Samsung

For years, notebook technology has been advancing at an incredible pace. Processors grew in speed exponentially, along with hard drive capacities, and mobile multicore computing made a huge splash with the Core Duo. In contrast, the biggest headline for batteries this year was that the current generation has a tendency to explode.

Samsung is going to give laggard consumer notebook battery technology and needed boost next year with, get this, a battery that will last an entire month!



They also have one that doesn't look like a cordless docking station, but it only lasts a week.

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Tower of Babel Translator

It's a translator that translates words as you subvocalize them (think Snake's communicator in Metal Gear Solid). Right now they have a Chinese to English translator as well as English to Spanish/German version.

Toshiba Tecra M4 Tablet

Thanks to CSE481b, I will be the owner of a brand new M4 for the remainder of this academic quarter.

I received the tablet a few hours ago through the departmental equipment borrowing system. After the novelty of being able to draw on the screen wore off, I realized that most applications are rather terrible on the tablet platform. Using web browsers is a pain, file navigation and menus are not pen-centric etc.

However the tablet does have one good app, Windows Journal. Journal is like the classic notepad, but it's pen instead of keyboard based.

Tablet PC's of interest

pics from
whatisnew.com

Motion Computing's LE1600 Slate:
Insane viewing angle (the glare suggests this is a VA screen)

nice cushy stylus

really bright screen

IBM X41 Convertable:

Screen looks kind of dim, but it's probably just the flash's fault. Notice the lack of touchpad.

It's insanely thin.

The stylus looks a bit bland...