The notebook PC is undoubtedly the meat and potatoes for PC makers these days, but the basic processing resources that laptops have offered for the better part of a decade have been just as stagnant as they have been on the desktop. Ever since Intel's Sandy Bridge microarchitecture made its debut, getting a thin-and-light Intel machine has meant getting a CPU with a TDP in the range of 15W. That chip has had two cores, as many as four threads, and a serviceable integrated graphics processor as the cherry on top.

Sure, power consumption has fallen as process sizes have shrunken, allowing for thinner and lighter laptops and longer battery life, among other benefits. But for folks who want more processing power from their mobile systems, period, it's been necessary to step up from thin-and-light machines to beefier systems with bigger batteries, thicker chassis, and above all, more pounds on the scale.