Laptop Rain Check
Anil Patrick, at Business Traveller India, gives a nice little article on how to keep your notebook running in the rainy conditions that happen more and more as fall creeps up on us here in North America.
On the fateful July 26th when Mumbai’s roads went under, many road warriors were forced to ditch their cars and wade through ankle to neck deep water. While there are laptops built for such extreme conditions, it is unlikely that you can lay your hands on one unless you are an army or naval commando. “Precaution is better than cure” and in case of laptops certainly less expensive, making it imperative on knowing how to safeguard your mobile computing devices during rainy days. While the tips listed below might not necessarily guarantee your laptop’s survival in extreme conditions like taking a dip on flooded city roads, it can certainly help it survive the rains in a better manner.
Read the rest at Business Traveller India.
Logitech Laptop Speakers
Smart Office News has details on speakers for your notebook from Logitech. The V20 speakers are compact for easy travelling, and like most logitech speakers, I am sure they sound pretty decent too.
The V20 speakers are USB powered and require no additional cables - they just plug into the USB port to deliver crisp, digital audio quality anywhere. Since the speakers are USB powered, they will work with both PC and Mac laptop computers. Including a collapsible stand on each satellite for maximum portability, they also come with a protective travel case, making it easy to organise cables while shielding the speakers from bumps and scratches.In spite of their small size, the V20 speakers deliver outstanding bass due to the combination of two-inch high-excursion drivers and three-inch pressure drivers.
For convenience, Logitech has integrated multimedia controls (play, pause, stop, skip forward and back, volume and mute) into the top of the speakers so there is no more fumbling with a notebook keyboard to control common multimedia functions.
The Logitech V20 laptop speakers have an expected retail price of $129.00.
Laptop vs Desktop Debate Part 2
Alex Scoble over at Computer World continues his Laptop versus Desktop debate.
Last night I talked about why I thought laptops were being deployed more than desktops, by a two to three margin, in corporations. Tonight I’m going to turn the coin and discuss why, in my opinion, desktops are undervalued and what situations they should be pushed strenuously to users.
First off, let me do a quick rant on speed. I see a lot of blogs, comments, editorials, etc. where people say things like “fast enough for today’s needs” or “those computers are plenty good for what that person does”. This is a horrible attitude to take when it comes to your users.
Companies pay for every missed cycle of opportunity, whether it comes from a receptionist, a programmer, manager, CEO or attorney. ALL members of a corporation are interconnected and the slowdown of a system used by a secretary can affect a higher paid “VIP” just the same as if the slowdown happened to the VIP’s PC.
An IT manager should always look to deploy the fastest most capable systems that can be afforded to every position in a campus. Does this mean that everyone should get the same system as the graphics developer or other user with extreme bandwidth requirements? No…what it means is that IT managers would be remiss to shortchange employees just because they don’t get paid much or because they are perceived as not needing “much power”.
Often people make these judgements when they have no good idea what a user will use the PC for is capable of doing with a PC.
Keep reading at Computer World
nVidia Updates High-End Laptop GPU
BIOS Magazine has got the scoop on an update to nVidia’s high end laptop GPU, with the new GeForce Go 7800 GTX. Looks like all the latest games will be able to run with this power house of a graphics card.
NVidia’s GeForce Go 7800 GTX graphics processing unit (GPU) is go! The flagship chipset in the company’s laptop GPU line-up is based on the desktop PC version, the GeForce Go 7800 GTX, but features a completely redesigned architecture which delivers a number of groundbreaking achievements. The chipset is immediately available in laptops worldwide.
‘Laptop PCs have entered a new age of performance and features,’ stated Rob Csongor, general manager of laptop GPUs at nVidia. ‘With twice the performance compared to the previous generation, the GeForce Go 7 GPU delivers the ability to play all of today’s and tomorrow’s hottest games and the power to process high definition video -all with remarkable power savings.’
Read the rest at BIOS Magazine.
LG Chemicals to Market Notebook Fuel Cells
LG is looking to be first to commercialize fuel cell technology for laptops. Newlaunches.com with the details:
Korea-based LG Chem, a mother company of the well known LG Group, aims to be the first in the world to commercialize fuel cell technology to power notebooks. LG Chem will probably launch its marketing campaign in one or two months, and the company said that it does not intend to change the design of the fuel cell (see the photo). The 25W power supply is based on direct methanol fuel cell (DMFC) technology and consist of two parts, a base unit and a removable fuel cartridge. The device weighs less than 1kg, and one 200cc methanol cartridge is enough to power a 25W notebook for more than 10 hours, LG Chem said. The company expects that cartridges will be priced under US$1. The base unit price will be around US$500.
The global demand for portable fuel cells in 2006 is estimated to reach US$600 million, according to LG Chem. By 2010, the market is expected to reach US$1.9 billion.
Laptop vs Desktop Debate
Alex Scoble over at Computer World has put up part one of his Laptop vs Desktop debate.
So you just got a new job and are asked what kind of PC you want. Laptop or desktop? What do you choose? Or perhaps you don’t have a choice, what does your company give you?
According to a new article put out by Computerworld, the business world is deploying more laptops by a good margin that continues to get wider.
Robert Mitchell opines that this basically means that companies are demanding more from their employees without extra pay. It’s a good part of the debate that will continue for as long as workers are workers and employers are employers, I’m sure.
Tonight, however, I’m going to look at what laptops are good at and when they are a better fit than desktops.
Read the rest at Computer World.
MIT’s $100 Laptop
An amazing idea for a project, MIT is working on creating a $100 laptop, and Cnet has images of what the concept might look like.
A research project at the MIT Media Lab has a plan for getting $100 laptops in the hands of millions of people around the world. One notable feature is a hand crank for providing power in places where electricity is undependable or unavailable.
ASUS W5A
Laptop Magazine has an article up detailing everything about the ASUS W5A.
The W5A’s second most unique feature is the swiveling Webcam above the display, which will help you stay in touch with colleagues or family members using your video chat or conferencing application of choice. The system features a built-in microphone for use with the Webcam and Lifeframe software for capturing, recording, and playing photos and videos.
The camera captures video at up to 640 x 480 pixels, which we found to be pretty choppy. Video was smooth at 320 x 240 resolution. The camera can be used as a security device, snapping photos whenever it detects motion. The installed ASUS Video Security utility can stream a video feed to a remote PC over the Internet. The Webcam’s 1.3-megapixel still photos look better than what the average camera phone is capable of capturing.
We enjoyed the W5A’s bright screen. It measures a scant 12.1-inches diagonally, but you can get away with working in Word or Excel if you’re willing to zoom the view of your pages up to 150 percent. With its 1280 x 800-pixel WXGA widescreen resolution, this display proved ideal for watching DVD movies on the go. When you get to your hotel, you’ll appreciate the front-firing speaker beneath the display, which is louder than what you’ll find on most ultraportables.
The W5A flies through productivity applications, thanks to its 1.7-GHz Pentium M 740 processor with 512MB of DDR2 memory.
OQO model 01+
Today the OQO model 01+ was announced. There are a few changes from the OQO 01 which might make this model even more marketable. The best part, is that the have put a better system in the same small 14 ounce package, making it still the smallest and most portable Windows XP computer.
The model will include a 1GHz processor, 30 gigabyte hard drive, 512MB RAM and a 800 x 480 W-VGA 5 inch display which can now rotate.
The unit also features a 3-D accelerated graphics chip with 8MB of video RAM.
The model 01+ will cost $1899 USD.
HP Compaq NX6125 Review
Pocket-lint has a review up of the HP Compaq NX6125, I still think the name sounds like a spaceship name.
HP may be one of the largest suppliers of notebooks in the world, after Dell it’s ranked second worldwide, so why do their machines lack that “must have” factor of the likes of Sony and Apple? For the main part, HP works to the keep-it-simple approach and just take care of business.
Which segues neatly with the arrival of the HP Compaq nx6125, which so clearly is taking care of business, users that is. This is the first Compaq to sport an AMD processor and it has taken the arrival of the Turion 64-bit processor to make an impression. Turion is being billed as the rival to Intel’s all-dominant Pentium M chip and while we’ve yet to see any real battery gains from the Turion, the use of 64-bit processing means its more than powerful enough for notebook use.
At this price point you find the Turion 64 ML-30 CPU running at 1.6GHz and is complemented by 512MB DDR SDRAM and a Seagate 60GB hard drive with a 5400rpm rotational speed. As a base specification this isn’t too bad but if you consider that the nx6125 has a list price of £645 (inc. VAT) and suddenly you’re looking at something special. In use, we found that this notebook could more than handle daily tasks. If you want to edit a little video or audio, it’ll more than handle that too.
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