Hasta La Gadget!

3G Americas, the wireless industry trade association representing GSM devices, has announced that as of December 2008, four billion cell phones are currently in use, covering 60 percent of the world population.

The organization said in a statement that in some countries, millions of people are now experiencing connectivity to the world for the first time through wireless, “changing their economic, social and political fortunes forever.” Of the countries listed in the report, Latin America and the Caribbean region both posted 16 percent year-on-year growth; subscription numbers are expected to reach in excess of 440 million.

Looking forward, 3G Americas is pushing the adoption of next-generation LTE networks. “Third generation technologies continue to evolve and the GSM operator today has a clear path towards LTE,” said Chris Pearson, president of 3G Americas, in the statement. “In addition to the evolution to LTE by GSM operators, LTE is proving to be the technology choice for CDMA operators as well.”

In a separate study, Informa notes that 415 million cell phone subscribers use 3G networks, with 77 percent of them on HSDPA/UMTS and the remaining 95 million on CDMA EV-DO.

Desktops have been on the road to oblivion for a few years now in the U.S. but now the rest of the world seems to be catching up.

Global notebook shipments exceeded those of desktops on a quarterly basis for the first time ever in the third quarter, says research firm iSuppli.

"This marks a major event in
the PC market because it marks the start of the age of the notebook," said Matthew Wilkins, principal analyst
for compute platforms at iSuppli in a statement.

Laptop sales rose almost 40 percent in the third quarter to
reach 38.6 million devices shipped, while sales of desktop PCs declined
1.3 percent to 38.5 million
units.

Despite a weak economy, people didn’t slow down on their purchases of a computer. Worldwide PC sales rose 15.4 percent in the third quarter to 79 million units.

In terms of the top players, Hewlett-Packard
retained its position as the market leader followed by Dell and Acer. Lenovo and Toshiba ranked fourth
and fifth on iSuppli’s charts.

For Apple fans there was some bad news. Apple lost almost
half a point of market share from the previous quarter, placing it seventh overall, says iSuppli.

“The
big news was
undoubtedly the performance of Taiwan’s Acer ” said Wilkins said.

Acer’s netbook strategy paid big dividends for the company. It grew its market share by 45
percent in the third quarter and by 79 percent on a year-over-year basis.

Acer shipped
almost 3 million more notebooks in the third quarter than it did in the previous quarter, with a majority of them being netbooks.

So will netbooks become the notebook-killers of the future? Will they do to notebooks, what notebooks did to desktops?

Photo: (coda/Flickr)

Mac cloner Psystar claims it’s nothing but an independent Florida-based startup, despite Apple’s suspicions of a conspiracy.

Apple
has been in legal battle with Psystar for several months, and recently
the corporation said it believes the Mac cloner is receiving help from
other parties — possibly corporations.

"Psystar denies that
said activities are unlawful and improper," Psystar said in its
response. "Psystar likewise denies the suggestion that there exists a
concerted effort to commit infringement of Apple’s intellectual
property rights, to breach or induce the breach of Apple’s otherwise
unenforceable license agreements, and to violate state and common law
unfair competition laws."

Psystar in April began selling a PC
hacked to run Mac OS X Leopard — a Mac clone — and the company has since added
several Hackintoshes to its product line. Apple in July filed a lawsuit claiming Psystar was committing copyright, trademark and shrink-wrap infringement.

Apple’s lawsuit against Psystar wasn’t enough to scare off other companies that later arose to offer similar Mac clones. The army of Mac cloners was largely driven by Apple’s switch to Intel chips, which made its operating system easier to hack to run on other non-Mac, Intel machines.   

See Also:

• Apple Cries Corporate Conspiracy Behind Psystar
• Psystar: Blu-Ray Hackintosh for Sale; MacBook Clones on the Way
• Psystar Tags Back Apple With Antitrust Suit
• Psystar Offers Cloned OS X Servers
• Apple Finally Sues Mac Copycat Psystar
• Apple Demands That Psystar Recalls All Hackintoshes

Psystar: No conspiracy against Apple [ComputerWorld]

Photo: Psystar

Dashboard Devices says it will formally launch its “carputer” at the Consumer Electronics Show in January.

DD plans to market its ENV (Entertainment and Navigation for Vehicles) as a two-part system: the ENV-XC, which includes the CPU, graphics unit, and other basic computing functions, as well as a choice of head-ends, including the ENV-100 (a double-DIN system); the ENV-50 (a single-DIN system with motorized screen), or the ENV-50c (a single-DIN system with detached screen). The standard DIN measurements are two inches high by seven inches wide, with a double-DIN setup doubling the height to four inches.

Dashboard Devices hasn’t published the units’ prices, although TWICE claims that the double-DIN ENV-100 will cost $2,700. Representatives from Dashboard Devices weren’t able to be immediately reached for comment, possibly because of the Christmas holiday.

More details after the jump.

Approximately 7 percent of broadcast stations making the switch from analog to digital signals next year will experience a loss of service coverage, known as the “digital cliff,” according to a Tuesday report from the Federal Communications Commission.

The 7 percent of the affected stations are expected to lose about 2 percent of their audience because of the phenomenon, which includes both changes in the coverage area as well as technical issues with the digital signal, the FCC said.

That covers 123 of the 1,749 stations that will be making the switch. Congress has ordered TV broadcasters to switch from analog to digital signals by February 17, 2009 in order to free up spectrum for public safety use. After that deadline, consumers will have to swap their analog TVs for digital sets, subscribe to cable, or attach a digital converter box to their analog televisions in order to receive a signal.

“Although the Commission tried to maximize the ability of TV stations to replicate their analog coverage area as closely as possible, TV station were not required to do so,” according to the report.

As a result, some TV viewers might experience a change in their coverage areas. Approximately 89 percent – or 1,553 stations – will gain channels, but that 7 percent, mostly in rural areas, could see certain channels drop off that digital cliff, the FCC found.