Way back in the hazy salad days of 2001, Apple worked up a bold revamp of its flagship laptop line, the Powerbook. The company, in the pursuit of stronger, lighter, more attractive materials, moved from the black plastic casings it had used for its G3 computers to a sleek titanium shell. It was the onset of a new era in Macs. The basic look was clean and simple: squared edges, a roomy and functional layout, a matching pair of stereo speakers to either side of the keyboard, a consistent silver coloring throughout. In 2003, the company refined this design, replacing the titanium with lighter-weight aluminum and heralding in one of the most recognizable and persistent pieces of industrial design in the computer industry. The MacBook Pro (as it became known) has remained largely unchanged in the five years of its existence — in fact, the look and feel of the laptop has become such a staple of the Apple lineup that it’s almost as representative of the company as the Apple logo itself. But five years (or seven in the long view) is an awful long time to see one design, and the user outcry for significant updates has been nearly constant.

Those cries were answered last Tuesday, when the company announced the long-rumored (and badly leaked) refreshes for both the MacBook Pro and MacBook lines. As with most of the modern designs emanating from Cupertino, these are evolutionary — not revolutionary — steps, but they’re drastic in comparison to the stale, familiar versions of our not-so-distant past. Beyond the spit and polish of the Air- and iMac-inspired casings, the company has re-upped the internals as well; new graphics chips, a completely new motherboard design, and some slashing and burning of familiar ports are part of the new packages. So did Apple deliver the goods on what is arguably the most anticipated laptop release in recent memory, or has it failed to meet the absurdly high expectations placed upon it… and is that even possible? Read on to find out.

Just when you thought you were safe from the overwhelming spate of laptops we saw last week, Toshiba strikes again with the Portege A605. This notebook is based on the R500, but where the R500 measures .77-inches thick and weighs in at 2.4 pounds, the A605 is a relative behemoth at 1.18-inches thick and over 3 pounds. And unlike the R500 series, there are no SSD options available. Other than that, you get just what you’d expect: a 12.1-inch LED backlit screen, Core 2 Duo processor, 3GB of RAM, 250GB SATA hard drive, DVD burner, and the promise of almost seven hours of battery life. Prices start at $1,399, hit the read link for more info.