The President of Toshiba, Shozo Saito, delivered a fascinating look at near future of solid-state memory last week. He's in a position to know about NAND flash memory and Solid State Drives, and the future not only looks bright, it looks like the future is right now. He predicted one-quarter of notebook PCs will have a solid state...Read more...
The One Laptop Per Child project is in kind of a muddle. Their "$100" laptop costs $188; not many ended up in the hands of children around the world they were supposed to help; and now the number two man, Walter Bender, who oversaw content and software for the OLPC has resigned. It's not clear if it's the factor that drove the decision,...Read more...
As though we need still another reason to hate DRM, here comes one. Remember the now-defunct MSN Music store? Hopefully you weren't one of the few to use it.Customers who have purchased music from Microsoft's now-defunct MSN Music store are now facing a decision they never anticipated making: commit to which computers (and OS)...Read more...
You know you have compensation issues when you buy the latest Apple thin & light laptop and feel the need to replace the shell with a 24k gold coated, gem studded variant.Whatever drives people to want such outrageously and expensive mods, Computer Choppers is there to meet those needs. The company offers so many services and customization...Read more...
South Korean electronics conglomerate Samsung's Chairman Lee Kun-hee has resigned after being indicted for tax evasion. He'll likely lead a small exodus of other executives out of the building as well. Well, let's give the guy credit for two things, anyway: He didn't think small, as he is accused of evading $113 million in taxes; and unlike...Read more...
One of the most requested new features for Apple's iPhone has been instant messaging. After all, e-mail is sort of old-fashioned to your average cutting edge phone phreak. Apple seems to be poised to offer IM, as it has filed a patent for a universal interface for real-time messaging. In normal use, users would continue to use the same bubble...Read more...
If you’ve ever wanted a laptop computer that resembled a thick book, you might want to make friends with a chap named Kyle Bean. His mod is certainly an interesting one, in that it puts the ‘book’ back into ‘notebook’, or the other way around.Here’s a little background on the project:With everything turning towards technology, we have adapted...Read more...
On Monday Skype, announced new subscription plans that allow flat-rate unlimited calling to 34 countries. It should be noted that for Skype defines unlimited as 10,000 minutes / month; after that standard fees apply. Of course, 10,000 minutes equates to about 5 hours a day, so what the heck?The company said it was offering unlimited...Read more...
Google is the the most powerful brand name in the world according to survey firm Millward Brown, with an estimated value of $86 billion. Google is one of those companies whose name becomes synonymous with the product or service it provides, and even becomes a verb. If you don't believe me, just Google it. Google beat General Electric to the...Read more...
Vista certainly had a less-than-smooth delivery, and there are still lingering issues that keep some away. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer recently addressed the issue in a speech he gave at Microsoft’s Most Valuable Partners conference.Here’s an excerpt:“Windows Vista: A work in progress. [Laughter, applause.] A very important piece of work,...Read more...
Shipments of computers for personal use jumped by 14.6 percent worldwide in the first quarter, well above prior estimates of 13.2%, according to market research firms IDC and Gartner, and reported at Digitimes. The market in the USA had a weak showing compared to other areas of the globe, but still clocked in with a respectable 3.5%...Read more...
Pirate Bay has announced plans to Danish ISP Tele2 over their court ordered block of their web site that began in February. Pirate Bay set up a sister site with trackers called The Jesper Bay to prove just how ineffectual the block was, and as a result the block was more or less an exercise in futility.“The court case was initiated by the...Read more...
Just in case you missed it, we're writing to let you all know that we have just posted a new article here at HotHardware in which we evaluate the features and performance of Lenovo's sleek ThinkPad X300 ultra portable notebook. According to Lenovo, the ThinkPad X300 was designed to be the most efficient notebook the company has ever...Read more...
While he may not have invented the Internet, Al Gore has played a major role in bringing the issue of Global Warming to the masses. In his book and movie "An Inconvenient Truth", Gore made a compelling case, and whether his message convinced you or not, one thing is certain, it's clear people were listening. Today, there...Read more...
For those waiting on the G45 series of products, especially those that will find their way into the Montevina notebook platforms, we have bad news: The rumor going around is that the HD decode offload is broken, and it’s allegedly not a driver issue.Here’s the rumor direct from the source:“The problem with G45 is in the video decoders. We...Read more...
As many of you know, ATI has been particularly aggressive with their FireGL workstation graphics card lineup over the past six months. While their flagship R600-architecture was the basis for the solid (but ultimately underwhelming) Radeon HD2900XT for the gaming market, our tests have shown that this particular GPU architecture is much more...Read more...
ATI has been particularly aggressive with their FireGL workstation graphics card lineup over the past six months. While their flagship R600-architecture was the basis for the solid (but ultimately underwhelming) Radeon HD2900XT release for the gaming market, our tests have shown that this particular GPU architecture actually is much more competitive...Read more...
We recently reported on the company Psystar who is selling machines with an option to load OS X 10.5, a.k.a. Leopard, and how threats of litigation from Apple was all but imminent. That has now come to pass, and apparently Psystar is firing back:Speaking to InformationWeek, a Psystar employee identified only as Robert said his company sees...Read more...
The distinctly different manufacturing expertise needed for success in the mechanical and the solid state storage markets means that few companies are prepared to play both sides of the fence. As faster and cheaper SSDs loom, it isn’t surprising that major players are doing everything they can to stop or stall the march of progress long enough...Read more...
Apple has almost always had a reputation for not pushing new hardware on ‘old’ platforms, but to be fair, they’ve never really had the opportunity to update platforms quite as frequently as they have under their present partnership with Intel. As a result, the company is starting to offer new hardware products such as the 8800GT video cards...Read more...
Russell Beattie had an interesting idea. He observed the fascination that other countries had for using their smartphones and other mobile devices to browse the Web. He started mowser and tried to put the big Web onto the small screen in your pocket. Yesterday he announced that he's giving up the effort, and offers a cautionary opinion to...Read more...
If you’re looking to buy a motherboard from DFI then be on the lookout for signs of a fake board. Apparently an unknown company has decided to rebrand a few of their own motherboards, and even ship them in boxes that resemble authentic DFI boxes.“Two models have been discovered so far; MCP73V and MCP68V. They are not made by DFI and will...Read more...