Will Lenovo’s IdeaCentre Horizon ‘bring back family night’ or just drain the vacation fund?

By Matthew S. Smith January 8, 2013

Check out our review of the Lenovo IdeaCentre Horizon all-in-one table PC.

Lenovo surprised everyone at CES by announcing the Horizon, an unusual all-in-one that can be laid flat and used as a tabletop device. A battery is included for up to two hours of use away from power and a demo at Intel’s press conference suggested it will “bring back family night.”

Is it really that much fun? We decided to put it to the test with a game of air hockey. Lenovo handed us a pair of unique capacitive-touch mallets and sent us to play. Though we did miss the feel and sound of a real puck the experience was far better than the cheap air hockey sets most people can afford. We had no problem sending the puck flying across the screen or blocking incoming shots. The only handicap was the glossy display which made the game difficult to enjoy in Lenovo’s brightly lit showcase.

Image used with permission by copyright holder

We also briefly played Monopoly, poker and several arcade games. Monopoly was disappointing, but that was the fault of a grating soundtrack and shaky performance rather than the Horizon’s touch controls. Poker, however, seemed like good fun. Lenovo connected two of its smartphones to the Horizon and let us use them to display cards, though that’s not required to play the game. Virtual cash was used to make bets and players could toss chips in the pot by swiping on his or her smartphone.

Image used with permission by copyright holder

The selection of games is only part of what Lenovo’s custom interface, known as Aura, offers. It can display a variety of media content, including photos and video, on a virtual tabletop. Each individual media item can move, rotate and resize with a few simple gestures. There’s also a selection of creativity and productivity apps that we didn’t have the opportunity to check out.

Though we enjoyed our time with the Horizon we can’t deny that its price is intimidating. $1,699 buys the all-in-one with a stable of capacitive accessories, but the stand is not included (pricing is unannounced). Will families spend almost $2,000 to play virtual versions of games sold at a fraction of the price? We have our doubts.

Topics

Lenovo

Matthew S. Smith

Former Digital Trends Contributor

Matthew S. Smith is the former Lead Editor, Reviews at Digital Trends. He previously guided the Products Team, which dives…

Computing

Best Chromebook deals: Cheap computers starting at $54

HP Elite Dragonfly Chromebook front view showing display and keyboard deck.

If you want to grab yourself a Windows laptop but feel that the prices are pretty high, especially when it comes to the best laptops on the market, you may want to consider going for a Chromebook instead. That's because ChromeOS tends to be a lot more lightweight than Windows, so the specs you have can go a much longer way, and even the best Chromebooks don't cost as much as the best Windows laptops. Even better, you can still get some great Chromebook deals, which is why we went out and collected our favorites below, although if you'd still like to go with a laptop, these laptop deals are a good option too.
HP Chromebook 11A G6 Education Edition -- $46, was $244

Probably one of the cheapest options you're going to find for a Chromebook is this education edition that's made to be as basic as possible to bring the price down. The processor is a very entry-level AMD A4 9120C which is just about enough to get productivity tasks completely, and probably can't handle more complex tasks. The 4 GB of RAM isn't a lot either, but at least with ChromeOS not being as demanding resource-wise, you shouldn't feel it as much as you would on a Windows device. The biggest downside is the 16GB SSD, which means you will almost certainly have to rely on one of these external hard drive deals.

Computing

I would give up my Steam Deck if the ROG Ally 2 had these features

Lies of P running on the Asus ROG Ally.

Last year, I wrote about how I went back to my Steam Deck after using the ROG Ally for several months. Asus' device is a real competitor (read our Asus ROG Ally review to learn why), but there are a handful of aspects of the Steam Deck that make it the right handheld for me. That could change with the ROG Ally 2, however.

Rumor has it that Asus is gearing up to release an updated version of the ROG Ally for 2024. Even if this isn't an entirely new handheld, it's hard to imagine Asus will exit the world of handheld gaming PCs any time soon. And if it makes a few key changes to the next iteration of the ROG Ally, I might finally retire my Steam Deck for good.
No Windows lock screen

Computing

The simple reasons your PC games don’t play as well as they should

The HP Omen 40L desktop sitting on a coffee table.

Whether you have the best gaming desktop money can buy or a budget-oriented PC, the whole point of it all is to be able to play your favorite games and make them look nice and run great. Not every gamer cares about visuals, but performance matters, and getting your money's worth out of your PC is important, too.

If a PC performs poorly in games, many of us immediately assume that the hardware is to blame. Sure, that can often be the case, but before you start looking into ways to upgrade your computer, try out these solutions that might solve your problem and let you get back to high-quality gaming.
PC settings
Whether you're dealing with poor performance, such as stuttering and low frames per second (fps), or you're simply unhappy with how your games look, the root of the problem might lie in the settings of your PC -- and as such, it could be an easy fix.