VIZIO CT15T-B0 Review and Ratings

Introduction & Design

If you only associate the name Vizio with Black Friday TV deals at Walmart, then you haven't been paying attention to the brand lately. Sure, Vizio established itself as a value leader in LCD HDTVs when Sony, Sharp, and Toshiba ruled that market and prices were steep. But since then, Vizio has tried to distinguish itself as a design leader to stand out among me-too electronics offerings. Nowhere is that more evident than in the company's upscale-looking CA-series all-in-one desktops and CT-series 14- and 15-inch laptops.

The $1,189 Vizio CT15T-B0 seen here is a refreshed, touch-screen version of the 15.6-inch thin and light laptop that debuted about a year ago as the CT15-A1, with the notable substitution of quad-core AMD power in place of an Intel CPU (though there's a Core i7 configuration available). It delivers high style and high-end specs to back it up, including a dedicated Radeon GPU, 8GB of RAM, and 802.11ac Wi-Fi. But some feature missteps—ports sacrificed in the name of thinness, lack of a keyboard backlight, a 128GB solid-state drive in the 256GB price range—make this design feel half a generation behind the times.

The look of the CT15T-B0 is striking—minimalist and clean. The gunmetal aluminum lid has a matte texture that looks and feels terrific, and the angled beveling gives it more visual presence than the similarly sleek Asus Zenbook UX51VZ$1,769.95 at Amazon we tested last February.

Even better is the rubberized black paint used on the aluminum base. It gives a sure grip when you are carrying the machine and keeps it from sliding off your lap, even when you're kicked back in your slippery silk jammies. Weighing just 4.8 pounds and measuring 0.68 inch thick also doesn't hurt. You can see just how slim the machine is here...

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