I don’t know if this is a prototype for a future product or this is something Samsung did just for the heck of it, but they have a new 14-inch OLED laptop which has a transparent screen. I do have to give Samsung plus points for innovation. This may look like a totally impractical laptop to have, but you can’t fault them for not taking a risk.

To be fair though, since OLEDs don’t need a backlight and that would result in a much thinner screen. We’d get a more portable laptop than ever. I’m pretty sure that Samsung’s OLED laptop won’t necessarily be transparent or the transparency can be controlled. Transparent computer screens even have their uses.

That being said, Samsung claims to have created the world’s first transparent laptop. When the laptop is off, the screen’s transparency goes to forty percent – that’s way below than the industry standard’s below twenty-five percent.

However, I don’t think this would be an ideal laptop if you’re a traveller. Working with your laptop in an unfamiliar place where everyone is just looking at me isn’t really an experience I relish, and the paranoia of people peering into your work would definitely increase once people can actually see what you’re doing from behind the screen – not that there’s anything information-sensitive about writing a blog entry in WordPress, but still.

But the concept is pretty intriguing to me, and seeing how thin this laptop can get, I am pretty sure that this will be the future. Imagine lugging along a thin and lightweight 14-inch laptop. I’d kill for that. Make a non-transparent variant or let us play around with the transparency settings, Samsung, and I’m sold.

Fresh off the heels of the Nexus One announcement, it seems that Google is not yet finished pulling off another surprise in the hardware department.

Google has been working with hardware manufacturers in Chrome OS-related matters to ensure a good customer experience when the OS comes out next year. According to a Google FAQ, “The Google Chrome OS team is currently working with a number of technology companies to design and build devices that deliver an extraordinary end user experience. Among others, these companies include Acer, Adobe, ASUS, Freescale, Hewlett-Packard, Lenovo, Qualcomm, Texas Instruments, and Toshiba.”

But now it seems like the big G is coordinating with a hardware manufacturer right now to create a Google-branded netbook. Ok, I honestly don’t see anything wrong with this. I’m guessing they’re doing this to prevent splintering of the OS – a trap that Android is in danger of falling into right now. A Google-branded netbook would keep hardware developers from changing Chrome OS too much. Just look at Android app developer’s frustration right now.

The thing is, I don’t see Chrome OS having apps being developed for it. Chrome OS is meant to keep all your data in the cloud in the first place. So it’s all going to be shortcut icons leading to the web app of choice. If the web app works for Chrome the OS, I don’t see how it wouldn’t work on Chrome the browser on Windows/Mac/Linux.

I’m sure the Google netbook will be way more unpowered than the current netbooks available. Anyway, it’s too early to see what Google has up their sleeve.

Google is in no hurry to release their netbook, by the way. People are predicting that Google is aiming for a late 2010 release.

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A study done by Savannah College of Art & Design (SCAD) published by Core77 featured a variety of netbook usability factors on non-Windows surfaces. The study focused on a variety of factors including user interfaces, various use scenarios, and ergonomics.

Apparently, most of the popular ways of using netbooks are actually not comfortable. Most positions can subject your joints to stress and cause pain.

They discovered that a conventional small clamshell laptop is most comfortably used lying down in bed with the device on the thigh when the knees are kept up.

Take note, however that this study was done with a sample group of children 11 to 14 years old. I wonder if people in different age groups have the results applicable to them. Because, of course, ergonomics that applies to a 14-year old would probably be different for a 26-year old.

So, tell me guys, how do you use your netbooks? Do you put it on your thigh with your knees kept up and lying down, or is another position more comfortable for you? Give me your ideas in the comments!

I know, I know, one of the first things they tell you when you purchase a netbook is to forget gaming. You see, netbooks aren’t made to handle games. Sure, it can handle web browsing, watching non-HD movies, and maybe a little Photoshop (yes, I know of a few people who do that on their HP Minis), but gaming? No way, they say.

Well, we wouldn’t expect much from our netbooks in the gaming department. Most of them are running on a 1.6 GHz Atom processor, 1 GB RAM, and of course no video card. Those specs alone could make Firefox choke in the middle of watching a video on YouTube.

That never stopped determined netbook owners from downloading and running them games anyway. Heck, on the Eee Wiki, we even have a list of games that’ll run with the Eee PC 701. FYI, that list came out mere months after the Eee PC was launched.

Over at Liliputing, Joe has posted a list of 5 recent netbook-friendly games. He names Torchlight, Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords, Sins of a Solar Empire, Trials 2 Second Edition, and, um, World of Warcraft.

Torchlight has been recommended to me by a lot of friends and I am going to give it a try once I finish this article.

I must point out, however, that he left out the insanely addictive Plants vs Zombies. PVZ runs very, very smoothly on netbooks. It killed a lot of productivity for me and my 701 until I forced myself to delete the game for the sake of my sanity.

What games do you run on your netbooks? Tell me about it!

So the world waited with bated breath this November for Michael Arrington’s much-awaited $200 internet tablet, the Crunchpad. And it never arrived. In fact, the way it just disappeared from the zeitgeist made people speculate about its premature demise.

Well Arrington came out and said that no, the CrunchPad is not dead. In fact, it’s going to be out sooner or later and it’s going to cost between $300-$400, with sponsorship (probably like Google sponsoring Firefox by being its default search engine).

Check out this video.

Okay, wait. $400 dollars for a paltry Atom-powered tablet designed to do nothing more than surf YouTube? Atom at a time when CULV netbooks are coming out? Something that doesn’t even have Windows on it? Seriously?

I’m sorry, but I think $200 is the sweet spot for something like this. I don’t think I’ll be seeing the CrunchPad take off, really. Not with its current state and price.

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I know, I know, this isn’t laptop related news at all, but I would just like to let you guys running Symbian S60 on your phones know that Opera Mobile 10 Beta is out.

The new mobile browser borrows a lot from its java-based sibling, Opera Mini 5 Beta. However, from using the two browsers side-by-side for a while now, I can say that Opera Mobile 10 is the snappier of the two. It obviously benefits from being a native Symbian app. It features touch screen support, speed dial, and a password manager. However, it’s still a bit buggy. (Just now, Opera seems to have misplaced the upper half of mobile Plurk’s screen.)

Either way, when I’m on the go and I don’t have a laptop with me, I’ll just grab my E63 and open Opera Mobile. It’s awesome that way, really.

Download it here.

As you may have read in the news already, the Philippines has been hit by one of the strongest typhoons in over 40 years. Typhoon Ondoy (international name Ketsana) has displaced hundreds of thousands of families and left hundreds of people dead.

Floods are still everywhere and people are left with no electricity, food, water, and at the worst, no roof over their heads.

Splashpress Media is running a donation drive in aid of the victims of the flooding in Metro Manila. We are starting the donation drive with $1,000 from ourselves. For those who can make credit card payments, you may directly send donations to the Philippine National Red Cross which is one of the bigger organizations organizing and handling aid. However, for those who might prefer PayPal, The Philippine National Red Cross can also accept PayPal payments through this address: give@redcross.org.ph.

You may link to our campaign drive using some buttons we have created:

You can copy and paste the code below, so you can add a link to our donation page on your blog, website, or social networking profile.

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<a href="http://www.splashpress.com/2009/typhoon-relief-manila"><img src="http://www.splashpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/ondoy-help-125.jpg" title="Donate to Typhoon Victims in the Philippines" /></a><br />

We will list the names and links of all donors here in this post (please email us after you have sent a payment to the Red Cross).

Any help or form of support will be appreciated!

Now this is a must-have device for any discerning traveller out there. In the US, Verizon’s AD3700 USB modem will connect to Verizon’s EV-DO network. But if you’re on the go, it will work in 175 countries because the modem support GSM, GPRS, EDGE, HSPA, and UMTS.

For $80, this seems like a pretty good deal. Yeah, you might be cringing at the price, but it’s a small amount to pay for connectivity everywhere.

Will you look at that. We don’t even know how to define netbooks anymore. The Acer Aspire Timeline 1810T sports an 11.6 inch, 1366 x 768 pixel display, and has a 1.4GHz Intel ULV processor and GMA 4500MHD graphics. It’s not an Intel Atom! It can also handle up to 4GB of RAM, comes with a 250GB hard drive, and HDMI out.

This kind of reminds me how far netbooks have gone. heck, 11.6 inches will provide us with the best possible option for portability (heck, us travelers need all the help we can get) without sacrificing screen space.

But even though technological advancements are happening all over the world there are some cities that can be considered as ahead of the curve in terms of technological acceptance and immersion. These are the cities that have made technology one of the building blocks of its growth both economically and culturally. These cities have incorporated technology to such a degree that it is beginning to define itself in terms of how it has melded itself to the digital age.

Seoul

The South Korean capital is probably the most technologically integrated in the world. Seoul boasts of having one of the fastest commercially available broadband speeds on the planet. And the level of immersion in households is also among the highest – with four of five households getting broadband internet of up to 100Mbps for just $40 a month. Even mobile communications is tops in Seoul with nine out of ten people owning mobile phones. Leading technological advancements are also being developed and released in Seoul mainly because Samsung and LG, two of the top consumer electronics makers in the world, are headquartered there. This means Koreans are probably getting these advanced technologies first.

Seoul is also leading the world in terms of convergence. It is the first city to fully explore digital mobile TV broadcasting. This technology was launched way back in 2005 and at present more than two million Koreans are now subscribed to the service – watching TV on their phones at practically any place they want.

Seoul is a great city to visit, there are many Seoul hotels to choose from – from economy to luxury hotels.

Tokyo

If technology is the subject, Tokyo is probably the first city that any person will think of first. And for good reason. Tokyo is one of the most advanced cities in the world and probably the first truly technology driven city way before these new technologies were developed. Even before the advent of the internet, Tokyo has gained a worldwide reputation for being the source of new technologies. It is often said that if you want to find out hat kind of technology will be popular in a few years, go to Tokyo and look at what the people there are using and what the stores are selling.

It will be interesting to note that the current 3G mobile technology that the rest of the world is enjoying for the last couple of years has been used in Japan during the early years of the decade. Japan turned the phone into a real multimedia convergence device that can practically do anything. The fact that you can buy from vending machines using mobile phones is just the kind of ubiquitous application of technology that not many countries have done.

Technological advancements in Tokyo is also helped by the number of leading electronics manufacturers based in Tokyo and in other parts of Japan. It’s the reason they get a taste of the first deliveries of gaming consoles, mobile phones, electronics equipment and even down to the mundane everyday items that you wouldn’t even give second thoughts to – for example, electronic toilet bowls that warm the seat and give a gentle stream of water to wash your bottom. Only in Japan, indeed.

Technology is also well integrated when you visit Tokyo and stay in any one of the hotels in the city. A Tokyo hotel will usually have a number of high tech facilities.

Stockholm

The European city of Stockholm in Sweden has also distinguished itself as a technological city. The impact of technology in Sweden in general and Stockholm in particular has resulted in a big shift in educational priorities in Sweden’s youth. A significant majority of kids in Sweden now want to become engineers instead of doctors or lawyers. Science and technology has firmly taken hold of the whole country.

Sweden is one of the top countries in Europe in terms of broadband speed and penetration. And this has significantly impacted on the way technology is new being used in the city. For example, convergence efforts has now resulted in a unique application of broadband speeds, the internet, mobile telephony and e-commerce. Shoppers can now buy groceries using their mobile phones. Each item in the grocery has an RFID tag. A shopper will just have to scan all of the tags in his shopping cart and after this is done a unique ID number is given. The shopper will only need to SMS the ID number to a phone number and the groceries are automatically charged to the phone bill.

Stockholm officials are hard at work in making Stockholm one of the leading ICT capitals in the European region. And they are succeeding in that task. A growing number of IT companies are now holding office in the city and the list is growing. Government officials are hard at work in ensuring the necessary infrastructure is in place to make the city more attractive for tech companies.

Stockholm is a great place to visit since it is a great jump off point when visiting the rest of Scandinavia. There are a number of great hotels in Stockholm that you can stay in.

Tallinn

Among the cities in the world that is slowly making its presence felt as a technological capital is the city of Tallinn in Estonia. Tallinn’s proximity to other progressive cities in Scandinavia has benefitted in tremendously in establishing its IT roots. In fact, Tallinn boasts of being one of the most wired cities in the region. The Tallinn residents are quite pampered in terms of connectivity since practically every place – whether it be the park, bars, pubs or hotels – have free WiFi. In fact, it is quite common to see road signs that indicate the nearest free WiFi hotspots in the area.

Tallinn has also earned the distinction as being the first city in the world to hold elections online. Voters merely swiped their smartcard on a card reader attached to their computer and then voted securely on a website. The same smartcard also allows residents to view any data the government may have on them. Taxes in Tallinn are now paid in the same way and because the whole system is linked to banks and other public institutions, any deductible amounts are automatically made.

Tallinn is already being marketed as a Silicon Valley of the Scandinavian region. And it is gaining a lot of success and recognition for its efforts. In fact, Skype is one of the most successful start-ups to originate in Tallinn.

Tallinn hotels are quite numerous and because of the city’s initiatives practically all of them have free WiFi.

Songdong City

If you are on the lookout for a true, built-from-the-ground-up technology city then all you need to remember is Songdong City. This new city is being developed 60 kilometers from Seoul on a vast 600 hectares of land reclaimed from the sea. If we’re talking about technologically advanced Songdong may just take the cake. It is the first city that will have its residential, medical and business sectors linked.

The key to everything would be a smartcard. The smartcard will be used as a housekey but can also be used in accessing the subway, paying for parking, buying movie tickets or even borrowing free public bicycles. The whole city will be pollution-free because conventional gas powered cars will not be allowed inside. Instead, visitors and residents will use the aforementioned bicycles and also electric smart cars and public transports. Over 10,000 such cars will be plying the routes of the city.

Fixed line fiber optics will be wired into all homes as well as high speed wireless in all other areas of Songdong. In one of the more inspired aspects of the city, the government’s IT infrastructure will be tied to the home networks of residents, which means residents can have access to their files wherever they are. These files can be accessed through their computers, mobile phones and other portable devices. It can also be accessed through government provided city kiosks and public screens. Even the garbage will be electronically advanced in Songdong. Sensors in garbage can will automatically alert garbage collection teams to empty the trash, while RFID can be used to credit residents if they help in recycling efforts.

With Songdong due to be completed in 2010, the future is truly just around the corner. You can already check on the progress of Songdong when you visit Seoul since it is just a short drive away. You can stay in one of the many hotels in Seoul that will fit your budget and needs.