Tuesday, July 15, 2008

MSI WIND LAPTOP





With its pearl-white finish, the much-awaited MSI Wind is like a breath of fresh air and this mini-laptop may just emerge a strong contender to challenge the Asus Eee PC's claim to fame.

Features and Specifications
The MSI Wind is powered by the latest Intel Atom processor clocked at a speed of 1.6 GHz. It has 1GB of DDR2 SDRAM (expandable to 2GB), an 80 GB hard drive spinning at 5400 RPM. The graphics engine is driven by Intel GMA 950, and the 10-inch non-glossy screen, which is larger than the Eee PC 900's 8.9-inch display, supports a maximum resolution of 1024x600 pixels. On the connectivity front, it bundles in 802.11b/g standard Wi-Fi, three USB ports, 4-in-1 card reader, mic and headphone jacks, VGA port, and Ethernet. The build quality of the chassis is good, and it also has an integrated 1.3MP web camera for taking snapshots and recording video. The microphone carved into the front chassis, a little right of the webcam; comes handy during video chats. Watching movies and listening to songs is still good, given the laptop's dimensions. The speakers are situated beneath the keyboard, and we liked the sound pumped out at full volume, and listening to streaming music over the Wi-Fi was a breeze as well.

Design and Usability
Our lab sample came with a base install of Windows XP. It weighed in at a minuscule 1.25 kg thus offering truly impressive ultra-portability. Slightly larger than a hardcover book, it can be easily tucked away in an office desk drawer. Its standard 6-cell battery provides an extensive battery life which easily lasted over 5 hours with standard usage. The Wind didn't buckle under the strain of surfing the Internet on Firefox 3.0, with multiple tabs open and multitasking with MS Office applications - which is what its intended usage is. For a mini-laptop, the Wind's keyboard isn't bad at all. Typing on it takes getting used to, but the keyboard's tapering design simplifies that, and it takes little time before your fingers move seamlessly on the keypad. There is a discernible key flex but not enough to spoil the party as every key is well-defined. Keyboards become even more of an issue with mini-laptops as they're small in size. Chunky fingers notwithstanding, all of us in the lab were satisfied and felt the overall tactile feedback of the Wind's keyboard was good. The touchpad is fairly responsive, too.

Verdict
Battery-life, performance, screen-size and the size of the keypad were our biggest concerns, and the Wind scored high in each of those categories. But for all it offers, it still lacks an optical drive, Gigabit LAN and doesn't support the latest Draft-N wireless connectivity standard, which the Eee PC 1000 does. It is hard to understand the omission of the Draft-N standard as it offers much higher data transfer speeds as compared to the wireless b/g standard.

Comparing mini-laptops to normal laptops is fair when the prices are at par, but overall the trimmed down, low-cost versions aren't really designed to compete with normal notebook PCs. These are small laptops aimed at people who want small, light devices that are easy to carry around and surf the Internet with. If you want a small device that weighs about 1 kg, connects to the Internet and multitasks with simple software, the Wind is pretty nifty at Rs. 22,000. With Windows XP it is approximately priced at Rs. 25,000.

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Sunday, July 13, 2008

Net Neutrality - We want to be Independent!


I am just a middle class guy with a laptop and dial-up internet connection. I also deeply care about the future of our world. Big corporations are taking control of our country’s government, our economy, our media and now they want to be able to control the internet. These entities are only interested in money and the power it brings. The Internet may just be the last best hope of preserving the freedoms that our founding fathers dreamed of and fought for. And when democracy has been transformed to corpratocracy, the hope for a better world will be extinguished. The web is a powerful voice for the disenfranchised and for spreading ideas that would otherwise be stifled by those with great power and little conscience.

I depend on my connection to voice my opinions to government, corporations, organizations and people who have the power to make important decisions that change my life. I also depend on it as a valuable tool to investigate issues that concern me, but are not adequately reported in the media. With corruption and Orwellian double-speak rampant among the power brokers, the internet remains a refuge of useful truth to me.

I don’t have the kind of cash for High-Speed connections and the way things are going, only the well-off will have that kind of discretionary money. Please don’t take away the best tool of real democracy in this electronic age.

Net Neutrality is essential to free speech, equal opportunity and economic innovation in America. Since the FCC removed this basic protection in 2005, the top executives of phone and cable companies have stated their intention to become the Internet’s gatekeepers and to discriminate against Web sites that don’t pay their added tolls.

This fundamental change would end the open Internet as we know it. It would damage my ability to connect with others, share information and participate in our 21st century democracy and economy. The FCC must ensure that broadband providers do not block, interfere with or discriminate against any lawful Internet traffic based on its ownership, source or destination.

Krish image


Saturday, July 5, 2008

Paperless Office: A Hit or Myth


Papers is one man's greatest inventions. It was invented hundreds of years ago and has been in use ever since then. In olden days the books were written using hands and then came the print technology and the books were printed and published.

Then came the office environment were paper played a major role. So in short man was in use of papers for more than three centuries. In the 21 st century we have witnessed the digital world and digital life style grow in leaps and bounds. So why aren't we leaving the trees to live in peace and turn our face towards the computers, laptops, the internet, emails, phone, electronic faxes. So despite having such a huge list sources for communications and storing and processing raw data and information we still depend on papers. According to recent surveys a normal Indian company prints papers that would equal 15 to 20 million trees. Thats really huge. Just think how much carbon dioxide these trees might have absorbed and made the environment a lot more cleaner and greener. Some critics do maintain that to set up a paperless office is almost impossible. But thats why I am writing this article on my blog to bring about that change.

To bring about a paperless office cannot happen overnight. It should be a slow and gradual process. It is because an average Indian youth today has seen a computer and heard about and used an internet only when he was into his teens. Thats because India witnessed the IT revolution much later than countries like U.S.A, Japan etc. So we were brought up using paper all our lives. So do you think is it possible for an average Indian to cope with and get adjusted to the paperless office. I don't think so but is actually possible. So how are we going to achieve it? Below you can read a solution of the same.

Every office should encourage the usage of the electronic media compared to that of the paper media. Thy should limit the paper that they provide to the employees. Employees should also understand their responsibility as a human being and give their best in bringing up a paperless office. But th actual paperless office is sure not to be the thing of the recent future. It is a gradual process which can be achieved with the company, government and the individual citizens all working together in creating one.

Krish image




Friday, July 4, 2008

An Online Image. Why is it so important?


In the 21st century the Internet is on boom and is becoming a household item and is included in every person's monthly bill. This is of course not affecting the business of the internet point's business. They are witnessing a never before profits in this kind of business. According to recent surveys over the internet, majority of the people us internet to send and receive emails, maintain their online image and profiles. So what is online image, and why is it so important? I will tell.

An online image is like a passport of an individual to the world of internet. Every individual wishes that his identity should stand apart from others and of course not get lost in the crowd. But how do you create a unique and different image of your online. Well you need to be a celebrity for that. Never mind but I can list some points to maintain an image that is sure to attract visitors irrespective of your status.

Well to begin with you can get an internet connection at your home or very well get a membership in your local internet center. This will prove economical for you in the long run. So now you have got an internet connection, what next? Well go to any online social networking site like Orkut or Facebook and create you own profile. Do add a photo of yours without fail because that will give a professional look. The next step is to include all your friends and then update your profile with your career, your qualifications, expertise and interests etc.

Then go on create a separate email id with your name which might look professional. Please do not create email ids with some funky names like w used to during our college days. Then go on and crate a blog if you are really interested in maintaining and having one. In that blog you can post your likes and dislikes and also write about your favorite subjects and articles. But please do not copy articles from other blogs. That is really an unprofessional act.

So thats it I guess. Go ahead and have an online image of yours.

Krish Cool


Thursday, July 3, 2008

Salma Hayek

Guys I came across this pic, thought you can also have a look. :)

krish image