CES 2021 preview: Narrow corporate laptops will be the hot status symbol

This story is part of CES, where our editors will present the latest news and the hottest gadgets from CES 2021 entirely virtual.

CES 2021 will look very different in 2021, becoming completely virtual for the first time. Many of us radically changed the way we work in 2020 too, leaving the office behind and working mostly at home. The idea of ​​having a work computer in the office and a personal computer at home also came out the window, and now we are looking for our devices to do more and serve in various functions, further confusing the line between consumer and business computers.

But, due to the long development cycle of new laptops, desktops and tablets, no PC manufacturer could realistically take these colossal changes and turn them into new products in time for CES 2021. What they can do is change the narrative and emphasize new or updated products more suited to the current reality.

In other words, expect to see many business laptops at CES 2021.

All work, no fun

A year ago, at CES 2020, we saw a lot prototypes, experimental designs and new gaming PCs – many products focused on the fun consumer. This year, it will be a little darker.

Rather than First-generation folding screens and colorful gaming equipment, much of the attention will be on laptops with better webcams, better microphones and better security features. Basically, the things your company’s IT department would be looking for in a new work laptop. This may not be as flashy, but it is what many people need now.

For example, if we learned anything in 2020, it was that most laptops very bad webcams. Spend enough hours a day at Zoom meetings and it starts to become very important. Models with enhanced hardware, or at least enhanced software for digitally polishing the camera image, will receive a major marketing boost. The webcam’s physical blinds will continue to grow in popularity.

Not so much for 5G, which was just starting to infiltrate laptop ads last year. With home Wi-Fi replacing the need for many employees with reliable travel connections, I doubt we’ll see 5G antennas installed on each laptop; instead, it will just be an option in a handful of cutting-edge business systems.

A very Chromebook year

The other big thing we learned in 2020 was that Chromebooks can solve most problems with our laptops. Do you need a low-cost, high-reliability laptop for a child doing remote learning? Chromebook! Do you need a computer for parents or grandparents that you won’t have to solve? Chromebook!

Especially with so many families that need a separate device for each family member, especially one per student, Chromebooks saved the day in 2020.

Chromebooks have been part of the mix at all recent CES, but this year, I suspect we’ll see them pushed to the forefront, especially due to uncertainty about COVID-19 vaccine launches and the moving target for any kind of return to “normal”.

Every PC manufacturer wants to get out of the $ 250 Chromebook business hold, so look for slightly updated models. Frankly, a $ 500 Chromebook can offer a much more premium experience in design, materials and performance than a $ 500 Windows laptop, so that’s my ChromeOS strength now.

For PC games, a year of reconstruction

We are in the middle of a great new era in video games. Unfortunately for fans of PC gaming hardware, all that enthusiasm involves next generation consoles, the PlayStation 5 and the Xbox Series X.

This new cycle, which takes place every seven years or so, puts the sealed boxes in the living room on top of the game stack for now. After all, $ 500 (or $ 300 for the smaller Xbox Series S) offers lightning tracking, HDR lighting and other high-end GPU tricks, previously only available on PCs for much more expensive games.

But the clock is already running on PS5 and Xbox. The internal hardware is frozen in amber, aging slowly and bound to be further behind PC gaming hardware each year. That said, I wouldn’t expect much more, and CES’s official gaming topics page looks pretty sad right now.

There is at least one big jump expected. At least according to informed speculation, we will see laptop versions of Nvidia 3000 series video cards. This will make gaming laptops more powerful – maybe even some that can make Cyberpunk 2077 look good …