Acer Aspire One to come in 10-inch flavors

Acer Taiwan’s president Scott Lin has confirmed rumors that a 10.1-inch version of the popular Aspire One ultraportable netbook to arrive in black, white and sexy red colors. The release is tentatively set at early 2009, and possibly we will hear more about it during CES 2009.

Acer netbook

The screen gets bumped up to 10.1 inches, but the resolution however remains at 1024×600, which is a disappointment because it means although the pictures will be bigger, they’re not going to be more detailed. 3G, Bluetooth is an optional extra and expect to fork out some more money if you want them integrated into your Aspire One.

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The best of Windows 7 now on Vista/XP

The news of Windows 7 making a launch in this year have caught many by surprise, as Microsoft scrambles to remedy the poor performance and consumer reception to Vista by launching another version of Windows.

Windows 7 pic

Joking aside, the newest iteration of Windows does have some appeal, especially some new usability enhancements that promises to make it “friendlier to use”. However, what you might not know is that a lot of the enhancements are available right now for Vista and XP, with the right applications and tweaks. Here are some of the best features of Windows 7 you can have on your desktop today:

Item Pinning on Taskbar

The effect is basically being able to pin shortcuts or items to your taskbar. You can do pretty much the same thing by enabling the Quick Launch toolbar and resizing it to your liking. Do this by right clicking on the task bar and selecting Toolbars then Quick Launch. Unlock your taskbar (if it’s locked) then drag it to a bigger size. Using Large Icons will give a better effect.

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NVIDIA to launch GTX295 January 2009

In August, ATI, now a division of AMD finally pulled its socks together and put out what was possibly their best product yet with the launch of the Radeon 4xxx series of graphics card. Not only did they outperform their similarly classed Geforce 9xxx serious counterparts, they also smashed the performance crown with the 4879×2. Subsequently, NVIDIA responded with their GTX 2xx series of products, which were big, hot, expensive, very complicated, but only marginally better than ATI’s offerings.

NVIDIA GTX295

With the GTX 295 set to launch in January, NVIDIA is releasing their flagship product, which will be the most powerful card yet in their arsenal, and the preliminary results show a marginal improvement over the leading 4870×2 from ATI.

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ASUS EeeTop ET1602 touch screen nettop

Don’t worry folks, this is not another launch of their ubiquitous budget laptops, but a new version of their desktop, which is now available in touchscreen mode.

ASUS EeeTop

The first EeeTop I came across was a minimalist, simple machine that is light and surprisingly portable. No clunky, complicated wires and a small CPU that’s both stylish yet subdued at the same time. The price, coupled with its WOW factor, really made it look better and more expensive than it really was.

With this new EeeTop, ASUS has outdone themselves yet again. As you can see, the style borrows heavily from Apple and HP’s recent laptops. The monitor and CPU is integrated into one compact unit that’s only 4cm thick, with no bulky protrusions from the back and curves on all orders to make it look neat and nice to hold. The mouse and keyboard look like Apple’s, which is to say they look awesome. Some people might not like this type of keyboard, but I for one find it quite useful because it attracts less dust and is easy to shift around and fit on all but the smallest and most cluttered desks. It also has a side-mounted USB port for you to connect your mouse, reducing the wire clutter as you don’t have to run another long cable all the way to the CPU.

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Best new software of 2008!

With Christmas just over, there are few surprises left in store. Here is a list of some of the best new software that have launched this year:

Firefox 3

This is without a doubt the best browser out there right now in terms of features and extensibility, although Opera comes a close second. There are a slew of new features and improvements, and the AwesomeBar is just amazing. Now you no longer have to recall the exact URL of a website, and can simply type in part of the website’s title name and Firefox will automatically search and find the best match for you. This is absolutely the best feature of all and you’ll never go back to plain old Internet Explorer once you get used to it.

Firefox 3

The vast availability of extensions or add-ons also mean Firefox can be tricked out with lots of enhancements and tweaks to improve and streamline your browsing experience. It looks like Mozilla has finally lived the dream that they always wanted, especially now that IE is fast losing market share.

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Samsung to launch new Google Phone in Q2 2009

We will be seeing a slew of new Google phones next year, that’s for sure, and Samsung seems to be throwing in the gauntlet and expects to have their own Google Phone out in the second quarter of 2009.

Android

The first Google Phone by HTC called the HTC G1 only had average performance in the market, but to no fault of the Android operating system powering it. Most of the criticisms were leveled at the design of the phone, which had a less than satisfying keyboard and screen. To that end, Samsung Electronics have assembled together a team of 80 comprising of Linux and Java experts together with other engineers to design a phone that could extend the capabilities of Android beyond HTC’s G1.

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Bush shoe throw game

The incident in which Iraqi journalist, Muntadar al-Zeidi tossed his shoes at US President George W. Bush during a Baghdad press conference recently, has turned into a fast-moving Internet meme, spawning dozens of games and video pranks.

Let’s check out a few of the games which were inspired by this shoe throwing incident.

Sock and Awe
A pun on the US military strategy of “shock and awe”. This game gives the player 30 seconds to try to hit Bush as many times as possible, with shoes of course!

Bush shoe game

The game is pretty addictive but needless to say it’s difficult to hit President Bush in the face. I only managed to do 10 in one go… the best on the hall of fame is 35! Try yourself and see if you can beat the record! Play Sock and Awe.

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Most popular searches in Google

It’s the time of the year again! No, I am not talking about Christmas and year end sales, but I am talking about the top searches in Google which has been compiled and released by this most widely used search engine.

Earlier this year, I certainly didn’t believe that “anwar ibrahim” would top the most searched local (Malaysia) celebrity list!

The volume of searches topped when the Dow dropped 733 points. This simple chart is certainly interesting.

Google search chart

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iPhone clone Meizu M8

Meizu is a brand familiar in China and they have been in the business of making portable media players for quite some time now. They have been hinting at the M8 for close to 2 years now, touting it as an iPhone killer. And finally in December 2008, they have finally launched it in China, and by proxy, all over the world.

Meizu M8

Comparison with the iPhone is inevitable. The similarities are quite a bit, from the exterior (although it is a tad shorter than the iPhone and not as good looking) to the user interface that powers the M8. It’s running a modified version of Windows CE which supports multitouch to the surprise of this author; how they managed to get that working on Windows CE is quite amazing and the screen resolution of 480×320 3.4 inches is just 0.1 inch smaller than the iPhone, although the quality of the screen is noticeably not as good as the iPhone.

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Brand New Original Apple iPhone 3G 16GB Unlocked

I was surprised to see this ad in Mudah.com.my, selling Brand New Original Apple iPhone 3G 16GB Unlocked at an unbelievable price of RM1,400. Others are selling at more than RM3,000, this dude is selling it at half of the price!

Mudah

Of course I wanted to get this 3G iPhone at this kind of insane price. I emailed the seller yesterday and today I received a reply.

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