BSNL Brings iPad to India

Its official…but not quite as expected..as usual Apple surprised us….except this is more like shock to the Apple Indians who were waiting for the official iPad launch.

I am guessing, the only reason BSNL got first preference because its the only service provider with the most 3G coverage. Hope Airtel catches upon soon.

Anyway..according to reports the price starts from 26k for 16 GB Wi-Fi only and the 64 GB 3G+Wi-Fi is priced at a outrageous 44k.

The iPad data plans from BSNL is more outrageous than its price Even though the 3G model is offered from BSNL you can still change the SIM (but the ? is which one !!)

Like i said earlier, wait for your right tablet…..

ADAM Is Here…Almost

Its been more than a year since I first blogged about Adam. Many like have been waiting for so long, that one wondered whether will it actually come to a store near us. Well good news is..Adam is not a just a concept product (or mythological!) .Its as real as any other tablet and it is here…well almost.

click for more pics in notion ink blog

Rohan of Notion Ink has posted few photos from Honk Kong where the shipping of the first batch has started.

The first batch got sold out in just about 2 weeks (only thru pre-order!!) and this happened without any official launch,a CES keynote,any sort of official advertisement..mere social buzz. Of course there were controversies and technical glitches in the payment gateway, but still this is phenomenal. The prices range start from a modest 18k for an LCD Wi-Fi to 27k for an PixelQi Wi-Fi+3G model, which means its still cheaper than Samsung Galaxy tab!

Btw iPad may be launching this week (Jan 28).No official word nor any info on the telecom partner.Some predict the Wi-Fi only model could be priced between 24-27k which I think is very low. My guess is, it will priced a little more than galaxy atleast and the iphone 3GS (no idea when India will get iPhone 4! )

If you are in plans to get a tablet..wait for 3 months..

Hi ,Waves Google

After many attempts, I got my Google wave invite from Satish (thanks Doc :P). About 5 months before I had blogged about G Wave (??) and its features.Now a preview is out(invitation only) and it shows what would be the interface where the convergence of various communication & media sharing options will take place(that was the original idea).

The interface reminds me of a email client and the waves remind me of threads in online forums.If u are familiar with threads in online forums(my first forum exp was pagalguy.com) and how discussions take place, then G Wave is almost similar to that . But here you can keep the thread private,choose participants by your choice and has multiple media sharing options like videos and pictures etc,send invites and RSVP’s for events ,parties etc.

Google's video on When to Wave??

Some Q’s came to my mind while waving, why don't they add certain features to Gmail than introducing a whole new product?? Does it mean Gwave will exist along with Gmail? The answer is Gwave is based on a different protocol called XMPP,different from Gmail.Moreover XMPP is a open source protocol which will allow developers to build custom wave engines, add-ons,gadgets etc. To Know more on this read wiki of Google wave Federation Protocol

But still, Isn’t it going to make communication lil more complex? I mean now i have one more inbox to check in and some more messages to reply …but to the same contacts??

I Phone Pre Phone U Phone??

It was mobile mania all again this week.Palm Pre hit the stores and made a record breaking sales (rumored to be more than 50,000 units in just 2 days!!).

Apple’s WWDC devoid of Steve Jobs still had something solid to show Iphone 3GS.  (faster better iphone ..but not very exciting as the previous ones).

Meanwhile Dhiru and Tiger took their blogging to a professional level after attending the Nokia N97 launch in India.

While Dhiru stands up for Apple 3GS (btw he is apple biased :p ) when compared to N97, I put my bet on the new Palm Pre which is considered as the first true iphone killer.It has a QWERTY keyboard which is one of things Iphone will love to have.The Web OS is the real deal which beats the iphone OS .The ability to run many applications at once,touch accuracy,mail,IM  notifications  while running any app,etc make it far superior even than the upcoming iphone 3.o. 

Still iPhone’s large application base,build quality,iPod scores over the Pre.But I think a large chunk of business  users may shift to Pre ,considering the cost advantage(refer pic),and business features like  MS exchange and Office.

As far i can see,the $99 iphone 3G will give the Pre a stiff competition than the iphone 3GS.

While the N97 with a price tag of $699,can kiss US markets goodbye..Asian markets is not much promising either.And with HTC planning to launch Android phones in India,they better plan something better.

Meanwhile I am trying to lose my Sony Ericsson “accidentally” and get  a Nokia  ..waiting for Nokia 2730-budget phone with 3G

Sony Walkman W series ….Keep walking

Its a mp3 player, its a headphone..its a walkman…Yes Sony is still alive and Walking.With the  W series walkman Sony has once again proves its strength in unique product design without a single trace of Apple.Remember Vaio P??

Unlike many other Mp3 players the  W series has got a fresh design without a trace of Ipod in it,however it as  cool as an Apple Ipod . The headphones and the flash drive is fused to form this hassle free design just like a Bluetooth headset.

It has the patented Jog dial and a new Zapping feature,which plays a small clip from the middle of the song , so u can instantly recognize the song and decide to play or skip to next song.The two parts have magnetic sides which get attached nicely,making easy to carry.Click here for more details 

The W series was featured in CES 2009

With 2 gb memory and 12 hr battery life @ $65-70 ,it is premium priced,as Sony always does.There is also the same Ipod Shuffle problem of no headphone choice as the headphone itself is the player.  But Sony is best known for audio quality so need to worry abt it unless you are an audiophile or something like that.

GOOGLE WavE-Mail

While Microsoft was revamping its Live Search Engine into Bing-the Decision Engine,Google was busy re-inventing the good old email.

What would Email look like if it were to be invented today?          This was the question Google asked its Googlers and BING!! (pun intended) they got the answer(atleast they say so)…Google Wave is the new email.

What is a wave? Google says:

A wave is equal parts conversation and document. People can communicate and work together with richly formatted text, photos, videos, maps, and more.

A wave is shared. Any participant can reply anywhere in the message, edit the content and add participants at any point in the process. Then playback lets anyone rewind the wave to see who said what and when.

A wave is live. With live transmission as you type, participants on a wave can have faster conversations, see edits and interact with extensions in real-time.

Its like hybrid email which has Gmail enriched with cool features of many Google products like Docs,Gtalk, iGoogle, Orkut, You tube, Search etc etc.

What surprised me was, Google which is known for making things simple,has actually made email a little complex by adding so many features in one application.Of course,there could be another view that instead of using 4 0r 5 different applications,users can “simply  Wave it”.

Its still early to comment on the success of Wave,however I am pretty sure,good ol’ Email wont be washed away by the Wave,at least for now .

Google Squares the Wolf

I cant believe that I missed this when I read about WolframAlpha. Anyways,looks like Google is all set to rip off the Wolf.

Google will be rolling out Google squared as part of Google labs by the end of May.The special feature in Google Squared is that it will extract data  from the web and produce the results in “Squares”  in the form of spreadsheets.  Techcrunch has released a demo video on Google Squared.

Also Google has already added new tools called Search options which “are a collection of tools that let you slice and dice your results and generate different views to find what you need faster and easier”

This may not exactly mirror WolframAlpha’s capabilities but the point is ,no matter what competition comes ,Google can easily replicate and will even better it.So that when it comes to search GOOGLE RULES ALWAYS.

WINDOWS 7 RC - just around the corner

Attention XP lovers , WIN7 will have a XP mode which will run through Windows Virtual PC. MS says this will help small firms using XP to move migrate more easily to Win 7.Older Applications can be installed directly in the XP mode without any compatibility issues.The beta versions of Windows XP Mode and Windows Virtual PC for Windows 7 Professional and Windows 7 Ultimate will be released soon. (I have the WIN7 Enterprise edition..and its good)

The official Microsoft blog says that the Release Candidate of Win 7 will be available from April 30 for MSDN and TechNet subscribers and for public downloads from May 5th.

Microsoft recently reported a fall in sales of 5.6 percent to $13.6 billion in the third quarter, which ended March 31. Profit declined 32 percent to $2.98 billion.This is the first decline in 23 years since the company went public.

However, it seems cost saving plans have convinced investors which resulted in astounding 11 percent,biggest jump in 5 months.Hopefully WIN 7 will give the additional boost to sales….

Sixth Sense-the Future of Mobile Technology

Just when I thought touch devices like iphones,Tablet pc's etc are going to rule the near future, comes a far more cutting edge technology which looks like as if pulled out from a Sci-Fi movie. Pattie Mae , founder of Fluid Interfaces Group recently unveiled Sixth Sense, a wearable device comprising a projector which projects the virtual world onto any surface an can be accessed with hand gestures…something like in the movie Minority Report.Watch the video to get a peek into the future.

SIXTH SENSE DEMO

Pranav Mistry, a PhD student in the Fluid Interfaces Group at MIT's Media Lab is the wizard behind this project, which aims to blend in the virtual world with physical world by making data accessible, anywhere, anytime.

If this becomes viable ad practical, we will be “wearing” our mobile devices either as cap, sunglasses or as “bling bling” chains.Hope the day come sooner………

Windows 7 is the Good Side of Vista

One of the good things to have techies in the family, is that you get cool techstuff much before others ,atleast I get it before most of my friends:) [when it comes to software even my engg friends ask for tips!!!].

So it is not much of surprise, when some of my friends are getting convinced to move to Vista I have 'moved on' to windows 7 [build 7.000-new version coming in sometime but I couldn't wait :)]. And before anything else , I would say this if you are using XP hold it, don't move to Vista. wait for some more time because Win7 will be releasing soon commercially!!.(latest by 4th quarter 2009).

Well I am not going to review Win7 for you ,there are others who are better qualified than me for that.But as a normal user and a non tech guy I would say these.... its faster than XP (believe it or not :p), has all the good stuff of vista aero theme,safety etc etc,a uncluttered Taskbar which shows mainly the icons of application,revamped start menu,free to move gadgets,improved preview,libraries through which you can access similar files from single location (for example, in the photos library all photos in the system can be accessed despite of their original location).Click here for detailed preview

Now ...Tiger,who had installed WIN 7 before me had some issues so uninstalled it.Well the requirements are similar to Vista,minimum is 1 gb ram and atleast 2ogb hard drive space..If vista works fine in your system then Win7 should work splendidly.There was a critical update after its initial release, so guys who had used without the update may not have enjoyed it.I had uninstalled Vista then loaded Win7 so its working like a charm.

Bottom line: Win 7 is Vista reloaded but this time MS has got it right :)

Two Sides of the New Ipod Shuffle

If you are a regular to my blog you would have realised it by now.Nevertheless I will say it up front,"I am Microsoft Biased"

However, I wont argue over the fact that Apple is the Greatest when it comes to product design and one of the most innovative companies in this planet. Apple's new Ipod Shuffle sure stole my eyes. For starters, its half the size , 4 times the memory(4Gb). At $79 its not too pricey either, considering other Ipods.Apart from the new multiple playlist support, the coolest feature is that this player talks!!

The VoiceOver feature announces the name of song or playlist, notifies about the battery life in 14 languages!!.

Surely Apple knows how to be Invincible.I felt "Wow" really belongs to Apple and not to MS... remember Vista wow :(

But again my Microsoft biased mind was desperate to find something wrong about Apple. I was having thoughts that Why Apple does not always give out their best at first?? May be Apple had this design before itself, but planned to release only when the sales slowed down.May be it wants to skim the market as much possible, before release a better version(like the case of Iphone 3g). But then came my saviour.....

Dan Leahul points out in Brand republic's Digital Blogger

"...the volume and tracking controls have been moved to the iPod earphones.The earphones, proprietary earphones... why Apple, why?

Seems like a kick in the shins to devoted iPod users, just what happens if (when) you (eventually) lose the earphones, besides obviously shelling out £40 for another set?

An explanation? Are we granted an apology? A hand written letter from Steve Jobs with a dab of his Apple musk sealed in the envelope?

Since when is the World's Nicest Company^TM so mean? "

Aha ...looks like Apple is not so innocent after all and Microsoft is not just the one which is blamed all the time.

I am Microsoft biased and I can sleep peacefully tonight....

Bye Bye Cellphones... Hello MID

Technology is moving at a greater speed than we think,atleast it is faster than I thought.

Earlier I had  pointed out the narrowing difference (Toshiba Ikiller) between mobile phones & computing devices  and the possible strategic inflection point (Call rates RIP) the telecom industry might come across.

So what? take a look at the news from CNET.com

Intel announced here Monday at the GSMA Mobile World Congress that LG Electronics will use its latest generation technology to build a new class of device called mobile Internet devices, or MIDs.Now the companies are working on a new class of product that are mini-computers that can also be used to make phone calls using a wireless Internet connection. Intel sees the category of product as something that is somewhere between a smartphone, like the Apple iPhone, and a Netbook, a scaled-down version of a notebook computer.

IF you see the image below you will get the idea of that "something somewhere" product Intel is talking about. ARM is one of the early firms to have a vision about MID's or Mobile Internet Devices

The article further states the implication of MID's in the telecom industry which will eventually make Call rates R.I.P

I thought it will take another decade for this to happen, but looks like  we will bid farewell to cellphones & embrace MIDs,very soon.

Ikiller from Toshiba

When rumours about Dell's Smartphone were spreading,Toshiba a significant player in laptop category has launched a smartphone err..pocket PC..Iphone killer..(the differences are narrowing)

When Sony entered the mobile market ,mobile was seen as extension in consumer electronics.Soon LG & Samsung followed suit.

Then came Apple with its Iphone and changed the rules of the game.Since the difference between smartphones & ultra compact PC's is getting smaller day by day,many laptop firms are entering mobile space. Its not more like a product category extension but more like product line extension.Now this phenomenon has seriously affected core mobile manufactures like Nokia , Motorola etc.

Btw TGO1 is the first mobile to run on Qualcomm Snapdragon platform using a Windows Mobile 6.1 OS.It has a 1ghz mobile CPU with a 3d UI.Looks pretty impressive.See demo below...

Lets see whether it kills competition or killed by competition....

MOBILE MANIA 2009

Coming soon to a store near you

NOKIA -N97,E63,Slide,5130,5300

HTC - G1,S740,HD

MOTO-E66,Aura,VM35

Samsung-pixon,i7110

LG-Renoir,Prada

Blackberry-Curve,Storm

SONY-G705 &W705

For more details here

PC to become Super PC

NVIDIA ,the leader in visual computing devices  ,has unveiled the First ever Personal Super Computer.NVIDIA's has leveraged its high performance processor GPU to bring in High Performance Computing (HPC) solutions. 

Until Super computers which are usually room size ,million dollar,complex computing systems. But the The GPU-based Tesla™ Personal Supercomputer, is priced between£4,000 and £8,000 and look much like an ordinary PC.

“We’ve all heard ‘desktop supercomputer’ claims in the past, but this time it’s for real,” said Burton Smith, Microsoft Technical Fellow.  Heterogeneous computing, where GPUs work in tandem with CPUs, is what makes such a breakthrough possible.”

Though it is priced 1/100th of the price of a normal supercomputer,it is still high for a normal PC user.So initially NVIDIA will be looking at universities and to the scientific and research community.

David Kirk, chief scientist at NVIDIA, the American company which has designed the new technology, said: "Pretty much anything that you do on your PC that takes a lot of time can be accelerated with this.These supercomputers can improve the time it takes to process information by 1,000 times.If you imagine it takes a week to get a result [from running an experiment], you can only do it 52 times a year. If it takes you minutes, you can do it constantly, and learn just as much in a day."

The PC maker Dell, however, said that it would soon be mass producing them for the general consumer market. Eric Greffier, a Dell senior executive, said: "Before mobile phones were reserved for the few, now we can't live without them. It will be the same with these supercomputers. They are the building block for the computing of the future."

I don't know about research , but imagine all the games that could be played with so much power.Looks SUPER COOL to me :)

N97 ,The Real Iphone Killer

After the several attempts to kill the Iphone by major rivals,Iphone still topped the lists as the most favoured smartphone. But when everyone thought the dust has settled,here comes the new N97 

Samsung Omnia,HTC Diamond,Sony Xperia..etc , although they were considered good,they weren't good enough. Nokia N96 and Google G1 emerged as promising threats to the Iphone (In India,it was almost suicide.see why) .They were iphone replicas or equivalents in terms of features and designs,but there was not much of a radical difference..except the G1's  Android.

But the N97 is packed with new features  taking mobile computing to the next level leveraging the web applications.One of the most unique features of N97 is Social Location.

  Sensing your 'So-Lo' -The Nokia N97 introduces the concept of 'social location'. With integrated A-GPS sensors and an electronic compass, the Nokia N97 mobile computer intuitively understands where it is. The Nokia N97 makes it easy to update social networks automatically with real-time information, giving approved friends the ability to update their 'status' and share their 'social location' as well as related pictures or videos.

In a press release ,Jonas Geust, Vice President, heading Nokia Nseries,said "From the desktop to the laptop and now to your pocket, the Nokia N97 is the most powerful, multi-sensory mobile computer in existence.Together with the Ovi services announced today, the Nokia N97 mobile computer adjusts to the world around us, helping stay connected to the people and things that matter most. With the Nokia N97, Nseries leads the charge in helping to transform the Internet into your Internet"

N97-DEMO

Sad news is,not all markets will see the N97 now.Initially it will be launched only in European markets,  it will be a long time before US consumers get their hands on this new mobile computer. In India? ..It will come ...well eventually.

Palin!! Power!! -Prez & Play???

Tired of seeing the power plays by the US prez candidates? Well you can relax by playing with their Action Figures.You can get either the Power Palin or Obama Sock Monkey depending upon your support(Possibly the opposite party's?!!)

While Palin comes in like a Secret Agent and a School Girl, Obama is the beach dude.Hey dont forget the the bouncer McCain , who is often forgotten as it seems that the fight is between Ms.Alaska Barracuda VS Mr.Barack.


From a marketing point of view,what was the need for these action figures? who are they targeting?.I think these dolls are made for the parody lovers (people who mock ads,make spoof videos etc).Spoof videos are one of the highest watched category in sites like youtube,dailymotion etc. And since the dolls having a mocking tone,the Palin toys are for the democrats and the Obama sock monkeys are for the republicans.

Its time for Prez & Play!!!!