FocuSoft Tech Blog |
- Acer Aspire Timeline 3810T Review
- iPhone 3GS Review
- Corsair 64GB and 128GB Performance SSDs
- ASUS Eee Keyboard delayed until August
- mintpad MID first-impressions: surprisingly capable
- MacBook Pro 3.0Gbps SATA upgrade breaking third-party drives?
- Lenovo S12 NVIDIA Ion netbook 1080p video demo
- French MacBook transformer video
- Palm 2009 financial results: “Save us Pre!”
- NKK Switches OLED Rocker home-automation control
| Acer Aspire Timeline 3810T Review Posted: 26 Jun 2009 07:21 AM PDT Acer's Timeline range of notebooks spans the gamut from 13.3-inch ULV ultraportable to 15.6-inch mainstream laptop, promising prolonged battery life with an affordable price tag. The company sent over their Aspire Timeline 3810T, a 13.3-inch 1.4GHz ULV machine with heady runtime estimates and an $899 sticker, for SlashGear to try out; check out the full review after the cut.
The display is an LED-backlit 13.3-inch panel, running at 1366 x 768. It's a crisp, readable screen with less glare than you'd imagine from when the Timeline is switched off, but – like with other ultraportables we've used lately – we found ourselves wishing it offered a slightly higher resolution. When you can get the same number of pixels in an 11.6-inch netbook for a few hundred dollars less, you find yourself asking for more. Still, what the Timeline 3810T did deliver on is runtime. Acer claim you can manage a full eight hours on the standard battery, and much to our surprise with moderate use and sensible backlight settings it lasted for roughly six hours. Shut off the WiFi, turn the brightness right down and limit yourself to the most basic of Office tasks and you'll probably see that eight hours.
Performance won't light any fires, with the 1.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo SU9400 and 2GB of DDR3 memory primed for prolonging runtime rather than heavy crunching, but the Timeline is still capable of multitasking with a few browser windows and an Office document or two open. It scores fairly well on GeekBench 64-bit with total score of 2281, comparable to Lenovo T400s (2864).This isn't the machine for graphically intensive tasks, however, as the integrated Intel GMA 4500MHD falls short of anything approaching reasonable gaming performance. Still, the 500GB hard-drive is impressively capacious, and goes some way to making up for the absence of any sort of optical drive.
Build quality overall is reasonably high, with the aluminum lid and creak-free plastics impressing. It's a demure machine stylistically, compared to rivals such as MSI's X-Slim X340, but the Timeline delivers a sturdier typing experience with no flex from the flat, well-spaced chiclet keys. The trackpad supports basic multitouch gestures such as rotation and pinch-zooming, but we were disappointed by the single, centrally-hinged mouse button bar that proved unduly stiff.
Connectivity is for the most case good, with both VGA and HDMI outputs, three USB 2.0 ports, an SD card reader, audio in/out and gigabit ethernet, but there's no standard Bluetooth to go along with the WiFi a/b/g/n. That's an option, as is integrated WWAN or WiMAX connectivity.
The Acer Aspire Timeline 3810T is a decent, portable notebook, that offers business or home users a fair balance of size and capabilities. We liked the standard gigabit ethernet and the HDMI port – though we might be tempted to swap it for standard Bluetooth if we had the choice – and appreciated the battery life, even if you do have to dial down your expectations in order to achieve it. As with all of these ULV ultraportables, the Timeline 3810T hovers in-between CULV netbooks and full-sized notebooks, and it's arguable whether you're getting significant functionality over the cheaper models. Still, for its highly usable keyboard and sturdy build, the Timeline 3810T does at least feel as though you're getting something solid for your money.
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| Posted: 26 Jun 2009 05:14 AM PDT With over one million iPhone 3GS units sold in the first three days, there's no shortage of opinion as to Apple's successes in their latest smartphone. We've covered the basics in our hands-on first-impressions piece; with a few more days of intensive use under our belt, has the iPhone 3GS proved its worth? The iPhone 3GS' striking physical similarity to the last-gen 3G came as a mild disappointment back at the WWDC, but we've come to appreciate the stability. It underscores the evolutionary, rather than revolutionary, nature of this update and, perhaps more importantly, it means accessories acquired for the iPhone 3G will still have a place with the new 3GS. For a device introduced halfway through the contract agreement of its predecessor, that sort of continuity was pretty much necessary if there was to be any hope encouraging existing owners to upgrade. We do wish that Apple had been a little more imaginative with the finish, however; a matte coating, perhaps slightly rubberized, would differentiate the new handset while not demanding reinvestment in car-kits, cases and cradles.
Many hoped for the introduction of a hardware keyboard, always a long-shot considering Apple's touchscreen affections, and came away disappointed. Still, the on-screen QWERTY keyboard remains one of the better – and arguably the best – such implementation, and Apple has only improved things with the landscape-orientation version, which is now accessible in many more apps. That's not limited to the For those that do bite the bullet and upgrade, their first impression will likely be of the new iPhone's speed. Apple's "the S is for Speed" may have reeked of marketing hyperbole, but that doesn't make it untrue. Definite hardware specifications haven't been revealed, but we're led to believe that Apple have slotted a new 600MHz processor, twice the ram – at 256MB – and a new PowerVR SGX graphics chip into the iPhone 3GS. Instead of cold specs, though, Apple prefer to describe the 3GS as twice as fast on average, and our initial impression of a cleaner, snappier device hasn't waned. As you might expect, it's in data-packed applications such as an email inbox or contact-heavy address book that the new grunt shows itself best, with the periodic pauses, stutters and lulls of the iPhone 3G now smoothed out. Speed, though, is one of those things that users eventually learn to ignore, both as they become acclimatized to the increase and as the device itself gets more loaded up with apps and content. Because of that, it's the more tenable improvements over the iPhone 3G that make themselves known in the 3GS, and they can be summed up in four areas: camera, compass, voice control and battery.
It's the camera that has had the most attention, and rightly so; in terms of what the iPhone 3GS has on offer, it's the biggest jump in consumer-friendly features on the spec sheet. Out goes the unloved fixed-focus 2-megapixel snapper from the iPhone 3G, and in comes a 3-megapixel autofocus replacement with support for video recording. As we've already said, straight snapshots are no harder to take than on earlier iPhones, with the 3GS' autofocus controlled by tapping on the preview screen. The same system has been used on several other smartphones, not to mention a number of consumer digital cameras and camcorders, and it works just as well on the iPhone 3GS as it does on the rest. Focusing is relatively quick and generally accurate, and can be left to do its own thing if you decide not to bother tapping. We wish Apple had added a macro mode, however, for close-up shots; apps like Evernote, which can use OCR to pull text out of a photo, do a lot better when the shot is crisp and up-close.
Flick the switch into video recording mode, and the iPhone 3GS shows off its next new trick. We've been asking for native videos capture since the first iPhone, and Apple have finally delivered with VGA quality at 30fps. If we complained about a lack of manual control in the still camera, though, we're even more bereft when recording video: the 3GS assumes all control over focus, leaving you nothing to do but tap the record button. You're looking at a little under 5MB for every ten seconds of footage, in our experience, with the raw file saved in .mov format.
Apple has seemingly tuned their new optics to video recording, in preference to stills. Normal images seem a little soft and over-exposed – which of course there's no way of changing on-device – whereas footage is crisper and smooth. We've heard quite a few people say the iPhone 3GS could replace a Flip camcorder or similar, and that's certainly true when measured in convenience, but unless you're still using a first-gen Flip we don't think it's quite up to that level as yet. Quality is decent for a smartphone, yes, but not earth-shattering.
Once you've got your footage, the iPhone 3GS does what few mobile devices offer and allows you to edit those clips. When the first rumors circulated about such functionality, we did have hopes for a cut-down version of iMovie for iPhone; unfortunately the reality is somewhat more basic. Grabbing and dragging their respective icons can trim the start and end points of each clip, but beyond that there's nothing else. We would have liked to see clip merging or at least the ability to string a number of clips together, maybe even a few transitions and titling options, but it looks as though we'll have to wait for that.
As we noted in our first-impressions piece, one of the more frustrating aspects of iPhone 3GS video editing is its destructive nature. Slice off the start or end of a clip and that's it; there's no way to copy the file and edit that copy, you're always working with the original. We imagine Apple have done things this way in the name of simplicity and preserving storage space, but it joins the list as another thing we'd at least like to have the option to decide for ourselves. Sample video uploaded to YouTube:
Still, once you've done whatever trimming you want, it's a simple matter to upload that file to YouTube or MobileMe, with the 3GS automatically compressing it to suit. You can also send it as an email attachment or – if your carrier supports it – MMS. Strangely, there's no Flickr upload option for still photos.
Making a big deal out of a digital compass may seem a little strange, but we've already seen how beneficial one can be on HTC's Android handsets. Out of the box, the iPhone 3GS offers either standalone access to the compass, or integrates it with Google Maps. Tapping the "Find Me" button once loads up GPS, as before, but tapping it again turns on the compass; the map automatically rotates to show which direction you're facing. It works smoothly and without any stuttering, but we were disappointed to find that it doesn't pan around Street View as on Android phones. Nonetheless, it's a decent start, and once third-party apps begin to tie into the compass we'll likely see even more use of direction data.
Voice Control is less successful, and that's jointly down to a limited number of command options and only passable recognition accuracy. Triggered by holding down the home button for a few seconds, it can be used to control either the iPhone 3GS' call features or PMP functionality, with relatively naturalistic commands such as "call Alex Patterson" or asking "what track is this?" Contact recognition seemed more successful than over in the media app, where complex or similarly sounding artist, track or playlist names presented Voice Control with more trouble. Where the similar system on the latest iPod shuffle makes sense, though, seeing as that PMP lacks a display, we found it generally quicker to flip through tracks via the iPhone's ever-responsive touchscreen, especially now that the faster processor speedily handles sizable music catalogs. As for battery life, Apple is quoting some reasonably significant leaps in runtime for the iPhone 3GS over its predecessor. Perhaps it's the impact of a still-not-quite conditioned battery, but we're yet to see any major improvements; admittedly we've been using the 3GS hard over the past few days, but then we're also heavy users of the 3G before it. The biggest improvement, looking at the 3GS' spec sheet, is in media playback and WiFi browsing, which will come as a relief to anybody looking to stock up on 32GB of audio and video; we find ourself wishing that 3G browsing had received a similar boost, though, as in our experience that's the most significant drain on battery life. The iPhone 3GS will last a full day with reasonable, all-round use, but don't expect miracles of longevity. Happily the backward compatibility with accessories like Mophie's JuicePack means external batteries are still usable with the new handset.
The rest of the iPhone 3GS' notable features are brought by virtue of iPhone OS 3.0, and as such available to existing owners too. That includes A2DP stereo Bluetooth – though not, frustratingly, AVCHP remote control, meaning the buttons on your stereo headset won't control playback – and cut, copy & paste. The latter certainly works better than it does on the Pre; with the ability to not only grab chunks of editable but non-editable text (such as on webpages or in received emails) together with images and formatting. Ironically, perhaps, after being such a demanded feature we've found that we don't particularly use cut, copy & paste all that much; still, it's a feature that should have been present from the start, and certainly makes the iPhone 3GS more complete in its capabilities now that it's here. Two other significant improvements from OS 3.0 are Spotlight and Push Notifications. The former is Apple's response to universal search, and is certainly thorough; it bests Palm's Pre search by covering email – both on-device and on the server – notes, contacts, calendar entries and applications. The downside to all that content is that, once you have your list of results, you then need to tap them and go into their respective app to actually do anything. Not so bad with emails and notes, but there's no way to call a contact directly from the search results, for instance.
Push Notifications are Apple's answer to background apps, which the company claims still have too great an impact on battery life. Developers can now take advantage of pop-up messages, audio alerts or message counters, with Apple's servers handling the hard work of monitoring for changes while the iPhone itself trots along happily, its battery unaffected. It works, in as much as it sets out to do so, relatively well: load up AIM and, if there's a new IM message while you're browsing the net, it'll throw up a box telling you so. Meanwhile the numerical counter by the AIM icon continues to climb, just as it does by Apple's own Mail or Calls icons. The downside, of course, is that apps have to be specifically coded to take advantage of push notifications, whereas that's not the case for simply leaving a program running in the background. One argument might say that doing so forces the developer to conform to good app writing practice, but it also applies limits that maybe aren't there in the same way when background apps are allowed universally. Keeping software quietly running isn't just about keeping track of new messages or game updates; it also means apps that automatically upload new photos, or that play internet radio, can do their magic. Push notifications don't address that, and nor really can they. Apple's arguments begin to look a little churlish when you contrast the iPhone with, say, Palm's webOS on the Pre, which for all its first-gen glitches still manages to handle multiple running apps in a smooth and intuitive way. As we started out by saying, the iPhone 3GS is an evolutionary upgrade for Apple, not a revolutionary one. They, perhaps unlike any other cellphone manufacturer however, get to take that evolutionary step because the product they started out to improve was so proficient in its own right. The fact that the iPhone 3G stays on sale alongside the 3GS – albeit as the cheaper sop to budget buyers – shows that there's still plenty of appeal in what's now last-gen hardware, and that's not a situation you find applies to many other companies. We owe the iPhone for its work in pushing rivals to up their game; without it, we doubt handsets like the Pre and platforms like Android would be so advanced. So, the iPhone 3GS should feel flattered at the opponents it has stimulated, but does it make a convincing case on its own? For all the carriers' conciliatory gestures, the upgrade pricing for existing iPhone 3G users is significant, especially if you don't satisfy their criteria as an eligible – read "high-paying" – customer. For new customers it's a more straightforward matter: we'd walk straight past the $99 iPhone 3G, and stump up at least the extra $100 for the 16GB iPhone 3GS. Over the course of your contract that's a little over $4 per month, or fourteen cents a day, and we'd happily pay that for double the storage and a speedier handset. Apple's iPhone is a fantastic smartphone, undoubtedly, and the extra 3GS features – not least iPhone OS 3.0 – only make it better. It's more of the same from a company we've come to respect for how they blend innovation with usability; no, it's not perfect, but it's certainly good enough to be a legitimate contender for any user wanting a powerful mobile device. Don't forget, you're getting what perhaps we now take for granted: a mobile browser that's still arguably best in class, a fine media player and a mobile App Store that's packed like no other. Even if you're not an Apple fan, or nowhere near tempted by the iPhone 3GS, you can rely on it to motivate rival platforms to get even better. That, perhaps, is the mark of a truly good device: it drives the market in which it sits to strive for even greater things. Unboxing iPhone 3GS Sample videos taken with iPhone 3GS Apple iPhone 3GS hands-on (SlashGear) Sample videos uploaded to YouTube
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| Corsair 64GB and 128GB Performance SSDs Posted: 26 Jun 2009 04:09 AM PDT Corsair have announced two new SSDs in its Performance Series range, bringing high read/write speeds to lower price points. The P128 and P64 – which unsurprisingly offer 128GB and 64GB respectively – slot in below the current flagship P256, with the P128 offering the same 220MB/sec read rate and 200MB/sec write rate.
Meanwhile the P64 promises 220MB/sec read and 120MB/sec write rates. Both drives use the same Samsung controller as their more-expensive sibling, together with 128MB of cache and NCQ support. The Corsair P128 is available now, with an MRSP of $339; you can currently find it on Newegg with a $40 rebate. The Corsair P64 will follow on in July; prices are yet to be confirmed. Press Release:
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| ASUS Eee Keyboard delayed until August Posted: 26 Jun 2009 03:51 AM PDT After telling us – and then telling us again – that the Eee Keyboard would arrive this month, ASUS are now promising their nettop-in-a-keyboard will actually drop in August 2009. Rather than blaming manufacturing delays or last-minute firmware tweaks, ASUS claim the Eee Keyboard – which squeezes in an HD capable nettop and 5-inch touchscreen – was in fact held back while they attempted to define a niche for it to sit in.
That's surprising, given that back at CES in January the company seemed to have a pretty good idea of what the point of the Eee Keyboard was. Fitted with Wireless HDMI, it can stream HD content either stored on its 32GB SSD or from the internet to a nearby display, with controls and other apps shown on the compact touchscreen. Still no final word on pricing, but the last we heard ASUS were planning for a $400 starting price – though that doesn't get you Wireless HDMI, only wired – and two different models. Each will have a 1.6GHz Intel Atom processor, 1GB of RAM and both WiFi b/g/n and Bluetooth 2.0. Earlier this month ASUS demonstrated the Eee Keyboard running Moblin, rather than Windows XP as it has been seen using in the past.
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| mintpad MID first-impressions: surprisingly capable Posted: 26 Jun 2009 03:41 AM PDT We're still harboring a soft-spot for mintpass' mintpad MID, so it's relieving to hear that the first English-modified units are meeting with approval. Pocketables shared their unboxing earlier this week, and now it's time for some first-impressions. The mintpad's 1.3-megapixel camera is proving surprisingly capable, as is the browser (despite not being fully translated yet) and the QVGA screen may be small at 2.86-inches but it's still highly readable.
Build-quality, responsiveness and file support continue to satisfy, while the mono speaker is loud and clear. Fans of Windows CE – and we're sure there are some out there – will be pleased to hear that the mintpad is compatible with apps for the Microsoft platform, so there's flexibility in what you can run. Flash support in the browser is a nice touch (especially when you look at the number of smartphones that can't do this) and audio quality is decent. On the downside, there are no hardware volume controls, the browser lacks an on-screen keyboard so far, and the rotation-sensor is underused. Still, these things might change when the final English firmware release arrives at the end of the month. Relevant Entries on SlashGear
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| MacBook Pro 3.0Gbps SATA upgrade breaking third-party drives? Posted: 26 Jun 2009 03:17 AM PDT The recently-released MacBook Pro firmware that promises to enable 3.0Gbps SATA connectivity has ironically been causing problems in third-party drives. Apple released the upgrade earlier this week, after users of the new 13- and 15-inch MacBook Pro models reported that the notebooks were limited to 1.5Gbps SATA; this did not affect the speed of standard-fit hard-drives, but may have limited future performance should the user upgrade to a faster HDD or SSD. Now, some users with third-party drives already installed are reporting frequent pauses, usage spikes and data errors with the new firmware.
Both traditional hard-drives and solid-state storage are presenting problems. One user found his Western Digital Scorpio Blue HDD now suffers intermittent data errors and that the whole machine freezes randomly. Meanwhile another user who has upgraded to an Intel X25-M SSD found his drive no longer works at all following the firmware update. Some have found that re-installing the original SATA 1.5Gbps drive supplied by Apple restores the machine to working order, while others have had no luck. Apple distanced themselves from aftermarket upgrades when they first released the firmware, warning users that they had "not qualified or offered these drives for Mac notebooks" and that "their use is unsupported." That seems to mean they won't fix the issue under warranty: many who have contacted Apple Stores or technical support regarding the firmware issues have been told that "Apple is not responsible for maintaining compatibility with third-party aftermarket hardware with their firmware updates." However there is also talk that Apple Store "Geniuses" can roll back the firmware if there was a problem during the upgrade itself, though not otherwise. [via Register Hardware] Relevant Entries on SlashGear
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| Lenovo S12 NVIDIA Ion netbook 1080p video demo Posted: 26 Jun 2009 02:38 AM PDT SlashGear stopped by the Pepcom Digital Experience in New York this week, and caught up with one of the more interesting netbooks on the horizon: Lenovo's S12. While it may physically resemble one of the company's previous models, albeit with a larger 12.1-inch display, what makes the S12 really special is the NVIDIA Ion chipset inside. The demonstration – which you can see after the cut – showed silky-smooth simultaneous HD encoding and playback.
Video demo of the S12 after the cut In fact, the Lenovo S12 was using its HDMI port to output 1080p content onto a big-screen HDTV while also re-encoding a 1080p clip into an iPhone-friendly format. Both moved on at a fair clip, and the playback was completely smooth and unaffected by the encoding process. When you consider that the S12 is otherwise pretty much identical to a mainstream netbook today, it's all the more impressive. As well as Ion there's a 1.6GHz Intel Atom N270 processor, 1GB of RAM and up to 320GB hard-drive, together with WiFi, Bluetooth and an ExpressCard slot. Full specifications are here. The Lenovo S12 with NVIDIA Ion is expected to go on sale this month, priced at $499.99; cheaper models, lacking Ion, will start at $449.99.
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| French MacBook transformer video Posted: 26 Jun 2009 02:26 AM PDT I've no doubt this video will be all over the place before long (if it isn't already) but we're suckers for transforming tech here at SlashGear. Apparently created for the French postal service, to publicize their new home printing service for shipping labels, it shows a MacBook option that, while cool, could get expensive after a while.
Video after the cut In the video, the user's MacBook transforms into a Star Wars-esque spacecraft after he attempts to organize a shipment, complete with Transformers-style robotic noises. It's not the first time we've seen such adverts – Citroen's C4 commercials are a good prior example – but we still love them. Perhaps even funnier are the discussions the video prompted in the 9to5Mac comments, about how this isn't actually a real MacBook (pre-transformation, of course). It has the screen bezel of a pre-unibody model, but the keyboard of a newer machine. [via Gear Diary] Relevant Entries on SlashGear
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| Palm 2009 financial results: “Save us Pre!” Posted: 26 Jun 2009 02:05 AM PDT Palm have announced their Q4 and full-year 2009 financial results [pdf link], covering the period up to the end of May 29th. Palm chairman and CEO Jon Rubinstein revealed full-year revenues of $735.9m and gross profit of $159.8m; he went on to describe the launch of the Palm Pre and webOS shortly after the period finished as when the company "officially reentered the race". That's good news, because while smartphone shipments in Q4 rose 6-percent from Q3, year-over-year decline for the quarter was a huge 62-percent.
In Q4 2009, then, Palm report total revenues of $86.8m, with gross profit of $20.1m and a gross margin of 23.1-percent. That amounts to a net loss to common shareholders of $105m, or $0.78 per diluted common share; that's more than twice the net loss in fiscal-year 2008. Rubinstein remained positive, however, suggesting that the Pre was a "major milestone in Palm's transformation" and pointing to "a large group of developers waiting to build great applications for Palm webOS". He also tipped "a new product pipeline" which is presumed to include the Palm Eos, also based on webOS. Relevant Entries on SlashGear
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| NKK Switches OLED Rocker home-automation control Posted: 26 Jun 2009 01:42 AM PDT
The control joins NKK Switches' existing display-control range, which already features a color-OLED button. However that control is only a push-button, and requires a far deeper panel mount. NKK envisage the control as being used in home automation systems, scrolling through different options and perhaps replacing a whole bank of lighting or audio/visual controls. It's also IP64 rated for resistance to dust and water, meaning it can be installed in industrial locations. No word on pricing, nor general availability.
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3GS, of course, and is one of the many improvements in iPhone OS 3.0; ironically, Apple's main competitor for the new smartphone could in fact be owners of its predecessor whose upgrade urge has been lulled by the free software update.
NKK Switches have announced a 
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