If you really like the HTC One M8 but didn't care for the aluminum casing or the flagship pricing, the HTC One E8 might be your phone. I know, the aluminum unibody design is the main reason some of you pine for the M8, and it is a classy and elegant design. But the One E feels darned good in hand, is less slippery and is a tad lighter. As of this writing, the E8 is only available on Sprint in the US, though it's sold by a variety of overseas carriers. The hardware is nearly identical to the HTC One M8, from the 2.3GHz quad core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor with Adreno 330 graphics to the 2 gigs of RAM and the 1920 x 1080 SLCD 3 display. It has the same front 5 megapixel camera, NFC, GPS with GLONASS, Bluetooth 4.0 and dual band WiFi 802.11n (not ac according to HTC's website).

So what's different? The casing is polycarbonate and available in your choice of Polar White or Misty Gray. Instead of the 4 megapixel equivalent Ultrapixel duo camera you get a traditional 13 megapixel rear camera. The phone has 16 rather than the M8's 32 gigs of internal storage, though they both have a microSD card slot for storage expansion. Lastly, the E8 lacks the IR blaster for AV Remote control and thus there's no HTC TV app. Those concessions save you $100 on the contract and retail price compared to the M8. For those of you on GSM networks like AT&T and T-Mobile, there are GSM unlocked versions of the HTC One E8 sold by importers online, though you won't get 4G LTE.

Despite the different casing material, there's little different here from the HTC One M8. The One E8 has the same pleasingly curved back, microSD and nano SIM card slots (one slot on each side) and the power button up top. Unlike the M8, the power button on the E8 is centered and is metal since it doesn't double as the IR blaster window. From the front, you might be hard pressed to tell the E8 from the M8 since it has the same full HD 5" display and HTC BoomSound speakers flanking top and bottom. We have the gray model in for review, and I really like the soft touch back that's somehow silky yet grippy.

Voice quality has been a mixed bag on Sprint in the Dallas, TX metroplex with sometimes digitized voice, but the HTC One E8 sounded very clear and full for both incoming and outgoing voice. Sprint's network is improving and the E8 is an excellent voice phone. It supports HD Voice (when calling another Sprint HD Voice phone) and Sprint Spark that uses 3 LTE bands to channel bond for faster data speeds (AT&T and Verizon's version is xLTE). The HTC has GSM and 3G HSPA+ for world roaming and it uses a nano SIM.

Sprint shows data network improvements here as well, and even with 1 bar of LTE (in much of the metroplex that's all we got), the HTC One E8 averaged 16Mbps down and 5.6Mpbs up according to Ookla's Speedtest.net app. In one neighborhood with full bars the phone managed an incredible 75Mbps down and 12Mbps up, showing the effects of Sprint Spark.

The front 5 megapixel camera with BSI and a fast f/2.8 lens is better than most selfie cameras on the market. Again, it's identical to the M8's camera and it's a pleasure for video chat with less noise and richer colors.

The rear traditional 13MP camera with BSI, HDR and panorama mode is a selling point in my book. I'm not a great fan of HTC's duo camera and its 4MP equivalent resolution. Yes, it does well in low light settings thanks to the larger sensor sites, but the resolution is too low for anything but small format presentations and cropping results in noisy or watercolor-ish photos. The 13Mp rear camera still has some typical HTC flaws such as blown out highlights in bright sunlight, but overall it captured good detail, rendered pleasing colors and was quick to focus. It's not the best camera on the market; the LG G3, Samsung Galaxy S5 and higher end Nokia Lumia models like the Lumia 930/Lumia Icon and Lumia 1020 do a better job, but the One E8's camera is pretty good. It can record 1080p (but not 4k) video and has a white LED flash rather than the two-tone flash on the M8.

The One E8 runs Android 4.4 KitKat with HTC Sense 6 software, just like the M8. As ever, we really like HTC's light touch that's refreshing compared to Samsung TouchWiz and LG's heavy remaking of Android's UI. The phone has HTC BlinkFeed for news and social networking as the leftmost home screen, and HTC Zoe that creates a short video from shots taken on a given day with music and visual effects.

Again, just like the One M8, the E8 has a 2600 mAh Lithium Ion battery that's sealed inside, and battery life is very good compared to today's flagship smartphones with big screens and fast CPUs. We had no problem making it through the day with heavy use and averaged 1.5 days per charge with moderate use. Should you need extra staying power, there are micro USB battery packs that can top up the battery.

The Dell XPS 12 joins the short list of Windows 8 convertible tablet-Ultrabooks to hit the market after that new OS launched in late October. The XPS 12 started shipping in December 2012, and it has everything you love about the XPS line mated to the older Dell Duo's easel-mounted touchscreen. The build is extremely solid, upscale and attractive with Dell's signature carbon fiber surfaces (top and bottom this time), an aluminum frame and soft-touch painted magnesium wrist rest. Unlike the Dell Inspiron Duo, this isn't a plasticky netbook with a touchscreen, but a premium ultraportable that starts at $1,199. It features third generation Intel Core i5 and i7 ULV CPUs, 4 to 8 gigs of RAM and fast SSD drives. The XPS 12 runs both the Modern UI with Live Tiles and the traditional desktop with support for Windows 7 programs (x86, .exe apps).

Other goodies include an excellent island style backlit keyboard that's every bit as wonderful to use as the XPS 13's, a 1.3MP webcam, dual band Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6235 WiFi (compatible with WiDi) and Bluetooth 3.0.

The XPS 12 has a lovely 12.5" full HD IPS touchscreen with 400 nits brightness and Gorilla Glass. It has wide viewing angles, extremely sharp text and pleasing colors. 1920 x 1080 means 1080p videos play without scaling and photos look very detailed. Windows 8's new Live Tile interface scales perfectly on high res displays, keeping everything the same readable and touchable size as they'd be on 720p displays, but the desktop UI (the other half of Windows 8 that looks much like Windows 7) still suffers from shrunken touch targets and text. You can scale fonts on the Windows desktop side of things, and Dell wisely ships it set to 125% zoom, as does Sony with their Vaio Duo 11 that runs full HD on an even smaller 11.6" display.

The laptop weighs 3.35 pounds, which is heavier than the 2.89 lb. Vaio Duo 11 but a little lighter than both the Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga 13 and 12.5" Lenovo ThinkPad Twist convertibles. It's easy to hold and grip thanks to the carbon fiber finish and is fine for use on a table or lap. At twice the weight of the iPad and Android 10" tablets, you won't be holding it in your hands for an hour of reading unless you're a body builder.

The styling and looks are pure XPS, and that's a good thing. We really like the XPS line's attention to detail, good build quality and high quality materials. It feels rugged and strong without looking bulky or ungainly. Quite the opposite, it looks slim and sleek with modern lines.

The tablet has two USB 3.0 ports, a mini DisplayPort (more versatile than HDMI since you can use adapters for VGA, HDMI and DisplayPort for ultra-high resolution monitors) and a 3.5mm combo audio jack. Like the XPS 13, there's no SD card slot. The tablet's power button is on the side, as is the display rotation lock button and volume rocker so you can access these even when the tablet is closed. There are multimedia controls including volume on the Fn row of the keyboard as well.

The side mounted stereo speakers put out clear sound that's lacking in bass, as you'd expect from a small computer. Volume was loud enough to fill a small room and was fine for watching a feature length film on Netflix. There's a 3.5mm stereo jack for higher quality audio output and/or private listening, and you can use Bluetooth headphones and speakers as well.

The 1.3MP webcam yielded bright and relatively detailed video in Skype and the built-in dual array mics did a good job of picking up our voice.

Third generation Intel Ivy Bridge Core i5 and i7 ULV CPUs power the machine, with Intel HD 4000 graphics. In other words, it's a standard Ultrabook. The base model has the usual 1.7GHz Intel Core i5-3317U, 4 gigs of DDR3 1600MHz RAM and a 128 gig Samsung PM830 SSD drive. For a pricey $1,699 you can get it with the 1.9GHz Intel Core i7-3517U ULV CPU, 8 gigs of RAM and a 256 gig SSD. You can also order it in a variety of in-between configurations, like the tempting $1,499 Core i5 with a 256 gig SSD and 8 gigs of RAM. While the performance gain of the Core i7 isn't huge, many of us will be tempted by more storage space. The 4 gig model uses single channel RAM and the 8 gig uses a dual channel configuration for a slight speed boost.

The XPS 12's performance is in line with other Windows Ultrabooks running on the same hardware. Our Core 1.7GHz i5 unit with 4 gigs of RAM performed similarly to the Asus Taichi 21, Asus Zenbook Prime UX31A and Sony Vaio Duo 11. The machine feels responsive and is more than adequate for Office, web, streaming video, photo editing and light video editing. It has the power to be a main machine unless you do a lot of heavy lifting with computationally intensive applications or lots of HD video editing. Clearly, with Intel HD 4000 graphics, this isn't a gaming rig, though it can play older games and casual games perfectly well.

Dell Ultrabooks tend to be a little noisier than other Ultrabooks, as are some Lenovo machines. Dell builds corporate products that are built to last years, and we suspect their cooling errs on the side of longevity. That said, the CPU runs in the 40's Centigrade, which isn't unusually cool. Fan noise isn't bad at all when the XPS 12 is unplugged, but when plugged into power you'll hear the fan more often at moderate volume. Thanks to the carbon fiber casing, the laptop doesn't get too hot to touch, even when working moderately hard.

 

Like the XPS 13, the XPS 12 has a superb island style keyboard that's a joy for those of us who spend a lot of time writing. The sculpted keys keep your fingers located and there's good key separation along with better than average travel for a thin machine. The white backlighting is effective and it has three levels (off, medium and bright). The XPS and Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga have the best keyboards in the convertible Ultrabook space.

The keyboard has a standard layout with the expected oversized keys for both shift keys, backspace, enter, caps lock and the tab key. There's a small arrow pad and the Fn row up top does double duty with multimedia and notebook control keys (you'll have to hit the Fn key to use functions like volume and wireless control).

The Cypress trackpad is fairly large for a 12.5" machine and gestures such as side swipes to bring up the Charms menu and multi-tasking list worked fine, as did pinch zooming. Given the touch screen, we suspect most folks will use touch rather than the trackpad for Windows 8's grand gestures and zooming. Though the trackpad visually blends into the wrist rest area, its texture is smoother than the soft touch wrist rest area and the border is physically distinct so your finger won't unwittingly wander off. The trackpad uses the now standard buttonless design where the entire trackpad moves down and up with an audible click when you left or right click.

So far, Windows 8 convertible Ultrabooks haven't had stellar battery life. That said, the Dell XPS 12 leads this lackluster pack with 5 hours and 30 minutes of runtime on a charge with average use at 50% brightness. In our test we edit MS Office documents with Outlook running in the background, stream HD video for 45 minutes, surf the web with 8 tabs open and play music for 30 minutes. The Dell comes out ahead of the Vaio Duo 11 (not including the Vaio's optional sheet battery) by 30 minutes and lasted a full two hours longer than the Asus Taichi 21. It also outlasted the Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga 13 (which admittedly drives a larger display) by 35 minutes.

The Acer Ferrari One 200 runs on the AMD Athlon 62 X2 duo-core L310 CPU at 1.20GHz with 1 MB L2 cache. It comes with 4GB DDR2 667MHz RAM in two slots and a 250GB hard drive. Since AMD owns ATI, the Acer Ferrari One 200 has integrated ATI Radeon HD 3200 graphics and the AMD M780G chipset. Though the ATI Radeon sounds impressive, the benchmark results (see below) show it didn’t add much to gaming power though movie streaming is quite smooth. For an 11.6” notebook, the Acer Ferrari One has a healthy collection of ports including 3 USB 2.0, VGA, Ethernet, mic in, headphones/speaker line out with SPDIF support and a media reader that works with most memory cards. The netbook has an ATI XGP port for external graphics though we haven’t seen anything available to make use of this feature. The Acer Ferrari One 200 doesn’t have a built-in optical drive, but it worked with all external DVD drives we tested it with. Software installation and file transfers feel fast via USB 2.0 from external optical drives.

As with many AMD powered notebooks, the Acer Ferrari One 200 runs at higher temperatures compared to Intel notebooks, but not by much. The notebook runs at about 38 degrees Celsius when running productivity applications including MS Office, Internet Explorer, Outlook and more. Streaming movies via Wi-Fi raises CPU core temperatures by 10-20 degrees. When playing a 1 hour Hulu movie, the Acer’s temperature rose to 43-53 degrees Celsius; playing movies via Netflix the Core temps went up to 40-50 degrees Celsius. Playing games raised the temps to 60 degrees Celsius. The Acer Ferrari One 200 also takes a bit longer to cool down compared to Intel based notebooks. The fan blows out on the left side of the notebook, and the air exiting the fan is hot when it’s running full blast.

Since the Acer Ferrari One has built-in ATI graphics, we tested gaming. Bundled Casual games by Wildtangent worked smoothly, but FPS games with demanding graphics were unplayable. Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 played at 10 fps with all effects turned off, and at that frame rate, the game was unplayable. Consider the heavier and more expensive Alienware M11x if you’re looking for serious gaming power in an 11” design. We also tested movie streaming on the Acer Ferrari One, and it handled it admirably. Netflix movies streamed over WiFi at solid 30 fps and looked smooth with audio in sync with video. If you install the latest Flash 10.1 with GPU acceleration, Hulu movies streaming over WiFi will play at 25 fps, which is very watchable. YouTube streaming over WiFi played at 25 fps at 480p resolution and looked smooth; but at 720p resolution YouTube videos played at about 18 fps and audio went out sync with video. All streaming movies we tested were playing in full screen mode, which reduces fps. 

The Acer Ferrari One has a 6-cell Lithium Ion battery that’s 5600mAh in capacity. That’s a high capacity battery for a netbook size computer, and the dual core AMD CPU needs it. With the power setting at Balanced and screen brightness at 50%, the notebook made it just past the 4 hour mark performing productivity tasks such as editing MS Office docs and surfing the Web via WiFi. The screen is bright enough at 50%; you don’t need to crank up the brightness. Streaming movies from Hulu or Netflix via Wi-Fi lasted 2:15 hours on a charge. The laptop doesn’t charge very fast with the included AC charger (100-240V), taking 2 hours to fully charge from 40% full. So users who are on the go will likely to need to charge the notebook overnight. Standby time is about 2-3 days.

The Acer Ferrari One comes with Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit and essential software for media playback and system recovery. Acer bundles its own webcam tool called Acer Crystal Eye and their own Acer eRecovery Management tool. For DVD playback, the Ferrari One 200 has InterVideo WinDVD. MS Silverlight and SQL Server 2005 are preinstalled. Like many notebooks, the Acer comes with the 60-day trial version of MS Office Home & Student 2007 as well as a McAfee Internet Security Suite trial.  There’s some bloatware including toolbars, shortcut icons for Google, eBay, Norton Online Backup, Oberon Game Zone, eSobi and more. But fans of Ferrari will enjoy the included wallpaper, screensaver and the Windows startup sound bite of a Ferrari race car passing by.

The Moto E, not unlike the Moto G, is meant to take the world by storm. Not because it has killer high end features or a huge display but because it's affordable enough to be within reach for many folks on the planet. When Google started the Nexus line of Android smartphones years ago, they wanted to show the world what a high end Android phone could be. Now that's taken care of and companies like Samsung, HTC, LG and Sony are covering the high line with fearless abandon. Really solid entry level Android smartphones? There aren't many on the US and EU markets, and quite a few of those are no-name brands that don't inspire trust.

The Moto E is just $129, no contract. Wow. For a phone with a nice enough design, interchangeable and colorful back covers, the latest 4.4 KitKat OS, a pleasing display and good voice quality, that's crazy. And Motorola's phone business, currently owned by Google but soon transitioning to Lenovo, is a brand you can trust in terms of quality and warranty. This is an unlocked GSM phone that comes in two flavors: worldwide GSM (works on AT&T 2G and 3G but not T-Mobile 3G) and the US GSM version that works on AT&T and T-Mobile 2G and 3G, but doesn't cover all the rest of the world's 3G bands (2100MHz is missing). Motorola says a CDMA version (the type of network used by Sprint and Verizon) is coming soon, but we don't have word on whether companies like Verizon will allow it on their network. So for now, think of the Moto E as a solid choice for AT&T, T-Mobile, wireless providers that piggyback off those networks and overseas GSM networks.

This is a $129, no commitment phone that's unlocked for use on any GSM carrier. It's not a $600 flagship. That means you get a decent but not super-fast CPU, a 5MP rear camera and a 4.3" qHD 960 x 540 display. There's no LTE 4G (uber-budget phones don't generally have LTE) and somewhat disappointingly no front camera. That said, the phone has 3G HSPA 21Mbps for very usable data speeds, a sharp and colorful display and the usual collection of wireless radios including 802.11n WiFi, Bluetooth 4.0, a GPS with GLONASS but no NFC. Honestly, for the price we're pretty impressed with the 256 PPI display, though viewing angles aren't superb and brightness is just OK. The Snapdragon dual core CPU is adequate for everyday tasks that don't include demanding 3D gaming or smooth streaming full HD video playback. The light, near pure Android build no doubt helps keep the phone fluid and responsive. We only saw it falter when playing Real Racing 3 and when streaming HD video (audio sync often was off, but playback was otherwise good).

This is a GSM world phone with voice and 2G EDGE on the 850/900/1800/1900MHZ bands. 3G HSPA 21Mpbs bands vary depending on the variant you purchase. As mentioned, Moto says a CDMA model is coming soon, but we don't know if it will appear in the US and be approved for Sprint and Verizon's networks. Voice quality, typical of Motorola phones, is very good and volume is also good via earpiece. The mono speaker is surprisingly loud for speakerphone calls and multimedia.

Data speeds will vary by region and network, and on AT&T we averaged 7Mbps down and 1Mbps up according to the SpeedTest.net app, which is average for that carrier's 3G network in the Dallas, TX area. That's enough speed to load web pages quickly, download email and even stream video at 720p and modest to moderate bitrates. Since the phone doesn't have a 1080p display, there's obviously no need for speeds sufficient to stream full HD video.

The good news is that you get a name brand, decent dual core CPU. The Moto E runs on the 1.2GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 200 CPU. Our benchmark utilities report the graphics chip as an Adreno 305 rather than the 302 listed on Moto's site. Since Motorola has ordered custom chips before with upgraded GPUs, we'll report what the benchmark and testing apps tell us. In any case, the Adreno 302 is simply a slower clocked version of the 305, so the difference is moot.

The phone has a gig of RAM, standard for non-flagship Android smartphones and a paltry 4 gigs of storage with about 2.5 gigs free for your use. For the price, we won't complain, and this obviously isn't the phone for hardcore 3D gamers in terms of CPU, graphics or storage. The Moto E has a microSD card slot where you can store music, videos and files but not programs.

Motorola has a reputation for making mediocre cameras in their phones. Sadly, the Moto E is no exception, and the camera takes photos that I'd not call vivid or even colorful. Photos are mostly a tad murky and dull, though turning on HDR mode does wonders to improve contrast and color saturation. The camera can shoot 720 x 480 video at 30fps, which is surprisingly low resolution even for a 5MP sensor, though third party camera apps on the Google Play store can drive the resolution higher (not to 1080p, sorry).

The phone has a 1980 mAh battery, and that's a high capacity battery for a smartphone with a small display, lower end CPU and small body. To fit the big battery in a small phone, Motorola couldn't make it removable, so it's sealed in the casing (you can see its outline if you remove the back cover, but there's a plastic plate over the battery to prevent removal). Given the beefy capacity and low demands the Moto E places on the battery, we easily made it through the day on a charge. In fact, we've so far averaged 2 days of use with moderate use including streaming a few YouTube short videos, 30 minutes of calls, checking and sending email, browsing the web for 1 hour, playing Hay Day, reading an eBook for 45 minutes and playing music through earbuds with the display off for an hour.

Perhaps this is Windows Phone's future: very affordable handsets that reach the widest possible demographic. The platform has so far done particularly well there. The Nokia Lumia 635 is one of the least expensive smartphones on the US market. The T-Mobile version used for this review lists for $168 outright (no contract, no monthly pay off) and sells for just $129 on MicrosoftStore.com and $119 on the Home Shopping Network. The AT&T GoPhone version is $99 full retail. And surprisingly, the phone doesn't stink. Quite the opposite: it's nice enough looking, has a decent display, 4G LTE where most ultra-budget phones stop at 3G, a quad core processor and a decent rear 5 megapixel camera.

In the spirit of the Moto E, the Lumia is meant to be a phone that most anyone can afford (T-Mobile does offer $7/month payment plans if the full retail exceeds the contents of your wallet). Yet it ships with the latest version of the OS, Windows Phone 8.1, has a truly good voice assistant named Cortana and important core features like expandable storage via microSD card slot and a replaceable battery. Yes, it lacks features that high and mid tier smartphones offer like a front camera (that will be a deal breaker for some), and it has a paltry amount of internal storage. To a certain extent, you do get what you pay for, so everything is scaled back here to achieve the affordable price tag. Build quality is good and you can get different colored backs for $15 apiece from Microsoft's store.

The Nokia Lumia 635 is essentially the 4G LTE version of the 3G Lumia 630 available overseas. It runs Windows Phone 8.1 on a 1.2GHz quad core Qualcomm Snapdragon CPU, and it has 512 megs of RAM and 8 gigs of internal storage (with around 4 gigs actually free for your use). It has a microSD card slot under the removable back cover and it uses a micro SIM rather than the more obscure nano SIM used on some higher end Lumia phones and the iPhone 5s. The smartphone has single band WiFi 802.11n where dual band is the norm, Bluetooth 4.0 and a GPS with GLONASS. It ships with Nokia HERE Maps, HERE Drive+ and Here Transit: all solid offerings. Like all Windows phones, a mobile version of IE and MS Office are pre-loaded. The 4.5" ClearBlack IPS display doesn't win resolution awards at 845 x 480 pixels, but it does have decent viewing angles, good color saturation and plenty of clarity.

There is no front camera! Skype users and selfie artists, this isn't your phone. The rear 5MP camera has no flash (again, budget phone) and it records 720p but not 1080p video. It's a decent camera for well lit environments, and will likely seem like an improvement if you're moving up from a feature phone or older smartphone. Photo colors are pleasing, but the camera tends to wash out lighter colored items in the sun, and noise is average.

The Nokia Lumia 635 has a removable 1830 mAh Lithium Ion battery and it ships with the usual compact 5v charger and micro USB 2.0 cable. Since neither the processor nor the display are particularly demanding, we expected long battery life. In fact, battery life with moderate use was the same as on bigger screen flagship phones: 1 day. Video playback is the Lumia 635's Achilles' heel, where the phone hovered just over the 5 hour mark. Non-multimedia runtimes were better, and the phone held up fine for web, email, social networking and snapping a few photos.