2013年12月15日星期日

CES 2012

CES 2012

Dell Vostro V13 laptop is only 16

Dell Vostro V13 laptop is only 16.5mm thick, costs a quarter of Dell Adamo XPS

If you’re suffering from Apple MacBook Air or Dell Adamo XPS cravings this just might be your lucky day. Meet the Dell Vostro V13 – it’s a 16.5mm thick 13-incher that brings very much the same specs as the Dell Adamo XPS, but at a netbook-scale price.

Okay, I’ll admit that the XPS 9.9mm thickness for a laptop sounds (and looks) amazing – it can even put most smartphones to shame. But the price is just too hard to swallow. The Dell Vostro V13 on the other hand is actually reasonably priced… though it’s only available in Singapore right now. Which isn’t a big deal, considering it’s not quite official yet (though it’s up on the Dell Sinagpore website, specs and all).


First off, things are not quite as rosy – 16.5mm is just the thinnest part of the of the Vostro V13, at its thickest it’s 19.7 mm. But that still is only a hair thicker than the MacBook Air. Anyway, let’s see what we get for our money. The Dell Vostro V13 is a 13.3″ laptop with 1366 x 768 pixels resolution (the MacBook Air has 1280 x 800).

For the CPU you have a choice between Intel Core2 Duo SU7300 (1.3GHz, 3MB L2 cache), Intel Core2 Solo SU3500 (1.4GHz, 3MB L2 cache), Intel Celeron 743 (1.2GHz, 1MB L2 cache), all of them of the ultra-low voltage variety (the Adamo XPS has Intel Core2 Duo 1.4GHz ULV CPU).

Dell Vostro V13Dell Vostro V13Dell Vostro V13Dell Vostro V13
A better look at the Dell Vostro V13

So far so good. The Dell Vostro V13 also sports goodies like up to 4GB DDR3 RAM 1066MHz, 802.11n support, gesture-controlled touchpad, 2 USB ports, one of which is a USB/eSATA combo, 34mm ExpressCard, 5-in-1 card reader, 1.3MP webcam.

For the OS, the choice ranges from anything from Ubuntu Linux, through Windows Vista Home Basic to Windows 7 Home Premium or Professional. The graphics are a bit disappointing – Intel GMA 4500MHD. The same holds for the storage memory – there is no SSD option. Not that you can put “SSD” and “cheap” in the same sentance. And obviously you don’t get an aluminum body or the touch-enabled latch that opens the Dell Adamo XPS.

Still, the Dell Vostro V13 price is only 450 US dollars, so the non-aluminum body doesn’t seem like such a loss. That price will probably be valid only for the Intel Celeron Ubuntu OS version. Since the Vostro V13 is still not announced properly, the price situation is a little unclear.

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2013年12月13日星期五

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 trailer is out

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 trailer is out, promises some epic stuff

As you should well know, the last Harry Potter movie was split into two parts, because the seventh book turned out impossible to fit into a two-hour movie. The first part of the Deathly Hallows premiered last November and it was really good and the script was very close to the book.

Today the Deathly Hallows Part 2 trailer was released and it looks epic. Let’s hope the movie keeps that spirit.

I personally like the books but I’m not such a fan of the movies. In my opinion the Half-Blood Prince was a disaster – it was a good and a beautiful movie, but it was very far away from the events in the sixth book. I honestly didn’t believe David Yates & Co will give us a decent ending, but the Part 1 of the Deathly Hallows was quite a surprise – it followed and covered almost all events in the book it was based on. And it was an excellent movie too.

The Deathly Hallows Part 2 will hits cinemas on 15 July this year. Would you go watch it?

2013年12月6日星期五

LG and Sony settle patent dispute with a cross-licensing deal

LG and Sony settle patent dispute with a cross-licensing deal

Sony and LG have finally settled their patent dispute that concerned infringed patents on smartphones, TVs and Blu-ray technology.

The dispute began after a technology sharing agreement expired three years ago and the two companies have exchanged a couple of blows in the US and European courts since then. A complaint was filed by Sony concerning LG smartphones in the US and LG accused Sony of infringing its Blu-ray video technology in the PlayStation 3. LG even got a court injunction in the Netherlands, where PlayStation 3 consoles were seized by customs.

Both companies have now confirmed, however, that the battle is over and that they have signed a cross-licensing agreement that will allow each of them to use the other’s patents. There’s no saying if any money changed hands for the agreement to be reached, though.

Well that’s one patent war down, but there are still many many more to come as the technological world currently seems to be in a full blown patent war.

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2013年12月3日星期二

Chrome for Android will likely remain Flash-less forever

Chrome for Android will likely remain Flash-less forever

Limited availability aside, the Chrome beta launch went as smooth as Google could have possibly hoped. Everyone who got a chance to take the new Android browser for a spin loved it and for a good reason. The Chrome beta is smooth, offers a cool UI and plenty of eye-candy and seemed to have the stock browser in its pocket.

And then you notice that it’s lacking Flash support. But hey, the stock ICS browser also missed Flash at launch and got it later, right? As it turns out, Chrome for Android won’t be as lucky and it will most likely remain without Flash support forever.

The problem is that the mobile-friendly Chrome arrives too late – it comes after Adobe announced the discontinued development of its Flash player for mobile devices. The developing company will only release security and bugfixes from now on and won’t bother creating a plug-in for the Chrome browser.

And while it’s true that Chrome scores the highest of any mobile browser on the html5test.com benchmark, the web is still a long way from moving completely to HTML5 and Flash is still a pretty major part of it.

Normally, the lack of Flash support wouldn’t be a big problem for a browser as cool as Chrome, but the problem here is it faces a really strong rival in the face of the stock ICS browser. The stock browser from the latest Android release is impressively smooth too and offers the innovative quick controls interface plus a ton of other extras.

As it turns out choosing between the two is a matter of picking your priorities – great syncing with your desktop Chrome browser vs Flash support and for some this might not be as easy a choice as Google might have hoped.

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