Microsoft today officially announced Project Origami; the Ultra Mobile PC’s that will be running a version of Tablet XP.
Built to go everywhere, do everything. With powerful processors, big, bright displays, easy input options, and support for the latest connectivity standards, Ultra-Mobile PCs are ready for your life on the go.
While not initially impressed with Microsoft’s latest attempt to push XP Tablet PC Edition on us all again, after seeing the Engadget photo’s I am warming to the idea. It looks very slick, like a system with quite some potential and if rumours are to be believed it seems as though Microsoft may have beaten Apple to the punch with this one.
Think Secret has posted an article confirming rumours of a Ipod Video with 3.5" diagonal display and touch screen wheel. According to the site an announcement could be as soon as 1st April which would coincide with the companies 30th anniversary.
Apple has been working with at least two other companies to perfect the digital click wheel display technology. While not all the engineering was completed in-house by Apple, sources have said Apple could hold an exclusive license on the technologies it borrowed from other developers for a period of time, limiting the ability of competitors to copy Apple’s design.
Apple today announced the 1GB Ipod Nano, retailing at $149 or £109 it is ready to ship according to both the US and UK online Apple Stores.
This has got to be a sensible business move for Apple after making the high end (Ipod) and middle (Nano) market their own, this entry level price point Nano is surely going to seal the lower end of the market. Surely the next step is to discontinue the 1GB Shuffle? Though still listed at $99 or £69, depending manufacturing levels, could it be a case of selling off the remaining stocks? Its is interesting that it coincides with Microsoft’s recent announcement that they’re looking at the portable music player market. At this late stage though surely they must have doubts about entering a marketplace that is so dominated by Apple.
I have recently taken the plunge and purchased a new 19 inch LG Flatron monitor. Using the excuse that I am doing much more Photoshop and Dreamweaver work I decided that it would be a good idea and am pretty happy with outcome. Moving from a 17” CRT, you can imagine the difference and it has been quite refreshing experience. With the higher resolution (1280 x 1024 compared with 1024 x 768), the monitor has undoubtedly made a significant improvement to my productivity.
I can take the marginal drop in quality with the advantages gained (in desk space alone) but really wanted to make the most of it of my LCD display.
More and more rumours are circulating about Digg being snapped up by the Web 2.0 harvester that is Yahoo. $30m is the figure circulating and my point of view is there is no smoke without fire. Both the Search Engine Journal and Techcrunch have posted on this along with countless others recently and I, for one, am keen to see this happen. I posted more on this subject over two weeks ago and have touched on the benefits in another post. According to Kevin Burton’s blog, it’s not a matter of if but when and the announcement could be as soon as next week!
