Have Laptop Will Travel

A phone I can alternate with my laptop

Originally posted on October 26, 2007 @ 10:28 pm

I’m about to renew my mobile phone plan at the end of this month and this means getting a new phone for free as part of my mobile service provider’s policy for renewals.

I’m not much of a mobile phone freak so I only really upgrade my phone during my mobile plan renewal. I’m not the type who looks at mobile phones as a status symbol and thus have the weird need to change to the latest must-have phone every couple of months. I’m quite content with my two year renewal plans especially since it saves me a lot of money.

The phone that I have set my sights on is quite nifty because it could possibly become a wonderful alternative to my laptop. It’s the Nokia E61i. What I love about this new convergence device is that it actually has built in WiFi. The nature of my job requires me to always have access to websites and the Nokia E61i really fits my particular need. Of course, WiFi also means that I can now also check my email anywhere I am (doubly important since I have important emails that come in everyday, which require my immediate response). The phone’s QWERTY keyboard also means that composing long messages (or even posting blogs) won’t be a difficulty anymore. The only negative is the lack of touchscreen controls. This would have made the E61i THE absolute best in phones right now. But that’s a minor quibble over a device that will allow me the luxury of not bringing my laptop at events or situations where a piece of expensive equipment may get damaged.

New gaming router from D-Link

Originally posted on October 30, 2007 @ 6:41 pm

I love playing games using a gaming laptop. A laptop frees you and allows you to move anywhere in your house (or ANYWHERE, for that matter) to play your favorite games. Heck, I’ve even tried playing games while in the toilet! A gaming laptop transforms your whole house into an instant gaming room. Of course, if you are the type who loves playing games online then a gaming laptop will not be enough. You will also need a reliable WiFi and WLAN connection, one that has practically no lag and stable connections. These requirements have resulted in the development of a family of products called gaming routers that are optimized for the demanding conditions that gamers need.

D-Link recently released a new gaming router that offers a number of really cool features. The D-Link Xtreme N Gaming Router can operate at the draft 802.11n standard (which makes it somewhat futureproof) and also possesses GameFuel technology as well as a nifty little OLED screen.

The new router boasts of having a quality-of-service technology. This means that the router will automatically give priority to gaming related traffic. It is also optimized for the gaming requirements not only for PC games but also for the Xbox and PlayStation gaming consoles. The OLED screen is quite useful because it gives users a quick view of network statistics, the devices that are connected to the router as well as other important information.

The  D-Link Xtreme N Gaming Router (model number DGL-4500) will sell for a $239.99.

USB 3.0 being developed

Originally posted on September 20, 2007 @ 2:44 am

Ask any computer user and they will tell you that one of the things that they look forward to are fast transfer speeds. The advent of USB has put us in the right path. Even with the introduction of Firewire (which was admittedly a faster protocol), USB continued to be the popular choice and it has continued to be developed as evidenced by USB 2.0, which offered faster transfer speeds. But with the advent growing capacities of storage drives and the increased demand for data transfers for various computer peripherals, USB 2.0 just could not cut it anymore.  It’s good news that USB 3.0 is now being developed.

During the Intel Developers Forum, the formation of the “Superspeed” USB Promotions Group was announced. This new collective will be tasked to develop the specs for USB 3.0 that they are hoping will be able to become the standard for the next five years.

It’s too early to really know what USB 3.0 will be but preliminary information includes backwards compatibility with USB 2.0, lower power consumption, and a ten fold increase in transfer speed, that is, from USB 2.0’s 480Mbits/s to 4.8Gbits/s.

Let’s see how this will develop in the coming months.

Annoying flash drive virus

Originally posted on September 22, 2007 @ 6:58 am

A couple of days ago, my sister called me up looking for a particular document she needed for her citizenship application. She left the said document in my care and now she wanted me to send her the document. She also asked me to have the document scanned so I can send her a copy while waiting for the actual document to reach her through Fedex.

I couldn’t make my scanner work so I decided to visit a computer services shop and have the document scanned. Everything went smoothly and uneventfully — that is, until I went home and plugged in the flash drive I used to save the image file in the shop. The moment I inserted the flash drive my browser popped up and this weird message from “jayker” appeared on the page. I thought it was just some random pop-up ad and proceeded to email the file to my sister. But when I rebooted my laptop the first thing that popped up when I got to the Windows desktop was the same “jayker” message on my browser! I got virus from the flash drive itself without me even opening a single file. Apparently, this virus takes advantage of the autorun feature of flash drives in order to embed itself into a computer. It then copies itself to other computers or any other drives connected to the infected computer. The virus is believed to have originated in the Philippines. This virus is really annoying and since the level of infection is not yet that high, your antivirus software will most likely not detect or clean it yet.

Fortunately, there is a workaround. You can remove the virus on your own but it will take some knowledge of DOS and dealing with the Windows registry to do this. Just refer to the instructions posted on this site.

MSI comes out with GX600 gaming notebook

Originally posted on October 24, 2007 @ 11:45 pm

MSI Computers is one of the most popular IDMs in Taiwan. In  fact, it is so success that the company even decided to expand by entering the market for branded computers itself. MSI, as a brand, has become quite popular and has also built a reputation for quality products at very competitive prices.

A few days ago, MSI announced the arrival of the GX600 gaming notebook.  This new gizmo offers a very unique feature, the ability to overclock by just a touch. The 6.16 pound notebook will come in two “flavors”. One of them will have a cool flame graphic design while the other will have a more “traditional” look.

The one touch overclocking actually serves like the old “turbo button” of computers years and years ago.  A simple press of the button and the speed of the CPU improves by as much as 20 per cent. Cool isn’t it? Actually this feature can also be done through a mere software tweak but a hardware button makes it look very cool.