays. If you get the 15" model, there's a $300 2880 x 1620 option that should look very sweet. The Flip 15 with NVIDIA GT735M dedicated graphics, pen included and the higher display resolution gets pricey though, and Sony's preconfigured model sells for $1,799. That configuration does include a Core i7-4500U 1.8GHz dual core CPU, 16 gigs of RAM and a 5400 RPM terabyte HDD with 16 gig solid state boot drive, so it's a very well appointed machine. There's a 15 Flip for $1,249 stocked at Best Buy that has the Core i7, dedicated graphics, 8 gigs of RAM and a 1920 x 1080 display.

All Flip models come with an active digitizer made by N-Trig. Sony's used N-Trig on their Duo models and the Flip works the same. One point of confusion: the pen isn't included with most SKUs, you'll have to pay $40 to get one from Sony (it's the same pen as used on the Vaio Duo 13, and it uses N-Trig DuoSense 2 technology). Generally if a tablet has an active digitizer the pen is included in the box, and I'm sure this will confuse some folks, or they might not even realize they can use a digital pen.

As ever, with N-Trig you get accurate tracking and 256 levels of pressure sensitivity. Though the pressure sensitivity doesn't compare well with Wacom's 1024 levels, this is something only artists would notice. Even then, 256 levels are enough to do advanced artwork even if I personally do prefer more levels for nuanced art work. N-Trig's pen tip tracking is better than Wacom's, especially near the edges of the screen where Wacom equipped convertibles and tablets tend to be off. You have to hold the pen closer to the display compared to Wacom, and that may be off-putting those accustomed to Wacom pen behavior since the digitizer must detect the pen before it will disable capacitive touch (also called palm rejection). N-Trig supports modern Windows Ink APIs so programs like MS Office 2013, ArtRage Studio 3.5 (bundled), Manga Studio 5 (change tablet settings to Tablet PC rather than WinTab) and Sketchbook Pro have pressure sensitivity. Adobe recently added Windows Ink support for Illustrator and Sony has released WinTab 32 big drivers for Photoshop, thus providing pressure sensitivity. Word is that Adobe will start supporting Windows Ink in 2014 for their Creative Cloud suite. When will Corel Painter and other programs that rely on WinTab follow suit? Who knows.

The Sony Vaio Flip 13 runs on 4th generation Intel Haswell ULV CPUs with Intel HD 4400 graphics. Unlike the Duo 13, there's no wildly expensive option to move to HD 5000 integrated graphics. Given the small performance difference, I'd spend my money on other things, so I won't ding the Flip 13. There is no dedicated graphics option for the 13 and 14 inch Flip models, likely due to cooling constraints. You can get the machine with 4 or 8 gigs of DDR3L 1600MHz RAM, which is soldered on board so you can't upgrade it yourself. The Flip 13 is available only with SSD drives, and you can get 128, 256 and 512 gig SATA SSDs. The SSD is socketed, so you could upgrade it yourself at a later date, but it uses the currently less common M.2 form factor that's hard to find aftermarket. The Flip 14 and 15 are available with conventional HDDs and SSD drives.

If you go with the Flip 15, you can order it with NVIDIA GeForce GT 735M with Optimus switchable dedicated graphics. That option nets you 2 gigs of VRAM and is a low-midrange solution that will boost 3D games and CAD performance though it won't have you playing Battlefield 4 at full HD and high settings.

Sony offers the Flip 13 with Core i3, i5 and i7 CPUs. We recommend avoiding the Core i3 since you only save $100 and lose Turbo Boost. Our unit is the one stocked at Best Buy and it has a 1.6 GHz Intel Core i5-4200U dual core CPU, 8 gigs of RAM and a 128 gig SSD ($1,199). Windows, Sony's generous software bundle (Acid Music Studio, SoundForge Audio Studio, DVD Architect and Movie Studio Platinum 12) and the recovery partition take up significant space, so our machine had 55 gigs left after installing Windows updates and MS Office 2013 Home Edition. After we upgraded to Windows 8.1 we gained almost 5 gigs of space, which has been par for the course when upgrading our Windows 8 machines to 8.1. We assume at some point Sony will start shipping the machine with 8.1 rather than 8.

This is a standard Ultrabook in terms of performance, and that means it's more than capable of MS Office work, email, full HD video playback and light gaming. You could use it for software development and some HD video editing, and Photoshop runs like a champ. It's not a gaming rig, so don't expect to play Battlefield 4 on medium or high settings. But less demanding games like Civ V at full HD with low-medium settings and WoW on low settings and 1366 x 768 resolution run fine.

Here are the two ugly items: battery life is OK but not stellar. The fan is on all the time. ALL THE TIME. From the moment you boot the machine and before the CPU has risen to a normal operating temperature, the fan is quite audible. Small machines have higher pitched fans, so it's noticeable. When the CPU is at 36C, which is well below the 100C max allowable and 45 to 50C where most Ultrabook fans come on, the fan is buzzing along. If you tax the machine a little bit and the CPU temp rises to 42C, the fan kicks in higher and louder. When editing several RAW files in Photoshop, our Flip 13 gets as loud as the Microsoft Surface Pro 2 playing Civ V at full HD resolution! In our offices, we've nicknamed our Flip 13 "Hoover", after the vacuum cleaner: it's that noticeable. Clearly Sony was overzealous with cooling and they could change the fan operation with a BIOS update. Will they do so? I don't know. Speaking of BIOS, there is no option for fan control. Your only option is selecting silent mode in Vaio Control settings, which unfortunately drops performance. For those who have used the Sony Vaio Pro 13 and found its fan too loud, the Flip 13 is even louder and more constant (the Pro 13 fan is generally busy only when plugged into power).

Back to battery life: the Vaio Flip 13 has a 3170 mAh Lithium Ion battery that's sealed inside. That's not a very big battery and in fact it's half the battery capacity of the Vaio Duo 13. I'm sure Sony went with a small battery to keep the machine very thin and light, and that's the tradeoff when you buy something even lighter than the 13" MacBook Air. Battery life isn't horrid at 6 hours; it's simply not excellent by Haswell standards. We average 6 hours of mixed use with automatic brightness disabled and display brightness set to 50% with WiFi and Bluetooth turned on. If you use a more power frugal plan setting (we used Balanced) or enable silent mode and drop the brightness a bit, you could get 7 hours. If that darned fan wasn't whirring away at all times, battery life could be even better.

It's 2008 and Steve Jobs stands before a large audience. He pulls something out of a manila envelope--oh my God, it's a laptop! One so impossibly thin and compact that it fits in an interoffice envelope. And so the world of laptops was changed. Years later, Intel wanted to see Windows PC makers offer up something, anything that might compete, and the Ultrabook was born. Apple is hoping to change the world of mobile computing again with the MacBook, a 12" laptop that's not much larger or heavier than the first iPad, yet it's capable of getting real work done. Just as the original 13" MacBook Air was port-constrained, a little slow and expensive, so is the MacBook. Just as the Air had one of the best displays on a 13" laptop at the time, so the MacBook has a stunning Retina display. Like the Air, I wouldn't be surprised if the MacBook gained a port or two in the years to come, and the price might even come down in a few years.

The new Apple MacBook, or 12" MacBook or Retina MacBook (whatever you want to call it to differentiate from MacBooks of old) is as polarizing as it is striking. This 2 lb. laptop is one of the most gorgeous on the market, and one of the smallest. It sits between the iPad Air and 13" MacBook Air in terms of size, though functionally it's a Mac and not an iPad. In fact, we suspect Apple is targeting those of you who bought an iPad and keyboard as a laptop replacement, but have since realized it can't handle everything a laptop can. For $1,299 you get a 1.1 GHz Core M CPU with Turbo Boost to 2.4 GHz, 8 gigs of RAM and a fast PCIe 256 gig SSD. The $1,599 bumps the CPU 100 MHz and doubles storage to 512 gigs. Either way you get one of Apple's best displays in years, the 2304 x 1440 IPS Retina display exceeds 100% sRGB color gamut and it has excellent contrast and high brightness. The laptop has dual band WiFi 802.11ac, Bluetooth 4.0 and a just OK 480p webcam.

What do you get for your money? Not horsepower and not a huge screen. This is meant to be a second computer for folks who have an adequately large and powerful main desktop or laptop. You get a head-turning design, incredible portability (it weighs as much as in iPad Air in a case and takes up virtually no room in a bag) and a phenomenal screen. You certainly don't get ports: it has just a 3.5mm audio jack and a single USB-C port that also handles charging. Like the MacBook Air that Steve Jobs slipped out of a manila envelope in 2008, it's pricey, port constrained and not wildly powerful. Like the Air, it's an attention-getter and a feat of engineering, though some might wonder if this little guy is just too small.

It's an Apple Mac, and that means exquisite attention to design, fit and finish. There are no gaps, unsightly seams or pointless design elements. It's clean, well balanced and comfortable in the lap and easy to pass around when open or closed. The lid isn't difficult to open with one hand and the hinge is firm yet not stiff. The machine is available in the usual Apple silver, Space Gray and gold, not unlike the iPhone 6 and iPad Air 2. All are attractive and have a matte aluminum finish that resists fingerprints and maintains grip.

As ever with recent Mac laptops, you can remove the bottom panel if you have a pentalobe screwdriver, but there's little point since RAM, the CPU and the SSD are soldered permanently onto the motherboard. The stacked battery isn't all that easy to remove either. The MacBook has a 3.5mm combo audio jack (headphones and mic in one) and a single USB-C port that supports HDMI and DisplayPort 1.2. You'll also use that port for charging via the included compact charger and USB-C cable. If you wish to connect USB peripherals, you'll need a USB-C to female USB adapter that Apple sells for $19 (other companies make them too, and they're often less expensive). You can't charge the laptop and use the USB port for a peripheral at the same time with the $19 adapter, instead you'll need the $79 AV adapter with a charging port, USB port and HDMI. I'm sure 3rd party companies will make all sorts of adapters for the MacBook, but keep in mind that the port doesn't support Thunderbolt, so you won't be able to use Apple's Thunderbolt display or any other Thunderbolt peripheral.

The keyboard is just plain weird, yet it's good. I type thousands of words per week and I'm picky about keyboards. I didn't like the miniscule key travel at first, but after 20 minutes I acclimated and typed as well on the MacBook as I do on my 13" Retina MacBook Pro. Each key has a tactile click thanks to the butterfly mechanical switches under each key, and they provide tactile feel that makes up for the lack of travel. The backlit keyboard has an LED beneath each key for even lighting, and our unit's keys are very evenly lit in soft white (you can adjust keyboard backlight level).

Apple makes perhaps the best trackpad on a laptop, regardless of OS platform. Somehow they've managed to make it ever better with the Force Touch trackpad. It might sound like a gimmick, but it's actually more accurate and efficient. On normal trackpads just the bottom edge moves. For large trackpads, it's easy to have the hand and fingers wander higher, where it will do no good because the top half doesn't register clicks (unless you enable tap to click). With the Force Touch trackpad, you can click in any corner and there are four spring-like mechanisms under each spot. Yes, the trackpad actually does move just a little, and your mind will tell you it moves quite a bit thanks to the force feedback that creates the sensation of a tactile click (what Apple calls their Taptic engine--a cross between tap and haptic). You can even adjust the force setting in trackpad settings for a light, medium or heavy touch and feedback. The end result is a trackpad that feels even more responsive and precise. I generally hate clicking trackpads because it slows me down and the required force causes my pointing finger to wander, resulting in errors. Problem solved with the Force Touch trackpad. I've stopped using tap to click in fact, which was my old preferred method even though it wasn't very precise and sometimes resulted in accidental clicks.

Even more interesting, there's a secondary deeper click if you continue to press down with some force. That can bring up a word definition in quite a few programs and in Safari force-clicking on a link brings up a small preview of the web page. I'm sure Apple and third party developers will come up with even more uses.

The superb 12" IPS display is a selling point for the MacBook, and it's likely one of the reasons folks will consider it strongly vs. the MacBook Air models with their lower resolution TN panels. This panel is every bit as good as the Pro MacBooks, and in fact it slightly exceeds them in color gamut at 102% of sRGB and 80% of Adobe RGB. Contrast is high, colors are accurate and saturated and the panel can get very bright (we measured 350 nits). The brightness ramp is a little odd and it doesn't get very bright until the last few ticks--perhaps Apple wants to conserve power.

The 16:10 aspect ratio "Retina" panel has a resolution of 2304 x 1440. Usually Apple does pixel quadrupling for Retina displays, so the effective "looks like" resolution is one quarter of the absolute panel resolution. That makes for efficient performance, but in this case Apple runs it higher at an effective 1280 x 800 resolution, and we set it to 1440 x 900 to match the 13" MacBook Air (that's also my preferred setting on the 13" MacBook Pro with Retina display). The machine can drive a 4K monitor at 30 Hz according to Apple, but we found that the Intel HD 5300 integrated graphics struggled a bit with both the laptop display on and anything higher than a 1920 x 1200 monitor attached. The MacBook really isn't for graphics pros who need to drive very large high resolution external displays--I'd go with the 13" Retina MacBook Pro or the 15" rMBP for that. Even the MacBook Air with Intel HD 6000 graphics can handle high res monitors, including Apple's Thunderbolt display, which the MacBook can't.

The MacBook runs on the new Intel Core M CPU, a low power 4.5 watt CPU that sits above the Intel Atom and below the 15 watt Core i3/i5 used in the MacBook Air and many Windows Ultrabooks. This is a 5th generation Broadwell dual core chip with Turbo Boost that's paired with Intel HD 5300 graphics that sits below the HD 5500 and 6000 commonly paired with the Core i5. Apple pushes the wattage a bit and the normally 900 MHz Core M 5Y31 can be TDP up-clocked to 6 watts and 1.1 GHz, which is exactly what Apple does for the base model MacBook. There are 1.2 and 1.3 GHz Core M options, but honestly you won't see much performance improvement. You may however like the 512 gig SSD that comes bundled with the $1,599 1.2GHz model if you need lots of storage. All models have 8 gigs of RAM soldered on the motherboard (not upgradeable).

Core M has high Turbo Boost speeds, and the 1.1 GHz MacBook has Boost to 2.4 GHz. Turbo Boost offers very short speed bursts to accommodate processor intensive tasks and it can make a low clocked CPU feel considerably quicker. Still, if you compare that to a 5th generation Core i5 like that in the Dell XPS 13 with a base 2.2 GHz clock speed and Turbo Boost to 2.7 GHz, the MacBook is clearly not going to be a performance powerhouse. It's fine for common light loads that include MS Office or iWork, web, email, streaming 1080p video, occasional video editing for fun and even some fairly serious Photoshop work. I wouldn't pick it if you intend to frequently run Parallels (Windows VM), do frequent 1080p or 4K video editing or if you have to compile large programs for software development. It's best as a second highly portable machine for those who have a beefy laptop or desktop to do the heavy lifting. It could however work well as a primary machine for those who have light computational needs.

The Core M is also used in the equally expensive Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro (a Windows 8.1 convertible), the $699 Asus Zenbook UX305 13.3" Ultrabook ($999 with a QHD display) and a few other models. As you can see, it runs the gamut in terms of price point and position, even though it's not the sharpest knife in the drawer. Mac OS X Yosemite is quite good at processor management and it's not a CPU hungry OS, so the Core M never feels slow in everyday use when doing productivity tasks or streaming video for fun. In fact, the MacBook rarely stuttered with 10 tabs open in Safari while MS Word 2016 and Photoshop CC were running. The fast PCIe storage and ample 8 gigs of RAM help keep things moving along nicely too. But when editing and exporting 15 minute 1080p videos, we found ourselves waiting and grabbing a few sodas during export.

Apple's laptops generally top the industry for runtimes, and their runtime claims are accurate rather than the more common overly optimistic claims from other makers. The little MacBook obviously has less room for a beefy battery, so Apple stacked slices of Lithium Ion polymer to fill the diminutive notebook's every internal nook and cranny. The 39.7 Whr battery is good for 9 hours of actual use time according to Apple, and we found that to be accurate with brightness set to 50% with ambient brightness enabled and WiFi on. That's in a mix of productivity and casual use tests that include working in iWork and MS Office, editing 10 RAW photos in Photoshop 6, watching an hour episode of Mad Men on Netflix, email and playing a few short YouTube videos. One of our editors prefers brightness set to an eye-searing max (with auto-brightness disabled), and that dropped battery life to 7.5 hours. These runtimes are similar to the 11" MacBook Air but fall short of the 13" MacBook Air's 12 hours and the 13" Retina MacBook Pro's 11 hours.

The Mac ships with a compact 29 watt charger that's a bit bigger than the iPad Air charger but considerably smaller than the MacBook Air charger. Though its output wattage is low compared to the 45 watt average for Intel Core i5 Ultrabooks, it provided sufficient power to continue charging the laptop even under load. We charged the MacBook from 8 to 98 percent in 2 hours while the Mac was sleeping.

The MacBook Air hardly needs an introduction. It started the Ultrabook craze before Intel coined the word "Ultrabook" as a way to gain PCs some market share and encourage manufacturers to produce good looking, light laptops in the face of Apple's challenge. The mid-2013 MacBook Air gets special notice because it's one of the first ultraportables to run the new fourth generation Intel Haswell CPUs (the Sony Vaio Pro is the only other Ultrabook with Haswell at the time of the new Air's launch, and the Sony Vaio Duo 13 convertible will follow in a few weeks). While we've seen a few desktops and gaming quad core machines with Haswell, they're largely the least to benefit because Haswell's improvements particularly target Ultrabooks and thin and light laptops where they can amp integrated graphics and bring significant battery life improvements. The MacBook Air, much like the Sony Vaio Pro 13 Ultrabook and Vaio Duo convertible, stand to gain the most. As it turns out, the Air gains a bit more in the graphics department since it uses the faster Intel HD 5000 graphics rather than HD 4400 graphics found in the Vaio Pro. Don't get too excited, because as it turns out neither HD 4400 nor HD 5000 come anywhere near dedicated graphics performance (watch our video review below where we play Diablo 3). We're talking a few percentage points and 5-7 fps gains in demanding 3D games.

So how about CPU performance improvements? These are small compared to the outgoing third generation Ivy Bridge platform, but they're impressive because they slightly outperform Ivy Bridge while running at lower clock speeds and consuming less power. The mid-2013 MacBook Air isn't a genius compared to the outgoing model in terms of CPU performance, but it does show gains in graphics thanks to Intel HD 5000 graphics, and better yet it runs even cooler and much longer. Part of that battery life improvement is thanks to Apple increasing the battery size a bit; the 13" MacBook Air has a whopping 7150 mAh battery that's larger than most Ultrabook batteries (the Vaio Pro 13, whose goal in life is to be super-thin and 3/4 lb. lighter than the MacBook Air has a 4740 mAh battery). Our review unit is running on the 1.7GHz Intel Core i7-4650U, while most reviews cover the 1.3GHz Intel Core i5-4250U, yet battery life is still amazing. We're talking 10 to 12 hours at 50% brightness with WiFi on in a mix of productivity tasks plus some YouTube and Netflix streaming. No external sheet batteries or clip on barrel battery required.

Intel fourth generation Ultrabook ULV CPUs are paired with Intel HD integrated graphics. There are two versions: Intel HD 4400 and HD 5000. The HD 5000 is the faster of the two, and while it shows a modest improvement over Ivy Bridge HD 4000 graphics and is a few points faster than the HD 4400, it won't compete with anything beyond a low end dedicated graphics offering. The MacBook Air has never been a gaming or CAD workstation machine, but the Haswell MacBook Air does gain 5-8 frames over the HD 4000 and HD 4400 in some current popular 3D games like Diablo 3 and Civ 5. The gain is sufficient to make these games playable as long as you go for lower resolutions and graphics settings. Apple offers only the faster HD 5000 graphics on the MacBook Air, and it's matched with slightly slower clocked CPUs to keep the power requirement at 17 watts total, which is Haswell's power cap for the CPU and GPU combined. If most of your work is CPU intensive (calculations, compiling software), then this offers less of an advantage. However, if you do play games or depend on Adobe Photoshop's use of the GPU, the Intel HD 5000 is more attractive. If you need more computing power, the full mobile CPUs in the 13" MacBook Pro with Retina Display offer considerably more. The dedicated graphics plus full mobile CPUs in the MacBook Pro 15" and 15 inch MacBook Pro with Retina Display are good for serious computing plus good gaming with dedicated graphics. Of course, those Mac models are larger, heavier and more expensive than the MacBook Air.

 

The rest is the same old MacBook Air 13" that we know and love. The design is unchanged from the last generation model, and it has two USB 3.0 ports (one on each side), a Thunderbolt port that also functions as a mini DisplayPort, 3.5mm audio, MagSafe 2 charging connector and an SDXC card slot. It weighs 2.96 lbs., is clad in curvy silver aluminum, has a large glass trackpad that's as good as it gets and a good backlit keyboard. There's a webcam for Skype and FaceTime video chat, and new for this model are dual built-in mics. Build quality is always superb with Apple computers and the Air is an essay in visual perfection. There are no gaps, pointless angles or creaking and the casing is extremely rigid (I'd hate to drop it on my foot). Our only complaint with the MacBook Air is that the front edge feels sharp against the palms when typing.

The gloss display's resolution stays at 1440 x 900, which hurts a bit in the face of today's premium 1920 x 1080 and higher Windows 8 Ultrabooks. My guess? Apple didn't want to cannibalize the Retina line of Mac laptops, and a full HD display would drag down that record-setting battery life. Obviously there's no touch screen here, Apple doesn't do that (at least not yet). That's not to say this is a bad display, rather it's quite good. Viewing angles are comfortably wide (except when viewed from below, but few people sit lower than their laptop) and colors are pleasing. Movies look bright and color saturated and there's sufficient sharpness to make text look good. Those who've grown accustomed to Apple's much higher PPI Retina displays will likely think that text looks a tad fuzzy, but those who've been using standard resolution laptops will find it very good.

This isn't a wide color gamut display that you'll find on some high end laptops like Apple's own Retina 13 and 15 inch models that cover 99% of sRGB or the Sony Vaio Pro 13 that covers 95% of sRGB. The 13" MacBook Air covers 67% of sRGB and 51% of Adobe RGB. At 300 nits, it's as bright as the Retina Macs and brighter than the 250 nit Sony Vaio Pro 13, but contrast is lower at 550:1 in our tests vs. 900:1 or higher for the Vaio and Retina. That's decent contrast and the display doesn't look washed out, but blacks aren't as rich and black on white text isn't as crisp compared to the Retina and Vaio Pro. Contrast is above the industry average though, as is brightness.

The 13" MacBook Air starts at $1,099 for the 1.3GHz Intel Core i5 with 4 gigs of DDR3 RAM and a 128 gig SSD drive (now using the significantly faster PCIe interface). You can get the machine with the 1.7GHz Intel Core i7, 8 gigs of RAM and a 256 or 512 gig SSD drive. The Core i7 with 8 gigs of RAM and a 256 gig SSD costs $1,549. For those of you who really love traveling small, the MacBook Air 11" ($999 base price) is available with Haswell and Intel HD 5000 graphics too. Battery life is lower at 9 hours according to Apple because 11.6" notebooks don't have room for as large a battery as their 13" brethren.

If you're a Mac person, the choice is between the 13" MacBook Pro with Retina Display and the MacBook Air. The 13" Retina is heavier at 3.57 lbs. and more expensive at $1,499 (base price), but you get a much better display and faster full mobile CPUs in trade. If you're looking for extreme portability and the least expensive Mac you can buy, the MacBook Air is the better choice. Both can handle productivity work with MS Office, email, web, streaming HD video playback and image editing perfectly well. Neither is well suited to gaming since both models use integrated graphics. You can play casual games on either, but you'll have to resort to lower resolutions and settings for current 3D titles. Of course, there's the standard 4.5 lb. 13" MacBook Pro which offers a full mobile CPU and Intel integrated graphics like the Retina, but it adds a built-in DVD drive, Ethernet and FireWire 800. It's the heaviest of the three, and has a lowly 1280 x 800 resolution display (really, Apple?). That said, if you need an all-around laptop that can be your one and only machine, the base $1,199 MacBook Pro has all the creature comforts like plentiful ports, an optical drive and a fast CPU for a relatively low price by Apple standards.

And how about the world of Windows? I generally don't recommend a Mac If you plan to run Windows 7 or 8 most of the time. Apple's Windows drivers aren't nearly as good as their Mac OS X counterparts. Power management and the trackpad, which are two highlights under Mac OS X become mediocre under Windows using Bootcamp. If you only sometimes need Windows, then a Mac is fine (via Bootcamp or Parallels).

For those of you who are Windows users, you've got a great selection of Ultrabooks to choose from. A few years ago the Air had a significant lead but now the Asus Zenbook Prime UX31A Touch, the Sony Vaio Pro, Dell XPS 13 FHD, Samsung ATIV Book 7 and Samsung Series 9 (also called ATIV Book) are compelling alternatives with classy designs, full HD displays, touch screens and good backlit keyboards.

We need more machines like the Asus Zenbook UX305: stylish, highly portable, quite capable and priced at just $699. We were already impressed with Asus' $899 Zenbook UX303 that was recently refreshed with Intel Core i5 Broadwell CPUs. The UX305 is the more affordable version of the UX303 (higher numbers don't always mean better in Asus' world). But the key point here is that Asus cut very few corners to create the $200 less expensive UX305. You do give up the touch screen, which is the biggest drawback given Windows 8.1's push to use touch, but since it's a pure laptop form factor with no convertible-tablet feature, we'll forgive it. Instead of the Intel Core i5 used in the UX303, the UX305 has the lower power and slower Intel Core M CPU, and the UX305 loses the backlit keyboard. But there's plenty of goodness left: an all metal casing with Asus' signature swirled aluminum lid, plenty of ports, a striking and slim design, and a full HD 1080 matte IPS display (QHD 3800 x 1800 will be available in April 2015 for $999).

The Asus Zenbook UX305 is a traditional laptop that looks quite similar to previous Zenbook models, from the swirled aluminum lid to the tapered side view. The UX305 particularly reminds us of the 13" MacBook Air with a similar lid and hinge design, a large metal bezel and a keyboard that's a lot like the Air's (that's not a bad thing even though we wish Asus would stop placing the power button where the delete key should be, as does Apple). The entire external casing is made of metal, including the bottom panel that's affixed with several torx T5 screws and two Phillips head screws hidden under the back rubber feet. The metallic plum color is a mix of blue and purple, which isn't my favorite look, but color preference is personal. We've seen Asus use silver, gunmetal, champagne and black on other Zenbook models; clearly they're not afraid of playing with hues. The machine is rigid and we couldn't twist or torque it. If you press really hard on the keyboard deck, it will flex, but it's hard to imagine anyone would apply that much pressure when typing.

Despite its impressive slimness, the Zenbook UX305 has a healthy selection of ports for a 13.3" Ultrabook: 3 USB 3.0 ports, micro HDMI, 3.5mm combo audio, an SD card slot and Gigabit Ethernet via the included USB 3.0 to Ethernet dongle. We'd give Asus a hard time about micro HDMI but there really isn't room for a full size HDMI port and compared to the single port 12" MacBook with which it competes on some fronts, it's doing just fine. Asus includes their usual square charger with a relatively short and thin cord. The UX305 is an attractive looking laptop for the price, though it doesn't hit quite the high note that some more expensive Zenbook models do, since there's less attention to esthetic detail like the flat-cut stainless steel look on the sides of the UX303 or the glass lid of the UX301. But for $699, it's wildly good looking and it keeps up nicely with machines priced considerably higher.

The Intel Core M doesn't require a fan, so the UX305 doesn't have one. That means the laptop is always dead silent, and happily we didn't see significant thermal throttling when the Zenbook worked on heavy loads like Benchmarks and gaming with Skyrim for 30 minutes. The bottom doesn't get hot, but the strip just above the keyboard does get warm to hot--fortunately that's not a place most of us touch often.

The good news first: the keyboard is very good and not noticeably different from the UX301 and UX303, both of which had keyboards we thoroughly enjoyed. Asus might not employ ergonomically shaped keys like Lenovo with their ThinkPads and Dell in the XPS line, but I typed well with the Zenbook UX305. It has 1.2mm key travel, which is a little lower than the 1.5mm travel of larger and thicker laptops, but par for the course with a slim 13" Ultrabook. Unlike most Zenbooks, the keyboard isn't backlit; something had to go to meet the low price point. Happily the black keys and white masking are easy to see even in dim rooms.

The trackpad is fairly large (almost as big as the MacBook Air 13"), and we have the Microsoft Signature Edition that avoids Asus' sometimes tepid drivers. Still, the trackpad was passable but nothing more. It was reliable and didn't skip or falter, but it sometimes missed touches when we tapped, didn't always register two-finger scrolls and the click is loud.... loud enough that my colleague turned to stare at me (granted that's happened with some ThinkPads too). It's not a horrid trackpad, but it's not among the best.

Our $699 model has a 1920 x 1080 IPS matte display. I love matte displays--the much reduced glare doesn't induce eyestrain, and you can set the brightness lower since there's no need to combat reflections. The bad news is that there's no touch screen option, so those of you who actually enjoy using touch in Windows 8.1 are out of luck. Since this is a traditional laptop that doesn't convert into a tablet, it's not an outright necessity, and it did allow Asus to price the UX305 lower. Asus will offer a $999 version with a QHD 3200 x 1800 display in the future, and we'll be interested to see how much it taxes the Core M CPU and Intel HD 5300 graphics.

Like most things in this world, IPS displays come in different qualities, and this isn't the lovely matte non-touch display of the $1,800 MSI Ghost Pro full HD or even that of the UX303. It has noticeable light bleed when displaying dark backgrounds and when booting up. We could see bleed all along the bottom edge and the lower sides that extended about 1.5" toward the center of the display. For those who aren't familiar with the term, light bleed is when the white backlight bleeds out around the edges of the screen, resulting in lighter areas that you'll notice when watching a letterboxed movie. It's not bad enough to affect colorful desktop wallpapers, photos or full screen video playback that has no letterboxing. Again, for the price, we're not going to complain too much, especially when we've seen more expensive Asus models with backlight bleed at the same level a few years back.

The display is fairly bright at 294 nits, and contrast is decent at 500:1 but not stellar (gloss panels tend to deliver higher perceived contrast). Color gamut falls just a few points below the $900 Ultrabook pack at 92% of sRGB, which is still quite good overall and great for a laptop at this price point with a host of good specs. Color calibration from the factory was wildly off, making the panel look cool with excessive contrast (colors were a little blown out). We've seen Asus put out panels with quite good calibration (the UX303), and when they don't, they tend to be hiding panel deficiencies (they're not the only manufacturer to do this). When we calibrated the panel using our Spyder 4 Pro Colorimeter, brightness dropped 10 nits but colors looked more natural and that slight solar flare look was gone.

Here's the section many of you were waiting for. The Zenbook UX305 runs on the 5th generation Intel Broadwell Core M CPU rather than the more common Core i5 and i7 CPUs used in Ultrabooks. The Core M is the evolution of the Y series CPU in 4th gen generation Haswell, and it was intended for Windows tablets and 11" laptops. It's paired with Intel HD 5300 graphics rather than the HD 5500 used with the Core i3, i5 and i7 Broadwell CPUs. No, it's not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but Asus is always good at performance tuning and that, coupled with 8 gigs of RAM and a quick SSD, mean that the Zenbook UX305 never felt balky or sluggish when doing everyday tasks like web browsing with 5-10 tabs open in IE, MS Office, email, social networking and streaming 1080p video. It feels quicker than the more expensive Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro that uses a slightly higher clocked version of the Core M, and we suspect this has much to do with drivers and good hardware tuning. The 800 MHz (no, that's not a typo, we're back in megahertz land here) has Turbo Boost to 2 GHz, and that helps it feel quick--the CPU can ramp up clock speeds for short bursts as needed to handle demand. Of course, this has its limits, and the UX305 isn't our pick for those who need to accomplish more challenging work like frequent 1080p video editing and encoding, compiling tens of thousands of lines of code for software development, or juggling a few concurrent VMs. It's an everyday productivity machine, not a powerhouse. It's also not a great pick for those of you who want to run recent 3D games in the desktop environment (Metro Live Tile games are fine, though touch-oriented ones won't be a joy here). We tested a few games and we demo Skyrim in our video review. It managed only 22 fps at 1366 x 768 with all settings at low except textures which was set to medium (AA was off). When we dropped textures to low the game was a more playable 30 fps, though it didn't look great at that low a resolution and quality setting combo. If you need more horsepower, Asus is hoping you'll consider the $899 Zenbook UX305 instead (of course Dell would like you to think of the XPS 13).

Intel Core M is supposed to be all about better battery life since it's a 4.5 watt CPU vs 15 watts for U series Intel Core i3/i5/i7 U series CPUs. Broadwell itself focuses on battery life improvements, and while we've seen those materialize in the first Broadwell machines, we haven't seen Core M significantly beat the higher powered Core i5. So our expectations weren't very high for the UX305 and its 45 Wh battery, but we were pleasantly surprised by its 9 hour average battery life (that's actual use time, not sleep time). In our real life tests using the laptop for web browsing with 5-10 tabs open, working in MS Office, streaming an hour of House of Cards in 1080p via Netflix, watching several short YouTube videos and editing 10 RAW files in Photoshop CC, all with WiFi on and brightness set to 50%, our unit averaged 8-9 hours. That's a very respectable number for a 13" Windows laptop, and only the non-touch full HD Dell XPS 13 and the MacBook Air beat it among Intel-based portables.