What is an Ultrabook, Really?

Thus far, Ultrabooks have been really slim, with 11-inch or 13.3-inch displays. Whether you're talking about the , the , or the , you're expecting a somewhat Air-like product; less than three-quarters of an inch thick, around three pounds or so, with a decent processor, a solid state drive, and a battery that will last about 5 hours or more. It's a new breed of ultraportable PC: thinner, lighter, faster, and made with premium materials. Just look at Intel's and you'll see a super-slim and light laptop with a tapered edge and a 13-inch display. Even Intel is selling the idea that Ultrabooks are like the Macbook Air.

Here's the rub: the specifications a laptop has to meet to be called an Ultrabook don't have a whole lot to do with that image. In order to participate in the Ultrabook branding program, a laptop has to have a current-generation Intel Core processor, a battery that lasts for 5 hours (I'm not sure how that's measured), and a resume-from-hibernate time of 7 seconds or less. It also has to support a few key Intel technologies (the Intel Management Engine, Intel Anti-Theft, and Intel Identity Protection). Notice anything missing from that list? Like weight, size, durability, materials, or display quality?

Intel does make one size constraint, but even there it leaves too much wiggle room. An Ultrabook must be no more than 18mm (0.71 inches) thick if the laptop has a 13.3-inch or smaller display. Want to make a big 'ol Ultrabook? No problem! A 14-inch or larger display a manufacturer can bump the thickness up to 21mm (0.826 inches). That's pretty thin, but it's not a thickness never-before-seen in the land of Windows laptops. In fact, it's just three millimeters thinner than a Macbook Pro, and nobody even calls that an ultraportable -- let alone a whole new breed of ultraportable. Oh, and it doesn't include the little feet on the bottom of some laptops, so the real practical thickness may be thicker. We're already seeing this in Ultrabooks like the and . Both have 14-inch screens and both were criticized for being a little too thick and heavy to meet our expectations for what an Ultrabook should be.ce."We can only hope that, as Intel evolves the requirements for the Ultrabook brand over time, it sets the bar high enough that you won't see 75 laptops in a single year all claiming to be the "pinnacle of everything that users have come to expect from their computing device." The worth of an Ultra brand is in proportion to how hard it is to achieve. This year, the Ultrabook brand is a bar so easy to clear that it's all but meaningless.