WINDOWS 7

Today is an important day for Microsoft. Windows 7 will be officially launched today.

Will this be the WinXP equivalent to save the face of the WinME equivalent? Well, I always see WinVista as a total failure, a sort of good comparison of WinME. I know it is pretty stable but still most of the people who uses lotsa computer all their lives are avoiding it. I am still pretty much a WinXP user up to today. I swear I have not spent more than 10 hours on a WinVista since its birth.

The question now is should I upgrade directly? My new computer will arrive anytime now. They will provide the registration number for Win7 which I need to register on-line with Microsoft. The Win 7 will be valid till January 2010. I have until then as my last resort to upgrade from now. One of the biggest issues is about the various software support I need. I hope they all can run on Windows 7.

One of the coolest things about the new Windows is its capability to support touch screens. Dell is probably the first ever Windows computer maker who is selling such monitors now. I am unsure about the rest.

Windows Touch

One important feature which XP users like me must use is the Windows XP Mode. I am having the Win Vista Ultimate for my new computer, which allows me to upgrade to Win7 Ultimate. I heard it is better than the normal virtual machine because you are directly running it in Win7. This is probably a good way of luring WinXP users to jump into Win7. Still, let's be very sceptical until we test all the programs vigorously. I will not be praising anything until it is proven stable and good, especially Microsoft products.

Win7 editions

Windows XP Mode

Will Win7 flourish? Will it be a success to win over WinXP users like me? Well, we'll find out soon!

ANDROID VS. IPHONE VS. SYMBIAN VS. WINDOWS MOBILE

The battle of the current generation of mobile devices have gone to the battle of the operating systems. We have the Google Android against the Apple iPhone against the Nokia Symbian against the Microsoft Windows Mobile for the domination of the next generation of the mobile industry. I have to upgrade to a new phone in August 2009 and I am watching closely all these battles to select my choice. The open source Android has been one of the most interesting things to happen to the mobile industry currently. As part of my current research work deals with 3D graphics on mobile devices, we do have the opportunity to test some of these mobile monsters coming into the market. A colleague of mine has the Google phone and its Street View response is very encouraging!

My three requirements are simple, I need a decent digital camera on the phone so I don't have to rely entirely on my compact digicam all the time. I would say 5 megapixels is good enough. I also need the GPS so I can easily navigate without depending on the GPS device attached to my car all the time. This is especially when I go to places where I do not drive. It will also come in handy when I travel overseas. Finally, it must not be too wide or too thick so I can easily put the device into my pocket.

As for now, Windows Mobile is definitely a no for me as we know how unreliable it is. I can honestly shared with you all that sometimes I wanted to go and crush the Windows Mobile phones of my friends. This is because messages can sometime take over a day to reach, calls can be very difficult to be connected and sometimes the whole system just hang there making them impossible to reach for hours. Research In Motion's BlackBerry is more for business people and they are normally very huge or wide, not to mention the small keys. The current devices that are getting a lot of attention are Apple iPhone 3G S, HTC Magic, Samsung I7500, Palm Pre and Nokia N97. Some of them are too wide and some only have 3 megapixels cameras. We'll see close to August 2009 what other options are available. It looks like Nokia N97 is a tempting phone to invest in. I need to find out how good are Nokia Maps and Google Maps performing in mobile devices.