News Bits: New Sharp M4000, Paint Your Laptop, 7 Types of Windows Vista , Flash Memory HD?

Sharp WideNote M4000 Widescreen 13.3" Notebook

Sharp isn't a common name in the laptop arena, but their latest laptop release is definitely interesting. The WideNote M4000, a 13.3" widescreen notebook, competes directly with the likes of the popularSony VAIO S series. The M4000 has an impressive set of specs for such a small and light notebook. Weighing only 3.75lbs, it houses a Pentium M740 1.73GHz processor (2MB of L2 cache and the Intel 915GM chipset) and can house up to 1.5GB of memory. Here's a run down on the specs

• 13.3-inch Widescreen
• Pentium M740 1.73GHz
• 80 GB hard drive
• CD-RW/DVD-ROM
• 10/100 Ethernet; a 56K V.92 modem
• Two USB 2.0 ports
• One PCMCIA Type II card slot
• Support for SD/MMC cards
• VGA out port.
• Battery life in excess of six hours when set to maximum power conservation
• Ships with Windows XP Professional SP2; Norton AntiVirus; and Intervideo.
• $1800 and available late September

CNET already has a review of this notebook, they gave it a 7.2 or "Very Good" rating

"Lots of notebooks are either too big or too small, but the $1,799 Sharp M4000 WideNote is just right for business travelers looking to slim their load for the road. With its 13.3-inch wide-screen display, midrange Pentium M processor, and high-capacity battery, this system takes Sharp's notebooks to new heights of practicality and economy--although the machine's range of ports, amount of memory, and networking might be limiting to some. "

Laptop Branding Service - Paint Your Laptop Any Color

Any Aflac insurance employee would surely want the duck on their laptop -- now they can

Want to brand or paint your laptop so it stands out and looks a little different from the rest of the crowd? Of course you do, and now you easily can for the price of $95 - $195 (depending on the laptop size and type of paintjob you want). Laptop Design has developed aprocess to apply a durable, automotive-quality finish to the exterior top surface of a laptop without touching any internal parts or affecting the manufacturer's warranty. The company's designers can match almost any color and produce a matte, glossy or metallic finish. See more about this company and their work here:

http://www.laptopdesignusa.com/

Want to spice up your white Apple PowerBook? Go for it!

Windows Vista to Have Seven Versions in Two Categories

If you thought that things were confusing by having to choose between Windows XP Pro and Windows XP Home, then just wait until Windows Vista hits the market at the end of next year. The number of options you'll have will balloon to seven flavors of Windows. These seven flavors will be grouped into two categories, Home and Business. Here's the breakdown:

Windows Vista Home Category

• Vista Starter Edition - for beginner users in emerging markets who can only afford low cost PCs. 32-bit and only 3 applications can run at once, no user switching. For emerging market countries only.
• Vista Home Basic Edition- Designed for single PC homes, the baseline version on which all other Vista editions will be based.
• Vista Home Premium Edition - Will include all features of Vista Basic and also entertainment and productivity options. Includes Media Center and Media Center Extender functionality, Tablet PC functionality.
• Vista Home Ultimate Edition - Includes everything from Home Premium plus a Game Performance Tweaker, podcast utility and many other unique personal utilities.

Windows Vista Business Category

• Vista Professional Edition - A powerful, reliable and secure OS for businesses of all sizes that includes all major networking functionality standards and also Tablet PC functionality
• Vista Small Business Edition - Includes everything in Vista Professional and unique features such as backup and Microsoft Volume Shadow copy Service support.
• Vista Enterprise Edition - Optimized for the enterprise and includes everything from Professional and also has Virtual PC, Multilanguage User Interface and Secure Startup-Full volume encryption security.

So most laptop buyers will be looking to get the Vista Home Premium Edition it seems. An OS with all the Media Center functionality and Tablet PC functionality would be pretty sweet -- although somewhat useless if you don't have hardware to support those features of course. Either way, it'll be a while before we see any of this and it's all "subject to change" of course, but this is where things lie now.

More: http://www.windowsitpro.com/Article/ArticleID/47665/47665.html?Ad=1

Flash Memory to replace regular HD memory?

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. has developed a high density NAND flash, capable of storing 16Gigabit (Gb) or the equivalent of 2GB (gigabytes) per NAND memory device. NAND is the most widely used memory for multi-feature mobile applications.

"Memory is opening a bold new world in consumer electronics," said Dr. Chang-Gyu Hwang, Samsung Electronics' semiconductor business president and CEO, at a press conference in Seoul today. "With cards containing multiple 16Gb flash memory chips, you will be able to take your entire music and personal video libraries with you on one small portable device."

The availability of this product will allow mobile and portable application designers to use memory cards with densities up to 32 gigabytes by combining up to 16 such devices on a single card.

More: http://www.geekzone.co.nz/content.asp?ContentId=5177

 

ahhhhhh....there are 2 many windows vista categories!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! .... :decision: ...lol...wonder what the diff. costs would be b/w all those categories..lol..and that Apple Powerbook looks SWEET!!!!!

 

I'm very interested in the Sharp M4000. When do you think you guys will have a review of this notebook? Thanks in advance, and I love the site...

 

This is very hard, considering that Home Premium, Pro and Ultimate exceed all my demands. I'll have to wait and see for myself in September 2006 :buyIBM: :hp:

 

$100-200 is a good deal for the paint job, esp. if you consider that you can have whatever picture you want on there. Man... I'm having my laptop painted by P1 for $250. Pros: They're painting the stuff around the keyboard too, since they're taking it apart. Cons: It's all one color, and it's taking forever since they're not trying to make a business out of it. I'll post a pics when I get it back (in 2 wks?), but for most people who don't care as much about the area around the keyboard and really want it just as a promotional tool for their business or whatever, this is a sweet deal...

 

it is a good deal and the best thing is it doesn't void the warranty or anything which is a concern when modifying a laptop in such a way.

man, that's quite a bit of time they're taking to paint the laptop, hopefully it comes out well.