I've always found it strange that computer manufacturers build specialized computers for gamers, but nothing for photographers. You'd think we must be a much larger market. Well, that's finally changing.

Lenovo's been first out the door with their entry, the W700. I got one a few weeks ago and am very impressed. When people would ask me what you needed in a good photo computer, I gave the standard answers of speed and storage. It always came down to plenty of RAM (minimum of 2GB now), fast processors (minimum two core, at least 2.0 GHz) fast video performance and plenty of hard drive space (minimum 250GB). And that pretty much summed up a gaming machine. Lenovo's gone several steps further though with the W700.

The standard version of this machine has an Intel Core 2 Extreme, 3.06GHz) with a quad core version coming. It will support up to 8GB of RAM. The video card is a new NVidia 3700M with 1GB of memory. It has slots for two 2.5" hard drives, letting you have either a RAID 0 or RAID 1 configuration - in a laptop! Or how about a pair of SSD drives in one 2.5-inch slot as your C drive and the second slot holding a 320 or 500GB D drive? And they didn't stop there. How about CF, SD and ExpressCard slots. Three (yes, three) video ports - VGA, DisplayPort and DVI - and that video card means you can drive two external displays at once. So this is one powerful laptop. Then Lenovo started thinking outside the box.

The palm rest beneath the keyboard is a bit unusual. Most noticeable is a digitizer pad, by Wacom. Using the stylus that's hidden in the side of the machine, you now have tablet editing capability without having to carry a separate device (like a Wacom tablet). Less obvious, but perhaps more important, there's an X-Rite calibrator built into the palm rest as well. Paired with the installed Huey Pro software, by closing the lid you can create a profile any time you want from the WUXGA display, which covers almost 70% of the Adobe RGB color space. I've found it to be nearly dead-on with my Epson 4800 printer, which means I'm doing what would normally be a big no-no - printing from a laptop.

Are there downsides? Yes, one big one. It only comes in a 17-inch, 8lb model right now. I've taken it on the road for a couple of trips now, and while it's big it's not impossible. But that's likely to change next year with the addition of a smaller model. And Sony's also come out with a large laptop aimed at us, with a screen that can actually display 100% of the Adobe RGB gamut, a first for a laptop.

So these are good times for photographers. Not only have camera and software makers realized we're a good market, but the computer manufacturers are understanding that as well. And that's nothing but good news for us.