smartech

After the Asus Eee PC, MSI Wind and the HP 2133, there’s a new kid on the mini-laptop block, as Michael Dell has snappily revealed the new Dell Mini Inspiron at the All Things Digital conference. This sub-$500 lappy presumably features an 8.9-inch screen, a card reader, three USB ports, Ethernet connection, a VGA output, a built-in webcam and many more. We can’t be sure if it is equipped with an Atom-based processor but the Mini Inspiron is expected to run either Windows XP Home or Ubuntu Linux OS. Stay tuned for more details to be revealed next week at the Computex show.

Another picture after the break.

[via gizmodo]

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Microsoft has revealed a very nice demonstration, at the All Things Digital conference, showing some snippets of the next windows 7 OS (coming up in 2009) with amazing multi-touch capabilities that were shifted from the Microsoft Surface to a Dell Latitude XT tablet PC. The images undoubtedly prove that Microsoft wants to change the user interface experience by assimilating finger gestures that let you move, rotate or shrink images, navigate maps, play the piano and a lot more, with a simple touch of a finger. Checkout the video to see the future:

[via windowsvistablog]

iRiver was one of the stars, at the CES show, back in January. Now the company officially releases its P10 PMP, coming with a 4-inch 16M colors touchscreen (800 x 480) and 33GB storage capacity. In addition, the new sleeky whitish player features a built-in microphone, 10EQ, a dictionary, TV output, external speaker and DMB-TV tuner. It supports WMV, MPG, AVI, XVID with 720×480 HD support, MP3, WMA, OGG, FLAC, WAV, APE, JPEG, BMP or Microsoft Office documents and runs Windows CE 5.0. The new P10 is equipped with a 600MHZ RMI AU250 processor, sized at 108 x 73.5 x 19.2 mm 205g and available in black or white.

Update: Price ranged from $318 up to $385.

[via anythingbutipod]

Philips jumps on Apple’s board with the new Xenium X800 touchscreen phone, housing a 2.9-inch 262k colors touchscreen (240 x 400), a 2MP camera, microSD slot, Bluetooth connectivity and more. The new X800 will also include a Windows Mobile 6 OS and battery that can last up to 8 hours of talk or 850 hours of standby time, which is very impressive. No word on price or availability but we hope Philips will be smart enough to add wifi connection and a built-in browser for internet usage.

[via slashgear]

HBO has officially arrived to iTunes, offering episodes from The Wire, Rome, Sex and the City, The Sopranos, Deadwood and Flight of the Conchords, for prices, ranged from $1.99 up to $2.99 per download. In addition, you can get some extra content, like behind-the-scenes images, cast interviews, audio clips and more, so if you miss some douche bag action, just log into iTunes and download it.

[via macworld]

As planned, the Eee PC 900 goes live in the US right on time, coming in 2 versions: The first, running Windows XP with 12GB of storage (4GB Built-in + 8GB Flash based), priced at $600. The second, running Linux with 20GB of storage (4GB Built-in + 16GB Flash based), priced at $566. The rest pretty much stays the same, including 8.9-inch WSVGA display (1024×600), 1GB DDR2 RAM, 1.3 megapixel camera, MMC/SD/SDHC Card Reader, WLAN 802.11 B/G connectivity and more. Surprisingly, the prices are a bit higher than previous declarations but i guess early adopters always pay some extra cash. Both models are available in Buy.com and ZipZoomfly, so if you can’t hold your breath anymore, this is your time to get one.

[via engadget]

Singapore telecoms company, SingTel announces a confirmed agreement to distribute the iPhone in Asia and some other pacific countries, together with 3 more associates. The company has plans to bring the handset and sell it “later this year” in Singapore, India (via Bharti Airtel), the Philippines (via Globe Telecom) and Australia (via Optus). No clue whether this would be 3G iphone devices or regular iphone handsets, but one thing is for sure, they will officially get something, sometime this year.

Update: Orange has officially announced that it has secured rights to release the iPhone in Switzerland, Austria, Belgium, Poland, Portugal, and Romania.

[via zdnet]

iPhone 3G rumors, keep floating around, as new firmware 2.0 image has just emerged, suggesting integrated 3G capabilities within the next update, coming out this June. Although it is a common feature, no one really knows if this beta release shot is real or fake, but as you can see the new firmware includes 3G radio control function, allowing users to turn it off, whenever they want to save some battery life, so i guess there is a tangible hope for an imminent release of the new iPhone 2.

[via engadget]

HTC announces the release of the new Touch Diamond smartphone, at the Soho Hotel in London. This sleeky black iphone killer has a very impressive slim design, including a  click-wheel button to zoom in or out, a fantastic 2.8-inch VGA touchscreen with beautiful vivid colors, a built-in 3.2MP camera with video calling, 4 GB Internal Storage, WiFi 802.11b/g and Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR connectivity. It runs Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional and sports a great user interface, featuring animated weather application, full Opera web browser, one-touch music playback with an animated music browser, Youtube app, flicking contact-list mode and accelerometer rotation support (similar to the iphone). Sized at 102 x 51 x 11.33mm, 110 g, the new HTC Touch Diamond will be available across all major European carriers in June and later this quarter in Asia and the Middle East. The North American and Latin American versions of the Touch Diamond will be available in the second half of 2008. Checkout the videos + full specs after the break.

[via HTC]

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Zune 2.5 spring update goes live with some cool modish features, including a video store that houses 4,800 music videos and a wide vriety of TV shows (no movies yet), available to download for $2 each or 160 MS Points (from the libraries of NBC, Nickelodeon, Comedy Central and Cartoon Network). In addition, Microsoft has integrated the Zune Card sharing, which allows you to build a social network, present your dynamic friends’ list and automatically grab their recent playlist, albums and favorite artists, as long as you subscribe to Zune Pass (similar to last.fm). Furthermore, the new update integrates Windows Live Messenger “now playing” function, album review fields, to let you express your personal opinion on different albums and publish it to the world, Auto Playlists, meta data editing, easy syncing controls and finally, Gapless playback support. Needless to say, the new 2.5 Spring Update is free of charge and ready for your downloads. Check the video after the break.

[via engadget]

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After making a huge impact in the US and plenty of noise in countries like Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, Switzerland and France, the iPhone is about to arrive to 10 more places, including Australia, the Czech Republic, Egypt, Greece, Italy, India, Portugal, New Zealand, South Africa and Turkey, as Vodafone has signed an exclusive agreement with Apple to distribute the most desired handset to its customers in the aforementioned countries, later this year - Lucky them.

[via gizmodo]

Alright, so Microsoft has officially backed off from bidding on Yahoo, after a roller coaster of ups and downs, that started with an official offer to buy the company for $44.6 Billion, price that reflected $31 per share, back in February. The generous bid has never made any impression on Yahoo’s management, as the company’s directors has officially decided to turn off Microsoft’s hostile acquisition, claiming the bid is substantially lower than its real value, and whoever wants to buy them should hit $40 per share, meaning extra $9 to Steve Ballmer’s offer. Still, Microsoft clutched to its original bid (desperately trying to stay a major internet player in the growing online advertisement and searching markets) and considered an hostile takeover, by pursuing Yahoo share holders, but at the end of the day, after taking off their threatening suit, the Redmond’s were willing to raise the bid to $33, which was rejected by Yahoo as well and lead to today’s proposal withdraw announcement.

“Despite our best efforts, including raising our bid by roughly $5 billion, Yahoo! has not moved toward accepting our offer. After careful consideration, we believe the economics demanded by Yahoo! do not make sense for us, and it is in the best interests of Microsoft stockholders, employees and other stakeholders to withdraw our proposal,” said Ballmer.

Again, that wasn’t much of a squall to Sunnyvale, as Yahoo’s CEO, Jerry Yang, has apathetically responded:

…”With the distraction of Microsoft’s unsolicited proposal now behind us, we will be able to focus all of our energies on executing the most important transition in our history so that we can maximize our potential to the benefit of our shareholders, employees, partners and users.”

End of story? I’m not so sure, Temporary cease-fire? definitely yes.

[via Microsoft]

Today, after months of speculations, Archos has finally met the expectations and released firmware update 2.0.10 that includes:

• WebTV and Radio (with optional Plug-in).
• GPS (with optional car cradle).
• Alarm Clock.
• Flash 9 support.

There’s no doubt that among the new features above, the most juicy newsworthy one is the Flash 9, which places Archos PMPs at the top of the players and the only ones to support flash 9. The new release enables Archos users to surf the internet seamlessly, without having to miss any web details or applications, as the tendency points to built-in flash 8/9 web services. The new firmware is available to download here, check out the videos after the break.

[via Archos]

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Though It’s Monday (and not super Tuesday), new things are coming from Cupertino’s direction, as Apple has updated its online store, coming up with a more powerful iMac lineup, including a 20-inch model, equipped with a mighty Penryn CPU, ranged from 2.4GHz up to 2.66GHz with 250GB or 320GB storage capacities, 1GB of RAM, and ATI Radeon HD 2400 XT graphics. The 24-inch model sports the same mighty Penryn proccessor ranged from 2.8GHz up to 3.06GHz with 320GB - 500GB storage capacities, 2GB of RAM, and strong NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GS graphics. Both versions feature a built-in iSight cam, Bluetooth 2.1+EDR, WiFi 802.11n connectivity and more. The rest pretty much stay the same, including the starting price that stands on $1,199 and soars up to $2,199, respectively.

[via Apple]

Big day for Archos, as the company has launched its new GPS device for the Archos 605 player, coming with maps of 22 European countries and equipped with lots of road and traffic services. In addition, Archos has launched 2 revolutionary plugins for the 605 devices, the first is the WebTV & Radio which enables wide variety of TV channels and radio stations, live via WiFi connection on the internet, thanks to a team up with TV Tuner. This plugin is available to purchase from Archos website for $19.99. The second plugin is the TV Portation which enables Archos TV+ owners to stream TV shows, directly from the living room into the Archos 605 PMP, wherever they are, on the go, which turns the TV+ device into a streaming media server, similar to the Sling box. This plugin will be available to purchase from Archos website next month for $49.99, but if you have a registered TV+ device it will be available for free.

Update 1: It will also feature full support for Flash 9 and WMV9 formats, free of charge, at the next firmware update, coming up next month.

Update 2: Check out the plugins demo videos after the break.

[via Archos]

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