Samsung G600 with 5 megapixels

Today Samsung officially confirmed the Samsung G600 - its latest 3G cameraphone armed with an impressive 5 megapixel camera. According to the manufacturer, it should be the slimmest slider of its class with only 14,9 mm.

The rumor about the Samsung G600 actually went off a week ago after the handset was spotted at the American FCC website.

The Samsung G600 features Bluetooth v2.0, a FM radio with RDS, USB 2.0 support and a microSD slot. The G600's TFT display measures good 2.3" and boasts QVGA (320 x 240 pixels) resolution.

Five megapixel cameraphones are no longer something revolutionary, but still, the announcements of such handsets will remain trailing news. LG already have their KG920, Nokia have the N95, and soon Sony Ericsson will offer K850. Obviously Samsung doesn't intend to lag behind.

The Samsung G600 should first ship in Europe, but the exact release date is still unknown - so is its pricing.

The BlackBerry 8820 with Wi-Fi pops up

The BlackBerry 8820 is the first smartphone from RIM that combines EDGE/GPRS/GSM and gives you, for the first time, Wi-Fi connectivity. The 8820 has a full QWERTY keyboard, a large display with a QVGA (320 x 240 pixels) resolution, trackball navigation system, a built-in GPS, a microSD/microSDHC memory slot, and it is all packed the thinnest smartphone shell.

The BlackBerry 8820 smartphone is quad-band GSM/GPRS and EDGE-enabled and provides you with almost global wireless voice and data capabilities.

The 8820 supports the 802.11 a/b/g Wi-Fi standards and WEP, WPA and WPA2 wireless security protocols which allows you full wireless connectivity experience. And thanks to the UMA support users can seamlessly switch voice calls between a wireless carrier cellular network and a Wi-Fi network. The idea behind the UMA technology is simple enough - when there is an accessible Wi-Fi hotspot near you, for example in your home, office or university, or simply in the street, the UMA-enabled device would connect to it and use the broadband connection for making and accepting calls and sending and receiving data. It resembles a lot using wireless VoIP-telephony through your GSM mobile phone. Things get even better though, since the UMA enabled phone would also be able to use regular GSM base stations as any normal mobile phone would. The handset would be able to change connections between the licensed cellular radio access network and the unlicensed IP network seamlessly even in the middle of a call without even the user noticing. All you need to use the new technology is a UMA-enabled device, an operator that supports UMA, and an Internet broadband connection that you can access via Wi-Fi (WLAN). The most important difference from the widely known VoIP technology is that UMA is after all tightly linked to the mobile radio network, which is used for routing, authentication and billing. A call initiated using the Wi-Fi interface after all reaches the 2G core network through the UMA Network and once the signal is transferred, it becomes indistinguishable from the rest of the cellular traffic. Do not throw your hopes for free calls through the window just yet since the technology allows the UMA-enabled devices to be used as regular VoIP handsets. But it's of course up to the manufacturer to decide whether to block that functionality or not.

The Wi-Fi functionality of the device is further enhanced by an IPSec-based software that supports the most commonly used VPN gateways to allow users access the corporate network through a VPN.

The Blackberry 8820 comes with an enhanced music player, fullscreen video playback capabilities plus stereo Bluetooth (A2DP) support for listening music on wireless headphones. The handset doesn't have a camera but that goes without saying for the most part of business-oriented devices.

Availability and pricing for the Blackberry 8820 are yet unknown.

Motorola gets new ROKR rolling

Phonescoop.com uncovers fresh news from Motorola. Announcement is due of a new addition to the ROKR series. The ROKR U9 is a music enabled clamshell taking after the PEBL. It features an external color display and music controls similar to the ones we have already seen in the RAZR2. Information about the new model's specifications is scanty, but a mini-USB slot is much more likely to be expected than a 3.5 mm jack. Given Motorola's choice of names, U9 coud easily be expected to be an exclusive, top-of-the-bill model.

The PEBL is another Motorola attempt to perk up the ROKR which are having a hard time getting a corner on the music-enabled phones market against the Sony Ericsson Walkman series and Nokia’s XpressMusic lineup.

Dell 'Vostro' PCs target small businesses

DALLAS, Texas (AP) -- Dell Inc. is launching a new line of notebook and desktop personal computers called "Vostro" that are aimed at small businesses with 25 or fewer employees.


"Vostro" PCs will come with a suite of subscription-based services and a dedicated tech support staff.

"Vostro" PCs will come with a suite of subscription-based services and a dedicated tech support staff, said Frank Muehleman, senior vice president of Dell's small and medium business group.

Chief Executive Officer Michael Dell planned to debut the new machines at a "town hall" meeting Tuesday in New York.

Vostro, a Latin word meaning "yours," joins Dell's existing product lines, which include Inspiron for consumers, the Latitude and Optiplex for large companies, and the XPS for gamers.

Vostro systems will be available with Windows Vista or XP operating systems, but won't come with any so-called "trialware," or sample versions of software that expire after a few weeks or months, Muehleman said.

Muehleman also said Dell had assembled a staff of about 6,500 Dell employees to handle tech support for Vostro customers.

The systems include three notebooks with screens ranging from 14 to 17 inches and starting prices from $449 to $799. A desktop version will be available starting at $319. Exact specifications weren't available.

Vostro will also come with a 30-day money-back guarantee and services that Muehleman said would make it easier for small businesses to focus on productivity instead of technical computer issues.

They include a network assistant for finding a wireless hotspot or a shared printer, an automated PC tuneup feature for defragmenting the hard disk and other maintenance tasks, and an online backup system.

Both the tuneup and backup system are free for the first year but will require a subscription thereafter.

The Vostro line comes a few weeks after Dell, based in Round Rock, launched a new line of Inspiron models that come in a rainbow of colors.

For now, Vostros will come in black and silver only, Muehleman said.

The 20 worst Windows Features of all time

10. Windows 95 USB
Today, it's hard to imagine living without USB. Back in 1997, it was hard to live with it. Windows 95 predated the USB standard, so support was added via a patch known as Windows 95 OSR2.1. When we tried it out with early USB peripherals, they worked only sporadically, and sometimes trashed the PC--and OSR2.1 managed to trash our Win 95 machine so badly that we had to reinstall the operating system from scratch. Twice. Win 98 did add built-in USB support, but in a form that was far from fabulous: Bill Gates famously managed to crash a PC during an onstage demo when he plugged a USB scanner into it.

9. Windows Genuine Advantage
Is Microsoft entitled to fight pirates? Absolutely. But Windows Genuine Advantage, which makes you do a piracy check before downloading software from Microsoft.com, and displays nag notes if it thinks your copy of Windows is stolen, leaves millions of Microsoft customers caught in the crossfire. The first version with the nagging "feature" got installed with security updates and was famous for mistaking legit copies of Windows for stolen ones. To this day, trying to download software from Microsoft in Firefox is a miserable experience. And to add insult to inconvenience, Microsoft's marketing for WGA says it's all being done to help customers verify that their software isn't counterfeit. Thanks, guys.

8. End Task
A program hangs. You type three finger combo, to bring up the Task Manager, then click End Task to kill the app. Nothing happens. You try again and again, and it eventually works. Or doesn't. Why is such a basic operating-system need so flaky in 2007? We're not sure. Especially since Mac OS X's equivalent feature, Force Quit, manages to work perfectly every time.

7. User Access Control
Nobody can argue that the idea behind UAC is crummy: If the computer is about to do something that's potentially risky, it makes sense to verify that the PC's user wants it to happen. UAC in practice, however, is incredibly clunky, from the alarming screen blackout to the often cryptic dialog box asking for permission to the way UAC gets in the way of humble tasks that ren't particularly riky. We hope that Vista gets a more polished UAC someday--this version is so annoying it's tempting to just disable it and take your chances with attackers.

6. Windows Update
There are lots of things you can criticize about Windows XP's approach to software patches. But when we asked around, the biggest complaint by far was how the OS's Windows Update feature (also known as Microsoft Update) pops up a dialog box nagging you to reboot your PC) and continues to do so every ten minutes until you obey. (Ignore it, and the machine may reboot if you walk away for a moment, sometimes destroying unsaved data in the process.) That dialog box is in desperate need of a button marked "I'll Reboot When I'm Damn Well Ready." Windows Vista's version doesn't offer that, but it does allow you to wait up to four hours before being pestered again.

5. Messenger Service
Just perusing the article in Microsoft's knowledge base about this alert service (no relation to the Windows Messenger IM client)is enough to make you shudder: "If advertisements are opening on your computer in a window titled Messenger Service, it may indicate that your system is not secure...some advertisers have started using this service to send information via the Internet, and these messages could be used maliciously to distribute a virus." Windows XP SP2 disabled it by default; Vista eliminated it. Good riddance.

4. Notifications
Hey, you've just installed a program! A network cable is missing! You've got icons on your desktop you're not using! Windows is constantly alerting us to stuff it thinks we should know, usually by means of word balloons that pop up from the System Tray. (Which, incidentally, is more accurately called the TaskBar Notification Area.) An amazing percentage of these messages are painfully obvious, irrelevant, or just plain inaccurate. Never have so many computer users been distracted from their work by interruptions so useless.

3. Internet Explorer 6
Beginning in the mid-1990s, Microsoft fought the browser wars against Netscape with all it had. With Internet Explorer 6, released in 2001, though, it seemed to declare "Mission accomplished." For five long years, IE barely changed, even as competitors such as Firefox and Opera showed there were plenty of ways to make browsing better. At the same time, attacking IE 6 security holes became a full-time occupation for an army of hackers--and patching them up turned into part-time work for everyone who used the browser. IE 7, released in 2006, is a passable upgrade, but wouldn't the world have been a better place if it had shown up two or three years earlier?

2. The Registry
Ever wonder why the U.S. power grid is so fragile that that a blip at one power plant in Cleveland can black out the Eastern Seaboard? We ask the same thing about Windows' Registry: Why did Microsoft put so many vital pieces of Windows configuration data in one place, where a minor problem with that single file can turn into a full-tilt PC disaster? You can back up your Registry religiously. You can run Registry cleaning utilities. You can edit the Registry very, very carefully, should you dare to edit it at all. But you can't eliminate the possibility that it'll bring Windows to its knees.

1. ActiveX Controls
For years, ActiveX--the technology which dates all the way back to Windows 3.0's OLE (Object Linking and Embedding)?had not one but two majorly pernicious effects on computer users. Folks who use Web sites that run ActiveX applets on their PCs open themselves up to security risks, since an ActiveX control can do pretty much anything it wants on your PC once you'd told it to run. And the fact that ActiveX runs only in Internet Explorer in Windows stunted the growth of alternative browsers and operating systems for years. ActiveX controls still exist, but with some exceptions--mostly related to Microsoft "benefits" like Windows Update and Windows Genuine Advantage--it's easier than ever to ignore them. Thank goodness for that.

The 20 Worst Windows Features of All Time

From Windows 95's Active Desktop to Vista's UAC, a loving tribute to the tools, technologies, and applets that drive us absolutely bonkers.

20. DriveSpace
In a day in which half a terabyte of hard disk costs $99, it's easy to forget that megabytes were once a rare and precious commodity, and disk-compression utilities felt slightly miraculous. Microsoft's DoubleSpace was introduced with DOS 6.0 in 1993; after a patent suit by competitor Stac Electronics, it was replaced with a non-infringing twin, DriveSpace, which was part of Windows 95. DriveSpace did indeed squeeze about twice the stuff onto a disk, but the risk was immense, since data recovery was much tougher if something went awry. Windows XP was the first version without DriveSpace support of any sort--by then, nobody noticed or cared.

19. Windows Movie Maker
Windows Me--which we declared the fourth worst product of all time--introduced Windows Movie Maker 1.0, Microsoft's answer to Apple's then-new iMovie video editor. You could say it was a tad bare bones: As we said in our original review, it didn't do titling or effects, offered a grand total of one transition effect, and could output video in only a proprietary format. Version 2.0, which came with Windows XP, was the first respectable one--although even it didn't live up to the Windows XP commercial it was featured in, which showed XP users flying Superman-style to the beat of Madonna's "Ray of Light." As for Windows Vista's Movie Maker 6.0, our biggest question is this: What happened to 3.0, 4.0, and 5.0?

18. Web TV for Windows
New versions of Windows always seem to come with at least one much-hyped feature which instantly sinks into obscurity. Windows 98 had the decidedly lackluster WebTV For Windows--which, confusingly didn't have much to do with Microsoft's WebTV set-top box. Instead, it let you watch the tube (via a tuner card) and peruse TV listings. It also offered interactive TV features through Intel's short-lived Intercast service. At the time, we said it was "slow and unstable, clashed with Windows 98's screen savers, and locked up regularly even when nothing else was running." Fun bonus: The software also introduced a security flaw that could allow hackers to take over your PC.

17. Shut Down
Some people gripe about how long Windows takes to boot up. Us, we're more aggravated by how long it takes to shut down--and how often it seems to just give up before it's completed the job. Microsoft says that shutting down works better in Vista, and it seems to--but we still get puzzled by the array of different ways to end a Windows session. (Here's a fascinating and revealing blog post by a former Microsoft developer who worked on Vista's Shut Down menu.)

16. Paint
Call this applet the Rip Van Winkle of Windows software. Paint has been bundled with Windows since version 1.0 back in 1985, and it's changed remarkably little over the decades. (That's the Windows 3.0 edition, known as Paintbrush, in the image above.) With Vista's real photo-related features living in a different app called Windows Photo Gallery, it seems a safe bet that Microsoft won't ever bring Paint into the new millennium. If you want a taste of what Paint should be in 2007, check out the superb free photo editor known as Paint.net.16. Paint
Call this applet the Rip Van Winkle of Windows software. Paint has been bundled with Windows since version 1.0 back in 1985, and it's changed remarkably little over the decades. (That's the Windows 3.0 edition, known as Paintbrush, in the image above.) With Vista's real photo-related features living in a different app called Windows Photo Gallery, it seems a safe bet that Microsoft won't ever bring Paint into the new millennium. If you want a taste of what Paint should be in 2007, check out the superb free photo editor known as Paint.net.

15. Windows Aero
Transparent Windows borders! That let you see the stuff beneath them! The Aero user interface, which Microsoft touted as one of the major breakthroughs in Windows Vista, are (mildly) cool when they work as advertised. But the upside of Aero seems tiny given the hardware oomph required: For PCs with less-than-potent graphics (including ones on sale today), Aero is a machine-choking headache. In fact, Vista sometimes decides on its own to turn off Aero without telling you. Don?t worry--you're really not missing much.

14. Active Desktop
You could make a case that Active Desktop (which originated as part of IE 4.0's Windows Desktop Update and became part of the OS with Windows 98) was a decent idea a decade too early. Part of the short-lived "push" fad of the mid-1990s, it piped Web content directly to your Windows wallpaper, where it would sit and auto-update itself. That's the same basic idea as current OS enhancers such as Yahoo Widget Engine, Apple's Dashboard, and, come to think of it, Vista's Gadgets. But in an era of slow PCs and even slower dial-up connections, Active Desktop was famous mostly for making Windows run like molasses.

13. Windows XP Search
It's kind of astonishing: Windows users had to wait nearly a quarter century, until Windows Vista, for an OS with really good search features. Windows XP Search may be the worst of all, with an interface that's as patronizing as it is sluggish and confusing. You search with the help of a talking dog who even Microsoft's own site says some people "loathe". PC World columnist Stephen Manes was so worried that this "bastard pup of Microsoft Bob" might make it into Vista that he started a write-in campaign to beseech Microsoft to euthanize the pooch; hundreds of readers sided with Steve.

12. The Microsoft Network
Never used the original version of MSN, which shipped with Windows 95? Consider yourself fortunate. Dating from the pre-Web days when AOL was the hottest thing online, MSN 1.0 tried to bring a Win 95-style interface to online services--forums, for instance, were shortcuts that sat inside desktop folders. But the whole thing was unintuitive, sparse on content, and excruciatingly slow (connection speeds initially topped out at 14.4-kbs). And by the time it debuted, it was already an anachronism, forcing Microsoft to reinvent MSN as an ISP and purveyor of Web services.

11. Windows Explorer
If your memory stretches back to the pre-Windows 95 age, you remember Windows' File Manager. You might even miss it--Windows Explorer, even in Vista, lacks some of the features File Manager had, such as the ability to use wildcards to filter a view down to documents of a certain type. Then there features that Explorer has always needed and never gotten, like the ability to print a list of the files in a folder. As often happens, a third party has done what Microsoft hasn't: VCOM's PowerDesk is a worthy utility that's exactly what File Manager should have evolved into.

More to come... keep visiting my blog..

AMD Cuts Prices, Intel Expected to Follow

Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD) announced its latest round of desktop processor price cuts on Monday, and rival Intel Corp. is expected to follow the move later this month.

AMD slashed prices on its top-of-the-line desktop PC microprocessors on Monday to US$599 per pair for the 3GHz version from US$799, making it the same price as its 2.8GHz version. The move may be a sign it wants to clear out the chips ahead of the launch of its next generation chips, Barcelona. The company also reduced the price of some of its best dual-core processors, the Athlon 64 X2 6000+, which runs at 3.0GHz, fell to $178 from $241 and its AMD 64 X2 5600+, to $157 from $505, according to its latest price list.

The company has apparently stopped producing several chips, the Athlon 64 X2 3600s and 3800s.

A total of six AMD Athlon dual-core offerings for the desktop can now be bought for below $100 each. The company's single core desktop processors are all now priced below $100, with the Athlon 64 3200+, a 2GHz chip, at $48 and the Sempron 3200+, a 1.8GHz chip, at $31, the lowest price processor on the list.

AMD's laptop PC processor prices remained the same.

AMD and Intel have been in a tit-for-tat price war for well over a year now, and the results have been great for users - particularly in desktop PCs. Price reductions for microprocessors and other computer components are a natural part of the business. As products age, they lose value, so lower prices are used as a way to entice users to spend less on slightly older technology. But the market share battles between AMD and Intel in recent years have pushed both companies to boost technology and keep pricing down, to the benefit of users.

Intel is expected to follow the AMD price reductions with a round of its own price slashing on July 22, according to a report by investment banking firm Goldman Sachs Group Inc.

Samsung unveils E950, J600, and F210

Today Samsung unveiled two new fashionable sliders with touch-sensitive controls plus a music-oriented device. Samsung E950 is a successor of the Samsung E900, while the Samsung J600 is a budget-oriented model which definitely manages to look the part. Both the handsets feature touch sensitive controls as their main navigation solutions. The Samsung F210 is the next music handset in swivel form factor by the Korean manufacturer after Samsung X830 and Samsung F200.


Samsung E950

The Samsung E950 comes with a 3 megapixel (possibly autofocus?) camera and a fashionable metal finish. The handset is among the first Samsung mobiles said to include a new graphical user interface. The touch-sensitive control is performed through a small (1.2") touch-sensitive 65K colors OLED display. Interacting with the user interface on the small display is immediately transferred to the main 2" 262K color TFT display with a QVGA resolution.

In terms of connectivity, the Samsung E950 is limited to tri-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE network support plus stereo Bluetooth and USB. Other features include FM radio, TV out jack and a microSD memory card slot used to expand the available 70MB of integrated memory.


Samsung J600

The Samsung J600 on the other hand has a 1.3 megapixel camera, a 65K color TFT display with a resolution of 128 x 160 pixels, Bluetooth (no stereo), and a microSD memory card slot. Among the highlights is that it comes in a number of lively color variations. Specs are nothing special but let's not forget that it's the first handset with touch sensitive controls for the budget conscious users.


Samsung F210

The new Samsung F210 builds on the already announced at CeBIT 2007 Samsung F200 by adding a 2 megapixel camera, a smoother design and 1GB of integrated memory. The memory is expandable through the microSD memory card slot (unlike Samsung X830) and is more than enough to get you started (unlike Samsung F200 with its meager 5 (read five) MB). The display of this baby is 1.46" 262K color TFT one with a resolution of 128 x 220 pixels.

LTU Network

Today I went LTU for solving a problem with their Server.