The Netopia - Microsoft partnership

While most internet shops have closed business during the year, leading internet café chain Netopia is planning to open more than 12 new branches in 2009, adding that the global economic slowdown has little or no effect on them.

Netopia President George H. Tan said that they are setting aside P25 million to P30 million in budget for the projected expansion. They will be eyeing spaces inside the malls around the country for the new branches.

With the cost of computer equipments going down, and also the prices of crude oil, Netopia is very optimistic in their planned expansion.



Although Tan admitted that they have closed some 25 company-owned branches during the year which were considered as ‘non-contributing’ outlet during their ‘period of consolidation.’ Said decision was brought about by the then increasing prices of oil, because “foot traffic in the mall went down as people did not want to go out,” Tan added.

Learning from previous mistakes and seeing new opportunities now, Tan said that they have learned on how to identify a good location, what should be the ideal size, and how to market if effectively. They (Netopia) are now undertaking new marketing strategies to set them apart from their competitors.

And just recently, Netopia was able to enter into a partnership with technology giant Microsoft Philippines. The partnership will see Microsoft displaying their products inside the EGG-Netopia store in the SM Mall of Asia. Windows-based consumer electronics products like computers, mobile phones and video games, among others, will be showcased in this joint project which was called the Windows Technology Zone.

Tan expects that this will bring in more customers to their places, thereby increasing the traffic as it becomes known in the market. Although Netopia will not be handling the selling of these products, they will refer customers who will inquire to authorized dealers.

Pinoy e-Jeepney is Featured at Discovery Channel

We have the solution at hand, but somehow, bureaucracy and other self-vested interests from controlling industries have formed such a big hurdle that we cannot fully maximize the potentials of the e-jeepneys. With the international exposure that it has recently, perhaps this promising invention would get the much needed push to be fully developed for our country’s main thoroughfare.

The e-jeepney or electronic jeepney which was developed by Solar Electric Company, Inc. (Solarco) was featured in the Discovery Channel’s Ecopolis, a technology TV program hosted by Nobel Prize-winning scientist Dr. Daniel Kammen.

Kammen presented the e-jeepney in the show as one that may prove to have the most impact in reducing harmful carbon dioxide emissions. Although in the said episode, the e-jeepney failed to pass the test, because it was only effectively able to reduce carbon emissions in the city by 4%.

But that was understandable, because the Ecopolis (where it was tested) was designed in such a way that everybody would be driving their own cars and would not take public transport. Dr. Kammen pointed out that if everybody would be taking the public transport, the e-jeepney would effectively reduce carbon emissions by 80%.

With the exposure that it got from the Discovery Chanel, it might get more interest and support. Hopefully from the parties that can really do something to bring this project into its full potential.

Currently, the e-jeepney is being pilot tested in the cities of Makati and Puerto Princesa in Luzon and Bacolod in the Visayas. It can carry 14 people, including the driver and can run for 60 to 90 kilometers after an overnight charging from an ordinary wall power outlet.

The e-jeepney was launched in July last year. It is a good solution to high fuel prices, but aside from the a few units on a pilot run, the Land Transportation Office has yet to make it fully road-legal. (Source: Pinoy Business)

Scientists find hole in Earth's magnetic field

LOS ANGELES, CA. – Recent satellite observations have revealed the largest breach yet seen in the magnetic field that protects Earth from most of the sun's violent blasts, researchers reported Tuesday. The discovery was made last summer by Themis, a fleet of five small NASA satellites.

Scientists have long known that the Earth's magnetic field, which guards against severe space weather, is similar to a drafty old house that sometimes lets in violent eruptions of charged particles from the sun. Such a breach can cause brilliant auroras or disrupt satellite and ground communications.

Observations from Themis show the Earth's magnetic field occasionally develops two cracks, allowing solar wind — a stream of charged particles spewing from the sun at 1 million mph — to penetrate the Earth's upper atmosphere.

Last summer, Themis calculated a layer of solar particles to be at least 4,000 miles thick in the outermost part of the Earth's magnetosphere, the largest tear of the protective shield found so far.

"It was growing rather fast," Themis scientist Marit Oieroset of the University of California, Berkeley told an American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco.

Such breaches are temporary, and the one observed last year lasted about an hour, Oieroset said.

Solar flares are a potential danger to astronauts in orbit but generally are not a risk to people on the surface of the Earth. (Yahoo! Science News)

Hands-on review: Sony Xperia X1

It's not an iPhone, and for many that's half the appeal: Sony's $800 (unlocked) Xperia X1 is the most expensive mainstream cell phone on the market, but it's one of the sexiest handsets around that doesn't start with an "i" and end in "phone."

The main X1 interface is unlike any other handset you've tried, and you'll notice the difference immediately as you punch into the XPanel home screen, a custom dashboard that lets you quickly -- and stylishly -- jump from one application to another, usually with just a single touch. You get nine panes to work with. By default they include an FM radio, calendar, clock, photo viewer, and the Opera web browser (a much appreciated improvement over the IE browser included with Windows Mobile, atop which all of this is built). Some Xperia-specific apps, including a bizarre system that uses colored fish as alerts, are also on tap to baffle you for months. Dig into the settings and you can mix and match the apps you want to appear and download new apps from Sony's website.

The phone is a horizontal slider, and when closed the front of the phone features a three-inch touchscreen (with a whopping 800 x 480 pixel resolution) with a small collection of buttons beneath it. Of special note is the center action button, which also works as a tiny touchpad in many applications while you drag your fingertip around on it.

Flip the phone on its side and slide the screen up and you get a full QWERTY keyboard, a real blessing for those of us cursed with the inability to type on touchscreens. The buttons on the keyboard are a bit too flush for my taste -- typing with two thumbs didn't work well for me -- but it beats tapping on the screen with a stylus. The design is very sturdy (and not too heavy at 5.6 ounces), and the phone, on the whole, feels like it will be able to handle multiple drops to the floor.

Other features include a nice 3.2 megapixel camera (though it's dog slow to focus) and a microSD slot (no Memory Stick for this bad boy), which is located under the battery panel cover. The phone supports 3G, but only if you use an AT&T SIM card, but it also has Wi-Fi built in to pick up the slack no matter what network you're on. GPS (and Google Maps) are also in the box. I haven't done a full battery drain test on the handset, but Sony rates it for six hours. Judging by experience and the size of the battery, that seems like a fair guess.

In addition to notes above, I have a few smallish complaints with the phone. The biggest problem is that Windows Mobile underlies the innovative XPanel, and I found I had to scurry back into WM more often than I'd like in order to get certain things done. I wish Sony would have enhanced the OS it uses on its Walkman handsets instead of building on Windows... though I do understand the benefits that Windows Mobile gets you, including email and application viewers. But still, do we really need both Opera and IE on one handset?

The X1 also has some general performance problems: Apps load so slowly that I often found myself clicking a button twice, which would then inadvertently undo what I was trying to do while I waited for the phone to catch up. Everything is kind of pokey, even the web browser. Whether it's a slow CPU or all those layers of OS that slows the Xperia down I don't know, but it's bothersome to the point of frustration.

Lastly there's that little matter of price tag. Who will pay $800 for a cell phone? No matter how excited I am about the mini-touchpad and the XPanel system, I can't justify spending nearly a grand on this handset. Subsidize it to $200 with a contract and I'm on board. (Source: Yahoo! Tech)

Coming in 2009: Nokia's touchscreen N97

I thought we were done with big phone announcements for the year, but it looks like Nokia had one last trick up its sleeves. Behold the N97, a sleek new touchscreen handset with 3G data access, a slide-out QWERTY keypad, and customizable widgets. Count on a hefty price tag, though.

Nokia invited a small group of reporters and bloggers—including me—to check out the N97 (due in the first half of 2009) at the Midtown Manhattan Nokia store Monday night. We only got a brief look (hence, this is not a review), but from what I've seen so far, the N97 looks like a significant step up from the 5800 XpressMusic, Nokia's first stab at a touchcreen phone.

First, the basics: We're talking 3G HSDPA access (a version of the N97 will be tailored for U.S. HSDPA networks), GPS, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth (including a stereo Bluetooth profile), and a whopping 32GB of on-board memory—plus a microSD memory slot, for a potential total of 48GB of storage. (Compare that to just 16GB of flash storage—tops—for the priciest iPhone 3G).

The N97 boasts a sharp-looking 3.5-inch touchscreen (same size as the iPhone); slide the screen to the side and you'll find a backlit, full-QWERTY keypad. With the phone open, the touchscreen tilts at a 30-degree angle relative to the keypad—a nice touch.

Of course, a slide-out keypad also means more bulk; in the N97's case, that means 5.2 ounces, with a girth of 0.62 inches, which puts it somewhere between the iPhone 3G and the bulky T-Mobile G1.

Besides its QWERTY keypad, the Symbian S60-powered N71 boasts another cool trick: Customizable "widgets" for the home screen that let you tap into your e-mail, upcoming events, favorite contacts, music, oft-used applications, and more. Five of the rectangular widgets fit on the home screen at one time, and you can tap and drag them around the display as you see fit. Nokia reps said they'll be encouraging developers to cook up their own widgets, so expect examples from Facebook, MySpace, Friendster ... you name it.

Unlike the Noka 5800, the N97 is a full-on Nseries handset, and that means access to Nokia's "Ovi" suite of online tools, including new universal messaging features, online file storage, and the ability to sync driving directions—from PC to phone, and vice versa after you've completed your journey—with Nokia Maps (now enhanced with topographical features and satellite views). Also on tap: N-Gage gaming.

Multimedia features look promising, including 30 frame-per-second video playback, a 3.5mm headset jack, TV out, and a 5-megapixel camera capable of VGA-quality video capture—nice.

The N97 is slated to get the same robust messaging features that I've seen on Nokia's other Nseries handsets, including POP, IMAP, and Exchange e-mail access. If you don't want to use the slide-out keypad for composing messages, you can tap on a virtual keypad (both numeric and QWERTY) or use the phone's handwriting-recognition features (with help from the included stylus). As far as Net surfing goes, the impressive Nokia HTML Web browser—complete with Flash support—is present and accounted for.

Overall, sounds pretty cool—but keep in mind that Nokia's phones (especially its Nseries handsets) are never cheap, and the N97 is no exception. While U.S. pricing hasn't been set yet, the N97 will go for a cool (unsubsidized) 550 euros when it debuts in Europe next year. I'm guessing an unlocked version of the phone will cost in the $500-$700 range once it arrives Stateside ... ouch.

Stay tuned for a full review once I get my hands on a review unit. (Reprinted from Yahoo! Tech)

Motorola Joins 'Touchscreen' Technology with Innovation

The sexy Motorola Krave ZN4 for Verizon looks like a Star Trek communicator, makes a great little portable TV, and incorporates some genuinely innovative touch-screen technology. But its lack of interesting applications leaves me wanting a lot more. Here's the problem: The bar for touch-screen phones has been raised considerably recently. With the iPhone, the LG Dare, the Samsung Instinct, the T-Mobile G1, and the BlackBerry Storm out there, just having a touch screen isn't enough anymore. A handset needs to offer fresh software, too. And the Krave's software feels old—functional but stale.

A descendant of the Ming, a Moto phone that was wildly popular in Asia, the Krave is a rounded 4.6-ounce slab (4.1 by 2 by 0.8 inches, HWD) with what appears to be a clear, protective flip cover over the screen. But that "clear" cover is actually composed of a nearly invisible wire mesh that allows the cover to become a touch screen, too.

This is a neat concept, but it's slightly self-defeating. You can control the music, TV, or GPS applications through the cover, which means you can watch TV, for example, with the flip closed. But if you don't hit the physical lock switch, it's easy to trigger apps accidentally while the phone is in your pocket.

When you flip up the clear cover, the earpiece—a silver Motorola logo—looks as if it's floating in space—an extremely cool effect. With the flip closed, you get a bright color screen of 240 by 320 pixels; opening the flip reveals the full 2.4-inch screen and adds another 80 pixels, bringing the total screen resolution to 240 by 400. Above the display, there are just two buttons: Home and Power. The sides of the handset house the microSD card slot, 3.5mm headphone jack, volume controls, micro USB power/connection port, lock switch, and voice-dialing and camera buttons.

The main reason to buy the Krave is V Cast Mobile TV, powered by Qualcomm's FLO TV. which is ten channels of honest-to-goodness TV from partners like Comedy Central, ESPN, and Nickelodeon. The programs, however, are time-shifted; they're not showing what's on your TV at that moment. Boob tube addicts will also appreciate Verizon's new library of streaming episodes from partners like MTV and the Sci-Fi channel, which streamed smoothly, though not in full screen.

In a fringe reception area, TV on the Krave worked well laid down on a table, but not when I held it in my hand because my hand partially blocked the antenna. With better reception, TV worked well in both scenarios, but again, holding the phone up reduced the quality. TV audio through the phone's speaker and either wired or Bluetooth headphones sounded just fine.

This is the best FLO TV experience so far, because of the big screen and clear sound. The Krave seems less like a TV phone than like a little TV.

As a voice phone, the Krave is solid, once you can get over the fact that it feels odd pressed up against your face. The drop hinge causes the top half of the phone to fall about half an inch behind the bottom half, which is an unusual form factor. The Krave has strong RF reception, good voice quality in the earpiece, and adequate in-ear feedback of your own voice. The speakerphone is loud but transmits a lot of background noise, too. The Krave worked well with our stereo Motorola S9 Bluetooth headset and our mono Aliph Jawbone headset. Ringtones are loud, but the vibrate function isn't very powerful, though it does make a noticeable buzzing sound. Battery life, at 6 hours 20 minutes of talk time, is simply awesome.

But otherwise, the Krave's too-standard Verizon software is pretty boring, especially held up against the competing LG Dare.

The phone features visual voice mail, but so do an increasing number of Verizon handsets. The dial pad, address book, and SMS application come across as generic. You enter data by tapping on a portrait-style T9 keypad or a landscape-format QWERTY, both with slight vibrating feedback. Both keypads feel lively and responsive. It works well. But the software, overall, is far too similar to too many other Verizon feature phones to stand out from the crowd.

You get Verizon's underpowered OpenWave barely HTML browser, and very basic AOL, MSN, and Yahoo! IM clients, along with the standard Verizon e-mail client, which can access AOL, Windows Live, Yahoo!, or any POP/IMAP account. The VZ Navigator GPS software also worked well, including rerouting me around a traffic jam.

For music, the Krave hooks up to PCs and syncs with Rhapsody clients using a standard microUSB cable. You can also buy new music over the air, but you can't download files from your Rhapsody library over the air. Our handset synced smoothly and easily, and loaded music onto our 16GB SanDisk microSD card without a problem.

I wasn't able to get a Bluetooth file transfer to work, and Motorola said the Krave isn't eligible for Verizon's Bluetooth modem plans. This isn't a huge deal, since the phone doesn't hit Verizon's fastest network, anyway; it runs on the older EV-DO Rev 0.

A surprising number of BREW games run on the Krave, considering that the phone doesn't have a physical keyboard. When I loaded Pac-Man, for instance, I could control my little guy by tapping the top, bottom, or either side of the screen. Tapping the corners of the screen activated virtual soft keys.

Built-in applications aren't bad. I was just hoping for something a little more fun, or new on this unusual phone—something like the Dare's photo contact cards or draggable menu items, for instance.

The camera is oddly bereft of options. You can't change the resolution of your photos, like you can on plenty of other phones on the market today: it's 2-megapixel or nothing. There are two video modes: MMS and 320-by-240 at 10 frames per second. Shots were a bit soft, with highly saturated colors. They weren't terrible, but they weren't great, either. At least the roomy 128MB of built-in memory leaves lots of space for photos.

At $149.99 (with contract), the Motorola Krave ZN4 goes for $50 less than its main competitor, the LG Dare. Also, the Krave's touch keypad is a bit more responsive than the Dare's. But the Dare prevails in plenty of other ways with a much better camera, a better browser, and most important, software with a sense of whimsy, fun, and freshness. The Krave costs the same as Verizon's other large-screen mobile TV phone, the LG Voyager, which adds a physical QWERTY keyboard to the mix. I definitely crave the Krave's hardware, but its generic software doesn't allow it to stand out from the crowd.

BlackBerry 5-megapixel phone, Storm 2 coming soon

While it’s already confirmed that both Globe and Smart will offer the BlackBerry Bold in the local market, we have yet to receive news of when and if the touchscreen-equipped Storm will make it to Philippine shores. Now, to further complicate things for the frugal shopper, word on the net has it that RIM has a 5-megapixel camera phone and a successor to the Storm already in the works.


According to two independent sources, the 5-megapixel phone will feature an auto-focus camera, 1GB RAM and a “near HD quality” display. If everything goes according to plan, this will be the best imaging BlackBerry device to date. Design wise, it could look like a fusion between the Storm and the Bold which could mean a touchscreen phone that’s equipped with QWERTY keypad. No details were divulged regarding the Storm 2, but we’re guessing it’s the one that will support 850MHz and 1900MHz 3G spectrum bands for use in more countries.

So, with this bit of info regarding new and better BlackBerry devices in the pipeline already, are you still interested in getting the BlackBerry Bold when it comes out? Personally, I’d wait, but hey, in the world of gadgets and technology, everything will eventually become outdated anyway so it’s really all up to you if you’d rather get what’s available right now or wait for the next batch of device to come out first.

Watch out for the "Tube" by Nokia

The Nokia 5800 is an upcoming portable entertainment device by Nokia.

The Nokia 5800, code-named "Tube," is a Symbian S60 smartphone. It's a XpressMusic series phone, which emphasizes music and multimedia playback. Although it's not the first Nokia phone with a touchscreen, the first being the Nokia 7710, it's their first phone based on the S60 platform which utilizes a touchscreen. While it has tactile feedback, it doesn't use Nokia's upcoming Haptikos technology.


It has a compatibly mode for older S60 and Java applications that aren't touchscreen aware. It works by using part of the screen for displaying the essential buttons that the program needs.

The phone was seen in Britney Spears' Womanizer's music video.

Nokia announced the 5800 XpressMusic in London on October 2nd. The suggested retail price is €279 before taxes and subsidies. The phone will be available Q4 2008 in developing markets, specifically India, Indonesia, United Arab Emirates, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Russia and Spain. The phone will miss Christmas sales in more matured markets. Nokia has only commented that it needs time to customize the phone's software for operators in other markets. Analysts speculated the delay as a business maneuver not to butcher its existing product portfolio sales for Christmas as the phone is very competitively priced. The phone will hit the rest of Europe sometime in early 2009. A United States and Asia-Pacific release date has yet to be announced.

Specifications

Nokia 5800 XpressMusic has the following specifications:

3.2-inch 16M touchscreen.
640 x 360 pixels resolution (16:9 display ratio).
Symbian S60 5th edition OS with touch input
Quad band GSM / GPRS / EDGE: GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900
Dual band UMTS / HSDPA: UMTS 900 / 2100 or UMTS 850 / 1900 (Latin America and Brazil variant)
Accelerometer for auto screen rotation.
3.2 MP AF Carl Zeiss lens, dual LED flash and geo-tagging support
GPS with A-GPS function
FM Radio 87.5-108 MHz with RDS.
3.5mm headphone/video-out jack
microSDHC card slot (up to 32 GB)
8GB microSDHC card included

Watch Out, Apple.. Google's gPhone is Coming

The G1 may not be as sleek and sexy as the iPhone, but its peppy, easy-to-use touchscreen interface makes mincemeat of all the other iPhone wanna-bes, and it packs in some killer features—like 360-degree Street View—that the iPhone has yet to match.

The G1's 3.17-inch screen is slightly smaller than the iPhone's 3.5-inch display, and at first glance, its interface looks a bit dull compared to Apple's red-hot handset (and unfortunately, my shaky photography skills don't help). But beneath the G1's sliding display, we get a surprise—a full, Sidekick-sized QWERTY keypad, perfect for those who don't want to deal with a touchscreen keyboard. There's also a trackball, a Home key, and physical Call and End buttons.

While the G1's main screen isn't quite as eye-popping as the iPhone's, the Android-powered display was surprisingly responsive—a quick flick of my fingertip opened a windowshade of applications, while tapping the status bar at the top of the screen instantly revealed e-mail, SMS, and voice-mail alerts. Indeed, tapping and scrolling around the G1's various menus was a seamless pleasure, akin to what you'd expect from an iPhone. And while leading iPhone competitors like the Samsung Instinct always felt a bit sluggish to me, the G1's peppy interface responded quickly to my every touch.

The G1's dialer and contact list immediately grabs all your online Google calendar info and contacts—and for those with IM accounts, the G1 will indicate which of your contacts happen to be signed in for chat, an "online presence" feature familiar to anyone with a Helio phone. As with the iPhone, you can flick your contact list with a finger, spinning it roulette-style. Nice.

The Android Web browser on the G1 immediately takes its place as one of the top mobile browsers I've seen, right next to those on the iPhone and Nokia Nseries handsets. Pages rendered quickly (over Wi-Fi, at least) and perfectly; a tap brings up zoom in/out controls, while a touch-enabled magnifying glass lets you quickly scan lengthy Web pages. (No multitouch-enabled "pinching," however.) See a picture you want to save? Just touch and hold; a contextual menu pops up with a variety of options, including saving the image to the phone.

Coolest of all, though, is Google Maps on the G1, complete with GPS and Street View. In the demo I saw (over Wi-Fi), maps loaded quickly, as did Street View images, and they refreshed almost instantly as I dragged maps and images around with my finger.

The best part? Using Street View with the G1's built-in compass. Say you're facing north; you hold the G1 in front of you, select Street View, and you'll see your street from a north-facing vantage point. Turn east—with the phone still in front of you—and the Street View image follows. Angle the phone skyward, and Street View moves likewise. Way, way cool (and impressively fast and responsive, to boot).

Disappointments? Well, the G1's music player is no great shakes; it'll play your standard MP3/WMA/AAC/Ogg Vobis files, but the bare-bones player interface can't hold a candle to the iPhone's. (At least you can buy MP3s wirelessly using the bundled Amazon application.) Also, there's no video player—then again, as T-Mobile reps kept repeating, there's nothing stopping third-party developers from building one (or many).

And while the G1's three-megapixel camera tops the iPhone's 2MP shooter, the G1 doesn't come with built-in video recording—although (yep, you guessed it), third-party developers should feel free to fill the void.

Overall, however, I'm pretty impressed. I wasn't that wowed by the G1's uninspiring design, but Android shows a lot of promise, and its peppy performance on the G1 is a huge plus. (Yahoo! Tech Editor)

Meet your new bestfriend: the Dell's Inspiron Mini 9

Dell’s long awaited entry into the netbook market has finally been made official, and based on the leaks it seems that it comes with little surprise, both in terms of pricing but also overall specs. The netbook has been officially dubbed the Inspiron Mini 9 and its available today with an estimated shipping date of September 16.

The Mini 9 offers a few configurations and will be available in either Obsidian Black or Alpine White, of course the Alpine White comes as a $25 premium. In addition to the outside coloring, the netbook will also offer a choice between Windows XP or Ubuntu 8.04 with a “custom Dell interface.”

The specs inside the Mini 9 are about the same as what we have been hearing around the Internet and include an 8.9-inch display with a 1024 x 600 resolution, 1.6GHz Intel Atom processor, Intel Graphics Media Accelerator (GMA) 950, Wi-Fi 802.11g and a 4-cell battery.

The lower priced Mini 9 starts at $349 and comes with Ubuntu 8.04, 512MB of RAM, a 4GB SSD and leaves off the webcam. However that same model tops out at $494 with an upgrade to 1GB of RAM, a 16GB SSD, built-in Bluetooth 2.1 and an integrated 1.3-megapixel webcam. Other options include a middle of the road 8GB SSD and 0.3-megapixel webcam.

The higher priced, aka Windows XP model of the Mini 9 begins at $449 and features 1GB of RAM, an 8GB SSD, built-in Bluetooth 2.1 and the integrated 1.3-megapixel webcam. This model offers an upgrade for the SSD to 16GB and tops out at $489. (Shared by Bongski)

World's Next Super Scope is 10 Times More Powerful than Hubble

CHAJNANTOR PLAIN, Chile — Sixteen thousand five hundred feet up into the Andes, deep inside the Atacama Desert, lies this barren, windswept plateau of maroon rock and sand. One of the driest places on Earth, the table-top-flat Chajnantor is nothing short of a wasteland, offering few humans reason to tread here. Until now.


High-tech teams from across the globe are racing to 16,000 ft. in the Chilean Andes to erect ALMA, which will become this planet's largest and most advanced radio telescope when it's completed in 2012. PopularMechanics.com heads south—way south—for a field report on what it takes to let astronomers look 14 billion years back in time, with 10 times the power of Hubble.

Giant excavators and construction equipment operate in the distance as I labor to breathe in the thin air while walking toward a gleaming metal and glass building. I've come to get an in-depth progress report on the construction of what will be the planet's most advanced land-based telescope: the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA).

Consisting of 66 radio antennas spread across 10 miles and linked to the world's most extensive superconducting electronic receiving system, ALMA will peer into regions of space never seen before. The Chajnantor Plain was chosen following a worldwide search due to its cloudless skies and razor-thin atmosphere, which will allow the antennas' super-sensitive receivers to detect electromagnetic wavelengths of less than a hair's width, down to 0.3 millimeters. By tapping the millimeter/submillimeter spectrum, ALMA will soon generate images of the cold universe, dim areas of gas and dust where new stars form. For the first time, astronomers should be able to see 14 billion years into the past, to the formation of the earliest galaxies.

Researchers will move the antennas to shrink or expand the array, creating a giant zoom lens with resolutions 10 times better than that of the Hubble Space Telescope. Funded by a consortium of astronomical organizations from North America, Europe and Japan, the $1.3 billion project is scheduled for completion in 2012. But first it must be built.

"Nothing like this has ever been done before," says Adrian Russell, ALMA project manager for the National Radio Astronomy Observatory, one of the American sponsors. "We are delivering a lot of very complex, sensitive and expensive hardware to a remote and challenging site where it all must be assembled."

My visit begins at the Operations Support Facilities site at 10,000 ft., where I arrive following a 9-mile drive up a dusty road after turning off Chilean Route 23 and passing through a guard station. With its modern metal and glass buildings, the OSF site resembles a high-tech campus in Silicon Valley. Known as "the low site," this is the base camp for ALMA with housing for 500, a power station, cantina, cinema, medical clinic, stop signs and streetlights. Technicians will operate the antennas from here. This is also where engineers are assembling the antennas after trucking in the parts from the port of Antofagasta 180 miles away.(By Paul Tolmé; YahooNews)

Large Hadron Collider Project is a Big Success

GENEVA - The world's largest particle collider passed its first major tests by firing two beams of protons in opposite directions around a 17-mile (27-kilometer) underground ring Wednesday in what scientists hope is the next great step to understanding the makeup of the universe.

After a series of trial runs, two white dots flashed on a computer screen at 10:26 a.m. (0826 GMT) indicating that the protons had traveled clockwise along the full length of the 4 billion Swiss franc (US$3.8 billion) Large Hadron Collider — described as the biggest physics experiment in history.

"There it is," project leader Lyn Evans said when the beam completed its lap.

Champagne corks popped in labs as far away as Chicago, where contributing and competing scientists watched the proceedings by satellite.

Five hours later, scientists successfully fired a beam counterclockwise.

Physicists around the world now have much greater power to smash the components of atoms together in attempts to learn about their structure.

"Well done, everybody," said Robert Aymar, director-general of the European Organization for Nuclear Research, to cheers from the assembled scientists in the collider's control room at the Swiss-French border.

The organization, known by its French acronym CERN, began firing the protons — a type of subatomic particle — around the tunnel in stages less than an hour earlier, with the first beam injection at 9:35 a.m. (0735 GMT).

Eventually two beams will be fired at the same time in opposite directions with the aim of recreating conditions a split second after the big bang, which scientists theorize was the massive explosion that created the universe.

"My first thought was relief," said Evans, who has been working on the project since its inception in 1984. "This is a machine of enormous complexity. Things can go wrong at any time. But this morning has been a great start."

He didn't want to set a date, but said that he expected scientists would be able to conduct collisions for their experiments "within a few months."

The collider is designed to push the proton beam close to the speed of light, whizzing 11,000 times a second around the tunnel.

Scientists hope to eventually send two beams of protons through two tubes about the width of fire hoses, speeding through a vacuum that is colder and emptier than outer space. The paths of these beams will cross, and a few protons will collide. The collider's two largest detectors — essentially huge digital cameras weighing thousands of tons — are capable of taking millions of snapshots a second.

The CERN experiments could reveal more about "dark matter," antimatter and possibly hidden dimensions of space and time. It could also find evidence of the hypothetical particle — the Higgs boson — which is sometimes called the "God particle" because it is believed to give mass to all other particles, and thus to matter that makes up the universe.

The supercooled magnets that guide the proton beam heated slightly in the morning's first test, leading to a pause to recool them before trying the opposite direction.

The start of the collider came over the objections of some who feared the collision of protons could eventually imperil the Earth by creating micro-black holes, subatomic versions of collapsed stars whose gravity is so strong they can suck in planets and other stars.

"It's nonsense," said James Gillies, chief spokesman for CERN.

CERN was backed by leading scientists like Britain's Stephen Hawking , who declared the experiments to be absolutely safe.

Gillies told the AP that the most dangerous thing that could happen would be if a beam at full power were to go out of control, and that would only damage the accelerator itself and burrow into the rock around the tunnel.

Nothing of the sort occurred Wednesday, though the accelerator is still probably a year away from full power.

The project organized by the 20 European member nations of CERN has attracted researchers from 80 nations. Some 1,200 are from the United States, an observer country that contributed US$531 million. Japan, another observer, also is a major contributor.

Some scientists have been waiting for 20 years to use the LHC.

The complexity of manufacturing it required groundbreaking advances in the use of supercooled, superconducting equipment. The 2001 start and 2005 completion dates were pushed back by two years each, and the cost of the construction was 25 percent higher than originally budgeted in 1996, Luciano Maiani, who was CERN director-general at the time, told The Associated Press.

Maiani and the other three living former directors-general attended the launch Wednesday.

Smaller colliders have been used for decades to study the makeup of the atom. Less than 100 years ago scientists thought protons and neutrons were the smallest components of an atom's nucleus, but in stages since then experiments have shown they were made of still smaller quarks and gluons and that there were other forces and particles.

___

RP Car Sales in 2008

Car sales this year increases in spite of soaring prices of diesels and fuels. Although recent months sales have declined, the car sales in the early part of the year created more than just a cushion that causes still a net increase from prior year’s sales. The Chamber of Automotive Manufacturers of the Philippines (Camp), credits this higher sales to the US dollars remitted by the OFW and the growing middle-income market in the country.

Alfonso Salcedo Jr., president of BPI Family Bank, one of the leading banks in the car loan sector noted that while there is an increase in car sales, the car types that get sold more has shifted from SUVs or bigger vehicles to that of smaller cars. “There has been a very noticeable shift in preference to smaller cars. It’s what’s driving the industry, the under one-million peso cars” Salcedo said.

It’s the big sports utility vehicles (SUVs) that are greatly affected by high fuel costs as the market is shifting to low displacement engines, according to Daniel Isla, first vice president for marketing and sales of Toyota Motor Philippines Corp.

Topping the sales from January to July this year is Toyota Motor’s Vios which is priced below P600,000 each at 6,215 units while Honda Car’s City ranked second in the small passenger car sub-compact category.

Toyota Innova with a retail price around P800,000 leads sale for MPV or multi-purpose vehicle at 6,094 units. MPV’s are getting more popular because of their dual purpose, either for family use or for business.

Toyota’s Avanza is next on the MPV category with 3,317 sold units at a tag price above P500,000 per unit, followed by Isuzu’s Crosswind at 3,219 units. Mistubishi’s Adventure comes in forth with sales of 3,091 units.

Hyundai.’s Getz, priced below P600,000, meanwhile, leads the sale of small passenger car hatchback category with sales of 1,573 units in the seven-month period. SUV’s aren’t totally pushed out of the picture, as they are still the vehicle of choice for the more moneyed buyers. Toyota’s Fortuner, a P1.3 million vehicle, leads at 3,226 units, followed by Honda’s CRV at 2,132. Coming in at third with sales of 1,288 units is Ford’s Everest.

Summary

Small car sub-compact category

1. Toyota VIOS
2. Honda City


Multi-purpoe vehicle category (MPV)

1. Toyota Innova
2. Toyota Avanza
3. Isuzu Crosswind
4. Mitsubishi Adventure


Small Car Hatcback Category

1. Hyundai Getz


Sports Utility Vehicle (SUV)

1. Toyota Fortuner
2. Honda CRV
3. Ford Everest

Used Cooking Oil for Cars?

Yes. Filipino ingenuity is at it again. After the LPG powered taxis and the E-Jeepneys or the electric powered vehicles, there is yet again another way of beating today’s rising cost of gasoline and fuels. This time, by using a cost-efficient biodiesel combined with cooking oil – no, make that used cooking oil.

The Makati branch of the Philippine National police will be spearheading this project. Senior Superintendent Gilbert Cruz said they will be converting their cars to run on 60 percent diesel and 40 percent used cooking oil. Giving them a hand in this noble cause is Mcdonald’s who is more than willing to donate their used cooking oil.

It will be hitting two-birds in one stone. Mcdonald’s used cooking oil will be recycled and the Makati Police is set to save $10,000 a year once this project is in full swing. Already, one unit has been converted and already patrolling the city of Makati.

If after the six-months testing phase and this project is proven to be effective, the biodiesel program will be recommended to be adapted by the entire police force of the country, according to Metro Manila Chief Geary Barias.

Globe to sell Apple's iPhone 3G locally starting at P41,899

Globe Telecom will offer Apple’s iPhone 3G prepaid kits in the country for more than P40,000 and with free “text” loads, the company said during its investors’ briefing Wednesday.

The prepaid kit of the 8-Gb version of the much-anticipated phone is priced at P41,899, while the 16-Gb version costs P48,899. Both units, to be sold locally beginning August 22, come with free short messaging service load of P200 for five months.

The iPhone 3G will also be sold under postpaid monthly plans from P1,599 to P4,999 inclusive of free wi-fi connectivity hours.

The Apple iPhone 3G, which operates on the third-generation (3G) mobile network, will also come with a built-in global positioning system (GPS) for location-based mobile services.

The iPhone 2.0 software includes support for Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync, apart from hundreds of third-party applications built with the recently released iPhone software development kit.

Globe Telecom has more than 21 million mobile subscribers to date.

The Battery-Powered Plane Makes Its Debut

Take your everyday metal moni motoglider, trick it out with a custom battery pack and you've got the ElectraFlyer C, a small electric airplane that debuted at the AirVenture show in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, last week.



The plane, which received its airworthiness certificate in April, features a 5.6 kWh lithium battery with a projected life cycle (the number of times it can be depleted and recharged) of 1,000 cycles. The battery has a max weight of 78 pounds and can be custom-built to fit the available space in an airplane. It provides juice for a motor driving a 45-inch superlight PowerFin propeller made of a foam core surrounded by an outer shell of carbon fiber and glass fabric.


Once in the air, the ElectraFlyer C cruises at 70 miles per hour. Top speed is 90 mph and the stall speed is 45. The plane can fly for 90 to 120 minutes before the battery needs recharging. When the battery winds down, just plug it into a 110V outlet -- your house is full of them -- and you're good to go in just more than six hours. Bump the voltage to 220 and you're flying again in two hours.

The people at Electric Aircraft Corporation say the small plane carries some big benefits. The motor is nearly silent, which means no earplugs for pilots, and brings the potential for flying into new sites. And then there's the a dramatic improvement in what the company calls "neighbor relations" -- no droning engines to drive them nuts. Electric motors don't produce a lot of soot or pollution, and overhauls are a snap. And by combining this motor with the ElectraFlyer's slow turning propeller, you've got a flight that is practically vibration free.

But the most compelling sell is an economic one: The company estimates that "refueling" the plane with a full charge of the battery will cost, on average, a whopping sixty cents.

What you should avoid while texting!

The warning came too late for Barack Obama's adviser: Don't walk and text at the same time.
Obama aide Valerie Jarrett
fell off a Chicago curb several weeks ago while her thumbs were flying on her Blackberry.

"I didn't see the sidewalk and I twisted my ankle," Jarrett said. "It was a nice wake-up call for me to be a lot more careful in the future, because I clearly wasn't paying attention and I should have."

Jarrett got off easy and didn't need medical attention.

But in an alert issued this week, the American College of Emergency Physicians warns of the danger of more serious accidents involving oblivious texters. The ER doctors cite rising reports from doctors around the country of injuries involving text-messaging pedestrians, bicyclists, Rollerbladers, even motorists.

Most involve scrapes, cuts and sprains from texters who walked into lampposts or walls or tripped over curbs.

Still, ER doctors who responded to a recent informal query from the organization reported two deaths, both in California. A San Francisco woman was killed by a pickup truck earlier this year when she stepped off a curb while texting, and a Bakersfield man was killed last year by a car while crossing the street and texting.

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission has no national estimate on how common texting-related injuries are. But among the reports it has received: A 15-year-old girl fell off her horse while texting, suffering head and back injuries, and a 13-year-old girl suffered belly, leg and arm burns after texting her boyfriend while cooking noodles.

Giancarlo Yerkes texted his way across a busy Chicago street Tuesday and escaped unscathed. But the 30-year-old advertising employee admitted he once walked straight into a stop sign while texting and bumped his head.

Yerkes said that he texts while walking to maximize his time, and that the emergency doctors' warning probably won't stop him.

"There's a lot of things you shouldn't do — this is another one on my list," Yerkes said.
Dr. James Adams, chairman of emergency medicine at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago, said he has treated minor injuries in several texters.
"Common sense isn't always common," Adams said.

Sometimes even among doctors.

"I have to admit that I started a text while I was driving and then I said, `This is so stupid,' so I stopped," Adams said.

Dr. Patrick Walsh, an emergency physician in Bakersfield, Calif., said he is a texter, too, but tries to remind himself to do it intelligently.

"We think we're multitasking, but we're not," he said. "You're focusing on one task for a split second, then focusing on another one, and with something moving 40 miles an hour like a car, it just takes a couple of seconds to be hit."

Walsh, a native of Ireland, said that on a recent visit there he noticed an effective government TV ad campaign against texting and walking, aimed at teenagers.

The message echoes the new advice from U.S. emergency doctors.

"We don't want to sound like some stern schoolmistress, telling people don't text on your cell phone," Walsh said. "But when you're texting, look around," he said.

The ER group also says people should never text while driving, and should avoid talking on a cell phone or texting while doing other physical activities, including walking, biking, boating and Rollerblading.

Mad scramble for Apple's 3G iPhone sent prices up

Pent-up demand for the iPhone 3G is manifesting itself on auction site eBay, where eager buyers are bidding in excess of US$1,000 to get what's turning out to be a hot commodity.

The demand for the iPhone remains high even off the Internet, with lines forming Monday outside an Apple store in New York to buy the limited stock of the devices.

Launched on July 11, the phone sold more than 1 million units worldwide over the first weekend, according to analysts. The demand has continued with carriers, including AT&T in the U.S. and O2 in the U.K., reporting iPhone 3G shortages. The 16G-byte iPhone is priced at $299 in the U.S., with the 8G-byte version priced at $199. In some countries carriers are giving the iPhone for free with contracts.

The bidding for a 16G-byte iPhone 3G on eBay is exceeding $1,000, with one bid ending at $2,325. The average 8G-byte iPhone 3G bid is reaching the $800 to $900 range.

In one auction a potential bidder asked if the iPhone could be shipped to Indonesia, indicating that bids were coming from countries where the iPhone won't be shipped by the end of this year. The phone is currently sold in 20 countries, but Apple hopes to expand its availability to 70 countries by year-end.

The sellers are advertising the iPhones as "unlocked" to work with any carrier, also providing a link to a recent hack issued to unlock the iPhone.

Apple did not supply enough devices at this year's launch, creating a demand. During last year's launch of the first-generation iPhone the company sold 270,000 handsets.

Supplies should normalize over the quarter and the iPhone 3G is set for long-term success, said Mike Abramsky, of RBC Capital Markets, in a report. The company could ship up to 5.1 million iPhones in the quarter. (Elizabeth Montalbano; IDG News)

The Sony Ericsson XPERIA X1.. simply amazing!

My friend 'Bong' from the Middle East introduced this one to me.. and my!! it's just simply amazing. I promise I'm going to wait for this one. Unfortunately, it's not yet available in the Philippines (or at least in Cotabato City).

12345678910 12345678910 12345678910

What's in store for this mobile monster?? It's multi-media phone equipped with the camera and music player designed to your complete satisfaction. It's a touchscreen wonder, and what more with its full QWERTY keyboard that slides sideways gives you the orientation of a notebook computer, and therfore, needs no unfolding or turning around of the screen to suit your view..


Now, to see is to believe.. indulge in its specifications hereunder:

General Specification:
2G Network
GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900
3G Network
HSDPA 850 / 1900 / 2100
Announced
2008, February
Status
Coming soon
Size
Dimensions
110.5 x 52.6 x 17 mm
Weight
158 g
Display
Type
TFT touchscreen, 65K colors
Size
800 x 480 pixels, 3 inches

- Full QWERTY keyboard- Optical joystick navigation
Ringtones
Type
Polyphonic, MP3
Customization
Composer, download
Vibration
Yes
Memory
Phonebook
Practically unlimited entries and fields, Photocall
Call records
Practically unlimited
Card slot
microSD (TransFlash)

- 400 MB internal memory- 256MB RAM, 512MB storage memory- Qualcomm MSM7200 528MHz processor
Data
GPRS
Class 10 (4+1/3+2 slots), 32 - 48 kbps
HSCSD
No
EDGE
Yes
3G
HSDPA, 7.2 Mbps
WLAN
Wi-Fi 802.11b/g
Bluetooth
Yes, v2.0 with A2DP
Infrared port
No
USB
Yes, v2.0 miniUSB
Features
OS
Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional
Messaging
SMS, MMS, Email, Push E-Mail, IM
Browser
WAP 2.0/HTML (IE), RSS feeds
Games
Yes + downloadable
Colors
Solid Black, Steel Silver
Camera
3.15 MP, 2048x1536 pixels, autofocus, video(VGA@30fps), flash; secondary videocall camera

- Built-in GPS receiver- A-GPS function- Java MIDP 2.0- FM radio with RDS- MP3/AAC/MPEG4 player- Motion sensor (with UI auto-rotate)- TrackID music recognition- Picture editor/blogging - Organiser- T9- Built-in handsfree- Voice memo/dial
Battery

Standard battery, Li-Po 1500 mAh (BST-41)
Stand-by
Up to 833 h
Talk time
Up to 6 h 30 min

Macbook Air: the thinnest notebook computer

Amazingly thin. Amazingly full-size.

The thinness of MacBook Air is stirring. But perhaps more impressive, there’s a full-size notebook encased in the 0.16 to 0.76 inch of sleek, sturdy anodized aluminum. And at just 3.0 pounds,1 MacBook Air is more than portable — it’s with you everywhere you go.

A no-compromise display.

The glossy 13.3-inch, widescreen LED backlit MacBook Air display is the same viewable size as the screen on MacBook. The 1280-by-800 resolution gives you vibrant images and rich colors at full brightness the moment you open MacBook Air. So you get full-screen performance with all the benefits of a slim design.

Full-size, full-feature keyboard.

The keyboard is full-size with crisp keys just like the ones on MacBook. But MacBook Air goes further by adding backlit key illumination, making it easy to work in low-light settings such as airplanes and conference halls. A built-in ambient light sensor automatically adjusts keyboard and display brightness for optimal visibility. And with the oversize multi-touch trackpad, it just keeps getting better for fingers.

Sonny Ericcson's C905: 8.1-Megapixel Camera Phone

Further blurring the lines that divide digital compact cameras and camera phones, Sony Ericsson has come out with the 8.1-megapixel C905. As part of the Cyber-shot camera phone family, you can expect a more-than-the-average feature set on this baby.

This slider comes with a Xenon flash and technologies such as auto-focus face detection, smart contrast and image stabilizer to give you the best shot possible. The large 2.4-inch scratch-resistant glass display allows you to view all your captures easily while the integrated GPS helps in navigation and provides geo-tagging services to all your photos so you’ll never forget where they were taken.

The bigger megapixel count will mean more space will be consumed by your photos, but not to worry. They’ve also decided to include a 2GB Memory Stick Micro (M2) as part of the sales package. Veering away from the camera functionality, it also packs in a media player, FM radio,Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, 3G, and a host of others.

You can choose from Night Black, Ice Silver and Copper Gold once it becomes available towards the end of this year (read: 4th Quarter of 2008). If it does make it on time, this’ll surely make for a pretty fine present once the Christmas season begins. (by Allan David Reyes)

Nokia launches new phones

SINGAPORE — Nokia has unveiled its latest mobile phone models, designed to keep people connected with both work and personal life—two elements that clash every so often.

In an event highlighted by a pomp and upbeat performance of a drum-and-chime ensemble, Nokia’s vice president for sales in Southeast Asia and the Pacific, Chris Carr, introduced the two new members of the Nokia E series—the E71 and E66, both crafted to suit the needs of people on the go.

“The E71 and E66 are for people who want to lead a mobile lifestyle and want quick and easy access to their personal and work e-mail,” said Carr.

At the annual Nokia Connection 2008 here, Carr explained in his opening remarks how the new models respond to modern times when the means of communication constantly evolved at a quick pace.

He said Nokia continued to “find new and better ways to connect people,” some of whom are miles apart.

The sleek and stylish E71 and E66 run on the S60 platform and are pre-loaded with a program called Mail for Exchange, which is particularly for mobile e-mail clients who use Microsoft Exchange.

The phones also support e-mail accounts with several Internet service providers, including Gmail (Google mail), Yahoo! mail and Hotmail [Microsoft], Nokia said in a statement.

At the push of a button, one can switch from business—where the screen is filled with notes on the next appointment or task—to personal home screen mode, a wallpaper of perhaps a favorite photo along with shortcuts to the music player and Internet Web browser.

At a news briefing, Nokia’s vice president for E-series, Ilari Nurmi, described the E71, which features a full Qwerty keyboard, as an improved version of its predecessor, the E61i.

A third-generation phone, the E71, perhaps as slim as a ball pen at 57 mm, is twice as fast as the previous version, with a standby battery life that can last up to 20 days.

The E66 is designed for the more conventional cell phone users, with a slide design and the usual numerical keypad, Nurmi said.

Both the E71 and E66 come in grey and white stainless steel, a material that gives the phones additional strength and a touch of class. They will be out in the market by July 2008.

Renewed interest in low-cost computing growing in RP

The success of the Asus Eee notebook PC in the global market has renewed interest in low-cost computing in the Philippines.

Villman Computer Systems, one of the country's biggest computer retailers, said the demand for low-cost computers is expected to boost its PC sales this year.

"Desktop PC sales are steady but notebook sales are increasing," said Manuel Villaroman Jr., president and CEO of Villman Computer Systems.

Villman is one of Intel's local partners in the launch of a local low-cost computer package introduced together in cooperation with the Commission on Information and Communications Technology (CICT) on Friday.

"Market demand for low-cost computing products is expected to grow 10 times by 2011," Ricky Banaag, country manager of Intel Technology Philippines, said in a briefing.

Local consumers can now buy a computer system for less than P10,000 through Villman and another local distributor Enigma. These low-cost computers run on a 1.2-Gigahertz Intel Celeron processor.

Villaroman expects tougher local competition over low-cost computers.

Banaag said that PC ownership and Internet access are becoming a necessity in the 21st century. But one of the challenges is cost and accessibility.

Since 2004, the CICT has embarked on a project to bring down the cost of computing. It partnered with Intel and launched "PC ng Bayan," which Banaag recalled, was "very successful."
This week, Intel and CICT revived the same initiative but under a new name, dubbed "Nettop ng Bayan," which is a low-cost computer package.

Nettop is a new category introduced by Intel, which hopes to describe Internet-ready desktops that are designed for first-time users.

Apple's iPhone will be available for prepaid, postpaid users

Globe Globe Telecom said the latest version of Apple's iPhone will be available across all subscribers but the company has not yet disclosed when exactly it will launch the handset locally.

The recently launched iPhone 3G will be available to Globe's postpaid and prepaid subscribers in the Philippines later this year, according to a Globe announcement.

Globe's announcement did not carry much other details, including pricing schemes. The company said it has 21 million subscribers to date.

"We can't wait to get this revolutionary mobile device in the hands of even more people around the world," said Tim Cook, Apple's chief operating officer, as quoted in Globe's announcement.

Acer unveils Ultra-portable One

Almost everyone seems to have jumped into the ultra-portable bandwagon these days, and though some have released very impressive units that boast of high end specs, price-wise, the Eee PC still reigns supreme.

That was until Acer decided to join the fray. The Acer Aspire One rumored to just cost around $ 399 (Linux OS) which is way lower than the Eee PC making this the most affordable ultra-portable that comes from a known PC manufacturer. Those who attended Computex 2008 had an opportunity to see this thing of beauty first hand. Engadget even has a quick hands-on review on it based on the unit displayed at the showroom floor.

So what does $ 399 get you? You get a compact laptop that looks somewhat like a cross between an Eee and a Mini-Note. The keyboard layout albeit being a tad smaller is similar to the HP 2133, but spec-wise, it leans more toward the Eee. It’s got a 1.6GHz Intel Atom processor, 512MB RAM, 8GB SSD, Wi-Fi (b/g), 8.9-inch screen, 1.3-megapixel camera, card reader and a Linpus Linux OS. A Windows version will also be made available at a higher cost with a 80GB HDD. It will become available in various colored editions that include red, blue and pink.

Specifics as to its availability have yet to be disclosed. It looks like the competition is indeed stepping up, but we’ll reserve our judgment on the Aspire One once we get a full hands-on review on this nifty lappie.

Meet the Samsung SGH G800

The Samsung G800 is the company's latest camera focus mobile phone and comes with a 5 megapixel digital camera with the promise that photographers can still get great shots even without a standard compact camera. But is that the case? We get snapping to find out.

The Samsung SGH-G800, to give it its full title, is a HSDPA slider with dimensions of 101 x 51 x 19mm. Fairly fat compared to your average mobile, the Sony Ericsson W880 is just 9mm thick for example, the G800 is to put it bluntly big and heavy. This isn't a phone that can be hidden in a pocket and forgotten about. It might be big and heavy, but the design is stylish with a brushed metal finish. The front of the handset is dominated by 2.4-inch 262K colour 320 x 240 pixel QVGA display that is crisp and clear with a d-pad and call buttons situated at the bottom underneath this. Slide up the screen (it is a slider design after all) and it reveals a big, solid, easy to use keypad. The topside of the phone sports zoom buttons and a dedicated shutter button while the underside offers two compartments for charging, headphones (not 3.5mm), and a microSD card slot. Like Nokia and Sony Ericsson, Samsung has professed the phone's camera credentials with a bulky camera lens cover that slides out the way (normally in your pocket) to reveal the 3x optical lens and a Xenon flash.

Luckily for Samsung the main selling point isn't the size, but those 5 million pixels and a 3x optical zoom waiting to get the perfect picture and a range of software applications that go with it. The phone's overall software is the same found on Samsung's Ultra edition handsets and comes with an easy to use interface that lets you get the most out of the phone from text messaging to listening to music via the MP3 player. Trying its best to be a fully-fledged camera, the phone offers a number of features that you can opt and choose for in the camera mode.

Which camera to use (front or back) is going to be a no brainer, but opting for one of the 14 scene modes might not be. On resolution you can opt for 2560 x 1920 (5M) down to 640 x 480 pixels while you can also choose whether you want to choose single shot, multi-shot, mosaic shot, frame shot or panorama. Then there are the flash modes; auto, on, red-eye reduction or off, timer options, macro modes, white balance, exposure settings, anti-shake, ISO settings up to 400 and special effects to boot. The options list like a real camera. Taking pictures is incredibly easy and in our tests we noticed no noticeable shutter lag as we experienced with the Nokia N95, although subjects too close can be blasted by the powerful Xenon flash. When it comes to the camera software users can share images or video via ShoZu. ShoZu, according to the blurb "is the leading provider of mobile social media services that connect mobile consumers with their online social networks, personal blogs, photo storage sites and other Web 2.0 properties from the handset".

Basically what this means is that you can access flickr, YouTube, Facebook, blip.tv and a host of others including CNN and the BBC all from your mobile phone without even going near a computer, and thanks to the G800's HSDPA 3.6Mbps connection speeds you can upload content as if you were on broadband at home. Of course before you upload your pictures you want them to be the best they can be and so you can edit in camera. Here the G800 gives you the ability to add effects such as changing the picture to look like an oil painting or if it was drawn with crayons while more useful options include removing red-eye, brightness, contrast and colour levels. You can even opt to add frames, clipart and emoticons if that's your thing.

Images are saved in addition to your original file so you won't lose anything and overall, while the software is basic, it's good enough to give you some control over what your images look like before uploading them to the web to share. But unlike Apple's iPhone, the G800's camera isn't just about still photography and users can record video as well. Here you have two resolution choices 320 x 240 and 176 x 144 disappointingly missing out on 640 x 480 or even higher resolutions. You do still however get control over white balance, exposure and sound. Once recorded you can, like the still images, edit the footage in camera. Here you get the ability to trim, spilt, cut, copy, add effects and audio as well as text. Once done you can then upload it to the web via ShoZu.

Features beyond the digital camera include Bluetooth 2.0 and an FM radio.

Rediscover Storytelling with the Nokia N82

Discover. Make new discoveries everyday with the A-GPS routing and free Nokia maps;

Capture. Take remarkable vivid pictures with a 5 megapixel camera, powerful xenon flash and Carl Zeis optics;

Share. Easily share your stories with WiFi connectivity and one-click photo upload.

Technical specifications

Operating Frequency

WCDMA2100 (HSDPA), EGSM900, GSM850/1800/1900 MHz (EGPRS)
Automatic switching between bands and modes
Dimensions
Volume: 90 cc
Weight: 114 g
Length: 112 mm
Width: 50.2 mm
Thickness (max): 17.3 mm

Memory Functions

Up to 100MB internal dynamic memory* for messages, ringing tones, images, video clips, calendar notes, to-do list and applications
Hot swappable microSD memory card slot
*Dynamic memory means that the available memory is shared between dynamic memory functions. When any of these functions is used, there is less available memory for other functions which are also dependent on dynamic memory.

Power Management

Battery: Nokia Battery (BP-6MT) 1050mAH
Talk time: up to 190 minutes (WCDMA),up to 260 minutes (GSM)
Stand-by time: up to 210 hours(WDCMA),up to 225 hours (GSM)
Still images: up to 290 pictures (with flash)
Video capture: up to 110 minutes (VGA, 30fps)
Video call: up to 120 minutes
Video playback time: up to 200 minutes (VGA, 30 fps)
Music playback time: up to 10 hours(offline mode)
*Operation times may vary depending on radio access technology used, operator network configuration and usage.

Display

2.4" LCD QVGA (240 x 320 pixels) TFT color display with up to 16.7 million colors

Video Features

Video player - supports MPEG4, AVC/H.264, H.264, H.263, WMV, RV
OMA DRM 2.0/1.0 & WMDRM support for video
Resolution: MPEG4 VGA @ up to 30 fps scaled to QVGA on device or VGA in TV-out mode
Transfer your videos from compatible PC: Windows Media Player, USB mass-storage file transfer or Nokia Nseries PC Suite using full-speed USB 2.0 connectivity
Full-screen video playback to view downloaded, streamed or recorded video clips
Supported video formats: MPEG-4, H.264/AVC, H.263/3GPP, RealVideo 8/9/10

Imaging

Up to 5 megapixel (2592 x 1944 pixels) camera, Carl Zeiss Optics: Tessar™ lens, MPEG-4 VGA video capture of up to 30 fps
Direct connection to compatible TV via TV-out or wireless LAN/UPnP
Front camera, CIF (352 x 288 pixels) sensor for video telephony
Video call and video sharing support (WCDMA network services)
Integrated xenon flash
Slideshow from gallery
One-click upload of photos & videos to web
Nokia XpressPrint: direct printing via USB(PictBridge), Bluetooth connectivity
Music Features

Digital music player - supports MP3/AAC/eAAC/eAAC+/WMA/M4A with playlists
OMA DRM 2.0/1.0 & WMDRM support for music
Integrated stereo hands-free speaker
Stereo FM radio (87.5-108MHz) with Visual Radio support
Nokia Stereo Headset HS-43 in-box
Bluetooth wireless technology 2.0 with A2DP Stereo audio

Explore

Navigation
Integrated Assisted Global Positioning System (A-GPS)
Pre-installed Nokia Maps application and free downloadable maps*

Connectivity

Integrated wireless LAN (802.11 b/g) and UPnP (Universal Plug and Play)
Bluetooth wireless technology with A2DP stereo audio
USB 2.0 via Micro USB interface and mass storage class support to support drag and drop functionality; 3.5 mm stereo headphone plug(Nokia AV Connector)and TV out support (PAL/NTSC); Nokia Nseries PC Suite connectivity with USB, and Bluetooth wireless technology
Local synchronization of contacts and calendar to a compatible PC using compatible connection
Remote over-the-air synchronization; Send and receive images, video clips, graphics, and business cards via Bluetooth wireless technology

The Nokia N96 redefines "high-end"

Rumored for a few weeks now as the N95's successor in waiting, the mighty N96 dual slider has gone all official at the Mobile World Congress that it is definitely reaching the market very soon. Though the phone it replaces is still a beast by any measure, the N96 pushes the envelope further by packing a solid 16GB of storage internally in addition to a micro-SD slot, something the N95 8GB lacks. The 5 megapixel autofocus camera with Carl Zeiss Tessar lens carries over, but there are now two LEDs doing flash and video light duty. The 2.8 inch QVGA display will come in handy for the integrated DVB-H mobile TV tuner, while a 3.5mm headphone jack, A2DP, and integrated stereo speakers should handle audio with aplomb.

Other features include WiFi, AGPS, and morphing lights on the smaller second slide that hook the user up with game controls when it's time to relax with a little N-Gage action. Unfortunately, the first version of the N96 (and the only version announced thus far) supports HSDPA only on the 900 and 2100MHz bands, but we imagine the strength of the spec sheet should still be enough to sell a few of these stateside when it launches in the third quarter for €550 (about $797 or close to Php40,000).

Some high-tech gifts for Mom on Mother's Day 2008

Flowers, chocolates, a greeting card? Sure... but tech-minded kids may want something a little more with the '00s to give to mom this year. Here are some hot ideas for computer savvy sons and daughters to consider as gifts for Mother's Day. (Reminder: It's May 11th!)

Kodak ESP3 All-in-One Printer

What does mom do with all the pictures you send her? She prints them out on a lousy old inkjet and waits for them to shrivel up and fade. Get her a real printer that can make her kids and grandkids look good: Kodak's ESP3 uses far less ink than other printers and those cartridges are cheap (at $10, for B&W, or $15, for color). Better still: It includes a blemish reduction mode to automatically smooth out wrinkles and other imperfections as it prints, no graphical tinkering required.

Thirsty Lights

If mom's got a green thumb, you can't go wrong with these cool gadgets, which I reviewed a few month's back. Thirsty Lights sit in mom's potted plants and flash when the greens need water. These things have the bonus feature of being completely non-technologically-threatening, so if mom can open up the package, she should be fine with them even if she's a total Luddite. We swear by them now at Null HQ.

Digital Keychain

These pocket-sized digital frames used to be bulky, ugly, and have virtually invisible screens. New models are better, and they're dirt cheap. Digital Foci's Pocket Album has a 1.5-inch screen, nine hours of battery life, and holds over 70 pictures. Oh, and it looks pretty good, too, even when it's off!

HALO Ultraviolet Vacuum

Not for every mom (lots of mothers don't appreciate gifts that imply they're slobs, after all), but if she's the kind that's always wrestling with her old vacuum and complaining about the filthy house, the HALO is a cool way to indulge both your neatnik side and your techie side at once. It's not just a light and a powerful vacuum, it also features a strong ultraviolet light underneath that kills any viruses and germs the light happens to hit. Even flea eggs get killed by the thing.

A Book of Mom's Own

If you're willing to put a little work into, a printed photo album is a very thoughtful and personal gift that any mother will break into tears over. Lulu lets you upload photos and create photo books (in hardcover or paperback) with a minimum of fuss. The real effort is in wittling down your gargantuan photo collection into something more manageable. Hardcover books run a mere $26 for the first 20 pages.

iWaveCube Tiny Microwave

It's the world's smallest microwave oven, about one cubic foot in size. Perfect for the spare room or mom's office if she's a microwave popcorn junkie or is always looking for a quick reheat on her coffee or tea.