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Posts Tagged ‘opinion’

Microsoft ClippyThis is a follow up note to some folks who work in Redmond (it’s OK for the rest of you to read it if you want to).

Hi guys. How are you doing these days? There’s no doubt that you must be frustrated. Really frustrated. After all, you were in digital music long before Apple, had cool phones that played music long before Apple and in general had a pretty compelling story for the digital consumer that was very complete, but no one paid a whole lot of attention. There were WMA players on the market long before iPod. In fact, Microsoft might have been dominant in digital music if it weren’t for that pesky iPod and iTunes combo. You’ve taken some hard hits, I remember when Apple introduced a flash memory music player, removed features and had customers waiting 2-4 weeks to get one. Gladly waiting I might add and ignoring all those other devices your partners brought to market. Yep, it’s been a tough few years.

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I used to be a total Macintosh user; however, over time, various places I worked depended on Microsoft Windows and other MSFT technologies so that I was forced to use Windows for much of what I do. I still kept using a Mac, mostly for creative work and where business use allowed, but I had to have Windows in my life. Over the last few years, Apple has created a new line of machines that more closely match my laptop needs and have made a lot of changes to their core platform OS X. The result is a combination that makes for a very compelling argument to use Macintosh full time.

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ocean2 7 slashgear 480x386As recently as a five years ago, it was relatively easy to segment the mobile market into business users and consumers. Business users had specific needs, as did consumers, and rarely did those needs intersect. Today, the idea of segmenting users into the classes of business vs. consumer is becoming archaic and to attempt that level of breakdown will lead to erroneous views of the market.

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With the successful launch of the iPhone 3GS last spring and a new version of OS X and a new crop of iPods expected this fall, one player in Apple’s lineup seems to have gone missing, namely Apple TV. On Apple’s financial conference call, the device that Steve Jobs once described as “a hobby” was not mentioned once. I hope Apple hasn’t given up on this category as there’s a lot of value and function in Apple TV that has yet to make it into other products in this space.

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We’ve come a long way. It was not long ago when most of us had but a single screen in our homes – the television set. (Of course in our house growing up, we had a lot more than that. I come from a family of early adopters). Over time, we added second and third TVs as well as an entirely new category of screen in the form of the personal computer. Increasingly, both TVs and PCs are now found throughout the home, connected to each other as well as the Internet. Net result, a dramatic increase in the complexity of consumer infrastructure. In short, it just doesn’t work most of the time for too many folks and I blame the home network. Oh, it’s not merely three screens consumers are dealing with but rather multiple PCs, TVs, and other stuff with a screen on it.

home entertainment

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dell adamo 9Dell had already confirmed that the 13.4-inch Adamo ultraportable was merely the start of a new high-end series of luxury computers, but signs of what’s likely to be the next model – the Dell Adamo 9 – have already been spotted.  As we said at the time, the main question is whether Dell make what’s presumably a 9-inch ultraportable into another Atom-based netbook, picks a more mainstream processor as you might find in the Sony VAIO TT, or takes another route.  Coincidentally, VIA announced their 1080p-capable Surfboard C855 reference design today, something that could well supply Dell’s “another route”.

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Sprint’s webcast about the Palm Pre has just ended, and much to our disappointment there were no bombshell announcements.  Sprint opened the event by clarifying that there would be no new details about launch dates or pricing, and went on to run through pretty much the same demonstration we’ve already seen of the Pre for the first 20 minutes.  That was followed by a 20 minute Q&A session with questions submitted from the audience.

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Yesterday Toshiba took the wraps off their latest smartphone, the TG01, and with it catapulted themselves into the must-see category at Mobile World Congress next week.  We’ve got details, photos and high-definition video of the TG01 if you need to get fully up to speed, but basically it’s a 9.9mm thick WM6.1 smartphone with a 4.1-inch touchscreen, all the usual 3G and GPS connections, and a custom GUI as is so common now among users of Microsoft’s mobile platform.  There’s no denying it’s a slick, attractive handset – so how come I can’t get excited?

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It’s Thanksgiving today, and the SlashGear team will be taking a break to enjoy the day with family and friends.  We’d like to say a big collective “thank you!” to all of the manufacturers, PR people and, most of all, you the readers, for keeping us informed, keeping us on our toes, and keeping yourselves opinionated!  I’ve also been asking the team what they’d individually like to give thanks for; Vincent’s you can see here, the rest are behind the cut.

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ms windows7After a week or so of positive reports on Windows 7 pre-beta performance – with testers generally finding the upcoming OS, even in its current early state, besting Vista in real-world challenges such as start-up and friendliness to ageing or low-power hardware – we’re perhaps overdue a more critical one.  InfoWorld’s Randall Kennedy certainly delivers the goods, with a full-on benchmarking comparison that, on the face of it, suggests that Windows 7 “threatens to deliver zero measurable performance benefits while introducing new and potentially crippling compatibility issues.”

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