.::REALITYRECALL::.

The Archos 9 has been with us for about 5 days now and we’re due to send it back to Mobilx in a few days so we thought we better get an early review out to you all. This isn’t an in-depth review but it’s everything we’ve learnt from the live session and time we’ve had with it since unboxing.

For full specifications, check out the Archos 9 information page in our database.

Archos launched the Archos 9 to the U.S. market in September with a rather bold marketing statement.

In our opinion, that statement is somewhat overblown. The Archos 9 is neither the next generation of netbooks or even the next generation of mobile entertainment. What we’ve got here is lightweight PC tablet that really fails to push boundaries in mobility, entertainment or productivity.

Around the device.

Build quality is excellent along with the buttons and overall styling. We really like the look of the Archos 9. The matt touchscreen (resistive) is reasonably bright and sharp although it doesn’t ‘pop’ like other screens we’ve seen. The 800gm device is used in either two-hands (with the thumb on the optical mouse pointer to drive the Windows 7 Starter Edition user interface), with one hand (for brief periods of using the touchscreen) or on a table as a viewer or ‘netbook’ screen with external keyboard and mouse. The 8.9”, 1024×600 screen is actually pretty good when used on its stand for such a scenario.

Two good quality stereo speakers, a 1.3mp webcam, built-in mic, headphone port (no mic input) and single USB2.0 output complete the line-up of standard ports. There’s a docking connector on the bottom which is used for an optional break-out port (VGA, LAN, USB, Mic-in, Line out)

On the back of the device you’ll find an extendable flip-out stand which hasn’t been very well designed. Moving the device to the right when on the stand results in the stand collapsing. That’s not good for devices with hard drives! The pivot also looks to be a potential weak point too.

Inside the device.

Archos have built the ‘9’ around the single-threaded Atom 1.1Ghz Z510 which we’ve seen in a few other devices before. A 60GB HDD, 1GB of RAM and some hardware video decoding from the chipset are also included. With Windows  7 Starter we have to say ‘disappointing.’

Wifi b/g and Bluetooth are included but there’s no 3G module included.

Usability.

Driving Windows 7 with a touchscreen can be a fun experience. Almost all of the default UI is easily accessible and as Archos have framed the touchscreen with a very thin (height) frame, there’s no problem with accessing corners of the screen as we’ve seen on other devices.

Finger-nail touch is the easiest although there is a (thin and flimsy) stylus included in a slot of the rear.

If you’re holding the device in two hands though (as you most definitely will have to after a while – 800gms isn’t light enough for a long-term single handed experience)  your right thumb will fall to the optical mouse. It’s quick and accurate and we like it a lot. Call us lazy but taking one hand off a device to touch the screen while sofa-surfing is not ideal.

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2. ARCHOS to merge Android and Media Stack in voice-enabled MID This could be a great move for Andriod, TI and…
3. Laptopmag: Archos 5 Internet Tablet Review. 8/10 (to Laptopmag) Laptopmag have beaten me to a full review of the…

Anti-malware testing group AV-Comparatives.org not only gave Microsoft Security Essentials a top rating for malware removal, but now they’ve given it their best ranking in their performance test as well.

AV-Comparatives.org ran a series of real-world tests running through common scenarios like downloading, extracting, copying, and encoding files, installing and launching applications, and they also ran through an automated testing suite as well. Once the dust had settled, it became clear that not only is MSE one of only three products that both blocks and removes malware well, but it’s also very light on system resources.

Out of all the products tested, Microsoft Security Essentials was the best-performing free antivirus solution, and one of only two that received “very fast” on each of the real-world tests, earning it their top award: an “advanced+” ranking. We’ve been telling you for a while that you don’t need to pay for Windows security, and now with MSE ranked alongside the top paid apps in both malware removal and performance, you might want to consider making the switch.

Hit the AV-Comparatives link for the full report in PDF form, or check out the PC Mag story for the overview—if you can deal with some irritating in-text ads.

Alberta lost more people to other parts of Canada than it gained in the third quarter of 2009, a first in 15 years for the once booming province.

Sadly, stories about police discrimination and the Tasering of 10-year old girls are frighteningly commonplace these days. Officers in San Jose, CA have a particularly bad reputation, which is one reason why they are being outfitted with head-mounted cameras.

The kit includes a camera, a control piece and a computer that hangs from the belt. Every time an officer interacts with a civilian, they are required to activate the AXON camera. Afterward, the officer can switch the camera to a “buffer” mode that records limited video, or turn it off completely. At the end of a shift, the video will be downloaded to a central server.

A leading critic of the department welcomed the cameras as a tool to provide useful evidence, but dismissed their significance as a solution to rocky police-community relations.

“The AXON project is unfortunately a positive thing right now because the level of distrust is so high,” said Raj Jayadev, director of the community organization Silicon Valley De-Bug. “But it doesn’t address the more fundamental problem: What stereotypes police may carry when they see people of color on the street and make assumptions about character.

Since an officer can simply turn off the device at anytime, I don’t think AXON will put an end to police abuse. However, keeping a record of these interactions can do nothing but help the evidence gathering process. Trials financed by Taser are currently underway, but reports estimate that a full-fledged deployment in the San Jose area would cost upwards of $4 million in taxpayer money. [Mercury News via Crunchgear]

According to BGR, an inside source has tipped them off about a possible 7" Apple Tablet being announced in January. The source was not sure if they will be releasing a 10" tablet alongside the 7", but is 100% sure that they will announce the 7" tablet next month. BGR confirmed that this inside source has provided information to them in the past, and was accurate with the leaked information. Apple also alerted a select group of developers to get ready for next big wave of applications, asking developers to add full screen support to their applications. Currently developers only support the iPhone and iPod touch at a fixed 320×480 resolution.

Read full story…

Silicon Alley Insider has it from a “plugged-in source in the mobile industry” that Apple will demo their tablet in January, and have asked selected iPhone devs to prepare high-res apps for the occasion. So, what exactly is the occasion?

The first possibility—and the one that could put a welcome end to the endless fragments of tablet information that we've been parsing for the last few months (fuck that, years)—is that this is some kind of public demo. Apple’s iPod and iPhone events have been dominated by apps since the App Store opened, sometime to a fault. If Apple’s going to announce this thing, they’re going to have app support.

The second possibility—the more likely one—is that this will be a closed demo; that it's some kind of private event to give app developers a heads-up before a public announcement, and presumably to comfort them about app interoperability between the iPhone and the new tablet device. According to SIA's source:

[Apple has] told select developers that as long as they build their apps to support full screen resolution — rather than a fixed 320×480 — their apps should run just fine

Essentially, it sounds like they're asking app devs to write quick'n'dirty fixes to remove specific resolution limits from their apps, so that they can run—though not necessarily gracefully—on a larger screen. That's the kind of thing that could put developers' interoperability fears at rest, but not the kind of thing that Apple would want to show the public.

The source claims the device isn’t going on sale until later, which fits nicely with the WSJ’s claim of a March release date, which falls roughly in sync with announcement-but-no-product Apple events of the past. Also, the source claims that the entire Apple tablet concept is a sick prank by Steve Jobs, and that he literally hasn’t stopped laughing for, like, three whole years. [Silicon Alley Insider]

A flaw in two recently released versions of BlackBerry Messenger appears to be the cause of Tuesday night’s BlackBerry e-mail outage, Research in Motion said in a Wednesday morning statement.

“Root cause is currently under review, but based on preliminary analysis, it currently appears that the issue stemmed from a flaw in two recently released versions of BlackBerry Messenger (versions 5.0.0.55 and 5.0.0.56) that caused an unanticipated database issue within the BlackBerry infrastructure,” according to RIM. “RIM has taken corrective action to restore service.”

RIM released a new version of BlackBerry Messenger (version 5.0.0.57) and encouraged any user who upgraded their Messenger since Dec. 14 to download the lastest version.

“RIM continues to monitor its systems to maintain normal service levels and apologizes for any inconvenience to customers,” the company said.

Late last night, RIM confirmed that its BlackBerry service had suffered its second e-mail outage in five days. Users were unable to receive messages or chat via BlackBerry Messenger, though calling and texting functions were unaffected.

“A service interruption occurred Tuesday that affected BlackBerry customers in the Americas,” RIM said Wednesday. “Message delivery was delayed or intermittent during the service interruption.”

A similar problem occured on Thursday, when users were once again not able to receive e-mails on their devices.

Ah, Balloon Boy. It happened barely two months ago, yet it already seems ready to show up on an I Love the 00s nostalgia-fest. Anyway, Balloon Boy’s a-hole parents just got hit with a $42,000 bill for the stunt.

The tab covers the local, state and federal agencies that were called in to deal with the hoax, and seems kind of steep (do fire engines take some sort of special $10,000 per gallon gas or something?) but maybe there's a premium for captivating the nation with idiocy. However, the Heenes aren't about to pay the fine without a fight—their lawyer insists upon seeing precise documentation before paying a cent, which is reasonable. Let's hope this is the last we hear of poor, puking Balloon Boy until he writes his tell-all memoir in ten years. [Denver Post]

The Windows Live SkyDrive service is nice for storage and for sharing documents, but it can be annoying to always have a browser open to access it. Today we take a look at a free utility that lets you access your SkyDrive from Windows Explorer.

SkyDrive Explorer

After installing SkyDrive Explorer…go into My Computer and you’ll see the drive listed.

To access the drive you’ll need to sign into your Windows Live account.

Now you should see all of the folders and files you have created and stored in your SkyDrive.

You aren’t able to open files directly from SkyDrive Explorer, but you can copy, delete, and rename them. Before deleting an item, you’ll get a confirmation dialog box making sure you want to permanently delete it from the SkyDrive.

Creating a new folder in your SkyDrive.

Another handy feature is being able to copy the URL to a shared document on your SkyDrive so you can easily point other users to it.

It allows you to simply drag and drop documents from your computer into the SkyDrive…

And you can drag files from your SkyDrive to your desktop.

From the toolbar you can sign out of your SkyDrive.

It’s available in several different languages.

Conclusion

SkyDrive Explorer lets you easily access your SkyDrive as you would any other drive connected to your PC. Unfortunately Microsoft still  limits an individual file size of 50MB per upload. If you’re looking for something to store large media files, SkyDrive isn’t the best choice. For smaller files and documents, SkyDrive Explorer works great for storage, access, and collaborations. It will work on XP, Vista, 2003, 2008, and Windows 7. If you use your Windows Live SkyDrive to store and share documents, this handy Windows Explorer extension will make the process much easier.

Download SkyDrive Explorer

Would you like a way to view link URLs wherever you mouse is located in a webpage rather than using the Status Bar? Now you can do so very easily with the URL Tooltip extension for Firefox.

Before

Here is our browser before adding the extension. At the moment the only way to view the “link URL” is through the “Status Bar”…not very convenient if you like keeping the “Status Bar” hidden to conserve screen real-estate.

After

Adding the extension makes viewing “link URLs” a lot easier. Now your webpage viewing can flow much smoother without having to shift your view from the article to the “Status Bar” and then back to where you were reading again.

Note: The “Wrap long URLs” option is enabled in this screenshot.

Options

The options for the URL Tooltip extension are very simple. Choose the font sizes that you would like to use and it is recommended that you enable the “Wrap long URLS” option for best URL viewing.

Conclusion

If you have been looking for an easier way to view link URLs without using the Status Bar, then this is definitely a must-have extension.

Links

Download the URL Tooltip extension (Mozilla Add-ons)

Look, BlackBerrys are always supposed to do a few things well: 1) grab your email in real time off an Exchange server; 2) make you look important; and 3) work. It seems, though, that we’re working on our third major North American outage here in less than a month, with reports flowing in that users connected to BIS are having trouble with Messenger, web browsing, and apps that consume data (though email is inexplicably unaffected). Anyone out there seeing problems?

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

BlackBerry services down in North America yet again? originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 22 Dec 2009 16:35:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Previously mentioned web service Backupify backs up all your online accounts (Gmail, Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, and a ton more) to the cloud, normally for a nominal fee—but until January 31, 2010, all Backupify accounts will be free with unlimited storage. After this period, the service will go back to a paid pricing structure. Anyone who signs up for an account during this free period, however, will remain free—and unlimited—forever. So if you've been considering the service (or feel the need to backup your Gmail, Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, WordPress, or many other supported online accounts), now is the time to sign up. If you don't see your service listed, sign up anyway—they've announced that YouTube and Linkedin backups are coming soon, and they plan to continue to launch support for more services. It can't hurt—after all, it doesn't get much cheaper than free. [Backupify via ZDNet]

It’s getting closer and closer to check-writing time for Steve Ballmer, as the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has just upheld a decision that would see Microsoft Word and Office banned from sale starting January 11. If you’ll recall, Microsoft lost a patent infringement suit against XML specialists i4i back in May when it was found that Word’s handling of .xml, .docx, and .docm files infringed upon i4i’s patented XML handling algorithms, but the injunction against further Word sales was put on hold pending the results of this appeal. Now that Microsoft has lost once again, we’d expect either another appeal and request for the injunction to be stayed, this time to the Supreme Court, or for a settlement between these two that would end this whole mess right now. We’ll see what happens — stay tuned.

P.S.- Just to be clear on this, i4i isn’t a patent troll — it’s a 30 person database design company that shipped one of the first XML plugins for Office and was actually responsible for revamping the entire USPTO database around XML to make it compatible with Word back in 2000. What’s more, the patents involved here don’t cover XML itself, but rather the specific algorithms used to read and write custom XML — so OpenOffice users can breathe easy, as i4i has said the suite doesn’t infringe. Existing Office users should also be fine, as only future sales of Word are affected by the ruling, not any already-sold products.

Engadget: Helping you flame with accuracy.

Update: Microsoft says it’s moving quickly to prepare versions of Office 2007 and Word 2007 that don’t have the “little-used” XML features for sale by January 11, and that the Office 2010 beta “does not contain the technology covered by the injunction,” which can be read in a number of ways. It’s also considering an appeal, so we’ll see what happens next.

Microsoft loses patent appeal; Word and Office to be barred from sale starting January 11 originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 22 Dec 2009 13:35:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Sad news, space cowboys: According to NASA insiders, Ares 1 will be no more. Good news, space cowboys! According to the same sources, Señor Presidente Obama has decided that it’s worth to invest in space. The man got a plan:

Reporting on a White House and NASA meeting last Wednesday, sources say that the President has decided to give NASA an additional $1 billion in 2011. The extra funding will serve to create a new, simpler heavy lift rocket, as well as to increase the fleet of satellites controlling Earth’s land, oceans, and atmosphere.

The objective is to have the heavy rocket ready for a 2018 launch, while Europe, Japan, and Canada would develop a lunar lander and moon base modules with their own billions. While this may make some NASA fans sad—after the US single-handely arrived to the Moon—I'm convinced that the collaboration with other countries is the only way to move forward in manned space exploration.

I mean, the Klingons will be here any minute, people! Let’s get on with the program. And where the fuck is Kirk? [Science Magazine]

Firefox 3.5 has managed to overtake IE7 as the most popular single version web browser. According to StatsCounter, Firefox 3.5 has surpassed all other browsers, as a single version, in user choice. Internet Explorer still has the overall edge on all other browsers combined, with 55% of the mark share. Users are still slow on upgrading from Internet Explorer 6 & 7, showing a steady decline week over week. Users are however slowly upgrading to Internet Explorer 8, but during the upgrade period, Firefox 3.5 managed to surpass all other browsers, as a single version, in market share. Firefox 3.5 ended the week with 21.93% of the market share, just surpassing Internet Explorer 7 with 21.20%.

Read full story…

By switching from PHP to C++, Facebook could move from 30,000 servers down to just 7,500 servers, and trim 49,000 tons of carbon dioxide emissions from its footprint.

Ottawa Senators forward Mike Fisher and country music star Carrie Underwood are engaged.

😎