Nokia 5800 Xpress Music review roundup
Posted by Scout on January 16, 2009
Image courtesy of Yugatech
The Nokia 5800 XpressMusic was announced as early as October 2008, but it wasn’t officially launched in the Philippines until about a week ago. It’s Nokia’s new flagship handset, with a huge touchscreen interface that you know was set to rival the iPhone. The difference is, Nokia managed to create a great mobile phone at almost half the price of its competitors Like the aforementioned Apple iPhone and Sony X1.
Initial pricing on the Nokia 5800 is at P19,990, and while that’s still a little steep, its a lot of bang for your buck. The phone weighs just 109 grams and measures 111 x 51.7 x 15.5 mm. It’s responsive 3.2″ touchscreen has a fairly wide 360 x 640 pixel resolution. Internal memory is small at just 81MB, but it has a microSD expansion slot that can accomodate up to 16GB. As for wireless connectivity, it offers a plethora of options such as Bluetooth, WiFi b/g and 3G (HSDPA). The camera is no slouch either with a 3.15 MP sensor, Carl Zeiss optics, and autofocus.
A few people have gotten the unit and were kind enough to share their reviews of this much talked about phone. I’ve compiled reviews from the Philippines and from others around the world for your convenience. So what are people saying about Nokia’s latest pride and joy? Well, it’s mostly positive, but for the details, click below to find out.
Yugatech
A Bugged Life
Technogra.ph
Times Online
Tech Radar
All About Symbian
Dial-a-Phone
Mobile Burn (video review)
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What’s the best phone under P10,000?
Posted by Scout on January 15, 2009
A lot of those who answered this blog’s poll on cellphone purchase limit voted for P10,000. It seems to be a reasonable price point, and one that probably has some psychological underpinnings. Whatever the case, for those who plan to buy a cellphone within the next few months, I’ve compiled a few of the better models that are under this category. The list was taken off current prices from Greenhills stalls as published here.
If I were to pick and choose among these, I’d lean on getting the tried and tested SE K810i. Some of my friends have had it, and the pictures taken with this phone actually came out pretty good. Users also swear by its great battery life and overall stability. Of course, to each his/her own. If you have anything to add to this list as a recommendation for other gadget hunters, please sound off below.
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| Nokia 5320 P9,500-10,000 |
Nokia N70 P9,000-10,000 |
Sony Ericsson K810i P9,500-10,500 |
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| Samsung D700 P9,500-10,000 |
Samsung D600 P8,700-9,500 |
Motorola RAZR2 V8 P9,800-10,500 |
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MSI X-Slim 320 coming soon to a store near you
Posted by Scout on January 14, 2009
If you want a portable computer that you can carry everywhere, but the small screens of the current crop of netbooks are too small for your squinting eyes, perhaps MSI could interest you with their new “Macbook Air Killer”, the MSI X-Slim 320.
I had to put that under quotes because aside from the form factor, the two machines are quite different under the hood and appeal to very different audiences. For one, the Macbook Air sells for ~Php100K, so that pretty much excludes most of the population. Meanwhile, the X-Slim 320 is quoted at $800, or roughly PhP40,000 if you include taxes and other consumer burdens. Still expensive, but bordering on reasonable if you think about the 60K price drop.
This ultra-thin notebook will have a 13.4″ screen with a 1366×768 resolution, be only 0.7″ thick, and weigh just 2.87 pounds. Inside is a 1.6GHz Intel Atom Z530 processor, a maximum of 2GB of DDR2 RAM, 802.11a/b/g/n WiFi adapter, Bluetooth, 3.5G network card, three USB ports, an Ethernet port, a VGA port and a card reader. As for the battery, they’ll come in either 4 or 8-cell variants, the latter touted to last up to 10 hours.
PC Corner has already announced that it will be offering the MSI X-Slim 320 starting Feb 20, 2009 - that’s much earlier than reports at CES saying it will be available in Q2 2009. Well and good for us Filipinos then. Final specs for the various configurations will be published by Feb 15, 2009. You can wait a month, can’t you?
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Acer Aspire One with free ODD at PC Corner
Posted by Scout on January 13, 2009
PC Corner is offering a good deal for new Acer Aspire One netbooks bundled with 3-6 cell batteries, SATA drives between 80GB to 500GB, and Windows XP Home. Of course it still has the usual Intel Atom N270 1.6Ghz, 8.9″ screen, webcam, and WiFi. Prices range from PhP14,995 to PhP25,995.
To spice things up, they’re giving away a free Acer External DVD Super Multi Drive to the first 40 Tipid PC buyers. It’s easy to register and they periodically offer deals to TPC users (in exchange for some positive feedback), so I suggest you sign up if you haven’t done so yet. The limited units are available starting today at the Gilmore branch only. For more details, visit the PC Corner page here.
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Price comparison: Optical Discs vs Hard Disk Drives
Posted by Scout on January 12, 2009
Let’s do some simple math. In order to store 1TB of data on DVDs that have a capacity of 4.7GB each, you’ll need about 213 blank discs. At an average price of P10 per disc, that amounts to P2,130 per terabyte. However, that’s assuming you’ll fill each disc to its maximum, which isn’t always the case.
In reality, you’re lucky to get 80% efficiency, especially if you’re dealing with large blocks of files. For example, if you have many 2GB video files, only 2 will fit in a disc, and you’re left with 0.7 of wasted space per disc, and so on. Adjusting our computations for efficiency, the number of DVDs needed increases from 213 to 267 - an equivalent of P2,670 per terabyte. That’s still cheap if we compare it to buying a 1TB external HDD at ~P7,400, which is roughly 3x as much.
So for now, I’m taking Pow’s advice and sticking to an optical drive video archive with my LaCie DVD writer. The 1TB drive will have to wait until next year when, hopefully, they’ll be cheaper and more commonplace. The money I’ll save will most probably go into the purchase of a new WiFi-N router later this year, and my eyes are already fixed on the D-Link DIR-655. I’ll explain why in a later post.
Meanwhile, here’s a summary of price ranges among different optical drive formats being sold by CD-R King:
Blu-ray Disc (BD-R) - P300
Blu-ray Recordable (BD-RE) - P500
CD-R Lightscribe - P25
CD-R - P5 - P8
CD-RW - P20 - 40
DVD-R Lightscribe - P35
DVD-R - P6 - P16
DVD-RW - P20 - P60
DVD+R Lightscribe - P35
DVD+R - P6 - P16
DVD+RW - P15 - P50
DVD+R Dual Layer - P35 - P120
» Filed Under Computers | 2 Comments
Netbooks under 10K: Freescale-powered Pegatron
Posted by Scout on January 11, 2009
Pegatron may sound like an Autobot in Transformers, but it’s really not. It’s a company that spun-off from ASUS, and they’re getting ready to join the netbook craze. The focus is on low price and functionality, but they’re no slouch in the design department, either. Just look at this prototype (courtesy of Engadget):
This 17mm-thin netbook will run via Freescale’s 1GHz ARM i.MX515 processor and will feature an 8.9 screen, 8 hours of battery life, and an 8GB SDD - all for $199. The processor isn’t Windows-friendly, so it’s likely to come bundled with an optimized version of Ubuntu (Linux). I personally like Ubuntu, so I’ll be keeping an eye on this one. I hope a local distributor picks it up. It certainly looks more appealing than most of the other sub-10K netbooks in the market today.
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How NOT to run a computer store
Posted by Scout on January 11, 2009
I just had to get this out of my system. When my friend and I went to Megamall the other day, we also looked for a 1TB external hard drive. My preference was Seagate FreeAgent (~8.5K), but it was very difficult to find a store that had it in stock. On one display window, I noticed a Western Digital 1TB MyBook Essentials box. I wanted to ask for the price, but as we went in, the two shopkeepers - a man and a woman - just kept on exchanging gossip and pretended not to notice us. Strike 1.
So I scoured the other shops nearby, but it was one disappointment after another. Finally, I figured I’d just settle with the MyBook I saw earlier, and returned to that store. They were thankfully finished with their tsismisan, so I asked the man at the counter about the price of the external drive. He said, “Twelve thousand.” I stopped for a moment to make certain I heard him right. The very same drive goes for about P7,400-8,000 in other shops. Don’t they check on their competitor’s prices? I would. Strike 2.
But what annoyed me the most was the man’s tone. He uttered the price with a sort of annoyance, as if I shouldn’t even be asking because I couldn’t afford it anyway. Then he looked away and ignored me, a potential customer. How arrogant. Sure, I could buy it, but I don’t see the point. I’m informed enough to know that I’d be wasting my money if I did. Lose the attitude, buddy. No wonder that among the shops in Cyberzone, it was the most empty. That store will be lucky to survive another year with this kind of service. Strike 3.
Anybody else had the same type of experience with rude customer service?
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LaCie 8x Portable DVD Writer - bought, unboxed, and photographed
Posted by Scout on January 9, 2009
If you follow this blog, you’ll know about my storage predicament. Today I took the plunge and got myself a new external DVD writer in Cyberzone, SM Megamall. It was a difficult hunt. Almost every shop I went to either didn’t have stocks of any brand, or selling theirs at an unreasonably inflated price. Good thing I didn’t bite because I’ve researched prices thoroughly online. Again, thank goodness for the Internet.
Fortunately, CompLink had a few LaCie Portable DVD+/-RW with Lightscribe, which is exactly the type I was looking for. The cheapest listing I know for this product is P4,290 at Villman, but since they didn’t have any stocks, CompLink’s asking price of P4,500 was acceptable. The LaCie drive is “thin and light”, weighing in at only 319g. This DVD writer can be powered by just one USB cable, but it comes with an extra USB cable in case you need to get more power. You also have the option to use the included AC adapter.
Here are some shots of the box’s contents:
Lesson learned: call first, buy later. Check stocks and ask them to reserve what you need. I really should have known better. I’ll post a review in a few days.
» Filed Under Others | 1 Comment
2TB max SDXC memory cards within reach
Posted by Scout on January 8, 2009
Running out of space in your memory card? Is the 32GB upper limit of the SDHC standard weighing you down?
My guess: Probably not, unless you’re into shooting HD videos. The standards-defining SD Association isn’t taking any chances, however, and is taking steps to make the SD format future-proof (for now, anyway).
They have just announced the creation of the SDXC specification (Secure Digital eXtended Capacity) which can provide up to a whopping 2 terabytes of storage capacity and accelerates SD interface read/write speeds anywhere from 104 MBps to 300 MBps. They will use Microsoft’s exFAT file system, also known as FAT64. Expect these SDXC cards to infiltrate the market later this year, starting with 64GB-128GB capacities, and working their way up to the published maximum within a few short years.
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Asus introduces EEE PC T91 and T101H convertible netbook tablets
Posted by Scout on January 8, 2009
Just when HP got everyone talking about the gorgeous Mini-note 2140, Asus steals the limelight and presents the arguably dreamier Asus T91. In this crowded market filled with cookie-cutter specs, Asus attempts to stand out with its newest line of touchscreen netbooks, with swiveling monitors that can be flipped 180 degrees and laid flat on the keyboard, instantly converting them into tablet PCs. I’d love to use this as my primary ebook and digital comic book reader.
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