Hasta La Gadget!

This article was written on July 16, 2007 by CyberNet.

Microsoft Monday

Last week we covered some of the unfamiliar features and terms that were introduced with Windows Vista like the UAC (User Account Control), ReadyBoost, and SuperFetch. That was just the start of the new terms, so this week we’ll be covering three more.

What is Fast Sleep and Resume?

You may have also seen this labeled “Fast Boot and Resume.” It’s Vista’s new way of powering down and starting up so that you’ll be using your computer sooner. In other words, the initial “wait” is shorter.

The reason for this is that when you turn off your computer, it will save your current session to memory and enter into a low power state. Then when you turn your computer on, it’ll only take a few seconds before you see your desktop just as you left it.

What’s great is that there are no settings that you have to change because this is the default “off” state. When you press the bower button, it will automatically go in to “sleep” mode (very low power) and then quickly resume when you press the power button again to turn it back on.

What is Sync center?

The Sync Center is perfect for those of you who need to keep multiple devices synchronized. The Sync center in Windows Vista will be your centralized location where you can monitor the progress of the devices that you have synchronizing.

Here’s what you can do in Sync Center:

• Initiate a manual sync
• Stop an in-progress sync
• View status of current sync activities
• Receive notifications

You can get to the Sync Center by clicking start > control panel > Sync Center.

What is Shadow Copy?

Shadow Copy is for those of you who copy over files accidentally. It’s available in Business, Ultimate, and Enterprise editions of Windows Vista, and is described as a feature that “automatically creates point-in-time copies of files as you work, so you can quickly and easily retrieve versions of a document you may have accidentally deleted.”

To use this feature, all you have to do is right click on a file or a folder and click “restore previous versions.”

Keep in mind, this will work with single files, even whole folders! After clicking to restore previous versions, you’ll see a pop-up window that looks like this:

It will display the different previous versions that are available for a file or folder, and then you can select which one you’d like to restore.

Wrapping it up:

While the three features mentioned today, Fast Sleep and Resume, Sync Center, and Shadow Copy aren’t all going to be something that everybody will use, at least one of them should come in handy for you at some point.

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Continue reading Kinect / Arduino hack makes stuffed monkey dance for your amusement

Kinect / Arduino hack makes stuffed monkey dance for your amusement originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 10 Aug 2011 23:13:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink PC World  |  Subtours  | Email this | Comments

Lookin’ to get your Grown Nerd on? Look no further. We just sat through 1.5 hours of high-brow technobabble here at SIGGRAPH 2011, where a gaggle of gurus with IQs far, far higher than ours explained in detail what the future of 3D face scanning would hold. Scientists from ETH Zürich, Texas A&M, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Carnegie Mellon University as well as a variety of folks from Microsoft Research and Disney Research labs were on hand, with each subset revealing a slightly different technique to solving an all-too-similar problem: painfully accurate 3D face tracking. Haoda Huang et al. revealed a highly technical new method that involved the combination of marker-based motion capture with 3D scanning in an effort to overcome drift, while Thabo Beeler et al. took a drastically different approach.

Those folks relied on a markerless system that used a well-lit, multi-camera system to overcome occlusion, with anchor frames acting as staples in the success of its capture abilities. J. Rafael Tena et al. developed “a method that not only translates the motions of actors into a three-dimensional face model, but also subdivides it into facial regions that enable animators to intuitively create the poses they need.” Naturally, this one’s most useful for animators and designers, but the first system detailed is obviously gunning to work on lower-cost devices — Microsoft’s Kinect was specifically mentioned, and it doesn’t take a seasoned imagination to see how in-home facial scanning could lead to far more interactive games and augmented reality sessions. The full shebang can be grokked by diving into the links below, but we’d advise you to set aside a few hours (and rest up beforehand).

Continue reading Researchers demo 3D face scanning breakthroughs at SIGGRAPH, Kinect crowd squarely targeted

Researchers demo 3D face scanning breakthroughs at SIGGRAPH, Kinect crowd squarely targeted originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 10 Aug 2011 21:46:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Physorg  |  Carnegie Mellon University, Microsoft Research  | Email this | Comments

Windows Phone’s Mango update was released to manufacturers for testing two weeks ago, and you know what that means — it’s time to speculate on what’s lined up after the still-unreleased refresh. Mary Jo Foley’s dishing out some juicy rumors from sources that the next version of Windows Phone is codenamed “Tango,” and has a few tricks up its sleeves. The new OS would have a tighter focus on Nokia’s desire to bring lower-priced phones to the fold; it’ll also apparently target the Asian market “largely or even exclusively.” This prediction sounds as though Tango would only be pushed to inexpensive handsets, effectively turning Windows Phone into a two-tiered platform — but as many rumors go, we’re still waiting for a little more meat to chew on before making such a conjecture. If the new codename sticks, however, we expect to see a video chat service that won’t be too happy with the news. We’ll grab the popcorn and get a good seat for the (lopsided) duel that’s sure to come.

Windows Phone ‘Tango’ may be Mango’s successor, geared toward less-expensive handsets originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 09 Aug 2011 23:03:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  ZDNet  | Email this | Comments

If you can’t beat ‘em, undercut ‘em.

It’s the new slogan of tablet and smartphone manufacturers trying to push products into an already packed space.

Companies are attempting to compete in today’s crowded tablet market by slashing product prices to undercut rivals. The iPad, the front-runner in the field, set the entry-level price for tablets at $500. It’s the price to beat.

And many companies are trying hard to beat Apple. Toshiba’s recently debuted Thrive tablet starts at $430, while Acer’s Iconia Tab A500 costs $450. As recently as last week, HP announced steep discounts on its TouchPad tablet, which was originally priced at $500. TV manufacturer Vizio announced a new tablet today priced at $300, one of the cheapest Android tablet options to hit the market.

It’s the latest attempt by Android tablet manufacturers to combat the problem that essentially all of them face: differentiation. With some exceptions, many of today’s Android tablets offer microSD card slots, HDMI output, 3G connectivity and other common attributes. Essentially, they all do the same thing. And beyond customizing the user interface to make the tablet’s operating system look different than others, there’s not much the manufacturers can do.

“As the devices become more and more alike, manufacturers will do anything they can to differentiate themselves,” Gartner analyst Ken Dulaney told Wired.com in June.

Ports, UI tweaks and connectivity options aren’t enough. Now they want to lure you in with a bargain-bin price tag.

It’s a similar story for smartphones. Samsung recently debuted the Conquer 4G, one of the first low-end Android phones to run on Sprint’s WiMax network. ZDNet reporter Mary Jo Foley reported that Microsoft may be working on its own low-end Windows Phone operating system, codenamed “Tango.” And of course, we’ve had feature phones available to consumers for a long time, made specifically for those who don’t want to shell out wads of cash on the latest and greatest mobile device.

Despite the growing adoption of smartphones, most of the global population still thinks cheaper is better — for phones, at least. Nielsen research claims over 55 percent of U.S. mobile phone owners have low-end phones.

Tango isn’t much more than a rumor circulating in tech circles at this point. Yet in the wake of Nokia announcing it would move away from pushing its low-end Symbian operating system on North American low-end phones (as reported earlier today by AllThingsD), the Tango rumors begin to make a certain amount of sense. Especially considering Nokia’s big bet on Windows-based phones this year.

But there’s a difference the smartphone and tablet markets that manufacturers aren’t yet taking into account. Phones are an integral part of how our society functions today. We use cellular devices on a daily basis, relying on them more and more as they’ve grown “smarter.”

Tablets are a different story.

“The tablet market, though growing, is not mass-market yet,” Gartner analyst Phillip Redman said. “Buyers today are still early adopters and are less concerned about cost versus functionality.”

Few manufacturers outside of Apple are broadcasting tablet sales widely, which suggests sales of non-Apple tablets aren’t as high as manufacturers would like. And yet, as Redman said, it’s an emerging market, one that is still forming with each new tablet release. It’s far too early to tell whether or not the low price strategy will pan out.

But one thing is certain: Even with all the discount tablet options currently available, many people are willing to pony up $500 for Apple’s tablet. In the company’s last earnings report, Apple announced it sold close to 10 million iPads over the past three months alone. Compare that to the 440,000 Xoom tablets Motorola shipped — not sold, but shipped to retailers — last quarter, and the picture becomes pretty clear.