…and don’t think that Apple isn’t paying attention:

Samsung goodness just keeps rolling along. In Korea, the manufacturer
of all things slick has announced it’s going to put Solid State
Drive notebooks into production, and already have the specs of one on
its Korean website.

CrunchGear :: Samsung Intros SSD-Based Notebook

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Another Dell laptop has undergone spontaneous combustion, prompting the evacuation of the office it was situated in and the urgent intervention of the local fire brigade. Pictures of the incident point to a battery meltdown as the cause of the conflagration.

Dell laptop goes up in smoke | Reg Hardware

technorati tags:Dell, notebook, battery, fire

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As the One Laptop per Child project, a nonprofit effort based in Cambridge, MA, nears the completion of its rugged and versatile laptop designed for school children in poor countries, a key component has fallen into place: an efficient, human-powered generator that could make the computer practical for children living in areas without reliable, affordable electricity.

The new generators, which will be field-tested beginning this October, abandon the bulky and inefficient hand-crank design featured on an early mock-up of the laptop in favor of a more compact off-laptop design that uses a pull string to spin a small generator. It was developed by Squid Labs, Emeryville, CA, a design and engineering group whose co-founders include several graduates of MIT’s Media Lab, where the laptop project originated.

MIT Technology Review: Powering the $100 Laptop

technorati tags:$100, notebook, MIT

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If you thought that the legend of the PowerBook battery catching fire was bad…

AN INQUIRER READER attending a conference in Japan was sat just feet away from a laptop computer that suddenly exploded into flames, in what could have been a deadly accident. Gaston, our astonished reader reports: “The damn thing was on fire and produced several explosions for more than five minutes”.

Dell laptop explodes at Japanese conference

(Thanks CNet’s Apple Blog.)

technorati tags:notebook, explosion

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The Voodoo ENVY u:909 may be the most powerful notebook yet – too bad it only runs Windows. The u:909 features a 19-inch monitor running at 1680 x 1050 resolution powered by dual NVIDIA Geforce 7800 GTX 256 MB graphic cards. The brains behind the machine is an AMD Turion 64 processor.
All that gaming muscle doesn’t come without a price however, the u:909 weighs in at a hefty 16 pounds and will set you back US$7771 when configured with a 2.4GHz ML-44 processor, dual video cards, 2GB RAM and a 120GB HDD. The ENVY u:909 is pictured above in imola pearl orange.

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A price comparison of three 17-inch Core Duo notebooks: two Dells and the new 17-inch MacBook Pro. The results may surprise you:
Spoiler:
1. MacBook Pro – US$3,148
2. Dell Inspiron XPS M1710 – US$3,642
3. Dell Precision M90 – US$3,601
Read More…
Contributed by: Kenn Marks

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Engadget has a link to a video of MIT’s US100 laptop in action:

We can’t say this is the pinnacle hands-on review of the One Laptop Per Child prototype, but it does offer a nice view of the ambitious $100 lappy, and the interview with Dr. Mary Lou Jepson, who is the CTO of the initiative, is rather informative.

Click through to Engadget for the link…

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Looks like Wal Mart’s one-upping itself from it’s sub-$600 laptops last year; looks like in 2005 you’re going to be able to get a $400 laptop from the ‘Mart, and a not too terrible one, at that (AMD 2800+ Sempron, 256MB RAM, 40GB drive, 15-inch screen, CD-RW/DVD). We’re sure they’re making like $3 on this thing…

Engadget – www.engadget.com

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Dell has a new mobile workstation that not only features a port replicator, but also lets you use a new stand, raising the laptop display to an ideal height for desktop use.

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Hot on the heels of the Apple PowerBook 17-inch is the new Toshiba Satellite P25, the first Windows-based notebook computer to offer a 17-inch wide screen display – making them the second computer manufacturer to achieve this feat.

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