The Apple Store: doing things… differently

Thursday, August 18th, 2011

Confession time: last night I bought a MacBook Air.

I know many PC owners react to new Mac products with an ire usually reserved for a looter on benefits, but I’ve been without a laptop for nearly a year now, and this Sandy Bridge generation of Air has finally won me over.

The merits and otherwise of buying Apple kit are not the point of this blog though. This blog is about the Apple Store — or, more specifically, how utterly terrifying it is. (more…)

Budget Android tablets are a false economy

Monday, August 1st, 2011

Temptation must be a terrible thing when you’re the boss of a small technology company. Caught on the hop by Apple as it reinvents and reinvigorates a previously stagnant tablet market, the lure of the quick buck must be hard to resist.

I’m not sure any company can beat Apple’s marketing nous, build quality or lawyers, though, so any smaller firm wishing to make inroads has to approach the market from a different angle – by undercutting the fruit-themed firm and heading down the rutted and well-trodden value route.

That brings us to the bottom of today’s burgeoning tablet market. Far away from the Dell Streak, HP TouchPad and BlackBerry Playbook, you’ll find a multitude of familiar – and surprising – names trying to make ground with a constant stream of cheap, nasty and generic tablets.

It’s a counter-productive strategy that’s harmful for all involved, from company to consumer. (more…)

It takes more than a new processor to fix the Windows tablet

Thursday, July 7th, 2011

Intel’s “Oak Trail” Atom processor refresh has finally arrived, claiming to reduce heat and power consumption enough to power the next wave of tablets. On those promises it appears to deliver, with the Motion CL900 lasting almost eight hours on one charge – despite the bloat of Windows 7.

But if tablet manufacturers think this is the turning point for the Windows tablet – which, judging by the press releases arriving in my inbox, they do – they’re missing the mark by a mile. Yes, Oak Trail lowers the TDP to 3W to better suit handheld devices. But in doing so it takes a step backwards. (more…)

Superzoom cameras: take me to the bridge

Tuesday, June 21st, 2011

There’s an excellent Labs round-up of Superzoom cameras (also commonly called “bridge cameras”) in the latest issue of PC Pro. My only criticism is that it doesn’t makes a strong enough case for its subject.

Most people tend to think that there are only two types of digital camera to choose from: point-and-click compact cameras majoring in convenience, and high-end DSLRs majoring in picture quality. Anything in between is – almost by definition – seen as an uncomfortable compromise. However I think that the vast majority of users would actually be far better off with this intermediate format.

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Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 isn’t a rip-off: the UK price is

Thursday, May 12th, 2011

My review of the new Creative Suite 5.5 (CS5.5) has just been posted and there’s plenty to talk about in terms of new functionality and what this means in relation to the future of cross-platform design.

However, it’s not so much the extraordinary and mouth-watering creativity of CS5.5 that is likely to strike users as the extraordinary and eye-watering cost. (more…)

Why are rights lawyers still allowed to bully consumers?

Tuesday, May 10th, 2011

It seems the rights holder community, their parasitic lawyers,and the authorities haven’t learned their lessons when it comes to taking on illegal downloaders. Despite court rulings on both sides of the Atlantic that have declared scatter-gun lawsuits based on flimsy IP address evidence to be untenable, lawyers are being allowed to continue to pursue the money-spinning tactic.

In the US, a judge has given the US Copyright Group permission to start legal proceedings aimed at identifying an unprecedented 23,000 BitTorrent users alleged to have downloaded Sylvester Stallone’s The Expendables – a film deemed so poor that the Twittersphere believes watching it should be punishment enough for pirates.

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StartUp Britain – business advice or marketing machine?

Tuesday, March 29th, 2011

One week after the Government focused on big business with a 2% cut in the main rate of corporation tax (which doesn’t apply to small businesses) it’s seeking to make up for this by supporting StartUp Britain.org. This website, which features a picture of David Cameron levitating and a very red-faced Richard Branson, purports to “make it easier for new companies to flourish” and, perhaps, is the planned replacement for BusinessLink.

The essential difference with StartUp Britain is that it’s been developed and run by private companies rather than the Government. This gets around BusinessLink’s obsessive focus on regulation rather than the development of business. However, the Government’s much vaunted idea – that private individuals and companies will philanthropically fill the gap left by their withdrawal from public services – is immediately exposed as pie in the sky by StartUp Britain.

The site is little more than a series of links to other sites (how original) along with “up to £1,500 of great offers”. Sadly what these offers amount to is a set of promotional vouchers, many offered by the founders of StartUp Britain. For example, Glasses Direct (whose founder Jamie Murray Wells is one of the backers of StartUp Britain) offers a £15 discount voucher.

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Named and shamed: the “unlimited” liars

Friday, March 25th, 2011

For years, fixed and mobile broadband providers have used the term “unlimited” to advertise services that are anything but.

We’ve moaned about it for years, and last month even our normally docile telecoms regulator said the term “unlimited” was being abused.  “There are people offering unlimited packages that contain a fair-use policy that means what you are getting is not unlimited,” said Ofcom chief executive Ed Richards. “If you are claiming unlimited then it needs to be unlimited.”

It seems the industry wasn’t listening. New data tariffs are still being advertised as “unlimited” even when they have specific download caps.

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has been conducting a review of broadband advertising, but frankly, we’re tired of waiting for this weak-kneed, self-regulating body to get its act together.

So, from now on, whenever we see a new tariff being advertised as “unlimited” when it patently isn’t, we’re going to add it to our blog of shame.

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The iPad 2: looks nice, plays ugly

Wednesday, March 9th, 2011

The dust has begun to settle on the announcement of the new iPad 2 and first reaction has generally been positive. Not everyone’s persuaded, however. Darien Graham-Smith’s objection – The iPad 2: yes, but still, what’s it for? – is that it’s still just a cross between a glorified smartphone and cut-down netbook, so what’s the fuss?

Darien’s right: tablets are just another form of existing computers, but I think that they are as revolutionary as Apple claims. In particular I think they will come to provide our main platform for consuming web-based content. Key to this is the tablet’s new, book-like, handheld form factor which allows computers to become truly personal and enables their users to move on from merely browsing content to actively and immersively engaging with it (the activity previously known as “reading”).

Apple, as well as pioneering the tablet format, currently produces the best implementation of it and the iPad 2 will raise the bar even higher. Moreover, by providing a superior system for the same price, end users will clearly be getting more for their money.

However, I won’t be buying an iPad for the foreseeable future. And I don’t think that you should either…

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A letter on behalf of the world’s PC fixers

Tuesday, March 8th, 2011

I was going to contribute to Stewart Mitchell’s request for horror stories about computer repair people; then I was completely diverted by a panic phone call from an old friend, which helped me to realise that I was far more of a repairer than a customer of repairers.

That 72 hours of raw-edged panic was quite enough for me to focus on the sins of those who come and ask for help, which can be every bit as difficult as the sins of the fixers. So pardon me while I abuse the Pro blogs to let my friend know how I felt about her approach to the whole sorry matter.

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