The Sunday Techie Notebook
For those of you who don’t know, http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/ is a great site for free stuff of all sorts, from useful utilities (some retailing for a fair amount of money), to screensavers, to…you name it. I’ve been frequenting the site for awhile, and gotten tons of great stuff.
I know what you’re thinking .. ‘Ah, just garbage on there that authors can’t even give away, so why not throw it on there?’ And some of it is that sort of software, but most of it is actually useful. And no, it’s not warez; it’s all approved by the authors of the software. Worth a visit.
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Packard Bell (yes, those of the slow, cheapie systems from years ago) has a new laptop and attitude, apparently. Take a look at the iPower GX:
This model comes with a “street art cover” that basically stands diametrically opposed to their boxy, beige history of design. Specifications are pretty beefy: 1,920 x 1,200 resolution display, nVidia 9800M GTS 1GB video card, Intel Core 2 Quad Q9100 processor, Draft-N Wi-Fi, and Blu-ray drive. Should be out in early October.
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The HTC Dream, the first Google Android smartphone is expected to be released this month, priced at $199 the same price with Apple iPhone 3G. This will no doubt trigger huge waves in the smartphone industry, as it has enough muscle behind it to seriously compete with the iPhone for market share.
The Google Android gPhone will be available on the October 13th ~ 2-year contract, a specified data plan, and Gmail account included.
All I know is: I’m glad I waited to decide on a smartphone, as the competition is just now heating up, and should bring lower prices and better service to consumers as a result.
Blackberry vs. iPhone - Who will win?
The batteground has been marked, the weapons are sharpened. The war has begun.
Research In Motion, maker of the BlackBerry handheld e-mail device, is moving deeper into the consumer market, where it is sure to run up against tough competition from Apple iPhone, which has expanded its reach this year into various international markets.
Earlier this year, RIM forged a partnership with social networking site Facebook that lets BlackBerry device owners access information from their Facebook pages.
Now, RIM has announced partnerships with a host of new companies that will give BlackBerry owners access to Windows Live Search, Google, getting tickets on Ticketmaster, MySpace, and TiVo. This gives it a huge head start against Apple, but RIM lacks their “flash factor” and deep advertising pockets. The bevy of partnership announcements is just the latest move by RIM to tap into the consumer market.
A look at RIM’s business and how it’s changed over the last few years, specifically with the Pearl handset, they’re clearly trying to expand from a traditional enterprise/company customer base to a broader consumer market, and the aggressive nature of these partnerships indicate the battle lines being drawn against the iPhone.
They still have their core business built around e-mail and messaging end of things, but they’ve been adding support for video and cameras, and all the things that fit into the consumer side of the market for a while now. The partnerships with Microsoft’s Windows Live Search and Google have an obvious goal - to get BlackBerry users the fastest, most relevant, location-based search results possible; something the iPhone had been criticized for early on in its product cycle.
The partnerships with MySpace, Ticketmaster, TiVo and Slacker serve the same purpose as RIM’s alliance earlier this year with Facebook — to make the BlackBerry a “lifestyle” device.
It’s made a difference: Like many of its competitors in the handheld market, RIM is growing very quickly. In the fiscal year ended March 31, 2008, RIM reported earnings of US$1.7 billion on $6 billion in revenue, up from earnings of $800 million on $3 billion in revenue in the previous year.
One thing is clear: the iPhone will get stiff competition in the smartphone arena from RIM.
A Hewlett-Packard PC with Linux?
According to a recent story in BusinessWeek, Hewlett Packard has been exploring the possibility of using something other than Windows Vista for some of its computers. The article has some denials from HP spokespersons, but their denials seem weak and uncertain in wording, so odds are, they’re correct in some form or another.
Apple and Mac computers are grabbing increasing market share; at least some of Apple’s new sales are coming at the expense of companies like HP and Dell. It has to be frustrating to Windows OEMs like HP that they don’t really control the complete user experience the way Apple does. HP has a history of wanting to control the user shell more closely, so that loss of control must really irritate them at times.
The idea that HP might create its own operating system from scratch is crazy (and expensive and unnecessary), so they had no problem denying that rumor. Part of the article, confirmed by HP, was about their efforts to “innovate on top of Vista”, in HP’s words. That could simply be some tack-on applications, or added functionality at the BIOS level for certain functions, but I have a hard time believing that would solve a lot of consumer problems. It may even create a whole new set of compatibility issues.
The big question is whether HP is pondering the use of Linux on its consumer PCs. This is territory already explored by the successful Asus Eee PC. That tiny notebook offers both Linux and Windows — but it’s Windows XP. Microsoft has made it clear that XP is OS-non-grata its future plans, so the Linux option may be HP’s best alternative. This would turn the whole OS/PC world pretty much upside down, and MS would be none too happy to see one of its biggest partners defect to Linux.
There are plenty of Linux distributions that HP could use, so the engineering effort could boil down to making sure that high-quality Linux drivers are available (sometimes not a given). HP could push most of that work down to their chipset suppliers such as Intel and NVidia. Sure, they’d want to brand their Linux user interface with some sort of custom HP look, but that shouldn’t take long and wouldn’t cost much, more than likely. Some Linux gurus would probably volunteer testing and ideas for nothing, just to see it happen.
HP has tried to be a good partner with Microsoft in the past, and hasn’t always been rewarded with much loyalty for the effort. One example came to light in a lawsuit where MS told HP execs that Vista would require high-end video hardware, and HP accelerated a redesign of their product lines to support the new chipsets Vista needed. Then, Microsoft backpedaled and said that less-capable video chipsets, the ones in HP’s soon-to-be-defunct products, could be labeled “Vista Capable.”
Microsoft has some options to keep HP consumer products Linux-free. Microsoft will probably use the carrot of a price break or marketing money, similar to the way Intel appeased OEMs with the Intel Inside program. In essence, Microsoft can price Vista or XP in a way that “pays” HP to not use Linux. That may ultimately be an offer HP can’t refuse. Either way, MS needs to step up and do something it appears, or an HP box with Linux may become reality.
Online Movies - Are we there yet?
The recent surrender of HD-DVD in the latest format war has got us thinking about online video rentals - so we thought we’d review the options available today.
Streaming or downloading full movies instead of renting or buying physical media is nothing new. As happens time after time in the world of technology the real first adopters are the adult industry and the hackers/pirates. The adult movie folks have been providing video content only for years now. And we all know well that hacker-kids have distributed full dvds in online format for some time as well. If both these groups can handle it successfully why not the movie studios?
With the rise in popularity of Youtube consumers have grown familiar with online videos and the entire medium has gained market acceptance. Fears that studios once had over the customer acceptance of less-then-highest quality video have disappeared. Consumers bandwidth will only increase in the future allowing for higher quality.
Netflix: As part of the base netflix subscription all customers can watch unlimited movies online - free. Tough to argue with that deal. The biggest downside is the selection, of course the online library of movies are limited. Quality is above average and the program is very easy to use. As netflix offers more movies into this category it will have an even bigger market impact. We have to wonder when/if they will start charging for the service. Another challenge for Netflix is getting onto the TV and into the living room - not everyone is willing to watch movies on the PC or laptop. Watch for a partnership with Microsoft, Nintendo or Sony in the future. But right now it is the market leader for cost and ease of use.
Amazon Unbox: Amazon has been at this market for quite some time (opened in 2006). Unbox offers a wide selection of newly released and classics at near DVD prices ($14.99 for most movies) and rentals for lower cost (4.99 in most cases). Although the service received mixed reviews when it was released it has improved over time.
The videos can be played on about 20 handheld devices (again - big drawback if you can’t connect the PC to the TV). They’ve since partnered with Tivo to allow purchase of videos which can be sent directly to your living room Tivo system for review. Of course Tv shows are also available for those into that type of thing (who really buys and watches old tv episodes?!)
Apple - iTunes: When it comes to online media - iTunes is still the name we all think of first. Apple has made available movies for download since 2006. Of course they use the itunes market place and application to support the download service. The move catalog matches the size of Amazon’s and most physical rental stores. Pricing is equivalent to Amazon (about $14 a pop) with the edge going to Apple for ease of use. Naturally the advantage is apple’s in the device category as legions of iPod Video’s and Nano’s can show movies and tv shows purchased through itunes. Recently Apple released the AppleTV device (getting into your living room.. sound like a familiar theme?). It allows for move rentals (HD content too) as well as the rest of the itunes HTPC functionality - plugged into your TV of course. So far its received a bit of a lackluster response (for an Apple product that is) and we’ll hold our breath before we tell anyone to run out and buy one.
Comcast (ondemand): The biggest name in the video on demand cable industry - comcast leads the pack. One of the first cable companies to roll out on demand video (which comes free with their digital cable package). This competes with downloadable purchases and rentals head to head. Comcast has the advantage in many areas since they are already entrenched in the consumers living room, have market share and control much of the delivery. The ease-of-use factor cannot be dismissed either. Consumers have embraced the video on demand service in a surprising fashion and other cable vendors have been struggling to catch up.
Directv on demand: Directv is fighting to catch up to Comcast on the movie delivery/video on demand front. Their vod service is still in beta. The distinct disadvantage for Directv is not controlling the consumers broadband as Comcast does, meaning Directv VOD users must rely on their existing dsl/broadband to download video content to their DVR system.
Slingbox & Orb: Both worth a mention here as similar software packages and devices which allow for ‘place-shifting’ of video content. You can pull your recorded TV episodes from the living room and watch them on the cell phone, in the hotel room, or at work. Not mounting any big-time competition with the video rental/download services yet - but keep an eye on them. Either could provide a medium or means of easy distribution in the future.
None of these are set to overtake Blu-ray or DVD sales in 2008 - but with the delay in adoption of hidef movies caused by the format wars you can bet that they’ve gained traction.
You can bet your gold-plated dvd’s that downloads will overtake physical disc purchases by 2011.
Any comments or additions are welcome. We’ll be glad to update this as they come in.
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