Image from Engadget

I have to be honest – I have become quite numb in reading about all the new tablets coming out, especially the Android ones. They all seem similiar, yet only one or two stand out, like the Motorola Xoom. I am much more interested to see what HP is working on. See, HP bought out Palm (one of the great names in PDAs) a while back, primarily for their beautiful operating system called WebOS. In South Africa we are not used to WebOS, seeing as the Palm Pre cellphone never officially arrived here.

You might remember a while HP announced the “slate” with Windows 7, but apparently it was not the greatest device to use. Windows 7 is not a tablet friendly operating system – for stylus use, sure. But we are all moving to finger input, and Microsoft just does not seem to get it yet, despite their “touch packs”. In fact, the “slate” was such a disaster that HP focussed the device only to its enterprise customers, and as you might have noticed, it is not available in SA.

But lets see what we can expect from the HP WebOS tablet (codenamed “Topaz”):

• 9.7 inch screen (same as iPad), XGA (1024 x 768) resolution
• 1.2 GHz Qualcomm processor
• Adreno 220 GPU
• 512MB RAM
• Dual Camera
• 16, 32 or 64 GB storage
• And of course – WebOS

And here is the leaked image if you want some more details (from Pre Central):

Cannot wait to get my hands on this. Lets hope it does better than the Palm Pre phones…

As you have probably noticed, CES is in full swing in Las Vegas, and we have all been bombarded in the tech news by all the wonderful new gizmos. Once again 2011 looks like the year of the tablet. Whereas 2010′s CES had everyone wondering what Apple’s rumoured tablet would be like, this year everyone is also trying to get in on the party. Some are more successful than others however…

Perhaps more importantly, Intel has released the latest version of it’s processor lineup, running on a new chipset, called “Sandy Bridge”. While the same basic model structure is followed as before, the new model names make even less sense. Initial benchmarks look promising, but the jump in performance isnt as game changing as the leap from Core 2 to the Core i3/i5/i7.

Changes are more evolutionary, and Intel seems to have focussed more on graphics and better power efficiency. With Intel’s renewed focus on graphics, they do make some very strange choices. In the latest Sandy Bridge chips, Intel integrates the graphics on the chip, but this time actually integrates the graphics on the same die as the CPU.

Currently Intel is putting two different classes of its graphics processor on the chip – a “2000″ series and “3000″ series. Essentially the biggest difference is the frequencies at which these integrated GPU’s run, but the 3000 GPU does offer much better performance. One problem – currently Intel will only put the 3000 GPU on the top 2 processors, and the people who buy those level of processors will most definately skip the integrated GPU and fit a discrete graphics card. Do not quite know what Intel’s thinking was with this…

The big performance changes with Sandy Bridge comes down to better Turbo Boost functionality and a new video decode/encode accelaration language called “Quick Sync” which fixes Intel graphics apparent lack in this field up until now. So if you have been holding out on a new PC recently, you might want to wait just a little while for the Sandy Bridge chips to arrive on our shores…

Find Intel’s press release below:

Smart Performance, Energy Efficiency and Intelligence Merge The Intel® Core™ i3, i5 and i7 processors also include the enhanced Intel® Turbo Boost Technology 2.0. This feature automatically reallocates processor core and processor graphics resources to accelerate performance, giving users an immediate performance boost when and where it’s needed.

Other new chip features include Intel® Advanced Vector Extensions (AVX), Intel® InTru™ 3-D, and Intel® Clear Video Technology HD. Intel InTru 3-D enables immersive stereoscopic 3-D to 3-D-capable HDTVs or monitors via HDMI 1.4, making movie excitement almost come out of the screen.

Intel® AVX increases performance for such demanding visual applications as audio processing and professional video image editing such as stitching together multiple photographs. Intel® Clear Video improves the visual quality and color fidelity during video playback for a spectacular screen experience. To make it easy for users to find a 2nd Generation Intel® Core™-based system that is just right for their particular needs, Intel is also announcing a wide array of SKUs including Intel vPro™-enabled processors.

The chips are made on Intel’s 32nm manufacturing process on the company’s second-generation high-k metal gate transistors. These unique advantages further boost performance; reduce power consumption for better battery life and smaller designs, and lower overall manufacturing costs. Intel announced more than 20 processors, wireless adapters and chipsets, including new Intel® Core™ i7, i5 and i3 processors, Intel® 6 Series Chipsets, and Intel® Centrino® WiFi and WiMAX adapters. More than 500 laptop and desktop PC platform designs are expected from all major computer makers worldwide based on these products. The quad-core-based systems (four processors inside one chip) will be available on Jan. 9 with additional dual-core versions in February. Video, benchmarks, photos and more details are available at www.intel.com/newsroom/CES.

Last week on Memeburn Matthew Buckland wrote a piece entitled “5 reasons why the iPad is a fat waste of money“, and it was subsequently passed around on Twitter. Now, the iPad is not perfect, granted. In the past I mentioned my top 10 grievances with the iPad (which are mostly now fixed with the new software update), but not once would I say it is a waste of money. In fact, I believe it is a very valuable platform, and (excuse the cliche) a good indication of what the future of computing is all about.

Here is my opinion on Matthew’s reasons for stating that the iPad is waste of money:

1) It’s too expensive. OK, the iPad starts at $500 for the entry level Wifi one, and $630 for the 3G one. True, first generation devices are typically more expensive, and yes the iPad 2G will most probably be cheaper, granted. But even at $500 the iPad is still coming in at a lower price than similiar devices which are only being released 8 months after the iPad. Samsung’s Galaxy Tab is coming in at a higher price, despite having a smaller screen and plastic construction. And this is not a Android vs iOS thing – in terms of cost and build quality, the iPad looks like pretty good value in my opinion. (If you want an Android user’s opinion of the iPad, read our review) And do not try to compare it with Netbooks either, the iPad is pretty cutting edge technology compared to the highly commoditized netbook market.

2) No Front Camera. Have to agree with that one (even though I do not miss it at all). I think they need to do it.. not that they want to do it. The Facetime camera would be perceived ”nice to have” feature, and would probably be part of the next iPad. Apple’s renewed focus on video calling should be a good indication of that. Rear camera – yes, I would like one to quickly take pictures of slides in meetings. Even though lifting up the iPad to take a photo will probably look a little silly.

3) No USB port: This was one of the big criticisms of the iPad when it was announced, and somehow most of those critics have calmed down. Why? Because we are living in the cloud era – our media does not have to be stored on our devices. Case in point – I use Dropbox on my devices, and just like that I have access to all my files.

In terms of video – just use ZumoCast. You can instantly watch videos that are stored on your network, or alternatively, quickly select the video ou want to take with. Also – if you forget to bring with a file, you can always download it from anywhere, provided you have an internet connection connected to your PC. That seems pretty easy to me.

If you want to transfer files for safekeeping on your iPad, you can use iTunes and select files to do that. iTunes is pretty common these days, so just carry around the dock connector cable. Those are pretty common these days as well.

4) Not enough capacity. True, 16GB might not be enough if you are a big media gatherer, but it is most certainly enough for people who will use the iPad as a simple internet device. But 32GB and 64GB is plenty for people who have a lot of music and photos. If you are someone who has a very large photo library I would think that 64GB is awful lot of storage for it – remember, iTunes compresses (or “optimizes”) images to a little more than 1MB per photo before storing them in the iPad photo library as well.

5) Flash support. Yes, this is one of those areas that some people feel the iPad has fallen short. But be honest – how often do you access Flash-only websites? I do not like to have Flash on my mobile devices – in fact I also switch it off on my laptop as well using a Firefox plugin. Why? Because 90% of Flash usage on the web is for intrusive, animated ads. I can do without those, thanks. And online video is already quickly changing to H.264 format.

Like Matthew mentions – yes, there will be a new iPad around April next year, if Apple does stick with its yearly upgrade cycle. I would like to see if Apple would indeed drop the prices somewhat, and also if they will keep the current iPad next year  as a lower cost version (like they currently do with the iPhone 3GS). If I do have to choose a reason not to get an iPad, it would be this – if you are someone who would look longingly at iPad 2G once it arrives, maybe you should wait. But by no means is it a waste of money.

A few weeks ago we promised you that we would follow up our review of the Cell C Speedstick with some real world speed tests, and here you go. I ran these tests during different times, and also at a few different locations. Overall the speeds are very quick, but there is a definite spike in network speed at off peak hours, a few times my connection reached above 10Mbps, which is great considering SA still has a maximum of 10Mbps of ADSL lines…

In terms of reception I was pretty lucky – I used it in quite a few areas in the Cape Town / Bellville / Stellenbosch areas, and also to a trip to Pretoria, and not once did I have reception problems. I did however once get only EDGE reception in Durbanville (or D’Urbanvale to be precise), despite Cell C’s map indicating full HSPA reception where I was standing – maybe I should tell Trevor eh?

I also found that the reception can be very sensitive – for example at work I found that connecting the modem to a laptop above my table gave me full HSPA speed, whereas connecting to a desktop below my table gave only a WCDMA connection. Maybe your experience would be different. But to be honest – in 90% of my use I had full HSPA+ speeds.

At present I am sharing a PDF file with my Speedtest.net results so far, based on connections to Johannesburg and London. Information includes download and upload speeds, and ping times. I also check how long Youtube videos had to buffer before playing (using standard definition videos). You will also find my signal strength and location info.

• You can find my Cell C Speedstick speedtest results here (PDF).

Once again I will try to keep this updated over time…

Boy, this is going to be unpopular. Microsoft is dropping its Drive Extender technology in the next release of Windows Home Server (“Vail”), which is one of the most fundamental parts of the personal server operating system. Drive extender is a pretty great flexible storage system that gives you the redundancy of a RAID setup, but with the flexibility of adding hard drives with different sizes, interfaces and speeds. It really works well – simply open your home server case, connect another drive, reboot and then just “add” the disk to storage pool, no mess, no fuss. In fact you dont know where any specific file is necessarily stored, you just know  its safe.

For example, in my Windows Home Server I have a few different hard drives which give a total of 5TB of storage over 4 disks, to which all my machines backup to. This actually adds up to around 3TB, because I have the choice to have certain folders duplicated over more than one hard drive. For example, documents and photos are duplicated, but movies are not. If any one drive fails, you can be assured the files you value would be somewhere else in your storage pool.

So why did Microsoft drop it?

Microsoft gives the excuse that hard drives have grown so big that such a solution is not necessary anymore. That is ridiculous – in fact, with the bigger sizes of hard drives, I would think that some sort of redundancy becomes even more important. If I now lose a 1TB drive, that is an awful lot of data to lose if it is not duplicated somehow.

Paul Thurrott also revealed that one of the reasons of Drive Extender is that it struggles under heavy server loads, which is not exactly relevant to a home server. This is a concern for Microsoft because DE is going to be used in the upcoming Small Business Server 2011 Essentials, and Microsoft wanted to share this with the platform of Windows Home Server v2 (“Vail”). It really is beyond me why MS would want to unify these two operating systems.

So if you want to switch to WHS version 2 when it comes out, you might have to set up scheduled backups to extra hard drives… How boring. Bad move Microsoft. Vail better have great features when it arrives. Personally I want better power management, Apple Time Machine support, and built in video transcoding support (so that Xbox 360 can finally play any video file). Give me those features, and I might consider upgrading.

One of the most highly-anticipated pieces of consumer technology in recent years, the revolutionary Kinect for Xbox 360, goes on sale in South Africa this week – bringing with it an era of controller-free gaming and entertainment.

Kinect and the long-awaited Xbox LIVE service were launched in Sandton last night to more than 200 media, customers, evangelists and fanatics. Both products will be available locally from 10 November.

Unlike any other consumer technology available today, Kinect lets people use their bodies play games and access entertainment, literally turning the user into the controller. It locks onto people and follows their motions. Players activate it with a wave of a hand, navigate menus by moving their arms and then run, jump, lunge, lean and dance to direct their on-screen avatars.

“For us, this is a really big deal,” said Yvette van Rooyen, product manager for Xbox in South Africa. “Kinect literally transforms entertainment and introduces the Xbox 360 console to millions of new people — families, friends and people of all ages. There’s nothing like it on the market.”

Launching along with Kinect in South Africa is Xbox Live, an online service which allows Xbox users to play online against people around the world and get access to premium content and services.

Deemed a “breakthrough innovation” by Popular Mechanics, the “best of what’s new” by Popular Science and awarded the US National Parenting Publications Awards Gold Award, Kinect for Xbox 360 promises to usher in a new era of entertainment.

Kinect removes the “wands, gadgets, and gizmos” that sometimes act as a barrier, making Xbox games and entertainment more approachable, social and interactive so everyone can enjoy them, said Van Rooyen.

“Once it meets you, Kinect recognises you. With just a wave of the hand, Kinect comes to life, bringing games, movies, TV, music, exercise, dancing and sports to your fingertips,” she said.

5 games will be launching with Kinect – Kinectimals, Kinect Adventures, Kinect Sports, Kinect Joyride and Dance Central.  In addition, there will be 10 3^rd Party publisher titles in line with the launch too.  These include : Your Shape, EA Active 2, Zumba Fitness, DanceMasters,  Adrenalin Misfits, Motion Sports, Sonic Free Riders and on the 19^th November we will see the launch of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows Part 1 as a Kinect ready release.

Kinect for Xbox 360 is great value for the whole family. The all-in-one Xbox 360 4GB Console with Kinect includes the new Xbox 360 4GB console, Kinect sensor and “Kinect Adventures,” priced at R3699. For those who have an Xbox 360 console already, the stand-alone Kinect for Xbox 360 sensor is priced at R1999, and includes the Kinect sensor and “Kinect Adventures”.

Sharing the limelight with Kinect at the launch was Xbox LIVE. Speaking at the launch event, Robin Burrowes, Xbox LIVE product manager for Europe, Middle East & Africa, said Xbox LIVE is about “building communities and connecting people to each other and to great content”.

With an Xbox 360 and broadband internet connection, users can now connect and join LIVE for free to access their personal profiles with Gamerscore, Gamertag, Avatar; access the Xbox LIVE Games Marketplace; and access free game demos. An upgrade to Xbox LIVE Gold membership allows users to play games with their friends online, including great new Kinect titles, or video chat with Video Kinect. It also allows users to receive early access to content and exclusive Gold discounts.

An Xbox LIVE Gold 12-month membership will be available for R599. A 3-month membership will cost R199, with numerous launch specials available.

“This is an exciting step forward in the experience we can give our loyal and committed Xbox communities,” said Burrowes. “Xbox fans in South Africa will now be able play the best games in the industry with the 25 million other Xbox LIVE users across the world who have made this their online gaming destination of choice.”

Guest Post: Albert is a developer, gadget geek, and all-round nice guy. He’s passionate about Android, and writes for ZADroid, a new blog that covers Android in South Africa. However, anything shiny and sufficiently technologically advanced puts a smile on his face. Above and beyond that, Albert loves the web and the technologies that drive it, good design, and original ideas.

Samsung South Africa was nice enough to send their current flagship Android phone, the Galaxy S, to ZADroid so that we could spend some quality time with it.

I used the phone as my primary device for the whole review period, just as I’ve been using my Hero for the past year or so, with one exception. Over  at ZADroid we keep our review units unrooted, running the stock firmware. That being said, this phone went where I did, whether it was to work, going out for a beer, or climbing a mountain (yes, it sat in my pocket at 1600m or so above sea level).

There are quite a few variants of the Samsung Galaxy S out there, but in South Africa, our specific model is the GT-I9000. Some of the highlights are a 1GHz processor, massive internal storage space, and an amazing Super AMOLED display.

Physical Features
The first thing I noticed when I picked the Galaxy S up is how light it is (weighing in at just 119g), and yet it feels solid and well built, even though it looks plasticky at first glance. It’s also surprisingly thin, being just under 10mm deep. The front is your standard glass facade, with a metal rim of an oxidized-silver colour running around the outer edge. The front also features a large physical “home” button flanked by two capacitive buttons (“menu” and “back”). I’m not crazy about capacitive buttons, as they promote unintentional presses, but the position of the buttons on the Galaxy S minimized this irritation. The “home” button is nice and clicky, and the raised ridges make it easy to find by touch alone. The omission of a “search” button is frustrating, as is an input method to move the cursor around on the screen. I thought the “home” button may double as a touch-pad or at least a D-pad, but this, unfortunately, wasn’t the case.

Around the sides, a volume rocker is on the left (which works well), and the power/lock button is on the right. The position of the power button was strange at first, but as I got used to it, it just felt right. I’m not too fond of the position of the micro-USB port on the top of the device. Also found on the top is a standard 3.5mm headphone jack.

The back of the device is made up of a shiny plastic with a nice dotted-pattern effect that can only be seen from certain angles, and a raised chin at the bottom, which has a nice ergonomic effect. A case for the phone might be a good idea, though, as this plastic back seems quite scratch prone.

As for the overall design of the device…it’s pretty, but it looks too much like it’s trying to imitate a previous generation of a certain fruit-adorned device. Apart from that (and the fact that it is quite the fingerprint magnet), overall I was pretty impressed with the overall look, feel, and build quality of the device.

Display
The Galaxy S sports a 4″ (or 100mm) Super AMOLED capacitive touch screen, which is protected by a special crack and scratch resistant glass, known as Gorilla Glass. Colours are bright and vivid, and at a resolution of 480 x 800 pixels, images and text are crisp and sharp. I did notice, though, that the display on our review unit has a slight blue-green tint, which is most evident on content with a white background. That being said, I love the display. It’s probably one of the best out there at the moment.

Sensors and Such
The internet was awash with people complaining about the GPS performance of the Galaxy S range, but in my experience it worked well. Satellite locks were quick, and accuracy was surprisingly high. Another thing that seems to be difficult to get right for phone manufacturers are proximity sensors, but the Galaxy S has it down pat. Lastly, the ambient light sensor works better than expected, as the brightness adjustment was smooth and gradual, making it virtually unnoticeable.
Bluetooth worked well, for both copying files to and from the device, as well as pairing with my car for hands-free calling, and streaming of music.
I couldn’t test the FM Radio, as I didn’t receive a headset with my review unit (and you need to plug it in to act as the antenna).

Performance & Battery Life
With the Galaxy S, Samsung decided not to go the “Snapdragon” route, as it features an in-house developed system-on-a-chip housing a 1GHz ARM Cortex A8 based processor known as “Hummingbird” (that was jointly developed with Intrinsity), and a separate graphics processing unit, a PowerVR SGX 540, which supports OpenGL ES 2.0. The Galaxy S has 512 MB of dedicated RAM, and when it comes to storage space, it blows most other phones out of the water with its 8GB (or 16GB – depending on the model) internal SD Card, allowing for expansion of an additional 32GB by using an external MicroSD card.

The phone is quite snappy, and quick to boot up, and I never experienced any lag when moving between menus and screens. Applications loaded up in no time at all, and those that support OpenGL whizzed along beautifully, thanks to the separate GPU. There were one or two times, when I had quite a few applications open in the background, that I noticed a second or two of slowdown, but that’s to be expected.

Battery life is amazing. I’ve gotten so used to plugging in all my gadgets every night, that the battery of the Galaxy S was a welcome breath of fresh air. The lithium-ion battery is quite large, at 1500 mAh, and a full charge would last me almost two days with regular use. I’m sure that, with tweaks and conservative use, you could push this to 3 days.

Actual phone calls were acceptable. I never experienced a single dropped call, but sound quality was questionable at times. On more than one occasion, the person on the other end of the line had trouble hearing me, either because my voice was too soft, or because of distant echos. This didn’t happen often enough to be a deal breaker, though.

3G/HSDPA performance is top notch, and I was getting speeds well in excess of 4Mbps, consistently, with switchovers to EDGE or GPRS happening rarely, if at all.

Camera(s)

The Galaxy S is blessed with not one, but two cameras. A regular, 5.0 megapixel camera at the back, and a front-facing VGA camera for video calling. The main camera features autofocus, and delivers pictures of 2592×1944 pixels at its highest resolution.

Samsung phones have always had amazing cameras, and this one performs well, especially with enough light. Colour reproduction is good, and the pictures are sharp. Taking pictures in low light produces better than expected results, but as with all phone cameras, noticeable noise is introduced in sub-optimal lighting conditions.

I didn’t get to test the video-calling capabilities of the phone, as initiating a video call through the standard dialer to another Samsung phone with (alleged) video calling capabilities failed repeatedly, and Fring also refused to play nice. I’m sure it’ll work just fine once software appears that can actually make use of it.

Software
Our review unit was still sporting Android 2.1, but South Africans should get an update to 2.2 before the end of the year (some lucky Europeans have already received their update).

I’m not a big fan of manufacturer “skins”, but the TouchWiz 3.0 UI that lives on this phone is one of the more acceptable examples out there. Above the standard Android features, you can arrange homescreens quite easily, it adds a few custom widgets, a modified app drawer with vertical scrolling, and other nice touches like settings toggles in the notification drawer and a built-in task manager.

Even with all of these nice little tweaks, the UI still feels like a bit of an afterthought. The widgets aren’t the prettiest I’ve ever seen, and the vertical-scrolling app drawer doesn’t quite do it for me. I do like the colour scheme of the interface, though, as the dark greys and blues work quite well.

Samsung also provides a few pre-installed applications (that you can’t remove, unfortunately). Among these is Aldiko, Layar, and the standard customized email, calendar and notes fare. They’re nice, but it’s a bit of a bummer that you can’t outright replace them with alternatives. One of these pre-installed applications that is a welcome addition is an alternative keyboard, called Swype. If you’ve ever used it before, you’ll know that “swyping” is an awesome way to type, greatly improving the speed and accuracy of text input.

All in all it feels like the software could use a bit more polish, but it never interfered with my day-to-day use of the phone.

Samsung’s desktop management suite, Kies, is another story all together. It’s large, unwieldy, slow, and buggy. Luckily the phone doesn’t depend on it. Avoid installing this monster.

Conclusion
For all its little niggles, I really liked the Samsung Galaxy S. If I had to buy a phone right now, at this very moment, it would probably be one of my top three choices. To be perfectly honest, though, I’d get a case for it, root it, and install one of the custom 2.2 vanilla Android ROMs out there on it first chance I got. The hardware is in a class of its own, but as it stands, the software still needs some work. Hopefully the 2.2 update will provide the polish that is needed.

Build Quality: 4.5/5
Performance and Responsiveness: 4/5
Aesthetics: 3.5/5
Display: 4/5

Score: 4/5

Anybody who has used the latest smartphones or a device like the iPad would probably agree that these devices change the way we consume media – but especially how we keep ourselves informed. With the wealth of news apps out there from many different sources, its only a matter of time before these devices replace newspapers in our daily lives.

But the newspaper still rules for one thing:

Have a good weekend people.

Source: Newsday