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Saturday, March 04, 2006

OLPC $100 laptop shown in final form?


OLPC $100 laptop shown in final form?: "Filed under: Laptops

We haven't been hearing too much out of the OLPC camp for a while, but they've been peddling their green 'concept design' for long enough that we had begun to get used to it. Well, we still can't know for sure, but according to Martin Varsavsky, who has recently met with project head Nicholas Negroponte, the pictures above are of the 'winning design.' We're not quite sure what he means by that, and we're not even sure which one of these two designs is supposedly destined for production, or if both are, but they do match up fairly well to most of the $100 laptop specs. We're also unclear on whether the fabled hand crank is present on either design, but we do know that they hadn't worked out all the technicalities of that part, so maybe it got the kibosh for the 'final' version -- if that is what we're really looking at.

Toshiba Tecra A6-S513


Toshiba Tecra A6-S513: "The Toshiba Tecra A6-S513 doesn't have groundbreaking performance, but it's a solid, lightweight business system for those who want a few multimedia extras for a low price."

Friday, March 03, 2006

Apple MacBook Pro (15-inch)


For typical users running the iLife suite, iTunes, and even non-universal-binary applications—such as Microsoft Office and Adobe products—the MacBook Pro is a solid notebook. It's a sweet upgrade from the PowerBook G4, and new users will like it just the same. But for sophisticated media enthusiasts or professionals, we suggest you wait a couple of months, or at least until the software can catch up with the Intel components, before diving in.

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Thursday, March 02, 2006

HP Pavilion dv5000t Core Duo laptop reviewed


Laptop Magazine has taken a closer look at the HP Pavilion dv5000t Core Duo laptop that we first spotted at CES, and bestow it with four out of five stars, concluding that "this sleek mainstream machine is a great buy." Highlights include the 1.83GHz dual-core processor, of course, as well as the Nvidia GeForce 7400 Go card, which sacrifices a bit of performance (compared to the dv4000's ATI x700, that is) in exchange for exceptional battery life- 7.5-hours with the optional 12 cell battery, which is double the life of the stock battery for only $39 more. Also of note were the performance of QuickPlay 2.0, an instant-on option (instant in this case equals 11 seconds) for boot-less multimedia playback, and the crisp 15.4-inch WSXGA screen. Downsides include the aforementioned video performance (i.e. gamers look elsewhere), 7.4-pound weight, and protruding battery pack with the extended-life option. Still, these are mostly trifles for a ~$1600 dual-core notebook with solid performance and a healthy feature set, so consider this your permission to buy.

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Wednesday, March 01, 2006

Mac mini inside an NES -- what could be more beautiful?


We've seen our fair share of Mac mini mods, and NES hacks precede the dawn of time, but seeing the two devices join together in one glorious hack really warms our hearts. Brent Housen's buddy managed to get the whole Mac inside a NES case, and added a DVD writer via an IDE to USB adapte

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Tuesday, February 28, 2006

8TB media PC


You can never be too rich, be too thin or have too much hard drive capacity, according to VoodooPC.

The gamer PC specialist later this year will launch a desktop PC with 16 hard drives, according to Raul Sood, VoodooPC president.

In all, the system will be capable of holding eight terabytes of data. That's the same amount of information you could store on the paper from 400,000 trees, according to a UC Berkeley research study. Academic research libraries typically contain about 2TB of data.

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The new Mac Mini


Mac mini makes it easy and affordable to work with digital photos, movies, music, and the web. And now it all happens with the blazing speed of the Intel Core, in either Solo or Duo configurations. Choose the Solo for a low-cost entry to iLife ’06. Or select the Duo model for unprecedented power in such a small package — up to four times faster than previously. Coupled with an all new architecture and the world’s most advanced operating system, Mac OS X, Mac mini runs all your modern and innovative software, speedily.

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Monday, February 27, 2006

Fujitsu Deskpower CE slim desktop with matching display


It's been a long time since we checked in on Fujitsu's Deskpower series; the last one we saw was an all-in-one media PC built into an LCD display. The latest model, the Deskpower CE, is a more modest offering, available through Fujitsu's direct sales channel in Japan. The ¥114,800 (about $983) comes well-equipped with a dual-core Athlon, dual-layer burner, minimum 512MB RAM, 200GB drive, and a 17-inch display. Options include a 20-inch LCD (pictured), 1GB RAM, and a Pentium 4 processor if you're not down with AMD.

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Sunday, February 26, 2006

AOpen MiniPC Revealed


As the PC market continues to show its age, many manufacturers are changing focus and research to reflect niche markets – with or without the help of the channel partners. AOpen received much fanfare for the original MiniPC; a small desktop PC running on Intel’s Dothan and Yonah CPUs. The MiniPC is strikingly reminiscent of the Apple Mac Mini, but in reality the two are quite the opposite

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