Dell bumps Apple to ship world’s most expensive RAM

Thursday, July 22nd, 2010

Dell has knocked Apple off one pedestal this week. Last year, we highlighted how an upgrade from 4GB RAM to 8GB RAM on the 17in MacBook Pro would cost a whopping £839 — over £200 a gigabyte.

Dell’s Mobile Precision M6500 manages to top that.

(more…)

How will IT departments cope with virtualisation fever?

Thursday, July 22nd, 2010

This week, the Channel Pro team has been chatting about different industry trends, and in particular, the virtualisation ‘love-in’ that we’ve seen happening for a while now. Better utilisation of resources, lower power consumption, ease of management – the list of things virtualisation can do seems endless. Too good to be true? Well maybe it is, a little.

Those who remember back to the switch from mainframe to client server will recognise another paradigm shift, but there are some drawbacks. Much more technically adept colleagues tell me virtual machines are easy to set up and deploy but gauging performance is much trickier. And even though assets are now sweated harder, performance is degraded as resources are no longer dedicated.

(more…)

Xara: 15 years of next-generation graphics

Wednesday, July 21st, 2010

One of the first reviews I wrote for PC Pro back in 1995 was a review of the “new generation of graphics software”, Xara Studio. I recently wrote another Xara review this time of its latest incarnation, Xara Photo and Graphic Designer 6, and it reminded me just what it was that made Xara stand out.

(more…)

Android App of the Week: Proxoid

Wednesday, July 21st, 2010

Android may have its problems, as committed iPhone owner David Bayon highlighted earlier this week, but Google’s open-source OS excels in technical areas that Apple’s handset just can’t reach.

Take our latest Android App of the Week: while Proxoid wouldn’t fly on the iPhone – it’s evidently not allowed into Apple’s walled garden – this impressive tool is freely available in the Android marketplace.

While it replicates the functionality of a tethering app nicely, it works slightly differently: while the former set up your phone as a wireless hotspot of sorts, apps like Proxoid turn your phone into a modem without the need for root access

As an added bonus, Proxoid is free – the best of its tethering app competition, PdaNet, costs a whopping $19 – and could be greatly appreciated by regular travellers: after all, why use a 3G dongle when you could just plug your phone in, especially if you’ve got an unlimited monthly data package?

Unfortunately, getting started is quite tricky. This page explains how to install Proxoid but, in a nutshell, you’ll need to take a few steps that’ll be more familiar to app developers: enable USB debugging on your handset, download the Android SDK, and download and install Proxoid’s own driver.

Once that’s done, you need to configure your browser to use a proxy server and then run a batch file that was downloaded with the driver as well as the Proxoid app on your phone.

It’s not easy, at least initially, but the benefit far outweighs a little bit of legwork. After all, harnessing your internet connection for use on your laptop is a godsend, especially during long journeys, and it’s far cheaper than splashing out on a 3G dongle. As an added bonus, it’s free, but it’s worth checking the terms and conditions of your phone contract before you take the plunge – some networks take a dim view towards tethering and proxy services such as this.

Do you have a suggestion for Android App of the Week? Nominate your favourite using the comments form below.

Click here to read our 36 best Android apps feature

So far, so good with the switch to ADSL

Wednesday, July 21st, 2010

Back in January I wrote about my impending flat purchase, and the concern I had over being forced to move from cable to ADSL broadband. Well, by now I’ve been in the flat a few months, I have my broadband up and running, and I’m pleased to say it’s been plain sailing so far.

Thanks to all the readers who commented both with suggestions and with their own experiences – good and bad. After much consideration and a good look through the deals offered in my area, I opted for Be’s Unlimited package. It’s not cheap at £17.88 per month, but I was won over by the promise of a support team that actually knows about broadband and the lure of a static IP address, no download cap and 1.3Mb/s uploads.

It activated right on cue, and I even got to try out the support first hand. I have to confess to attempting the setup process with my own 802.11n router at 12:45am on a Thursday (don’t ask), and had a few issues with the settings for my static IP. Despite the ungodly time and my suspiciously slurred speech, a knowledgeable Dutch chap was all too happy to walk me through the process and we had it up and running within minutes. He was even chatty and cheerful, which is not something I’m familiar with when it comes to ISP staff.

Several readers suggested looking at SamKnows and ThinkBroadband, so before I made my choice I had a rough idea I’d be getting around 5Mb/s speeds at 800m from my local exchange. I ran some checks over the weekend and my actual peak-time speed seems fairly stable at between 5Mb/s and 5.8Mb/s. It’s not exactly Virgin cable broadband speeds but it’s plenty for my needs, and it’s good to see the estimates proved on the money.

So it’s first blood to Be, and a positive experience for me with ADSL so far. The next hurdle will come when BT’s Infinity fibre lines make their way to my area – pencilled in for late this year - ready for ISPs to take advantage. Has this reached your area yet? If so, has it met expectations? Let me know in the comments below.

Meet the magical irePhone 4

Tuesday, July 20th, 2010

I’ve invented a new smartphone. It’s called the irePhone 4 and it has a ten-hour standby time, which it wiles away by murdering kittens and sending lewd pictures to nuns. Very occasionally it will explode. Despite this, I’m confidently predicting that sales of the irePhone will be stratospheric, because I’m pretty certain the internet will have exhausted itself of apocalyptic hysteria by the time it launches.

I’m sad to say I missed Act One of the iPhone 4 show, though I believe there was clapping. Just in case anybody missed the hijinks, it turns out that once the clapping subsided people discovered their iPhone 4 drops calls, which is a bit like dropping grenades except nobody gets hurt, it doesn’t matter all that much, and we only care because Apple makes people sooooo mad.

(more…)

Windows vs Ubuntu: in a nutshell

Monday, July 19th, 2010

You may recall how Dell dug itself into an almighty hole last month, after proclaiming that Ubuntu was safer than Windows, before swiftly changing its mind and declaring itself more neutral than Switzerland.

Well, now the PC maker’s had time to think the matter through, another page has appeared on the Dell website, condensing the whole Windows vs Ubuntu debate into about 100 words.

From Dell’s perspective the choice is clear. You should choose Windows if (and I swear I’m not paraphrasing here):

(more…)

The phone with the real flaw? It’s not the iPhone 4, it’s your Android

Monday, July 19th, 2010

So Apple has made its defence. Whether right or wrong, wise or foolish, the media circus rolls on. This blog isn’t going to cover that. Instead, this blog will discuss the most consistent comment we get when we talk about the iPhone 4:

“Why don’t you buy an HTC Desire/Dell Streak/other-as-yet-unreleased Android handset? You can hold that any way you like!” [presumably accompanied by self-congratulatory smirk.]

In response to this, there’s one very simple reason why I won’t, at this point in time, be buying an Android handset, and it’s one that I consider to be more damning than a rare, entirely avoidable signal drop.

The story begins late last year, when PC Pro’s own Mike Jennings bought an HTC Hero. It ran Android 1.5. HTC decided to skip 1.6.

(more…)

15 ways to keep up with PC Pro

Monday, July 19th, 2010

The PC Pro website isn’t the only way you can keep up to date with the latest news, reviews, features and opinion from the tech world. Here are some of the many ways you can keep in touch:

(more…)

iPhone App of the Week: Firefox Home

Friday, July 16th, 2010

A few of us in the PC Pro office, myself included, have replaced Firefox with Google Chrome as our default browser. Firefox Home is an innovative reason to consider going back.

Mozilla claims Apple’s App Store guidelines prevent it from bringing a full version of Firefox to the iPhone, but Firefox Home is the next best thing.

It sucks up all the Firefox bookmarks and web history stored on your desktop computer and makes them accessible from the phone’s default browser. Better still, it knows what tabs you have open on your desktop browser and makes them available on the iPhone, meaning you can continue browsing where you left off if you suddenly have to rush out of the office, for example.

The iPhone app also includes a search facility, so you can tap in the name of that site you visited last week without having to remember its URL.

(more…)