Samsung Chromebook...form an orderly queue!

Samsung have unveiled a video detailing the spec of their lovely looking Chromebook, set to launch in mid-June. It works for me!

Google I/O - Christmas comes early...

Google hosts their annual developer conference ‘I/O’ at this time of the year and the latest event was yet another festival of goodies for gadget fans, technology freaks and IT professionals.

The list of revelations included:

- Long awaited first products sporting Chrome OS – Google’s own operating system.

- Google @ Home – a home automation system utilising Android at its core

- Ice-cream Sandwich – the next iteration of the Android mobile operating system

- Honeycomb 3.1 – a swift update to the just released Android version for tablets

- Google Music – cloud storage and streaming of 20,000 of your own home to a multitude of devices (initially at least).

- Google TV reboot – a new push for their tv integration system.

Perhaps most intriguing is their Chrome OS rental approach detailed in the video below:

Either way it made for happy days for Google fans and an intriguing few months of releases...

Beats me...

The recently released (in the UK anyway) and massive marketing campaign for the Beats audio range got me thinking of another range of what many may perceive as overly expensive electronics peripherals in Monster cables. Monster cables have long been perceived as expensive yet unnecessary interconnects by many.

Back to Beats though...

Beats audio, the brainchild of the talented Dr Dre, offers a variety of headphones and other gear as well as in-laptop integration designed to deliver maximal audio quality to the listener.

This is an admirable aim but the prices involved are simply incredible – headed for pure audiophile territory. Paying triple digits for headphones seems pretty excessive to me! Especially when the tv commercials hint that HD audio content is required and in truth this single requirement alone will deliver a massive part of any audible audio improvement for the listener.

I enjoy HD audio at home and yes the sound is awesome but I have my doubts that when listening by headphone that I would really be able to notice compared to say a high-bit rate mp3 or the humble cd which still delivers the highest quality outside of a Blu-Ray.

I must confess I smell a con and indeed my fears were realised when I note just who is behind the Beats range....Monster!

I therefore shall pass until proven wrong....

Netflix slows downloads...everyone else's illegal ones, not their own!

Netflix has been mentioned here previously – it’s clever business model of offering movie deliveries through the mail and instant streaming access through a huge variety of connected devices (Xbox, iPad, blu-ray players etc.) has been incredibly popular, despite it not having ventured outwith North America.

Now it is being hailed as a saviour of the movie industry and playing a significant part in reducing piracy. Findings have illustrated that as the number of Netflix subscribers increases, downloading of movies, particularly older ones, has diminished. This is understandable as many people elect to watch older films through the ever-growing Netflix catalogue instead of using p2p to acquire them.

We may well see only newer movie rips shared through p2p sites in future but these too could be eliminated if Hollywood allowed Netflix access to them earlier.

This then provides a very curious example of how to successfully combat downloading and is clear justification of the many comments heard from downloaders who wanted ‘a better option’ for watching movies. Netflix is not much loved by Hollywood but it certainly appears to be its Messiah and the industry should maybe learn to give it some love…