ASUS Xonar Essence STX

 

 

 

Audiophiles are interested in getting the best audio quality they can out of their components. The ASUS Xonar Essence STX is probably one of the best consumer level audio cards on the market thanks to its high signal-to-noise ratio, 192KHz/24bit support, superb digital to audio converters and even a built-in headphone amplifier. The audio components also have shielding to ensure that it doesn't receive any interference from other computer components. This provides it with some of the best playback and recording capabilities in a desktop audio card. The card does require an additional 4-pin power connector to provide it with sufficient power. It uses a PCI-Express x1 interface. Priced around $200.

 

 

 

 

Audio Chipset: ASUS AV100
Sample Rate: 192KHz

Digital Audio:24-bit

SNR: 118 dB Input Signal-to-Noise Ratio 124dB for Front-out 110dB for Headphone-out dB

Line In: Yes

SPDIF Out: High-bandwidth Coaxial/TOS-Link combo port supports 192KHz/24bit

MIC In: Yes

Other Ports: Aux-In (4-pin header on the card) Front-Panel Header: Shared by Headphone out / 2 channels out / Microphone in S/PDIF Header: Connects to compatiable graphic cards for HDMI output

 

 

 

LCD Monitors 2010

NEC E461 and E551 LCD Monitor

NEC has launched its latest technology named as NEC E461 and E551. This cool LCD has a good performance than other monitors, it has 46-inch E461 and 55-inch E551 both feature 1920x1080p Full HD, and up to 5000:1 typical contrast ratio. It may contains 210W and fully connectivity, in terms of 4 HDMI inputs, analog RGB, composite video and S-Video.

Other features include multiple picture modes, features advanced video and a 120Hz refresh rate, built-in ATSC/NTSC/QAM analog/digital tuner, built-in closed captioning and integrated CONEQ Sound technology. It is have a swivel stand, its detachable for wall amount applications. The NEC E461 and E551 LCD is available with a retail price of $999 and $1,499 respectively, and will be released in the month of August.

Samsung UN55C7000 55-Inch 3D LED HDTV

Samsung has unveiled its latest technology, now it is a 55-inch wide screen HDTV. One unique features of this TV is that it can connect on web applications therefore you can stream movies, play games, display your slideshows of pictures, and many more not just watching like on ordinary television sets. The Samsung 3D LED UN55C7000 HDTV features HDMI, movie connect share where in you can insert a USB 2.0 flash drive, or connect to digital camera to see a clip or images, and it also has skype built-in. Core specifications includes 240Hz Clear Motion Rate and 6,000,000:1 Mega Dynamic Contrast Ratio. They also added a feature that can eliminates all motion blur for excellent performance.


Dell SX2210T Multi-touch LCD Monitor + Webcam

Dell has unleashed their latest technology, but this time a 21.5 inch multi-touch LCD monitor called Dell SX2210T. What’s good with this Multi-Touch LCD Monitor is it has a webcam that you can use for chatting and other video conferencing stuff. If you’re using Windows 7 Home Premium & above with its multi-touch capabilities, the Dell SX2210T monitor features full HD 1920 x 1080 experience with 16:9 widescreen display. Aside from that the Dell SX2210T multi-touch monitor has a 220 cd/m2 brightness, dual microphones for video chat, and the capability to to flick, tap, drag, and scroll with your fingers using its multi-touch technology.


HP S2031, S2231 and S2331 LCD Monitors

HP has announced their latest affordable LCD monitors which are expected to be released and sold to the market in late May 2010. These are the S2031, S2231 and S2331 series. These brand new model of monitors have a contrast ratio of 1000:1, a resolution of 1600 × 900px, 250 nits of brightness levels and has a response time of 5 ms. Only S2031 model supports 1080p and 300 nits of brightness levels. For the price, the S2031 costs $150, whereas for S2231 has a price of $190, while the S2331 has a selling price of $220.


BenQ “World’s Slimmest” Monitor

BenQ, the leading LED monitor manufacturer has finally introduced its three latest and the world’s slimmest LED monitors in India. Yes they are three, this are the BenQ V2220 (21.5” W), V2420 (24.0” W) and V920 (18.5” W) these three are also known as BenQ’s V series. These three V series has the following features: LED backlighting technology, set apart by proprietary Senseye Human Vision Technology, which has six preset modes: Game, Movie, sRGB, Eco, Photo, and Standard. This latest monitor is also energy saving because it can consume up to 44 percent less energy compare to those other LED monitor.

What is Android?

Android is a software stack for mobile devices that includes an operating system, middleware and key applications. The Android SDK provides the tools and APIs necessary to begin developing applications on the Android platform using the Java programming language.

Features

• Application framework enabling reuse and replacement of components
• Dalvik virtual machine optimized for mobile devices
• Integrated browser based on the open source WebKit engine
• Optimized graphics powered by a custom 2D graphics library; 3D graphics based on the OpenGL ES 1.0 specification (hardware acceleration optional)
• SQLite for structured data storage
• Media support for common audio, video, and still image formats (MPEG4, H.264, MP3, AAC, AMR, JPG, PNG, GIF)
• GSM Telephony (hardware dependent)
• Bluetooth, EDGE, 3G, and WiFi (hardware dependent)
• Camera, GPS, compass, and accelerometer (hardware dependent)
• Rich development environment including a device emulator, tools for debugging, memory and performance profiling, and a plugin for the Eclipse IDE

Android Architecture

The following diagram shows the major components of the Android operating system. Each section is described in more detail below.

Applications

Android will ship with a set of core applications including an email client, SMS program, calendar, maps, browser, contacts, and others. All applications are written using the Java programming language.

Application Framework

By providing an open development platform, Android offers developers the ability to build extremely rich and innovative applications. Developers are free to take advantage of the device hardware, access location information, run background services, set alarms, add notifications to the status bar, and much, much more.

Developers have full access to the same framework APIs used by the core applications. The application architecture is designed to simplify the reuse of components; any application can publish its capabilities and any other application may then make use of those capabilities (subject to security constraints enforced by the framework). This same mechanism allows components to be replaced by the user.

Underlying all applications is a set of services and systems, including:

• A rich and extensible set of Views that can be used to build an application, including lists, grids, text boxes, buttons, and even an embeddable web browser
• Content Providers that enable applications to access data from other applications (such as Contacts), or to share their own data
• A Resource Manager, providing access to non-code resources such as localized strings, graphics, and layout files
• A Notification Manager that enables all applications to display custom alerts in the status bar
• An Activity Manager that manages the lifecycle of applications and provides a common navigation backstack

 
 

Libraries

Android includes a set of C/C++ libraries used by various components of the Android system. These capabilities are exposed to developers through the Android application framework. Some of the core libraries are listed below:

• System C library - a BSD-derived implementation of the standard C system library (libc), tuned for embedded Linux-based devices
• Media Libraries - based on PacketVideo's OpenCORE; the libraries support playback and recording of many popular audio and video formats, as well as static image files, including MPEG4, H.264, MP3, AAC, AMR, JPG, and PNG
• Surface Manager - manages access to the display subsystem and seamlessly composites 2D and 3D graphic layers from multiple applications
• LibWebCore - a modern web browser engine which powers both the Android browser and an embeddable web view
• SGL - the underlying 2D graphics engine
• 3D libraries - an implementation based on OpenGL ES 1.0 APIs; the libraries use either hardware 3D acceleration (where available) or the included, highly optimized 3D software rasterizer
• FreeType - bitmap and vector font rendering
• SQLite - a powerful and lightweight relational database engine available to all applications

 

Android Runtime

Android includes a set of core libraries that provides most of the functionality available in the core libraries of the Java programming language.
Every Android application runs in its own process, with its own instance of the Dalvik virtual machine. Dalvik has been written so that a device can run multiple VMs efficiently. The Dalvik VM executes files in the Dalvik Executable (.dex) format which is optimized for minimal memory footprint. The VM is register-based, and runs classes compiled by a Java language compiler that have been transformed into the .dex format by the included "dx" tool.
The Dalvik VM relies on the Linux kernel for underlying functionality such as threading and low-level memory management.


 

Linux Kernel

Android relies on Linux version 2.6 for core system services such as security, memory management, process management, network stack, and driver model. The kernel also acts as an abstraction layer between the hardware and the rest of the software stack.

 

Belkin N1 Vision

Belkin's latest N1 series router, the N1 Vision, isn't just hands-down the smokiest 802.11n draft 2.0 router we've seen—it tries to one-up everyone else with a built-in LCD screen that displays info ranging from a bandwidth speedometer to the number of neighbors leeching your internet. At $200, the sexiness doesn't come cheap, but it can be yours later this month. More details after the jump.

Belkin N1 Vision

   

•Interactive network display •Plug-and-Play "CD-less" setup •Operating Range: Up to 1,600 ft.** •Link Rate: Up to 300Mbps in 20/40MHz channel mode •Compatible with IEEE 802.11g, 802.11b, 802.11n draft 2.0*, 802.3ab •Ports: WAN - 1 Gigabit port; LAN - 4 Gigabit ports •Security: Wi-Fi Protected Setup™; WPA™, WPA2™; 64-/128-bit WEP encryption; multiple SSID •VPN Support: PPTP; IPSec pass-through

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