Laptops, particularly stylish “thin-and-light” machines, such as Dell’s Adamo ($, ♥♥♥♥)*, Apple’s ultra-thin MacBook Air ($, ♥♥♥♥), and Acer’s Aspire Timeline ($$$, ♥♥♥), which has excellent battery life, are objects of desire and even envy among early adopters and the digerati.

Alternatively, consider a Lenovo ThinkPad X300 ($$, ♥♥♥♥), which is plain-looking but has a great keyboard and screen, or Toshiba’s Portégé R600 ($$, ♥♥♥), elegant and very thin. Ap­ple’s 13in MacBook Pro ($$, ♥♥♥♥♥) is good if you prefer OS X. Read more