News Bits: MacBook Air Problems, Lenovo Slim Adapter, Penryn in Dells Soon

MacBook Air has problems

Apple has documented several issues with the new MacBook Air on its website. The MBA has an issue with external monitors as detailed in the following excerpt: "If your MacBook Air is closed and an external display is your only display, you may notice a reduction of throughput for wireless networks that use the 2.4-GHz band." Other issues include slow connection speeds when multiple Bluetooth devices are connected, and some routers that do not work with the Remote Disc feature. One of the biggest issues is with Boot Camp and Windows - users must have the external CD drive in order to install Windows, it will not work via Remote Disc. And finally, some headphones will not work properly with the MBA because of its recessed headphone jack.

Read More (ComputerWorld.com)

Lenovo introduces new slim power adapter

Lenovo introduced a new slim AC/DC combo power adapter today for its ThinkPad and IdeaPad notebooks. It is designed to charge not only the notebook but other devices as well, including cell phones and PDAs. It is 33 percent smaller than the company's previous combo adapter and only about one-half inch thick. According to the press release, it is "roughly the size of a deck of playing cards."
The slim 90W adapteris currently available for $119 via Lenovo.com and Lenovo business partners.

Product Page (Lenovo.com)


NVIDIA acquires AGEIA

NVIDIA on Feb. 4 acquired AGEIA Technologies Inc, a producer of gaming physics technology. NVIDIA plans to bring GeForce-based PhysX cards to gamers with the company's technology.

NVIDIA Press Release (Nvidia.com)


Dell to offer Penryn in notebooks soon

According to a post on one of CNET's blogs, Dell will be offering the new Intel Penryn Core 2 Duo 45nm processor in its notebook computers "within a week or so". The Penryn processor has not seen widespread adoption yet.

Read More (blogs.cnet.com)

Hotswap batteries: the next big thing?

Most current notebooks allow the battery to be swapped. However, the notebook must be shut down in order to make the swap. Hotswap Batteries change this - the laptop does not have to be powered down any longer. Hotswap batteries allow users to swap batteries without shutting the computer down. A Hotswap-enabled battery has a second power outlet on it which connects to the laptop's power jack. Once connected, the power from the new battery keeps the laptop running while the exhausted battery is taken out; the new battery is then swapped in and powers the laptop, and the cable can be removed. The Hotswap batteries are currently being offered to manufacturers of laptops and other mobile devices.

Read More: http://siteground218.com/~ricipedi/web/hotswap.htm#

The Xbox 360 Elite laptop mod

(view large image) Image courtesy Gizmodo

Bejamin Heckendorn has created an Xbox 360 Elite laptop. It is based on one of the new Xbox 360s with the 65nm chipset, has a 17-inch 720p widescreen display, and a 120GB hard drive.

Read More (Gizmodo.com)

 

Is it just me, or is the Xbox 360 laptop....for lack of better words really fugly?

 

That's a nice slim power adaptor, but what does it weigh with the cables? Somewhere at home I have the iGo Juice. The adaptor is OK but the multi-function cables make it heavy and bulky to carry around.

Anyway, let's hope it shows a trend towards thinner and lighter power adaptors (with suitable thin and light cables).

John

 

lol yeah but geeks aren't known for having sense of style

 

1. I'm not surprised the MacBook Air is having problems, and the elitist in me is really happy to see Apple make some real miscalculations. Sure, it's really thin and light, but it's not terribly functional either, now is it?

2. nVidia acquires Ageia, accomplishes nothing. Yawn. With the way CPUs have been scaling, hardware accelerated physics will be obsolete before it even gets off the ground. If anything, I can hope nVidia just acquired Ageia to put them out of their misery.

3. The irony of the Xbox 360 Elite mod is that it probably is less likely to RRoD than a storebought 360 (lack of a ring to go RRoD notwithstanding). This guy's been modding consoles into laptops for a while, his build is probably better suited to handling the 360's hardware than the 360's own case.

 

You and me both

 

I feel the same way too.

 

That Xbox 360 notebook is really thick...haha .

And I suspected NVIDIA might acquire AGEIA...it'd definitely benefit them.

 

I recall reading somewhere that 50 - 60% of Xbox360's will experience a red ring of death within 3 years. That Xbox360 laptop looks like a bad investment to me. I be the fans sound like turbines!

As for the Nvidia and Ageia thing, I have yet to figure out why an Ageia card helps me. Ok, so I can understand the physics calculating software, but the Physics Processing Unit really isn't helpful in a world where CPU's are commonly dual core and soon will be quad core in larger numbers. I've never had to turn down the physics settings in a game and I run a single core Pentium M 760. Ageia never convinced me that their products were actually worthwhile. I hope Nvidia isn't throwing away money. I'd like to see more multi-core GPU's too since we have multi-core CPU's.

Hotswap batteries sound expensive. And, it's good that Dell is trying to keep up with technology.

 

Maybe it's just me being evil, but the more problems with the MBA, the merrier.
On a more serious note, hot swappable batteries sound a very attractive solution, but only for those willing to buy an extra battery for their notebook - bussiness users for the most part.

 

I read that about 1/3rd of all the consoles sold before the 65nm upgrade have already failed (via Dailytech), and projected failures were much higher for a three year outlook (Dailytech).

But after the 65nm revision and the cooling system upgrade, failures have drastically fallen.

Me thinks you read something written by Sony ...

 

I'm with Pulp on the AGEIA thing . My only worry is that Nvidia being the market leader will try to shove it down our throats now .

This is why we need ATI to get going again with high end alternatives and soon .

 

Of course not Though I do have to give credit to Apple for attempting to be innovative, it's kinda obvious that it's not going to work this time. It's like someone asking to test-drive a prototype flying car. Sure, it may look fun, but, um are sure it's safe??? In Apple's case, we should be asking, "Are you sure I'm not spending $1800 on a defective product??" Apple had their chance to laugh at Vista users who had a ton of issues with it when it was released. Now it's time for us Windows users to sit back and enjoy the hilarious comedy Apple is putting on with its MBA. Popcorn, anyone?

And, yes, Apple, there are some things that your eternal updates can't fix...

 

Hotswap batteries have existed, I think I remeber Twinhead laptops sporting it, a long time ago, even Toshiba. It was just some kind of little battery, chargeable or not.

Not new, but really useful.

 

you put it perfectly , very well said.

 

See, I don't even think it's innovative. There have been smaller, slimmer laptops before (*cough*SonyX505*cough*). There isn't anything about the MacBook Air that doesn't scream "see how freaking slim you can make a MacBook. Take out whatever you need to, just get that b**** to fit in a manila envelope." That's not innovative, that's just target practice.

As a sidenote, am I the only one who appreciates the irony of a story about hotswappable batteries in the same post as a story about the MacBook Air?

 

Nice on the batteries, i hope they would make them for older models too, but somehow i doubt that.

As for the MBA, im not sure if it really could win a cagematch against Hulk Hogan, as its somewhat un-American.

 

Hi everyone...

I dont know if you ever heard about a person called ben heck (or Benjamin J Heckendorn)........(use google or yahoo for more info)

This X360 laptop is made by him, he took an xbox360 elite out of the box and combined it with an LCD screen then produced what you see next:



also



also you can watch it -HERE-

It features:

-120 gig Elite hard drive.
-HDMI-to-DVI video connection for digitial picture on the LCD (versus VGA on past mods)
-Uses an Xbox with the new 65nm processor die.

Here is a link to his site -HERE-


Isnt this the best gaming laptop........or what do you think?!

 

Dell has already started selling Penryn in their notebooks in Asia-Pacific markets.

 

this is old news and by old i mean VERY old.

 

The start of that video made me laugh...

 

There are 2 versions for the xbox360 laptop,

xbox360 core system(v.old) and the elite(which is new)

Think before you act...

 

Well played, sir.

 

im talking about the elite

 

How does he cool it?

The 360 had cooling problems already. How does he address this in an even smaller form factor?

 

This video is very sad...what a kind of nerd can create that?
i respect his abilities and intelligence but from social point of view this man needs a life...

 

Heh, yeah...it is pretty good. I really like that idea. I personnally wouldn't have much use for it, but it'd be great for business travellers or watching a movie on a plane and not having to shutdown for a dead battery.

Also, didn't nvidia want to use their fully programmable shaders to do physics already? It only makes sense for them to snatch up Ageia and own the PhysX software API as well which most games do use...that way your GPU can do graphics and physics w/o having to blow money on a separate card which is what I believe to be the key barrier to entry for Ageia. Who the heck wants to spend another $150 bucks to buy an expansion card for something most games just have the CPU do anyway?

 

Nvidia : who needs crossfire scalability when you have the law of physics, eat that ATI.

(The phrase above is obviously some random rantings)

 

I take my comment about hotswap batteries back. They really shouldn't be all that more expensive than having an extra battery. I do remember now that when I owned a Sony GRZ630 laptop years ago it was equipped with a battery bay and then a hotswap bay where the CD drive could be swapped out for a second battery. That worked really well since it had a desktop Pentium 4 in it. As long as one battery was always plugged in you could switch things around. It was also possible to select which battery to drain first.

I have no idea. I have yet to buy into either of the new consoles. I just hate beta testing products. =P

 

I didn't even realize that, but now that you mention it . . . ironic indeed.

This was the first sentence of the Hotswap article when I first wrote it:

I took it out on second thought, I didn't want the MBA to be a focus of that article. If the MBA didn't exist, I wouldn't have had to say *most* notebook computers.

 

That thing is identical in size to my Dell slim adapter (although mine is only 65 watt). I love it. You usually only carry two cables, the wall power and cable to the computer. I have two extra cables for the car and plane DC power but only carry them when I expect to use them.

My only wish is that the cable going from the adapter to the computer was the plug-in type instead of attached to the power brick. I can see that connection failing in a few years (happened on my old IBM adapter).

 

It should work fine, since it ... oh

 

What, no Apple Fanboys in here yet? Wow.

I am not big on the hot swappable batteries as it. I would much rather it be that they had a smaller internal battery capable of 5 minutes of run time, then you just yank it and go. I think it would be easier and better. The only problem is that people would inevitably screw it up (the users, that is).

 

I'm no apple fanboy as I also have windows on my MBP, but what's with all the apple hate?

 

Apple's one of those companies that can "do no wrong." They have a fan base that borders on the kind of slavishness usually reserved for Star Wars/Star Trek, and routinely gets excused for anything and everything they do wrong.

It's schadenfreude. We like seeing a company typically regarded as so high and mighty making mistakes.

That, and when you live on the kind of campus I live on, you get real sick of seeing Macs and iPods everywhere real fast. Apple's trendy, but I'll openly say it: I really don't think the iPod is any damn good compared to its competition. And when Apple strips the phone out of the iPhone (a gross piece of overhype on its own) and just calls it the "iPod Touch," there's something that feels really cheap about that. One of the smartest things I've done in the past couple months is trade in my 30GB iPod for a Zune 80. The Zune works better, sounds better, and its software runs better. iTunes is a disgraceful resource hog.

I'm also unimpressed with OS X, have found Macs to generally feel pretty sluggish, can't figure out why they won't just put a second damn mouse button on their notebooks, and am even more perplexed by why Apple constantly screws its customers on RAM when OS X is almost more RAM-dependent than Windows is (at least was, until Vista showed up).

There's also something really smug about Apple's PR and their advertising, so it's nice to take them down a peg any chance we get.