9 Massive Laptops That Redefine “Portability”

Even the largest and heaviest laptop that I have – a 17 -inch workstation monster – can always easily hold in a backpack with enough space for snacks. But during portable computer history, there have been computers that really extend the definition of “mobile”.

So I wondered what were the most pig laptops (or computers intended to travel with you), and this is the list of impracticable PCs that I found.

9

The Osborne 1 (1981) – The first “portable” computer

National Media Museum, Bradford

Largely considered the first “real” laptop, the Osborne 1 is a beast to transport at around 24 pounds. Two floppy disks, a tiny 5 -inch monochrome CRT and a 4 MHz processor with 64 KB RAM does not seem to weigh a lot, but it is definitely a “luggage” according to modern standards.

In today’s money, this is a computer that would cost more than $ 6,000, and it was introduced to $ 1,795, which, I think, led to very few takers. Nevertheless, the people who saw this were surprised, because you should keep in mind how great a computer was in 1981. Perhaps the most impressive thing about Osborne 1 is that the cutting-edge power draw is only 37W.

Osborne Computer Corporation / Virginia Tech Special Collections and University Archives

This means that the largest laptop battery that you can legally take on an aircraft today could feed it for about 2.5 hours, but, ironically, Osborne 1 did not really have an integrated battery. You must always connect it to a wall outlet, but at least you can win with you “conveniently”.

8

Portable compq (1983) —A suitcase of 28 pc pc

Tiziano GARUTI (Public domain)

While OSBORNE 1 was impressive, if you are looking for a modern ancestor with laptops today, it will be the 1983 portable compq.

You see, it was not only one of the first laptops, he was one of the first compatible compatible computers. Inside is an Intel 8088 processor, and he performs MS-DOS. Thus, this computer would perform the same software as a desktop IBM PC with similar specifications. It was a huge Deal, even if it was still a “luggage” computer without battery and weighed more than the Osborne 1 to 28 pounds. The presentation price of $ 2,995 (almost $ 10,000 today) lightened your wallet, which has balanced things.

7

IBM Portable PC 5155 (1984) —Big Blue’s Behemoth

Although Compaq may have beaten ibm himself in punch with a portable IBM compatible, the big blue Blue has highlighted what was essentially the same thing, but with an additional weight of 2 additional pounds, with this huge machine which is now 30 pounds on the scale. I love this amber screen.

6

Toshiba T3200 (1987) —Desktop Class Power in a brick

Jumping only three years before 1987 and look, we have a valve laptop! It has a plasma screen, a powerful CPU 80286 and a 40 MB hard drive. This thing had the same performance as our domestic computer throughout the first half of the 1990s! Still no battery, so always technically a “luggage”, but it is starting to look like a laptop.

It was much smaller and lighter than other luggage. To “only” 17.4 pounds, it’s almost half of the weight of the IBM above, now it’s progressing!

5

Macintosh Portable (1989) – Monster of 16 pounds from Apple

Apple museum in Prague (public domain)

Ok, forget the world of the PC for a second and ask where the devil apple is in all of this. After all, MacBooks are extremely popular and known to be some of the smallest and lightest machines on the market. So how did Apple occur here? Well, in 1989, Apple released the very first Mac fed by battery (so not a baguette) and he weighed 16 pounds, as much as Toshiba without battery.

He had a powerful Motorola 68000, one of the most influential processors of all time, an LCD screen with Active 640×480 matrix 9.9 inch and a 40 MB hard drive. Much of the weight had to come from the lead acid battery, and I would not really want to have it on my knees, but it is quite incredible how far these portable machines arrived in a few years.

4

Dell XPS M2010 (2006) – A 20 -inch leaflet titan

By browsing the 90s, laptops did not stop becoming smaller and lighter, and there are not really large notable boys Pariticular. I had a very beautiful Samsung i386 book submoster in the late 90s, then a compq 486, and an IBM Thinkpad Pentium 133 in high school. All portable ementials, even according to modern standards.

But in the 2000s, we started to get new contenders, and the 21lb XPS M2010 from Dell took the cake. It looks more like a foldable iMac type PC than a laptop. Of course, it is a valve design, but one with a 20 -inch screen. It is like a return to luggage workstations of the 80s, but with much more modern specifications of course.

The keyboard is detachable and the optical reader comes out of the body vertically. This thing is savage And honestly, I want a little one.

3

Alienware 18 (2013) – GPU games juggernaut

I had only one alienware laptop in all my life so far, and it was great but nothing like this beast. The main claim to glory for the very large alienware 18 2013 is the double-GPU configuration. At the time, it was possible to connect two GPUs to perform an application (theoretically) twice the performance. These days, for various reasons, it no longer works, but we could return to Dual-GPU one day because time is a flat circle.

Another thing that is a flat circle is your ball joint thanks to the weight of about 13 pounds of this thing, according to its manual.

2

Asus ROG GX700 (2016) – A “laptop” cooled by liquid

Asus

If your game laptop is hot, what are you doing? In the Asus case, you bolt a water coolant. The ROG GX700 was a daring experience in the design of laptops cooled by liquid. In itself, the laptop weighed approximately 8 pounds, but with the cooling quay attached, it jumped almost 11 pounds.

The idea may not be as stupid as it may seem at first. This first attempt was too large and bulky to be practical, but since then there have been several portable computers cooled by liquid, and there is a chance that it could become a somewhat traditional cooling solution because more people leave office computers and do not want to compromise on trendy performance.

1

Acer Predator 21x (2017) – The curved screen beast

Almost 19 pounds with a massive 21 -inch screen, it was mainly a portable game office. In particular, the screen is curved, which has no sense or difference to this screen size, but it makes it a laptop with an interesting air.

GPU Dual GTX 1080 sportsman, it is also the end of the era of Double-GPU for the game because it did not work very well at this stage, but perhaps the owners of this laptop had the last laugh, because it should always play in current generation console games of 2025 perfectly well at its resolution of 2560×1080 native. This makes its original list price of $ 8,99999 little more reasonable.

Apple

Operating system

MacOS Sequoia

Processor

M4 Pro 12-Core

Gpu

M4 GPU with 16 cores

RAM

24 GB