Should regulators step in to “green” mobile phone industry

Thursday, October 16th, 2008

As PC Pro’s resident “Eco Warrior” – a term that’s used with more than a hint of sarcasm by the rest of the team – I was chosen to attend the recent Green IT conference in London.

All the speakers gave food for thought, but one stood out in particular; James Page has over a decade’s wireless engineering experience at Nokia, and is an active member of the Green Party, too. He was also speaking independently, so was probably free to be a little more forthcoming than those there under a corporate banner. (more…)

Baylis revolutionises wind-up media player

Monday, October 6th, 2008

On the right is Baylis’ original wind-up Eco Media Player, which we’ve reviewed before here on Pro. On the left is its replacement, the Eco Media Revolution, which we haven’t.

You may notice that they’re the same size, which is a bit of a disappointment; a self-proclaiming revolutionary update could do with taking up a bit less pocket space, I think. Nevertheless, it’s still perfectly portable – just not as much as my non wind-up MP3 player is.

The wind-up handle is also exactly the same, and we got a similar charge from using it: crank like crazy for five minutes and you will get the majority of the way through a short album, while you rest your aching hand.

The software, though, looks like it’s come on a long way, which is a relief, although it’s still infuriatingly complicated to use and in need of yet another dollop of refinement. Keep your eyes peeled for a full review coming soon…

From a wind-powered 386 to solar-powered ThinkPad

Friday, June 20th, 2008

In the current issue of PC Pro, which has just hit the newsstands, I’ve written a feature in which I document my attempt to leave the National Grid for a week and run my mobile phone, MP3 player and notebook on solar and wind power. If you want to know how I got on then you’ll have to go and buy an issue, but I’ve already received an email from one reader to let me know that he’s been investigating exactly this sort of thing for 16 years already. (more…)

Just in: a monster PC from Mesh

Monday, June 16th, 2008

It’s fair to say that we were quite impressed by the Chillblast Fusion Juggernaut. A powerful 9800 GX2 graphics card, Core 2 Quad Q9450 processor and 24in Samsung screen certainly made an impression in the Labs – and it made everyone who saw it quite jealous. We all wanted one.

Except that I now have a feeling that the Juggernaut’s crown as top monster PC may be under threat. We’ve just taken delivery of the Mesh Ultimate XT9450 GTO and, well – to paraphrase the slogan of a particularly nasty meat snack – it’s a bit of an animal. As you can see, it’s housed inside a monolithic Cooler Master Cosmos, which is certainly a good start.

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