Bshrop's Tech Corner

Now this is some disturbing news and something my friend asked me the day of Microsoft's press conference. Will WinMo 7 phones only have 1 type of model? A good question since during the press conference we were told that all phones will have 3 buttons: back, home, and search. I assured her that wouldn't be. There would be some differences. In Engadget's article they claim there will be 3 different types of chassis (es? lol). The first one is the one that was passed around during the conference. Pretty much your standard touch screen, iPhone type. This may be the only type available at release. And according to the article there will be one much like the Palm Treo and 1 other. We'll just have to wait and see. I'm kinda on the fence on how I feel about this. Actually that 3rd one better have a sliding QWERTY keyboard.

Engadget's Article

So this morning when I woke up, the first thing I did was log into Facebook like a junkie. The only thing that seemed interesting in my News Feed was a YouTube video my friend posted:

Now although the video was entertaining (I mean that guy was 67 years old and laid that dude OUT!), I knew immediately the kind of reaction it would get. So I scrolled down to the comments and there we had all of our "nigger" comments. Now in the video you can hear different racist comments towards the old white guy too, which were of course wrong, but some of the comments I read just made it seem like this guy was a representation of the entire black human race. I'm just really disappointed with the comments and the racist comments from the people in the video.

But yeah...they're are alot of racist comments like this on Youtube. If you Google....no if you SEARCH the internet (Google did not invent the search engine!! sorry...random) for "Youtube, racism" i'm sure you'll get lots of results

L.A.S.E.R.S. coming soon

Since Facebook social networking has becoming a huge industry. Facebook alone is worth about $11 billion dollars. Ridiculous. And I know they're trying to figure out how to profit off of Twitter. Actually some celebs, like Kim Kardashian (God bless her) gets paid thousands of dollars per tweet advertisement. Craaaazy!

Even cops are beginning to use Facebook to make bust on all kinds of crimes: Sex offenders, underage drinking, etc.

Besides these little companies that make software for our phones and computers to stay connected on the social networks, we now have other BIG companies are hopping on the social networking band wagon. Companies like Google and even Microsoft. Google recently launched a beta software called Google Buzz which basically is a Facebook/Twitter built into your Gmail. So far it has failed.

Now Microsoft is releasing something that integrates your Facebook and Twitter into your Outlook program called the Outlook Social Connector. Now this is pretty neat, but how many people outside of their job use Outlook? Not many. It would have been a better fit with their Hotmail product. Oh how I wish Gmail did something similar instead of trying their own thing.

Social networking....ahh how it has made life so impersonal. What's worst...text messages or a tweet?

For 2010, a lot of people have been talking about how this will be the beginning of the tablet/slate era. For those that don't know a tablet is basically a laptop with a touch screen and a slate is laptop with touch screen and no keyboard.

At the beginning of the year Apple introduced it's Apple iPad which fits into the "Slate" category. Now everyone had high hopes for the product, but from reading different articles and forums on the Internet, not many people are that excited.

Now, Apple isn't the only company releasing this year. There are several other companies, such as HP and Dell, releasing a slate.

Here's a list and comparison of all the devices from Gizmodo.

I've highlight the two that I think are going to be the best. The HP Slate and the iPad. I already gave my thoughts on the iPad here. Now the HP Slate looks very promising. It has the iPad beaten in just about every aspect; the main being the OS. Now the only point it may not beat the iPad is the battery life. Apple is great with battery life, and I don't think HP will be able to get it up close to those 10hrs. If it can do 5hrs I will be impressed. I mean its running a full computer OS.

The Dell mini seems kinda pointless IMO. I mean 5" screen? You might as well stick with a cell phone. The Archos 7 isn't too bad and does quite a bit. It can even act as a DVR. But no flash, so don't plan on going to YouTube

The JooJoo is an Internet based device. No apps, no multitask, no multimedia. Pretty much useless. Definitely not worth $500. Archos 9 has no multitouch, and uses a regular hard drive and not a SSD like the others.

Conclusion: Keep an eye out on the HP Slate and even the Apple iPad. I think they are the most promising out of the bunch and the ones i'm more willing to drop $500 on

Yesterday I saw the funniest Old Spice commercial. So I went on youtube today to watch it again and I found a few more. These could have easily had made the Super Bowl cut.

I posted this up on my Facebook the other day, so I had to share this. Play both videos to get the full experience. (I'd say give the music a good 5-10sec head start on the video...)

• Price - This may be one of Apple's most reasonably priced products they've ever released. $500 for the bare minimum isn't too bad for all that you get (giant iPod + eReader)
  
• Battery Life - They say it can get a good 10hrs (probably really 7) off a single charge which is pretty nice for those long flights or car rides
  
• Size - 10" can fit just about anywhere except for your pocket

I guess that's really all for that. I could see myself buying this for watching movies on trips and playing games, but that's really all.

DISLIKES:

• eReader - Now although it is also an eReader, the bright ass screen will cause eye strain after long periods of use. dedicated eReaders use e-Ink that lets you read without this problem.

• It's from Apple - Now...since this is running on iPhone OS, you'll have to get apps from the their App store, which means you have to play by their rules, which i just hate.
  
• Multitasking - None. WTF? So if I'm surfing the web, and have to pull up something else, I have to close the browser, open the other program, close it, then go back and start over where I was at on the web? Come on Apple....really?
  
• Presentation - Now this is really nothing against the product itself, but the way Steve Jobs presented this to us. He made it sound like this was something completely ground breaking and it would change how computing was to be done. Such BS. There is really nothing new or special about this product.

They have different models such as 16, 32, 64GB versions with or without 3G from AT&T

There's more I like and don't like about this product. Could I recommend it to someone? It's hard to say. if you think you need a large iPhone/iPod touch then go for it. Movie watching and ebook reading would be great. At the end of the day...I know I dont have a need for one. I rather spend money on a fully functioning laptop.

I finally made the move to get this blog up and running.

Let's see....i'll be posting any news I find interesting relating to consumer electronics and tech. Computers, videogames, TV, Phones, etc. etc. It will be all over the place

But there will be more to it. There will also be News articles, Youtube videos, pictures or anything else I find worth sharing. (Yea I know this blog will be all over the place. aw well).

Layouts on here are pretty *blah* so this will be it till I find better.

So thanks for coming through. 1st post coming in a few!