Un PC à moins de 100 euros

Voici une information qui pourra nous intéresser en ces temps de crise. Un vrai PC à moins de 100 euros. 99 pour être plus juste. 

Certes, ceci n'a aucun rapport avec l'Alsace mais avec un pouvoir d'achat en berne, crise oblige, il est bon de savoir qu'un PC à moins de 100 euros existe.


99 euros est le prix annoncé. Faisons d'abord un tour de la machine qui est une unité centrale sans écran, ni clavier et souris. La machine trouvera sa place pour un remplacement suite à une panne qui vous oblige au changement de toute urgence et à moindres frais. L'unité, baptisée  PRIMO, est vendue par Abaco Computers. Elle est équipée d'un processeur Intel de 1,6 Ghz, de 512 MB de Ram, et il n'y a pas de disque dur ; une mémoire Flash de 4GB recevra vos documents. Côté connectique : une prise Ethernet, une sortie pour l'écran, un slot PCI de libre (pour recevoir une carte Wi-Fi par exemple), 2 USB et les sorties audio.
Enfin, la machine est équipée d'un système Linux.
Si votre porte-monnaie est prêt à quelques largesses, la "bête" demandant une plus belle parure, le PRIMO pourra se vêtir au gré de vos envies. Par exemple : un disque dur de 80 GB à 28 euros ou encore une carte Wi-Fi à 18 euros. Mais, de base, la machine suffit amplement pour des applications bureautiques et surfer sur Internet.

Adepte du tournevis ?

Ah ! On ne vous a pas dit le plus important : la machine est à assemblée soi-même. Ce qui se révélera un sérieux problème pour les novices. À moins d'avoir un neveu Geek et spécialiste du tournevis cruciforme, la bonne nouvelle s'arrêtera là. Mais cette information pourrait donner des idées aux nombreux clubs informatiques d'Alsace. Assembler son propre PC et s'en servir est un formidable apprentissage.

Parla italiano ?

Enfin pour terminer, le PC est disponible sur Internet. Il faudra décrypter le bon de commande, le site étant en langue italienne. Le bon de commande rempli, on verra s'afficher un tarif de livraison à 24 euros. On est donc loin des 99 euros annoncés avec 123 euros, mais trouver une machine à ce prix-là reste une première.

Retrouvez l'offre en suivant ce lien : abacocomputers.com

Microsoft downsizes Live Labs, asks researchers to do more product work

April 10, 2009 (IDG News Service) Microsoft Corp. is downsizing its Internet-focused Live Labs research group by reassigning about half of the operation's employees to work within product groups at the company. 

The goal of the restructuring move is to increase the likelihood that Microsoft's investments in research will actually translate into shipping products, company spokeswoman Stacy Drake said yesterday. Moving the Live Labs researchers into product groups will allow them to contribute directly to development projects, Drake said.

In addition, she acknowledged that "economic conditions do play a role" in the changes. Microsoft said in January that it planned to lay off up to 5,000 workers over the next 18 months because of the recession and a drop-off in profits, although the cuts are expected to be partially offset by the addition of 2,000 to 3,000 new employees in different positions.

Drake wouldn't say how many people have been working in the Live Labs group. The employees who remain there will focus broadly on research related to Web user experiences, including navigation, exploration, information discovery and retrieval, and approaches for organizing data, she said.

Live Labs was launched in early 2006 as a partnership between the software vendor's MSN and Microsoft Research units under the direction of Gary Flake, who will continue to lead what remains of the group. Flake came to Microsoft from Yahoo Inc., where he ran that company's research labs.

Researchers at Live Labs developed and launched Photosynth, a technology that can stitch together hundreds of photographs into a single 3-D image that viewers can navigate around. They also developed Seadragon, another photo application that lets users zoom in and out when viewing large images online; an iPhone version of that application, called Seadragon Mobile, was released in December.

Perhaps in anticipation of the organizational changes, a high-profile member of the Live Labs team left Microsoft recently. Don Lindsay, formerly a Live Labs design director, appears to have taken a job as vice president of user experience at BlackBerry developer Research In Motion Ltd., according to his LinkedIn profile and a story posted by the MocoNews Web site. Lindsay worked at Apple Inc. before joining Microsoft. 

Microsoft often promotes the importance of its research efforts. "Research is really critical to the company," Craig Mundie, Microsoft's chief research and strategy officer, said in February at the vendor's annual TechFest event, where its researchers show off their latest inventions.

Companies that cut research spending in response to short-term pressures, or that never do pure research, don't tend to thrive for very long, Mundie added. "My belief is the company would struggle to survive and prosper if we didn't have research investments," he said.

K95 waterproof USB drive

Moscow’s Man Works Design a new waterproof USB drive K95. K95 comes in shape of submarine and it is available in 1GB and 2GB, you can choose one for you from White, Green, Red Black colors. Still no words on pricing and availability.

Microsoft's 'Apple tax' claims are 'stupid,' counters analyst Microsoft's 'Apple tax' claims are 'stupid,' counters analyst

Macs 'far less taxing' to use day in, day out, argues analyst who covers Apple

     By Gregg Keizer

April 10, 2009 (Computerworld) Microsoft Corp.'s claim that customers pay a $3,400 "Apple tax" when they buy Macs rather than Windows-based PCs is "silly" and "stupid," an analyst who follows Apple Inc. said today.

"You can make a reasonable case that Apple PCs are somewhat more expensive in a hardware-for-hardware comparison," said Ezra Gottheil, an analyst at Technology Business Research Inc. "But the comparisons Microsoft makes were just silly."

In a repeat from a late 2008 public relations campaign, Microsoft yesterday said that Macs cost more than PCs, again dubbing the difference an "Apple tax." In a post to a company blog, Microsoft spokesman Brandon LeBlanc talked up the idea of a "'hidden tax' of owning a Mac."

Citing a Microsoft-sponsored paper written by analyst Roger Kay of Endpoint Technologies Associates Inc., LeBlanc claimed that over a five-year span, a family of four -- who currently run a pair of Windows XP-equipped machine -- would pay an additional $3,367 if they switched to Macs rather than continue to buy within the Windows PC ecosystem.

LeBlanc also argued that buyers get a better value when they choose PCs. "It is human nature to focus on the upfront price," he said, and referred to the Apple-bashing television ads that Microsoft has been running. "The harder thing to capture is the overall cost and the value. Cost is getting something cheaper. Value is a function of getting more of what you want, regardless of what you spend. And you're a lot more likely to find that with a Windows PC."

Gottheil strongly disagreed with Microsoft's conclusion. "Why do they think this is an effective comparison?" Gottheil asked. "They add MobileMe to the Mac, but that's a pure added-value service, and not necessary for the Apple experience in any way. Nor do they mention that there are plenty of free alternatives for the Mac [to MobileMe], just as there are for Windows." Kay's PC-to-Mac comparison listed an annual Family Pack subscription to Apple's sync and storage service; at $149 per year, the five-year total added $745 to the Macs' total cost, or about 22% of the "tax."

"And taking a Mac Pro as the desktop? That is just stupid. It's not a reasonable kind of comparison with what consumers buy," Gottheil said.

Kay used the most expensive Apple desktop system, the Mac Pro -- which starts at $2,499 and is targeted at professionals, such as video editors and graphics artists -- rather than the lower-priced iMac in his comparison. Kay's paper didn't explain why the Mac Pro was selected, although he did note that the $1,199 iMac, a 20-in. model that now sports 2GB of memory and a 320GB hard drive, was a choice in what he called "midrange" desktops.