Would you like to own a computer that comes with filtering software? Like it or not, the government of China insists that all computers be installed with this software, which is produced by a local firm, from July 1.

In spite of government officials clarifying that this is only meant to protect children from pornography and all other unhealthy content, there have been protests galore from various quarters.

According to Liu Zhengrong, deputy chief of the Internet Affairs Bureau, “The nationwise move is purely to protect the youngsters from Internet pornography and violence. The software has proved to be effective in trials in schools.”

Even the producer of this software, Jinhui Computer System Engineering Co. said the software only filters nude pictures and other pornography. Their official media quote says, “Our software is simply not capable of spying on Internet users, it is only a filter.” (more…)

Time to get a new PC? Think again! Based on what you use your computer for, you may want to check out the new netbook.

If your use of the computer is limited to surfing the web and light application, you could easily make the transition from a PC to a netbook.

On the other hand, if you use your computer for playing high-end video games like Counter Strike, use Photo Shop or any of the heavy programs that need high resources, you are better off with your PC or laptop.

Although, a netbook is also a laptop, it is a “mini” version of the laptop. These machines are powered by Intel Atom processors, which means you cannot expect anything fancy from them. They have been specifically designed for tasks like surfing the internet, email, playing music, streaming video online, word processing and other programs that need low resources.

However, the advantage with a netbook is that it is cheaper than the regular laptop or PC, because it is fitted with smaller processors that are slower than the ones in a regular PC. The cost can be anywhere between $250 and $850. The low-end netbooks come with very small hard drives and are great for people looking to just surf and use the email. A good mid range netbook with plenty of features will cost around $400. In a high-end netbook, the processor speeds will be far better.

Netbooks are small, light and portable; have large hard drives to store movies, music and other files; streaming movies and internet games. (more…)

Power, performance and reliability are the three essential elements of a good processor and everyone looks for these features when buying a processing unit. Technological advancements have given birth to processors with far higher performance than ever before.

For people who wish to get the most out of their PC, here are some of the best processors in the market that stand out for providing the best.

Intel Core i7 920

This quad core processor is being hailed as the best chip in the market today. This 2.66 GHz processor easily provides the best performance. With significant architectural changes in the x86 architecture in 13 years, the Intel Core i7 has been completely reinvented. It comes with an integrated memory controller with the capacity to support Triple Channel DDR3 Memory. This provides more maximum memory, which can be as high as 24GB, and faster access.

AMD Phenon II X4 940 Black Edition

AMD has always been known for its power-packed processing units. The great thing about this chip is that it can be used as a simple upgrade from AMD AM2 or any dual core central processing unit. This will be a wonderful upgrade to any existing system with a huge increase in speed and performance. There is no need to get a new motherboard or memory as this chip will work well with the existing one. The stock clock speed of 2GFz and 6MB of cache make this one of the best processors available in the market today. (more…)

These days when traveling, you carry a ton of tools around with you. You have your notebook, camera, GPS device, MP3 player, smart phone, USB drives, power cords and many other gadgets.

So, does this mean that things are completely organized and you never face problems? No way! You still experience dropped calls, bad Wi-Fi signals, files that get corrupted, gadgets that die on you because of lack of power and the best part is that all these things happen when you need them the most.

Here are a few extremely handy tools that can help you keep connected at all times and alleviate the need to carry tons of cables, chargers etc.

Chargers

We now know that our laptops are the best chargers. The only problem is that most laptops need be charged with 110-volt AC and don’t come with many USB ports for charging other gadgets.

Imagine what a charger that can take power from different sources and charge all those gadgets can do. (more…)

If you want to have your game on your laptop, it usually means paying for it, but it doesn’t have to be that way anymore. There are many notebooks in the market that are game-ready; with high performance processors, dedicated graphics cards and plenty of system memory. Top gaming laptops these days use dual or even quad processors.

Most gamers prefer nVidia and ATI for Graphics Cards, 2 Gigs of RAM, although most high-end laptops come with 4 or more Gigs of RAM.

Be prepared to pay top dollar for high-end gaming laptops, especially when you are interested in the well-known brands.

Alienware Area-51 m17x

Alienware has always been a leader for gaming machines. But then for all that performance and style, you are expected to pay as they don’t come cheap. This 10.5 lbs machine comes with the 2.8 GHz Intel Core 2 Extreme X9000 CPU, 4GB of RAM and 250GB hard drive (at 7200rpm), 512MB nVidia Quadro FX 3600M graphics, 17” dWideUXGA display 1920 x 1200 LCD with Clearview technology. It comes with Windows Vista Ultimate.

The only issue is with the battery, as you can expect with any gaming laptop. It is a power hungry monster that can use up the power pretty quickly. Although, it is mobile, it serves better as a desktop replacement rather than a portable laptop. But even if you wish to lag it around, it is still one of the coolest laptops – looks wise too. (more…)

Answers to the most complicated computing tasks are found in the clouds. Not the clouds in the sky that shower rain but clouds that deliver a super computing power on the internet.

Cloud computing is the development and use of computer technology using the internet. The word “cloud” has been used as a metaphor for the internet. This enables users to completely rely on the internet for satisfying all their computing needs. They will be able to access services that are technology-enabled on the internet or you could say “in the clouds.” Users do not need any sort of expertise or control over the technology or the support structure for that technology. With cloud computing, information can be stored permanently on the internet in huge servers and cached on desktops, table computers, notebooks, monitors, handhelds etc. on a temporary basis.

The frenzy around cloud computing is at its peak, with high-speed internet connections, powerful but cheaper disk drives, chips and huge data centers with hundreds of computers to serve millions of users. Customers will be able to rent this infrastructure and pay for the usage only. Cloud computing power is being tapped into by almost every major company as it delivers sophisticated data analysis in the quickest way possible.

Cloud computing is being looked at as extremely powerful because of its ability to perform tens of trillions of computations every second and this is huge when you compare it to the most powerful desktop PC, which can process about 3 billion computations in a second. This power can now be accessed through the web for analyzing financial portfolio risks, for playing computer games, for delivering personalized medical information etc. With cloud computing, large groups of servers that use low-cost consumer PC technology are networked through special connections that spread data processing chores across them. (more…)

The few minutes that it takes for the computer to boot up are called the “black hole” of the digital age. During that time, there is nothing to do but wait and wait before one can log on. Have users become impatient or are the computers slow?

What do people do when waiting for the computer to boot up? While some people stare at the screen, others walk up and down or grab a hot cuppa. If it is time for brushing, then people do that too!

With all the complaints there have been of computer boot up time, the computer industry is forced to look into it and try and give back those precious seconds lost. Several of the major PC makers in the world are soon introducing “quick-start” computers. A few months back, we have mentioned that Hewlett-Packard is onto something in this arena in one of our articles titled, “Computers With Instant Start.” You can read that for more information and to understand how it works.

According to a senior executive of a company that makes quick-boot program from PC makers, it is ridiculous to expect people to wait patiently for a couple of minutes, in this day and age when people want instant-on. (more…)

Computers which are robots created by man to perform all the computing tasks, are being encouraged to develop a mind of their own and understand their creators better. They now are being programmed to respond to your emotions.

A new navigation system with the ability to provide emergency services with the quickest route while at the same time taking stress into account, has been developed by Trung Bui, a PhD candidate at the University of Twente. This dialogue system identifies users’ emotions and has the ability to react to them appropriately. (more…)

If you went to this music show and shot a video of your favorite rock star, and wish to share it with the world, you would obviously head over to YouTube. Why are people not considering the several alternatives?

When we think of video on the internet, the first thing that comes to mind is the Mogul of video, YouTube. No doubt YouTube’s popularity is unparalleled. There is certainly nothing wrong with YouTube and they have the distinction of spearheading the video sharing revolution. However, it is not necessarily the only site that can be used for posting videos on the Web.

Even if you decide to check out different video sharing sites, where would you go? Different people have different needs; while some have memories to store, others may wish to make a quick buck.

Here is a list of some video sharing sites which allow sharing of the videos and much more.

Tubemogul.com: This is a service that is provided by an online distribution and video analytics company. It helps marketers measure the impact their online marketing campaigns have. It allows uploading of video to all the main video sharing websites at one go. Users are also provided stats of when, where and how often their videos are watched. The most beautiful feature is the ability to track viewer demographics and geographics. With 100 MB being the upload limit, the major sites that are supported by this service are YouTube, MySpace video, AOL video, Google video, Yahoo video , Revver and Metacafe. (more…)

“How nice it would be if I could taste that food.” “What if I can touch things through the PC.”

I cannot be the only one who would have thought such things when using the computers as a youngster. The need to feel them is always there, although we know it’s all just virtual.

Carnegie Mellon University developed a controller that allows computer users to use their sense of touch along with the senses of sight and sound, in manipulating three-dimensional images and exploring virtual environments.

This device, created to use mostly for training, industrial purposes and for research, comes very close to the sensitivity of the human hand.

This haptic (devices that convey the sense of touch) device uses magnetic fields to replicate the response a hand has to textures and gravitational forces.

According to Ralph Hollis, a professor at Carnegie Mellon, “We believe this device provides the most realistic sense of touch of any haptic interface in the world today.”

This controller is said to have only one moving part and rests in a bowl like structure connected to the computer. Two controllers can be used simultaneously to pick up more objects (virtual) from the monitor.

Recently, a demonstration was held for the visitors of Hollis’ lab and they were invited to move an image of a pin across a plate of various textures, which caused the controller to bump along ripples, vibrate across fine striations and glide across smooth areas. On one computer, users were amazed that they could actually “feel” the contours of a virtual rabbit.

Hollis said that his researches created 10 such devices, out of which six were sent to other universities across the country and Canada. He said that a new company, Butterfly Haptics would begin marketing the device in June or July of this year.

The cost of this controller is said to be less than $50000, and may perhaps come with a bonus of a virtual surgeon, which allows people to operate on a virtual human organ and feel the tissue texture or even allow a designer to enjoy the feeling of fitting a part into a jet engine that is of course virtual.

Researchers say that this device can provide the most amazing and unbelievable experience, to the extent of users feeling the wind below the wings of military planes.

Hollis and his team did build a prototype of this device in 1997, but later they refined it and made it into a much more advanced system, as well as lowered the cost recently, with the grant from the National Science Foundation.

This technology of haptic devices is already being used in a different form, with cell phones that vibrate as well as in video games that already make users feel the physical sensations.

However, there is a huge difference in the technology created by Carnegie Mellon, as their system relies on a part that floats in a magnetic field rather than on mechanical links and cables.

We may not (yet) be able to taste food, but we can enjoy the feeling of being able touching it.