Computers and hardware

CHIBA, Japan--The Sharp NetWalker comes off like a computer with an identity crisis.

It's part Asus Eee PC Netbook and part Samsung Q1 ultramobile PC.

And it's a little bit puzzling.

The NetWalker is dressed up like a super-petite Netbook, weighing less than a pound, with a five-inch touchscreen and a measly 512MB of memory and wireless LAN.

It's got a pretty robust battery life--up to 10 hours, according to Sharp--and runs Ubuntu. There's a Firefox browser, Thunderbird for e-mail, a Twitter app, and some open-source programs for word processing and reviewing spreadsheets, so you can … Read more

More "details" have emerged about the supposed upcoming Apple tablet. iLounge says a trusted source has provided 10 bits of info about the device, including a notably specific announcement date: Tuesday, January 19, with the product shipping in May or June.

This potential product has been discussed ad nauseum. But Apple isn't the only one pondering this market. As more companies start offering their own versions of tablets in anticipation of Apple jumping in later, and as more tidbits leak out about what Apple might be cooking up, it's useful to look at how it would … Read more

Hewlett-Packard is sending mixed signals on what exactly it plans to do with the Voodoo PC brand it acquired three years ago.

After purchasing the gaming and PC enthusiast brand in 2006, HP in 2008 began using the Voodoo name beyond powerful gaming PCs. It painted the name Voodoo and VoodooDNA on high-end HP notebooks and desktops, and talked up their premium engineering and design. They used the analogy that if the HP brand were a Smart Car and Compaq were a Chrysler, Voodoo would be their Maybach.

But a year later, HP's consumer PC lineup contains little trace of the Voodoo branding. HP had introduced the HP Blackbird with VoodooDNA and more recently HP Firebird with Voodoo DNA. Both are nowhere to be found on HP.com. In a more recent example, a new notebook, called the HP Envy was released last week. A year ago it was called the HP Voodoo Envy 133. Though the updated model takes some Voodoo ideas like the thin profile, quick booting, the power adapter, and packaging, you'd have to be a Voodoo fanboy to know Voodoo had any sort of influence at all on it.

So what gives? It seems the Voodoo team didn't have much to do with the Envy, despite its sharing the same name with older products.

"The reason there's no 'Voodoo DNA' on the (most recent) product has to do with the overall design language, the target market, and the fact that we weren't directly involved in the design," Rahul Sood, the founder of VoodooPC and the chief technology officer of gaming PCs for HP, wrote on his personal blog.

In the same post, Sood that Voodoo is "transitioning from 'desktop and notebook' manufacturing to something beyond." While it's unclear what "something beyond" means, he hints that besides HP taking some design and engineering cues from Voodoo that the company he founded didn't quite fit into HP the way Sood had initially expected.

… Read more

To really be a Jedi-level iTunes guru, you must master the art of the Smart Playlist. The most enlightened of all the playlists (don't let Genius Playlists fool you), Smart Playlists can be used to quickly create genre playlists, sort out your least favorite tracks, or keep your kid's insipid music from infecting your iPhone.

To help you on your way toward total playlist domination, I've put together a little video and a slideshow to get the ball rolling. If you've got a favorite Smart Playlist tip to share, please be kind enough to drop it … Read more

Using an iPod on a Mac is so simple--it's a little scary. With iTunes already installed on every Mac, a newly-connected iPod will just automatically soak up your music collection like a sponge.

But what if you want to use a non-Apple brand of MP3 player with your Mac? iPods are great and all, but they're not for everyone. Even die-hard iPod owners sometimes want a cheap little iPod alternative to take to the gym or hand over to a destructive toddler.

If you're a Mac user whose MP3 expertise begins and ends with iTunes, you might … Read more

By now you've undoubtedly heard the news: Until July 11 (or while supplies last), you can preorder the Windows 7 Home Premium Upgrade for $49.99.

After the deal expires, that same upgrade will cost you $119.99. Needless to say, if you're interested in Windows 7, now's the time to buy.

My advice: buy two. Then, after Windows 7 ships (on October 22), turn around and sell your spare copy for $100. Obviously that's $20 less than the list price, meaning you should have no trouble moving it on eBay, Craigslist, or wherever.

At the … Read more

Apple's iTunes software makes it dead-simple to copy music onto your iPod, but when it comes to moving files in the opposite direction--from the iPod to your computer--there's no obvious solution. I get an e-mail on this topic at least once a week, usually from someone who's had his laptop stolen or watched helplessly as his hard drive crashed. After an incident like that, it can be a relief to know your music collection (or at least part of it) is backed up on an iPod.

Of course, relief can quickly turn to frustration when you plug … Read more

The iPod Touch is one of the sleekest, most advanced portable media players on the planet. Unfortunately, it's also one of the most fragile. With one side covered entirely by a thin pane of glass, a single careless drop is enough to turn the iPod Touch into nothing more than an expensive paperweight.

To protect your investment, Apple offers a one-year, limited warranty on its iPods, with the option to buy an extended Apple Care warranty. But on the day CNET Associate Editor Antuan Goodwin dropped his first-generation iPod Touch face-down in a parking lot, he was out of … Read more

People sometimes criticize Apple's iTunes software for looking too much like a spreadsheet--but for some people, it's not spreadsheet enough. If you're the kind of data-devouring music nerd who dreams of spinning your iTunes library database into a killer Microsoft Excel pie chart, then you have come to the right place.

In the following video and slideshow tutorial, I'll show you how to break your library data out of iTunes as a tab-separated list, PDF file, or Web database.