Digitimes has unnamed sources telling them that laptop manufacturers are anticipating the Metro UI of Windows 8 and are planning to equip upcoming ultrabooks with touchpanels. Really? Touchscreens on our laptops? Why? More »
The Transformer Prime, with its quad-core silicon and tasty OS, has rightfully garnered much attention lately. A PowerPoint deck detailing ASUS’ Q3 earnings now gives us a peek at its Eee Pad strategy — confirming the aforementioned Prime’s November 9th release date, while also promising two more bot-powered slates in the first quarter of 2012. Of course, ASUS isn’t putting all of its eggs in the Android basket, as the same slide reveals that the Taiwanese firm will be getting its first two Windows 8 tablets to market by this time next year. So it seems that there will be an Eee Pad for all, whether you’re from Redmond or Mountain View. No need to shove, fellas, there’s room at ASUS’ tablet table for everybody.
ASUS’ Eee Pad plans: Transformer Prime landing November 9th, two Win 8 tablets coming in 2012 originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 31 Oct 2011 13:36:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Microsoft’s Windows 8 developer preview greeted us with an interface steeped in Redmond’s new Metro style — its tile-centric start screen is sleek, fresh, and downright pretty. Imagine our surprise then, when the preview’s desktop default view punted us straight back to the contemporary “Aero” dressing of Windows 7. It’s not an ugly interface by any means, but shiny, translucent window frames are so last generation. Where’s the style? In the big M’s latest Building Windows 8 preview, of course. The MSDN blog’s latest Task Manager update shows the familiar feature in a clean Metro suit. Although Aero is still the OS’ default look, the Windows 7 basic theme has been substituted for a style heavily inspired by Metro’s clean tiles. The post doesn’t say much on the matter (nothing at all, in fact), but it’s nice to see the classic interface getting a facelift to match Microsoft’s new look. Want to see more? Hit the source link below, it’s got all the Metro window frames you could ask for.
Update: This post originally misstated that the updated Basic theme was a new style, but in fact, it is already available in the Windows 8 developer preview.
Windows 8 desktop interface swaps classic theme for Metro, gets with the times originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 31 Oct 2011 08:54:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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This article was written on September 23, 2011 by CyberNet.
The new (default) Windows 8 interface is something that Microsoft has spent a lot of time rethinking, and will drastically shift the way we use computers. The good news is that the classic Windows 7-style interface is still buried underneath for those that want it, but you won’t be able to move completely away from the Metro-style UI.
One good example of that is with the notification system. There are all kinds of reasons that you’d see a popup notification on a Windows system. For example, if you insert media into the DVD drive you’ll see a popup like this:
That is a slick little popup that doesn’t feel obtrusive, and it fits in extremely well with this new design. If you go ahead and click on that notification you are given a few different actions you can take:
In this situation those actions will take you back to the classic desktop interface, but that’s understandable considering the type of media I inserted. What’s interesting, however, is how the notifications look when you’re already on the classic desktop. Instead of the balloon notifications we’re used to seeing in Windows 7 the design is now exactly the same as what we saw above with the Metro-style UI:
And then going on to click on the popup reveals the actions:
Considering the fact that this is a developer preview Microsoft still has plenty of time to refine the desktop UI, but I’m hoping they don’t try to force some of the Metro-style elements onto the desktop where they may not work as well. I do prefer these style of popups to the old ones, but the color scheme and overall design should conform to the Aero theme that is being used when they are displayed on the desktop.
Download the Windows 8 Developer Preview
Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com
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Let’s be honest: with the size of a brick and a relatively short battery life, it’s no surprise that ITG’s xpPhone hasn’t quite dominated the smartphone market since its launch back in November. In fact, we haven’t even seen one in the wild, and we certainly wouldn’t have missed it if there ever was one on the street. That said, ITG hasn’t given up, as the company’s just announced its second-generation Windows-powered smartphone. The reason? Well, interestingly enough, ITG prefers Windows’ greater range of compatible software compared to those of mobile OSes, namely Android and iOS. Let’s just leave it at that for now.
Simply dubbed the xpPhone 2, this beast of a QWERTY slider packs a 1.6GHz Intel Atom Z530 chip, along with 2GB RAM, up to 112GB of SSD storage, 4.3-inch display and compatibility with both Windows 7 and Windows 8 — obviously the latter OS will depend on its final release date. Not only has battery life been bumped up to around 18 hours of call time or 46 days on standby, but the phone’s also been slimmed down to 140mm x 73mm x 17.5mm, which is a huge improvement compared to its bulky predecessor. With the touch-friendly Windows 8 on board along with a non-underclocked CPU, we have a feeling that the xpPhone 2 will at least fare much better than Fujitsu’s F-07C; as for the rest, we shall see when it comes out in January next year. And no, it probably won’t run Crysis.
Update: Looks like we were misled by the company’s other promotional photos and thus mistakenly thought the xpPhone 2 will have a slide-out QWERTY keyboard. This would explain the slimmer body then.
Gallery: ITG xpPhone 2
ITG xpPhone 2 to get some Windows 8 love, starts living large in January originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 28 Oct 2011 07:59:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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If Apple is that paranoid friend that has four deadbolts on his door and a loaded weapon in every room, then Microsoft is the over-sharer who tweets where, when and what he had for lunch — including both before and after photos (and we’re not talking about pictures of a clean plate). Redmond wants you to know about everything it does — no accomplishment is too minor for a lengthy explanation of the what and why. Take for example, portrait mode. Windows 8 will have one. We know what you’re thinking, “well I would frackin’ hope so,” but the devs want you to know this isn’t just some feature they slapped in the OS knowing people would expect it. The team studied users both familiar with and new to the tablet form factor. They looked at grip, posture and when people chose to rotate their slates. And, if you’re some weirdo who likes reading things on their side, there’s a rotation lock option. For more details hit up the source link and the video after the break.
Continue reading Microsoft talks Windows 8 portrait mode, really wants you to be proud of it (video)
Microsoft talks Windows 8 portrait mode, really wants you to be proud of it (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 21 Oct 2011 11:26:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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NVIDIA’s founder and president Jen-Hsun Huang has never been one to dodge a question, and that made for an excellent closing interview here at AsiaD. Outside of (re)confirming what lies ahead for Tegra, he also spoke quite openly about his feeling towards Windows on ARM in response to a question from Joanna Stern. Here’s the bulk of his reply:
“It’s important for [Microsoft] not to position these as PCs. From a finesse perspective — I can’t speak on their behalf — but I would come out with tablets first with Windows on ARM. It helps to establish that this isn’t a PC. Will yesterday’s Office run on tomorrow’s Windows on ARM PC? Will a new version of Office run on tomorrow’s Windows on ARM tablets? Both questions are about legacy, and both are about Office. The actual implementation of it is radically different. I see no reason to make Office 95 to run on Windows on ARM. I think it would be wonderful, absolutely wonderful — I’d say, as someone who uses Windows — it would be almost a requirement to me that [the ARM] device runs Windows interoperably. If Office runs on Windows on ARM — it’s the killer app. Everything else is on the web.”
He elaborated to say that he would hope Office for Windows on ARM would support the same files that today’s Office does, much the same way that Office for Mac eventually synced up with its Windows-based sibling. For more from Huang’s interview, hop on past the break!
NVIDIA’s Jen-Hsun Huang: Windows on ARM should hit tablets first, battling Intel is a bad idea, would love his chips in iPad originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 21 Oct 2011 01:16:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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This article was written on April 11, 2011 by CyberNet.
Welcome to the WrapUp by CyberNet. This is a collection of news stories, downloads, and tips that we have collected over the last few days, but never got around to writing about. Don’t forget to send in your own tips, or just leave a comment on this page if you think you’ve got something we should include.
YouTube Launches Live Streaming Service
YouTube has been testing a live streaming service over the last few months, and now they are officially rolling it out. At this time only certain content makers, such as Revision3, are available, but they plan on making it more widely available later on.
Windows 8 Can Adjust Aero Color Based on Wallpaper
A cool new feature discovered in a leaked Windows 8 build demonstrates how you will be able to have the color of the Aero transparency automatically change based on the main color used in your desktop wallpaper. This will be pretty awesome if you have a rotating set of background images.
Thunderbird Returning to Mozilla
In 2007 Mozilla separated Thunderbird into its own organization called Mozilla Messaging, and they announced last week that it will be brought back to Mozilla under the Mozilla Labs umbrella.
Apple Purchases 12 Petabytes of Storage
A report suggests that Apple just purchased 12 petabytes (12.5 million gigabytes) of storage, and that it will likely be used for an online iTunes locker and MobileMe in their North Carolina data center.
Grooveshark Pulled from Android Market
Grooveshark didn’t last very long in Apple’s App Store, and now it looks like it has been slapped with the same legal fate in Google’s Android Market.
Motorola Xoom Estimated to Have Sold 100k Units
Many reports are saying that the Motorola Xoom isn’t doing very well since it has “only” sold 100,000 units in the first month and a half. It may not be selling as fast as the iPad, but that is still an incredible number.
Apple Patents a Smart Bezel
This isn’t the first time that we’ve seen a touch-sensitive bezel on a device, but the patent filed by Apple shows how they might make use of the technology in a future product.
Mozilla Shames Add-on Developers with List of Slow Extensions
Mozilla has assembled a list of extensions they’ve tested and they go on to highlight the ones they’ve found to slow down the browser the most. As a Firefox extension developer myself I think this is good information to have, but wish they would have contacted the developers first before calling them out in an un-professional way like this.
Windows Explorer Ribbon Found in Windows 8
This article has some screenshots taken of the Windows Explorer Ribbon that will appear in Windows 8. There is still plenty to be done on it since there are barely any icons on the Ribbon, but this will give you an idea of how it will work.
Add Tabs to the Mac Mail Application
This is a plugin for the Mac Mail App that will add a tabbed interface for composing messages, replying to emails, and more.
Google Docs Notifier Displays Recent Changes
Windows users can grab this Google Docs notifier if you’d like to be alerted anytime there are changes to documents in your account. Of course if you never do any collaboration this probably wouldn’t be very useful since the only thing showing up in the list will be the changes you made.
Free Online OCR Service
If you have some PDFs or images that you’d like converted to text then this free online OCR service may be exactly what you’re looking for. The downside is that you are constrained to 20MB uploads.
Simple Folder Synchronization with QuickSync
This free Windows tool isn’t packed with features, but that’s kinda the point. It is a barebones app for synchronizing two directories.
Disable Auto-Adding of Contacts in Gmail
Google rolled out some new settings last week that target some of the finer annoyances people had with Gmail. One of them is the ability to stop Gmail from automatically adding contacts that you email to your contacts list.
Make Amazon Cloud Drive Appear in Windows Explorer
Using a program called Gladinet you can drag and drop files into Windows Explorer that you want to upload to your Amazon Cloud Drive account.
Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com
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You can unpack your suitcase and drop that custody suit, because Microsoft has heard your Windows 8 complaints, and it’s willing to change its ways. Yesterday, in a lengthy post on its Building Windows 8 blog, the company acknowledged that it’s received plenty of feedback since unleashing a developer preview of the OS last month, and pledged to respond with a number changes. For starters, apps displayed within the Windows 8 App Screen can now be organized into groups, rather than alphabetical arrangements (see image above). Apps will also be displayed at a higher density, thereby cramming more content within the same space. Enterprise users, meanwhile, will be able to customize their companies’ Start screens and unify them across networks, though there’s still no word on whether administrators will be able to opt out of the software’s tiled interface in favor of the more Windows 7-esque Desktop app — one of the most highly requested features. These are just two of many, relatively granular changes that Microsoft is implementing to help users maximize the efficiency of its new Start screen, and they likely won’t be the last. To dig into the nitty gritty, check out the full post, at the source link below.
Microsoft responds to disgruntled users, unveils changes to Windows 8 UI originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 13 Oct 2011 06:31:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
[Thanks, Nicolas]
France’s eviGroup SmartPaddle surrenders to lower prices originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 11 Oct 2011 21:19:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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