Hmm.. It certainly does seem to be like a Microsoft week. Here is yet another post related to them. Make no mistake, while Microsoft is a great company, I am no fanboy. I like Apple’s products as well as Microsoft’s. I just share what I find interesting as it happens. So here you go..
image courtesy of gizmodo
While people have been waiting and excited about Apple’s rumored tablet, the fruity company has yet to disclose anything official. Microsoft in the meantime has announced their working development. The Courier is a dual 7-inch screen multi-touch. The screen interface can be controlled by finger swipes and can be written into with a stylus pen. The full story can be found on gizmodo which were given the exclusive. Watch this video:
There is no specific activities disclosed but it is guaranteed there will be alot of games, prizes, and marketing gimmicks for this weekend. Part of Windows 7 launch strategy is to offer alot of discount and promos related to the release. One such promo is that you can get the Windows Home Basic Full Product for only Php 7,777. It is said to be at Php 8,000 post event. I still find this item to be pricey to be honest. It would be better to just get the Windows Home Premium version for a bit more.
Alot of other marketing was done via Facebook and Twitter and I must say its a stroke of genius and well played by the marketing team. The facebook was able to get over 12,000 fans and its wall has just been crazy with activity and buzz. Alot of prizes were also given out via these social networking sites and the marketing promotions milked the social network perfectly. One of the longer term contest was the Hunt for Points. People just have to click on special banners across the Microsoft site and partner website to earn points. These points can then be redeemed during the event. Giveaways include pens, buttons, stickers, shirts, hoodies, and even Windows 7 Home Basic software products.
All in all, I think this was the best marketing launch Microsoft Philippines has pulled off to date. It remains to be seen at the even itself but they hype they were able to build up is impressive. Too bad not everyone could walk away a winner of some prize since you had to compete with 12,000 other fans. =)
Whoever remembers the days you still used MySpace? I came across this funny image on the Internet. Its supposedly MySpace’s creator ‘Tom’ trying out facebook. Hilarious. Read the wall from the bottom up for better appreciation.
For a time-limited offer, I can sell you Microsoft’s latest new operating system at discount. Through my company, i4 Asia, I was able to get from our supplier a pre-launch special for the Full Packaged Product (FPP) versions of Windows 7.
FPP means they are not OEM and they are not upgrades. These are new original and transferable licenses. This is a good investment actually. This means when your PC gets obsolete, your license can be transferred to your new computer. (OEM licenses can’t). Also, this is the only option I believe that you can buy if you are using a Mac and wants to install a licensed version of Windows 7. You can compare the editions here.
Home Basic – Php 5,500
Home Premium – Php 7,500 (Regular SRP of $199)
Professional – Php 12,500 (Regular SRP of $299)
Ultimate – Php 13,500 (Regular SRP of $319.99)
PRICES VALID UNTIL OCT 29, 2009 (as a special tie-up promotion to my blog, I will give P500 starbucks gift certificate for readers of my blog that buys. Just tell me you saw this)
SAVINGS!! I can get you discounts for volume orders. Just call me at 09178124062 for faster discussions. Hurry as this is a limited offer only. I am not sure what the new price will be after Oct 30. Don’t miss out! Order Now!
This version is said to be better than Windows XP or Vista by all reviewers. Since there has been tons of review out there, I will not waste time writing what has been written already. Here is an Engadget review if you want to know more.
Official launch in Philippines is on Nov. 7, 2009 at SM North Edsa Cyberzone
Honda recently unveils its new personal mobility gadget–The U3-X. Its the smallest compact personal mobility device Honda has ever shown. Its still in development stages and Honda still has no plans on putting it on the market.
The device is small enough to be carried and is battery operated. It operates much like a segway device but is much much smaller. The device is steered by leaning towards the direction you want and no hands are required in its operation. While it can useful to anyone, it opens up new possibilities elderly and the handicapped.
Honda visions that this can be the smallest personal transport for the future. Check this video:
It has almost been 2 weeks since Apple’s 9-9-9 event and everyone has almost had their chance to download and try out the newest technologies from Apple’s Music products. The iTunes and iPods.
So What is New?
New iTunes 9
New iPhone and iPod Touch 3.1 software update
New iPod Shuffle colors + Limited Edition Shuffle in silver aluminum casing
Bigger iPod Touch capacity at the same price
New Video Recording feature for the iPod Nano
So let me discuss in summary what I think about each of these new updates. Keep in mind I am not doing a full review but I would just like to share briefly and straight to the point what you may need to know.
New iTunes 9
If you still haven’t updated, go do it now. iTunes 9 is a major upgrade and it is packed with new features. What you will first notice is the interface. It kept the same old navigation scheme but now has a brighter and cleaner look.
Next up are Genius Mixes. Remember the Genius Playlist function that never quite worked so well? Now it does! Finally after some time of much data gathering, apple seem to have a more refined Genius function now. What Genius does for those that didn’t know is that you can pick a song and Genius will create a playlist from that song of what it thinks will go well together. You can surprise yourself or even rediscover music you forgot you even had.
Now what Genius Mixes does is that it takes it one step further. Instead of just creating a playlist, it can go on forever just like having your own personal DJ. It can also create Genius Mixes albums already for you!
Important Note on this feature is that after installing the new iTunes 9, you have to click “Update Genius” to have this feature kick in.
Genius Mixes is the best feature for me in this update but the other new stuff are:
Better Syncing (especially for iPod Touches and iPhone where you can graphically manage your apps layout)
iTunes LP (essentially it lets albums have extra content like lyrics, trivia, video clips, etc. The interface to this LP menu can also be custom designed by the artists themselves)
Home Sharing (you can now copy music from a family member’s iTunes Library when Home Sharing is turned on. It used to be you can only play. Now you can copy them too
New iPhone and iPod Touch 3.1 software update
Genius for Apps (this is the best feature I think. It does for apps what it does for music. It will recommend what app goes well together)
Genius Mixes for Music
Improved Syncing
New iPod Shuffle Colors
A picture is said to be worth a thousand words so I rest my case.
Bigger iPod Touch capacity at the same price
For the same price point, they upgraded the 16GB to 32GB and the 32GB to 64GB. Too bad if you just bought a new iPod Touch before this announcement but if you have been thinking about getting one, now is a good time as any. Just make sure to check with your local retailer to make sure he is not trying to unload his old stocks on you.
While local retailers pricing may vary, Apple’ s pricing scheme is pretty much standard worldwide so expect similar pricing.
New Video Recording for the iPod Nano
Everyday, more and more people are creating video content. Browse through YouTube alone and you will find thousands and thousands of videos. Apple has not built into the iPod Nano a video camera of good quality. Here is a sample of an unedited video:
My initial reaction to this is that “yeah its cool but hey, my phone has video too.” If you think about it, the feature alone is not gonna make you buy the Nano but if you consider that you are buying a portable music player that has a bonus video recording function that has good quality and is just as think and just as light.. hmm.. awesome. No other portable music player has that.
Other new features in the Nano worth mentioning are the Live Pause for FM Radio and the Pedometer for the Nike+iPod. Now the iPod Nano can pause radio in real time and let you play back up to 15 minutes and then lets you fast forward to catch up to real time broadcast.
In Summary
There you have my friends is as short of quick run through as possible on the new noteworthy features and updates for the new iPods and iTunes. I did not cover every single detail as it is not my aim to bore you and those information can be googled anyway if you are interested in any particular topic. Thank you for reading and I hope you are enjoying the other posts in my blog.
Yahoo! CEO Carol Bartz (left) and Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer (right) signs the deal with a giant pen
This is one of those news that already happened before I even put my blog up but its interesting enough that I wanted to post it out there for those that haven’t heard yet. Yes folks, Yahoo! has officially sold their search engine business to Microsoft.
So what does this really mean?
What this really means is that Yahoo! will still have a search function on their site. What just happens when you search something is that it will be Microsoft’s technology working its magic and not Yahoo!’s. The site will be powered by Microsoft’s own search engine–Bing. If you search on Bing and on Yahoo!, you will get the same results. Yahoo’s will just have a “powered by Bing”.
So where will be the future of Yahoo! and Microsoft on this matter?
Yahoo will concentrate on it being a portal and being the site everyone wants to go to for all the other services like mail, groups, special interests. It just needs to have a search function but does not want to handle that side of the business anymore.
Microsoft will be focusing on promoting Bing and its ad-serving technologies to compete with Google. Having this deal adds value to advertising on Bing as it gets both customers searching on Bing and Yahoo!
Why did they do this?
From Yahoo!’s point of view, they feel that people go to their site to do other things like check email, horoscopes, rather than the search engine as a primary purpose. As such, by selling it, Yahoo! CEO Carol Bartz feel that the deal enables them to have a healthy revenue stream to invest on critical areas to their future while Microsoft can focus on search.
From Microsoft’s point of view, they wanted to have a stronger competitive platform to compete with Google. By buying Yahoo! they would now have an estimated 30% of the market compared to Google’s 70%. This gives them a much better footing.
How much did it cost?
Nothing. Nada. Zilch. Zero. What happens is that Microsoft will be paying Yahoo! 88% of the ad revenues coming from ads on Yahoo! for the next 5 years. Microsoft further guarantees Yahoo that it will earn equal or more than it currently does for the next one and a half years. Not a bad deal considering Microsoft originally wanted to buy it for $45 billion back in 2008. Today, it doesn’t have to pay anything outright and as they pay Yahoo! with revenue generated from Yahoo’s own site.
And oh, Microsoft gets exclusive rights for 10 years to Yahoo!’s search engine technology. After that its pretty much unclear. But given it has Bing, its really just to be sure Microsoft will have control.
So when is this going to happen?
The deal has already been confirmed and is expected to complete by early 2010. There is still alot of paperwork and signatures to get in order. The implementation is expected to take another 3-6 months so we should be seeing Yahoo search powered by Microsoft in mid 2010. The ads listings will take another 2 years so everything fully integrated should be by year 2012. Just right on time for the end of the world according to the Mayan calendar predictions.
This is old news but for those who haven’t heard yet, Microsoft announced last June 1, 2009 during E3 2009 that they are developing the next generation of console gaming. Code-named Project Natal, this will be on the Xbox 360. It features controller-free gaming. All you need is yourself. With motion sensors and cameras installed on your TV setup, Project Natal can detect hand and body gestures, facial expressions, and voice. The resulting experience is pretty amazing!
Check out this trailer:
There is no announcements yet on price or a release date but there are expectations for its release late 2010.
Apple announced today that its newest OS will launch August 28, 2009. The new OS dubbed “Snow Leopard” is an enhancement over the previous version of Mac OS X “Leopard”. Apple has chosen the name as to reflect what would be faster and better version of a Leopard.
Current Leopard users can pre-order the upgrade for $29 and a family pack (5-users) for only $49.
Snow Leopard promises major improvements over the previous version with key features being:
64-bit
This means that previous memory limitation of 4GB as being the max that applications can use is no longer. With 64-bit computing, the theoretical max is now 16 billion gigabytes. While that is an exaggeration, this just means the memory capacity is ready for the future. All built-in applications are now also in 64-bit. This means everything is faster from startup to shutdown.
Grand Central Dispatch (GCD)
Simply put. The new Snow Leopard is now more efficient in the utilization of multi-cores. This feature further enhances the speed and capability of the hardware available today.
OpenCL
Formally called Open Computing Language. This is an open standard C-based programming language that allows programmers to maximize the power of the graphics processing unit (GPU). Most of the routine applications we use are not really graphics intensive. So while that processing power is there in our graphics cards, generally these are resources that are not used. With OpenCL, Snow Leopard can now use that power in your general applications. Again, another leap towards being the faster OS.
These are just the main technologies that make Snow Leopard so exciting. It is because of these that makes possible the overall improvement across all built-in applications and future software to be better, faster, and easier.
Hi. I'm Selwyn Uy. Here I share my thoughts, discuss topics of my interest and random things I find online. For work, I am a co-founder at i4 Asia and I am a service provider at Elance. When not working, I like to play computer games, watch movies, and keeping fit. Thanks for visiting.
Alot of other marketing was done via 
For a time-limited offer, I can sell you Microsoft’s latest new operating system at discount. Through my company, 
Honda recently unveils its new personal mobility gadget–The U3-X. Its the smallest compact personal mobility device Honda has ever shown. Its still in development stages and Honda still has no plans on putting it on the market.
t you will first notice is the interface. It kept the same old navigation scheme but now has a brighter and cleaner look.
For the same price point, they upgraded the 16GB to 32GB and the 32GB to 64GB. Too bad if you just bought a new iPod Touch before this announcement but if you have been thinking about getting one, now is a good time as any. Just make sure to check with your local retailer to make sure he is not trying to unload his old stocks on you.
Hi. I'm Selwyn Uy. Here I share my thoughts, discuss topics of my interest and random things I find online. For work, I am a co-founder at 
