News Bits: New VAIO, New Satellite Tablet PC, Gateway in Stores, New Notebooks January 18

New Sony VAIO FS Series Widescreen Notebook Announced

The new Sony VAIO FS series notebook has a 15.4-inch widescreen XBrite display (view larger image)

Sony is a big player in the consumer oriented notebook market and today they have announced another enticing option for consumers.  The Sony VAIO FS series notebook will offer a 15.4-inch WXGA (1280 x 800) display that includes the gorgeous XBrite screen for vivid color display.  The FS series will  combine performance, mobility and multimedia capabilities in a svelte package.  The lightweight design of the FS series will be good for portability between home and office.

Sony's XBRITE LCD technology ensures that video playback is crisp and vivid, while its Smart Display Sensor makes setting up external projectors and monitors a snap. Users can create and watch DVD movies with the built-in double layer drive, as well as capture, edit, and burn home videos from a camcorder. The FS series also features the Sony software suite for editing and managing multimedia content.

The VAIO FS will feature Intel's Pentium M processor line and will retail starting at $1,600 at the end of January

New Toshiba Satellite R15 Tablet PC/Convertible Announced

A live picture of the upcoming Toshiba Satellite R15

Toshiba has announced the new Satellite R15-S822 Tablet PC Convertible. The machine will come in at an attractive $1500-ish price point, yet include all the Toshiba quality and features one would expect from the Satellite product line.

Toshiba already has Tablet PC options in its Portege model series, notably the Portege M200 (review: http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsID=2127), but this Satellite offering is going to come in at a cheaper price point and be geared more towards the consumer market.

TabletPCReviewSpot.com has all the details on this new offering.

Gateway to enter More Retail Stores

Gateway has already pushed into Best Buy and CompUSA as a channel for selling notebooks.  Expect to see Gateway laptops in Circuit City soon too.  Gateway is doing a great job expanding the availability of its notebooks, so although things looked not so good for them a year ago, if they can continue to be successful with expansion into other retail outlets you might see this company make a nice comeback.

more: http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1746227,00.asp

Intel and Notebook Manufacturers to Announce New Alviso Based Notebooks on January 18

Intel's new Alviso chipset will be officially announced on January 18.  When Intel announces this new chipset and what it can do there will be notebook manufacturers alongside them to announce new notebooks that will include this chip.  We know that IBM will be standing alongside Intel with their new IBM ThinkPad T43 offering, expect other new notebooks from this manufacturer and others.