MSI prepping 10-inch Tegra/Android tablet for $500 later this year

MSI is planning on launching its 10-inch Tegra tablet, first shown off at CES, later this year for $500 according to Digitimes. It should be armed with Tegra’s Cortex A9 chipset and Android operating system.

This will pit it against the Apple iPad, with a similar price point, display and computing power. However the MSI tablet should benefit from multitasking and it is reported to be “thin and light.” Tegra should also be able to handle 1080p video as opposed to 720p for the Apple iPad. There are still question marks over a full spec-list but we’ll keep you posted.

Alienware’s M11x netbook pricing revealed

The Alienware M11x is the closest thing to a netbook we’re likely to see from the company. It sports an 11.6-inch screen, switchable Nvidia GT335M graphics, Core 2 Duo processor and 6 ½ hours of battery life.

When it was first announced at CES, we only knew that pricing would fall below $1000. Well it seems pricing will start from $799 according to some information tucked away in the official page’s source code. Read more

Qualcomm fights back in ‘smartbook’ name dispute

Qualcomm has released a statement, where it responds to Germany company Smartbook AG’s “aggressive campaign to prevent the continued use of the term “smartbooks” by journalists, manufacturers and consumers”.

Qualcomm goes on to say that it is complying with a restraining order in Germany that requires it to issue a disclaimer if it wants to use the smartbook term. It goes on to say that ‘smartbook’ is a generic term used to describe a subset of devices sitting between netbooks and smartphones.

Qualcomm is looking to cancel the trademark in Germany. Smartbook AG has been trying to register the term in other countries, however European countries have thrown out their request. Hopefully, we’ll see an end to this ridiculous dispute very quickly. Check out the full statement below. Read more

Apple iPad finally unveiled – official pics, specs and video

Apple has finally revealed the iPad, a 9.7-inch tablet device that will be powered by a custom 1GHz Apple A4 processor and a 10-hour battery life. As expected, the iPad certainly looks gorgeous, measuring half an inch in thickness and will come in various flash storage options from 16GB to 64GB.

It will run the iPhone OS with a new UI. Included is a new e-book reading app called iBooks with a wireless online store. The company has partnered with Penguin, HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster, MacMillan and Hachett Book Group. Read more

Samsung N220 netbook in video unboxing

The premium Samsung 10-inch Pine Trail netbook, the N220 has been unboxed by nDevil. It comes with a chiclet keyboard and matte display. The particular version unboxed has a 6-cell 4400 mAh battery, although the higher capacity 5600mAh battery will appear in other regions. Check out the unboxing after the jump.

Update: Also check out a quick disassembly video below, showing access to the hard drive, single RAM slot and Mini PCI-E slot. Read more

10-inch Pine Trail netbook shootout

The guys over at Laptop Mag have pitted six 10-inch Pine Trail netbooks against each other to find out a worthy winner. All models sport the 1.66GHz N450 Atom processor and various features were compared including design, performance and battery life.

The models tested were the Acer Aspire One 532h, ASUS Eee PC 1005PE-P, Dell Inspiron Mini 10, HP Mini 5102, MSI Wind U135 and Toshiba mini NB305. We won’t spoil the overall winner, but three models stood out. The Toshiba has the best keyboard and touchpad, whilst the Asus offers the best battery life. The HP is a great all rounder and great for business use. Click here to read more.

HP demos Slate Tablet with video hands-on

Perhaps reminding people that there are other tablets coming to the market apart from Apple’s mythical device, HP has released a timely video where a few employees talk about its Slate tablet device. The device is demoed by HP Spokesperson Greta Schlender and Phil McKinney, CTO of HP’s Personal Systems Group.

Apparently it was conceived two years ago but shelved as it wasn’t ready for the market. Since then a “perfect storm” of hardware and software has made it viable again. It is expected to arrive at some point during 2010. Check out the video after the break. Read more

Netbook/Ultrathin CPUs benched with Windows Experience Index

The sheer number of processors on the market can be a minefield to try and differentiate – different clock speeds, cores and cache sizes all need to be considered (along with TDP).

When testing netbooks, it’s strange that some models have felt more sluggish than others, especially when they’re meant to have the same clock speed. In particular, I’m talking about the 1.6GHz N270 and Z530 Atom. Both had the same speeds but the Z530 always felt more sluggish.

Well it looks like Yugatech has come to the same conclusion (albeit marginal). They have charted all the main Atom netbook processors including a few Intel ULV processors as well as AMD ones. Check out the interesting chart after the jump. Read more

Panasonic CF-R9: Intel Core i7 CPU squeezed into 10.4” netbook

Panasonic has announced a new line-up of “Let’s Go” notebooks and amongst them is a netbook sporting the new Intel Core i7 processor. Panasonic has managed to fit a 1.06GHz Intel Core i7-650UM processor into its R9 series that boasts a 10.4-inch (1024 x 768) display.

This processor benefits from Intel’s Turbo boost technology that allows the speed to flex up to 2.13GHz depending on usage. It manages to include this in a chassis weighing just 0.93kg, whilst also bundling a 3100mAh battery rated to last for 7.5 hours. It features 2GB RAM (max 4GB), 250GB HDD and Windows 7 Professional 32-bit. Read more

Acer targets Chrome OS in 10% of netbooks; first to launch in Q3

Acer will look to aggressively push Chrome OS in its netbook line-up, expecting around one million Chrome OS netbooks to be sold this year out of a total 12-15m forecast. The company wants to be first to the market with Chrome and is planning to launch its first netbook in the third quarter.

Acer is targeting Chrome OS netbooks to account for 10 percent of its line-up, to put this in context, its dual boot (Android/Windows) netbooks currently account for 5 percent. “For Chrome, we’re aggressively pursuing to become one of the first, so there’s a change to the Microsoft-Intel environment,” Jim Wong, president of IT Products division said. Read more

Asus prepping ION 2 powered Eee PC netbook for April?

We still don’t know exactly how Nvidia plans to introduce its ‘next-generation’ ION chipset/GPU into Pine Trail netbooks, but despite that Digitimes is reporting that Asus is planning an ION 2 powered Eee PC to launch in April.

The report goes on to say that Pine Trail netbooks should drop in price by the end of the second quarter as N270/N280 Atom-based netbooks fall out of the market. It also said that the Eee PC T101 touchscreen netbook will launch in February.

ARM processors to overtake Intel in mobile devices by 2013?

The use of ARM-based processors will exceed Intel’s x86 equivalents by the year 2013, or so says they data crunchers over at ABI Research. They say that current shipments of UMDs (ultra-mobile devices including netbooks, smartbooks, MIDs and UMPCs) using x86 processors stands at around 90 percent.

This is expected to reverse as ARM-based devices offer more choice for vendors. The perception that ARM devices, such as smartbooks, are always-connected and have much longer battery lives than their x86 equivalents will no doubt help the ARM push. I’ve seen many similar reports that talk of Linux overtaking Windows for UMDs in a broadly similar timeframe. One thing’s for sure smartbooks and the like are here to stay.

Broadcom’s HD media accelerator benched against Nvidia ION

Those looking to enjoy high-definition video content on their netbooks currently have two main choices. The first is to seek out an Nvidia ION-powered netbook and the second is to get one installed with Broadcom’s Crystal HD media accelerator card for $30.

The guys over at Laptop Mag did some tests comparing a Dell Mini 10 netbook with Broadcom Crystal HD card against the HP Mini 311 armed with the Nvidia ION chipset. Read more

Dell’s Pine Trail Mini 10 reviewed – better design & battery life

Laptop Mag has published their review of Dell’s new Pine Trail-powered Inspiron Mini 10 netbook. One of the biggest improvements is a new design that means less bulging batteries, however this hasn’t compromised battery life. According to their tests, the Mini 10 lasted for nine hours, nearly four hours longer than the original.

Other positives include loud speakers, a fast hard drive and better performance when streaming web content compared to other netbooks. One frustration is that Dell has kept faith with its integrated mouse buttons on the touchpad that are tricky to use. Read more

LG X300 promo ad parodies Macbook Air [Video]

The super-slim LG X300 has seen its first promotional ad, trying to hit home just how skinny it really is. It uses the same envelope stunt used by Apple when showing how thin its Macbook Air was.

When the ultraportable is taken out, the Apple system is referred to as “unthinkable” and chooses the LG X300 instead that is thinner (0.7-inches) and lighter (2.1lbs). Check out the video after the break. Read more

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