Home & Small Office Computer Guide

Microsoft have unveiled the latest version of the Office suite of programs. The first releases will come later this year but you can find out more here

Microsoft recently announced that Vista would not be as secure as everyone first thought. In fact Microsoft was intentionally leaving a back door in their otherwise secure system to allow various law enforcement agencies to be able to access files in the interests of national security.

Now that sounds all very noble and patriotic doesn’t it?

But there’s one slight problem. If there’s a back door there for the security agencies how long will it be before hackers find it and exploit it?

So you think your business needs a laptop but what do you look for in a laptop? What are the important qualities of a good laptop?

Obviously a lot is going to depend on what you want to do with your laptop but in general the following are some of the things you should consider.

1. Weight - the lighter the better. Most people buy laptops so that they can travel with them and so weight is important. Even with a carry bag a heavy laptop can become an absolute burden when you travel.

2. Battery Life - the longer the better. How long will the battery in your laptop last before it needs recharging. Of course, if you’re going to be using the laptop in motel rooms you will be able to use the power pack but, it is inevitable, there will come a time when you can’t plug it in to a power socket. That’s the time when you will want a battery that can run for several hours without the need to recharge.

3. Warranty - is it on site or back to base? If something goes wrong will your laptop be away for long periods of time. Does the manufacturer have a temporary exchange programme if your laptop is going to be out of service for several days.

4. Price is not always a guide when it comes to suitability. More expensive laptops may not necessarily be more suitable for your business.

Here in Australia the Samsung X20 comes highly recommended for many applications and the RRP is only $1799.

There are three other points to consider when thinking about buying a laptop.

1. Not every computer repair centre will work on laptops. They are a specialised piece of equipment and only some technicians will touch them.

2. Talk to your insurance company about coverage as soon as you make your purchase. You might find that your new laptop is not covered under any of the policies you might have.

3. Don’t buy a laptop to replace a desktop machine. If you spend a lot of time working on your computer the change to a laptop will quickly become an ergonomic nightmare.

Don’t worry, Volkswagen and Google are on the case

Volkswagen of America, Inc. and Google recently presented the future of vehicle navigation at the 2006 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, and it’s closer to virtual reality than ever before.

Volkswagen, Google, and graphics chipmaker, nVidia, are working on an in- car navigation map system and display that is 3-dimensional and more real looking than anything that’s available today.

Driver and Passenger will be able to instinctively recognize where they are in relation to the surrounding topography, especially in urban areas that are depicted with depth and accurate size relationships between buildings and roads.

Volkswagen, working through its Electronic Research Laboratory (ERL), in Palo Alto, Calif., together with Google and nVidia, is also working on other advancements, including automatic personalized content updates for its vehicle navigation systems.

Highlights of Volkswagen’s prototype vehicle include a vehicle-centric touchscreen interface to Google Earth with state-of-the-art graphics, accurate 3D maps and real-time traffic updates and routing. This open system harnesses the power of the web to maintain a dynamic database of current information on restaurants, dealerships, gas stations and other points of interest that can be overlaid directly onto the user’s 3D map.

With the increasing accuracy of GPS, dead-reckoning and laser-radar imaging, as well as ever-improving car-to- infrastructure communication, this prototype will be available on showroom floors in the near future.

High-quality 3D and satellite-based representations of the world are becoming an exciting feature in on-line search engines and navigation. These photo-realistic, high-resolution 3D images are not only more engaging for the user, but they are also more efficient and accurate at conveying information than traditional 2D mapping representations.

It may not look much on the outside but under the hood the story is very different.

CompAmerica has announced that it has enhanced the ORCA Laptop to accept the AMD Dual Core FX-60 CPU in addition to the AMD Athlon 64 Dual Core X2. Other ORCAs also supports Intel Pentium 4 Processors. The FX-60 upgrade extends the performance of the product line to “faster than nearly all desktop PCs”, claimed the company.

CompAmerica ® has dubbed the ORCA, which spans all three CPU types, is “the most powerful laptop on earth” and also “the most powerful Gaming Laptop on earth”, sporting the nVidia 7800 GTX CPU.

CompAmerica ® indicated it will continue to introduce more dual core Laptops in both DTR and Centrino / Duo Core versions in the not too distant future.

“We want people to be happy with the performance of their laptop” said company Chairman Dr. Jack A. Shulman. “In the grand scheme of things the X2 4800+ combined with the nVidia 7800GTX is extremely fast and the extra 10% performance of going to 5200+ rated FX-60’s just inspired us at CompAmerica to build this laptop to do everything ‘yesterday’.”

Featuring new CPU-based Enhanced Anti-Virus Technology and 64 Bit AMD Instruction Set Extensions, the Orca sets the bar for safe performance. Other “world beater” features: its dual HDD SATA-150 Disk Array, its dual DVDRW / CDRW Optical Array… the Orca X2 Laptop is said to be “technologically superior”.

All Orcas include an integral Gigabit Network Adapter (compatible with 10/100 Mhz Fast Ethernet as well), a fast v.92 Faxmodem, and versatile wireless networking: a WIFI 802.11 G/B standard adapter with optional Bluetooth.

For the audiophiles, Orca FX2 includes a built-in 4.1 audio system (with an external 8-channel interface) with audio enhanced, distortion-less sound and a potent Subwoofer (beneath the Keyboard!) CompAmerica’s ® new 64 Bit ORCA (both the Pentium 4 based 9098 and the new X2 Dual Core) vaporize the previous limits as to what a Laptop can do.

You can obtain more information at http://www.compamerica.com/X2

An early version of Internet Explorer 7 has been released in Beta and some people are starting to play with it.

You can find one review here

Personally I’m not going to be in a hurry to have a look at it. I don’t like the quirky Firefox that I use for most of my web browsing but IE7 is still in development so I wont’ be changing until there is a stable and reliable version out for general consumption.

Does your keyboard take up too much space on your desk? Do you find all those extra keys confusing?

Well here is a keyboard that comes with just three keys - the Optimus mini three keyboard.