TMCnet News
From phablets to budget tablets [New Straits Time (Malaysia)](New Straits Time (Malaysia) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) PHABLETS According to industry observers, this will be the year of phablets - big smartphones which combine the functionality of a phone and a tablet. With Samsung making headway with its large screen Galaxy Note devices last year, more manufacturers made announcements of smartphones with bigger than 4-inch screens. Phablets were announced by Sony, Huawei and ZTE, among others. Sony's Xperia Z has a 5-inch display and ZTE revealed its 5-inch Grand S. Outdoing Samsung's 5.5- inch display on the Galaxy Note 11 is Huawei with its 6.1-inch Ascend Mate. INTERPERSONAL COMPUTING For many years now, we have heard of personal computing but now, according to Lenovo, it's time for interpersonal computing - that is turning personal computing experience into a shared computing experience. And the way to go about doing this, the company proposed, is with its multi-user, multi-touch, multi-mode device, the IdeaCentre Horizon Table PC. This PC can lie flat on any surface, allows two or more people to use the screen at the same time, supports interactive physical gaming accessories and is designed for touch screen game-play among several players. The device can also be transformed into a 27-inch high- performance desktop. This product is expected to be available sometime in June at a starting price of approximately RM5,100 (US$1,699). 1 TB FLASH DRIVE STORAGE You can now store your entire digital world on a portable USB 3.0 Flash drive, thanks to Kingston. The company unveiled its DataTraveler HyperX Predator which has an incredible 1 terabyte of storage. Currently, the HyperX Predator is shipping in 512GB capacity and the 1TB capacity will be available later in Q1. This flash drive is the fastest USB 3.0 device in the Kingston family, with speeds of up to 240MB/s read and 160MB/s write. To celebrate the 10th year of its HyperX flash drive the company also revealed the HyperX 10th Anniversary Edition Memory drive in capacities of 4GB, 8GB, 16GB and 32GB. OLED TV WITH CURVED SCREEN Just when you think you've heard everything about television technology and innovations, in comes the curved screen model. Such a design is intended to give viewers more viewing angles and realistic viewing experience. It removes visual distortion and detail loss when viewing from the side. First to launch the 55-inch OLED TV recently, LG Electronics also showed off its OLED TV with a curved screen, the EA9800 model. It comes with full CINEMA 3D support, proprietary WRGB technology and the Smart Touch Control feature for better viewing and control experience for users. Samsung Electronics was the other manufacturer which displayed the curved model, with plans to launch OLED TVs - both flat and curved screens - in the first half of this year. LOW-PRICED TABLETS Will more price competitive tablets come our way Perhaps so with Acer revealing its budget Iconia Tab B1-A71, a 7-inch tablet running on Adroid Jelly Bean OS. Weighing 320g with 8GB built-in storage and 1024x600 display resolution, the budget tablet is expected to be priced between RM300 and RM450 (US$99 and US$149). The Tab B1 is expected to be made available later this month. Dell, on the other hand, unveiled the Latitude 10 Essentials Windows 8 tablet priced at about RM1,500 (US$499). This basic tablet is supported by the 1.8GHz Atom Clover Trail processor, 2GB of RAM with either a 32GB or 64GB solid-state drive, a single USB slot, and a full-size SD storage card slot. (c) 2013 ProQuest Information and Learning Company; All Rights Reserved. |