It’s been a few months since HP launched their Z400, Z600 and Z800 workstations, and we’ve finally got the company’s mid-range Z600 on the SlashGear test bench. A dual-processor monster that HP envisage being used in midrange CAD, financial modelling and even high-end DCC, the Z600 would also make for a storming video editing workstation; HP also claim it’s environmentally friendly. That’s the theory, anyway: can the Z600 really deliver performance in a home or small-office friendly way?
Perhaps the stand-out device from Nokia World this year was the N900, the Finnish company’s new internet tablet/smartphone crossover. The final production version still isn’t on the market, but that hasn’t stopped “preview” reviews from those with access to prototypes, covering both Maemo 5 and the N900 hardware itself. My-Symbian have just pushed out a four page article doing just that, and they’re more than a little excited.
We’re not cellphone manufacturers, but we can’t imagine there’s much more disheartening to hear reviewers suggest your latest handset “isn’t ready for primetime”. Unfortunately for Motorola, that’s just the conclusion the Boy Genius Report have come to in their CLIQ preview, with the handset’s power-gobbling ways being the prime suspect for their dissatisfaction.
Wacom may have only made their new Bamboo tablet range official yesterday, but eagle-eyed early adopters have been picking them up in stores for over a week now. BestTabletReview have been putting the Bamboo Pen & Touch Fun – which has both an active digitizer stylus for precise control and artwork, and a multitouch layer for recognizing finger-touch and gestures – through its paces, compared to Wacom’s well-considered Graphite tablet.
The BlackBerry Bold 9700 – aka the BlackBerry Onyx – is definitely on the cards, it’s just that RIM won’t tell us exactly when we should see it on shelves. That hasn’t stopped the Boy Genius Report from publishing their early review of a pre-production 9700, however, and they’re certainly impressed: in fact, they call the Bold 9700 “the finest BlackBerry ever crafted”.
Acer’s Android netbook has been regular grist for the rumor-mill, with delays tipped, buyer apathy prediced, along with vehement denials from the company themselves. So it’s with no small amount of interest that we read one of the first reviews of the Acer Aspire One D250 Android – as the netbook appears to have been labelled – courtesy of ePrice. They found the AOD250 to be “semi-finished”, with Android perhaps unsurprisingly causing many of the issues.
With a press conference imminent, ATI’s new DirectX 11 video cards are beginning to make their appearance on retailer shelves. Two cards – the Sapphire Radeon HD 5870 and the ASUS Radeon HD 5870, each marked “Cyprus HT” and with 1GB of memory – have shown up for sale at Newegg, while over at Hexus and The Tech Report they’ve each been reviewing the new Radeon HD 5870.
The latest DigiTimes rumors are in, and this time they don’t seem all that unlikely. According to industry sources in Taiwan, Acer’s F1 and HTC’s Leo – both using the Qualcomm Snapdragon 1GHz chipset – will each drop in Q4 this year, complete with Windows Mobile 6.5. They also finger ASUS and Inventec as developing Snapdragon-based smartphones, though those are unlikely to hit full-scale production until the first half of 2010.
Wacom’s upcoming Bamboo Touch multitouch tablet has not only been spotted in the wild, but prematurely bought, unboxed and reviewed, all with no official word from Wacom themselves. Meanwhile, Wacom’s corporate site has confirmed that [pdf link] they’ve begun mass production of a Windows 7 compatible multitouch panels for notebooks, which can be combined with the company’s pen sensor.
Video unboxing and review after the cut
If asked what’s the next big evolution in desk lamps, I can’t imagine many people would say “why, an integrated digital photo frame, of course” but that’s what Sungale have delivered. Over at Zatz Not Funny they’ve been playing around with the unusual desk accessory, and reckon that while it pretty much delivers what it promises, they can’t help but wish it promised more.
JP
