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One Graphic Card or Two?

2009-09-28T01:57:00.000-07:00

Whether to go in for a multi-GPU setup or a single powerful graphics card is quite arguable. But it will all become very clear to you by the time you reach the end of this page. Before we delve into the topic let’s start with the basics of SLI and CrossFire X.

Scalable Link Interface or SLI is Nvidia’s multi-GPU technology that allows clubbing the power of two or three graphics cards by linking them together on the same motherboard. CrossFire X is ATI’s technology and does the same job, the difference being you can club up to four graphics cards on a single PC. The hardware requirements of SLI and CrossFire X also differ. First of all, you require a motherboard that is either CrossFire X or SLI-compatible.

You will easily find a single powerful card that will be equally powerful as two mainstream or mid-range cards. In some cases two cards in SLI or CrossFire are more powerful and budget-friendly than a single powerful card.

There aren’t many SLI motherboards to choose from, and the ones available are high-end and expensive. Whereas, there are plenty of CrossFire X motherboards available in the market, such as the ones based on AMD 780 GX, 790 GX and 790 FX. Secondly, you require two or three identical Nvidia graphics cards to configure them in SLI (same GPU and amount of video memory). In case of CrossFire X, you can club two or more cards from the same family as well - for example, Radeon HD 4850 and HD 4870, which belong to the HD 4800 family.

Starting from Rs. 3,500 you’ll find a more powerful graphics card at every Rs. 1,000 interval, way up to Rs. 35,000. You will easily find a single powerful card that will be equally powerful as two mainstream or mid-range cards. In some cases two cards in SLI or CrossFire are more powerful and budget-friendly than a single powerful card.

We tested a few SLI and CrossFire setups to show you how powerful they are as compared to single high-end cards. Two GeForce 9600 GT graphics cards (each costing Rs. 5,500) configured in SLI perform equally well as a single GeForce GTX 260 which doesn’t cost less than Rs. 13,000. Next, we clubbed two GTS 250 graphics cards (each costing Rs. 10,000) and found that their combined power easily outperforms a single GTX 285 which costs around Rs. 26,000 - a saving of Rs. 6,000 if you opt for the former! We also jammed two Radeon HD 4770 graphics cards in CrossFire and found that a single Radeon HD 4890 a much better deal. Both the options cost the same (around Rs. 18,000), but a single graphics card is more preferable.

Click on the image for the full-sized score comparison sheet

These are just a few examples. There are many more such smart multi-GPU setups that are great value for money. But at the same time a single powerful graphics card can be a better option than two mainstream cards. It will be lighter on the power supply and at the same time the heat dissipated and cable clutter will be less. There are many who hesitate going in for a multi-GPU setup because compatible motherboards are priced steeply and the cost of ownership is high. You also require a cabinet with good cooling because the amount of heat dissipated by two cards is much more than a single card.

However, if you already have an SLI or CrossFire motherboard and a good power supply, it makes a lot of sense to add another identical card (especially if it’s a GeForce 9600 GT) if you want to upgrade your graphics card. Multi-GPU is the way to go even if you don’t have a budget for two powerful graphics cards. So, you invest in one card today and add another card some time later.

Intel Core i7-975 Extreme Edition

2009-09-28T01:46:00.001-07:00

The Core i7-975 Extreme is Intel’s new speed demon that has set a new benchmark in the desktop computing space. Clocked at 3.33 GHz, this CPU is a notch higher than the former most powerful model, the Core i7-965, thanks to a bumped up multiplier (from x24 to x25). Intel has also applied a few minor tweaks which include improved thermals and better memory overclocking.

We installed the CPU on the Intel DX58SO along with 4 GB DDR3-1066 RAM and threw a couple of rigorous tests at it. It encoded a one minute MPEG video to x.264 format in 13 seconds which is just 3 seconds faster than the Core i7-965. To give you an idea about its immense processing power — it’s twice as fast as the Intel Core 2 Quad Q8400!

Extremely demanding applications such as 3D modeling, imaging, page layout, and video editing will make best use of this processor’s immense potential—ideal for heavy-duty workstations. But it hardly impacts gaming performance. Go in for this CPU at Rs. 59,940 if you’re ready to spend another Rs 25,000 for a decent X58 motherboard and 6 GB DDR3 RAM.

Package type: LGA 1366; Speed: 3.33 GHz; Cores: 4; Fab process: 45 nm; L3 cache: 8 MB.

Intel Core i5 and i7

2009-09-28T01:44:00.000-07:00

At long last, a new mainstream CPU generation is upon us. Last year’s Core i7-900 series (Bloomfield) launch gave us our first taste of Intel’s latest microarchitecture, but those CPUs were unashamedly high-end and expensive. What we have now is Lynnfield, comparatively lower end but way more affordable. Lynnfield has launched in two varieties; the absolute mainstream Core i5-700 series and the mid-to-high-end Core i7-800 series (the i7-800s being clubbed with the i5s since they have way more in common with those than with the existing i7-900s—we’ll refer to them together as “Lynnfield”).

To explain the new names a bit better: i7-900s replace older Core 2 Quads and XEs and are aimed at gamers and enthusiasts; i7-800s replace older high-end mainstream dual and quad-core CPUs for performance-minded users; and i5-700s target the same mainstream value-conscious buyers as the low- and mid-level Core 2 Duos. Going forward, the Core i3 brand will target entry-level users with low-cost chips. The i7-750 is priced at US$196 (approx Rs 9,450) and the i7-870 at US$562 (approx Rs 27,123) though Indian street prices will be known only in the coming weeks.

What lies inside

All i-series Core chips are based on the new-gen Nehalem architecture, which moves most of a motherboard chipset’s guts onto the CPU package. This totally breaks compatibility with previous motherboards and chipsets, and for the first time in several generations, there are now different CPU sockets for the high end and mid-range—LGA1366 and LGA1156 respectively. Lynnfield CPUs will use LGA1156. For now, all iX-series CPUs are also quad core. At launch time, three CPUs are available, as explained in the table below:

Click on the table for full-size

All Lynnfield CPUs will per force have to use the new Intel P55 chipset, which is the only platform capable of running them in their LGA1156 sockets. Just like the X58 for the i7-900s, there’s only one chipset and only one version of it. Lynnfield users will get most of the benefits of their high-end cousins, such as the integrated memory controller and IO subsystem, four cores with a huge shared L3 cache, the return of HyperThreading (on the i7-800) for more efficient multitasking, and most importantly the neat Turbo Boost feature which is a sort of reverse HyperThreading for boosting single-threaded apps. The main differentiator from the original Core i7-900s is that Lynnfield chips continue with a standard dual-channel RAM configuration rather than the triple-channel setup that feeds Bloomfield CPUs. They also have PCIe links for a discrete graphics processor rather than the rich QuickPath Interface (QPI) intended to connect multi-CPU Bloomfield configurations.

Where Lynnfield actually surpasses Bloomfield is the Turbo Boost feature. Turbo Boost basically panders to single-threaded applications by raising the speed of a single core (or two cores) when it detects that the rest are totally idle. As long as the cores collectively stay within the total heat and power envelopes they’re rated for, one core can actually jump significantly in speed. All of this is managed by a block of logic called the Power Control Unit. The Core i7-900s allowed one core to jump two multiplier notches up, or two cores to jump one notch up each. Lynnfield has a far more aggressive approach, and a core can reach around 20-25 percent higher speed under the right conditions. A single core can go four or more multipliers higher, and if heat isn’t a problem, all four cores can jump one or two speed bins as well. In absolute numbers, the Core i5-750 with a stock speed of 2.66 GHz can jump to 2.9 GHz with all four cores or as much as 3.22 GHz with a single core under stress. Think of it as selective, intelligent, official overclocking managed completely within the CPU, without any user intervention!

Lynnfield has one more surprise in store: Windows 7 is tweaked to work with its multiple cores and threads. Core Parking is a new technique to not only help applications make better use of available threads, but also prevent apps from jumping between cores (or background processes from needlessly occupying them) so that Turbo Boost can take full effect. This has the side effect of letting the CPU be more efficient, since unused cores can be powered down.

We’d be missing out if we didn’t talk a little bit about the P55 platform. Since so many of the chipset’s core guts have been moved onto the CPU die, this is the first single-chip solution from Intel for the mainstream desktop. That combined with the dual-channel RAM requirements and simpler circuitry should mean we’ll see some interesting microATX and maybe even ITX P55 motherboards in the coming months. There are no exciting new features such as SATA 3 or USB 3.0, but you’ll get the usual flavors of RAID, 14 USB ports, and Gigabit LAN.

Performance

We set up the Core i5-750 and i7-870 on a Gigabyte P55-UD3R motherboard with 4 GB of 1600 MHz Corsair XMMS3 DDR3 RAM and a Radeon 4770 graphics card. Both processors were put through our entire benchmark suite, including synthetic tests, real-world tests, and 3D games. We were expecting high scores, but what we found was literally game-changing. In most tests, the i5-750 was as good as even the fastest Core 2 Quad Q9650. In gaming, where even the i7-900s didn’t show too much of an improvement over the Core 2s, Lynnfield excelled, most likely due to Turbo Boost. Considering it’s officially priced over 40 percent lower than the Q9650, the i5-750 seems to be a brilliant deal.

Click on the table for full-size

There are even more surprises in store when we check out the i7-870’s scores: it actually beats the higher-ranked i7-900 series in many tests, and comes close to the i7-900 Extreme Editions. Again, it does so at a far more attractive price point.

Both CPUs run right over their top outside competition, the Phenom II X4 665 Black Edition, leaving AMD firmly in the dust, hopefully readying its own next generation CPUs.

Conclusion

The Core i5-750 brings devastating levels of performance to the mainstream market, and the i7-870 rivals the non-extreme edition i7-900 series at a far lower price. Combined with cheap RAM and motherboards, the Socket 1156 platform is looking mighty attractive, and Socket 1366 will probably be pushed into extreme performance territory: future 6-core Gulftown (Core i9?) and multi-CPU solutions only. Back at the mid-range level, Intel has effectively destroyed demand for most of its Core 2 series chips which plainly have no more headroom for growth. Turbo Boost is intriguing, and we’ll be running lots of tests in the near future to see exactly which types of applications benefit. And as for AMD, they might just have to go back to cutting prices and concentrating on the lower end for a while—only the top end Phenom II X4s can hope to compete.

Estimated Prices

Intel Core i7 965 - Rs 56,000
Intel Core i7 920 - Rs 14,900
Intel Core i5 750 - Rs 9,450
Intel Core i7 870 - Rs 27,100

ECS G43T-M3

2009-09-28T01:43:00.000-07:00

The ECS G43T-M3 is slightly better off than most entry-level G41 chipset-based boards in terms of features—it offers DVI output, gigabit Ethernet

and six SATA ports.

Like most other motherboards based on the same chipset, the ECS G43T-M3 is well-designed keeping in mind good airflow and ease of installation. The areas around the core components are very tidy so that the air blown by the CPU cooler also cools the memory and northbridge.

The SATA ports and headers for USB, parallel port and front panel are placed very thoughtfully at the edge of the board. The only quirk in design is the lack of heatsink on the ICH10 southbridge. It’s placed between the PCIe x16 and PCI slot and tends to heat up with a graphics card installed.

The rear panel of the ECS G43T-M3 comprises eight USB ports and 5.1-channel audio jacks in addition to the gigabit Ethernet port and DVI output. However, it lacks a parallel port and PS/2 port for the mouse.

We tested this board with the Intel Core 2 Duo E8400, 2 GB DDR2-800 RAM and 500 GB hard drive. It didn’t give us any problems and the power was just sufficient handling home and office applications.

At Rs 4,925 the ECS G43T-M3 is slightly better off than an average G41 board.

Tech Specs:

CPU socket: LGA 775
Chipset: Intel G43 + ICH10
Memory: Up to 8 GB DDR2-800
LAN: Gigabit; SATA | USB: 6 | 8
Expansion slots: 1x PCIe x16, 2x PCIe x1 and 1x PCI

Samsung P2250 LCD Monitor

2009-09-28T01:42:00.002-07:00

Samsung is a big name in LCD displays, be it for swanky HDTVs or the more functional and personal PC monitors. Today we have a 22 incher by Samsung called the Samsung P2250, so let’s see what’s in store.

Design and features
At the risk of sounding like an ad voiceover, I have to say that all Samsung monitors now come with Samsung’s Touch of Color red accents - a red streak visible on the bottom panel. The bezel of this model too is as usual glossy black, with a transparent, hard plastic layer married on to the top. This layer sticks out a bit from the sides, thus giving the front view transparent borders, which look pretty cool. The bottom panel has touch sensitive controls on its right half, while the Samsung Logo is printed at the center - overall it looks very neat and sober. These buttons light up, with red illuminated text below them, once any of them is touched. This last design aspect is the icing on the cake, thus the aesthetics get high marks for a nifty feature like this.

The monitor is fairly well built, with tilting capabilities, but not swiveling, plus the joint between the stand and panel is quite firm, with just a little wobble. We were disappointed with the connector section as there is no HDMi, only DVI-D (with HDCP) and VGA . There are no other bells and whistles in the monitor: no speakers, no headphone outs, no cameras etc.

As for rated specs, The panel is a TN panel, with viewing angles of 170/160 degrees. Panel contrast is 1000:1 (native), and brightness is rated at 300 cd/m2. The resolution is 1920 x 1080, a pure 16:9 aspect ratio. The exact size is 21.5 inches diagonal. Response time is rated at 2 ms.

Performance
The first thing that impressed us was the UI, it's quite well designed and easily navigable. The touch sensitive buttons are also well responsive, except for a few instances where they ignored our delicate touches. There are presets like Text, Movie, Game, Dynamic Contrast, game etc., but still it's ritual for us to use to the Custom setting, and start with the ever handy Display Mate test software suite.

First we only check grayscale, which in our case, yielded not such a pleasing result. At least in darker extremes, as blacks were weak. Our blackest shades of grey did not show up, they all got merged into one another, thus the test fails. If we raise the brightness too high then things get faded as usual, thus we have to say that the contrast is not so spectacular.

The colors on the other hand were much more appreciable, at least in their saturation level wise. It's not bang on target, for graphics work, but very much in balance to not make things look cartoony. There was not much blooming of whites also, even on highest contrast rating.

In areas of detail and sharpness, we were impressed again, as text and minute images look extremely accurate. We played Wolverine and Prototype on this monitor to see motion. Here too there was not too much to complain or nitpick about. The occasional moiring and jaggies were not absent, but tolerable for us.

Conclusion
The monitor cost is slightly high, at s. 11,500. Comparatively, 22 incher TN panels come for around 10K, plus this does not have HDMI or any other candy, thus we feel it’s a tad pricey. The Blacks are weak, but color accuracy is good. Sharpness and motion also impress, but most of all, if it matters really, it is the external aesthetics that make a killing here. The monitor is really sexy looking. Thus if the aforementioned buffet appeals to you, you can go for it, especially if one gets it at a bargain.

ATI Radeon HD 5870

2009-09-28T01:42:00.001-07:00

AMD/ATI’s next-gen Radeon HD 5870 graphics card is here, and it’s a blockbuster. Its architecture is a refinement of the 4xxx series, and is manufactured using the 40nm process that AMD demonstrated it had mastered with the 4770.

First some numbers: The 5870 GPU has 1600 shader units (or stream processors) and 80 texture units for over 2 TeraFLOPS of rendering power—exactly twice as many as the 4870. All that power goes into making lots of new tricks work, the foremost being DirectX 11. Yes, this is the first and only DX11-capable card available.

DX11’s new features included multi-threaded rendering, better tessellation and shadows, better physics and AI calculations, new types of transparency, and real-time post processing. All this means we should expect vast improvements in textures, shading, antialiasing, and effects such as HDR lighting, depth of field, lens effects, realistic shadows in DX11 games, which will start trickling in from October onwards. DX11 also brings in DirectCompute 11, which will tie into Windows 7’s GPU optimizations to enable desktop acceleration.

Stream technology is another buzzword. This is what AMD pitches as its open-standards-compliant approach to GPU processing. Stream is implemented in both hardware and software, and enables better load sharing between CPUs and GPUs so that each does the task it is best suited for. The last cool new trick is Eyefinity, which lets you drive up to 6 HD displays with a single card for up to a crazy 8192x8192 pixel theoretical maximum desktop area! Gamers will love it, while designers and analysts can benefit too, especially now that LCD prices are so low.

The HD 5870 card itself is huge and heavy, and comes in black with firetruck-red accents. It’s nice to see two DVI ports as well as HDMI and DisplayPort on the back. It runs cooler and quieter than expected, but still blocks a lot of room in a big PC cabinet. We used Windows 7 and DX11 with the latest pre-release Catalyst drivers, to get the most out of this card. In our tests, the new Radeon easily took the top spot for single-GPU cards, beating its own predecessor, the HD 4890 as well as Nvidia’s GTX285. The overall 3DMark score was 14,724, while Crysis gave us 51.52 fps at 1680x1050, Gamer settings, and 2xAA. Sadly, no DX11 games or tests are available yet, but we can’t wait to see the new muscle in action.

Nvidia’s going to have a hard time keeping up; only its dual-GPU GTX295 and a few SLI solutions will match it even if prices are cut. With all intelligence suggesting that their own DX11 generation is still months away, AMD can enjoy this victory for a while.

Specifications:

GPU: ATI Radeon HD 5870
Stream processors: 1600
RAM: 1 GB GDDR5
Process: 40nm
Core | Memory speeds: 850 MHz | 1200 MHz
Outputs: DVI, HDMI, DisplayPort

The expected price is Rs. 24,990.

Samsung Releases 7000, 8000 Series LED Lit LCD TVs

2009-09-28T01:40:00.002-07:00

Samsung India has launched its 8000 series of LED HDTV in the Indian market, in 55” screen size and has added 32” screen size to its 6000 Series and 55” screen size to its 7000 Series lineup.

“Samsung LED TVs redefine the standards for design, viewing experience and energy efficiency in colour televisions. Based on the strong initial acceptance that we have received for our 6000 and 7000 Series in LED TVs, we are now going in for range enhancements for the existing series and introducing our advanced 8000 Series of LED TVs with 200 Hz Motion Plus technology. Based on our considerably strengthened LED HDTV Lineup, I am confident , that we will successfully create a new category in the television market in India as we are doing in other global markets such as the US.”

At just over an inch thick, each of the three Samsung LED HDTV Series feature high dynamic contrast ratios and Samsung’s acclaimed Auto Motion Plus frame interpolation technology. The 8000 Series uses a refresh rate of 200Hz. The 7000 and 6000 Series has a 100Hz refresh rate.

There are some new features like the USB 2.0 movie feature that makes viewing videos and photos from a camcorder, playing music from a media player or accessing multimedia files from a portable drive possible. The DLNA Wireless feature in the 7000 and 8000 Series lets the user watch content from the PC without any wires or cables. The Samsung LED TVs come with a built in Content Library Flash which includes pre loaded content.

Samsung now has three LED Series- 6000, 7000 and 8000 with 32”, 40”, 46” and 55” screen size segments priced between Rs. 69,900 and Rs. 3,00,000.

Sony to Launch 3D TVs Next Year

2009-09-28T01:40:00.001-07:00

Sony Corp plans to launch 3D TVs next year in a move to spur sales amid slowing growth in flat TV demand, the Financial Times said.

Sony CEO Howard Stringer will announce the 3D TV launch as well as plans to make its Vaio PCs, PlayStation 3 game machines and Blu-ray players compatible with the technology at the IFA electronics trade show in Berlin on Wednesday, the FT said. The newspaper said Stringer is expected to tell the audience: "As with high definition a few years back, there are a variety of issues yet to be addressed. But the 3D train is on the track, and we at Sony are ready to drive it home." Sony said the company plans to hold a news conference at the IFA at 1500 GMT and that it may update progress on its 3D TV development there, but declined to comment on the timing of any 3D TV launch. Shares in Sony, the world's second-largest LCD TV maker behind Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, were down 3.2 percent at 2,440 yen, underperforming the Tokyo stock market's electrical machinery index, which lost 2.5 percent.

IFA 09: Samsung AMOLED TV

2009-09-28T01:39:00.002-07:00

IFA 09, Berlin is where it's at, for the world of AV media right now. Currently on display is an AMOLED TV prototype by Samsung. When will it come to India? No clue.

IFA 09: Samsung Releases Whole Line up of LED TVs

2009-09-28T01:39:00.001-07:00

The exhibition booth for Samsung Electronics at IFA this year is the second largest after Sony’s. When you enter the booth, the first thing that captures your eyes is a monument consisting of 128 LED TVs, resembling leaves.

Each of the eight petals consists of two 55-inch, six 46-inch, six 40-inch and two 32-inch TVs. Samsung claims, "Compared to other TVs on the market, Samsung LED TVs offer vast improvements in three distinct areas: picture quality, design and environmental impact."

Follow tech2eets on Twitter for live coverage on this.

IFA 09: LG Debuts Borderless LED TVs

2009-09-28T01:38:00.001-07:00

LG Electronics unveiled new home entertainment products at the 2009 IFA in Berlin.

LG's theme for this year is Live Borderless, is reflected in its BORDERLESS TVs, which appear to be a single, uninterrupted sheet of glass. These are the first TVs to completely eliminate the seam between the screen and the surrounding bezel.

LG is introducing two BORDERLESS TVs, the SL8000 and SL9000.

The SL9000 LED TV has a dynamic fine contrast ratio of 3,000,000:1. Other features include Bluetooth and HD DivX compatibility.

Beneath the SL8000’s beautiful exterior hides a top-end Full HD 1080p SuperIPS panel, which can be finely tuned using LG’s Expert Mode. TruMotion 200Hz ensures that fast onscreen action is always super sharp and a dynamic fine contrast ratio of 150,000:1 gives the TV amazing clarity. LG’s exclusive Intelligent Sensor reduces energy consumption, helping make both TVs friendlier to the environment.

LG was able to create these super-slim smooth TVs by using a new Injection Compression Molding technique, which creates a sleek, uninterrupted glasslike surface. Special laminate films reduce glare and improve picture quality.

Follow us on Twitter as we cover IFA LIVE at Berlin.

Philips Rolls Out 'Cinema-proportioned' LCD TV

2009-09-28T01:37:00.002-07:00

Philips has rolled out its Cinema 21:9, calling it the world’s first cinema proportioned LCD TV. Philips also announced a move into the Blu-ray category with a complete range of Philips Blu-ray players and home theatre systems.

Mahesh Krishnan, Vice President, Consumer Lifestyle, Philips India, said, “Philips’ strategy is defined by a clear focus in four key areas in the health and well being domain of which the home, including TV and DVD players, is one. We’ve refined our positioning to focus on the premium market where our advanced technology and design resonates with consumers to provide the ultimate cinematic viewing experience.

“We’ve also looked at the understanding and perception of Blu-ray and developed a totally new ecosystem that will help broaden Blu-ray’s appeal in India and greatly extend the range of titles available. Indian movie fans will be able to enjoy the latest Bollywood blockbusters on Blu-ray and get the full cinema treatment through a series of deals that Philips has arranged with India’s leading production houses.”

The Cinema 21:9, delivers a home cinematic viewing experience with movies displayed in the 21:9 aspect ratio – on its 56” Full-HD screen. It also has a refresh rate of 1ms.

The Cinema 21:9 is priced at Rs. 450,000.

“Cinema 21:9 and our Blu-ray players bring sleek, superior new technology into homes and give viewers the ultimate cinematic viewing experience from the comfort of their couch. Our Cinema 21:9 technology sets the benchmark for LCD TV’s and promises viewers no more movie black bars on the screen. And, it is of immense pride that our Bangalore innovation campus played an important role in the software design for this leading product”, added Krishnan.

Philips also launched a new range of Blu-ray players and home theatre systems for the Indian market. The range of five new players includes one of the highest end standalone Blu-ray players in the market and a value conscious entry level player. The Blu-ray player prices range from Rs. 16,990 to 79,990.

Pradeep Kumar Ramachandran, Director - Marketing, Audio, Video, Multimedia and TV, Consumer Lifestyle, Philips India said, “The Blu-ray range offers uncompromising performance at affordable price points. We’re providing superior performance with great upload times across the board with our Blu-ray players. There is something for everyone from an entry level player to the high end.”

Cinema 21:9 will be sold through an exclusive new dealer channel that Philips developed just for this product. The selected dealers specialise in complete home entertainment systems and cater to high end consumer interest. Initially, the Cinema 21:9 will be available from these dealers in Mumbai and Delhi only.

To give consumers a Blu-ray experience and help them purchase a Blu-ray player and Blu-ray disc in the same place, the Blu-ray range and the latest titles will be showcased in Blu-zones at all premium outlets across eight cities – Mumbai, Delhi-NCR, Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Kolkota, Ahmedabad and Pune.

To support and broaden Blu-ray use in India, Philips is also working with a number of key players in the market to further develop the Blu-ray ecosystem. Production houses such as Eros, Yash Raj Films and Big Videos will make available over 500 Indian films before this year’s Diwali. In celebration of the launch, Philips is giving away the movie New York in Blu-ray format for a three month period.

Creative Launches Two Speaker Systems

2009-09-28T01:37:00.001-07:00

Creative Technology has introduced the Creative Inspire T3130 and Creative Inspire T6160 speaker systems.

The Creative Inspire T3130 and Creative Inspire T6160 speaker systems feature proprietary technology and sleek designs and were built to stand out acoustically and aesthetically, making the Creative Inspire T3130 and Creative Inspire T6160 speaker systems distinctly superior in their respective classes, while remaining competitively priced.

Key features of the Creative Inspire T3130 Speaker System include:

- 2.1 channel speaker system designed for use with PC, notebook or MP3 player
- Creative IFP for satellites with improved sonic directivity and imaging
- Convenient volume and power control via wired remote, providing ease of reach
- Subwoofer features a large, flared port tube for clean bass with adjustable bass control
- Magnetically shielded satellites enable placement near monitors or notebooks without causing image distortion

Key Features of the Creative Inspire T6160 Speaker System include:

- 5.1 channel speaker system designed for immersive multi-channel surround sound
- Creative IFP for satellites delivers better sonic directivity and imaging
- Creative Phase Cap for improved high frequency dispersion ideal for digital surround
- movies and games
- Subwoofer features a large, flared port tube for clean bass with adjustable bass control
- Easy-access volume and power control via wired remote control provides greater
- Convenience

The Creative Inspire T3130 and Creative Inspire T6160 speaker will be available at a suggested retail price of Rs. 2699 and Rs.4999 respectively.

Asus Launches F83Se in India

2009-09-28T01:36:00.001-07:00

Asus has launched its latest F83Se notebook in India.

The 14” widescreen F83S is based on the latest Intel CoreTM Duo Processor P8700 technology and Windows Vista Home Premium operating system.

Stanley Wu, Country Manager for Notebook business, Asus India, said, "The F83S is one of our performance notebooks which we are most pleased to release in India. This notebook performs to the hilt and also offers a sense of style with its smooth & polished exterior. Observing the need for high performing notebooks amongst the Indian consumers, we're sure that a product offering such as the Asus F83S will be a force to reckon with in the Indian notebook scenario."

The Asus F83Se has a scratch resistant satin-brushed aluminum body, spill-proof keyboard, Smart Logon that uses facial features as the pass-key, a media player, instant messenger, web-browser and email.

The Asus F83Se is powered by an ATI Mobility Radeon HD4570 graphics card with 4GB RAM and a 500GB hard disk.

The F83Se comes with a 2-year limited global warranty and costs Rs. 60,340.

TGS 09: Alienware Launches New Gaming Rigs

2009-09-28T01:33:00.001-07:00

Alienware has added five new high-performance gaming rigs to their arsenal, including four overclocked liquid-cooled desktop systems and "the most powerful 15-inch gaming laptop in the universe".

The All powerful Alienware Aurora, Aurora ALX, Area-51 and Area-51 ALX desktops and the Alienware M15x laptop join the M17x, launched in June, to expand the Alienware line-up.

The Alienware M15x - the most powerful 15-inch gaming laptop in the universe - sports Alienware's acclaimed new mobile ID which debuted with the M17x laptop.

The first Alienware laptop to feature a mobile Core i7 processor, the M15x also offers a 1 GB NVIDIA GeForce GTX 260M GPU2 and up to 8 GB DDR3 1333MHz memory3.

The Aurora is most upgradeable and the Aurora ALX is the most powerful MicroATX desktops Alienware has ever created. Featuring the latest Intel Core i7 processors, including an optional Extreme Edition overclocked to 3.6GHz, the Aurora line of desktops are designed to deliver the power needed for hardcore gaming, pro-level HD audio and video editing, 3D animation and more. To crank up gaming performance, Aurora and Aurora ALX have options for dual 1GB ATI Radeon HD 5870 graphics cards, up to 24GB DDR3 1333MHz memory or 12GB DDR3 1600MHz memory, respectively, and up to 2TB of hard drive storage – all in a compact, MicroATX chassis for taking up less desk space. Prices start at $1,299.

Alienware Area-51 and Area-51 ALX are designed for extreme gamers and tech enthusiasts who demand only the latest, most advanced equipment. The Area-51 line of desktops features Intel Core i7 processors factory overclocked to an intense 3.86GHz for peak performance. To max out your graphics benchmarks, these systems offer the quad-GPU power of dual NVIDIA GeForce GTX 295 graphics cards. Other featured specs include up to 12GB DDR3 memory clocked at 1333MHz or 1600MHz, respectively, and six easy-access, cable-free hard drive bays that support both 7,200RPM and 10,000RPM drives, solid state drives and RAID 0, RAID 1 and RAID 10 configurations. Prices begin at $1,999.

The ALX brand denotes a distinguished class of Alienware systems that deliver both unique designs and peak performance. Both Aurora ALX and Area-51 ALX offer technology options beyond their respective standard editions, allowing for higher benchmarks and extended future-proofing. Aurora ALX features design elements not available on Aurora such as the Active Venting louver system, internal theater lighting and cable-free hard drive bays. Area-51 ALX ups the ante with an anodized aluminum body and motorized front panel. All Alienware desktops also offer CPU liquid cooling right out of the box which allows the ease of overclocking that deliver extreme computing.

Also announced today, Alienware customers can now configure the M17x laptop with the intense power of the ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4870 in both single and ATI CrossFireX configurations for up to a 145 percent graphics performance increase.

Alienware users can build out a complete, high-performance gaming ecosystem with the recently announced Alienware TactX Mouse and Keyboard, and the Alienware OptX AW2210 Monitor which features a 21.5-inch full HD screen for experiencing the latest generation games and HD movies in 1080p resolution.

These branded peripherals can be ordered immediately at www.alienware.com.

Hands On: LG KM900 Arena

2009-05-20T09:03:00.000-07:00

LG’s latest touchscreen handset that’s been making waves with their new S-Class User Interface since February of 2009 made its way to our labs before hitting the stores. Yours truly got a crack at the prototype and instead of waiting for a review, when it launches perhaps sometime in June (not confirmed yet), I thought I’d give you a quick preview of the handset. Please understand that this is only a prototype and while I did have a few issues with the handset, it’s very possible that the actual review piece may be perfect. With that in mind I’ll update the preview with a Review when I do get a proper handset so you’ll have to be a little patient guys. Until then here’s what I can tell you about the Arena and its features.

Form Factor
The design is quite typical for a touchscreen handset. Unlike the iPhone its front is designed to be a full touchscreen with the Call Take and end keys and a shortcut option all being touch sensitive. This is quite like the HTC HD’s functionality; the difference is that these keys light up. The 3.0-inch touchscreen display sports a resolution of 480 x 800 pixels and 16 million colors. It’s a light handset at just 105g with a slim form so naturally it becomes very easy to carry around.

On one side is an LG proprietary USB slot that’s universal for the charger and USB and on the other side are a set of Zoom/volume keys and a camera key below them. A 3.5mm handsfree socket is located at the top beside the power key that can also be used to lock the display, like in the iPhone. What I thought the handset could have used is a hot swap slot for the memory card, but with 8GB of internal space, that was hardly necessary. However, under the rear panel, a microSD card slot does exist, and you won’t have to remove the battery to remove it. The Arena also has a light sensor for the display that’s also like the iPhone's.

So it’s not an iPhone with a calm sophisticated look, it’s not an HTC HD with a large display, it’s not a funky Nokia 5800, nor a Pixon with its hefty camera, but the Arena, at least in the looks department, does have a unique blend of elegance, simplicity and a dash of femininity. Hopefully if it’s launched in another color I might see the latter part a little differently. But just so you know, it’s not a bad thing either way.

Features and Performance
I’m not going to go into detail about the actual performance of functionality of the handset’s features. Like I said, the model I received was a prototype tester, so any issues I faced I'm attributing to that factor.

Interface
The S-Class interface has a lot of good and bad points. The desktop is similar to the multiple desktops with widgets that the LG Cookie has. This version is a little more visually attractive and instead of two, you now have four separate desktops that cater to very specific needs. While I did like the smooth flow of the UI when flicking to switch desktops, I realized that I’d rather just have one with multiple widgets for various purposes, naturally the Samsung UI came to mind. Each desktop only offers a very specific set of features that you can use. You can customize the layout a bit but not too much. On the whole though, I found the desktops quite intuitive and colorful. Video will play in a small preview screen, but switch to landscape and it goes to full screen. The same goes for images. On the other hand music files can be played from the same Favorite’s (media) screen but you won’t be able to adjust any settings, which is rather odd.

The inside menu system is neatly categorized into four divisions – Communication, Multimedia, Utilities and Settings. Each category has more options than just the four per slot that you see initially. To access those you’ll have to flick to the side or simply use the accelerometer by changing the viewing orientation by shifting to landscape. The problem is the entire screen is then taken up completely with a bunch of colorful icons that have no headings so you’ll just have to wing it and go with the icon design.

The accelerometer is extremely smooth and thankfully not too eager to please. By that I mean it’s not going to switch orientation when the handset is tilted a bit. Of course I did wish that the entire interface would change orientation and not just particular screens so I wouldn’t have to keep switching from landscape to portrait and back again. I wasn’t too fond of the keypad layout. The alphanumeric keypad is large, but it took a lot of getting used to. Stubby fingers like mine kept hitting all the surrounding feature keys most of the time. The QWERTY keypad is large and was a lot easier to use. Once again, when it came to editing text, just like the iPhone, the Arena also has a small preview pop up to place the cursor. This was not as easy to use as the iPhone's and was not very receptive to placement.

Media
The music player doesn’t have a full screen view. It plays directly from the list itself with a small
drop down system that has a visualization and a CD icon that has the album art. There are plenty of EQ presets to choose from including Dolby Mobile and Bobcat Mobile sound settings. They make a difference, for sure, but the problem was that I could have used a little bit more decibel level and a little less in the higher frequencies. Hopefully this will be fixed.

Videos looked gorgeous. The player has a Dolby Stereo setting in portrait mode but it vanishes in landscape for some reason. There didn’t seem to be any Resume Play option for files, which I had a major issue with. You can adjust the video size to suit the screen if your file resolution is lesser than the screen's display. The handset supports DivX playback so some files won’t need to be converted. LG has provided a DivX converter with the package to make things easier.

The radio refused to work so I can’t say much about that. It’d consistently gave me an error for the Auto-Scan option and refused to pick up any signals even if I manually located the stations. Hopefully I wont have an issue with the review piece. A voice recorder is also available as a stand alone application.

The handset’s multi touch capabilities really came through when it came to zooming in on images and web pages. It was quite smooth and responsive I have to say but I’ll admit the iPhone’s was just a little bit more so. Only a little though. Flick control for the images works well with the UI and the flow was fluid with no hiccups.

A couple of motion-based games are included. None of them are really entertaining as such, except for may be the Tepong, but that too gets a bit old after a while. My suggestion to LG would be to include a few more games like this to fill the space or at least include a few that are a little more entertaining.

Connectivity
The Arena is a well equipped handset when it comes to connectivity. It’s ready with Wi-Fi, Bluetooth with an A2DP profile and of course EDGE/GPRS. It’s also 3G ready for when that technology becomes available. The Web browser seems a bit sluggish when it came to opening flash content on websites even via Wi-Fi. The layout of web pages looked good, but even on optimum settings for the display, text appears too small. You’ll have to Pinch to zoom in for a better view. Double tapping on the screen won’t do it for you.

It also offers Microsoft Exchange capabilities as well as easy setting up of POP and IMAP email addresses for email on the go. Google services like Google Maps, Search and access to Google Mail and You Tube as well as Blogger are also preloaded. The Google Maps works with the handset’s integrated GPS antenna, however, I couldn’t get it to work.

Misc. Features
All of the basics are available with this handset. The Arena also supports document viewing of DOC, XLS, PPT, PDF file formats. A dial system for making changes to the date etc. is designed to be similar to the iPhone, but when it comes to setting an alarm, it looks quite familiar to a clock with hands you can adjust accordingly. There’s also a well sorted calculator, World Clock, Unit converter and Memo pad.

Camera
A 5 megapixel autofocus camera with plenty of goodies is on board for those with the photo bug. From Geotagging, image stabilization, face tracking and manual focus, the Arena’s camera seems well equipped, but I did expect a few scene modes. There’s also an image editor and movie creator for slideshows as well. A pity it has just a single LED flash though. The Schneider-Kreuznach optics work brilliantly. Images appear clear and quite crisp. It did seem to take a little long to process pictures though, so a few pics came out a little blurry at times if there was a lot of movement, and I’m hoping this is not going to be an issue with a boxed piece.

Macro images looked good and the Arena allowed me to get pretty up close and personal to a lot of subjects.

The Bottom Line
The Arena is a ‘Cool’ handset. Perhaps my choice of words seems a little crass but I stand by that. It has a lot to offer. The very trendy S-Class UI is well designed but does have a few bugs when it comes to speed but not flow. The pricing of the device hasn’t been set yet nor can I confirm its India launch date. But to sum it all up, the UI could be tweaked a little to be fully optimized for touch control in a few places and a few features that didn’t work for me (like the keypad, radio and GPS) in the prototype I’m hoping fare better in the review piece. On the whole I like the S-Class UI and the LG Arena in general. It has a bit of a way to go before it can actually beat out the iPhone, but it’s pretty damn close.

Nokia Launches 3 More Handsets for Emerging Markets

2009-05-20T09:02:00.001-07:00

Nokia brings the Internet in emerging markets closer to reality with the announcement of three new mobile phones that open the door to information, entertainment, family and friends. The Nokia 2730 classic, Nokia 2720 fold and Nokia 7020 each come Internet-ready, and work with Nokia's range of emerging market services such as Nokia Life Tools and Ovi Mail.

"The power of the Internet is undeniable," says Alex Lambeek, Vice President at Nokia. "We've seen mobile technologies catalyze the growth of the informal sector across the world, empowering local entrepreneurs and having an immediate and lasting impact on people's lives. Services like Nokia Life Tools and Ovi Mail, combined with the mobile phones we're launching today, bring powerful solutions that can be the gateway to knowledge, entertainment and people, without the need for a PC."

Nokia 2730 classic

The Nokia 2730 classic is Nokia's most affordable 3G phone offering faster access to the Internet at Rs. 5155 (EUR 80). The Nokia 2730 classic is expected to start shipping in the third quarter of 2009.

Nokia 2720 fold

The Nokia 2720 fold is a compact fold phone with a mirror-effect design, which helps people stay organized with easy access to email, calendar, Internet connectivity and file sharing applications. Email can be activated by completing a simple three step set-up process, and in select markets will be offered with Nokia Life Tools. The Nokia 2720 fold is expected to begin shipping in the third quarter of 2009 for an estimated retail price of Rs. 3576 (EUR 55) before subsidies and taxes.

Nokia 7020

Another fold phone from the company, the 7020 uses light, color and metal finishes conveying personal style. It has a stardust effect when a call or message comes in, or users can tap twice to have the cover light up. It also has options to connect to social networks and share pictures taken with the 2 megapixel camera. The Nokia 7020 is expected to begin shipping in the fourth quarter of 2009 for an estimated retail price of Rs. 5799 EUR 90 before subsidies and taxes.

According to extensive Nokia consumer research, nearly half of emerging market customers state that they would rather connect to the Internet over a mobile phone than a PC. As a result, Nokia has developed solutions that consist of affordable mobile phones and applications, designed and built from the ground up to meet the specific needs of customers in the developing world. Lambeek continues, "Whilst many people are still primarily using voice and text, the Internet does offer a whole new range of opportunities."

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars

2009-05-20T08:54:00.000-07:00

From the days when GTA honed a 2D top-down visage to its current 3D third-person avatar, the series has seen its share of both - evolution as well as devolution. After regressing back into its top-down womb, the series makes its debut on the Nintendo DS with 'Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars'.

Chinatown Wars takes place in the series' fictional hub populated with the most GTA tales to date - Liberty City. To keep things fresh, the storyline doesn't intersect those in previous iterations, and the game hosts a cast that's new to boot. You step into the expensive shoes of 'Huang Lee', the spoiled son of a recently murdered Triad Boss. He's given a pretty simple task - to deliver his family heirloom, which is a sword named 'Yu Jian', to his gangster uncle Wu "Kenny" Lee. As soon as he hits the airport, Huang's crew's hit by a group of thugs who kill his escorts and leave him for dead. What follows is a series of missions to help uncle Kenny recover the sword, trace your father's killers (since you're hell bent on avenging his death) and help him in all the shady operations he has running.

The playground offered is incredibly reminiscent of the first two GTA games (owed to the top-down view), but with the detail and scale of GTA 3 and 4 (to an extent). The game manages juice all it can from the DS where both visuals and the game's scale's concerned. The little beast gives you access to two of four islands of Liberty City, each brimming with more life around any corner than you could hope for. The game world's beautifully designed, rendered and littered with details.

Be it the bright red dumpsters lining the edge of a gloomy building or a orange and yellow canopy that hovers above a hotdog stand, the game's a visual treat with its vivid color palette that plays with contrasting colors and cel-shaded style that leaves a lasting impression. I love the way even the little things boast of intricate details - when it rains, little umbrellas prop up over walking pedestrians, when you run over a dustbin or a derelict carton that litters the streets, puffs of wasted paper flutter in your wake. It all comes together in the most wanderlust-inspiring way, which is a truly big plus for a sand-box game where exploration plays such a vital role. And then there's the obvious - the game looks brilliant on every level and runs as smooth as noodles off a chopstick.

When you try to steal a ride, the touch-screen's used to hot-wire the car, and depending on the how old the car is, you get simple locks (that you can use a screw-driver to start-up), slightly more complicated locks that require you to hotwire manually, and electronic number locks, which require you to time your clicks to get a certain numeric code in from a series of spinning wheels.

Rockstar's done a tremendous job with Chinatown's Gameplay too. The control's designs are ingenious - they've used the touch-screen as a fully functionally PDA with everything from GPS to e-mail access, which is one up on the series previous pager/cell phone. When you try to steal a ride, the touch-screen's used to hot-wire the car, and depending on the how old the car is, you get simple locks (that you can use a screw-driver to start-up), slightly more complicated locks that require you to hotwire manually, and electronic number locks, which require you to time your clicks to get a certain numeric code in from a series of spinning wheels. If you don't hotwire the car in time, the car's alarm kicks in, alerting nearby police patrol vehicles and throwing them in pursuit of you.

Alternately, the touchscreen's used to do everything from playing a scratch-card minigame which allows you to win cash, to letting you assemble a sniper rifle before an assassination mission! What starts off seeming like an entertaining gimmick, quickly proves itself to be a really well though-of and designed core-feature of Chinatown Wars' gameplay.

You control the movement of Huang and you drive around using the D-pad and face buttons. The cars controls are really responsive, and the game assists you re-align your ride with a road after those steep turns, making it really easy to dodge traffic and ram into cop cars. Speaking of which, unlike previous games where could find a quite spot to take a nap while your 'wanted level' cools off, in Chinatown Wars you'll have to earn your freedom. The game's littered with cop cars, so sneaking past them is not an option. If you wish to lose the heat, you've got to ram into and disable cop cars, making it much more of a challenge to make it through those intense cop-chases.

It can become really frustrating at times though, since the cop cars are extremely persistent (and fast) and the damn cops have huge fists full of talons instead of hands. They use these deadly talons to latch onto your car and pull you out mercilessly, busting your ass, even while your car's spinning all over the place wildly. The only way to get rid of these suicidal cops is to drive straight and really fast. Getting busted during a long, multi-objective mission can be extremely frustrating, especially if you're on the last part of mission and one of these cops from hell latch on and pull you out of your ride, even while your car's far from stationary. The game's checkpoint system fails miserably at such times; it would be great if they could incorporate one that saves your progress after every objective in multi-layered missions.

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars is one of the rare breed of games that excels in both design and implementation, while giving you access to a plethora of content. It's without a doubt, a must-buy for DS owners; in fact, it pushes the series forward where innovation and ingenuinity are concerned, far more than GTA IV ever could

To sum up, Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars is one of the rare breed of games that excels in both design and implementation, while giving you access to a plethora of content. It's without a doubt, a must-buy for DS owners; in fact, it pushes the series forward where innovation and ingenuinity are concerned, far more than GTA IV ever could (yes, Chinatown Wars is better than GTA IV, which wasn't that great a game anyway). However, just like with its brethren, its gameplay and checkpoint system leaves a lot to be desired; but that's in no way a reason to not dish out the Rs.1,699 it costs, to buy the game (which is available locally, by the way) for your beloved Nintendo DS.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine

2009-05-20T08:49:00.000-07:00

You don’t need to be a big comic book aficionado to have heard of Wolverine. In recent times he’s pretty much become a household name thanks to all three X-Men movies and tons of comics, cartoons etc. Unfortunately none of the movies or the abysmal game eons ago could portray him in all his primal fury.

Thankfully Raven Software, the makers of the Soldier of Fortune series stepped up to the task and started working on a brand new Wolverine game that’s as bloody, visceral and violent as it gets. The story of Wolverine revolves around Wolverine’s origins, his torrid relationship with his brother and the bane of being a mutant. Of course when you have Ademantium claws to fall back on, life becomes a whole lot easier.

Wolverine borrows a bit from tons of high profile action games on the block like Ninja Gaiden, God of War and Tomb Raider. The Tomb Raider bit of course is limited to platforming and certain locations that feel like they’ve stepped right out of Tomb Raider Underworld. These platforming segments can range from moving huge stones/crates to reach a higher ground to a bit more complex stuff that may require exertion of the gray matter. Still, there’s nothing over here that’ll stop you in your tracks.

On the combat front, the game delivers the good and how! For starters you can decapitate, maim and dismember every enemy on-screen with reckless abandon. Limbs, heads and appendages fly all over the place as Wolverine slices and dices his way through his enemies. You’ll start off with a few basic heavy as well as light attacks but as you progress you’ll acquire experience points that’ll help you improve existing abilities and learn newer ones at the same time.

Now Logan is one pissed off mutant and that fact is reflected through his Rage meter that sits pretty on-screen right below his health bar. Kill people and destroy objects to build up this bar after which you can unleash up to four devastating rage attacks that’ll affect multiple opponents and cause a serious amount of damage to bosses as well.

Speaking of bosses the game will throw tons of them at you. Initially it’ll go a bit easy with one boss per level but half way through the game it’s like the game goes into over drive with nearly every level offering multiple boss fights. In fact towards the last few levels you’ll have nearly three boss fights back to back so I suggest you try out the game in Easy for the first time (Hard is only unlocked once you finish the game once).

If you aren’t in the mood to systematically dismember foes (shame on you then) you could indulge in some quick kills that are as awesomely violent as they are effective. To do this you need to grab an enemy and hit the heavy attack that prompts Logan to raise his claw slowly. At the peak of his motion it’ll gleam and that’s your key to press the attack key once again. Time it right and you’ll watch Logan smash his claws through an enemy’s face only to rip his head off in a glorious gush of blood and gore. Screw up and well, they’ll just kick you away after which you can try the entire process again. Another way of quickly dispatching off your foes is by using the game’s many environmental hazards to impale, pulverize and obliterate them.

And then you have Wolverine’s Lunge ability that’s unlocked from the get go. This ability allows Logan to literally lunge towards an enemy and bury his claws deep within their chest (or face at times). This game mechanic offers an instant kill on lower level opponents and will be your key to taking down some of the gigantic bosses as well.

Also spread out through every level are tons of Mutagens that can be equipped to make Logan a serious force to reckon with. You can only equip three at a time but they can be switched every so often allowing you to try out all the power-ups the game has to offer.

Once you finish the single player campaign, you unlock bonus challenges and if you perform them successfully you’ll unlock different Wolverine costumes. After that you can play through the entire game using that costume but that’s really no motivation to go back unless you’re an obsessive fan. The game has no multiplayer or co-operative component as well, so after you sink in around 8 – 10 hours into the game, you’re pretty much done with it for a while.

Visually the game is pretty stunning running on none other than the Unreal 3 engine. Logan has been recreated really well and bears a stunning resemblance to his real life avatar. As most of you already know Logan regenerates immediately and that fact has translated to the game as well with Wolverine healing his wounds in real time. After taking a ton of damage Logan actually looks a bit like a T-1000 and you can actually see his innards nearly popping out till his tissues, muscle and flesh all regenerate fully again. Voice acting on the other hand is God awful and I couldn’t comprehend the fact that Hugh Jackman sucks this hard at voice acting. Most of his lines were delivered with such lifeless emotion I honestly thought it was a low budget porn voice actor.

Speaking of all things that suck it’s time to address some of this game’s faults.

For starters, Wolverine suffers from the very same syndrome most action games on the block do – monotony. Around half way through the game it seems developer Raven just ran out of steam as the game just throws wave after wave of repetitive enemies your way in a bid to increase longevity. Even locales – especially the Africa level – repeat themselves way too often and the latter ones come off as bland and generic.

Don’t get me wrong here; the combat carries this game a long way. It’s just that the game could have been so much more if they had only thrown in a bit more variety or cut down the length to a certain extent. Boss fights – save for 2/3 – are unimpressive and highly boring. Each and every boss or mini boss in this game will go down in the exact same way leaving little room for creativity or variety. And it really doesn’t help matters that I’m fighting the same boss nearly 7- 8 times throughout the game.

So yes X-Men Origins: Wolverine is no God of War but at the same time it’s still one of the better Movie-to-Game Adaptations out there. In fact I’d put this bad boy up there right after Chronicles of Riddick and the Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction. Its production values are off the charts and developer Raven has done a seriously commendable job in capturing the raw, uncaged essence of Wolverine. If only the game was tweaked a bit more we could have been looking at the best Movie-to-game adaptation out there. Still, if you’re a fan of Wolverine or just like action games in general, I definitely recommend picking this game up. You will not be disappointed 'bub'.

Cryostasis

2009-05-20T08:46:00.000-07:00

Its uncanny resemblance with BioShock and the fact that its first gameplay teaser featured what looked vaguely like plasmids accompanied by vintage weaponry, tainted my first impression of Cryostasis, making it seem like a BioShock clone. When I played the game though, to my relief, I was proven wrong. Think of Cryostasis as a mix between the combat from Condemned, and the eerie atmosphere from BioShock.

Cryostasis takes place in 1981, when a nuclear icebreaker named the North Wind gets shipwrecked near the North Pole. You play the role of Alexander Nesterov, a Russian meteorologist who's hell bent on figuring out what went wrong aboard the North Wind. Throughout his investigative journey, he comes across the ship's dead crew who metamorphosed into weird creatures that don't seem to like company too much.

For most of the first quarter of the game your main focus is on melee combat, which boils down to pressing the left button to attack and the right button to block. You can hold down different directional buttons while attacking for different punches, and you can hold down two directional buttons to start up a multiple hit combo. The fist fights are really good in the game, but the melee combat gets boring once melee weapons such as the axe or the broken valve come in. The reason behind this is that the melee weapons have no cool combos, and no matter what direction you hold while attacking, they attack the same way.

Eventually guns come into the picture, which feels like a breath of fresh air. The guns in Cryostasis are not the easiest to use and ammunition is pretty hard to come by, making the game challenging and adding to the atmosphere of dread. There's a handful of guns in the game, including a bolt action single-shot rifle, a machine gun with bulky magazines and a sniper-rifle, all of which have a good bit of recoil, and absolutely need you to use iron-sight if you wish to hit your target.

It's not just about killing the dead, the game has a few puzzles up its sleeve too, which range from simply powering up a door before you can enter it, to moving back in time to change events that transpired. This ability of moving back in time sometimes helps you see incidents of the past, and at others, allows you to enter the body of the deceased to change the events that led to their death. Doing so supposedly saves their soul, and allows you to change your immediate surroundings by performing actions in the past, giving you access to previously blocked areas. This system works really well for Cryostasis, forming the base for all its puzzles as well as the story-telling mechanism; it's basically one of the only two reasons you'd label the game 'innovative'.

The other innovative feature is the game's health system. Your health and body heat are one and the same thing, and the more you get shot, the less your body heat becomes. Illogical as it sounds, the health system works quite well. Everytime you run low on health, you find a heatsource and rightclick near it to warm yourself. The health bar tracks your body heat as well as external heat. If the external temperature drops too low, your body heat reduces rapidly, making it imperative to find a heat-source every few minutes during gameplay if you wish to stay alive.

The level design in Cryostasis is really dull and uninspiring, with similar looking rooms that are basically many frost-covered rusted-metal walls with narrow stairways, ladders and corridors inter-connecting them. The event triggers are in the right places though, which is great for a horror game like this since it makes all those startling moments largely unpredictable. This fact also makes the dull game world more beareable. The story progression is rather vague though and the story-telling mechanism lacks a pivot - most of the story is told to you through extremely cryptic cutscenes regarding an ancient tribe, while the rest is told through flashbacks. The process of finding a relation between the two seemingly unrelated stories makes you move perpendicularly away from the gameplay, since it's too vague initially to urge you into playing more, making it more obstructive than inspiring.

What let me down even more is the game's poor optimization. While the visuals look pleasing at best, there's no way you can justify the horrendous framerates since the game's nowhere as great looking as even last year's BioShock, let alone Crysis. On my Core2Duo e8600, 4GB RAM, Nvidia 9800GTX+ rig, the game ran at just about 30 frames per second, with all but shader model maxed out. If I moved the shader model from 2.0 to 3.0 or 4.0, the framerate would drop by as much as 15 FPS. The problem is the insane amount of particle effects used throughout the game, and the fact that the damn thing doesn't support multicore processors. You heard that right - Cryostasis features PhysX, SLI and Shader Model 4.0 support, but doesn't even have multicore support.

While Cryostasis has a great story to tell and some really great ideas, it fails big time on the technical front. The game has a few bugs that require you to input console commands manually to fix, which can be quite a daunting task for those amongst us who aren't technically sound. If you think you can deal with the bad optimization, there's quite a decent shooter experience in-store in Cryostasis. The game's not available in retail locally, but you can buy it off Steam for nearly Rs. 1,500 ($29.99).

Bionic Commando

2009-05-20T08:44:00.000-07:00

Resurrecting an old franchise is a tricky proposition. On one hand you have to make sure you don’t piss off long time fans while on the other hand, you have to make the game accessible to newer audiences as well. Developer GRIN finds themselves treading that very fine line with Bionic Commando, a remake of the Nintendo 64 game of the same name. Since I’ve never played the original game I never had lofty ambitions to begin with. But even if I did I wouldn’t be disappointed since Bionic Commando is one awesome f*****g game.

In Bionic Commando you’ll step into the boots of Sgt. Nathan 'Rad' Spencer, a Bionic Commando (duh!) who along with his bionic brothers protected the fictional city of Ascension against all things evil. Once they outlived their purpose, the government conveniently "took care" of them. Some of them received a bullet to the brain while some of them were imprisoned in the process. Our man, Rad dodged a bullet only to find himself rotting in jail sans his bionic arm.

But as they say, karma’s a bitch and the government now finds itself helpless against a new breed of terrorists that have detonated an experimental weapon in Ascension City, destroying half of it in the process. Being the shameful bunch that they are, they actually have the audacity to ask for your help and being the stand up guy that you are, you step up to save the asses that imprisoned you in the first place. Besides the cinematic at the start that lays down all of this for you, there isn’t a lot of plot progression in the game. You’ll keep receiving orders from an old boss who just so happens to be as clueless as you. It’s only towards the end do things become clear and even then the game ends on a cliff hanger note setting up the possibility of a sequel.

At first glance Bionic Commando may appear to be a free roaming game but it’s not. It’s pretty linear offering players a few alternate routes along the way. Stray from the pre-determined path and you’ll die of radiation in a matter of seconds. You will however be able to swing all over the place to your heart’s content using your bionic arm since you can latch onto pretty much any surface that isn’t radiated. Now we’ve already discussed the swinging mechanics in our preview so I won’t waste any more time on that.

What you do need to know (and I’m really gonna stress on this) is that it’ll take some getting used to since it isn’t of the pick up and play variety. But once you do get the hang of it, it’s the most exhilarating swinging experience after Spiderman 2. Since more than half of Ascension City lies in ruins, using regular roads is not an option so the faster you get accustomed to the swinging, the faster you’ll progress through the game. Be careful though; the bionic arm weighs a ton, so if you screw up and fall in water, it's lights out for Rad.

Throughout the game you’re limited to carrying three items in your inventory. One’s for your default pistol, one’s for sticky grenades while the third one’s reserved for more powerful weapons like shotguns, rocket launchers, machine guns and snipers. Ammunition for these weapons is pretty scarce so you’ll find yourself relying on your pistol a lot. The pistol is pretty weak and will take out the most basic grunts with ease but once you come up against tougher opponents you’ll need to bring out the heavy hardware. And by that I do mean your uber-awesome Bionic arm.

Initially you’ll only be able to use the arm to swing around but as you progress through the game you’ll unlock newer abilities like throwing and kiting heavy objects (vehicles included) on unsuspecting guards. This will be instrumental in taking out some of the tougher enemies like robotic guards who are only vulnerable from the back. Unlike what I expected, there aren’t too many boss fights in the game. The few that are there are well balanced and are challenging enough without making you tear your hair off in frustration. Some of them are pretty epic in scope and it will take a few minutes to figure out their weak moments.

While playing through the game you’ll constantly be notified of Challenges that if completed successfully grant you newer abilities like improved armor, increased ammo carrying capacity etc. Most of these challenges are pretty simple and can be completed by just playing through the game once. If you’re a completionist, you can tackle the game once again in a harder difficulty level to get all 100%.
You may have noticed that I haven’t bad mouthed the game a lot simply because there isn’t much to begin with. Besides the weak plot and a few minor bugs, I never came across anything that made me cringe or stop playing. I do however foresee a camp of (impatient) people that won’t like the swinging, simply because it’s not the pick up and play variety. And if you just don’t get the hang of it, you’ll kind of hate the game since that’s one mechanic, the game leans on heavily... even in multiplayer.

That’s right. Bionic Commando has multiplayer and while it isn’t too deep or detailed, it’s still awesome fun nevertheless. You have just three modes to choose from - Team Deathmatch, Deathmatch and Capture the Flag. Of course all of them lean heavily on the swinging mechanic so if you haven’t mastered that yet, prepare to get frustrated. I suggest you complete the single player mission, or at least nail the swinging down and then venture into MP. That way you’ll have a blast and enjoy all aerial acrobatics and combat you’ll be indulging in.

So do I recommend the game? Hell to the mother loving yeah!

Visually the game isn’t shabby to begin with but at the same time it won’t make you wet your pants the way Killzone 2 did. Ascension City is well detailed and so is Rad’s character. His animations for jumping, diving, swinging are extremely fluid (I especially love the swan dive). Frame rates are silky smooth except for a few hiccups during the boss fights. Voice acting is pretty campy and I’m guessing that’s a homage of sorts to the original game (one line regarding a worm boss really cracked me up).

So do I recommend the game? Hell to the mother loving yeah. Bionic Commando is a game that challenges you, but never frustrates you (at least on the normal difficulty level). The game achieves a perfect balance between platforming and combat so you never get really bored of either of them. Even though the game’s pretty linear, you do have a few options up your arsenal so you could say the game even warrants multiple playthroughs. The swinging mechanic will take some time getting used to but stick with it and you’ll love it the way I do. The only downside (and that’s a pretty big one) is its price in India. Both the Xbox 360 and PS3 version will set you back by Rs. 3,499. As you can see, these are pretty steep prices but if you have the money I wholeheartedly recommend this game. If you don’t, well save up for it. Or you could take part in our Bionic Commando contest to win a free copy. That way you don’t have to sell your kidney.

Bionic Commando is available for the Xbox360 and the PS3 for Rs. 3499.

Iomega Announces New Generation of eGo Portable HDDs

2009-05-20T08:42:00.001-07:00

Iomega has announced the worldwide availability of a new generation of the Iomega eGo Portable Hard Drive, featuring USB 2.0-powered models with more ruggedness and bundled data protection software all backed with a three-year limited warranty.

The new USB 2.0-powered eGo Portable Hard Drive comes in a variety of colors and capacities. The bright Ruby Red model is available in 250GB, 320GB and 500GB capacities; the sparkling Silver model comes in 320GB; and the deep Midnight Blue model is available in 320GB.

Inside an anodized aluminum shell little more than a half-inch thick (16 mm) and weighing less than 7 ounces (200 grams) is a 2.5-inch portable hard drive. Iomega's Drop Guard feature protects data on the new eGo drive from drops of up to 51 inches, or 40% above the industry average. The new 500GB Iomega eGo BlackBelt Portable Hard Drive USB 2.0, available in June, comes complete with a black eGo Power Grip Belt and Iomega's Drop Guard Xtreme, which provides protection for the drive from drops of up to 7 feet (2.1 mm) - over twice the industry average.

All of the new USB 2.0 eGo Portable Hard Drives receive power from a laptop or computer's USB port so there's no power supply to carry around. The drives ship with a "Y" cable which gives users the flexibility to use two USB ports to power the drive, if needed.

Bundled free of charge with the new USB-powered eGo Portable Hard Drives is the new Iomega Protection Suite, a one-stop portfolio of backup and anti-virus software giving users added protection for their photos, videos, music and other files.

The Iomega Protection Suite includes:

- McAfee VirusScan Plus: a free six-month subscription to this market-leading software that protects your PC with anti-virus, anti-spyware, 2-way firewall, and web security protection (PC only).
- Iomega QuikProtect: backup software for simple scheduled file-level backup of data to hard drives and network-attached storage devices (for Windows and Macintosh desktops and notebooks).
- EMC Retrospect Express or Express HD: backup all of your data plus applications and settings (for Windows and Macintosh desktops and notebooks).
- MozyHome Online Backup: Convenient online backup service with 2GB of online capacity for free (unlimited online storage for $4.95/month). MozyHome Online service allows you to restore your most important data from any computer with internet access, at any location in the world.

All of the software elements in the Iomega Protection Suite are accessible via easy download to new eGo Portable Hard Drive owners.

The new Iomega eGo Portable Hard Drive USB 2.0 models are compatible with Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional, Windows XP, and Windows Vista, and Mac OS X 10.4 or above. MozyHome software is available for Windows XP and Windows Vista, along with Mac OS X 10.4 and above. EMC Retrospect software is available for both Windows and Mac OS X operating systems.

Available for purchase at www.iomega.com are two new accessories for the new USB-powered eGo Portable Hard Drive: a durable black carry case, and the Iomega Power Grip Belt (like the one on the eGo BlackBelt Drive), available in black and translucent colors.

The Iomega eGo Portable Hard Drive USB 2.0 family of drives are available today, except for the new Iomega BlackBelt Portable Hard Drive 500GB USB 2.0, which will be available in June. The 250GB Ruby Red eGo model is priced at $84.99 (Rs. 4,068); the 320GB Ruby Red, Midnight Blue and Silver eGo models are $94.99 (Rs. 4,519); the 500GB Ruby Red is $134.99 (Rs 6,450); and the 500GB BlackBelt eGo model is $139.99 (Rs. 6,642).

All of the new USB-powered eGo models include a 3-year limited warranty, and are available from online retailers, VARs, resellers and select retailers.

In June, Iomega will announce additional new eGo Portable Hard Drive models with multiple interface combinations.

Acer Launches Two New Netbooks

2009-05-20T08:40:00.000-07:00

Acer has extended its line of netbooks with two new models optimized for mobile customers – the 11.6-inch Acer Aspire One AO751h and the 10.1-inch Acer Aspire One AOD250.

The new Acer Aspire One models measure only one inch thin and come in four color chassis choices (Diamond Black, Ruby Red, Sapphire Blue and Seashell White). Both models weigh less than three pounds (2.75 pounds for the AO751h and 2.44 pounds for the AO250) and feature a soft-touch palm rest to increase typing comfort.

The new Acer Aspire Ones models provide access to the Internet via Wi-Fi 802.11b/g and come with the option for 3G broadband wireless connectivity. The extended 6-cell battery for the AO751h can provide uptime of up to eight hours, while the 3-cell battery can provide four hours of uptime. The AO250's standard 3-cell battery can provide up to three hours and 15 minutes of battery life, while the 6-cell battery can provide up to six hours.

The new devices use the latest Intel Atom processors (N270 on the AOD250 and N270 or Z520 on the AO751h) and feature the Acer Crystal Eye webcam, built-in digital microphone and two built-in stereo speakers.

The Acer Aspire Ones have three USB 2.0 ports, Ethernet and VGA as well as Bluetooth capabilities that can be activated with the Easy Launch Bluetooth key. Both new models also feature a multi-in-one digital card reader.

Both models are available in several configurations.

Nokia Further Refurbishes 6600 Slide

2009-05-20T08:37:00.000-07:00

One of Nokia’s more popular models was the 6600 with its neat plump design, like I mentioned. The handset, it would seem has been revamped, but unfortunately the new 6600i Slide is not as funky looking as its predecessor. But then again this is not the only handset from the company to bear the 6600 name. In April of 2008 Nokia had launched the 6600 Slide and 6600 Fold handsets. The previous 6600 Slide was equipped with a 3.2MP camera. So the 6600i Slide (note the ’i’) is actually Nokia’s smallest 5 megapixel slider to date.

The brushed steel covers and chrome center key do make the handset look quite elegant as compared to the previous model. It’s equipped with a function for discreet tap commands that bring the display to life and also be used to snooze alerts and silence or reject incoming calls.

Other features include -

2.2-inch TFT LCD display with 16 million colors
Series40 UI
5 megapixel camera with dual LED flash
MicroSD card support up to 16GB
FM radio
3G, EDGE/GPRS
Bluetooth with A2DP, USB 2.0 (micro)
3.5mm audio input

The Nokia 6600i slide has an estimated retail price of Rs. 12,972 (EUR 200) excluding taxes and subsidies and it is expected to start shipping in select markets in the third quarter of 2009.

15 Ways to Speed Up your PC

2009-05-18T01:39:00.000-07:00

It's all fine and dandy when you have a brand new PC nested on your desktop that runs as smooth as a smoldering broadsword through a carton of Amul butter (or through the annoying Amul mascot for that matter), but if your PC's as slow as a government employee, you know its time to do something about it. If you're one of the rich folk who has money flowing out of every orifice in the body, by all means - buy a new PC (and write me a hefty cheque if you're feeling extra generous); but if you're like the majority of us and wish to juice your PC till its hair goes gray, we've got a couple of tips to keep your work-horse running as speedy as it possibly can:

Tip 1: Clean Thy PC

We've covered this tip in our "Keep your PC Cool this Summer" article. If you've read that, you might want to skip to the next tip.

We can understand if some of you might not wish to bathe for a while, but unlike humans, PCs need to be cleaned in order to run efficiently. This doesn't mean that you should give it a bath of course, that's just downright foolish. You should clean your PC's innards every few months, to keep it dust free and unclogged. When dust accumulates on your processor and other fans, they start running sluggishly, cooling your PC less, causing all sorts of slowdowns and even crashes.

Just as a surgeon wouldn't mess around or juggle with the organs of a sliced up patient, you need to take care while handling the insides of your PC. Make sure to touch any metallic part on the inner frame of your PC before you touch your motherboard or any delicate hardware, since the static discharge from your hand can fry your PC's circuitry. Touching a metallic object on the inside helps get rid of any static charge your hand might have.

Once that's done, you're all set to clean your PC. To rid your graphic card and other easily removable components of dust, just plug them out of your mother board and gently blow into the fan. Don't blow t0o hard though, else you'll have dust in your eyes and curses at your tongue (for us) for giving you the advice. You can use a piece of clean cotton cloth to rid your PC's components off the dust that might have settled on the surface.

Just ensure that you're gentle. If you're lucky enough to find caned air at your local hardware store (it's quite rare in India unfortunately), you can use this to blow air out of the hard to reach corners in your PC. Alternately, you can use the special attachments you get with modern-day vacuum cleaners that are meant for cleaning those hard-to-reach places inside your PC.

Tip 2: Keep your PC Light on Apps

It may sound trivial to some of you, but it's a good habit to uninstall any applications you don't use on your PC. If you let your PC clutter up with all the world's apps, there are bound to be more than few that start a particular service or two that you wouldn't normally require on your PC, or they might run some apps in the background, hogging system resources. Such resource leeches are a major reason for slow-downs, making it critical to keep your PC light on applications. If you're the kind who likes installing loads of little programs on your rig, make it a habit to check your Add/Remove programs every week or so for any applications you think you're not going to need in the near future.

A lot of us form a bad habit where we keep applications that we think we 'might' need 'some' day, installed. I urge you to uninstall any program you don't actively use. Just as you wouldn't litter your home with all your clothes, thinking someday you might wear them (at least most of you don't, I hope), keeping your PC useless-app free serves the same purpose. If you think you'll need an application in the distant future, keep the installer on your hard-drive instead and uninstall the application; that way the only thing the app uses is your disk-space and not your precious system memory.

Tip 3: Reboot

No matter how much RAM you have, if you keep your PC switched on long enough, it WILL clutter up with bits and pieces of closed applications. The way this works is, whenever you open a program, the program unloads its application data (at least the part of it that has to be accessed often) onto the PC's Random Access Memory (RAM). Even after you close the program, parts of the application data stays within the RAM until the RAM's completely powered down. It's like emptying the trash accumulated after a while, and starting fresh.

So if you've kept your PC own for a couple of days, it's a good idea to power it down completely, and boot it back up to clear your system memory. Again, this doesn't mean you should powerdown your PC every hour or so, since that's harmful for you PC too (powering up and down the PC changes the internal temperature of the PC too often, and the hot and cold make metallic parts expand and contract, making them brittle).

Tip 4: System Settings - Performance

All the eye-candy of Windows XP or Windows Vista can seriously slow down PCs with inadequate hardware. So it your PC's hovering around the lower end of the specification spectrum, you might want to disable the visual enhancements offered by XP or Vista. To do so, right click on (My) Computer - Properties - Advanced System settings - Performance, and under visual effects adjust your PC for Best Performance.

If the Best Performance settings make your OS look too bland for you, you might want to play around with the custom settings, to enable some of the basic visual tweaks to satisfy the shallow PC user within, that needs them shiny features to stay interested. If you mess up your settings, you can always move back to the Best Performance preset.

Tip 5: Update!

I know that most of you hate that little message that pops up every now and then, stating that Windows needs to be updated (provided windows auto-update is activated, that is). Lets face it though, both Windows Vista and XP are far from perfect and Microsoft knows that pretty well. To address that, they keep releasing updates that fix everything from security loop holes to application compatibility issues.

It's a good idea to keep your OS, as well as other applications up-to-date since many such updates improve memory usage, and you won't know which ones do unless you either read each and every patch note or update everything installed.

Tip 6: Disk Defragmentation

Imagine looking for a something in a house full of scattered crap. Now imagine looking for the same thing (whatever the hell it is) in a room full of neatly arranged stuff. That's pretty much what disk defragmentation does with the data on your hard-drive; it takes all the little bits of data that take up and entire clusters, organizes them and stacks them together, making finding, reading and writing them easier and faster. This feature helps increase the amount of usable free space on your hard-drive, as well as speeds your PC to quite an extent.

It's a good habit to defragment your PC from time to time. Bare in mind that it takes a while for the entire process to complete itself, so you might want to start it before you sleep or if you're heading out for a few hours, while leaving your PC on.

You can also find a number of faster disk defragmentation applications for free online, as we have shown in this article.

Tip 7: Clean Start-up

A slow start-up usually means that you have a crap load of applications running in the background, which are sure to slow down almost anything intensive you've got going on your PC. To help cure this ailment, you can disable applications from starting up along with your PC, by using MSCONFIG (Click on the Start Menu -> Run -> Type in 'MSCONFIG' -> Press OK -> Click on the Startup Tab).

Beware though — disabling the wrong service/start-up item could handicap many programs on your PC, so you might want to refer to a guide to show you what processes are ok to disable on startup. One such resource, is this one on Sysinfo.org. It has details on over 18000 processes. It's best to check which applications are not required, in order to disable them from your startup.

Tip 8: End Background Processes

In spite of knocking many processes/applications off your PC's startup, you might have a ton running in the background that you may not need, that may kick in when you launch different programs. That said, its a good idea to be vigilant and keep a constant check on what goes on on your PC. To monitor your system processes, press CTRL+Alt+Delete to bring up your Task Manager, and click on the Processes tab.

If you find any process out of the ordinary, or don't know what a particular process is, the best thing you could do is cross check the name with websites such as this one . End any process that you don't need, but be informed of what it does before you do so. The more you know about what's going on on your PC, the better you can optimize it.

Tip 9: Optimal Virtual Memory

If your system slows down often due to RAM limitations, you can always increase the amount of Virtual Memory (or System Paging File). Virtual Memory's a part of the hard-drive assigned to be used as part of the Random Access Memory. Here are how you can reach them:

In Vista:
Control Panel -> System and Maintenance System ->
Advanced System Properties (on the right hand side) ->
Advanced Tab -> Performance Settings Button ->
Advanced Tab -> See Virtual Memory for Change ->
Uncheck Automatically manage ->
Set your Custom Size (in Megabytes) ->
Click on Set and restart your computer.

In XP (Category View):
Control Panel -> Performance and Maintenance System ->
Administrative Tools -> Computer Management ->
In the Window that opens, right click on "Computer Management" (not the one on the window's header) -> Select Properties ->
Click on the Advanced Tab -> Performance Options ->
Click on the "Change button" Under 'Virtual Memory' ->
Set an initial and Maximum Size according to your requirements.

If you don't know how much memory to assign, the recommended amount is twice to size of your RAM. Make sure that you don't use up most of the free space available though, and keep enough space for your daily use, and for saving other files/downloads you might have planned, should you be strapped for space.

Tip 10: Indexing

Indexing is Windows' equivalent of a book's index, where the location of each chapter (files in this case) have been registered. While this feature helps boost the time it takes to look for files tremendously, it can slow down older PCs quite a bit since it keeps track of files and folders constantly. It's completely optional to switch off Indexing, since its effect on your PC's speed may vary depending on how many small files you have on your hard-drive, how big your hard-drive is, how many folders you access actively, and many such variables. The best thing to do is to turn this feature off and judge whether it effects performance in anyway. If it doesn't, you can always turn it back on. Bare in mind that if you use your PC's search feature quite often, you might not want to turn Indexing off.

Here's how you can turn it off:

Start Menu -> Run -> Type in Services.msc and press Enter
Look for "Indexing Service" in the list that follows ->
Right click on it and click on properties ->
Change the Startup type to Disabled

Tip 11: Power Plan

If your PC takes an ass-load of time to get out of sleep or hibernation, and your Power Plan puts it into hibernation every time you stay away for a while, it can become incredibly frustrating to move in and out of it. To ensure that your PC's set to keep performance to the max, you can change your power plan to inch towards that goal. You should know though, that doing this will negate all Power Saving features that you might have on. If you wish to do so anyway, here's how you can do it:

In Vista:
Start Menu -> Control Panel -> Hardware and Sound ->
Power Options -> Set it to High Peformance.

If you wish to customize the plan futher you can always click on "Change Plan Settings" to switch off or on any feature.

In XP (Category View):
Start Menu -> Control Panel -> Performance
and Maintainence -> Power Options ->
Set the Power Scheme to Minimal Power management.

Follow this step only if your PC's really sluggish. If you can avoid it altogether, it would be nice since while in this mode, your PC will conserve no electricity.

Tip 12: ReadyBoost (For Windows Vista)

ReadyBoost is Vista's feature to help you boost your system's Virtual Memory using a Pen Drive. You can find the ReadyBoost settings by right clicking on your pendrive in Windows Explorer and clicking on Properties. In properties, all the ReadyBoost settings will be under the ReadyBoost tab.

While using ReadyBoost isn't as great as adding extra RAM, it can cause a massive performance jump if your PC's low on RAM. To see a difference, we recommend a higher capacity pendrive, such as 2 or 4 GB; anything lower won't be noticeable. Note: You can even add an SD card or an external Hard-drive with ReadyBoost. Just ensure that they all use USB 2.0.

To read more about ReadyBoost, check out Microsoft's article on the same .

Tip 13: CCleaner

CCleaner is an awesome freeware program that allows you to keep your system registry clean, helping you rid your PC of any registry errors/inconsistencies, and any registries left behind from crappy uninstallation. The program's designed for the end-user, meaning its really easy to use and built for safety. Check out the CCleaner website and for a list of features, a free download and help, should you need it.

Tip 14: Disconnect any External Memory

If you're one who keeps external memory constantly connected to your rig, as a hub for music or movies, or just out of habit, you should know that this can slow your start-up time significantly. This is especially true if your external drive's slow or damaged.

While on the subject, let me inform you that having an old hard-drive connected to your system (one that has many bad sectors) can really slow down your PC's performance too. It's a good idea to replace such a drive, or format it if you're hell-bent of using it.

Tip 15: Last resort

And now for the most obvious and painful tip. You know, the tip you don't wanna hear: UPGRADE YOUR RIG!

If your PC's running painfully slow in spite of all of this, you might want to format your hard-drive, reinstall all you need and see if that helps. If it doesn't, I'm afraid it's time for the inevitable upgrade! So stop being cheap and spend some dough on your beloved PC.

Asus Rampage II Gene Motherboard

2009-05-18T01:37:00.000-07:00

The latest addition to Asus’ ‘Republic of Gamers’ series of ultra high-end motherboards isn’t something that an enthusiast or a hardcore gamer would expect—a micro-ATX motherboard. This time around, Asus has something to enthrall LAN party goers who prefer carrying a mini tower case instead of a bulky mid tower one.

The last product we saw from the ROG series was the X58-based Rampage II Extreme for the new Intel Core i7 processors. It still remains the leader of the pack because the Rampage II Gene is its younger sibling with a scaled-down feature set.

Features
To shrink the motherboard to micro-ATX form factor, Asus has subtracted a PCIe x16 slot and installed a compact heat sink for the northbridge and voltage regulators.

Despite its compactness, the Rampage II Gene boasts a lavish feature set. The board has six RAM slots which can support up to 24 GB of DDR3 memory, and six SATA ports placed vertically to the surface of the board for easy cable routing. An additional SATA port, eSATA port on the rear panel and an IDE port are courtesy JMicron 363 controller.

Going by the specifications, the X58 chipset supports 3-way SLI and CrossFire X. We don’t regard one less PCIe x16 slot as a drawback because there are only a handful of gaming freaks who would jam three graphics cards into their PC. The two PCIe x16 slots support both SLI and CrossFire X in dual-x16 mode.

The rear panel sports six USB ports, optical SPDIF output, gigabit Ethernet port and a FireWire port. Six additional USB ports and a FireWire port are provided by the onboard headers. Unlike most ROG boards that include an add-on soundcard that fit into a PCIe x1 slot, the Rampage II Gene has an 8-channel SupremeFX X-Fi audio codec onboard for pristine sound quality.

Asus has incorporated a couple of features that would be useful for overclockers. There are tiny groups of three LEDs (Voltiminder as Asus calls them) for CPU, memory and northbridge. These indicate the voltage range when you over-volt the components. The layout and features of the BIOS are similar to those found in the BIOS of the Rampage II Extreme. If you’re well versed with overclocking, you can overclock by tweaking the parameters of the CPU, memory and northbridge.

But if you’re a novice, you can use preset settings that depend on the model of the CPU and memory. We installed the Core i7-920 on this board and it gave us an option to bump the speed to that of the Core i7-940 or 965. It does so by simply boosting the CPU’s base clock (Bclk), so you don’t need to know what the Bclk (bus speed), multipliers and memory ratios do, and it works like a charm.

Performance
We loaded the board with 3 GB of Kingston HyperX DDR3-1333 memory and Zotac GeForce GTX 280 Amp! and we were all set to test this board.

But before we move on to the results, the design of the RAM slots deserves a special mention. There are clips on only one end of the slots and the other end just has a tiny slit to slide in the module. This has been done to prevent the graphics card coming in the way while installing or ejecting modules.

The Rampage II Gene is a terrific performer and whizzed through the tests in no time with the Core i7-920 installed. The overall performance of this board is similar to that of any other X58 motherboard on the market. We only wished this board had a PCIe x1 slot instead of the PCIe x4 slot as there are hardly any PCIe x4 expansion cards available. One could at least use the PCIe x1 slot to install a TV tuner or sound card.

Conclusion
The average price of an X58 motherboard is around Rs 18,000. At it's street price of around Rs. 16,000, the Rampage II Gene is one of the cheapest boards for the Core i7 series and it rocks!

Acer H233H LCD Monitor

2009-05-18T01:36:00.001-07:00

LCD monitors. We just can’t get enough of them. From the jargon printed colorfully on stickers hugging the side panels, to the detachable stands that come packed snug in their thermacol factions. There are numerous brands, and even more series of product models by those brands. Today we have Acer, a brand we haven't covered recently, thus it will be a refreshing change, let’s see what their 23-incher, the H233H can do to stand out in the crowd.

Design and Features
This LCD monitor has one thing going for it very well, and that is its aesthetics. It is markedly cooler looking than other brands' models — it’s the subtle stuff that matters. The finish is high gloss piano black all over, even on the oval stand. The stand surprisingly looks the best, with a large Acer logo embossed in, and a special glitter finish on the gloss. Everything is in good limits so as to not go into the realm of ‘tacky’. The bottom panel has a nice looking power button, with a white LED accenting when turned on. The controls for the monitor are touch sensitive, and smoothly flush with the bottom panel. I like the white backlit buttons; they become brighter when you touch them.

The stand only allows for the screen to be tilted forward and back, while the back itself is also good looking; not that it matters as it is out of sight. The connectors are bare necessities for an HD multimedia experience, which are one HDMI, one DVI-D (HDCP compatible) and VGA in. There are no USBS ins, no webcam or other fancy stuff, as this monitor is aimed at the segment where HD viewing on a budget is the need of the moment. The monitor has 2-watt speakers, located behind the bezel, though, but their physical attributes alone do not look too promising. A headphone out would have been nice instead of the included audio in, but the former is not there.

Specs

The screen is full HD at 1080 x 1920, and true 16:9, so this model takes on the avatar of the new breed of affordable Full HD displays. The brightness is at 300 cd/m2, and contrast ratio is at 40,000:1 dynamic. Response time is standard 5 ms, and the panel is TN panel. Thus viewing angles rating is less at 160/160 degrees. There is one point that needs mention here: the monitor does not swivel left and right.

Performance
We were quite eager to see what this shiny looking LCD could do when turned on, so in went the power cord and out came the HDMI wire brimming with a 1080p signal. On turning it on the first thing we had to encounter and familiarize ourselves with were the backlit fancy touch sensitive buttons. I was expecting them to misbehave as their kin always does, but these were not so finicky. In fact they were satisfactorily responsive. A light feather touch is all that’s required.

The menu actually has limited controls for calibrating stuff and the five presets, namely User, Standard, Text, Graphics and Movie were nothing out of the ordinary. So we selected User preset and put on Grayscale test patterns.

The low blacks were weak, and this disappointed us outright. There was not much discernment amongst low black level bars, and overall they did not go that deep. On the other side, whites were clear, but again, the contrast in the image that could make the image really vibrant was absent. So overall we can say that the brightness and contrast is average to decent. The good part is that the whites do not bloom at high levels, nor are there colorations or tinges, thus mostly 6500 K neutral color temp is maintained thereabout.

The good part of the monitor was the sharpness and detail. Fonts look very crisp and readable, plus we conducted our test of 1080 lines of alternating black and white, that can really show the monitors level of accuracy in detailing colors and minute regions, which this Acer did well at depicting.

For the movies and games playback we used Tropic Thunder HD file, and Prince Of Persia. The motion department was satisfactory, impressive rather. Very little motion blur and artifacts of the sort were encountered. With the contrast being weak, there was a certain washed out feeling. Blacks did not look too convincing.

Conclusion
This one is an affordable monitor at Rs. 13,000. But there are compromises in the grayscale luminance department. Simply speaking the blacks are not too deep and looks washed out a bit. The good things are the clear sharpness and well controlled motion scenes. Overall it might work as a nice office monitor for doing text and presentation work, and casual gaming and movies will pass, but anyone who is an enthusiast level video guy will want more juice for sure.

Samsung Launches New Notebooks

2009-05-18T01:35:00.000-07:00

Samsung has strengthened its mini notebook and notebook range in the Indian market with the announcement of four new, stylish and lightweight models under its N series and three new, advanced R series of notebooks.

The N series models launched are the N110, NC 20, N120 and N 310.

The N110, N120 and N 310 run on the Intel Atom processor while the NC20 runs on the VIA Nano ULV Processor U2250. The notebooks are equipped with 1 GB RAM, 160 GB HDD, 1.3 megapixel webcam, Bluetooth and come with a 1 year International warranty.

The N110 is priced at Rs. 25, 252, the N120 is priced at Rs. 26,327 and the NC20 is priced at Rs. 30,089. Pricing for the N310 hasn't been indicated.

The R series of notebooks includes the R522, R470 and the R518 that feature 2 GB RAM, a 1.3 megapixel webcam and a 1 year international warranty.

The 15.6-inch R522 has an integrated aluminum-style palmrest and touchpad lighting. The system is covered with a water-tight seal to prevent it being damaged if up to 100 cc of liquid is spilled on the R522’s keyboard or any other part of its case. The R522 also includes 4 USB2.0 ports and a separate combo port that supports both USB and eSATA connections. The R522 is available in two versions, priced at Rs. 37,399 and Rs. 41,914.

The R470 features a 14.0" LED display and incorporates a new-generation Nvidia GeForce G105M graphics card. It has three USB 2.0 ports, including a combo port that supports both USB and eSATA connections. It also incorporates a USB port that emits power so users can charge portable devices, such as mobile phones or MP3 players, even when the notebook is turned off.

The R470 is priced at Rs. 48,364.

The R 518 runs on the Intel Pentinum processor, has a 15.6-inch HD gloss LED, powered USB, and spill-resistant keyboard. It costs Rs. 33,637.

Nintendo Prepares to Set New Wii Gizmo Into Motion

2009-05-18T01:34:00.000-07:00

There's nothing all that charming about Nintendo's latest gadget.

It's not as zany as a zapper or as sexy as a steering wheel. It doesn't even tell you whether you're losing weight. However, the gamemaker is hoping a small cube-shaped device called Wii MotionPlus will take the Wii's motion-sensing controls to a new level of precision.

It's no secret the wrist-flicking Wii Remote's lack of accuracy has long been the console's clunky downfall. The Wii MotionPlus, available beginning June 8, successfully defeats that dilemma by using gyroscopic sensors to exactly mimic gamers' hand movements, making such activities as sword fighting, disc throwing and golfing look seamless on screen.

"The great thing about this particular new technology, which isn't always true for other new technologies, is that we immediately saw the benefits of it," said "Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10" senior producer Jason Shenkman. "Before I even touched it or got my hands on it, I knew exactly what having a gyroscope in our possession would do for this game."

Electronic Arts' "Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10" will be the first game bundled with the Wii MotionPlus. Shenkman insists the increased sensitivity doesn't boost difficulty because instant feedback helps gamers before their shots.

Nintendo has been pairing cute peripheral gadgets with games since launching the Wii, such as the Wii Wheel, Wii Zapper and Wii Balance Board, the scale-ish device packaged with "Wii Fit." Just how Nintendo plans to market the obscure Wii MotionPlus accessory - or why such technology wasn't originally included in the controller - is unclear.

We are always looking at ways to enhance the gaming experience for consumers," said Denise Kaigler, Nintendo vice president of corporate affairs. "This was another way of enhancing the gaming experience, and consumers will hopefully choose to experience that more immersive type of gameplay and enjoy it."

Only five games have so far been confirmed to employ the new functionality. The most prominent is Nintendo's own "Wii Sports Resort," a beachy follow-up to the popular "Wii Sports." Besides "Tiger Woods," the other games are Electronic Arts' "Grand Slam Tennis," Sega's "Virtua Tennis 2009" and Ubisoft's slice-and-shoot-'em-up sequel "Red Steel 2."

Though the original "Red Steel" was one of the most anticipated games to debut alongside the Wii in 2006, the first-person samurai shooter's wonky fidelity left many gamers feeling let down. Creative director Jason Vandenberghe promises Wii MotionPlus technology will remedy that in "Red Steel 2."

"One of the cool things is that with Wii MotionPlus, we know how hard you have swung the remote," said Vandenberghe. "That means we can ask the player to have a more physical experience, like having enemies who are wearing armor that players will have to hit harder with their sword."

If the blockbuster sales of the Wii Balance Board with "Wii Fit" are any indication, gamers want the new contraption even if it's not compatible with their old titles.

Wedbush Morgan game analyst Michael Pachter believes Wii MotionPlus' price - $19.99 for one, $49.99 if bundled with "Wii Sports Resort" - is right for cash-strapped consumers. He anticipates that over 30 million Wii owners will pick up the new accessory in the first year.

"Some people will find Wii MotionPlus really appealing, and some people won't understand it and will wait until they're told by their friends they need it," said Pachter.

Nintendo is likely to promote Wii MotionPlus and announce new games that use the technology at next month's Electronic Entertainment Expo, where the gadget was first unveiled last year. Rumors have been circulating that Nintendo competitors Microsoft and Sony may announce their own motion-control technologies for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 consoles at E3.

Multimedia Mobiles Under Rs. 12,000

2009-05-18T01:31:00.000-07:00

In today's fast paced, techno-crazy world of wireless handheld entertainment and the almighty mobile phone with its promise to fulfill all of man's desires, the latest focus in the manufacturer's head seems to be mobile multimedia. The once hardcore business handsets like RIM's BlackBerrys that have been a symbol for Enterprise handsets designed for the businessman on the go, have taken a step in a new direction by developing and incorporating heavy multimedia capabilities into their handsets.

However, the BlackBerry handset range is not for the common man as the handsets do tend to weigh one down when the price hits you square in the face. This is the time of an apparent 'recession', and I'm using the term loosely here, as the money situation that's infected the global economy still doesn't seem to have truly affected the individual's propensity to buy. Handset manufacturers are still launching newer and better models all the time. With this in mind here’s a quick list of handsets for those with a tight budget looking for ‘mobile’ entertainment.

LG KP500 Cookie – Rs. 10.479
The LG Cookie is not a handset one would regard as a contender for the iPhone’s coveted crown when it comes to touchscreen handsets. However, it is one of the cheapest handsets to come with touchscreen technology that also manages to deliver on its multimedia capabilities. LG’s UI for the handset offers dual desktops for segregating specific functions. Even the main menu is neatly divided to make navigation easier. The Cookie also offers users multiple options for data entry, from a full QWERTY virtual keypad in landscape mode to a standard mobile phone keypad, half QWERTY and handwriting recognition for use with the stylus.

Its large 3.0-inch display will make watching videos easy on the eyes. It’s also loaded with an FM radio and music player and plenty of editors for various purposes. LG has also included a few motion sensitive games and a 3 megapixel fixed focus camera and a Muvee Studio application for editing images and creating slideshows. Users will also be able to view MS documents on the Cookie. So even if the handset looks nothing like its namesake, but at the risk of sounding a little feminine, it’s a ‘sweet’ handset.

Samsung S5233 – Rs. 11,100
Samsung’s Star S5233 is their cheapest touchscreen mobile to date and even manages to beat out the Cookie in terms of price. This is going to be the Cookie’s toughest competitor. Aside from the fact that it features a 3.0-inch touchscreen and Samsung’s Widget desktop UI, the company has tried to make the touchscreen experience a little more interesting by introducing a new-ish technology called Gesture control. This new system allows for a rather innovative way to control the handset’s touchscreen interface. The best part is that users will be able to customize various applications to particular gestures. The phone also supports a virtual QWERTY keyboard for messaging and handwriting features.

Multimedia features include a 3.2MP camera that has smile technology and Samsung’s DNSe sound engine for audio playback with multiple format support for video and audio playback. Although it has just 50MB of internal space, it supports up to 8GB of external via microSD cards ensuring you have plenty of memory on hand. Google has also integrated a few of their services on the handset, that include - Google Search, Gmail, Google maps; online widgets and photo blogging.

Sony Ericsson F305 – Rs. 7,689
Although the F305 may not be a member of Sony Ericsson’s Walkman series range of music handsets, it is their flagship gaming mobile, designed for more than just communication but a fuller multimedia offering. Though pretty much all other mobile handsets across the board come preloaded with games, this is one of those few that have been designed to enhance that particular feature. The handset is a small, light weight feature rich handset that combines mobile gaming with all the other multimedia capabilities a mobile handset should have. It’s been specially designed with gaming keys and comes with games specially modified to suit the handset. The display resolution is not too high but where it lacks in that it makes up in all other multimedia features from Bluetooth with an A2DP profile to a decent 2 megapixel camera and a music player. This smooth slider also incorporates an accelerometer for motion gaming.

Mobile gaming handsets are becoming ever popular with Nokia’s N-Gage Arena and iPhone gaming being the forerunners in the mobile division. Sony Ericsson is merely trying to keep up and has offered the F305 as a well rounded mid level gaming mobile.

Nokia 5220 XpressMusic – Rs. 7,299
Nokia’s XpressMusic range of audio enhanced mobile phones is quite popular among the younger crowd. All these devices, except for the 5800 XpressMusic cater to those looking for multimedia but with a tight leash on their wallet straps. The XpressMusic range with the 5220 as the second ultra slim model are affordable and not a bad solution for a low budget. The 5220 has employed a rather unique, yet somewhat lopsided form factor, but manages to come off looking quite funky. It’s designed to be very portable and it definitely won’t cause a bulge in your pocket even with tight jeans.

The 3.5mm earphone socket is placed at the top which is just brilliant. Running on a Series 40 UI it’s loaded with an audio player that’s equipped with EQ presets and a customizable setting. It also has an FM radio as well as a 2 megapixel camera with all the relevant features for low end cameras. It supports external memory via microSD cards. If the design initially throws you, and it might, trust me it’ll grown on you.

Motorola ROKR EM30 – Rs. 8,209
Motorola’s EM30 is a lower end version of their ROKR E8 handset that incorporated the use of a morphing keypad. The handset looks the same, its morphing keypad is not as sophisticated as its big brother but it does lack a touch sensitive navigation wheel, which is actually a good thing. It appears that Motorola just cut its cost down by omitting certain high ended features and re-branded the E8 to be more accommodating for the lower end segment. The EM30 is equipped with plenty of multimedia features to make it a consideration for this list though.

It’s equipped with a 2 megapixel camera for the photo bug, a music player that has a 3.5mm earphone socket so you can conveniently use your own earphones if the bundled set is not to your liking and it also has Bluetooth complete with A2DP. It also has an FM radio and for external memory the EM30 uses microSD cards.

These handsets are perfectly suited for those of us who don’t particularly give a damn about high ended features like auto-focus cameras and such. The list is for the people sticking to a stringent budget and can make do with basic features from a mobile perspective and employ a few multimedia features like a music player and an FM radio that have become quite a necessity in this modern day and age.

Spyder II GX Wicked Laser

2009-05-18T01:22:00.001-07:00

Just like everyone else who's remotely fond of technology, we at Tech 2.0 think that lasers are totally awesome. I'm not talking about the regular laser pointers that are commonly used for presentations and general annoyance, but the kind of laser that's powerful enough to be easily visible from miles away , and also have the power to burn. If Star Wars just flashed in your mind, you're on the right path.

Claimed to be the most powerful handheld

laser in the world, the Spyder II is nothing like any laser pointer you have encountered before. It's as big as a standard flashlight (210mm x 26mm), heavy at 240g, and thanks to it's military grade aluminum body, it's sturdy as a tank.

The laser has an output power of 200-300mW, which is a lot considering that a standard laser pointer has an output power of 5mW. With this much power backing it up, the laser is extremely bright, especially when aimed at nearby objects, where it appears blindingly bright.

Luckily, the Spyder II GX bundles with LaserShades, that significantly cut down the light intensity of the laser point - an absolute necessity.

It's not the power that makes the laser so unique, but the quality of the beam as well. The Spyder II GX produces a flawless straight beam of light even at long distances. I was pointing the laser at objects that were clearly a couple of kilometers away, and the size of the green dot produced was not significantly bigger than at close range.

This intensity is amazing to look at, but you have to be careful how you use it. The laser can easily burn through thin paper and plastic, pop (opaque) balloons within seconds. It only takes a couple of seconds for it to light a match. The site claims that the laser can also light cigars, we reckon that would take a bit of patience.

The match lit in under 2 seconds

The reason we stress on user care is because the Spyder II GX is a class IIIb laser, capable of easily causing blindness, even when viewed for a short instance. It even stings your skin quite a bit if you point it directly at yourself — a fact we learned the hard way.

So what's the practical purpose of this laser? Well, besides the fact that it's so awesome, you can use it for various tactical purposes, like giving directions to someone in a jungle or a crowded area by pointing the beam towards the sky. You can use the beam as a very powerful flashlight in extremely dark environments. A laser this powerful may seem like a gimmick at first, but it's usefulness gets more an more apparent once you start using it. You're pretty much limited by your own imagination here.

Considering that the laser is currently not sold in India yet, the only way or purchasing it is ordering it online at the official Wicked Lasers website. At $1699.99 (Rs. 86,100 approx), the laser is definitely not cheap and clearly not aimed at the mass population. This one is strictly for the elite hobbyist. The bottom-line is that if you can afford it, it would be a gadget you wont regret buying.

New Ultra-thin, Wireless Bravia LCD TV Released

2009-05-18T01:21:00.001-07:00

Sony has waved its magic wand once again, and given us a sparkling new LCD TV, the 40-inch Bravia ZX1. It is touted as the world's slimmest LCD TV - 9.9mm thick and weighing in at about 15kg.

The ZX1 comes with many technologies to help contribute quality images and digital entertainment experience. At its heart is the Bravia Engine 2, surrounded by Edge LED technology, Motionflow 100Hz and Image Blur reduction. The ZX1 comes with a Full HD display resolution of 1920 X 1080 pixels, and a glossy black bezel and screen.

Apart from the usual Bravia features like Live Color Creation, 24p Cinema, Xross media bar, Bravia Theatre Sync, the ZX1 has audio enhancement features like digital amplifier, S-Force Surround, voice zoom, dolby digital plus, etc. This screen has two integrated speakers and a woofer that delivers a net output power of 20 watts (5 Watts for each speaker + 10 Watts for woofer).

The main USP is probably Wireless HD, one of the most innovative features in the Bravia ZX that enables users to enjoy Full HD quality images without any messy wires and cables. Wireless technology allows the user to utilize the media library located anywhere in the house, via the supplied HD media receiver. Wires from the HD devices are connected to the HD media receiver and the display will receive the input signals from the media receiver wirefree, with the help of high-speed wireless connection and RF technology.The connectivity of the Bravia ZX1 is distinguished with 4 independent HDMI inputs, a PC input, composite inputs, component inputs, USB connection, and a RBG compatible SCART input.

There is no price point attached to the Bravia ZX1 as yet. You'll know as soon as we do.

The Advent of 3D Video Technology

2009-05-18T01:17:00.000-07:00

It’s been around for years, in English movies as well as some Hindi ones, but now there is going to be a resurrection of the nerds in silly glasses, and little kids doing ‘ooh!!!’ and little older kids saying “WTF!!!”. I am talking about 3D video technology, more technically known as stereoscopic vision. There is a boom predicted this year for 3D cinema and games, what with about 40 films already in production, and biggies like Sony, LG, Philips, Panasonic and the like all adding that elusive Z axis in their products and marketing. This objective of this article is to throw some light on the technology, and basically just being prepared for it when it hits big, as it is really going to be the future of television.

So what is 3D?
This is for the totally uninitiated: to view in 3D you invariably need special glasses to wear on your eyes. There are some TVs slated to offer 3D without the need for these glasses. But they are still raw in RnD, and they have an inherent problem with viewing angles to actually view 3D. So forget those for now, let's get back to the regular 3D with glasses.

What are these glasses? In their most simplest form (the color filter ones), each lens is a chromatically opposite color, usually red and cyan, and they really do not need to be extremely Hi-fi or immaculate, in fact next page we will do a small DIY on how to make your own glasses.

Theaters that release 3D movies give them to each customer before the show. Even planetariums etc. are all required to give you a small pair when they are showing you a 3D show. Of course there are brands that are already sporting special 3D glasses designs, like Sony who are flaunting Polarized glasses, and another technology which uses LCD shutters on their glasses.

We have the glasses on, so now what? Basically this contraption allows us to view specially created 3D content for a more realistic, three dimensional experience. Imagine the camera fixed and a football coming towards it. In 3D one will actually feel the ball’s trajectory and it will appear nearer to you by the second. In a game if someone shoots a cannon at you, it will actually feel like it whizzes past you, (hopefully you can dodge it). So in a nutshell, it adds the 3rd dimension, or depth. Check this pic with glasses on. It’s made by our very own editor Gagan.

The Gyaan
Before you move on to making your own 3D glasses and accessing 3D content, it’s prudent to understand how the 3D image itself works. IF you look at a 3D image without glasses on, it will plainly look weird, the reason being they are actually 2 images super imposed on each other. Why, because in real life, our eyes see two separate images, one by the left and one by the right, as our eyes are about 2.5 inches apart remember?

For that matter, even our two ears listen to sounds separately, and that is exactly how our eyes and ears can position the source, and gauge how far it is etc. This is the basic concept behind anything stereo. It is this intermixing of two images by the brain (that marvel of an organ) that creates the perception of depth in our vision. Thus in essence, production guys make the 2 sides of the image separate, and with the glasses on, we can see the content in actual 3D.

The easiest way to get your own 3D glasses is actually to have cardboard cutouts, and use cellophane. It is no doubt crude, but initially to get the 3D experience one can try this age old method, plus there’s the advantage of looking like Emperor Cleon’s imperial guard of Trantor.

Color filter glasses
The oldest form of 3D glasses, you can actually make these on your own. Click the pic below, sourced from here. Print it out. Now we have few choices. The straight up way is to stick the whole thing on cardboard sheet first, easily available in any stationery store. Then take a thick pair of scissors and cut out the borders on the image, including the lens part.

Next we need to take the eye pieces out and stick small patches of red and green cellophane respectively on the left and right eyepiece, from the inside. Then finally glue the other two folds in on the sides. Besides cardboard one can visit a hardware store and get 4 mm thick plastic sheets, but you will need a heavier cutter for that, and glue will need to be araldite or something stronger.

Polarized Glasses and LCD shutter glasses
These are not so easy to make at home, and trying out is not recommended. Polarized glasses are adopted by movie studios, and mainly require the video to be polarized and superimposed by two projectors. Then the polarized glasses can separate between the two and view in 3D, as their eyepieces match the angles of the light rays entering. These diagrams from How stuff Works should make really make things simpler.

The LCD shutter method is advanced, and involves a TV displaying the two left and right images alternating one right after the other. These LCD glasses block the view of one eye and then the other in rapid succession.

Gear to go 3D now
This is the best part of the feature, probably the most relevant to us this moment. The first name to mention is obviously Nvidia: they have a feature in their GeForce series called 3D Vision. Quite a few of their GPU models support 3D vision, (click here for a complete list)

But you have to have the other accessories, glasses remember... Nvidia sells packages with special glasses and the appropriate GPUs that can render 3D. Also you need a 3D ready monitor or TV. For that there are 2 names on list: ViewSonic FuHzion VX2265wm 120 Hz LCD display and Samsung SyncMaster 2233RZ 120 Hz LCD display. There is one point that I would like to mention, you can view 3D on a CRT monitor, provided the refresh rate is more than 100 Hz.

There are many games already available in 3D enabled versions, plus lots of movies are also being redone, so we can view them in the comfort of our own home, with this gear. A nice place to check out 3D available movie titles is here. It is an updated list.

I am sure everyone is aware of DVD upscaling, and how you can get a full HD image from a now boring SD image. Analogously, there is gear available that can make normal images into 3D images. There is one cool company called Glacier Media systems. Google 3D home gear and their name pops up. These guys have products that can play real 3D games/movies and also convert normal DVDs to 3DVDs. Particularly interesting is the Glacier Iceberg PC.

This is just the beginning, we are trying to get our hands on the gear and do hands on reviews. Sooner rather than later Tech2 will be reviewing and watching everything in 3D.

Motorola Aura Launched in India

2009-03-06T07:38:00.001-08:00

Motorola has just launched their rather prestigious new fashion statement of a handset the Aura here in good ol’ Mumbai. Brand ambassador Abhishek Bachchan was present to launch the handset, at Vie lounge in Juhu. The premium handset was also presented to one of India’s premium fashion designers, Manish Malhotra.

The Aura’s sexy form factor and brilliant one of a kind circular 1.55-inch display that sports 16 million colors and a 300 dpi resolution also happens to be protected by a grade 1, 62-carat sapphire crystal that makes it scratch resistant. The body is encased in Stainless steel with chemically etched textures for a bit of class. The swivel key-guard is swung around by 130 precision ball bearings. Motorola guarantees the same grace at opening, even after 100,000 times of opening and closing it.

The Motorola Aura has an aluminum keypad, Swiss-made bearings and tungsten-carbide coated gears.

Other features include -

2GB internal memory
GPRS/EDGE
Bluetooth with A2DP, USB 2.0
2 megapixel camera
Music and Video player
CrystalTalk Technology

Needless to say this is nothing more than Motorola’s version of a Vertu mobile that simply exudes a sense of chic fashion and premium quality building materials. With a price tag of a whopping Rs. 1,11,492 in these times of recession, it’s a bit of overkill in terms of price but then again it's not for the every day user. This handset simply comes waving a flag that says – If you got it... Flaunt it!

The phone will be available from mid-March at exclusive premium stores in select cities that include Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Chandigarh, Chennai, Delhi, Hyberabad, Kolkata, Ludhiana, Mumbai and Surat.

Samsung Launches 8MP Pixon in India

2009-03-06T07:33:00.000-08:00

Samsung’s Pixion is here in all its 8 megapixel camera glory and touchscreen wonder. As of now that’s just the excitement talking of course. The official ‘glory’ and ‘wonderment’ will be judged when I get it for review. The M8800 Pixon is the latest addition to Samsung’s growing touchscreen range of handsets following the F480 TouchWiz and i900 Omnia.

"Samsung Pixon is made for users who want to experience the best multimedia entertainment on their mobile phone with the ease of a touch. Right from enjoying music and videos on the 8.1cm wide full touch screen, to high quality image and video capturing, to sharing them with their friends and family, Samsung Pixon offers consumers the real benefit of mobile entertainment,” said Sunil Dutt, Country Head, Samsung Telecom Division.

The Samsung Pixon features the latest camera functions found in digital cameras, like Advanced Shake Reduction, Blink, Smile and Face detection, Panoramic shot, geotagging etc. The photographs taken on the phone can be edited and users can even make a photo memo by scribbling on the photos. The phone also facilitates easy mobile blogging. For scrolling through images, flick control may have been one thing, but the Pixon takers it to a whole new level with what I’m calling ‘tilt-to-scroll’. It also has video recording capability and TV output for both PAL and NTSC systems.

The Pixon is also equipped with –

a 3.2-inch WQVGA (240 x 400 pixels) touchscreen featuring Samsung’s TouchWiz UI with auto screen rotation
Samsung widgets on the desktop
3G (HSDPA), GPRS/EDGE
GPS
DivX, Xvid, mp4 file support
Music Player with SRS 3D surround sound
MicroSD card support
8MP AF camera with LED flash
Bluetooth with A2DP and USB 2.0 (micro)

Samsung Pixon is also ideal for enthusiastic gamers as it comes pre-embedded with a host of popular games like Brain Challenge, Diamond Twister and Millionaire-3. Apart from these, users can also enjoy the motion-sensor based game - Tumbling Dice.

The SAMSUNG Pixon is priced at an MRP of Rs. 28,750 which is almost Rs. 20,000 less than the INNOV8. That in mind I’m presuming that there’ll be no 16GB memory card included with this one

LG 42PG61UR Plasma TV

2009-03-06T07:31:00.000-08:00

Plasma TVs are always refreshing to review, as the ratio of LCDs to plasma is anyways askew in the HDTV market. Besides all the technical differences, there is a difference in the picture output, and it is especially important to check out a brand like LG that still manufactures both types of HDTVs: LCDs and Plasma. We have LG's new series called the 42PG61, which comes with a fancy design and a promise to deliver ‘crystal clear’ images. That we will see...

Design and Features
After the Scarlet and the Jazz, LG has come up with more ideas for aesthetic beauty. These plasma TVs have no real frame around the screen, rather it's a seamless transition from panel to bezel, with a glass on top, thus having a very smooth and original looking screen. The black bezel is also very narrow in the front, thus making the TV look ultra sleek. The sides of this frameless screen is a continuous silver metallic strip, adding to the subtle, futuristic look. Then we have a regular back panel with grilles exposing the anatomy of the TV and a small, neat connection window on the right at the bottom.

The connections available are plentiful, with 3 HDMI 1.3a inputs, 2 component ins, PC input (Mini D-Sub), composite ins( 3 in total), plus the all important USB 2.0 input. One point needs mention here: the USB can play MP3s, JPEGS and also Div X, MPEG 4 movies. There is no headphone out, and it comes with inbuilt stereo regular speakers that output 15 watts of power each at their loudest.

The unit is actually a heavy 35 Kg machine along with its oval stand, but due to the glossy finish and sleek frameless glassy screen, it looks much lighter. It’s a 42-inch screen, with native resolution of 1024 x 768, which is typical of 42-inch plasma screens. The brightness is 1500 Cd/m2 and contrast ratio is 30,000:1 dynamic. (LG is famous for having some over the top numbers in specs; I wonder how they measure them.)

Performance
We connected the TV to a PS3, Xbox and our HTPC. The first mission was to try and calibrate the unit, so we ran test patterns from software. Our initial tests were for grayscale, meaning only black and white levels. I was disappointed. The black levels were hardly accurate. The last few black bars of our pattern merged together, and this was after raising brightness to optimum level. Plus this is a plasma, the blacks are supposed to be good. There is one test with 2 blacker than black bars moving from side to side on a O IRE( black screen), and these were not discernable at all.

In the full white zone, things were better. We raised the contrast pretty high and received a nice setting after calibrating, one with no clipping and blooming of whites, though it just was not spectacular, if taken in comparison. The grayscale had no colorations. It was pure levels of black to white throughout the graph mostly around 6500 K, and this is a good thing. It helps in having natural looking images.

Colors were also good, and in a basic 50-55 setting on the menu the colors looked the most natural, and desirably saturated. They were not too deep, probably because of this TV’s dark level problems.
Moving images in 720p were obviously the best, as that is closest to the native resolution. We were watching The Incredible Hulk and Pan’s Labyrinth. There was the PWM noise that some plasmas have, basically it’s a noisy flickering sometime visible on pixels, due to the way plasmas are powered.

A problem I had was with the menu itself. There is'nt much setting or tweaking we can do, except basic color, contrast etc. The presets are blinding, too much contrast settings in them - I think user setting is best with some calibration. Another issue was the sharpness setting on the menu. If you increase it anywhere above 50, haloing results around tiny objects. It needs to be kept low.

Conclusion
In total, this TV has its share of complaints and flaws, though it does have an incredible aesthetic design and some very nice color reproduction. It costs Rs. 65,000 (MRP), but on compareindia.com it's quoted as low as Rs. 45000. The price is reasonable if it's available for that less, as this is still a 42-inch screen, and a decent HD ready TV, but not the best plasma TV reproduction.

Dell Inspiron Mini 10 Netbook Available for Order

2009-03-06T07:27:00.000-08:00

The Dell Inspiron Mini 10 Netbook has made an official appearance on the company’s website, and this is after a few issues had to be ironed out on the mail order front through the same.

So, the juice we get after the wait looks a little like this: 1.33GHz Intel Atom processor, 533 MHz FSB, 512K cache, and a Windows XP Home SP3 front end. The weight is 2.86 pounds, and includes a multi-touch track pad, a keyboard with convenient fit, a 10.1-inch display with a 16:9 aspect ratio. The native res is 1024 x 576.

With regard to storage it has 160 GB 5400 rpm SATA HDD and 1 GB DDR2 SDRAM. Other features include Wireless 802.11g (1397) Mini Card, video handled by Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 500 video card and 24WHr Lithium-Ion Battery (3-cell). Apart from this it also have an HDMI connector, 1.3 MP camera, 3 USB slots, 3 in 1 card reader and kensington lock.

Dell has started shipping at a suggested retail price of $399, which be around Rs. 19,800.

CeBIT 09: Kingston Releases HyperX SO-DIMMS for Netbooks

2009-03-06T07:26:00.000-08:00

Kingston Technology has announced the release of a high-performance 2GB HyperX SO-DIMM specifically targeted at owners of netbook computing devices using the Intel Atom processor.

Shipping immediately, the new SO-DIMM is designed to increase system performance by using faster latency timings in netbook computers that support 533MHz bus specifications.

"A netbook or mobile internet device will automatically recognize the preset low latency value of the HyperX memory module and properly boot the mobile device to provide higher performance than standard memory," said Mark Tekunoff, senior technology manager, Kingston. "Netbooks are growing in popularity and Kingston is pleased to present a HyperX module that makes these small mobile devices run faster."

The 2GB HyperX SO-DIMM is suitable for netbooks like the Asus Eee, MSI Wind and Gigabyte UMPC lines.

Kingston HyperX is backed by a lifetime warranty and free 24/7 technical support.

CeBIT 09: Asus Showcases Slew of Eee Solutions

2009-03-06T07:23:00.002-08:00

Asus showcased a number of Eee solutions at this year's CeBIT in Hannover.

The products on show included the Eee Box PC B206, Eee Stick, EeeNAS PC, Eee Videophone and Eee Top PC ET1602 all-in-one PC.

The Eee Box PC B206 is being touted as the world's smallest HD-capable desktop PC. A space-saving PC-cum-home entertainment solution, the Eee Box PC B206 allows users to enjoy hardware-accelerated High Definition content via its HDMI output. Its design allows it to be mounted on LCD TVs and monitors, saving space. It consumes just 15 watts of power, operates at a near-silent 26dB, and boasts Wi-Fi 802.11n connectivity for high speed Internet browsing.

The Eee Stick is an innovative plug-and-play wireless controller for instant gaming fun. It translates hand motions into onscreen movements and offers complete freedom of movement when gaming. Its three modes-motion, pointing and tilt-make it suitable for any type of game. A Game Manager allows users to access games quickly, as well as adjust the controller's settings to suit their personal playstyles. The Eee Stick can also enhance the user's PC experience by serving as a 3D mouse.

The EeeNAS PC is an all-in-one solution for centralized file storage and sharing. The 2 TB Network-Attached Storage (NAS) solution, is designed for 24/7 operation and boasts low power consumption figures, an Uninterrupted Power Supply (UPS), and a noise level of 28dB. In addition, it is equipped with a 3.5” touchscreen control panel, a front slot loading DVD writer and multi-server capabilities.

The Eee Videophone is the world's first Skype certified PC-free videophone. It is dedicated to unlimited video calling over the Internet in three steps. Boasting a 7" display and a built-in webcam, speaker and microphone, the Wi-Fi-capable videophone lets users make unlimited face-to-face video calls without the need for a computer. It has a simple-to-use, icon-based interface and intuitive button layout.

The Eee Top PC ET1602 is an all-in-one touch computer that comes with a comprehensive suite of touch-optimized applications spanning productivity, entertainment and communications. Housed in a compact LCD monitor form factor, the Eee Top PC ET1602 offers features such as Wi-Fi 802.11n connectivity, built-in high fidelity speakers and an integrated 1.3 megapixel web camera and microphone array for convenient web conferencing. It also features Asus Tranquiller Technology that ensures that the system stays cool while operating.

Sony Launches 24x DVD Burner

2009-03-06T07:23:00.001-08:00

The DVD format is relentless. The big guys are not letting this market go, even though we have Blu-ray out, and flash drives that store triple the storage amount in DVDs. One of the biggest guys, Sony, has launched AD-7240S, a new high-end DVD burner. The DVD Re-Writable from Sony is claimed to be the world's first DVD burner to achieve a 24x burning rate.

The AD-7240S' Auto Strategy Technology, which was first seen in the predecessor series AD-7200, works like this: When you burn a DVD, the drive always reads a section of the media in advance so that the writing head can be optimally adjusted. Adaptive Self Tuning also makes the drive automatically adapts to the disc and the hardware environment in every burning process to compensate quality fluctuation.

Rajesh Goenka, VP-Sales and Marketing, Rashi Peripherals Pvt. Ltd., said, “We would like to take this opportunity to congratulate our SAP, as they will be the first in India to sell 24x DVD-RW. This is undoubtedly the latest, fastest and most reliable DVD-RW available in the market to date. With this, I am sure our partners will be able to further capitalize the leadership position of Sony in the ODD business. Besides being the first 24x DVD-RW to be launched in India, I hope we will also further improve the profitability of out partners. At Rashi we believe in the best – The fastest, the most reliable and a profitable business module.”

The AD-7240S comes with a serial ATA interface. It burns DVDs in +/-R format at up to 24x speed and CDs at up to 48x speed. In DVD-RAM and DVD+R9 format, and on double layer DVD-R media, the AD-7240S writes at up to 12x speed. DVD+RW discs are written at up to 8x speed and DVD-RWs at up to 6x speed. The AD-7240S achieves up to 16x reading speed with DVDs and 48x reading speed with CDs.

The DVD Re-Writable AD-7240S is compatible with DVD+/-R, DVD+/-R DL, DVD+/-RW and DVD-RAM (Ver.2), CD-Audio, CD-ROM (mode1 and mode2), CD-ROM XA (mode 2, form 1 and form 2), Photo CD (single and multiple sessions), CD Extra, CD-R, CD-RW, CD-TEXT discs. It can also playback CD-I (FMV) and VIDEO CD with special hardware. This drive unit can also play DVD-Video with special function, such as MPEG decoder.

The DVD Re-Writable AD-7240S by Sony is available through Rashi Peripherals and its 53 branches throughout India at an estimated retail price of Rs. 1500 and comes with a 1 year warranty.

AMD Phenom II X4 940

2009-03-06T07:10:00.000-08:00

Ever since the Intel Core processor family has been launched, AMD has been trying hard to keep abreast of the competition.

AMD kept its fingers crossed that the new lineup of Phenom processors would help them grab a larger market share, but the efforts were in vain because of a few glitches in the architecture, and Intel had better performing processors at competitive prices.

This time, AMD is back in action with Phenom II, which is the former Phenom with a couple of tweaks and a leaner design. Now the question is how good Phenom II is and how hard is it going to hit Intel?

Features
Phenom II is built upon the same architecture as that of Phenom, but it’s manufactured using a 45 nm process. Measuring 258 mm2 the die size of Phenom II is 9.5 percent smaller, but yet the transistor count has increased by 68 percent to 758 million.

This increase in the number of transistors has allowed AMD to triple the size of the L3 cache from 2 MB to 6 MB. However, the size of the L1 and L2 cache remains the same. Apart from these, other major improvements are faster L3 cache and more efficient Cool ‘n’ Quiet.

Measuring 258 mm2 the die size of Phenom II is 9.5 percent smaller, but yet the transistor count has increased by 68 percent to 758 million.

While Phenom could only run either at full or half speed, Phenom II can run at four speeds ranging from a minimum of 800 MHz to full speed. In addition to this, AMD has moved away from allowing individual cores to switch independently between different speeds because it caused problems with certain multithreaded applications—runs all its cores at the same frequency, just like the Core i7 except that it cannot completely switch off idle cores.

AMD plans to launch Phenom II in two phases. In the first phase they plan to launch two quad-core variants in AM2+ package, followed by low-voltage and tri-core variants in AM3 package, which will add support for DDR3.

So if you have a motherboard based on AMD 780G, 790 FX/GX or Nvidia GeForce 8200 / 8300 or Nvidia nForce 780a / 750a SLI, you can upgrade to Phenom II after flashing your BIOS with the latest fi rmware. Currently, AM2+ Phenom II processors are available in two quad-core variants—the top-end X4 940 Black Edition clocked at 3.0 GHz and the X4 920 clocked at 2.8 GHz. The upcoming socket AM3 models are the X4 945 Black Edition (3.0 GHz), X4 925 (2.8 GHz), X4 810 (2.6 GHz), X3 720 Black Edition (2.8 GHz) and X3 710 (2.6 GHz).

While Phenom could only run either at full or half speed, Phenom II can run at four speeds ranging from a minimum of 800 MHz to full speed.

An interesting feature of the AM3 Phenom II processors is that these will be backward compatible with socket AM2+ motherboards due to the reduced pin count (938 pins as compared to 940 pins in AM2+) while maintaining the grid pattern. Hence, socket AM3 Phenom II processors will feature both DDR2 and DDR3 memory controllers. Thus, users will have a broad choice of motherboards (both socket AM2+ and AM3) depending on the type of application.

Performance
We received the Phenom II X4 940 from AMD and tested it on the Asus M4A79 Deluxe (AMD 790 FX) flashed with the latest BIOS. The test rig was loaded with 4 GB of DDR2-1066 memory and GeForce GTX 280 to give the CPU ample headroom to perform.

At Rs 12,500 the X4 940 lies between the Core 2 Quad Q8200 and Q9400 in terms of price. However, the native quad-core design and cache hierarchy resembles that of the Core i7. The X4 940 defeats the Q8200 by a big margin and certainly offers more value for money than the Q9400.

We also overclocked the processor and managed to get it running steadily at 3.7 GHz on air cooling by increasing the multiplier from 15 to 18.5. Water cooling and voltage bump could take it to 4 GHz.

Conclusion
The Phenom II offers excellent value for money, but the Core i7 is the ultimate choice.

MWC 09: Microsoft Unveils Windows Mobile 6.5

2009-02-17T08:43:00.000-08:00

Today at Mobile World Congress 2009, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer along with key mobile partners, HTC, LG and Orange, unveiled new Windows phones featuring new user-friendly software and services. The next generation of Windows phones will be based on Windows Mobile 6.5 and feature a new user interface and a richer browsing experience. In addition, Windows phones will feature two new services: My Phone, to sync text messages, photos, video, contacts and more to the Web; and Windows Marketplace for Mobile, a new marketplace that will provide direct-to-phone mobile applications and can be accessed from both the phone and the Web.

"Windows phones bring together the best of the Web, the PC and the phone so you can connect instantly to the experiences you care about, no matter where you are," Ballmer said. "We’re working with partners across the industry to deliver a new generation of Windows phones that break down the barriers between people, information and applications and provide great end-to-end experiences that span your entire life, at work and at home."

The new Windows Mobile 6.5 home screen keeps people up-to-date on important information by providing a dashboard-like experience to items such as new e-mails, texts, missed calls and calendar appointments. It also includes an improved touch-screen interface, making it easy to take action with a finger, and an updated version of the latest Internet Explorer Mobile browser, which in a third-party research study sponsored by Microsoft supported execution of up to 48 percent more assigned tasks than the other browsers and phones studied.

The free My Phone service will enable people to access, manage and back up their personal information on their device to a password-protected Web-based service, making it easier to upgrade phones without the worry of losing important information. With automatic syncing and backup, users can count on their contacts, appointments, text messages and other information being kept up to date and easily restored should they lose or upgrade their phone. Consumers also will be able to automatically upload photos and video from their Windows phone directly to the My Phone service.

The My Phone service is currently available in a limited invitation-only beta.

MWC 09 - Android Runs on New NVIDIA Tegra Platform

2009-02-17T08:40:00.000-08:00

It seems like social networking is the biggest trend there is these days. Always being available online for work or play is something most mobile users are looking for in a device. To fill this void, NVIDIA Corporation has introduced a new platform, based on the NVIDIA Tegra 600 Series computer-on-a-chip that enables a $99 (Rs. 4,873 approx.), always-on, always-connected HD mobile internet device (MID) that can go days between battery charges.

“Mobile internet devices have evolved to provide consumers with the performance and connectivity required by today’s lifestyle,” said Michael Rayfield, general manager of the mobile business unit at NVIDIA. “Until now, consumers could get just another ‘gadget’ with limited functionality or a PC that’s not ‘always on’. A Tegra-based platform combines the best of both worlds.”

Image Source

The Tegra MID delivers:

720p and 1080p video playback
Days of use between charges
Full Wi-Fi and 3G connectivity
Optimized hardware support for Web 2.0 applications for a true desktop-class internet experience
A complete software solution including Microsoft Windows Embedded CE OS, application viewers, full Internet browser, UI framework, board support package (BSP), software development kit (SDK), Web mail client, and more

In addition, NVIDIA partnered with ST-Ericsson to add 3G communication capability into this new platform, allowing for seamless connectivity, worldwide. ICD, a leading consumer ODM, also announced support of the new class of devices enabled by this new platform.

NVIDIA also announced that it has worked closely with Google and the Open Handset Alliance to unleash Android, with the Tegra series of ‘computer-on-a-chip’ processors. By supporting Android, manufacturers and operators can now easily use a Tegra processor to build mobile phones with advanced user experiences that leverage web and Internet content and provide services such as mobile mash-ups and location-based applications.

“We welcome NVIDIA’s support of Android on Tegra and we look forward to many more Android-based devices that deliver an outstanding consumer experience,” said Andy Rubin, Google’s senior director of mobile platforms.

NVIDIA will be enabling its OEM customers with a highly optimized and accelerated Android port starting in the second quarter of 2009.

“NVIDIA and Google are both working to unlock the visual computing potential of mobile devices and this announcement matches the power of Tegra with the innovation of the Android platform,” stated Michael Rayfield, general manager, mobile business unit at NVIDIA. “NVIDIA will be working within the Open Handset Alliance to continually strengthen the ability of Android to tap into advanced mobile graphics and media acceleration to make interaction with handheld technology more intuitive and instinctive.”

Check out Tegra in action here.