Posted 11/01/09 at 02:00:12 PM by Tom Halfhill

In August, Nikon introduced the world’s first digicam with a built-in video projector. The Coolpix S1000pj has a tiny projector—called a picoprojector—that can display photos and videos at 640x480-pixel resolution. In a dark room, projected images are visible up to six feet away, up to 40 inches wide.

Although picoprojector technology has been appearing in small video projectors and a few other devices, the S1000pj moves this revolutionary technology into a mainstream consumer product. Soon, “embedded” picoprojectors will be everywhere.

An embedded picoprojector is one that’s built into a device other than a stand-alone video projector. Digital cameras, video camcorders, and camera-equipped cell phones are obvious candidates. Embedded picoprojectors will probably become as common as webcams in notebook computers. Hand-held videogames, media players, portable TVs, and ebook readers are additional possibilities. Picoprojectors will be used for advertising displays, vehicle entertainment systems, heads-up control panels, and other applications that can benefit from their space-saving properties.

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Posted 10/07/09 at 02:00:25 PM by Tom Halfhill

If there were such a thing as post-traumatic stress disorder for weary veterans of OS wars, I’d have it. Frightening flashbacks of MS-DOS vs. CP/M... Windows 3.0 vs. Apple System 6... OS/2 vs. Windows NT... Windows vs. Mac again... then Linux vs. Windows vs. Mac. And that’s not counting the smaller conflicts that engaged OS-9, CP/M-86, AmigaDOS, and others too numerous to mention.

Now Google’s Chrome OS is challenging Windows? Please.

Look, I’ve railed at Microsoft as much as anyone, sometimes in these very pages. And my other computer is an iMac. But one thing I’ve learned is that a new OS needs a strategic advantage before it can defeat a deeply entrenched OS.

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Posted 09/29/09 at 04:15:07 PM by Tom Halfhill

It’s getting almost impossible to be a fully equipped techie. There’s always another new gadget threatening to leave you behind, even if you’ve already got a desktop PC, laptop, netbook, home WLAN, game console, e-book reader, smart phone, iPod, GPS, portable DVD, digicam, DSLR, HDTV, HD camcorder, Blu-ray, DVR, dish, and surround-sound home theater.

What’s next? Media phones.

Nope, they’re not smart phones. We’ve already got that. Media phones are next-gen landline phones tethered to broadband Internet service in a home or office. Typically, they have cordless handsets for voice calls and a fairly large (8-inch or so) touch screen. Built-in DSL or Wi-Fi provides fast, always-on Internet access. VoIP can provide cheap long-distance calling. Like conventional phones, media phones needn’t be booted or shut down.

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Posted 08/28/09 at 05:45:48 PM by Tom Halfhill

Many people still think of Apple as a relatively small computer company, even though it’s a large consumer-electronics company. Those folks were surprised by recent reports that Apple is hiring more chip designers. They question the wisdom of plunging deeper into the risky and costly venture of designing custom chips.

But Apple’s moves are a logical response to current events. We are witnessing a fundamental shift in computing, as important as the debut of personal computers in the 1970s.

Desktop PCs—and to a lesser extent, notebook PCs—are the old wave. The new wave integrates mobile computing and communications with ubiquitous Internet access. Although notebook PCs can ride this wave, they are the largest species of new personal computers. Netbooks are better examples. Best of the new breed are the Apple iPhone, RIM Blackberry, and Palm Pre. More are coming.

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Posted 08/13/09 at 05:30:33 PM by Tom Halfhill

In a rare example of limb-crawling, Intel’s technical marketing manager recently made 10 predictions for the next 10 years. But he didn’t crawl very far. Most predictions were boring references to long-standing development projects at Intel and elsewhere.

“Realistic computer-generated images.” (Hey, Intel, we’ve already got that.) “New classes of portable devices with 10 times more battery life.” (Who else saw that coming?) “Personal Internet devices will be truly personal.” (Like I’ve been saying for years.) “Low-cost silicon photonics for faster, more reliable data transmission.” (Intel and many others have been working on that technology forever.)

Nevertheless, two predictions are interesting. The boldest was “Malware will become a thing of the past.” The idea is that microprocessors will incorporate security features to stop malicious software from attacking the operating system and application software. It’ll be like a Roach Motel for malware—bugs crawl in, but they won’t crawl out.

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Posted 07/16/09 at 11:17:54 AM by Tom Halfhill

Intel, the world’s largest semiconductor company, suffers from a Freudian case of appendage envy. The appendage is an ARM.

Simply put, smartphones (and other mobile consumer-electronics gizmos) are the next PCs, and Intel wants them to run on Intel x86 processors. Right now, your mobile phone, MP3 player, or digicam probably has a custom chip with a microprocessor core licensed from ARM. Although most people have never heard of ARM, it makes the most popular 32-bit microprocessor architecture in the world.

Yet ARM doesn’t make a single chip. It licenses its 23 different processor cores to other companies that design and make chips. These chips are very different from most of Intel’s. They are system-on-chip (SoC) devices—highly integrated chips that surround the processor core with built-in peripherals, memory, I/O interfaces, and application-specific logic.

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Posted 07/06/09 at 08:30:00 AM by Tom Halfhill

The recession is getting so bad that stock market refugees are snapping up Treasury bills at 0.2 percent interest, and car dealers have tried everything but adding immortality to their option packages. So you would think that a hot-selling product would be universally welcomed.

Netbook computers are a rare bright spot in a dimming economy. They’re selling faster than copies of Foreclosure for Dummies. The Asus Eee PC opened the door. Now there are too many to count.

However, critics say netbooks might be a bad thing. Their reasoning is that most netbooks use Intel’s Atom processor, which costs less and has lower profit margins than Intel’s other mobile processors. Atom’s popularity, they say, might actually hurt Intel and drag down profits for system vendors and their suppliers.

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Posted 06/29/09 at 09:00:00 PM by Tom Halfhill

Imagine having your car serviced and finding 100 unexplained miles on the odometer, plus evidence that burglary tools had been stashed in the trunk. Would you be pissed? I was.

Except it was my computer, not my car, that a repair shop messed with.

We’re so focused on threats coming from the Internet that it’s easy to forget the hazards closer to home. The best antivirus software, firewalls, and spyware scanners are worthless when someone violates a trusted relationship. Maybe you can learn from my experience.

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