The 2026 Vivobook S14, S15, and S16, announced today at CES, pair a familiar design with new processors, including the Qualcomm Snapdragon X2 Elite, along with updated Intel Core Ultra Series 2 and AMD Ryzen AI 300 Series options.
According to Asus, the Snapdragon-powered S16 boasts 25 hours of battery life.
Acer is announcing a new Nitro V 16 AI entry-level gaming laptop with AMD’s new Gorgon Point chips. Announced at CES with a handful of other Acer laptops, the Nitro is meant to offer a budget-friendly-ish price for AMD’s new chip and Nvidia GPUs — from the RTX 5050 to RTX 5070. It’s expected in Q2, but pricing isn’t finalized.
Dell reversed course on its confusing naming scheme from 2025, but some of it’s intact — with new tweaks. The returning XPS laptops are still joined by entry-level vanilla “Dell” models. Enterprise-focused Dell Pro laptops are now topped by Dell Pro Precision models instead of the Apple-y sounding Pro Max.
Perfect? No. Better? Much.
The upcoming 14-inch HP Chromebook Plus and Chromebook Plus x360 announced at CES have been updated with Intel Core 3 N355 processors and offer up to 512GB of M.2 SSD storage, with the previous 16:9 aspect ratio displays switching to 16:10.
Want a sneak peek at HP’s CES 2026 lineup? Windows Latest claims to have the entire list — my eye is on the HP EliteBook X, which will reportedly let Intel’s Panther Lake, Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X2 Elite, and AMD’s reportedly refreshed Ryzen AI 400 compete head-to-head. Wonder which one is best!
Remember when Dell made the baffling decision last January to ditch its awesome XPS brand for the utterly milquetoast “Dell Pro” and “Dell Pro Max” instead? After just one year, VideoCardz’ sources report, XPS laptops are coming back. Dell will reportedly announce them at CES 2026 next week.
The two already announced a collaboration back in October meant to “streamline creator workflows with AI.” Now the relationship is evolving into a dedicated button on new ASUS ProArt GoPro edition laptop that’ll probably also net a free subscription to GoPro Premium Plus for some period of time. All will be revealed at CES on January 6th.
I asked Jeff Clarke how Dell is navigating the ongoing memory shortage and he said the company is, “Advocating that we should get the parts we asked for.”
Sure.
What if the three companies that make RAM don’t play ball, or alter their deals? Micron is already abandoning consumers and SK Hynix is sold out into the new year.
Price hikes related to the memory shortage aren’t just coming for PC gamers; smartphones, laptops, and storage drives could soon get increases, too.
5
Verge Score
A $700 laptop with a great screen and fantastic battery life? What’s the catch?
Antonio says the heat issue is fixed!
The old Ryzen 9 7940HS averaged 58 degrees Celsius and reached a piping hot 93C; the new AMD Ryzen 7 AI 350 CPU averaged an internal temperature of 50C and peaked at 64C.
Unfortunately, it seems the 2nd-gen Laptop 16 still needs work. More in his full review:
6
Verge Score
Slapping an RTX 5070 onto your laptop is a big deal. It’s other parts of the Laptop 16 that falter.
