8 New Notebooks For Road Warriors

Much like with servers and desktops, most recent significant technological improvements to notebooks have been less than evolutionary -- relatively modest gains in battery life, weight, memory, storage and processing power. But a handful of technologies have the potential to influence demand and upgrades. They may or may not turn out to be groundbreaking, but they're all worth keeping an eye on.

1. Wireless WAN
The success of wireless LAN technologies in the form of 802.11/Wi-Fi networks may well be the single biggest factor driving the widespread adoption of notebook computers. Even the newest iteration of the 802.11 protocol, however, retains a significant limitation: short range. No one is holding their breath for municipal Wi-Fi, and even as Wi-Fi hotspots proliferate, it can still be frustrating and time-consuming to locate one on the fly.

Enter the wireless WAN (WWAN) modem. Offered by all of the major cellphone carriers, these devices tap into digital cellular networks to provide broadband connectivity without a nearby wireless access point. Just like a cellphone, they can even work inside a moving vehicle.

WWAN modems are quickly becoming a must-have feature for power users and field service users. According to the Economist Intelligence Unit, 27 percent of corporate executives report that their mobile workers used notebooks with WWAN modems as a primary means of remote access. That number will only rise as coverage improves and prices fall.

2. Full-Disk Encryption
The possibility of a lost or stolen laptop may be the biggest security threat presented by the continued growth of notebook adoption in SMB, enterprise and government markets. In addition to the obvious damage resulting directly from lost or compromised data, regulatory disclosure requirements make such incidents very public -- very embarrassing. By rendering stored data essentially inaccessible, full-disk encryption (FDE) products provide both an effective defense against the security breach and a legal "safe harbor" against mandatory disclosure.

Demand for software-based FDE solutions has grown dramatically over the past 12 months and shows no signs of slowing. New notebook hard drives from Seagate and Hitachi incorporating hardware-based encryption promise to raise FDE's profile even further.

3. Solid-State Drives
Recent price drops have begun to place solid-state flash-based drives within the reach of notebook manufacturers and upgraders. Lacking moving parts, these drives are faster and more durable, and require less power than traditional hard drives. They still lag behind traditional drives in capacity, however, and are too expensive for most uses. A 64-GB drive -- the largest currently available -- could increase the cost of a laptop by thousands of dollars. Look for this to change over the next 12 months.