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I have been aspiring to own a laptop from last few months. There are so many people who have been aspiring to own a laptop, but always get spoilt for choice. There are so many varieties available in market that can satisfy the needs of the customer but that confused him as well. People are not aware from the fact that a small consideration can satisfy their needs of the laptop as well as style too without burning a hole in the pocket of them.

Your Requirement: Before you buy a laptop for yourself, you will need to calculate your requirement. You need to figure out what you want to do from the laptop which you are going to purchase. The need for a professional, a graphic designer, a web developer and a student will always differ. You have to take your pick depending on your usage of the functionalities.

Here are a few lists of things which you require to consider before purchasing the laptop which can suit your style and need:

1> Memory: Depending on your need you can choose the memory for your laptop. You can choose the option of 1 GB RAM and 160 GB Hard Disk for your laptop, for a normal laptop. If you need a faster laptop then you can opt for 2GB or more RAM too. If you need more movies on your laptop then you can choose for higher memory too.

2> Processor: If your budget is less then you can opt for Celeron, but if you don’t have any problem with the money then you can choose Core2Duo processors. There are so many varieties of processors available in market, choose the processor according to your wallet.

3> Monitor: You can get 14 or 15 inch monitor if you want to limit your budget. If you travel a bit more and you need a smaller Laptop, then you can opt for different monitors of the range of 5.6 inch to 13.3 inch. If you have a big budget then you can also opt for 17 inch monitor.

4> Connectivity: Most of the laptops today come with 2 ports; some with 4; and some with 6 too. Parallel ports are common these days. You can either choose Wi-fi, USB, LAN, Bluetooth etc. for your laptop or not.

5> Battery: Battery life is crucial for your laptop. At the minimum the laptop should be able to function for at least 2-3 hours on full charge. If you can invest more than you can get a more battery life too.

Do a bit of market research before purchasing the laptop and choose which suits your needs and preferences as per your pocket too.

A sad news for the fans of the Lively, it is going to shut down after 31st of December 2008. Lively was a program developed by Google Lab, through the help of which you can be able to create an avatar in the way which you like and chat with your friends in the rooms which you design.

Google team has launched the Lively in July 2008 in Google Lab. The motive behind developing Lively was to provide the users an opportunity to be able to interact with their online friends and express themselves. Google always supports these type of activities as they have clearly mentioned it in their official blog:

Google has always been supportive of this kind of experimentation because we believe it’s the best way to create groundbreaking products that make a difference to people’s lives.

Ultimately google has accepted that all risks are not going to pay off, and that is why they have decided to close it at the end of December. Read more about all this at http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/11/lively-no-more.html

With the advent of technology and its fast pace over the last few decades the humankind has been forced to look for alternative sources of energy. The current economic crisis coupled with energy crisis, dwindling resources have made us ponder, and re look at our natural resources. Solar energy is a promising field, which has made sufficient head way since its first use. A renewable from of energy, which is abundantly available, and has been utilized since ancient ages. Testimony to this fact has been specific references of solar ponds found in ancient civilization.

solar home lightning system

Solar technology normally relates to use of sun’s radiant energy in form of heat absorbed by ponds, oceans, and atmosphere. It is also a fact that about 30 percent of this incident radiation is reflected back to the space. Solar technology utilizes and traps this energy by use of devices for use. Typical installations, which have been utilized since early civilization in many architectural monuments, include heating of rooms and providing light/ warmth. The orientation and design of such buildings was made to utilize the energy. Agriculture and horticulture have also evolved and green houses are now a days a common feature. It has a great utility value in our daily homework too where the solar energy is converted to thermal energy and is available for cooking, heating water etc. Solar technology has found its most successful use in rural development in most of the countries owing to its cheap and abundant supply.

Use of photovoltaic cells in applications such as electronic industry and production of electricity for home has also been an area of extreme research and expansion. It is a form of energy devoid of any pollution and harmful effects and hence popular for automobile industry. This coupled with rising oil prices have led the researchers turn towards this form of energy in the field. Though it has its own disadvantages but the benefits such as low pollution, abundant and economical availability, and conservation of energy resources offsets it.

The global market is flooded with electronic, electrical and IT devices which prove to be extremely helpful in professional as well as personal life of the user. Apple Inc has proved to hold the customers fascination and is one company, which satisfies the customers in every aspect. I also am a big user of the apple products. My five favorite apple products are as follows:

Mcbook: It is a single enclosure device performing multiple functions at the same time popularly known as “unibody”. The LCD monitor has been designed using LED back light technology, which warms up faster, and the images appear brighter. This product has proved to be environment friendly by using the LED technology, which is mercury, and arsenic free. This technology exhibits energy conservation. The new McBook trackpad is devoid of all buttons as the trackpad perform all the button functions single-handedly.

Touch screen IPod: This sleek iPod boasts off a sleek body. This iPod is loaded with 100’s of games, iTunes and movies and has amazing memory status. There is a volume button on the left side, which enables us to easily monitor the volume. There is an inbuilt speaker, which eliminates the use of headphones. It has a very long lasting battery. This technology has an associated Nike plus iPod sensor, which can be fixed in a Nike shoe keep a track of our work out be it running or cardio workout. It is easier to transfer the data too from the sensor to the main memory.

Apple 3G iPhone: This is the latest in iPhones with better memory and added salient features. 3G iPhones have made communication easier by inbuilt feature of net access where mails can be checked. The phone has better memory space and downloading games is easier. Its GPRS technology helps in map reading and tracing locations. It has language support system, which encourages use of the iPhone in different languages giving it a universal appeal. The iPhone has a scientific calculator too. Apart from that, there is SMS facility, music download facility, camera, easy contact search, more viewing of attachment, calendar etc.

Apple IPod nano: This is an amazing sleek iPod with a sleek body and a wide screen for featuring videos and movies. There is an inbuilt MP3 player and iTunes too can be downloaded and played. There are many games downloads possible with visual graphics. The iPod has excellent memory space of 4GB and 8GB. The phone has a very long lasting battery. It has split screen feature displaying the song play list and what is playing right now facility.

iTunes5: The iTunes were launched in Sept 2005 and have been one of the most widely used products of apples. There is a shuffle facility for randomizing the shuffle d songs and play list can be created for easy access of songs. There is an enhanced feature of podcasts which incorporate 100’s of songs and an equal number of Audio tunes. There is a parental control facility, which enables the parents to keep a track of their child’s iTunes ventures. There are numerous iTunes available online in the music stores, which can be accessed using credit cards and can be put into a folder.

Convergence technology in lay mans’ term is alliance of different technologies to form a common access point for all of them at one go. The merger is formed to improve efficiency of the product by sharing of resources. The world today is surrounded by media convergent’s functioning at multiple level.

The best example of convergent technology is the internet. This IT programme was introduced in 1969 for the sole purpose of education. Internet was used as a medium of transference of educational data among different institutes. However with the changing time and IT boom in 1990’s this medium suddenly glorified. It was used for sharing of information on all possible topics. Now it has book reading facility, and you can play songs, watch a movie and have the updated news of what all is happening around the world.

The secondly important convergent technology development is mobile. The handsets today are loaded with GPRS facility, Bluetooth options, FM radio, MP3 player, camcorder, voice recorder, voice mails and text messages. The latest versions today come with web connectivity for accessing mails. There are additional accessories like memory card which enhances the efficiency of the mobiles. The mobile market has become very competitive with each company coming up with new user friendly feature.

Convergence technology has boomed to such an extent that the whole world appears to be at your door step. Text messages can be sent from mobiles and internet to the landlines. PC‘s are used to watch movies, play games, listen to songs and watch television along with internet. IPod is the new music machine falling in the same category with ample memory storage and can play 1000 songs at a go and is also used for watching movies, for clicking snaps and is also used as camcorder.

The multiplicity of these objects make life easier for the user. But there are drawbacks too of this technology. The original use of the product gets lost in the web of multi functionality. However there are pros and cons of everything. But we should not forget that life has become so convenient after convergent technology.

Sitting right now writing this article makes me thank Bill gates from the core of my heart and is a reminder to every non technical professional of the wonderful technology of   “Microsoft” which had made life so easy. Microsoft technology is used in every aspect of a common man’s life. Whether it is to make a presentation, or send a mail or to make database.

Before the introduction of Microsoft packages people used to work on a note pad for text writing, data base or fox pro was used for arithmetic calculations and so on. These packages were not very user friendly as one had to learn the commands. But then Microsoft introduces MS office which was commonly known as Windows 95. It was the first system which used graphical interface and the salient features of this package were Lotus123, word pad etc. the package had all the features displayed on the menu bar and task bar. Help function was used in the same package to for guidance of the user. Things became simpler for the common man with every information present on the screen itself.

Presentations became manageable and more informative with the MS office tools helping one in making graphs, histogram, pie charts etc. later on office packages were also introduced .

The latest version of MS office is MS 2003 and windows vista which has more add on features. In this version grammatical errors and spelling mistakes can be easily corrected. The ms office is also loaded with dictionary and thesaurus which help in improvement of the text.

Microsoft has contributed greatly towards the changing world scenario. It has made the common man more computers friendly and no more does one think twice before switching on the PC by lots of computer firms but Microsoft holds the first position with high performance packages.  New technologies and programmes are getting introduced everyday and Microsoft is a leading force in the IT scenario today with their R&D department working day and night ensuring a simple technical life for the common man.

What they are: First things first, short codes are also called short numbers or common short codes and are shorter than normal telephone numbers. They are basically used to address SMS and MMS messages from mobile or fixed phones. They are definitely short and easy to remember. Mostly they are used by the content providers like large media organizations, consumer Products Company or advertisers. They are used to promote the products or services as the receiver can interact with these short codes. These codes are registered in the name of the content provider, like television broadcasters/producers, radio stations, movie/record companies, advertising agencies, promoters, mobile content providers etc.

Application providers: Each message addressed to a short code is routed to an application. There are many application providers that specialize in software development and hosting for mobile messaging applications, but the application may also be hosted by the content provider. Most application providers are experts in various fields like voting, gaming; marketing etc. they maximize the success of short codes by increasing receiver’s participation.

Benefits of short codes: As I had told you before, they are easy to remember as they are short. Indian users get on an average six of such SMSs a day and reply to at least three to four. Thus companies have found a new medium of promoting and advertising. Short codes in themselves have become a sort of advertising media. Also they can be used for variety of purposes like entertainment, voting, gaming, surveys and marketing. Since the advertisers can personalize using short codes, so they are increasingly becoming popular amongst them. In times to come the users will be able to download e-books, shop, and do banking using short codes. Surely short codes are going to develop as a new media itself!

Do you remember the days when calls were made from phone booths and a person would wait in a queue praying that people standing before him in the line don’t get connected? But the scenario has drastically changed now. No more queue ups; in fact calling booths themselves have become nearly extinct now a days. And all the credit goes to the changing technical scenario. Today mobiles, internet and voice messages have made connectivity easier.

The invention of computers and development of internet has been a big boon to the society. Internet is an information center and is an excellent medium of communication. The whole world is connected through the net today putting people around the globe on a common platform. On net there is information ranging from medicine, cookery, psychology, child rearing, information technology and every possible topic that you can think of. All the information is just a click away. The internet has proven to be monetarily beneficial too for people who are unable to go out and work, especially women. There are numerous online jobs helping people get independent.

Technical scenario is changing at a very fast pace in this information age. A new product comes in market and within few months becomes outdated and is replaced by an advanced, compact and better version. The time today is of miniscule commodities.

Technology has proved beneficial for human rights as well with the invention of new machineries and robots doing all the physical work which otherwise was done by men. People have become more educated about things around them and lot of myths and superstitions have been cleared. It has also made them aware of the pressing issues of globalization, saving environment, rights of a women and many more things.

Nothing is uncommon and new for a common man today. But care must be taken to not misuse or over use technology. We should also consider the negative effects of technical development and work towards minimizing them.

There was a time when cell phone was used for making and receiving phone calls only. Now a day’s with the growth of latest technologies cell phone too got enhancement and with the inclusion of 2G, 3G technologies cell phone is changing its shape day by day. I was not aware from the fact that there are some sort of watches too available which is in fact a cell phone.

Yesterday I was thinking about phone watch and made a search in different search engines about this, then I found this website www.phonewatch.com and I really liked this site. With this site I came to know about different models of cell phone watch and I liked almost all of them. Most of them are occupied with the latest technologies like Bluetooth, Camera, Polyphonic Ringtones, Touch Screen, Multi Language Support, GPRS and many more present day’s facilities.

I found that these cell phone watches are free from the shipping charge for Indian clients. The basics of these cell phone watch is the fashion, if you are really looking to impress your friends then you must need any of these models in your hand. These are too good for giving a gift to your near and dear ones.

I would really love to wear these.

Water is becoming expensive: We all are aware that water shortage in the entire world is increasing day by, thanks to global warming. And as a result the prices of water are on all time rise and it is the common man who is facing the music. Every time in summers we witness scenes like people running with their buckets and boxes to collect water from the water tanker because there is simply no water supply in their homes. Or most of the times people have to pay a little extra to get water during summers.

Cost of purifying can be reduced: Also the cost of purifying the water is also high and since the water has to be distilled and made eligible for drinking, its cost become high.

Mainly there are two processes by which water is purified- thermal desalination and reverse osmosis. Out of these processes, reverse osmosis is more cost effective. But it has its own disadvantages; the membrane used to filter impurities is susceptible to microbes in the impure water. As a result, a chlorine wash is necessary to combat the bio-film that collects on the membrane surface. Unfortunately, current membranes are significantly weakened by exposure to chlorine.

We all can contribute: We all in our own way can contribute towards this cause, mainly because this cause directly affects us and our families. None of us can survive without water, so we should all use it in an efficient manner so that we and our future generations don’t have to suffer from water shortages. You can start simply by putting the taps off when you don’t need water, using the waste water like water from washing vegetables to water the plants, or by consuming less water on daily basis. Apart from that you get associated with NGOs working towards the cause, help in water reservation projects and do rain water harvesting.