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Netbook gravy train starts to slow as euphoria fades Netbook shipments have started cooling after witnessing an explosive surge since late last year as customers started realizing its limits and looking for portable and affordable alternatives for full-size laptops. According to Xia Li, vice-president of Lenovo Group, growth in netbook sales during the second half of this year has slowed as consumers have started becoming more rational in their purchases. "Netbook sales surged in the past as consumers bought the product as gifts or as first laptops," he said. But with consumers starting to realize the limits of the products,...

Remember Compaq? Hewlett-Packard acquired the venerable computer company way back in 2002, but it's kept the name alive as a secondary brand ever since, mainly relegating Compaq to overseas markets (Compaq is particularly popular in Asia) and as second-tier PCs sold on the cheap at warehouse-style stores. But now HP is looking to breathe a little new life into the Compaq brand, positioning it not just as a label for extremely cheap computer equipment but also as one with mainstream appeal in the U.S. Today the company is announcing the rollout of a line of ultra-inexpensive PCs, both laptops and...

Ultra-low prices on portable computers are nothing new, and in fact have increasingly become the norm since the debut of netbooks — small and light ultraportables that are virtually defined by their low cost. However, there are some strong reasons to believe that Microsoft’s upcoming Windows 7 operating system, in addition to new types of Linux-based portables, could help drive profit margins for hardware manufacturers to surprising new bottoms. But is it good for the tech industry for laptops and netbooks alike to sell for fire-sale prices? And can hardware providers build healthy businesses around a new, premium-priced operating system?...

SNIPPET: "Aleem N. is then accused of then having transported the equipment and money to al-Qaida contacts in the Afghanistan-Pakistan border region. Sermet I. visited Aleem N. many times at his apartment in the town of Germersheim in western Germany, prosecutors said. The German of Pakistani heritage, who has been identified by his family as Aleem Nasir, went on trial in December in Koblenz, also charged with membership in Al Qaeda. A verdict is expected next Monday. In another linked case, prosecutors in March charged 31-year-old Omer O. with membership in Al Qaeda on allegations he was collecting money and...

Bought an aftermarket replacement battery from Ebay for $40 which is much more reasonable than the $130 Compaq charges. In any event I want to be able to maximize battery lifespan but also be able to use the battery to it's limits so as to near it's end of life so I can get a replacement if/when it fails to within a year. With the original laptop battery I tried to maximize the time the laptop was running off the battery to try this theory. I'd basically start from 100% full and then run it down to 8-10% and then...

Need some techie help pls . fellow Freepers. I have an XP Media HP laptop 2006 1.6 GB 2006. The laptop keeps attempting to boot up, the power is on but it wont just go to the XP /os start up,,,(the past 20 minutes now) the solution pls especially how to access the laptop drive because it looks like I will have to reboot this laptop completely with the recovery disks BUT I dont want to unless neccessary. And there's some info that I need to get to especially the hard drive. Expert and intermediate suggestions and solutions pls..

My daughter wants an Apple laptop for college in late August. Is there any reason to wait to buy one? Is anything new due out from Apple? Any suggestions on what to buy?

Note: The following text is a quote: Ali Al-Marri Pleads Guilty to Conspiracy to Provide Material Support to Al-Qaeda Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri, 43, a dual national of Saudi Arabia and Qatar, has pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to provide material support to al-Qaeda. Al-Marri entered his guilty plea at a hearing this afternoon before Judge Michael M. Mihm in U.S. District Court for the Central District of Illinois. In so doing, al-Marri admitted that he agreed with others to provide material support or resources to al-Qaeda in the form of personnel, including himself, to work under al-Qaeda’s...

At one point in the first half of last night's loss to West Virginia, Notre Dame trailed 11-2, with one made field goal and one broken laptop. An errant pass from Zach Hillesland sailed into press row and made a direct strike into the back of a New York Times Web producer's Dell laptop. We'll let him remain anonymous, but he gave us the permission to run the photo below. As you can see, his screen was fried:

The family is tieing up the main PC in the house so I want to get a laptop with limited usage: wireless access to network, Outlook (express) and Word, Excel, PPT. A dvd RW drive would be ok too. Primarily, it's main use is for email. Can anyone recommend a manufacture for this? Been looking at Dell's but they are OVER loaded for my needs. I shouldn't need to spend $ 1k for something like this!

Reporter Shahn Mufti was able to purchase a US military laptop that contained restricted U.S. military information, as well as software for military platforms, the identities of numerous military personnel and information about weaknesses and flaws in American military vehicles being employed in the war in Afghanistan.

I am soon to pull the trigger on getting a laptop. Which one, I do not know. But one thing that is slowing me down and is of great concern to me is transfering the bazillions of songs I have in my iTunes software to the new computer so I can use my iPod with that instead of the old desktop. What is a quick, simple, and easy method of doing this for someone that knows jack squat about computers?

The 'world's cheapest laptop', developed in India, was unveiled by Union Minister for Human Resources Development Arjun Singh at the Tirupati temple on Tuesday evening. The laptop, jointly developed by several organisations, such as the University Grants Commission, the Indian Institute of Technology-Madras, and the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, will be priced at around $10 to $20 (about Rs 500 to Rs 1,000), officials said. S K Sinha, joint secretary in the ministry for education, giving a demonstration of the device which is smaller than the normal laptop, said that it will need some more fine-tuning. He said the...

India is poised to unveil the ultimate in credit-crunch computing: a 500 rupee (£7) laptop. A government-developed prototype, due to be shown for the first time tomorrow, will mark the most ambitious attempt yet to bring computers to the developing world and to bridge the "digital divide" between rich and poor. It is also the latest example of ultra-cheap engineering to emerge from the sub-continent. India has already given the world a 100,000 rupee (£1,420) car, the Tata Nano, and a super-basic £10 phone — goods that are now expected to find favour among relatively affluent Westerners as the global...

I jsut yesterday purchased a Dell Studio 17 (S1737) laptop computer with Windows Vista(x64)Home Premium factory installed. Upon starting it for the first time, I went through the usual info entry bits and pieces, and Windows Update wanted to install a bunch of updates... It went through the process quite normally; however, upon restart, Windows BSOD'ed me and the system went through an extensive attempt to do a startup repair... I had to restore Dell factory settings and such and it will now still not allow the updates to work without the BSOD reappearing and having to do the whole...

The message that popped into Laurie Gale's Facebook inbox last month seemed harmless enough -- a friend had seen a video of Ms. Gale and had sent a link so Ms. Gale could view it. The link led to a video site that prompted her to update her video software, which she did. "Within seconds, everything started shutting itself down," says Ms. Gale, a 37-year-old lamp-works artist from Versailles, Ky. Ms. Gale's new Dell Inspiron laptop had been infected with malicious software, or malware, that has spread through social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace. "I cried for an hour,"...

PINEVILLE, Mo. | A southwest Missouri police officer is facing felony theft charges after a laptop computer he dropped off at a sheriff's office to get software installed was identified as the same one he was accused of stealing more than a year earlier. [...snip...] The woman told police she saw Cummings take her computer and put it in the back of his patrol car. But when she asked for the computer to be returned after she was released, Cummings denied having it and the woman did not get it back, records say. She reported it stolen to the Pineville...

Mohamed Shommo, an engineer for Cisco Systems Inc., travels overseas several times a year for work, so he is accustomed to opening his bags for border inspections upon returning to the U.S. But in recent years, these inspections have gone much deeper than his luggage. Border agents have scrutinized family pictures on Shommo's digital camera, examined Koranic verses and other audio files on his iPod and even looked up Google keyword searches he had typed into his company laptop. "They literally searched everywhere and every device they could," said Shommo, who now minimizes what he takes on international trips and...

A year or so ago, a laptop was obtained from a dead FARC terrorist in Ecuador. On the laptop they found some e-mails that referred to 2 "gringo's" that were associated with Barack Obama. The main thrust from the news report was that Chavez was working with FARC to get some uranium for a dirty bomb. The minor thing that was overlooked was Chavez wanted Obama to vote against the free trade agreement with Columbia to hurt Uribe. He did that and continues to support the Chavez position. Now we hear the trade agreement may have come up in the...

Inexpensive laptop computer called Eee ( Manufactured by ASUS?) $299 looked pretty cool. Saw it in target today. Does any body have any experience with it?

I have a 5-6 year old A45 Toshiba Satellite. I recently replaced the main fan to get it running again.(and added memory while it was apart) It worked for a month and now it's acting like it's overheating again. This time it give me a quick blue screen with something on it I can't read (because it disappears too fast) and starts automatically rebooting. It will keep doing this until I power it off. any suggestions? (yes, I know I should get a newer computer,but can't afford it now) I'd at least like to figure out how to keep it...

A passenger's laptop computer is being considered as a possible cause of the Qantas incident off Western Australia on Tuesday. The Airbus A330-300 was flying from Singapore to Perth when it suddenly plunged thousands of feet, leaving more than 50 people injured. The plane was forced to make an emergency landing at an air force base near Exmouth in WA. A computer malfunction involving the auto-pilot system is being blamed for the incident. 'There certainly was a period of time where the aircraft performed on its own accord as it pitched over nose forward,' said Julian Walsh from the Transport...

Republican campaigners in Missouri are beefing up security after a laptop containing "strategic information" was stolen from a campaign field office of presidential contender John McCain. The theft occurred at a campaign office in Independence, Missouri, sometime between 10 p.m. Tuesday and 6 a.m. Wednesday, according to Tina Hervey, a spokeswoman with the Missouri Republican Party. When staffers showed up for work Wednesday, they found that someone had thrown a brick through the glass windows fronting the office, rifled through a bag and stolen a Dell laptop belonging to a regional campaigner.

WASHINGTON - The ATF lost 76 weapons and hundreds of laptops over five years, the Justice Department reported Wednesday, blaming carelessness and sloppy record-keeping. ... "It is especially troubling that that ATF's rate of loss for weapons was nearly double that of the FBI and DEA, and that ATF did not even know whether most of its lost, stolen, or missing laptop computers contained sensitive or classified information," he added. ... Compared to weapons loss rates for the FBI and Drug Enforcement Administration, the ATF misplaced almost twice as many guns. ... The Justice Department's report can be found at:...

A computer virus is alive and well on the International Space Station (ISS). Nasa has confirmed that laptops carried to the ISS in July were infected with a virus known as Gammima.AG. The worm was first detected on Earth in August 2007 and lurks on infected machines waiting to steal login names for popular online games. Nasa said it was not the first time computer viruses had travelled into space and it was investigating how the machines were infected. [snip] The laptops carried by astronauts reportedly do not have any anti-virus software on them to prevent infection.

Federal agents may take a traveler's laptop or other electronic device to an off-site location for an unspecified period of time without any suspicion of wrongdoing, as part of border search policies the Department of Homeland Security recently disclosed. Also, officials may share copies of the laptop's contents with other agencies and private entities for language translation, data decryption or other reasons...

Bought the Acer Aspire 6920. Thank you for giving me the guts. This is computer number four that I have bought with Freeper input and my first laptop. I will be installing dragon next week. I will be able to work without pain. Literally. Thank you.

After a frustrating few months of searching for a solution to the audio problems he encountered while ripping on-screen video with his Dell laptop, a ripten editor discovered that others were experiencing the same issue—and that the problem was not confined to Dell laptops. Apparently, the lack of a sound card Stereo Mix recording option is to blame—and numerous forum threads have suggested that the RIAA has put pressure on laptop manufacturers like Dell, Gateway and Pac Bell to remove it.After posting this information on ripten, a Dell representative chimed in to say that the lack of a sound card...

AMD today announced the ATI Mobility Radeon™ HD 3800, tripling top-of-the line graphics performance in comparison to the previous generation ATI Mobility Radeon™ GPUs1. Joining the previously announced ATI Mobility Radeon™ 3000 family, the new ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3800 series offers notebook manufacturers the ability to deliver fast graphics performance, energy-efficient 55nm graphics processor technology, amazing video playback, and, for the first time ever, ATI CrossFireX™ technology for a mobile graphics solution. ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3800 series coupled with the AMD Turion™ X2 Ultra Processors, the AMD 7-Series Chipset, and industry-leading wireless technologies like 802.11n Draft 2.0 form...

Some advice from the FBI: You're at the airport waiting for your flight. With time to kill, you're thinking of connecting your laptop to the airport's Wi-Fi to check your office e-mail, do some personal banking, or shop for a gift for your spouse. But first, consider this: Odds are there's a hacker nearby, with his own laptop, attempting to "eavesdrop" on your computer to obtain personal data that will provide access to your money or even to your company's sensitive information. Here's something else to consider: There are 68,000 Wi-Fi "hot spots" in the U.S., at airports, coffee shops,...

A tech-savvy White Plains woman whose apartment was burglarized solved the crime herself after she was able to log on to her stolen laptop, photograph one of the suspects with it and get photos of another, police said. Edmon Shahikian, 23, of 13 Cobbling Rock Road, Katonah, and Ian Frias, 20, of 1609 E. 174th St., the Bronx, were picked up at their homes Wednesday night after the victim turned the pictures over to police. The police said they recovered most of the $5,000 worth of electronics stolen in the burglary. On Tuesday, police said, one of the victims, who...

The screen on my laptop has died again; 3 times in two years. I need a portable computer but do not need the instant convenience of a laptop. Do these smaller computers (cubes) provide an alternative, especially if I'm willing to take a keyboard and screen into the various hotel rooms? I'm not a gamer. I have word publishing and some photo shop applications. 60 Gig of HD and 1Mg or Ram minimums to accomodate MS Office 2007 and Adobe PS. Any suggestions from the freeper community?

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) - A single laptop can reveal much, and so it is with the digital treasure chest that Colombian commandos found in the jungle quarters of slain rebel leader Raul Reyes. Files in the computer seized in Saturday's raid into Ecuador that claimed the lives of Reyes and 23 of his comrades offer an intimate portrait of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's desire to undermine Colombia's U.S.-allied government. If authentic, the documents show that sympathies Chavez first aired publicly in January grew out of a relationship that dates back more than a decade. But Chavez is not one of...

It emerged last night that a laptop containing close to 175,000 patient records belonging to the Irish Blood Transfusion Service was stolen in New York. The news comes within weeks of Labour TD Ruairi Quinn warning that data protection in Irish government departments needed better controls. He revealed nearly 100 notebook and desktop PCs have been lost or stolen from Irish government departments over the past five years, along with 14 BlackBerry smartphones and 11 portable media devices. In recent weeks, Pat Moran of Ernst & Young’s Risk Advisory Services practice told Siliconrepublic.com that the prevalence of laptop theft was...

I am looking at purchasing a laptop in the next few days. My top price is 2K (possibly more depending features). Few things I am looking for:64 bit, dual core2-3GB Mem160GB+ HDD17 inch screenCD/DVD R (write would be cool).Not too worried about weight or how "thin" it is.I intend to run Redhat Enterprise WS 5 Looking to see what your experiences have been in laptop land.

Just got my first laptop a few days ago. Today somebody told me that always keeping the laptop plugged in will drain the battery. Is this true?

At CES, Everex is launching a $399 ultramobile that will be sold through Walmart.com starting January 25. The low-cost Everex CloudBook uses the open source gOS V2 Rocket operating system and VIA 1.2GHz C7-M ULV processor, same as the $199 Everex gPC. The Cloudbook is designed for Internet usage, not for heavy duty graphics applications. Like the gPC, it will come with software or links to FireFox, gMail, Meebo, Skype, Google Documents & Spreadsheets, Google Calendar, Google News, Google Maps, Wikipedia, Google Product Search, GIMP, Blogger, YouTube, Xine Movie Player, RhythmBox, Faqly, Facebook and OpenOffice.org 2.3. The unit weighs 2...

A couple of years ago, Michael T. Arnold landed at the Los Angeles International Airport after a 20-hour flight from the Philippines. He had his laptop with him, and a customs officer took a look at what was on his hard drive. Clicking on folders called “Kodak pictures” and “Kodak memories,” the officer found child pornography. The search was not unusual: the government contends that it is perfectly free to inspect every laptop that enters the country, whether or not there is anything suspicious about the computer or its owner. Rummaging through a computer’s hard drive, the government says, is...

JOSH SHENKLE knew that he couldn’t hook up any old PC to the 106-inch Panasonic projection television in his home theater. Most computers come with buzzing fans, whirring disk drives and whining capacitors that compete with the sound system. “After a while, the noise gets to you during quiet scenes,” he said. “It overwhelms you and takes you away from the movie.” Computer users who want silent offices and living rooms are starting to ask for quiet computers. Manufacturers are taking notice. Some new computers like the Apple iMac or the Alienware Area-51 7500 are marketed for their silence. A...

Okay, I have a vaiio laptop that I love dearly. But let's backup a bit and explain how this almost impossible occurence.... (I screwed up, ok!!) We were going away on vacation and decided to 'safe' the laptop, as it was not needed, and lurking in the back of mind was my ever present near paranoia 'did we remember to turn the stove off, honey??' and memories of internet pictures of laptop fires caused from faulty batteries ; No, we're gonna unplug this thing - and remove the battery. That is safe enough, right? Remember when I said I was...

Sorry for the vanity post but I'm having a possible computer problem and I need some Freeper input! I inherited a laptop from my brother. Earlier tonight, I went to a coffeeshop where they have Wi-Fi access. I clicked on the Internet Explorer icon on the desktop but it wouldn't connect to the 'Net. Am I missing something here? If a business has a working Wi-Fi, I should be able to connect to the Internet by clicking on the Internet Explorer icon...right? Thank you!

Hi: I hope there are freepers out there who are more computer savvy than I am. I am not a fan of wireless (phone or computer). I try to minimize usage as much as possible. I have a laptop (given to me from work) which has wireless capability. When I don't need to be online, I disable the wireless device by clicking on the icon. Does this mean that when this is done, there are no microwaves emitting and receiving from the device? Thanks in advance for your help.

CAMBRIDGE -- With its cute bunny ears, its whimsical pull-string charger, and its big plastic handle, the lime-green XO laptop doesn't look like a technology that will change education and computing worldwide.One Laptop Per Child unveiled its "$100 laptop."

Pardon the vanity, but the laptop I am working on right now has an LCD Screen that keeps getting horizontal lines across it and three or four times tonight has had the entire bottom half of the screen go white on me. This laptop is a D**l, and contrary to how "America voted" my experience with their customer service has not been very good. So, considering a new LCD screen for the laptop will be very expensive, I figured why not go for a new laptop? I like to listen to music, do some graphics work and web work, do...

Well, my experiences of both types of laptop this week has left me reeling. Where do I start? Let’s start with the Mac, a MacBook with OSX preloaded. The MacBook was a joy to look at, very well finished with a glossy white sheen that looked and felt good in the hand. And light. On opening the thing had obviously been placed in suspension, and it just started. It found my network and was ready to use. The interface, OSX, with its one button for the mouse, threw me for a few minutes as I am VERY used to Windows...

I just purchased a new laptop for the 17 yearold as she enters her senior year in highschool. Its a very cool Compaq model. The box that it came in has a big sticker on the side that says "Do Not Sell Until Janruary 30th 2007". Vista. Its running the new Vista system. So far it runs good. No problems have arised. My question is with the wireless router that I bought and connected to my desktop. So far the router works great and the internet is working fine. From what I gather, I can also use the router to...

Have an Acer laptop with battery problems, I think. Have fresh windows xp home and the problem still exists.

A very strange thing happened to my computer. The other day I was booting up and received a message that my C drive was almost full. I checked it and it was. So I went to system tools and ran disk clean up. This freed up about 3 gigs. I also noticed that there was a game on the disk, I removed it. Then I started looking at my d drive and decided to prune it as well. I got to a game I had and went to remove it it was taking a long time so I went to...

It's one of those software design decisions that makes you scratch your head and wonder, "What were they thinking?" The "it" in this case is XP's most powerful rebuild/repair option, and yet Microsoft chose to hide it behind seeming dead ends, red herrings, and a recycled interface that makes it hard to find and (at first) somewhat confusing to use.But it's worth exploring because this option lets you completely and nondestructively rebuild, repair, or refresh an existing XP installation while leaving already-installed software alone (no reinstallation needed!). It also leaves user accounts, names, and passwords untouched and takes only a...

I am trying to reinstall WimXP on an older Dell machine that has accepted it many times before. And now it freezes about 3/4ths the way through installation. I tried taking out a memory chip since it has slots for two of them and even relacing one chip with the other with the same results.No, I'm not going to buy a Mac. Yes, I am going to try a linux distribution. SLAX in particular because I'm burning the disc right now.