For those of you who enjoy lightweight gadgets, you might want to take a look at Lenovo's X300 Series Thinkpad. Weighing in at only two and a half pounds, this laptop is sure to make connoisseurs drool at its slim, yet very substantial features.

More details on this thin laptop in the full article after the jump!

Dell is now offering their Inspiron E1405 with the latest Intel Core 2 Duo Mobile (Merom) processor at their store. According to Dell, their E1405 is currently the cheapest Core 2 Duo notebook in the market that can also be configured with Intel Core Duo Mobile (Yenoh) processor.

The E1405 sports a 14-inch screen and has a memory of up to 2GB, a SATA hard drive with 60-100GB capacity or 120GB PATA hard disc. Users can choose between Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 950, ATI MOBILITY RADEON X1300 with 128MB of video memory, RADEON X1400 with 256MB or NVIDIA GeForce Go 7300 with 256MB memory.

The E1405 also has the next generation WLAN 802.11n standard that has 5x the speed and twice the range of the 11g that most notebooks currently use. It also has Bluetooth and supports 802.11b and g wireless networks. Aside from the T5500 CPU, you also have the choice of having your E1405 configured with Intel Core 2 Duo T7200 (speed of 2GHz and 4MB cache), or T7400 (speed of 2.16GHz and 4MB cache) processor. The notebook's flexibility in its processor gives you the option of customizing your processor and not just settle for the one the laptop comes with.

Dell's E1405 comes with a T5500 processor, a CD/DVD burner, and a DVD combo drive and sells for $779.

Intel officially completes its comeback special leg this Monday. According to insiders, the world's largest semi-conductor company plans to launch finally the notebook version of Core 2 or what was formerly known as Merom. Notebook makers are expected to endorse new systems based on this said chip.

Intel's performance figures dramatically improved because of other Core architecture chips that are slower and more efficient. Older laptops that are now slowly being replaced encounter slow processor and overheating problems. Eventually, Intel envisions to have Merom supersede all Core Duo, the first dual-core notebook chip.

Core Duo 2 chips plug anyway into the same motherboards these prior chips use. More is expected of Intel as it announces more substantial renovation to its notebook products in March 2007.

Mac Rumors seems to be the most apt place to keep hearing about this... though we do wish Apple would make make a definitive announcement. WWDC 2006 came and went, and we still have no official word on the mysterious Merom CPU and whether it will make an appearance on the newest MacBook release.

According to Mac Rumors and their linked report from Reg Hardware, Asustek is supposed to be making new MacBooks with the new CPU, instead of the previously used processor, known as "Yonah." All that we know so far are vague ideas of the specs of the Merom: it is supposed to go up to a max clock speed of 2.33 GHz and be a Core 2 Duo, which is meant to be more powerful than the Core Duo CPU, "Yonah."

It's genius how they're keeping tight-lipped about it and making the rumors spread to intrigue others, but too much silence is just as annoying as being wishy-washy over details and decisions.

Let's hope Apple makes up its mind and gives us all an answer soon, shall we?

When the infamous MacBook Pro was released to the masses back at the start of the year, it was housed in a very fetching aluminium case, gained somewhat from its predecessor. When the MacBook was released recently, that too supported a 'newish' case, which gained popularity thanks to its slimline appearance, and its choice of white and black. We have now learned that the new release of the PowerMac will be housed within a newly designed case.

The new case will be different enough to allow instant distinction between the PowerPC and Intel Core Duo variants. Together with the cases, there will be a few choices on which processors to adopt. The new Intel Core Duo will be available for the PowerMac with 2 chips, A.K.A. Quad-core platform. It is not known whether the PowerMac will adopt the soon-to-be released Core Duo 2 chip, codenamed Conroe. The mobile variant is not expected till Fall.

The MacBook Pro will also have a new case for its range. However rumour has it that this will not be released till the system adopts the Intel Core Duo 2 chip, codenamed Merom. We would hope that issues are fixed in the new case release including heat expulsion.

On Monday, Intel, the largest chip manufacturer, took the sheets off its new dual-core Xeon Processor 5100 series. The chips, codenamed Woodcrest, are high-volume server and workstation chips which are capable of 135% performance improvement, and 40% power reduction over their previous server products. Power consumption will start at 40 watts for lower models, going up to 65 and 80 watts for the faster processors.

This is very important for Apple's view of things, aside from the obvious inclusion in future products, this would most certainly mean cheaper and lower prices for the current range of processors used in Apple machines.

The new Core micro-architecture is being implemented, which is based on the a power sensitive blueprint design. It is expected that this design will be used in two forthcoming chips for the desktop and notebook called Conroe and Merom. These are expected in July and August, but we all know about delays that can be involved. The 5100, will be shipped at speeds up to 3.0Ghz, with 1333Mhz front side bus and 4 MB of shared L2 cache. The chips are compatible with the current Bensley Platform, which means that they can be dropped in with the current pin format. The platform uses faster and more reliable memory technology, FB-DIMMs, Intel Virtualization Technology, Intel Active Server Manager and Intel I/O Acceleration Technology.

"Simply put, the Core micro-architecture is a technical marvel that is driving a new era of power efficiency without compromising on what can only be described as eye-popping dual-core 64-bit performance," said Pat Gelsinger, senior vice president and general manager of Intel’s Digital Enterprise Group.

Pricing will start at $209 to $851 in 1000 unit quantities, and Intel expect the family of processors to be the fastest-ramping ever. However, they are still loosing ground to the AMD range of processors, and are aiming to rectify things with Woodcrest, Merom and Conroe.