Personal Computing
Duo-Touch II rugged PC
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February 25, 2008 General Dynamics Itronix has announced the availability of the Duo-Touch II, the second generation of the company’s lightweight rugged tablet PCs. Combining processing power with an ergonomic tablet design for one-handed operation, the Duo-Touch II enables rugged, high-performance computing for mobile professionals in industries such as public safety, telecommunications, utilities, government, and insurance. The unit also features Dynavue display technology that meets military standard for cockpit displays for direct sunlight viewability.
SpaceStation laptop cable organizer
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February 25, 2008 No matter how sleek your laptop looks, it will inevitably be surrounded by a tangled knot of cables and peripheral devices spread messily around your desktop. The latest solution to come to our attention is Bluelounge’s SpaceStation - a docking port for laptops that manages connections with an internal 4-port USB hub, keeping wires tangle-free and out of sight. The US$79.95 unit provides connections for peripherals where needed, and has an ergonomic slanted surface for keyboards.
Zonet's SATA Enclosures for PC and Mac
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February 8, 2008 Zonet has released a line of SATA Enclosures for PC and Mac desktops, laptops, and peripherals. Ranging in price from US$25 to $35, the four models can convert any 2.5-inch or 3.5- inch SATA hard disk drive into SATA and Hi-Speed USB 2.0 external hard drives by connecting the drive to the cables inside the enclosure.
Explay unveils the new oio companion
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February 7, 2008 Israeli technology company Explay is set to unveil a new version of its oio companion at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Monday. The oio is a stand alone battery operated miniature mobile projector that connects to mobile devices to provide a big screen experience.
Lenovo all-in-one laptop and mobile device charger
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February 7, 2008 High-tech travelers often end up with more plugs, cords and cables than they care to carry, just to charge their suite of mobile devices. Lenovo's latest effort aimed at lightening this load is an all-in-one adapter designed to charge laptops and other electronic devices such as cell phones, PDAs and mobile music players.
Dual interface LaCie Little Disk 2.5 features extractable USB cable
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February 6, 2008 Designed by Sam Hecht, the LaCie 320GB Little Disk 2.5 features an integrated, extractable hi-speed USB 2.0 cable and two FireWire ports.
Intel and Micron unveil world’s fastest NAND Flash memory
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February 6, 2008 Intel Corporation and Micron Technology Inc. have developed a high speed NAND Flash memory technology targeting data-munching consumer electronics applications that's five times faster than conventional NAND.
Pulse Smartpen: merging the mobile computer with the humble pen
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Efforts to combine the sheer convenience of the pen as an input device with the benefits of digital technology continue to evolve with Livescribe's launch of the Pulse Smartpen. Based on licensed technology from pioneering digital pen developer Anoto, the Pulse not only digitally captures handwriting, but simultaneously records and synchronizes audio. The system promises incredible benefits for students, professionals or anyone in a note taking situation... and that's just the beginning. Everything you hear, speak or write is captured by the Pulse and by tapping the pen on the paper, the system will replay audio coinciding with the moment those notes were taken.
LaCie releases 320GB Rugged All-Terrain portable hard disk
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January 29, 2008 LaCie has announced increased capacity to its Rugged all-terrain hard disk, making a total space allowance of 320GB.
GETAC expands rugged range with new ultra-lightweight tablet PC
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January 25, 2008 Rugged computer manufacturer GETAC Inc. has added the ultra-lightweight GETAC E100 slate-style tablet PC and the “bright-as-you-need-it” GETAC B300 notebook PC to its growing roster of versatile mobile computing solutions.
Kingston releases DataTraveler/110/ USB drives
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January 25, 2008 Kingston Technology is introducing the DataTraveler/110/ range of USB Flash drives, available in 1GB, 2GB, 4GB and 8GB capacities. Designed to Hi-speed USB 2.0 specifications, the DT/110/ drives feature a capless, retractable USB connector that keeps the sensitive part of the drive safely concealed, and lacks a lid to lose or break.
Jerkstopper prevents AC connector damage
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January 22, 2007 The weakest link in the hardware chain bringing charge to you laptop is usually the power cord input - anyone who has ever damaged the connection and been left with spontaneous power-downs, or with a cord that only functions on a specific angle, will be familiar with this problem. This simple and affordable Cable Retention Device (CRD) from Jerkstopper is aimed at protecting this weak spot by providing an extra stay and reducing the likelihood of accidental - and expensive - bumps to the power cord.
Logitech announces MX 5500 Revolution Bluetooth keyboard and mouse combo
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January 16, 2008 Logitech's latest wireless input package - the Cordless Desktop MX 5500 Revolution - bundles the company's MX Revolution cordless laser mouse with an ergonomic Bluetooth keyboard that boasts a range of 30 feet and integrates a 2.95-by-.79 inch (7.5-by-2 cm) LCD display showing key information such as time and date, calculator, temperature, favorites, e-mail updates and song titles.
Apple’s US$1800 MacBook Air becomes the World’s thinnest Notebook
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January 15, 2008 Apple’s Steve Jobs unveiled the world’s thinnest notebook (0.16 inches at its thinnest point, 0.76 inches at its thickest) at MacWorld today. The new US$1800 MacBook Air is powered by Intel Core 2 Duo processors running at 1.6 GHz or 1.8 Ghz, has a full-size, back-lit keyboard, a 13.3-inch display, five hours of battery life, 802.11n Wi-Fi, and a large trackpad designed for multi-touch gesture support. It comes standard with 2GB of memory and an 80GB 1.8-inch hard drive, with an optional 64GB solid state drive. Countless features make the MacBook Air a compelling proposition for road warriors, including its 3 pound (1.36 kg) weight and "instant on" start-up.
Eikon Fingerprint Reader now Mac compatible
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January 15, 2008 Biometric security specialist UPEK has launched a software solution allowing Mac users to connect to its Eikon Digital Privacy Manager USB fingerprint reader. Announced at Macworld in San Francisco this week, the UPEK Protector Suite® for Mac software supports Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger and OS X 10.5 Leopard.
Corsair ups capacity of durable USB drives to 32GB
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January 14, 2008 USB drives are usually treated pretty roughly whether in the bottom of a bag or attached to a set of keys. Designed to cope with these knocks and bumps that come hand-in-hand with portability, Corsair's ruggedized all-rubber Flash Voyager and aluminum-encased water-proof Flash Survivor line of USB drives have now been expanded to 32GB capacity.
NVIDIA's hybrid technology balances PC performance and power consumption
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January 12, 2008 NVIDIA has announced the industry’s first hybrid technology for PC platforms that increases graphics performance and reduces power consumption. NVIDIA Hybrid SLI technology is based on the Company’s GeForce graphics processor units (GPUs) and SLI multi-GPU technology and enables NVIDIA motherboard GPUs (mGPUs) to work cooperatively with discrete NVIDIA GPUs (dGPUs) when paired in the same PC platform. Hybrid SLI provides two new technologies - GeForce Boost and HybridPower - that allow the PC to deliver graphics performance for today’s applications and games when 3D graphics horsepower is required, or transition to a lower-powered operating state when not. For lower energy consumption and quieter PC operation, HybridPower allows the PC to switch processing from a single GPU or multiple GPUs in SLI configuration to the onboard motherboard GPU.
Westinghouse’s US$10,000 47-inch 2560 x 1440 LCD Monitor
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January 10, 2008 There’s no doubt that more screen real estate offers more productivity, which led to the success of the 30-inch monitor market offerings from Dell, HP, Gateway, Samsung and Apple, and to a lesser extent, the HD 46- and 47-inch marketplace. Westinghouse looks set to take a step beyond its $2500 1080p line, 47-inch LVM-47w1 as its stand at CES this week includes QuadHD 47-inch and 56-inch displays. The US$50,000 56-inch display runs 3840 x 2160 Quad Full HD resolution (8.3 million pixels) while the US$10,000 47-inch runs at 2560 x 1440 Quad HD (3.7 million pixels). Both will see showroom floors in "March or April", and you can bet that the marketplace will respond, so all those big-screen-guys and –gals out there can look forward to a big year. Via Engadget
Lenovo's new IdeaPad line of notebooks
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January 10, 2007 Lenovo has launched a consumer-oriented line of PCs that encompasses three IdeaPad notebooks - the Y510, Y710 and U110 - that incorporate unique design features such as a frameless screen hinging back from the keyboard, touch sensitive controls and GameZone keys along with VeriFace face recognition, which uses embedded camera and facial recognition software in lieu of password protection.
Samsung 2.5” 500GB HD drive among new storage solutions on show at CES
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January 8, 2008 With the need for a fast, easy way to store, backup, share and transport data and multimedia files fueling explosive growth in the worldwide storage industry it is not surprising that companies are rolling out drives to fill this need at the annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES) to be held in Las Vegas from January 7-10. Among them is Samsung's new Spinpoint M6 500GB, the world’s first 500GB 2.5” hard drive that fits in the industry’s standard 9.5mm height dimension.
SentrySafe launches FIRE-SAFE/Waterproof Hard Drive at CES 2008
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January 7, 2008 Among the deluge of new product announcements emerging from the International CES which gets underway today in Las Vegas, residential and small office security-storage container manufacturer SentrySafe has launched a range of data and document security products including the world’s first FIRE-SAFE/Waterproof Hard Drive that protects data from fire and water disasters, as well as computer crashes and theft. The new line-up also includes a multipurpose Data Storage Chest that provides protection for data storage devices, CDs and DVDs, plus the world’s first multipurpose USB connected FIRE-SAFE/Water-Resistant Safe and a CD/DVD File to protect and organize up to 100 CDs or DVDs.
Hitachi hard drive gives ASUS M70 notebook 1TB of storage capacity
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January 6, 2007 ASUS has integrated Hitachi's Travelstar 5K500 hard drive into its new M50 and M70 notebook PCs. This will make the M70 capable of delivering one terabyte of storage capacity – equal to 1000 hours of video - in a two-drive configuration.
Dell introduce Crystal 22-inch widescreen flat panel monitor
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January 4, 2007 News of bleeding-edge product offerings continues to roll in ahead of next week's International CES in Las Vegas with Dell to launch its elegantly styled Crystal 22-inch widescreen flat panel monitor. Constructed using 4mm thin ultra-clear tempered glass, this exceptional piece of eye-candy features WSXGA+ 1680x1050 image resolution, in-built speakers and a 2.0 megapixel miniature web camera with microphone.
SanDisk announces USB flash drive with automatic online backup
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January 4, 2008 While the development of Flash based USB drives have enabled people to store increasing amounts of data on ever smaller devices, they have also increased the risk of misplacing data in the event that these diminutive drives disappear. Recognizing this SanDisk has announced the Cruzer Titanium Plus, a 4GB capacity USB flash drive that offers automatic online backup for every file copied to the drive. In the event that the drive is lost, stolen or if users simply forget to bring the drive with them, quick access is provided to their backed-up files through a personal password-protected online account on any computer connected to the Internet.
Axiotron ships Modbook Mac tablet computer
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January 2, 2008 Following its unveiling at last year's Macworld Conference & Expo, Californian based hardware manufacturer Axiotron has announced that the much anticipated Mobdbook™ tablet Mac solution is now available to consumers. Recently designated as an Apple-authorized product, the ModBook is the only Mac-based tablet computer on the market and comes pre-installed with Mac OS X Leopard™ and Inkwell® handwriting recognition software. Featuring a durable aircraft quality magnesium alloy structure, the 13.3" widescreen tablet incorporates Wacom® digitized pen-sensitive hardware with 512 levels of pressure sensitivity for responsive, intuitive onscreen writing and drawing, plus an in-built iSight® camera, a 2.0 GHz or 2.2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, integrated 24x DVD Combo drive or 8x DVD SuperDrive and Global Positioning System (GPS) functionality.
Next-gen acoustic modeling: developing the keyboards of the future
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December 20, 2007 It's fair to say the computer keyboard has done a pretty sensational job over the last 20+ years as the primary input device we've been using – but that doesn't mean nobody's searching for the next big thing. Voice recognition and speech-to-text software is developing to the point where it's now a genuine option – and a group of European scientists are working on some very interesting technology that uses acoustic wave reading to turn ANY surface into a primary input device that can read handwriting or be used in any number of different and configurable ways. The technology can take a wall, table, or floor and turn it into a musical instrument, a touchpad, a keyboard or a tablet-style interface. And it's even being trialled on three-dimensional objects.
Dell Latitude XT tablet PC
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December 13, 2007 In a move they believe will help facilitate the tablet PC product category to go mainstream Dell has announced the Latitude XT – a 12.1-inch convertible tablet with pen and capacitive touch capability that weighs in at under four pounds and is just an inch thick. Capacitive technology, popularized recently thanks to Apple’s iPhone and iPod Touch, senses the touch of a finger with no pressure required for the system to recognize input. It is also the forerunner to emerging multi-touch capabilities that allow the use of more than one finger for tasks such as zoom and repositioning a picture.
No strings attached: DisplayLink’s wireless USB monitors
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December 12, 2007 It's no secret that hooking up multiple monitors to a computer provides a clear productivity improvement and DisplayLink is aiming to make the setup even more efficient by incorporating Wireless USB technology into their designs. Alereon and DisplayLink have announced the availability of a reference design for a Wireless USB display adapter, which Alereon will display at the Consumer Electronics Show in January 2008. The reference design will enable PC accessory Original Equipment Manufacturers to develop wireless display connectivity adapters and related products.
Microsoft's Mobile Memory Mouse 8000
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December 7, 2007 Microsoft’s new USB rechargeable Mobile Memory Mouse 8000 frees up extra USB ports by incorporating 1GB of Flash memory into the transceiver and features magnetic connectors that allow you to continue your work while your mouse is charging.
MSI unveil PR200 Crystal Laptop Collection
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December 4, 2007 Looking for an aesthetic edge in the portable computer fashion stakes? MSI Computer Corporation has launched a crystal-studded laptop finished in pearl white that just might fit the bill. Underneath the 120 crystal studs that adorn the lid, the PR200 Crystal Collection features an Intel® Core™ 2 Duo processor, 12.1" TFT WXGA display, 160GB SATA HDD, plus a fingerprint reader, a 4-in-1 card reader and built-in 1.3 mega pixel webcam. Equally chic accessories are offered with the PR200 including two leather carrying cases in different sizes; a specially designed pearl white mouse and a 1GB crystal-studded flash drive.
DeskUNPDF converts PDF files into a range of editable formats
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December 3, 2007 The venerable PDF document format has been around for about 14 years now – longer than most people have been using the Internet – and despite a few foibles it's proven itself as a highly effective means of distributing formatted content. But for the end receiver, the format leaves very little flexibility to get information out and re-use it, which is where Docudesk's DeskUNPDF software comes in handy. The software allows you to quickly and easily convert entire PDF documents (or selected bits of them) into a broad range of formats including Word and Excel files, HTML files and JPG images.
New research highlights the environmental benefits of e-paper
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December 3, 2007 Computer screens aren’t really conducive to reading pages and pages of text so with the proliferation of online content has come new ways to view words electronically. E-paper is a display technology designed to mimic the appearance of ordinary ink on paper - even its flexibility - and according to new research, reading the news on e-paper is more environmentally friendly than viewing via PC. Interestingly, the study by the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm also showed that 30 minutes of reading an Internet newspaper has about the same environmental effect as reading a hard copy version.
CDSoft-R Cryptex: self-recorable media with automatic encryption
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November 30, 2007 Soft-R Research LLC has released an “all-in-one” self-recordable CD with the added bonus of a in-built encryption technology. The CDSoft-R Cryptex "digital safe box" integrates a simple recording wizard with the ability to automatically encrypt and secure your data, removing any trace of your files on the computer used by destroying all Temp files when the CD is removed.
Dell adds M1530 laptop to XPS range
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November 29, 2007 Following hot on the heels of the recently released XPS One, Dell has announced another addition to their ‘Xtreme Performance System’ (XPS) line of PC’s with the release of the XPS M1530. According to Dell, the XPS series aims to offer the latest PC technologies available at competitive prices and with distinctive styling and judging by the specs, the XPS M1530 goes a long way towards delivering: the 15.4-inch laptop features a built in 2 megapixel webcam, biometric finger-print reader for added security and fewer passwords to remember, and design accents such as polished chrome detailing, touch-sensitive multi-media buttons, brushed aluminum accents and a choice of colors.
LaCie Hub plugs into style
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November 26, 2007 There are plenty of products out there that solve the problem of not having enough direct USB or FireWire ports on your computer, but few do it as effectively and with as much style as this Hub from LaCie.
