Sony Vaio L117FX/B: 24-inch Multitouch PC Doubles as an HDTV

Like the Vaio LV180J all-in-one that it replaces, the new Vaio L117FX/B has great performance, a Blu-ray drive, an HDTV tuner, a media center remote control, and a gorgeous 24-inch display. But this time around, Sony has included a multitouch screen, Windows 7, and a design that's sleek and modern.

The Vaio L117FX/B starts at $1300; we tested a high-end, $2000 (as of December 8, 2009) configuration. At that price, you could score a standard tower desktop that has greater performance and upgradability, but such is the nature of all-in-one PCs.

This Vaio ratchets up the Intel processor to one step past that of the 2.33GHz quad-core chip found in the Gateway One ZX6810-01--a $1400 23-incher that also has a multitouch screen and a TV tuner (but no Blu-ray). However, despite its combination of a 2.66GHz Core 2 Quad Q8400S processor, 6GB of DDR2-800 memory, and a 1TB hard drive, this Sony AIO in some ways doesn't surpass the Gateway in performance.

Both systems earned a WorldBench 6 score of 105, the best general performance by an all-in-one without an Apple logo. For comparison--as tested using 64-bit Windows 7 and Boot Camp--the $2200 Apple iMac (27-inch/Core i7) scored 128 in WorldBench 6, while the $2000 iMac (27-inch/Core i5) notched 123.

The Vaio also delivers strong gaming performance for an all-in-one, but falls behind the Gateway and the iMacs. Still, its 69 and 41 frames per second in our Unreal Tournament 3 tests (at 1024-by-768 and 1680-by-1050 resolution, respectively; high quality) make it better suited for gaming than most all-in-one-desktops.

The Vaio's picture quality is as lush in its saturation as it is strong in its contrasts within a scene. That's partly thanks to the screen's glossy finish, which does much to amplify the perceived richness of the images--almost too much. It's very easy to catch a reflection of yourself in this display, let alone any nearby light source. Meanwhile, the built-in speakers definitely sound better than your average laptop. It won't shock and awe you, but it's a sweeter sound than what most competing all-in-one desktops can offer.

External port connections are extensive. The side of the screen has two USB and a FireWire 400 port, plus separate slots for a Memory Stick and a standard SD card. Three more USB ports are on the back, along with one optical audio output, a gigabit ethernet port, an RF connector, an HDMI input, and a composite video input. Sony clearly wants this system to become an essential part of your living room setup, which is possible to do in a wireless fashion thanks to the Vaio's integrated wireless-N connectivity. An included Blu-ray reader/writer rounds out the system's high-definition multimedia capabilities. Except for a faster connection standard like eSATA, it's difficult to think of other pertinent connections that the Vaio could offer. On the other hand, you may wish for more upgradability: You could upgrade the hard disk in the previous Vaio all-in-one, but this time around you're limited to notebook-style RAM upgrades.

The bundled keyboard and mouse are mostly generic, but are styled to match the Vaio's dark color and straight edges. They're both wireless, and the keyboard has extra buttons to access PC functions such as volume controls, sleep mode, and zooming. The keyboard can also tuck away in the gap provided beneath the display.

Sony's Vaio VPCL117FX/B matches the cheaper Gateway One ZX6810-01 in general performance, and both have a TV tuner. The Vaio is larger (a 24- versus a 23-inch multitouch screen) and includes a Blu-ray reader/writer. But the Gateway comes out ahead in gaming performance, and it costs $600 less. If money is not an issue, however, then by all means feel free to splurge.

--David Murphy

Dell's Vostro V13 Is A Lighter, Thinner Workhorse

Dell's Vostro line has traditionally been geared towards small businesses, doling out drab, low-powered notebooks and desktops for organizations that need PCs on a tight budget. But the V13, the latest notebook in the Vostro lineup, hopes to shake things up a bit. Weighing in at 3.5 pounds and a svelte 0.65 inches thick, this brushed-metal bijou promises to turn heads, without emptying your corporate warchest. We recently had a chance to sneak a peek at one, and came away fairly impressed.

The basic model runs for $449, and comes equipped with a 1.2GHz Celeron ULV 743 processor, 2GB of DDR3 SDRAM, a 250GB, 5400 RPM hard drive, and Ubuntu Linux. Connectivity options include 802.11 b/g WiFi, Gigabit ethernet, and Bluetooth 2.1 on every model. The 13.3 inch LED-backlit screen is also standard on every model. Klutzes will appreciate a Free Fall Sensor built into the motherboard, while road warriors can opt for a Mobile Broadband Module.

There aren't too many expandability options to speak of -- you'll find one USB 2.0 port, one USB 2.0 / eSata combo port, and a VGA display port. Ponying up for the $649 model will also net you Windows 7, a larger, faster hard drive, a webcam, and a 1.3GHz Core 2 Duo ULV SU7300 processor.

Now that we've got those pesky numbers out of the way, let's talk design. The V13 takes the ever popular brushed aluminum route, with zinc hinges. The chassis feels solid, despite being just about light enough to tote with one hand. There's a bit of plastic on the lip of the case to house the WiFi antenna, but nothing too egregious. While our typing-time was limited, the keyboard is full sized, and performed amicably. The trackpad also supports gestures, which could be a nice touch for users who opt for Windows 7.

Of special note is the battery: the 6-cell Lithium Ion battery is integrated directly into the case, much like unibody Mac notebooks. While it does allow Dell to shave off considerable girth, it means that should you ever need to replace the battery, you'll have to get your machine serviced. Like all machines in the Vostro line, the V13 comes with a year's worth of access to a plethora of business-friendly services, including 10GB of online backup, automated PC tuneup, and the DellConnect remote-troubleshooting service.

Shred 3: Wipe Out Files for Good

We all have sensitive information that we don't want anyone to see, like credit card numbers, bills, and correspondence. When you're done with the data you usually delete it to keep others from seeing it, but deleting a file isn't enough. Hackers who know where and how to look can retrieve your data from those deleted files.

Shred 3: Shred filesShred 3 eliminates this problem by making shredded data completely unrecoverable. When you delete a file with Windows built-in delete function, Windows simply removes the reference (pointer) to the file. Not until the locations on the disk are overwritten with other data is that file really deleted.

Shred 3 completely removes the data using the following steps:
1. Shred determines exactly which clusters on the disk contain the file
2. Shred accesses those particular clusters and overwrites them according to the US Department of Defense's standard. It overwrites the file three times. Once with zeros, again with a 0xFF pattern, and finally with randomly generated data.
3. Shred renames the file 26 times as a method to remove the name from the directory
4. To finish the job it deletes the file

Shred 3 is a complete rewrite of Shred 2. The shredding method has been rewritten and adds many enhancements. Shred 3 includes the following features:
• New shredding methodology
• Explorer context integration
• New user interface
• Easy shredding of IE, Firefox, and Opera history, cache, cookies, search & form history, and download history
• Shred successfully clears IE's index.dat files without deleting the file
• Shred IM chat logs
• Quick access to shred recent documents list and temporary files
• Shred registry history items

Shred Files

Shred's main interface consists of four vertical tabs: Shred Files, Clean Browsers, Shred IM Logs, and Shred Misc.

Shred 3: Shred files When Shred is launched you will see the Shred Files tab. This tab contains an Explorer view of your system. Find the files or folders you'd like to shred and select them by clicking the associated checkbox. Once you've selected all the items you want to shred simply hit the Shred button.

Shred 3: Error reportWhen Shred has finished processing the selected files you will see a report. It will give you a count of all the shredded files. It will also list any files that could not be shredded.

Shred 3: Warning messageIt is possible that a file isn't shredded because it is currently being locked by another program. For example, when Microsoft Word opens a file, it creates files containing changes in your temp folder. If you try to shred your temp folder, those files, which are locked by Word, won't get shredded. Not until you close Word would you be able to delete those files. Because of this possibility of a lock, Shred recommends that you close all running programs when you want to shred.

Clean Browsers

Shred 3: Clean Browsers The other three tabs in Shred make it easier to shred common data. The Clean Browsers tab allows you to shred stored data from Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Opera.

Start by selecting the browsers you'd like to shred and then select which data you'd like to remove. You can choose to shred:
• History – the list of pages you've visited
• Cache – the data stored from the pages you've visited
• Cookies – the data sent from the web server to your browser
• Search & Forms History – all the information you've inputted into sites
• Download History – the list of files that you've downloaded

As part of this process, Shred also shreds the index.dat for Internet Explorer. The index.dat is sort of like a database storing all of the URLs of Web pages you've visited and search queries you've submitted. Shred cannot actually delete this file because it is in use by IE and Windows. However, it does shred the data contained in the file and truncates the files, thus eliminating the information stored in the index.dat file.

Shred IM Logs

Shred 3: Shred IM logs Most instant messaging clients will log all of your chats. Some do it automatically and others require you to take some action in order to begin the logging process.

If you want to make sure all of your communications are thoroughly deleted, you can use Shred to eliminate the logs of the following clients (tested with these versions):
• Skype 3.2
• AIM 6.5
• Trillian 3.1
• Pidgin
• Yahoo Messenger 8.1

Shred will attempt to shred all logs from the default log locations of these clients.

Shred Misc

Shred also makes it easier to permanently delete other common bits of data. You can quickly shred:
• Recent documents list – this is the list of files you've opened and found in the "My Recent Documents" entry in the Start menu.
• Windows temporary files – the temp folder contains installation, scratch, cache, and other files that are temporarily used by programs
• File search history – this stores the files and folders and computers you've searched for using Windows built-in search functionality
• Windows Explorer history – Windows keeps a history of all files you've opened from Windows Explorer
• Start menu run box history – this lists every program or file you've launched from the Run link in the Start menu
• Open/Save dialog history – the standard Windows Open/Save dialog stores all of the files you've recently accessed when you click on the History location

Shred 3: Shred misc By selecting one or more of these items you can quickly and easily shred the data without going through your file system looking for them.

The data for "File search history," "Windows Explorer history," "Start menu run box history," and "Open/Save dialog history" are all stored in the Windows registry. To eliminate this information, Shred overwrites the values multiple times and then deletes the registry value. However, please note that the changes won't take effect until after you restart your PC.

Cleaning Removable Media Free Space
Shred can also shred the free space on removable media like USB flash drives. Simply plug in your flash drive and it will appear in the box on the Shred Misc tab. Select the drive and hit Shred. All of the free clusters on the drive will be shredded. This can really be handy if you previously had sensitive data on the drive but didn't shred it with Shred. All those deleted files that are now free space can be permanently deleted.

Settings

Shred 3: Settings Shred has four different options in the Settings dialog. You can choose to:
• Enable Windows Explorer context menu – this adds Shred to the right-click menu of any file or folder in Windows Explorer
• Show splash screen – this allows you to enable or disable the splash screen when Shred launches
• Do not display confirmation before shredding – this allows you to turn off the dialog that alerts you to close applications before shredding
• Use portable mode – checking this allows you to use Shred from portable media like a USB flash drive (this mode requires a Shred 3 restart).

In addition you can also reset all the settings to the default values and check for program updates.

Known Issues

Clearing Removable Media Free Space
Shred doesn't remove deleted filenames in the directory structures during clearing of free space. If you use file undelete software you can see the deleted filenames and restore files but the files will be damaged.

Files less than 4 KB
Shred cannot delete files that are less than 4 KB if the drive is formatted with NTFS. NTFS stores small files in the MFT (Master File Table). Shred cannot go into the MFT and shred these files.

RenaMusic: Rename Music Files Hassle-Free

I often get MP3s or WMA files that don't use the same naming convention that I use in my own collection. Renaming them manually is out of the question when I've got more than one album's worth of songs. RenaMusic makes it easy to rename files.

RenaMusic - main windowYou simply create a file pattern using the tags of the MP3 or WMA files, select the files to rename, add them to your queue, and hit rename.

For example, I keep all of my songs in directories based on artist and album. My file pattern looks like this \\

With RenaMusic, you can use any of the tags embedded in MP3 and WMA files, such as artist, album, title, and even bit rate, to create a new filename for the song.

In addition, RenaMusic supports the following string manipulations to give you even greater control of your filenames:
• Replace ___ with ___ Allows you to replace a character with another character. For example, you might want to replace a space with an underscore.
• All lowercase Converts the tags to lowercase.
• All uppercase Converts the tags to uppercase.
• First letter uppercase Makes the first letter of each tag uppercase.
• Remove initial "The" from Artist and append to the end This takes the "The" from a band's name and appends the ", The" to the end. For example, "The Police" would become "Police, The."

The program also has two additional tags:
• First letter of artist Takes the first letter of the artist and makes it a tag. For example, if the artist is U2, this tag will have the value U. This is handy if you store your collection in alphabetical folders.

• Original filename Lets you use the filename that originally was associated with the file.

I often get MP3s or WMA files that don't use the same naming convention that I use in my own collection. Renaming them manually is out of the question when I've got more than one album's worth of songs. RenaMusic makes it easy to rename files.

RenaMusic - main windowYou simply create a file pattern using the tags of the MP3 or WMA files, select the files to rename, add them to your queue, and hit rename.

For example, I keep all of my songs in directories based on artist and album. My file pattern looks like this \\

With RenaMusic, you can use any of the tags embedded in MP3 and WMA files, such as artist, album, title, and even bit rate, to create a new filename for the song.

In addition, RenaMusic supports the following string manipulations to give you even greater control of your filenames:
• Replace ___ with ___ Allows you to replace a character with another character. For example, you might want to replace a space with an underscore.
• All lowercase Converts the tags to lowercase.
• All uppercase Converts the tags to uppercase.
• First letter uppercase Makes the first letter of each tag uppercase.
• Remove initial "The" from Artist and append to the end This takes the "The" from a band's name and appends the ", The" to the end. For example, "The Police" would become "Police, The."

The program also has two additional tags:
• First letter of artist Takes the first letter of the artist and makes it a tag. For example, if the artist is U2, this tag will have the value U. This is handy if you store your collection in alphabetical folders.
• Original filename Lets you use the filename that originally was associated with the file.

Using RenaMusic

RenaMusic - tags Once you've got the program installed and running, the first thing you'll do is create a file pattern. The file pattern determines how your files will be renamed based on the tags embedded in the music files. Select the tags that you'd like to have appear in the filename from the drop-down button called "Insert tag." When you select a tag, it will be copied to the pattern input box.

In addition to the tags listed, you can also enter your own text into the pattern. If you'd like hyphens between tags, you could type "-" in the file pattern. For example, if you have a song embedded with an artist tag of "U2" and a title of "Sunday Bloody Sunday," the file pattern -

You can also type a backslash to create a directory of the tag preceding the "\." For example, if you had the pattern \\

Or perhaps you'd like to move the file to a different root directory so that "C:\Music\Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.mp3" would end up in "D:\My Other Music." Simply change the file pattern to D:\My Other Music\\\

In addition to the music tags, there are string manipulations and additional tags, described on the first page, that enable you to have even more control over the resulting filenames.

Once you've created your file pattern, you select the files you'd like to rename. You can select a folder and its subfolders or specific files by clicking on the checkbox next to the folder or filename. Once you've made your selections, hit the Add button to move those files to the queue. If you'd prefer, you can drag and drop files from Windows Explorer to the queue.

The Queue

The Queue is the list of all the files that you are going to rename. In addition to the filename, you can see all of the tags associated with the files.

RenaMusic - queueYou can view the queue as a simple list, or you can view the list grouped by tags. For example, perhaps you have 200 files in your list, and you'd like to see them displayed by artist. Simply drag the Artist column header to the top of the queue and it will display the list grouped by artist. Now suppose you want to define the view further so you can see the albums from the artists. Drag the Album column header to the top and it will now show you the artists with their respective albums.

The Queue provides a nice way to confirm the selection of files. You can also edit the embedded tags of a file by clicking the tag and editing it directly in the queue.

Preview & Rename

RenaMusic - preview window Before renaming the files in your queue, I strongly recommend previewing what effect the file pattern will have on your files. You can't undo a rename, so previewing really helps ensure that your file pattern is designed the way you intended it to be. Hit the Preview button and a new window will appear showing you the original path and filename and the new one.

Once you're satisfied with the preview, simply hit Rename. RenaMusic will process all of the files in the queue and pop up a dialog to notify you when it has finished.

That's it. RenaMusic takes a tedious, time-consuming project and makes it easy and quick to complete.

Shopping for a Photo Printer

The holidays are upon us, which means you'll be seeing more friends and family in the next few weeks than you usually do the rest of the year. You'll be taking a lot of photos and sharing them. Rather than sending your guests a digital file in e-mail (how festive!), consider printing some photos and sending them home with bright, sharp prints. Need a printer? No problem. I've got four tips to help you make a smart choice when you go to buy a photo printer. And after you get that shiny new printer, be sure to check out my five tips for getting great-looking prints with it.
1. Choose the Type of Printer

Printer are as varied as snowflakes. Well, maybe not quite that much, but there are three main varieties of photo printers you'll need to think about when you go shopping.

Inkjet: You're probably familiar with traditional inkjet printers, which print text documents as well as photos. Inkjet printers accommodate standard 8.5-by-11-inch paper, which means you can make 8-by-10-inch prints. With an oversized inkjet, you can make larger prints, like 14 by 17 inches. It all depends upon the printer's specs. Inkjet printers also vary by how many inks they use to create the color on the printed page. You'll find printers that use anywhere from four to a dozen cartridges. More colors usually help generate more photorealistic images, especially when reproducing flesh tones and shadows.

Color Laser: Color laser printers are another affordable option. Inkjet printers are mainly photo printers that can also do duty for text; think of color lasers as superb document printers that also do a respectable job with photos. You won't want to rely on a laser printer for all your photo printing duties, though. Laser-printed photos lack the brightness, saturation, and clarity you'll want in photos to frame or share. I use a laser printer to make drafts of photos that I will print on a photo printer later.

Snapshot Printer: If all you want is the ability to make great prints, then check out a snapshot printer. These compact printers are generally about the size and shape of a lunch box, so they don't take up much space (and can even be somewhat portable).

Snapshot printers typically use a printing process called dye sublimation, which means they work by transferring heated dyes to special paper. You might not care about the process itself, but the results are some of the best-looking photos you will ever see from a home printer. The downside: You'll have to look long and hard to find a model that prints any bigger than 4 by 6, so these printers are designed for sharing small prints. And the printers are photo-only--they're not designed to print text.
2. Compare Real Print Samples

Printer specifications are fine, but they don't tell you any more about what a printer will print than megapixels tell you how good your photos will be. For the best results, go to a store that has printers on display and ask to see real samples. Often, there will be samples on display with the printer. Some stores will let you print something on the spot. Don't be wowed by bright colors and deep saturation. Instead, check out fine details like hair and the weave in fabric. Also, look for how much detail you can see in the brighter and darker regions of the photo.
3. Think About the Future

No matter how great inkjet prints look today, they'll eventually fade. How long your prints will look good is called lightfastness, and it's a selling point for some printers (like, for example, the Epson Stylus Photo 1400). Printers like this one use "archival" inks, which are supposed to resist fading for 100 years or more (which, honestly, is longer than old-fashioned prints from film cameras were designed to last). You can also look for printers that use pigment-based inks; these are typically archival.
4. Consider Convenience

In the Days of Olde, you'd usually print by transferring photos from your camera to your PC, and then sending the prints you liked to the printer. You can certainly still do that if you like, but these days, it's often easier to print directly from your camera to your printer, leaving your PC out of the loop.

Of course, you'll want to make sure your potential printer has a PictBridge connection (most do), which allows you to connect your camera directly to the printer. But an LCD display is also important so you can see your photos and edit them before printing(some models allow you to crop, remove red eye, and make other changes). Another option: Some printers have memory card slots, so you can transfer photos without connecting a cable to the camera.

One snapshot printer, the Epson PictureMate Zoom, even includes an integrated CD burner, so you can copy your photos to CD as you print them.

Hot Pic of the Week

Get published, get famous! Each week, we select our favorite reader-submitted photo based on creativity, originality, and technique.

Here's how to enter: Send us your photograph in JPEG format, at a resolution no higher than 640 by 480 pixels. Entries at higher resolutions will be immediately disqualified. If necessary, use an image editing program to reduce the file size of your image before e-mailing it to us. Include the title of your photo along with a short description and how you photographed it. Don't forget to send your name, e-mail address, and postal address. Before entering, please read the full description of the contest rules and regulations.

This Week's Hot Pic: "On the Road Again," by Erica Maxine Price, Gallatin, Tennessee

Erica writes: "This photo is from one of my regular weekend drives. I use Photoshop to create miniature scenes from regular photos that I have taken."

This Week's Runner-Up: "The Wave" by Scott Whitehill, Keene, New Hampshire

Scott writes: "I shot this photograph using a Canon G9 as I rode in an amphibious boat on the West River in Brattleboro, Vermont."

To see the November winners, visit our Hot Pics slide show. Visit the Hot Pics Flickr gallery to browse past winners.

McAfee VirusScan Plus 2010: Protection Issues

McAfee Virus Scan Plus does well with traditional, signature-based malware detection, but it delivered a large number of false positives and fumbled on essentials like proactive protection and scan speed. Overall, it ranked tenth out of the 11 products in our roundup of stand-alone antivirus programs.

When put up against AVTest.org's huge cache of spyware, Trojans, and other malware, McAfee's program successfully identified an impressive 99.9 percent of samples, which earned it a second-place rank in that category behind G-Data. Then again, most of the programs we tested handled basic signature detection well.

However, the apps we tested differed greatly in their ability to proactively protect against new malware that didn't yet have a full signature. Here, McAfee's offering disappointed. In heuristic tests that use two-week-old signature files and newer malware, the program detected only 56.8 percent of AVTest.org's samples. Six other programs did a better job.

VirusScan Plus mitigates that lackluster heuristic detection with its ability to check unknown files against online servers, which means that the latest available signatures will always be used. And the company proved quick in providing those signatures, usually within two hours of any given outbreak. Only Symantec was as nimble in its outbreak response.

But online crooks devote a great deal of effort to evading signature detection, and VirusScan Plus lacks any ability to identify malware based solely on behavior. Behavioral analysis provides a strong extra layer of proactive protection; VirusScan Plus, however, wasn't able to block any malware in behavioral tests.

The program also fared poorly in disinfection tests. Every other app we evaluated was able to detect and disable all of the test malware infections, and while McAfee disabled what it found, it failed to detect one of the ten.

The bad news continued with scan speed. The app's data throughput for automatic scans that occur when you save or copy a file, for instance, was a pokey 7.06MB per second. Only Trend Micro Antivirus + Antispyware was slower. And McAfee made the most mistakes when it came to putting up false alerts about harmless files. Its 15 incorrect results was more than twice as many as the next worst showing (Kaspersky had 6).

McAfee does offer some nice extras with its app. For one thing, subscribers get all future program updates for free, with no need to pay extra for new software versions. Also, the company doesn't offer any antivirus programs without a firewall, so you'll get one with VirusScan Plus (we didn't test the firewall for this roundup, however).

VirusScan Plus is also relatively easy to use, and its warning pop-ups display plenty of information when it finds a threat. But some good features and a decent user interface can't outweigh a poor job at many critical protection tasks.

Microsoft Office 2010: 5 Ways to Make It Better

I've just put the beta of Microsoft Office 2010 through its paces for a Computeworld review, and while there's plenty to like, there's plenty that should be made better as well. Here are five ways it can be improved.

[See related stories Microsoft Office 2010: An Intriguing Beta, Office 2010 Beta: A Visual Tour of What's New]

Add Synchronization

Office 2010 Web Apps are the Web-based version of Office, and they let you create Office documents online, as well as open those documents in the client version of Office. But there's one thing that Web Apps don't do, and it's a very serious flaw: there is no automatic synchronization of files. Unlike in Google Docs, the files you create with Office Web Apps don't synchronize to your PC. This is a serious shortcoming, and makes the apps not nearly as useful as they should be.

The oversight is especially surprising, because Microsoft already has excellent synchronization technology, in Windows Live Mesh, and Windows Live Sync. Not having synchronization built it gives Google a feature that Office doesn't have --- not a good idea from Microsoft's point of view.

Let the Excel Web App Create Charts

Here's a surprise: The Web App version of Excel can't create charts. It can't do it in the beta, and Microsoft says it won't do it at launch. How can Microsoft leave out such a basic piece of functionality? It certainly can't be tough to do. This omission is just plain baffling.

Beef up the PowerPoint Web App

The PowerPoint Web App can't add backgrounds to presentation, or animations between slides. That's the case now, and will be the case at launch. This should change --- those are basic features of any solid presentation program.

Build in Facebook integration

Probably the niftiest addition to Office is the Outlook Social Connector, which will allow third parties and Web sites to write tools to integrate social networking sites with Outlook. Within Outlook, for example, you'll be able to see the status of your Facebook friends, and grab updated information from Facebook and LinkedIn.

It's a superb new feature...but you can't use it yet. Microsoft didn't write the required connectors to do it. Microsoft should immediately work closely with Facebook, LinkedIn, and other sites, to get those connectors written, even during beta. It's a potentially killer feature, and would be great to be able to use it right away.

Toshiba U505-S2980 Gets in Touch With Multitouch

The Toshiba U505-S2980's main gimmick is a multitouch touchscreen. Outside of that, it is, for the most part, a decent laptop, even above average in many ways. But that one gimmick is the root of my issues with this 13-inch notebook--and helps raise its cost to a somewhat pricey $1050 (as of 11/24/09).

Because the panel is a touchscreen, the U505-S2980 suffers from grainy picture quality. This exacerbates a more basic problem of the screen just being dim. Viewing angles and backlighting are all right--the hinge actually sets the screen to the perfect angle when the unit is fully open--but the screen is really not bright enough. What you wind up with is a display that's made too many compromises for an idea that just doesn't work in practice. (In all fairness the touchscreen variant of the Lenovo ThinkPad T400s and the Dell Latitude TX2 were also a little dim--it's not something unique to Toshiba).

I suspect Toshiba wants you to use the touchscreen more than anything else, but I'm just not sold. The 13-inch screen runs at a resolution of 1280 by 800 pixels, far too fine for a proper touch interface without a stylus. Sure, you can up the font size, but it grossly reduces usable space on an already cramped resolution. Multitouch also seems silly, given how awkward it is to reach forward and manipulate the bundled multitouch application when the notebook is upright. That bundled app--software for posting notes and images like a blackboard--is in itself quite cute, but hardly practical. That said, with the touchscreen, it's a breeze to zoom in and out of images or Websites. And if you want to do some on-screen doodling in something like Photoshop, you can.

If the screen is problematic, the good news is that the mousing touchpad is pretty stellar (though a bit small), offering up multitouch capability, too. So if the using the display via touch turns you off, at least you have a reliable alternative.

Now if Toshiba could just get the keyboard part down. The glossy, flat-surfaced, backlit keyboard is a pain. The cheap plastic used for it squeaks and squeals when you slide your fingertips across it, and it's just not comfortable to use. But the touch-sensitive buttons above the keyboard are nice, and the visual styling with the white LED backlighting is really beautiful and a welcome change from the world of blue LEDs elsewhere in the market. Another user might find the keyboard style to their liking, but to me it remains a gaudy reminder of Toshiba's over-glossed yesteryear.

The performance of the U505 is pretty reasonable--though it's hardly a speed demon--but the now-standard 4GB of DDR2 comes coupled with a meaty 500GB hard drive, which is virtually top of the line for capacity in modern notebook drives. The 2.2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo T6600 processor isn't going to win any awards, but backed with 4GB of DDR2 RAM and that big hard drive, it scores an 87 in WorldBench 6. That's more than adequate for general use. The Intel integrated graphics preclude any real gaming performance, but high-definition media playback worked very well, with no stutters or hiccups.

The trade-off for that performance is reduced battery life--you get 3.5 hours if you're lucky. The average for an all-purpose machine is about 4 hours, 14 minutes.

The speakers on the body below the screen fare at least a little better. Though still tinny as notebook speakers are wont to be, they at least make some effort made to produce at the low end, and you get plenty of volume. At 60 percent volume the speakers are plenty loud enough for either video or music.

I find myself quite liking the overall look of the unit, even though it is a little bulbous for a 13-inch laptop (it measures 12.5- by 9.1- by 1.5-inches and weighs 4.7 pounds). A pleasing texture to the lid and the inside (similar to what we saw on the NB205 line) give a modern, toughened style and a comfortable texture for the palm rest.

The U505-S2980 is very firm, with no creaks or flexing in the chassis. Port selection is excellent, with three USB ports (one of which is a combo e-SATA port), along with VGA- and HDMI-video outputs, speaker and mic jacks, gigabit ethernet, and even an olde-tyme modem port. You'll also find an ExpressCard slot, plus an SD/MMC card reader on the front. These connections are very nicely placed, too, with two of the USB ports near the front. And finally, hats off to employing a slot-loading DVD drive instead of the flimsy tray-loading ones more commonly found in laptops.

Though I find a lot to like about the U505, it's ironic that the main selling point is also what's holding this laptop back--the touchscreen. A user's experience with a notebook is often going to depend chiefly on the keyboard and the screen--the two most direct ways of interacting with it. You can fit all the hardware you want under the hood, but if these two don't hold up their end of the bargain, people aren't going to want to use it. The touchscreen is a cute gimmick whose poor visual quality unfortunately brings the whole thing down a peg.

How to Run Chrome OS From A USB Drive

Have you already tried Chrome OS using a virtual machine, and were less than impressed? Well now you can get a feel for how Google's Web-centric operating system will run natively google chromeon your machine. The folks over at Engadget were able to boot Chromium OS -- the open source version of what will become Chrome OS -- off of a USB stick on a Dell Vostro A90 netbook. The USB bootable disc is based on the Chromium OS build of Twitter user Hexxeh, who set up a Web site where you can view all the instructions you need for getting your bootable USB up and running.

If you're ready to get your hands dirty and try out the new OS, here's what you need to know:
Get the Torrent

Before you do anything, you're going to need to download the Hexxeh's Chromium OS build. You can find a torrent link on Hexxeh's Website or you can use the mirror links found here and here courtesy of Engadget.
Set Up Your USB Stick

Hexxeh has some easy instructions for writing your Chromium OS image onto a USB stick. The instructions for Windows and Linux look pretty straightforward, but Mac users are going to have a slightly more complicated time.
Pick Your Machine

A major problem with Chromium OS right now is that its device drivers are in the very early stages of development. That means some parts of your computer may not respond when using Chromium OS. One of the most common problems being reported is the lack of Wi-Fi functionality. So you may have to use an Ethernet connection instead. You should also know there's no guarantee the OS will boot up at all.

If you're in the market for a netbook or laptop, and you plan on experimenting with Chromium, google chromecheck out Google's list of devices that are known to work with the latest version of Chromium OS. The list is primarily for developers who want to work with the new OS, but there's no reason you can't use it as a buying guide. The device index features a sortable checklist that lets you know if the Wi-Fi and trackpad functions are working, as well as general comments and warnings specific to each device.

For example, you might want to stay away from the Asus Eee PC 900 if you plan to run Chrome right now. The netbook's Wi-Fi is supposed to work, but the device's fans may not run, which could cause your system to overheat. Other Wi-Fi-ready devices, according to Google's list, are the Toshiba mini NB205, and the Asus Eee PC 1008HA. The Lenovo ThinkPad T400 may also work after upgrading the Wi-Fi firmware. But before you go out and spend money on a new computer, read over Google's hardware list to make sure you are fully aware of the functionality and problems for the device you have in mind.
Booting From the USB

Once you've got your computer, and have gone through the steps of writing your bootable disc, you may find you can't get Chromium OS to boot on your Windows-based machine. If this happens, you may have to change the settings for how your machine boots up.

You can learn how to change the settings by checking out PC World's guide to installing Windows 7 on a netbook using a USB drive. The instructions are not Chromium-specific, but you should be able to figure out how to adapt this method for your purposes.

A word of warning: Changing the boot order means messing with your system's command prompt and BIOS. If that sounds scary, you might be better off picking up an official Chrome OS machine later next year. For the rest of you, let us know in the comments how Chromium is running on your netbook.

By Ian Paul

Adobe Online Tools for Documents and Presentations

Adobe’s Acrobat.com has free content-creation tools that can help in a pinch or even be a regular part of your workday. Most of the Web-based application are collaborative, and Adobe will even host your files, so both the app and the documents can be accessed on any PC. Its great if you bounce between machines and don’t carry a USB drive.

Adobe Buzzword is a word processor, and Adobe ConnectNow handles on line meetings. Just released is presentation tool, called simply Presentations. Most of the tools require Flash 9; Presentations needs Flash10. Set up free account, log in, and work away.

With Buzzword, you can adjust fonts, formatting, and other text basics, as well as insert images. It’s also great for collaboration. As with Google Docs, you invite contacts to view or edit a file, and you can make changes at the same time. A commenting tool lets you add notations.

Buzzword imports and exports Word, Open Doc, text, and RTF files; it also exports as PDF, HTML, or .e-pub (Adobe’s e-reader format). In ConnectNow on line meetings, up to three people can share desktops and documents using the live screen casting tool. Its VoIP option handles spoken conversations a chat window works for typing and a collaborative whiteboard allows everyone to focus on the same thing.

Presentations is hosted at labs.acrobat.com because it has additional critical features coming. For example, it can’t yet export PowerPoint files a deal breaker for many small businesses. But Adobe is working on adding that option, which may come by the end oh this year.

Overall, Presentations follows the familiar slide-creation paradigm of PowerPoint.. Unlike in that office app, you can invite an unlimited number of people to view or edit the files, making Presentations a hub for both collaboration and showing slides. It exports only PDFs at the moment, if you need to use Presentations documents outside of the tool, you may want to wait until it can save as PowerPoint and other file types.
- Zack Stern

DirectX 11 GPUs Soon

Advanced Micro Devices plans to deliver its first graphics processor with support for Microsoft's new DirectX 11 graphics API (application programming interface) late this year, the company announced in June.

This GPU promises to deliver more-detailed and more-realistic images on system that support the technology. AMD says it expects to beat competing graphics chip makers to market with the feature. “It’s the biggest inflection point in graphics in ten years, “ says Rick Bergman, senior vice president of AMD’s products group.

The new technology brings three major improvements to DirectX, AMD says. The first concerns a graphics technique called tessellation that lets game designers create 3D models with much higher definition than before. The result is a much more natural look to the graphics.

DirectX 11 also brings a new way to program the graphics chip. “it’s the ability to unlock the massively parallel capabilities of the graphics processor in different ways, “ says Bergman Combined with Windows 7, it could be used to help programs run faster.

The third major change improves multithreading in multiple-core CPU’s to better graphics performances. AMD didn’t announce a launch date or price.
-Martyn Williams

Amazon launch iPhone app

Amazons has launched a free UK iPhone app that lets you buy from its store using one-click ordering. Shopping could already buy product using Amazon’s mobile site, but the new app significantly simplifies the process.

The app includes a feature called Amazone Remembers which identifiers photos you take of items you see in shops and adverts and sends you to a link to buy it. If the app fails to recognize what’s in the photo, it sends the image to a team of people who will search for the best link to the item and email it to you.

Amazon’s app also lets you track your deliveries, view your Amazons Wish List and read recommendations and reviews on the site.
www.apple.com/iphone/apps-for-iphone

Firefox 3.6 beta arrives.

A beta version of the Firefox 3.6 browser has been released by Mozilla. Coming just four months after the launch of Firefox 3.5, the new version offers little in the way of visible changes, but many improvements to stability and speed, the company said.

“Firefox 3.6 is primarily a release with security, stability, speed and capability enhancements, with no visible user interface changes over Firefox 3.5”, said Mike Beltzner, director of Firefox at Mozilla.

However it does boast some new features, such as the ability to detect the orientation of the screen on some devices. This will be especially useful ‘tablet’ style devices, allowing the screen to rotate it self so it can be read no matter which way up the unit is.

According to Mozilla, laptops such as the MacBook Pro and Lenovo Thinks Pad are capable of utilizing this feature as they have built-in accelerometers – devices that can detect which way is up.

There is no official date set for the release of the full version of Firefox 3.6 yet but Mozilla said it would happen before the end of the year.

Meanwhile, the company has launched a website that Firefox users can visit on a regular basis to check whether their plug-iins such Microsoft Silverlight and Adobe Flash are up to date. Vulnerabilities in older versions of software such as Flash are often targeted by cybercriminals looking to turn hacked computers into spam -and malware- generating ‘bots’.

Yahoo calls time on GeoCities

Yahoo has finally closed the door on its long-running GeoCities site-hosting service. Launched in 1995, GeoCities offered suffers a space to set up their own, personalized hompage for a small fee. Having initially backed GeoCities with considerable investment. Yahoo decided to buy the service in 1999 for $3.57bn.

However, Yahoo announced in April that it would close Geocities because it has alternative service such as Yahoo Groups that offer similar functions. “We have decide to focus on helping our customers explore and building relationships online in other ways. We’re excited about the other services we have designed to help you connect with friends and family and share your activities and interests,” a Yahoo spokesman said.

Rival services have claimed that they are seeing increased traffic thanks to GeoCities’ closure.
www.yahoo.com