Avyaya – Tech Rants

Driving the Tech BandWagon

World’s Powerful Shotgun

AA-12 Model to rip anything apart

 

February 29, 2008 Posted by avyaya | Technology, Weapons | , | 1 Comment

Sony Ericsson’s XPERIA X1 QWERTY

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It’s here, the XPERIA X1 QWERTY from Sony Ericsson. Yes, full QWERTY to make the most of that Windows Mobile 6 operating system. SE’s new XPERIA brand will focus on multimedia and mobile web communication. The X1 then, brings a 3-inch wide VGA (800 x 480) touchscreen display, 3.2 megapixel camera (with photo light), A2DP Bluetooth, aGPS, WiFi, and microSD — just 400MB on board. On the phone side you’ve got quad-band GSM/EDGE, and 900/1700/1900/2100MHz UMTS/HSDPA/HSUPA (or 850/1700/1900/2100MHz in what must be a US-bound model). Navigation is accomplished via touch, arc-sliding QWERTY, 4-way key and optical joystick. Now just replace that Internet Explorer Mobile browser with Opera Mobile 9.5 or Skyfire and the 110 x 53 x 16.7-mm X1 is ready to live up to its potential. You know, when it ships in “select markets” in the second half of 2008. Full specs posted after the break.

More Info at:

Sony Ericsson

Engadget

February 29, 2008 Posted by avyaya | Mobiles, Sony Ericsson, Technology | , , | No Comments Yet

RoboScooter by MIT: Robot on Roads

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Truth be told, MIT Media Lab’s RoboScooter prototype would be a lot more intriguing if it had some sort of autopilot button, and while that could very well emerge in the future, it looks as if the first models will still require human intervention. Nevertheless, the ultra-compact vehicle is entirely electric, and aside from supporting swappable batteries, it can also fold up for easy transport. Furthermore, its creators boast that the entire rig is constructed from just 150 parts, which makes life on the assembly line that much easier. Granted, even engineers realize that scooters don’t stand much of a chance in America, but if all goes well, this bugger could start conquering Asian streets as early as next year.

Check for more on AutoBlogGreen

February 29, 2008 Posted by avyaya | Technology | , | No Comments Yet

Reviews: New Mac Book Pro – An Efficient Tool

Efficiency: The Foreword of Mac Book Pro

20080229-190614_wwwbloglinescom.jpgThe new Macbook Pro is not much of a bump up from its predecessors, but it is a step in the right direction. The addition of Multi-Touch is a great new feature, even on a touchpad that’s smaller than the one on the Air. However, the Penryn-powered processor in this MBP is running at roughly the same speed as the last generation’s chips, GHz to GHz, and give no good reason to upgrade from machines that are less than a year old. The most interesting point here is the boost in efficiency the now-pervasive LED backlighting and 45nm Penryn chips bring to the MacBook Pro, which together give an hour extra battery life over older models with CCFL screens and 65nm CPU technology. That makes this the most efficient Macbook Pro yet. Here’s more on the 2.6GHz 4GB 15-inch MacBook we got to play with.

Multi-Touch Trackpad
After a month of getting used to the Multi-Touch touchpad on the MacBook Air, I have to say that the Pro’s touchpad is not quite as good in comparison. Comparatively, the Pro’s touchpad is slightly narrower in width and a whole half of an inch shorter in height. (It’s identical to the touchpad on the last Gen MBP’s pad.) My initial thoughts were that the smaller touchpad would make using Multi-Touch more difficult, but that wasn’t exactly the case.

Initially, in iPhoto, Multi-Touch on the smaller pad was more difficult, but after a few minutes we realized we were trying to use fingers in the same fashion as we did on the Air, where we had more room to gesture. For example, on the Air we skipped through photos with our fingers vertically but because of the Pro’s size it’s not comfortable to do this. So we placed our three fingers horizontally and it worked perfectly.

We came to the same conclusion with the rotate function. Instead of trying to move our rotate finger from the top of the touchpad to the bottom, we realized that by simply doing the rotate movement with more of a flick, iPhoto and Preview correctly rotated our photo to the next layout.

For testing zoom, we did a side-by-side comparison with the Air and found that the Pro’s smaller touchpad actually zoomed into the same position as it did using the Air.

Screen
One thing to note though is that the LED matte screen on the version we got was less bright than the glossy screen on the MacBook Air. This might be the matte vs. glossy difference, or it might be that the MacBook Air’s screen is just brighter.

Keyboard
The updated keyboard now has the F-key functions, same as the MacBook Air, and we think the additional Dashboard and Expose buttons use the F-keys nicely. We might not actually use buttons for these features but we think it’s cool that the buttons are now clearly labeled.

Benchmark
The Penryn MacBook Pro has already been benched and compared to the previous generation MBP, and its clear it’s about the same performance, per GHz. With that in mind we tested the new Penryn MBP agaisnt a year old Merom MBP and found a slight increase in speed. Also not surprising.

In a video encoding test, the Penryn MBP exported a 2.5min HD trailer in 11 minutes, where as the older Merom MBP took 13 min. (The basic config on the older machine included a 2.33GHz processor and 2GB of RAM; the Penryn had a 2.6GHz processor and 4GB of RAM, so this test is just a rough guide.) As noted in the temperature section, the Penryn did use much more of its power to accomplish the encoding which produced more heat. If you would like to see the Xbench results and compare it to your own machine you can check them out here.

Related Article: Beasts(Read Laptops) That Smell So Sweet

For more: Click Here…..

February 29, 2008 Posted by avyaya | Computers, Laptops, Technology | , , , , | No Comments Yet

Apple cares a Shit about Unlocked iPhones

iphone_vsmall.jpgUnlike some Apple analysts, Apple management doesn’t sound too concerned with the “significant” number of iPhones that have been bought to be unlocked and used abroad.

“Of all the problems that I might face, this is one that I face looking at with a little bit of a smile,” Apple (AAPL) chief operating officer Tim Cook said yesterday at Goldman Sachs’ annual tech stock conference. “Because it means there’s great demand for the phone. To have people stepping over each other to get the phone isn’t a bad thing, I think.”

Why are analysts so agitated? Bernstein’s Toni Sacconaghi says Apple is missing out on more than $1 billion in lost revenue. Because those phones aren’t being activated on Apple-chosen wireless carriers like AT&T (T), Apple isn’t getting an estimated $10-$15 in revenue per subscriber, per month from its partners.

But that’s a tough sell. Most people aren’t unlocking the iPhone to escape Apple’s partners, Cook said. They’re buying them to take to countries that Apple isn’t selling its phones at all yet, like China. Apple rolled the iPhone out at a “chosen speed” — just four countries last year — on purpose, Cook reminds us.

February 29, 2008 Posted by avyaya | Mobiles, Technology, iPhone | , , , | No Comments Yet