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Tablets in Waiting

The tech world is already chock-a-bloc with tablets. Inspired by the phenomenal success of Apple’s iPad.

The tech world is already chock-a-bloc with tablets. Inspired by the phenomenal success of Apple’s iPad, many companies want a piece of this pie. Many have already come out with products, which showcase their haste more than anything else. But there are a few products, in the pipeline, which can give serious competition to the iPad.

*Motorola Xoom:
The Xoom will be the first to run on the Google Android Honeycomb OS, made especially for tablets. First impressions suggest that the interface will be livelier than the regular Android mobile OS, and will be much more interactive. Users will no longer feel like they're using a giant phone. That’s not all, the 10.1” device will pack some serious power with its 2GHz Tegra 2 chipset and 1GB of RAM. The 16GB tablet’s screen will also have a 16:10 physical aspect ratio, almost the same as Blu-ray. 

Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1:
The 7” version of the Tab has done its bit in the market. The new larger 10.1 Tab runs on the vanilla version of the Honeycomb OS. While the complaint with the smaller tab was that it was running on an OS meant for phones, this one will be a tablet in the true sense. Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 is powered by Nvidia Tegra 2 dual-core processor, but doesn’t have the TouchWiz feature of its smaller brother. There is an 8-megapixel back-facing camera and a front-facing 2-megapixel camera for video calls.

*BlackBerry Playbook:
This 7” tablet will be the preferred option for business users due to its pedigree. It will feature the BlackBerry Tablet OS and support symmetric multiprocessing with its 1 GHz dual-core processor and 1 GB RAM. Its USP will be e-mail and multimedia features. The Playbook will be an extension of the phone, which it will pair with using a secure Bluetooth connection.

*HTC Flyer:
This will be the size of the smaller 7” Samsung Galaxy Tab and will run on Android's Gingerbread (2.4) OS, though paired with a special tablet version of HTC’s very own Sense UI. Reports suggest this little tweak “turns the flat-looking Gingerbread interface into a 3D environment with a lot of movement”. The Flyer will also come with a stylus. Though you will not need it for regular use, the stylus will let you draw out ideas in the Notes App.

*HP TouchPad:
The TouchPad will run on the critically acclaimed WebOS, made popular by the Palm Pre. The OS will also be the factor that sets it apart, considering that most tablets run on Android. Running on a Qualcomm Snapdragon 1.2GHz CPU, there is no shortage of power either. But more details of the TouchPad are awaited.

 

When is Sandy Bridge Coming to Macs?

Sandy Bridge is the name for Intel’s second generation Core processors, including the Core i3, i5 and i7. As you know, Apple switched to Intel processors in 2006 and the question is now, when will Cupertino put Sandy Bridge into Macs?

In the past, it’s actually happened that Apple has adopted new Intel processors before they’re widely used by PC manufacturers but not so this time apparently. And that may have been a wise decision. Intel officially unveiled the Sandy Bridge processors at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas in January but shortly thereafter problems set in.

The chip-manufacturer announced early February that there was a “design flaw” in the chipset used with the Sandy Bridge processors. Specifically the Serial-ATA (SATA) ports could degrade over time, possibly impacting performance and functionality of storage devices, like hard drives. Now this problem has been rectified and PCs with Sandy Bridge are coming fast and thick, as manufacturers scramble to get them to customers.

If Apple were to adopt Sandy Bridge, what would it offer Mac users?

First, Sandy Bridge offers more speed at lower power consumption. Basically you would get a faster Mac that uses less energy, which also means less heat and better battery life in portables. This is of course most important in portable computers but even in desktops energy efficiency is increasingly important.

Second, Intel has focused a lot on video transcoding in Sandy Bridge. This means taking a video file in one format and changing it, translating it, if you will, into a different format. A good example is taking an HD movie file from your Mac and putting it on your iPhone: to play correctly on the iPhone it has to be transcoded. Transcoding is a processing-heavy task and Intel’s Quick Sync technology in Sandy Bridge speeds the conversion process up considerably. A 4GB HD video file was transcoded in 16 seconds in Intel’s demonstrations at CES.

Third, Sandy Bridge has graphics built-in to the processor. That in itself is nothing new but Intel has integrated the graphics even closer to the processor itself. So close, in fact, that they are talking about processor graphics now, not integrated graphics. Graphics performance is now good enough to play games like World of Warcraft on high quality settings, something previously unheard of with integrated graphics. The processor graphics in Sandy Bridge are also geared for playing back HD video, something we do more and more of with our computers.

Fourth, this is where there’s the most uncertainty how and even if this will affect Mac users, is Intel Insider. Insider allows HD video to stream to the computer, and, by using Intel’s Wireless Display technology, also to HD TV sets. The streaming is not the key though; the key is that the stream can be protected by the hardware, from tampering, copying, capturing, etc. In other words, Intel Insider is a form of hardware DRM (Digital Rights Management). Apparently major TV studios and networks in the US are now looking at offering their content streaming, as they can be assured that it’s protected by Intel Insider.

I’m sure Apple will put Sandy Bridge processors in Macs soon, perhaps even before you can read this article. The new Intel processors will bring a number of benefits to portable Macs in particular, so you may want to hold off buying one for just a while yet.

Women 'more competitive than men'

If you perceive that women are the weaker sex, think again, for a new study claims they are more cunning and competitive than men -- particularly when the going gets tough. Researchers have carried out the study and found that instead of physical violence, women rely more on subtle forms of aggressi
 
on, such as excluding someone from a group if they think they are a threat.

For the study, the researchers asked volunteers to play a game against two hypothetical partners. The subjects had the option of playing alone or joining forces with an opponent, the Daily Express reported.
The results revealed that when the volunteers played the game with no threat of social exclusion there was no difference between men and women.
When the exclusion factor was used, however, women chose to join forces with an opponent and exclude the third player more often than the male volunteers.
Psychologist Joyce Benenson of Harvard University, who led the study, said: "The social worlds of men and women differ in that females have to worry about alienating others, whereas males worry about getting beaten up.
"As their primary competitive strategy, females may attempt to form an exclusionary alliance, whereas males may try to directly dominate an opponent."

Researchers develop stretchable solar cells

Researchers in the US are a step closer to creating electronic 'super skin' that can detect everything from touch to certain chemicals.

Zhenan Bao and her team from Stanford University have already developed flexible sensors that are ultra sensitive to pressure and biological molecules.

Now they have created stretchable solar cells that can generate their own electricity to power these sensors.

These cells can be stretched up to 30 per cent beyond their original length, snapping back into shape without any loss of power or damage.

The ultimate aim is to create artificial skin that could have uses in robotics, prosthetics and medical research.

"With artificial skin, we can basically incorporate any function we desire," Ms Bao explained.

She said that the organic transistors at the heart of the super skin can be coated in specific molecules, allowing the sensors to detect different elements.

"Depending on what kind of material we put on the sensors and how we modify the semiconducting material in the transistor, we can adjust the sensors to sense chemicals or biological material," she remarked.

Rapid Electronics is a leading UK supplier of electronic components, LEDs, electrical products and industrial equipment.
 

Motorola’s Xoom tablet takes on iPad

Motorola’s Xoom tablet computer went on sale in the U.S. on Thursday, amidst positive reviews that labelled the device as the most powerful rival yet to Apple’s iPad.

Apple sparked the tablet computer craze last April with the iPad, and has since sold 15 million of the devices. It is expected to launch a second-generation iPad at a media event slated for March 2 in San Francisco.

Though companies like Samsung and Dell have tried to respond with tablets of their own based on Google’s Android operating system, the Xoom is the first tablet to feature the latest Android version, Honeycomb, which is optimised for tablets as opposed to smartphones.

The Xoom is roughly the same size as the iPad, and costs about the same for a similarly spec’d version, though buyers who opt for an iPad with limited memory and restricted to wi-fi connections can save hundreds of dollars.

The Xoom has slightly higher screen resolution than the iPad, and boasts front and rear facing cameras for picture-taking and video conferencing. Powering the device is a dual core 1GHZ processed with 1GB of RAM, and battery life is assessed at 10 hours.

Nevertheless, the consensus among established reviewers is that the device is a worthy competitor to the iPad.

“Both Motorola’s hardware and Google’s new software are impressive and I believe the Xoom beats the first-generation iPad in certain respects, though it lags in others,” noted Walt Mossberg in the Wall Street Journal. “As much as I like the Xoom and Honeycomb, I’d advise consumers to wait to see what Apple has up its sleeve next before committing to a higher price for the Motorola product.”

Engadget’s Joshua Topolsky said that the Xoom’s ability to multi-task gave it a key advantage over the iPad, but that the device still lacks polish. “Honeycomb and the Xoom are spectacular — unfortunately they’re a spectacular work in progress,” he noted.

MSNBC’s Wilson Rothman said the Xoom was a “worthy competitor” to the iPad and would only gain momentum as the price dropped and more apps became available. However he criticized both the screen and the body for being less scuff-proof than the iPad’s.

Like Mossberg, Rothman said potential purchasers might like to wait to see what other tablets come out in the coming few months. Not only may they prefer the iPad 2, both LG and Samsung have new Android tablets set to launch soon, while Hewlett-Packard and Research in Motion will both debut tablets based on their proprietary operating systems.

Google’s new art project offers HD museum tours

Google has come up with the next best thing to visiting the world’s greatest museums — high-definition virtual art tours that use powerful cameras to zoom into some of the most famous masterpieces in history.

The Google Art Project was announced Tuesday and uses technology adapted from the company’s Street View feature to allow web browsers to wander the halls of 17 leading museums around the world.

The most prominent works on show, numbering about 1,000 in all, can be viewed in ultra-high definition, allowing users to zoom in to see the smallest of brush strokes and cracks in the canvas. Each picture is accompanied by explanatory text.

The institutions on show include the Metropolitan Museum of Art and MoMA in New York, the State Hermitage Museum in St Petersburg, Tate Britain and the National Gallery in London, Museo Reina Sofia in Madrid, the Uffizi Gallery in Florence and the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. Among the works available for ultra close-up viewing are Botticelli’s Birth of Venus, Cezanne’s Bathers and Van Gogh’s The Bedroom.

“It started when a small group of us who were passionate about art got together to think about how we might use our technology to help museums make their art more accessible,” said Amit Sood, head of Google Art Project, “not just to regular museum-goers or those fortunate to have great galleries on their doorsteps, but to a whole new set of people who might otherwise never get to see the real thing up close.”