Screen
The 12.1-inch screen has a 1280 x 800 resolution, which is extremely rare on notebooks Sony VGP-BPS9/S Battery these days but a welcome improvement over the nearly-ubiquitous 1366 x 768 panels we see every day, because it allows plenty of vertical Sony VGP-BPS13 battery screen real estate for viewing web pages. The screen’s matte surface allowed it to provide really strong viewing angles to the left and right.

At 11.8 x 8.6 x 0.9 inches the Cr-48 is a very comfortable size for your bag or holding on your lap, but its 3.8-pound weight seems Sony VGP-BPS13A/B Battery a bit heavy for a system this size.

Keyboard and Touchpad
The very isolated keyboard layout provided good tactile feedback and key placement that Sony VGP-BPS9 Battery makes typing on it a breeze. However, you will notice that the keyboard has no function keys, but instead has dedicated keys for forward, back, Sony VGP-BPS9/B Battery refresh, full screen mode, change windows, brightness up, brightness down, mute, audio up, audio down, and power on/off. The caps lock key has been replaced a search button, because Google says it wants to discourage Sony VGP-BPS9A/B Battery all-caps typing.

Ports
There are very few ports on the device. On the right side is an SD card reader, an audio-out jack, Sony VGP-BPS10 Battery and a USB port. On the left is a VGA port. As stated above, storage devices and memory cards work for uploading files to the cloud, toshiba pa3535u-1brs battery but do nothing else. We were able to attach both a wired and a wireless mouse to the USB port and both worked pretty well.

If you don’t have a valid Gmail account already, you hit Toshiba PA3534U-1BRS Battery a bit of a wall at the login prompt, because there’s no way to create one during setup. If you don’t already have a valid Google account, your best bet is to walk over to your nearest non-Chrome OS device, visit Google.com, and create your account studio 17 battery there before continuing.

The iPad Bluetooth keyboard/case race is starting to heat up. The newest entrant, the Zaggmate, features a studio 1737 battery sturdy aircraft-grade aluminum shell, responsive keys, and a thin and light design. But is this $99 accessory worth the effort it takes to studio 1535 battery use?

Editor’s Note: Because the Cr-48 netbook is a test product that is not for sale commercially (and never will be), we’re latitude e5500 battery not giving it a star rating.

Design of the Cr-48
The Cr-48 won’t be available to consumers and Google has already stated the systems its partners latitude e6400 battery launch in mid-2011 will not use this exact design or hardware. However, there are several things about this test system we found interesting, latitude e6500 battery because they may inspire the final products.

First, we were amazed at how MacBook-like the Cr-48 is in its design. The chassis is rounded and shaped like a last-generation latitude e4300 battery plastic MacBook, its keyboard has the same size, shape, and nearly identical layout to a MacBook’s, and even the hinge, which sites in the middle of the vostro 1510 battery chassis, takes its cues from a MacBook.
We love the black, soft-touch rubberized material vostro 1310 battery that is used throughout the chassis and wish more products were made out of it. Laying your wrists on the soft touch palmrest is a pleasant experience.

Though the official release of its cloud-based Chrome OS is months away, Google has begun a massive pilot program, offering specially-chosen inspiron 1545 battery end users, Google employees, and journalists their own prototype Chrome netbooks. Known as the Cr-48 (for the element Chromium 48), inspiron 1525 battery these particular 12.1-inch laptops will never be sold commercially, but they offer a very detailed preview of what we can expect from the first latitude d630 battery Chrome systems when they launch by mid-2011. So what’s it like living in a browser-only PC?

There are numerous keyboard shortcuts which match those you would find in the Windows version of Chrome. These include such as studio 15 battery CTRL + H to see the history, CTRL + W to close a tab, and CTRL +/- to zoom in and out. You can see a complete list of these by hitting CTRL + latitude d620 battery ALT + ?.

The touchpad does not have built-in buttons, but like many xps m1330 battery notebooks these days, is itself a button. In our experience most clickpad designs, apart from the MacBooks, are unpleasant to use particularly if you like to navigate with one finger and click with another. The Cr-48’s clickpad alternated between making inspiron 6400 battery our cursor jump and stopping it mid-movement. Pinch-to-zoom didn’t work either. As we expected, right-clicking doesn’t do anything. To finish the inspiron 1501 battery review, we had to plug-in an external mouse.

True to Google’s word, initial set up takes only a minute or so. After you power inspiron e1505 battery on the Cr-48 for the first time, you’re asked to configure your Internet connection by selecting a Wi-Fi network, then you’re asked to agree to the Google EULA, and finally asked to login with a Google account and given the option vostro 1000 battery to take your picture with the webcam so the picture can accompany your login.

When it came to logging in, we noticed two interesting flaws. gd761 battery First, the system did not recognize any Google account we used with a username that did not end in @gmail.com. When we tried to login with our laptopmag.com address, which is a registered Google Apps user account, or with another Yahoo latitude d830 battery address that’s registered with Google, the system said our account could not be located.

Keyboard Features
Like the Kensington Keyfolio, we liked that the Zaggmate reversed the function keys and let us inspiron 1520 battery perform tasks, such as controlling the volume, without having to press the Fn key first. Other useful shortcuts include buttons to launch a vostro 1500 battery slideshow, Search, and return to the Home screen.

Typing Experience
Unlike the KeyFolio, the Zaggmate's keys are not covered in a rubber membrane. It's more like a traditional keyboard, inspiron 1720 battery which made this layout easier to type on. The keys were responsive and snappy, not to mention in the right place. However, the keys are smaller than those xps m1530 battery found on a typical netbook.

Unfortunately, our fingers brushed up against the metal case when xps m1730 battery pressing keys positioned on the outer edges of the keyboard (such as the Fn, Control, and arrow keys). You'll definitely make some errors until you get the hand of the inspiron 1420 battery layout

When the Nook was first announced a year ago, Barnes & Noble promised that it would push over-the-air updates to vostro 1400 battery enhance the eReader's functionality. Since that time there have been at least three major firmware updates that have not only added new apps and upgrades, but CF623 battery have also significantly improved the Nook's speed. On top of improving performance, the bookseller also dropped the device's price to $199 (from $259) xps m1210 battery and released an even less expensive Wi-Fi only version ($149). In our original review, we praised the hardware but wished for speedier software. Now that we have both and a lower price, we've decided to revisit the Nook and give it a second latitude d610 battery look.

We're mostly fans of the Nook's dual-display concept--a standard 6-inch E Ink screen above a 3.5 x 1-inch KD476 battery LCD­--as it allows for a more robust feature set. The half-inch thick white plastic bezel that frames the two displays is slick and smooth except 1525 Battery for slightly matte areas where the Next/Previous page turn buttons are. The only other physical button on the Nook is the power/sleep control on top. The stylized n between the two displays serves as a capacitive Home button. Two small speakers flank Sony Laptop Battery the headphone jack and miniUSB port on the bottom. The back of the device feels slightly rubbery and keeps the Nook from sliding too much on Lenovo/IBM Laptop Battery smooth surfaces.

At 7.7 x 4.9 x 0.5 inches, the Nook is fairly slim and sleek and not much HP/Compaq Laptop Battery bigger than the Kindle 3G (7.5 x 4.8 x 0.34 inches). At 12.1 ounces, it's almost 50 percent heavier than the Kindle (8.7). Still, even after reading with it for hours, we never experienced major wrist Dell Laptop Battery fatigue.

Design and Setup
The Zaggmate is barely larger than the iPad itself, and at 12.8 ounces, is about 4 ounces good battery lighter than the KeyFolio. You'd be surprised, but that makes a lot of difference. The device has a power switch and a Bluetooth button for easy pairing. A asus laptop akku small microUSB port on the left side is used to recharge the device.

Instead of completely enveloping the iPad, the Zaggmate is designed to cover just the screen when stowed. When traveling, fujitsu laptop akku simply insert the iPad, face-down into the case. As it's the same color as the iPad, it looks like you're carrying around a hunk of aluminum. Just keep in mind toshiba laptop akku that this case doesn't protect the back of Apple's tablet.

In order to use the keyboard, you must pry the iPad out of the case, dell laptop akku lift open the plastic tab and bring it forward, then rest the iPad vertically in a slot above the keyboard. That's a pretty lengthy process just to use a physical keyboard. You can use this accessory in your lap, but the whole thing bounced around acer notebook akku as we typed; the Zaggmate just doesn't feel secure when not being used on a desk.

Zagg says that the Zaggmate should last several weeks without apple notebook akku charging.

Verdict
Like the tablet category itself, the tablet accessory market is in its nascent stages, and companies ibm notebook akku are apt to get as much right as they do wrong. The $99 Zaggmate, like the similarly priced Kensington KeyFolio, is a perfect example. While we like hp notebook akku the Zaggmate's sleek and sturdy design, not to mention its responsive keys, we were put off by the fact that you can't use this combo securely in your lap, and that the layout feels cramped. Although our hunt for the ideal iPad keyboard continues, sony notebook akku the Zaggmate gets the job done.

The Nook's user interface has gone through some minor facelifts since its initial release, but it remains asus notebook akku essentially the same. It's based on Google's Android operating system, but heavily modified. The home screen offers nine icons: The Daily, fujitsu notebook akku My Library, Shop, Reading Now, Games, Wi-Fi, Audio, Web, and Settings. With this, Barnes & Noble brought to the forefront functions and settings that previously were two or more taps away. We definitely approve, particularly when it toshiba notebook akku comes to Reading Now and accessing Wi-Fi controls.

Still, controlling the Nook isn't as intuitive as we'd like. It takes time to get used to moving the cursor dell notebook akku and making selections on the electronic paper display by using touch buttons on the LCD. Our eyes were drawn to the LCD when we needed to look to acer battery the EPD to see our options.