Desktops Will Go Online with GDrive

Search Engine giant Google will soon launch a service called GDrive that would enable users to access their personal computer from any internet connection making the desktop computer virtually redundant, predict technology experts.

The GDrive System will merge Google’s all existing web-based services to make them easier to use together. It could kill off the desktop computer, which relies on a powerful hard drive. Instead a user’s personal files and operating system could be stored on Google’s own servers and accessed via the Internet.

“Throw your Hard Drive away, Google’s GDrive is arriving in 2009,” the Telegraph quoted TG Daily, an American Technology News website, as predicting.

The GDrive would make it possible to access and update information like emails, photographs, music, documents and spreadsheets from any device with an Internet Connection.

The novel system is being described as “Cloud Computing”, wherein the web rather than the hard drive is used as the place where information is stored. Google experts are said to have begun convincing the world of its benefits.

It is believed that the GDrive could “cause a major paradigm shift in how we use computers and bring Google one step closer to dethroning Windows on your desktop”.

However, there are some who think that trusting Google with so much personal or commercial data is dangerous, for information may not be as safe in the cloud as it is in a computer.

Peter Brown, of the Free Software Foundation Charity, said: “Does it matter to you that someone can see everything on your computer? Does it matter that Google can be subpoenaed at any time to hand over all your data to the American Government?”

Popularity: 19% [?]

HP Photosmart C4588 Printer

Hp is well known for its printing solutions, which include multifunctional devices. The HP photosmart C4588 is a new MFD inkjet aimed at home users or small businesses,but also for those who want photo quality printing.

The C4588 is a neat looking MFD with its smooth clean look. There is a one inch LCD color display on the right surrounded by buttons. The paper support tray feels a bit weak and breakable.The scanner lid didn’t feel very strong either.

HP Photosmart C4588

HP Photosmart C4588

When you power on this printer, it gives you step-by-step instructions on how to start installing the cartridges right up to print alignment-all on the LCD display itself.You do not even need to connect the printer to the computer for these initials steps.

A unique feature of this printer is the WiFi support.You can either connect the printer to a network using a router or directly to a PC or laptop using ad-hoc networking.We ran the printer through a series of tests to check the print quality and speed in two modes economy and standard. The economy mode was quite unsatisfactory with very edgy lines in a full page text document as well as for a color document. The standard mode, on the other hand, was a great improvement in terms of quality, but printing speedĀ  took a hit. The time difference between economy and standard for the test document (text) was 10 seconds, whereas the colored document was a whole 30 seconds. The quality of the photo test turned out to be exceptionally good. It took 164 seconds for printing, which is decent. The scanning performance was average.

The HP photosmart C4588 does live up to the mark for being a really good photo MFD as photo printouts were very impressive.

Popularity: 34% [?]

Zebronics Air Gear Headphones

Zebronics has come up with an MP3 solution for wire free music as the Air gear MP3 player is the headset itself.

The Zebronice Air gear is worn behind the neck.These headphones look like Bluetooth headphones, and in fact,are the MP3 player itself.There is no device that needs to be plugged in to play music.The only time you need to connect the headphones to a wire is for charging or transferring music through the mini USB port located on the earphone.All the controls are located on the right earphone.The power on/off and the play and pause buttons are all combined into one button,whereas the volume controls and the next/previous buttons are also combined into two buttons.This is not very easy to use and takes a while to get used to.We faced a frequent problem between switching songs and controlling the volume.
Zebronics Air Gear Headphones
It is very delicate as the plastic neck band that holds the whole device together looks very likely to break if not handled with care.This device will not survive a trip in your bag, if you intend to travel a crowded train or bus during peak hours.

There is no management in transferring music, as you can directly drag and drop the songs you want into the removable disk folder. there is no shuffle or repeat feature available with this player, which means you have to be very selective of the songs you want to listen to, or it will be a cumbersome task to look for that one particular song you feel like hearing.

Priced at $49, it’s not the best of MP3 players. If the neck band was sturdier with a slight improvement in the sound quality, we would recommend it to users who don’t like wires, or to those who like listening to music while they exercise. So until an improved version of this wire free MP3 player comes out, we wouldn’t suggest you buy it.

Popularity: 38% [?]