The general presentation of ULCPCs include a smaller size of screen and a flash-basé storage, also including/understanding slower and low-actuated processors. The XP proved to be the best alternative for these computers, considering that great applications, such as Vista, the need much that more resources than of the GCV at reduced price can offer.

considerable quantity of the There by buzz around this probable category and it to sell a wouldn’t of Microsoft of fate please miss outside on this market, stated Roger Kay, president of associated technologies of final point, and to be added: With INTEL putting much behind [ the segment ], Microsoft realized that much dash could collect behind him and the didn’t want to miss it. It is their best proposal, and XP is probably better, of option like city by TechNewsWorld.

Ever since the introduction of the $100 laptop (1 laptop per child project), there has been competition for the lower priced alternative. Despite its cost which most people assume is proportional to quality, this low cost laptop can mean a revolution not only in prices, but also hardware and software.

Looking into the laptop itself, there are some features that should not be underlooked at despite the low cost of the laptop.

Hardware-wise
This new low-cost laptop makes use of components that you cannot say are of low quality - AMD chips, Wireless support, a 253 MHz CPU; You can say it might be better than computers years ago. A low cost laptop with some basic features can turn the tide even against normal laptops.

Software?
Software used by the low-cost laptop are generally open-source software; Yay for the non-profits. Part of the reason is due to cost. Of course, because they use open-source software, this 1 laptop per child project will bound to promote open-source in essence.

—

Even though this project concerns the less fortunate, giving a laptop to every child will bring adoption of computers to a new level - perhaps doubling the number of computer users today. Computer (and Internet) literacy is no longer bounded by inaccessibility.

However, why does this low-cost laptop gets fired at by big players like Microsoft? This is because of the nature of the laptop, which will eventually cause people to use less of commercial software, and move to open-source ones. In business, this would lead to lower sales unless they do something innovative.

Nonetheless, the very existance of this abitious project is a sign of good things to change, opening the door to a world where everyone can have access to a piece of modern technology.

Apple was playing catch-up to Microsoft’s parental controls for Vista, which the computer giant unveiled in January. It, too, made its biggest push into the parental-control market with Vista, adding the same finely tuned features, so much so that parental advocates say Vista’s parent controls are a reason to buy the software. And that’s true of Apple now, too.

“The battle to one-up each other in parental controls is only going to benefit consumers,” said Chris Swenson, director of software industry analysis at the research firm the NPD Group. “There’s really no excuse now for parents not to lock down their PCs for their children.”

Parents are clearly paying more attention to technology for managing their children’s computer use, especially as more kids venture online at younger ages. As one proof point, U.S. retail sales of parental control software were up 47.3 percent in the first nine months of 2007 over the same period last year, according to NPD, which tracks sales of major retailers such as Amazon.com and BestBuy. Top sellers at stores are controls from Enteractive, Microforum, and ContentWatch.

Apple and Microsoft don’t have numbers on how many customers use parental controls, but analysts say the feature will easily be a selling point for Leopard and Vista this holiday season. Apple sold 2 million copies of Leopard in the first weekend it was available, blowing away early adoption rates of its Tiger software. In contrast, Microsoft has sold as many as 88 million copies of Vista.

Despite the uptick in U.S. retail sales of parental controls, some parents buy such software and then are left baffled by how to use it, or don’t have the time to properly install it, according to analysts and parent advocates. That’s why experts believe that operating-system software must be extremely easy and effective to use–which both Vista and Apple have proved to be so far. As millions of parents begin to upgrade their computers with the preinstalled software, parental controls on the PC may start to become mainstream, they say.

“Parental controls at the operating system level is really the best way on the family PC,” said Anne Collier, co-director of ConnectSafely.org, a community site for parents and kid safety. “There are more options for the parent and it’s seamless, rather than having to install something that may or may not crash the system.”

Feature by feature, Vista’s and Leopard’s parental controls are on par–with time settings, various levels of site and application blocking, and log activity files. But for parents of kids who play games online or on the desktop, Vista offers parents an edge with more granular controls for games. The settings include detailed age and content appropriateness ratings for games from an industry nonprofit called the Entertainment Software Rating Board, or ESRB. Parents of a 5-year-old boy could allow him to only play “early childhood” games, for example.

“That’s definitely a strength with Vista–where families are using it for gaming it has the rating system so that parents can block games based on (their child’s age and content appropriateness),” said Tom Laemmel, Windows product manager. That parental control feature was recently added to Microsoft’s Xbox, too.

In terms of user interface, however, Apple controls come off cleaner and simpler. Parents can configure their child’s Apple home page dock with only three tabs and one-click options so that younger kids operate the computer more easily. Leopard includes drop-down menus for setting when and how long a child can be on the computer. Microsoft’s Vista, in contrast, offers a calendar grid to set time.

In addition, Apple’s Leopard settings newly enable parents to control a child’s computer from their own, unlike Vista.

“We have a rich set of parental controls that are incredibly easy to use and that give parents the flexibility to decide how to use them and to create a certain experience for their child on the Mac,” said Chris Bourdon, senior product line manager for Mac OS.

Microsoft’s Laemmel said the company is good at remote administrative controls in the business realm, but in the home, it’s unnecessary.

“Within the home environment, you want it to be straightforward, you don’t want to have to have an IT person,” Laemmel said.

Such gridlock would drastically affect how people use the web and could mean the next Google or YouTube simply doesn’t get off the ground, it said.

The report said billions needed to be spent upgrading broadband networks.

It put the figure at around $137bn (£66bn) globally.

For users, the slowdown could see a return to the bad old days of dial-up, the report predicts.

Stifling innovation

“It may take more than one attempt to confirm an online purchase or it may take longer to download the latest video from YouTube,” the report cited.

But it is the knock-on effect for new services that could be the real problem, report authors think.

“The next Amazon, Google or YouTube might not arise, not from a lack of user demand but because of insufficient infrastructure preventing applications and companies emerging,” the report warned.

The demand for bandwidth-intensive applications shows no sign of abating.

Nearly 75% of US internet users watched an average of 158 minutes of online video and viewed more than 8.3bn video streams during May, according to research by measurement firm comScore.

The financial invested required to “bridge the gap” between demand and capacity would range from $42bn (£20bn) to $55bn (£27bn) in the US, Nemertes estimates.

The report is part-funded by the Internet Innovation Alliance (IIA) which campaigns for universal broadband in the US.

“We must take the necessary steps to build out network capacity or potentially face internet gridlock that could wreak havoc on internet services,” said Larry Irving, co-chairman of the IIA.

You can update your install using the software update feature on the system itself, or if you prefer, download it from the Apple site.

You can view a whole list of changes from the Apple site.

1) Viruses and Worms
Get this in your computer, and be prepared to use your system restore disk if you are not careful.
Inventor: Unknown
Popularized by: Anti-virus vendors

2) Bugs/Glitches
Often confused with features, these are often an oversight that can lead to unexpected problems.
Inventor: Unknown
Popularized by: Microsoft

3) Blue Screen of Death
Title says it all. See it and you feel like pounding on your key board. Great for those who know what they are supposed to do.
Inventor: Lattice Inc.
Popularized by: Microsoft

4) Patches
Without number 1 and number 2, you will never need this.
Inventor: Unknown
Popularized by: Many groups

5) Internet Explorer < 6
Microsoft sure loves setting standards that no one else seem to be following. Even up to Internet Explorer 6, Internet Explorer was lacking in something, or maybe in many things. Internet Explorer 7 came and solved all that, but then again…
Inventor: Microsoft
Popularized by: Disgruntled web designers

6) Windows ME
In 2000, stick to Windows 98; you are much safer there.
Inventor: Microsoft
Publicized by: Users of Windows ME

The cat and mouse game between hackers and Apple takes another move, with news that Apple’s new Leopard operating system has already been successfully installed on Windows PCs.

The OSx86 Scene forum has released details of how Windows users can migrate to Apple’s new OS, without investing in new hardware — even though installing Leopard on an PC may be counter to Apple’s terms and conditions.

The forum is offering full instructions on how to install the system, including screenshots of the installation process.

Not all the features of Leopard function with the patch — Wi-Fi, support, for example, is reportedly inoperable. Historically, Apple’s likely next move will be to track down and act against those behind the hack.

The move to make Leopard work on a PC is just the latest in Apple’s continual struggle with the hacker community.

Also this weekend a crew of hackers unleased Jailbreak Me, an online service iPod touch and iPhone users can navigate to in order to break into these devices in order to install applications on them.

Apple has encountered similar trials each time it releases a new version of its operating system, as PC-using hackers want the OS, but not necessarily the Mac.

Apple as yet hasn’t allowed virtualization software developers to create ways in which Mac OS X can be run on an Intel-based Windows machine, though this weekend’s Leopard news shows it’s possible.

The new policy began Thursday, Apple spokeswoman Natalie Kerris told the Associated Press. Before then, there was no cash restriction and the purchase limit was five per person. “Customer response to the iPhone has been off the charts, and limiting iPhone sales to two per customer helps us ensure that there are enough iPhones for people who are shopping for themselves or buying a gift,” Kerris said. “We’re requiring a credit or debit card for payment to discourage unauthorized resellers.” Since introducing iPhone on June 29th, Apple has sold over 1.4 million of the handsets, the company announced as part of its fiscal fourth quarter earnings last week. However, it estimated that approximately 250,000 of those iPhones were sold to buyers who intended to unlock them and then resell them for use on wireless networks other than AT&T. The new sales restrictions are the latest moves by Apple in its game of cat and mouse with iPhone hackers. Last month, it released iPhone software update 1.1.1, which rendered unlocked iPhones effectively useless.

The world’s largest software company is now working to adapt a basic version of Windows XP so it is compatible with the nonprofit One Laptop Per Child Foundation’s small green- and-white XO laptop.

“We’re spending a non-trivial amount of money on it,” Microsoft Corporate Vice President Will Poole said in an interview on Thursday.

“We remain hopeful with our progress to date, we still have significant work ahead to finalize our analysis and testing processes,” he said. “At the end of the day, there’s no guarantees.”

The One Laptop per Child Foundation, a spin-off from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, plans to start producing the $188 machines in China next month and eventually manufacture millions a year for elementary school children in developing countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America.

The foundation is also selling the machines in the United States and Canada for $400 apiece through a fundraising campaign.

The laptops were designed specifically to run Linux programs. If the machines run only Linux, Microsoft will lose an opportunity to expose tens of millions of children worldwide to its Windows system.

“We’ve made progress,” Poole said.

If the foundation is able to meet its goal of producing millions of laptops for school children around the world and they are all loaded with Linux software, then they would end up being more comfortable with those programs than with Windows, said Wayan Vota, who publishes a blog that monitors the project.

“People will realize there is an alternative to Windows and they might like it better,” Vota said.

But the new laptop uses some technologies developed by the foundation that haven’t previously been used in personal computers, Poole said.

“We still have plenty of work to do in determining if the highly constrained performance, power, and memory in the first generation XO laptops will be compatible with Windows and popular Windows applications,” he added.

Originally dubbed the $100 laptop, which is the group’s target price for the machine, the XO features a string pulley to charge its battery, a keyboard that switches between languages, a digital video camera and wireless connectivity.

The laptop’s designer, Mary Lou Jepsen, said in an interview earlier this month she expects the price to drop in the first quarter of next year because prices of memory tend to fall dramatically during that period.

The computer requires just 2 watts of power compared with the typical laptop’s 30 to 40 watts and does away with hard drives, relying instead on flash memory and four USB ports to add memory devices.

The XO laptop’s component makers include Advanced Micro Devices and Marvell Technology Group. Software maker Red Hat helped develop the device. Quanta Computer will manufacture it.

The foundation will start taking orders for its Give 1 Get 1 campaign on November 12 at laptopgiving.org.

As claimed by Apple, this problem may be due to an application bundled with Apple Leopard (called Application Enhancer). It is not known when the problem might be fixed.

This problem does not affect users doing a full-install of Apple Leopard.

(Credit: Tom Krazit/CNET News.com)It wasn’t exactly iPhone Day, but hundreds of people lined up on Stockton Street on Friday outside the San Francisco Apple store to get their hands on Mac OS X Leopard, the newest version of Apple’s operating system.

About 30 minutes before the doors of the store opened at 6 p.m., the line stretched up Stockton and around the corner onto O’Farrell Street, maybe two-thirds as long as the iPhone line at its longest on June 29. Still, prospective customers waited hours in line to buy Leopard, even though they could have preordered a copy from Apple or Amazon.com and have spent that time installing their new OS.

Tyler Howarth (middle) is psyched to be first in line in downtown San Francisco for Leopard.

(Credit: Tom Krazit/CNET News.com)

“That’s kind of lame,” said Tyler Howarth, first in line, referring to those who took the preorder route. Howarth, a student at San Francisco State University, arrived at 2 p.m. to start waiting in line, although the actual formal queue wasn’t set up until 3 p.m. He planned to use the $100 store credit he received after the iPhone pricing snafu to defray the cost of the Leopard upgrade (click for CNET’s review) for his Macbook Pro.

Granted, standing in line on a cool autumn evening in San Francisco isn’t exactly as demanding as dodging raindrops on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. And it’s really, really hard to run out of software; I’m pretty sure you’ll be able to walk into any Apple store later tonight or tomorrow and pick up a copy without a wait. But line-waiters seem determined to be part of something, to have an actual experience associated with their upgrades that’s a little more interesting than signing for the package.

Apple’s retail employees do everything they can to deliver that experience, cheering the early adopters like they just completed a 14-point comeback with 2 minutes left on the clock. The free coffee went quickly, but the first 500 people in line were given T-shirts to mark the occasion.

Apple retail employees welcome Leopard customers with a standing ovation and T-shirts.

(Credit: Tom Krazit/CNET News.com)

Several of those in line cited Time Machine as the single most important reason they’re rushing out to get Leopard, sheepishly admitting they don’t regularly back up their system. Not many people do so on a regular basis, even if they’ve taken the step of purchasing an external hard drive or going as far as to set up a home server.

Amadeus DeMarzi, about halfway back in the line, was relatively new to the Mac, having purchased his first Mac about a year ago. He was also planning to use his iPhone credit on the purchase of Leopard, and cited Time Machine and Spaces, a feature that lets you switch between four separate work areas to help organize your thoughts when working with multiple applications.

Passersby gawked at the crowd as things backed up in the area in front of the Apple store, which is adjacent to entrances for the Powell Street transit stop. “Ooh, I think they’re giving out free iPhones!” one woman exclaimed as she passed by with several shopping bags. At around 6:30 p.m., the line was still around the corner onto O’Farrell, but things were moving in an orderly fashion.

It was probably a pretty good night for Apple’s retail operation, but we’ll get a better sense of the pace of Leopard adoption over the next few weeks and months. I’ll check back over the weekend to see how the installation process is going for the early adopters. If you run into any problems, let me know in the comments below.

iPhone Day it wasn’t, but foot traffic still backed up in front of Apple’s downtown San Francisco store around 6 p.m. as commuters tried to figure out what was going on.

(Credit: Tom Krazit/CNET News.com)

Apple officially launches its new Leopard operating system Friday. But the first major release of the Mac OS in nearly two and a half years has been the hottest download for months on peer-to-peer networks, rivaling at times even the most popular movies and songs, a P2P tracking firm said. Apple has already started selling Leopard in Japan, where hundreds of fans lined up at stores to buy the OS. In the United States, Apple stores will close at 4 p.m. local time, and reopen at 6 p.m., giving away T-shirts to the first 500 buyers. The store closure is to give employees time to turn the outlets into party central, and to prepare for the higher traffic.

But all the fanfare is anticlimactic for P2P users who have been downloading Leopard in various forms of beta for about a year, Eric Garland, analyst and chief executive of Big Champagne, said. The highest traffic occurred after Apple distributed the release candidate in September. At that point, the number of Leopard downloads was comparable to those of the most popular movies and songs.

“It’s a little bit like kids on Christmas Eve,” Garland said. “They just can’t stand it. They know they’re not supposed to peek, but the excitement is just too much for them.”

Illegal copies of a new OS showing up on P2P networks are not unusual. Leopard’s rival Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT)’s Windows Vista, which was released to consumers in January, was also available over the Web before the OS shipped. Microsoft, however, uses a serial-numbering protection system that hackers had to penetrate first before the OS started showing up, Garland said. Apple doesn’t use such anti-piracy technology.

“It’s really as simple to acquire and use a pirated copy of Leopard as to install and use a legitimate copy,” Garland said.

Interestingly, Apple’s strategy of less protection for Leopard, officially known as OSX 10.5, actually works to the company’s advantage. People downloading illegal pre-release copies often say in chat rooms and discussion forums that they plan to buy a legitimate copy, which was not the same for Windows Vista thieves.

“There’s a commonly expressed sentiment among the community to go buy Apple,” Garland said. “Many of the people who have downloaded and installed pirated copies have also pre-ordered legitimate copies.”

People who downloaded Windows Vista, however, tended to take offense at what they viewed as draconian measures on the part of Microsoft, so felt less inclined to buy a legitimate copy, Garland said. In addition, Mac lovers view Apple’s price tag of $129 a better value than the $399 Microsoft charges for its most feature-rich version: Vista Ultimate.

Nevertheless, because Apple’s OS accounts for a sliver of the PC market compared to Windows, the amount of P2P traffic the operating system generates is extraordinary. “It really points to the cult of Mac,” Garland said.

The decision was based largely on the perceived benefits of HD DVD relating to the format’s market-ready technology and lower manufacturing costs, Paramount said.

The exclusive HD DVD commitment will include all movies distributed by Paramount Pictures, DreamWorks Pictures, Paramount Vantage, Nickelodeon Movies and MTV Films, as well as movies from DreamWorks Animation. Movies directed by Steven Spielberg will however continue to be released in both HD DVD and Blu-Ray formats.

The release of Blades of Glory will kick off Paramount’s exclusive HD DVD program, and will be followed by the release of Transformers and Shrek the Third, three titles that alone represent more than $1.5 billion in global box office ticket sales.

“Part of our vision is to aggressively extend our movies beyond the theater, and deliver the quality and features that appeal to our audience. I believe HD DVD is not only the affordable high quality choice for consumers, but also the smart choice for Paramount,” said Paramount Pictures chairman and CEO Brad Grey.

“We believe the combination of this year’s low-priced HD DVD players and the commitment to release a significant number of hit titles in the fall makes HD DVD the best way to view movies at home.” added DreamWorks Animation CEO, Jeffrey Katzenberg.

Source

Want to use an iPhone in a country other than the US, or use it in the US without needing to be on a two-year contract with AT&T?

Thanks to new software from Jon Lech Johansen, famous as ‘DVD Jon’, the man that cracked the DVD’s copy protection, you can ‘crack’ the iPhone and ‘activate it’ – but you won’t get phone service from it when you activate it using DVD Jon’s method.

The software and brief instructions are available at Johansen’s blog called ‘So Sue Me’ , in the June 3rd post entitled ‘iPhone Independence Day’ and let you use the iPhone’s web surfing and email features using your Wi-Fi connection, listen to music, watch photos and videos and do everything but make phone calls and surf using an EDGE connection to the Internet.

Naturally, users trying to make phone calls find that it simply doesn’t work, as there is no connection to any cell phone networks without a proper SIM card, activation through AT&T and a valid contract.

Yet predictions that the iPhone would be ‘unlocked’ within one to two weeks are raging online, with the expectation that iPhone users will in theory be able to insert any SIM card from any GSM provider worldwide.

If hackers are successful, it could easily unleash a worldwide frenzy of grey importing as iPod and Apple fans around the world try to get their hands on a iPhone long before their official release in other countries.

But Apple is known to not look upon such activity favorably at all, with the likely outcome being that Apple attempts to block any hacks or cracks through an iTunes and iPhone software update.

This could cause updated iPhones to stop working in other countries, causing grief for overseas iPhone owners and more work for hackers who will need to find new ways to play the cat and mouse game of hack and repair with Apple.

As rumors swirl that an updated 3G iPhone will appear in Europe rather than the existing EDGE model, and with the reviews all generally quite positive, the issue of being able to only buy the iPhone in the US will soon be eliminated as the iPhone starts going on sale worldwide.
But even when that happens, the issue of being able to use an iPhone without needing to have a phone contract will still be officially impossible, even though DVD Jon proves it’s easy.

With the iPhone barely more than a week old, the story and saga of the iPhone’s future is still being written, and what the iPhone’s conditions of use will look like with future versions is unknown.

For now, what we do know is that the hackers are no doubt causing Apple to iMoan internally about their vaunted iPhone, as hackers react to consumer demand to make the iPhone operate the way they want it to – not entirely the way that Apple wants.

iTWire

The Electronic Entertainment Expo, or E3, is also a chance for investors to look under the hood of a $30 billion global industry that rivals the movie and music businesses as it expands beyond a traditional audience of teenage boys.

This year’s E3 is forgoing the huge crowds, gaudy displays and scantily clad “booth babes” of years past in favor of smaller, more dignified proceedings scattered among venues in the Southern California seaside city of Santa Monica.

The biggest expectation is that Sony will slash the price of its PlayStation 3, which is stuck in last place among new gaming machines due to its $600 price tag and thin lineup of games.

However, if Sony does cut the PS3’s price by $100, the impact could be blunted if Microsoft responds by trimming prices on its own Xbox 360, which comes in three models now costing from $300 to $480.

“The biggest potential would be maybe announcement of price cuts for both the PS3 and the 360,” said Mike Hickey, an analyst with Janco Partners.

Nintendo almost certainly won’t tinker with its prices. Its Wii console is enjoying runaway success, outselling rivals by several times due in part to a $250 price that hits a sweet spot of mass-market affordability.

Instead, Nintendo may announce new features for the Wii or unveil a redesign of its popular DS handheld gaming device.

“The only thing I think Nintendo may announce is a headset and microphone for the Wii. They are also inching their way into online gaming. They are not as focused on communications as they should have been,” said Peer Schneider, vice president of content publishing for IGN, a games-oriented Web site.

Price cuts for two of the three consoles may be just the thing to juice sales and build a larger base of hardware ahead of the year-end holiday shopping season that accounts for more than half of the industry’s annual sales.

But Evan Wilson, an analyst with Pacific Crest, said Sony may not cut prices until just before the holidays. Sony already loses several hundred dollars on each PS3, and management’s drive to get the giant electronics company back on track financially may force it to stay the course on price.

“Any meaningful price cut on the PS3 would drag down the profitability of the game unit,” Wilson said.

Many are looking forward to checking out a dizzying array of new games at E3 that analysts think will mark a turning point for the industry after a longer-than-expected transition to new consoles.

“The migration to next-gen consoles has taken longer than expected, which is prolonging the early stages of this product lifecycle,” analyst Eric Handler wrote. “But an increasing slate of games being readied for market offers the potential for strong growth.”

A small sample of the titles expected to grab the spotlight this year includes Grand Theft Auto IV and Bioshock from Take-Two Interactive Software, Killzone from Sony, Super Smash Bros. Brawl from Nintendo, Rockband from Electronic Arts and rival music game Guitar Hero III from Activision.

“Last year was all about hardware. This year is software, and software drives hardware,” Hickey said. “In a few years, they’ll be selling software to a gigantic installed base and at a higher price point. The economics are phenomenal.”

The new game titles could be a catalyst for publisher shares, many of which have traded flat to lower this year.

Wilson of Pacific Crest estimates industry total revenue could jump 20 percent in 2007.

The fast growth is drawing increasing attention. Lehman Brothers recently began covering four major U.S. video game publishers, saying that returns in the industry were better than in all other media and entertainment sectors.

Electronic Arts and Activision are two favorite picks by analysts due to their broad array of games and strong movie tie-ins.

Investors have frowned upon publishers that are overly reliant on one or two hit games, such as Midway Games, which has dropped 10 percent this year and Konami, which has shed 23 percent.

Source