The news came out today that Microsoft (through PR agency Edelman) sent out a bunch of free Ferrari 5000 and 1000 Acer laptops to some bloggers, “no string attached”. Scott Beale showed off pictures of his Ferrari 1000 laptop, which sports a 1.80GHz AMD Turion 64×2, 1 gig of RAM and a 160 gig SATA hard drive, as well as coming preloaded with Windows Vista Ultimate. Considering Scott didn’t write a single article about Microsoft between June 19 and December 14 of this year, it seems strange they’d pick him, but I guess they’re trying to make a friend.
Mitch Denny posted about his new laptop, explaining that it appears to be related to a viral marketing campaign called “Vanishing Point” that is gearing up to Microsoft’s CES keynote.
Funny thing: Scott’s laptop only meets a 2.8 on the Windows Experience Index, which Microsoft says isn’t good enough to run Vista Business, let alone Ultimate. That’s weird (especially since the system specs are plenty good).
Long Zheng has more details, including a list of some people who got one (including Brandon LeBlanc). Bloggers have a “choice” to return it, but I don’t see too many people taking them up on the offer.
Damn. What should I have done to get one? Paging Miel 
December 27th, 2006
Posted by
Nathan Weinberg |
Vista, Corporate, Windows, General |
44 comments
The OneNote Extensibility blog has a bit of good news for OneNote 2003 users: There will be an upgrade version of OneNote 2007, complete with upgrade pricing. Give that OneNote 2003 retails for $100, expect an upgrade to 2007 to be cheaper (I’m hoping for $59). There is some bad news: The upgrade won’t be available when Office 2007 ships in a few weeks. You’ll have to wait a little longer for it to show up, and hopefully that will be before Office 2007 Beta 2TR expires on March 31, 2007.
December 27th, 2006
Posted by
Nathan Weinberg |
OneNote, Applications, General |
no comments
Back in September, Microsoft conducted a survey, asking people how they use their RSS readers. The results are here, and I’ve taken the liberty of translating one of the tables into a graph, just to give you an idea of how fragmented the RSS reader space is:
Igvita has made graphs of most of the other data, including “How many feeds are you subscribed to in your primary RSS reader?”, “On average, how frequently do you open your RSS reader (e.g. to read unread articles, to find an old article)?” and “What time of day do you usually use your RSS reader (check all that apply)?”.
Besides asking questions, they asked participants to submit their OPML reading lists to get data on which feeds were popular. Of the 1,354 respondents, 320 OPML files comprising 40,616 subscribed feeds were received. The top 18:
(via Randy Charles Morin)
December 27th, 2006
Posted by
Nathan Weinberg |
Blogs, General |
no comments
HTC, makers of the cheapest (and very popular) Windows Mobile devices out there, is closing in on the release of the HTC Athena, a cross between an “Origami” Ultra-Mobile PC and a Windows Mobile device. The Athena will feature a 5-inch screen, 3-megapixel camera, 8 gig hard drive, wifi, Bluetooth, GPS, 3G and HSDPA, Windows Mobile 5.0 and a detachable keyboard.
There are three points worth making:
- Windows Mobile 5.0 devices take up a lot less power than full-on computers, so this device will not have the battery problems that plague the so-far failing UMPC platform.
- HTC prices their stuff damn cheap, and if this device doubles as a phone, the manufacturers may even pick up some of the tab.
- If there’s a hard drive in there, someone will figure out how to load on Windows XP, or at least Linux, and let it dual-boot between the mobile OS and the full OS, making it a double-threat.
Those three points combined make for a third point: The Athena is the only UMPC so far with a shot at mass-market success. If I can get one for $700 ($500 with a new contract), I will , guaranteed. Yes, it isn’t really a phone, but Bluetooth can handle that lickety-split.
Tatung is readying a WinMobile UMPC as well.
December 27th, 2006
Posted by
Nathan Weinberg |
Windows Mobile, General |
no comments
