Everybody loves a big TV, a big car and a huge house, so why not a big monitor. Monitors have always been small and the biggest that was around was only 24 inches, but now they have been upgraded and are as big as TVs.

High definition displays are becoming highly popular, and the bigger the LCD panel the higher the resolution.

In spite of the price going down when compared to earlier, they are still on the expensive side, but for those that are willing to pay for quality, there are quite a few good 30-inch LCD monitors in the market.

Gateway XHD3000 – Around $1000

This one is the best general purpose monitor that gives the feel of a television, as the video is sharp, thanks to the special built-in chip, the Silicon Optix Realta HQV upscaler. This works by upscaling video content.

This monitor has a resolution of 2560×1600 with a decent 6ms response time, and a contrast ratio of 1000:1. It supports everything from DVI-D, VGA, component, composite and S-Video. The Nintendo 64 can be hooked up, and with HDMI support, Xbox 360 or PS3 can be connected too. It comes with a 6 port USB 2.0 hub.

With the stunning image quality that is perfect for both play and work, the XHD3000 is a great monitor and one of the best in the market. It stands out for its connectivity and QUAD HD-display with built-in processor. (more…)

“Don’t work so hard, you don’t own that company,” was the message glaring from

my computer screen. It was from my sister who always felt I deserved much more.

My boss walked in behind me at that moment. I was caught unawares and didn’t have time to close the window. He read it (I’m sure), talked about something else and left the room with a weird expression on his face.

I’m sure all of you must have faced similar embarrassing situations, either at home or at work.

Luckily for us, now there are systems that can block sensitive content on a computer screen. When a document is displayed, only the user of that computer can see the text. All others will see content that is convincingly made to look like real but is not.

This miraculous system is “Chameleon,” developed by Oculis Lab, a U.S. based company. According to Bill Anderson, president of Oculis Labs, “For example, a line of text that reads “the cat ran across the road” may appear to a snooper to say “the turtle had a nice lunch.”

For now, this system is designed specifically for military use. (more…)

Ultraportability combined with features is what the mobile professional looks for.  These notebooks stand out among others for being lightweight and offering good features.

Lenovo ThinkPad X200 – $1,542

This is one of the best full-featured ultraportable laptops that offer a wonderful performance and an unbelievable battery life. It is equipped with the new Centrino 2 processor and is far more powerful than its predecessor, the ThinkPad X61, although the screen is only 12.1 inches.  But that doesn’t make this 2.95 pound beauty any less superior.

The screen is bright and easy to read with a resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels and it also has a built-in Webcam, which makes it perfect for execs to work on the move.  The keyboard is much bigger and is spill resistant.

It comes with 2GB of RAM, 2.4 GHz Core 2 Duo P8600 and a 160 GB hard drive. Lenovo has also expanded the battery line and offers three choices, with the most powerful nine-cell model giving almost nine hours.

For people looking for the “best” travel laptop, nothing can beat this Lenovo model. (more…)

Apple never ceases to improvise and innovate, always ready to up the ante and create new benchmarks, whenever competition is seen hotting up.

In the recent past, there has been a great deal of talk and rumors about there being a consistent decline in the ringtone craze off late, and this is mainly attributed to the fact that users are now adept at creating their own ringtones easily from song downloads.

There are sites such as makeownringtone.com that allow users to create ringtones for free. Users just need to upload songs in various formats, such as MP3 and WMA, and then select the part of the song they want to use as a ringtone, remix their selection and upload the final result to their phones. As simple as that!

CNET sources recently created a base for rumors by reporting that Apple has come up with an excellent innovative idea, that of offering ready-made ringtones for the iPhone.

Apple has concentrated a lot on the iPhone in the past and continues to do so. iPhone users have enjoyed the option of creating their own custom-made ringtones for their devices ever since 2007. Users had to look for the bell icon next to the song that indicates the song can be converted into a ringtone, and double click on the bell for the ringtone editor to open. Once the portion of the song for the ringtone is selected, the user has to click buy, for the ringtone to be created and the user charged for the purchase. It will then show up in a ringtone play list to be synced to the iPhone. The whole process takes the least amount of time and one doesn’t have to be tech savvy either to figure out how it is done. Even a child can do it with ease.

However, Apple is bent on pampering and making iPhone users lazier than ever. It is said to have struck a deal with the music industry and obtained rights for offering ready-made ringtones. (more…)

Even as people await the release of the much-speculated tablet from Apple, Freescale has come out with the Smartbook that could be a competition for the low-cost mini laptops.

Smartbook is a combined effort of Freescale Semiconductor and Arm Holdings.  The company is marketing the smartbook as a new category of computing devices that can be squeezed somewhere between the smartphone and the PC-like notebook or netbook.

Freescale Semiconductor is a leading manufacturer of embedded semiconductors for the consumer, industrial, automotive and networking markets. The company is based in Texas and has several research and development, design, manufacturing and sales outlets spread all over the world.

Rich Beyer, Freescale CEO said, “Netbooks based on Intel’s Atom processor and Microsoft Windows simply replicate the PC experience, they are just notebooks in a smaller format.  The Smartbook is a different experience, something between a small screen phone and a PC.” (more…)

Credit: Bert Kommerij (via Flickr)

When I look back into my son’s childhood, there are specific images that flash in my mind – images of his tiny frame playing in his room, his first day at school, him walking into my office with blood all over from a bike accident and smilingly calling it tomato ketchup.

Some sad, some happy, but they are all precious.  But then I regret not remembering every single day of his growing up years. If only I could….

We do remember some things from our past but definitely not every single detail.  This is where Gordon Bell is trying to ring a bell.  He is part of Microsoft’s research team, a principal researcher and is working towards making sure we can remember all the special moments of our lives.  He has worked as a chief engineer and vice president of research and development at Digital Equipment Corp. for 23 long years and later founded the Computer History Museum.

Bell himself wants to capture all the moments of his life and store them on his Dell laptop. He wants to be able to pull up every single picture, every conversation, every email whenever he wants. (more…)

The Internet takes tax-free shopping to a totally different level. This is one of the main attractions for customers to shop online. However, the fact is that some Internet sales are subject to sales.

The pressure on the major internet retailers like Amazon.com is forcing them to scale down their operations in states where they are being demanded to collect taxes from buyers.

Online business is growing rapidly and is expected to reach almost $160 billion this year, according to Forrester Research.

Online Retailers With A Physical Presence In A State

But most online sales do not have to collect sales tax, unless they have a physical presence in the state. If an online retailer has some sort of a physical presence in any state, such as a business office, warehouse or a store, then it must collect sales tax from customers of that particular state.

To better understand, let’s take an example: If you have a store in California and you sell online who is also from California, you will need to collect sales tax from that person, even if the item is being shipped from a warehouse located elsewhere.

Currently, there is no need of collecting sales tax from customers who are located in a state where there is no such physical presence.

This rule comes from a decision by the Supreme Court in 1992, where it was said that mail-order merchants did not have to collect sales taxes for sales into states where they did not have any physical presence. This ruling includes all remote sellers, including online retailers.

Independent Partners Selling Through Major Online Retailers

While many online retailers may not have presence in many states, they are still responsible for collecting taxes if they have independent partners in states. For example, Amazon and Overstock permit independent companies with physical presence in different states to sell their goods through their sites and charge them a fee. These major retailers will have to collect taxes even in states where these independent companies exist, as they are selling indirectly through them.

This rule came into effect last year in New York. If you have been following the internet sales tax drama, you would remember that it was even challenged in court. Now, Hawaii, Rhode Island and North Carolina also have passed similar laws. As a response to this law, both the internet giants have cancelled all their associate programs in these states.

Amazon will not really be affected even if all their associate partners are cancelled, as it constitutes only 10% of their total sales. In fact, the margins from these indirect sales are lower than their direct sales.

Local Stores Creating Legal Subsidiaries Online

There are exceptions to this rule. Local stores sell products online tax free by establishing separate legal subsidiaries to handle the business online. Since the online business does not have a physical presence in the state, they do not have to collect sales tax on online purchases. This practice of getting around the rules to avoid sales tax is not appreciated by the “solely” brick-and-mortar retailers who still have to collect taxes from their customers.

Why Local Retailers Feel At A Disadvantage

(more…)

Small, light and inexpensive laptops that are best suited for general computing, internet applications and accessing web-based applications are now also going to do the job of navigation devices.

The Netbook, typically weighing 2-3 pounds could be your latest personal navigation device that shows you the way around.

Dell has introduced a GPS and Wi-Fi card in their netbooks, and turned them into gizmos that can offer turn-by-turn directions as perfectly and as efficiently as any other good standalone navigation device.

Alan Sicher, a senior wireless product manager at Dell said, “Smartphones already have GPS capabilities. We are now bringing it to netbooks so the devices know where you are and can help you where you want to go.”

Now that the traditional standalone GPS gadget has been around for a while and taken for granted, navigation device makers are looking to create something innovative and are looking to offer their software on other devices too. (more…)

In this digital age, users from around the world are looking for ways to store information, data, movies, videos, music and photos. This is where external storage devices prove to be extremely useful.

External storage devices such as hard drives can be used everywhere; offices, homes and when traveling with a laptop. Small drives can have large capacities and are bus powered, and take the power from the laptop, thus eliminating the need for an external power supply.

Here are a few excellent external storage devices that seem to be doing their job perfectly. (more…)

The younger generation literally eats, sleeps and breathes computers, and the older generation is catching up fast as if in competition with the youth.

Advances in computers began in the 1960s and the impact they have on our society today is immense. We are able to access the World Wide Web, which has become our lifeline. Acquiring knowledge has become much simpler and things are done faster than ever before. Living in the electronic age has great advantages and we have the world at our doorstep, or should we say finger tips.

But with all the comfort and convenience that computers offer, there are potential problems they can cause too, such as health perils associated with their usage.

The physical manifestation of problems is usually noticed after years of using computers. As we all know, sitting for long in a fixed position puts strain on the lower back. If we ignore that, it can lead to major problems later on. It is better to take care before our body intervenes and things get out of hand. (more…)