2016 and Beyond: What are we missing in laptops/notebooks?

After visiting with our friends at Eurocom about their quest to drive the future of computing technology, I decided to pose the question to the community to brainstorm as many ideas as possible.

I could not identify a perfect sub-forum for it, so I chose this one. It is not for one company, but all of them. Hopefully, they will be paying attention. I know that the Eurocom Team will be, and hopefully at least a couple of others that care enough to be disruptive.

As the thread title suggests, this thread is not for one specific OEM and not a place to list out the features that you want in a notebook/laptop if those are available already. Rather, it's a twist on your typical wish list and poses the question about what we want to see that is not available.

In other words, no need to mention 4K. That's already here and starting to become popular. No need to mention an eGPU contraption. We already have a couple of those available. No need to mention thin and light... we already have a plethora of options like that.

What do you want that IS NOT available?

Yes, WILD and CRAZY ideas and concepts more than features are what we want here.

Think the exact opposite of this thread: Current design fads in laptops that you hate.

Let imagination be your guide and assume all things are possible in the future.

Dare to hate the status quo.
Innovation and the future go together.
Innovation is capability to create the future.​

The only stupid ideas are those you keep to yourself. After posting your ideas here, see if the company you do business with has a suggestion box email, and use it. Point them here as well. If they not, or even if they do, feel free to use the email suggestion box that Eurocom has made available: [email protected] if you would like to.

The more ideas we share, the brighter the future can be.

I will go first in the next post.

 

First, I want:

• X99 laptop with 5960X CPU
• Delid from the OEM/Reseller
• Three-way SLI
• 1KW AC adapter
• Internal liquid cooling for CPU and GPU (please, no desk-bound colostomy bag for the GPU a la ASUS)
• No more plastic laptop bodies... metal, metal and more metal in the chassis

Second, I want AMD to make a comeback and kill the monopoly that NVIDIA and Intel have on the industry.

Third, I want a real, full-fledged, fully functional OS replacement for Micro$oft Windows. Since they have lost their way and are trying to do a one-size fits all OS loaded with spyware, the Redmond Mafia is no longer adding value to being a PC owner. I want a new OS that can run anything made for Windows; not a half-baked Linux that only does some things well... and not something from Apple. Something fitting for the hardware mentioned under my first want.

 

Detatchable screens: easily "pop" off the panel so you can tuck the main chassis somewhere under your desk or by a TV in the living room for when you are not mobile.

Detachable panel is particularly prudent for using said panel in a multi-monitor setup. Desk space is prime real estate - it's nice to use a laptop in a multi-monitor setup but if you have a dedicated mouse and keyboard in this arrangement, and why wouldn't you, the bottom base/keyboard of the laptop is big useless block taking up unneeded space on the desk.

 

I think that is a fantastic idea @Schwabe. I hope more people offer innovative suggestions like that. Thanks for your post.

 

I love this idea. I have created a FasterPlan so we can vote and get the most voted at a glance.

http://www.fasterplan.com/dd6VsQ35xK

You can create/modify or delete options.

Let's vote!

PS: Again outstanding idea.

 

One idea that just popped into my head, that I don't recall seeing before, is putting on the bottom of a laptop something similar to what you have on the bottom of keyboards where you can extend plastic tabs to pop up the back of the keyboard.

Put something similar on the bottom of the chassis that is perhaps made of metal or extremely strong plastic to support the weight of the machine. Unlike a keyboard though that just has the two in the back, put four on the bottom of the chassis. One in each corner. If they are "foldable" just like those on the bottom of the keyboard, you could choose to prop the front, back, or the whole thing. Most people always say to prop up the machine if you can for better ventilation/cooling, and the rubber feet on the bottom of the machine typically serves no purpose other than preventing scratches on the surface of where the laptop sits.

 

An added option to choose real gamer 120/144 hz panels, <2ms (no 3d crap) like found in BenQ monitors, more mechanical keyboards(MSI idea) and a minimum 5 years full company support with new BIOSes as necessary in case new unsupported GPUs arrive in market. Oh and all ideas above this post =D

 

Enthusiast Laptops deserve enthusiast system setup menus (efi/uefi/bios),No need to give us locked down stuff (at best keep all life threatening options under some bio-hazard tab or something with useful explanations).While at it don't solder the bios/eeprom/flash chip down make it removable like desktop motherboards or even add dual bios/eeprom for backup in case of failure.(no i don't want to put prema out of a job,we will always need him).

Give us a dual cpu rig.

 

Just a minor idea, but bring back physical display latches on big notebooks. My HP 8740w has two heavy duty latches which don't come undone unless I press a button. Display latches are important for bigger notebooks since their displays are heavier, and magnets sometimes aren't strong enough to hold them together with the chassis, especially if you're carrying the notebook at your side with the front of the chassis pointing upward.

Another one: for 17.3-inch and larger notebooks, actually design a keyboard that takes advantage of the width, with full-size numpad keys. 15.6-inch notebooks with numpads almost always have 2/3-sized keys in the numpad so they'll fit, which is understandable, but it annoys me to see those same keyboard put on the 17.3-inch models. That's cost cutting. I want a full-size numpad.

Charles

 

All excellent recommendations, guys.

 

- 16:10 WQXGA (2560x1600) 17" (I think that's the perfect resolution for 17", the hell this 4K) wide gamut with color space control software. For me 16:9 is and always would be for consumption (I have no issues that my TV set is 16:9). 16:10 gives you much needed extra space for toolbars and stuff and still edit full blown 16:9 content (editing 16:9 content on a 16:9 display is rather stupid IMO), not to mention if you code...
- CNT-FED - CRT's successor with none of the cons - thin, light, energy efficient, with all the pros - instantaneous response time, 180º viewing angles, wide color gamut, half-pixel drawing (resolution independence).
- AMD - CPU (high power and unlocked) and GPU back in laptops
- There's a 12" EliteBook (forgot the model) that has a socketed BIOS, and my friend @pipkata borrowed it and soldered the socket to his 8740w for testing (no luck so far). But yeah, the more widespread, the better. Also some BIOSes do tend to get corrupted over time without obvious reason, so what's better than reduce the time from like 15 minutes, if you are handy with the iron, to like 3... If you are not handy and rely on someone else, it would literary reduce the time from days (shipping back and forth), to the above mentioned 3 minutes.

All the rest I already have them, minus the contemporary hardware (sorry for bending the rules, but I can't see all of them currently in the same machine):

One and only 17" WUXGA 10bit IPS RGB LED
Xtreme CPU support (overclocking)
4 RAM slots
MXM-B
Magnesium chassis
Backlit keyboard
Pointstick - if you haven't used one, you don't know what you are missing, it is useable in games as well
Multitouch touchpad
3 buttons for both the touchpad and the pointstick
Short-cut touchboard
ExpressCard 54 slot
Dock port
Secondary 12cell battery - quick swap - you can run off the main battery while swapping the secondary, for virtually unlimited on-the-go power (only limited by the amount of secondary batteries one has)
Smartcard reader
Fingerprint reader

So, my ideal machine would contain - 17" CNT-FED WQXGA, FM2+ (or whatever socket they have planned for Zen) and of course AMD GPU (HBM MXM, whatever the board design ends-up to be, I think that MXM-B would be just fine, but they might think differently) and all of the rest.

 

- What a fantastic idea

Water cooled GPU's in laptops.....


FULL alloy chassis - Choice of colours.

Dedicated support (Gaming rigs only)

Minimum 24 months guaranteed spare parts availability.

More efficient use of internal space in laptops (No redundant or useless connections, use of latest slimline or micro tech)

 

My dream notebook would be a dual PSU one.

I imagine a 17.3" or even bigger notebook but with an accent in light "weight" and raw power.

What I mean with this its to have a super light weight and powerful machine with a dual BIOS system, where at home we could plug it to a 1kw Ac adapter, like Mr. Fox said (or just a 330w) + a 90w psu.

1-We could call this "desktop mode" to a full-power in all areas with also a "dual mode screen panel" set up to 144Hz or more.

2-Then a "mobile office mode" where the GPU would be disable and the screen refresh would lower to 60Hz and all this using a smaller PSU between 90w or 120w max.

Like this we'll have total flexibility to play games at home and still be able to conmute to work without carrying a 5Kg laptop + 1.5 Kg PSU adapter.

Would be more like carrying a 3Kg laptop + a 600grms PSU

Then of course would have to be all in metal thinking in durability, with the same flexibility we have in desktops (not only CPU and GPU replacement, but also the main Motherboard!) Thinking of a notebook to "everyone" from the outside, like the macbooks pro, will only differ if you want to play games you coudl upgrade cpu and gpu, etc but from the outside all to look the same that even my grandma could have one and no one could notice any difference.

Then they'll have to last 1o years or even more.... this definitely will make me feel better about how we are trashing this only world we have

I wish I could start a new company like One+ One and make this kind of machine

 

I'd like a good sound set up, I love my L702x for it's amazing sound, I've had 2 Alienwares which boasted amazing sound quality by Klipsch I want to see more JBL because it sounds like they know what they are doing!

multiple msata ports would be cool too, running them instead of hhd's would be costly but it'd be so worth running 6 SSD's in raid where one HDD used to be we're asking crazy here

 

I want laptops to have hardware unity. Alienware GPU not supporting Clevo or MSI GPU wont support ASUS.... NO MORE! One bios(vbios) for all. Like in desktop.

And how come $5000 laptop dosent use quality component!? I had so many issues with my gaming laptops that I am seriously considering buying desktop! ( Just lost one of my 880ms on ALienware 18 )

What nvidia doing is great desktop gpus on laptop!! Future starts from here... But OEMs need to put more resource on R&D so people like us can comfortably buy laptops without worring that "can i use this laptop for next 2-3 years or will it be upgradeable after that?" Laptop component cost far more then desktop parts and i am ok with it as long as they can serve same or better. I am sure someone will agree with me.

 

I agree, with MoBos alone costing in excess of $300, one would've thought that the components are high quality, because the same amount can get you a top-tier desktop MoBo!

Although it's nice that we have "desktop" 980 in laptop, the whole implementation is SO FAR from perfect that not only it's not funny, but it actually defeats the whole purpose. There's only one 980 that can have comparable to desktop 980 performance and it is the P870DM one. It's all downwards from there on, and don't get me started on board designs, because it is even worse than the performance differences. There are no two similar designs, all proprietary... What's desktop about that? In desktop you can have whatever GPU you want and you'll get same or better performance (overclocked models) across the board. Thank you, but no thank you. Next time they better focus on communication and forward planning, instead of rushing things, just to one-up Fury Nano.

 

Great point. We need an industry standard form factor for notebook motherboards. Like the notebook equivalent of E-ATX, ATX, m-ATX, etc. You should get dual GPU capacity automatically with the 17.3" or higher motherboard, and if you like your Alienware chassis better, just move your Clevo motherboard over, or vice versa. I would also like to see one standard for notebook displays... all eDP, no more LVDS, and all wired identical regardless of brand. The OEMs could still benefit from proprietary cooling systems, chassis, display, audio and other add-on features. But, they would all have to build a chassis around the standardized motherboard to be "with the program" and desirable. Proprietary tech almost always sucks.

 

how abouuuut....taking "thin & light" to a new level without compromises in performance and modularity?

desktop cpu machine with socket cpu, 4 socketed RAM slots, M.2 storage only (more space for battery and cooling)

--> full, unrestricted cpu performance with fully unlocked tweaking options, no bios restrictions, no BGA crap performance hit!
--> running on iGPU while on the move
--> using eGPU while at home, but please with TWO TB3 ports in parallel to counter any and all bandwidth-based performance penalties one could hit using nextgen desktop flagship gpus
--> eGPU enclosure with MODULAR psu, i dont want any cheap-ass psu but would like to choose it myself from the plethora of desktop models already on the market
--> neat idea: option to use laptop psus for the eGPU enclosure, extra points for easy portability and modularity
--> heres a crazy one: expandable display size using FOLDABLE DISPLAYS! oh yeah
--> another crazy one: modular mobos! imagine mobile upgrade kits to swap out the entire mobo, especially in model lines that dont really have any chassis differences (HM/EM/SM/SM-A, anyone? )

 

I think this had become very dangerous. You could risked all laptop models would become crippled in one way or another. All would become like new Alienware. Imagine if P870 had been equally crippled as Msi, Dell and Asus? Some further up had guaranteed made some traps with such a solution.

 

Easy

• P750DM with Infinity edge screen.
• eGPU Docks

Difficult

• P750DM with X99 and 960m + eGPU dock

 

ah yes, thin bezels, good point! 18 inch screen in 17 inch chassis and 17 inch screem in 15 inch chassis FTW

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

• Real significant advances in battery life, to the point that notebooks can last at least 8 hours of heavy use (gaming, rendering, simulations, and multitasking) and 24 hours of light use (web surfing, video watching, and productivity software)
  
• Functional and fully configurable voice commands and/or interface
• Password-based or biometric privacy locks on personal computers that allow users to clearly regulate what information on a system is shared with outside parties (including governments & operating system manufacturers)
• The rise of services that allow users to pay to design their own notebooks to incorporate the performance, connections, battery, build materials, and form factor of their choosing

 

imagine a 17" screen in P750ZM/DM size ..... sigh

 

I always thought someone would make a cooling dock that would adapt thermoelectric or liquid cooling abilities into an enthusiast laptop without limiting its current air cooling abilities. What I imagine is a laptop with a removable rubber window on the bottom that would expose the heatpipes or additional heat exchange block arrangements. Once connected to the external dock direct contact would be established to the heat exchange and the implemented additional cooling would take place. When on the go or without the dock reinstall the rubber window and away you go.

I know Asus is already trying this but its performance was extremely hindered with standard air cooling. I don’t want to give up what has been accomplished with enthusiast laptop air cooling only add additional cooling when docked without a messy situation.

The next think I would like to see several of us have asked for but I would like a smart power brick that can support 500+ watts instead of the standard 330 that most companies use. When I say smart brick I would enjoy the capabilities to capture and record information like corsair link allows.

 

Assuming that things got to the point where everything was standardized..........It would be awesome if they were to sell empty notebook cases (chasis) just like how you can go out and pick up a new case for your desktop when doing a new build. The mere thought of being able to take a M18x R2 chasis and throw what ever I would want into it makes me drool.

 

thats what im talking about, @Keith!

 

PHOENIX WITH 980 SLI, C'MON!!! Sorry, this had to be said (again)!

Internal (Water-) Liquidcooling in (Enthusiast) Notebooks is what I would like to see next.

Spoiler: Aquabook Rev 2.0

 

Better anti-glare LCD panels, OLED panels etc. Unless one can work outside in the shade a summer day the screen isn't good enough!
Quick P&P expansion of a docked computer, some professional models come close to an ideal extension but it could be done better. A subset: external graphics card that can use the internal screen or external ones.
Better touchpads. Apple still have the best but still not as good as it could be.
Larger touchpad with integrated screen and stylus support.
Partially upgradable computer.
Better cooling. My ideal computer would be close to a cooling system with a battery and computer bolted on. Why? Cooler machines are more efficient, more efficient cooling would make the computer less noisy etc. Decoupling the chassis from the hot components would also be a goal, using the chassis as heatsink isn't my idea of an ergonomic design.
External cooling. It would make use of the docking port to connect an external cooling system to a internal heat spreader.
Mirrored ports: some ports should be available on both the left and right side such as power, headphone out, microphone in.
Internal USB ports for small dongles like for a wireless mouse.
Place some ports on the power supply. Examples: Ethernet port and VGA port.

 

OLED displays

 

Bigger and more powerful fans + heatsink in enthusiast Notebooks. Of course Internal Liquid Cooling for CPU and GPU. Equally powerful processor and graphics solutions as the best high end desktop PCs you can buy for $.

 

-fanless high performance laptops, the less moving parts, the less can break.

-a jump in industrial design, think the first unibody macbook pro where the battery, harddisks etc all could be exchanged easily while the chassis was durable and simple.

-True modularity, hotswappable gpu's & cpu's in industry standard style module boxes which fit into a laptop. Make it accesible so that the potential customer base is high which keeps the costs low.

-a real jump in battery performance

 

hot swappable gpus ok, if u have a seamless switch to igpu, but hot swappable cpus....? i wanna see that!

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

Personally, I'd love to see all laptops natively support eGpus for at least one lane to an actual (don't have to open the case) external port. Potentially with optional extra power. 16 lanes in the expensive laptops +1500-3000$ that you'd WANT to have upgradeability over time since you paid so much initially. Potentially as thunderbolt now. Or a mini pci-e port.
Also more standard form factors and less blacklisting certain components or ram in bioses. Make laptops worth it to buy over desktops basically.

Wireless charging I can see become a thing for laptops at least up to 200Watts, no more broken adapters or sockets, just a large amount of induction, and even a built in notebook cooler for high preformance modes. SS drives that are more reliable for longer (yeah right), Batteries that begin hybridizing supercapacitors and nanoparticle lithium cells...higher capacities and quicker charges when required...hmmmm, what else.


OH....and get rid of bloody touch screens on laptops, they aren't phones. That's why there's a touchpad. Having a sort of ultrasonic sensor like phones do however would be a nice option to put your laptop to standby or wake it up as an option to configure when you are within a foot or so, as in sitting down to it or leaving after a timeout. More freedom in the BIOS options, especially for $$ laptops.. More ability to control your entire PC experience. Manual control of fans and less overzealous throttling in place for MUCH better cooling systems regardless of extra cost, possibility of gaming laptop plug n play external cooling systems, as simple as the radiative peltier based fins being able to connect to an outside source of power and cooling for an enhanced preformance mode while at home, or simpler, a connection adapter to allow tap water to flow in a seperate tube hitting every hot spot on it's way back out to a local sink (crazy simple no?..also probably crazy). Honestly it could be done with the battery even, optional lesser capacity battery with fan, or battery charger powered fan pack intake / exhaust system, could pull hot air out and push cool air into the case, and simply snap in flush to where the old battery used to go, it's typically a direct hole to the innards of a laptop (dependent on size), and with more heat spreaders to radiate heat to the case as well, it would be a VERY doable current tech option (wish my laptop had that option!). The big one for cheaper laptops, NO more one year ponies that die once their limited warranties are up. Resolutions of 720p should be standard on even netbooks.

Sound systems on laptops, especially enthusiast ones are greatly discounted and should make a good comeback, good ones, enough to make you say, did that come from a laptop? In that manner, lower tones could be made with different speakers above or beneath, and even plasma speakers are essentially the best "tweeters" for clear higher frequencies in the world in my opinion..or at least have the potential to be, and a magnetic speaker of such clarity could NEVER get that small. Thus you could easily have multiples for dedicated frequencies, I can see that being a big hit too.

Backllit keyboards are a must, the options to have 4K resolutions, depending on how thin screens become, more screens! which fold into the main one, that's a lot of portable workstation.
LEDs in speakers that dance to music like mine has? , might be a bit gimmicky.

And finally, it must brew me coffee, and have jetpacks to fly around with me and make R2D2 / BB8 sounds at me. And all the access to all the p0rn that ever existed.

 

- A small, easily accessible internal USB port (or hub) for wireless mouse dongles etc.
- Integrated XBox 360 wireless dongle.

I hate wires and permanently occupied USB ports!

 

100% this. At least one internal USB port or two. Would love to put my mouse and wireless headset receiver internal, and even Xbox 360 wireless dongle as noted. Some stuff you just plug in and want to leave in. Heck they could even integrate Logitech's universal receiver into the mainboard since those are probably most popular, and still add an extra internal USB port or two. Worse case offer an internal mPCIe slot that supports USB and make a two port USB adapter.

And I agree with Matchbox2022. We don't need no stinkin' touch screens. Get rid of em. Give us more LCD options, 1080p, 2560x1440, 2880x1620, 3840x2160 and option of matte or glossy on all of them.

 

One can dream, no And yes - lookie, no touchie. I HATE when someone touches my screen, all of the smudges, or even worse - scratches.

 

WORD! anyone touching my screen = instadeath!

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

Maybe with velvet gloves!?

 

that i could barely tolerate

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

It's almost 2016 and my lappy still can't make me a sandwich.

 

There are plenty of models that would. Get a random crapbook, open it, throw the products on the keyboard, close the lid, open after 3 to 5 minutes - there. Enjoy!

 

No more M gpu... laptops with slot for normal gpu cards!

 

I couldn't resist...

 

For those that haven't already noticed, Eurocom has a "Poll of the Week" feature on their web page. Regardless of what brand is your favorite, or who you prefer to buy from, Eurocom has a direct line of communication with Clevo. So, let your voices be heard. The poll this week is especially important.

 

More like this?

 

That's how I cast my vote. Being able to do whatever I feel like doing to my private property is not a preference... price of admission. As amazingly stupid as it seems to me, a few folks actually chose the "let the manufacturer decide" option. I really don't get that... even a little bit.

 

Something all OEM's should offer... Anything less is not acceptable. This gets me in a very good mood

 

Almost felt like the poll was perfect till i read "let the manufacturer decide" don't know which one is more pathetic,that people actually chose it hoping it was in error.

Addition to the post

I feel that some more work/attention should be done on mxm and hope that the desktop gpu is an indication of a shift in tradition.I get that heat is a laptops enemy,but a mobile card is already almost twice the cost of it's desktop counterpart,that gap in performance should be closed once and for all.

I'd prefer having the card and not be able to clock it anywhere near it's desktop counterpart than to pay twice as much for a card with half it's counterpart performance.

Desktop grade cards would make egpus reach their prime because now you can have much smaller enclosures with less bulky juice to back them up.

 

I miss a good Panel for gamers, who prefer to play competetive. Screens of recently released "gaming" notebooks have G-sync, but are capped at 75hz. Also IPS has a bad response time.

Is there a technical problem to put a 120hz or 144hz G-SYNC panel into a notebook?

The missing item for me in a future notebook would be a 18.4inch 144hz Gsync panel.