Speak One's Mind

comparison of Blackberry Playbook and iPad

8:55 PM

Here comes the rival of iPad. Yap, meet the Blackberry Playbook. We thought some of you would appreciate a summary of how the PlayBook excels when directly compared to Apple’s iPad. Here's an info. Enjoy!

Start with physical design, the PlayBook is just 10mm thick, whereas the iPad is 13.4mm thick, also the PlayBook weighs less at just 0.9lbs, whereas the lightest iPad weighs 1.5lbs. To be honest the weight difference isn’t surprising as the iPad’s 9.7 inch display is larger than the PlayBook’s 7 inch display.

The clarity of the displays should be pretty similar, this is because the PlayBook’s 7 inch display supports a resolution of 1024 x 600, whilst the iPad’s 9.7 inch display outputs at 1024 x 768.

The PlayBook should offer a great web experience as it features full Adobe Flash 10.1 and HTML 5 support, at the moment a high percentage of websites use Flash, however in the future it is thought that HTML 5 will take over, therefore the PlayBook should be compatible with pretty much every website you tried to view.

Here is bad. One thing I dislike about the iPad is the need for accessories such as the iPad Camera Connection Kit and the iPad Dock Connector to VGA Adapter, the PlayBook features a built-in microUSB connector and micro HDMI, these standardized connectors should allow you to easily connect your PlayBook to a wide-range of devices with a wide-range of cables.

The micro HDMI output allows your to connect your PlayBook to an external HD display, according to RIM’s website you will be able to stream video at 1080p, which is far superior to the iPad’s 576p output (via the Apple Component AV Cable).When the iPad was revealed I was surprised that there was no built-in camera, the PlayBook features two camera, a 5 megapixel rear-facing camera and a 3 megapixel front-facing camera for video conferencing, these additions increase the PlayBook’s appeal, however no-doubt also increase its price.

Finally we will talk about performance, so far we haven’t seen a proper hands-on demo, however we do know that the PlayBook is capable of true multi-tasking, this is thanks to the combination of a 1 GHz dual-core processor, 1GB of RAM and BlackBerry Tablet OS, it will be interesting to see how this compares to the iPad’s 1GHz single core processor, 256MB of RAM and iOS.

The iPad’s build quality and software interactivity are in my opinion its best qualities, therefore I am sure RIM will do their utmost to match this, if the build quality of BlackBerry smartphones is anything to go by the PlayBook should be OK, however I do feel that RIM have a long way to come with touch screen intuitivity, what do you think?

Do you think the BlackBerry PlayBook will be better than the Apple iPad? We'll see next..

Laptop Karya Anak Bangsa

4:57 PM

Andin Puspitasari , 0 Comments

Kemarin, saya mencari artikel tentang penemuan-penemuan yang hebat buatan Indonesia. Tapi, saya tertarik saat menemukan netbook buatan Indonesia yang sangat terjangkau. Harganya hanya 1 jutaan! Memperkenalkan, Elevo. Mungkin masih asing ditelinga kita, bahkan saya pun baru mendengarnya kali ini.

Sang produsen, PT Elevo Technologies Indonesia (ETI) bahkan sudah menyiapkan 2 laptop murah di bulan Agustus 2010 ini. Yakni Netbook Elevo R7 (layar 7 inci) dengan harga Rp 998.000 dan Elevo R10 (layar 10 inci) dilego dengan harga Rp 1.398.000.Cukup terjangkau kan?

Elevo R7 menggunakan layar 7 inci (800 x 480), Prosesor ARM9 533Mhz, Wifi 802.11b/g, OS Original Windows CE 6.0 atau Android, Memory 128 MB, 2GB Nand Flash, 2-in-1 SD Card, 2 USB Port, Keyboard, Touch Pad, USB to VGA (Optional), USB to Ethernet (Optional).

Sedangkan R10 menggunakan layar 10 inci (1024 x 600), Prosesor ARM9 533Mhz, Wifi 802.11b/g, OS Original Windows CE 6.0 atau Android, Memory 128 MB, 2GB Nand Flash, 2-in-1 SD Card, 2 USB Port, Chiclet Keyboard, Touch Pad, Built-in Camera 1,3 Mpx, Built in Stereo Speaker, Earphone Jack in/out, Ethernet LAN RJ 45, USB to VGA (Optional). Lebih lengkapnya buka saja sitenya, http://www.elevo.co.id/

Touchable Hologram

5:32 PM

Andin Puspitasari , 1 Comment

The latest invention developed by scientists from the University of Tokyo is a hologram projector that allows a person to touch a hologram with bare hands. Usually it is impossible to do so due t

o the fact that holograms are made only of light. However, improved technology allows a user to actually feel holograms floating in 3D space.

Researchers called their latest invention Airborne Ultrasound Tactile Display. The hologram projector takes advantage of an ultrasound phenomenon, which scientists dubbed acoustic radiation pressure. Thus, the projector is able to generate a pressure sensation on a person's hands that are identified with the help of two Nintendo Wiimotes. More great inventions can be found here at www.InfoNIAC.com - check the links at the bottom of the article.

According to Japanese scientists, the technology does not require any physical contact, which means that the quality of the hologram will not be diluted. The team of researchers led by Hiroyuki Shinoda, recently presented their latest invention at SIGGRAPH 2009 in New Orleans.

On their website the team explains: "A retroreflective marker is attached on the tip of user's middle finger. IR LEDs illuminate the marker and two Wiimotes sense the 3D position of the finger. Owing to this hand-tracking system, the users can handle the floating virtual image with their hands."

If you look at the video below you can see scientists demonstrating how a person can feel virtual raindrops that fall off the user's hand. Such technology could be widely used in video games.

13 of the Most Memorable Google Doodles

1:41 AM

Andin Puspitasari , 0 Comments

On Thursday, April 1, 2010, Google jokingly changed their name (and logo) to "Topeka" for a day in response to the city of Topeka; Topeka, Kansas, had unofficially changed its name to Google for the previous month.

On March 2010, the Pi Day, 3.14 was celebrated by math nerds and Google, worldwide. Having been conspicuously missing from Google's ever-growing repertoire of special-event doodles for years, Google finally relented and unleashed its inner nerd, not that it tried to hide it too hard in the past. And, perhaps to make up for all the years it skipped, Google went all out this time and showed off six common uses of the famous number. The Pi Day Google logo starts off with the formula everyone knows (?) for the area of a circle A = πr2, but goes on with some more advanced stuff. The two 'os' in Google are used to represent the sin(x) function over a 2π period. I hate Pi, it makes math or physics difficult than before *hmmm

Google's Doodle for Charles Darwin's 200th Birthday, in celebration of the discoveries and life of Charles Darwin, the scientist and naturalist who first described biological evolution via natural selection.

Google unveiled this logo to celebrate the 400th anniversary since Galileo Galilei, the Italian astronomer, showed Venetian merchants his new creation, a telescope.

A coolest doodle. On Friday, October 8, 2010 (That's my birthday, anyway), to mark what would have been the day before the 70th birthday of John Lennon, a 32-second "Video doodle" appeared on the google homepage. The "E" of google was shaped like a play button. The video was a simple animation that was accompanied by Lennon's song "Imagine."

This logo was featured on December 12, 2006 (Edvard Munch's Birthday). Featuring "The Scream," this composition was created by Munch and is said by some to symbolize the human species overwhelmed by an attack of existential angst.

This doodle that appeared online in Sept 2010 was meant to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Flintstones.

Google's Doodle for world cup 2010 final with the 3 most important elements of that day: Spain, Netherlands and Octopus Paul. I vote for Spain for sure. Yay!

The UFOs in Google's logo were designed to mark the 143rd birthday of author HG Wells. Although Google regularly uses its doodles to mark significant events, anniversaries and notable dates, it usually does so explicitly. This was the first time Google has used a series of mysterious logos to build up to an event, although the search page today shows a new Google doodle to mark Wells' birthday which takes web users straight through to a list of web pages related to the author.

This is my favorite, Cookie Monster! In 2009, Google marked the 40th anniversary of Sesame Street with a new 'doodle' featuring the programme's Cookie Monster. Users of Google in the UK, France and Canada were greeted with the hungry blue character's familiar 'googly eyes' in honour of the programme's four decades on air.

Google's August 29th logo celebrated Michael Jackson's birthday a couple of months after his death. The two Os in Google were replaced with two feet, en pointe, wearing patent leather shoes and shiny white socks below slightly-too-short trousers.

Five blue dots, three red dots, three yellow dots, four blue, three green and two red: yes, it's Google spelled out in Braille. This was issued on 4 January 2006, in celebration of the 197th birthday of Louis Braille, who invented the embossed-point alphabet for blind and visually impaired people.

On Friday, 21 May 2010, on the 30th anniversary of the arcade game Pac-Man, Google unveiled worldwide their first interactive logo. Anyone who visited Google could play Pac-Man on the logo, which featured the letters of the word 'Google' on the Pac-Man maze. The logo also mimicked the sounds the original arcade game made. The "I'm Feeling Lucky" button was replaced with an "Insert Coin" button. Pressing this once enabled you to play the Pac-Man logo. Pressing it once more added a second player, Ms. Pac-Man, enabling 2 players to play at once, controlled using the W,A,S,D keys, instead of the arrows as used by Player 1. Pressing it for a third time performed an "I'm Feeling Lucky" search. It was then removed on Sunday, May 23, 2010, initially replacing Pac-Man with the normal logo. Later on that day, Google released a permanent Google Pac-Man site, due to the popular user demand for the playable logo.

Touch the 'Touch'

4:28 AM

Andin Puspitasari , 2 Comments

Having an interest with music? I think everyone have their own tastes of music. Maybe you like pop, he likes rock, and she likes jazz. It's your choice! In this era, we cannot hide and not having a deal with this evolution.

Who doesn't know iTouch? The iPod Touch (stylized, trademarked, and marketed as iPod touch) is a portable media player, personal digital assistant, and Wi-Fi mobile platform designed and marketed by Apple Inc. The product was launched on September 5, 2007, at an event called The Beat Goes On. The iPod Touch adds the multi-touch graphical user interface to the iPod line. It is the first iPod with wireless access to the iTunes Store, and also has access to Apple's App Store, enabling content to be purchased and downloaded directly on the device. Apple Inc. has sold over 32 million iPod Touch units as of the end of 2009.

Nowadays, iPod Touch has entered the fourth generation.With the iPhone 4, a huge makeover to the handset promised to reshape Apple’s media player, and it did. Including the iPhone 4’s A4 processor, Retina display and front-facing camera for Facetime, the 4^th generation iPod Touch includes almost everything the tech giant’s latest phone introduced. It accomplishes all this while still thinning down and shedding weight, from the already absurdly-thin design.

The iPod Touch 4G makes older models look fat in comparison. The mirrored back surface still scratches easily, and rounds the glass off to an almost razor-thin edge. Past iPod’s had much larger, rounder edges – this iPod is by far the sleekest. The power/standby button has finally been moved over to the right side, as on the iPhone. The volume rocker has thicker, rounded buttons which are easy to press, though iOS4 on the iPod does not support quick mute like on the iPad.

Pros:

Best design yet, excellent screen and feel
Faster, thinner, lighter
Facetime and 720p video recording

Cons:

No FM radio, no numerical battery
Low resolution and low quality still photography

Past iPod touch models had qualities that made them seem less professional, less clean. The Wi-Fi antenna showing, thick rounded edges, etc. The iPod Touch 4G, however, does not. It’s clean, crisp, and looks and feels great. The thinness of the design is excellent for holding in a pocket, though like the Nano, it’s easy to forget because it’s so light and thin. Yet with that miniscule frame, the iPod is still tough. Users can safely play a game of ball with the Touch in a pocket. I’ve on more than a few occasion forgot it was even there.

Performance is stellar. It seems silly that each new i-device is considered snappy and fast thanks to performance boosts, yet the same applies with this iPod Touch. There isn’t a faster mobile device on the market today.

Many have thus far been impressed by the Retina display, boasting a higher resolution 960×640 display and 326 pixels per inch. I’m not. Yes, it looks great, and yes, it is much clearer than older every other screen I’ve tested. But having switched back and forth between my iPhone 3GS and the iPod Touch 4G, it really isn’t that big a deal. Some journalists have openly stated that the upgraded screen makes the iPad useless, but I couldn’t disagree more. There is certainly a difference, but that’s not worth upgrading for alone.

But despite being an excellent PMP, the iPod touch faces big rivals these days. Increasing smartphone proliferation, strengthening of the Android stable and the birth of tablets could see the iPod touch pushed aside with those more affluent buyers. We've seen a standalone Android PMP from Samsung and if that can build on the success of the Samsung Galaxy S, then we may see the iPod touch facing more challenges in the future.

For sure, i'm so addict with this gadget. I have the 3rd gen and i think that's not too bad. the specification isn't too far with the 4th. Gotta post something cool later. See ya!

The Barcode Stories

1:27 AM

Andin Puspitasari , 0 Comments

I know that it is not about the latest inventions. I'm here is just to tell you about the story behind the complicated numbers called Barcode. Got this info when i'm googling about invention. Hopefully it can be useful for all of us.

Perhaps one of the most under rated inventions belongs to the barcode. Barcodes aren't given much thought by the majority of consumers, but these codes were fairly recently implemented, in a working fashion, in 1970.

A small food store owner decided one day that keeping records of the inventory of his stock and their associated prices was an extremely laborious process and so, in 1948, he took it upon himself to contact The Drexel Institute of Technology in a bid to work towards a feasible solution. Bernard Silver rose to the challenge and set out to investigate this problem, and began working on a solution involving an automatic way of keeping track of items which had been sold. Bernard Silverand a group of students from the institute realised their answer inthe form of ultraviolet rays, ink and a scanner.

The system did work initially, but possessed two major negatives. The system was incredibly costly making implementation on a large scale much more economically draining and the system was also notorious as being unstable. If the invention was to become commonplace ingrocery stores, these two problems had to be ironed out to provide a more viable solution.

The patent for the bar code system was file by Silver and one of his students, Woodland. The patent was not granted immediately; in fact it took three years for the patent agency to grant their invention patent for the bar code, occurring on 7th October, 1952. The invention of the barcode is patent number 2,612,994, Classifying Apparatus and Method, the official title of the patent.

Despite this patent being issued, the system was still not welcomed by the majority of store owners. It wasn't until 1966, that the system began creeping its way into more and more grocery stores. This system was soon criticised, as there was no central mechanism for controllinguniformly coded items. In 1970, Logicorn developed Universal Grocery Products Identification code (UGPIC), soon shortened to Universal Identification Number (UPC). It was Marsh's superstore in Troy, which was the very first store to install this sophisticated barcode reading system and its popularity has soared ever since, obviously now common place in all types of stores worldwide.

The first product to have ever been added to the barcode system was a pack of Wrigley's chewing gum.

The invention of the bar code may not appear as complex, ground breaking, or as revolutionary as many other inventions,but few have been as understated, yet so effectively time-saving, efficient and manageable.