XFX G210 [Review]

After the Zotac GT220 put on a good show when we reviewed it last week, it's time to check out its smaller sibling, the G210 from XFX. It sports the same features as the GT220 but is heavily crippled in order to make it as an entry-level card. To start with it only has 16 shader units which is less than half of what the GT220 has. To make things worse, the memory bus has been cut down even further to 64-bit. The clock speeds as well as the memory speeds have been cut down as well and you don't get any DDR3 option here, just DDR2.

Looking at the competition, we have ATIs last generation HD4350, which shares similar specifications when it comes to the number of ROPs, texture units and memory interface. This card is strictly targeted at someone looking to accelerate their full HD movies since it's too weak to perform any serious gaming. Let's see what it has to offer.

Bundle

The bundle includes the following accessories;

• Manual
• Driver CD
  

There isn't much in the bundle but then the card itself has all the connectors, so no need for any adapters.

Google Product Search for Holiday Season

Google has optimized its Products Search feature for the upcoming Thanksgiving and Holiday season shopping spree. Google has made some improvements and brought new Gallery View mode, video product reviews, review summaries and store locations. Meant for those looking to buy stuff online, Google offers comparison of products and prices for shopping.

Google Product search has been optimized and tweaked a bit for the holiday season shopping. A new Gallery View shows larger thumbnails of products that help in checking differentiating between two products say Digital Cameras.

Before one buys a product like netbook, it's wise to check the reviews online. Now, reviews summaries are included in the product pages that will have summaries of reviews posted online and get the consolidated overview from it.

If you wish to see the product working like a laptop or cellphone, check out the video reviews. Google Product search also provides location of the stores nearby to the ZIP code, City or State entered in the search. Apparently, Product Search is in beta stage and shows only those located in U.S.

It would've been great if Google could optimize it for rest of the world as well. However, Google's Product Search is quite similar to Bing's Shopping search. Nonetheless, either of these comparison based search engines do help a user to narrow down to a specific stuff to buy online or from stores.

Surf Yahoo, Wikipedia for Free

Sistema Shyam Teleservices' mobile telephony arm MTS has launched its prepaid service, MBlaze, through which users can surf a few websites for free.

MBlaze comes with speeds of up to 3.1 Mbps at charges of 10 paise per MB. You can recharge your account at retail outlets or through a web-based process. All MBlaze tariff plans allow free Internet browsing of websites like Yahoo, Wikipedia, Makemytrip and more.

MBlaze will be available in Delhi- NCR, Jaipur, Jodhpur and Bhiwadi in Rajasthan, Kolkata, Durgapur and Siliguri in West Bengal, Patna in Bihar, Gangtok in Sikkim, Chennai, Coimbatore, Trichy in Tamil Nadu, Kochi, Kozhikode, Thiruvanathapuram, in Kerala and Mysore, Mangalore, Bengaluru and Belgaum in Karnataka. In Mumbai, the service will be launched in December 2009. As many as 26 cities will be covered by MBlaze service by the first quarter of 2010.

Gmail gets Offline Attachment Support

Adding attachments to Gmail can be quite a pain at times when the Internet connection is slow or intermittent. Google has been improving attachment feature in Gmail and has now brought offline attachment support for it. Of course, the Offline Gmail is powered by Google Gears introduced in January this year. Google Chrome web browser users have Google Gears already installed.

Gmail's certain interfaces such as Gmail Mobile App, iGoogle's Gmail Gadget or Gmail's Mobile - don't allow attachments. Starting today, users who have Offline Gmail enabled through Gmail Labs can attach files to Gmail when offline. However, when offline, one can't add inline images.

Once Offline Gmail is enabled, all emails go through Outbox - just like desktop based MS Outlook express and sends mail through it even if you're offline. To use this feature, you'll have to enable Offline Gmail from the Gmail Labs and then reload the tab/web browser to see the "Offline" link on the top right corner of Gmail page.

Again, one needs to download Google Gears to enjoy the Offline Gmail functionality. With Offline Gmail now supporting attachments, all those working on netbooks and using low-speed Internet connections can send add large files (upper limit 20MB) to Gmail.

Clickfree Traveler 16GB [Review]

Flash memory-based storage drives are generally used to carry around data and not for backup purposes, as they are usually small in size. The Clickfree Traveler 16GB we have with us for review, however, is flash memory-based but yet a backup drive. It looks like a credit card and can be kept in your wallet. But don't let that appearance deceive you, as this drive has powerful backup features. We will let you know more about the drive's features and performance in the review.

Bundle

• Clickfree Traveler 16GB
• Quick Start Guide
  

Clickfree does not provide a software CD with this drive, instead the software is present on the drive itself.


The Box

The Traveler comes packed in a transparent blister pack. You need to be careful while opening it as it can painfully cut through skin.

Nokia N900 Arrives in the US

Nokia has confirmed the availability of its latest Internet Tablet, the Maemo 5 laden N900 in the US market. The launch comes after almost a months delay and amidst rumors of revised launch dates for the device.

The first Nokia device based on its latest Maemo 5 platform, the N900 is the company's flagship smartphone. Although it is positioned as an Internet Tablet, most people seem to have replaced the N97 with the N900 as the company's flagship smartphone.

In the US, the unlocked N900 will cost $649 and will be initially available via Nokia Flagship stores in New York and Chicago, as well as online and through independent retailers. As of now, Nokia hasn't clarified if it is in tie up with any US based carrier to offer the N900 at a subsidized price.

If you're still wondering what the fuss is all about? Let us remind you that the N900 boats of some nice features that makes it one of the hottest Nokia products to have ever been conceptualized and eventually manufactured. It features a 800 x 480 pixels touchscreen display, offers GSM and HSDPA connectivity, has a full QWERTY keyboard and loads of storage space - thanks to the 32GB internal memory. The N900 uses the Linux based Maemo5 OS, which seems to have a fan following already. Apart from all these, there are the usual plethora of features like Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and a very usable 5 megapixel camera.

All this does make the N900 the Nokia device to own, at least for now.

Nokia N97 mini and N900 Hands-on

Nokia on Wednesday showcased two of their latest N-Series phones - the Nokia N97 mini and the Nokia N900 - at the 'N-Tour-Age' event. We were there for the event and got our hands on both the devices. So today we give you our first impressions of the phones.

Nokia N97 mini

The younger brother of the N97, the N97 mini features a slightly smaller body but with nearly all the features of the N97 crammed in. The first thing I noticed when I held the phone was how good it felt in the hand. The dimensions were just right and the phone, although not a lot smaller compared to the N97 on paper, somehow feels a lot smaller in hand. The build quality is good, brilliant actually, and the slider mechanism moves with a flawless precision and smoothness that makes you slide the phone just for the fun of it.

On the front you see the same set of keys as on the N97; the Menu key, call key and the end key. The Menu key has been changed a bit and now resembles the one on the N86 8MP with the dotted pattern. The key is angled that way so that it is comfortable in both landscape and portrait modes.

I tried my hand (or thumbs, to be precise) on the keypad of the N97 mini. The keys have the same basic shape and design but there is no D-pad this time and the Space key is still on the right side. The keys take sometime to get used to, especially the Space key's location, but after a couple of minutes of typing I started getting used to them.

The rear side loses the huge plastic cover of the N97 and gets a smaller metal cover instead, which apart from saving a few millimeters of thickness also adds some more solidity to the design. The camera, however, loses the lens cover, which makes it more prone to damage. Everything else on the side remains the same.

Moving on to the software section, a welcome addition to the N97 mini UI, which by the way runs on the Symbian S60 5th Edition, is kinetic scrolling. Now, although kinetic scrolling was available even on the Nokia 5530 XpressMusic and the N97 after a firmware update, the one on the N97 mini works even in the main menu with the icon view. This means it now works everywhere in the UI and not just in lists. The interface speed is pretty good and the phone feels responsive. The resistive touchscreen response is as good as it can get for its kind but a capacitive screen would have been a lot better.

Apart from this the N97 mini is the same old N97, which means it is a pretty solid device that can do a lot of things quite well. Priced at Rs. 30,000, the N97 mini is cheaper by just a thousand bucks compared to the N97. Eventually it boils down to what you want if you have to decide between the two; whether it would be the extra features in the N97 along with the larger body or the more compact N97 mini, but with a couple of minor features missing. Personally, I'd go for the N97 mini.

A-Data NH92 320GB [Review]

We have seen in the past that portable hard drives need not have a boring look but can be stylish too. The NH92 from the Nobility series of A-Data is one such drive that is not only super stylish but also one of the slimmest external hard drives in the world today. It is barely larger than the 2.5-inch laptop hard drive that is housed within the casing. Being small in size doesn't mean it is small in capacity - it boasts of 320GB of space, and USB 2.0 high speed interface. We have the review ready for you, so read on to find out whether its performance matches its style.


Bundle

• A-Data NH92 320GB
• USB Y cable
• Leather pouch
  

A-Data does not provide a software CD with this drive, instead the software is present on the drive. The drive comes with a nicely stitched luxurious carry pouch, which protects the drive from scratches when it is carried around. The USB Y cable is provided so as to be able to provide extra power to the drive, which may be required to drive it in case of older computers.

The NH92 comes packed in a transparent blister pack. You need to be careful while opening it as it can painfully cut through skin.

Sony Ericsson 'Kurara' is Super Fast

Sony Ericsson's upcoming S60 based handset, the Kurara has been in the news for a while now. In fact, the last time we heard of it, it was regarding the "HD" label that someone found the phone with.

Back then, nothing much was made of the label since little was known about the kind of processing power the Kurara was likely to sport. Almost a month down the line, Eldar Murtazin from Mobile Review seems to have got hold of an early version of the Kurara. He seems to have figured out that the phone comes with an ARM Cortex A8 Processor with 256MB of RAM, which for a S60 phone translates to blazing performance.

It is also likely to be equipped with a Power VR chip for dedicated Graphics processing. In fact, the hardware specs seem to match that of the Omnia HD, which is arguably the fastest S60 handset around as of now. The Omnia HD also boasts of HD Video recording - thanks to its processor - the same one as the Kurara's. Now, speculation is rife that since Kurara has the capability and the hardware to record HD Videos, has Sony Ericsson gone ahead and enabled the same for the device?

Eldar is likely to post first impressions of the handsets later this week and we will finally find out if the Omnia HDs reign as the only HD capable (recording and playback, both) phone has eventually come to an end. The Kurara is likely to arrive officially by the second week of February 2010 in the $745 (Rs, 34,000) price range.