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Summary OF Microsoft’s CES 2011 KeyNote

It is hot news that Windows PCs can be soon obtained along with the crazy-cool dual touch screen Acer Iconica laptop, The alternative for a keyboard is a second display that is touch sensitive. Touch it with all the 10 fingers and lo, it opens the on-screen keyboard! Also the latest Samsung PC 7 sliding series laptop [looking like a monster Hiptop], was also exhibited. It runs a fanless Oaktail processor, along with a trio of Micro connectors adding the Micro SD, Micro HDMI and the Micro USB.

A tablet from Acer was also displayed along with finger input, which includes a capacitative pen to use with Microsoft’s Ink. Its unique feature is that it differentiates between the pen and your palm and does not record the palm touches while you are writing with the pen. It contains 4 elements of display [touch input, pen input, display and glass] combined to lessen wastage of light, thereby bringing about a larger viewing angle and sufficient brightness.

Since there is less air between the layers, the display needs only 20% of the lighting power for any brightness as against all other touch screens. News is also that Windows 8 will be coming to System-on-chips [SoC]based on x86 and Arm. Also, a build of Windows 8 [which contained a native interface] which ran on Intel Quantcomm Snapdragon and Texas Instrument OMAP SoCs the size of a matchbox, was released. A complete functioning version of the Windows on the x86 based Intel SoC and a recompiled Arm version of Word printing on an Epson Printer with recompiled drivers, a recompile version of PowerPoint with hardware acceleration, the hardware acceleration present in IE9 and finally a Full HD Video running on a NVIDIA Tegra chip was exhibited.

All this was done by Mike Anguilo, Corporate VP of the Windows Team! Interesting information is that Windows Phone 7 is opting for an entertainment spin and Big-B Ballmer is bringing Fable to Windows Phone 7 in the form of golf called Fable Coin Golf, and whatever gold you earn through that will be transferred to your Fable 3 character on your Xbox 360. A video show of some of the games to come soon was also on the Windows Phone. Rise of Glory, Full House Poker, Zoombies!!! Pac-Man, Fable Coin Golf, Halo Waypoint, Fruit Ninja and many more.

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Google Chrome OS – A New Open Source Operating System

Google Chrome OS – A New Open Source Operating System

We all know that Google has recently released their browser namely Google Chrome and today this browser has over 30 million users world wide. Now, Google has planned to release its Google Chrome OS as one more innovative approach. You could download and use this all new Google operating system at absolutely free of cost.

This operating system is especially targeted to empower all the computers either it will be a small netbook or a full-size fully featured desktop system. Some of the main highlighting features of this OS are security, simplicity and speed. This all new OS enhances the users experience while accessing the web. Google Chrome OS has been integrated with all the basic features, functionalities along with the essential security architectures.

Google is most likely deciding to work jointly with some of the OEMs like ASUS, Adobe, Freescale, Acer, Lenovo, Hewlett-Packard, Texas Instruments, Qualcomm and Toshiba so that they could reveal excess of netbooks into the marketplace by coming year. This innovative OS is designed to work efficiently with both ARM and x86 chips. The software architecture of this OS is pretty simple, introducing the new windowing system over Linux kernel.

Lots of web-based applications are involved in this system and they are estimated to work automatically. There are no restrictions that have been imposed on the web technologies as all these web-based applications are greatly running on standards-based browser.

Google stated that the Google Chrome OS is completely new project and it is apart from Android. Under the first few stages, the Android constructed for working across the array of the devices such as set-top boxes, phones, netbook and so on. Recently, the company has decided to work along with open source community, so that they could bring about this new project very soon.

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Acer-Ferrari Liquid E Ferrari Review, Price, Color – Where To Buy?

Acer lures all Ferrari lovers with brand new smartphone in collaboration with the Italian sports car company; Acer is out to reveal the latest device based on Google’s Android 2.1 [éclair] OS. But it is yet to be seen if the handset is able to receive the updated Android 2.2. Handset which is named Liquid E Ferrari turns out to be only a limited edition device from the package of Acer’s liquid model line, totally with the specific red splash and the Ferrari Logo at the back.

The combo of the two companies is not something that has come out new. We have indeed witnessed their expertise in the special edition Ferrari Themed Acer Liquid E Smartphones in September last year. Ferrari based notebooks too have been released as a result of the joint efforts of both he companies. This phone too will bear the same features as the Liquid E Phones coming with carbon fibre accents and chrome detailing. Let’s just take a look at some of the important features:-

  • A TFT 3.5 inch capacitive Touchscreen with 262 K colours and 480×800 pixels resolution.
  • Bundled Ferrari content, including Ferrari wallpapers, ringtones of Ferrari engines and videos.
  • Pre-loaded Acer Media Player widget and the Acer Web player widget.
  • Android 2.1 [éclair] platform.
  • A 768 MHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 8250 processor.
  • 5 mega pixel camera with auto focus and geo-tagging.
  • 512MB RAM.
  • 512 MB ROM.
  • A micro SD card slot for memory expansion [upto 16 GB].
  • Wi-Fi- 802, 11b/g, HSDPA 7.2 Mbps.
  • HSUPA 2.0 Mbps.
  • Bluetooth 2.0 with A2DP support.
  • Bundled Ferrari-branded Bluetooth headset with noise cancellation technology.

It was released at the Ferrari Theme Park event in Abu Dhabi, UAE, not very long ago. It is known that Acer will be producing only 200,000 units. The price is not announced yet, but you can avail the device at all Ferrari outlets. Since it is branded as the limited series, the price too may be on the higher side. Of course, it will be you who has to make up your mind.

The phone also bears a signature Ferrari red paint and Scuderia Ferrari crest with chrome trim and carbon fiber accents. Thanks to its superior casing, the device is well protected from dust and damage. It is also studded with attractive goodies from the Ferrari, inclusive of a wall paper for each of its 5 home pages, ringtones and some Ferrari related and F1 images as well as videos.

It even comes with a matching Elite Bluetooth headset and a carrying case too. Acer is all set to release their smartphone in the Indian market too. Two other models have earlier been released in India, though a lot cheaper than the new one, at Rs 24,999 and Rs. 9,999. It offers a special combination of fine detail, great performance and high quality materials.

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Chrome OS, Availability, Pricing, Reviews – Will It Be In India Anytime Soon?

I’m sure many of you are eagerly awaiting Chrome OS from a very long time. It was Acer which heralded the news of Chrome OS being launched soon. Well, Digitimes says that it will be released this month before the holidays. The information was leaked out by ‘component players’ the middle men, who are busy working on iPhone 5, and still can find time to make such comments.

News is out that the Google will be launching a self-branded device and has its mobile OS slightly better suited for bigger screens. But all this is yet to be seen! Although Chrome OS cannot be obtained as a download to install, it can only be shipped on other hardwares from Google’s partners. Due to the fact that the sole application on the device will be a browser through a media player, Google Chrome OS targets those who are at their PC most of the time.

Google Chrome is initially meant for secondary devices like netbooks, rather than for user’s PCs and will run on hardware using an x86 or ARM-based processor. It utilizes one-sixtieth of the drive as Windows 7. Considering the fact that Chrome is an open source project, it is sure interesting to view the Google Code page often, to be aware of the changes that take place.

In can be technical most often, but they do come up with a few interesting features/designs as well. Its main aim is to give us a light weight Linux distribution for a great web browsing feel.

Some of the software features are:-  GNOME 2.30 desktop environment, Google Chrome 8.2.552 web browser, Flash Player 10.1 plugin, Google Picasa 2.7 photo manager, Wine Windows emulator 1.2, Open Office.org 3.2 office suite, GIMP 2.6 image editor, Pidgin 2.6 instant messenger

Chrome OS requires a processor –[Intel Pentium, Xeon or newer, AMD Duron, Athlon, Sempron, Opteron or newer], RAM – min.256 MB; Hard disk-min 1GB; and Graphics card which supports most of the latest graphic cards!