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Techradar |
- Amazon's Kindle tops its top 10 Xmas sales list
- Tutorial: 14 Thunderbird tips to help you take control of your inbox
- Google providing Boxing Day hangover cures
- In Depth: The evolution of the Linux desktop
- Review: Synology DiskStation DS211
- 10 best Safari extensions
- Review: Asus Eee PC Lamborghini VX6
- Review: Seagate BlackArmor NAS 420
- Catch up: this week's most popular posts
| Amazon's Kindle tops its top 10 Xmas sales list Posted: 26 Dec 2010 12:57 AM PST  Amazon has announced its biggest Christmas sellers, and is its own Kindle device that tops the chart, beating the Toy Story 3 DVD into second place. In fact, the top four sellers are all from different genres, the Kindle from electronics, Toy Story 3 from DVD, Call of Duty: Black Ops from gaming and Take That's latest album Progress making up the best-selling quartet. But Amazon's well-priced and critically acclaimed Kindle has brought in the bucks for the online retail giant, and the purchase of digital books for the device will only serve to cement the company's dominance in the market. "This was the first Christmas that Kindle and Kindle 3G have been available from Amazon.co.uk and the demand has been exceptional," said Brian McBride, Managing Director of Amazon.co.uk Ltd. £109 "At only £109, Kindle has been on the top of Christmas Wish Lists all over the country this year and we expect to see many people visiting the Kindle Store over the days that follow Christmas to take advantage of the massive selection of low-price Kindle Books available," he added. Apparently, 27 items were being ordered every second at the peak of its Christmas buying period – and a total of 2.3 million items were bought on the busiest day – Monday 6 December. Top 10 1.Kindle(3G + Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi only) 
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| Tutorial: 14 Thunderbird tips to help you take control of your inbox Posted: 26 Dec 2010 12:00 AM PST  Can't manage your inbox? Want to deal with attachments more efficiently? Revive your email account with these quick Thunderbird tips. 1. Filter messages into folders An inbox with only one main folder is a definite recipe for disaster. Not only will you receive spam mixed up with messages from trusted contacts, you'll end up with too much mail to deal with all at once. To get round this, create new folders (usually via File > New Folder) and then set up rules or filters for each one. 2. Back up and restore your mail and contacts Hard drive crashes are always possible, but your email can be saved in a flash. In Thunderbird, just copy your profile (C:\Program Files\Mozilla Thunderbird\Defaults\Profile) to another drive to back up your emails. To restore backups, copy each folder you archived to the original location. 3. Work faster with mail templates To create a new template and use it as the basis for future emails, make a new message, add your text and formatting and select File > Save As > Template. To use this example as the basis for a new mail message, select the Templates folder and then double-click the one you just saved. 4. Tag your messages Alongside filters, tags are the best route to a tidy inbox. In Thunderbird, the default ones are 1) Important (red), 2) Work (orange), 3) Personal (green), 4) To Do (blue) and 5) Later (purple), but you can add your own. Highlight a message and press a number from 1 to 5. Filter rules can also be used to apply tags. 5. Compact messages To compact all folders in Thunderbird manually, click the account on the left and then select File > Compact Folders. If your mailbox is too large then try working with one folder at a time by right-clicking on one and choosing "Compact this folder ". 6. Make attachments as small as possible The Auto Zip Attachments extension enables you to compress attachments automatically prior to sending, manually compress with the Auto Zip button, add a comment and password-protect zips. 7. Encrypt emails Using a personal email certificate such as the free Thawte option, you can digitally sign your emails so that recipients can see they're really from you. You can also encrypt your messages so that only the intended recipients can view them, offering you real security. 8. Use IMAP rather than POP3 Most email clients support IMAP and POP to access messages from the server. If you're using a popular webmail client or a personal domain, you should be able to use IMAP, which is good for multiple machine use because it automatically synchronises. Handily, it can also be organised server-side. 9. Plan ahead Lightning is Thunderbird's personal organiser, and can be bolted on to the mail client to act as a handy calendar. It even has event filters. 10. Display birthdays This add-on displays birthdays from the address book as events in Lightning. Now you'll never forget a friend 's special day again. 11. Copy Gmail To make Thunderbird more like Gmail, turn on the threaded view. Go to Tools > Options > Advanced > General and click Config Editor. Now search for the preference "mailnews.thread_pane_ column _unthreads". Double-click to change the value to "false". 12. Add Gmail power Another Gmail-esque extension is GMailUI. The Expression search type enables you to enter multiple Gmail-like operators into the field, such as " from:amazon subject:order". 13. Navigate quickly Install the Nostalgy extension to copy or save a message. You can also use it to switch to any email folder quickly with the [C], [S] and [G] keys. 14. Transfer mail The Mail Redirect add-on is ideal for exporting Thunderbird messages to another address without having to forward them. It preserves all the message headers and bounces them to a new destination. 
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| Google providing Boxing Day hangover cures Posted: 25 Dec 2010 05:00 PM PST  Google is aiming to help people with the inevitable Boxing Day hangover, with the search giant conjuring up the remedies being sought by people across Europe. Google has looked at the top searches for hangover cures from several countries across the world, and rooted out some interesting cultural differences and some fairly obvious similarities to boot. "During Christmas time, people tend to party more, and to drink more too," explained Google. "How well prepared are people to recuperate after a long night out? What kinds of hangover remedies and tips are user searching for?" Oatmeal? According to the Brits, oatmeal is a good way to get over a hangover, the French like their medicine beer and sugar is a sure anti-hangover remedy according to the Spaniards," the search giant added. "Italians prefer to go to the gym to combat hangovers, Germans rely on cucumber and pickled herring to cure a hangover, the Polish have lemon to get over a long night of drinking and coffee is internationally recognized beverage against hangovers." We're happy about the coffee, but not entirely convinced that we fancy cucumber and pickled herring for a hangover cure. Or at all, quite honestly. UK Canada France Germany Italy Switzerland Poland Australia South Africa 
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| In Depth: The evolution of the Linux desktop Posted: 25 Dec 2010 04:00 AM PST  Back in 1998 when I started using Linux, it was ugly. In those days you installed it by inserting around 40 floppy disks into your computer and praying that one of them wouldn't be a duffer and make you have to start again. After this lengthy installation process, you were typically presented with this not-entirely-intuitive interface: darkstar login: At that time, the dominant operating system was Windows 95, with Windows 98 just getting its wheels rolling – and Linux's Wargames-esque vibe clearly didn't cut it for a modern generation raised on the GUI. As our beardy friends in the Linux kernel world figured out how to get graphics cards working, more and more effort was going into producing a graphical environment that the world was familiar with. This effort started with X – the chunk of software that paints things on to your screen – but it wasn't enough. To get a truly usable GUI, you needed a good window manager to work with. Unlike the Windows world, X enabled you to run multiple window managers, and a plethora of wacky and wonderful attempts were made. Some were simple, some were more complex, some tried to emulate Microsoft's operating system and some were just bonkers. Amid this creative explosion, two graphical environments emerged as the clear popular choices: KDE and Gnome. While both were fully functioning environments and great for users, they were essentially two different walled gardens with little crossover. Both solved many of the same problems, such as presenting ways to launch files and manage fonts, but each did its own thing in its own way. Things had to change. While our community was growing, it was madness that two developers could be solving the same problem in two different ways. Fortunately, the situation was about to get a lot better. Unifying the desktop With more and more chatter about cross-desktop participation, the freedesktop.org project was announced as a desktop-independent place in which software could be developed to benefit any desktop that wanted to use it. The site provided a wiki, code hosting, email discussion lists, IRC channels and more. It had a tremendous impact on desktops. A lot of software was created; some of it reached maturity quickly and solved real problems, while some projects got started but were ultimately never finished. Irrespective of which projects worked and which didn't, freedesktop.org also brought an important message: we should try to collaborate between desktops where possible. The message was popularly received and the desktop continued to evolve. One of the most important pieces of software that came out of freedesktop.org was a unified messaging system. At the time, a key challenge desktop developers faced was how applications could communicate with one other; the web browser needed to communicate with the system keyring, the networking daemon with the icon in the panel, and so on. KDE tried to solve this problem with a system called DCOP, which was an intuitive way for applications to send and receive messages to and from other applications. While DCOP worked well in KDE, it unfortunately didn't solve the wider problem between multiple applications across multiple desktops. And thus the D-BUS project was born. D-BUS is, in a nutshell, a cross-desktop equivalent to DCOP. It provides a facility in which applications can communicate with one other via a common bus and using a common language. D-BUS went through a feverish period of development, ultimately became ratified as a freedesktop.org standard, and the technology was built into both the KDE and Gnome environments. This was a huge leap forward for the desktop, and another strong step in its evolution. Refining the desktop With all this cross-desktop work going on, we saw tremendous developments on the Linux desktop. Many of our long-suffering problems were getting addressed – USB devices were plug and play, wireless networking was only a click away, printing was a breeze, software was simple to install; things were getting better. It felt like we were really becoming relevant, and we had something the competitors didn't: an incredible global community working together.
In the world of Ubuntu, we were doing our best to be at the forefront of delivering this innovation to users. We were taking open source software and integrating it, and our goal was to deliver this content in a way that solved real-world problems for people; be it getting your music player to work, getting online or whatever else. Back in 2008, Mark Shuttleworth, the founder of Ubuntu, was keen to ramp up this innovation and focus in Ubuntu, so he founded the Ayatana project. The idea was simple: to recruit a design team and an engineering team, and build a set of user-interface enhancements and improvements defined by a strong sense of quality in design. This was new for both Mark, the company (Canonical), and Ubuntu. We had had a long history of shipping and integrating software, but such a design-centric initiative was uncharted territory. Ayatana When Ayatana was founded, a comprehensive design team was hired by Canonical. The team came from a variety of backgrounds: many came from brand, graphic design, product development, interaction design and other walks of life. The term 'melting pot of personalities' is an understatement, and many were new to open source and still taking it all in, but all were enthused and inspired by the idea of great design infused with strong community. The first project to come out of the team was called Notify OSD and provided a new approach to notification bubbles, which we were all too familiar with in Ubuntu. For years we had seen these boring yellow square bubbles appear in the top-right of the Gnome desktop when an application needed to tell you something. Notify OSD was the same basic concept, but re-imagined. With it, an attractive black transparent bubble would appear, and instead of clicking it to dismiss it, hovering your mouse over it would cause the bubble to fade so you could interact with the application underneath it.
The justification for the design was that notification bubbles should present information to the user in a way that isn't intrusive. With the first version of Notify OSD released and shipped in Ubuntu, the Kubuntu team wanted the technology in KDE too. Fortunately, the Ayatana team had created the Notify OSD specification in a cross-desktop way and the Kubuntu team simply worked on a different GUI that fitted well into the KDE desktop. Like the Notify OSD in Gnome, it was well received; a subtle and gentle improvement to the desktop. The Ayatana team weren't limiting themselves to just notification bubbles, though. The next goal was to fix the system and application notification area; an area that had become something of a wasteland in the Linux desktop. There were multiple problems with the notification area. To start, the notification area typically had a number of notification icons for applications that used it, and you couldn't click once and scrub through the icons – you had to click each individually to use it. In addition, the user interface on these icons was often inconsistent. Some have certain types of menu in left-click menus, some in right-click menus, some had strange and inconsistent widgets, and some had other odd bits. The icons in the notification area were the same as in the application launcher – typically full-colour icons – and this often looks sub-optimal in different themes. As an example, in a dark theme you usually want single-colour icons in the notification area for clarity and definition, but also normal bright-coloured icons in the application launcher. All of these issues caused accessibility problems for blind and disabled users, and made it difficult to navigate the notification area with a keyboard. The Ayatana team wanted to fix these problems in a cross desktop way. To do this they based their work on the System Notifier Specification that was created and used by the KDE project, and created a new application programming interface (API) that developers could use to put an icon in the notification area for Gnome applications. The technology had a number of benefits, including the fact that you can now click one icon in the panel and scrub through the icons and each notification area menu would drop down (similar to how you can move your mouse through the menus in an application). Additionally, applications can set a specific icon in the notification area, which made single colour notification area icons a reality while keeping the application icon a normal full colour icon. Notification area menus were made more consistent. No more confusion about left- or right-clicking to see a menu; you can only left-click, and only standard menu items, checkboxes and radio buttons are supported. This results in a much simpler and more consistent user experience. Everything was made far more accessible, and functions in the notification area can be controlled by the keyboard, which makes it much easier for blind and disabled users. When the technology was ready, it was shipped in Ubuntu and was well received by users. With these indicators being fully open and with APIs for C, Python and Mono, application developers had a field day and more and more applications were adjusted to support the technology. What is particularly interesting from a cross-desktop perspective is that due to the technology being built on a standard cross-desktop specification, KDE applications running in Gnome have their notification menus rendered in the native GTK toolkit and using native Gnome icons. The same works for Gnome applications running in KDE: those notification menus are rendered in Qt. This makes applications that aren't designed for your desktop feel much more native and integrated. System indicators Another feature of the technology is the concept of system indicators: notification icons that group together similar types of content (such as messages) or present system related content (such as battery, power and sound). A key technology here was the messaging menu: a small envelope-shaped icon that presents all of your incoming messages in one place. With it, applications can put content there; you can see how many new emails you have, new social network messages, chat messages and more. Again, due to the cross-desktop specification, any application can put content in the messaging menu and many projects surfaced to bring support in Zimbra, Gmail and more. Other system indicators have also been produced in Ayatana too. A good example is the sound menu, which not only enables you to adjust the volume of your soundcard, but also shows which song you're listening to and gives you the ability to skip through songs when listening. This is handy because typically when you want to listen to music on shuffle, you never need to interact with the music player other than for skipping tracks. With this feature you can hide your music player and just use the sound indicator to skip tracks. Application menus The final indicator-related feature that the Ayatana team have focused on is making an application's main menu also use this specification. The driving influence here was the netbook world.
On netbooks and other small form-factor devices, vertical space is a premium, and putting the application menu in the top panel saves space. This was developed as part of the work on Unity, a new netbook interface. The application menu indicator technology was developed and applies to almost all applications; all KDE and Gnome, GTK and Qt applications get the benefits of the technology without any changes to the application. Consequently, if you run an application with these new application menu indicators switched on, the application's menus appear in the panel and work in exactly the same way. Like the notification indicator icons, this is an entirely cross-desktop technology, so running KDE applications in Gnome means that the application menus are all rendered in native GTK widgets and icons, and vice-versa. It's pretty stunning to run KWord in Gnome and see all the application menus rendered as native widgets; again, it makes applications designed for other desktops feel more native and more accessible. Over the last three years, the Ayatana team have gone from strength to strength and some important lessons have been learned along the way. When Notify OSD was first launched, there was a pretty severe lack of interaction between the Canonical designers and the community, and this rightly caused some irritation among those in that community. However, we took those lessons onboard and now new technologies are not only discussed first in the community, but running code is released as soon as it's available. As an example, when the application indicator work was started, running code was available within a few weeks, and the community could play with it, explore the code and contribute bugfixes and improvements. This improved transparency has its most notable benefit in application support. A number of applications have built support into their projects for the application indicators and Notify OSD, and more and more applications are harnessing these features because Ubuntu ships all this technology, too. Looking forward We've come a long way on the Linux desktop. It only feels like yesterday when having a graphical desktop in the first place was a huge novelty on Linux, and luxuries such as consistent user interfaces, great usability and quick and easy access to devices and applications seemed like a world away. The community has come together, fuelled by inspiration for making a better experience for everyone, and we're seeing the benefits of many these changes. While we have made great progress, the future holds so much more potential. Linux is now an unstoppable force and, unlike back in 1998, we now have a great portfolio of technology that has the ability to touch the lives of computer users around the world. We also have a rich range of hardware to target – laptops, desktops, netbooks, tablets, phones, appliances and more – the world is our oyster, and driven by our continually growing community, who knows what Linux will look like in 2018? 
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| Review: Synology DiskStation DS211 Posted: 25 Dec 2010 02:00 AM PST  The DiskStation DS211's excellent features make it an ideal NAS drive for home and small business users. As well as FTP and HTTP servers, it supports PHP and MySQL. It can control and record up to 8 IP cameras, and its backup software enables Windows users to set up scheduled backups. For Mac owners, it's Time Machine compatible, and its USBCopy function lets you back up data from a USB storage device with a single button press. Downloads with BitTorrent, FTP, HTTP, eMule and NZB are supported, as are RSS and RapidShare. After installing the Mail Station package, it can be used as a mail server, and with Web Station it can host up to 30 websites. Audio Station is perfect for organising and playing your music, or listening to internet radio with station information provided by SHOUTCast and RadioIO. You can stream digital media to any DLNA/UPnP compatible home device, including the PS3, Xbox 360 and compatible televisions. It's compatible with iTunes too. Photo Station 4 lets you share your photos, videos and blog over the internet, and there are mobile apps for streaming music, viewing videos and accessing files through an iPhone or Android device. Don't expect the DiskStation to be the easiest to set up, but its versatility, excellent interface and the ability to download mini-apps from the Synology website for extra functionality make it a real winner. It's also available as the DS211j, with a little less RAM, a slightly slower processor, and a £179 price point. Beyond that however, both units are almost entirely identical. Related Links
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| Posted: 25 Dec 2010 02:00 AM PST  Since they first appeared on the scene, Safari extensions have been springing up everywhere. While the list of available items isn't anywhere near as long as the App Store's, it can still be tricky deciding which are the best ones. So we've done the hard work for you – read on to discover our 10 favourites. You'll need Safari 5.0.1 or later to use extensions. If you haven't got it, run Software Update, then fire up the latest version and go to Safari > Safari Extensions Gallery. To install any listed here, just locate it then click the Install button below its name. But if you find extensions elsewhere on the web, download them, double-click the file and simply click Install in the dialog that appears. They'll install instantly, but some may require you to quit and relaunch Safari to activate them. Most have settings you can tweak by going to Safari > Preferences > Extensions. One word of caution: a developer who was up to no good could potentially put malicious code into an extension, so only download them from reputable sources. Any that appear on Apple's Safari Extensions Gallery will be fine. For more see here. 1. Mini Google Maps
Google Maps is fantastic. We constantly find ourselves opening it up when we're browsing – whether it's to find out where a local news story happened, or to plan our route to a restaurant. Its great, but having to load it in a new tab is a pain, especially if you're trying to remember an unfamiliar postcode or road name. This extension adds a button to your toolbar, which you click to open a map and search bar. You can drag the window around the site you're viewing so that it doesn't obscure the address. 2. Reload button
This is one for the nostalgists. Early versions of Safari had a Reload button at the left-hand end of the toolbar alongside the Back and Forward ones. It was removed in Safari 4, to be replaced by a little icon at the end of the address bar. This extension puts the Reload button back where you like it. Because it doesn't double as a Stop Loading button, however, it leaves the icon at the end of the address bar in place, should you need it. 3. Instapaper Beyond Instapaper is a fantastic way to save articles on the web to read later. This little extension enhances the service's, so rather than doing everything with your mouse, it speeds things up using simple keyboard shortcuts. Sign into your account with this extension installed and you'll see the top article is highlighted yellow. Press H at any time to see a list of the commands. As you get to know these, you'll be amazed how much more quickly you can work your way around Instapaper. 4. Get the best shopping deal
It's well-known that shopping online is generally cheaper than on the high street, but how can you be sure you're getting the best price? Rather than you searching through a bunch of different websites, have the InvisibleHand Extension do the work for you. As the name suggests, you'll forget it's there until you're browsing a product page. At this point, it'll flash up a yellow bar with a raft of information about the item. First and foremost, it tells you if you've found the best deal, or how much you can save if you shop elsewhere. There's a link to the product page on the cheapest seller's site, alongside a drop-down menu of other possible retailers. This menu lists the product's price and the postage costs. Simply click the retailer's name in the list to be taken to their web page where you can buy the product. 5. Colour coded HTML If you're a developer or ever have to work with web code in any way, this handy little extension is one you should add to your arsenal. Rather than viewing a page's code in Safari's minimalist Source window, BetterSource colour-codes HTML and adds line numbers. It opens the code in a new tab, however it doesn't support JavaScript. 6. MouseGestures
Speed up your web browsing by using your mouse for common tasks. So rather than clicking the Back button or hitting Backspace, simply hold down the middle mouse button and move your pointer left. There are 12 different commands you can use, although you're limited to four gestures – up, down, left and right. After you've installed this one, you need to restart Safari to get it working. And we suggest you don't change the Execute gestures with: drop-down from Middle Button, since using either left- or right-click alternatives could conflict with dragging or contextual menus. 7. Exposer
If you've got lots of tabs open, or several from the same site, finding the one you're after can become time consuming. The more tabs you open, the shorter each one's title becomes, making it even harder. Exposer brings Mac OS X's Exposé feature to your browser tabs, enabling you to bring up a visual grid of all the tabs you've got open in that window. Hover your mouse over each for a larger view, then simply click the one you want to bring that tab to the front. You can use Exposer via the button it places in your toolbar, or through a shortcut key, which you can define in its settings. 8. A Cleaner YouTube
YouTube is all about the video, but unless you switch to fullscreen mode, whatever you're watching is surrounded by related videos, like and dislike buttons, social media controls, comments and more distractions. A Cleaner YouTube strips all that away, leaving you with a minimalist interface built around the video, so you can watch it without diversions. You still get a search bar and the essential controls for the video, but all the rest is hidden behind a link at the bottom of the screen. So if you want to see the comments, embed code, sharing buttons and so on, it's all just a click away. 9. Tweet from Safari
If you're a heavyweight Twitter user, chances are you'll use a dedicated client, such as Tweetie or TweetDeck. Tweet for Safari isn't designed to replace such programs, but it means you're always in touch with what's going on in the Twitter cloud. Click any of the trending terms and a column appears showing you relevant tweets. There's also a search bar and a button to create a new tweet about the page you're viewing. Handily, if you've got Tweetie for Mac installed, you can go into the Twitter for Safari preferences and tell it to use that for your tweets. The toolbar shows Twitter usernames related to the page you're viewing – head over to www.macformat.co.uk and you'll see '@MacFormat' appears. Click each username to see the person's tweets. 10. Invisible status bar When you're browsing the web, the status bar at the base of your Safari window will often lie redundant. The only time you're likely to use it is when you hover over a link, to see where you're about to be whisked off to. Install Invisible Status Bar and up pops a bar whenever you hover over a link; it vanishes again when you move on. 
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| Review: Asus Eee PC Lamborghini VX6 Posted: 25 Dec 2010 01:52 AM PST  Since Asus pioneered the humble netbook around three years ago, its Eee PC range has faced fierce competition from almost every other laptop manufacturer out there. From Packard Bell's Dot machines to MSI's Wind series, there's a mind-exploding variety of netbooks to choose from. Although most of these mini-machines appear identical on paper, there's actually considerable difference between many of the models. From the incredible battery life of the Acer Aspire One D260, to the solid build quality of the Dell Inspiron Mini 1018, every netbook we see has its own strengths and highlights. To make things even more confusing for the average consumer, there's also the huge resurgence of tablets to consider, offering a smart and convenient method for browsing the net and consuming media. Into this saturated market bursts the Asus Eee PC Lamborghini VX6. Inspired by the Lamborghini Murcielago LP640 roadster, this is easily one of the most stylish netbooks we've seen. The curved lid mimics the roadster's drool-worthy chassis and comes in a choice of white or black. Lamborghini's famous crest is planted firmly in the centre and adds an extra touch of class to the Eee PC VX6. Pull back that lid and the black interior looks just as sharp. Asus has gone for rubberised palm rests, which feel good and add another distinctive touch that sets the Eee PC VX6 apart from its competitors.
We were highly impressed by the Eee PC VX6's build quality, with no flex or weaknesses in any part of the chassis. The lid is incredibly solid and could probably brush off a firm knock without concern. This quality continues inside, with a firm and highly usable keyboard in place. Asus has stuck with the isolated-key design of its recent Eee PC models, such as the Eee PC 1015PE, and we found the board to be well-sized, filling the width of the chassis. There are gaps between each key to prevent mis-hits, but the gaps are covered to stop crumbs and muck from invading the Eee PC VX6's innards. It's rare to find an attractive touchpad, but the glossy finish to the Eee PC VX6's pad gives it a sleek chrome appearance that stands out and looks great. The touchpad is smooth and responsive, and a good size considering the netbook's compact chassis, with a firm single bar used for the two mouse buttons.
The pay-off for the solid build is, of course, extra weight and bulk. While the 1.6kg weight isn't exactly going to drag you down, and the 38mm thick chassis can still slip with ease into most bags, the Eee PC VX6 is still heavier and chunkier than many of the netbooks we see. Unfortunately, it's also much pricier. With an RRP of £499, the Eee PC VX6 is almost double the price of the average netbook. The question is: is the extra cash worth it?
We like some of the little touches Asus has thrown into the Eee PC VX6, which should please any car fiends out there. The netbook actually revs when you switch it on, an effect that never fails to amuse. Lamborghini fans will delight at the desktop background, which showcases the Murcielago LP640 roadster, and if you leave the netbook idle you'll be treated to a noisy screensaver featuring – you guessed it – cars screeching around the place. Most netbooks contend with a tiny 10.1-inch screen, but the Eee PC VX6's 12.1-inch display means browsing the web and editing your documents isn't as fiddly. We were impressed by the sharpness of the screen, with a 1,366 x 768-pixel resolution in place of the standard 1,024 x 600. Images are crisp and also reasonably vibrant, while brightness levels are standard for a machine this size. However, the screen only bends back a fraction past vertical, so finding a comfortable viewing angle can be tricky, especially with the Eee PC VX6 positioned on your lap. Storage is average for a netbook, with 250GB of space for your files and media. This should prove plenty for most people, assuming the Eee PC VX6 is used as a backup machine and not your main computer. Some standard Asus features are in place, including the Express Gate Cloud quick start option. By hitting a second power button, the Eee PC VX6 launches an alternative operating system in mere seconds. This is a basic OS with limited options – you can browse the web, check out your photos and play some simple games such as Solitaire. However, the Express Gate OS is rather slow and ugly, and we much prefer the Windows 7 interface. It's definitely worth the extra minute or so it takes to boot the Eee PC VX6. Much more impressive are the ports the Eee PC VX6 offers. Most netbooks contend with a VGA port for outputting to an external display, but this machine has an HDMI port too. You also get two USB 3.0 ports, which allow rapid data transfer with compatible devices. Networking is another highlight and as strong as it comes, with 802.11n Wi-Fi on board for wireless connections and Gigabit Ethernet for good old-fashioned wired communication. We usually raise the point of a netbook's audio only to mention how tinny and useless it is, but Asus has employed Bang & Olufsen to add a bit of oomph to the Eee PC VX6's sound quality. Initially we were sceptical about the 'ICEpower' audio, which promises 'crystal-clear and powerful sound'. However, at top volume the Eee PC VX6 does deliver a surprisingly strong aural experience. Music has more depth than usual, while it's actually possible to sit through an entire film without plugging in earphones. This isn't a party machine, though, and a pair of dedicated speakers are required to fill even a small room with sound.
One of the most intriguing aspects of the Eee PC VX6 on paper was the power beneath that highly desirable chassis. While an Intel Atom processor is in place as usual, Asus has gone for the dual-core Atom D525 backed up by 2048MB of DDR3 memory – twice as much as normally found in these mini machines. Yet despite this extra power under the hood, the Eee PC VX6 performed only marginally better in our benchmarking tests than any other netbook. If your needs are basic, restricted to browsing the web, consuming your media and editing office documents, the Eee PC VX6 will be sufficient. However, as with other netbooks, don't expect to run several applications at once without everything slowing to a painful and shuddering halt. Although standard performance may be a letdown, we were highly impressed by the graphical abilities of the Eee PC VX6. Asus has included Nvidia's Ion technology, which offers considerably better performance than the integrated solutions found in almost every other netbook. We found the Eee PC VX6 had more than enough power to smoothly play HD video and run older games, and you can even get away with some light video editing. Even better, Nvidia's Optimus technology is on board to help conserve battery power. Whenever the battery-draining Ion graphics aren't needed (for instance, when browsing your email), the Eee PC VX6 switches to the more economical integrated graphics. The resulting 313 minutes of battery power is enough to keep you active for most of the day away from the mains. However, this isn't a patch on most recent netbooks, such as the Packard Bell Dot S, which managed 502 minutes, and the Acer Aspire One D260, which lasted an incredible 532 minutes.
The Asus Eee PC Lamborghini VX6 is the netbook evolved. Featuring a slick chassis inspired by the Lamborghini Murcielago LP640 roadster, this is one of the most stylish mini machines we've seen. Add in an impressive specification and this should – on paper at least – be the best netbook of the year. But is it worth that hefty price tag? We liked The Eee PC VX6's chassis is incredibly well put together, as solid as it is stylish. The excellent build quality also extends to the keyboard and touchpad, which are responsive and highly usable. Performance is nothing special, but the Nvidia Ion graphics mean you can happily watch HD video, edit your home movies and play basic games – quite a feat for a humble netbook. We enjoyed the Eee PC VX6's 12.1-inch screen, which is pleasingly sharp and reasonably vibrant. Other features also impressed, including the HDMI port for hooking up to external displays and the two USB 3.0 ports. The Bang & Olufsen speakers are actually decent too, although dedicated audiophiles will need to plug in headphones to get the most from their music. We disliked Although the chassis is undoubtedly solid, it's also a little weighty and bulky compared to slimmer models such as the Packard Bell Dot S. Despite this, the Eee PC VX6 still slips with ease into any reasonably sized bag. Although 313 minutes of battery power will keep you going through lengthy journeys, it's beaten by most modern netbooks. The Acer Aspire One D260, for instance, survived almost four hours longer. The price tag is also a little steep, although if you want a netbook packed with style and features, we feel it's just about worth the extra spend. Verdict Easily the best-looking and most graphically powerful netbook we've seen in the last year, and indeed since Asus conceived the first ever Eee PC. We'd happily take an Eee PC VX6 on the road with us any time, although that price tag might put off many potential buyers. Related Links
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| Review: Seagate BlackArmor NAS 420 Posted: 25 Dec 2010 01:30 AM PST  Compatible with Windows, Linux and Mac OS, Seagate's BlackArmor NAS is designed for business user and home office user alike. It's easy to get it up and running, though you need a little networking knowledge to get the most from it. Its advanced features aren't always easy to use and access, but they're worth the effort. The drive's back-up features are excellent, offering a wealth of options and facilities such as incremental and differential backups, and wizards are available for both backing up and restoring data. On the business side, you can connect up to 50 workstations. The Seagate Global Access service means files stored on the Black Armor NAS 420 can be accessed securely over the internet using a standard web browser. Two of its four drive bays are populated out of the box and the drives are hotswappable, though the caddies and door are a little flimsy for a business-orientated NAS. You can configure your drives in RAID 0/1/5/10 and JBOD arrays, provided the necessary quantity of individual drives for the RAID array in question is met. Although it's not designed for home use, iTunes and DLNA-compatible media streaming are catered for here. The Black Armor NAS 420 includes good expansion options. It offers two Ethernet ports and four USB ports – three rear-mounted and one at the front. You can connect external hard drives for extra storage capacity and add a printer for sharing over the network. This NAS drive is a little bulky, so ensure you have enough room to set it up. It's not too expensive, but home and more demanding business users should look elsewhere. Related Links
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| Catch up: this week's most popular posts Posted: 25 Dec 2010 01:00 AM PST  This week, we looked at saucy uses for Kinect, heard about the playstation app for smartphone users and wondered about Google Nexus S price slashes. We also looked back at the year's gadget releases which didn't live up to their hype and looked forward to see what we can expect from Apple in the coming year. Top five news stories Microsoft Kinect sex game announced Microsoft Kinect is to get its very own X-rated sex game, courtesy of adult videogame company ThriXXX. The unnamed game (it's currently at demo stage) is offering up controller-free stimulation, where you can wave your hands to caress pixelated ladies on the screen – and probably cry afterwards as you try and figure out how your life got to such a low point that you have to get your kicks out of virtual porn. Free PlayStation app heading to iPhone and Android While the world awaits official news of the PSP phone, Sony has announced the imminent release of a free PlayStation app for iPhone and Android users. The app will be available on Apple iOS 4 or above and any Android version 1.6 (Donut) or higher. In version 1.0, users can check their achievements and keep an eye on friends' online statuses, as well as receive news of updates to PlayStation hardware and a feed from the PlayStation Europe blog. Google Nexus S price slashed by UK retailers Carphone Warehouse and Best Buy have slashed the price of the Google Nexus S handset by a whopping £120. The Google Nexus S, built by Samsung, has generated huge interest – following on from the Google Nexus One. However, Carphone Warehouse and Best Buy - both of the UK retailers of the phone - have cut the price from £549.99 to £429.95 – for the SIM free version obviously. Android 2.3 source code released by Google Google has released the source code for its recent Android 2.3/Gingerbread update, meaning new builds and custom ROMs can be created. Google confirmed the update is not only going to be available for smartphones, but also those with 'extra large screens, such as tablets.' "The source code for the Android 2.3 platform and software stack has been released! This release allows OEMs to begin preparing Android 2.3 for installation on new and existing devices, and allows hobbyists, enthusiasts, and researchers to develop custom builds." LG B Android handset to be slimmer than the iPhone 4? Hot on the heels of this week's official LG Optimus 2X reveal, a handset codenamed the LG B has leaked from LG's 2011 Android line-up. Although there's no mention of processing power, memory, connectivity or which Android OS version it will run, the LG B is shown to be slightly slimmer than the iPhone 4. This will no doubt upset Apple, which has been touting its latest iPhone as the world's thinnest smartphone. Top five in-depth articles The 10 biggest gadget letdowns of 2010 Not everything lives up to the impressive-sounding, bullet-point list of features that appeared on the internet six months before launch. Sometimes owning high-spec gadgets is best left to the imagination, as the result of your latest internet shopping spree can end with the courier dropping off something that isn't quite as life-changing and empowering as the multi-million pound, pan-European marketing assault initially suggested. Spec sheets are one thing, but as tech gets more and more complex and attempts to please more and more people by combining ever-longer lists of features into one box, we're seeing companies fail to get the dizzying modern blend of software and hardware anything like right. Apple in 2011: 10 things to expect There's every chance Steve Jobs will at some point pull the tech industry equivalent of a rabbit out of a hat in 2011, unleashing an amazing gadget no-one had thought of but that everyone will want (or, if they're a competitor, want to copy). However, through existing Apple announcements, the company's previous form and some cunning and incisive guesswork, we can be pretty sure we'll see the following ten things from the Cupertino giant over the coming months. Top 10 best tablet PC iPad alternatives Apple hasn't just rekindled interest in tablet devices, it has created the kind of hysteria that only Apple can. There's no denying that the iPad is a beautifully crafted device that's a joy to use, but not everyone wants to buy into Apple's design and marketing hype. iPad 2 rumours: what you need to know The internet loves Apple and it loves ill-founded speculation, so it's hardly surprising that iPad 2 rumours were flying before the first iPad even reached the UK. With only weeks to go before its expected unveiling the iPad 2 release date, specs and price are still closely guarded secrets, but that doesn't mean there aren't some juicy rumours, inspired guesses and possibly even Apple leaks to consider. Reports suggest Apple is also expecting massive demand for the new device and has ordered six million units per month. On comparing iPad apps with iPhone equivalents, one thing rapidly becomes clear: apps for Apple's tablet are pricier. Many of the best free iPhone apps cost 59p or more in their iPad incarnations, and the quality level of what's still free is often ropey. But among the dross lie rare gems - iPad apps that are so good you can't believe they're still free. Reviews The Google Nexus S is designed to be the device that showcases the power of Android 2.3 and comes without the constraints of network upgrade delays. Sony has bolstered its line of 3D ready TVs just in time for Christmas with another handsome Monolithic Design. But can it live up to the performance of its high flying brothers and sisters? Acer has stuck with the same UI as the Acer Stream and if you hated it before, you'll probably still hate it. But the Liquid Metal costs £299 SIM free, which is £30 cheaper… Finally they've arrived; the HD 6900 series cards from AMD. Right here we've got the very top-end of AMD's latest single-GPU cards, the AMD Radeon HD 6970. This set costs £1,300, which seems reasonable for a 47-inch, 3D-capable TV that looks great packs and packs a fearsome set of specifications. Hopefully, this ostensibly attractive price hasn't been achieved at the expense of picture quality. Also reviewed this week... Amplifiers Audio systems Speakers CD players Hi-Fi accessories Furutech PC-2 optical disc cleaner review TVs Tags: PS3, iPad 2, Android Market, gadgets 
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