Laptop Specs And Price

Since the beginning of the millennium, there have been projects like the $99 computer, with the sole purpose of pushing developers into creating a device which can be purchased by any category of people, without worrying about the price. Although that exact limit has not been touched, Google has just taken a step forward with its Chrome book laptop, built in cooperation with Samsung, which costs no less than $249.

Selling for the price of a cheap smartphone, the Samsung Chrome book may prove to be a little more than what can be seen at a glance, and may even develop into a Kindle-like competitor of the laptop segment. Besides its attractive price, the Chrome book comes with a pleasant and simple design which integrates some very slim curves, decent components and a high degree of mobility – one that will surely appeal to thousands of people.

Google’s Chrome book built by Samsung– the short story

The Samsung Chrome book has just been introduced as a Google product that does not generate any hassle, does not require software updates, nor expensive software to buy and comes with great Google-made apps, downloadable right from the browser. The laptop is very portable, weighting slightly under 2.5 pounds (that’s around 1.1 kg) and being 0.8-inch thin. Also, the large battery can supply about 6.5 hours of continuous use, which surpasses most laptops and achieves even the marks of some ultra-books Here is the list of technical specifications:

Airtel on Fri launched the iPhone five in Asian nation creating the sixteen GB, thirty two GB and sixty four GB models out there. The sixteen GB has been priced at Rs forty five,500, the thirty two GB at Rs fifty two,500 and therefore the sixty four GB version at Rs fifty nine,500.

Airtel announced special data packages for the latest iPhone version and has described the phone as being "in high demand” in India.

“We’re launching it at a time when more youngsters use smartphones to access data. The concept of phone has transformed from voice to a data device. iPhone 5 will offer customers an unparalleled experience which will make them use it for data access,” said Airtel CEO for Karnataka circle Rohit Malhotra, while talking to the media on the sidelines of the launch event in Bangalore on Friday evening.

According to reports, customers who have made pre-bookings will receive the phone in five to seven days. Only the 'Black & Slate' model of the phone will be available for now and not the 'White & Silver' version. Asked if the data experience would be the same, given that iPhone 5 is tailormade for LTE (Long-Term Evolution or 4G) networks, Malhotra claimed that speeds on the existing 3G networks of the carrier would give customers a “wow” experience.

“We’re yet to have LTE in India, but the existing 3G networks can give users an equally good experience,” he said.

The phone is compatible with Airtel’s HSPA and DC-HSPA networks.
Two months after the original launch of the phone, Indian customers will be getting a feel of the iPhone 5, which comes with a four-inch multi-touch retina display, and is 18 per cent thinner and 20 per cent lighter than the iPhone 4S, shipping with Apple’s own dual-core A6 chipset.

The phone has also been described as the thinnest and the most slick with aluminium design. It is the first Apple smartphone with a 4-inch screen that features the high-speed LTE network.

The IOS 6 operating system has been deeply integrated with Facebook and has its own mapping application, Apple Maps, a source of widespread dissatisfaction for Apple customers that forced a public apology from Apple CEO Tim Cook.

Besides Airtel and Aircel, the carrier partners for the phone, iPhone 5 is also been made available through retailers. According to CMR data, during January-June 2012, total India shipments of mobile handsets was recorded at 102.43 million units and shipments of smartphones were 5.5 million units in the same period.

Tech: Apple iPad mini Hits and mis
Apple last week took the wraps off iPad mini, the smaller version of its popular tablet. Much speculated about before its launch, the iPad mini will take on the likes of 7-inch tablets from rivals like Google Nexus 7, Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 and Kindle Fire HD. Only time can tell if iPad mini has what it takes to beat the competition. Here is a look at the hits and misses in Apple iPad mini

1. Track your Stolen laptop with Adeona
adeona from University of Washington provides an open source, free and completely non-proprietary way to track your stolen laptop. You can install Adeona on your laptop and go as there’s no need to rely on a single third party! What’s more, Adeona addresses a critical privacy goal different from existing commercial offerings. It is privacy-preserving. This means that no one besides the owner (or an agent of the owner’s choosing) can use Adeona to track a laptop. Unlike other systems, users of Adeona can be rest assured that no one can abuse the system in order to track where they use their laptop. You can read the detailed article on Adeona here.

2. Locate your laptop with LocateMyLaptop.com
LocateMyLaptop is a free service that offers a stealthy app on your laptop which reports its position whenever the computer is connected to the Internet. If it’s lost or stolen, you can issue a self-destruct command to erase all the data on the hard drive – but that requires upgrading to the Platinum Plan, which costs $3/month. But you do not need to pay anything until the disaster strikes. this is because, tracking of laptop is FREE, and you can upgrade to the platinum service only if your laptop gets stolen.

3. Browser Plugin to Track your stolen Laptop – Loki
Loki is basically a service which can add location of users to any website. But it can be tweaked in such a way that you can log directly into Loki to see your laptop’s location on a map, or enable “sharing” – which blasts your location to a public Web page, to Twitter, Facebook, or a handful of other services. Only concern is, Loki is not always reliable as it sometimes fails to update the public page with laptop’s location. This issue is seen even when Loki browser plugin on the laptop knew where it is. Hopefully this issue should be fixed by the next release.

4. Locate your stolen Laptop with LocatePC
LocatePC is FREE software which lets you track and finally get back your stolen computer or laptop back to you. LocatePC sends you a secret email message from your stolen computer or laptop with some crucial information. But again, we will be hoping that the thief will connect the laptop to the internet before formatting. Still, something is better than nothing right?

FREE Tools to four steps Track & Recover Your purloined portable computer

locate your purloined portable computer with LocatePC
Browser Plugin to trace your purloined portable computer – Norse deity

Apple MacBook professional with tissue layer show

Windows 8 is coming on October 26. But it is not just any other update to Windows, the most widely used operating system (OS) in the world. According to Microsoft, Windows 8 is re-imagining of the 25-years-old OS.

Windows 8 is publicly available as a Release Preview. I downloaded the 64-bit version, installed it onto a laptop and used it to see what sort of changes it brings for the end users. There are interesting and significant ways in which this Windows is different from its predecessors. All of them affect the way people use computers. Some in a good way and some in bad. Dive in to know how Windows 8 fared on my laptop...

Day one
I got the Windows 8 ISO file from Microsoft website. Downloading the OS is simple: Just select the version you want -- 32-bit or 64-bit -- and hit the download button. If your computer has Core 2 Duo or newer processor and at least 4GB RAM, get the 64-bit version. Or else go for 32-bit OS. I used the USB tool created by Microsoft to convert the ISO file into a bootable pen drive and installed it on a laptop running AMD's A8 Trinity processor, 4GB RAM and AMD HD 7670M graphics card. The installation was smooth and took just 20 minutes.

When I booted into the Windows 8, I found everything worked well. If you are used to the quirky Windows XP, you will be pleasantly surprised by how well Windows 8 can identify the hardware. But the Wi-Fi and touchpad caused some issues. Some tinkering with the system revealed the driver for Wi-Fi chip was missing. The laptop, which was made by Acer, lacked Windows 8 specific driver for the Wi-Fi chip, made by Atheros. But I tried Windows 7 drivers and it worked. I also managed to sort out touchpad issues but couldn't make multi-touch support work on it.

The touchpad also did not support the gestures, like swiping from left to multitask. Apparently there is some confusion about gesture support on touchpad of laptops released before Windows 8 launch. I asked Microsoft but the company was ambiguous in its answer. "Gestures are delivered via driver updates that are not currently broadly available," it said in an email.

Day two
Windows 8 can be personalized in a way similar to a smartphone or tablet. There is an option to use Microsoft Live ID to log into the system. Tying up the ID with a machine in Windows 8 does a lot. It allows users to install apps from Windows Store. It allows users to automatically backup their important files and photos on to SkyDrive, Microsoft's cloud storage system, and it configures the Microsoft email automatically. I also changed the wallpaper on Lockscreen, which could show notifications like amount of unread email, Twitter mentions, time, and weather information etc. This is similar to how lockscreens on tablets and smartphones work.

Unfortunately, beyond the cosmetic options, I did not find too many ways to configure the OS. Wallpaper on the screen can be changed with any photograph, but for background on the Home screen, users are limited to just five abstract drawings. (In the final version of Windows 8 more images have been added but users can't select a custom picture).

More than anything, I disliked the way Windows 8 de-emphasized folders. There is no Start button that can help a user navigate through folders and files. And in the part of the OS that uses Modern UI with big bold tiles, the file system is virtually non-existent. If you are the kind of user who never changes default folders like Download, Pictures or Music in Windows and does not care about meticulously keeping track of files, it may not bother you. In fact, you may even like the way Microsoft is trying to move away from the folder-inside-folder approach of storing files. But to me a machine doesn't feel personal enough unless I don't know exactly where each file is.

Day three
Windows 8 puts a lot of emphasis on Modern UI. And it discourages users from spending time in the Desktop mode, which has been reduced to an app. The command centre in the new OS is the Home screen, which is populated by tiles that replace icons in Windows 8. Some of these tiles can show information such as the number of unread mails and breaking news in almost real time. The Home screen also uses a powerful universal search, which helps users quickly find an application or file.

Despite my best efforts to use Modern UI mode, I found myself switching to the Desktop mode frequently. The reason is simple: There are few apps with Modern UI. You can't help but use the good old apps like 7-ZIP. And when you use an app that lacks Modern UI, the OS kicks the user into the Desktop mode. In fact, the Desktop mode is brought to the front even when a user accesses advanced system options like MS-Config or configures a newly-installed harddisk or uses Windows Explorer, renamed File Explorer in the final version! The to and fro between desktop mode and the Home screen is jarring. And bad if you want to do some serious work on the computer.

Day four
I am slowly getting the hang of the Windows 8. Unlike the earlier Windows, which relied on point-and-click philosophy, Windows 8 uses a lot of gestures. For example, do you want to switch off the computer? Navigate to the bottom right corner of the screen and wait for the charms to appear. Then click on settings and switch off the machine. Want to multitask? Navigate to the top left corner and wait for the open apps to show up. Want to close a program? Go to the top of the window, hold down the mouse button and then drag the window to the bottom.

While I find point-and-click much easier to use, I feel comfortable with gestures on Windows. But it may not turn out to be the same experience for everyone else. Until you are familiar with these gestures, it's kind of a hit and miss. There were times when I navigated to a corner of the screen and nothing happened. Or dragged a window to the bottom of the screen but it didn't close. Depending on your patience, you are either going to love the gestures or may ditch Windows 8 for something like Windows 7 within days.

Day five
As my familiarity with the OS grew, I started to appreciate some of the changes Microsoft had made with Windows 8. I liked the fact that the OS was snappy, with fast performance, and booted within seconds. I liked the revamped file transfer tool and task manager in the desktop mode. I liked the way the OS was always connected to the web and applications like Mail and Weather could pull in the data and showed the information right on the Lock screen. More than anything, I liked the big and bold design of the apps with the Modern UI.

Unfortunately, the availability of these apps is limited at the moment. For example, the Windows store doesn't have Firefox, my favourite browser, with Modern UI. Or WinRar, another of my favourite program. Similarly, there are no CPU-Z, KMPlayer, VLC Player, FoxIT reader, DaemonTools, OpenOffice, Picasa and InfraRecorder. I use these programs on daily basis. And I miss their Modern UI versions.

Instead, a user gets the Internet Explorer 10 (Modern UI) and the inbuilt Video Player. But I didn't like them. IE10 focuses too much on the design at the cost of functionality. For example, to open and access multiple tabs I had to do a right click and then select the tab. When I work, there are often 15 to 20 tabs open in my browsers. Opening this many tabs in IE10 with Modern UI and accessing them proved to be a cumbersome task. Similarly, I found the Video Player too basic. It didn't even utilize the full functionality of AMD graphics card in the laptop to playback HD videos in a better way.

Day six
I love Modern UI for its design but I totally hate the multitasking it provides. When I used Windows 8 in Modern UI mode, I could only open two windows. Of these, one was just a vertical strip on the left or right side of the screen. Apps did run in the background and I could navigate to them using gestures or ALT+Tab but I couldn't keep an eye on more than two windows at a time. When I was in Modern UI mode and wanted to see the programs I had opened on Desktop, I couldn't do it with ALT+Tab. I couldn't resize the windows. By default they took the full screen.

Multitasking is the single biggest drawback with Windows 8. Even on a 15-inch laptop screen I felt the need for a more flexible multitasking. I can only imagine how I am going to feel about running two windows — one taking 80% screen and another 20% — on a 24-inch desktop monitor. It's not pretty!

Day seven
I decided to 'forget' that I am a geek so that I could use Windows 8 the way many of not-so-tech-savvy users would do. I realized that if you were not so particular about multitasking -- and many people who work on one thing at a time might not be - Windows 8 was not that bad.

The dynamic information on the lockscreen is a nice touch. And so is the Settings corner, which has been simplified and now comes with options like Factory Reset. The more advanced settings are available but only in desktop mode.

Installing apps from Windows store is very easy. Just click install and they will be available to you. For uninstalling them, just click on their tile, do a right click and select delete... the app will vanish. There is no mumbo jumbo of click next, next, and next. Every file that is being downloaded goes through security check by default. There is no need for a user to look for the appropriate program to open file. The OS handles all of it automatically.

Yes, there is much to like with Windows 8 if you are not a power user. The only problems for such users are figuring out gestures, which requires patience, and the availability of apps, which Microsoft says will be solved.

Day eight
There is no other way to put it: Windows 8 is an OS with dual personality. I realize that I like both, just not together. The part with Modern UI is completely different from the good old Desktop mode. I personally prefer the Desktop mode but the part with Modern UI has some merits. It terms of design and ease of use, Modern UI part is good and if Microsoft can take care of the app problem, it can be a perfect fit for users who find computers confusing and currently struggle with even tasks like installing a program.

But at the same time, I feel millions of existing Windows users are going to be frustrated with the Windows 8 experience. The real problem is that Microsoft has deliberately made it difficult for users choose between the Modern UI part and the Desktop mode. On desktop computers and laptops, it is either both or none. The persistence of Charms, gestures and Start screen breaks the Windows experience as we know it. At the same time, it is missing crucial bits in terms of multi-tasking and file management.

Apple iPhone 5, which will be launched in India on November 2, will be priced at Rs 45,500 for the entry-level 16GB model.

The 32 and 64GB models will be sold at 52,500 and 59,500 respectively.

The prices have been shared by Redington, one of the two distribution partners of Apple in India, in the country and are in

line with the unconfirmed price range that TOI had earlier reported.

Redington and Ingram have also confirmed TOI's Friday report that Apple is set to launch the iPhone 5, its latest

smartphone, in India on November 2, 2012. Apple has joined hands with Redington and Ingram Micro to distribute its flagship

device in the country.

This is a departure from Apple's earlier strategy of partnering with telecom operators like Airtel and Aircel to retail the

phone in India. Redington and Ingram Micro already distribute iPad and iPods in the country.

Considering that the device will not be tied to a few telecom operators only, most telcos in India have readied their

stocks of nano-sim cards which can be used only in iPhone 5.

As reported by TOI on Thursday, besides online site Infibeam, another online retailer Saholic has begun taking pre-orders

for the 16GB variant of iPhone 5 at Rs 45,500. Infibeam had started taking advance bookings at Rs 5,000, while the

remaining amount will be collected at the time of launch.

Apple is yet to launch the unlocked version of iPhone 5 in the US, its home country, and only sells the device with carrier

partners like AT&T, Sprint and Verizon.

The Cupertino-based maker of iPhone smartphones, iPad tablets, Macbook notebooks and iMac desktop computers posted revenue of $36 billion and net profit of $8.2 billion, or $8.67 per diluted share for its last quarter.

In comparison, the company had recorded a revenue of $28.3 billion and net profit of $6.6 billion, or $7.05 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter. However, it saw its gross margin decline by a fraction to 40 per cent compared with 40.3 per cent in the year-ago quarter.

Higher international sales accounted for 60 percent of the quarter's revenue. Apple ended the quarter with $121.3 billion in cash and securities, of which $83 billion was offshore.

Apple sold 26.9 million iPhones in the quarter, representing 58 per cent unit growth over the year-ago quarter.

But the reported iPad sales by Apple fell short of Wall Street's expectations, marring the company's record of consistently exceeding investors' expectations. It sold 14.0 million iPads during the quarter, a modest 26 percent unit increase in the same period. It was well below the forecasts as the economy remained weak and consumers also awaited the iPad mini, for which pre-orders started on Thursday night.

Apple's computer sales seem to have virtually frozen as it sold 4.9 million Macs during the quarter, a mere1 percent unit increase over the year-ago quarter. Apple also saw a 19 per cent unit sales decline at 5.3 million iPods.

As a result, shares in the world's most valuable technology company briefly dipped to levels not seen since the start of August, after it delivered a 27 percent rise in revenue. The share later bounced back after the CEO Tim Cook's conference call with analysts.

Apple's board of directors declared a cash dividend of $2.65 per share of the company's common stock. The dividend - same as the previous quarter ending July - will be payable on November 15, to shareholders as per records on close of day on November 12.

"We're very proud to end a fantastic fiscal year with record September quarter results," said Tim Cook, Apple's CEO, in a statement. "We're entering this holiday season with the best iPhone, iPad, Mac and iPod products ever, and we remain very confident in our new product pipeline."

Together with the iPad 2, these two new iPads (iPad 3 and Mini) run more than 275,000 apps in the App Store. Recognised revenue from sales of iPad and iPad accessories during the quarter was up by 9% at $7.5 billion compared to $6.9 billion in the year-ago quarter. Apple ended the quarter with about 3.4 million iPads in channel inventory, a sequential increase of about 200,000, pointed out Cook.

"We're pleased to have generated over $41 billion in net income and over $50 billion in operating cash flow in fiscal 2012," said Peter Oppenheimer, Apple's chief financial officer (CFO).