Hidden Camera Video Spy Pen Review

Original Sphere Pen Camera – Hidden Video Spy Pen in Silver-trimmed Black Executive Pen. A Sphere Gadget Technologies brand product. 640 x 480 pixel. 4GB. Comes in original Sphere gift box. Descriptions : NOTE: Please ensure you purchase from an authorized Sphere seller. Ensure the product you receive looks exactly as shown in the images. Customers have experienced receiving counterfeit Sphere products from unauthorized sellers and left negative reviews. ** The original SPHERE spy pen to catch your family and friends on video without them noticing! Encased in this elegant looking executive pen is a 2.0 megapixel CMOS lens that captures video in super-clear HQ 640 x 480 pixel resolution. Thanks to the Micron Chipset processor, video saves in a smooth 30 frames per seconds – the frame rate you get from most full-sized digital cameras! The SPHERE spy pen also takes JPEG still images at 1600 x 1200 photo resolution, all at the push of a button. 4GB of built-in internal memory that can store over 1 hour 30 minutes of video footage. Viewing and copying files is easy – unscrew the barrel of the pen to reveal the USB port which connects to your PC or MAC. No adapters/cables or drivers needed. Once connected, the unit becomes a conventional 4GB flash drive. Simply drag and copy files to transfer the video and images onto your computer in minutes! Turn pen tip to extend ballpoint pen to write just like any other pen. Perfect for sales, law enforcers, spy shopping, pranks, parties, spy games, home movies, internet fun, lawyers, evidence collection and more. *Compatible with most Windows PC and Apple MAC O/S. * Video files plays back under most video playing software including Windows Media Player, Quick Time, Real Player, VLC, WinDVD, PowerDVD and more. Also comes with KMplayer video playing software. **Built for performance, quality and reliability. —To protect your legal liability and interests, audio recording feature has been deliberately disabled in this model. Consequently, this product complies with 18 U.S.C. 2512 (criminal procedure: wiretapping law) making this the first and only LEGAL surveillance spy pen in the market today.

The original spy pen designed and developed by Sphere Gadgets Technologies. Version 3.51, new 2011 model.

4GB built-in flash drive allows more than 1.5 hour of HQ video data recording, or store up to 8,000 still pictures.

Powered by SGT’s Micron Chipset – the advanced video capture enchancement processing unit.

Inconspicuous hidden CMOS camera in pen offers steathy video recording at 640 x 480 pixel resolution, or

Plug-and-plays into your PC and/or MAC computers. Built-in Li-ion battery charged by USB from computer or wall socket.

Capture still images at 1600 x 1200 pixel resolution.

Compare of Original Sphere Pen Camera – Hidden Video Spy Pen in Silver-trimmed Black Executive Pen. A Sphere Gadget Technologies brand product. 640 x 480 pixel. 4GB. Comes in original Sphere gift box.

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All About Chrome OS Laptops

The spotlight on Day Two of the Google I/O developer event here in San Francisco was firmly on the company's Chrome OS. After six months in which only a prototype was available, laptops running Google's Chrome operating system will finally come to market for consumers, businesses and education. Two Chrome laptops, one made by Asus and one by Samsung, will be sold by Best Buy and Amazon in the US starting June 15. And Google announced inexpensive lease deals that will give businesses laptops and other infrastructure, support and end-of-life hardware replacements for just $28 per user per month.

The keynote was every bit as news-heavy and action-packed as the first day keynote: Google also unveiled some Chrome OS upgrades that give users more control over locally stored files, along with announcing several key HTML5-related updates to its Chrome browser. But the announcement that got some of the biggest cheers was this one: Angry Birds will become available as a desktop app in the Chrome Web Store!

The huge hall here at the Moscone Center was nearly full, with around 4,000 developers, media people and others.

Chrome Laptops for Consumers

The Samsung Chrome OS laptop will have a 12.1 inch display, "all-day" battery usage, Wi-Fi and an option for Verizon 3G service. The Wi-Fi only version will cost $429, while the 3G version will go for $499. The Acer Chrome Book will have an 11.6-inch screen and Wi-Fi, and will sell for "$349 and up."

Google's slogan for the Chromebooks is "Chromebook: Nothing but the web." The argument behind it is this: The Chromebook is almost completely an internet device. If you can do your work and access your content on the web, you don't need the virus updates, slow local services, and endless startup process that can plague a conventional PC.

But Google clearly knows that asking users to give up the security of a local hard drive and conventional desktop software is a hard sell. So it tried to make businesses a particularly compelling offer.
Google wants businesses to use the new Chromebooks to quickly and inexpensively update their laptops to run a modern OS. Google says half of all company-owned PCs in America still run Windows XP.

To make the Chromebooks fit in better in the office, Google is working on a "Chrome Box", a flat square box that connects Chromebooks to large monitors and company file systems.

And here's the kicker: Google says it is offering businesses the Chromebooks, the Chrome Box, full support, full warrantee service and automatic end-of-life equipment replacement at a price of $28 per month per user. (I think I heard a couple gasps around me when this was announced.)

In short, Google is seriously upping the ante in its challenge to Microsoft in the workplace. It's already making inroads with its Google Docs cloud-based productivity apps, but now it has dramatically sweetened its offer to provide the OS and even the hardware, too. At this price, Google's offer could be a very attractive to many businesses.

A similar offer is being extended to education, but the price per month per user for schools is only $20.
Improvements to OS

The biggest problem with the Chrome OS to date is that it's been so completely about the web that you really miss being able to do things like download and install apps or play music or video content on the local hard drive. You just couldn't do that in the first iteration of Chrome OS.

Knowing this Google appears to have made some real-world concessions in response to the problem. It has added a file manager, where you can store music and video files you've downloaded. There's also a new media player in the OS that you can use to play the content. This alone makes me want to give Chrome OS another chance.

Google says the OS will stream content from Hulu and Netflix and the new media manager will plug into the new Google Music Beta and Google Movies services. The OS handles photos better now too. Users can now plug in a camera to the Chromebook, move photos from the camera, then store them in the cloud.
Chrome Browser Improvements

The day wasn't all about the Chromebook. Google announced today several cool new HTML5 tricks for its Chrome browser. Google has been a strong proponent of HTML5, which it says developers can use to develop one version of a Website or service that will have advanced capabilities, and most importantly, work on "all modern browsers."

Google has built some impressive APIs for the Chrome browser that will help developers create cool web pages faster. For instance, developers can use a Google API to build voice recognition into their apps. Google says it has also improved the hardware acceleration of its browser, which revs up the graphics card in the PC to render highly dense, colorful animated graphics.
Google also made several announcements about its Web App Store, where Chrome users can grab apps to run in the Chrome browser. Google says that people spend twice as much time in Chrome apps compared with apps on other platforms, and make two and a half times more purchases within the apps.

When the guy who made Angry Birds took the stage here it was clear that the popular game had come to the desktop as a Chrome App. Huge applause. Developers, it appears, love Angry Birds too. (It occurred to me that employers everywhere should mourn the time and productivity that just went out the window with the announcement of a desktop-based game as addictive as Angry Birds.)

The only thing developers love more: Keeping as much money as possible from the sale of their apps. Google got uproarious applause with the announcement that it will take only a 5 percent flat commission on each app sold by a developer at the Web Store. Apple, by contrast, takes a 30 percent commission on app sales.

Finally, Google announced today that everybody in the room will be getting a Chromebook, so I will give it a thorough run-through and let you know if the "Web book" is finally, really, ready for prime time.

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Review HP EliteBook 8460p

HP's new EliteBook line looks much like models in the older EliteBook line, such as the EliteBook 8440w we reviewed 15 months ago. Yes, the external skin offers a more pleasing brushed aluminum aesthetic, but it's still a little clunky looking. You could call it the gray flannel suit of laptop computing.

The latest EliteBook 8460p is the smallest model in the EliteBook lineup, with a 14-inch screen and a weight of about 5.5 pounds. The new model is equipped with one of the latest-generation Intel Core CPUs. Our review unit carried a 2.5GHz Core i5 2520M with a maximum turbo boost speed of 3.2GHz. HP's configuration also included 4GB of RAM, Windows 7 Professional 64-bit edition, and a Radeon HD 6470M mobile GPU.

The Radeon HD 6470M is fully DirectX 11-compliant, but it's unlikely to give you much of a performance boost in current-generation DX11 games: Its 3DMark 2011 performance score is a modest 598. T play hardcore games, you'll have to dial down the resolution and detail settings substantially.

But the EliteBook 8460p is all about business, not play, and HP includes a robust package of software that caters to business users. HP ProtectTools, for example, gives end users and IT managers fine-grain control over security features, such as drive encryption and user login control. ProtectTools includes facial-recognition software that can work in concert with your Bluetooth-enabled phone to verify that the person logging in is really you.

HP Power Assistant is a reskinning of the Windows Power Management controls, but it isn't deeply buried and it's substantially more user-friendly than its predecessor. Like ProtectTools, Power Assistant supports remote management by IT system administrators, if the right HP management suite is running on the server.

The laptop's overall performance was about average for a system of its class, with a PC WorldBench 6 score of 124. Battery life is quite good, at well over 5 hours in the PCWorld Labs' battery life test.

The keyboard's feel is excellent, with good tactile feedback during touch-typing sessions. HP supplies both a pointing stick and a trackpad, plus two sets of buttons located to provide optimal support for each pointing device. Even though I'm a trackpad user, I liked having both sets of buttons at hand, since I could easily reach one button or another with different fingers while touch-typing. The trackpad is well-designed, too--not too sensitive and offering good support for multitouch-gesture recognition.

Another plus is the matte-finish LCD panel in place of a glossy glass display. Matte finishes sometimes yield somewhat muted color saturation, but the resulting display is much more usable because it minimizes reflections and glare. Video playback quality was excellent: DVD upscaling showed only a little edge enhancement, and we noted good detail levels on the native 1366-by-768-pixel screen. (HP also offers 1600 by 900 resolution as an option.) High-definition playback scaled down to native resolution looked very nice.

On the other hand, the overall audio quality through the built-in speakers was abysmal. Without the SRS audio enhancement software activated, maximum perceived sound levels were very low, and music had a tinny, grating quality. With SRS switched on, the speakers' perceived loudness went up, but the sound stage seemed muddy and treble was completely lost in the midrange. I played around with different settings, but ultimately I couldn't improve the music-listening experience. Surprisingly, movie audio quality was somewhat better, though still muddy sounding. I strongly recommend that you use headphones or external speakers if you plan on listening to a lot of music.

The EliteBook 8460p we tested shipped with a 320GB Hitachi hard drive and a DVD-recordable optical drive. The hard drive seemed a bit sluggish, and the system took several minutes to boot. HP does offer larger-capacity hard-disk drives as well as several solid-state drive options. On the optical front, you can add Blu-ray as an option.

The system comes with plenty of connections, including a USB 2.0 port on the right side that's designed to make charging USB-connected mobile devices easier. The other USB 2.0 port on the right is a combo eSATA port. Two SuperSpeed (USB 3.0) ports are on the left side.

The left side also houses an ExpressCard slot, a four-pin FireWire connector, and the optical drive. A VGA connector, ethernet, and an actual V.92 modem connector is built into the back. A full-size DisplayPort connector is available on the right side, as are a pair of audio mini-jacks--one input and one output. Our unit shipped with 802.11n, Bluetooth, and gigabit ethernet. Cell-phone-style mobile broadband cards are available as an extra-cost add-on.

The preconfigured model of the 8460p delivered to PCWorld is priced at $1199--a touch high for a midrange business class laptop with its configuration and performance. However, it's price is considerably lower than that of any custom-configured unit.

Overall, the HP EliteBook 8460p offers decent performance, a good display, and a great keyboard in an unassuming exterior design. The price for preconfigured models is reasonable, given some of the system management features built into the EliteBook. So if you're looking for a fairly light business-class all-purpose laptop that gets the job done without being flashy, the 8460p deserves closer inspection. Just remember to bring your own headphones.



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Mini Wireless Spy Camera 2.4GHz Color Spycam

Introducing the World's Smallest "Truly Wireless" COLOR Spy Camera. Measuring about the size of a dime, concealing this camera is not a problem. The transmitter uses the 2,400MHz "switch phase" circuitry to GUARANTEE no interference from cordless phones.

Digital circuitry ensures no lost video from external wireless devices. Range is a minimum of 300 feet through walls. In an open area the transmission range jumps up to 600 feet.

The color sensor is Sharp brand so you can expect excellent quality. The best performing color wireless cmos camera on the market, PERIOD.

Feature :

Operation is SIMPLE. Anyone can use this amazing wireless camera.
Simply snap a 9 volt battery onto the camera/transmitter unit
Attach The Wireless Receiver To Your VCR or Television
THAT IS ALL THERE IS TO IT!


Covert video surveillance has never been easier. With the ability to use a single 9 volt battery, concealment is no problem. Hide in a plant, a book, a video case, air vent, automobile, the only requirement is to make sure the small pinhole lens is facing the video surveillance target. When properly placed, the wide camera angle will give you a complete view of a normal size room.


Spesification :


Color 420 Line Sharp Sensor @ 2 Lux
600 Foot (line of sight) Range
300 Foot (through walls) Range
Operates on a Single 9 Volt Battery
Matching 2.4GHz Wireless Receiver Included
Size = 2/3" Cube
Field Of View 80 Degrees
Pinhole Style Lens
NTSC (U.S.A.) Video System


Usage :


Nanny Camera
Residential Surveillance
Small Business Surveillance
Automobile Security / Back-Up Camera
R/C Enthusiast in Airplanes and Helicopters
Motorcycle Helmet Camera
Great For Any Application Requiring Small Size and Portable Use


Content :

1 Full Color Miniature Wireless Video Camera
1 Perfectly Matched 2.4GHz Wireless Receiver
1 Video Cable For Receiver To VCR/TV Hook Up
2 9V Battery Clips for Camera and Receiver
Satisfaction of Owning The World's Smallest Color Wireless Camera





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Hidden Spy Camera Sunglasses DVR Camera Video TF Card Black Red Blue

Specification

• Product Name: 2GB 4GB 8GB Hidden Spy Camera Sunglasses DVR Camera Video TF Card Black Red Blue
• Effective: 2011-05-20 - 2011-06-19
• Item Code: g153012278
• Catalog: Spy Sunglasses
• Package Size: 30 * 30 * 20 ( cm )
• G.W./package: 1.500 (kg)
• Short Description: 2GB 4GB 8GB Hidden Spy Camera Sunglasses DVR Camera Video TF Card Black Red Blue Grey DVR68 freeshipping
  2GB 4GB 8GB Hidden Spy Camera Sunglasses DVR Camera Video TF Card Black Red Blue Grey DVR68

Description

Features:
Support several audio formats, e.g. wmv, mp3, wma, and other music formats.
Polaroid Lens from brand makers
User friendly operation button for easy control
With extended memory slot for TF/MicroSD Card
Easy connection with PC/Laptops, no driver needed
Built-in 2GB memory with extended memory for as long as 5 hours video recording
Sleek and elegant design suits for both men and women users
Real time recording
Recommended for journalists, traffic , travelers and students
Product Specifications:
Product Size 170mm x 160mm x 40mm
Physical weight 39grams
Speed Read>700kbs, write>500kbs
USB 2.0
Power supply Embedded 550mAh Li-polymer Battery
Power duration 4-5 hours
Power Adapter 5V DC/500mAh
Power Consumption <0.4W
Memory Built-in 2GB-8GB, Support TF/MicroSD card, .4GB
Resolution 640x480 1.3mage photo :1280*1024
Video Format AVI
Recording Speed 30fps
Working temperature 0°C - 60°C
Storage temperature -20°C - 80°C
Player Quicktime, Real player, codec
Menu Language English
Operating System Windows 98/ /XP/2000/Vista



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Hands On With the Samsung Chromebook Series 5

Hang on, folks, because mobile computing has just got a bit more interesting. Google’s Chrome OS is finally ready for the wild--two years after its launch—and the Samsung Chromebook Series 5, due out on June 15, will be one of two laptops to showcase Google’s Web-based operating system.
When Chrome OS was first announced two years ago, I wondered if we really needed another mobile OS. Many of my questions still stand, especially given the runaway success of Android. But after taking the Samsung Chromebook Series 5 for a spin tonight, I was pleasantly surprised to see how far some aspects of the laptop and its OS have come.

From the outside, the Chromebook looks like any other ultralight laptop, save for the Google Chrome logo on the outside cover. It measures 11.6 by 8.6 by 0.8 inches, compact, but not especially svelte.
Its weight doesn’t impress, either. At 3.3 pounds, it’s no featherweight like the Apple MacBook Air; however, at least the Chromebook felt deceptively lighter than it is, a phenomenon I’d credit to how well-balanced the laptop felt in hand. I was surprised by how easily I could grip the Chromebook in one hand, actually.

One of the big selling points of Chromebook is its near-instant-on capability. It starts up in under 10 seconds from a cold boot, and it's ready to use as soon as you open the lid to wake it from sleep. The latter mirrors the sense of immediacy one gets with a Google Android 3.0 tablet, but that cold boot time remains an important differentiator. Android continues to have overhead bottlenecks that cause startup and shutdown times to take some time. None of the Android 3.0 tablets I’ve tested have wowed me with their boot times; and for a couple, I literally was able to grab some iced tea and down half of it before the tablet came to life again.

While some of the Chromebook’s startup zippiness has to be credited to the design of Google’s Chrome OS, some of it, perhaps, could be due to the components inside. The Series 5 actually runs components that echo today’s netbooks: It has a 1.66GHz dual-core Intel Atom N570 processor, 2GB of RAM, and a 16GB mSATA SSD (used for caching data locally). Those specs are meatier than what you’ll find in an Android tablet today.

Physical connectivity on the Series 5 Chromebook is minimal. All ports along the sides are tucked away beneath covers, except for a lone USB 2.0 port at the far right rear of the laptop. You get an SDHC card slot at front, another USB 2.0 port beneath a cover at the left, a video-out port, and a full-size SIM card slot (on the 3G-capable white and titanium models). The 3.5mm headphone jack doubles as a microphone input as well; and the Chromebook has a 1-megapixel Webcam for video chat.
The island-style keyboard felt very roomy and comfortable for my touch-typist fingers. I liked the smooth and roomy trackpad as well; it wasn’t stiff, as I’ve found with other touchpads that double as the mouse buttons. The keyboard swaps out the function keys of yore for a row of browser-friendly keys, though the idea of having navigation buttons like page back, page forward, refresh, and new window situated so far up on the keyboard seems like it may be counterproductive (I’d prefer such keys to be more handily situated, but I’ll need more time with the laptop to tell how well they work in practice).

I was encouraged at the Google I/O keynote introducing the Chromebook to hear about the file manager that’s been added to Chromebook. I’ve been tracking the challenges of native file handling in mobile operating systems, and was eager to give this feature a try on Chromebook.

My torture test was simple: I pulled out a random USB drive and attached it to the USB port. Chrome OS quickly recognized external storage was attached, and up popped the file manager as another tab in the Chrome browser on-screen. I was able to view my folders and files, select a file, preview the image in a pane at right, or double-click to open the image.

The high-resolution images didn’t always automatically resize to fit the screen (as they do when you double-click on a photo in Microsoft Windows Explorer and open it Window Photo Viewer), but they looked good on the 12.1-inch, 1280 by 800 pixel display. Really good. Colors were vibrant and accurately rendered--no small trick, as we’ve seen from Android 3.0’s snafus. The file manager remains limited for now--the version I used lacked the ability to do basic file copy functions--but a Google rep promised that functionality will be in place soon.
While nosing around the Chrome OS interface, I looked at how apps appear in the Chrome browser (see the image above) I also tried replicating my usual Web browsing experience in the Chromebook’s Chrome browser. (Hrm. I think I just tested how many times one can put Chrome into a sentence.) The usage I was trying to gauge here was the scenario that sees 30-some-odd tabs open simultaneously--and that’s just in one window. While I learned about a couple of interface shortcuts, like jumping to a different tab by pressing the tab number and a key combo, while talking with Google reps about this scenario, I learned that right now, it’s not easy to move among scores of open tabs. Those tabs were reduced down to tiny tabs with just “…” as a tab identifier—and that’s no way to figure out what’s actually on that tab.

Considering these tabs will, in the Chrome OS universe, represent your open documents, media files, applications, and Web pages, this is an interface challenge that Google will need to crack, and soon. Google reps said that several approaches are being considered, but nothing has been nailed down as yet. Of course, this is where Chromebook and Chrome OS’s regular updates, currently scheduled for once every six weeks, will come in handy.

I’m not convinced that everyone will want, or even need, a Chromebook. But what I saw so far looks to have promise. And with pricing for Samsung’s models starting at $430 for the Wi-Fi version, and $499 for the 3G version, the Chromebok looks set to give standard netbooks and ultralight laptops some new competition.



Source : http://www.pcworld.com

Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1: Everything There Is To Know

The Android tablet race is about to get a dashing new contender.
Samsung's Galaxy Tab 10.1 will officially launch next week, the company announced on Thursday. The Galaxy Tab will go on sale in New York City on June 8, with a limited number of units available at the Best Buy in Union Square. The device will reach stores nationwide nine days later, on June 17th.


So what's Samsung's new Galaxy Tab all about, and is it right for you? Take a quick scan of the high points -- and the low ones -- and see what you think.

Samsung's Galaxy Tab 10.1 design has certainly earned a lot of attention. The company originally unveiled the device in February -- then, after seeing Apple's iPad 2, decided to pull back the product and go back to square one.

The new Galaxy Tab is billed as the world's thinnest tablet, beating out Apple's offering by a hair: The 10.1 Tab is 8.6 millimeters thick compared to the iPad 2's 8.8-millimeter size. The Galaxy Tab is also slightly lighter, at 565 grams compared to the iPad 2's 601-gram weight.

Look, when it comes down to it, the differences are pretty -- shall we say -- slim. The point is this: The Galaxy Tab is really freakin' thin. Capisce?
Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1: The Hardware

Size aside, the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 rocks a Nvidia Tegra 2 1GHz dual-core processor along with 1GB of RAM. It has a 3MP camera on the back and a 2MP camera on the front. The Tab can record video at 720p with 30 frames per second.

The new Tab's 10.1-inch screen has a resolution of 1280-by-800 pixels. Its battery, a 7000 mAh unit, is said to be good for nine hours of continuous use on a single charge.
Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1: The Software

Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 Tablet

The Galaxy Tab 10.1 ships with Android 3.1, the latest version of Google's Honeycomb OS. In an interesting twist, Samsung is shipping the tablets with Google's stock Android software -- but plans to update them at some point "in the near future" to add in its proprietary TouchWiz UI. Depending on your perspective, this may be a good or a bad thing.

Like most Android devices, the Galaxy Tab 10.1 fully supports playback of Adobe Flash content.
Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1: The Storage

Samsung's Galaxy Tab 10.1 comes in both 16GB and 32GB models. Neither model supports external storage via microSD, according to a Samsung representative.
Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1: The Pricing

Samsung's 16GB Wi-Fi Galaxy Tab 10.1 will cost $499. The 32GB Wi-Fi model will cost $599. You can place a pre-order at any Best Buy store beginning June 8 (only the New York City Union Square store will have them in-stock on that day). Starting June 17, the tablets will be available nationwide at Best Buy, Fry's, Amazon, Micro Center, Tiger Direct, and New Egg. Sprint will also be selling the Wi-Fi tablets later this summer.

If Wi-Fi doesn't cut it for you, Verizon Wireless will soon offer 4G versions of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 as well. The 16GB 4G model will cost $529.99 with a two-year contract; the 32GB version will cost $629.99 with a two-year contract. Verizon is currently accepting pre-orders but has yet to announce when the 4G models will ship; a spokesperson tells me a date should be announced sometime "in the coming weeks."

Source : http://www.pcworld.com

Acer Aspire 8950G Aspires to Multimedia Greatness

When I first hauled out the Acer Aspire 8950G from the backpack, I almost dropped it--not because it was that heavy, but because it was lighter than expected. This massive (I hesitate to say "notebook") desktop replacement system sports an 18.4-inch, true 1080p LCD panel. At 8 pounds, 5 ounces without the power brick, it's lighter than some smaller systems that have been through the lab here. Even with the 120-watt power supply, the weight falls just a little short of 10 pounds.
It's still too big to carry around, but it could make for a useful living room PC. The system includes an Intel Core i7 2630M quad-core CPU clocking in at 2GHz and maxing out at a Turbo Boost clock of 2.9GHz. The CPU is complemented by 8GB of DDR3 DRAM and 64-bit Windows Home Premium. Driving that big, bright LCD panel is an AMD Radeon HD Mobility 6850M discrete GPU with 2GB of GDDR5 video RAM. Given the GPU's pedigree, I expected greatness when it comes to gaming performance as well as reasonably good video playback quality.

The game tests brought me back to earth, however. The Aspire 8950G is a cut above many laptops when it comes to overall gaming performance, but you'll still need to dial back graphics settings to about "medium" to get good frame rates in current-generation games. Far Cry 2 ran at 44 frames per second (DX10, "optimal" settings), while the recently released DiRT3 mustered 20 fps, and Total War: Shogun 2 eked out only 16 fps. (These tests were run with all graphics settings maxed out, but antialiasing disabled.)

Performance in desktop applications proved robust, however, with the unit earning a strong WorldBench 6 score of 128. The battery life of this massive unit was a surprisingly good at 4 hours, 41 minutes. The 750GB, 5400-rpm Toshiba hard drive is capacious, but seems a little slow on bootup. A system like this deserves a Blu-ray drive, and Acer delivers one, in the form of a Panasonic unit that doesn't generate a lot of distracting seek noise.

The keyboard has a good feel, with nicely done tactile feedback, but the layout could be better. The arrow navigation keys are tiny and clustered tightly together. The dedicated numeric keypad, however, offers widely separated keys, making its use as a 10-key pad easy.

While the keyboard is mostly good, the trackpad is mostly bad. It's extremely sensitive, and you'll often see the mouse cursor flying wildly across the screen. That's partially curable via some control-panel settings. However, someone at Acer decided that building media control keys into the glass surface of the trackpad is a good idea.

It's not. Really, it's not.

You can use the trackpad either as a pointing device or as a set of media-control touch-sensitive buttons, but not at the same time. This feature is toggled via a gigantic button placed between the two main mouse buttons. That means you can accidentally enable the media control keys all too easily, and suddenly your mouse isn't responsive. Unless you're looking at the trackpad, you won't know why. Luckily, the big volume-control wheel directly beneath the trackpad works whether or not the media-control feature is enabled.

The handling of standard-definition video scaled up to the full 1080p resolution of the screen is a mixed bag. DVD playback seems noisy, though edge enhancement is thankfully minimal. Blu-ray high-definition playback looks much better, but overall video quality is still a touch soft.

Audio sounds fairly good through the built-in speakers. Acer ships this model with Dolby audio-enhancement software, which helps movie playback substantially--the virtual surround sound works fairly well, though the surround "speakers" are still more front than rear. You still don't get much bass, though, so low-frequency effects are often missing. Music playback is less robust. In stereo mode, vocals take on a dirty, edgy quality, though the speakers sound fairly good in pop and rock.

The Acer 8950G is a capable digital media system that can handle current-generation DirectX 11 games if you're willing to dial down detail settings a bit. High-definition playback is generally pretty good, but not exceptional. At roughly $1500 as configured (price as of June 7, 2011), it's a balanced set of compromises that falls short of perfection, but gets the job done.



Source :http://www.pcworld.com

Asus EeePC 1215B: Netbook or Ultraportable?

It's an ultraportable, it's a netbook, it's an ultraportable, it's a netbook... Judging by its size, screen real estate, and features, Asus's 3.3-pound Eee PC 1215B is an ultraportable. However, it's priced at only $450 and sold as part of Asus's netbook line. Alas, the performance of its AMD Fusion E-350 CPU just muddies the waters further; while significantly above average for a netbook, it falls well below the norm for ultraportable laptops.


Whether considered as an underpowered ultraportable or a supersized netbook, the Eee PC 1215B is a well-designed, comfortable-to-use laptop. A thoughtful combination of matte and glossy blacks gives the unit a sedate but classy overall appearance. The status lights are out of the way on the front of the unit, and the power button, while directly underneath the display, is dim enough that it won't intrude on your viewing experience. The keyboard is a tad on the soft and quiet side but still quite easy to type on. The touchpad offers excellent response as well, and its restrained silver trim makes it easy to locate on the keyboard deck, though the rocker button is a tad stiff.

The 1215B's 1366 by 768 display delivers a sharp image with a decent if not overly impressive amount of usable brightness. However, the backlight on our test unit bled badly on the upper left corner, to the point of distraction. Whether this is a one-off defect or a design flaw, we don't know, but check yours out before you leave the store.

The 1215B's port array is considerably above average: It includes, besides two USB 2.0 ports, an always-on USB 3.0 port, VGA and HDMI ports, an SC card slot, audio in and out, and a Kensington lock port. Connectivity is comprehensive, if not quite state of the art. Bluetooth is on board to accompany the Wi-Fi and ethernet; however, the Wi-Fi is single-band 2.4GHz only, and the ethernet is 10/100, not gigabit. The specs on Asus's site claim a/b/g/n wireless, but the hardware IDs in Device Manager showed that its Broadcom chip is the 4313, which supports only b/g/n. Asus has confirmed that U.S. versions of the 1215B are b/g/n only.

As to the tweener performance: The 1215B's WorldBench score of 52 is well above the Atom-powered netbook norm, but far slower than that delivered by the Intel Core processors found in many ultraportables, and even slightly slower than the other Fusion E-350-powered units we've tested.

Being slower than other E-350s is more likely due to the number of background applications and services, rather than to the healthy 2GB of memory or the capacious 320GB, 5400-rpm Seagate ST932032 hard drive. Note: if you're thinking of installing a solid-state drive, the 1215B is old-school in burying the hard drive within the body of the unit. The task of removing it is clearly daunting enough that I dropped the idea.

The 1215B's gaming frame rates are a huge tease. With midtwenties frames per second at medium detail on less-stressful games, it gives just enough performance to invoke wistful thoughts of what might have been. As it is, most modern games are unplayable. On the other hand, the Eee PC 1215B played every video stutter-free, even high-def 1080p, at high bit rates. By comparison, the Webcam is pixel-challenged, providing only 320 by 240 resolution.

Software detritus sitting atop the 1215B's Windows 7 Home Premium operating system includes the Bing toolbar and quite a few Asus utilities, although most are actually somewhat useful and not sucking up a lot or space or CPU cycles. Microsoft Office 2010 Starter is on board as well as Trend Micro's Titanium antimalware software.

Battery life on the Eee PC 1215B is hardly record-breaking, but decent enough given the chipset and performance: 5.5 hours is about enough to get you from coast to coast if you don't tax the unit unduly.

If you're looking for the ultraportable form factor and ergonomics without the ultraportable cost, then the Asus Eee PC 1215B is a product you should consider. The performance is middling at best, but for everyday chores and video, it's more than adequate.



Source : http://www.pcworld.com

Toshiba Portege R700: Super Slim, Super Fast, Super Hot

Toshiba's new Portégé R700 surprised me with its mature styling, serious muscle, and ridiculously light heft. Despite being a true ultraportable, this machine is quite powerful--Toshiba somehow even fit an optical drive on it! But a few unpleasant surprises make the whopping $1599 price tag less appealing.

The 13.3- inch laptop accommodates three USB plugs (one a USB/eSATA combo), headphone/microphone jacks, an HDMI plug, a VGA plug, an ethernet port, a memory stick port, an optical drive, a 128GB solid-state drive, a Core i7 620M running at 2.67GHz, and 4GB of RAM--all tucked into a 12.44-by-8.94-by-0.66-inch frame weighing 3.2 pounds (the rear of the unit fattens out to a width of just over 1 inch). That's power to spare for most on-the-go users, as reflected in an excellent WorldBench 6 score of 128. Factor in a battery life of almost 6 hours, and you have the makings of a pretty awesome ultraportable laptop.


The screen is a reasonably good LED-backlit matte LCD, filling out a resolution of 1366 by 768 easily enough. Colors were good, but the R700 struggles to fill large black areas in video. The Intel HD integrated graphics solution is more than adequate for playing modest video; it even playing through the HDMI port without difficulty. Horizontal viewing angles are excellent, but vertical viewing angles most certainly aren't. The audio can't fill a room, the speakers get a bit shrill at high volume, and there's no bass to speak of--so rely on the headphone jack instead.


The laptop's black plastic interior complements its black metal lid. The "Toshiba" emblazoned on the lid itself, and the two hinges provide silver accents. Almost everything feels very sturdy, and the keys have remarkably little flex. The display lid, however, is a bit too thin and flexible.


The R700's gigantic touchpad invites occasional accidental contact, but none of the touchpad responses I triggered slowed my work on the machine significantly. If it does become an annoyance, you can tap a handy little button between the keyboard and the touchpad to deactivate the touchpad altogether (or to toggle it back on).


Unfortunately, this laptop has three major drawbacks. Foremost among these is the keyboard, whose Chiclet-style keys are incredibly far apart and mushy to the touch. Second, the powerful technology packed in the small space generated quite a bit of heat along the left edge and bottom of the machine. And third, the fan used to dissipate the heat was noisy. For me, these shortcomings made using the R700 less comfortable, but they weren't deal breakers.


The R700 is a fantastic machine for a specific niche: laptop users who want to combine lots of power with extremely light weight. If you want to change the specific components, Toshiba makes it very easy to customize your machine when you order it (I would drop the solid-state drive in favor of a bit more storage on a traditional hard-disk drive, for example).






Source : http://www.pcworld.com

HP Pavilion dv7t Quad Edition Laptop $875

HP's dv7t Quad Edition laptop runs on the new Intel second-generation Core i7 CPU and comes with goodies like a Blu-ray player, HDMI connection, and a 6GB of RAM. It's loaded with Windows 7 Home Premium and has a 17.3-inch display. When we reviewed the first dv7t, we deemed it "high-octane performance in an extremely shiny package.

The HP dv7t Quad Edition usually starts at $1250 for a base model, but you can use coupon code NBQ5286 at checkout and pay only $875. Shipping is free





Source : http://www.pcworld.com

HTC Sensation 4G Review

The HTC Sensation 4G ($200 with a two-year contract from T-Mobile) pretty much has it all: a dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, the latest version of Android (Gingerbread), and 4G speeds on T-Mobile's HSPA+ network. When I first played with Sensation 4G, I was blown away by its beautiful hardware, gorgeous display, and slick user interface. After spending a few days with the phone, my opinion of it hasn't changed; but I did run into some troubling issues with its antenna.
Death Grip Issues?
There has been quite a bit of rumbling about the possibility that the Sensation 4G has "death grip" issues similar to those that plagued the iPhone 4. Sites are reporting that when you hold the Sensation in a certain way, you can lose Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and 4G connectivity. According to a Swedish Website called Nordic Hardware, the problems occur when you lay the phone flat in the palm of your hand.

I decided to take matters into my own hands (no pun intended) and conduct a series of informal tests in which I mimicked the way that the Nordic Hardware folks held the Sensation 4G in this video. I streamed a movie trailer over 4G from HTC Watch and managed to choke the video three times during playback, though I had to move my hands around quite a bit and grip the phone to kill the 4G signal and send the video into buffer mode. When I performed the same test over Wi-Fi, I couldn't kill the Wi-Fi signal, no matter how hard I tried.

I also tested T-Mobile's HSPA+ network in various parts of San Francisco, using the FCC-approved Ookla app. Again, I found that how I held the phone seemed to affect its data speeds. In three tests conducted in the South Park neighborhood of San Francisco, I recorded an average download speed of 1.82 megabits per second and an average upload speed of 0.79 mbps when I held the phone by its edges. But in three tests immediately afterward in the same location, this time with my hand covering the phone's back cover in the "death grip," the phone delivered an average download speed of 0.83 mbps and an average upload speed of 0.64 mbps. These test results suggest that holding the phone in a certain way may have contributed to the observed degradation in data speeds.

One caveat: T-Mobile does not have a very strong 4G signal in the South Park neighborhood of San Francisco (where PCWorld's offices are located). When I asked the company about these issues, HTC replied, "Every phone experiences a slight variation in signal strength when the antenna is covered in its entirety by a palm or fingers, however under normal circumstances this does not affect the performance of the phone."

I view my test results as worrisome, but not conclusive. We will be conducting more of our own tests over the next few days. Stay tuned for a video and our test results.

Thin, Curved Design

I love the way HTC unibody phones look and feel, but it's getting hard to distinguish one from another, with their solid gray or black battery covers. Thankfully, HTC has mixed up the color scheme with a tritone paneled battery cover for the Sensation 4G.

You'll also feel a change in design when you hold the Sensation 4G. Despite having a 4.3-inch display, the phone doesn't feel oversize. Large phones such as the HTC EVO Shift 4G and the HTC ThunderBolt are wider and more difficult for me to use (I have small hands). The qHD display technology allows the phone to be relatively narrow, so it's easier to hold and use in one hand. Measuring 4.96 by 2.57 by 0.44 inches, the Sensation 4G is quite thin as well. And because the display is slightly concave, it won't get scratched if you place it face down on a table.

The Sensation 4G's 4.3-inch Quarter High Definition display has a resolution of 960 by 540 pixels arranged in a 16:9 aspect ratio. That resolution is one-quarter of a full-HD 1080p frame (hence the name), or three-quarters of a 720p frame. The HTC EVO 3D for Sprint, which we saw at CTIA last month, has a qHD display, too, but it uses a parallax barrier to create 3D images.

The screen on the Sensation 4G yielded spectacular images: Colors were bright yet not oversaturated, details looked sharp, and animations in the user interface--and native video--played back smoothly. In bright sunlight, however, the display completely fades. Don't phone manufacturers know that people need to use their phones outdoors sometimes? I had a very hard time finding a phone number to let some friends know that I was outside their apartment.

You'll find the usual touch-sensitive buttons below the display: Home, Menu, Back, and Search. The headphone jack and the power/lock button sit at the top of the phone. A very long chrome volume rocker occupies the left spine, with the micro-USB port situated below it. The left spine and the bottom of the phone are bare. Note that there is no HDMI port or MHL port for connecting the Sensation 4G to your HDTV.

New Sense User Interface

Like the EVO 3D, the Sensation 4G sports the latest version of the Sense user interface, with Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) running underneath. Sense is the prettiest of the Android overlays, and the latest version has some sweet features.

One of these features is a new customizable lock screen, which works similarly to the newly announced lock screen in iOS 5. You can pick a theme for your lock screen (the phone offers quite a few of them to choose from) and then select four apps that you visit most frequently. When you turn on your phone, you'll see the four apps at the bottom of the screen. To unlock the screen, simply drag the circle into position over an app, at which point you'll jump straight to that app. Thanks to this feature, you don't have to go through multiple menus to reach your e-mail or other frequently accessed items.

The new version of Sense has a spruced-up Walls system, too. Rather than having to flick back and forth between your walls, as you do in the stock Android operating system, you can flick the Sensation 4G's screen to make the walls spin. The effect is reminiscent of a rotating carousel. And like the older version of Sense, you can pinch anywhere in your homescreen to see thumbnail-size images of your walls.

You'll find a clutch of new widgets in Sense, but my favorite is the gorgeous new Weather widget. HTC has a solid tradition of creating visual weather apps, and it's nice to see the company continue to improve them.

Multimedia

The Sensation 4G also comes loaded with HTC's new movie and TV show streaming service, Watch. You can download videos from Watch and start viewing them immediately. Watch is well integrated into Sense, so finding the videos that you want to view is easy. The app's interface is clean, and movies are easy to find, but the library is pretty sparse at this point. You'll find some newly released movies like Due Date and some classics like Top Gun. If you're looking for something in particular, though, you're not likely to find it (no Spinal Tap!). A few popular TV shows like Chuck and Gossip Girl show up, but you're limited to one or two seasons of episodes.

On the plus side, video from Watch played back smoothly and looked great on the Sensation 4G's display. Audio accompanying the video sounded crisp and clear when piped through the Sensation's external speakers, with ample volume.

Unfortunately, the Netflix Android app is not yet available for the Sensation 4G. Watch has potential, but HTC needs to add more content to keep customers happy.

Camera

HTC Sensation smartphone: indoor photo.Like the EVO 3D and the ThunderBolt, the Sensation has a back-facing 8-megapixel camera and a front-facing camera for video chat. HTC says that it has tweaked both the hardware and the software to improve the back-facing camera's shutter speed. I noticed and appreciated the quicker speed in my hands-on tests. It doesn't matter how good a camera's image quality is if the device suffers from shutter lag, since the delay makes snapping photos of people or animals incredibly difficult.

Colors in my outdoor photos looked vivid yet natural. Details could have been sharper, but HTC Sensation smartphone: outdoor photo.overall, I was very pleased with how the snapshots turned out. Photos taken indoors also looked pretty good. There was a bit of a dark cast to the colors, but details were fairly sharp, even when the photo was blown up. The flash does a decent job of lighting up photos without completely blowing them out (except for whites, as evidenced by the middle Furby's chest in the test photo above).

You can shoot video in 1080p thanks to the dual-core processor, but I was disappointed with its overall quality. Playback was choppy, and the colors had a strange cast to them.

Performance

Call quality over T-Mobile's network was fairly good. A few of my friends reported that my voice sounded somewhat muffled. One reported that the background noise (traffic and wind) was quite distracting during our call.

Thanks to the dual-core Snapdragon processor, the Sensation 4G handled every app I threw at it perfectly. Angry Birds Rio played smoothly and looked terrific on the phone's lovely display. Even when I had multiple apps open, the Sensation 4G did not seem to slow down.

We haven't had a chance to formally test this HTC phone's battery life. Its 1,520mAh lithium ion battery has a vendor-rated talk time of 8.3 hours and up to 12 days of standby time. My unit went a full day of heavy testing before I had to recharge it.

Bottom Line

If you're in the market for a new phone this summer, you face a tough decision: There are a lot of hot phones available. Hey, that's not a bad thing at all! The Sensation 4G has some impressive specs and a gorgeous design, and I love the new updates in the Sense user interface.

The phone's possible antenna issues are disturbing. As we learned from the Apple iPhone 4 fiasco, trying to avoid holding a phone in a certain way is not a reasonable limitation to impose on users. And though I had to try to kill the Sensation 4G's signal, I succeeded in doing it. We'll be doing more testing in coming days. For now, I recommend the HTC Sensation 4G, but you should be aware that antenna problems could interfere with your data speed.



Source : http://www.pcworld.com

Chrome OS is here. The Series 5 from Samsung is the first of the so-called Chromebooks, and I'm not sure it's exactly what we all had in mind when Google announced Chrome OS two years ago. Back then, our imaginations pictured computers that were thinner and lighter than those with enough horsepower to run Windows. We thought we would see computers running on ARM processors, not just x86. We were promised it would look like the Chrome browser with "a new windowing system." Frankly, I'm not sure we really knew what to expect. But if someone had told us, back then, that the first Chromebook would be a large and simple netbook that does little more than run only the Chrome browser, I don't think we would have made such a big deal about Google producing its own operating system.
The Hardware

ASUS G53SW-A1 Full Review

ASUS has shrunk down its popular 17.3-inch G73 gaming notebook into a more manageable 15.6-inch size with the introduction of its G53SW. Is this travel-friendly gaming laptop as impressive as its bigger brother? We find out.
ASUS G53SW-A1 review unit has the following specifications:

• 15.6-inch 1080p (1920x1080) glossy panel with LED backlighting
• Intel "Sandy Bridge" Core i7-2630QM quad-core processor (2.0GHz~2.9GHz Turbo Boost, 6MB cache, 45W TDP)
• Intel HM65 chipset
• Nvidia GeForce GTX 460M graphics w/ 1.5GB GDDR5 dedicated memory
• 8GB DDR3-1333 dual-channel RAM (2x 4GB, supports up to 16GB - 4x 4GB)
• 750GB 7200RPM Seagate hard drive (ST975042AS)
• Atheros AR9002WB-1N wireless network adapter
• Integrated Bluetooth wireless
• DVD burner (HL-DT-ST DVDRAM GT34N)
• 8-cell li-ion battery (14.4V, 5200mAh, 74Wh)
• 1x USB 3.0 port
• Backlit chiclet keyboard
• Weight: 8.1 lbs.
• Dimensions: 15.5 x 11.75 x 2.13 inches
• Two-year warranty with one-year accidental damage protection
• MSRP: $1,499

The G53 packs a punch, especially with the second-generation Intel Core i7 quad-core processor, 8GB of RAM, and its powerful Nvidia GTX 460M graphics card with a whopping 1.5GB of its own memory. The two-year warranty with one year of accidental damage protection is also worth noting; most competitors do not offer this kind of coverage standard.
Build and Design
The G53SW is essentially a shrunken version of ASUS' larger and extremely popular 17.3-inch G73JH and G73JW gaming notebooks. The notebook's design imitates a stealth bomber aircraft, especially the rear with its recessed and upward-angled cooling exhaust ports. The G53SW is quite unique; the only notebooks that likely get more attention from onlookers are Alienware laptops.
Most of the G53SW's touchable surfaces are covered in a rubber finish, which feels great and adds to the long-term durability. The notebook is appreciably absent of glossy plastic. The G53SW is constructed entirely of plastic. The plastic is reasonably thick and does not make a cheap sound when tapped by a fingernail. The chassis is acceptably stiff but can be flexed by twisting the corners. The areas around the chassis are solid though cave in slightly under pressure.
The lid is attached the chassis via one large hinge. It is possible to open the lid with one hand. The lid flexes rather easily; additionally, the hinge could be a bit more supportive since the display can move around a bit. I also wish the display tilted back further. Fit and finish is good; there are no rough or unfinished edges. The overall build quality is above average; the lid could be sturdier, but otherwise there are no concerns.
Upgrading the G53SW is possible but not easy. Accessing the RAM and hard drive requires removing the keyboard, the palm rest, and several screws; then the bottom panel will pop off. The G53SW actually has two hard drive bays, though most configurations only come with a single drive.
Ports and Features
The G53SW has an average amount of ports for a 15.6-inch notebook; a larger variety would be appreciated. It lacks an ExpressCard slot and eSATA. All picture descriptions are left to right.



Source : http://www.notebookreview.com